The Lost Artifact

by Vaughn Heppner

  “I see,” Maddox said.

  There was a pause. “I compute you to mean that you think I was lying just now when I spoke about your keenness—or hatred—directed at those you believe are your superiors.”

  “It isn’t important,” Maddox said. “I would rather stick to the issue.”

  “A clue as to the clone’s next rendezvous point?” the cube asked.

  “There you go,” Maddox said. “If you cannot provide that, can you give me a possible place holding the tech of the Nameless Ones?”

  “I have searched my memory banks for such a place. I have correlated everything the clone said and what he studied while in the ghost-ship under my watch. Through this process, I have discovered a possible place. I would rate it as a forty-three percent possibility. There is a dwarf planet holding something the original Strand held as valuable. It is guarded by a Windsor League hammership.”

  “The dwarf planet is in Windsor League territory?”

  “On no account,” the cube said. “It is in the Beyond, as you term such things.”

  “Can you be more specific?”

  “Prepare to receive data.” The cube thereupon proceeded to tell the captain a highly interesting story regarding a Windsor League hammership. The cube ended the data-dump by giving Maddox the hammership’s present known location.

  “I deem the selected dwarf planet as having a forty-three percent probability of containing that which you seek,” the cube added.

  “What is the probability the present clone is heading there?” Maddox asked.

  “There are too many unknown variables for me to give it a probability.”

  “Is there a better place for the clone to go?”

  “According to my analysis,” the cube said, “no.”

  -13-

  The clone’s journey after leaving Brahma took two and a half weeks of dogged travel. The clone Strand might have become lonely during that time, but he was used to endless isolation. Besides, he had a lot to think about and a horde of preparations to make.

  He laughed at the unformed clone’s earlier worry about having his own identity. He was Strand. He was unique. He was also in a chain of Strands that no force had ultimately been able to defeat. He often marveled at his fantastic foresight. The old Strand had gone down. Thus, his many enemies certainly thought he was defeated.

  They were all going to be in for a rude and shocking surprise, soon.

  At the end of the two and a half weeks, he reached the selected star system. It was in the fringe region of the Beyond that butted against Human Space.

  This was the Jarvo System. It had been named after Lieutenant Jarvo Mars of the Patrol, the man who had first mapped the region. There was a G-class star, four terrestrial planets and three Jovian gas giants with a regular host of dwarf planets in the Kuiper Belt region beyond.

  Strand knew from experience that the terrestrial planets and several of the Jovian moons had one feature in common. Each had been burned down to the bedrock when a neutroium-hulled Destroyer had been through this star system many millennia ago. The Swarm had once reached here and built up on the terrestrial planets and the terrestrial-like Jovian moons. The Builders had arrived with their borrowed Destroyer and burned out the vicious bugs as part of their overall plan for humanity.

  There was something else, though, to the Jarvo System that not even the Builders had learned. The arrogant spoilers would never have left something of the Nameless Ones in this star system if they could have helped it. That was the prize Strand had come to collect.

  As his spacecraft exited a Laumer Point and headed out-system for the Kuiper Belt region, the comm began to beep for his attention.

  Strand sat at the controls. He’d been waiting for this. He cracked his knuckles and almost answered the call. As his left hand descended toward the switch, he realized that he looked like a mess. He hadn’t really taken proper care of himself these last few weeks.

  Rising, hurrying to a shower, he scrubbed, washed his hair and combed it, and finished by shaving his face. Then he donned clean clothes, and sat down at the controls ten minutes later.

  “Yes,” he said.

  The screen wavered until a man with chiseled features regarded him. The man had short blond hair and the faint blue eyes of a killer.

  “You will identify yourself immediately,” the man said.

  Strand checked his spacecraft’s scope. The message came from a large military fighter, a gunboat in Windsor League military terminology, that was many hundreds of millions of kilometers away. It was a five-man craft, a heavy fighter with thick hull armor and a railgun of some potency.

