The Colony Ship Vanguard: The entire eight book series in one bundle

by John Thornton

  The beast dropped to all four legs and charged at Tarpay. It tried to swat at Tarpay again, as well as biting with its big snouted mouth. Both the swat and the bites missed. The two animals wrestled and bit in a frenzy of fighting. That was when Paul saw the beast’s small yet blazing orange eyes and the drool that foamed at its fanged mouth.

  “It is a Roe beast!” Paul yelled. “A giant tagalong thing!”

  Gretchen, squatting by Victor, was trying to utilize the medical kit, but turned as the beast and Tarpay rampaged, rolled and wrestled through the clearing. She protected the medical kit and dived out of the way.

  The beast roared again, but Tarpay barked furiously and leaped. Tarpay got under the beast’s huge clawed front legs, and bit into the beast’s neck. His jaws clamped down and he shook as best he could. The beast roared in agony and pulled its front limbs back in as it sat down on it butt. Tarpay yelped a bit as he was caught by the beast as its front legs squeezed, and the claws raked into his sides.

  “No!” Paul screamed and fired the pistol.

  Piff. Piff. Piff.

  His shots slammed into the tangled and jumbling mass of beast and volkosoby. Paul saw one shot rip apart the beast’s side, but another shot tore directly into Tarpay’s back. They both were knocked away and fell into the growth of tall plants. The beast roared again and there was a crunching sound. Then a small whine was heard.

  Paul rushed over to see. The beast had rolled over onto Tarpay. Paul knew he had killed Tarpay.

  Piff. Piff. Piff.

  Gretchen dashed back to Victor and read out the display on the medical kit.

  The medical kit was flashing a message on its display. ‘Unable to treat. Neurogenic activity zero. Cardiovascular activity zero. Severe orthopedic injuries. Thanatological state confirmed by four measures.’

  “Victor is dead,” Gretchen said sadly.

  Piff. Piff. Piff.

  Paul fired into the beast as it lay on the floor. It quivered and shook as the projectiles ripped into it. The last one exploding its huge skull.

  “This Roe thing killed his helper animal, Tarpay,” Paul said as he started down the pistol’s sights. “It crushed Tarpay and speared him with its claws.” Paul’s mind kept seeing when his shot had inadvertently hit Tarpay, but he did not say anything about that. Frantically his mind whirled as he consider who had really killed the wolf-dog. ‘Could Tarpay have escaped that beast if I did not shoot?’ Paul’s mind was conflicted.

  Gretchen pulled the wires from Victor and carried the medical kit over to where Paul stood. “I can try the medical kit on Tarpay.”

  “He is under that thing,” Paul said and pointed to the beast. “I am sure he is dead.”

  “That must weigh two hundred kilograms. Are you sure Tarpay is under that?” Gretchen asked.

  “His tail is over here,” Paul pointed to a limp bit that was sticking out from under the side of the beast. “I saw that thing squeeze him in a crushing way.”

  “I can help out in pulling the Ursus arctos off if that will be of assistance,” Tiffany stated from the automacube as it rolled into the clearing.

  “Help us now? Only after the fighting is over?” Paul sarcastically remarked.

  Gretchen had squatted down and worked the wires from the medical kit onto the exposed tip of Tarpay’s tail. “I am taking an assessment now, but I doubt there will be a anything we can do.”

  Gretchen unhooked the wires a moment later, “Tarpay is also dead.”

  “We need to flee, if that beast is the kind of Roe around here,” Paul said. “It is just more reason to escape. Tagalongs or other beasts will come.”

  “That broken doorway leads out, and there is no other ramp leading down. Maybe that will lead us to the concourse Victor was talking about and then we can find the elevator to go up to Reproduction and Fabrication?” Gretchen said.

  “Right. But I need to find somewhere to rest. I cannot go on like this,” Paul said. His mind was still replaying the shooting of Tarpay. “But it must be somewhere safe, if there is such a place in the disaster of a colony ship.”

  Gretchen pulled the broken belt out from around Victor’s body. She gently stroked his ruined face. “We might need some of his equipment, and he will not. Farewell Victor. I am sorry about you and Tarpay.”

  14 Concourse to an elevator

  Gretchen lifted the multiceiver from Victor’s belt and began to activate it.

  “Wait!” Paul said and grabbed her hand. “If you tell Constable Jeffry about this, he will be our enemy.”

  “Paul, they need to know what happened to their friend,” Gretchen rebuked.

  “Sure, sometime we will tell them, but making another enemy now will not help us to escape, or bring Victor back to life. Come on!”

