The Lost Secret

by Vaughn Heppner

  “Continue your mission,” Ural told the commander, clicking off the comm afterward. He sat back, staring at the main screen, which showed the bleak ice world. He heaved a sigh and clicked a different button.

  “Is the shuttle read for launch?” Ural asked.

  “Yes,” a dominant said.

  “Then launch,” Ural said. “Launch and retrieve the drop troops.”

  A half minute later, a sleek combat shuttle left the Shapur’s main hangar bay. The shuttle headed for lower orbit.

  “Sir,” the comm operator said. “Artaxerxes Par is hailing us, wishing to speak with you.”

  “It begins,” Strand whispered at Ural’s elbow. “The jockeying begins in earnest now.”

  Ural wished the snake would cease its sibilant whispering. He knew very well how to handle this. “Patch the captain through to my chair.”

  The golden-skinned comm officer manipulated his board.

  “Ural,” Artaxerxes Par said roughly. “Is the shuttle heading down?”

  “Have you received any surface communications, perhaps?” Ural asked. “Is that why you’re calling, to inform me?”

  “The Emperor’s life is at stake,” Artaxerxes said. “You must immediately recall the shuttle.”

  “That is an interesting way to issue a challenge,” Ural said.

  Artaxerxes did not ask what Ural meant. The dominant knew. A challenge was a challenge to duel, to the death in most instances.

  “This is not a game,” Artaxerxes said. “The Emperor’s life is at stake.”

  Ural glanced at Strand, who watched him much too keenly.

  “Did the recall transmission go through?” Artaxerxes asked.

  Ural said smoothly, “Maintain your station, captain. The flotilla may have to react quickly. Unless you receive word from the Emperor saying otherwise, do not use this channel again.” Ural shut off chair communications, swiveled in his seat and motioned the comm officer to do likewise.

  “Bold,” Strand whispered afterward. “It might even have been rash. I hope you don’t fail.”

  “Your words cease to amuse me,” Ural said.

  “Don’t order me away,” Strand said. “You’re going to need my expertise sooner than you think.”

  It galled Ural that the Methuselah Man could be right. He made an offhanded gesture before glancing at the main screen and watching the progress of the combat shuttle. It had begun to enter the upper stratosphere, its heat shields glowing.

  “Sir,” the comm officer said. “Javed Kir is hailing us.”

  Ural did not sigh. He sat straight as a dominant should as he radiated confidence. It would be wrong to take the call privately. He needed to show the bridge crew that he had the situation under control.

  “Put him on the main screen,” Ural said.

  The comm officer tapped his board.

  A second later, Javed Kir appeared on the screen, obviously sitting in a shuttle’s control cabin. He was like before, golden-skinned and lean with dark hypnotic orbs.

  “You have broken the truce,” Javed said emotionlessly. “I see a shuttle heading for us, coming down from orbit.”

  “Not for you,” Ural said. “It’s performing a surface rescue operation.”

  Javed Kir twitched as his mouth jerked. Then a smoothing calm steadied him. “You cannot reach the Emperor. You dare not land near us.”

  “Of course not,” Ural said. “We’re rescuing a few of our men already on the surface.”

  Javed shook his head. “Your verbal deceptions have failed. There are no men on the surface to rescue.”

  “On the contrary,” Ural said. “I sent a…an exploratory team onto the surface ice. I wanted to have firsthand observations about conditions.”

  “I detected your hesitation just now. It was not an exploratory team, but an insertion team.”

  “What if it was?” Ural said. “A storm blew them over a hundred kilometers from you. I’m sending down a shuttle to rescue them.”

  “No,” Javed said emotionlessly. “You must let the drop troops die. If you do not…the Emperor dies in their place.”

  “You don’t have the means to kill the Emperor,” Ural said, “as he is not in your possession.”

  “That is a small matter. Venna will kill him if I send the message.”

  “If she does, we’ll saturate the ice around you with antimatter bombs. We’ll use bore bombs to finish her afterward.”

