Crapkiller: A Thrilling Science Fiction Novella (The Solarian War Saga Book 0) Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Crapkiller

  Part 2

  Part 3

  Part 4

  Books by Felix R. Savage

  Copyright Page

  CRAPKILLER

  (A PREQUEL TO THE SOLARIAN WAR SAGA)

  Felix R. Savage

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  CRAPKILLER

  i.

  To minimize its time in Jupiter’s radiation belt, the Sargent Shriver decelerated so hard that many of its passengers grayed out. Magsails folding, the ship roosted on the icy plain of Neith Spaceport, on Ganymede’s leading hemisphere.

  Elfrida Goto regained consciousness on the floor of the senior trainees’ bathroom; she had ignored the warnings to strap in. She met the eyes of Jennifer Colden, whose idea it had been to get rid of their stash by injecting it all at once.

  “Urrrggh,” Elfrida said.

  Out on the radiation-soaked ice, four rovers rolled between the parked spaceships. They looked like crude ice sculptures on treads. Banners unfurled between them:

  WELCOME SPACE CORPS!

  GANYMEDE CONGRATULATES THE GRADUATING CLASS OF 2277!!

  Colden rolled onto her side and threw up.

  A housekeeping bot trudged across the galley floor and vacuumed up the puke. Elfrida noticed that up was up, and down, down again.

  “Am I ever ready for some R&R,” Colden groaned.

  “Um, Colden? Like we’ve done anything else since we left Earth?”

  “That lovejuice was crap. I don’t feel loved-up. I feel sick.”

  “We took too much,” said Elfrida. She grabbed the wet wipe dispenser to pull herself upright. Figures sleeted across her woozy brain. Ganymede’s gravity was 17% of Earth’s. Diameter 5,268 km. Biggest moon in the solar system. Its day lasted just over a week. The 3D mirror framed her reflection: cotton-candy-pink hair, filed incisors, a Las Nerditas tattoo on her cheek.

  “Remind me never to score drugs on Ceres again,” Colden said. “Groan.”

  The class of 2277 gathered in the ship’s boarding lounge, where the dean reminded them that they would be expected to uphold the high ethical standards of the Space Corps during their stay on Ganymede.

  “While this is a graduation trip, a treat for all you wretched yoof, remember that you have not yet received your assignments.”

  At this point Elfrida and Colden flew into the lounge, uniforms rumpled, gear trailing from their hastily packed rucksacks. Mocking texts piled into the HUD area of Elfrida’s network interface contacts. Half-blinded, she stumbled against Magnus Kristiansen, the trainee who ranked top on every test they were given.

  “It’s a miracle you two even graduated,” Kristiansen texted her, pushing her upright so her boots could grip onto the floor.

  “Well, we did,” Elfrida texted back, not very cleverly.

  “It’s not over yet. They won’t say so, but this is our final exam. Flunk it, and you’ll probably get assigned to Ceres.”

  Elfrida knew he was right. The Space Corps could be sneaky like that. But after two years of training, she had a pretty good handle on what was expected, what counted, and what didn’t. Drugs and debauchery, for example? No problemo.

  “Venus for me!!” she texted, the exclamation marks belying her bloodshot eyes and wobbly posture.

  “There are a limited number of spots,” Kristiansen replied. “And one of them’s mine.”

  So he wanted Venus, too. Well, everyone did. In the year 2277, the only reason people joined the Space Corps was to get assigned to the United Nations Venus Remediation Project. This screamingly ambitious scheme to terraform the planet Venus had seized the imagination of a whole generation. UNVRP was the new frontier, pushing the envelope of possibility, in a solar system where it could seem that technology’s limits had already been reached.

  Those limits, however, encompassed some achievements that previous generations would have found fantastical. He3-deuterium fusion drives could take passengers from Earth to Jupiter in less than a year, making several stops in the Belt en route. Precisely calibrated gravitational assists enabled ships to land on the Jovian moons, deep within Jupiter’s gravity well. Human colonies dotted the Belt in an ever-expanding nimbus of entrepreneurial zeal. And there was a large, vibrant colony on Ganymede, whose trailing hemisphere sucked up 8 rems per day of killing radiation, and whose surface temperature plunged as low as –180° C at night.

