The Lost Secret

by Vaughn Heppner

  Maddox leaned his butt against the desk. He just wanted ordinary problems for once. He was sick and tired of these supernatural or ultra-powerful creatures. He didn’t want to think about Erill spirit entities or ball-of-light aliens. He didn’t want to, but he had no choice. Really, he needed to just suck it up and do his duty.

  Maddox turned to Galyan. “Is your core all right?”

  “I would appreciate it if someone could give it a physical check,” Galyan said.

  “I’ll have Andros go,” Maddox said. He looked around at the others. Would Balron show up here? How would the ball of light try to use them, and against whom? “Does anyone have a suggestion as to what we should do next?”

  “I most certainly do,” Ludendorff said. “We’re between the Kuiper Belt and inner Oort cloud. We don’t know who is here with us in the star system, where they are and in what numbers. I suggest we use the Lieutenant Commander and her stealth ship. To start, have her scout the second planet. At the same time, we could send fold-fighters to various areas and check them out too. Clearly, by Half-Life’s actions, someone is here. Is it the New Men with Strand? Is it Balron? We don’t know, but we’d better start figuring it out fast.”

  “An excellent suggestion,” Maddox said. He’d been feeling down for a moment. Action was the right cure for that. “We’ll run a deep sensor scan and catalog the system from here. We’ll figure out a star-drive jump schedule, picking up more data on the inner system planets. That’s where people or others should be, especially near the Library Planet.” Maddox looked at Meta, Galyan and Ludendorff in turn. “So, what is Balron after? Why did he do these things to us?”

  Ludendorff shook his head. “I don’t know yet, but I plan to find out.”

  “I will consider the problems in detail,” Galyan said.

  “Right,” Maddox said. “We’ll run the scans. We’ll scout, and then we’ll decide what to do next.”

  -59-

  The Darter Tarrypin exited the hangar bay, positioned itself well beyond Victory and left the deep Kuiper Belt using a star-drive jump. It appeared five million kilometers from the Library Planet, behind the smallest and farthest moon.

  After recovering from jump lag, Lieutenant Commander Valerie Noonan began a passive sensor scan of the outer and inner orbital areas of the second planet.

  Derrick sat at another sensor panel, watching for attacking vessels or a suspicious ball of light.

  The first mate was in the main engine compartment in case anything went wrong back there.

  “Nothing so far,” Derrick said.

  Valerie had discovered the same thing: essentially nothing other than confirming the orbital speeds of the moons and their sizes. She began studying the planet, and found its frozen nature as everyone else had.

  Here we go, she thought, keeping the worry to herself, not wanting to unduly frighten Derrick.

  Dumping a small amount of gravity waves, the darter eased from behind the fifth moon and began its slow journey toward the planet.

  Every half-hour, Valerie dumped more gravity waves to build up velocity.

  Soon, the passive sensors discovered six star cruisers parked in an equatorial stationary orbit over the planet. After a little more time, Valerie found small metal housings on the surface ice.

  “This is interesting,” she said. “There’s a shuttle on the surface ice, but only one. Why aren’t there more?”

  “I see it,” Derrick said from his sensor station. “Hello,” he said a moment later.

  Valerie stared at him.

  “I’m seeing orbital insertion troops,” he said. “They’re in low orbit three hundred and ten kilometers from the star cruisers.”

  Valerie went back to scanning and soon saw ten space-suited individuals with thruster packs and bulky equipment that must mean drogue and other chutes. Oh, yes, they surely wore heavy planetary suits in order to survive the freezing temperatures once they made it down.

  She sat back abruptly.

  Derrick gave her a worried glance. “Is there a problem, Commander?”

  “You could say that,” Valerie said slowly. “Why are the New Men using orbital insertion troops? Why don’t they send the men down in more shuttles?”

  “Uh…because they’re trying to surprise someone,” Derrick said.

  “That has to be the answer. But who are they trying to surprise?”

