Resurrection

by Jeffrey Burger

“Oh, well, so far we have two restaurants, a lounge, a hundred rooms for lodging - though only about a quarter of them are ready for use yet. There are plans for another hundred rooms, a park with native plants and trees from Veloria, a theatre, a mall of stores, office space…”

  “That’s a lot more than I would have expected for a repair station,” offered Jack.

  “Well Deep Star was considered the anchor, and they paid a considerable sum to get the project started. But there are other investors, including the Velorian government. And the design is modular of course…”

  “Of course.”

  “So additions can be put into place above and-or below the current structure.”

  “I didn’t think I was gone that long,” muttered Jack under his breath.

  “What was that?”

  Steele’s lips pressed thin, contemplating the scope of it all, “Nothing, just thinking out loud.”

  The walkway slowed as they all stepped off its end, onto a polished marble floor, inlayed with the Deep Star logo, another walkway starting about thirty feet away and continuing on. “This is the center of the facility and this is the main elevator bank,” she indicated an open elevator door, “level two is the service office. They’ll take care of you there…”

  “You’re not going with us?” asked Andrea.

  “I have to head back to my office,” she tapped her earpiece, “I was notified there is another ship coming in soon. And I will need to check on the progress of the survey of your Drake…”

  ■ ■ ■

  Both sets of elevators across the corridor from one another on the previous floor, faced each other in the elegant Deep Star service lobby, its marble floor similarly decorated with the company logo. A set of floor-to-ceiling glass doors offered them the only route from the lobby, whose only occupant sat in one of the plushy leather chairs in the waiting area, reading something on his MOBIUS.

  The glass doors opened automatically as they approached, the large, round, well-lit glass office, several people at computers, working. Through the windows, a busy warehouse that stretched in all directions, full of racks, bins, crates, parts-large and small, some identifiable, some not. Jack walked around the polished counter, past the employees and to the closest pane of glass overlooking the warehouse floor and stared in awe.

  “Crap on a cracker,” muttered a woman walking past. 'Where in hellion did I put it?” she complained, rummaging around on a desktop. “Dory, have you seen it?” Petite, no more than five feet tall, she had a shock of short platinum-blond hair that from the back made her thin five-foot frame resemble a Q-Tip.

  “Hey mister, you’re not allowed back here in my office…” she snapped, not looking back.

  “Still looking for that puff stick?” asked Jack, rotating away from the glass, instantly recognizing her voice and manner, recalling how her short-cropped platinum-blond hair framed her pixie-like features, accentuated by one eye as blue as ice, the other as green as an emerald.

  Reaching for the elusive e-Pad-H she had been searching for, peeking out from under a ship service manual, she froze,” I don’t smoke anymore…” she replied, snatching up the pad, turning back slowly to meet the voice, her eyes narrowing at first, having to see past the beard and long hair. Cheriska Skye’s mouth opened wide with surprise, her eyebrows rising, but she recovered quickly, her eyes darting around, “Jax Mercury,” she said slowly, deliberately, her voice barely above a whisper.

  “You remembered…”

  “No, no, no, no,” she hissed, glancing at her employees who were busy, buried in their work, “you can’t be here!” She roughly grabbed him by the sleeve and pulled him towards her private office, motioning Sam and Andrea to follow, “Hurry up,” she demanded in hushed tones.

  Ushering them into a spacious, executive, pie-shaped office, she closed the door. “Office, privacy!” she ordered, the glass of the windows facing the warehouse and the working office, frosting to an opaque white, soft music playing. “Noise-cancelling music,” she noted. She pointed an accusatory finger at Jack, “Jax Mercury…”

  “Yes…”

  Her finger and her intensity never wavered, “Jack Steele.”

  A quick chill raced up his back, “Yes.” He glanced at Sam and Andrea, “Cheriska, what the hell are you doing here?”

  “Me?” she thumbed her chest, “What the hellion are you doing here?” she poked at him, not quite reaching.

  “I live here, Veloria is my home, what’s your excuse?”

  “Yes, I know that… As it turns out, it’s my home too.”

  Steele raised an inquisitive eyebrow, “Say what now?”

