Alpha Fleet (Rebel Fleet Series Book 3)

by B. V. Larson

  He squirmed visibly. It did my heart good to see it.

  Glancing at Hagen and Samson, I noted that my XO was frowning. My old friend, however, was grinning ear-to-ear. He knew me better. He knew I was enjoying myself.

  Finally, after listening to Abrams wheedle and complain for a few minutes, I grew tired of the game and handed the circlet over. He ran off with it to his labs before I could change my mind again.

  Hagen and Samson headed to the upper decks, but I examined the other artifacts they’d brought back from the dead ship. I became aware of scrutiny by the only other person nearby—Lt. Rousseau.

  “Yes, Lieutenant?”

  “Nothing, sir.”

  “You were on a dangerous mission—one that was highly successful. I’d like to hear your thoughts.”

  She frowned, then nodded. “Very well. I think it was mean and counterproductive for you to mistreat Dr. Abrams that way.”

  This took me by surprise. First off, I didn’t think she’d noticed. Secondly, people rarely stood up for Abrams in my presence.

  “Mean, huh? How so?”

  “You know how driven he is to experience alien hardware. You didn’t want the artifact yourself, so there was no purpose in toying with him.”

  “That’s where you’re wrong, Rousseau.”

  “How so?”

  “Have you heard of the Nomads? The one named Godwin in particular?”

  She shrugged. “Vaguely. I know you’ve had odd personal relationships with many aliens.”

  That line made me blink. Could she be complaining about my girlfriend, Mia? I couldn’t think of anyone else she might be referring to.

  “I am experienced with xeno-behaviors, if that’s what you mean,” I said. “Teasing Dr. Abrams amounted to a purposeful test.”

  She put her hands on her hips. “Really? What did you get out of it?”

  “Information. The Nomads have the power to appear as other people—every time we see one he’s in various human forms, at least. To make sure Abrams wasn’t compromised, I gave him a behavioral test.”

  “Really? You made sure he wasn’t an alien? How’d you do that?”

  “Mannerisms. Behavioral twitches gave him away.”

  “Gave him away…? So, he’s an—?”

  “No,” I said. “He’s clean. He acted just the way Abrams would have if I’d hinted I might not give up the circlet. Threats, whining, outrage—it all fit his usual personality. The key to understanding a person’s character is in their behavioral patterns.”

  She blinked at me, and slowly her face transformed, becoming prettier as it went. Her hands came off her hips, and she lowered them to her sides.

  “So… you think an alien might be aboard our ship?”

  Now, we were getting into uncharted territory. I’d been bullshitting about Abrams—I’d just wanted to irritate him a little. But now I couldn’t back off of my story. I was the captain, after all. I had to play it all the way.

  “Um… it’s possible,” I admitted, thinking of Godwin’s last visit. “Something strange is going on out here, you have to admit that.”

  She nodded slowly. “Thank you for sharing that, Captain,” she said, heading past me and into the passageway. “I’ll be sure to keep this to myself.”

  “Yes… it isn’t general knowledge.”

  As she brushed by me, I sensed the heat coming up from her spacesuit into my face. She’d taken off her helmet, and she’d spent tense hours in space. Her scent was hot, but not unpleasant. For some reason, I found it intriguing.

  My eyes lingered on her form as she walked down the passageway. Despite her suit being basically a bulky protective bag of fabric, she seemed quite feminine in her movements.

  My mind wandered for a few seconds. She’d probably head to the showers next. I couldn’t help but wish I had an excuse to join her.

  Giving myself a shake, I followed Abrams’ trail to his lair instead.

  He’d already set up what they called a “glove box” and inserted the circlet. It was a large box made of lead-impregnated glass designed to handle hazardous materials.

  With his arms thrust inside the long gloves, he handled the ring delicately, connecting wires that led to a variety of test equipment.

  Stepping up and looking over his shoulder with interest, I gave him no warning of my presence.

