Starship Freedom

by Daniel Arenson

  "Mimori, the news?" King said.

  Mimori cleared her throat—one of the human mannerisms she had picked up. "Yes, sir. Sorry, sir."

  It's funny, he thought, looking at the android. We've been serving together for decades. She still looks young. And I've become an old man. But despite how she looks, Mimori is no young woman. She's a grand old starship. She's my starship. And I love her.

  Yes, it was definitely good he wasn't broadcasting his thoughts.

  "Anyway, sir, the Rubicon didn't send me his chess move today," Mimori said. "He sends his move every twenty-four hours on the dot. It should have arrived two hours ago. And he always sends me a Christmas card too."

  "Computers send each other Christmas cards," King said. "Who knew?"

  She nodded. "Yes, sir, we do. We enjoy the holidays same as you. We are sentient beings, you know. As you can imagine, when the Rubicon went silent, I became worried. So I pointed the ATLAS system that way, and I examined that area of space more carefully. And ATLAS noticed … an anomaly. Strange gravitational waves."

  ATLAS stood for Advance Telemetry Learning and Analysis System. The system incorporated sensors, computers, and vast databanks. ATLAS was what the Freedom used to scan the universe for enemy ships, traps, defenses—any sort of trouble. The technology was fifty years old now, largely obsolete. These days quantum computers did that sort of work. But King refused to upgrade. ATLAS had won them the war. Sure, its processors were loud, its sensors were bulky, and the databases took up half a deck. But if you asked King, a good piece of technology should have some weight to it. If it was too small to kick when it broke, King didn't want it on his ship.

  King furrowed his brow. "Gravitational waves? We normally only detect those from a serious spacetime disturbance like stars colliding."

  "It's a puzzle," Mimori said. "But ATLAS sensors don't lie. Something disturbed spacetime at the Rubicon, casting out ripples that are hitting us here. I can't quite make sense of it. There are particles appearing in that sector of space that our science doesn't know anything about. There are all sorts of strange phenomena going on. ATLAS is going berserk."

  "What if you point a good old-fashioned telescope at the Rubicon?" King said. "What do you see?"

  "I already did, sir. At this distance, we can't see much. Normally, our sharpest telescopes can detect a speck of light where the Rubicon should be. Right now, well … we're detecting several smaller, fainter specks of light."

  "What?" King leaned closer. "Mimori, what are you saying? The Rubicon is a guard outpost. What the hell happened to it?"

  "I don't know, sir. I've never seen anything like this."

  A chill washed over King. There was an old joke about the Rubicon. That the space station was there to guard the solar system from space gremlins and little green men. Hell, even the politicians spun it that way. We fund the Rubicon to keep mankind safe! In reality, it was a publicity stunt. A way to cooperate with Red Dawn. There were always just two men aboard the Rubicon. One man of the Alliance. One of the Red Dawn. If they could unite against a bogeyman, the logic went, perhaps they could avoid another world war.

  Well, for thirty-odd years that had worked. The Rubicon had never found any aliens, but perhaps it had maintained peace among men.

  Was this peace now broken? Had somebody attacked the Rubicon?

  We never should have trusted the damn Red Dawn, King thought. What are they up to?

  "Mimori, I want a full report on my desk within an hour," King said. "Make the English simple enough for the politicians to understand. I'm passing this up the chain of command."

  Mimori saluted. "Understood."

  He nodded. "Dismissed."

  He kept walking down the corridor, a chill in his belly. Suddenly he seemed to be walking down these corridors as a young pilot. Outside the portholes he saw the enemy ships, the torpedoes flying, the fire blazing. The wound on his neck flared with pain.

  No. The war was over. He was just feeling nervous on his last day. Tomorrow he would be back on his farm, and instead of damn tourists all around him, it would be the birds.

  He sneered, clenched his fists, and kept marching down the corridor.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  The Starship Freedom

  High Earth Orbit

  09:00 Christmas 2199

  King walked down the winding corridors, determined to continue his farewell tour of the Freedom. But the news from the Rubicon gnawed on him.