  “So, you may be wondering, how do we stay alive out here?” a voice drawled.

  None of the 77’ers thought of replying. They were sprinting across the ice, towards the rovers. They wore EVA suits with outer-system temperature tolerances and the best integrated shielding that UN taxpayer money could buy. Nevertheless, Elfrida hardly dared to look at the radiation counter in her faceplate’s display, which was clocking up the millirems at terrifying speed. They were all one stumble away from maxing out their EVA allowances for the year. This is the first test, she thought.

  “We hide,” the voice said.

  There was a trick to running fast in microgravity: keep your feet together and hop like a kangaroo. While bounding along like this, Elfrida managed to steal a look at Jupiter.

  Wowzalmighty! she thought, grateful that her life had included this moment.

  The gas giant filled more than half of Ganymede’s black sky. Flawed jewel, failed star, king of the planets, it lit the ice of Neith Crater with a toasty glow. She spotted Ganymede’s shadow, a black dot on the ivory equatorial band.

  And then her assigned rover loomed over her. It had no airlock, just a hatch under its skirt of icicles. Elfrida climbed into an unpressurized steel box. More trainees pushed in, some of them flipping upside-down in their haste. They were packed in helmet to ass. The rover was a lot smaller on the inside than on the outside.

  “Four-fifths of this rover’s mass is ice,” said their friendly guide. “It’s a regular four-ton crawler, like you see everywhere. We print out plastic molds contoured to its shape, fill ‘em with water, let em freeze. Hey presto, instant radiation shielding.”

  The rovers drove into a hole in the ground, which turned out to be the spaceport terminal. Bots trundled between administrative domes and stacks of cargo containers. There was a tram station—that was what it looked like, anyway. People in spacesuits stood waiting on a loop-shaped platform. The 77’ers disembarked and shuffled onto the platform.

  A sleek capsule coasted out of a hole in the wall. They got in and took their seats. The capsule glided around the loop—and plunged straight down.

  “Here on Ganymede, we’re all about innovation. This is a maglevator: an elevator that runs on magnetic suspension.”

  Their seats swung to keep them upright while the maglevator descended. The voice explained that Ganymede obtained most of its power from magnetohydrodynamic generators on the trailing side of the moon. The MHD generators converted Jupiter’s lethal radiation into a boon, by slowing down charged ions and converting them into electricity—the opposite of what happened inside ion thrusters, as used for small-scale mobility throughout the solar system.

  The maglevator stopped. There was a wait, and then they started to descend again.

  “Our colony was established in Neith Crater because it’s easy to dig here. Neith is a penedome, formed by an upward bulge of ice …
”

  “That sounds rude,” Colden texted to Elfrida.

  “…flattened during the process of viscous relaxation.”

  “Viscous relaxation,” Elfrida texted. “Chortle.” It felt as if they’d been going down forever.

  “Your Mother lies seventy kilometers deep, buried beneath the ice of Neith Crater. Yes, you heard that right. Our city is named after the ship that brought the first colonists to Ganymede, the Your Mother Is So Ugly. They thought it was funny at the time ...”

  Elfrida did, too. “At least they have a sense of humor,” she texted Colden.

  “We usually shorten it to YM City,” their guide said. “And … here we are!”

  The maglevator tilted 90 degrees and halted.

  The 77’ers stumbled out onto a grubby concrete platform. The maglevator departed.

  The platform had no roof. They stood in rain and fog.

  The fog, as pink as Elfrida’s hair, haloed rows and rows of LED growlights receding into the distance. Square fields checkered the flattish terrain on either side of the maglevator rail. The pink light made all the vegetables look like poinsettias. The rain fell from a roof hidden by the fog, drop by fat drop.

  They straggled down from the platform and reassembled on a gravel road dotted with puddles. A robot tractor pootled past, splashing the nearest trainees. They jumped back into the vegetables.

  “Don’t step on the kale, kids.”