  Gretchen reluctantly lowered the multiceiver and strapped it onto her waist. She took several other items off the bloody belt and then she tossed the belt away

  The broken door was hanging askew, with one section loose, and the bottom missing. Paul ducked under the upper portion and looked around. The doorway led to a hallway, not the concourse they were expecting. The hallway was lit up, but he could not see where the illumination was coming from. There were three doors on one side, and a door at the far end.

  “We need to seal this up,” Gretchen said as she looked for the remains of the broken door. “Where there is one beast like that, there might be more. That vegetation was so thick and that room, habitat, that compartment, or whatever it was, was large enough to hide places where other animals might lurk. Tagalongs always seem to show up when something dies, so we should seal this off.”

  “I just want to leave and get away from here, before anything else comes,” Paul said as the automacube rolled out through the doorway as well. He noted a blur of gray and black as the cat dashed into the hall.

  “I am going to weld something over the door,” Gretchen said sternly as she picked up some broken metal pieces. “Victor was trained and experienced, and that beast killed him. I do not want to take any chances with a second one.”

  “How do we know it did not come from somewhere out in these hallways?” Paul asked. “We could be sealing ourselves in with another beast.”

  “I disagree Paul. Gretchen’s plan has the best potential, considering the vegetation which was growing in that location. I believe the Ursus arctos was probably feeding on those plants. My historical records show that those animals were omnivorous, eating a wide and diverse variety of things, including both plants and meat. Victor stated that his volkosoby, Tarpay, ate one of those pods. That is evidence the plants are edible, and therefore it is plausible that the Ursus arctos was consuming them,” Tiffany related.

  “It was a Roe beast! It tried to eat Victor too, so I do not want to encounter another one!” Paul snapped. “I need somewhere to rest and relax for a while. I am hungry, exhausted, and scared. If you would please access the ship’s system and find out what is happening it would help me!”

  “I am sorry Paul, I will not do that at this location,” Tiffany relied.

  Gretchen was welding the broken door back into place.

  “Is any of this on Victor’s map?” Paul asked.

  Gretchen stopped the welding and pulled out the map. She briefly looked at it. “I do not see anything that looks like this hallway, but remember, Victor said that other place was not on this map either.”

  “I am finding us a way out, even if Tiffany refuses to help me escape.” Paul looked around the hallway, and with his pistol drawn pushed carefully on the first of the doors. It slid open easily as it did not even have a latch or lock. Inside were the remains of a toileting area. A shower in the far corner was leaking a dribble of clear water. Beneath that was a pool over a drain which was slowly letting the water out. There were bits of broken plants scattered across the floor of the toileting area. The bowls and sinks were bent, but the toilets themselves were intact.

  “I found where that beast drank.” Paul filled his water container, and
took a deep drink of the water. He walked back and got Gretchen’s water container and filled it as well.

  Gretchen was finished sealing over the door when he came back out. “It will not stop everything, but I think it would deter a beast as large as that one was from following us.” She then packed up all the equipment. “Maybe if tagalongs come they will feed on that beast long enough for us to escape.”

  Paul almost said they would also feed on the dead Victor and Tarpay, but restrained himself.

  “More doors to try, and if they are dead ends, maybe we will have to cut that door open again and search in there? Behind those plants there could be other doors that we missed. I hate that thought,” Paul lamented. “That maze of vegetation was creepy.”

  “If we have to do that we can,” Gretchen said. “And Tiffany, thanks for the information you are providing. I trust you are doing the best you can under these circumstances.”

  “Yes I am,” Tiffany answered.

  “I doubt it,” Paul said. He walked to the next door and saw that it had a broken lock. It too swung open easily.

  Inside was a small control room of some kind. A chair with various buttons, levers, and dials was in one corner. It had been torn and ripped. The cushion on the seat was missing, and wires had been yanked out from the sides of the chair. A broken old-style monitoring screen was on the wall. It had been caved in.

  “That beast must have been inside this room at one point. No other exits from in here, and nothing that looks salvageable,” Paul said as he let the door swing shut. “The only things that are working are the ceiling lights.”

  “So no concourse? No elevator yet?” Gretchen asked.

  “I do not think so, but we have been fooled by hidden things before. I sure hope the next door leads somewhere. I have a bad feeling about going back in that jungle of overgrown plants,” Paul lamented.

  The next door had locks and seals on it. There was a ghostly outline of a color control pad next to the door. Paul connected in the fusion pack to the access port and the color pad lit up brightly.

  “Now to enter a sequence,” Gretchen said.

  Paul nodded as he held his pistol at the ready.

  Gretchen punched in the override code.

  There were clacks and a twang and the door unlocked. It then slid open, and the concourse was revealed. The passage was very large. Roughly fifty meters wide, and about ten meter high, the concourse stretched to their left for as far as Paul could see. The lights were regularly spaced, and looked to be intact. To the right there was about a one hundred meter distance and then a wall.

