The Orion Deception

by Tom Bielawski

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Endorsements

  A Few Words About Cystic Fibrosis

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  About This Book

  About the Author

  More From Me

  The DragonWriters Collective

  The

  Orion

  Deception

  Part One

  A Heck Thomas novel

  by

  Tom Bielawski

  This is a work of fiction.

  All of the characters and events portrayed in this novel are products of the author's imagination.

  Any resemblance to real persons or events is purely coincidental.

  The Orion Deception Part One Copyright 2012 by Tom Bielawski.

  All rights reserved.

  Cover art created and copyrighted by Tom Bielawski

  www.facebook.com/thechroniclesofllars

  www.SpecFiction.Net

  @tombielawski

  "Tom Bielawski is a bright light in today's dark sea of new writers. His writing gives me hope for the next generation of dreamers. I highly recommend both him and his works." -NYT Bestselling author, Tracy Hickman.

  "Tom is a great new literary voice in a sea of indies." -Bestselling independent author, MR Mathias.

  A few words about Cystic Fibrosis (CF):

  I am a CF Dad; someone I love needs a cure. CF is a genetic, inherited, disease that affects the lungs and digestive systems of about 30,000 children and adults in the United States, and 70,000 worldwide. A defective gene and its protein product cause the body to produce unusually thick and sticky mucus that:

  -clogs the lungs and leads to life-threatening lung infections;

  -obstructs the pancreas and stops the natural enzymes from helping the body break down and absorb food.

  This disease used to be a death sentence. Now, more and more people with CF are living into their 30's, 40's and beyond. And that is thanks in large part to organizations like Cystic Fibrosis Foundation (CFF) and others who have supported and driven the research community with awesome fundraisers, studies, and media attention. Please support CFF.org, Cystic Life (cysticlife.org), Boomer Esiason Foundation (esiason.org), or any other great organization that is helping to fight this terrible disease.

  Thank you.

  Prologue

  ~

  Heck Thomas sat at the controls of his cruiser, Sixkiller, drifting away from the Stalin as he watched the remnants of the wormhole disappear from his scanners. Gone. Just like that.

  Why, God? he demanded silently. Why couldn't I save her?

  Anger surged through his veins as the ship's sensors lost the final traces of the wormhole. Anger at God, at the terrorists who did this to him, at himself. Then he became torn by emotions that conflicted with his savage fury. Grief, sadness and anger; all ripped his spirit to shreds along with his rapidly slipping grasp on his self-control. Sixkiller was a powerful cruiser and it was very capable of delivering the wrath of his fury upon the nearby Stalin, the flagship of the modern criminal organization dedicated to replacing the Commonwealth with a communist dictatorship state.

  The Stalin was the place where his girlfriend, Detective Laylara Espinosa of the Moon Police Service, had been held prisoner over the past few days and used as leverage to force him to recover the lost technology known as the Centaurus Project. At the same time he was framed for the destruction of the CS Marauder and the murder of her crew, as well as the murder of a Secret Service agent and the kidnapping of Detective Espinosa, and became a wanted fugitive. His career and his life had been destroyed.

  He had a lot to be angry about.

  Slowly his breathing came back under control and he was able to reach through the red haze of hatred and flip the switch on Business Mode, that state of mind where the career lawman forced all his emotions into a mental strongbox, surviving solely on cold logic. Finally, he could think again. This was no time to get lost in a panic of emotion; it was a time for revenge. Cold, hard, revenge.

  Sixkiller's scanners had recorded the exact location of the wormhole before it vanished. Now there was just cold, empty, space taunting him with gently flickering stars and drifting asteroid debris. The Centaurus Device beckoned to him from its place on his console, its activation light blinking ominously. Heck held his finger amid the holocontrols of the Centaurus Device, thinking about the choice before him. Could he do it? Could he brave the unknown for her? Did he really love her that much?

  Truth is, I just don't know.

  And the not knowing was what shamed him the most. The wormhole was gone, but the device that he now possessed would reopen it for him. He just didn't know what would happen when it did. No one did. The Centaurus Project had been a secret project to explore wormhole science long ago. Several manned and unmanned expeditions went through the wormhole, and nothing had ever returned. The project had been scrapped.

  What would happen when the device activated and ripped a hole in the very fabric of time and space? What would happen when he passed through that very hole? Would his ship be torn to pieces? Would he be transported to the Centaurus System as most scientists of the time had thought? If so, only God knew what he would find there.

  He thought about that for a while, slowly drifting toward the location of the wormhole. The adventurer in him wanted to go through with it. He had no family left in the System, and his closest friend had become a traitor. A dead traitor. But the cop in him was a bit more practical and warned of all the different ways this could end badly. Did it matter? Did he really want to continue policing for a government so troubled with corruption?

  Just then his sensors went wild, and alarm chimes activated indicating hostile missiles were inbound from three directions at once. He quickly shoved the throttle forward and engaged his thrusters. The missiles were inbound fast and he didn't know enough about the workings of the Centaurus Device to trust that the wormhole would offer him an avenue of escape. So he trusted in Sixkiller and took evasive action.

