The Santana Nexus (Junkyard Dogs Book 3)

by Nolte, Phillip

  As Clancy watched the displays from the bridge of the Dingo, he instructed his pilot to bring the Whitney jump module online and microjump back towards the hyperlink zone. He also instructed the crew to bring shields to full power. The Dingo's shields were some of the most robust available on a non-military ship but he still didn't want to take any chances. The enemy's pulse beams probably weren't powerful enough to do much damage to the destroyer, at least not just an isolated strike or two but any kind of pulse beam strike, even at extreme distance, was best avoided by his freighter.

  Microjump completed, Davis-Moore frowned as he considered the possibilities. If these two enemy ships coordinated their attack and were able to land enough pulse beam impacts, things could get dicey for the Asimov and her inexperienced captain and crew. That and those gunboats could be carrying missiles. Clancy hoped that Captain Nesbitt wasn't making a mistake. He shook his head as he ordered full acceleration back towards the hyperlink zone.

  Chapter 31.

  Naccobus/New Ceylon Star System, near the L-5 point of the gas giant, Naccobus V, January 8, 2599.

  As the cutter with the salvage team onboard approached the remote location of what they had dubbed the "Secret Scrapyard" in the L-5 point of the Nacobbus star system's only gas giant, the asteroid that had been described in the hidden files grew in size until it dwarfed their small vessel. Like almost all of the asteroids that were large enough to be mined with a portable mining factory, this one was between twelve and fifteen kilometers long and about ten wide. As they got even closer to the planetoid, they noticed that one of the craters on its surface was marred by a nearly circular opening, one that was just the right size to have been created by a semi-permanent mining facility. Carlisle, who was at the controls of the small craft, said as much.

  "There, in that big crater right at the top of the viewscreen," she zoomed the display in on the crater, "That looks like the footprint left by an asteroid mining facility."

  "It sure as heck does," replied Harris, "Get us in closer."

  Within the next few minutes Carlisle maneuvered the cutter until it was stabilized over the top of the crater.

  "Do you want me to try going inside, Lieutenant?"

  "Not just yet, Ensign," said Harris, "I think we'd better take a look in there first. Shine some light down into that opening."

  Carlisle raised the tail of the cutter and pointed the nose of the small craft towards the three-hundred meter wide opening in the crater. She then switched on the cutter's landing lights. Intense beams of light flooded the pitch black interior of the asteroid. The cavern that had been excavated by the mining station was several kilometers deep and at least the same distance across as the excavated area ballooned outwards inside the asteroid from the relatively narrow opening. Near the floor of the cavern, the exploration team could make out what appeared to be several ships illuminated by virtue of being in the direct path of the shuttle's beams. Outside of the bright circles of light directly illuminated by the landing lights they could also see a number of less distinct glints and reflections indicating the presence of additional ships or other constructs within the huge, dark space.

  "What do you think, Lieutenant?" asked Carlisle.

  "I don't see any reason that we shouldn't go in and have a look around inside," replied Harris. "Take us in slowly."

  As Carlisle maneuvered the cutter through the entry, some of the ships in the pools of light created by the landing lights began to take on more recognizable shapes. Once they had gone completely inside the asteroid and were several hundred meters away from the opening, Carlisle slowly swiveled the cutter to port and back to starboard through a 180 degree arc to scan the interior space with the lights.

  What was revealed was not a large collection of ships, certainly nothing like the myriad types and quantities found in the Scrapyard proper but there were still somewhere around twenty-five ships packed inside the hollowed out space. Closer examination revealed that each of the ships was secured in place by cables anchored to the walls of the cavern, to keep them from drifting into the walls or into one another. Also, unlike the Scrapyard proper, there did not appear to be any facilities for a permanent or even semi-permanent human presence.

  "No habitat," said Harris. "I wonder where they housed their working crews?"

  "They may have had a habitat and took it with them when they abandoned this place," observed Talbot.

  "Or it could be that there were facilities built right into the rock," said Carlisle, "A lot of mining operations do that." She swung the lights of the cutter along the "bottom" of the artificially created cavern. "See, that looks like an airlock door built into the rock, right there."

  If it were an airlock, the door had been left open so there was obviously no atmosphere in what may have formerly been a living habitat. Harris concluded that Carlisle was probably right.

  "Looks like this place has quite a story to tell," said Talbot.

  "No doubt," replied Harris, "but our main purpose is to locate some parts to repair the Greyhound. Does anyone see anything that looks like an Orion Mark V destroyer."

  "Nothing so far," replied Carlisle.

  "I'll be jiggered," said Hawkins. "It be lookin' like those two big ships are being Federation cruisers. The one t' starboard be a Brooklyn Class by the look of her. I ain't seen one of them for twenty years or more. The other one be...the bow is missing. It's kinda hard t' be tellin'. Could be an Argus maybe?"

  In fact, it appeared that both of the cruisers had been partially dismantled. The Brooklyn Class cruiser that Hawkins had correctly identified was missing her stern. Another mystery for the salvagers to ponder.

  "I repeat, does anyone see any sign of the Mark V Orion destroyers that are supposed to be here?" asked Harris.

