by David Smith
Dave was beginning to gather his wits. As well as realizing that the Magistrate was clearly not the Izzy Grosvenor that he knew, it dawned on him that thi Izzy Grosvenor had genuinely confused him with someone else, a counter-part of his who existed in this universe. And from what the Magistrate was saying, O’Mara and Mengele seemed to have counter-parts within this universe too.
Did this mean that there really was a Terran Empire vessel called Tiger, with an entire crew of doppelgangers exactly like the personnel on his ship?
Dave tried again to explain his situation ‘I’m sorry if there’s been any confusion Magistrate, but I really am who I claim to be, and as this is clearly just a misunderstanding, I hope you’ll release me and my crew and . . . ‘
She cut him off abruptly. ‘NO. That’s not going to happen.’
She stood and paced up and down again.
‘Surely you can see that I’m not the person you want, and we can’t be of any use to you?’ pleaded Dave.
She stopped pacing and turned to face him. ‘Ah, well’ she said with a disconcerting smile ‘I wouldn’t go as far as to say that!’
She looked him up and down. ‘A perfect facsimile of the Empires most wanted insurgent? A working, fully armed heavy-cruiser that isn’t accountable to anyone? And that seems to have a stealth technology that only we are aware of?’
She threw her head back and laughed out loud ‘Well that puts it beyond doubt that you really aren’t Dave Hollins, the treacherous rebel leader! If you were, you’d realize exactly how much use you and your ship will be to me!’
She called the guard back in and told him ‘No-one speaks to any of the prisoners except me.’ She span and walked out of the compartment turning her head back over her shoulder to add ‘If anyone does, I’ll be wearing your bollocks as ear-rings.’
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The rest of the away team had fared no better. Each of them was kept in isolation in the same type of bare cell as Dave.
The Magistrate had approached each of them individually, and spoken to them without making her intent clear. Like the Izzy they all knew from her time as Tiger’s Liaison Officer, she was clever and intuitive. Unlike the Izzy they knew, her sole interest was in furthering her own personal agenda.
The Magistrate thanked the stars that she’d managed to intervene before that imbecile Nixon had lost the opportunity. He was serving an extended sentence in an agoniser booth for his errors. He’d not broken any regulations, but Izzy so detested stupidity. A few hours of having his pain receptors artificially stimulated might sharpen up his intellect a little.
The Magistrate had quickly built up a mental picture of this parallel universe her captives kept talking about and needed to know nothing more. She had been subtle in her interrogation and found out everything she needed to know without them really understanding what they were being asked.
They were weak and insipid. Their inherent and sub-conscious desire to co-operate with each other meant none of them would ever be strong enough to stand up to her alone.
None of them had demonstrated the mixture of low-cunning and high-strategy necessary to advance to a position such as hers.
She was the Magistrate for this entire province. She held sway over dozens of Sectors of the Empire, and the billions of Empire citizens and slaves within them. She’d crushed the rebellion in Sector 193 mercilessly, wiping out hundreds of thousands of insurgents. The power of life and death was hers to wield on a whim. And if she needed new ear-rings . . .
She knew these strangers from a strange universe were no threat to her as long as she kept them in check. They’d have their uses, especially Hollins’ double. She’d had dozens of ideas on how she might use him, and was still mulling them over: She couldn’t decide which would bring her the greatest advantage. The duplicates of O’Mara and Mengele might have uses too, if she could find a way to harness their undoubted expertise.
For all of that, it was their ship that interested her most. Its IFF details and what she’d seen of its Bridge on the view-screen suggested the ship was one of the ‘Constitution’ class vessels that she was familiar with.
If she could coerce the crew or possibly replace them, she’d have her own personal heavy-cruiser: now that was real power. And with the stealth capability she’d already observed first hand, it would be an invaluable tool, easily capable of dispatching ISS Nebula, flag-ship of that dullard Admiral O’Connor. Carefully used, such a ship could make her dreams of becoming the next Emperor a reality.