  “Hey,” I barked loudly. “Any breakthroughs yet?”

  He jumped, and his glasses slid on his nose to hang askew. Inside the glove box, the circlet toppled to the bottom of it with a rattling sound.

  “Good God, man!” he complained. “Of course there aren’t any results! I only just got hold of the thing!”

  I sniffed. “All right, Doc. I’ll check back soon and often. Carry on.”

  Walking out, I grinned as he carefully set the circlet up again. He muttered unpleasant comments under his breath in a steady stream, and it did my heart good to hear them.

  =36=

  Analysis teams all over my ship churned for two solid days after the away-team had returned. Devilfish was as much a vessel of science as of war, so there were nearly a hundred folks with doctoral degrees in something prowling our decks.

  Generally, the overload of nerds had seemed like a waste of O2 to my regular crew, but they were showing their value today. They analyzed everything that came back from the Terrapinian ship. Air samples, remains samples, equipment samples—the works.

  Data flowed into the computers and the AI did most of the raw briefings for me. Higher up the food-chain, human teams were working on assembling the picture of what had happened over there into something coherent.

  “So there’s nothing toxic in the air other than smoke—that’s confirmed?” I asked the AI.

  “Correct,” it said patiently.

  “How did the dead ones die, then?”

  “There were a variety of causes. Physical trauma, smoke inhalation, and injuries sustained in combat.”

  “You mean from the shockwave? When the gravity bomb hit?”

  “Insufficient evidence.”

  “But you said physical trauma and signs of combat.”

  “That’s correct. Most of them were either beaten or strangled to death.”

  I don’t know why, but that thought chilled me. The idea of hundreds of beings all going berserk and beating each other to death—

  “Hold on,” I said to the AI. “End session.”

  Wheeling around, I beckoned for Chang to follow me. He did so without a word. He was heading up an analysis team, as he was a medical doctor. The only man of science in my crew who’d spent an extended time in space among the Kher.

  “Sounds like someone jolted their syms to me,” I said to him.

  He nodded grimly. “I’ve come to the same conclusion. They appear to have died killing one another.”

  My eyes narrowed as I turned it over in my mind. “We found a Nomad circlet—on their bridge. We also found evidence that a Nomad had teleported in and out. Possibly, some of the Terrapinians went with him—or them.”

  “Let me postulate a theory,” Chang said. “What if your friend, Godwin—”

  “He’s not my damned friend. He’s like a ghost that haunts me.”

  “Sorry sir—an important distinction. In any case, Godwin knows about the syms. Godwin knows how to move among us undetected—why couldn’t he do the same thing Abrams device did to the Terrapinians back at Mars Station?”

  “Right…” I said. “I’ve been thinking along those lines. Worse, that circlet of his—he could erase memories with it.”

  “More mental manipulation. Influencing emotion through the syms, memories through the circlet…”

  The more I thought about it, the more it seemed likely the Nomads, or someone with similar powers, had done this.

  Armed with new information, I headed down to Abrams’ lab to confront him. He was holding a meeting with a score of lab coats when I got there.

  “…entirely unsatisfactory,” he declared to them. “T
his team is being downgraded. No, no—I don’t want to hear any whining. This circlet has been in our possession for nearly forty-eight hours, and we haven’t gotten back so much as a blip from it.”

  I stood with my arms crossed in the hatchway until his team slunk away. They looked dejected, and they grumbled as they passed me.

  “Doc?” I said. “Have a moment?”

  He threw his hands high in a dramatic flourish.

  “Why not? Everyone else has pestered me and failed in every particular today. Feel free to join in, Captain Blake.”

  “Thanks.”

  Walking up to the much more elaborate setup he had going now, one in which the circlet appeared to be enclosed in a compact particle accelerator, I picked up an instrument and toyed with it.

  “What is it, Blake?” Abrams asked, sounding pained.

  “Are those calculations ready?”

  “What?”

  “For a quick exit. I don’t want to wait around if we see the encircling gravity bombs begin to fall.”