  Not that Strand’s craft was in range of the railgun. The heavy fighter—the gunboat—was, like all its type, meant for close-combat swarming attacks against larger warships.

  The Windsor League had merged with the Commonwealth of Planets some time ago. In fact, that had happened after the first war with the New Men. Before that, Admiral Fletcher of Star Watch had led a Grand Fleet against the New Men. That fleet had contained a concentration of Windsor League hammerships, along with Wahhabi Scimitar-class laser-ships, Social Syndicate vessels and many Star Watch battleships.

  In the end, the New Men had retreated from the Thebes system in the “C” Quadrant of the Commonwealth, taking their captives with them. Not all the Windsor League hammerships had returned home, though. Some had been destroyed and others captured, while one hammership had gone rogue. That fact had been carefully purged from the records, but Strand had known.

  The Windsor League had been British in style and composition. There had been a few planets, though, with other backgrounds. One of those had been the planet Hindenburg, full of German-descended soldiers, scientists and settlers. Hindenburg was a rocky world full of useful ores and deep, extremely lush mountain valleys.

  WLN Hammership Bismarck had been through hell during the campaign. Commodore Hans von Helmuth—the captain of the Bismarck—had received suicidal orders during one of the offensives. He had balked, communicated his displeasure with higher command, received a confirmation and finally had a confrontation with Third Admiral Bishop, the Windsor League commander under Admiral Fletcher’s orders. The Third Admiral had made certain that von Helmuth understood that he and his crew would be court-martialed if they failed in this task.

  Von Helmuth had clicked his heels, saluted and departed the Windsor League flagship. The British-descended officers had always given the dirtiest jobs to the German-descended-crewed vessels. This time, that was going to change.

  During the maneuvers to combat, von Helmuth had taken the Bismarck through a different Laumer Point. He and the hammership had disappeared, certain that the fleet faced destruction at the hands of the New Men.

  When, instead, Admiral Fletcher pulled his rabbit out of the hat, making the New Men retreat from Human Space, von Helmuth realized he was ruined. People would consider him a coward and a traitor.

  The commodore did the only reasonable thing possible. He summoned his chief officers and laid out in exacting detail how they were all in this together. If they returned home, they would all live in shame for the rest of their lives. It was quite possible they would all hang. No one would understand that they had been trying to save warships for humanity’s future defense.

  “What can we do?” a major asked.

  Hans von Helmuth had stared down his officers. “We have a hammership. We have gunboats. We have hard-bitten marines. Let us take over a world and rule as kings.”

  After some sharp debate, the chief officers agreed.

  But things hadn’t worked out quite as expected for the Bismarck or its crew. Strand—the original—had discovered the rogue hammership. He could have told the New Men, and they would have sent out star cruisers to hunt down and destroy the vessel. Instead, Strand sought out the mighty warship, studied the commodore from afar and lured the hammership and its commander into a trap.

  The details weren’t important. The key was that in the end, Com
modore Helmuth had decided to parley his way out of the problem. He had gone with bodyguards to the original Strand’s cloaked star cruiser.

  Once aboard, the New Men easily overpowered the bodyguards. They did it without injuring any of them. Strand ordered the commodore rushed into his medical facilities. There, his surgeons inserted a control chip into the commodore’s brain.

  Shortly thereafter, Hans von Helmuth ordered his chief officers to come aboard the star cruiser. There, they, too, received control devices inside their skulls.

  Strand the original had modified the commodore’s desire. Once returning to the Bismarck, von Helmuth had promptly taken his hammership to the Jarvo System. He and his men had been here, ever since.

  As the clone sat before the comm screen, regarding the powerful Hindenburger, he leaned forward and pressed a switch.

  “You will inform Commodore von Helmuth that I wish to speak to him.”

  The transmission took time because of the distance between vessels. Finally, the chiseled-faced Hindenburger showed surprised.

  “The commodore certainly does not have time to talk to the likes of you.”

  The clone had expected no less. He hadn’t wanted to broadcast his arrival, but he didn’t see any way out of it now.