Yes, this was a gift from the gods, a real chance to stake her claim to the throne, and she’d seize the opportunity.
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The call ASBeau had been expecting came around four hours after the First Officer had failed to report a safe landing.
ASBeau was still in the Captain’s Chair when Lieutenant Shearer said ‘Incumen cawl from tha station, sir. Putten it on view-screen.’
The face of Isobelle Grosvenor appeared again. The smile was gone now and she was blunt in her demands. ‘I am Magistrate Grosvenor, Governor of this Province of the Terran Empire. You are to power down all weapons, shields and drive systems immediately and prepare to be boarded.’
ASBeau played along, knowing their fate might well depend on how well she believed him. ‘What’s the meaning of this Magistrate? We’ve done nothing wrong! Where is Commander Hollins?’
‘David Hollins is under arrest on charges of treason, sedition and terrorism. You and your crew are to submit to interrogation by my Security Team to ascertain your degree of duplicity in his crimes.’
ASBeau paused before replying ‘No, I’m sorry I can’t allow that. We are a Federation vessel and I would remind you that diplomatic status is merited for the ship and its crew, which includes Commander Hollins. I insist that you return him to us immediately.’
He could see the Magistrate grinding her teeth and her manner became more aggressive as she replied. ‘I am the Magistrate here!! You will do as you are instructed or face the consequences!!’
Her voice was becoming louder and gruffer as she spoke, and she pressed a button on the arm of her chair, widening the camera angle so they could see the rest of the control room.
She sat in a Chair like the Captains in the middle of a very large control room, surrounded by dozens of staff in Fleet uniforms. The Magistrate didn’t look at her staff, but ASBeau could see the look of terror on many of their faces. It was clearly not a good idea to argue with Magistrate Grosvenor.
ASBeau objected again. ‘I respect your position ma’am, but you have no authority over Federation citizens . . . ‘
She cut him off. ‘ENOUGH!!’ She produced a small phaser, seemingly from nowhere, and turning to the Officer who’d previously identified himself as Commander Nixon, fired.
The look of surprise on his face lasted just milliseconds, but was clearly seen by all of Tiger’s Bridge crew before he was disintegrated in a puff of greasy smoke.
‘HE WAS ONE OF MY OWN STAFF, SO YOU’D BETTER BLOODY UNDERSTAND THAT I WON’T HESITATE TO FRY HOLLINS, O’MARA, MENGELE, ROMANOV AND EVERY ONE OF YOU LOT TOO IF YOU DON’T STAND DOWN NOW!!!’
She sat there, incandescent with rage, challenging them to defy her further.
Quietly from the Tactical Station, Lieutenant Janus said ‘The Star-base and all ships are powering up weapons and shields. We’re a sitting duck . . . even if they can’t get a lock on us there’s enough fire-power here that they can’t all miss us.‘
Bowing to the inevitable, ASBeau opened a general broadcast channel throughout the ship and said ‘This is Lieutenant-Commander Beauregard. All crew stand down. Prepare to be boarded. Comply with all instructions from Imperial Security.’
Chapter 5
At Magistrate Grosvenor’s instruction, the majority of the crew of the Tiger were herded into the Hangar Deck and a large security presence from the Star-base transported across to guard them. They were taken away, six at a time and transported directly into a cell
in the Star-base’s Brig.
Star-base Engineers came across from the station and they immediately began to crawl all over the ship, examining her in microscopic detail.
The crew of Tiger could only watch in confusion. The new-comers wore crimson fleet uniforms like themselves, but they were adorned with more gold braid, broad gold sashes and everyone, without exception, was armed to a greater or lesser degree.
The uniforms of the Star-base staff were like caricatures of their own. Where the Tiger’s male crew-members wore three-quarter length crimson tunics with black cropped trousers with boots, the males among the Star-base crew wore tunics of the same colour and approximate style, but they were sleeveless and adorned with a gold sash across the chest.
