The Ruins of Arlandia Complete Series

by William Wood

  “Need help?” Astra asked, sitting down next to Calvin.

  “I’m glad you’re here,” Calvin said. Astra studied the sensors. “Can you take the guns please?”

  “Got it,” she answered. Calvin had focused all his energy on getting through the asteroid field, and less on the fighters attacking them. He had kept his eyes on the shields though. When one section got low, he re-balanced the energy, spreading the available power evenly to cover all sides. Shield strength was down to thirty-nine percent. A sudden blast rocked the bottom of the ship. It felt like it came from inside the ship.

  But there was no time to worry about that right now. The Goremog fighters followed them the whole way. The robots piloting the fighters must have been their best. They were able to avoid the mines and the Frost’s laser turrets all the while dodging asteroids.

  Finally they cleared the asteroid field. Sensors showed seven enemy fighters were still behind them. The battleships were turning to follow.

  “The hyperdrive engines are charged,” Astra said. “Coordinates are set for the tenth segment. Go, Calvin!” The ship vibrated; the stars blurred, and the ship was wrapped in a hundred shades of vibrant blue. They were safely in hyperspace.

  All of a sudden, everything got very quiet. All communications chatter stopped, and the sound of combat was gone. Calvin sat still for a moment and unclenched his hands. The clock had stopped on 1:24. They barely had an hour and a half to find the tenth segment before the two hostile fleets caught up to them. He quickly checked his status board to check for damage to the ship. He didn’t like what he saw. There were multiple systems showing up in red. Astra read them off before he had a chance to read them all.

  “We lost another shield generator,” she said angrily. “Life support is offline, oh, and the maneuvering engines. I better get to work. Let’s go find Ion.”

  CHAPTER FIFTY-EIGHT:

  INVISIBLE SHADOWS

  Calvin sat at a workbench in a corner of the workshop. Multicolored wires, circuit boards and electronic components were spread around him. There was a monitor on the wall in front of him, where a gray haired man dressed in a white lab coat spoke slowly and clearly.

  “Now you’re ready to re -attach the image enhancer. Observe how it slides without resistance along the groves on each side. Don’t force it. If it doesn’t go in easily, then you are putting it in wrong.”

  Calvin picked up a small video screen and examined it one last time. He smiled. It was a special moment for him. He’d just learned how to repair a short-range scanner.

  “Calvin,” Astra called over the intercom. “Where are you?” There was something in her voice, something he only heard when there was a serious problem.

  “I’m in the workshop. Why?”

  “Are you busy? I’m in the lab. There’s something you need to see.” “I’m on my way,” Calvin said quickly. He put the screen down and

  hurried out of the room. Fortunately, the lab was right next door. He found Astra in front of a large monitor, which he ignored. Calvin focused on her. “Oh, Calvin,” she said, visibly relieved. “I’m glad you’re here. Look at this, I was able to configure the scanner to detect invisible Dark Terrors.”

  “That’s good,” Calvin said, wondering what the problem was. “You might not think that in a second, look.”

  Calvin looked up at the monitor for the first time. There was an image of Azure Frost.

  He recognized this particular view as a schematic from the internal scanner. Everything looked normal. Wait. His glance stopped near the engine room. Two small torpedo shaped objects were sticking out of the side of the ship.

  “What is that?” Calvin asked.

  “Those are Goremog warheads,” Astra explained. “I’m pretty sure that’s how the Dark Terror’s got on board, but I think you should go check them out, just to be sure.”

  “Just the ship,” Calvin stated. “I don’t see any Terrors.”

  “I haven’t finished scanning the whole ship yet,” Astra answered. “It’s going to take another hour.”

  Calvin stared at the screen for a few seconds, not wanting to move. When he did, it was to turn on the intercom.

  “Wexton, if you’re not too busy, meet me in the locker room. We have a problem, and we’re gonna have to arm up for this.”

  “On my way,” Wexton said eagerly.

  “Is there a way for you to add this information to our Helcomps?” Calvin asked on his way to the door.

