by Crucible
Chapter Twenty-Two
Pegasus – The UnderDecks
A few cautious rats poked their heads into the ventilation shaft.
The cat was cornered. He clicked his empty weapons a few last times at the approaching rats, then threw them down, bared his fangs, and hissed.
The rats waited, and after a while, they parted, leaving a path through the center of their mass.
A human child, confronted with imminent death will instinctively cry out for assistance.
The Telepathic Rat came slowly up the center of its army, its little red eyes blazing with hate, its fur bristling with hate, and its whiskers twitching with hate.
A puppy, in contrast, will whimper and cower.
The rat moved forward slowly, deliberately, with hate in every movement of his paws. His tail behind him dragged with hate. He farted, also with hate.
Kittens, on the other hand, hiss and bear their claws.
It paused in front of the cat, just out of reach of his claws. Near a thousand brown, angry, malevolent rats closed around their king, the Telepathic Rat, a giant mutant freak almost as large as Queequeg himself.
It doesn’t matter how you face death. The important thing is that you will die.
Queequeg raised his paws, as though surrendering.
I am going to rip out your throat, thought the Telepathic Rat (hatefully). And when I am finished, my legions will tear the flesh from your bones.
“If you strike me down,” Queequeg growled. “I will become more powerful than you can possibly imagine.”
That is highly unlikely, thought the Telepathic Rat.
“O.K, then consider this,” Queequeg said. “First, humans are not going to be exterminated by your plague. If their bodies have not already adapted to it, they will find a cure. You have incubated your virus 2,000 years for nothing.”
The virus is strong, and mutates quickly. It will kill millions before they can adapt to it. And they will die in agony.
The smaller rats were still advancing in the rear. The ones in front were so close, Queequeg could smell the rot of their nasty rodent breath. Queequeg activated the magnetic clamps in the feet of the X-Term-O-Bot.
I’m going to enjoy your death most of all, kitty-cat.
Queequeg lowered his paws. “And second, telepathy is great and all, but it has its disadvantages. Like when you’re on a ship with voice-activated systems. Pegasus, open Airlock, Deck minus sixty-three, section 35. Override Authorization, Queequeg Omega.” At the end of the shaft, the magnetic locks on a small hatchway cycled. Orange danger lights flashed in its vicinity, but no one was there to see them. Two layers of hatches slid aside, leaving an oval void in the ship’s hull. The inner airlock cycled, the several metal petals of its iris spun and retracted, opening the entire duct to space.
A violent, explosive gale pushed through the shaft.
Queequeg had chosen the spot to make his final stand with the utmost care, an emergency atmosphere purge. Deep enough in the ship that, until it was too late, his rats would not realize it opened to space. Lined with smooth stainless steel that offered no purchase to their claws.
Queequeg was held firmly in place by his magnetized feet, and was able to suck air through a strategically positioned tube in his X-Term-O-Bot suit. He watched the rats fly backwards through the duct, bouncing off the sides of the shaft. With cat-like satisfaction, he saw in every tiny brown face desperation and horror at their imminent death. A horrible shrieking arose as hundreds of furry, vermin were dragged along, claws frantically scratching but finding nothing to cling to. At the end of the shaft, blown into space; a small brown cloud of disease-ridden vermin, squeaking their last breaths into the cold vacuum.
The Telepathic Rat was the last to blow out. It’s final word came from its mouth, not its mind. That word was “Squeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!” Then, the rat tumbled through the airlock, its lungs sucked desperately for the thin molecules of air that went out with it, then exploded from its throat in a pulpy mess.
“Gotcha, suckers,” Queequeg said. “Pegasus, close airlock, Deck minus sixty-three, section 35.”
When atmosphere was restored to the shaft, he slouched and rested.
And despite his better nature, he wondered if John Hunter, launched in the escape pod just as the battle had begun, was all right.
Lexington Keeler – The BrainCore
Lex created a holographic display showing their ship’s course.
We will be in the shadow of the planet’s largest moon seventeen minutes before the solar flares reach unmanageable levels.
Muffy knelt next to Christmas’s unconscious body. “Is he all right?” Trajan asked.
