Empty Casket Conspiracy (Terran Patrol Book 1)

by Lewis Dually

  “I have a line on the missing vaccine. The Krueg are looking for that as well, so maybe their action out your way is a diversion to keep us busy while they pick up the meds?”

  Scott rubbed his chin as he thought about that for a second and then said. “I think you’re right. They came blasting up on us at first and then pulled back when we called for help. They’re not here to fight, they’re here for show. Where is the vaccine?”

  “I think it’s out near Pinky’s. I have a coordinate provided by my inside man and it’s just outside of that quadrant. How about you keep the Krueg occupied and we’ll jump out there and see what we find?”

  “Sounds good. Any idea where the Crimson Moon is? We could use them if the Krueg decide to charge.”

  “She has the same stealth shielding hull upgrade we got so she’s probably already there, you just can’t see her on the scopes. If she is close I’d rather have her with me. One old cruiser won’t stand much of a chance against one of their battle carriers.”

  “Ten four. If I hear from them I’ll send them your way. Good luck. It’s nice to have you back by the way.”

  “Thanks and thanks for whatever you did to get me back sir.”

  “Pinky’s?” Walters asked as I signed off with Scott.

  “It’s a refueling station on the far edge of sector one in the Kuiper belt. They have a bar and grill there named Pinky’s. All the cargo transports know it because it also has a hotel and casino and a few other off the book activities. Also happens to be where your uncle went.”

  I tapped my coms unit to call Chaffey on the bridge again.

  “Chaffey here Sir.”

  “Send out a general broadcast on the fleet band worded as follows. Gale, maintain current condition and meet me at Pinky’s. Grandma.”

  “Aye aye Sir.” Chaffey replied and probably knew exactly what I meant because he then asked. “Set destination for sector one of the Kuiper?”

  “Yes. Set 168 mark 302 mark 55 and jump. Before we come out of the warp bubble cut all power and go to run dark condition. Let our inertia carry us out. We’re on our way up.”

  I signed off as Walters opened the cargo bay door and we sprinted out into the corridor nearly colliding with Cob.

  “Welcome back Sir.”

  “Thanks, run with us and update me on the ships condition.”

  Running wasn’t an exercise the fifty four year old Chief of the Boat was accustomed to but he managed to keep up while giving me the low down on the ship’s status between his ever increasing gasps for air.

  “All systems are operational except the water filtration and recovery units. We took them off…. line to remove a bulkhead and we’re working on that now….. We removed the number seven bulkhead on decks four and five to install another reactor….. to power our new guns. We have six new turrets with five eighteen millimeter……. guns each. They can fire rapid secession with the new reactor…… Each gun has five firing capacitors that can recharge in twenty seconds. We can put…… ninety rounds down range every minute and they fire an eight foot long.….. eighteen millimeter uranium tipped tungsten steel round. R and D says…… they will penetrate the Krueg battle carriers. We have two thousand rounds total. The Constellation has one of the GUTMA war heads and the Russians have the other. Wish we could have gotten one of those Sir.”

  We had reached the elevator and the Cob stepped inside and leaned against the wall trying to catch his breath while Chaffey’s voice came over the PA system setting the ship to run dark status.

  “Sorry Sir.” Logan managed to say between breaths. “My ribs are still giving me fits. I’m worried about our new systems…… We haven’t tested any of them and with all the new hardware mounted on the ship’s hull…… it opens up a greater chance for an EMP to penetrate through the new shielding.”

  “Yeah I was thinking the same thing. Last time we got hit it took about an hour to get back on line. Any way to shorten that recovery time if it happens again?”

  “Yes Sir. I’ve been working on that and think I can get it down to fifteen minutes.”

  “Fifteen minutes? That’s fantastic, but how?”

  “By only repairing the systems needed for the fight we can save a lot of time and I’ve come up with a way to start the reactor in about two minutes. The GUT charges are now preset to our reactors specifications. Just load them and close the door. And I rigged an air motor to that old generator. No need to hand crank it anymore. Just open the valve on a compressed air cylinder and the motor will spin that jenny up to full speed in about five seconds. I took the idea from an old Kenworth truck I saw in a truck museum. It had an air starter that would start the truck without batteries as long as you had enough air in your tanks.”

