The Lost Planet (Lost Starship Series Book 6)

by Vaughn Heppner

  SF Books by Vaughn Heppner

  DOOM STAR SERIES:

  Star Soldier

  Bio Weapon

  Battle Pod

  Cyborg Assault

  Planet Wrecker

  Star Fortress

  Task Force 7 (Novella)

  EXTINCTION WARS SERIES:

  Assault Troopers

  Planet Strike

  Star Viking

  Fortress Earth

  LOST STARSHIP SERIES:

  The Lost Starship

  The Lost Command

  The Lost Destroyer

  The Lost Colony

  The Lost Patrol

  The Lost Planet

  Visit VaughnHeppner.com for more information

  The Lost Planet

  (Lost Starship Series 6)

  by Vaughn Heppner

  Copyright © 2016 by the author.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. All rights reserved. No part of this publication can be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, without permission in writing from the author.

  -1-

  Captain Maddox ducked at the shrill sound of a high-energy buildup. A millisecond later, a pulse-bolt flashed over his head. The bolt struck a tunnel wall behind him. The energy sizzled through the metal plating, scouring the planetoid rock behind it.

  Maddox drew a long-barreled gun. He should have brought a higher-caliber weapon. The pistol was a marksman’s tool. He believed an android had just fired at him, and they were notoriously difficult to kill with anything but the biggest weapons. Had Ludendorff planned an assassination attempt together with the androids, or had the androids found the professor’s hideout and were they now trying to stop the captain from reaching Ludendorff?

  The tunnel’s overhead lights flickered once, twice, and then abruptly went out. It turned the deep corridor pitch-black.

  In his imagination, Maddox could hear Sergeant Riker’s disapproving voice. The sergeant had told him less than forty minutes ago that it was rash to go down alone. Maybe the sergeant had had a point.

  Maddox shifted positions as he slipped a pair of goggles over his eyes. They contained advanced sensors that recorded data from his surroundings and turned it into something his eyes could recognize.

  He was deep underground on Saturn’s largest moon, Titan. These were old tunnels, dating back more than two hundred years. He was in a large access tube several hundred meters before reaching a huge storage area filled with old machines. He was too deep for Galyan to communicate with him. He was even too far from Riker’s position many levels above.

  The captain studied the darkness. Junk littered the way. There! He saw movement. A man—an android?—peered over a rusted machine. The humanoid drew back his arm. The hand clutched a grenade-sized object.

  Instinctively, Maddox fired three quick shots. He knew each shot would give away his position, but he had to stop the grenade before it became airborne.

  Two bullets went wide. The third hit the wrist as the hand moved forward, stopping the arm’s forward movement. It caused the fingers to spasm open. The grenade lost its forward momentum and fell.

  Maddox dove from his location, rolled across the floor and struck an old machine on the other side of the corridor. The dive was in case another assassin had pinpointed him because of the pistol shots.

  Up ahead, an explosion caused metal to blast apart, raining everywhere. The concussion blew debris as far as Maddox’s location.

  The captain was crouched low, with his hands over his ears. The blast and heat told him that had been a military grade grenade, not a mere police tool for subduing criminals.

  Cautiously, the captain peered up from his new spot. He was a lean individual, taller than most, with angular features and a high metabolism due to his dual nature as half human and half New Man. He was a captain in the Patrol arm of Star Watch. Not so very long ago, he had been in Intelligence. He wore his uniform now, along with several special items on a utility belt.

  Starship Victory—the ancient alien vessel he commanded—waited in Titan orbit for him. He had left the ship in the hands of Lieutenant Noonan and Galyan, the vessel’s alien AI, for this mission.

  “Captain Maddox,” a voice—man or android—called from the darkness.

  Maddox grinned to himself. Did the second assassin believe he would answer and give away his position?

  “This is the end of the line for you, Captain. You have fought valiantly for many years but your use is at an end. Do you understand what I’m trying to tell you?”

  With infinitesimal deliberation, Maddox peered from around the lowest part of the side of the machine that served as his cover. That gave him a limited view, but it was hopefully the unexpected move as far as the assassin was concerned.

  “Do you know…?” the assassin said, pausing for effect.

  Maddox could not see him.

  “That I know your father’s identity?” the assassin finished.

  The captain’s gut clenched as his breathing tightened. Could this be true or did it merely mean the enemy understood one of his motivations? Maddox would bet on the latter. Still, if the assassin did know this…

  “You are quiet, Captain. Are you afraid of me?”

  Maddox debated with himself. Slowly, he peered over the machine. The man or android peered around a larger machine fifty meters ahead, with a scoped rifle aimed in Maddox’s general direction.

  The captain ducked behind his machine, doing so barely in time—thanks to his speeded reflexes. Something hissed overhead. Unseen in the darkness, the captain’s smooth forehead furrowed with furious thought.

  The assassin used spring-driven ammunition. The shots would not give away the assassin’s location as the pistol had done with his.

