Chronicles of Athena Lee

by T S Paul

  Captain Carver turned to the communication ensign. “Tell Buckley not to provoke that station!”

  “Sir, we have a signal coming in. It’s from the station.”

  “Put it on screen.” The captain turned to look at the main screen.

  The visual screen lit up to show a short, attractive blond woman with slight Asian features. She was wearing an obsolete Pan-Pacific Navy uniform with ensign rank showing.

  “Identify yourselves or be destroyed!”

  Captain Carver caught the eye of the ensign. “Communications, send this please.” Carver straighten up. “This is Captain Carver of the Empire of Humanity ship Prosperous. I am in command of this patrol. Who are you?”

  The ensign cocked her head to one side. “My name is Ensign Athena Lee of the Pan-Pacific League navy. Who or what is the Empire of Humanity? Are you allies with the Anglican Alliance?”

  “Ensign? The PPL and the AA have been gone for 15 years. They don’t exist anymore. It is only the Empire now. Who are you really? Who built this station?” Finding out who built that station was important.

  The blond ensign looked angry. “This is my station, I built it. I don’t believe you, Captain!”

  Not sure what to say the Captain was silent for a moment.

  “So, what are you saying? Your empire just conquered everyone? Or are you trying to trick me? Is that what you are doing? Is it? “ The ensign was getting more and more erratic.

  “Ensign after the battle that was fought, here, in this system. The peacemakers sat down and hammered out an accord. That accord is what founded our Empire. The war has been over for you a long time.” The Captain replied.

  “I’m afraid that I don’t believe you Captain. The PPL that I belong to would not do something like that. They would not just give up! I don’t respond well to tricks. Do not come any closer. Tell that sneaky destroyer to stop trying to flank the station. The area that it is sneaking through is filled with unexploded ordinance and junk. It is a huge minefield.”

  Captain Carver whirled to his right. “Communications contact the Redcoat. Tell Captain Buckley to hold his position!”

  On board the Redcoat, Captain Ringo Buckley was thinking about his future. He was envisioning himself riding to the rescue destroying the enemy. Ringo came from a family of warriors. There had been a Buckley fighting in every remembered conflict. In the was war a Buckley had fought on both sides.

  When Ringo had gotten this assignment he had thought that HIS chance for fame and glory was never to be. A survey mission? No aliens to kill or hostages to free with something like that. Now finding a rogue station was like gold. This was his chance to have is name in the history books. His chance for personal glory. Hopefully that rogue station was full of pirates or terrorists.

  Buckley had stretched his orders to the limit. He had closed with the station and had scanned it. Now he thought to flank it. He thought that if he could get into a better striking position he could lead the attack! Fame and glory awaited.

  “Sir, have you been monitoring the broadcasts from that station?” The sound of hi XO’s voice woke him from his day dream. Seeing that it was just the XO, Buckley ignored him and ordered flank speed from navigation.

  “Uh, Sir, we were just told there was a minefield out here in this area.” The XO was frantic. “Sir, haven’t you been paying attention?”

  Captain Buckley turned and looked his XO in the eye. “You are of course aware of the standing orders that forbid line troops from obeying orders from the enemy, aren’t you? We have orders to scout and scan the area. Until I hear otherwise that is what we will do!” Pointing to the rear of the station. “ I choose over there it scout.”

  “CAPTAIN!” The navigation lieutenant was screaming. “We are being tracked by multiple sources. Tracking….tracking…Alert! Multiple-in-bounds! I am tracking fifty, that is five zero in bound tracks. Suggest evasive action.”

  With the tactical officer screaming at him too, the captain simply froze. Shaking his head to clear it he ordered evasive maneuvers. “Get us out of here!”

  “Damn you, Captain,” cried the XO. “Your arrogance has killed us!”

  The light destroyer was hit with over 50 antimatter torpedoes and other surrounding munitions as it entered the active minefield. The Redcoat exploded in a bright flash of light.

  Another Buckley had entered the history books.

  Chapter5

  The past, 10 years ago

  Athena was bored.

  The last time she was this bored she had built a space station! Thinking back five years ago she wondered why she did it.

  The asteroid base had been easy to finish setting up. It had a small hydroponics lab that was super easy to put together.

  “I need something to do, and I really need to stop talking to myself. Before I know it inanimate objects will be talking back!”

  I suited up and went to the hanger bay. Using the runabout I made my way back to the Tesla. The ship still a mess inside. Very carefully, I picked my way in and around the wreckage. The room that contained the technical library had been damaged but no any of the media inside.

  Engineers like hard copy records. Nothing is left to chance in case a ship loses power.