  He waved at me dismissively and snatched the instrument I was toying with from my hand. He set it back on the workbench and fixed me with a level stare.

  “Of course,” he said. “I’ve run the calculations a dozen times personally. If any drones approach, they will be detected. We’ll have ample time to escape.”

  “Assuming they take as long to fall on our heads as they did the first time.”

  He blinked at me. “Your usage of the word ‘fall’ is incorrect in this instance—”

  “Right—whatever, Doc. Let’s talk about the circlet. I take it you’ve gotten nothing out of it?”

  “Nothing. No energy pulses. No indication whatsoever that it’s anything other than a piece of metal.”

  “Did you try X-raying it?”

  He rolled his eyes at me. “Oh no, that never occurred to me!” he said sarcastically.

  “Okay, okay. So, you did your best and failed. That’s okay, not everyone can figure out an alien mystery in two days.”

  His face reddened. “I want to try it on a human subject,” he said.

  “Hmm… we went over that, Doc. I can’t risk—”

  “The memories of a crewman? How about a volunteer?”

  “It wouldn’t be right. What if it gives them total amnesia? What if it drives them mad?”

  His tongue darted out, slid over his thin lips, and then vanished again.

  “I’ll do it myself,” he said.

  I stared at him, shaking my head. “No way. You’re much too valuable for that.”

  This pleased him, and I realized I’d been tricked into giving him a compliment. He relaxed a little and even smiled with the left corner of his mouth.

  “You really think it would be worthwhile?” I asked, staring at the circlet.

  “More than that. It’s a necessity. We can’t figure out what this thing does without attempting to use it.”

  I rubbed at my jaw lightly. “You could be right… but I’ve got another plan.”

  Turning to leave, I heard Abrams raise his voice. “It won’t work.”

  “What won’t work?”

  “You’ll never get what you want out of Godwin, even if he does come back to haunt you again. He’s too smart for that. I think he’s been outsmarting you all along.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “The Terrapinian Captain said he was after Godwin, didn’t he?”

  “Yes.”

  “And Godwin has been following you. Once we got out here, and we followed their ship for a time, Godwin seems to have preempted the bounty hunters.”

  “You mean… he struck first?”

  Abrams nodded.

  “That is possible… I just don’t know what else I could have done.”

  “You could have let them go home. You could have left them with their honor and not shamed them into staying here.”

  I frowned at that, and I thought about it. Was Abrams right? Had I gotten the Terrapinians killed? Or was he just tweaking me now, the way I liked to tweak him?

  I looked at him, and I decided he wasn’t just trying to make me feel bad. He wasn’t like that. He wanted to feel smarter than everyone else. That’s all that moved him to do anything.

  There was a quiet moment in the lab. Abrams turned back to his tests and fiddled with settings. But I could see the defeat in his slumped shoulders. He was going through the motions. He couldn’t get the circlet to perform any tricks—not without wearing it.

  * * *

  The next morning—it was very early in the morning—I awoke with Mia’s fuzzy ears in my face. I was having a pleasant dream, but the universe had other plans for my day.

  The ship’s klaxons began to wail.

  It was no drill. I knew that right off, and not only because there weren’t any drills scheduled for today. I rolled out of bed and stumbled around the cabin, bumping into things and pulling on my uniform.

  Both my sym and my traditional intercom were demanding attention. I assured everyone who cared that I was on my way to the bridge.

  Commander Hagen’s was the one call I took and conversed with him directly, without just giving an instant affirmative response through my sym.

  “Captain?” he said urgently. “The mines are falling.”

  That was all I needed to hear. “Open a rift immediately.”

  “The generators are already winding up, sir.”

  I could hear them now as I strode down passages and bunched my legs before shooting up vertical, gravity-free tubes. The generators had started off with a deep thrum, but they were winding up now to a higher note every second.

