“This is Johnston R-twenty-seven zero four, four, nine Rectal, Anus, Penile five requesting permission to taxi. Again, this is Johnston zero, four, four, nine RAP five requesting permission.”
“Roger, Johnston R-twenty-seven. You are cleared to taxi.” I could hear other flight controllers squawking in the background as the man on the radio struggled to keep from laughing.
“Aren’t there regulations about what you can say on the air?” I asked.
“To the tower?” the pilot asked, sounding genuinely surprised. “The controllers love it when I talk dirty. It’s their supervisors who get pissed, and that’s all right. They can’t touch me. I have military clearance and they’re just civilians.”
The commuter runway was a mile-long tunnel with several airlocks. A crewman towed us to the first airlock using a cart. When he reached the far wall of the airlock, the crewman detached our tow cable, gave us a quick wave, and drove back to the terminal. The runway behind us vanished as the thirty-foot door closed behind us, sealing in the spaceport’s manufactured atmosphere.
The wall in front of us was thick and heavy, the color of oxidized iron. After two minutes, a seam showed in the center of this great metal barrier. The cogs at the base and top of the wall groaned as they pulled it open along their zipper-like causeway.
This time we rolled forward under our own power and stopped just shy of a final barrier, an electroshield. The first two barriers we passed through protected the atmosphere inside the spaceport. This next shield was in place for military purposes. It was a force field designed to stop intruders and deflect attacks. The electroshield could dampen particle beam and laser attacks, and anything solid that hit the shield would be instantly fried. I could see the surface of Mars ahead through the electroshield’s translucent white aurora.
“Do they know you’re self-broadcasting?” I asked.
Having a “self-broadcasting” ship meant that this highly modified Johnston R-27 did not need to enter the Broadcast Network to travel long distances. The ship was equipped with its own broadcast engine that, used in conjunction with the right navigational computer, could transport the ship anywhere in the galaxy.
“It’s sort of hard to hide something as big as an anomaly,” the pilot said.
Anomaly was the term used to describe the electrical field through which broadcast objects vanished and appeared. “They track us the moment we leave Mars. We’re the only ship that flies toward Saturn instead of Earth or the Broadcast Network. That kind of thing gets all kinds of attention these days.”
“I suppose,” I said.
The surface of Mars looked like an Earth desert from our cockpit. Peering out as we arched away from the planet, I saw dented plains that stretched around the horizon. Huge as the Mars Spaceport building was when seen from the inside, it became a mere speck as we pulled away from the planet. Soon enough, Mars looked no larger than a coin, and all of its features vanished.
The only broadcast discs in the Sol System, Earth’s solar system, hovered a few hundred miles above the spaceport. Normally spacecraft either flew up to the discs or headed toward Earth, the only populated planet in the solar system. We, however, flew in the opposite direction. We headed out toward space, toward Saturn, and traveled more than 100,000 miles. Only the most powerful tracking systems like the ones on Mars would detect what happened next.
Sitting out in space, we glided as the contraption in the back of our craft came to life. The glass around our cockpit became as black as space. It was opaque but not dark enough to block out the electrical storm caused by our broadcast engine. Lightning danced across the edges of the Johnston R-27. I could see its squirming outline through the tinting. It looked like neon chalk lines as the cabin filled with the acrid scent of ozone.
“Welcome to the Perseus Arm,” the pilot said.
“Still in Perseus?” I asked. “I thought they would have moved the ship by now. We are at war.”
“Why move?” the pilot said. “No one knows we are here. We’re protected from both sides.”
CHAPTER FIVE
March 7, 2512 A.D.
Ship: Doctrinaire; Galactic Position: Perseus Arm
Sections of the Doctrinaire were still under construction and probably would be for the next thousand years.
The Doctrinaire was so incredibly large that its size created an anomaly. Viewing the ship alone in space, you could not estimate its size. At first glance, she looked like any other fighter carrier—the same wedge-shaped body, the same beige hull and light gray underbelly. In the vast panorama of space, size and distance become blurred. Seeing the Doctrinaire floating beside a Perseus-class fighter carrier, you would think they were identical ships and that the Doctrinaire was closer to you because she was so much larger than the other.