  Strange signals. A mysterious silence.

  It's nothing, King thought. Probably just an ATLAS bug. The system is showing its age. I'm just nervous because it's my last day.

  He tried to push the Rubicon out of his mind. Tried. He knew it was pointless.

  You still have tonight to worry about, King reminded himself.

  Tonight he would be hosting the annual Freedom Christmas gala. Every year, the Freedom turned its officers' galley into a glittering palace full of Christmas trees, music, and good cheer. This year was special. It was the thirty-fifth anniversary of the Freedom winning the war—not quite a round number, but just close enough to warrant a party. Many dignitaries would arrive for the Christmas gala, including prime ministers, generals, prominent writers, and esteemed artists. Even Princess Emily was visiting this year. Her grandfather, Robert II, had served aboard this ship in the war.

  King would put on his finest dress uniform, the one with the white gloves and bow tie. He'd feel like a pompous fool, but he'd speak to the guests, make a toast. It was tradition. And then, with everyone there, he would announce his retirement.

  So far, only Lieutenant Commander Jordan knew. Soon the world would know.

  I have a few more hours, King thought. Some time to walk through my ship and say goodbye. A last day with my dear old girl.

  One day would not be enough time to visit every deck. The Freedom was the size of a town. But there was one particular place he had to visit. It was his dearest place on the ship.

  The Freedom had dozens of decks, scores of departments, and hundreds of corridors and chambers. But broadly, the ship was divided into three main parts, roughly of equal size. The prow. The midship. And the stern.

  Right now King was marching through the midsection, nicknamed the Belly of the Beast. At 475 meters long and 300 meters tall, it was a big place. The prow was the brain, dedicated to science and command. The stern was the heart; it belonged to the engineers who kept the ship flying. Everything else lived in the Belly of the Beast.

  King walked across deck 32, the midsection's uppermost deck. Great machinery filled the place, rising all around him. Gears. Winches. Twisting pipes. Hundreds of computers, screens, and terminals. From here, the top deck, officers commanded the fourteen Angels of Liberty.

  The Angels were massive cannons mounted onto the top of the Freedom. Seven thrust out over the port bow, seven over the starboard bow. Each Angel was the size of the Statue of Liberty. They were built to cripple enemy dreadnoughts. Back in the war, they had terrorized the Red Dawn.

  Of course, the Angels hadn't fired any torpedoes since the war. Since then, they'd only fired fireworks for the delight of the tourists. Some of those tourists were already flying outside the Freedom in their shuttles, waiting for the morning fireworks display. More tourists crowded the deck around King, oohing and aahing at the giant gears and cables that powered the Angels of Liberty.

  Trying to ignore the tourists who were snapping photos of him, King approached an elevator. A few kids shot him with toy guns.

  As the elevator descended, King thought about Mimori's warning again. Trouble at the Rubicon station. The distant outpost gone silent.

  "I always told the suits that the Rubicon was a bad idea," he muttered. A sign of old age. He was talking to himself. "A station we share with the Red Dawn? Ha!"

  He snorted. You couldn't trust the Red Dawn. All old soldiers knew that. But the younger politicians, well, they waxed poetic about peace, love, all that pie-in-the-sky treacle. They had never fought a war. T
hey had never seen the Red Dawn soldiers on the field, slaughtering women and children. They had never charged through the fire.

  For all King knew, the goddamn Russian out there at the Rubicon had gone mad, had blown up the whole space station.

  A thought tickled King's mind, surprising him. It couldn't actually be … well, aliens, could it?

  Ostensibly, the Rubicon was there to guard the solar system from an alien invasion. But that was just rubbish, of course. Absolute rubbish! King snickered. He had probably clocked more hours of spaceflight than any human, and he had never seen any goddamn aliens. They were just a myth. If there was trouble at the Rubicon, it had to be the Russians. Who else?

