Second Earth

by Stephen A. Fender

  “Sir, it’s unquestionably not one of ours. No way. The hull materials are way off.”

  “Keep going, Fredericks. Is it anyone else we know?”

  Melissa watched as the young enlisted man shook his head in frustration.

  “Not that I can tell, sir. It conforms to no known specifications we have in the database. Hull materials and markings—at least, what I think are markings—are totally alien in origin.”

  A lump formed in Melissa’s throat. The Rhea’s computers were up to date with the latest library and sensor data known to the Unified Collaboration of Systems. If the sensors were unable to identify the interloper, then the intruder was a wildcard—and capable of anything and everything at once. It was also entirely possible that they could be completely benign. This was where Captain Richard Krif, with his incredible arsenal of firepower and diplomacy, would either shine or be tarnished forever.

  “And they are not Kafaran?” Krif asked.

  Fredericks rechecked the sensor palettes, making sure they were turned optimally for anything that could even remotely identify the target. “I really can’t say, sir; a very small fraction of the materials in the hull do conform to known Kafaran construction materials. But it’s only a minor percentage, Captain.”

  “Could it be a new design? Something we’ve never seen before?”

  “I can tell you this is something that no one has seen before. There are no records of contacts with any vessels matching this description in the Unified database. If it is Kafaran, then they’re playing a whole new ball game. This is nothing like anything else we’ve ever encountered from them before.”

  Krif strode up to the holographic status table on the upper level of CIC. “Operations Officer?” he called down to the starboard side of the room.

  “Yes, sir?” replied the soft voice of Commander Caitlin Hayes from the flight commanders podium on the other end of the compartment.

  “Commander, which reconnaissance unit is on deck right now?”

  Without even looking, the lithe woman had the answer ready for him. “Lieutenant Mitchell of the Star Kings, sir; launch bay three.”

  “Excellent,” Krif said, smiling. David ‘Hawkeye’ Mitchell was the best ELINT pilot on the ship. It was his right to be out there. “Clear Hawkeye for launch immediately, and send out a pair of interceptors to cover him.”

  “Yes, sir. I’ve got Black Lions Two and Four lined up and ready to launch.”

  “Very well. Let ‘em fly, Commander. Then put three more on standby, just in case.”

  “Yes, sir.” She gave Captain Krif a curt nod, then leaned over her console. She brought up three holo-images of the individual pilots from each of the three craft and gave them their orders. With a push of a button, the three officers were cleared to launch.

  On the port side of the Rhea, three hexagonal doors opened in unison. From the openings, Lieutenant Mitchell’s craft was launched first and was immediately flanked on both sides by the two Seminole fighters from the 492nd interceptor squadron, the Black Lions. Within seconds, the three craft rocketed away from the Rhea with all available speed toward the unknown ship that was quickly nearing the edge of weapons range with the Sector Command carrier.

  Richard leaned over the status table, watching intently as the three icons representing his patrol squadron moved quickly away from the carrier. “Chief of Security?” he called out, addressing the most senior security officer in the room.

  An older, olive-skinned man stepped up to Krif’s side, his gleaming sidearm plainly visible even in its holster. Krif was glad to see one of the biggest and strongest men he’d ever known stand beside him. “Yes, sir?”

  “Lieutenant Commander Wamata, I need you to go down to the brig and bring up that sensor specialist from the Icarus,” Krif ordered.

  “Lieutenant Garcia, sir?”

  Krif nodded slowly. “Something tells me that he may have seen what we’re looking at right now. I want him up here. Double-time it, Commander.”

  “Yes, sir.” Wamata said, turning his nearly two hundred fifty pounds of bulk from the captain and bounding out of the space. “Make a hole!” he shouted to a meek-looking ensign as she entered through the main door, causing the small girl to nearly jump out of her skin. “Coming through!”

  Melissa stepped up beside Krif and watched the holographic image of the unfolding reconnaissance mission.

  “What happens if they get into trouble?” she asked.