  “Tell him Strand has arrived, and be quick about it.”

  The Hindenburger stared at him suspiciously. The man obviously didn’t like the message. Even so, he nodded before the screen went blank.

  Now, Strand had to wait as he kept a careful watch on the distant gunboat. Von Helmuth had been heavily conditioned, but sometimes people broke their conditioning. If that had happened here, Strand had to be ready to run for it. This was a risk, possibly a grave one, but he didn’t see that he had any choice at this point.

  Strand had not randomly chosen the Jarvo System for von Helmuth and his men. An abundance of Laumer Points here made it an important junction in the fringe Beyond. There were shortcut routes here, even though the area was considered to be in the Beyond, outside the jurisdiction of any Human Space government. The shortcuts meant that a few bold freighters passed through here for faster deliveries as they traveled to distant star systems.

  That had been the key to the original Strand’s plan. There was a dwarf planet in the Kuiper Belt region of the Jarvo System. Upon his arrival at Kelle—the dwarf planet—von Helmuth had started to indulge in selected space piracy. His men seldom committed such piracy in the Jarvo System. Instead, the sailors and marines who’d turned brigand charged a fee to any freighters passing through. It was better to steal a few golden eggs at a time instead of killing the goose that laid them. The actual piracy occurred against freighters attempting to bypass the Jarvo System in order to forgo paying the fee.

  There was a secondary and more critical function to the dwarf planet Kelle. That was von Helmuth’s true purpose for having been located here.

  The comm began to beep.

  Strand felt his stomach tighten. Here was the first test. He checked the scope, but could not see any approaching gunboats or stealth vessels. He doubted von Helmuth would use the Bismarck against him.

  Strand opened channels.

  Another sharp-planed individual peered at him. This man had iron-colored hair cut just as short as the first Hindenburger’s. Hans von Helmuth sported a special monocle in his left eye and a dark green uniform with a matching military cap. The cap was adorned with a skull and crossbones patch. The Bismarck’s crew had been known as Death’s Heads even before the space campaign against the New Men.

  “Leader,” von Helmuth said. “I did not know. I’d heard rumors about your…passing.”

  Strand said nothing as he stared at von Helmuth. Would his younger appearance affect things? So far, it appeared not.

  “What can I do for you, Leader?” von Helmuth asked, worry etched across his face.

  Strand studied the commodore’s features. The signs seemed good. Von Helmuth’s conditioning seemed to have held. It did not seem as if the commodore had removed the control chip from his brain. If von Helmuth was tricking him, the commodore had become even more clever than before.

  “I’m coming to Kelle,” Strand said abruptly.

  After a passage of time for the message to reach him, von Helmuth asked, “Would you like an escort in?”

  “There is no need. I do not wish to make a stir. I am coming in and leaving again soon enough.”

  “Yes, Leader,” von Helmuth said.

  Strand couldn’t help it. He nodded in appreciation of the commodore’s subservience. This was how it should be. The New Men used to all bow to him. That was before the Emperor had led them in rebellion against the ordered way of existence.

  Strand had not forgotten. Oh, no—

  The clone jerked his head. He realized that von Helmuth had just cocked his head. The commodore seemed to study him. Strand checked a timer. He might have blanked out for over a minute. Von Helmuth might think that significant.

  “You have a question?” Strand asked.

  “No, Leader.”

  Strand almost asked the commodore why he hadn’t cut the connection yet. That would have been a mistake. Von Helmuth hadn’t cut the connection because Strand hadn’t given him leave to go.

  “Prepare my quarters,” Strand said. “Now, go. Hurry.”

  “Yes, Leader. Von Helmuth out.” The screen wavered and went blank.

  Strand realized that the second and more dangerous test was about to begin. As a clone, he’d always lived alone. Yes, he had taken the original’s memories, but could he act enough like his father to fool those who had known the original? Could he make von Helmuth obey him in all things? Maybe more to the point, could he survive von Helmuth’s secret tests against him?

