Beyond the Starport Adventure (Bullet Book 1)

by Richard Fairbairn

  Silverman would have recognised Orion’s belt in the night sky from Earth. He remembered, too, that Sirius was the brightest star in the night sky. But the only other constellations he would have recognised were Cassiopeia and the Big Dipper. Otherwise, the star filled sky was just a bright and beautiful mystery he’d enjoyed losing himself in. Sirius looked very bright and very close. Quinn was smiling and Matt thought of his father for a moment, remembering their planned trip. They’d called it The Starport Adventure. All of their trivial, insignificant and brilliant trips together had been referred to as adventures. Matt found himself smiling too. As a child, they’d been adventures enough for him. He looked towards the robot and opened his mouth to speak, but Cass Linn sounded first.

  “My father referred to this place as the end of the arrow,” Her voice had lost its disturbing buzzing and electronic quality. Once more, the robot sounded like a living person, “Oss Linn transported us here before the ship made impact with father’s mountain.”

  “Oss Linn? You mean the ship itself?” Quinn asked.

  “My sister. She is a part of the ship, yes. For the moment it appears that she was destroyed. But it might be possible for me to repair or reinstate her. I am not sure of the extent of her damage. My own systems are failing,” The voice seemed to tremble, “I do not know if I will… live… or not.”

  “Where is this place?” Matt interrupted, “What do you mean by the end of the arrow?”

  “It’s a place of religious significance,” The robot said, “That’s all I know.”

  Matt was standing beside Quinn. The two men exchanged glances. Quinn shrugged his shoulders and shook his head.

  “I always thought it looked like an arrow – kind of,” He admitted, “Can you show us where we are?”

  Cass Linn did not speak. She adjusted the view screen until Orion’s belt filled it. But the arrangement of stars appeared as they’d never seen before. Instead of three stars there were five. And each star was as bright as the next, standing out clearly against their more distant neighbours. Just above the tip of the arrow there was another star. It was smaller than the arrow stars, but still clearly visible. A red target appeared on the screen and it quickly centred on the smaller star, flashing.

  “This is where we are,” Cass Linn said, “We are at the end of the arrow.”

  “What star is that?” Quinn asked quietly, “Robot… I mean, Cass Linn… what is this star?”

  “It has no name,” Cass Linn replied almost immediately.

  “What does that mean?” Silverman said, “Jim? Where are we?”

  Quinn smiled enormously. He squeezed Silverman’s shoulder. Matt looked into Quinn’s eyes for much too long a moment, hypnotised by the energy there. He couldn’t help smiling back, even though he did not know why.

  “What?” Silverman laughed, “What are you smiling at?”

  “We’ve gone where no man has gone before,” Quinn kept smiling.

  Silverman stopped laughing. His face suddenly became grim and fearful.

  “You’re kidding,” He said, “Right?”

  2195AD - USS Neil Armstrong.

  “USS Neil Armstrong calling Justice Six. This is earth vessel Neil Armstrong calling Enrilean spacecraft Justice Six. We come in peace and do not want to fight you. We are on our way to pick up survivors from the vessel you attacked. If you make any aggressive action towards us, we will destroy you.”

  There wasn’t a reply. O’Rourke hadn’t expected one. Or had he? He wasn’t sure. Now, standing in the centre of the pale grey bridge room, he wondered what to do next.

  “Order them to recall their fighters,” He commanded, “Or they’ll be shot down. How soon until they’re within range?”

  “Ten minutes, sir,” Cutter replied, “Comms, you heard the captain.”

  “Aye, exec.”

  Cutter sidestepped a pace closer to the captain. They were both now standing together in the centre of the small room. The bridge crew were busy with their tasks. The tactical station prepared to engage the rapidly approaching Enrilean fighter ships. The communications officer continued to hail the large alien vessel. The engineering, sensors and power stations were double staffed. The bridge was rarely this crowded, but everything was working the way that it should.

  “War’s about to happen,” O’Rourke commented quietly. “Do you think so?” Only Cutter could hear him and the raven haired executive officer nodded sombrely. But he frowned pensively at the same time.

  “I hope not,” John said after a thought, “I hope they’re testing our resolve.”

  “Like the Drake?” O’Rourke grunted, “They’ll find our resolve packs a bit more punch.”

