Captain James Heron: First into the Fray: Prequel to Harry Heron: Into the Unknown of the Harry Heron Series

by Patrick G Cox

  “Yes, sir. Anything else, sir?”

  “Call my Coxswain. I’m going to the Vanguard.” He watched the Lieutenant depart. “So that’s how you do it, madam,” he muttered under his breath, alluding to Bast. “And now we can bloody well find you and identify you no matter who you’re impersonating.”

  Chapter 26

  Bast Strikes Again

  The problem with her disguises, Bast knew, lay in the need to keep applying the DNA masking compound. Continuous use over several weeks introduced changes in her own DNA, essentially splicing bits of the mimicked genes into her own. For this reason she was always careful to avoid maintaining a false identity for too long. Now she had a problem. She had intended to take down the Dysson woman and kill the Captain, then switch to Raddeck’s ID to escape the Dock with the data chips.

  But the Dysson woman had gone to ground. Someone must have tipped her off—and that meant her own ID had been exposed. The fact she couldn’t get a fix on Dysson’s location despite having cloned the woman’s comlink channel warned that someone had access to the means to counter it. That meant the damned woman was being protected by an agency of some kind. Fleet? Or the Consortium? The lack of her usual support team meant she no longer had access to some systems and information. She would have to play it very carefully, and Raddeck had proved elusive and damned difficult to get access to.

  For now she had no option but to continue to use the worker’s ID. Two weeks and she could already feel some of the changes in herself. It worried her since there was no way to predict what the final impact would be. She needed Raddeck’s ID and his authority to get herself a clearance to depart to an Earth Dock. Once there she could switch back to being herself and get the hell off Mars and out of World Treaty space.

  A coworker arrived to take the next shift.

  “It’s all yours,” said Bast. “The feedstock bins’ll need reloading at the end of this run.”

  “Yeah, right.” The man smelled of stale beer. “I’ve got the weight.”

  Like hell you have, she thought. If things worked out, she wouldn’t have to put up with him much longer. Killing him would be a kindness.

  From his throne, as the TechRates had named it, in the ship’s Command Centre, James Heron watched the three-dimensional display. “Launch interceptors. Designated Target is Asteroid 5673 November Golf Lima.”

  “Launching Strike Force Alpha. Target 5673 November Golf Lima. Flight Leader Nielsen launch.”

  Six interceptors emerged in rapid succession from the starboard fin, formed a strike pattern and veered off toward their target.

  “Launch defence screen.”

  “Defence screen to launch. Defence screen launching. Flight Commander van Heerden, launch.”

  Twelve strike craft emerged from the portside fin and dispersed to form a screen around the ship.

  “Commencing microtransit to position reference 98-57-90.”

  “Microtransit acknowledged.”

  “On the mark.” He watched the seconds wind down. “Mark.”

  The display blurred then cleared. “We seem to have lost one,” said the Officer of the Watch. “No, there he is. Must have been slow to link his NavCom. Flight will be having a word with him.”

  As the ship moved through her evolutions, civilian and Fleet technicians monitored and tested all systems, and recorded data. Flights were launched and recovered, relaunched and sent to target asteroids and moons; then, barges and smaller ships were launched and sent on missions to recover targets or debris.

  “That’s sufficient for today, Captain.” The Flag Officer of Space Training—aka FOST—announced. “Well done. Debrief at twenty hundred ship time.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  Captain Heron’s link chirped.

  “Captain.”

  “Message, sir. Secure channel.”

  “On my position, please.” He waited. “Vanguard, Captain on link.”

  “James, it’s Brown.” The Admiral paused. “I’d appreciate your making a detour on your way back. I’ll transmit the coordinates. Rendezvous with the Hyperion. She’ll pass a message in cypher for me.” He chuckled. “She has a passenger that should see you passing. Put on a good show, will you?”

  “I’ll alert Commander Dieffenbach to capture the encrypted message for you. A show, sir? We’ll see what we can do.”

