These thoughts quickly took whatever joy he had felt from flying the pod and sent it far away, banishing it to some place so distant it felt as though he would never be happy again. As if he would never truly completely overcome the losses he had sustained and the emptiness that now had become such a big part of him. Where once people had stood, occupying a piece of me, he thought, now there are so many vacancies, how could it be possible not to feel so hollow? So very…empty?
“Hey, Calvin,” said Nikolai, who was seated on Calvin’s left, about two feet away. “You all right?”
“Of course I am,” said Calvin. “I’m just trying to get us back home, and out of this God damned pod.”
“Okay, all right, easy, it was just a question,” said Nikolai. “It’s just…you don’t look too good. I thought you might be sick or something.”
Calvin nodded. “I might be.”
What was depressing him the most was the sudden realization he had that, even if he succeeded at everything from this moment onward, returned to the Nighthawk, got back inside Imperial space, saw Kalila on the throne restoring order to the Empire and eliminating all of the corruption that he’d fought against all this time…even if every tiny detail from here on out went exactly perfectly, the best he could hope for was to be on his Nighthawk again, where, inevitably, he would feel almost completely alone.
It would never be the same without Miles. Anand was long gone, and insane, and God knows what happened to him. Shen and Sarah were gone; perhaps they would come back, perhaps not, but Calvin considered it unlikely, for some reason, that they would return. And now, whenever he went to the infirmary for any reason, not only would there be no Monte to swap stories and jokes with, there would also be no Rain.
Rain, more than anyone Calvin had ever met, had seemed to know exactly how to look at the bleakest and darkest of things and find the light inside them. Now she too was gone and however she had done it, whatever her talent had been, that force inside her that had filled her with such light, life, and positivity, it had gone with her. If there was some secret to happiness, Calvin didn’t know it. And Rain had never taught it to him. How could she have? Their time together had been cut far too short. Just like his time with Christine…and, truthfully, so many others.
Calvin shook his head. His feelings of despair shifted into feelings of anger, directed at himself. I’m not going down this road any longer, he thought, giving himself a mental reprimand. Yes, I’ve experience tragedy. Yes, I have suffered. Yes, there have been sacrifices along the way. But that isn’t my fault and there is nothing I can do to change it. That’s simply how life is. You take what you are given. Sometimes you can make something more out of it, sometimes you can’t. And, sometimes, when you do make the most of it, something else comes along and steals it away from you. But, God dammit, I’m not going to let this beat me. I have to hope and keep hoping. I don’t know in what exactly. But I will see this through!
The time had come to bring an end to all of it…all the suffering, and all the darkness, and all the lies. He had sacrificed much trying to fight for the future of the Empire, and for what he believed to be right, and those he loved had sacrificed even more. Some of them had made the ultimate sacrifice. And some, he knew, perhaps even himself, may yet make that sacrifice too. But he owed it to them, and himself, not to give up, or give in, no matter what happened. No matter what darkness and evil and corruption remained out there, he would play the cards he held, as best he could, and then the chips would fall where they may. That was the truth of life. He wished there were a better answer, or some way he could save and protect all the good from all the evil, but there wasn’t, and he couldn’t. And that was simply something he just had to get past. Because if he didn’t, then he could never move on. And perhaps it was that, most of all, that sensation of entrapment, where no progress is made, that most crippled him inside. Well, no more. Come what may, I’ll be ready.
By then they had reached a position distant enough from the planet that the Nighthawk should have picked them up on its scopes and made an attempt to hail them. Yet no hail came. And, as Calvin examined the view out the windows, searching for running lights, or anything that might be a ship, all he saw was blackness.
“You there,” Calvin pointed to First Lieutenant Ferreiro. “Check the Ops readouts and tell me what you see. If you don’t see anything, begin a full scanner sweep.”
“Uh, all right,” said the man, looking confused. He jumped up and went to the terminal as Calvin directed. Meanwhile, Calvin began repositioning the ship; perhaps he had gone to the wrong coordinates, he thought, though he felt quite sure that this was the rendezvous point.
