The image of Andron’s bridge vanished, along with his old friend, and the traitor, Junior Officer Zare. “Reeve, where are we with the Terontiun device?” Tom asked his chief engineer.
“Almost done, Captain,” came her reply.
“Good. Get on board when you’re done. You’re in charge until I return,” he said, moving toward the hangar.
____________
Tarlen waited until he could hear nothing outside the ship. He’d jammed a socket wrench into the ramp right before it had sealed shut, and he listened to Treena’s commands as she directed him how to open it. The codes had been changed, but since the door hadn’t closed and locked, Basel’s cruiser controls were accessible.
Tarlen straightened the glasses Treena was watching through, pushing them up the bridge of his nose. “Are you sure we shouldn’t leave?”
Treena’s voice was calm. “They would shoot us the instant we escaped, even if we could break through the hangar barrier.”
It was so bizarre having Treena guide him, speaking into the earpiece. He kept peering over his shoulder, expecting the woman to be standing behind him, until he remembered she was really in a bed on Constantine.
“Fine, but I have no idea what you think we’re going to accomplish sneaking around the enemy ship,” Tarlen said. Half of him wanted to return to the storage compartment and wait for this to all be over, but he was part of the crew now, one way or another, and he needed to stick his neck out, like they’d all done for the Bacal people.
Captain Baldwin saw something in Tarlen, and he wasn’t going to disappoint his hero.
Treena advised him how to lower the ramp, and he pressed the commands, the long metal panel descending from cruiser. He’d been stuck on the cruiser for quite some time, and he stepped off, taking a deep breath. For some reason, he’d thought the air would be fresher, but it was the same kind of recycled and filtered air.
“How many people do you think are on this ship?” Tarlen asked.
“On Andron? They used to have over a hundred, I think, so I’d suspect a similar number. There are only so many bunks on board an older cruise ship like this one. Come on, and don’t forget the weapon,” Treena said through his earpiece.
He’d already begun walking down the ramp, and he cursed his ineptitude. He raced back, grabbing the snub-nosed gun he’d found in the compartment he’d been hiding in. The moment he’d seen it, he’d considered using it on Zare but couldn’t bring himself to. Treena had told him to refrain as well, and he was relieved she hadn’t asked him to kill the woman in cold blood. Tarlen had seen a lot, and had even shot a few armored Statu, but somehow, them being faceless behind their masks made it easier.
He doubted he’d have been able to pull the trigger against Zare. “Tarlen, what are you doing?” Treena asked, and he realized he was standing in the cargo hold, staring at the gun.
“Nothing. I’m good.” Andron’s hangar was about half the size of Constantine’s, and Tarlen ran for the exit. He glanced up at a series of windows overlooking the space, and saw a uniformed woman walking by staring at a tablet. Her head turned toward him, and he raced to the wall, hoping he’d avoided her line of sight. He stood there, panting along the edge of the hangar for a minute, and when no one came rushing in, he kept walking. “Where to?” he asked.
“I’ve been on this cruise ship a few times,” Treena said.
“Really? I thought it was decommissioned a long time ago,” Tarlen said quietly.
“It was, but all new graduates were given a tour. It was the most famous vessel of the last century, maybe ever, and it was a real treat to see,” she told him.
“Was it at Nolix?” Tarlen asked.
“Yes. That’s where it stayed for a few decades, but they eventually moved them all to the Earon station,” Treena said.
“Why?” he asked, heading for the door.
“You’re asking the wrong person. I have no idea, but now that I see them out here, I suspect the Assembly had something to do with the orders,” Treena told him.
“You think they’re that powerful?” Tarlen was questioning many things and saw that he understood nothing about the politics of the Concord. Did the texts he’d been reading in class with Kriss even hold any truth to them, or was it propaganda spread by the corrupt past of the Concord? He doubted he’d ever find out.
“I think they are, yes. I wish we would have known about them before. How did they stay so hidden?” she asked.
“You said one of those ships was there when yours was attacked?” he asked, standing by the exit.