  The holocontrols scanned and identified the inbound missiles as Commonwealth Ruger Class missiles, the same used by the Marshal’s Service and the Bureau.

  "Attention, this is Commonwealth Marshal's Service Cruiser Sixkiller Sam! Stop firing!" he shouted over the Commonwealth hailing frequency.

  When he received no response he activated his missile countermeasures, hoping to fool the missiles with false signatures and radio jamming.

  "Stop firing dammit!" he shouted over the hailing frequency as he spiraled and rotated his craft to avoid the missiles.

  But the only answer came in the form of concussive blasts of cannon fire. The cannons used by the Commonwealth Fleet and police services were used mainly to create explosive forces to alter a fleeing spacecraft's trajectory and interfere with its maneuvering capabilities. Heck was having a difficult time keeping his cruiser under control from the barrage of cannon fire, even though he had not suffered a direct hit. A direct hit from one of these cannons could have devastating consequences.

  "What the hell?" he shouted. "I am a Commonwealth Marshal! Cease fire! Cease fire! Cease fire!"

  The countermeasures he deployed from Sixkiller seemed to be working and the missiles were drawn away from his cruiser. But the cannon fire was still doggedly trailing him, making it exceedingly difficult to get his cruiser up to top speed. Heck suspected h
is pursuers were, in fact, Bureau agents sent after him. But why wouldn't they at least talk to him on the radio? Why not demand his unconditional surrender? He knew what the Bureau was after, though he was genuinely shocked that they would resort to murder to get it.

  "So you want the Centaurus Device after all, eh Director Hall?" he snarled, deciding that he might as well get in a parting shot over the hailing frequency. "And I thought you were better than that slug, Gem Revelier!"

  The enemy didn't rise to the bait, however, and the disciplined foes maintained their radio silence. Heck was in trouble, he was outgunned and outnumbered. Bureau cruisers were every bit as powerful as his own, and there were at least three of them on his scans. They should have killed him by now.

  "You can't have it, Hall!" he shouted. "And you won't risk destroying it along with my ship. So why don't you just force someone to make you a new device?"

  He was answered by a barrage of heavy machine gun fire from a pair of the Bureau cruisers. While he had been able to dodge most of the 50 millimeter bullets, a few got close enough to Sixkiller for the Phalanx Defense System to activate and vaporize them.

  That was close, he thought grimly, wiping sweat from his brow. If they can't have it they might just take my advice and blow me away!

  Heck took advantage of the brief lull to go on the offensive and turned off the radio. He singled out one cruiser and flew straight at it while he launched a barrage of missiles at the other two. He fired Sixkiller's 50mm cannon at the ship before him and chased it as it maneuvered out of his path. Heck had no desire to engage all three of those cruisers in a dogfight he could not win. But his furious, if brief, offensive forced his attackers to react to him instead of continuing their own barrage. His plan worked, and the enemy cruisers were forced to flee and evade the missiles and bullets that Sixkiller Sam sent toward them, giving him the precious seconds he needed to reach open space. As he zoomed out from between the three enemy ships now coming about to attack again, Heck vented Sixkiller's empty fuel cells.

  A cloud of nearly invisible vapor spilled out behind Sixkiller just as a Ruger missile homed in on Heck. As the lawman had expected, his enemy was still trying to incapacitate his ship with concussive forces rather than destroy it. And when the missile detonated in the vapor cloud, the ensuing explosion created a blinding flash of light and a burst of spectrum interference that made the enemy ships' sensors simply go offline.

  Heck Thomas rocketed away from the wormhole at Sixkiller's top speed and headed into the perilous and ever moving debris cloud of the Asteroid belt. As he had hoped, his pursuers had not followed. He piloted Sixkiller into a crater on a large asteroid and anchored the cruiser to the surface, shutting down all systems but basic life support. The temperature inside the cabin grew colder and his nose and ears grew chill. Heck wondered just what the Hell was he going to do now.

  Chapter

  One

  ~

  Heck Thomas sat at the bar, staring bleary eyed into the bottom of an empty shot glass. A holovision unit at the end of the counter played an infomercial about a new getaway fad resort drift in the Outer System, something called Rigel's Escape. A pair of lovebirds nearby were discussing how they just couldn't wait to begin their own getaway to Rigel's Escape. There were few other patrons in this dive bar. A pair of scruffy grease-covered fellows sat four seats down from him. Some fly-bikers entered through the back door, letting in a wave of stifling Florida heat, and occupied a table in a shadowy corner, close to the way out. An old, sad-looking, man played a rigged holographic game of chance in a dark corner, hoping that he would be the first to beat the machine's impossible and ever-changing odds.

