The Inner Ring (gxg)

Chapter 3

The rest of the morning consisted of Pepper napping on the couch in Vanessa's office while several people from IT moved her massive computers and monitors up from her cubicle to the CEO's office. Pepper awoke after a good power nap to see the office transformed into a much nicer version of her old work setup. They'd even brought her Captain Kirk Funko Pop!

Meanwhile, Vanessa was pacing back and forth making mental notes and mumbling to herself. Every once in a while, Harry would let her know another division head was on the line, and she explained to them that she was involved in a high priority project, and that they would have to handle all issues in their division for the next few weeks, as she wouldn't be available. It was a heady feeling. Most of her days were spent in meetings and with paperwork, but now she was giddy with the excitement of what this new discovery would mean.

And who else might want to get in on it.

She wasn't a fool, the same pictures that Pepper had been analyzing were going to both NASA and the European Space Operations Centre. Even if they were lucky, sooner or later someone at one of those agencies would see the same thing Pepper had shown her this morning, and then the cat would be out of the bag. But only PASSpace had the ability to capitalize on it.

Over the last 20 years, several large companies had put space stations into orbit to support the fledgling Mars colony, they were used as warehouses of a sort to load transports that could take them to Mars and resupply the colony with a small landing craft. But her father had been taking other items up into orbit and developing even more in their labs. He had been hoping to send a mission to the asteroid belt, or perhaps Jupiter or Saturn, but with a manned mission. There were riches in the solar system, and Anton Joseph was meant to be the one to find them.

But the photos were going to exceed his wildest dreams.

"So, what did I miss?" Pepper asked as she stretched.

"Well, I'm officially your new acting assistant," Vanessa grinned. "So, we're going to start going over all of these pictures again. If we found two spacecraft, there may be more."

"Agreed. Those inner rings could have several more in them, though they might be smaller, and harder to pick out. We were lucky that the two we found were so large," Pepper pointed out.

"Pepper, I should have mentioned this before," Vanessa interjected in a serious manner. "All of what you have found, and anything that it leads to, must be kept as secret as possible. I know that others will see the photos and possibly understand what it means, but we have a small window to get a jump on the rest of the world. Do you understand?"

"I kind of figured. I don't even have anyone to tell anyway, you're the only person that even knows about them right now. Nobody else has seen them," Pepper shrugged. She lived alone, and she wasn't going to tell her aunt anything, that was for sure.

"Perfect," Venessa breathed out a long sigh, running her hands through her hair. "I have to say, I'm scared of what the future is going to hold here. My father is ambitious, but this is far beyond anything I would have expected for an undertaking."

Pepper looked at her, somewhat shocked. She didn't have friends, and the CEO of a multibillion-dollar company confiding her fears to her was way beyond where she thought her life would be less than 24 hours ago. "I'm terrified. When you told me that we were going out there, I almost fainted," she admitted. "But I really want to see them with my own eyes, so if you're going then I'm going with you."

Vanessa looked at her and they shared a grin, only interrupted by her phone ringing. "Father?" she answered breathlessly.

"No, it is Jason," came the voice on the phone.