She hesitated. “Yes. I’d forgotten, but when I awoke after my artificial body was destroyed in the wormhole, I relived my final moments… or what were nearly my last breaths. I saw a cruise ship, only I didn’t recognize it. It’s here. It’s one of theirs.”
“I’m sorry. What was your vessel called?” Tarlen realized she’d never told him the name.
“It doesn’t matter now. We need to see if we can help in any way,” Treena told him.
“Can’t Constantine fight them off? I thought it was state-of-the-art. You saw what it could do to the Statu,” he said.
“I thought so too, but I have a feeling Zare screwed us over.”
Tarlen placed a hand on the keypad. “What do I do?”
“Enter the hall, turn left, and take the stairwell. It will take you to Deck Two, where the laundry facility is,” she advised him.
“What do we want with laundry?” he asked.
“If you’re going to sneak around, you have to fit in. In case you forgot, you’re wearing the JOT uniform, and that will make you stand out like a sore thumb,” she said.
Tarlen didn’t get the reference. “Sore thumb?”
He heard the frustration in her reply. “Concentrate, Tarlen. Focus. Get to the laundry room and find a uniform. I’ll keep an eye out for anyone in the hall. Keep the glasses on and look forward.”
He did, opening the doors. He half-expected to discover a gun in his face as he stepped into the halls, but found them empty. There were no alarms, no people, only an empty corridor. The walls weren’t bright and white like Constantine’s. Everything was muted gray tones, the flooring hard and clean. It was old, worn, but still serviceable, and intricately maintained for use.
Tarlen moved quickly, passing at least three closed doors in the hall before finding the elevator. “Don’t take that. Use the stairwell.” Her warning came at the right time, and he heard the elevator opening, voices speaking as he pressed the stairs entry closed behind him. His breath caught in his throat, his heart pumping hard against his chest, and he waited for the voices to carry further down the hall.
When he trusted no one was going to hear his bootsteps over the metallic steps, he ran along them, heading two stories down. The lights were dim in the stairwell, and he gripped the snub-nosed gun tightly in his right hand.
There was a faded red number two decaled near the exit. “Is this it?” he whispered.
“Yes. If I recall, the laundry is at the far end of the corridor,” Treena told him.
“What else is down here?” he asked.
“I assume maintenance. I doubt they have many staff on hand,” she said.
Tarlen entered Deck Two and was glad to hear nothing but the gentle whirring of the air ducts as he stepped inside. The lights were low, the whole place exuding an ominous tone. He moved slower, his legs betraying his urgency. Treena didn’t say a word, likely wanting him to have full access to his hearing. His own heartbeat was so loud, it boomed like a drum in his ears, but he made it to the end of the corridor unscathed.
He tapped the keypad and opened the door. A white-haired Kwant woman faced him, a look of surprise on her face.
____________
“I really don’t think this is a good idea,” Brax said, shaking his head.
“Why not?” Oquid asked.
“Because we have no idea what we’re going to be flying into. If there is a trap, how is jumping into the fray goi
ng to help?” Brax asked.
“The lieutenant commander has a good point,” Ven said. “We need to scout first.”
Kaino’s voice was serious. “Then we jump in, survey the area, and jump out.”
“They’ll detect we were there,” Brax said.
“So what?” Oquid shrugged, his armored suit clinking together at the action. “We’ll be long gone and find out what we’re up against.”
“The Vralon does have a point,” Ven said, and Brax tried to make the right decision. It was a better option than returning in Cleo or staying put on the planetoid, waiting for Constantine to be destroyed. Not that Brax thought the Assembly had a chance of succeeding. Their ship was too powerful, and they had the help of the Ugna’s Faithful at their disposal.
“Fine. We’ll make the trip, capture as many details as we can, and jump out. Can this ship do that?” Brax asked Kaino.
“It has enough Nek for four in-system jumps.” Kaino stood proudly, staring at the vessel.
“Good. Then let’s not waste any of them. It’s going to be a tight fit.” Brax opened the door and waited while the two Vralon entered. He took the rear bench with Ven, and the Ugna shut the door behind him without touching the controls.
