The Lost Starship

by Vaughn Heppner

“That’s all past us now,” she said. “We’re finally on the same page. That’s what counts.”

  Cook stared at his big hands.

  “Sir…” Maddox said.

  The Lord High Admiral raised his head. “Son, no one on our side can know what you’re doing. That’s another reason you’re the perfect candidate.”

  “By no one,” Maddox said, “you mean no one other than the brigadier and you.”

  The Lord High Admiral’s features grew even graver. With his eyes fixed on Maddox, the old man nodded.

  The captain felt a stir in his heart. Maybe he should have felt betrayed at their suggestion. Instead, a thrill raced through him. Perhaps he had been born for this very purpose. The Lord High Admiral was saying that he wanted him—Captain Maddox—to save the human race. That was an impossible burden. Yet, that was also a goal to fire a man’s imagination. It meant that what he did was vital. It meant that he was important. He mattered in the grand scheme of things. Cook and O’Hara trusted him. In a way, they were like his parents, asking him to save the family.

  “Yes,” Maddox said. “I accept the challenge.”

  “I haven’t told you the rest,” Cook said.

  “I think I already know, sir. You mean to fool the New Men, or their operatives here. That means I will have to act as a fugitive from justice. I will be on the run. In Intelligence parlance, I will be out in the cold.”

  “I told you he’s sharp,” O’Hara said proudly.

  “One thing troubles me,” Maddox said.

  “Yes?” Cook asked.

  “You can’t just be sending me out there on a rumor. The operation is too important. That means you have facts about this system, not just old stories.”

  “You’re right,” Cook said. “Son…there’s a crazy genius out there, half mad explorer and half compiler of ancient secrets. His name is Professor Ludendorff, and we have some of his notes. Ludendorff claims to have made it to the star system in question. Even more importantly, he says he saw the sentinel and measured a few of its abilities. He says it isn’t just big, but claims the vessel is three times the size of a Gettysburg-class battleship.”

  “That’s massive,” Maddox said.

  “There’s more. Ludendorff says he studied a few of the wrecked hulks. By examining areas of damage, he claims the sentinel fired some sort of neutron beam. I don’t know if you’re aware, Captain, but our scientists say such a weapon is impossible. If one could develop it, though, that beam would quickly overload our present shields. It couldn’t slice through them like the New Men’s weapon. What the neutron beam would likely do, however, is bypass regular armor. It would hit the inner systems with devastating power. If that wasn’t enough, the professor claims a shield flickered into place over the sentinel on two occasions. The second time, he had his instruments running. The shield must have used dampeners, increasing its strength compared to our shields and changing its complexion. There are reasons to believe this shield would hold up against the New Men’s beam. That would give the sentinel a deadly advantage against our enemies, giving us a tactical edge, maybe enough to win fleet actions.”

  “I’d like to talk to this professor,” Maddox said. “Where is he now?”

  Cook shook his head. “We wish we knew.”

  “Do the New Men have him?”

  The Lord High Admiral raised his hands. “He’s lost. That’s all that matters for now. We have a thick book of his notes. We have also located one of his former assistants.”

  “Where?”

  “On the prison planet Loki Prime,” Cook said. “It turns out she’s amassed quite a criminal record.”

  “What’s the assistant’s name?”

  “Doctor Dana Rich,” Cook said. “Among her many talents, she’s a clone thief and computer systems specialist.”

  “This is slim evidence to use, some madman’s notes and a criminal’s testimony.”

  “The truth, son, is that we haven’t spoken to her. At this point, we’re going off Professor Ludendorff’s notes alone. We also have reasons to believe he’s not as mad as advertised.”

  “If Ludendorff was there, why didn’t he board the sentinel himself?” Maddox asked.

  “He didn’t have those on his crew who he considered as the right people.”

  “What is that supposed to mean?”

  The Lord High Admiral reached down, taking a briefcase from beside his chair. He set it on his knees, clicked it open and extracted a folder.

  That’s quaint, Maddox thought. Why isn’t he handing me a reader?