  Lieutenant-Commander Timms entered the expansive lounge of the yacht Hyperion with a big smile on his face. “I think you’ll want to see what just dropped into our patrol area. The Vanguard is completing her latest set of trials, and FOST must have brought her out this way.” He activated the display. “And there she is.”

  As Yelendi Dysson watched, an unaccustomed feeling of pride welled up within her. She’d had a small hand in building this magnificent ship, albeit one intended to reduce her effectiveness. “She’s beautiful,” she murmured.

  Theresa smiled. “Impressive.” She studied the long, lean hull with four great fins extending above, below and on either side of the hull. The weapons emplacements looked almost innocuous at this distance. As they watched, interceptors emerged from the lateral fins and formed a defensive screen that surrounded the ship in the front and on both sides, while others broke away and flew toward the yacht.

  “Looks like the flyboys are going to give us a fly past.” Timms grinned in anticipation.

  Yelendi sucked in a breath. “First time I’ve seen her complete like this. She’s beautiful in a rather strange way. Long and sleek—she exudes a sort of quiet menace, and at the same time she has a graceful elegance.”

  “Yes,” said Theresa, enthralled with the view. “There’s a grace to her that manages to convey something beyond her potential as a weapon of destruction. Curious, but several of her people say there is something about this ship that really is different.” She glanced at Yelendi and Timms. “They say the ship seems self-aware.”

  “The AI department must be the best of the best,” Yelendi mused as they watched the great ship pass with her swarm of strike craft manoeuvring round her in an intricate dance. “You know, Theresa, I’ve been giving your proposal a lot of thought.” She hesitated. “Certain developments in recent months make me think I may be working for the wrong organisation. I’ll take your proposal.”

  “I’m delighted to hear it.” Theresa touched her link. Unseen and unheard, a brief message passed to the Vanguard. As the starship receded, already recovering her strike craft, she said to Yelendi, “You won’t regret it.”

  James Heron dreamed he was once more in the abandoned tunnels on Mars. As he walked, the barren rocky landscape transformed into hills of tangled vegetation. Lightning played in tall cumulus clouds in a darkening sky, and the sky was definitely an Earth sky, not a Martian one. He seemed to have companions, but their clothing was very old fashioned, as if they belonged in the nineteenth century.

  He didn’t recognise the landscape, but it seemed to be on Earth, and the group, several youths and a few older men, appeared to be suffering from the heat, and were plucking at their shirts to relieve them of the damp patches of perspiration. A short distance ahead of him walked a heavily built man who evidently was not enjoying the walk in the heat. His face was crimson, and he was perspiring profusely.

  The sky darkened and large drops of rain pelted the group, and they increased their pace. His view changed slightly as someone behind him called something he could not quite hear. The lightning seemed to be getting closer, and he and a companion—a youth, he noted—ran for cover. He could smell the rain on the wet earth, and the fragrance of the vegetation intensified. He could feel the tension of the group—their fear perhaps?

  Suddenly there was a blinding flash that seemed to engulf him—and then he jolted awake bathed in perspiration.

  “What the hell was that about?” he asked the darkness. He closed his eyes and tried to recall every detail of the dream. It made no sense. The landscape was one he’d never seen, and while the vegetation was vaguely familiar, it wasn’t any
thing he recognised. The clouds though—yes, he’d experienced monsoons in a couple of places, and recalled how those towering thunderheads sailed across the sky dumping water as they came.

  He focussed on the people in the dream. None of them struck him as people he knew or had known, and the nineteenth century clothing was a strange anomaly. He frowned as a memory from the dream crystallised—the expression of horror and fear on the face of the florid youth as he stared directly at James during that brilliant flash.

  Was he recalling some memory from his training days? The flash could have been a plasma discharge. No, that didn’t fit. There’d been plenty of hard knocks during training, but no fatalities or serious accidents. Checking the time, he grimaced. Too early to get up, but now he was wide awake.