She touched her hands to his eyes. The lights on the ruined half of his face were dim, but still sparkly. Suddenly, he reached out his hand and grabbed her arm. “You can not kill the dead,” he said.
I have also managed to restore or bypass 87% of control linkages throughout the ship.
“Maybe a crew isn’t necessary,” Goneril Lear mused. “With a central intelligence, the ship is fully functional. You would only need some androids to…” There was a click. She looked up to see her son crossing the deck, pointing a pulse cannon at her. “All right, mom. Show’s over. Let’s get you back to Pegasus.” The expression that crossed Goneril Lear’s face was one of genuine hurt. “You’ve changed, Trajan,” she said sorrowfully. “Bellisarius, Constantine, take them down.” Sukhoi and Churchill looked at each other.
Goneril Lear corrected herself. “I meant, just stop them, stop them from…” Long pause. Goneril Lear looked as though she were trying to remember something.
“… from taking me back to … to Pegasus…”
Sukhoi and Churchill moved toward Trajan Lear and Matthew Driver. Driver whipped out his sidearm and pointed it at them.
“Mom, you have to go back to Pegasus… now!” Trajan insisted, not lowering his weapon.
“I can not return to Pegasus, ” Lear stated firmly. “This is my ship, now. I saved it. I fixed it.
I will never go back.”
Trajan Lear looked at the Centurions. “You can’t let her do this. She needs a healer or she will die.”
Churchill was equally firm. “Holster your weapon, son. Threatening a superior officer is a violation. I have to arrest you now.”
“No!” Muffy cried out, moving between then and stretching out one arm in an angry, cat-like gesture. Her voice had an edge in it that drew everyone’s eyes to her. Her own eyes were glowing with cat-like heat. Her aura, normally perceived only by the new senses, now glowed bright enough to throw shadows faint in the darkened chamber of the BrainCore.
“I…” she said, and then, without crossing the space between her and them, she was between Sukhoi and Churchill, one hand on each of their chests, somehow under their tunics and touching their bare skin.
“…am…” her hand slipped down the front of Churchill/Bellisarius’s pants. Sukhoi dropped his weapon, and the two of them seemed to fall under a kind of spell, falling toward her.
“… a sex slave…” she finished.
And then the three of them collapsed in a rather embarrassing pile.
Driver and Trajan Lear looked at each other and exchanged slight shrugs. Then, Trajan Lear pointed his weapon back at his mother. “Come on, Mom. Back to Pegasus. Now.”
“Not possible,” Goneril Lear told him. “We are cut-off from the hangar bay. You couldn’t take me back even if I wanted to …”
A shot buzzed across the chamber, striking Lear in the chest. She collapsed, in slow motion, to the deck.
It wasn’t Trajan Lear and it wasn’t Matthew Driver. They looked at Christmas, who was pointing his weapons at Lex. So, it wasn’t him.
“Where did that…?” Trajan Lear began.
There is a cryostasis escape pod located in the adjacent section of the ship.
Move her into it. It will keep her alive and begin repairing her systems. You can ject the pod and recover it using your Aves when repa
irs have been completed.
Each of these data points was illustrated by an appropriate hologram projection.
“You shot my mom?” Trajan said incredulously?
There are automated defenses on this level to defend the BrainCore from intruders. If I were the monster Mr. Christmas makes me out to be, I could easily have killed all of you. Now… go!
Chapter Twenty-Two and a Half
Three Days Later
The worst of the solar flares passed within a few hours, and by that time James had regained Pegasus. A flight of Accipiters managed to recover the trio of escape pods launched from Lexington Keeler after both ships had sheltered in the broken moon.
Acting TyroCommander Lear was taken to Hospital Four where she recovered under the healing rituals of Dr. Reagan. Churchill and Sukhoi were sent to the brig for disobeying Prime Commander Keeler’s orders.
Matthew Driver and Trajan Lear remained behind until repairs to Prudence were completed.
Queequeg returned to his master’s quarters and fell asleep on the sofa. He remained there for five days. No one asked about the X-Term-O-Bot suit he was wearing.
