by PP Corcoran
Search for the Saiph (Saiph #2)
PP Corcoran
Copyright 2015 PP Corcoran
Published by PP Corcoran Ltd
License Notes
This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This eBook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your enjoyment only, then please return to your favorite retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
Table of Contents
Chapter One: The Happy Wanderer
Chapter Two: The Shrine
Chapter Three: The Journey Begins
Chapter Four: The Dinner Party
Chapter Five: Fateful Decision
Chapter Six: Advance!
Chapter Seven: Counting the Cost
Chapter Eight: The Algol Paradox
Chapter Nine: Somebody Else’s War
Chapter Ten: An Audience with the Emperor
Chapter Eleven: Investigations
Chapter Twelve: It’s good to Talk
Chapter Thirteen: The Committee Hearing
Chapter Fourteen: Origins
Chapter Fifteen: The Rock
Chapter Sixteen: Alona See What You Want to See
Chapter Seventeen: In Earth Space
Chapter Eighteen: Hold the Line
Chapter Nineteen: Repercussions. Military. Political. Personal
Chapter Twenty: Operation Hades
Chapter Twenty-One: More Questions than Answers
About PP Corcoran
Other books by PP Corcoran
Connect with PP Corcoran
CHAPTER ONE
The Happy Wanderer
GARUNDA – 49.41 LIGHT YEARS FROM EARTH
“Chief Engineer Logan reports we’re ready to fold, Captain. Port control has given us the green light and wishes us a safe journey.”
“Very well, Robards, let’s be on our way. ‘Time and tide wait for no man.’”
Richard Boswell smiled at the quizzical look his young navigator gave him at his use of the ancient phrase before turning his attention to the controls.
The journey from Garunda to Alona was split into ten folds of 5000 light year legs each. As the ship emerged at the end of each leg, it contacted navigation buoys placed by the navy’s survey command and verified its position. The whole trip would take around ten hours, incorporating the mandatory two-hour shutdown for normal service, inspection, and any minor adjustments the gravity drive needed between such long folds.
The Happy Wanderer accelerated steadily under the push of its ion drive, its massive bulk of 1.8 million tons picking up speed until it finally reached three-quarters the speed of light.
“Three. Two. One. Fold!” Robards called.
They shifted into fold space with an almost-imperceptible shiver that ran the length of the ship.
A second, stronger vibration indicated their return to normal space.
Alarm bells rang.
Throughout the ship, the “FIRE” alarm signs flashed, their urgent blinking mirrored in the captain’s display, demanding Richard’s attention.
What the hell! Richard quickly brought up the ship’s schematic. Fire in the engine room. The sound of bulkhead doors clanging shut reached his ears and the normally constant hum of the air conditioning died as it automatically shut down to prevent the spread of smoke. Richard overrode the alarm on the bridge, silencing it.
First Officer Yoshi Marona turned to Richard. “No reply from the engine room, Captain. I think I should head down there.”
Richard desperately wanted to go himself, but his place was on the bridge. He reined in his impulses and calmly released his first officer.
“Off you go, Yoshi. Scare up what crew you can along the way and give the chief all the help she needs.”
The majority of functions on ships like the Happy Wanderer were fully automated. She ran with a skeleton crew of just fifteen. Most of this crew worked in engineering, which just happened to be the seat of the fire.
Yoshi nodded and headed for the bridge exit.
“Yoshi!”
The first officer turned toward his captain.
“You be careful now. Take no chances, or your wife will never forgive me!”
Yoshi flashed Richard a toothy grin and disappeared down the corridor, heading for the engine room at a dead run.
Richard turned to his next order of business. “Sitrep, Robards!”
“Captain, on re-emergence into normal space, we continued on course at just under a quarter the speed of light…” he tapped the controls as he spoke. “The engine controls are unresponsive and my board shows the engines went on automatic shutdown at the first indication of fire. My systems are running on emergency power and I have minimal active sensor systems.”
“Kennedy,” Richard addressed his young communications officer, who was busy tapping keys at her workstation; so focused on the screen she was studying, she seemed unaware of her surroundings. Richard raised his voice. “Kennedy!” Still he garnered no response.
“Lorna!” Richard shouted.
Lorna Kennedy jumped as if stuck with a cattle prod. “Yes, sir!” she squeaked.
“Take a deep breath and calm yourself. We have a job to do, keep focused. OK?”
Lorna’s cheeks flushed with embarrassment, her first real emergency at the age of twenty-one and she was acting like a scared five-year-old. She shook herself. Yes, it’s my first deep-space voyage, yes, I’ve only been here fourteen days and don’t know the crew, but where did that bubbly, confident communications officer go!? Get a grip on yourself, woman, you’re meant to be an officer! In a stronger voice she replied, “Yes, sir. Sorry, sir. It won’t happen again.”
“I’m sure it won’t. Now, lock onto the navigation buoy and download a message to it. Instruct it to launch its emergency communications drone back to Garunda and inform Port Control we have a fire in the engine room, we’re currently adrift at the first way-marker, and we’re declaring an emergency and request assistance as soon as possible.”
