“Yes,” Jason said. This caused Kage and Twingo to laugh uproariously.
“Someone has been spending too much time with ConFed spies,” Twingo said. “Does he really think we’re out here just broadcasting away as we fly along? Who did he think he was talking to?”
“To be fair, we have been trailed for some time now,” Doc said. “It may be our indiscriminant use of the com node that’s allowed them to pop up in a lot of the places we’ve been, even a planet like Restaria.”
“I think what he is concerned about is leaks on his end,” Jason said tiredly. Twingo and Kage had been working tirelessly in the cargo bay on the material regarding the key and that meant they’d ingested an unhealthy amount of chroot. It had now hit critical mass where the pair were slap happy and were wearing down the nerves of their crewmates. Crusher had actually demanded they be sedated and when Doc refused he stormed off the bridge. “The Defiant is an enormous ship and it’s impossible to keep that close of an eye on every crewmember without creating a hostile work environment.”
“Whatever,” Kage said.
“You guys have been working pretty hard,” Jason said. “Maybe you should hit the rack for a few hours. We’re half a day away from the Defiant.”
“We’re good, Captain,” Twingo assured him. “We can sit up here and keep you company during your watch.” Jason sighed heavily and Doc walked off the bridge without a word to any of them.
After a few hours, the stimulant effect of all the chroot wore off and the pair began nodding off. At a bit more prodding from Jason they headed for their quarters and a blissful silence descended on the bridge.
“Computer, set ambient lighting for overnight watch,” Jason said. The lights dimmed down to just enough to keep him from tripping over things in the dark. He watched the stars streak by in silence, thoroughly enjoying the simulation he’d programmed for when they were in slip-space. He had the computer use real visual spectrum data it had on where they were in space and create a simulated, moving star field on the main canopy so that it seemed they were flying though the universe instead of moving outside of it. He’d gotten the idea from a science fiction show from Earth and the others ridiculed him to no end when he’d initialized it. Now he caught them all sitting up on the bridge staring out at the hypnotic effect.
“Are they gone?” Lucky asked from the bridge entrance. “Or will they be back momentarily?”
“They’re gone,” Jason laughed. Lucky walked all the way onto the bridge and sat at one of the sensor stations. He pulled up a few screens of data and began working with his back to Jason. This was unusual enough behavior from Lucky that he couldn’t contain his curiosity for very long.
“Whatcha working on?”
“I have had multiple programs running analyzing the script on the artifacts we’ve found,” Lucky said, sending one of his screens over to Jason’s display so he could see. “I hope to find a correlation between these symbols and the written language we found on the ships the A’arcooni were operating.”
“What gave you that idea?” Jason asked, examining the elegant program his friend had designed to analyze the images.
“Due to the way my brain functions, I was able to identify similarities as soon as we unearthed the antenna on DC915,” Lucky said. “Then Naleem mentioned that she had visited A’arcoon in order to learn what she could of the culture that had made contact with them and led to the exodus from their planet. I wrote the program to satisfy my own curiosity. I did not want to bother you with the details unless it was successful.”
Jason frowned as he thought back to what it was that Naleem had said about the A’arcooni. He had been ignoring most of what she’d said when they picked her up because it was so obvious she had been lying.
“She said she’d gone there and that’s where she learned of us,” Jason said.
“Do you think it is related?” Lucky asked.
“I don’t think it’s actually true,” Jason corrected. “She knew of us long before she visited A’arcoon. But, have you noticed that all the old ghosts from our past are coming out all of a sudden? Keep plugging away at that, if you would. Something tells me the A’arcooni will have some part to play in this tragic comedy before it’s all over.”
“Of course, Captain,” Lucky said, turning back to his terminal.