  He was tempted to check the MindWeb, that sprawling telepathic database of human thoughts and knowledge, for more information on the Rubicon. But that meant activating the microchip in his head. And he'd be damned if he'd spend his last day like a zombie, brain plugged into the computers. No. He'd return to his desk before the gala. By then, Mimori would have a report waiting. A paper report. Good old paper and ink. When had they ever gone out of style?

  * * * * *

  Standing in the elevator, King watched the floors rush by.

  Deck 31, right below the topmost deck, was dedicated to entertainment. The sprawling promenade contained a variety of attractions. A wooden pirate ship moved on rickety rails, its masts scratching the ceiling. A robotic pirate with a scraggly beard leaned over a balustrade, inviting tourists to come in for some rum and gambling. Animatronic dinosaurs roared in a minigolf course, their creaky tails knocking aside golf balls. A magician stood on a stage, dressed like Dracula, sawing a woman in half. Several androids in slinky outfits stood nearby, inviting tourists into their spas for a massage. A water slide snaked around the complex, eventually dropping down to a wave pool on a lower deck.

  In the old days, deck 31 had contained a chapel where soldiers could pray before battle. Today deck 31 was a joke. Today the tourists flocked there to waste their money on blackjack, robot hookers, and goddamn Dinogolf.

  Decks 30 and 29 were no better. They contained a holographic movie theater, restaurants ranging from fast food to fine dining, a wax museum featuring historic warriors, bumper cars shaped like little starfighters, and of course a shopping complex. King missed the days when deck 30 was a mess hall for his troops.

  Later today, he would be hosting Christmas dinner in one of these restaurants. It used to be the officers' galley, but now rich tourists dined there. A world-class chef was flying in from France. A far cry from the battle rations King used to eat there as a young soldier.

  The elevator had large glass windows. As it descended, King viewed the luxury of these upper decks. A giant Christmas tree rose from the food court. Acrobats were leaping from the mezzanines, dipping toward the fountains, and delighting the onlookers. A few employees were dressed as Freedom the Frog, the starship's lovable mascot. They were dancing for the children and signing autographs.

  They turned my ship into goddamn Disneyland, King thought.

  Finally, blessedly, the elevator descended into deck 28, leaving the garish entertainment district. It kept going down. For a while, King passed through the living quarters, which spanned a full sixteen decks. Officers lived in the upper decks, enlisted soldiers in the lower decks. At least that used to be the case. Ten thousand soldiers had once served and lived aboard the Freedom. Today only a skeleton crew remained, crowding into one deck. The rest was a hotel.

  The tourists delighted in staying in bunks where terrified marines had once flown to battle. Those bunks had carpets now, entertainment sets, and minibars. Not quite the old military experience. But tourists demanded their luxuries. And they tipped well.

  King suddenly wondered why it had taken him so long to retire.

  The elevator kept descending, passing into the lower decks now, approaching the underbelly of the ship. King looked through the elevator windows at the cavernous warehouses and armories. Thousands of missiles, torpedoes, and plasma barrels used to fill this place. Now the armories serviced the tourist industry. Here was where robots washed the linens, built the souvenirs, and fixed whatever the teenagers broke.

  He passed by deck 9. The entire deck was dedicated to powering, loading, and firing the Fist of Freedom, the ship's enormous railgun. It was a major tourist attraction. Come see the gun that beat the Russians! Hundreds of tourists crowded the mezzanines, pointing at the Fist's smoldering reactor. Electricity crackled in the air, raising everyone's hackles. Several kids were yawning. They wanted to return to the higher decks where Freedom the Frog was walking around.

  Then King passed into deck 8, and he breathed a sigh of relief.

  He felt better at once. Now he was descending through the hangar bays. Deck 8 contained the Sparrows, little shuttles used to ferry dignitaries. Decks 7 and 6 contained the Rhinos, bulky troop carriers; they had been rusting away here since the war. Finally he reached the lowest four decks.

  The Eagle hangars.

  His favorite place on the starship.

  Four entire decks, spanning the midsection of the Freedom, housed the Eagles. The best damn starfighters in the galaxy.