  Then another news story broke over the holovision and drew the attention of everyone in the room. Commonwealth Prime Minister, Horatio Arnold, was making an announcement. Even the morose Heck Thomas cast a curious glance at the man who had come to represent everything that had gone wrong with his life. He had met Arnold a time or two before and the man had always seemed nice enough, always seemed to support those who protected and defended the Commonwealth from its enemies. But all politicians were like that, hiding their dark side behind a shield of righteousness. The PM's silence on the existence of the Centaurus Device and the corruption of his own Bureau of Investigations was stinging for the ex-lawman. Somehow Arnold's administration had been able to keep the whole affair quiet and the media, who had been in the Prime Minister's pocket from the beginning of his term, had not reported a peep of the shocking affair.

  The bartender tapped a control on the countertop and the volume of the holovision kicked up. Prime Minister Arnold stood behind a podium bearing the seal of his government, the blue flag of the Commonwealth dangled from a banner overhead. A sea of reporters stood quietly, quivering with anticipation over what the charismatic leader was going to say. A network reporter speculated about the nature of today's surprise press conference, seeming almost giddy, as the PM conferred quietly with his Deputy Prime Minister at the podium. Then the reporter vanished and the room quieted as it became clear the PM was going to speak.

  Prime Minister Arnold began by addressing the terrible plight of the Commonwealth member states on Earth, known as the Terran States, and the impact of a long-running economic recession that seemed to affect the Earth more severely than anywhere else. A few grumbles of agreement emanated from the patrons in the bar. Arnold went on to talk about how revenues generated by the successful mining operations of the Drift States in the Inner System and the Asteroid Belt were being used to send aid to the Terran States. But a caucus of Members of the Commonwealth Parliament from the Drift States were obstructing his plans to save the starving people of Earth and stem rising tide of rampant crime and corruption. The PM seemed benevolent and kind, almost a father figure, as he claimed that he would gladly end his own political career to save the Commonwealth. While that seemed a selfless statement, Heck recognized it for what it was: the Parliament was going to call for a Vote of No Confidence. And that was something that would end the man's career.

  Heck threw back a shot of whiskey and tuned out the holovision as he savored the flavor of his drink. He slid the empty glass back across the counter, indicating his desire for a refill, but his attention was drawn back to the holovision by a few shouts of approval from nearby drinkers. Arnold had said something that stirred the people in the bar but he’d missed it. It didn't matter to Heck anyway, the ex-lawman knew the Prime Minister had turned out to be a fraud. Whatever dribble he was spouting would simply serve to divide the peoples of his Commonwealth further, not bring them together. He was playing an age-old trick of politicians everywhere, play the fears of those who support you against those who oppose you.

  The PM had indeed made a great show of effecting his own measures to save the economy of the Commonwealth. A popular but very controversial measure he had taken was to create large numbers of Commonwealth Credit Currency to give to the citizens of the Terran States. It was a measure he made unilaterally by Executive Decree, without the consent of Parliament, and outraged the rest of the Commonwealth as vote buying. While the PM had certainly grown his popularity among the Terran States, the measure did nothing to stabilize the economy. In fact, the measure triggered significant inflation because as the government created more money, the money everyone else had became less valuable. And it took more money to buy things than it had before, a lot more.

  “The Drift States are being greedy,” he heard the PM say. “There is a movement put forward in Parliament to transition back to a physical currency based on existing stores of precious metals. Tell your Members of Parliament to vote NO! The Drift States control the stores of precious metals and they would control the currency! Your credit money would become useless!”

  That was not true, Heck knew. He had thought that the idea actually had some merit, until he remembered that he didn't care about the Commonwealth anymore. Then someone changed the holovision to a sports network to the great relief of some in the bar but not oth
ers. Heck was fairly certain that the PM's speech would stir up anger in the Drift States. But what would they do about the blatant disregard for their rights? The Commonwealth wasn't a very old nation, not as old as many of its member states, and it had not yet seen a civil war. Heck suspected that time might come very soon if the PM continued down this road.

  The bartender, a giant of a man nearly seven feet tall, reached over with an enormous hand and topped off Heck's shot glass with his special house brand whiskey, muttering angrily about the PM's speech. The drink, a clear liquid that the locals called "swamp water," and had a taste to match its name, burned all the way down his gullet and seemed to set his blood on fire. Heck began to see the play that the PM was making, pitting the poverty stricken Terran States who would vote for him against the successful Drift States who were likely grooming their own replacement for the Commonwealth leader. He wondered if that play would really work for the PM. It didn't make sense, the people of the Terran States would not be the ones participating in a Vote of No Confidence. That would be done in the Halls of Parliament, where it seemed the PM had exhausted his fortune and favor.

  Heck downed another shot and waited for the burn to fade and his thoughts turned to Laylara. He had been so close. He had finally convinced himself to abandon his thirst for revenge and go into the wormhole after the woman he loved, despite the risks of the unknown. But just as he was going to engage the Centaurus Device and enter the wormhole, he was attacked and pursued into the Asteroid Belt by government agents from a mysterious organization. At first he suspected the Bureau was behind his attempted apprehension. But it really didn't make sense for Director Hall to take such a sudden turn against him. He had to assume another government organization wanted the device and was planning to commit its own brand of mayhem with the machine that could rip the very fabric of time and space.