  Talking to myself again, “how do I get all this back to the asteroid?”

  Staring at the piles and boxes of books I pondered that question. A light lit over my head. The Tesla, like many of the other support ships used piloted drones for a variety of jobs. I had seen quite a few of those drones as I explored the ship. The next day my boredom was gone and I had boxes of books to devour.

  Having my own library was great. I spent the next couple of weeks boning up on how space stations were built and maintenance procedures for bases. The tech manuals that I found on weapon systems were very interesting. All this reading made me think of something I had missed. The floating debris of two fleets surrounded me. The enemy ships along with others from my fleet might have information that I could use.

  Exploration time.

  First things first.

  PPL ships first. Exploring ‘my’ fleet was both heart breaking and informative. Our ships had been support not battle wagons. After the explosion there really was not much left. I did find a few broken or damaged drones. Lots of drifting supplies in fancy shipping containers.

  I used the salvage drones and cleared a path to the enemy ships. I lost a few. Un-exploded ordinance was everywhere. A bomb disposal tech I was not. Once upon a time in school I had dated a ‘Jack’. For some reason all bomb techs were called Jacks. He had never told me how to not set them off! I programmed the drones to gather and place all of the explosives in an area to the rear of the asteroid base. I wanted them out of my way but also as a deterrent from a possible attack from that direction.

  It seems that when they had evacuated the AA ships, they had shut down or stripped out all of the computers. As far as I could see all of the reactors were stone cold. I guess they didn’t intend to return and were worried about information being compromised. However, engineers and the same everywhere. Hard copies still existed. Either they forgot or did not know about them. Some engineering ‘secrets’ are universal.

  I had gotten excited in one of the AA ships, the communication room had been intact. Someone had wiped the computers and set off fusion grenades on the broadcast equipment.

  Something else that I am not, a computer tech. Yes, I can hum a tune and dance to it, but singing is another matter. I can use them but not fix them. I can and did rewired a few things, without electrocuting myself, so that I had short ranged communications. I could not reach the fleet to tell them I was here and alive. But, if someone entered the system I could talk to them.

  Chapter 6

  The Present

  A massive fireball erupted into space lighting up the station. The Redcoat was just gone, vaporized. No trace was left of either the crew or this ship.

  “BATTLE STATIONS, BATTLE STATIONS, THIS IS NOT A DRILL” echoed through th
e ship.

  Captain Carver stood looking at the screen in shock. He had never seen destruction like that before. “Sensors! What caused that explosion? Did the station just attack the Redcoat?”

  “Sir, the Redcoat attempted to flank the station the sailed right into the minefield. Either Captain Buckley disregarded your orders or it was an accident. We show no weapons trace from the station.”

  “Connect me with that ensign!” Carver was angry now.

  “That ship of yours just tried to attack this station! Hold your positions. If another ship enters my airspace I will open fire this time.”

  Captain Carver just stared at the now blank screen. He turned to his intelligence officer. “Do we have anything about that station or that Ensign?”

  “Sir, scans show that the station is based on a asteroid. A frigate, a former AA Anzac class frigate makes up the core of that station. The weapons are a mix of torpedoes and laser batteries.” The intelligence officer paused. “Our database shows that there was an Ensign Athena Lee in the PPL navy. She was born in 2267 on the planet Hong Kong, assigned to the PPL support ship Tesla. Nothing else except that she was listed as KIA in 2285 in the Battle of Diablo sector.”

  The Captain nodded his head. “The briefing that I received said that there were no survivors of that battle and that this station was not here at the time.”

  “Sir, that information is not entirely true.” Typical bureaucracy thought the intelligence officer. “At the end of the battle there was one AA ship not destroyed. The AAN Winston Churchill. That ship had only taken light damage. The crew of the Churchill searched the area for survivors. Intelligence records show that they scanned all surviving ships and any life pods they retrieved. Survivor count, from both fleets, was less than 100. SAR was not dispatched, from either fleet, due to survivors accounts of the Churchill’s efforts. The horror of the Churchill’s after action report is what shocked the delegates at the peace conference.”

  The Captain was not really surprised by this. Orders from HQ sometimes were lacking in their intellegence briefing portion of the orders. “The Churchill must have missed a survivor then. Send everything that we have back to fleet HQ. With any luck we will still be here when they respond.”

  Chapter 7

  The Past

  Staying busy make the time go by faster. Using the salvage drones I cleaned up the area of debris. I stripped the wrecks of all usable parts and weapons. I have three things to help me with the super boredom, Lots of scrap, construction drones and time. Lots and lots of time. Take all of those things add them together with an engineer. It’s time to build a space station!