The hull of the Doctrinaire filled the view from our cockpit long before we reached its landing bay. The ship was shaped like a bat—its wing span measuring two miles wide and its hull was about 1.3 miles in length. The great ship had four launch tubes, hollow tunnels used for launching fighter craft that stretched the entire length of the ship. The Doctrinaire had an additional four landing bays for transports and supply ships.
The pilot flew the Johnston toward Bay three. We slowed to a mere hover and the pilot used thruster engines to guide us into place in one of those docking bays.
“Well, Corporal Marsten, it’s been a pleasure flying you on Doctrinaire Spacelines. Fly with us again sometime,” the pilot said as he climbed from his seat. He gave me a sloppy, mock-salute. This was not an unfriendly gesture—he knew that I was AWOL.
I left the ship and walked to a nearby locker room. I pulled a key from my pocket and looked for the matching cubicle. Once I found it, I stowed my civilian clothes and dressed in the charley service uniform of a U.A. Marines corporal. For all appearances, I was just another enlisted clone on active duty.
The trip from the landing bay to the bridge was lengthy and fast. The Doctrinaire had twelve decks, plus a bridge and an observation deck. The ship had nearly twenty square miles of deck space. Just getting from the landing bay to the central elevator bank required a ride on the recently installed tram. Officers might spend their careers on this ship without visiting the bridge or the engineering decks.
I lived on this ship two years ago. Back then everything but the shell of the ship was still under construction. Last time I traveled this path, the corridors were covered with scaffolding. Welders used to work in these halls around the clock, the white glare from their torches shining up and down the halls like a continuous flash of lightning. Back when I was assigned to the Doctrinaire, the ship housed more builders than crew. You might pass ten construction workers walking down a hall and not see a single sailor.
A lot had changed. The cylindrical corridors I entered on this occasion had smooth shining walls. Bright light shined down from inlaid ceiling fixtures and polished chrome address plates adorned most doors.
The Doctrinaire had several banks of elevators, but only the central bank reached the bridge. As I entered one of these elevators, a security computer scanned and identified me. The doors closed behind me. Moments later they opened on to the bridge of the Doctrinaire—a sweeping deck manned by dozens of officers.
Three officers came in my direction. The man on the right was a captain—a heady rank in the U.A. Navy. He was young, stout, and very attentive. He looked like the kind of aggressive officer who runs a tight ship and accomplishes his mission at any cost. The man on the left was a rear admiral. He had a single star in his collar. He was an older officer whose casual smile and soft eyes gave the impression of patience.
The man in the center was Fleet Admiral Bryce Klyber, possibly the most powerful man in the entire Republic. Klyber was an accomplished Naval officer. He rose through the ranks by answering every challenge. With the exception of Bryce Klyber, no one had worn the fifth star of a fleet admiral for forty years.
Klyber was one of the last active officers who had fought in th
e Galactic Central War—the last full-blown war. Klyber, of course, won that war when he unveiled his battalion of top-secret Liberator clones.
“Marsten,” Klyber said, and eyebrow cocked to show his surprise at seeing me. “I thought I left orders for you to meet me in my quarters. Just as well. Corporal, this is Rear Admiral Halverson and Captain Johansson.”
I saluted.
They saluted back.
Klyber looked over at the rear admiral. “Admiral Halverson, have you met Corporal Marsten?”
Something about Captain Johansson caught my attention. He was tall and skinny with a shaved head and squinting dark eyes. He did not even bother looking at me as he saluted. He seemed to want to ignore me, not in the “you’re not worth my time” way that many officers greeted clones, but in a way that seemed far more contemptuous.