  Cheriska moved around her desk and dropped into the leather chair parked behind it, waving her visitors to sit in the chairs in front of her desk, “Sit, sit… My mother and father were both Velorian. I never got to know either one of them, my father killed my mother when I was very young and then disappeared. I ended up in an orphanage for a while before being adopted by my mother’s sister.” She leaned forward, her elbows on her desk, “How can I be sure you’re the real Jack Steele?”

  Jack slid to the edge of his seat, leaning forward, his expression immediately turning into a scowl, “What do you mean, real Jack Steele?”

  Feeling the swift intensity escalation, Cheriska shifted backwards even though the desk separated them, “Never mind, I think I have my answer...”

  “But I don’t. What the hell are you talking about - what’s going on, Cheriska,” he growled, his voice flat.

  “My father was Alfano Toberus.”

  Jack’s head pulled back some, his mind running, “That name - Alfano, that’s not familiar. But Toberus… Toberus is Alité’s maiden name; her father was King Leõn…”

  “And my father was Prince Alfano, Leõn’s younger brother.”

  Steele’s eyebrows arched, his eyes wide, “That makes you…”

  “Your wife’s cousin.”

  “Ah geez,” he grunted, running fingers through his hair. “How did you figure all this out…”

  “Long story,” she interrupted, waving it off, “not important right now. What is important right now is we have a problem - a huge problem.”

  “I’m almost afraid to ask.”

  “If you’re the real Jack Steele…”

  “IF?!”

  “…and I believe you are,” she finished, ignoring his interruption, “then, who is the guy currently pretending to be you, down on Veloria?”

  Steele was on the edge of his seat again, “Please tell me you’re joking.”

  Cheriska shook her head and leaned in, her arms on the desk, hands folded, “He arrived a little over a week ago, resumed his kingly duties and started making changes nearly immediately. Declared Veloria an independent neutral, severed alliance with the UFW and cancelled all UFW contracts; which immediately caused the loss of one of your ships.”

  “How?”

  “The UFW Commander of the Hyperion…”

  Steele simply cocked his head to one side at the unfamiliar name, “Hyperion?”

  “The Hyperion was the sister ship to the Wronin…”

  “Walt Edgar’s ship.”

  “Yes,” nodded Cheriska. “But the Velorian crew of the Hyperion had not yet finished their training and taken delivery of the ship - the UFW Commander and instructor crew sent them packing and simply repossessed the ship.”

  “What about Walt’s ship?”

  “The Wronin has disappeared. I’m not sure if it was by order of the Queen, or if Captain Edgars followed the Hyperion out of Velora Prime.”

  “How do we find out?”

  Cheriska leaned back, “Don’t know that we can. I’m not really welcome in the palace right now and I haven’t talked to Alité in days. I’d been staying there for months, Alité insisted on it. But I get the feeling he’s suspicious of everyone and everything. The Prime Minister disappeared about three days after the other Jack arrived. I haven’t seen Colton or his puppy in days either.”

 
Steele was leaning forward, his hands clutching the edge of the desk - white knuckled, his head bowed down between his arms, “So, my son is missing, and an imposter is sleeping with my wife…” he breathed, his voice a low rumble.

  “Not according to Alité. The last time I talked to her she wasn’t very happy; you - he,” she stumbled, “hadn’t shown her any attention or affection at all. According to her, that was very unlike you. At first, she thought it might be stress related from his ordeal, but his behavior was odd - her word, not mine.”

  He raised his head and pushed back from the desk, “And my son?”

  “The only thing I can think of is maybe she sent him and his nanny off with the Prime Minister and his wife. It is possible they were around, and I simply wasn’t present at the time, I’ve been shuttling back and forth to Deep Star.”

  “When was the last time you were there?”

  “Five days ago, when he made it clear I wasn’t welcome any longer.”

  “What did he say?”

  “Not so much what he said as what he did - like having all my things packed and stacked out in the hall because he took over my suite.”

  “Subtle.”