  Cutter didn’t say anything. He watched the screen. Fifteen small specks of red light. They were approaching the ship faster than anything that man had ever put into space. The Justice six was no longer approaching the earth ship. But it had settled between the USS Drake’s wreckage and the approaching and more heavily armed Neil Armstrong. The Enrilean ship’s position made sensor readings of the USS Drake impossible. There was no way to know what was happening to the wreck – or if anyone was still alive. But Neil Armstrong’s engines were already beyond full power and the ship had reached its top speed.

  “They’re gonna find we got something nasty in store for them,” Strange’s mouth stayed open after he spoke, “All our weapons systems are ready, Captain. We got a surprise for them. They’re gonna be…”

  “Thanks Chris,” O’Rourke nodded, “So we’re going to blow these fighters out of space. When?”

  Strange shrugged. “Minutes…”

  “Alright then. Now I don’t want any mistakes. I don’t want any chances, heroics or anything but a reliable and positive outcome of this situation,” O’Rourke waited for each of the bridge crew to give a sign that they’d heard and understood him. “Good. Now let’s get this done.”

  The four minutes passed very quickly. The approaching Enrilean fighters did not seem to realise that they were moving within range of the large carrier’s plasma cannons. If they did, O’Rourke thought, they showed no sign of it. If anything, the fighters increased their speed.

  “The first group of enemy fighters are coming into range sir,” Strange reported.

  “Open fire,” O’Rourke growled, “Ion cannons port and starboard.”

  The first wave of Enrilean fighters could not have avoided the invisible burst of energy from the earth ship’s powerful weapons. Four of the fighters were vaporised in the first blast. The remaining fighters began to break formation, splitting into three groups. One group continued straight towards the carrier. The other two peeled off the port and starboard. The Ion cannon recharged quickly. The Enrilean fighters were still a full sixty eight seconds from being able to fire their own weapons. A second blast from the Ion cannon endured that the lead group would never get the chance.

  “Eight enemy craft have been destroyed,” Sensor Operations Officer John Deepblue’s bored monotone sounded, “The others have split formation.”

  “Stay with them,” O’Rourke ordered, “Weapons free. Bring them down with the main guns. Use the railguns if they get into range. When will we be within their weapons range?”

  “Fifty six seconds,” Strange replied smartly, “Their railguns are powerful, sir. We’d do well to avoid taking any hits from them.”

  “Sir. Fresh contact in sector nine eight five,” Deepblue interrupted, “Another group of fighters coming at us. Three small craft – they’re fighters too, sir.”

  The three new targets on USS Enterprise’s sensors belonged to Grid Fannchin and his wingmen. The Imperial command had ordered Fannchin and his men to join with the first wave of fighters. Fannchin watched as the large enemy ship systematically destroyed each of the ships he’d been told to meet rendezvous with. In less than a minute there would be nothing left of the nineteen fighters or their pilots. Just scorched wreckage in space. Imperial command had given odd, dangerous instructions. They’d specified a precise
course that Fannchin realised would mean his and his wing’s destruction. Disobeying an Imperial order was an offense punishable by death, but continuing towards the Justice Six on the same course would also mean death. He closed his eyes and grunted to himself. Then he made his decision and acted.

  “New contacts are changing course. Looks like these guys are a little bit wiser than their friends.”

  “Sensop observations… confirmed,” Strange’s voice was haunting and cold, “New contacts staying clear of our Ion cannons. Look like these guys are a little more interested in their lives.”

  O’Rourke did not answer. The new craft were keeping their distance. And there were only three of them. Of the nineteen fighters that were still surging towards his ship only six remained. A few moments passed and then there were only two.

  “Perhaps they can’t change direction at that speed,” O’Rourke commented, more to himself than anyone else in the bridge.

  “New contact, sir,” Deepblue said, “A larger vessel moving towards us.”

  “How big is it? Will it get between us and the wormhole?” O’Rourke barked.

  “I can’t get an accurate reading on its size, sir, but definitely not a fighter. Could be a close packed group of fighters, but I don’t think so. Appears to be a ship roughly the same configuration as the Justice Six. Entering sector seven golf and moving at about Mark seven. Not as fast as the fighters, but getting there.”

  “The wormhole, man?” O’Rourke snapped.

  “I can’t say for certain, sir, but it’s heading straight towards us,” He hesitated, “Yes, I’d guess that they’re going to get between us and the wormhole at some point.”

  O’Rourke frowned, remembering his orders.

