The Dark Ship

by Phillip P. Peterson

  “You’re kidding me,” said Finni, who had come up behind him. “That’s like the shaft down by the gate.”

  “Get a flashlight,” Jeff ordered the radar technician.

  “At least now we know how the … thing … got in here,” said Owl. “There’s probably a ventilation shaft like that in every cabin. Fuck! This is a fucking nightmare!” His voice became shrill.

  “We’re not safe here,” Green said, echoing what Jeff was thinking.

  “Here …” Finni handed Jeff a flashlight. Jeff dropped to his knees and shone it into the shaft. There was a right turn just beyond the opening. Jeff hesitated a moment. What if one of those things was hiding behind the corner? It was no use. Sending someone else in there would make him look like a coward. He drew his pistol, crawled inside, and shone the flashlight down the tunnel. A few feet further on it forked to the left and right. Jeff had seen enough and backed out of the shaft. “The whole ship is probably riddled with these ventilation shafts,” he said after straightening up. He put the gun back in his holster. “Whatever it was must have sneaked in unnoticed and taken the major by surprise.”

  “At least now we know that these light aliens aren’t ghosts,” Joanne said.

  “How do you know that?” Owl asked.

  “If they could walk through walls, they wouldn’t have needed the ventilation shaft,” Joanne replied impatiently.

  Jeff took another sheet from the pile of spare bedclothes neatly folded on a shelf, shook it open and spread it over the major’s corpse.

  “What do we do now?” Castle asked after they had left the major’s room and returned to the rec room.

  Jeff went to the kitchen, took a glass off the shelf, and filled it with water. He felt sick and wasn’t sure if he could stop himself from throwing up. He knew the answer to Castle’s question, but was afraid to say it out loud.

  “Captain Austin will decide,” Joanne replied on his behalf. “He has the highest rank now.”

  Jeff sipped his water, but felt barely any better. He turned around and gazed around the faces of his shipmates, who were all staring at him expectantly.

  “We’re dead meat!” Mac said.

  “Wouldn’t it be better if someone else took command?” Castle asked Joanne. “You or me?”

  Joanne gave him a withering look.

  Owl whispered something to Finni, who shook his head and looked at Jeff in disgust.

  “I’m not taking orders from him,” Mac said to Shorty, not even bothering to lower his voice.

  Jeff swallowed. Perhaps it would be best to hand over command to Castle. Or to Joanne, who was a good at thinking logically, and usually came up with better ideas than he did. But then he remembered his conversation with Irons. The major had trusted him. He would have had Jeff transferred, if he was dissatisfied with his work. What had Irons said?

  Your problem, Captain Austin, is your unwillingness to lead.

  No, it was his job. It was what Irons had wanted. There was no way he would hand over command to Castle, with his big mouth, or to Green, with his awkward manner. But what about Joanne? She was clever, logical, and decisive—but she’d never shown any interest in taking on a leadership role. And Jeff wasn’t sure if she would be able to stand up to Shorty and Mac. No, he couldn’t put the burden of responsibility on her. He was in charge.

  Jeff pulled himself up straight. “I hereby take over command.”

  Mac groaned. “It’ll never work. He doesn’t have what it takes.”

  Jeff knew he couldn’t let him get away with talking about him like that. Not anymore. The situation had changed. Irons was gone. Someone on this ship was trying to kill them. They had to pull together as a group. If he didn’t enforce his authority now, they didn’t stand a chance.

  Jeff took a deep breath. “Private McGuinness, I will no longer tolerate your continued insubordination,” he said with all the authority he could muster. “You will obey my orders, unconditionally.”

  Mac stared at him open-mouthed. Joanne blinked in surprise. Jeff wasn’t sure if he’d hit the right tone.

  Now Mac narrowed his eyes, approached Jeff, and looked down at him condescendingly. “You are not a commander. I only obeyed your orders because Irons was there, and he is no longer around. I’m not listening to your orders.”

  How should Jeff react? Should he put him under arrest as a deterrent? Would the others support him? What would Irons have done in this situation?