  “I know where you are now,” the assassin said. “You are doomed, Captain. I merely adjust my weapon so—”

  Maddox heard faint clicking. He clutched his gun with manic strength. Was this it? Did the assassin have grenades? Should he try to retreat? Maybe he should charge the assassin and try to close—

  A loud report sounded from behind Maddox. He flinched in surprise. So that had been the assassin’s game. The enemy had spoken in order to cover the approach of a third assassin from behind. He should have understood the ploy sooner.

  An explosion sounded from farther ahead.

  Maddox cocked his head in surprise. That was odd. What could have—?

  “Captain?” a gruff-voiced man called. “Are you hit, sir?”

  “Sergeant Riker?” Maddox asked in amazement.

  “Yes, sir,” Riker called from behind. By the sounds, the sergeant was forty meters or so to his rear.

  “What did you just do?” Maddox asked.

  “I used a grenade-launcher,” Riker said. “I believe your attacker is dead. At least, he’s not moving and he has a big machine lying on his head.”

  Maddox ingested that. “I gave you explicit orders to remain behind.”

  “You did, sir. But Brigadier O’Hara countermanded the order and told me to hurry and find you. She had reason to believe you were in danger, and it seems she was right.”

  “The brigadier is on Titan?”

  “No, sir,” Riker said. “She’s in Titan’s orbit.”

  Maddox nodded. That seemed implausible and much too fortuitous. He might be di-far, but this was stretching the bounds of luck beyond reason.

  Di-far was a Spacer term for a person who could change the destiny of worlds
and civilizations. Such a one could lift a world’s fate, as it were, and set it onto other tracks with a completely different future outcome. Such a one often had lucky breaks.

  “What are your orders?” Riker called.

  Maddox cocked his head in the other direction. Was the sergeant being insistent? That seemed odd, and off. The man was his subordinate, a solid plodder, usually waiting for orders, not insisting he receive them. Hmm…maybe something else was in play here. It was time to find out. Yes, it was time to play this new hand.

  “Keep a sharp lookout, Sergeant.”

  “Sir?”

  “Do you see anyone else?”

  Several seconds passed until Riker said, “I do not.”

  “Then come up and join me,” Maddox said.

  “Where exactly are you?”

  “Just hurry along, Sergeant. I believe Time is our enemy, particularly if we’re going to save Ludendorff from the androids.”

  -2-

  In the darkness, the two men stood near the dead android. One of them was tall: the captain. The other was shorter, with the beginning shoulder-hunch of an older man. Despite the darkness, Maddox could see Riker's weathered features. The sergeant's left eye and arm were bionic.

  The sergeant wore a pair of goggles similar to his own. The captain knew that Riker’s bionic eye could see just fine in the dark. Why, then, did the sergeant wear sensor goggles like him?

  Could the androids have committed an oversight?

  “Is something wrong?” the sergeant asked.

  “I notice you’ve closed your top button. Is your throat feeling better then?”

  “My throat?” Riker asked. “Oh, yes, it is. Thank you for asking, sir.”

  Maddox kept his features bland despite the realization that he was alone with the enemy and deep from any quick help. Why would the androids destroy one of their own in order to try to foster this pretense? It must have something to do with Ludendorff.

  There was nothing wrong with Riker’s throat, of course. The captain had just made that up. And he was nearly one hundred percent certain this was an android play because…

  The pseudo-Riker’s grenade had knocked down the second assassin and caused the machine to fall on the individual. Tiny sparks still sizzled within the crushed cranium, showing the circuitry of an android brain.

  Maddox knelt on one knee as he studied the dead construct. He did not know why—but the crushed head did not strike him as an ancient Builder-made android. This construct seemed to have been manufactured within the last few years on some human world. In other words, this dead android was a throwaway.

  Did that mean the android acting as Riker was the real deal—an old Builder android? It was an interesting possibility.

  Maddox noticed the crushed rifle. That was too bad. He had planned to take the weapon. There was no point now.

  Standing, Maddox decided on his options. The pretend-Riker android would be hard to kill with the pistol. He would have to shoot it in an eye to do so, and that task was made more difficult with the thing’s goggles.

  The captain did not glance at the pseudo-Riker. He was not sure he could hide his revulsion. If the android had harmed his faithful sergeant—

  “Follow me,” Maddox said abruptly. “And keep a sharp lookout for others.”

  “Begging your pardon, sir,” the pseudo-Riker said, hurrying to catch up. “But is it wise to continue? The brigadier gave me strict orders to find you and bring you back up. Besides, what can your gun do to other androids if we find them?”

  Maddox did not respond to the question. Instead, he continued down the old corridor, with his long-barreled gun ready. He could hear the construct’s footsteps as it followed behind him.

  Old and discarded machines from an earlier space age littered the tunnel. These tunnels and machines came from the time before Laumer-Drive technology. These days, Maddox realized that Methuselah Man Strand had given mankind the liberating jump technology. Strand was the evil Methuselah Man. Professor Ludendorff was the…well, maybe not the good one. Ludendorff was the more helpful of the two, and he was supposed to be down here in the old Titan mines.

  Ludendorff had called Maddox several days ago, asking him to come immediately. Maddox knew that the Methuselah Man had a reason, an intense one, according to the professor’s hints. Ludendorff had also asked Maddox to come down alone. That was suspicious, but a gut instinct caused him to trust the professor in this, this time.

