The Last Flight of the Argus

by E. R. Torre

  B’taav was led to the room next door to Gail Griffen's. It was the same room Shepherd and he rented several nights before. The Independent was told to sit there with three fresh-faced Ferro City Police Officers. He was asked no questions during that initial wait. Through the door leading out into the hallway B'taav spotted a small army of technicians pacing back and forth. Photograph flashes went off at a steady clip. Another technician walked very slowly past his room. In his hand was a three-dimensional holograph quality Vid Camera. He talked into it as he panned the instrument back and forth. The three-dimensional imaging would offer anyone interested a virtual walkthrough of the crime scene.

  After a half-hour, B’taav got to his feet. The police officers said nothing, though one of them momentarily tensed. B’taav slowed down. There was no need to alarm his babysitters. He walked to the room’s window. A mob had formed outside the hotel. They were held back by at least twenty police cars and a plethora of officers.

  “It’s crazy down there.”

  The voice came from the entrance to the room. Though calm in tone, there was a discernable edge to it.

  Len Herbert, the Commissioner of the Ferro City Police, stood at the doorway. He wore a dull gray trench coat and smoked a thin white cigar. The lines on his face were pronounced. There was a genuine sadness in his eyes.

  “I’ve taken a look around next door,” he said. “Care to tell me what the hell happened?”

  B’taav pulled out the vial labeled Ac2 and the syringe. He handed them to Herbert

  “What is this?”

  “Amidoadrenalin. Some call it an adrenalizer. Others call it Accelerant.”

  “Accelerant? I don’t believe I’ve heard—”

  “It’s a stimulant. It works on the user’s body, speeding up their system. If you’re a miner and work on commission you take a small dose and it gives you the energy to work three or four days in a row without needing sleep.”

  “I suppose it also increases your strength?”

  “Yes, though if used in the regular doses this increase is minimal. Gail Griffen overdosed. On purpose. Even if I, or Officer Shepherd, hadn’t shown up, she would have been dead within the hour.”

  “Are you saying Officer Shepherd’s death wasn't necessary?”

  “She could have left the apartment, crashed into a number of other rooms and killed many more before the drug eventually killed her.”

  “She didn’t want to be taken alive?”

  “That's my guess.”

  “Why? According to your own reports, you had her on relatively small charges. Why go nuclear?”

  “She was a member of the Black Bird organization. The pirates I was tasked with rooting out used their members as potential recruits.”

  “You have proof she was a recruit?”

  B’taav didn’t answer.

  “Figures,” Herbert said.

  There was movement in the outside hallway. Bill Goodwin, the Merrick representative of Salvation, entered the room. He wore a heavy gray coat and was in the process of removing an expensive pair of black leather gloves. He wasted no time greeting Herbert or acknowledging B’taav’s presence.

  “What a fucking mess,” Goodwin began. He poked his finger in Herbert’s chest. “You’ll tell the media this was a case of domestic violence or a lover’s quarrel or whatever story you come up with that sounds good. You will not even whisper any mention of Merrick Cruise Lines in your report.”

  “A lover's quarrel? One of our officers is dead and you want us to pretend nothing happened?”

  Goodwin stared down the chief of police.

  “As far as Merrick Cruise Lines is concerned, nothing has happened.”

  Herbert nodded. There was no use arguing the point. He stepped back and said:

  “You two should get going. It seems we’ve got a domestic violence case that needs to be cleaned up.”

  B’taav and Goodwin followed two police officers to the elevator. They were taken down to the second floor and escorted to the Hotel’s rear exit. There were no news crews there. When the officer was satisfied no one might see the Independent or the Merrick official, he whistled and waved. A sleek white limousine pulled up. Its rear passenger door opened.

  "This way," the officer said.

  Goodwin and B'taav hurried out the Hotel's exit and into the limousine.