  Javed turned away and spoke monotone words to someone offscreen. He waited like that, finally turning back to the main screen. “Behold her beauty,” Javed said, a harsh tinge changing the emotionless of his voice.

  The screen wavered as Javed disappeared and Venna turned around to face them. There were bright lights behind her and a great volume of space. Could she have already made it down to the Builder tunnels?

  Ural’s heart thudded at the sight of her. She was so lovely, so achingly beautiful. To lie with her, to peel off her garments and enjoy—

  “Golden Ural,” she said, while glancing to the side and then making a sharp motion to someone unseen.

  “Ural!” a man shouted down there, sounding like the Emperor.

  There was a harsh buzz, a groan, and no more shouts from the unseen Emperor.

  Venna smiled at Ural. “Recall your shuttle. You are sending one down, right? Javed told me you are.”

  “I’m rescuing a landed exploration team,” Ural said.

  “No, no, that isn’t going to work with me.”

  “Listen—”

  “Ural,” she said, interrupting. “Are you recalling the shuttle?”

  He didn’t want to tell her he wasn’t. He hated defense. “Are those the Builder tunnels? Have you made it down there?”

  “Answer my question,” she said.

  “You answer mine first,” he said.

  Venna looked up, shook her head and regarded him as if he were a child. “You have no idea. This—” She indicated the tunnel. “This is so much more than you, Ural. You’re forcing my hand, and I really don’t want to do this.”

  “What are you attempting down there?” Ural asked.

  “Tish,” she said, flicking her hands.

  The connection cut.

  Javed stared at them on the main screen. Javed Kir turned sharply, screamed—the image disappeared.

  “Sir,” the sensor operator said. “Look.”

  On the main screen, a great flash appeared from the surface ice. It must have been a nuclear or antimatter detonation.

  “It came from the landed shuttle, sir, the original one,” the operator said. “It’s gone, and so is a lot of ice under and around it.”

  Ural turned wordlessly to Strand.

  The Methuselah Man studied the screen, the dissipating explosion. “I don’t understand,” Strand whispered. “What is Venna after? Why would she do that? How will she leave once she has what she wants?” Strand turned to Ural. “Could one or more of the star cruisers be secretly loyal to her?”

  Ural stared at the main screen, silently debating what to do next.

  -69-

  Golden Ural sat proudly on the Shapur’s bridge as he calculated fast. Venna the spy had destroyed the grounded shuttle, severing her comm link with the star cruisers. She’d also callously slain half of those that had traitorously joined her. Did that mean she’d reached her destination? Was it that easy to reach the Builder tunnels, or did she possess secret information? Strand had suggested she had secret allies, Artaxerxes Par, possibly. Was Strand another of her hidden allies? That seemed more than possible, likely even. Strand had been against the drop-troop insertion. Yet, Strand had moved openly against Artaxerxes when Artaxerxes had tried to have Ural slain.

  Without seeming to, Ural examined the bridge officers and guards. Would they turn on him if he ordered the flotilla to return to the Throne World? The Emperor had cried out to them. Venna had then ordered someone to shock and subdue the Emperor. That might start a crack in the loyalty of the officers. The Emperor had shown
himself as weak, as a captive to a woman, one of his harem girls. Word had already leaked out that his naked jaunts on the Throne World had been due to Venna’s ordering him to do that.

  Strand might know Oran’s murderers. With such knowledge, Ural might solve the old case in minutes. What did Venna’s plunge into the Builder tunnels indicate, whose secret hand was moving against the Throne World? Could Venna’s presence in the tunnels hurt the Throne World or was it essentially meaningless in the greater scheme of things?

  Ural shifted his jaw. He wanted to strengthen the Throne World. He wanted to turn the race of supermen into their own empire, without need of Earth women to propagate the greater society. To that end, he needed the data stored down there, data Strand could use to fix the genetic defect in the greatest race ever thrown up by humanity.

  That meant he could not turn tail and run. The harem girl was a spy, a Spacer likely, working either for the Spacers or for Lisa Meyers. Those were the likeliest possibilities. There might be others.