The women’s outfits were even more bizarre. Among Tiger’s crew, the females wore similar tunics to the men, but with knee length skirts and boots. The females from the Star-base crew wore tunics that were little more than Bolero jackets, leaving their mid-riffs bare and with a plunging neck-line that exposed considerable cleavage. A gold sash was worn around the hips, laying over tiny black mini-skirts so short and tight that only Sharon Shearer would have approved of them. Even she would have probably drawn the line at wearing the thigh-high black patent leather boots of the Star-bases female crew members.
The crew of the Tiger all gasped as they spotted a familiar face among the provocatively attired Star-base women.
Lieutenant-Commander Aisling O’Mara stood out a mile. Her incredibly pale exposed skin stood out in stark contrast against the dark tunic, skirt and boots of her uniform. Her normally wild and unrestrained hair had been scraped back from her face and bound into an ugly pony-tail that spread out like some wild anemone around the back of her head. As well as a common-place dagger tucked into the top of her thigh-boot, she carried a riding crop with which she casually meted out corporal punishment to anyone who showed the slightest sign of slacking.
She picked out a few unfortunate individuals from Tiger’s crew and had them brought to her at phaser-point.
Chief Deng, Crewman Jane Doe and Crewman Juno Parker were bundled over to her by three burly and heavily armed Security men.
O’Mara looked them over curiously. ‘I recognize you three. All of you work on drive systems don’t you?’
Deng, Doe and Parker looked at each other nervously, but were prompted to answer when O’Mara slashed the riding crop across poor Parker’s face.
Evidently angry, O’Mara said ‘I know the design of this ship. Why have the drive coils been changed?’
After more furtive glances between themselves, Deng reluctantly became their spokesperson. ‘We were stranded many light-years from home, and were forced to adapt coils we’d recovered from a crippled Tana battleship to replace six of our own damaged warp-field coils.’
O’Mara looked surprised ‘And that worked???’
Deng shrugged. ‘After a fashion. The field they generate doesn’t work in the same way as the field our coils generated. In essence that’s how we ended up here.’
O’Mara’s eyes narrowed as she asked a question that was something she was more obviously interested in. ‘And the black coating on the hull?’
Deng shrugged again. ‘Your guess is as good as ours. We were stranded in a huge dust cloud and were covered by a virus like life-form that had the ability to drain energy from anything they touched. We had to fly through the photosphere of a brown dwarf star to kill them off, but haven’t had time to clean the remains off the hull. Oddly, the remains still seem to be absorbing energy, which is why the ship’s so hard to see.’
O’Mara paused, thinking about the ramifications of this. ‘Did you keep samples of this life-form?’
Deng shrugged again ‘We didn’t, but I think you . . . er . . . I mean . . . our Science Officer might have done in the E&E labs?’
O’Mara’s eyes widened, and she shouted over to one of her staff. Another scantily-clad female Star-base scientist came over and under instruction from O’Mara, continued the interrogation.
While she did, O’Mara headed off to the E&E labs on her own.
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Magistrate Grosvenor was in her office, quietly fuming.
She stood face-to-face with Alderman Kennickie, a small slightly greasy individual who had been the key Terran Empire representative in Sector 244 until her appointment as Magistrate.
‘Who I keep in the Brig of my Star-base has absolutely nothing to do with you Kennickie’ she growled. ‘Frankly, even if we were still at Hole, you’d have no cause to ask such a question. You’re treading a dangerous path’ she warned, leaning towards him, her fists clenched tight in her anger.
He looked terrified and backed away ‘You wouldn’t hit a man with glasses, would you??’
She reined her anger in but there was still murder in her eyes as she replied ‘Of course not . . . ’
Kennickie breathed a sigh of relief which disappeared quickly as she continued.
‘ . . . I’d use a baseball bat. It would be much more damaging and so much more enjoyable.’
Kennickie smiled that horrendous false ingratiating smile that all politicians seem to keep for when they’re obviously lying.
‘I meant no disrespect, Magistrate, I’m just curious. Hollins and his rebels have been a thorn in our side out here in Sector 244 as much as he has anywhere else. I’m just relieved that you’ve brought the villain to heel.’