  When they were inside, the vehicle hurried down the darkened back alley streets. Goodwin nervously looked out the rear window until he was certain no one spotted their departure or was following. He then sat back and pulled out a long brown cigarette. He searched in vain for a lighter in his coat pocket before giving up.

  “Must’ve left it at home,” Goodwin sighed. “You got a match?”

  “Don’t smoke,” B’taav replied.

  “Just as well,” Goodwin said. He returned the cigarette to its packet. “That was some business.”

  B'taav nodded. Outside, neon signs flashed. A light rain fell and the splash of water broke the silence.

  “Mr. Merrick called yesterday,” Goodwin said. “His ship should be in orbit around Salvation by now. He wanted to know how we were doing. He’s arriving at Ferro City tomorrow morning.”

  Goodwin paused and shook his head.

  “I gave him a rundown of what little I knew about your investigation. Couldn’t offer him more than the date of your arrival and details of our one phone conversation.”

  “And?”

  “He said I shouldn't have told Commissioner Herbert about you.”

  “I see.”

  “Mr. Merrick was angry. He said you knew what you were doing and that if you needed any help, you’d ask.” A ghost of a smile appeared on his face. “He told me my job was in jeopardy.”

  The smile slipped away into nothingness.

  “He didn’t exactly come out and say I was fired. His type never does. I took on the job of running a cruise ship port of call. If I knew the position required dealing with pirates, industrial spies, Independents, and the police, I wouldn't have taken it.”

  In the distance, a mega-mall shone in blue neon. The lights reflected off the side of Goodwin’s face.

  “For what it’s worth, I’m sorry. I’m sorry for this whole mess.”

  “Did Shepherd have any family?”

  “A wife and two kids. His wife’s name is Susan. His boys are Elias and Thomas. Eight and ten years of age.”

  “You knew him?”

  “Well enough. When my family first arrived in Ferro City and began the transition with the previous Port Director, I was told it would be in my best interests to contact the local police and procure a bodyguard. Back in those days –hell, it was only ten years ago– the big corporations weren’t at all welcome. The locals figured all they did was use up Salvation’s resources and, once exhausted, split. In many respects, the people here were right.”

  “Anyway, we put off getting a bodyguard. We figured the stories about violence against corporate types were an exaggeration. That is, until we started getting threatening calls. The usual stuff. Environmentalists, nationalists. Freaks, protestors. I got in touch with Commissioner Herbert and he pointed me to Shepherd. He was our bodyguard for nearly a year. During that time, we smoothed over most of the bad feelings the locals had about Merrick Cruise Lines and painted a positive picture of our interests in Salvation. Now, the locals welcome the work and money we bring in.”

  The rain fell harder as the limousine entered a rundown neighborhood. Goodwin pointed out the window.

  “That’s Salvation,” Goodwin said. “The real Salvation. When we’re done here, she’ll rot. Maybe in another million years the plants and animals that inhabited this place will take over. By that time they’ll be another business conglomerate just like ours ready to chew the planet up again.”

  Goodwin sighed.

  “Talking about Merrick Enterprises doesn’t bother me anymore, Mr. B’taav, seeing as how I’ll be an ex-employee very soon.”

  B’taav was familiar with peopl
e like Goodwin. They were honorable to their bosses and sung their corporation’s praises as long as they held their job. Once it was threatened, they were quick to bite the hand that fed them.

  “At least you took care of your business,” Goodwin said. “I suppose you're done here. Where to next?”

  B’taav thought about the question and ultimately shrugged. Goodwin laughed.

  “Before I leave Ferro City, I should talk to Shepherd’s family and tell them what he did. What he really did,” Goodwin said. “It may not be worth much to them, but maybe they’ll feel his death wasn’t completely in vain.” Goodwin straightened in his chair and added, “They’ll get a pension from the force. I doubt Merrick will offer them anything for their loss.”

  Goodwin’s face twisted in on itself while the outside neon colored him in a rainbow of artificial lights.