  “Remaining enemy fighters have been destroyed, sir,” Strange reported, “Nineteen ships gone, sir. And they didn’t break formation.”

  O’Rourke rubbed his chin. He exhaled hard, but there was some relief.

  “Justice six?”

  “Just sitting there, Captain,” Strange shrugged, “They’re not moving.”

  “Alright. Engines to emergency power. I want us at maximum speed. And keep track of those fighters. If they come within range of our weapons I want them blown to smithereens.”

  “You can count on me, sir,” Strange said.

  Behind the USS Neil Armstrong, the Enrilean warship Devastation was accelerating to its top speed. The powerful nuclear detonations produced by its blast drive gave Devastation the greatest top speed of any ship in the Enrilean fleet. Within two minutes the ship would be moving at almost nine tenths the speed of light and almost twice as fast as the slower USS Neil Armstrong. But Devastation was still three hours away from catching up with the Earth ship. In less than ninety minutes the Armstrong would reach the Drake and the rescue operation would begin. The Enrilean warship Justice Six was waiting, but more and more of the Armstrong’s officers were beginning to hope that Drake had struck their enemy a deadly blow before succumbing. O’Rourke hoped that there would be no more cause for bloodshed. But the situation had already gone beyond his hopes for peace.

  The alien destruction of the unarmed Spirit of the Future and the unprovoked attack on the Drake were a clear message from the Enrileans. They were not interested in peace. O’Rourke’s science officer, Commander Kevin Spacey, was still listening to the recorded radio transmissions from the alien worlds. Spacey and his team were still working deep inside the big ship. Listening to broadcasts, analysing data. Sending it all back to Earth. His first impressions of the Enrileans had been that they were a highly religious, warmongering and aggressive race. The more time he and his officers spent working on the collected data, the worse it seemed to get. The Enrilean people were ruled by a single quasi-religious Empire. Spacey still hadn’t given much detail about the nature of the Enrilean rulers, or their belief system. But he’d used the word “dangerous” when O’Rourke had asked him to give a quick, first impression. The Enrilean empire seemed to occupy an entire city. It was situated in a highly industrialised area in the north east coastline of the largest continent on the planet. Errilas was a planet much like earth with a population of over 4 billion – under half the population of Earth. Strangest of all was that there seemed to be only one language used throughout the entire Enrilean Empire. That language, of course, being English.

  “More fighters coming at us from the second planet,” Strange reported, “Two groups of contacts. I can’t tell you how many individual targets there are, but they’re too far away to be any real concern.”

  Relathon. The second alien world and source of most of the radio broadcasts. Spacey seemed certain that Relathon was home to an entirely different species, despite the fact that the broadcasts were also in English. But that wasn’t completely true. There had been a handful of brief, weaker, transmissions that had seemed garbled or encrypted. On closer inspection these transmissions were revealed to be in another, unknown, language. A BURST message containing these transmissions was on its way to the Jupiter listening post. O’Rourke and Spacey both believed these transmissions were somehow important – but Armstrong didn’t have the manpower necessary to work on deciphering alien languages. O’Rourke, bringing his thoughts back in focus, reminded himself that he didn’t have the time to worry about that either. Movement from one of the monitoring screens caught his eye. One of the long range sensors had locked onto the three fighters that were staying beyond reach of the Ion cannons. O’Rourke stared at the blips and rubbed his heavy jaw.

  “I want Connah and Steed to intercept those three fighters. Send Sulu and Burrows too and put a backup team on standby. I don’t want those three fighters to get where they’re going.”

  “Reason, sir?” Cutter asked.

  “I don’t know,” O’Rourke frowned, “Call it an old man’s intuition. But I’m a lot more worried about three ships that tried to avoid being destroyed than I am about a couple dozen that fly straight into our guns.”

  2195AD - Enrilean “Dart” Fighter Group.

