“No, yesterday at brunch,” said Simona. “Yes. Now.”
“But we reserved this room.”
“And I’m unreserving it,” said Simona. “Now please leave.” She snapped her fingers again, and the engineers hopped to it, gathering their things and hustling out the door. They knew who she was and to whom she reported.
When they left, Lem said, “You have such a pleasant way about you.”
“It worked, didn’t it?” She moved to the holotable, wiped the holo away, and entered a series of codes and gestures. A ship appeared in the holospace, smooth and small, with a long tube-shaped device mounted on its underside.
“This is the Vanguard drone,” said Simona. “The biggest product launch we’ve had in years. It’s a prospecting drone, designed to seek out viable asteroids. If it finds something worth digging, it alerts us, and we send a manned craft out there to dig up the lugs. It’s been in development for over a decade.”
“Why have I never heard of it?” asked Lem.
“It was on a need-to-know basis. You weren’t on the list. Try not to be offended.”
“Okay.”
“Your father introduced the Vanguard to the world literally minutes before he found out about the Formics. Ukko was not pleased. The Vanguard was set to reignite the company. The interference had been killing business for months. We had two dismal quarters. Stockholders were antsy. We needed a victory. The announcement of the Formics couldn’t have come at a worse time. It threw the Board into panic mode. Everyone knew the news would eclipse any momentum we might have gained with the Vanguard.”
“Sounds like the Board,” said Lem. “More concerned about the bottom line than about an imminent alien invasion and the possible annihilation of the human race. Classy. What’s this tube underneath the drone?”
“That’s the glaser,” said Simona.
“Glaser? You have more than one prototype?”
“There’s only one prototype, and it’s on your ship. This is the real thing. Your father moved the glaser into production as soon as we heard that you had a successful field test in the Kuiper Belt about nine months ago.”
“You moved it into production?” said Lem. “But we weren’t finished with the testing. The results we sent you were from the initial test only. We had dozens of field trials to go.”
“Which you never got around to doing,” said Simona. “We lost contact with you because of the interference, and your father grew impatient. We did some more tests here, made some tweaks, shrunk the design, wrapped the whole thing in armored plates, and that was the end of it.”
“So you didn’t wait for us?”
“It was nine months ago, Lem. We weren’t even sure if you were still alive. It was very valuable tech. We weren’t going to sit around and hope you showed up. We took what we knew and we moved on.”
“If you could’ve done all the testing here, why did my father send me to the Kuiper Belt in the first place?”
“Because the K Belt is still the ideal place to conduct field trials secretly,” said Simona. “Your father wasn’t trying to get rid of you, if that’s what you’re thinking. The Deep is still our preferential testing ground. We only tested here because we had to. We didn’t have the time or the communications capabilities to launch another crew.”
Lem leaned on the table and stared at the holo. Two years in space, and Father could have just as easily done the tests here. Not as thoroughly perhaps, not as reliably, but that hadn’t stopped Father from doing them. It made Lem feel as if all that time on the Makarhu had been an utter waste. “If it’s a prospecting ship, then why is it outfitted with a glaser?”
“Because it’s not a prospecting ship anymore,” said Simona. “Now it’s a warship.”
Lem regarded her, an eyebrow raised. “You’re joking.”
“Ukko plans to attack the mothership,” said Simona, “and he’s going to use a fleet of drones to do it.”
“A fleet? How many of these drones does he plan to make?”
“Fifty. And he’s already made them. The glasers are produced as well. The only thing left to do is mount the glasers onto the drones. Our assembly lines are working around the clock on that as we speak. It’s proving trickier than we thought, though. We’re having to modify the drone’s flight controls to accommodate the glaser.”
“How extensive was your testing of the glaser?” Lem asked.