by GARY DARBY
“Incredible luck you found him when you did,” Rosberg observed.
Jadar let out a deep breath. “When I saw the Zephyr set down, I made for its landing site. Came over the knoll and saw a figure in the middle of what looked like a wolf pack.
“They were so intent on him that I just stood there and picked them off one by one until they finally scattered.”
His voice tightened, and he swallowed. “I didn’t know it was Dason until I got those things off him. They chewed him up pretty bad, but he put up quite a fight or it could have been much worse. I’m not sure any of us could have done any better.”
“And no sign of Colonel Romerand or Lieutenant Romer?” the general asked.
“No, sir,” Jadar answered. “The Zephyr was empty. Though he was a bit delirious, Dason explained what happened. I admit, at first I thought it was stress-induced hallucinations but after a bit I realized that his descriptions were too detailed for them to be hallucinations.
“When he mentioned Romerand and the fact that I was sitting in another Zephyr, I sort of put two and two together thinking that Lieutenant Romer might be the fictitious Captain Simur that hijacked off Luna.
“So, after I patched him up, I did a quick ground search. A short distance from the ship, I found boot prints intermixed with canine paw prints, but nothing else. The tracks led off into a thick grove, but it was getting too dark to follow safely.”
Rosberg peered at Jadar. “Their bodies or any remains of the extraterrestrial that Scout Thorne spoke of?” he asked.
Jadar shook his head in reply. “No sir. I did a slow flyover of the immediate area, but I didn’t see anything of the extraterrestrial. From Dason’s description, I was pretty confident I was in the right area but there wasn’t any sign of him
“Did see a pile of carcasses of those wolflike canines but nothing else. After that, I flew the Zephyr over to our crash site and picked Shar up.”
He motioned toward Shar and said, “We discussed our options which seemed to be to either wait for daylight and do another search or boost off-planet and yell for help.
“Dason was pretty adamant that these, uh, Mongans were dangerous and that they posed a real threat. He wanted us to do a search for the Sha’anay ship, but at that stage, with so many unknowns, we decided to make a fast run out of the system.”
Jadar glanced over at Shar, who picked up the narrative from there. “I got off an n-space message to Lieutenant Colonel Barkley, the nearest scout commander and—"
He stopped and cleared his throat. “I probably overstepped my bounds but I warned him about the possibility of hostile aliens in the area and ordered them to pull back from their current assignments and wait for further instructions from you.”
Meeting Rosberg’s frank stare, he explained, “I considered trying to contact you first, sir, but I thought that the situation demanded immediate action, and I wasn’t sure how soon I could get through to you.”
Rosberg waved a hand in acknowledgment of Tuul’s explanation and said, “You did the right thing, Shar, you took the initiative, and that’s what I expect from my officers”
Leaning forward, his eyes bored in on them. “Now, there is absolutely no doubt in your mind that what you saw was an alien craft, whose size and configuration doesn’t match anything in the Imperium inventory?”
Both men nodded vigorously while Shar said, “None whatever, sir. Since we’ve been back, I put in the dimensions and design of that ship into the computer database for a match, and it’s come back each time with a negative search.
“Nothing even remotely close to what we saw. It’s size alone was three, maybe four times larger than our biggest Nav dreadnaught. That thing was so immense it probably exerts its own gravity field based on sheer mass.”
Shar blew out a breath while muttering, “I hate to say this but the only other explanation is that either the Faction or some other organization has the capability to produce such a ship and there’s nothing in SOG’s database that points in that direction.”
His face became set. “Sir, I would be happy to go up before the council and swear on my honor as a Star Scout officer that what I saw was extraterrestrial in origin.”
“As would I,” Jadar was quick to add.
Rosberg grunted in answer. “Heaven help us if the Faction can manufacture a vessel of that size, then we’re in deeper trouble that I realized.”
He gave them a grateful smile. “While I appreciate your offer to go wading in that slime pit with me, the council will just have to accept the fact that I believe both of you as well as Scout Thorn that it was an XT vessel.”
Rosberg again drummed his fingers on his gleaming silver console top. “Now to Scout Thorn’s report. I’ve read and reread his initial account several times. And except for the portion dealing with these alien images in his head, I’m inclined to believe every word.”
He turned to Jadar. “It's a shame that you didn’t bring back one of those wolf creatures for examination. If we could determine that those collars were an alien meta-material, it would almost seal the deal.”
“I know, sir,” Jadar replied while he furrowed his brow. “And I apologize. I didn’t see the collars when I flew over those carcasses and didn’t know about them until we were already in n-space.”
He sighed and said, “I guess we could have gone back . . .”
“No,” Rosberg replied. “You did the right thing by getting out of there and putting out the alert. Besides, considering the threat level on the Alpha Prime planet, we need more resources there than just three scouts, two of which were pretty banged up.”
“Is that what we’re calling it, sir, the Alpha Prime planet?” Shar asked.
“For now, yes,” Rosberg shrugged. “I’m sure that some official name will come forth at some point but for now that’ll do.”
His mouth lifted at the corner, and he pointed at Shar. “And speaking of calling, I’m appointing you the acting chief in place of Colonel Romerand. Your first order of business is for you and Jadar to formulate a plan with Barkley on how we’re going to cover that planet in a grid-by-grid search pattern.