  “I’ve seen them.” Walters remarked. “My uncle had one as a show truck when I was a girl.”

  The door of the elevator opened and we started another sprint to the bridge.

  “I’ll be in engineering!” Logan shouted as the elevator doors started to close again. Entering the bridge we found Chaffey standing at the systems station poised to take the ship to run dark condition. By the way he was standing I could tell he already had his mag boots on and was planted firmly on the deck. Ensign Blain was at the communications station, Ensign Hollister was at the helm and Warren was at weapons.

  Chaffey turned to see me and said. “We’ll be coming out of warp in twenty seven seconds Sir.”

  “Ok. We’ll go dark as we exit the bubble and just listen for a while. “Blain, your files say you’re really good at this so let’s see what you got. Ensign Hollister, welcome aboard. Sorry we haven’t had a chance to do the usual ‘welcome to my command’ speech. We’ll get to that later. Walters, you need to get your space suit on after we shut off the gravity.”

  Walters headed for a suit locker at the science station as I reached down and turned my mag boots on and tapped my coms unit twice to make a ship wide announcement.

  “All hands, this is the Skipper. We’re going dark in twenty seconds. Keep your coms to a minimum and have your helmets close. That is all.”

  Then I retrieved my own space suit and started working myself into the bulky plastic and titanium cocoon that would keep me warm if our run dark status became prolonged or alive if for some reason the ship suddenly depressurized.

  “Five seconds.” Chaffey called out and I looked up to see the end of our warp bubble closing in.

  “Four, three, two, one.” Chaffey continued and then he flipped the switch to put the ship in run dark mode. Everything on board that emitted an electromagnetic signature or transmitted any kind of radio or microwave signal was shut off. Ship wide the lights went dark because the little LED units emitted a microwave signal that could be heard for hundreds of miles with the right listening equipment. The gravity plates were also turned off to hide their electromagnetic signature. All environmental controls were depowered and all coms units were reduced to one twentieth power. Even the lighted switches on our control panels were either turned off or reduced to a bare minimum power usage for critical use controls. Only the forward view monitor stayed on and we watched it as we glided out of the warp bubble and it closed behind us.

  “Ok Blain. Let’s see what you got.”

  She sat quietly listening to her head gear and watching the wave signature readouts at her station.

  “There are a couple ships at 91 mark 12 at about…. 600 miles or so. Sounds like mining equipment running. Several large electric motors going there. Also have some sort of station at 14 mark 30 at about eleven hundred out.”

  “That’s Pinky’s station, you can ignore it I think.”

  “Yes Sir. I’m getting a high band signal I’ve never heard before. It’s sweeping back and forth like a radar sweep. I don’t know what it is Sir.”

  I stepped over to Blain’s station and looked at the wave signature readouts. “Let me hear it.”

  Blain took off her head gear and handed it to me. Holding one side of the headset up to my right ear I
listened to the radio signal as its intensity seesawed up and down on a repeating pattern.

  “I think it is radar. What’s its origin location?”

  “Hard to say Sir. I think it’s actually two signals overlapping each other. Two ships I think. Yes that’s what it is. Two ships, one at 354 mark 261 at 2650 miles, the other at 277 mark 260 at 2570 miles. They are sweeping with the radar and moving straight at us Sir.”

  “I think it’s the Krueg looking for their missing vaccine. Hollister, using thrusters only, bring us to a stop and rotate 89 degrees port so we’re facing them. Blain, keep monitoring those radar sweeps and let’s try to find the vaccine ship before they do.”

  “Yes Sir. I’m also getting a DTL on our aft sensor array. It just started Sir.”

  “DTL Sir?” Walters asked as she zipped the front of her space suit to about half mast.