Brax didn’t think he’d ever get used to the telekinetic moving objects with his mind, or reading emotions. He glanced at Ven, wondering if he was sensing the unease Brax felt at that moment. The man’s expression was blank behind his facemask, and Brax turned to focus on the dash.
The jumper was tight, a modified shuttle by the looks of it. He suspected they’d chosen a basic model like this because the localized thrusters were so small, leaving room to modify the chamber with the jump technology. He peered behind them and saw the Nek drive glowing hotly.
“It has to charge, but we’ll lift off while it does,” Kaino told them. The shuttle hovered away from the warehouse floor, and Brax watched out the viewer as the walls split open, revealing an energy barrier. As if he didn’t have enough fear of being in space, now he was going to dart through an asteroid field with a barely-tested jump technology.
“We’ll be okay, Brax,” Ven told him.
“Thank you, Ven. I hope you’re right.” Brax was anxious to see what was transpiring with their ship. He never should have left. They should have seen the trap a thousand light years away. Brax was in charge of security, and he’d done a terrible job of foreseeing the Assembly’s ploy.
The jumper pushed through the dark blue energy barrier and lifted straight up, the bottom thrusters causing the bench they sat on to vibrate violently. Brax closed his eyes and clenched his jaw as Kaino directed them away from the mining colony. The shuttle moved slowly, and it took a solid ten minutes for him to move far enough from the Belt that he’d be able to make the jump.
“Can you check the Nek drive? If it’s yellow, we can make the jump,” Kaino said from the pilot’s seat.
Brax craned his neck, seeing it turn from red to yellow. “You don’t have a gauge on the dash?” he asked.
“Not yet. That was the next step,” Kaino admitted.
“Great, now we’re jumping through space in an old shuttle that isn’t even finished. What are you doing, Brax?” he mumbled to himself.
Ven gave the man the last established coordinates for Constantine, and Oquid programmed them in. “Brace yourselves.” Kaino pulled a strap from beside him and clicked it into place. Brax did the same, pulling the X-shaped strapping around him before snapping it into the receiver.
Kaino gave them no warning. He activated the Nek drive, and everything went dark.
Sixteen
Tom was alone on the shuttle, with two PL-25 guns pointing at him. Even their guns are old models. It didn’t seem to matter, but it was a detail that wasn’t lost on the captain.
“How long have you been traitors?” Tom asked the pair.
The one on the left was a thick-set Tekol man, his hair dark, his dreads hung over his shoulders. He grunted, and Tom peered over at the woman across from him.
“What about you? Wake up one day and decide that you felt like overturning your government for a change of scenery?” he asked. Tom had no logic for why he was antagonizing these people, seeing how he was alone with them on a shuttle and they were armed, but he couldn’t seem to help himself.
“You wouldn’t understand, Baldwin.” She said his name as if it tasted bad on her tongue. She was a frail human, probably his age, judging by the slight crows’ feet lingering at the edges of her steel-blue eyes.
“Why don’t you give me a try?” he asked. They were halfway between his ship and Andron, and Tom was using the conversation as a distraction from what was about to happen. He hadn’t stepped foot on that old cruise ship for so long, and of course Lark Keen was bringing him there. The guy had always been dramatic, even as a young man. He imagined Lark had only escalated in that category over the last twenty years.
Part of him was excited to see Lark again, in a sick kind of way. They’d parted in anger, but years estranged had left him with nothing but an empty feeling about the entire disagreement. In the rare times he’d even thought about Lark over the last decade, it had been in fondness.
Now, with the recent destruction of Faithful, Tom’s gut was tight, his nerves frayed. Their first mission alongside the new Concord partners, and Captain Wan and his entire crew had been killed. Tom tried to tell himself it wasn’t his fault, that he’d urged them to reconsider. To not engage. It did little to calm his mind.