“That’s the thing, sir. I’ve been trying to raise the buoy, but the rear whisker laser mount isn’t responding to commands or any of my computer fault interrogations. The bow mount can’t traverse far enough to see the buoy and get a lock.”
Richard mulled the problem. Each of the navigation buoys contained a communications drone equipped with its own gravity drive. The drones on this run were programmed to head for either Garunda or Alona, whichever was the closest. Any ship in distress could download a message to the drone and launch it automatically, then sit back and await rescue. Now that wasn’t an option.
“Kennedy, warm up the emergency drone. Download our current logs but don’t launch until we hear back from the First Officer.”
The Happy Wanderer, like every commercial starship, was required to carry at least one communications drone. After the incident with the TDF Vasco De Gamma, where it ended up 50,000 light years from its intended destination, it seemed like a prudent requirement. Well, thought Richard, how right they were.
Lorna was tapping at her keyboard again, happy to have a purpose.
The attention tone beeped in the captain's display and Richard activated the pick-up. It revealed the image of Yoshi in a hard vacuum suit. A sense of dreadful foreboding twisted his stomach. “Go ahead, Yoshi.”
“Captain, I’ve reached the bulkhead at Engineering. The tell-tale signs on this side of the door show it’s over 1800 degrees in there. I can’t get a
visual as the cameras are down. But…” Richard saw Yoshi's look of despair as he shook his head, “I'm sorry, sir, there’s no way any of the engineering crew could’ve survived.”
“No way?” Richard responded, rhetorically, as he processed the likely deaths of his crew.
Yoshi shook his head slowly, sharing his captain’s pain. “No. I can’t see it, sir.”
Richard lowered his head, rubbing his forehead gently. Chief Engineer Michelle Logan and he had been friends for almost thirty years, since he had joined Zurich Lines. They had crewed the long-haul cargo runs from the asteroid belt to the inner planets; they were godparents to each other’s children. Now, in an instant, she was gone. How was he going to break the news to her husband?
Yoshi’s tinny voice jolted his captain back to the present. “With your permission, sir, I’m gonna seal the next bulkhead back from Engineering and then pump out the air from between the two — use it like an air lock. If the fire’s consumed all the oxygen in Engineering then there's no point in giving it the fuel to re-ignite.”
“Sounds like a good plan, Yoshi.”
“I’ll enter Engineering and open it to space to allow the heat to dissipate before resealing and re-pressurizing it, before I do a proper damage estimate.”
“How long do you think till you can get in and give me a provisional damage report?”
“Not long, sir. We’re already suited up here. Give me twenty minutes and I should know what we’re facing.”
“OK, Yoshi. Permission granted and I’ll expect to hear from you in twenty.” Richard cut the link and turned to the waiting Robards and Kennedy. “We wait,” he said simply.
It was the longest twenty minutes of his life. Richard alternated between hope and dread. Surely there was a chance someone could have survived? There were emergency suits stored in Engineering in case of a coolant leak or sudden depressurization. A suit's internal oxygen supply was good for up to an hour. Some of the crew may have reached them in time. These thoughts were swiftly quashed by reality; there was no chance anyone could survive an 1800 degree fire that would have enveloped the entire space in seconds...
True to Yoshi's word, the captain's console beeped for attention just over twenty minutes later. At the touch of a control, Yoshi’s face appeared, sweat streaming from his brow and a worried look on his face. Richard steeled himself for the news he knew, in his heart of hearts, was coming.
“I take it the news isn’t good, Yoshi?”
“I'm sorry, sir... We’ve failed to locate any survivors. The heat was too intense. It's horrific down here. Without proper forensic analysis, I can’t even identify the remains of the crew.”
Nausea welled in the captain as all hope for the missing men and women dissipated. Now his next priority was his surviving crew, and he pushed aside his queasiness. “What about the machinery, Yoshi?”
“To put it mildly, Captain, we’re well and truly screwed. All the computer gel packs are destroyed. That wouldn’t be too much of a problem as we have enough spares to replace the more important ones and get the engineering computers back up and running if only…” Richard frowned as Yoshi continued, “the heat from the fire has warped everything in here. I could probably cobble something together to get the control mechanisms working but the actual physical parts of the drive are damaged. I’m afraid there’s nothing we have on board that could replace them... Sorry, sir.”
“Understood, Yoshi. Get your men clear and seal the door.”
“Yes, sir. And sir…”
“Yes, Yoshi?”
“I’m sorry about Logan.”
The captain's vision blurred as tears filled his eyes. “Thanks, Yoshi.”
Yoshi nodded curtly and cut the link.
Richard gave his eyes a quick rub, hoping that neither Robards nor Kennedy noticed and if they did, they would politely ignore it; he still had a ship to get home.
He quickly glanced at the ship's clock, fifty minutes – on this course at a quarter of the speed of light. Richard calculated they’d traveled 225 million kilometers from the position they’d entered normal space and with every passing second were moving a further 75,000 kilometers from the shipping lane. As long as a rescue ship had his base course and speed they should still find him without too much trouble.