“I don’t see anything here,” said First Lieutenant Ferreiro.
“Then do the scan,” said Calvin, unhappy that he’d needed to repeat the order.
“Yes, sir,” the soldier replied.
Calvin began ticking off boxes in his head as he attempted to make sense of the situation. Ship not in visible range. No hail from the Nighthawk. The Nighthawk not in expected position. Nothing visible on our short-range scanner…
Hmm…something was very peculiar, he decided.
“What is problem?” asked Nikolai.
“I’m having trouble finding our ship,” said Calvin, remaining certain that, although this was unexpected, there was no reason to think anything had gone wrong.
“Why not try to hail it?” asked Nikolai. “Send it a message, you know?”
“Because I can’t hail a vessel I can’t detect,” said Calvin. “Not with these instruments.”
“Don’t you have identifier code or something?” asked Nikolai.
“That’s not a bad idea,” said Calvin, wondering if he could force the annoyingly simple Comms system on the pod to transmit to a location based on an identification code, rather than a coordinate set. As Calvin set to task trying to program the Comms panel to do that very thing, he glanced briefly at First Lieutenant Ferreiro and asked, “Hey, how are you coming with that scan?”
“Almost finished, sir,” said First Lieutenant Ferreiro. “Got it. I’m detecting several objects.”
Calvin knew that could mean anything, asteroids, debris, space junk. “Filter out everything that is clearly not the Nighthawk’s size.”
“I don’t know how to do that, sir,” said First Lieutenant Ferreiro. “I’m sorry.”
“Here,” said Calvin, slightly annoyed. He turned his attention to the Ops controls and forced the scanner to filter out everything obviously too large or two small to be the Nighthawk. That greatly reduced the number of results. He scanned through them eagerly, almost nervously.
Come on, come on, he thought.
Nothing.
He expanded the range of the scan and tried again. This time it came back with a result that made him think he’d found the Nighthawk; the size seemed a bit off, but the materials detected definitely implied a starship, but, as he got the scanner to project an image of it, he discovered it wasn’t the Nighthawk. To make things even stranger, it was a Rotham ship. Stranger still, Calvin recognized the design; it was an unusual design, but he was certain he had seen it before. Then it dawned on him—a Hunter ship. What is a Hunter ship doing in the Forbidden System? he wondered. The fact that a Rotham ship would be here, apparently holding position, probably waiting for something, and it could sit there, cavalierly, without the Polarians losing their shit and sending everything to attack it, or, for that matter, without that damned energy vortex—Custos—trying to destroy it; none of it made any sense. But that was a mystery he could not solve, not today. Besides, he had a much more important ship to locate, and he was determined to do so.
He expanded the scan even further and waited, as the minutes passed, for the results to appear. “Whatever money the designers who made this thing spent on thrusters, they obviously got by scrimping on Ops equipment,” said Calvin, to nobody in particular.
“Thing is slow. But have patience. It will finish,” said Nikolai. He leaned
back in his seat, trying to make himself as comfortable as possible. As he did, Calvin resisted the urge to begin anxiously pacing around. Mostly because there wasn’t enough room in the pod for him to pace anywhere.
He wondered briefly if Nimoux would have engaged the stealth system for any reason but, even from stealth, the Nighthawk should be able to scan and detect Calvin’s pod, especially since they had been given specific instructions to do so. Another possibility he briefly entertained, then swiftly rejected, was that his mission on the Forbidden Planet had taken so much time that the Nighthawk had given up on them and withdrawn from the system. A final hypothesis that came to mind, one he could not immediately dismiss, but still found it to be lacking, was that the presence of the Hunter ship might be a related event to the apparent disappearance of the Nighthawk. Whatever the case, hopefully, he would know the answer soon. If they did not find the Nighthawk, Calvin wasn’t prepared for what he would do next. He decided not to worry about that until if and when he had to.
