James Wittenbach - Worlds Apart 06 Read online

  Worlds Apart Book Six:

  Crucible

  Copyright © 2007 James G. Wittenbach

  Desperado-Everlong Press

  www.worlds-apart.net

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  Manufactured in the United States of America

  Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data

  Wittenbach, James

  Worlds Apart Book 06:Crucible

  I. Title

  ISBN 0-0-9763384-0-8Chapter One

  Nineteen seconds have passed since Pegasus entered the Chapultepec StarLock.

  PC-1/Main Bridge

  Oing…

  … is the sound a forty kilo hunk of scorched metal would make when it spacked against Pegasus’s forward shield and spiraled off into space , if there were anything other than near-vacuum in space to transmit noise, which everyone knows there isn’t.

  If a starship explodes, and no one is around to hear it, it doesn’t make a sound.

  Oing…

  … something else, somewhat smaller, and something else impacted the shields, vaporizing against the energy barrier, releasing just enough energy to create a resonance in the shields, creating a tiny spark and a sound that translated through the system as…

  Oing…

  These appeared as little sparks in the Primary Holographic Display. Prime Commander William Keeler, stocky and commanding in his stockiness, furrowed his professorly brow.

  “What is that?”

  “We seem to be passing through a debris field,” answered Shayne American, his hyper-competent operations officer, a handsome woman with chocolate brown skin and a tight, pale blond crewcut. Of the twenty-something people in the command center, she was the one through which most information flowed to the “Inner Bridge,” the four big chairs occupied by the Prime Commander, his Chief Tactical Officer, and usually the First Officer, but she had been relieved of duty for almost igniting a global thermonuclear war on the last planet they had visited. “No damage to hull, shields holding,” American reported.

  Keeler turned to Alkema. “Hah! Pegasus one, Debris Field, zero!” Pegasus had left Chapultepec to come to the aid of the Lexington Keeler, one of the other eight Pathfinder ships the colonies of Sapphire and Republic had built to explore the galaxy.

  “A trillion cubic meters of space, and we emerge in a debris field,” said Tactical TyroCommander Redfire, the tall, thin, crewcut and artistic Chief Tactical Officer. “What are the odds?”

  Prime Commander Keeler tented his fingers and leaned thoughtfully forward. “With this ship, pretty much 100%.” Something impacted the forward shield and exploded in a grand yellow fireball. “Ooooh,” the Commander cooed. “Aaaah. Any idea what kind of debris we’re flying through?”

  “It could just be the tail of a comet, sir,” suggested Tactical Lieutenant Alkema, a handsome young man with a ruddy face and glossy black curls of hair framing it. Alkema was said to be the Commander’s brain. This was not true. He merely loaned the commander his own brain as a sort of repository for certain command information – such as, how the ship worked – that the commander couldn’t be bothered to remember.

  “Sensors have enough data to let me plot a course out of the debris field,” Specialist Jesus Powerhouse announced from the helm position. Plugged into the ship’s directional control systems by neural interfaces that enveloped his brawny brown forearms and the brow ridge and cheekbone of his right eye, he needed only to think to alter the ship’s trajectory. “New course laid and executed. We will be clear of the debris field in seventeen seconds.”

  “Do that,” the Commander sort of ordered. As though to spite him, another piece of debris smattered against the energy field above the starboard wing blade. There was an explosion of light, but no noise or impact vibration.

  “Clear the debris field in seven seconds,” Powerhouse reported.

  “The debris field could be the remains of the Lexington Keeler,” Alkema quietly told the commander.

  “Negative,” American corrected. “If the preliminary sensor readings are correct, there’s much too much mass.” As she spoke, a holographic projection appeared in the space between her station and the helm station. It showed a large half-crescent of matter and gas, Pegasus was passing through a corner of. “By a factor of at least 14,000.”

  “We are clear,” reported Powerhouse, as the tiny little golden flying swan icon that represented Pegasus cleared the holographic representation of the field. A few swirls of dust and chunks of metal swirled in her gravity wake.

  “Badang,” said Commander Keeler. “So, where does that leave us, exactamundo?”

  “We are within the planetary orbital margins of the system 15 215 Crux,” said Lt. Navigator Eliza Jane Change, a black-haired, almond-eyed beauty every man on the ship had officially given up on.

  “What do we know about this system?” Keeler asked. Instinctively, he turned toward the station his first officer usually occupied. Then, he remembered he had relieved her of duty, and he could not help but smile. He turned to Alkema instead.

  “We know that the Pathfinder Ship Lexington Keeler sent a distress message from this system, and we passed through the StarLock to see if we could render assistance,” Alkema reported.

  “I was there when that happened,” Keeler told him. “Seems like only yesterday… but it was actually about five minutes ago. What do we know about the… 15 something-something star system?”

  “It was uncharted prior to our launch,” Alkema continued, mentally accessing a data-feed from the ship’s library. “The Keeler probably found record of a colony here when they called on one of the colonies in their itinerary.”

  “This could still be a Hot Zone,” TyroCommander Redfire warned as he checked the tactical scans. “Whatever attacked Keeler could still be around here.”