  Derrick shook his head.

  Valerie stood up, walked into the middle of the control cabin and started doing deep knee bends. She started huffing at twenty.

  Derrick tried not to watch, but he kept glancing at her.

  Valerie stopped at forty-five, puffing harder. She noticed the ensign watching and decided this was a training moment. “That comes from working with Captain Maddox. He uses exercise to stimulate his thinking.”

  “Did it help?”

  Valerie grinned. “It did.” She sat back at the sensor station and used teleoptics to study the star cruisers. She found three of the names: the Shapur, the Paralos and the Cambyses. Using the computer, she discovered the probable captains, the Emperor, Samos of Thetis and Artaxerxes Par.

  “This is a royal flotilla,” she said. “Well, if the Emperor is here…”

  “Why would the Emperor come all this way?”

  Valerie nodded. “That’s the right question all right. I don’t know the other names, but the captain, Galyan or Ludendorff might.”

  “Should we wait until the orbital troops drop?”

  Valerie considered that, finally shaking her head. “No. We’ve seen the numbers involved and that there seems to be dissention among the New Men, either that or an enemy. This might be a good time to slip away, as their focus seems to be elsewhere.”

  “Do we check out the wreck at the third planet next?”

  “Exactly,” Valerie said.

  She didn’t make the star-drive jump immediately, however, but shifted the darter’s direction of travel. Twelve minutes later, they moved behind the third moon, one of the larger two.

  The orbital insertion team hadn’t dropped yet, but seemed to be traveling farther afield in relation to the star cruisers and the landed shuttle. That didn’t seem right to Valerie. Did the orbital team want the shuttle to see them, or whoever held the shuttle hostage? Was that even what was happening?

  “Get set to jump,” Valerie said.

  “Roger that, sir,” Derrick said.

  The Darter Tarrypin engaged its star-drive jump, leaving the outer orbital space of the second planet and appearing six million kilometers from the third planet.

  Now began a similar sequence of events, but without any moons to use as cover. Valerie and Derrick used passive sensors to study the planet and then the wreck as it came around the barren metallic-rock world in orbit.

  Nothing seemed out of the ordinary. The planet was the same as Galyan had scanned before they left. It was the same with the five-kilometer wreck with its thousands of attached pods. It was old, more than five hundred years old, and it had thousands of hull breaches.

  “We’ll move closer,” Valerie said, “but we’ll continue using passive sensors. For all we know, the New Men seeded the area with hidden mines.”

  “Why would they do that?”

  “I have no idea,” Valerie said. “I’m just saying we’re going to be cautious.”

  “Right,” Derrick said.

  For the next several hours, the Tarrypin began a slow and stealthy approach toward the wreck.

  “I know they told us in Patrol school that boredom would be our greatest enemy,” Derrick said. “I never realized how true it was until today.”

  “You’re bored?” asked Valerie.

  “Bored sick,” Derrick said. “I wish something would happen.”

  “Be careful what you wish for,” Valerie said.

  “I know. It’s just—hey, did you see that?”

  Valerie’s heart tightened. She liked boredom just fine, having lived through enough excitement for a lifetime. “What did
you see?”

  “On the passive sensor: there was a spike. The radiation soared from nothing to levels you would see if a nuclear bomb had just gone off.”

  “Radiation?” asked Valerie, as she checked her board. “There’s no radiation out there—you mean from the wreck, right?”

  “That’s weird,” Derrick said. “I saw it. Just a second.” He manipulated his board. “Yep, my sensor recorded massive radiation. It was there one millisecond and gone the next. I might not have noticed but I was staring right at the scope.”

  “Strange…” Valerie said. “It shows up on my scanner as well, on the recorder. Why didn’t the scanners beep, alerting us? Let me check something. Uh-huh,” she said a minute later. “It’s…ghostly radiation.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “It means the radiation spiked the scanner, one part of it anyway. But on the other part of the scanner, the radiation didn’t register. There’s no radiation out there now, and there should be if some leaked through a moment ago.”