  “Yes,” Astra answered. “And I’ll make sure you get the new stuff as it’s available. Hey, be careful.”

  “I will,” Calvin said, and left the room. Wexton was putting on his advanced combat gear when Calvin arrived.

  “What’s going on?” he asked.

  “Astra found Goremog warheads attached to the hull,” Calvin explained.

  “That’s how the Terrors got on board, isn’t it.”

  “Yes, and there may be more,” Calvin explained. “She wants us to check them out. We’ll have to be very careful.”

  Wexton grinned. “Then we shouldn’t take any chances.” He slid a laser pistol into his side holster and held another in his hand, inspecting it.

  “Give me a second,” Calvin said.

  “OK. I’ll get the combat robots,” Wexton said. “I’d rather be over prepared than not.”

  “Right.”

  Calvin changed quickly, grabbed his weapons and met Wexton out in the corridor. Sierra One and Two stood silently against the wall, awaiting orders. They each carried rifles, and even though they were robots, they looked angry and ready to fight.

  Wexton led the way, into the engine room. The images of the two Goremog warheads marked clearly on their Helcomps.

  The air was quiet, only the faint hum of the air circulation system and the deep throb of the engines could be heard.

  “We just got this place put back together!” Calvin spun around to see Dev walking behind them. He was not armed, or wearing his combat gear. “Why didn’t you guys call me?” He asked sullenly.

  “Dev!” Wexton hissed. “Either get a weapon and put your combat suit on, or get back to your room.”

  “What?”

  “Dev,” Calvin said. “Wexton and I can handle this.”

  “Oh, I see,” Dev complained.

  “Go!” Wexton hissed loudly. Dev turned and marched away.

  They followed the indicator on their Helcomp to a far corner of the engine room, on the lowest level of the ship. They followed it right up to the hull. There, they stopped and looked at nothing. According to the sensors, it showed nothing but a wall. Calvin slowly approached the wall, and placed his hand where he thought the hole was.

  His hand touched the solid surface of the hull. Slowly, Calvin moved his hand down, feeling his way. Where was the hole? He thought it was crazy and disturbing at the same time that the Goremog had mastered invisibility now, so much so that his Helcomp couldn’t detect the Dark Terror intrusion. Finally Calvin felt an edge, and his hand suddenly disappeared inside the wall.

  He took a deep breath, and felt around the edges to see how big the hole was.

  Obviously it had to be large enough for a Dark Terror to get through. Calvin turned and looked back. Wexton nodded, and raised his pistol. He didn’t give Calvin a chance to wonder who was going to go in first. Wexton stepped forward, through the hole.

  Calvin wasn’t sure what to expect when he followed Wexton through the hole. When he stepped through, the Helcomp registered the new environment. The two of them were in a small square room, ten feet wide and ten feet long. There were two weapons racks on the walls. Both were empty. A large piece of metal stood up against one wall. Its edges were burned.

  “That’s the piece of our hull that they removed,” Calvin noted. Wexton nodded.

  The only other thing in the room was a small holographic projector, beaming an image at the door.

  “So that’s how they hid the hole,” Calvin said. “We might want to analyze that. It must be speci
al, even our sensors couldn’t read it.”

  Relieved, Calvin keyed his radio. “Astra,” he said. “We’re on the Goremog ship. It’s empty. Are you sure our Helcomps are working? They were having problems seeing the wall.”

  “Oh, sorry,” Astra said. “Your equipment hasn’t been upgraded with the new scanning protocols. Stand-by, I’ll upload them to you now.”

  “It might have been a good idea to take care of this before we came on board,” Wexton complained.

  “I know, I’m sorry,” Astra said.

  Calvin shifted uneasily on his feet and waited. The longer it took, the more nervous he became. What if there was a Dark Terror in the room with them? That thought sunk into his brain and he became very scared. He was about to turn and ask Wexton if they should wait outside when his vision flickered. White lines cycled down and then vanished.

  “All done,” Astra said.

  “But nothing has changed,” Calvin complained. “The room looks the same.”

  “That’s good,” Astra said. “That means you guys are alone in there. One more to check.”