  The two of them—Maddox and the Riker fake—sidestepped derelict, rusty machines. The air was colder down here and stale in places. Maddox had a rebreather ready, but he had not yet put the mask over his mouth and nose.

  Maddox wondered if the pseudo-Riker truly believed he did not suspect the real situation. What was the thing’s game?

  As Maddox strode purposefully, he started scratching his stomach in order to keep his hand near a special weapon. It was a prized monofilament knife with a hardened alloy blade. It had an unbelievable edge of interlocking molecules, the reason why it was called a monofilament weapon. It could literally cut through anything, and that would include the unique Builder metal that often lay underneath an android’s fleshly disguise.

  “How much farther is our destination, sir?”

  Once more, Maddox did not respond to the question. He did not like people asking him too much. He had ordered Riker to follow him. If the sergeant asked too many questions, it smacked too closely of insubordination. Maddox detested that in underlings. He had come to believe that others viewed this behavior as part of his New Man heritage. He did not like to believe that was what caused the feeling of dislike. He was his own person. He was not some mini-replica of the New Men. What he disliked, he disliked, and that was that.

  “Sir…”

  “Shut up, Sergeant,” Maddox said.

  The pseudo-Riker quit talking.

  Two minutes later, Maddox reached a floor hatch. He knelt, tapped a code into an old but surprisingly dust-free keypad, twisted a handle and opened the hatch. Holstering the long-barreled gun, Maddox slid his feet onto a steel ladder and began to climb down.

  Above him, the pseudo-Riker followed.

  ***

  Three levels down, the ceiling lights glowed dimly. Maddox no longer wore his goggles, although he let them hang at his throat just in case he needed them quickly.

  The pseudo-Riker did the same thing with his goggles. The fake sergeant carried a dual-purpose weapon known in Star Watch slang as an over-and-under. The under part was a grenade-launcher. The above part fired heavy caliber slugs. Those would be android-killing bullets.

  The tunnels had narrowed down here, and the air had grown staler. They no longer passed regular hatches. The doors were more like ancient bank-vault entrances, each with a keypad to the side.

  “Why do you think Ludendorff is hiding down here?” the pseudo-Riker asked.

  “You can ask him soon enough,” Maddox said curtly.

  A hundred meters later, they turned a corner. Maddox stiffened.

  “Is something wrong, sir?”

  Maddox silently filed away the data that the supposed android watched him closely.

  “It is,” the captain said, leaving it at that.

  Like a stalking jungle cat, Maddox continued down the corridor. He passed another vault-like entrance, and then one more. The third heavy entrance was ajar the slightest bit. What was worse, it was the entrance to Ludendorff’s hidden location.

  Was this what the fake Riker wanted from him: the entrance location? Maddox scratched his stomach and twisted around to check on the sergeant.

  The pseudo-Riker glanced at him. The twin barrels of his over-and-under were aimed at the floor per regulations.

  That surprised the captain.

  “Trouble?” the Riker double asked.

  “We will assume so. I’ll open the door. You get ready to fire at anything suspicious inside.”

  The pseudo-Riker nodded, and did not seem distrustful regarding Maddox’s orders.<
br />
  Soon, Maddox stood by the vault-like entrance, latching onto the handle with both hands. The fake Riker took up his position.

  “It’s lit in there,” the sergeant whispered.

  “Now,” Maddox whispered, pulling the heavy vault-like entrance.

  The sergeant scanned the chamber until his shoulders slumped. “I don’t believe this.”

  Maddox waited.

  “Professor Ludendorff is dead,” the sergeant said.

  -3-

  Maddox followed the sergeant into the spacious chamber. The lights were brighter in here than outside.

  There were worktables along the sides and advanced computer equipment. There were also several strange machines, one of them a large aquarium with an android skeleton floating in a green solution. Wires and cables sprouted from the metallic-gleaming construct.

  A medium-sized corpse lay sprawled in the middle of the room. He wore a white lab-coat, had tanned skin and a neat burn-hole in the center of his forehead.

  There were others dead in the chamber, two androids with huge craters in their chest areas. A big melted gun lay near the dead scientist.

  “I cannot believe this,” the sergeant said, as he stood over the dead man.

  Maddox approached, making a show of holstering the pistol. He knelt beside Ludendorff, staring at the corpse, and realized immediately that it was not the professor. It was a close approximation of the Methuselah Man, but it clearly was not him. That was a relief, but it didn’t surprise the captain. He had long since learned to distrust notices of the professor’s death. The Methuselah Man loved employing body doubles and he’d proved exceedingly difficult to kill for those who had tried in the past.

  “Why do you think the androids killed him?” the sergeant asked.

  Maddox thought about motives, but not the motives of those who had slain the Ludendorff look-alike. He considered the motives of the pseudo-Riker. Why had the android gone to this elaborate charade? Why show him this? The best reason Maddox could suppose was to identify the corpse. The fake Riker had said, “Ludendorff is dead.” Then, the sergeant had gone straight here. If this wasn’t Ludendorff, was Maddox supposed to say so?