  "I think there're three of them in that row of ships just to port of the dismantled cruisers, Lieutenant," said Carlisle, who seldom missed anything.

  "I believe you're right," Ensign.

  "How far out do you want me to stop, Lieutenant?" asked Carlisle.

  "These ships are quite a bit more closely packed than they are back in the big yard," replied Harris. "That and they're all secured with cables. Be really careful, Ensign, but I think we can safely get close enough so you can tether over to one of them. Once you secure a lifeline, we can try Hawkins' portable power unit to see if we can open an airlock.

  "I can do that," responded Carlisle.

  "Make it so, Ensign," said Harris, "Just be careful."

  Carlisle got them to within ten meters of a row of three of what appeared to be Orion Mark V destroyers. Unlike the ships in the Scrapyard, almost all of which were showing some kind of battle damage, all three of the destroyers and the other ships in the vicinity appeared to be in virtually undamaged condition. Unfortunately, "undamaged" didn't mean that they were intact. Any hope of using one of the destroyers for the defense of the Quadrant was dashed immediately as all three of them were partially disassembled and each of the ships was obviously missing some of its vital parts, like their drive systems or their power plants. All three of the destroyers were also missing the front turrets of their main battery, which in the case of the Orion Mark V had been a twin-mount beam weapon.

  As they had done so many times before, Carlisle, Harris and Hawkins got into their spacesuits and prepared to do some exploring. The airlock on the cutter finished running its cycle and the door opened, revealing the row of destroyers a few meters away. With her special suit, her innate agility and her incomparable skills under weightless conditions, Carlisle was the obvious choice to get a lifeline connected to the row of destroyers.

  Carlisle clipped a coil of meta-kevlar rope to a D ring on the hull of the cutter just outside the airlock door, coiled her legs under her against the hull of the cutter and launched her body towards the nearest destroyer, paying out the rope as she soared gracefully through the space between the two ships. When she was about halfway across the gap, she fired one of her retractable tethers at the target
destroyer. The small pad on the end made contact with the destroyer's hull and, as it was designed to do, stuck fast. She then used the tether to reel herself over to the destroyer. She found another anchoring ring on the hull of the destroyer, threaded the end of the rope through it and pulled the rope taut before securing it. Her two companions could now clip a carabineer to the taut line and use it to safely make the transfer over to the destroyer.

  Hawkins was carrying a portable power supply that he had cobbled together a year or so ago. He and Harris and Carlisle had used to open airlock doors when they had been stranded in the Scrapyard a couple of months earlier. The plan was to plug the power pack into the destroyer's docking port and use it to activate the outer airlock door. The device did not have sufficient power to run any of the ship's systems, like life support or heat, for instance, but their calculations indicated that it carried enough power to open perhaps eight or ten airlock doors before it would require recharging.

  When he got over to the destination ship, Hawkins made straight for the forward airlock door. He braced himself against the hull of the old destroyer and used a hand tool to pry open the small, twenty centimeter diameter access door that protected the docking port. He uncoiled the power cord from the power pack, twisted the connector into place and flipped a switch on the power pack. LED's above the two buttons located within the docking port enclosure winked on before settling into a steady glow. Hawkins pushed the "open" button and was rewarded by the sight of the airlock doors sliding open.

  "Now, don't you be gettin' overeager, Lass," he warned Carlisle. "These old ships all be more than a wee bit dangerous."

  "I remember. I'll, be careful, Hawk," said Carlisle, once again both amused and touched by the old Chief's desire to protect her.

  The three of them switched on their suit lights as they entered the old destroyer and headed through the ship towards the engineering section, Carlisle using a wrist computer hologram schematic to help guide them. Hawkins had actually served on an Orion Mark V when he had first enlisted in the Navy and was finding much of this experience to be hauntingly familiar.

  "Seems t'be a lot smaller than I remember," he said. "That, and she looks t'be pretty well picked over."

  The ship had indeed been pretty well gutted, and much of the interior was in disarray with various components removed from the ship in some undecipherable pattern. Finally, they arrived in the engineering section. It too looked like it had been stripped of anything useful.

  "I be tracing the cables from the power plant to the beam weapons module," said Hawkins.

  "The module should be on the starboard side of the compartment, according to my schematics," said Carlisle. "It would be a box a meter and a half on a side and about thirty centimeters thick. If it's still there," she added.

  "Here it be," said Hawkins, illuminating what had to be the module with his suit lights and sounding somewhat relieved. He kept the module centered in his suit lights as his companions came over to examine it with him. From the outward appearance of the component, it certainly looked to be intact. A closer inspection indicated that the module was bolted to the deck with four fairly large nuts on four equally-sized studs.

  "We be needin' a powered spanner," said Hawkins, as he inspected the device more closely. "There be one in the toolkit I be puttin' together. I'll go an' get it. Mayhaps you and the Ensign can be takin' a look at the wiring while I be fetchin' the tools."

  Hawkins used his suit radio to call over to Frank Talbot who had remained on the cutter.

  "Frank? This be Hawk."