  Krif didn’t bother taking his gaze from the image. “My people are the best trained in the fleet, Agent Graves. They can more than handle themselves.”

  From below Richard’s position, the fresh-faced lieutenant sitting at the communications console spoke up. “Captain Krif?

  “Yes, Lieutenant Clifton? Did you get through to the intruder yet?”

  “No, sir. Not yet. We’re receiving a communications echo, though. It’s as if our transmissions are being scattered.”

  “You mean like they were being jammed?” Krif asked with impatience.

  “Not really, sir. It’s more subtle than that.”

  “Try broadcasting outside the system. Establish a link with our nearest communications relay station.”

  “Yes, sir. It’s not going to be easy with all this interference.”

  Krif didn’t like not having the whole picture. Now with the revelation that, should the Rhea and her escorts encounter any trouble, they wouldn’t be able to accurately call for backup, it made him all the more nervous. Hopefully Mitchell and his patrol squadron will give us something more to go on. “Just keep on it, Lieutenant. Notify me the second you have something.”

  “Yes, sir.” Clifton said, and then turned back to his equipment.

  “Captain,” Caitlin spoke up from the forward flight control station. “Hawkeye and the Black Lions are nearing the target.”

  “Communications, patch me into the ELINT.”

  With a swipe of his dark hand across his screen, Clifton changed the image in front of him to indicate the three icons of the patrol squadron. He pressed his finger against the one representing Mitchell’s E-41 and began speaking into his headset. “Hawkeye, this is control. Acknowledge.” When Mitchell responded on the signal, Clifton turned and gave Krif a nod.

  Krif pointed a finger and waved it in a lazy circle above his head. “Pipe it through the overhead speakers. I want everyone to hear what’s going on.”

  As Clifton entered the command, a single beep was heard throughout the entire command center, indicating to everyone that something was about to come through the speakers and that they should pay attention.

  “Hawkeye, this is Krif. Respond,” the captain called toward the overhead.

  “This is Lieutenant Mitchell,” the young man’s voice echoed around the room.

  “What do you see at out there, Lieutenant?”

  “It’s difficult to describe, sir. This thing is massive…easily several hundred feet longer than the Rhea. It looks almost organic in nature. Like…the bottom of an uprooted tree trunk. It’s tapered to a point at what I would consider the front of the vessel, with larger, vertical points protruding from the stern. No acknowledgement thus far to our requests for communications. I’m swinging around the vessel to port to get a closer look.”

  “Continue to maintain a safe distance, Lieutenant,” Krif heard Caitlin say into her headset. “Black Lion Two, any sign of resistance?”

  Lieutenant Stephen Franklin, the Black Lions’ tactical officer, came back over the loudspeakers of the Rhea’s control center. “Negative, ma’am. No defensive action taken by the intruder.”

  “Any sign of offensive or defensive batteries?” Krif asked.

  “Negative, Rhea. No defensive batteries that I can make out, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t hidden somewhere inside the hull.”

  Krif leaned toward Sergeant Fredericks at the sensor controls. “What’s their position now?”

  Fredericks shook his head in frustration. “We’re getting some mi
ld distortion on the long-range sensors, probably from the same source as the communications echo.”

  “Do we have enough information to extrapolate a holo-image of what the ELINT is seeing out there?”

  “I’m only receiving about seventy percent of the data they’re sending back, sir. The rest of it is being reflected out of the system. I’ll try and add their data to what our own sensors have already collected to come up with something.”

  Krif put a steady hand on Fredrick’s shoulder and lowered his voice. “Make it fast, son. I don’t want to get caught with our pants down out here.”

  “Yes, sir.” When Krif walked away, Fredericks was as at a loss as to how to get that much information put together in a timely manner. There were simply too many variables to take into account, and he didn’t have the training he needed to get the computer to respond the way he needed it to. He removed his ball cap, then wiped a hand across the bead of sweat that had formed on his brow as he contemplated what he should do first.