  Grid Fannchin and his two wingmen had taken a long, parabolic course that would take them towards the Justice Six whilst keeping them out of range of the alien ship’s long range weapons. Imperial Command had ordered Fannchin to attack the alien ship head on. Three times the orders had been sent. Fannchin wondered if he was being ordered to his death – for what he’d seen on the not so dead world of Crantarr. He thumbed through a bunch of images that the automatic camera had taken once he’d switched it on. The first was a blurred shot of the strange silver grey craft that he’d been pursuing. He adjusted some of the computer controls but couldn’t bring any definition to this image. Unfortunately, it was the only picture of the Aston Martin that his fighter had managed to capture. The next image showed the rust coloured Crantarr mountains. He hadn’t noticed it at the time, but there seemed to be a strange rock formation at the top of the photo. The next picture gave a clearer view and Fannchin realised that he was looking at the edge of a massive crater. He thumbed through two scrambled images before arriving at yet another clear shot of the crater’s edge. But on this image it was quite obvious that Crantarr had once been inhabited. Hundreds of miles from the crater’s edge lay an enormous city. Larger, even, that the Empire’s Throne City. Every photograph showed a dead, cold landscape. There were no trees or vegetation anywhere to be seen. The closer parts of the city showed that the buildings were crumbling and ruined. Ravaged by nature.

  “That was some powerful strangeness,” Fannchinn’s wingman said, “Did you see the cities?”

  “Roger that,” Fannchinn replied, “I have about thirty six photos of the planet surface.”

  “Sir, you know that’s in violation of the Imperial…”

  “Affirmative,” Fannchinn snapped, “I know that. But we were ordered to pursue into the atmosphere and that’s what we did.”

  “With all due respect, sir, we weren’t asked to perform any reconnaissance of the planet surface.”

  Fannchinn licked his lips. Hobd
inn was five years his junior and a staunch Crystallist. He was also a stickler for rules and regulations – particularly those concerning the Empire and the Crystal Church. His beliefs had helped him move swiftly through the officer training school and had earned him a quiet distaste amongst some of his fellow pilots. Fannchinn had never concerned himself too much with Hobdinn’s religious beliefs or with his strict adherence to the rulebook. He’d always accepted that, with his wingman, there was always a sense that he was being monitored. He’d found it almost challenging - mostly. Other times, like the present, he’d felt like blasting Hobdinn into pieces himself.

  “There was life there,” Fannchin snapped irritably, “Despite what your crazy religion tells you.”

  There was a long pause. Fannchinn regretted immediately what he had said. He wondered if the Imperial Command could have heard them. Of course, it didn’t matter. Hobdinn would include everything in his report – including heretical comments uttered in anger by his commanding officer. Fannchinn shrugged to himself. Did it really matter? Imperial Command seemed to be doing its best to ensure that none of them survived. For the fourth time now an order to proceed directly towards the enemy spacecraft was received. Imperial Command was ordering him to die. Because of what they’d seen on Crantarr. He wasn’t even sure what he’d seen that could be so damning. Most Enrileans believed that artefacts of the civilisation that had existed there still remained. It was written that the Crystal Warriors had destroyed every living thing on the planet

  “The scriptures do not indicate whether or not… prehistoric life was present on Crantarr,” Hobdinn said eventually, his tone hostile and defensive, “Nowhere is it written that Crantarr was a dead world.”

  “Damn it, your book tells you that the Crystal Warriors flattened the whole planet! They laid the whole planet to waste. So what’s that city doing down there? What’s anything doing down there if your so-called Gods destroyed the whole world?”

  There was silence. Fannchinn realised that they’d drifted closer to the enemy ship. His anger with Hobdinn had distracted him. He gently eased the fighter to the left, increasing the distance from the large carrier once more. His small craft’s sensors were not sophisticated enough to pick up the fighters that accelerated from the ship towards him. For the moment he was concentrating on the two fighters on either side of him. Ahead, Justice Six was getting closer. He remembered that Admiral Hazer Justi was in command of the Justice. Jaxx was one of the most ardent followers of Crystallism left in the fleet. They’d met once, in Throne city, long years ago. Jaxx had been grotesquely disfigured, Grid recalled. The story of Grid’s disfigurement was not widely known, but there were rumours of a failed suicide attempt following his capture by the Relathons shortly before war was declared. It was well known that Jaxx loathed the Relathons. A decade ago, he’d openly campaigned for the entire race to be exterminated. The Emperor and Jaxx were old friends. Grid looked to his right. Hobdinn’s ship was there, glinting in the bright sunlight. He inhaled slowly, his chest and arms quivering with the realisation of the danger he was in. But there was no way to make it right. There was nothing he could say to Hobdinn, now, that wouldn’t be an obvious reversal of his earlier comments. Instead, he increased the power to the fighter’s engines and surged ahead. Meeting up with the Justice Six was probably going to be… unpleasant. But he’d always been the kind to get things over with sooner rather than later. In the end, it was the soft sounding voice of the Imperial controller that brought him back to the present.