  The four locals who had driven the rovers, and accompanied them down in the maglevator, removed their helmets. Three of them were spaceborn, tall and weedy-looking. The fourth was shorter than Elfrida, stocky, with a round face that looked blueberry-colored in the pink light.

  “Take your helmets off,” his voice crackled in Elfrida’s helmet. “We’ve got one bar of atmosphere down here. The ice dome holds in the air.”

  So this was their friendly guide. Unpeeling her helmet seals, Elfrida was a bit disappointed—she’d pictured him being taller, not Earthborn like herself. She recalled that Ganymede was one of the few colonies in the outer solar system that actively welcomed newcomers from Earth.

  “And that is YM City.” The man gestured towards a brighter region in the fog. “I am Timothy Shyaka, and I’’ll be your liaison while you’re on Ganymede.”

  Everyone was quiet. The fog smelled of mulch.

  “Any time you need to touch base, you can find me at unsa_outreach dot ganymede. Any questions at this time?”

  Colden raised her hand.

  “Yes, Ms. … Colden?”

  “Ganymede’s got quite a reputation ...”

  Elfrida stirred the gravel with the toe of her boot. A drop of rain splatted on her lips, and without thinking, she licked them. Then she froze. But it was just water. Except for the pink light, this might as well have been a farm in the Arctic Circle on Earth, far away from anyplace fun.

  “I mean, there’s no substance to the hype,” Colden persisted. “Right? Because if it was true, what they say on the internet, about off-line parties, and the black tech industry, and like, genetic engineering … it would be really irresponsible to let us impressionable young people anywhere near here.”

  A few trainees laughed uncomfortably.

  Shyaka smiled. “I can’t comment on any internet rumors you may have heard. But I will tell you this, if you feel the need to blow off steam, don’t go to the Y-Zone. Nothing to see there, nothing to do. Stay in your rooms and sim something.”

  “Gotcha,” Colden said with a cheeky grin. “Whew,” she texted Elfrida. “I was worried for a minute there.”

  “Duh, of course they hide the good stuff,” Elfrida responded. “Nice of him to tell us where to go, though!”

  ii.

  As soon as they got to their hotel, Elfrida and Colden dumped their bags and made a beeline for the Y-Zone. Although, at nineteen, they were underage, they talked their way into one of the famous off-line clubs. All electronic signals were jammed at the door. Once inside, you had no idea who anyone was, no profile data, no way to google them, nothing. This anonymity generated a libertinous atmosphere, helped along by 160-bpm folk music and freely available lovejuice of a higher quality than the girls had scored on Ceres. Filled with a sense of freedom, Elfrida hooked up with a skinny blonde woman off some trading ship.

  She lost track of Colden after that. They reconnected at the end of the night, in the Y-Zone’s famous street market. “There you are!” Colden exclaimed. “Oooh-oh, someone’s got a loved-up gleam in her eyes.”

  “The real thing,” Elfrida smirked. “Beats the injectable version every time.”

  Plumes of litter drifted in the low gravity. Loved-up clubbers cacophonously sang ballads. Elfrida and Colden both decided to get a new piercing as a souvenir of Ganymede. Elfrida lay back in the chair, legs wide, enjoying the chilly air on her crotch. There was, after all, no rational reason one shouldn’t be naked in public … “Owoooo!” Passersby smirked. She arched her back, clawing at floating drug vial wrappers.

  They scuttled back to their hotel, arriving before the false sunlight of YM City had erased the night, but not early enough to avoid running into Magnus Kristiansen. Typically, he was up early, making himself a pot of coffee in the 77’ers shared kitchen, reviewing their orientation materials.

  “So you’ve been out on the town, ladies?”

  “Where there’s a will there’s a way,” Colden grinned. She helped herself to Kristiansen’s coffee.

  “Good night?”

  “Highly satisfactory,” Elfrida declared, grabbing the coffee pot and emptying it into a mug. There was none left for Kristiansen.

  ★

  Between showering, changing into non-smelly clothes, and grabbing breakfast, Elfrida didn’t have time to look at their orientation materials. But it turned out not to matter. Even those who had read every word, like Kristiansen, reacted with shock when it was explained exactly what they would be doing on Ganymede.

