by Saxon Andrew
“Eric McAnn is his best friend. He hurt him and I can imagine how he felt about that; then what?”
“He never won another match. The instructors say that the accident caused him to lose his desire to even try. Danielle, you’re beginning to scare me. How do you put all these things together?”
“Honestly, Eddie, I don’t know. Sometimes I just sense things. There’s one thing that feels right to me. Our Superman would never hurt anyone unless it was forced on him.”
“So it looks like Tag is our best candidate so far.”
“Yes, I think you’re right. But Eddie, don’t interrogate him first. Give him a chance for the pressure to build up while others are being interrogated. Also, make sure when he goes into the room that there are a couple of marines outside the door. I honestly don’t think that he would hurt anyone, but he may try to escape.”
“We’ll do it that way. I’ll inform Inspector Connor of our discussion and let him know that the interrogation is taking place in the morning. He may want to be here.”
“Probably,” Danielle said, but in her heart there was nothing but sadness for the young boy with the startling green eyes.
Chapter 13
T ag was sitting in a chair along with six other students outside an interrogation room at school. He was taken out of his first session by a security officer that told him to wait until it was his turn. His heart was hammering in his chest and he was very close to panic. He saw absolutely no way out of being interrogated. Eric was in there being questioned, and he knew he was probably next. “I have to calm down,” he thought. “If I go in there like this then they’ll know I’ve got something to hide.” He closed his eyes, began taking slow deep breaths, and focused on the psychic field. The patterns usually calmed him. “Only think about the patterns,” he thought. He almost started to panic again when the shadows showed him that every inch of the hallway he was sitting in was being watched. Then something new caught his attention. There was a new kind of shadow pattern coming out of the room Eric was in. It actually had color. It fluctuated from light blue to navy. Suddenly it turned red, and then went back to fluctuating blue. “This has to be the truth field,” Tag thought. He could actually feel it in his mind, and he could tell that the fluctuations were emotions that Eric was having during the session. The red was when a falsehood was detected. The patterns were soothing to Tag, and then he had a thought. “Red!” he thought, and the field turned red. “Blue!” and the field turned blue. Tag then noticed that the fluctuations grew noticeably. “Ah, that red must have startled the examiner,” He realized. He felt sudden hope, but he had to be sure. He wasn’t going to try to manipulate the field while Eric was being questioned. “Please don’t let me be the next one,” he prayed. Then he saw a security officer coming with Danielle Ashford in tow.
“How many times do I have to go through this before you people get it through your thick heads that I don’t know anything?” she said.
The security officer marched her up to a chair and said, “Sit down and wait until it’s your turn. Try to behave.”
Danielle stuck her tongue out at the security officer as he walked away, and then she sat down and saw Tag. She looked at him for a moment and then started giggling.
“What’s so funny?”
She said, “Tag, I guess you’re it this time,” and then she laughed out loud.
He smiled at her and said, “Yeah, I guess I am. You’ve forgotten one thing though.”
“And just what is that?”
“It appears you’ve been it several times. I guess you could say you’ve been tagged.”
Everyone in the hall laughed, including Danielle. She got up and sat down beside Tag. “So Mr. Fourth Level Tag Master, are you too hung up on Leila to ask anyone else out?”
Tag looked at her for a long moment, wondering how she could know about Leila, and said, “I’m not like Eric. It’s not easy for me to approach girls and ask them out.” He looked at the floor and said, “Any girls.”
She was again struck by the intensity of his eyes. Then she said, “Well, what if a girl asked you out?”
“I might go. It would depend on the girl that asks.”
“What if it were me?”
“Are you asking?”
“Yes I am.”
“Then you’re right again.”
“Huh?”
“Of course I’d go out with you. I guess that makes me it again. By the way, every boy in our class is planning to ask you out or already has, because if you haven’t noticed, you are pretty nice to look at. How can you have any room on your calendar for me?”
Danielle looked at him and said, “Thank you, however, I keep tight control of my calendar, Tag. I’m very selective about who I spend my time with.” She had decided to ask Tag out to see if there was any possibility of his being Superman. She felt somewhat guilty about the deception, but sensed it was something she needed to do. According to school records he would turn eighteen years old in three weeks. She had just turned nineteen a month before, so she was actually only a little over one year older. She wasn’t robbing the cradle, just rocking it.
Eric came out of the interrogation room followed by the interrogation officer. The officer looked at Tag and Danielle for a moment, then selected another student sitting across from them. “It’s your turn,” he said. Then he went back into the room.
Eric said, “Wow! You were right, Tag. These people don’t mess around. They have absolutely no sense of humor. Heck, you would think they could go out and buy one, but it would probably get them fired if they smiled. Oh, hi Danielle. Have you thought about my offer? I’m a great tour guide.”
“I’m so sorry, Eric. I’ve just hired a tour guide for Friday and Saturday night.”
“Who’s the lucky tour guide?” Eric asked.
Danielle looked at Tag, and he slowly raised his hand and said, “That would be me.”
