The Lost Artifact

by Vaughn Heppner

  “Do you suspect Professor Ludendorff?” the Emperor asked, most likely out of a sense of obligation and not because he cared what happened to the sub-men.

  “I do not suspect him,” O’Hara said. “You may not know, but Ludendorff has left our service. I believe the professor is recouping from injuries gained during the Swarm Invasion. What I’m saying is that he did not seem to be in a belligerent frame of mind the last time I saw him.”

  “I see,” the Emperor said. He straightened the slightest bit. “Obviously, then, you suspect Strand. That is why you have called me.”

  O’Hara nodded.

  “I assume you realize that Strand is still in our custody,” the Emperor said.

  “I do, Sire.”

  “You must also realize that he has had no outside contact with anyone but me.”

  O’Hara became cautious. Those the New Men considered inferior easily offended them. “I am in no way suggesting that someone can trick you, Sire. I was merely wondering if it is possible that some of your people could be secretly helping Strand.”

  The New Man smiled indulgently. “Brigadier, my people hate Strand. Most would like to strangle him with their bare hands. Those who think otherwise would like to torture him to death for all the indignities he has heaped upon us. There are none among us who would help Strand.”

  O’Hara wondered how to bring up the next question. She finally blurted out, “May I ask, Sire, why you don’t kill him, then? Strand is dangerous. He may be the most dangerous human alive.”

  The Emperor’s dark eyes swirled with passion. It’s possible he considered himself to be the most dangerous human alive.

  “If I have overstepped myself…” O’Hara said quickly.

  “You have,” the Emperor said. “Yet…you are a substandard model of—”

  O’Hara understood that the Emperor had just cut himself off out of what he must think of as politeness. New Men were insufferably arrogant. They couldn’t help it.

  “I realize that fear motivates your rudeness,” the Emperor said, taking a new tack. “Know, Lady, that I study Strand as I talk to him. He is full of unusual insights. He is restless, though. He hates captivity. Rest assured that prolonged confinement is better revenge than killing him. Strand seethes inside. He desires to be out creating mischief. He also fears what I will eventually do to him. There is another point to consider, one I believe you are intelligent enough to perceive.”

  “You are gracious,” O’Hara managed to say.

  The Emperor showed off his white teeth in a feral grin. Clearly, he understood how she really felt about New Men.

  “I believe there may come a day that we desire Strand’s insights,” the Emperor said. “That is the key reason I permit him to live.”

  O’Hara nodded. She didn’t like hearing that.

  “But I shall watch him even more closely,” the Emperor said in a condescending tone. “If I learn anything that shows he is actively plotting against the Commonwealth, I shall inform you at once, Brigadier. You have my word on this.”

  O’Hara nodded. She couldn’t ask for more than that. “Thank you, Sire. You are most gracious.”

  He smiled indulgently, clearly waiting for the interview to end.

  “I wish you well, Sire,” O’Hara said.

  “Yes, yes,” he said with a wave of his long-fingered hand and no pretense of returning the sentiment. “If that is it then…?”

  “It is, Sire. Thank you once again.

  The Emperor nodded a last time and cut the connection.

  O’Hara sat back as the screen went blank. She believed that the Emperor had told her the truth. So…if Ludendorff wasn’t plotting against the Commonwealth, if Strand could not because he was a prisoner of the New Men, was there a third Methuselah Man out there working against humanity? How could another one have been hidden this long, from her agents and from the other two Methuselah Men?

  O’Hara did not know. She hoped Maddox found a clue at Smade’s Asteroid. Star Watch needed to find this hidden foe if they were going to keep the Commonwealth intact. Humanity needed the Commonwealth because mankind needed Star Watch. For one thing, the terrible Swarm Imperium was still out there.

  We defeated one small Swarm Invasion Fleet, O’Hara thought to herself. And it took everything we had. What if the Imperium sends another fleet through the hyper-spatial tube? What if the Imperium sends two or three fleets, each of them three times the size of the first fleet?