  Cheriska made a face of derision. “Yeah, real classy move. I was beginning to think you were a real dick, by the way. Then about three days ago it got stranger; a day after he closed the ASP to traffic, a freighter arrived with a Tii logo on it. I had our control tower do a passive scan; no identity ping, no registry number, no known match for Tii or its logo in the UFW database. It passed us and went straight down to the ASP.”

  Steele rubbed his beard in contemplation, “Hmm. Tell me about the ship that delivered our friend to Veloria…”

  “Hold on,” she waved, “not done yet. Later that same day, about eight or ten hours later, fighter patrols started from the ASP. Several a day, round the clock. And they used to be friendly; pass us, say hello, do a flyby… not anymore. Like they were either ordered not to, or are different pilots…”

  A knock at the door interrupted the conversation, a woman poking her head through the doorway, “Survey of the Drake is done, Cheriska. Some interesting stuff there too…”

  “Thanks, I’ll take a look,” she replied, opening a holo-screen that appeared above her desk. “Hmm, we can repair your mid-engine, but they recommend moving it to the port position where you’re missing an engine…”

  “Why?”

  “Because the replacement we have in stock, has a higher output - which makes the center mount the logical spot for thrust balance…” she continued scrolling, “Oooo, OK, I see what she’s talking about when she said more interesting… Packages of diamonds and Glacier were found packed in the fuel tank of the truck you have stowed in the cargo area…”

  Steeles eyes went wide, “Drugs?”

  “Glacier. Dust. Blizzard. Ice…”

  “Yeah, I know what it’s called…” he rubbed his fingers through his hair, glancing at Sam and Andrea, “I guess you have to be careful who you steal a ship from nowadays.”

  “Oh shit, it gets worse,” added Cheriska, scrolling further, “Crawler bots RD1 & RD2 detected a transmission signal with your ship totally offline… Hmm, but they were able to locate the source – it says your Drake is fitted with a tracking system, tied straight into the main power cells. There was no way to tell where the signal was going, so they dug through the software and did a registry search. Your ship is owned by Tii…”

  “The same company you said just brought a freighter in… Ahh shit this is bad,” groaned Jack, rising from his seat, beginning to pace back and forth across the office. “This explains a lot…”

  “What are you talking about, Cap?” asked Sam.

  A rush of puzzle pieces began to fall together, prompting Steele to stop abruptly, his hand to his forehead like it helped the pieces from pouring out of his skull, “Dammit, somebody’s been one step ahead of me the whole way!”

  Andrea rose from her seat, concerned, “Captain, what do you see?”

  “I was on the Black Widow. Our detour to Castille… that was an intentional choice, not just a convenient one…” He watched their puzzled expressions, “There were other choices, but the Byas-Kuyol Clinic was on the way, even though we bypassed other opportunities for this detour. I didn’t think much of it - but it gave them time to plan ahead, make arrangements. The crew of the Drake was actually there to kill me. Erase the evidence after creating a clone or a Synth to replace me…”

  “Hoo boy,” exhaled Cheriska, “the ships you asked about before - the Black Widow and a transport she was escorting, right?”

  “Yeah…”

  “They left yesterday. Empty as I hear it, asked to leave early. They were going to wait for a replacement captain for the transport…”

  “Ahhh, dammit Mikie,” he sighed.

  “Did they know who you were?” inquired Andrea.

  “Just the captain,” replied Jack, his vision wavering as tears welled in his eyes. The betrayal crushed his heart - not only from a longtime friend, but a Brother. “Then there was the Pathfinder patrol…” he continued slowly. “I suppose they’d been searching for us since you took me off that prisoner transport, the tracker on the Drake made it easy for them.”

  “Then you spooked them,” offered Sam, “they didn’t want any part of a GIS operative.”

  Cheriska shot out of her seat, “You’re GIS?!”

  “Yeah, and if that thing down there is a clone or synth, he knows what I know; codes, secrets, plans…”

  “That’s not good,” offered Sam, rising from his seat. “We need to put a stop to this…”

  “He has my clearances; we need to be very careful…”

  “What we need to do, is start pulling triggers,” countered Sam, “time to go do Shadow stuff…”

  “We can’t do this alone, Sam, we…”

  “Nobody is going Shadow or pulling triggers without me,” interrupted the Master Chief from the office doorway, a nurse standing beside him.