“Outstanding,” Eric said. “Now let me warn you, Miss Danielle, that you better not hurt my good friend here or you’ll have it out with me. Believe me, I can talk a long time and make one minute seem like it will never end. No one should endure that punishment. So you better just watch yourself, Ducky.”
Danielle and Tag laughed and she said, “I’ll do my best.”
Eric winked at Tag and left for his next session.
“Danielle, I want to try and relax before my interrogation if you don’t mind.”
“No, not at all. Go ahead.”
“Thanks. I’ll see you in class later about this weekend.” Then he put his head back against the wall and closed his eyes.
Tag sensed the truth field and let his mind get in step with its fluctuations. He thought, “Red!” The field turned red. Tag kept the thought of red in his mind and the field did not change but stayed red. Then Tag thought, “Blue!” And the field turned blue. “That’s enough,” he thought.
The door opened and the interrogator stepped out and raised his com. Another technician came running down the hall and entered the room with a small tool bag. The student that was being interrogated stepped out and was told to wait. She stood next to Danielle.
“What happened?” Danielle asked.
“I don’t know. Evidently, every answer I gave was not true, including my name and birthday,” the student said.
“That’s odd,” Danielle thought. “Could Tag be doing this or is it just a malfunction?”
The technician came out and the interrogator called the student back in.
Tag then sat up and started humming.
“If he’s Superman, he doesn’t feel any pressure. He’s relaxed. This is not acting. Could I have been so wrong about him being our suspect? Or does the truth field no longer scare him?”
Then it was Tag’s turn. The interrogator came out pointed at him and said, “Come in, please.”
Tag stood up, smiled at Danielle, and followed the interrogator into the interrogation room.
“Mr. Gardner, please sit in this chair. I a
m going to ask you a series of questions. I want you to answer them with either yes or no. The first four questions I want you to answer honestly. The second four, I want you to answer dishonestly. Do you understand, Mr. Gardner?”
“Yes sir.”
“Okay, let’s begin. Is your name Thomas Gardner?”
“Yes,” he said, while he thought, “Blue field.”
“Are you nineteen years of age?”
“No.” He again thought, “Blue field.”
“Is your birthday in January?”
“Yes.” He thought of a blue field.
“Do you have a girlfriend?”
“No.” He imagined a fluctuating blue field.
“Do you live south of the school?”
“Yes.” This time he thought, “Red field.”
“Have you ever failed a class?”
“Yes.” He thought of a fluctuating red field.
“Are your parents separated?”
“Yes,” he said as he thought, “Red field.”
“Have you ever hated anyone?”
“Yes.” He thought of a red field.
“From this point on, Mr. Gardner, only truthful answers,” the security interrogator said. “Do you know anything about a missing test booklet?”
Tag thought blue and said, “No.”
“Do you know anything about a fight where four men lost their lives?”
Tag thought blue and again said, “No.”
“Do you know Leila Barber?”
“Yes.”
“Did she talk with you about her poor test results on her first test?”
Tag thought blue while he said, “No.”
“Are you able to avoid cameras?”
Tag thought of a fluctuating blue and said, “No.”
“Okay, Mr. Gardner. That will be all.”
Tag got up and left the room. He gave Danielle his com number on his way to class.
The interrogator called Danielle in for the next session.
“How did it go?” Danielle asked.
“He doesn’t know anything. Here, take a look at his results.”
Danielle looked at the results and asked, “Why is there so little fluctuation in his responses?”
“I was surprised about that. Usually most students are very nervous; he wasn’t. The field said he only gave honest answers.”
“Is there any way someone could tamper with the field?”
“No! Well, no.”
“Why did you hesitate?”
“There was one person we questioned ten years ago that lied, but the field said they were telling the truth.”
“How did that happen?”
“This person had a high psychic reading. He could tell you what cards were going to come up on a shuffled deck of cards. He got quite rich at several casinos’ expense before security arrested him and had him tested.”
“Can you test for psychic ability?” Danielle asked.
“Yes, but it takes multiple measures over a sixty-day period.”
“Does the person have to know they’re being tested?”
“Well, I guess you could just have them walk through a portal sixty straight days to get your measures. There is a chance if this person has strong psychic skills he will detect the test.”
“Does that matter?”
“Theoretically, no. Psychic power just doesn’t turn itself on and off normally.”
“Okay, I’ll talk with Inspector Connor about this; I guess you should finish the rest of the top thirty in this class.”
“Okay.”
She got up and left the room with mixed emotions. Tag passed. But it didn’t feel right. Well, maybe this weekend she would get a better feel for who he was. She felt something inside of her that something was wrong with Tag’s interrogation. “Can he control the truth field?” she wondered. “If he can,” she decided, “then he really is Superman.”
Chapter 14
G rand Admiral Dorg talked with the commander of the two Glod dreadnoughts. “Are you clear on the plan?”
“Yes, Admiral.”
“Just to be sure, explain your role in the coming attack.”