“Kennedy, please update the logs on our communications drone with our current position, heading and speed. Download the First Officer’s report and request immediate assistance. Launch the drone as soon as you’re ready, please.”
Kennedy busied herself at her console and Richard sat back as he calculated how long a rescue vessel would take to reach their location. The shaking of Lorna Kennedy’s head caught his attention.
“Problem, Kennedy?”
“Um… yes, sir. The drone accepted the downloads and the command to launch. But my board shows a red light from the launch bay doors. They appear to be stuck.”
Richard conjured an image of the launch bay doors in his mind. Positioned just forward of the rear whisker laser communications mount. The laser mount that also wasn’t responding. Damn! What else can go wrong? The captain punched the link to Yoshi. The image of his First Officer halfway out of his pressure suit filled his display.
“Sorry, Yoshi, you're not finished yet. The launch bay doors for the Comms drone are stuck. Probably damaged by the fire. I need you and someone else to go free them so we can get the drone out and get some help.”
Yoshi had paused while removing his bulky suit. He started shrugging it back on, his brow wrinkled in thought. “Either the hatch controls are fried or the hatch mechanism itself has been warped by the heat. I may have to cut the hatch away and release the drone manually, I don’t see another way around it.”
“Do whatever's needed, Yoshi, but the sooner we get the drone out, the sooner we get some help.”
“Understood, Captain. I’ll let you know what I find.” And with that, Yoshi cut the link, thinking that it never rains but it pours.
#
On the exterior hull Yoshi regarded the hatch in front of him and wished he wasn't always right. Just as he'd thought; the hatch covering the communications drone bay was partially opened and jammed. Most likely the bay door rams had suffered catastrophic damage. The drone was intact, though a minor miracle. Their first piece of good luck.
No sense hanging about out here, I may as well get to work, thought Yoshi, as he carefully held the plasma cutting torch at arm’s length and ignited it. The flame was designed to cut through anything up to and including battle armor, any mistake and it would make very short work of his suit. That mistake would take Yoshi's day from bad to fatal in a heartbeat.
He'd only been working a few minutes and already the plasma torch had easily cut through one of the four rams that operated the bay doors. Yoshi looked up to ensure that the crew member with him was safely out of the arc of the plasma torch while he moved to reposition himself to start on the next ram. He was confronted with the crew member’s back.
“Hey Browne, are you with me?”
Yoshi got no reply. He turned the plasma torch off and secured it to the hull, by the bay doors, using the magnetic strap. He walked over to Browne. As he edged closer, he noticed the small hole in the back of her helmet.
“Oh God, no!” Yoshi moved as quickly as he could in his cumbersome suit to check Browne from the front and was confronted by another neat hole in the faceplate. The suit encased a now-dead Browne.
“No!” Despair filled Yoshi as the rational part of his brain tried to figure out what had happened. Had a micro-meteorite hit her? If so, shouldn’t the faceplate be completely or at least partially shattered? Movement over Browne’s now stiff shoulder caught Yoshi’s eye. What the…
The short laser blast from the rifle of the armored figure passed right through Yoshi’s chest.
The shot destroyed the integrity of the suit, the electronics controlling the magnetic boots failed, the atmosphere rushed out, the sum result was that Yoshi was lifted clear of the Ha
ppy Wanderer's hull. Yoshi's brain, thankfully, began to shut down just as he saw dozens of armored figures scurrying toward the open airlock and entering the ship.
#
The screaming alarm on Lorna’s console drew all eyes to it. She silenced it and briefly interrogated the computer to confirm its readings. Without raising her head, she shouted: “Dutchman! Dutchman!” It was the call no captain wanted to hear. “I have a crew member off the hull and moving away at speed. Suit beacon is coming in strong and I’m getting good telemetry. Bio readings show…” Lorna’s voice faded as her throat closed over. My God, no! Not Yoshi! She slouched in her seat, dropped her head into her hands, and sobbed.
Richard left his seat and gently moved the sobbing young woman to one side. His worst fears were realized; on the display, a red circled icon with the name “MARONA” flashed.
The fire damage at the rear of the ship meant Yoshi had already been over 200 meters from the Happy Wanderer's hull and moving away at 40 kilometers per hour when the mid-ship sensors picked it up. It didn't matter anyway, the suit's bio-sensors showed that Yoshi was already dead.
Richard’s eyes fixed on the flashing icon of his dead first officer as he addressed Robards. “Robards, suit up. Browne’s still out there, and with the stern sensors down, we don't know her status, she may need your help.”
As Robards stood to comply, the bridge doors opened. Richard looked up and was confronted by the sight of a group of armored figures rushing onto the bridge.
Robards reacted faster than his captain, he lunged for the nearest intruder only to be viciously beaten into unconsciousness with a few swings of a rifle butt. As Robards fell to the deck, Richard instinctively placed himself between his Comms officer and the invaders. An uneasy standoff held for what seemed an age, it was broken only when a commanding figure entered the bridge.
This one was different. The entire left arm of his armored suit was painted red and a strange symbol adorned his chest plate. It looked like a black circle covering the entire chest with a red X the size of a man's hand in the middle. The figure held an ugly-looking pistol loosely in its right hand.