Eventually the results were returned. Calvin flicked through them quickly, this time audibly urging the computer to show him what he wanted to see. “Come on, come on,” and then he saw it. “There!” he said, pointing to the generated output.
Detected Object 30112000. Composition: Various Alloys and Synthetic Materials; Prediction: Starship; Expected Classification: Frigate. Coordinates: See Below.
“That has to be it!” said Calvin. He then set the Comms system, which had failed to send a message using the Nighthawk’s identification information, to transmit a message to the coordinates he fed it from the Ops terminal. Fortunately, in case the Nighthawk moved from that position, the comm-scanner was able to connect a message to anything within a certain spherical distance away from any specific coordinates.
“Hailing the Nighthawk,” said Calvin, eager to feel his boots back aboard his ship. The Nighthawk was his home and he was more than ready to return to it.
He waited. And waited. The hail continued to send, repeatedly, but no answer from the other end. It was as if the Nighthawk was refusing to reply to the call. But why would they do that? Calvin wondered. And then it hit him, the Nighthawk had been embattled with Custos when last he saw it; perhaps they had needed to drain energy from all systems, including the communication transmitters, in order to boost the shields!
“I’m thinking they can hear us, but they cannot respond to us,” said Calvin. “So I am sending them a message manually,” he began typing, knowing that, even with severe power limitations, the ship could almost certainly receive text-based communications, since they required the littlest amount of energy to receive. He informed Nimoux that they had arrived at the coordinates, and were ready for retrieval. And then ordered him to begin maneuvering the Nighthawk according to a vector he assigned. His plan was to move the pod along the same vector, and the two would meet in the middle, saving time.
After a few seconds a reply came, text only. B%^$# En route. #@ NOT #@!^&
“What the hell?” said Calvin, as he read the message, wondering why it had come in so garbled. There was no explanation he could think of, either someone was having some fun at the keyboard or else they were drunk. Either way, the important part of the message had gotten through, the vessel was en route.
“Okay, now we’re talking,” said Calvin, resisting the urge to let out a cheer. Knowing that the Nighthawk was still out there, not destroyed, and not gone from the system, was a huge relief. He took the flight controls and began maneuvering the pod until it was set to the same vector he had assigned the Nighthawk, and then he fired up the sublight thrusters, pushing them all the way to maximum. Of course he would have to slow to a near total stop for the docking operation, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t speed things along for the time being.
“And we are on our way,” said Calvin. He glanced up through the ceiling window, which, based on the pod’s design also made it, essentially, the bow of the craft. In fact, the pod a unique and clever artificial gravity system that kept passengers in their normal positions, how they would want to be oriented during a landing or takeoff, but, in space-flight, gave them the impression that they were standing or sitting sideways, in comparison to some other object, as the ceiling of the ship was what led the way.
“In just a few moments, gentlemen, you will see some lights appear right there,” he pointed toward the window where only stars could be seen. “Somebody keep any eye out for me; let me know when you see the ship.”
“I’ll do it, sir,” said First Lieutenant Ferreiro.
“That’s fine,” said Calvin, returning his attention to the flight controls. “For all I care, all of you can do it.”
After a few seconds, Nikolai spoke up. “I see something. But it is no Nighthawk.”
“What are you talking about?” asked Calvin. He looked up to see for himself. There was indeed something there, he saw it almost immediately; the thing, whatever it was, appeared like a large, bright star, although it flickered, and seemed to grow in size as they approached, as if it was following their exact same vector. “Oh, God dammit,” said Calvin, realizing what it was. “It’s that damned energy vortex.”
“I see the ship now,” said Nikolai. “Forward running lights are on. Now off. Now on again.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” asked Calvin. He looked up and all he saw was the Custos energy vortex, seeming to blink in and out of existence, apparently moving toward them, and then seemingly away; it was almost random in its behavior—or so it seemed.
And then he saw what Nikolai meant. With a flash, there were small but bright white lights. They shined directly at them, approaching rapidly; they had to be the Nighthawk’s running lights…there was simply nothing else they could be. But then, after a second, the lights went out. Another two seconds later, and the lights flicked on again.