  Yes… It was time to rush the tunnels. If he could reach them…

  Ural cocked his head. Should he attempt to free his cousin? If not, should he try to become the new Emperor of the Throne World? On all accounts, he needed to capture and interrogate Venna the spy. After the interrogation—

  Ural grinned lustfully, thinking about what he would do with Venna after he squeezed the truth from her. She would enter his harem, spending the rest of her life—

  “Ural,” Strand hissed.

  Ural blinked, glancing at a worried-looking Strand. “What’s wrong?”

  Strand motioned the tiniest bit with his head.

  Ural turned that way, seeing the comm officer waiting. Had the comm officer asked him something? Ural was vaguely aware the officer had been addressing him.

  Taking a chance, Ural said, “Yes.”

  The comm officer swiveled around and tapped his panel.

  The main screen wavered and Samos of Thetis stared at him from the bridge of Star Cruiser Paralos.

  “May I ask you a question, Golden Ural?” Samos asked formally.

  Ural inclined his head.

  “Do you intend to rescue the Emperor?”

  Ural studied the captain’s heavy features. He could not tell what Samos was thinking. This was a moment to act decisively. Yet, it was also the moment to make the correct decision. It struck Ural then. He would act boldly and aggressively, betting that the prize in the subterranean lairs was worth it.

  “I’m placing you in temporary charge of the flotilla,” Ural said, standing. “The Elder-Advisor will captain the Shapur during my absence.”

  Samos blinked in surprise.

  “I’m personally going to lead the rescue operation,” Ural said. “I’ll take a squad of royal guardsmen, another squad of drop troopers to augment those already on the planet and Methuselah Man Strand as a tunnel guide.”

  Samos appeared as if he wished to ask another question.

  “You will have tactical control of the flotilla,” Ural said. “The Emperor is my cousin. Thus, I will find him no matter what and free him from the witch.”

  “May I ask—?”

  “I have no time for further queries,” Ural said. “I am already late, but I will rectify that soon. The spy has made her move. Now, I am making mine.”

  “Yes, Golden Ural,” Samos said, forming a fist and thumping his chest with it. “I hear and obey. It shall be as you’ve ordered.”

  Ural nodded curtly. “The Emperor will hear about your promptness. I have full confidence in you Lord Samos. Until we speak again—”

  Ural motioned the comm officer, who cut the connection. Without further ado, Ural pointed at various guardsmen and Strand, and then he headed for the exit with the others following.

  ***

  Ural hadn’t taken Servant Franco or his NSS men. Instead, three combat shuttles raced through the atmosphere, full of royal guardsmen and drop troopers from the Shapur. The men were all loyal to the Emperor. Ural would attempt to rescue his cousin as befitted a close family member. Strand was in the same shuttle with him. Both of them were in the control cabin.

  A combat shuttle was narrower and more maneuverable in atmosphere than a regular shuttle. It had sleek swept back wings and less room for ground combat personnel. The others in the rescue shuttle had picked up the surviving drop troops and were already landing near a metal housing.

  “The winds are harsh, Lord,” the pilot said over his shoulder.

  “It shouldn’t matter,” Ural said.

  The bleak Niflheim-like planet spread out before them. It was various shades of white to gray-white. The surface temperatures would instantly freeze a man caught without an EVA suit. White blurry patches down there showed vast areas of the continent where storms raged. They headed into one of the storms, continuously dropping lower into the atmosphere.

  Their combat shuttle began to buck and shift, throwing Ural and others against their seat restraints.

  “I know why you took me along,” Strand said in a low voice. “I never liked the Library Planet. Even Builders died sometimes, to the weather, I mean.”

  “You remember that time?”

  A faraway look appeared in Strand’s strange eyes. “That was so long ago.” He blinked and grinned as Rumpelstiltskin might have to the miller’s daughter when first offering his deal. “Long ago, but I remember so much, so very much. You were wise to bring me along.”

  Ural grunted, preferring to stare out of the polarized window. So much of their highest technology came from the Builders. According to some Intelligence reports, Captain Maddox had spoken to a Builder on more than one occasion. Ural did not envy his nephew that. Now, he was plunging into an ancient Builder kingdom deep under the ice. It was too bad humanity couldn’t fight it out with their own technologies. Why this lust to plunder alien tech and seek deeper alien knowledge at each step?