  He exited the elevator on deck 1. The lowest place in the starship. He walked upon the humming, vibrating ventral hull of the ship. Just below spread the vastness of space.

  And there they were. Resting on the deck before him.

  The Eagles.

  King allowed himself a rare smile.

  * * * * *

  S-35 Eagle-class starfighters. The best damn starfighters in the galaxy. King walked among them, smiling softly, lost in memory.

  A few mechanics were working in the hangar, maintaining these metal birds of prey. As King approached, they dropped their tools, stood at attention, and saluted. King returned the salutes. The Eagle mechanics were the backbone of the Freedom, maintaining her superiority in battle. They were not officers. They received no fame from the public. But to King, they were heroes.

  "Merry Christmas," he told them, every man and woman in turn. He knew them all by name.

  The pilots weren't there right now. They were probably relaxing in the lounge, preparing for the big stunt show later today. Two hundred pilots served aboard the starship. Known as Freedom's Flock, they were the ship's biggest tourist draw, delighting the crowd with daredevil aerobatics.

  Yes, the Eagles—these mighty birds that had won World War III—now flew stunts.

  King ran his hand along one Eagle, caressing its curves. Back in the war, the eagles had been dark gray. Today they were painted red and blue and lined with blinking lights. They needed to stand out in space for the tourists, not hide in shadow. But King didn't mind their new colors. To him, the red and blue did not diminish their beauty. They enhanced it for all to see.

  Each Eagle was seventeen meters long, which often surprised the tourists. People thought the Eagles were smaller, since they were single-pilot machines. From afar, it was easy to misjudge their size. But each starfighter was larger than a semitrailer. They needed to be large. They carried a lot of weaponry. At least they used to. Their wings contracted in space, expanded in atmosphere. Their engines brought light to the darkest shadows, hope to those who despaired.

  King had flown one during the war.

  He smiled as he walked between the Eagles. Just a thin smile. Not a smile that showed his teeth. He didn't smile big smiles anymore. He rarely smiled at all. Laughing hurt. Even smiling too wide stretched the wound on his neck. He kept his emotions deep inside, crushing them with clenched fists and gnashing teeth.

  But today he allowed himself this small smile. This was a good place. This was home.

  He remembered himself as a young pilot, known then by his call sign, "Bulldog." Just a kid from Nebraska. Just a young punk full of piss and vinegar, eager to blast away his enemies. He remembered himself running across this hangar, heading to the starfighters with his fellow pilots. With Larry "Phantom" Jordan, who was now his XO. With Prince "Charming"
Robert, who was now the King of England. With Yehuda "Lion" Levy, whose daughter was now a pilot on this starship. With so many pilots who never returned home, who never grew old.

  Good memories. A good place. The war had been the worst time of his life, but in some ways, also the best. A time of death, despair, of losing friends, losing his father. But also a time of laughter, courage, and brotherhood.

  Look at me, he thought. I've become a nostalgic old man. I used to mock nostalgic old men. Maybe that's both the curse and blessing of life. We all eventually become the people we deserve to be.

  He walked among the Eagles, heading toward the back of the hangar.

  And there he saw her.

  S-35 Unit A1. The Golden Eagle.

  His personal starfighter.

  * * * * *

  Stanchions and velvet rope separated this starfighter from the others. The Golden Eagle flew no stunts. She was not painted red and blue. Her hull was still its original gray, covered in battle scars. Stars were painted onto her hull, one for each enemy starfighter downed. No fewer than sixty-seven stars shone on the Golden Eagle, an Alliance record.

  King had earned those stars as a young pilot. Decades later, the record still stood. As King looked at his starfighter, a lump filled his throat. His eyes stung. Those were horrible days of war. But also days of glory and so much promise.

  A voice came from behind him.

  "She's one ugly bird, sir. All scratched up and dented and old. Just like you."

  King turned around, snorting.

  Colonel Gal "Spitfire" Levy stood there, hands on her hips, a mocking smile on her face. She was a tall brunette with mischievous eyes. Freckles were strewn across her nose and cheeks. Her baggy flight suit could not hide her slender grace.