Jason turned back to his contemplation of the simulated stars streaking by. The mission was taking on shades of gray that were disturbing. When they were the good guys and others were the bad guys his world was a happy, explainable place. In his last moments, Klegsh had showed Jason that he wasn’t necessarily the bad guy, so if that was true, how could Jason be the good guy by killing him? If his explanation was to be taken at face value, and Jason had no solid reason to believe otherwise, then they had shot down a ship and crew who were attempting to keep the Machine from falling into the wrong hands. He wasn’t at all comfortable with the fact that Omega Force had just killed a group of beings that were trying to do the right thing. He wasn’t self-flagellating without being aware that Klegsh and his daughter presented themselves as the aggressors, but that was a small comfort.
Chapter 15
“Phoenix, you are cleared for final approach,” the Defiant’s com officer said. “Please secure primary flight systems prior to requesting hangar elevator retraction.”
“Is it just me or are they getting more and more wordy since they began flying that battlecruiser instead of the Diligent?” Kage asked.
“It may be a new com officer,” Jason said. “You want to send the approach to my station or would you rather I just try and wing it while we’re on a five-thousand KPH collision course?”
“Shit! I forgot to send it over,” Kage said. A moment later the final approach vector and velocity corrections appeared on Jason’s navigation display. He immediately commanded a speed reduction and corrected their course to they would be parallel to the Defiant.
Once the Phoenix was motionless in space relative to the Defiant, sitting off the larger ship’s port flank, he began to ease the gunship over so they could land on the battlecruiser’s flight deck. He dropped the landing gear and started thrusting down until the wheels impacted the upper hull with a soft bump and a green indicator on his display told him the mag-locks were engaged. He began shutting down the engines and securing all the ship’s weaponry. While he did this, Twingo switched over to backup power and shut the reactor down. The Defiant’s deck officer was never a fan of the Phoenix crew bringing their ship in with the anti-matter reactor still running, so Jason had agreed to start shutting it down and allowing them to hook up an external power umbilical.
“Signal the Defiant that we’ve shut down our engines and main reactor,” Jason said. A moment after Kage finished talking to the com officer there was a lurch and the elevator began lowering them onto the hangar deck. Once the mag-locks released, Jason grabbed the jog control and taxied the gunship off the lift and followed the illuminated arrows on the deck to their parking pad.
“I’m going out,” Twingo said, bounding out of his seat. “Don’t pop open the access panel for a minute. I don’t want those morons trying to hook a fuel vent hose up to the water fill again.”
“Maybe you should change the connections in the access panel so that can’t happen,” Kage suggested.
“Maybe you shouldn’t worry about shit you don’t know anything about,” Twingo said hotly before running off the bridge.
“He has a point,” Crusher said.
“Shut up.”
Jason ignored them and waited a few more seconds before double tapping the icon that appeared on his display to open the Phoenix’s service hatch. A few moments later and he saw external power was available so he selected it and shut the rest of their systems down.
“Let’s go,” he said. “The sooner we can talk Crisstof into helping, the sooner we can be on our way. If the Machine is beyond the fringe we’ve got a hell of a long flight ahead of us anyway.”
“Oh, I can’t wa
it,” Crusher said as he clomped off the bridge.
“Captain!” Mazer Reddix shouted from the bottom of the ramp as they walked down into the hangar. He nodded respectfully to Crusher. “Lord Archon.”
“Captain Reddix,” Crusher said with a nod. In the early days of the transition on Galvetor and Restaria, Crusher had tried to give up the honorific but the Galvetic Senate had convinced him that the people weren’t ready to walk away from all their traditions just yet. He agreed, and even though Mazer and his Marines were no longer in the Legions, they still deferred to him as their Guardian Archon and afforded him the respect accordingly. Secretly Jason thought the distinction caused more of a pain in the ass than it was worth, at least from his point of view, since it meant Crusher would always be a liability when operating with Galvetic Marine units.
“Mazer!” Jason said, embracing his friend warmly. “How have things been?”
