First Command kb-2

by Rodney L. Smith

  In a few minutes he cautiously poked his nose into the clear space, enough to give his sensors a free view of the space ahead. He put his recorders on high speed and high resolution and collected all that he could until his sensor operator reported a ship approaching from port.

  Captain Craig withdrew back into the star field and started mapping the complete course back to Barataria. He spent the whole return voyage analyzing what he collected in his short view of the K’Rang space beyond the Pleiades. He was pretty sure he found a new and lucrative hunting ground for the Brotherhood.

  The Missile Corvette J’New made its weekly pass along the face of the D’Rin star field. Lead Sensor Technician H’Talli recorded the sensor data from the passage to use at some future training event. There never was much that went on in this sector, but there was enough varied commercial traffic through it to make it a challenging sensor classification exercise. He counted over ten ships of various types and sizes. These would make a good training opportunity for his section when back in port.

  He observed the B’Kili system just off the starboard beam and the F’Tuj system ahead and off the forward starboard quarter. These systems containing two main worlds provided a lot of cargo traffic to analyze to keep his team on their toes. He liked these exercises, using recorded data after the patrol was over. It was always too noisy in the CIC during a patrol to really work the targets. He had spoken to the captain about it, but had not convinced him how much more effective his analysts could be if the CIC was quiet while they did their jobs.

  Chapter Eight

  Kelly read through the intelligence reports from the Rigel-Aldebaran trade route, not that they were much help. Ships left port and simply were never seen again. Kelly was amazed that none of the ships, crews, or cargoes appeared on any of the normal lowlife worlds that pirates and marauders frequented and used to move their ill-gotten gain.

  What could they be doing with the ships, people, and goods? It didn’t make sense. Pirates always needed credits. Ships needed repair and maintenance, especially ships that couldn’t pull into just any port and shipyard. Pirate ships always had special modifications and configurations that wouldn’t pass normal port scrutiny. How did they replenish their stocks? Crews needed diversions. None of those came cheap. If they weren’t selling their goods, how were they coming up with credits?

  If the missing ships were destroyed, there would be debris. Kelly had seen the effect of catastrophic kills on space ships. There was always an immense amount of debris. What of this report from Alistair, who said the container ship simply disappeared from his screens. How do you make a 300,000 metric ton ship disappear?

  Kelly put the Reporting Officer’s sensor plot up on his holographic viewer and rotated it to see it from all angles. He called up the astrospatial data layer of all known pirate-friendly worlds and saw no obvious connections. He noted how close the K’Rang frontier was to the area in question and wondered if they might be up to some mischief.

  He plotted out the ion trail that the Reporting Officer had followed and saw it peter out at the edge of the Pleiades Star Cluster. He could see why Alastair had turned back. The gravimetric flows in the star field would rip all but a reinforced warship apart. If the gravity pressure didn’t crush a ship, the gravity eddies could trap it and never let it out.

  Kelly pulled up all Galactic Republic surveys of the star field and found them unusually deficient. There were very few surveys into the star field’s depths. Most surveys covered the outer asteroid fields, and none of the few surveys into the field were earlier than five years old. Even the Fleet Intel long-range observation posts’ sensor scans into the field gave little information. The gases and dusts swirling through that part of space obscured all but close range scans. It made for a good buffer between the Galactic Republic space and K’Rang space, but was not good for much else.

  Kelly shut his holographic viewer down and made a note to Chief Blankenship to have diagnostics run on all sensors to make sure they were all at peak efficiency. He didn’t want to be blind going in to solve this mystery. He also made a note to requisition a few extra sensor pods. You can never have too much knowledge.

  Sally arrived at the spaceport just in time to make the shuttle up to the space station. Pete had gotten her a pass, with the help of Steven Maynard, which allowed her access to the station for just such forays as these. She used the flight time to go through her pantry list and organize what she would need off this container ship.