  Jack knew his mouth was hanging open, there just wasn’t anything he do about it; the Chief standing there in a hospital pajamas and slippers, looking like he had just gotten out of the shower. “Whaaaa?”

  Daryl Jolly pointed at him, “You know what you did,” he smirked knowingly. “You…”

  “I don’t think,” began the nurse, stepping forward, “that his injuries were as severe as you may have originally thought. When we unwrapped him before the doctor came in to examine him, we simply had to wash off the burn gel that you applied. He has some minor scarring in places but nothing a little dermalaser work can’t correct…”

  Out of the corner of his eye, Steele could see Sam and Andrea - both as stricken with surprise as he was.

  “You!” pointed Daryl, passing the nurse to get face-to-face with Jack, “you…” his voice dropped to a low tone. “You saved my life.” He put his hand on Jack’s shoulder, “I know who you are, what you are now… I am so sorry for ever having wronged you. If I had only known…”

  “It’s OK, Chief,” Jack reassured him. “It’s all good. We’re good…”

  His eyes glassy, the Chief squeezed his shoulder, “I would never have guessed… but your wings… they were… breathtaking…”

  “What’s this about wings?” interrupted Cheriska.

  “Nothing, nothing,” waved Jack dismissively. “I think he’s still recovering from the pain management meds…”

  “Actually,” interrupted the nurse, “he doesn’t…”

  “Thank you so much,” offered Andrea, stepping forward, gently steering and walking the nurse out toward the outer office, “for bringing him up to us, we truly appreciate all your help.”

  “Oh, you’re welcome. I hope…”

  “I told you, I need to see the station curator!” boomed a voice from the outer office. “This is an emergency!” A hulking man carefully pushed past the nurse and Andrea, a secretary in tow, trying to hold him back as he entered the office without so much as missing a
step.

  “DAMMIT!” shouted Cheriska, her arms in the air, “We’re supposed to be in a private meeting here! Doesn’t anyone know what that means anymore? Friggin’ circus,” she lamented.

  For the second time in as many minutes, Jack was dumbstruck, his mouth open. “Ragnaar?!”

  “Admiral?” he saluted, wide-eyed, before leaning back through the doorway looking toward the outer office, “In here!”

  Rocketing down the short corridor between the outer office and Cheriska’s office, a low blur caused Andrea and the nurse to quickly step aside, the form whipping through the door, brushing past the Chief, skidding on the carpet as it leapt headlong at Jack, crashing into his waiting arms. “Friiitz!” Dropping to a knee to prevent losing the furiously squirming German Shepherd, Steele struggled to control the joyous dog.

  Ragnaar needed no further proof, this was the real Jack Steele.

  ■ ■ ■

  Without enough chairs in the office to accommodate everyone, Jack, Andrea and Ragnaar sat on the floor.

  Leaning against his human, laying against his extended legs, Fritz stared up at his face with dark glassy eyes.

  Jack bobbed his head, reached out and gently booped the Shepherd on his nose, “Man, I missed you, kiddo,” sighed Jack.

  “Admiral,” said Ragnaar quietly, sitting cross-legged, “I don’t mean to ruin the reunion, but what are we going to do?”

  Sitting on the sofa, Daryl Jolly pointed at him, “I’ll tell you what we’re going to do, my rather large friend; we’re going to figure a way to get down to that planet and do a little trigger-pulling to expeditiously eradicate some unnecessary two-legged vermin that have managed to infect its populace.”

  “Ragnaar, can your ship get a focused directional signal out to the Perseus?”

  “Yes, Admiral. One of the reasons I chose that one to, uh, borrow.”

  Jack raised an eyebrow, “Borrow? Never mind,” he waved, “I don’t want to know. Alright then, get them here as soon as they can. And order them to broadcast a UFW military distress call for Veloria. We may need firepower in the system…”

  Ragnaar’s eyes flicked around to the unfamiliar faces, cautious, “Admiral, the Perseus is still operating under Dark Protocol, we have gained access to dark sectors - we may be jeopardizing that.”