  O’Hara took a deep breath. Star Watch had a lot of work to do before humanity could sleep safely. A lot of hard and ceaseless work if they were going to keep the human race alive in this part of the galaxy.

  PART I

  SMADE’S ASTEROID

  Ninety-seven days later

  -1-

  Captain Maddox abruptly returned to consciousness and tasted blood in his mouth. He didn’t know where he was. He didn’t know what had happened to him. He did, however, have a sense of danger.

  Was he in danger? Was someone close to him in danger, or was it broader than that?

  He tried to assess his surroundings, but that proved difficult, as he was groggy and disoriented. He lay on something cold and hard. The coppery-tasting blood came from a cut in his mouth.

  A cut in his mouth…? Yes! He’d been in a fight. He recalled…three blows. The first had smashed his inner cheek against his teeth, cutting skin. The second had badly staggered him and the third had presumably knocked him out.

  Maddox tried to bring his right arm around in order to touch his jaw. A jolt of pain caused him to open his eyes.

  It was dark. He couldn’t tell if it was night or if he was in a building. He was breathing hard from the pain in his right arm.

  He lay on his face on metal. Slowly, carefully, he shifted onto his left side. Then he tried to move his right arm again. That sent pain shooting up and down the limb. Was it broken?

  He didn’t know but was beginning to suspect so.

  Maddox concentrated on moving his right arm; he clenched his teeth so he wouldn’t groan. He refused to, for a number of reasons. The first was a matter of safety lest he give himself away. The second was a matter of pride. He did not like to give in to pain.

  Soon, his right hand touched his face. With his left hand, he tested the right arm. He did not find any ripped cloth or jagged bone ends. The muscles were tender, though, as if someone had repeatedly wrenched the arm back and forth.

  He was wearing boots, pants, a shirt and a jacket. He suddenly remembered why he wasn’t wearing his Star Watch uniform. He did not want anyone to know that he belonged to Star Watch.

  Star Watch—

  Abruptly, Maddox groaned as he remembered the Battle of Alpha Centauri. Star Watch had fought the Imperial Swarm and an ancient spirit-entity Ska. The good guys had been on the verge of defeat. Maddox had saved the day by engineering the explosion of the star Alpha Centauri A. It was a tri star system. The exploding star had annihilated most of the enemy fleet and the Ska. Unfortunately, it had also killed every human inhabitant of the Alpha Centauri System.

  The guilt of slaughtering hundreds of millions of humans—

  As he lay alone in the dark on the cold metal floor, Maddox ground his teeth together.

  He could logically process the idea that he’d saved the greater Commonwealth. He had also rid the universe of the wicked Ska. He had not yet found a way to process, to personally accept, murdering hundreds of millions of people to achieve those ends.

  None of that mattered to him here…wherever here was. It was time to figure that out.

  Making as little noise as possible, Maddox worked up onto his knees. He cradled his right arm. The injury couldn’t have occurred too long ago. Like New Men, contributed by the New Man who’d impregnated his mother, he healed faster than a regular human. He had a slightly higher metabolism and definitely had quicker reflexes than a normal person.

  He stared into the darkness but saw nothing. He craned his neck. There were no stars or sky or v
isible cloud cover. No breeze stirred against his face. Given the taint in his nostrils, the silence and the darkness, he could be in a basement or an underground garage.

  It has a metal floor.

  That could indicate a spaceship or satellite. He did not sense any vibration that would have revealed an engine. Could he be drifting in a dead spaceship?

  With a surge of determination, Maddox climbed to his feet, swaying for several seconds. The last blow, the one that must have knocked him out, must also have scrambled his brains more than a little. He waited, and the feeling of disorientation passed.

  He searched through his clothes. He did not have a gun or a link to Galyan in Starship Victory. No gun, no brass knuckles, he had nothing to defend himself, not even his monofilament knife. The empty scabbard was hidden under his jacket. He must have lost the knife somewhere.

  He listened but there was still nothing to hear.

  Maddox picked a direction and began to slide his feet. He did not step in case he might trip on something. His slid his feet—and bumped up against something.