  “I’m told you have an excellent memory,” Cook said.

  “Nearly photographic, sir,” Maddox said.

  “Read these files. Because of our fear of being compromised, it’s better if you gather these people on the run than if we send them to you. I suspect you’ll find they are an unusual group. There’s a reason for that. Each of them mentally matches the professor’s requirements.”

  Maddox looked up.

  “Let me rephrase,” Cook said. “Ludendorff believed the sentinel will only accept certain types of individuals.”

  “How did he reach such a conclusion?”

  Instead of answering, Cook checked his wrist chronometer. “We’re almost out of time, I’m afraid. You should know that your sergeant is already on a penal ship heading for Loki Prime. He will be sent down by pod in the area where Dana Rich is believed to live.”

  “Believed?” Maddox asked.

  “If we searched her out ourselves, we’re afraid the New Men would learn too much about our plan. They might beat us to her. That cannot be allowed to happen.”

  “I’m supposed to break her and Riker out on my own?” Maddox asked.

  The Lord High Admiral nodded.

  “Sir,” Maddox said. “No one escapes off a Commonwealth prison planet, particularly not Loki Prime.”

  “There’s a first time for everything,” Cook said. He put his meaty fingers into a pocket, taking out a small disk. He handed it to Maddox. “Those are the codes you’ll need to the prison planet orbitals, Loki System satellites and the location of a fast Patrol scout orbiting the moon. I think you’ll find it’s a unique little vessel.”

  Maddox nodded instead of laughing in their faces. Then he flipped open the folder and began to read the first file. He didn’t like what he found. Keith Maker, an ex-strikefighter ace with a serious drinking problem. How did a pilot like that have the right mental qualities? Maddox decided not to worry about it now. Instead, he kept reading. He would remember the facts and mull them over later.

  “By the way,” Cook said. “You’ll need a topflight navigator who knows her way around in deep space.”

  “Yes, sir,” Maddox said.

  “I’m giving you Lieutenant Noonan.”

  Maddox looked up. Hadn’t the woman been through enough already? During the meeting, she’d looked worn down. Despite his gut feeling that this was a bad idea, he kept his opinion to himself.

  “The lieutenant’s career is in ruins,” Cook said. Perhaps the Lord High Admiral sensed Maddox’s unease about the woman. “By her quick thinking and actions, she gave us a rare window of opportunity. Even so, too many Star Watch officers view her retreat through the Laumer-Point as cowardice in the face of the enemy. This will give her a chance to redeem herself. I think she’s earned that.”

  Maddox couldn’t very well refuse the Lord High Admiral. Clearing his throat, the captain asked, “Did she request this assignment?”

  “After she learned that her brainwave patterns matched our needs, yes, she did,” Cook said.

  Maddox kept his frown inward. This was getting stranger by the moment. “I suspect that means you told her some of the broader picture.”

  “Will that be a problem?” Cook asked.

  The Lord High Admiral’s question surprised Maddox. He took the opening. “She’s not an intelligence officer, sir. She may have already compromised the operation with her bold recounting of the battle.”

  The old
er, bigger man leaned forward and his eyes radiated intensity. “Then we’d better get started, Captain, before the competition catches on.”

  Maddox realized he didn’t have a choice in the matter. Nodding, he looked back down at his folder and continued to read.

  -7-

  Lieutenant Noonan burned with resentment. Usually, she kept that part of herself cordoned off from the rest. She did not have an axe to grind, but many of them lined up in a row.

  She stood beside a gargantuan foundation inside Paris’ largest mall, the Le Monde. Thousands of shoppers passed her. Most chattered to each other in French, a few must have spoken German.

  “Mademoiselle,” someone said from behind, his voice barely audible over the splashing water and buzz of the crowd.

  She turned. A man in a black leather jacket with a shaven scalp gripped a single rose. He looked dangerous, holding himself loosely like a knife-fighter. As he extended the red flower to her, a chain jangled on his wrist. He didn’t smile but watched her closely.