Grosvenor eyed him carefully. It was obvious he was lying, she just wasn’t sure why. It was also clear he had spies within the Star-base’s staff. As a civilian he had no access to operational issues and the only way he could have found out so quickly was if someone had actively sought to tell him. It angered her that she didn’t know who this mole on her station was.
What she did know was that she’d have to watch Kennickie carefully; he may only be an Alderman, but rumour had it he was well-connected on both sides of the law. That was probably the only reason he was still alive. The fool was the only politician in the whole of the Empire who advocated peace, claiming that war was bad for trade.
Trade! Trade was for weaklings. Trade was for cowards. Conquest was where the greatness of Empire was forged. He was lucky he hadn’t been charged with being a rebel sympathizer, or even an actual rebel.
It was only because they’d had to abandon Hole that she’d had to accept having him, a potential political rival, here on her own patch. It would have been much more convenient if he’d died in one of the Sha T’Al bombardments, but as he hadn’t been that obliging she might have to arrange something else.
‘I will announce who I have in the Brig in due course after I’ve discussed this matter with Admiral O’Connor. Suffice to say that in the mean-time, security considerations mean I will not be saying anything about recent events at this Star-base.’
Kennickie wrung his hands together and sweated profusely as he pushed his luck a little further. ‘I understand that Ma’am, but if I might venture an opinion . . . ‘
She interrupted him through gritted teeth ‘If I want your bloody opinion . . . ‘ she paused as a sudden realisation hit her. ‘Actually, now I think of it, that’s never, ever going to happen. Shut up and get out’ she said dismissively.
Knowing he was close to disappearing, as anyone who upset the Magistrate tended to, Kennickie bowed graciously and left the office.
Watching him leave, she decided that she’d have to get rid of him. Not just now, but soon.
Her train of thought was interrupted when Commander Jervis, the head of her personally appointed Security team, called her on a private comm-link. ‘We’ve apprehended the entire crew as instructed, Magistrate. Three hundred and seventy-eight in total, plus the six you have in the brig, which tallies with the three hundred and eighty-four shown in this ship’s records.’
‘Excellent!’ she smiled.
‘We’ve started transferring them to the Brig as requested, Ma’am’
‘And all Officers are being kept in so
litary confinement?’
‘Yes, Ma’am’
‘And are they doubles of the crew of ISS Tiger?’
Jervis scratched his head on screen. ‘Not gonna lie, Ma’am, it’s freaking a lot of my team out. The uniforms are different, the hairstyles and so on vary . . . a few of them hold different posts or ranks, but other than that, they’re identical. Not similar or alike: I mean really identical. Down to the last freckle.’
It added more and more weight to their story of being from another universe, but that was not of concern to the Magistrate. ‘Did any of them show resistance?’ she asked.
‘Not really.’ He held up a bandaged hand looking slightly sheepish. “The only one to give me any trouble was a bloody penguin we found in the stores complex. It took a dislike to us and a couple of the team got some nasty pecks. It calmed down when we found some sardines for him though.’
‘Why didn’t you just shoot the bloody thing??’ she asked shaking her head in exasperation.
‘He’s . . . well . . . cute’ replied Jervis wincing as he realised how daft that sounded. Hastily changing the subject he carried on. ‘We found the Captain in his Ready-Room having sex with his Yeoman. He just told us to get out and come back in a couple of days. I tasered him and threw his sorry ass straight in the Brig.’
Grosvenor’s eyes widened. ‘Was it LaCroix?’
‘Sure looked like him, but he was . . . intact. And very, very energetic’ said the Security Chief.
‘Well, well,’ said Grosvenor with a wry smile ‘it looks like there are some significant differences in this parallel universe of theirs.’
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Over the next few days, the crew of the Star-base pored over Tiger, but found little of note. Apart from the black external coating and the bodged drive-coils, she was nearly identical to the ‘Constitution’ class cruisers with which they were all familiar, and interest soon waned.