  Behind Krif, the control center doors opened and Lieutenant Vincent Garcia, with the large and imposing Commander Wamata behind him, strode confidently onto the command deck, his hands bound behind his back. Krif turned and locked eyes with Garcia, who was standing on the deck nearly two feet above him. Krif walked up one of the two staircases that flanked the space, moving up to the Lieutenant’s level, then nodded to Wamata, who removed the Lieutenant’s manacles.

  Garcia had shaved since the last time Krif had seen him. Even though he’d been in the brig under suspicion of being a spy, Garcia was still afforded the privilege of wearing his uniform. It was neatly pressed, and he looked ready for duty.

  “You were the junior sensor officer on the Icarus?” Krif asked sharply. He knew the answer to be true, having discovered the information in both the lieutenant’s files and what he’d gleaned from Garcia during their initial debriefing.

  “Yes, sir,” Vincent Garcia said with a stunned expression. “I was.”

  “And you said before that you saw what attacked you?”

  Garcia nodded slowly as he recalled the image. “I…I caught a glimpse of…of something, Captain. I can’t be sure—”

  Krif stepped closer to the man, close enough to feel his breath against his face. “We don’t have time to be unsure about things, Lieutenant. Did you or did you not see something?”

  “I…I did, sir. I know I did.”

  “Would you recognize it if you saw it again?”

  This time, Garcia’s answer was more resolute. “Yes, sir. Absolutely.”

  “Good. Now get down to the sensor console and work with Sergeant Fredericks. But remember Lieutenant, he’s the specialist in charge on my orders, and his word is gospel, so your rank doesn’t mean squat right now. Understood?”

  Garcia stood at attention. “Yes, sir. Perfectly understood.”

  “Then snap to it,” Krif said, letting the young lieutenant get to his new duties. The captain looked to Wamata, who gave the commanding officer a disapproving look.

  “Are you sure this is a good idea, Skipper?” the burly security chief asked. “He could be the spy we’ve been looking for over the past couple of weeks.”

  Krif’s voice was low. “I’m aware of that, Lieutenant Commander. But right now he’s the only person who may have seen what we’re dealing with. We need what he knows.” Krif looked to Wamata’s sidearm slung tightly against his side. “Keep an eye on him, just in case.”

  When Wamata noticed what the captain was looking at, he gave the commanding officer a curt nod. “Yes, sir.” He left the captain’s side, stepping to an inconspicuous corner of CIC where he could keep a watchful eye on Garcia.

  Down at the sensor control station, Garcia had pulled up a chair next to Fredericks. Fredericks looked at Garcia with a worried expression, having heard the rumors of the lone survivor of the Icarus over the last few weeks. He’d never thought he’d ever get the chance to see him, let alone be sitting next to him at a console while under alert conditions.

  “What are you working on, Sergeant?” Garcia asked with a nervous smile.

  “I’m…I’m trying to correlate all the data from our patrol wing with our established long-range sensor data. I need to construct a holo-image of what’s going on out there, but we’re getting these weird sensor distortions.”

  “Distortions,” Garcia asked, rubbing his chin with his hand. “Distortions. I remember something about those. Check the infrared band.”

  Fredericks waved a hand at the screen and a line graph appeared showing the infrared spectrum of the sensors. “Everything looks good there, sir.”

  Garcia pondered the readings on the screen. “What about EM?”

  Fredericks entered in the requested information into the computer. The readout came back instantly. “No, sir. There’s nothing on the electromagnetic frequency at all. In fact, there doesn’t seem to be any electrical activity coming from the intruder at all. Well, other than—”

  “Other than a communications echo bouncing off their hull.” Garcia said as he went wide-eyed.

  Fredericks looked at him skeptically. “Yeah, that’s right. How’d you know about that?”

  “Because I’ve seen it once before. It happened right before…” Garcia’s words trailed off.

  Fredericks allowed for a moment of silence to fall between the two before he prodded the lieutenant for more information. “Right before what, sir?”

  “Right before we were attacked. Try and create a temporary link to the secondary computer core’s main coprocessor, then feed the sensor data from the ELINT through there.”

  “Why the secondary core?”