  Valerie Noonan had lived with this all of her life. She attracted unwanted attention because men liked the way she looked. Her beauty should have been a blessing. Because of her circumstances, it had simply been one of the many hurdles to jump.

  She shook her head. She didn’t want his stinking flower.

  He continued to speak in a low voice while still extending the rose.

  “I don’t know French,” she said.

  “English,” the man said, speaking it better than he had the French. “You look lonely, and you’re lovely. Please, take this as a gift—from me to you.”

  “I don’t know you,” she said.

  His lips parted. “We can change that easily enough.”

  She turned her back to him. In these matters, some men only understood rudeness.

  With a shock, she felt the weight of his hand on her left shoulder. The man had just violated her space. He must think he could intimidate her into doing what he wanted. He was about to get a surprise.

  Valerie reached up, grabbing his fingers. They were rough-skinned, indicating manual labor or close combat training. She whirled around, twisting his hand and arm. He cried out in pain, his body spun around so he bent low, facing the mall’s tiles, with his arm half way up behind him.

  “You don’t hear very well, do you?” she asked.

  “Let go,” he said in a flat voice.

  Something about that warned her—this man was more dangerous than she’d first suspected. Instead of releasing him and trying to run, she kept twisting.

  That’s when the heel of his boot crashed against her shin. It exploded with pain, and it made her angry. She twisted his fingers even harder than before. His other arm reached up and slapped her wrist. A buzz of pain shocked her, a sizzling jolt through her entire arm. On their own accord, her traitorous fingers loosened their hold.

  The man with the shaven scalp and black leather jacket straightened, facing her. He hadn’t smiled before. He frowned now, an ugly thing. There was evil in his eyes.

  “That was a mistake,” he told her in a low voice.

  Valerie Noonan had grown up in the Prosperity Atoll of Greater Detroit in the old United States. In this case, what prosperity meant were survival credits from the government, what people had once called welfare. The atoll was its own world, surrounded by those who worked for a living, paid taxes and therefore had the right to vote.

  Valerie’s father had fought in his youth as a Beck & Loch corporate soldier. He’d lost his legs to a land mine and had been psychologically unable to take prosthetics. The corporation gave him a lump sum discharge and left him to his fate. Her dear old dad had gambled that away and soon found himself with a three-year-old daughter and very little to live on. He moved into Greater Detroit, accepting the government stipend and the lowering of status.

  Valerie’s mother had died in a car accident when she was ten. Her dad drank too much and didn’t have any ambition for himself. He became her drill instructor, making her study and often wheeling beside her as he guarded her way to school. The man had arms like no one could believe and an attitude and a knife that had cut anyone foolish enough to take on the crazy cripple. Most of the time, the gang members that prowled everywhere in Detroit left Valerie alone. The few times they’d tried something when her dad wasn’t around, his training had seen her through.

  She studied hard and aced everything. Finally, her dad’s endless filling out of forms got her admitted to a VA high school on the edge of the city. She went there, and discovered that the Prosperity schools had been a joke. She would have been better off reading fiction all the time.

  Instead of wilting, she worked overtime to catch up. By graduation, her marks had become sterling. Even so, she barely made it into the North American Space Academy. There, she busted her tail once more. Despite her beauty and good grades, she was from Detroit. She’d lived on welfare and therefore was a second-class citizen. Her fellow cadets looked down on her. As compensation, she worked even harder and almost ended up as the class valedictorian.

  Had that won her an ensign position on a battleship or maybe even a strike cruiser? No. They didn’t even send her to a destroyer. She found herself the navigator on a lousy escort, the smallest combat ship there was. Even there, the others had snubbed her…until the day the commander had an accident in the reactor room.

  She had been the right person to become escort commander, but the reviewing board hadn’t agreed with the obvious assessment. That had happened during the journey into the Beyond. Her first piece of good fortune struck then. Admiral von Gunther had reviewed the board’s finding. He had personally vetoed their recommendation and instead placed her in charge of the escort.