“Corporal, I don’t believe we’ve met,” the older officer said. “Rear Admiral Halverson.” He looked to be in his late fifties, an officer nearing retirement. Halverson looked like a youngster beside old man Klyber, however, a painfully skinny man who looked like he could have been one of the slaves forced into building the Pyramids of Egypt.
“Marsten here is retired from active duty,” Klyber said. “I, um, reactivate him on occasion. He’s got a knack for security.”
Klyber was tall. I was six feet three inches tall and he had me by an inch or two. On the other hand, he may well have weighed less than 150 pounds. Klyber stood perfectly erect, his rigid posture and skinny body made him look like he was made out of the outer limbs of an old oak tree. He had icy blue eyes that looked as focused and intense as sapphire lasers.
He turned to the two senior officers. “Perhaps we can take this up again later this evening. I have some business to take care of with the corporal.”
Halverson and Johansson saluted and walked off to continue their discussion.
“What do you think, Harris?” Klyber asked, looking around the bridge.
“She looks ready to run,” I said, noting the brightly lit navigational panels.
“More or less,” Klyber said. “It’s not the equipment that worries me. I worry more about the men at her helm. You get a limited selection of officers with top-secret projects. My crew was chosen for security clearance, not battle experience. If I wanted a ship full of military police and intelligence officers, this would be the ideal crew.”
“You worked with Halverson in Scutum-Crux,” I pointed out.
“Tom Halverson does what he can. I like Halverson,” Klyber said. He looked around to make sure that no one was within earshot of us and lowered his voice. “What did you think of Johansson?”
“Not especially friendly,” I said. “He doesn’t make a great first impression.”
Klyber smiled and took one last look around the bridge. “Let’s head down to my quarters.”
“Yes, sir,” I said.
We entered the elevator.
“What happened on New Columbia?” Klyber asked.
“Mogat terrorists happened,” I said. The elevator doors slid closed and I felt the slightest vibration as we dropped three decks and sixty feet. The doors opened.
“Anyone I have heard of?” Klyber asked.
“William Patel,” I said.
“Billy the Butcher? Are you sure it was him?”
“I saw him myself, sir,” I said. We entered the corridor that led to officer country. “Callahan, the informant you sent me to meet, fingered him. Callahan thought he could earn himself some credibility and a nice reward by handing him over to us.”
Officers walked past us in groups of two and three. They all stopped to salute as Klyber walked by. Klyber returned their salutes without breaking stride.
“Patel was wise to him?”
“Have you met Callahan? He figured he could pinch both sides of the loaf. He sold Patel supplies and us information. It takes a subtle hand to play both sides off like that. Subtlety is not one of Callahan’s stronger suits.”
We entered the admiral’s suite which included his quarters, a large office, and his war room. “So you don’t think the bombs were meant for you?”
“Not a chance,” I said.
“What tipped you off to the bombs?” Klyber asked.
“We were sitting on this balcony overlooking the street and out comes Patel, practically right on cue. He’s too far away to nab, but somehow he knows where we are sitting and he looks up at us. I mean, he’s a hundred yards away and he looks right at us.
“I didn’t trust Callahan. He struck me as a punk . . . a small brain with a big mouth. So when Patel looks right at us, I figure he knows exactly what Callahan is up to. The only question I had was if we could make it out in time.
“The big question is, who tipped Patel off?”
Klyber listened to this, his blue-fire eyes seeming to X-ray my thoughts as I spoke. “Do you have any theories?”
“Somebody on your staff,” I said.
“Interesting that you would say that. Of course, you realize that parked as we are so far from the Broadcast Network, we don’t have communications with the outside world. In order to get a message to Patel, our spy would need to travel . . . broadcast to another location.
“Given that, do you still think the leak came from here?”
This quadrant of the galaxy was dark. Communications were transferred through the Broadcast Network and the Doctrinaire was nearly 20,000 light years from the nearest discs.
“Yes, sir,” I said. “Whoever leaked the information traveled.”
