The Lost Earth (Lost Starship Series Book 7) Page 26

  “We’ve never faced these kinds of problems before, though.”

  Maddox shrugged. “Either we win or we lose. The critical thing is that we fight. We will never stop fighting until we’re dead, and that includes against the taint the Ska put on you.”

  Riker blinked several times. A tired smile crept onto his face. “That’s good advice, sir. I’ll keep fighting,”

  Maddox moved closer, and he clapped Riker on his fleshly shoulder. Then the captain turned around. He needed to speak to Ludendorff. The Methuselah Man had likely departed with Dana. So Maddox headed for the med center.

  -3-

  Maddox pulled Ludendorff out of the medical chamber where medics worked on Dana. He pulled Ludendorff along, heading into the corridor.

  “That’s quite enough,” Ludendorff said, trying to shrug his arm out of the captain’s grasp.

  Maddox merely tightened his hold, forcing the Methuselah Man to keep stumbling in order to keep up.

  “I say, old boy, this has gone on long enough. If you don’t release me—”

  Maddox stared at Ludendorff as if daring him to do something.

  “Don’t say I didn’t warn you,” the professor said.

  Maddox’s grip tightened even more. Then his hand flew off as a terrific shock jolted him. Maddox staggered backward, his hand feeling as if it burned with fire. He shook his hand and finally regarded Ludendorff with some surprise.

  The professor wore a smug look. “I tried to warn you, but no…you couldn’t bother giving a man the same courtesy you demand for yourself.”

  Maddox flexed his hand, covertly examining it. The flesh did not seem burned although it still felt raw.

  “Neuro-lash,” Ludendorff said. “Works every time.”

  Maddox’s hand froze, as he looked up, staring at Ludendorff a second time. “A lash,” the captain said.

  “What’s gotten into you, my boy? I’m the one who should be upset. Look at what your man did to Dana. That was an outrage.”

  “What do you know about the Ska?”

  “We’ve been over this before to a tedious degree,” Ludendorff complained. “I’ve already told you what I know.”

  “Professor, you often say such things. Just as often, you keep the juiciest tidbits to yourself in order to wring some perceived advantage for yourself later.”

  “My modus operandi has served me well thus far,” Ludendorff said with some pride.

  “Perhaps,” Maddox said. “Perhaps you should understand, though, why I probe further. Now, what do you know about the Ska?”

  “Hmmm…well,” Ludendorff said, running a thumb underneath the small gold chain around his neck. “It appears to be coming here, if that’s what Riker is warning us about.”

  “That is my own conclusion,” Maddox said. “I suspect it’s using the thought-travel route as we did—or whatever the process is. If the Ska isn’t using the route directly, the person he controls is doing so.”

  “If that’s the case,” Ludendorff said, “we’re wrong about the null space being a permanent trap for it.”

  “I’ve already accepted that as a given.”

  “Yes, yes,” Ludendorff said. “I knew that, too, but it’s good to lay out the parameters in order to arrive at the correct conclusion. So… If Riker is correct, the Ska is coming here, maybe coming after you or the Destroyer. Likely, the Ska is coming with the other Destroyer. Presumably, the Ska will appear in the company of at least one Spacer. I would tend to think more.”

  Maddox nodded.

  Ludendorff cocked his head. “The question is: when will it appear?”

  “Soon,” Maddox said.

  “Is soon a week, two weeks, what?”

  “Is it an hour or a day?” asked Maddox.

  “This is maddening.” Ludendorff looked up suddenly. “I think it’s going to be longer than a day.”

  “Why?”

  “The nature of the warning shows that,” Ludendorff said. “I suspect Riker’s subconscious recognizes the nearing Ska. The first tendril of that coming monster likely spawned your sergeant’s nightmare.”

  “I suppose that sounds logical.”

  Ludendorff turned away, his thumb trying to rub the small chain smooth. After a time, he faced Maddox again.

  “This is a disaster,” the professor announced.