  They found the other warhead on the other side of the engine room, two decks up. It was the same; empty except for a second piece of Azure Frost’s hull.

  “Is the rest of the ship cleared?” Calvin asked when they stepped back out into the engine room.

  “Not quite,” Astra said. “The scan isn’t finished yet. I’m scanning the front end of the ship now. Give me five more minutes.”

  “Did I miss anything?” Dev asked. He was now fully dressed in his combat suit and was holding a long rifle. Sierra One stood behind him.

  “Good timing,” Wexton said dryly. “Glad you could make it.”

  “Hey, it’s not my fault,” Dev said defensively. “I couldn’t find my helmet.”

  Calvin led them to the top level, intent on waiting in the library for the scan to finish. They didn’t make it before Astra called them.

  “Calvin, we have a problem,” she said in a serious tone, but Calvin recognized that she was fighting back her emotions.

  “There’s a Dark Terror on the ship!”

  “What?” Dev whispered loudly. “Where?”

  “Ten feet from the bridge,” Astra answered. “It’s standing still. Wait, there’s more. It’s transmitting a homing signal! Oh my gosh! It’s transmitting a signal to every Goremog ship within two light-years in every direction!”

  “What?” Dev exclaimed. “How could this happened?” “The signal was invisible,” Calvin said, with a calmness he didn’t feel.

  “That explains how they keep finding us,” Wexton said. “Right, now it makes sense,” Calvin said.

  “That’s nice,” Dev said. “Now what are we going to do with it?” Calvin scanned ahead, he could now see the Dark Terror though his Helcomp. A beam of white light emitted from it, breaking off into a thousand separate line lines going in every direction.

  “That’s a very good question,” Wexton said. “Whatever we do, we need to do it fast. We’ve got to make it stop calling for help.” “Yes,” Calvin agreed. “Astra, we’re coming to you, so we can figure this out.”

  “OK,” Astra said.

  They followed Calvin to the lab, where Astra was waiting for them. Calvin sat down and took off his helmet.

  “So, now what?” He asked.

  “We have enough fire power to deal with one Dark Terror,” Wexton said. “Let’s blast it to pieces. I know it’s dangerous, but we could be careful.”

  “No, we can’t do that!” Astra snapped quickly. “That’s a terrible idea. You’ll blast holes in the side of the ship.”

  “We could try and lure it into an airlock,” Dev suggested. “Then we could simply blow it out into space.”

  “How are we going to do that?” Calvin asked.

  “Simple,” Dev said. “We use a robot; just like we did with the last one.”

  “But this one isn’t attacking robots,” Astra said. “It’s been on board for a long time now, at least since the asteroid field. It hasn’t attacked any robots.”

  “It hasn’t attacked anything,” Calvin pointed out.

  “That’s right,” Astra said. “It’s invisible, and it prefers to stay that way; almost like it was programmed to avoid detection.”

  “Each Dark Terror had a different role?”

  “Yes,” Astra said, realizing. “The first one was programmed to destroy our engines; take us out of hyperspace. The second was programmed to destroy the robots on board, to keep them from repairing the engines, and the third was programmed to report our position to the Goremog, so they could come and finish us off.”

  “Or capture us.”

  “Of course,” Astra said. “If I’m right, this one will do whatever it can to stay hidden. I don’t think we’re going to coerce it to do anything. Especially not get in an airlock.”

  “All right,” Wexton sat back and put his hands up. “What then? We can’t attack it, and we can’t trap it. What else can we do?”

  Astra stood up and paced. “I know it was messy, but we can do what we did with the last one. We know where it is; it’s not moving. We could put up a force field around it.”

  “What did we do last time?” Dev asked. “We tried a lot of things; nothing worked. All we did was force it to selfdestruct.”

  “We weren’t trying to kill it, we were trying to capture it alive,” Astra said. “This time, we’ll try to kill it.”

  “I like this idea,” Calvin said. “I like it a lot. When can we get started, and don’t say after dinner,” he said the last part to Dev. “Funny,” Dev said.