  In her mind after that, von Gunther could do no wrong. It was the critical reason she had obeyed his last order. She would have done anything for him. During her three weeks on top, she had commanded a Star Watch escort. Then, the battle with the New Men took place. Now, all her hard work had evaporated into nothing. The others with their privilege had closed ranks against her, calling her devotion to the admiral, who had always treated her fairly, cowardice in face of the enemy.

  That plain made her angry. Yeah, she had gladly volunteered for the Lord High Admiral’s insane plan. The old man had some of the same grit as von Gunther. He had listened to her story and thanked her for what she’d done. The others yesterday in the conference room…she knew what those hostile stares had meant.

  As she stood beside the giant fountain in the huge Paris mall, Lieutenant Valerie Noonan’s wrist throbbed from the shock of a buzzer. Her shin hurt where this goon had kicked her with his iron boot heel. What a bastard.

  Now he acted tough, as if he could do something bad to her. Well, there had been gang members in Detroit who had tried to rape her before. Two of them would never walk right again.

  The thug with his rattling wrist chain reached into his jacket. Valerie had a good idea he meant to draw a knife. She’d seen her dad make a similar grab. With those eyes, she knew this thug liked to cut people.

  Knives were bad mojo. Vid shows often had a hero kicking a knife out of a cutter’s hand. She knew it didn’t quite work like that in real life. Her dad had taught her how to use a knife, and she had wielded one on those wannabe rapists back in the day.

  Therefore, Valerie didn’t wait for Mr. Tough Guy to pull out his blade. Despite her throbbing shin, she stepped forward and rotated her waist fast. At the same time, she smoothly swung an arm, closing her fingers into a fist. She shot a right cross against his nose. If she could break it and make his eyes water, he wasn’t going to be able to see so well.

  It all happened to script. She heard bones crunch. His head rocked back and tears of pain automatically began to well. Valerie kept stepping forward. The man’s hands went to his nose. That was a bad mistake. She drove a knee against his groin.

  He grunted, ooffing his bad breath into her face. Valerie reached up, put her hands on his shoulder, and shoved. Mr. Black
Jacket toppled, striking the back of his skull against the tiles as he hit the floor.

  People had stopped to watch. A few of the women began clapping.

  Valerie grinned at them. Then she realized that she was supposed to keep a low profile. What was the best way to deal with this now? Okay. She had an idea. She bowed at the waist, first in one direction and then in another.

  A few people laughed.

  Afterward, Valerie turned around and began walking away. Some of her burning resentment had departed. Security would be here any moment to take care of the man. She didn’t want to answer any questions. It was time to fade into the crowds. She had done that in Detroit too.

  “Impressive,” another man said quietly.

  She glanced to her left. This man also wore a black leather jacket and had a shaven scalp. The sight of him made her stomach tighten. What was going on? This wasn’t good.

  “Clancy failed,” the man said. “I assure you, I won’t.”

  Valerie saw that he had a shock wand hidden in his grip, most of it up his leather sleeve. She reached out, trying to block the hand that held the wand. The man’s other hand chopped her wrist. He obviously knew close combat techniques. Her wrist exploded with pain. She jerked her arm away. Then he brought the wand closer. If it touched her— A third man now got into the action. This one was tall and lean. From behind, he hit the thug’s elbow. The shock wand slipped out of the numbed grip and clattered onto the mall floor. The taller man kicked the shock wand away into a crowd of people.

  “What the—” Black Leather Jacket said.

  He never had the chance to finish his question. The taller man grabbed the back of the man’s belt and positioned his other hand on the man’s shoulders. The taller man strode briskly, and he must have been stronger than he looked. He drove Black Leather Jacket headfirst against a mall column. The man struck it with considerable force.

  Valerie winced at the brutal sound.

  The man simply collapsed at the base of the granite-looking column.

  Someone in the crowd screamed.

  The taller man gripped one of Valerie’s elbows. “My name is Captain Maddox,” he said in a cool voice. “I believe the Lord High Admiral spoke about me.”