  "I've been monitoring your chatter," said Talbot, "You need the toolbox, right? I'll put it in the airlock and cycle out the air. All you'll have to do is open the door."

  "Many thanks, Frank," radioed Hawkins, "Are you thinkin' maybe you'd be likin' a permanent job with us out here in the Scrapyard?"

  "I don't know if you can afford me, Hawk," Talbot joked back.

  Meanwhile, Carlisle had brought up the wiring diagram for the weapons systems on the Mark V Orion. Both the input and output sides of the module were connected to power cables. From what Harris could remember, the cables on this new module appeared to be considerably more robust than the ones on the module they had taken from the Exeter and installed on the Greyhound. The Orion Mark V's were a generation older than the Exeter and the other ships of her class but in this case the extra age might actually prove to be an advantage. Often the earlier components were intentionally over-engineered and therefore far more robust than necessary. Perhaps this older module was just what they needed for the one-of-a-kind weapons installation on the Greyhound.

  "I think we should be taking several meters of cable from either end of this module when we pull it out of here," Harris observed.

  "That sounds like a good idea, Lieutenant," replied Carlisle.

  Hawkins returned a few minutes later, pushing the toolbox in front of him. He opened the lid and pulled out the powered spanner, specially designed to operate in weightless environments, and selected the socket that fit the nuts holding the module in place. Within a few minutes, he had all four nuts removed and they were ready to attempt removal of the module. In addition to the four nuts and four washers, there were at least four layers of Navy issue gray paint that served admirably to glue the module securely to the deck.

  By bracing themselves and carefully alternating the application of a prybar from one side of the module to the other, Hawkins and Harris were able to first break the module loose from its mooring spot and then to walk it up the studs until it came free. The trio then took a hydraulic-powered shears out of the toolbox and severed the ten centimeter-diameter cables connecting each end of the module to the workings of the old ship. They then negotiated their way back out of the stripped hulk of the destroyer and loaded their prize into the cutter.

  Then, with their primary mission accomplished, they took some time to examine the other ships in the Scrapyard's new "collection."

  The two cruisers were initially impressive but ultimately as disappointing as the destroyers had been. They too had been partially disassembled for some kind of project and it did not appear as though the lost parts were anywhere to be found. The bow end was missing from one of them, and the stern was missing from the other. Someone had been working on a rather large project of some kind but whatever it was, it had been long ago and was now long forgotten.

  Unless...? Carlisle spotted an odd-looking ship, also secured to the floor of the asteroid, but over by itself, without any other ships within fifty meters. Upon closer examination, it looked as though it had been somewhat haphazardly assembled from the missing bow and stern components of the two dismantled cruisers. On the bow end there was what looked like a flat, roundish plate that covered the opening in the hull where the front battery would have been positioned. The position normally occupied by the rear battery was likewise covered.

  Sticking straight out from the sides of the odd-looking ship were a series of ten triangular fins, five of them sprouting from either side of the ship. Looking like a series of stacked delta wings, each fin was some forty meters long and measured about twenty meters wide at its widest point which was at the back edge the fin. The rear edge of the fins intersected the fuselage of the craft at a ninety-degree angle and ended less than halfway down the side of the ship. The five fins on either side were parallel to one another and each was spaced about a meter away from its neighbors.

  The resulting craft was a somewhat ungainly looking creation that was short, thick and stubby. The two donor ships had been sliced apart in such a way that when the bow end of one had been joined to the stern of the other, the resulting craft was somewhat shorter than either of the donors had been, making it about the length of a destroyer. The fins sprouting out of the sides gave it an almost comical resemblance to the sort of ship that might have been featured in an ancient space video or an old-fashioned science fiction yarn. The proportions of the homely little ship were...just wrong.

  Hawkins i
nadvertently described the strange construction almost perfectly: "What kind of a foul beastie do you suppose that be?" he asked, of no one in particular.

  "Looks like some kind of very experimental craft," replied Harris. "Have you got anything about it in your wrist comp files from the special inventory, Ensign?"

  "Let me check," she replied. After fiddling briefly with her wrist computer, she brought up a display and began to look it over.

  "This must be it here," she said, and then began to quote, "United Terran Federation experimental prototype XC-89: Basilisk Class Planetary defense light cruiser."

  "Basilisk?" said Talbot, "A creature so ugly that it can kill with a glance? That name certainly fits! Any details, Ensign?"

  "Yes, the stern section contains both of the power plants from the Brooklyn Class donor. Hmmm...the idea was to provide a whole lot of power for weapons...and for some extremely stout shielding." She skimmed down a ways before continuing, "...It was intended to have a small crew of only about thirty personnel or so. I'm paraphrasing here...but from the description it seems like they envisioned it as a planetary defender, and it would have remained pretty much in orbit close to the planet it was defending. By design, there isn't much storage space and even with a crew of only thirty or so, they would have needed to be resupplied every couple of weeks or so."

  "What about the armament?" asked Harris.

  Carlisle scanned the file some more before pursing her lips and saying: "Well I'll be damned!"

  "What is it, Ensign?" said Harris, his curiosity piqued.

  "That flat plate on the bow houses a highly experimental prototype Bofors turret."