The Lost Swarm

by Vaughn Heppner

  Slowly, she recalled her escape from the south sea island. She’d been in a flitter talking to the Lord High Admiral via com and then a ray had beamed down from the ship, turning her world orange and—

  She tried to raise her head, but that proved too exhausting. She must have fallen unconscious after the orange ray had struck. So, why hadn’t the flitter plunged into the ocean?

  The spaceship coming down must have used a tractor beam. That must have caught the flitter and dragged it up here. Yes. She could feel the subtle vibration that meant she was in a spaceship with an antimatter engine supplying power.

  She closed her eyes, thinking. Had that really been the Lord High Admiral she’d seen in the com screen? Maybe someone had been impersonating him in order to fool her.

  Could it have been an android imposter? Given the victorious space battle six months ago in the Solar System, she thought Star Watch had finished the androids for good. She wasn’t privy to insider information these days. But even she’d heard about androids tearing off their clothes and outer false skin to reveal the gleaming metal underneath. The androids had mined the heavy-metals chthonian planet in the Alpha Centauri System, building superior ship structures with them. Even so, Star Watch had smashed the invading android fleet, and that should have been the end of any android menace for years to come.

  This isn’t an android operation, she told herself. The androids were finished in Human Space.

  The voice in her head and the skull pressure…that indicated Bosks. Bosks meant New Men hardliners, which ultimately meant Lord Drakos. Because of Drakos and his Bosks, she’d lost her position as head of Intelligence, becoming a prisoner.

  “No,” she told herself aloud. She wasn’t going to feel sorry for herself. She was going to act like a Star Watch Intelligence officer and figure this out.

  Star Watch had smashed the Bosks’ operation some time ago. Hardliner New Men might have sent an agent to Earth, but it was unlikely even New Men would be arrogant enough to try to slip a ship into Earth’s atmosphere.

  “How is she?” a gruff-voiced man asked.

  Mary recognized the voice, bringing relief. It was the Lord High Admiral. Maybe he really was who he had claimed to be on the tiny screen.

  Mary opened her eyes, seeing a tall doctor and the taller, if stoop-shouldered, Admiral Cook peering down at her. Cook wore his white admiral’s uniform. There were a few more seams in his rugged face, and the crow’s feet at the corners of his eyes seemed deeper than she remembered.

  “How do you feel?” Cook asked.

  Mary ingested the question even as she realized the doctor hadn’t answered the admiral’s inquiry concerning her condition.

  “Why am I strapped down like this?” she asked, indicating the steel bands holding down her arms and legs.

  Cook glanced at the doctor as if he had the answer.

  The doctor had a long lean face and troubled eyes. Mary didn’t like that.

  “The straps are a precaution,” Cook finally told her.

  “Do you think I’m going mad?” she asked.

  “No,” the doctor said in a rather high-pitched voice. “You are certainly not insane. Tell me. Have you been hearing voices in your mind?”

  “No,” Mary said.

  The doctor gave Cook a significant glance, indicating the man thought she was lying.

  “Just one voice,” Mary said.

  “Did you recognize the voice?” Cook asked her.

  Mary shook her head.

  “When did you begin hearing it?”

  “Only today,” she said, “while flying toward Australia. Oh. There is something else. I was going to meet a man in a Sydney park. I don’t know who, but I remember thinking I would know him when I saw him.”

  “Did the voice tell you about the man?”

  “No. I just knew…” Mary’s voice trailed off. It hit her then, the seriousness of her condition, and she had to battle off a wave of dejection. She was the Iron Lady who used to run Intelligence. She wasn’t going to wilt before the mind specialist and certainly not before the Lord High Admiral. It was time to pull it together and help them against the hidden enemy who had been using her.

  “You told me earlier that you’ve been waiting three weeks for me to make a break,” she told Cook. “There has to be a reason for the particular timeframe. I would suspect—oh. You must have intercepted strange beams directed at the island.”

  “More precisely,” Cook said, “directed at you on the island.”