Klyber sat silent behind his desk and rubbed the thinning hairline around his temple. He seemed deep in thought, then brightened. “I have something for you,” he said as he stood and opened a closet hidden in the wall beside his desk. “A friend sent this to me. He did not know anything about you, of course; but I think you will appreciate this.”
When Klyber turned back toward me, he held a small book with tan leather binding that looked parched and old. The leather had gone stiff with age and drying. The words, Personal Journal of Father David Sanjines, were emblazoned in dark brown letters that stood out against the dust-colored leather.
“A friend in the Vatican sent this to me. Most of it is of no interest. It’s the journal of an archbishop. But there is a small section concerning a mutual acquaintance of ours.”
I looked down at the journal as Admiral Klyber held it out to me.
Klyber said. “I want you to have it.”
I took the old book and it seemed to fall open of its own accord. The pages had a faint red tinge to them that I knew was from clay dust, though it looked more like rust.
The book had a five-inch strip of blue velvet ribbon sewed into its binding for a bookmark. Parts of that ribbon had turned nearly black with age. I noted the date—April 10, 2494—on the open page.
Klyber watched me. “That is the only entry of interest. It goes on for a few pages.” He thought about the book for a few more moments, then shifted his attention. “I would like to revisit your impression of Captain Johansson.”
“You think Johansson is a spy?” I asked, closing the book.
Klyber did not answer. He smirked as he watched me from behind his desk. “Oh, I know he’s a spy, the question is for whom.”
“A spy?” I asked. “Do you think he’s a Mogat?”
“I’m guessing he’s worse,” Klyber said. “I think he works for Admiral Huang.”
Admiral Klyber had a long-standing feud with Che Huang, the secretary of the Navy and a member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Admiral Huang wanted to see himself as the most powerful man in the Navy, but Klyber, with his political connections, was generally recognized as having more clout.
“Huang?” I asked. “That would be bad.” Klyber could legally execute an enemy spy. A spy working for Huang, however, could only be transferred.
Possibly because Klyber headed the Liberator cloning project, Huang had a thing about Liberators. Huang was the officer who had assigned me to Ravenwood. To the best of
his knowledge, I had died on that planet, and I wanted him to continue believing me dead.
“We’re a thousand light years from the nearest planet,” I said. “Dump him in space and say he had an accident.”
“It’s too late for that,” Klyber said, putting up a hand to stop me. “Whatever he’s looking for, I assume he has already found it.”
“That doesn’t mean he’s been able to report everything he’s found,” I said.
“Whatever information he was after, he transmitted it the first time we sent him out. The safest thing to do with Johansson right now is to keep him onboard the Doctrinaire. That way we can observe him.”
“Assuming he doesn’t have any friends on board,” I said.
“I hope he does,” Klyber agreed. “We’re keeping an eye on him.
“If he’s Huang’s boy, you’re in for a fight in the Senate. If Huang hears about the Doctrinaire, he’s going to ask for control of the project. He’ll probably put Wonder Boy in command of the ship.”
“Wonder Boy,” a.k.a. Rear Admiral Robert Thurston, was Che Huang’s protégé, the brilliant young officer who replaced Klyber as the admiral of the Scutum-Crux Fleet. Bryce Klyber was no slouch when it came to strategy, but Thurston crushed him in a battle simulation.
I did not like Thurston. He had a mile-wide anti-synthetic streak. Thurston saw clones as supplies and nothing else. He used them like any other kind of inventory, something to be expended and reordered.
“I’m meeting with Huang and the Joint Chiefs next week at the Golan Dry Docks for a top secret briefing,” Klyber said, interrupting my thoughts. “I would very much like to return from that conclave alive.”
I spent the night on the Doctrinaire, sleeping in one of the state rooms that Admiral Klyber reserved for visiting dignitaries. My bunk was hard, my room was sparse, and the bathroom was entirely made of stainless steel. I felt at home.
Stripping to my general-issue briefs and top, I took the book Klyber gave me and climbed into my rack. The sheets were coarse and stiff, stretched so tight that you could bounce a coin on them. It felt good to lie down.
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