  He activated the night mode lighting in his sleeping quarters and settled back into his bed to force himself to relax. He filled his thoughts with memories of his time spent with Felicity, and eventually drifted into a fitful sleep. He experienced brief glimpses of his dream world drenched in the downpour. His companions appeared to be on a wide verandah watching the rain, through which he could just make out the shattered remains of a large tree that had been struck by lightning.

  “Your coffee, Captain.” The voice of his steward droid startled him out of his dreams. “Adriana wishes to remind you that you planned to check on Ms Rowanberg today. She leaves for the rehabilitation facility at eleven, sir.”

  “What?” The Captain sat up. “Yes, thank you, Victor One. Lay out my uniform please, and order breakfast. My usual.”

  Was he cracking under the strain? That damned dream might be a warning. He’d better have a chat with Len Myers about it. Sipping the coffee, he frowned as he tried to remember all the details of it. Had the horse been present? He couldn’t recall seeing one. The people in the dream had been on foot, as if they were hiking down a tangled hillside. Without a horse present, it wasn’t the ‘family dream’ that warned members of the family who had the sight, as they called it, that a family member faced impending danger.

  He shrugged it off. It would have to wait. He had a ship to run and the Acceptance Conference to attend. And he needed to see Felicity before she departed.

  Dylan Raddeck took his seat at the Acceptance Conference and glanced round the table. He was clear that his role at this was to try to contain the Fleet’s demands for changes and improvements—some of which he knew would arise from the variations introduced on orders from someone in DockCor.

  “Is Ms Dysson still on leave, Mr Raddeck?” asked the Admiral under the guise of Mr Brown of the Fleet Weapons Development Committee.

  “Yes, she is,” Dylan lied. Yelendi had been very economical with her reasons for leaving the station, and he felt very exposed. “Seems to be enjoying herself too.” The questioner made him nervous. All he knew about the man was that he was a weapons expert from the Fleet. He’d not been able to discover much about any of the Fleet representatives, and that worried him.

  Mr Brown smiled. “And she’s left you holding the bag, but at least the Constructor Admiral isn’t after blood this time.”

  The Constructor Admiral stood and waited a few moments for the personal conversations to die down. When he had everyone’s attention, he said, “First I want to thank Captain Heron and his Command Team for identifying a number of deficiencies and problems before the trials began for the NECS Vanguard. All the defects must be addressed during the next six weeks. After that we will conduct a further series of trials, and then the ship will embark the remaining strike squadrons and commence working up to operational efficiency. Does anyone have any problems that are not detailed on the schedule you have on your tablets?”

  “Yes, sir.” Commander Mary Allison got in the first strike. “The schedule doesn’t include the backup of our reactor controls. The backup system isn’t functioning properly. It needs to be a constant monitor rather than a check every half hour as it is now.”

  “Good point. Add that to the schedule. Anything else?”

  “I’ve raised this before, but the whole shielding system needs to be rerouted or given more shielding to the command fibres and the projectors. As it is now, it’s vulnerable in several places, and these need to be moved.”

  “Moving them isn’t an option at this stage,” said the Admiral. He turned to the Dockyard Manager. “Can the shielding to the vulnerable nodes and sections be fortified?”

  “Yes, but it will be difficult.” The Manager knew he couldn’t refuse—too much depended on getting this right. If the ship was ever called upon to engage an enemy, her defensive screens had to be operable even under damaged conditions. He glanced at Dylan, who nodded imperceptibly—at least that’s what they both hoped, but there were keen eyes in the room. “I’ll liaise with the Commander and get my engineers to look at it and see what we can achieve.”

  “Good, thank you.” The Admiral turned to the Communications Commander. “What about your systems, Fritz?”

  Commander Rheinhard von Dieffenbach smiled. “The AI is very good. It has learned fast and will surpass all expectations. However, some of the nodes are in positions where they may suffer damage in an engagement. I’d like to relocate them and increase the protection on the ones I can’t move.”

  “Won’t relocating some of the nodes cause the AI to lose a lot of what it has learned?” asked Commander Nicolas Gray, the Strike Wing Flight Commander, newly joined and already comfortably settled among his colleagues.