  Mary nodded even as a cold feeling came over her. She had almost become an enemy tool. Anger welled up. She latched onto that, but masked it from them, using it as a mental crutch to prop her up.

  “Was that the first time you intercepted such rays?” she asked.

  “It was,” Cook said.

  “Did I begin acting differently?”

  “On the contrary,” Cook said, “more routinely. You’ve done nothing out of the ordinary for the past three weeks except for the escape itself. If I were to guess, I would say you’ve been acting that way so your handlers would lower their guard, which they did.”

  “You didn’t warn them about the rays?”

  Cook shook his head. “We didn’t know if one of them was working with—with whoever sent the rays. How did the enemy know your precise location each time?”

  “Who do you suspect beamed the rays?”

  “The obvious people,” he said.

  “Lord Drakos?”

  “It doesn’t specifically have to be him,” Cook said, “but New Men hardliners certainly.”

  “Hmm. The voice suggested I dive into the ocean instead of allowing you to recapture me.”

  “Interesting,” the doctor said. “That would suggest that they would rather have you die than face recapture.”

  Cook had been fingering his chin. “What don’t they want us finding in her mind?”

  “I have no idea,” the doctor said. “Clearly, though, it must be important.”

  Cook rubbed his jaw further, looked away and then directly down at her. “Where’s Captain Maddox?”

  “What?” Mary asked, startled by the question.

  “His whereabouts?” asked Cook. “Where is he?”

  “How could I possibly know that? Why? Is Maddox missing?”

  “In a manner of speaking,” Cook admitted, “although I wouldn’t worry about him just yet.”

  Mary blinked several times, disturbed at the disjointedness of the questions versus the statement. It had been over six months already since the victory over the androids. What had the captain been doing since then? It sounded like something to stir Lord Drakos and his hardliners. Mary didn’t like that one bit. Maddox held too many grudges against Drakos for the captain to work as efficiently as he usually did. Maddox held too many grudges against New Men, and they were so damned smart and so much…better than ordinary humans, better even than Maddox.

  “What did you order him to do this time?” Mary demanded. “If you’ve sent him on another of your harebrained—”

  “Brigadier,” Cook said sternly. “That will be quite enough of that.”

  Mary didn’t think so. Then, she caught the doctor’s look. He seemed a little too eager to hear what she was going to say. That helped her calm down and switch mental gears.

  “Just how long am I going to be strapped down to this thing?” she asked.

  The doctor let slip the slightest of disappointed looks, but he hid it as well as could be expected. Mary noticed Cook noticing the doctor’s disappointment. The old man was sharp. That was interesting.

  “Doctor,” Cook said. “You heard her question. Answer it please.”

  “Oh,” the doctor said. “Well…if someone keeps an eye on her, I think she’s well enough to leave the med-cot. There are no devices inside her, and we scanned thoroughly. Our ship has special shielding that can block even their strange mind rays—whoever they are. Besides, we’ve already seen that she can stave off suicidal suggestions.”

/>   “Excellent,” Cook said. “Release her at once. I’ll escort her to the infirmary.”

  “I have people who can do that,” the doctor said.

  “I’m not in the habit of debating one of my orders,” Cook said.

  “Oh. Yes, of course, sir,” the doctor said. “I’m sorry, sir.” The lean man turned and shouted orders.

  With the doctor’s back to them, Mary gave Cook a questioning glance. He shook his head and then put a placid demeanor on his features as the doctor turned back to them.

  Something was going on here, Mary decided. She had no idea what it could be. Hopefully, Admiral Cook would let her in on the secret so it wouldn’t drive her batty trying to figure it out.

  -4-

  Mary walked beside the Lord High Admiral, and it seemed like old times back at Star Watch Headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland. Her green hospital gown defeated the image, however, and the narrowness of the ship corridors and the constant vibration on the deckplates ruined the feeling as well.

  “Admiral,” she began.

  He held up one of his big hands, a signal to wait.

  She closed her mouth as she walked beside him in her paper slippers. They moved through several corridors, passing the way to the infirmary.