  Ural sighed to himself. He knew part of the answer. Humanity had begun dividing even more finely after the beginning of the Space Age. Spacers were different from New Men, New Men quite at odds with submen, to say nothing about the handful of Methuselah Men and the androids that attempted to mimic “normal” humanity. Each of them sought advantages over the other, and against those of their own kind. If you fought with clubs, and your foe started using swords, you had to learn how to make swords. And so it went, with each side and faction within each side seeking newer and better ways to defeat others or to hold what they had already gained.

  What side used Venna? She couldn’t be after the same genetic knowledge they desired.

  Ural shook his head. He didn’t know what Venna was after, but he would find out—unless he killed her before that happened.

  Far down in the whiteness a terrible flash of brightness occurred.

  “What was that?” Ural asked sharply.

  “Checking,” a shuttle operator said. “It was an antimatter explosion, Lord. I’m—” The operator turned back. “The original combat shuttle landed at a metal housing. Both are gone.”

  Ural’s gaze slid away from the operator’s as he peered at the storm jostling their craft. The housing and shuttle gone, which meant the ten-man insertion team was all dead now too.

  Something in Ural hardened. He stared at the operator. “Find the next housing.”

  “Yes, Lord,” the man said, turning back to his panel.

  “The other elevator entrances might also be mined,” Strand whispered.

  Ural forced himself to look at the wizened Rumpelstiltskin. “How could Venna have mined them all? She wouldn’t have had the time.”

  “…True,” Strand said a moment later.

  “What?” asked Ural. “You know something you’re not saying.”

  “I know many things I’m not saying.”

  “We’re heading for the tunnels,” Ural informed him.

  “Even if it’s suicide to do so?” asked Strand.

  Ural wanted to throttle the dwarf, and yet, he needed Strand, needed the cunn
ing and ancient knowledge lodged in that odd-shaped skull.

  “How is she doing this?” Ural asked.

  “Truly, I don’t know,” Strand said. “But I’m beginning to fear her. Consider the kind of person Venna is to have done everything she’s managed.”

  “Yes,” Ural admitted. “It’s impressive. Venna is impressive.”

  “Quit thinking about her with your loins. She uses that as a tool. Don’t be another pawn like the Emperor.”

  Ural bared his teeth. “Choose a metal housing, an elevator entrance. You and I will go first. If it explodes, your era will have come to an end.”

  “Are you ready to die?”

  “If it means your death as well, yes,” Ural said.

  Strand laughed evilly. “I accept your challenge. May I?” he asked, touching his restraints.

  Ural nodded.

  Strand unbuckled, staggering across the shaking and tilting cabin to reach one of the shuttle operators. They spoke in low whispers, the operator clicking a switch and allowing Strand to study a panel screen. Finally, the Methuselah Man pointed at a place on the screen. Thereupon, Strand staggered back to his seat, clicking his restraints back on.

  “We’re heading east,” Strand said.

  “In relation to what?” asked Ural.

  “The annihilated combat shuttle,” Strand said.

  “Why did you choose the housing you did?”

  Strand grinned nastily. “I’m keeping that a secret for now—unless you want to beat it out of me.”

  “Remind me later,” Ural said.

  “Of course, Sire.”

  “Don’t call me that,” Ural said. “I plan to rescue my cousin. He will remain Emperor.”

  “Naturally, I concur.”

  They stopped talking as the shuttle swerved and picked up speed. Soon, the jostling increased as they raced into a greater storm. Behind them followed the other two shuttles.

  A feeling of excitement filled Ural. Would they have all died if he hadn’t taken Strand along? Would Strand have given him a useable elevator if the Methuselah Man hadn’t been on the mission but upstairs on the Shapur?

  Ural cocked his head. Perhaps the Builders had mined certain elevators or created traps for the unwary. Strand wasn’t going to say how he knew any of this. Ural’s gaze narrowed.