  She had storage at the restaurant for quite a few months worth of foodstuffs. She also pulled up her wine cellar list to see which wines she needed. Maybe this ship would have a few containers of food she could rummage through. Pete had only bid and won on the ship’s larder, but if no one was looking and there were good quality stores in a cargo container, who would know that they weren’t part of the ship’s food stores. She tried to pull up a ship’s manifest to see what the cargo was.

  The shuttle entered the station and Sally craned her neck to peer out the port, to see if she could make out the ship. It must have been on the other side. She couldn’t see anything but ships in the process of dismantling and reconfiguration.

  The shuttle docked, and Sally got up with the rest of the passengers to debark. This was Sally’s tenth time to the station and she no longer marveled at the facility inside the hollow metal moon of Barataria. She just plodded her way around the outer ring tunnel until she came to dock C27. She notified space station control that she had authorization to inventory and remove the food stocks and requested two grav sleds for what she would be removing. The airlock cycled, opening the way for her, and she was notified that her sleds were on the way.

  Sally entered and proceeded to the galley. Most modern ships were all laid out similarly, so she had no trouble finding her way. In moments, she was standing in the galley. She inspected the ready storage and plugged her pocket tablet into the galley terminal to read out what was in the long-term storage.

  Jackpot! The Andromeda Clipper was at the beginning of its cruise and was fully stocked. A quick survey of the ready stores locker showed that the inventory from the galley terminal was correct. She notified station control to send two more grav sleds. Wonder of wonders, they also had a full store of spices. She was in heaven. She sent a message to Pete to enquire about the Andromeda Clipper’s cook. She could always use an extra hand.

  Sally wandered down a passageway and found the long-term storage compartment, opened the hatch and made a quick tour inside. Again the galley inventory and what Sally found inside matched. The captain ran a taut ship. She normally found a degree of pilfering, but everything here was exactly as it should be.

  She was just about to turn and leave when she heard a scraping sound. Her first thought was that there was some creature in the compartment, but spaceships didn’t have vermin like the sailing vessels of old. She listened and heard it again. It seemed to be coming from above. She backed out of the compartment and sealed the hatch behind her. As she turned to move back to the galley, a vent grate dropped from the ceiling in front of her.

  A pair of legs dropped down followed by hips and a waist. A well-built young black man dropped down and hung from his hands. He saw her and his eyes went wide. He tried to scramble back up in the grate opening, but lost his grip. He fell off-center and landed squarely on his back. He lay there gasping for air, the wind knocked out of him.

  Sally walked over to the gasping Russell Obwobwo, looked down, and said, “You must be the missing crewman. I’d heard there was a discrepancy in the crew log. Don’t try to get up. You’ll get your breath back in a few minutes.”

  He looked up at her and just continued gasping for air like a fish out of water. As she said, his breath slowly came back to him.

  He slowly sat up, rubbing his back and ribs.

  She asked, “Is anything broken?”

  He looked up at her and said, “No, just bruised, I think. Aren’t you going to turn me in?”

  She smiled.
“Of course. You can’t hide here forever. They’re going to unload everything that’s useable and then dismantle her for parts. You’ll only have life support for another week, and then they open her up to space. I wouldn’t be doing you any favors leaving you here.”

  She pulled out her pocket terminal and he said, “Wait, just give me a chance to sneak out of here.”

  “You can’t. You haven’t got a chip. We all have chips implanted in our necks, right here.” The somewhat pleasant looking woman pointed at where her Adam’s apple would be, if she had one. “You wouldn’t get past the next dock before the alarms went off. The guards would be on you in a flash and they’d be none too gentle with you. Let me call them and you surrender real peaceful like. It’s the best thing for you.”

  His shoulders slumped and he asked, “What’ll happen to me? Will they kill me?”

  “No, young man, they probably won’t kill you. They have need of strong young men such as you. They’ll probably put you to work in one of the mines or factories. If you have a useful skill, they might use you somewhere else.”