  “Data Transfer Laser. It’s a covert form of communication. No radio or microwave signals for enemy sensors to pick up on. Just a four inch diameter laser beam. Unless you’re in the path of the beam you’ll never know it’s there. Is there an audio of video signal in it?

  “Both Sir.” Blain replied.

  “Put it on the main viewer. Let’s see who’s behind us.”

  The viewer’s image changed from the black star speckled image of deep space to the dimly lit confines of a ship’s bridge and the exuberant smiling face of Lieutenant Commander Gale Schmitt.

  “Good to see you Sir. I heard you was in the poky. They let you out or did you escape?” Gale chided me.

  “Let out. Good to see you too. I guess you got my message.”

  “Message Sir? What message?”

  “Message to meet me here.”

  “No Sir. Didn’t get that message. We’ve been here almost eight hours. When did you send it?”

  “About ten minutes ago from Earth. Why are you here then?”

  “We’ve been watching the Krueg. They’re looking for something. They’ve been searching this area with a grid sweep and this is their fifth pass. Every sweep through, they drop one thousand miles vertical and do it again. Not sure what they’re looking for so we just went dark and watched. By the way, the hull shielding has an unexpected benefit to our sensors. With the foam absorbing all the E-band and microwave signals it makes our sensor sweeps clear of distortion. They’re not picking up all the reflected noise from our hull so we can hear a lot better and a lot farther.”

  “Nice! What they’re looking for is the vaccine. The Croiddan hid it and missed the delivery deadline. Have you seen any other ships in the area?”

  “No ships but we did come across an unusual asteroid.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  “It had a heat signature. Under normal circumstances I would have checked it out but we were busy watching the Krueg. It showed a surface temp of negative one hundred fifty degrees and that’s plum near tropical in this sector. This far out it should have been closer to negative four hundred.”

  “Yes. That’s unusual alright. Sounds like it has an internal heat source. Is it big enough to have an active core?”

  “No Sir. It’s just over three hundred miles in diameter. No way it’s active but it does have a messed up magnetic field around it. I think there may be a deep mining operation in it but didn’t see a landing pad or loading area for ore. If the Croiddan are hiding in this area it would be a good place to check out.”

  “How did you get a temperature reading on it?”

  “One of Major Yukawa’s marines was scoping the area with infrared and noticed a different color reading on that rock. Then we launched a drone and got a good reading off it.”

  “Yukawa is with you?”

  “Yes Sir. And Commander Sprite and his boys are at Pinky’s. We were supposed to pick them up but I didn’t want to leave the Krueg unattended.”

  “We need to check out this asteroid but if we fire up our engines the Krueg will pinpoint our positions. Do you think you can hit Pinky’s with your DTL laser?”

  “We can hit it but who would be listening?” There aren’t any Navy ships docked there right now.”

  “No but there is a Ranger detention ship there and if its Captain is following protocol he’ll be listening. See if you can hail the SR1 Belinda.”

  CHAPTER 24: The Hot Rock.

  The Belinda, now designated SR1 and under contract to the newly formed Space Rangers, was indeed listening. After a brief explanation of the situation with Captain Ray Bishop and Merle Baca we went back to radio silence and continued watching the Krueg. The Belinda was going to pick up Sprite and his Seal team before heading out to investigate the ‘hot rock’ while we were standing by and doing what I hated most. Waiting! For the next two hours we waited and watched as the Krueg kept up their methodical search of sector one.

  Finally Blain called out. “Sir, The Belinda is at the asteroid and reports some kind of outpost with a gravity enhanced landing pad on its south pole. Commander Sprite is taking his seal team in to investigate.”

  “Ok. Try to get their video feeds patched through to us. I want to see what they find in there.”