  “This,” said Timothy Shyaka grimly, “is a pock.”

  On the screen behind him in the hotel’s conference room was a picture of a hamster.

  “Your mission is to hunt these vile vermin and cull as many of them as possible.”

  Someone raised their hand. Then everyone was waving wildly. Shyaka pointed at someone at random.

  “Sir, um …”

  “You had a question, Mr. Chung?”

  The room fell silent. There was something different about Shyaka today. The affable frontiersman had turned into an UNSA bureaucrat with liquid nitrogen in his veins. UNSA, the United Nations Space Agency, ran this colony, insofar as anyone did, meaning that Shyaka actually possessed considerable authority here.

  “Um, yes sir. It’s just. That looks like a hamster.”

  “It is a hamster. In all essentials. However, we call them POCKs. That stands for Piece Of Crap.”

  More Ganymede humor. Elfrida allowed herself a skeptical smile.

  “P, O, C, K,” Shyaka spelled out. “The K doesn’t stand for anything; we added it because we didn’t want to call them POCs.”

  Blank stares.

  “Persons Of Color,” Shyaka explained, jerking a thumb at his own dark complexion. “Never mind. You’ve barely begun your careers with the United Nations. I don’t expect you to be acquainted with all the jargon. For now, just understand that these are Pieces Of Crap, and your job is to kill them.”

  This time it was Magnus Kristiansen who raised his hand. His brow was furrowed in distress. He clearly thought he was trapped in a colony run by loonies. “Why, sir? Are they dangerous? What are hamsters doing on Ganymede, anyway?”

  “Sigh,” Shyaka said. “Stop me if I’m boring you …”

  He explained that Ganymede had from the get-go specialized in cutting-edge scientific research. Not only physics and xenogeology, but also biotechnology, had made great strides under the watchful eye of Jupiter. Originally, the biotechnologists had focused on optimizing crops for Ganymede’s extensive subterranean farms. They had since branched ou
t into adjacent markets, and now— “as some of you may have noticed, if you’ve been out of this hotel—” Ganymede offered the most advanced human augmentation and alteration services in the solar system.

  Elfrida nodded; the woman she’d hooked up with last night had come to Ganymede to become a cyborg, she had said. She was planning to get a prehensile tail. It seemed like a funny way to spend your life savings.

  Genetic engineering, too (Shyaka continued.) Elective gene modification had been outlawed on Earth, but legal loopholes allowed Ganymede’s providers to stay in business. The industry had flourished in direct response to Earth’s fogeyish banning of its core technologies. Nowadays, the rich flocked to Ganymede for rejuvenation therapy, and well-heeled couples came to buy designer embryos. Shyaka managed to convey by his tone that UNSA strongly disapproved of this kind of thing, but was constrained by red tape from doing anything about it.

  Elfrida had an insight, inspired by the reckless freedom she’d enjoyed last night. She texted Colden, “I bet I know why UNSA doesn’t crack down. If they piss the locals off, Ganymede might just declare independence.”

  “Yeah, and they could probably get away with it, being so far from Earth,” Colden agreed.

  So—don’t rock the boat; turn a blind eye; let the unlicensed surgeons in the Y-Zone continue on their merry way, grafting bionic tails onto people’s perfectly nice bottoms (the woman had shown Elfrida pictures of what she would be getting). Elfrida shifted restlessly in her chair.

  “Now that you know the context,” Shyaka said, “you’ll understand how the POCKs came to exist. The early biotechnologists experimented with a variety of livestock. Hamsters are a good protein source, as it happens. But mistakes were made in modifying their DNA to adapt to our environment, and so the POCKs cannot be eaten … yes? You have a question, Ms. Gilchrist?”

  “Sir, I was just thinking, there isn’t much eating on a hamster, to begin with? I mean, they’re kind of small?”

  Suppressed laughter rocked the room. Shyaka waited it out. He pointed at the picture of a hamster on the screen behind him. It was blown up to the size of a collie.