The day after the flares, Tactical Lieutenant Alkema figured out how to use the ship’s artificial gravity field to clear debris out of the cleft in the moon where the two Pathfinder ships waited out the remainder of the storm. This reduced strain on the shields considerably. And when Commander Keeler finally remembered to ask about the encrypted message from the silver spaceship, Alkema confessed that in the excitement of the alien battle, it had slipped his mind.
Ginger was able to return the following day, after riding out the solar flares on the dark side of the innermost planet. Nevertheless, Ginger’s crew required radiation healing.
At the beginning of the third day, they launched a pair of probes toward the sun on a reconnaissance run. There was no sign that any of the alien fleet had survived.
Goneril Lear regained consciousness, and didn’t ask about the presence of the Watchmen outside her healing chamber.
After Prime Commander Keeler got the translation of his encrypted message from Tactical Lieutenant Alkema, he went to bed and slept for nearly eight hours.
And in a makeshift temple near the summit of the Secondary Command Tower, a Holy Man finished the war prayer he had begun after the first attack. He emerged from his trance with a powerful need to speak to Commander Keeler.
Pegasus – Inhabitation Areas
General Kitaen knew what was expected of a Sapphirean Holy Man, and succeeded in looking the part. He was tall, his head was shaved, and his body was a tower of smooth, glistening muscle like a Guardian Bull. Underneath his oversized black crew jacket, he wore nothing to hide the hardened landscape of his chest and abdomen. Also, he wore a ceremonial mini-skirt, black with a row of sequins around the hem. Traditional blue and black warpaint surrounded his eyes.
He crossed down the breezeway to the primary inhabitation zone, the residential complexes that housed the ship’s crew and a faux-landscaped environment underneath an artificial sky created by the overhead holo-dome. The trees along the walkway drew back slightly as he passed, while the flowers seemed to stretch toward him, and bloom a little brighter.
When he approached Commander Keeler’s home-suite, strode to the door, and activated the announcement chimes. He had to hit it two more times before the commander appeared.
Keeler studied the Holy Man up and down, “I think you’re looking for Lt. Cmdr.
Honeywell,” he finally said.
“I am a Holy Man,” Kitaen told him. His voice, by the way, was a deep bass, like the low notes of a church organ.
“I didn’t order one of those.”
He gave a slight, respectful bow at the door. “Good Afterdawn, Commander Keeler.”
“Afterdawn?” Keeler blinked at the fake sunlight. “I suppose it is. I usually sleep through them. I’m not an afterdawn person.”
“I would like to come into your chambers and speak to you.” Keeler squinted at him. “Why?”
“I have a message from God.”
“Oh, in that case…” Keeler moved aside and bade the Holy Man entry. “There’s a cat on the couch, but you’re welcome to sit on the chair… or kneel on the floor if that’s more comfortable.”
“I’ll stand,” intoned the Holy Man.
“Right, of course,” Keeler said. “May I offer you something to drink?”
“I am a Holy Man.”
“Right, of course, scotch okay?”
“Single malt?”
“Of course.”
“I take it neat,” General Kitaen removed his jacket, which sported a patch identifying him as an Auxiliary Tactical Lieutenant. Keeler poured the scotch into a glass while Kitaen addressed his ancestor. “Hail and well-met, spirit-father.” Dead Keeler was not impressed “Why do you Holy Guys always have to talk like funny boys?”
“Many of us are ‘funny boys.’ Not me, of course, I’m into women… or in the vernacular of your era… females.”
“That’s what all the funny boys, say,” Dead Keeler scowled. He hated Holy Men.
Sapphireans regarded them as living Prophets through whom God would speak to his people.
Lexington Keeler was dead, and God had not spoken a syllable to him.
“Scotch, neat…” Commander Keeler reported. He handed the glass to the Holy Man. “So, what the Hell is your Holy Ass doing in my domicile?”
“I have come to help you face your dilemma,” the Holy Man answered. “Since the attacks began, I have been praying, in direct contact with the Eternal, trying to extend Divine protection over our ships, blessing the souls of those taken in battle, trying to guide them to their proper place in the world beyond. In the midst of my meditations, He appeared to me, and He gave me a Message that I should speak with you.”