  “It’s time to find out,” Strand said.

  While the clone held all the advantages, he was also worried. The best thing would be to take every precaution possible. There was no way he was going to let a mere Hindenburger outfox him. He was going to go into the deep tunnels and activate one of the most deadly computers in this part of the Orion Arm.

  -14-

  It took another three days for Strand to cross the distance from the Laumer Point to the dwarf planet in the Kuiper Belt region.

  He decelerated hard the last three million kilometers, the gravity dampeners making the spacecraft vibrate so fiercely his teeth rattled.

  Von Helmuth had sent out several gunboats to meet him. This was different from an escort, being the usual safety procedure near the dwarf planet. The gunboats were squat vessels with heavy hull armor and a single railgun each. The railgun was on top of each gunboat from stem to stern. They were in the same class of spacecraft as Star Watch’s strikefighter and newer fold-fighter. A gunboat was four times as massive as a fold-fighter, however. Still, like a fold-fighter, their function was to make massed attacks and, at times like this, stand in for dockyard duty.

  The massive WLN Hammership Bismarck was parked in orbit around Kelle. In former times, a hammership had been worth two Star Watch battleships. That wasn’t the case anymore with the new Star Watch disrupter cannons and improved electromagnetic shields.

  The hammership was big and round, and it possessed three layers of electromagnetic shielding when working. It had extremely heavy hull armor like that of a Star Watch monitor. Behind the armor was thick ablative foam to absorb whatever made it through. Unlike other warships, the Bismarck did not have any beam weaponry. Instead, it had giant railguns. Those railguns fired many types of rounds, the deadliest being thermonuclear warheads. That meant the Bismarck was most effective at close range. Its ultra-heavy shielding and hull armor theoretically allowed the vessel to survive distance assaults in order to get in close and hammer an opponent. Thus the name, hammership.

  At no time did the gunboats power up their railguns. Strand watched his sensor board closely. There wasn’t much he could have done about it if the railguns had powered up. He hated this helplessness, and wondered if he’d made a tactical mistake coming
in like this.

  The answer to that question took time as Strand approached Kelle in his overworked spacecraft. In the past, he’d come in his cloaked star cruiser. Then, he’d possessed the firepower to destroy the hammership and devastate everyone on and in the dwarf planet. If someone should take it in his mind to assassinate the galaxy’s greatest human, this was the perfect moment to attempt it.

  So far, nothing like that had taken place, Finally, Strand’s spacecraft followed one of the gunboats through a giant hangar bay door into the dwarf planet’s main dockyard, the remaining gunboats following his craft. He landed on the deck without incident. Just as good, von Helmuth approached with a delegation of Hindenburger bodyguards.

  Strand couldn’t help it. He became suspicious. There was something about the commodore’s stern features that alerted him. Yes. The Hindenburger had a glint in his eyes.

  Strand tapped his chin. If von Helmuth had wanted him dead, it would have been easy enough for the gunboats to have obliterated his spaceship. Why, then, did Strand have these suspicions? Had the commodore learned something new since the last time Strand had spoken to him?

  Yes. That had to be the case. Von Helmuth must realize that Strand held vast knowledge. Maybe some of the conditioning still held, but a cunning part of the commodore’s mind struggled to reassert control. The bodyguards would not have any conditioning or any control devices in their minds.

  With a sigh, Strand picked up a control unit. It was the size of a computing tablet. While watching the scope to gauge the commodore’s reactions, he manipulated the control unit.

  The commodore’s entire body jerked and his face contorted.

  Strand cursed under his breath. He should have been more skillful than that. He froze, then. According to a swift diagnostic, the twitchy reaction hadn’t been faulty tablet manipulation. No. Something had happened to the commodore’s conditioning. Could that imply a faulty or malfunctioning control net?

  Yes, that was most likely the case.

  Strand took a deep breath and let it out slowly. He made different adjustments, watching the commodore all the while.