  “What does that mean? Leaked through from where?”

  Valerie squinted at the ensign before she squinted out of the polarized window at the wreck. The wreck was still too far away to see with their naked eyes. It was five kilometers long, a battered wreck, and it had shown ghostly radiation that had leaked through from…from a null region like last mission? Could that be possible?

  Part of her realized she should get closer or use the active sensors to study the wreck. The other part realized this was a delicate mission fifteen hundred light-years from Human Space. They had found an anomaly here and six star cruisers at the Library Planet. What was more important: that Maddox receive this data or they learn even more?

  “We’re packing it up, Ensign. We found enough to inform the captain about things he’ll want to know.”

  “Shouldn’t we take a closer look?”

  “I’ve made my decision. We’ll stick with that. Do you have a problem with that?”

  Derrick stared out of the polarized window at the planet. His boyish features said it all: he wanted to poke around. He wanted to do something. They’d trained for months—

  “Whatever you say, Commander,” he said.

  “I am saying it.”

  “Uh…could we look just a little longer…please?”

  Valerie almost said yes. Instead, she decided to pull another leaf from Maddox’s book on leadership. “None of that, Ensign. Prepare for jump.”

  “Yes, Commander,” Derrick said, sounding disappointed.

  They readied for the star-drive jump back to Victory in the deep Kuiper Belt. Then, seconds before the jump, a bright light shined from the wreck and struck the stealthy Tarrypin.

  Valerie shouted in surprise. What did the light mean?

  “It’s shorting my sensors,” Derrick shouted.

  Valerie glanced at the ensign. Smoke rose from a sparking panel. The ensign seemed brighter than she remembered.

  A second later, the star-drive jump kicked in, causing the Tarrypin to vanish from the beam of light and leave…would the darter appear at its appointed spot, or would the light have an adverse effect on the jump?

  -60-

  Maddox hurried onto Victory’s bridge, having been woken from sleep. He stared at the main screen, at the drifting image of the glowing Darter Tarrypin. Three shuttles were out there, two of them half a kilometer from the darter. The third shuttle was near the darter, this one with a gaping blast-hole in the hull.

  Galyan had already informed Maddox that six people had died on the stricken shuttle.

  “I want some answers,” Maddox said, as he sat in the captain’s chair. “What’s causing the glow?”

  “Anti-energy,” Andros said from his station.

  “Explain that.”

  “I will,” Ludendorff said, interrupting.

  Maddox hadn’t noticed the professor sitting at one of the sensor stations until he had turned around.

  “Somebody had better,” Maddox said.

  “The anti-energy is similar in effect to antimatter,” Ludendorff said. “The energy circles the Tarrypin like a shell, the white and yolk of an egg.”

  “And…?” asked Maddox.

  “The anti-energy reacts violently to matter,” Ludendorff said. “In this instance, the hull of the first shuttle was ripped apart when it touched the energy.”

  “Why did the shuttle try to dock with the darter?”

  “Because we didn’t understand the properties of the…the alien anti-energy yet,” Ludendorff said.

  “How do we get rid of the anti-energy?”

  “We’re already working on it,” Ludendorff said. “I believe we can drain the anti-energy from the Tarrypin by pushing matter against it until the anti-energy is neutralized or dissipated.”

  Maddox frowned as he looked from Ludendorff to the main screen. “You mean by sending matter at it so the combination will explode.”

  “Explosion is just a side-effect,” Ludendorff said. “The goal is to drain away the anti-energy.”

  “What about the Tarrypin’s crew? What did they say about all this?”

  “So far, we haven’t been able to contact them, and Galyan can’t pass through the anti-energy.”

  Maddox nodded. “Let’s do it then. I want to find out how this happened as quickly as possible.”

  A fourth shuttle joined the other three. This one had cargo pods which ejected sand at the Tarrypin. Each time sand particles touched the glowing darter, an explosive reaction occurred.