  CHAPTER SIX

  MINING CRAFT "SANDSTONE", on the outer edges of Erebus

  Kelly Lang entered his ship’s decompression chamber and removed his helmet. Bright red dust fell off his suit and danced around the room before being sucked into the ship’s purification system.

  The old man ignored the rush of air and hurriedly walked to the door leading into the body of his craft. He pressed a series of buttons in a panel beside the door and, when the all clear light flashed, he re-entered his ship.

  The old man removed the remainder of his space suit, revealing a sweaty blue thermal suit underneath. He hung the space suit on its rack and walked the narrow corridor leading to ship Ops. He sat behind the ship’s navigational controls and worked the central computer.

  Images recorded during his latest spacewalk appeared on the monitor and were cross referenced with known landmarks in the navigational computer’s memory. The old man focused on one spot, a distant light he saw during his many hours outside. It was a reflection. He saw it only once before it faded away.

  To anyone else, the light was a blip and nothing more. To Kelly Lang, the aberrant flash meant there might be something out there worth scavenging. This was his vocation, after all, and over the years he developed a sense of the importance of spotting anything out of the ordinary.

  Kelly Lang replayed the flash of light several more times on the monitor before a broad smile appeared on his face.

  “Metal,” he mumbled with delight.

  There was no doubt the light was indeed a reflection off something metallic. But was the object man made? Could it be a remnant of the Erebus War? The larger the remnant, the bigger the reward.

  Kelly Lang could not contain his growing elation. Though the Epsillon government ordered most of the Erebus system off limits following the war, there were plenty of people like Lang skirting the security perimeters in the hopes of finding any of the war’s debris. There were collectors from the Homeworlds willing to pay top credit to buy the stuff.

  Kelly Lang steered the nose of his ship in the general direction of the reflection and worked some more on locating the reflection’s source. While he was pleased with the possibility of finding vintage Erebus War era material, the thought that there might be an Epsillon security ship or, even worse, claim jumpers also occupied his mind.

  If he were found by either in this section of Erebus, his ship could be impounded or stolen. Since the Sandstorm was his only means of income, he’d be forced to do whatever he could to stop anyone from taking her.

  “Where are you?” he muttered. He held the ship steady and initiated a gentle acceleration. Huge asteroids, the remains of Erebus Planet E, drifted past him.

  The planet, along with the rest of the planets in the Erebus system, was reduced to rubble at the abrupt end of the war. Thoughts of the massive wave of destruction haunted those who flew these parts, but Kelly Lang was not one to dwell on the Great Unanswered Question of what exactly happened here so many years before.

  He knew government officials ruled the cause of this destruction “unknown natural phenomena”, but he also knew there were plenty of alternate theories, from government conspiracies to the idea that some dark, unknown alien force that would not tolerate interstellar war ended it, once and for all. The later theory, he always felt, made the most sense.

  Kelly Lang’s eyes opened wide.

  “There you are!” he yelled.

  The object he briefly saw while on his spacewalk was revealed in his ship’s sensor equipment. Kelly Lang steered the Sandstorm in even closer. As he did, he found it harder and harder to contain his excitement. The object was the largest intact piece of machinery he had ever come upon. It measured at least five feet by seven and looked like a rectangular box. Several bent antennae and crumpled wires protruding from its body. Despite considerable charring and a few scars left behind from small asteroid impacts, the object was essentially intact.

  Lang licked his lips and parked the Sandstorm mere feet from his prize. He ran back down the corridor and picked up his space suit before returning to the decompression chamber. By the time he was locked inside, his suit was on. After checking the suit’s status, he opened the outer hatch doors.

  Lang guided the suit’s thruster and floated away from the Sandstorm and toward the object. He clicked on the short-range scanner and prayed no one was close enough to detect them. Floating in space unarmed and a good distance from his craft was, after all, a scavenger’s greatest moment of vulnerability.

  The scanner gave minimal radioactive readings on the device, so Kelly Lang shut it off and applied more power to the thrusters. The closer he got to his prize, the more he found it looked like nothing more than a very dirty gray box. Kelly Lang spotted several dark marks and cuts along the length of its body and faint red lettering half buried under a layer of dust.