  “You look like you could use a drink,” Cook said.

  “Uh…yes, I would like one.”

  “I have an excellent bottle of brandy in my office.”

  They took a lift to a different level and finally entered his office. It was more cramped than usual, which indicated a smaller spaceship. Of course, it had come down into a planetary atmosphere. A battleship couldn’t do that.

  He indicated a chair. She almost collapsed into it, not realizing until then how tired she really was. He went around behind his desk, sat with a grunt and opened a bottom drawer. Mary expected to see him set a bottle of brandy on the desk. Instead, he put a scrambler there and switched it on so it buzzed softly.

  “That should do the trick,” he said.

  “Who would try using a snooper on you aboard your own ship, sir?”

  “If the past is any indication of the future, a lot of people. Besides, I’ve wondered if enemy or double agents worked on the island. It would be no extraordinary feat if such an agent were aboard the ship. I also distrust the doctor.”

  “Why keep him then?”

  “Brigadier, I need some advice,” he said, avoiding her question.

  “That’s why you waited three weeks for me to escape the island?”

  The admiral squirmed in his chair, finally shaking his head. “Not altogether. The rays beamed at you greatly disturbed me. I suspected New Men hardliners, of course, which would logically indicate a stealth star cruiser somewhere near Earth. We have been unable to find one, though.” His lips drew back, exposing his teeth. “I would dearly like to know who sent the rays. Oh, we tried everything to find the sender. Everything failed. Does that mean New Men have infiltrated agents back on Earth? I hate thinking so, but it seems damned likely.”

  Silently, Mary agreed. The New Men were good at spying, usually three to five steps ahead of regular people. “How is Stokes doing running Intelligence?”

  “As well as can be expected. Stokes is a competent operator, but he is not the Iron Lady. I need you back in the saddle.”

  “I’m hearing a voice in my head, though.”

  Cook nodded. “The reason I can’t let you run the show. But…” He frowned down at his hands before regarding her again.

  “What happened to Maddox?” she asked in a worried voice.

  It seemed the admiral wouldn’t answer. “I haven’t heard from him for over two months. He’s in the Beyond, I believe. He has his long-range Builder com device. He was supposed to have given two reports already, one each month.”

  “Are you saying he’s dead?”

  “Mary, don’t torment yourself. Both Maddox and Victory have been overdue longer than two months before. He’s following a lead, a trail to attempt to find Commander Thrax Ti Ix.”

  “No,” she whispered. “I’d forgotten all about the bug leader.” She squeezed her eyelids closed before opening them wide. Old facts bubbled up. “Thrax is a hybrid Swarm creature,” she said in a rote voice. “He escaped from us at the end of the terrible Swarm Invasion. They sent eighty thousand warships.” Her brows furrowed as if she had trouble remembering more. “Thrax and his fellow hybrids fled the detonation of Alpha Centauri ‘A’ star.”

  Cook nodded.

  Several years ago, during the first Swarm Invasion, at the terrible crisis moment when it looked like the enemy fleet was finally going to overpower Star Watch and the allied New Men, Professor Ludendorff had subconsciously constructed a Builder device, the design long ago implanted in his mind. Maddox had used the device against an evil spiritual Ska entity. Powering the Builder device with his own life force, Maddox had badly wounded the Ska, which had fled into the hot star for healing. That had caused the star to explode, annihilating the vast majority of the remaining invading Swarm vessels. Thrax had led the only star-drive jump capable Swarm ships, fleeing the destruction with them.

  Thrax Ti Ix the hybrid had been an odd sort of Swarm creature. Maddox had first met the bug years earlier on a Builder Dyson Sphere one thousand light-years from Earth. Thrax with other hybrids had escaped the destroyed sphere, going to the Swarm Imperium and teaching them about Laumer Points and hyper-spatial tubes.

  After the destruction of Alpha Centauri “A” star, Thrax had taken his approximately one hundred and sixty warships to some unknown location. They had fled far into the Beyond, never seen since.

  Cook folded his thick fingers on the desk, leaning toward her.