  Crouching, Maddox felt a prone body. He searched for a pulse, but found none. He leaned near the mouth, but could not hear any breathing nor feel air move against his cheek. The skin was cold and clammy. He discovered the handle of a knife with the pommel pressed against the chest. Right. The blade was in the torso, possibly in the heart.

  Ah. Maddox recognized the handle of the knife; his monofilament blade, a weapon so sharp it could cut almost anything.

  Maddox must have stabbed this man for striking him.

  With a tug, Maddox removed the knife and, working carefully in the dark, wiped the blade against the man’s garments. Afterward, he slid the ultra-sharp blade into the scabbard inside his jacket.

  Turning around, he slide-walked back the way he had come until he reached a wall. His right arm didn’t hurt quite so badly now, although he had no intention of trying to use it yet. He felt left-handedly along the wall until he reached a hatch.

  Hatch?

  This wasn’t a door. It was a hatch. What did that indicate? A spaceship? A satellite? A submarine?

  Maddox bent his head but no memory came. Wait! He did remember something. He—

  With a sick feeling, Maddox felt his scalp. Someone had shaved him bald. They had done so in the past few hours, as he did not even feel bristles of hair.

  He felt along his scalp until he stopped at the back of his head. He felt stitches.

  For a second, rage surged through him.

  He fingered the stitches. He was going to yank them out and tear out whatever had been implanted in his head. Before he could, the hatch slid up and a blinding flashlight shined in his eyes.

  -2-

  “Don’t move,” a mountain of a man growled. “Don’t even twitch a muscle.”

  Maddox squinted as the harsh light blinded him. He raised his left hand to shield his eyes and backed away from the bigger man.

  There was a popping noise. A tangle capsule struck Maddox’s chest and flung sticky strands around him, webbing his arms to his torso. Another popping sound occurred. A second capsule struck his legs, tangling them. Then a third sound, a sharper one, heralded a solid rubber bullet striking his chest. It knocked the air out of his lungs, and it caused him to attempt to stagger to keep his balance. He couldn’t because his legs were webbed together. He toppled backward and hit the deck.

  “You don’t listen too good,” the man told him in a gloating voice.

  The bright light moved into the chamber. A second light appeared. The two beams centered on Maddox.

  A third man cursed. His light shined on the corpse in the chamber.

  “He killed Yunnan,” a higher-voiced and weaker-sounding man said.

  Despite his tangled position, Maddox turned his head. Through the beams shining in his eyes, he saw a massive corpse.

  The dead man looked like a pro wrestler from a 2-G planet. That would explain the power of the blows. The corpse had close-cropped hair, a mashed Asian face and wore an unfamiliar black uniform. Blood had welled from the chest like an old-fashioned oil gusher.

  “I’ll be damned,” one of the men said.

  Something clicked and light flooded the chamber.

  Maddox squinted in the glare and looked around a bare room. He didn’t remember it, and he didn’t understand why he wouldn’t remember. But he wasn’t going to worry about that now.

  He focused on his adversaries. Two of them looked like Yunnan clones. They were massive, wore black uniforms and had mashed Asian faces and ugly dispositions. One cradled a tangler, a shotgun-looking weapon, while the other had a pistol slugthrower. Each had a flashlight, which they now snapped off.

  The third member wore a white lab coat. He was much shorter and thinner, and had copper-colored hair that he wore like a bowl.

  “Why did you kill Yunnan?” the tangler-armed mountain man demanded.

  Maddox had a vague recollection of the fight. It seemed like a dream; he had trouble remembering.

  “Look,” said the scientist, the thin man in the white lab coat. “Yunnan hit him. There’s a welt on Maddox’s face.”

  The armed men looked closely.

  “Yunnan broke the rule,” the scientist declared. “Maddox is in a delicate condition—” The scientist stopped talking, possibly because he noticed the captain watching him intently.

  “Did you operate on me?” Maddox asked.

  The tangler-armed mountain man laughed, but choked off the jeering sound at a frowning glance from the scientist.