  Lang applied a counter thrust and stopped a couple of feet away from his prize. Cautiously, he reached out and touched it. Dust crumbled off the object’s surface and floated off. Lang swept more dust off, until he could read the letters hidden below.

  ISP. Information and Scientific Probe.

  The smile on Kelly Lang's face grew larger. He hit the jackpot after all. There were more markings on the lower half of the probe, but for the moment Lang ignored them. He removed a tinsel wire from his belt and connected it to the probe. Afterwards, he again activated his suit’s thrusters. The burst of energy sent both Lang and his tethered cargo back toward the Sandstorm.

  Once inside the ship’s decompression chamber, Kelly Lang locked the probe down and closed the Sandstorm’s outer doors. He then made a more detailed examination of his find.

  To get top credits for this prize, Kelly Lang had to verify the probe was part of the armada that met its end in Erebus two hundred years before and not some more recently discarded equipment.

  After a few minutes of detailed examination and clean up, Kelly Lang found a protruding metal plate on the lower half of the probe. He brushed the dust from it and found a set of serial numbers.

  “11345-23400,” Kelly read.

  The scavenger let out a laugh. The numbers could be easily cross-checked and the space craft that held this probe would then be found.

  Once it was, Kelly Lang stood to make a whole lot of cash.

  In minutes Lang was back at the Sandstorm’s Ops center.

  “Computer, access Epsillon common database,” he said. “Locate all information pertaining to scientific probe, serial number 11345-23400.”

  The computer worked on the information for a few seconds before saying, “Identification number belongs to a class 4 scientific probe.”

  “Which ship carried this probe?”

  The computer worked on that for a second.

  “The Argus, military designation PE-332. Juggernaut class.”

  “Status of ship?”

  “Ship was lost with all hands, May 21st, 50789, in the Vega system.”

  Lang’s eyebrow lifted. The timing was right: The ship was operational until the end of the Erebus War. But its final listed location had to be a mistake.

  “Vega system? Please verify.�
��

  The computer was silent for a few more seconds.

  “All hands lost in the Vega system. Craft lost communication with Epsillon Command on May 21st, 50789. Last reports indicate engine failure while approaching a class three gas giant. Craft was believed to be pulled into planet and crushed.”

  “And no way to check for wreckage,” Lang muttered.

  Though the records indicated the Argus met her end in the Vega system, finding the scientific probe here in Erebus proved otherwise. In the days leading up to the Erebus War, there was a great deal of misinformation floating around about the location of various warships. It hardly mattered that the Argus was one of many Epsillon ships whose existence in Erebus was, until this moment, kept secret.

  Kelly Lang strapped himself into the navigator’s chair. He activated the Sandstorm’s thrusters and began the slow trip back to the Titus Space Station.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  FERRO CITY, the planet Salvation

  Goodwin’s limousine dropped B’taav off at the James Hotel.

  B’taav exited the car and stepped quickly under the faded awning at the Hotel’s entrance and out of the rain. Goodwin’s limousine pulled off to the edge of the street. It paused a moment to allow traffic to pass before turning to the right and heading off toward the city's high class residential zone.

  B’taav stood under the awning for a few seconds and thought about the events that transpired over the course of this, and the past couple, of days. Being an Independent was a messy business, no more so than when things went so very wrong.

  B’taav ran his hand through his damp hair and walked into the lobby of the hotel. He slipped past the receptionist and made a brief call on one of the public phones before stepping into an elevator. He reached out to press his floor button, but paused as the memory of Gail Griffen and Ken Shepherd and their gruesome ends intruded upon his thoughts. He let the memories go and pressed the 32nd floor button.

  Beyond the elevator’s glass paneling B’taav was treated to a view of downtown Ferro City. Heavy rain soaked the buildings and sent bystanders running for shelter.