  Calvin was joking, and yet he wasn’t. He wasn’t going to be able to do anything else knowing there was a live Dark Terror on the ship. “Calvin, I’m sorry,” Astra said sincerely. “I’m sorry I didn’t believe you.”

  “Thank you,” Calvin said softly. Then louder, “See, I’m not losing my mind.”

  It took fifteen minutes to assemble the gear in the corridor outside the bridge. Astra and Dev set up the force-field projectors around the Dark Terror, while Sierra One and Two stood on either side with weapons leveled, powered up, and ready. Wexton stood nearby watching. During that time, the Dark Terror didn’t move an inch.

  When they were ready, everyone stepped well back. Wexton and Dev took cover behind Sierra One on the bridge side. Calvin and Astra hid behind Sierra Two on the other side.

  Astra looked deep into Calvin’s eyes and smiled, as if to reassure him.

  “Get ready,” Astra said to everyone. For a brief second, silence settled on them. Calvin could hear only his breathing and his heart pounding in his chest. A glance at the others showed their blood pressure had increased, as well as their respiration.

  Even though he knew it was coming, the flash of the force-field made him jump. Four solid light walls coalesced together to form a box.

  Calvin slowly stood up, and stepped out from behind the combat robot. He stared at the unmoving monster, wondering if it was aware of what was about to happen. Calvin thought the Dark Terrors were smarter than to allow themselves to be captured. This one didn’t even seem smart enough to know what was going on around it. ‘Huh,’ Calvin thought to himself. ‘So much for the scary Dark Terror.’

  Astra jumped up and approached the barrier. “OK, we should probably do this quickly,” she said. “We may only have a few minutes.”

  “We have it trapped inside the force-field,” Calvin said.

  “Yes,” Astra said. “But these Terrors are unlike the ones we’ve seen before; they’re unpredictable. I want to get this done before it knows what we’re doing.”

  “And what are we doing?” Calvin asked.

  “There’s only one way to make sure we kill it quickly,” Astra said.

  “Yes, only one way,” Dev said. “And we’re going to do what any crazy scientist would do in a situation like this; create an unstable, artificial black hole inside the force field.”

  “What?!” Calvin exclaimed. “Are y
ou kidding me? I thought you said that was too dangerous. Don’t you remember what happened in the nebula? Even the best Alerian scientists were only experimenting with it, and they failed!”

  “I know,” Astra said. “But we’ll just do a small one. Besides, I read their notes, and I think I corrected their mistakes.”

  “You think,” was all Calvin could say.

  “It’ll be OK Calvin,” Astra said. “At any time I think I’m losing control of it, I can shut it down.”

  “Right, and then we can deal with a very angry Dark Terror,” Calvin muttered.

  “Is there any other kind?” Dev asked.

  Astra stepped back two paces, and held up a small hand scanner. She pressed a few buttons, and a bright light flashed inside the forcefield.

  “Don’t worry, Calvin,” Astra said. “I’ll create a very small black hole; that should be enough to neutralize the monster.”

  Don’t worry, is that what she said?

  “Increasing power,” Astra said. “Five minutes to critical mass.” All eyes were on the force-field for the next five minutes. It felt like an eternity.

  A bright flash lit the room, followed by another and the forcefield glowed an angry red. Calvin looked at Astra, but her expression had not changed. Calvin assumed everything was going the way it was supposed to.

  “Here we go!” Astra exclaimed. “Full power!” She looked like a little kid that had snuck into her father’s lab and was conducting dangerous experiments behind his back.

  Suddenly a tiny dark sphere appeared inside the force-field. At first he thought his eyes were playing tricks on him, but the colors phased and shifted rapidly until it reached the size of a fist; the black hole was forming. The tiny black hole caused a massive mini-storm within the force-field. Small lightning bolts splashed into the shields. A cacophony of sounds rose to deafening levels. It was frightening to witness.

  “This is crazy!” Calvin shouted.

  An ear piercing scream stabbed terror into his heart and almost made him jump through the hull. The Dark Terror was moving. It began to thrash wildly about inside the force-field, slamming itself from one side to the other. It was trying to get out!