  “For that matter, Keeler could still be around here,” the Prime Commander shifted in his seat. “Have we tried… scanning or sensing or… you know, looking for them.”

  “Pegasus is continually scanning all known electromagnetic and neutrino pulse frequencies,” American told him. “If I can lock onto their distress beacon, we can isolate their location.”

  Keeler turned to Redfire. “So, about that debris field. If it’s not Lexington Keeler, could it be the other guys?”

  “Too early to tell,” Redfire told him, “We can’t even be sure they were Aurelians.” Keeler snorted. “Come on. How many alien species do we know who fly big spherical spaceships?”

  “How many alien species do we not know who fly big spherical spaceships,” Redfire came back. “Wait for the evidence, commander. For all we know, the debris field could be natural, perhaps a gas giant that blew up.” Redfire paused and pictured that imagery… and he smiled.

  “But I don’t want to wait for the evidence!” Keeler wanted to say, but he had to put a clamp on it. About then, Lieutenant American got a report from the telemetry station. “Pegasus has located Lexington Keeler. Second planet in the system… close orbit.” She tried to bring up a high-resolution view, but Pegasus was still too far away. The second planet appeared as a grayish red sphere, and Lexington Keeler, was a tiny blurry swan-shape at the edge of the planet.

  “We should remain at Defense Condition Two,” Redfire suggested.

  “Do that,” Keeler ordered. And he asked Shayne American how long it would take to reach the second planet. She told him it would be four hours, Redfire spoke, “Sir, if I may, we have multiple priorities here.
Let me lay them out as I see them. 1. We have to determine whether whoever attacked Keeler is still a threat to Pegasus. 2.

  We have to ascertain the condition of the Lexington Keeler. 3. We have to analyze the debris field we passed through. 4. We have to map out the system and determine the status of the colony Keeler came here to study. You can argue whether one or two is the higher priority, but they both get back to the same point, we need tactical data.” Alkema processed and reported to his commander. “We’ll need probes, sir. At least four for Keeler and the planet, and another four to collect readings the debris field.” Keeler nodded. “Let’s get probin’” He looked around the Bridge. He recalled that launching the probes was the job of the person who sat where the curly-haired blond kid who looked too young to be on the Bridge was sitting. “You!”

  The kid had been advised of the commander’s ineptness in remembering the names of minor personnel. “Operations Specialist Atlantic, Prime Commander.”

  “Mr. Atlantic, prepare to launch some of those… probey thingies.”

  “You mean probes, sir?”

  “If that’s what you young people are calling them nowadays, why not?” Atlantic tapped commands into one of his panels. “Four probes standing by to launch.

  Awaiting mission specifications.”

  Redfire called an interface panel into existence in front of him. “I’ll configure the probes we launch into the debris field to examine mass, composition, and residual energy patterns.”

  “Do that,” said Keeler, and he stepped toward Atlantic’s Ops Station.

  Atlantic had somewhat less interface growing on his body than Powerhouse. Keeler could see the boy stiffen nervously as he approached. Atlantic put some commands into his console, which holographically displayed a pair of phallic-looking missiles with big huge tailfins being lowered into their launch cradles. When they were in position, the launch cradles turned green.

  “Probes ready, Prime Commander.”

  “Launch them.”

  “Launching them now.” A display opened up to Atlantic’s left, and showed the probes powering out of the front of the ship. They repeated the process three more times, until eight probes were vigorously scanning the 15 215 Crux system.

  Lear Family Quarters – Deck 22, Complex Alpha

  Even though she had been officially removed from duty, confined to quarters, and was awaiting prosecution on charges of disobeying orders, acting outside the chain of command, and negotiating extra-legal agreements with colonial governments outside the purview of the Odyssey Project, Executive TyroCommander Goneril Lear still dressed in her white, black, and gray command uniform.

  The first two charges grated her the most; not following Keeler’s orders. The man was a joke, and so were half his orders. Keeler was the one who should be on trial.

  In the urgency to make an alliance with the ruling powers of the planet Aurora, she had inadvertently sparked a conflict that almost escalated to global annihilation. In retrospect, mistakes had been made.

  The one thing she could do to save herself this indignity was the one thing she could not do; explain that she had been under orders (admittedly implicit) from the Odyssey Directorate on Republic to do whatever was necessary to secure alliances against the Aurelians. But admitting that would expose too much of Republic’s agenda to the Sapphireans.

  She could plea for the Odyssey Project Directorate to intervene on her behalf, but she doubted they would. She would be the scapegoat for their incompetence, too.

  In the best case scenario, she would be stripped of her rank and relieved of all duties. The thought of remaining on this ship with no authority was unbearable.

  And, to complicate things a little more, her belly was now prominent with the daughter she was carrying.

  To spare herself the indignity of a trial, she was composing her letter of resignation. Artfully avoiding an admission of guilt, and requesting to remain on the Chapultepec Starlock. She would offer herself simply as a liaison between Republic and Chapultepec… a non-commissioned position.

  It would be a bitter outcome for a woman who had imagined herself the rightful commander of this ship. But she had a feeling that Keeler would not find it bitter enough.