  Jeff didn’t budge an inch. He had to show Mac, once and for all that he was in charge, and he needed to be sure he had the support of the other officers. There was only one way to find out.

  “Private McGuinness, you’re under arrest. Lieutenant Castle, Corporal Herrmannsson, please disarm the Private and take him to his sleeping quarters.” It was a game. And Jeff didn’t have the slightest idea how it would end.

  Mac’s eyes widened as if he could not believe what he had just heard.

  Finally, Castle stepped forward and pulled the pistol out of Mac’s belt holster. Finni grabbed the burly man’s arm. “All right. Come on.”

  “You can’t do this,” Mac stammered.

  Joanne opened the door to the corridor. Not even Shorty made a move to support his buddy. Jeff sighed with relief. He had won the game. Or at least this move.

  “You can’t lock me up. That monster! What if the creature comes and gets me?” Panic had crept into his voice.

  “Stop!” Jeff said.

  Finni and Castle stopped, and Mac twisted in their grip to look round.

  “Private McGuinness. Are you ready to follow my orders?”

  Mac stared at him in silence and pressed his lips together. Finally, he nodded. “Yes,” he said, barely audibly.

  “Excuse me?” Jeff asked.

  “Yes, Sir.” Mac almost choked on his own words.

  “I don’t want to hear any more dumb jokes from you. Or I really will put you under arrest. Have I made myself clear?”

  A long pause. “Yes, Sir.”

  Jeff nodded. “Good. Let Private McGuinness go.”

  Finni and Castle took a step back almost simultaneously.

  “My weapon?” Mac asked, almost timidly.

  Jeff didn’t want to give it back to him. He didn’t believe Mac would shoot him from behind, but he needed to teach him a lesson.

  “You need to earn it back, Private.”

  Gradually, Jeff felt himself relax. Since he had been in the space fleet, this was his first real confrontation with a subordinate. It was a test he should have passed much earlier.

  “What now?” Owl asked. Then he looked at Jeff. “Sir?” he added.

  That was a question Jeff couldn’t answer. “I have to think about if first.” Then he remembered something. Something very important. He turned around and went back into the corridor to the sleeping quarters.

  “Where are you going?” Joanne asked.

  “I need to go back to the major. All of you: collect your belongings and bring them to the rec room. From now on, nobody sleeps alone. Later we’ll talk about what we’re going to do.”

  He didn’t wait for an answer, but opened the door to the major’s room, stepped inside, and closed the door behind him. He retched violently as the repulsive smell of flesh and blood rose into his nostrils. He stepped to the end of the bed and pulled up the sheet to the major’s waist. He removed the major’s pistol from his holster. The butt was smeared with blood. Then he reached into the belt pouch to take out the major’s handheld. It was empty.

  Had the intruder taken it? Or had the major hidden it somewhere else? There weren’t many places to hide something in these rooms. Jeff bent down and shone his flashlight under the bed. Nothing there. Jeff moved tables and chairs aside, but there was nothing behind them, either. That left only the bathroom. Jeff opened the cupboards. Empty. The toilet didn’t have a cistern where you could have hidden anything. Jeff couldn’t avoid looking at his reflection in the mirror above the basin. He got a shock when he saw the deep rings
under his eyes.

  He turned on the tap and waited for the water to get hot. He scooped a few handfuls of water and splashed his face until his cheeks became flushed. He still looked like shit. And now what?

  Hot steam rose up, as more and more water gathered in the basin and condensed on the mirror, until Jeff could no longer see his face. But now he saw fingerprints on the edge of the glass. They must be the major’s.

  But what had the major been doing with the mirror? A glimmer of hope rose up in Jeff and he tugged at the glass. It was attached to a rail that Jeff could push to the side. Behind it was a small niche … and in the niche was the major’s handheld.

  Jeff took it out, turned off the water, and put the mirror back in position. As he weighed the device in his hand, he went back into the bedroom and sat down on the chair, being sure not to turn his back to the hole in the wall.