“Very good,” Mazer said. “Our success on Olem seemed to confirm to Crisstof and Captain Colleren that we were ready for full operational status. We’ve had a handful of missions since then, all successes.”
“That is good,” Jason agreed, walking around the tail of his ship to find Twingo arguing with the Defiant’s ground crew. “Anything exciting coming up?”
“We were actually getting ready to stand down for training when Captain Colleren reactivated us,” Mazer said. “Hell, we were already on the drop shuttles ready to deploy to the training area when we got the call to cancel the exercise.”
“That’s strange,” Jason said with a frown. “If it was something urgent I wouldn’t have thought they’d have agreed to wait for us.” Mazer just looked at him like he was a bit dense.
“Captain, I think we were told to stand down because you were on the way,” he said quietly. “I don’t know what’s going on, but the rumor mill on the ship is that you guys really stepped in something big this time.”
“Nothing new there,” Jason sighed. “Twingo! Leave him alone.” Twingo looked up from his escalating argument, shrugged, and walked over to where they were all standing by the tail. Jason was about to ask what the hell he’d found to argue about this time when a squad of armed Marines walked up and took position around the tail of the ship. He immediately mistook them as an openly hostile action.
“What is this, Mazer?” he demanded. Mazer seemed taken aback at his tone.
“Protection detail,” he said. “Crisstof has said that no unauthorized personnel are to board the Phoenix and that we’re authorized to take any measures necessary to ensure that. He made it as a shipwide announcement.”
“Let’s go find the esteemed Mr. Dalton and figure out what the hell is going on,” Jason said. He had a feeling he wasn’t going to like what he was about to be told.
****
“Captain Burke,” Crisstof said as Jason walked into the conference room with his crew in tow. Mazer was also there, but Kellea was conspicuously absent.
“Crisstof,” Jason nodded to the older man. “I felt the Defiant jump to slip-space while we were walking here. Anything we need to be aware of?”
“You felt that?” Crisstof asked, surprised. “Anyway, we’re departing the area as quickly as we can because of what your ship is carrying and who wants it for themselves. Captain Colleren is still on the bridge in case of an emergency, not to mention the conflict of interest she represents currently.” Crisstof was less than pleased that Jason had begun a relationship with his captain and was always sure to let him know through not-so-subtle passive aggressive barbs.
“Please tell me that you’ve just found out what it is that we’re carrying and this isn’t something you’ve been aware of for years and neglected to tell me,” Jason said. Crisstof immediately looked uncomfortable and Jason had his answer.
“I’ve suspected for some time that there was something unique about your ship, Captain,” the older man began. “However, I can assure you that I had not an inkling of just how special it really is. To be honest with you, if I had known the Phoenix carried a piece of the Key I would have instructed the Eshquarians to melt it down to scrap and find it while you were still in recovery.”
“I suppose I should appreciate your honesty,” Jason said sardonically. “You should know that we’ve searched that ship multiple times since this has started. We’re not even sure the encryption module is still even on her.”
“Perhaps my crews will have better luck,” Crisstof said. Jason narrowed his eyes speculatively.
“If you have anyone on the Phoenix at this moment, you had better get on your com, tell them to put anything they’ve touched back where they found it, and get the hell off my ship,” Jason said in a deadly quiet tone.
“Captain—”
“This is not a negotiation,” Jason said, never raising his voice. “You have ten seconds.”
Crisstof looked as angry as Jason had ever seen him, but he pulled out his com unit and gave a series of orders anyway.
“Perhaps—”
“This was an unforgivable breach of protocol and trust,” Jason cut him off again. “Let’s be very clear about our relationship so there aren’t any more of these … misunderstands. We do not work for you. You do not own the Phoenix. We are happy to provide you services as private contractors or advisors, but we do not fall under the command of you or any of your officers. Clear?”
Crisstof’s normally pale skin was shifting color as he tried to get his emotions back under control. “Clear,” he said, swallowing his pride.