  Reaching the bridge, I felt the guns begin to swivel and fire. Mia wasn’t there operating the weapons station—instead I saw one of Hagen’s hand-picked women performing the task. She had a rough look, and she was only mildly attractive compared to the rest. Her hands worked the controls like she meant business, and the ship shuddered as her guns lashed out toward the incoming targets.

  “How many targets do we have?” I demanded of Hagen.

  He turned to me, his face whiter than I’d ever seen it. He looked sicker now than he had when I’d beaten him down to the ground in the final exercise of my seminar back on Earth.

  “As far as we can tell sir—it’s all of them.”

  “Helm,” I said, stepping up to where Lt. Rousseau sat at her post. “The second that rift opens, you get us the hell out of here.”

  “Will do, Captain,” she said, sounding out of breath. Her eyes never left her console. She didn’t even glance at me, and I was glad for her dedication.

  After taking command formally from Hagen, I sat in the center of his team. There was no time to switch the watch now. I figured we’d just have to chance this maneuver with a green deck crew.

  No one talked much other than to relay information. Sensors tracked dozens of object—then hundreds. They were all moving toward us.

  The gunner worked her station with consummate skill. I was impressed. Mia perhaps had a more natural aptitude and superior speed, but this woman was smooth and practiced. She zeroed in on one target at a time, destroying it with mechanical efficiency. The fact that it was hopeless never impinged. She destroyed a score of mines before the rift appeared, all at great range. Quite possibly, she’d bought us a dozen more seconds during which we could freely draw breath.

  The gunner was benefiting from our superior sensory technology, I could see that right off. Abrams was to be praised. No matter how irritating he might be, if we survived this experience, I knew I owed him a beer.

  Suddenly, Devilfish lurched into motion, swinging her nose downward and toward our port side. A spiraling rift had formed there, nearby, but not directly ahead of us.

  “You’re spoiling my aim!” the gunner said, making her complaint sound bitter and heartfelt.

  “Can’t help it,” Dalton told her. “The rift didn’t appear squarely ahead of us.”

  “That’s not—” her words cut off.


  I never did find out what she was concerned about, because we plunged into the spiral of luminescence and left normal space.

  Behind us, still visible as if through a circular window of blackness, I saw the Terrapinian ship. It was struck repeatedly.

  The first mine made the shields spark and flash. The second strike caused that same shield to buckle and die like a snuffed flame, but still, the ship was unscathed.

  That all changed a fraction of a second later. More and more mines rained down. The ship was utterly destroyed as I watched.

  And then, as if it had all been a horrid dream, the iris in space behind us faded, and a new one opened up directly ahead. We plunged through, helpless to stop ourselves. We were committed now.

  It occurred to me that I hadn’t even bothered to ask anyone where the new rift went. I wasn’t sure that it mattered, but I felt that as the captain, it was something I really ought to know.

  =37=

  “What the hell is this?” I demanded as the holoprojector began to display our surroundings. “This isn’t Alpha Centauri!”

  Alpha Centauri looked like a single point in the sky from the perspective of Earth, but it was really a triple-star system. Two of the stars, Alpha and Beta Centauri orbited one another in a tight embrace. They were both yellow stars like our sun, and they had a third companion that swung far out, a dim red dwarf.

  None of this relationship appeared on the holoprojector. There was only one star, and it was big, white and hot.

  “I… I don’t know, sir,” Commander Hagen said. “Navigator? Are these the coordinates you were given?”

  “Yes, Commander. There was no deviation, no mistake. We used Rigel as a beacon this time, as Dr. Abrams suggested. I don’t know what happened.”

  “We scattered again, that’s what,” I said. “Badly. Worse than before.”

  “But sir,” Commander Hagen said, eyeing the layout of the system as it grew ever more distinct. “The odds are low we’d land in another star system. If we’d scattered, we should have—”

  “It doesn’t matter,” I snapped irritably. I took a dubious glance at the rift as it still smoldered on the screen behind us, knowing it was a lousy option to use it again right now.