  Jeff looked at the back of the device with the red flap beneath which was the handheld’s self-destruct mechanism. Gingerly, he lifted the flap with his thumb. The button was tiny, but protruded clearly from a small hollow. The manufacturer had obviously wanted to ensure that even the slightest pressure of a possibly seriously injured commander could trigger the destruction process. Jeff was a little surprised that Irons hadn’t destroyed the chip long ago. That he had even taken the risk of letting the codes fall into enemy hands. Especially after the revelation that this huge, sinister ship was set on a course for Earth.

  For a moment, Jeff toyed with the idea of destroying the device himself. But what about the major’s strange premonition? Had he really foreseen his own death? He had also said that the codes might save the lives of the crew. What if the major had been right about that, too?

  Jeff closed the cap. But if worst came to worst, he wouldn’t hesitate to destroy it. And that brought Jeff’s mind round to the next problem. He was now in command. What should their next move be? It was up to him to make a decision.

  He pushed the chair to the top end of the bed and leaned forward. He could see the outline of Irons’ head under the sheet. Jeff laid his hand on the sheet on top of the major’s forehead. He had spent over a year with the major. He had always admired Irons; he’d been his role model. Albeit one he would never live up to, no matter how hard he tried.

  Jeff sat next to the body for a long time and pondered. Ideas popped into his mind, which he rejected again a moment later. Create an opening to the outside with the explosives, as Owl had suggested? That would be suicide. At least here in the interstellar void. Talk to the computer and hope that it was all a misunderstanding? No. It had lied to them and stalled too often. If they waited here in their quarters to reach Sigma-7, which would never happen anyway, then they would die—one by one. Killed by the sinister something which was responsible for the deaths of Field and Irons. What had Green said? That they would probably only find answers in the center of the ship. The engineer might be right. Jeff was also convinced there was more in the vast interior of the giant ship than the computer was telling them. The longer Jeff thought about it, the more convinced he became that that is what they needed to do. They needed to penetrate further into the ship. The idea terrified him, he was afraid of what they would find—but it was the only option. To escape the abyss, they would first have to descend deeper inside it.

  Jeff slipped Irons’ handheld into his belt pouch next to his own and returned to the rec room.

  The others were sitting at the big table, engrossed in conversation.

  “What were you doing?” Joanne interrupted the discussion.

  Jeff decided not to tell the others about the major’s handheld. “I wanted to say goodbye to Irons,” he said simply.

  “And what are your orders, Sir?” The last word contained all the hatred that Mac clearly felt toward Jeff.

  Jeff tried to ignore his tone. He could make Mac obey his orders, but he couldn’t make him like him.

  “Has the computer made contact again?” he asked.

  Joanne shook her head.

  “Computer,” Jeff spoke loudly into the room.

  Silence.

  “Computer!” he repeated.

  Nothing. Perhaps the ship’s computer knew they’d discovered the truth about their position, and now considered it pointless to continue lying to them. It might never contact them again. But what was it trying to achieve?

  “We need to find out what’s going on here,” Jeff said. “I mean, what’s really going on.”

  “And how?” Castle asked.

  All eyes were on Jeff. Mac’s eyes were full of animosity, Castle’s full of doubt. Green’s face looked disapproving, Joanne’s curious, Owl’s fearful, and Finni’s confused. Only Shorty was poker-faced and didn’t show a trace of emotion.

  “We will go to the center of the ship. There must be more to find than the computer is telling us.”

  Green nodded.

  Owl shook his head. “I’m not going deeper into the ship,” he said firmly.

  “That’s three hundred miles,” Mac laughed scornfully. “I’m not traipsing three hundred miles to the core of this thing.”

  “We have no idea if we’ll find anything useful down there,” Finni said.

  “If we stay here, we won’t find anything at all,” Jeff said. With a start, he noticed his voice had taken on a whining tone again.

  “What if there are more light aliens down there?” Owl asked.

  “Well, they can obviously get us here, too,” Jeff said. “Besides, now they know where we are.”