“Priorities: First, find our missing scouts. Second, if there are extraterrestrials still there, establish contact. Third, if the XTs are gone, see if they’ve left anything behind.
“Maybe we’ll get lucky and find one of those downed XT craft that Thorne mentions. The Nav will do a systemwide search; you concentrate our efforts on the ground.
“Lastly, if we can’t find an alien ship, then I want teams to locate every landmark that Thorne described. Once the SciCorps goes in, I want integrated teams of Star Scouts and SciCorps techs at every site Thorne mentions.
“If indeed the aliens took casualties at the Zephyr crash site, there just might be bodily fluids or organics left behind, perhaps even a body.
“I want the same with the carcasses of those canine animals, get a collar and that implant device off and determine if it’s of unknown design and material.
“Find Scout Alvaro’s ‘big tree’ and see if there are any alien artifacts still there. If there are, get an AP team in there and with SciCorps run every diagnostic, metallurgical, micro and macroscopic test that they can think of.
“Stannick will have the Ticonderoga swing through the planetary space where Thorne spotted the interstellar battle. Who knows, they may find a derelict alien vessel adrift.
“Comb the forest for footprints. Make sure every team has at least one XT protocol specialist with them. If that means you have to draw from staff here, including senior officers, then do it.
He stopped and then using a finger to make his point said, “I especially want full-up teams searching every place that Thorne identifies as where he lost teammates. Maybe, just maybe, there’s some still alive, waiting to be rescued. Or, if the aliens are still on the planet, they’ll return our people.”
His eyes flicking from one to the other, he asked, “This is our number one priority and I want the command
and our resources fully committed to this mission. Clear?”
“Clear,” they both echoed.
Rosberg’s eyes then grew hard, and his mouth turned down in a deep frown. “When I meet with the council they’ll want to know about Romerand and his daughter, so bring me up to speed on what we know at this point.”
“Lieutenant Alena Beth Romer,” Shar began. “Her Scoutmaster gave her high marks during her novice scout time. She entered the academy shortly after enlistment; her instructor officers noted that she was ‘highly intelligent, quick-tempered, somewhat volatile, but superb in the field.’
“After her commission she did six months Out There on mostly routine duties. Her field commander gave her an ‘acceptable’ rating on her officer efficiency report but indicated she had an ‘attitude’ at times with authority.”
“Humph,” the general grunted. “Go figure. Go on.”
“Her reassignment to Star Scout Command was personally directed by—”
“Let me take a wild guess,” Rosberg interjected. “Romerand.”
“Yes sir. He assigned her to the J3 section.”
“Operations,” Rosberg grunted. “Of course. Everything flows into there. You want to know what we’re doing Out There, or the Nav, or SciCorps, that’s the place to be. ”
Shar nodded agreement. “I’m still digging into what she was working on, but from what I’ve found so far, Romerand had her doing ‘special projects’ for him.”
“Sounds like he just about made her his personal aide,” Rosberg said. “I want to know just what those ‘special projects’ were, Shar. Might lead to more skunks in the woodpile.”
“Yes, sir, already working on it. From Dason’s account, it’s clear that she is the daughter of Star Scout Bethany Simms.”
Shar glanced at Jadar, who met his look with a sad expression. “She was assigned to Team Marrel on Veni and was one of those who lost her life.”
He shifted his weight in his chair before he turned back to Rosberg. “I can’t state for a fact that someone altered her birth records, but Colonel Romerand is not listed on the record as her father, though from her own statements to Scout Thorne, he was.”
Shar frowned while saying, “It’s apparent that they hid their relationship well enough that no one had any idea that they were father and daughter.”
Rosberg’s fingertips tapped on his desk while he said, “And Romerand used her to try and kill Jadar here and Scout Thorne. Why?”
Jadar had his hand over his mouth and the word “Veni,” came out muffled and flat.
He removed the hand and met Rosberg’s eyes. His own were sad, and he said in a husky voice, “If Bethany—Scout Simms was Romerand’s wife and Alena’s mother, it has to be Veni, sir.”
“I agree,” Shar replied. “Romerand and his daughter blamed Deklon Marrel for the death of Scout Simms and when they found out about Dason, they planned to take out their revenge on him as well. Sheer insanity, of course, but the pieces fit.”
Shar stopped speaking, dropped his gaze, his eyes centered on his hands. Rosberg stopped drumming his fingers and leaned forward. “Out with it, Shar. I can see the wheels grinding in there.”
Shar shrugged. “After I read Dason’s report about the exchange on the planet between Romerand and his daughter, I made a very quick, preliminary investigation of Romerand’s past activities.
“I haven’t had much time to dig deep into all of his undertakings, mind you, but based on what happened on the planet, and from what I’ve uncovered here, there is a pattern emerging that tells me that Romerand had ties to the Faction. He is—was a crossover.”
His eyes became like plas-steel. “He was our mole, general, and has been for a very long time.”