  He looked up at her with resignation on his face, “Well, if I’m going to be a prisoner, I might as well start with a full stomach. Do the replicators have power?”

  She looked at him as if he had just used a profanity. “You’ll do no such thing. Come here. Sit. Let me fix you something. It’s the least I can do, seeing as I have to be the one to turn you in.”

  She moved into the galley and got some pans heating, then rummaged through the stores until she found some steaks and vegetables. She pan-fried a couple of steaks, whipped up some mashed potatoes, and boiled some Andelian beans. In moments, she had plated two meals and set one in front of Russell. The other was for her. It was lunchtime, after all.

  Russell and Sally ate their meals in silence. When it was over, she ran the dishes and pans through the cleaner and called up station security. Russell surrendered quietly. Sally hated to do it, but it was the best for him. She got security to let him help her load up the grav sleds and they all left the Andromeda Clipper together. She wondered if Pete could be talked into another waiter or dishwasher.

  Alistair decided he was not doing very much good where he was. He decided to make better use of his time by patrolling the fringes of the star cluster. He put his sensors on passive long-range survey mode and covered as much of the perimeter of the star cluster as the gravimetric pressure ebbs and flows would allow. After a week, he had built up a much better star map of the field. Patterns of energy readings resolved into likely areas to inspect more closely, once the scout ship arrived. He found one area of the field that had readings much higher than the surrounding space. That would be the first area he would recommend to Kelly.

  He looked down at the cat lying on the console and said, “Looks like you will have to go into stasis for a while, Rojo. I don’t think I’ll be able to drop you off at a kennel on any of the nearby worlds. It will be just a longer than usual nap for you, old fellow.” He rubbed Rojo’s head and watched the data flow.

  While he was surveying the far reaches of the star field, a strange ship cruised by his former hiding place. It was huge, bigger than a fleet carrier. It was shaped like a pecan shell, painted black, and with eyes painted on both sides of the bow. It turned out of the star cluster and headed toward Aldebaran.

  Irina asked Terri to get her info on the amenities of the Nebula Queen, sister ship to the Galaxy Queen that they’d come out on. Now that the pressure was off, she wanted to have some fun. She felt magnanimous and offered to pay for Terri’s amenities, too. Terri had been a good assistant and kept her from making an ass of herself quite a few times in the last year. A couple of days into the voyage, she called the concierge desk and arranged Swedish massages for both of them.

  At the spa, Irina and Terri left their clothes in a locker, showered, and donned fluffy cotton robes and slippers. Irina asked for a masseur and Terri asked for a masseuse. Irina felt so relaxed she had her clothes bagged and walked back to her cabin in the robe. Terri followed her lead. Irina wasn’t as slim and trim as her assistant, but she could still turn the heads of more mature men.

  The two padded down the hall in their complimentary terry cloth slippers and had just reached Terri’s cabin when the engine sound changed and the lights went out. Irina, knowing instinctively that this was a bad thing, pushed Terri into her room where the emergency lights were burning, and told her to get dressed. Now! The two women threw on clothes and prepared for whatever was coming.

  Kelley, Connie and Chief Miller hopped on a man lift with the yard boss and went up to perform a final inspection of the tail gun nacelle repair. The yard had fabricated a new nacelle, and replaced the destroyed rail gun with one fresh out of the shipping crate from the armament factory on Schirra. They had replaced the rear view camera assembly completely. All grazing fire damage to the hull had been sanded, filled, sanded, and painted. Kelly was satisfied. The yard boss brought up the form that transferred responsibility back to the captain, and Kelly thumbed his approval.

  Vigilant was ready four days early. Kelly wanted to give the crew liberty to blow off some steam before what looked to be a long cruise. As he was about to announce liberty, he got a call from CDR Timmons to see him as soon as the ship was returned to his control and his ship was out of drydock. Kelly prepared the ship for movement, and then requested permission to lift and move to Scout Force’s parking apron. Permission was granted and Vigilant smoothly lifted out of the drydock and across the field to the Scout Force parking apron. Once the ship was secure, he and Connie walked to CDR Timmons office.