Meanwhile the pod and the Nighthawk continued to close-in on one another, approaching at full speed. Calvin wondered if this turning on and off of the lights was supposed to tell them something. Perhaps to help the pod identify the Nighthawk’s spatial positioning? No, that can’t be it, thought Calvin, the pod’s sensors were more than adequate for that. Still, it was strange behavior, and did almost seem like some sort of code or effort to convey information.
Calvin watched it closely, as the vessels continued to approach each other; both the Nighthawk, and Custos right on its heels, were easily visible to the naked eye through the ceiling window. The lights continued to blink, as Calvin watched them, searching for some kind of pattern, any kind of pattern, he began to notice things. For instance, the lights weren’t simply switching on and off, they were doing so at varying rates, the speed between each switch changed; at first, it seemed to be almost random but, after he had watched it for more than fifteen seconds, he realized the same apparently random pattern repeated itself. Then began to do so again.
Calvin shook his head, “I don’t get it,” he said, “Maybe they’re trying to warn us about the Custos energy-vortex?” he suggested, shrugging his shoulders. No one replied. And even Calvin decided that could not have been the message, since they could plainly see Custos for themselves, they simply had to look out the window. Calvin’s plan for dealing with the hostile entity was to dock quickly with the Nighthawk, get everyone aboard as fast as possible, and then signal the Nighthawk’s bridge, probably using a deck Comm panel, to jump immediately into alteredspace.
That should work, he told himself, returning to the flight controls and getting things prepped to slow the craft and begin a docking operation, now that the vessels were getting so close together. As he began making the necessary adjustments, he noticed that a second message had been sent to them from the Nighthawk. The timestamp indicated that it had been sent immediately after the first message; Calvin had simply failed to notice it. He opened the message only to discover that it was even more garbled than the first had been. There were no recognizable characters within the body of the message at all, just boxes, boxes and
some other weird symbol Calvin did not recognize, and until this point had no idea keyboards could even generate.
“Okay…” he said, fighting off his gut reaction to all of this, that it was all too weird for something not to be wrong. The blinking lights, obviously some kind of pattern, the garbled text-only messages. The fact that the Nighthawk had been far afield from its expected position when the pod arrived at the pre-determined coordinates. Not to mention the apparent fact that the Nighthawk was unable, or unwilling, to answer their hail.
“Scan the ship,” said Calvin, unable to shake his hunch that something suspicious was going on.
“What?” asked First Lieutenant Ferreiro.
“I said, scan the ship,” said Calvin, using a firmer tone. “Do it, now!”
“Yes, sir, right away, sir,” said First Lieutenant Ferreiro. Calvin turned to the Ops display and waited for the soldier to nervously enter the inputs that would command the pod’s scanners to engage.
“Here, I’ll just do it myself,” said Calvin, annoyed. That was the trouble of captaining a ship whose crew was entirely composed of soldiers. Sure, you could fend off a boarding party of space pirates, but good luck getting your staff to even figure out how to maneuver the vessel out of the space dock!
The scan initiated. Calvin wasn’t exactly sure what he was looking for, though he suspected, if something were seriously amiss, as seemed to be the case, the scanner would pick up on some sort of clue. And any new information, at this point, would be extremely helpful, since, given what he had, he could not make heads or tails of it.
While the scanner did its thing, Calvin decided to continue with the plan as designed. “All right, everybody, listen up. The moment we dock with the ship and the seal is in place, I’m going to blow the hatch, and then everybody is going to get out of this pod as fast as they possibly can. To avoid confusion, I am assigning you an order.” He then pointed to each of them and gave them a number, telling them that that was the order they would use to get through the hatch and onto the Nighthawk. Calvin decided that he would go aboard last. That way he could be sure everyone was aboard when he used the corridor intercom to signal the bridge to jump into alteredspace.
The Phoenix Requiem (The Phoenix Conspiracy Series Book 7) Page 28