“And why couldn’t the Lord deliver His Message to me personally?” Live Keeler asked.
“He said, you had been drinking, and probably would have thought it was a hallucination.”
Keeler looked down at the double Scotch. “He’s good. OK, So, what is the message.”
“Our presence here is Divine Providence,” Kitaen told him. “The discovery of the StarLock, our being in a position to salvage that vessel. We were sent to rescue the ship. You are doing the Will of God.”
“God didn’t do such a swell job protecting Lex Keeler in the first place,” observed Dead Keeler. “Was killing half of Keeler’s crew part of His plan.” The Holy Man shrugged. “Probably, but the point is, the recovery of Keeler has brought us to a crossroads by which certain conundra may be resolved. ”
“Conundra?” Keeler asked. “Is that even a word?”
Kitaen paused for a moment, then downed his Scotch in a single gulp. He put down his glass, then spoke again. “I understand, you have received a message also.” Commander Keeler’s face betrayed a smidgen of surprise that the Holy Man knew this.
“All right, then. Just before the sun exploded, we received a message from Chapultepec.” The message popped up on a holodisplay behind him.
Commander William Keeler, The Odyssey Joint Project Command Authority approves your salvage plan. Our strategic situation makes it urgent that LEXINGTON KEELER be recovered. Your decision to appoint Goneril Lear as acting shipmaster has been entered into the official directive, and she is to continue in that position until the ship is restored to full functionality. In addition, you are to reassign no fewer than 3,000 of your crew to Lexington Keeler and rendezvous at the Chapultepec Station.
Kitaen studied the order and thought about it for a time. “You are disinclined to follow this order… after TyroCommander Lear’s betrayal.”
“Damn right,” Live Keeler shouted, with a punctuative slam of his fist against the table. “I want her in my brig, not over on Lex Keeler directing repairs and acting like she owns the place.”
Kitaen remained stoic. “I feel strongly you should let her have Lexington Keeler, despite your desire to puni
sh her for the disrespect she has shown you.”
“Why?” Keeler asked. “When she was over there, all she did was plot against me. Duke did the actual repairs.”
“In my day, we would have flushed her through an airlock,” Dead Keeler interrupted.
The Holy Man was unmoved. “I would not.”
“Yeah, you might break a nail on the release mechanism,” Dead Keeler taunted.
Kitaen let the insult pass. “It would be the better for the Odyssey mission if she were no longer on this ship. She also has talents to contribute to the reconstruction. She may even find away to redeem herself for the damage she has caused, and that opportunity would not afford itself were she to remain locked up in your ship. Although it would be painful for you to let her go, it would accrue greatly to your character if you did.”
“But I don’t want to,” Keeler protested, then sighed. “And it isn’t just about Lear. First, Sapphire and Republic split, and now they’re dividing my ship,” Live Keeler sighed, “I feel like everything is coming apart.”
“Everything is coming apart,” the Holy Man told him. “And that is exactly how it should be. Unity is not always the answer.”
“The funny boy is right,” Dead Keeler put in. “Keeping Lear on the ship, not to mention the part of the crew that thinks she’s right, is no benefit to us. Just like Sapphire and Republic can’t fight the Aurelians and each other at the same time. But an Alliance that thinks one way, and a Commonwealth that thinks another, together, we can beat them. And with Lear gone, and the trouble-making half of the crew gone, the remaining crew would be loyal to the mission.”
“Half an army, united in purpose, will defeat a far greater force divided against itself,” the Holy Man added. He put a powerful hand on Commander Keeler’s shoulder. “Let her go. Let her people go. Move on with a clarity of mission.”
Live Keeler was forced to agree with them, but indicated that he nevertheless needed more booze.
Pegasus – Primary Command/Main bridge So, on the morning of the fourth day, when he had sobered up, Prime Commander Keeler, in dress uniform, addressed his crew. He began by reading the order from Odyssey Joint Project Command Authority. Then, he told them how he intended to implement the order.