Chapter Thirty
Star Date: 2443.066
Star Scout Command, Cheyenne Mountain, Terra
Jadar flinched from Shar’s words as if someone had just punched him in the stomach. The truth was finally exposed. Colonel Ri Romerand, Star Scout Command’s chief of staff, second only to General Rosberg in authority was a Faction crossover!
The general’s expression was granitelike, his nostrils flaring in and out while he breathed. Rosberg glanced sideways at Jadar and in a raspy voice said, “That would explain—a number of things.”
“More than a number of things,” Shar rejoined. “How the Faction knew certain novice scouts were on this no-notice cycle, how and where they could hit those teams. Every detail of specific Star Scout operations, when and where to attack us, and especially about Kolomite finds.”
He turned to Jadar. “You were right. From what I’m seeing, he was using us to funnel Kolomite information to the Faction.”
“Is there anything to indicate that Lieutenant Romer was a Gadion?” Rosberg asked.
“I don’t believe so,” Shar replied in a frank tone. “From Dason’s report, she and her ship were hijacked by a Faction killer team.
“She was stun-gunned and from her account, if Jadar and I hadn’t shown up when we did in the nebula, there was a good chance they were going to kill her.”
He glanced sideways at Jadar and shrugged while saying, “As we discussed back on the planet, we just happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time. I think we surprised them and they attacked to make sure there weren’t any witnesses around.”
“Or,” Jadar offered, “in some ways, we were at the right place at the right time.”
Jadar screwed his mouth to one side. “Yes, I guess you could look at it that way.”
“But what I don’t understand,” Rosberg said, “is that it appears that those Faction thugs were sent to the Helix to stop her by Romerand himself.”
He shook his head several times. “First, he sends her off to murder Jadar and Scout Thorne and then he calls in Faction assassins to stop her, and by drastic measures it seems. That doesn’t make any sense at all.”
Shar didn’t say anything for several seconds before answering. “Unless he was ordered by someone higher up in the Faction to do so, or he let someone in the Faction know what was going on, and they ordered the hit.”
Rosberg stared at his desktop, his head moving back and forth in disbelief. “Incredible, unbelievable, and sickening,” he said.
He leaned back and asked, “Do we know how she was going to get to Scout Thorne by herself? After all, he was virtually surrounded by a dozen scouts and as many Nav personnel during the no-notice.”
“I can’t answer that, general,” Shar replied. “I’m assuming that they had a scheme of sorts, but that may be something we’ll never know.”
Rosberg’s eyes seemed to take on a faraway look, and his expression became grave and solemn. He spoke in a small, disbelieving voice, “For more than forty years I have walked the trail—to have proof that one of our officers, one of our scouts would do something like this . . .”
His voice trailed off as if he couldn’t bring himself to consider the monstrosity of Romerand’s actions.
“I know, sir,” Shar replied in an understanding tone. “But it appears that they’re both gone and can’t hurt us anymore.”
Rosberg raised his head to ask pointedly, “Are there any indications that Romerand had accomplices inside Star Scout Command, particularly inside the mount, other than his daughter?”
Shar was slow to respond. “I’m afraid that we are going to have to assume that there may be more. To be honest, Romerand hid his involvement so well that if he hadn’t misplayed his hand I’m not sure that we would have ever found out.”
Pausing, Shar considered his next words carefully as he knew that they were already treading a fine line and General Rosberg was already embarrassed to the depths of his soul.
“Sir, I hate to say this, but, in light of Romerand’s duplicity, and the possibility of how far this may reach, I believe that we need to pass this information to Teng Rhee at the Imperium’s Special Operations Group.
“They need to know, to help in their own operations, and frankly, to help me in my
investigation. They have, uh, resources that they can tap into that I don’t.”
Rosberg’s eyes turned hard and fixed as he stared at Shar. Jadar knew how tough this must be on the general, to have to admit that a turncoat existed within his command, and worse, that there might be others.
“You don’t mind pouring a little salt into the wound, do you Shar?” Rosberg growled.
Shar blanched. “Sorry sir. You know I wouldn’t have under any other circumstances but we have to determine just how deep this runs into the command. We’re just not geared to go witch-hunting. We’re trained to look outward, not inward.”
Rosberg’s sigh was long and morose. “I don’t like it,” he grumbled. “Makes me feel like I’ve stepped into a Zorellian mud bath, complete with blood-sucking leeches.”
Lacing his fingers pyramid-style in front of his face, he stared at Shar for a full minute before he growled, “You’re right. We’re out of our element here.
“Go ahead and bring them into the loop. You take care of SOG; I’ll report this personally to the High Council during my session with them today.”
He snorted and said, “All in all, should be one interesting meeting, might even wake those old fogies up for a change and make them do some real work instead of flittin’ around on these preposterous boondoggles of theirs.”
Tapping on his desk, his manner turned severe. “On another matter, the council will want to know my opinion of this notion of alien images in Scout Thorne’s mind.”
He furrowed his forehead while saying, “Frankly, he doesn’t strike me as someone who would make up some fantastic yarn, especially one where his scout mates died before his very eyes.
“But we all know that extreme stress can cause the mind do funny things—go space happy, as they say. See and hear things that aren’t there, believe in events that never happened. So, what do you two make of it?”