  OK, this is harder than it looks. Looking at the original plans for this base I saw that it was supposed to be camouflaged so it was secret. For me, secrecy is not really an issue. I went for a more classic approach. A central core with weapon pods and drone bays. Using the ship wreckage I think I may be able to do this. It’s going to be so much fun.

  I almost broke a construction drone, but I managed to stand a wrecked frigate on its keel. I placed the ship atop the asteroid base. It looks a bit funky but using scrap framework I bolted it onto the rock surface. Once the engines were removed, the drones cut them off, the empty space was perfect for big hydroponics bay. I really need one of those. Canned food only lasts for so long. In the books I found there was a way to grow yeast in a carbon matrix as a way to give myself a protein source. It looks a bit complicated so I will add it to the work on later pile.

  Reconfiguring the inside of the former frigate took over a year. I had to use the repair drones to do most of the actual work. Leaving the hatches and bulkheads in place gave me doorways in the floor and ceiling. At half gravity, achieved from the spin of the station, floating from room to room was easy.

  Salvaged weapons pods and drone bays surrounded the core of the station. As my daddy use the say “you can never have TOO much firepower.”

  Did I have accidents during construction? Oh boy did I. Only about half the construction drones survived the work I put them through. We won’t discuss the falling kitchen incident. Or what happens when you get confused about which connector is the waste collection or the fresh water tank. Yuck!

  I almost killed myself too. Did you know that the tiniest drop of ‘unconstrained ‘ anti-matter can blow a cargo container 300 yards? Neither did I.

  It almost seems that there should be an easier way to do all of this. Something to think about.

  Several years in the making but I built a home for myself. Its an ugly, colorful, crazy, wonderful home. The inside is far from finished. I have so many plans.

  I have to wonder after all this time if anyone will ever venture out this way again?

  Chapter 8

  Present day

  “I repeat, if any ship comes closer I will open fire.”

  Captain Carver was at an impasse. One of his ship had been destroyed and the other two were threatened. There was an irate ensign on an impossible space station in a hard to reach region of space. The whole situation was like a bad vid show.

  Looking to tactical, the captain asked “Do we have any readings on the station?”

  “Yes captain, we do. Scans show that there is only one life source aboard. We have detected missile lock from numerous sources surrounding the station on those pylons. Total estimate of weapons is inconclusive at this time.”

  The intelligence officer caught his captain’s eye. “Sir? There can’t be that many weapons. With only one person she can’t operate them all at once. We could send in the marines.”

  The Captain scowled at his officer. “What marines? This is an exploration ship not a line ship. Our marine force, including the destroyer, is less then ten. I don’t think that an assault is prudent at this time.”

  Deep in thought, Captain Carver looked up. “We must assume that the ensign is expecting to be rescued by her navy. We just have to convince her that WE, are that navy.

  Chapter 9

  The past

  “Get in there you little SHIT!”

  Here I was wedged under the solar maintenance console trying, trying to attach the cable runs. Some Idiot had made the wires too short. Since I WAS that idiot, I have only myself to blame.

  Fifteen years, I have been on this station fifteen years!

  If I had not been an engineer I think I should not have survived this long out here. I still have lots of little projects that I am working on but......

  “Wilson!

  What is that loud beeping noise!”

  “Ensign, that is the early warning system alarm. Three unknown ships have just entered the Nebula.”

  “What! ...Ouch, that frakking hurt. “

  Surprised, I jerked forward and whacked my head on the console, that some idiot made way too low!

  “Bring the system up to full readiness and figure out who those ships belong to. “

  Wilson, I thought to myself, is one reason I have not gone completely crazy.

  He was a prototype, an experimental A.I. unit I found on one of the frigates.

  He had been functioning as a command and control entity, helping to keep many of the on-board systems operational.

  When I finally got around to stripping his frigate, the PPLN Jiro, I discovered him still “alive” in the central computer.

  He had explained his name to me, saying his personality was based on a 20th century entertainer named Hank or Hankie. Something like that. I had stopped listening about half way through. He made a good companion, if a little pushy and annoying sometimes.

  .

  I floated down to the asteroid section of the station. This was my war room. All the sensitive equipment was here; weapons controls, the armory, power station, and my living quarters. It was the strongest part of the base since it was encased in rock

  “Seal all bulkheads and vent all compartments except hydroponics.”

  A hull breach at the wrong time would just suck.

  “What do your sensors say ab
out those ships?”

  “Ensign, there are three of them. Two destroyers and one cruiser. Their IFF says that they are ships belonging to the Empire of Humanity. Ensign, there is no known entity in my data banks that matches that name.”