‘So now we have to decide our destination,’ Kenelm said. ‘Do we—’
‘I’m sorry, captain,’ Tilliana persisted. ‘But if it happened for one component, it can happen for others.’
‘You’re not seriously suggesting we run analysis on every component in the fleet?’
‘No,’ Tilliana said. ‘But it’s the coincidence that bothers me. Here we are at rest velocity, and – Saints! – we pick up a Signal. How about that for amazing?’
‘What do you mean, coincidence?’ Cinrea asked. ‘Are you saying the component failure was deliberate? That somebody wanted us to be stationary to receive the Signal?’
Yirella gave Tilliana a surprised glance. And I thought I was the queen of conspiracies! She couldn’t decide how strongly she should intervene to refute her friend’s suggestion. Because I certainly didn’t know about the Signal.
‘We only received it because we’re stationary,’ Tilliana said. ‘Our sensors would have trouble picking up a Signal when we’re travelling just under lightspeed, but it wasn’t an issue when we began this flight because we’re no longer even looking for a Signal any more. We know the location of the Olyix enclave now, and if the Saints did send their Signal, it won’t reach us for tens of thousands of years. So, coincidence?’
‘Yes,’ Kenelm said. ‘Because to sabotage our flight at the right time and place, you’d have to know there was going to be a Signal to intercept.’
‘More than that,’ Yirella said, looking directly at Tilliana and hoping there was no guilt showing. ‘The Signal is irrelevant – especially to us.’
‘What?’ Tilliana spluttered.
‘It contains the Olyix enclave coordinates, right?’
‘Yes,’ Cinrea said.
‘Well, we already know the location, so we don’t need to investigate the Signal’s origin. QED, it’s irrelevant.’
‘All right,’ Kenelm said. ‘I’ll reserve judgement on that for now. What else do we know about the Signal?’
‘The K-class star it originates from is seventeen lightyears away,’ Cinrea said. ‘As soon as we detected it, I sent the Urquy and Konvo an AU out from the main fleet to give us a decent baseline measurement. Analysis revealed the transmitter is a massive spherical array; we estimate its diameter at ten thousand kilometres. So its broadcast is omnidirectional. They’re beaming it out across the whole galaxy. Its strength is phenomenal – strong enough to reach the fringe of the galactic core from here.’
‘How are they powering that?’
Cinrea smiled. The screen at the end of the table came on, showing a fuzzy image of a star with a halo of smaller stars. ‘That’s the best visual image we could manage with our current sensor array. We estimate there are at least four thousand solarwell MDH chambers in operation.’
‘Human technology,’ Wim said happily.
‘Pre-invasion human technology,’ Cinrea corrected. ‘We haven’t used solarwells since the exodus started.’
‘They’re quick and easy,’ Yirella said. ‘Exactly what you’d need to power a continuous Signal. You don’t need elegance here. The Olyix know their ambush ships were beaten at that star, and what we’d do when we found their enclave location. They’ll be heading back there right now from their sensor station, probably with a whole fleet of Resolution ships. Which means you’d need to get the Signal out fast. It’s how I’d do it.’
‘What about the Signal itself?’ Kenelm asked.
‘Short, but broadcast in one hundred human languages. Its message is very simple. The location of the Olyix enclave, triangulated by pulsar, and a warning.’
‘Which is?’ Dellian asked quickly.
Cinrea flicked a finger at the screen, and text rolled down.
This is the warship
Lolo Maude
, with a message for all surviving humans still fleeing our stolen Earth. A lure was established at this star system to attract the Olyix here. When they arrived, I assisted the Strike mission to defeat them. Be aware that the Olyix know about our generation worlds, and they have plotted the course of our expansion into the galaxy. They know our Strike ships create lures. Their weapons technology has now advanced past anything our original Neána allies gave us. They have ambushed countless human ships and societies during the last two thousand years. Please consider this stage of our exodus to be over. Do not engage their ships; it has become too dangerous. Find a new strategy. I wish anyone who receives this message well in your endeavour, and trust that one day we will join together again on all the worlds we have lost. Go in peace, and remember that our love is always stronger than their hatred.
‘That’s it,’ Cinrea said. ‘Constant repeat, no variation.’
Tilliana closed her eyes. ‘It’s an Olyix lure,’ she said.
‘How so?’ Kenelm said.
‘They know everything about us: the generation worlds, Strikes, lures. All of it. They know what we’re supposed to do after we receive a Signal.’
‘Oh, Saints,’ Dellian said in alarm. ‘Once we receive a Signal, we’re expected to travel direct to the nearest neutron star.’
‘You think they’re waiting there for us?’ Cinrea asked.
‘High probability,’ Tilliana said.
‘No,’ Yirella said as she recovered from the shock of the message. ‘It’s genuine.’
‘Okay,’ Kenelm said wearily. ‘How so?’
‘Two reasons. The logical one: This is a high-power Signal, and becoming stronger, right?’
‘Yes,’ Cinrea confirmed.
‘There is no conceivable scenario in which the Olyix would broadcast their enclave location – not in a transmission that will ultimately be detectable clean across the galaxy. Any aliens who pick it up won’t be able to translate our written languages because they have no linguistic or symbology references. However, the pulsar map is maths-based, so it’s relatively easy to determine. The Neána will understand that. The Katos, too. Maybe it will even make the Angelis war fleet turn around and head for the enclave. If you’re a species that’s suffered and fled from an Olyix invasion, the one thing you don’t have is the enclave location. Because once you have that, defeating the Olyix becomes theoretically possible. So no, that Signal is not an Olyix lure. It’s real.’
‘Okay,’ Tilliana said cautiously.