  “Did you hear what I said?” Finni asked. “Maybe there’s nothing down there.”

  “That’s exactly what we’ll find out. If we sit around here, we can be one hundred percent sure of not finding a way out of our situation,” Jeff said.

  “Then give me the explosives and we can get out through the airlock,” Owl demanded.

  “I think it makes more sense …” Jeff began. He imagined he could see Irons sitting opposite him. The illusion shook its head gently and then dissolved into thin air.

  Jeff swallowed. Discussing this wouldn’t get them anywhere.

  “Can I have the explosives?” Owl asked.

  Jeff took a deep breath. “No. We are all going together.”

  “But I just said—” Finni began.

  Jeff interrupted him, with some effort. It wasn’t right to interrupt others in the middle of a sentence, but he had to make it clear that he was in charge. “I heard what you said. But I’ve decided. We are going to the core of the ship—together.”

  “You decided?” Mac asked sarcastically. Jeff could almost see that Mac had another insult on the tip of his tongue. He needed to make sure it remained unspoken. His heart was beating like crazy. He hated it, but he had to go through with it. “Private McGuinness, if you have something you want to tell me, then call me Sir or Captain Austin.”

  Mac’s jaw dropped. Joanne grinned.

  “Have I made myself clear?”

  “Sure …” Mac said, before adding a stifled “Sir.”

  If the mechanic saw an opportunity to sabotage Jeff’s authority, he would take it. That much was clear.

  “When …” Green stammered. “When do you want to start?”

  “We’ll set off shortly,” Jeff kept a level tone. “We’ll go to the gate and from there to the other side. Major Irons wanted to investigate the projection more closely and that’s what we’ll do first. We’ll take all our equipment with us and work our way, as far as possible, to the center of the ship.”

  “Should we try and make contact with the computer first?” Joanne asked.

  Jeff shook his head. He didn’t see the point. “If it contacts us now—fine. But we mustn’t believe anything it tells us anymore. It’s got its own agenda, that’s clear to me now. It won’t tell us anything we need to know.”

  “What if it tries to stop us?”

  “It’s done that already by feeding us lies.”

  “Could be that the light aliens and the computer are working together,�
�� Owl said.

  Jeff leaned back in his chair. He hadn’t thought about that possibility. He had assumed the light aliens were degenerated or mutated descendants of the original crew. Or maybe intruders who had come onto the ship sometime over the preceding millions of years, though that seemed unlikely. Either way, the computer might be pursuing its own agenda, but if it wanted to kill them, it could have done so when they were in the airlock. Or it could have simply not let them on board. Ultimately, Jeff had to admit to himself that he didn’t have a clue what was going on on this ship.

  “No, I don’t think so. But I can’t say for sure.”

  “He’s not sure …” Mac mocked him in a soft voice.

  Since nobody reacted to his comment, Jeff decided to ignore it.

  “When are we leaving?” Finni asked.

  Jeff would have liked to wait a day or two; have some more time to think things through, but he knew he wouldn’t change his mind. And since they obviously weren’t safe in their accommodation, perhaps it was best if they kept moving.

  “Today,” Jeff said. “As soon as we’ve checked through the equipment.”

  “And you want us to take everything with us?” Joanne asked.

  “Yes, we’ll decamp. There’s no reason to come back here.”

  Jeff got up from the table. There was no point discussing this further. The sooner they got going, the better.

  16.

  “Here it is,” Joanne said.

  Jeff followed her into the projection room. A few pieces of furniture, which looked like some kind of exotic, curved metal chairs, stood in three rows along the back wall. At the other end of the room, a broad cylinder stuck out of the ground. Next to it was a table-like structure with controls, which must be the console for the projector.

  Joanne slid her medical kit bag off her back and walked briskly over to the console. The buttons, levers, and knobs were not dissimilar to those in the cockpit of the Charon. She pressed a large square at the edge of the console and immediately a hologram appeared above the cylinder. It was a little fuzzy at first, but quickly came into focus.