  “Nein,” Fritz von Dieffenbach responded. “This is not like the simple systems you may be familiar with. This is a new system entirely. This ship thinks,” he finished proudly.

  “There’s one thing I’d like shifted,” Commander Valerie Petrocova cut in. “There is a scanner array mounted on the fore part of the ship, topside, which interferes with the “A” arc of the upper plasma battery. Can it be relocated above the battery and outside of its arc of fire or shifted to another position? There’s a place just forward of the fin which would give it the same sweep and be clear of the projectors.”

  The conference ran its course, to Dylan’s relief, and the list of changes and replacements contained nothing major. As he gathered his tablet and exited the conference room, James Heron intercepted him.

  “Mr Raddeck, I want to thank you for your efforts on our behalf. A pity Ms Dysson is away, but perhaps that’s your good fortune. A few of my officers and I are having a small dinner at the Ricci Restaurant on the dock as soon as I get back from a few days’ leave. Perhaps you’d care to join us?”

  Flattered, Dylan Raddeck smiled. “At the Ricci? It’ll be a pleasure, Captain.”

  “Good, I’m away until next Friday, so it will be at nineteen hundred on Saturday. My SU Adriana will confirm it with you, and I’ll look forward to seeing you then.”

  Adriana approached. “Your appointment with the Joint Service Committee is in twenty minutes, sir. Shall I order a shuttle for you, or will you use your gig?”

  “I’ll use the gig,” he said. “Tell them I’m on my way.”

  Stepping from the Arrivals door, James Heron looked around then spotted her. He waved. “Felicity, I’m glad the old tyrant let you come. How are you?”

  “All the better for seeing you, James.” As she approached, the look of anxious expectation on her face melted into a warm, loving smile that lit up her green eyes. He dropped his bag and embraced her, planting a kiss firmly on her lips. He didn’t care who saw him, protocol be damned.

  “Missed you, Commander Rowanberg—and before you ask, no, I don’t greet all Commanders this way!”

  She laughed, making heads turn. “I should hope not, Captain, sir! Completely contrary to regulations.”

  “Good, then let’s see how many more we can break before they catch up with us.” Linking arms with her, he steered her toward the door. “I’ve ordered transport.” Noticing that she was not carrying a bag, he asked, “Do you need to collect anything on the way?”

  She smiled. “Yes, please, if
we can stop at my hotel—”

  “Hotel? Oh, yes, of course.” He kicked himself mentally. She’d taken a room at a hotel to wait for him after being discharged from the debriefing and medical centre. “How’d it go?”

  Stepping into the pod that responded to his code, she grimaced. “Bloody awful actually, almost worse than the time I was a captive in that damned holding place.” She paused while he entered their travel route. “But it’s over now.”

  Taking her hand, he said, “The Admiral—Mister Brown—suggested you might like to know he is closing in on Bast, and hopes to encourage one or two from the other side to work for him as a result of all this.”

  “That’s the Boss. Typical. Yelendi and her sidekick Dylan will quickly discover the old man plays a deep and devious game.” She laughed. “I had better ask—where are you taking me, James? Some secret love nest known only to senior starship Captains?” Her eyes lit up with her smile.

  “A friend’s holiday home, actually. Terribly unimaginative, but nice and quiet, a place we can just relax, walk, talk, or whatever….”

  “Whatever?” she teased.

  He flushed red, just the reaction she hoped for, and it was adorable.

  “I think you’ll like it—I hope you will.”

  “Sounds like the perfect love nest to me,” she murmured as he put his arm around her.

  The house was a cunning mix of modernity mingled with ancient architecture that made it seem as if it was part of the landscape yet partly below ground, and even those elements above the surface were partly concealed beneath a grassy mound. A wide open terrace faced the sea, and a wall of windows separated the living room from the terrace. The view was absolutely stunning.

  “This is beautiful,” said Felicity, her gaze taking in the landscape all the way to the sea. Turning to James, she slipped an arm round his waist. “Thanks for inviting me to join you. It’s so peaceful and lovely here. Finally I feel like we can be ourselves and relax.”