  “Paul, I will enter and explore, if that is of assistance to you?” Tiffany asked.

  “Enter the nonphysicality and explore than, and find out what is happening. That would help me,” Paul smartly replied.

  “I am offering what I am capable of and willing to doing,” Tiffany responded. “Shall I roll into the concourse and investigate?”

  “Sure, if that is all you will do. It looks clear as far as I can see, but that is a long passage,” Paul said as he stepped back from the doorway.

  The orange automacube rolled ahead and out into the concourse. It pivoted around as the left set of drive wheels turned clockwise, and the right set turned counterclockwise. It then reversed direction and circled the other way.

  “I perceive nothing which is an obvious threat within the distance I can observe,” Tiffany said. “Additionally, from my calculations, that wall is directly beneath where the ruined elevator was.”

  “You kept track of all those twists and turns?” Paul asked.

  “Yes. I am trying my best to assist you in this mission,” Tiffany replied.

  Paul snorted. He and Gretchen walked out from the doorway, and the door shut behind them. The concourse had a type of track running long-ways down its center. There were rails on either side of that track which stood about waist high. Otherwise the concourse was empty. There were occasional doors in the distance, none looked open.

  “We still need somewhere to rest,” Paul said. “I am exhausted.”

  “I am welding this door shut as well,” Gretchen said. “The beast that killed Victor was tough, and I am not sure the other door would totally hold back one of those Roe beasts if it was determined. Two doors between us is better than one.”

  “I hate to think of getting caught out in an open space this big,” Paul said. “We might be able to hide in the elevator itself, if we actually find it. But that could just trap us in somewhere, so I am not sure what to do.”

  “If we find the elevator, we will hold up in there,” Gretchen said as she welded the side of the door to prevent it from opening. “I am still expecting tagalongs to come for the bodies back there.” Gretchen nodded her head toward the door.

  “Just as long as they stay in there,” Paul said. Then he turned his head quickly. “That cat is still shadowing us. I just saw it run down next to the wall.”

  “Victor said patrol cats were immune to the infection of that mutated rabies virus. Perhaps those small predators have no real fears in places like this?” Gretchen asked. “That cat seems to have an ability to hide and sneak around very effectively; I also believe it is following to be close to you.” Gretchen gave Paul a smile which he did not return.

  After Gretchen welded the door shut, they walked down the concourse to where the wall was located. The wall had pale blue lights on either end, and in the center there were rectangles outlined and lit in that same pale blue light.

  “I see no hand symbols, but the perimeter of the doors are there. Are these elevators?” Paul asked.

  “They look right, at least about the right size as we have seen before. If they are directly below that broken one, perhaps they are all broken as well?” Gretchen pondered. “The entire system might be ruined. That could be why we are not seeing any hand symbols.”

  “Tiffany, there is an access port here, would you please jack in and let me know what you can discover?” Paul asked. “If they are elevators would you please review the log records and tell us what you can learn?”

  “I am sorry Paul. I will not do that at this location. There is too much risk to my systems,” Tiffany responded.

  “Again with your obstreperous refusal to help. I wonder what is really going on, but I am too tired to figure it out now,” Paul said. He grabbed the fusion pack out of his backpack and connected it into the access port. “Maybe some added energy will bring up the controls?”

  A hand symbol in red color appeared next to most of the elevator doors. There was one with a hand symbol which flashed between green and yellow and back. Paul reached out and touched the closest hand symbol, one of the red ones.

  “Ouch! That stings,” Paul said as he quickly snatched his hand away. “Obviously that red light means do not touch me.”

  “So that only leaves the flashing green and yellow one. If it was blue I would know it was working. Brinley also said green was a position-function color, but this green and yellow is different,” Gretchen said. She then just reached out and placed her palm against the hand symbol which was flashing green and yellow.

  “No stings,” Gretchen said thankfully.

  They waited.

  Nothing else happened.

  Paul removed the fusion pack. The lights did not change. He reinserted the fusion pack, but there was still no change. He pulled the cable out and placed the fusion pack into his backpack.

  Paul again placed his hand on the red symbol, and again it stung him. “That does not help! So I am cutting this door open and finding out what is happening.”

  Paul dropped his backpack and removed a molecular torch.

  “Paul, that might be open to vacuum, or have toxic air behind it,” Gretchen cautioned.

  “You sound like me now. We have to get somewhere where I can sleep,” Paul said as he ignited the molecular torch.

  “Paul, I will enter the nonphysicality and do an assessment,” Tiffany interrupted. “I conjecture that the risk to my syste
m is less doing that than the risk of what might happen if you chop into that elevator.”