“I and my fellow commander of the dreadnought Weapons Loaded will enter normal space and maneuver to get the Earth ship between us and your two ships. Then all four of us will open fire on the Earth ship.”
“What if they try to escape?”
“We will have them boxed in. They will have to flee close to one of our ships to escape. It should be close enough to saturate their defenses and destroy them. Especially since this is a destroyer class vessel.”
“Anything else?” Dorg asked.
“No missiles.”
“Very good! I have a ship powered down again and it should draw the Earth ship in when it passes on patrol. Even if they don’t approach, my ship will transmit the Earth ship’s coordinates and then start a ten-dreg countdown when all four dreadnoughts will jump to their assigned coordinates and begin the attack.”
“I look forward to working with you, Admiral. Maybe we can do this again.”
“Let’s get this done first, commander,” Admiral Dorg said as he signed off.
The Glod commander thought about four dreadnoughts attacking a small destroyer. The warrior in him detested the action as cowardly. A dreadnought is more than a hundred times bigger than a destroyer with forty times more tonnage; it also out guns it more than 800 percent. The commander would obey his orders; however, this was one action he would not brag about to other Glod commanders. He sat in his command chair and waited for the expected transmission.
The Earth destroyer Moscow moved silently though the sector where it had previously been attacked. Commodore Kosiev worried about his small ship. It had been his home for three years and it fit him like a pair of old slippers. He knew every nuance of its systems and knew its capabilities. He also knew that military intelligence was probably right about another attack, and that overwhelming force would be used this time. His patrol schedule had been changed and varied such that knowing exactly when Moscow would pass the sector where the first attack took place was not possible. He knew that in order to trap Moscow, a ship would have to be present to notify the attackers of his arrival. Hopefully, it would be detected before it could transmit; that would at least allow the destroyer to go to general quarters. It had been decided that the destroyer would not have any help, nor would it be allowed to fire upon any ship attacking it. It would have to escape by using its speed. It would not be allowed to reveal its weapons capability.
Moscow’s screen was out six hundred thousand kilometers and tuned to report anything containing metal. Then, just like before, Lieutenant Mikado said, “Sir, we have a return one hundred eighty thousand kilometers off our starboard side.”
“Analysis, Lieutenant?” Kosiev asked.
“High-strength alloys, sir.”
“Sound general quarters, all hands to battle stations; pull the screen in to one thousand meters and bring reactors two, three, and four on line. Ensign, open all channels of communication,” Kosiev commanded.
“Commodore, I have four star drives breaking into normal space close to our position,” Mikado said.
“Show them on our tactical screen, Lieutenant,” Kosiev said. He saw that the trap was well planned. Moscow was at the center of four ships entering normal space in a box formation. She would have to come close to two of them to escape. “Turn toward the ship at ten o’clock, helmsman,” he ordered. The destroyer turned and picked up speed.
“Sir, the four ships are in normal space and they’re all dreadnoughts,” Mikado said with an edge to his voice. “One of them has begun hitting our screen with a beam to prevent our being able to jump away.”
“By the creator, this is taking revenge too far,” Kosiev said. “These ships were all more than three thousand feet long.” He looked at Ensign Kelley and said, “Open all communication channels.”
“To the four dreadnoughts entering Directorate sector delt
a, this is the Directorate ship Moscow on patrol enforcing Alliance codes. We are not hostile and we will leave immediately. Do you require assistance?”
“No we don’t.”
“May we leave peacefully?”
“No!”
“What are your intentions?”
Suddenly, all four dreadnoughts simultaneously opened fire on the Earth ship with their energy weapons. The beams joined the low-power beam impacting the screen that prevented Moscow from using its star drive to escape, and the screen began to change color. A star drive cannot resonate when being hit by an energy weapon. The destroyer’s screen changed from white to yellow to red. “Screen status, Lieutenant?” Kosiev asked.
Mikado looked at his display and said, “Holding sir, but the four ships are moving closer, boxing us in, and the energy on our screen is going up.”
“How long until screen failure?”
“Less than 120 seconds sir.”
“Sir, all power is going into the screen and we can’t use our star drive.”
“Open communication channels,” Kosiev said. Then he faced his communications screen and said, “Stop your attack. We will not defend ourselves. We are no danger to you.” The attack continued. Suddenly Moscow turned and accelerated toward the gap between two attackers. Both dreadnoughts opened fire with two hundred primary lasers each and the Earth ship exploded.
“That didn’t take long,” the Cainth commander thought. Then he broadcast to the two Glod ships, “Is there anything left to analyze?”
“No. Our sensors show absolutely nothing remains larger that a pebble.”
“This action is over; return to your bases.”
The Glod did not respond but activated their star drives and disappeared. “This was too easy,” the Cainth commander thought. “Set star drive to return to Cainth. Notify the unpowered ship to return to base.” After a moment, both of the huge ships disappeared and the Cainth cruiser powered up its systems and left after the dreadnoughts.
Nothing was left to indicate that a battle had taken place, just empty space.
“Did you get all of that, Mikado?” Kosiev said.