  CDR Timmons emphasized to them the political visibility of their mission, especially with increasing pressure from the Senate. He told them to leave as soon as they were resupplied and good luck and good hunting.

  “So much for liberty,” Kelly thought, as they returned to the Vigilant.

  Steven Maynard conducted a captains’ conference in his main conference room on Barataria. He was a medium-sized, but big muscled man in his late fifties. The deference paid to him was due to his ability to guarantee good captures/profit and a safe haven in which to enjoy them, more than anything else. He was not about to disappoint them now that things had slowed down.

  “Looks like we’ll need to shift our operations to in-spiral for a while. The Rigel to Aldebaran run is starting to dry up. We’re seeing too many armed escorts and convoys since that last container ship that the Leviathan brought in. The passenger liner captured today was a fluke. Even our attempt to infiltrate a few of our ships into the escort fleet isn’t paying off any more. Captain Craig, brief us on that route you were surveying to get us out to the Perseus sector.”

  Captain Sam Craig got up from his chair and motioned for the terminal operator to bring up his plot. The lights dimmed and a 3-D view of the star cluster appeared before them in the center of the table. As the image built, several red paths from Barataria led out, but all terminated before reaching the edge of the field. One crooked blue path led all the way through the field and out into space in the K’Rang end of the Perseus sector, where several green lines stretched from system to system. Several systems were highlighted in orange or yellow.

  “As you can see, I’ve successfully piloted my ship out of the star cluster into the edge of the Perseus sector, represented by this blue line. It’s our back door into the K’Rang Empire. I’ve done a sensor scan and found several cargo runs that would be worth our while, shown here in green. There are at least ten runs here that would provide us with good captures. The best point is that these here, here, and here, marked in orange, are new worlds and get a lot of high tech and machinery cargos. The two more developed systems here and here, marked in yellow, get a lot of deliveries from outside the sector that will be on the edges of our ability to patrol, but high value enough to make it worth our while.”

  The captains murmured at Captain Craig’s comments, with hungry looks in their eyes.

  Steven Maynard signaled fo
r quiet. “Thank you, Captain Craig. Gentlemen and ladies, we will need to harvest this new area carefully. If we continue to hit the Rigel to Aldebaran run selectively and develop this new area as well, we can all live very well for as long as we remain smart. In addition, we might find fertile markets for trade between the empires. I’m sure there are many that would pay top dollar for proscribed goods from the other empire.”

  Maynard brought the meeting to a close and the captains drifted off in ones and twos. Captain Craig and Captain Chang, captain of the Leviathan, remained behind.

  “Steven, this path I found is just barely large enough for the Leviathan to make it through. If the navigators get sloppy, we could lose her to a gravity eddy.”

  Captain Chang, a grizzled man in his early sixties, bristled at the comment. “I guess it’s a good thing I don’t have any sloppy navigators, then.”

  Captain Craig turned to his fellow captain and said, “Lee, that’s not it. It’s just that we all have so much invested in your ship and depend on it so much. I just want to make sure you understand the risk.”

  “It’s all right, Ron, I understand your concern. I think once we fit the new thrusters we’ll pull off that container ship I brought in, she’ll pirouette in space like a ballerina.”

  “Pirouette?” laughed Maynard. “That I’ll need to see.”

  All three left the conference room and went their separate ways, chuckling at the vision of a ship larger than a Fleet carrier twirling in space.

  Maynard made his way to his private quarters on Helge’s Ridge. He walked out onto his terrace and surveyed what he had built so far. Below him lay a twelve-kilometer wide city, with over 300,000 members of the brotherhood and 100,000 captives. It nestled in a valley between two medium mountain ranges and had all the facilities of a second tier world in the Galactic Republic. Every resident, including captives, had private quarters, free medical care, entertainment of all types, and all the modern conveniences.