  The video monitor on the port side of the bridge lit up and the screen split into eight separate video feeds as Sprite and his team made their way down the ladder and out onto the exposed landing pad. The pad was pitch black and the teams LED head lamps illuminated the surrounding area but had little effect on the outlying darkness. I watched from the edge of my seat as they approached the airlock door at the end of the landing pad. The lead seal reached the door and made a quick inspection of its access panels and atmosphere readout. Then he turned slightly and motioned with hand gestures to Sprite. Sprite answered with more hand gestures and the seal turned back to the door and waited to enter as two of his teammates took positions on either side of him. Then he rotated the door lock lever and pushed it open as his two teammates moved swiftly passed him with their guns pulled to their shoulders and pointed forward into the darkness. As they entered the air lock, one crouched low and broke to the left, the other broke to the right, then the third man moved strait forward and disappeared into the dark confines of a large equipment sized air lock. The image on camera two started to pixelate and then froze followed by the image on camera five. One by one the video feeds from the eight seals froze in place as they moved deeper into the confines of the manmade subterranean structure.

  “We lost your video Commander. Are you still getting our audio?”

  “Affirmative. Audio is clear. We’ll keep recording video for download on our return.” Came Sprite’s reply.

  “Copy that Commander. Be careful down there.”

  “I always am.” Sprite replied. “This place is trying real hard to look abandoned but I don’t think it is. There’s been a lot of foot traffic through here. The dust on the floor has been disturbed recently. We’re approaching an inner bulkhead door.”

  There was a brief moment of radio silence from Sprite’s team and then all hell broke loose. Several of the Seals started calling out sightings of the enemy as the sounds of automatic gun fire filled the broadcast. Sprite shouted an order to fall back and take cover just as an explosion fragged his audio.

  “What’s happening in there?” Baca shouted over the coms.

  “Krueg!” Sprite responded. “It’s a Krueg combat unit. We’re outnumbered.”

  I grabbed the coms mic and called out to Gale. “Get your butt in gear and get those Marines to Sprite. ASAP!”

  “Aye aye Sir.” Gale replied.

  On the main viewer I watched the Crimson Moon spring to life as her engines came on line. Then she spun around and shot off into the darkness of deep space.

  Then Blain called out. “Sir! The Krueg Destroyer has changed direction and is heading for the asteroid. They’re going to fly right past us in about forty seconds. I don’t think they see us yet Sir.”

  I slapped my coms badge twice and announced to the ship. “Battle stations! Gunners listen up. The enemy Destroyer is making a high
speed pass to our starboard in thirty seconds. I want every gunner to strafe the crap out of them as they pass!”

  As I finished giving orders the bridge consoles came to life and the gravity came back on line. I stepped over to the skippers chair and belted myself in as the main monitor switched views and zoomed in on the approaching Krueg ship.

  “Twenty seconds Sir. They haven’t seen us yet.” Blain announced.

  “Good! As long as we don’t start our engines I don’t think they will.”

  The Destroyer grew bigger on the main monitor and I realized I was holding my breath. Several red boxes appeared on the screen as the gunners drew careful aim on the approaching ship and Blain started a verbal count down.

  “Fifteen……ten, nine, eight, seven, six.”

  “Fire!” I shouted into the coms mic. A second later the ship echoed with the sound of our mag railguns firing in quick secession and dozens of white tracer beacons zipped out to meet the unsuspecting Krueg. The Destroyer flashed by and our gunners kept pouring it to them, first from the forward mounted guns and then from the aft. Dozens of gas plumes erupted from the hull of the enemy ship as our rounds hit home punching through their armor and venting their precious air into space.

  “They’re turning Sir! I think they’re coming back for us.”

  “Spin us around and charge!” I replied.

  “Yes Sir.” Hollister shouted as he spun the ship and pointed us strait at the enemy Destroyer.

  “Incoming!” Chaffey shouted. “Dead ahead!”

  Hollister didn’t hesitate. He dove the ship down while spinning us on our long axis and then put us in a sliding maneuver that shifted the ship to port while still facing the oncoming enemy attack. Their shells passed harmlessly to our starboard as we fired a fourth volley. This time one of our five hundred millimeter rounds found its mark and a large explosion erupted on the enemy’s keel. The nose of the enemy ship pushed up violently and they started to tumble like a football being kicked for a field goal.

  “Sir! I read several small ships disembarking from the carrier.” Blain called out.