During the exchange, Mazer had looked extremely uncomfortable. Not only had his Marines allowed Crisstof’s people onto Jason’s ship, but he would have had to contend with Crusher and Lucky if things had escalated too far in the small conference room.
“Now, let’s put that behind us,” Jason said, pulling out his com unit and keeping it discreetly under the table so he could operate it with his thumb. “What do you know of the Machine and the Key that we may, or may not, have all the pieces to?” Before Crisstof could answer, Mazer’s com went off. The Marine Captain read the message, looked at Jason, and then put the unit back away.
“Captain Reddix?” Crisstof said.
“One of my sergeants just informed me the ramp to the Phoenix raised and locked,” Mazer said uncomfortably.
“Jason, is this necessary?” Crisstof said in annoyance.
“For now,” Jason said. “Please continue.”
“I first became aware of the Machine, as you call it, over fifty years ago,” Crisstof began. “At first it was just wild stories from prospectors about a hulking beast in space that would destroy any ship that came too close. But later on there were more credible accounts from exploratory vessels who were able to get a quick slip-space com signal out before the ship was never heard from again.
“Legend has it that the ConFed even sent a full battleship group, that’s over half a squadron, to ascertain if the Machine was a threat or if it even existed. They also were never heard from again.”
“We’d heard about the ConFed expedition from Naleem El,” Jason said. “I assume you’ve read all about her from the files we’ve already sent.”
“I have,” Crisstof said. “While she suffered from borderline paranoia and obsession, she was likely one of the more knowledgeable experts in the field. It’s unfortunate she was killed in her escape attempt.”
“Yeah,” Jason lamented. “If she had just tried to trust us instead of attempting a double-cross she’d likely be here right now briefing you. I think her father was the instigator in that incident, however.”
“Really?”
“He wanted the ship back,” Jason shrugged. “He had even gone so far as to find an old first generation DL7 to fly around while he plotted kicking us off and flying away. Anyway, it’s not important. Go on.”
“I’m afraid there’s not much more to tell past what you already know,” Crisstof said. “I’ve got two teams of intel analysts scouring through those files and a tech team on standby to look over the P
hoenix, but without finding the last part of the Key we may have hit a dead end.”
“Does anybody actually know where the Machine is located?” Twingo asked.
“Not precisely,” Crisstof admitted.
“So this is all just an interesting academic exercise,” the engineer continued. “No matter how large the Machine may be, it is still an infinitesimally small object compared to the area of space that must be searched.”
“He’s right,” Jason said. “I’ve been hoping that the Key may also help guide us to the Machine, but that’s just speculation on my part.”
“There were some encrypted files in Naleem’s belongings,” Kage said. “I didn’t include them in the data dump we sent to the Defiant since I hadn’t bothered to slice into them yet. There could be something there.”
“Why haven’t you gotten to these already?” Jason asked, annoyed.
“You’ve had me playing secretary with all the hardcopy files,” Kage shot back. “I had planned on doing it once we landed here.”
“You can use our facilities,” Crisstof offered. “We have some of the most powerful mobile computers in the quadrant down in the Intel section.”
Jason hesitated at the offer. If the work was done on the Phoenix he would control the flow of information, but if it was done on the Defiant Crisstof would know the instant he did if the files contained anything useful.
“Go ahead and make copies of the files,” he told Kage. “Get with Crisstof’s intel people and get those files cracked as soon as possible. It might be nothing, but we need to know.” Crisstof nodded his appreciation, correctly interpreting the gesture as an olive branch from Jason.
“I’ll go get them,” Kage said, hopping out of his seat. Jason pulled his com unit back out so he could unlock and lower the rear ramp as Kage hurried out of the room.
“We’ll be back on the Phoenix,” Jason said. “Twingo and I will begin another search for the encryption module.” He ignored Twingo’s dramatic sigh and walked out of the conference room.
Omega Force 6: Secret of the Phoenix Page 14