  Two of the shuttles headed back for a hangar bay, the other shuttle waiting near the darter.

  “Sir,” Galyan said. “I detect less luminance from the darter. I believe the professor’s gambit is working.”

  “Any sign of life from the Tarrypin’s crew?” Maddox asked.

  “Not yet,” Galyan said. “Perhaps if you prayed for their safety, sir.”

  Maddox looked sharply at Galyan, sighed a moment later, nodded and closed his eyes. “God, please help Lieutenant Commander Noonan and her crew stay alive. Thank you, sir. Amen.”

  “Thank you for that, sir,” Galyan said. “I believe that is the correct human response to a crisis of this nature.”

  “You’re probably right,” Maddox said. “Now, let’s get back to work. “

  Twenty minutes later, the two shuttles were back, each of them carrying cargo pods of sand. As before, the pilots ejected a little sand at a time at the glowing Tarrypin. The explosions continued and over time—fourteen shuttle loads—the glowing brightness around the darter ceased.

  Galyan immediately passed through to the inside of the vessel. He reported to Maddox on the bridge.

  “They are unconscious, but their vitals are strong,” the holoimage said. “I think a rescue team can evacuate them from the darter.”

  Maddox exhaled with relief.

  “You should pray more often,” Meta said from her station.

  Maddox nodded, saying. “Galyan, check on the progress of the rescue attempt. I want Valerie—I want the lieutenant commander and her crew in sickbay as quickly as possible.”

  “I am on it, sir,” Galyan said, before vanishing.

  Meta had risen and walked to the captain. “I wonder what happened to them out there.”

  “That’s exactly what I want to know,” Maddox said softly.

  ***

  A shuttle team extracted the darter crew without further mishap. Another team discovered that nothing electrical worked aboard the Tarrypin. Everything had fused or shorted, including the recorder and computer systems.

  The three crewmembers were alive, but none of them responded to any stimuli. It was as if their brains were in stasis.

  After Doctor Harris finished explaining this, Maddox stepped out of the medical center and began to pace the corridors. Galyan soon appeared.

  “Anything new?” Maddox asked hopefully.

  “Not yet, sir. We do not even know their flight log.”

  Maddox stared off into the co
rridor distance until his eyes suddenly widened. Spinning on his heel, he strode back to medical and spoke to Doctor Harris. “I have an idea. There’s no medical reason for it to work, but…”

  “What do you plan?” asked Harris.

  “I…I suspect all this has to do with Balron instead of a possible New Men attack. Maybe I can use my Erill soul energy. Perhaps…perhaps I can get through to Valerie with it.”

  “In what way?” Harris asked, sounding skeptical.

  “Touch.”

  “Why should your touch make any difference?”

  “Let’s call it a hunch,” Maddox said, beginning to get irritated. “Are you coming with me or not?”

  “I haven’t authorized the attempt yet.”

  “Doctor…” Maddox turned his head. He’d started to glare at Harris. This wasn’t the moment to bull through with his plan. He turned back to her and spread his hands. “How can this possibly hurt?”

  Harris nodded curtly. “You’re right. It shouldn’t make any difference either way. So why not.” She headed for the chamber.

  Maddox followed.

  The three crewmembers of the Tarrypin were laid out in a row on med-cots. Each had monitoring medical devices.

  Maddox went to Valerie on the left side. She lay there, breathing slowly, her features calm, maybe even relaxed. The captain glanced back at an obviously intrigued Harris before he approached the lieutenant commander. Maddox muttered under his breath, wondering why he’d thought he should do this. He didn’t feel any sixth sense now.

  He closed his eyes and breathed deeply, holding his breath and letting it out slowly. He did this three times, opened his eyes and approached Valerie’s med-cot. He took her right hand, holding it between both of his. He squeezed her hand.

  “Valerie,” he whispered. “Can you hear me?”