  Here it comes, Mary silently told herself.

  “Thrax’s one hundred and sixty warships represent a significant threat to us. Several years ago…” Cook shook his head. “Star Watch could have easily handled them back then. But the Commonwealth has taken massive losses from many sources. Consider: we faced the original New Men invasion, the Swarm invasion, the Grand Fleet’s attacking the Forbidden Planet and lately against the androids run amok. The personnel and ship losses have added up. We used to have two ancient Destroyers as backup, but the androids destroyed them. What I’m saying is that the Commonwealth badly needs peace. We need it so we can rebuild to our old strength. We can’t afford to fight a new war against a determined enemy.”

  “Star Watch really can’t face one hundred and sixty Swarm ships?” Mary asked.

  “That’s the kicker, a concentrated enemy fleet. Yes. If we gathered Star Watch into one place, we could overpower them. But we’re spread out to hold down the fort, as it were. There have been rebellions, outbreaks of piracy, worldwide unrest. This has happened all over the Commonwealth. Usually, showing the flag in the form of a Star Watch warship helps settle the situation. Sometimes, we have to send a flotilla. We’re stretched far too thin with far too few ships.” He drummed his fingers. “There’s something else. If Thrax appears, it will be at the behest of Lord Drakos. How many star cruisers will join the attack saucers?”

  Cold fear welled up in Mary.

  “Since the end of the Android War,” Cook said, “we’ve been breaking up some of the Drakos-funded rings scattered throughout the Commonwealth. That’s the good news. Drakos and his most dedicated people have vanished. That’s helped us hunt down many of his underground operations, as he’s not here to hinder us.”

  “Because he’s out in the Beyond making deals with Commander Thrax.”

  “Our best analysts give that a seventy-eight percent probability. Now, a hidden someone sends rays at your mind, causing you to escape. Do these hidden players want the data in your mind and fear us getting that data, or is there a different reason?” Cook shook his head. “There has to be a good reason for their wanting you at this time.”

  “I have a thought.”

  “I’m listening.”

  “Maddox is out in the Beyond chasing down Thrax and Drakos?”


  “I’m afraid so,” Cook said. “We need to know what’s happening out there. Regular Patrol ships would certainly fall prey to stealth star cruisers. That’s why it has be Starship Victory with its veteran crew.”

  “Maybe the hidden agents want me in order to try to persuade Maddox to give us his task.”

  “Would the captain do that if you asked?”

  “I don’t know,” Mary whispered.

  “Why do you think he would?”

  Mary said nothing.

  “We’re in the dark about far too much,” Cook said. “Now, if we’re lucky, perhaps Thrax will kill Lord Drakos for us. Perhaps Maddox will engineer such an event—”

  “That would be good,” Mary said softly, interrupting. She squared her shoulders. “Have you told the Emperor about all this?”

  “He already knows, as it was his operative that told Maddox about Drakos’s goal. The operative gave Maddox the information in exchange for one of Drakos’s secret agents that Maddox was in the process of capturing.”

  “What’s the Emperor going to do about Drakos?”

  “I have no idea.”

  “No?”

  Cook frowned. “I can’t afford word of…of any of this leaking out.” He paused as if reconsidering his words, soon shaking his head. “If Drakos and Thrax strike together, and if they make inroads into the Commonwealth, destroying a Star Watch fleet in the process, it’s possible the rest of the Emperor’s New Men might decide it’s time to reinvade and win for good. Maybe the Emperor is doing nothing because conquering us so-called submen is his real goal.”

  Mary grew pale. Another war with the New Men and with them having allies this time, with the Commonwealth at a grave disadvantage… The Drakos Affair could turn genocidal quickly.

  “I don’t understand,” she said. “If you can’t afford any of this leaking out, why are you telling me? I’m a security risk.”

  “True.” He stared across the desk at her. “Maybe I’m telling you so you’ll understand why I have to keep you in tight confinement.”

  Mary’s right hand began to shake. She grabbed it, squeezing the hand so it wouldn’t give away her terror.