  “What is this place?” Maddox asked.

  “You’re going to be all right,” the scientist said in a soothing voice.

  “Did I escape?” Maddox asked.

  “Now, now,” the scientist said. “You’re upsetting yourself with these questions. That’s not going to help you recover. You’ve been injured and we’re helping you.”

  “He killed Yunnan!” the pistol-armed Asian shouted, his features having turned red. “He killed him!”

  The massive Asian rushed Maddox. With a steel-toed boot, he kicked the Star Watch officer in the stomach.

  Maddox twisted in pain, tightening the sticky strands webbing him and making it harder to breathe.

  “Stop that!” the scientist shouted.

  The huge pistol-armed Asian cursed bitterly, kicking Maddox a second time.

  “No,” the scientist said, reaching into a lab-coat pocket.

  “Please, Doctor Lee,” the tangler-armed mountain man pleaded.

  The huge Asian went for a third kick, drawing back a tree-truck-like leg. Then, he stiffened as his eyes bulged outward. He turned stiffly toward the scientist, Doctor Lee presumably.

  Doctor Lee held a small device, pressing a switch with his thumb.

  The huge Asian raised his pistol at Lee.

  Lee frantically pressed the device a second time.

  A hiss sounded from the massive Asian’s skull. Smoke trickled upward as his eyes rolled up into his head. A second later, as the stench of burnt flesh filled the room, the huge man collapsed bonelessly onto the metal deck.

  The tangler-armed man’s head whipped around as he stared at Doctor Lee. “You killed my friend,” he accused.

  “He was going to shoot me,” Lee said.

  “You panicked. That’s not an ordinary gun, but a slugthrower firing rubber bullets.”

  Doctor Lee shook his head.

  “You bastard, you panicked and killed my friend.”

  “Don’t swear at me,” Lee snarled, stung, it seemed.

  “I—”

  “Don’t ever swear at me,” Lee shouted, raising the device as his thumb hovered over a switch.

  The massive Asian with the tangler turned away from the scientist. His shoulders hunched.

  Maddox glimpsed the mountain man’s face. He was furious, but Doctor Lee had cowed him.

  “I have a question,” Maddox said.

  The tangler-armed man focused on Maddox. Hatred burned in h
is black eyes, but he kept his back to the scientist.

  “Yes?” Doctor Lee asked.

  “Who are you?” Maddox asked.

  Lee seemed shocked by the question. Then a sly smile stole onto his face. “Interesting,” he said.

  Maddox did not find it interesting. He found Lee’s smugness annoying. It was time to begin playing his adversaries.

  “I’m finding it hard to breathe,” the captain said. “Could you loosen these strands a little?”

  Lee eyed him. Finally, he focused on the armed man. “Guard him, Jand. On no account will you touch him. If you harm Maddox in any way…” Lee glanced suggestively at the newly dead 2-G corpse

  The tangler man, Jand, nodded without looking up, although he had turned to face Lee.

  “I’ll be back with the stretcher team,” Lee said.

  This time, Jand did nothing.

  Lee seemed as if he was going to add something. Finally, he pocketed the device, headed for the hatch and stopped.

  “Oh,” Lee said. “Don’t talk to him, either. His memory loss…that is quite interesting. The Master will want to test this, I’m sure.”

  Lee moved through the hatch and continued walking, the sound of his footsteps soon dwindling.

  Maddox had a premonition. This was it. If he was going to do something to get out of this, now was likely his sole opportunity.

  -3-

  “Where is this place?” Maddox asked.

  The huge tangler-armed man, Jand, looked at him. Then, the heavy—a term for a 2-G person—sneered and turned his back on the captain.

  “The little guy always tell you what to do?” Maddox asked.

  There was nothing, no response.

  “Seems like Doctor Lee is a little prick with a big weapon,” Maddox said.

  Jand glanced at him, shrugged.

  “Lee also murdered your friend with his little device,” Maddox said.

  There was nothing again, but Maddox had the sense his words bothered Jand.