“No further comments?” he asked the woman, and she averted her gaze, watching out the viewer instead as they neared Andron. The vessel was far different than the new models: much smaller, with wings meant for suborbital flight. Constantine didn’t need that, as it was never meant to lower into atmosphere – the idea being that Cleo, the expedition ship, would be the one doing all the planetside landing or space station docking. Tom preferred it that way.
“Just bite your tongue, Captain Baldwin,” the Tekol quipped, waving at Tom with his gun.
Tom raised his hands in the air. “No problem.” He sighed, watching his grandfather’s old legacy ship grow larger in the viewer. Shortly after, they were flying through the hangar opening and settling to the floor.
The woman flicked her wrist, aiming the gun at Tom. “Get up.”
He rose, stepping to the shuttle’s exit. The doors spread wide, and Tom recognized the other ship in the hangar. It was the cruiser from the dead man on Constantine. He hadn’t known of its departure, which didn’t really surprise him. Most self-proclaimed traders were nothing but glorified smugglers, their crafts often modified to not show up on Concord sensors. He guessed Basel’s cruiser had a kill switch.
It was obvious this was how Zare had arrived here. Tom pictured her on his bridge, feigning an illness to escape. He’d always thought he was a good judge of character, but he’d proven himself wrong again. It wasn’t the first time. The one and only Lark Keen had been the biggest betrayer of his trust. Knowing that his once-close friend was on this vessel with him brought the disloyalty to the surface.
“This way.” The Tekol man shoved him, nearly sending him to the ground. Tom staggered and caught his balance. They led him from the hangar into the corridor and to the right. He was familiar with the blueprint. His grandfather used to play him training videos endlessly, for years before he was even old enough to join the Academy. Constantine was adamant his grandson, Thomas Baldwin, would join the Concord Fleet.
After losing his daughter and her husband, Constantine figured being the one controlling the weapons was better than being on the receiving end. Tom had turned fifteen, and it was soon after that he’d met Lark Keen for the first time.
Everyone knew Admiral Keen. He was one of the top Concord leaders during the War. Tom had been forced to attend the old man’s funeral. His grandson had sat at the front of the procession, with his parents around him. Tom remembered watching from a few rows behind, noticing the attention the boy his age was receiving from his
father.
The mother had turned and kissed the boy’s head. The father wrapped his arm around him protectively as various members of the Concord hierarchy took turns fondly recalling tales of Admiral Keen.
When it was Constantine Baldwin’s turn, Tom’s grandfather groaned and stood in front of the massive gathered crowd and regaled them with a tale of Keen leading a battle near the beginning of the Statu War. He had everyone in attendance smiling, and by the end, they clapped and Constantine left the stage, a scowl on his face.
Tom could sense his grandfather was playing along, but he knew for a fact there was bad blood between the two admirals. After Keen died, it didn’t matter. The boy turned his head, staring at Constantine Baldwin, and his gaze fell on Tom, who’d offered the grieving boy a respectful nod.
“Quit dawdling.” Another push from the Tekol. “In here.”
Tom followed the woman into the captain’s private office, just off the bridge. He saw some people through a window before they shut the door, leaving him alone in the space. Tom was sure the two escorts were standing on either side of the exit right then, so there was no point in trying to go anywhere.
Tom assessed his surroundings. He took a deep inhale, almost thinking he could still smell Constantine in the room. He smiled despite his circumstances. Never give up, son. Life will throw unimaginable blockades at you, but you have to press through them. Do you have any idea how many people thought we’d be destroyed by the Statu War? Almost all of them. But I didn’t give up. And we won.
We won. Tom thought about it. Had they really won? Those words were near the end of his grandfather’s life, a few years after his wife Yanni had passed on. It was the most uplifting thing he’d said in a long time, and it had stuck with Tom all these years.
Never give up. Tom walked to the desk, ran a finger along the smooth surface, and imagined the great man who’d sat behind it for years: a man almost a decade younger than Tom was now, with so much pressure and stress on his shoulders. A man with a child at home, and no way to see her.
Baldwin's Legacy: The Complete Series Page 50