  “Because all the secondary cores have active double-speed wave analysis enhancers installed in them. They only come into play when the main core gets shuts down or becomes incapacitated. But if we can create a secondary link from this terminal, then feed all the data into the secondary core—”

  “The computer will be able to sort out all the relevant data through the coprocessors, using the built-in enhancers to filter out non-relevant data,” Fredericks said triumphantly.

  Garcia nodded sharply. “Then we send the compiled data stream back to the main core for final conversion into the holo-matrix buffer.”

  Krif walked up to the two conferring crewman. “Anything yet, Mister Fredericks?”

  “Yes, sir. It’ll just take a minute. The Lieutenant and I have a plan that should get you what you need to know.”

  Krif’s eyes bounced quickly between the two men. He gave Garcia a look of consternation, then turned his gaze fully to Fredericks. “Then stop talking and get it done.”

  “Sir,” Caitlin called out from across the room. “Our patrol wing is awaiting their next orders.”

  “Has the intruder made any hostile actions toward them at all?”

  “No, sir. None.”

  Richard sighed heavily, looking around at the various monitors and personnel that surrounded him. He turned to the central image screen, a large viewer that dominated the forward bulkhead. The intruder vessel was still too far away to be seen, and the near-empty field of stars did nothing to alleviate his concerns. “I don’t like it,” he said quietly to himself as he gazed at the apparent nothingness ahead of the Rhea. “Fredericks, is the contact still closing?”

  “Yes, sir. Slowly.”

  “Course?”

  “Three-three-two mark four. Acceleration curve is indeterminate, but she can’t be moving faster than one-half our present speed.”

  “Commander Hayes, where is the Agincourt?”

  “She’s on our starboard side, aft, and below at two thousands yards distance.”

  “And the Breckenridge?”

  “Port beam, at three thousand yards, sir.”

  Krif nodded sharply, then stood for a moment in silence as he contemplated his next move. “Communications officer?” he finally said.

  “Yes, sir?” Clifton called out.

  “Send out a coded communication to the
destroyer Agincourt for immediate action. Tell them to change course and intercept the intruder at full speed. I’m not going to wait around to see what our unidentifiable friend wants. Then send a message out to the destroyer Breckenridge and advise them to stand by, but also to maintain their position until further notice.”

  “Yes, sir. Encoding and transmitting now.”

  Krif slowly walked back up to the command deck and stood silently next to Melissa. His arms folded, he looked back to the main viewer in time to watch the USCS Agincourt break out of formation with the carrier and head off toward the contact. The destroyer, one of the numerous and inexpensive-to-build Sheridan class, was considerably smaller and far more maneuverable than the Rhea. The rounded bow, with large particle cannon at its tip, slid across the side of the Rhea’s view port; her two power engines, placed one over the other, burned a bright blue-white against the blackness of space.

  Melissa fought the urge to ask Krif what he was planning. While his strategy seemed overly aggressive, she had to admit that, in this area, he had more training than she did. She only hoped that it was more capable that what her common sense was screaming.

  “Flight officer,” Richard called out to Caitlin. “Who else is on deck and ready to launch?”

  “The Red Skulls and the Rapiers, sir.”

  “Perfect. Get them spaceborne to provide a protective cover for the Agincourt.”

  “Yes, sir,” she nodded sharply, the bobbing action causing a lock of her hair to become tousled. She paid it no mind as she spoke into her headset to the squadron leaders. “Red Skull One, prepare to launch on my signal. Take vector Angel-Ten upon departure. Rapier One, prepare to launch on my signal. Take Beta-Three vector upon departure.”

  “What about Rippers, sir?” Melissa tried to ask casually from his side.

  Krif snorted as the fighters began to launch from the port and starboard launch tubes. “You mean, ‘What about Kestrel’?”

  She nodded without looking at him, instead watching the holographic fighters as they sped away from the simulated carrier.

  “His squadron is in Ready-Five status. That means, in the event of an emergency, the Rippers will be launch-ready in less than five minutes.”