  From his perspective, she had almost ignited a thermo-nucleonic war. He might think that mere exile to the Chapultepec Starlock was letting her off too lightly.

  Keeler’s Quarters – Deck 23

  An hour and 25 minutes after arriving at 15 215 Crux, Keeler returned to his quarters for a private consultation.

  The other pathfinder ship bore the name of Prime Commander Keeler’s most esteemed ancestor, one of the Founding Fathers of Sapphire Colony, although he arrived on the planet more than three hundred years after it had technically been founded. Until Lexington Keeler arrived, Sapphire had just been a run-of-the-mill tertiary colony of the Outer Perseus Arm.

  Lexington Keeler, an Admiral of the Christian Fleet, who had chased the last Dark Lord Enoch from the galaxy and spent three hundred years in suspended animation, established an artist’s colony on the north shore of what had been designated Southern Freshwater Lake Alpha, which he renamed Lake of the Loons, and his settlement he named New Cleveland, after one of the great cities of Ancient Earth. His intention had been to do nothing more than spend the remaining years of his life intoxicated, indulged, and, as often as possible, buck naked.

  Fed up with colonial government, he instituted a system under which the governing body of his city, and later his province, were selected by lottery from among the population. This had worked so well that it eventually became the model for the entire planetary government.

  Many of Keeler’s other ideas were also adopted as part of Sapphire’s laws and culture. Some (like his idea that all laws should expire after ten years, which kept the government so busy re-authorizing old laws that they had no time to pass new ones) worked well, others (old retired admirals should be allowed to go buck naked in public) did not.

  Either way, Lexington Keeler was a character of singular reverence among the people of Sapphire. So much so that, before he could be allowed to die a natural death, they transferred his consciousness into a cybernetic matrix that suspended him eternally in a hellish purgatory between life and death, so that they could call upon him (and others so imprisoned) for advice and guidance.

  This consciousness now resided in Prime Commander Keeler’s quarters.

  Prime Commander Keeler opened his personal bar, which was larger than some of the crew’s quarters, and poured himself a small glass of something purple he had picked up at Independence colony – a stiff drink before meeting with the family was something of a Keeler ritual – and went for the hidden alcove near the rear of his quarters, the one not so easy to find unless you really knew where to look for it.

  There was a large octagonal container made of a glossy black material with a silver crest in the center. The crest showed five flags entwined over the scene of a lake, some mountains, and three moons… the Shield of Sapphire. There was couch across from it, and Keeler flopped down in it. “As the Panrovian said on his honeymoon,” he began, “’Dad, are you awake? I need some help here.’”

  A ghostly form appeared above the black casket, the luminous shadow of Keeler’s three-thousand years deceased ancestor. “You may speak,” Dead Keeler hissed at him.

  “You may listen,” Living Keeler said, knowing full well his old dead ancestor might also not, but there was a certain ritual to these things that the dead appreciated and that the Commander followed when it suited his mood. “I seek your counsel, ancient learned one.”

  “My counsel? What is it?” Dead Keeler asked.

  “Usually bad advice that I end up following anyway, but that’s not important right now,” Living Keeler took a drink of the liquid, and it tasted like sweet, rotting cherries. “Do you know what’s going on?”

  “Specialist Anaheim has been seeing Technical Chief Apex behind his wife’s back. They haven’t done the deed yet, but they
’ve done ‘everything but.’”

  “Okay,… apart from that.”

  The specter of the old man turned away from Keeler. As he did so, a portal appeared behind him, as though a window to space had opened, although the Commander’s quarters were deep in the interior of the ship. It was a neat trick. In the middle of the portal was a composite of the debris field, the planet, and the Pathfinder Ship Keeler.

  “Okay, so you’re up to speed,” Living Keeler said. “You should know, we’re preparing a rescue and salvage mission.”

  “Why?”

  The question caught the commander off-guard. “How many times have you told me about the paramount importance of the Pathfinder mission? Don’t we need every ship we’ve got to find all the old colonies… and Earth? You didn’t just mean Pegasus was important, did you?”

  “Would you feel the same way about salvaging that ship if it were named Josh Nation, or Hieronymus Lear, or Jackie Chan? ”

  “Jackie Chan?”

  “Legendary warrior of Ancient Earth. Lieutenant Navigator Change is a distant descendant.

  Not that it matters.”

  “You probably didn’t want the ship named after you anyway.”

  “The Hell I didn’t. I petitioned the Executive Council to name one Pathfinder either after me, or after Ark Royal, my flagship.”

  “Ah…”

  “… but Sapphire is a world that honors ‘ideas not men,’ you are saying to yourself. Well, crap on that. Crap, I say.”

  “Right,” the Commander agreed, for the sake of pulling the Old Man back on task. “We’re going through with the salvage, regardless, but I did want you to know.”

  “Thanks,” said the ghostly figure. And he faded back into his box.

  Living Keeler went to his hygiene pod to find something to cope with the headache interaction with his ancestor tended to bring on.

  Fast Eddie’s InterStellar Slam-n-Jam - Deck Minus 221

  Eddie Roebuck placed a saucerful of White Borealan in front of a large green-eyed cat.

  “Eight spacebucks,” he said.