  “If you haven’t noticed,” Maddox said dryly, “the Swarm Fleet is also a disaster.”

  “Two disasters at once,” Ludendorff muttered. “Even if we could figure out how to prevent the one, the other will finish us off.”

  “We have our Destroyer, the Juggernauts—”

  “I hope you don’t seriously think those additions are going to turn the tide of battle,” Ludendorff said. “Even if we could capture the second Destroyer, I doubt that would be enough against the Swarm.”

  “Maybe we don’t have to have enough to defeat the Swarm, just enough to drive them away.”

  Ludendorff smiled. “Galyan would tell you that the Swarm never retreats. You either destroy it or it destroys you.”

  “Is Galyan correct in thinking that? Thrax retreated from us at the Dyson Sphere.”

  “Is Thrax truly Swarm, though?”

  “He looked Swarm enough to me,” Maddox said. “The Kai-Kaus certainly thought of his kind as Swarm creatures. Even the Builder believed so.”

  “Fine,” Ludendorff said. “So now that we’ve established that…now what?”

  Maddox looked off into the distance before regarding the professor. “Isn’t there some way to directly hurt the Ska?”

  “My boy, we’ve been over this—”

  “Then let’s go over it again,” Maddox said testily. “We were both on the Fisher world. We both saw the mural. The Fishers drove the dark cloud with rays of light. They seemed to push the Ska away with the light rays. I’d call that direct harm.”

  “I suppose you might have a point,” Ludendorff conceded.

  “Well…?” Maddox asked. “What does the ray of light in the mural represent?”

  “I frankly don’t know.”

  “Does Strand?”

  “If I don’t know,” Ludendorff said with a scowl, “then Strand isn’t likely to have any idea—”

  “You told me Strand is smarter than you.”

  Ludendorff stiffened. “I said no such thing. I told you he knew more about the Ska than I did.”

  “Then he’s smarter than you concerning the Ska.”

  “Are you deliberately trying to goad me?” Ludendorff asked suspiciously.

  “Without a doubt, I’m trying,” Maddox said. “Am I succeeding?”

  “Only in pissing me off, my boy,” Ludendorff said. “I resent your—”

  “Professor Ludendorff,” Maddox said. “We’re almost out of time. The Ska is coming. The Swarm Fleet will soon launch its next assault. Earth hangs in the balance. You have Strand’s notebook. You have your memories of the Fisher world. I suggest you do whatever it is you do at times like these. Make that mind of yours function overtime.”

  “Are you suggesting I ingest mind-altering drugs?”

  “If it gives you even a chance of figuring this out, then yes.”

  Ludendorff grunted in a peeved manner.

  “Give me something to work with,” Maddox said.

  Ludendorff’s head jerked up. “You? This is all about you saving the day yet again. Is that right?”

  “Us saving the day,” Maddox said. “This is all about us saving the day, if we can, if you can decipher ancient archeological finds quickly enough.”

  “Hmm…” Ludendorff said. “I am the greatest archeologist since the Builders. If anyone could do this, I’m the likeliest candidate.” The professor nodded. “My boy, that was a brilliant observation just now. Yes, this is all up to me, isn’t it? This may be the reason the Builder modified me in the first place. Oh, I’m not saying the Builder had prophetic powers. But it must have seen that humanity would need a Methuselah Man around in order to survive a few of the more
outlandish dangers in the galaxy. Yes. You’re quite right. It’s time I holed up in my laboratory and truly began to think.”

  Ludendorff eyed Maddox. “Good day, Captain, I have much work to do.”

  Maddox watched the professor march away. The Methuselah Man was possibly the most conceited person in the galaxy. Ludendorff was probably several orders of magnitude more conceited than the New Men. Yet, humanity’s survival likely rested on his ability to figure out a way to push the Ska away from them.

  That still left the Swarm fleet. Could the Destroyer and the Juggernauts turn the tide against more than 60,000 Swarm warships? The Combined Fleet had roughly three-quarters of its ships left, but only a fraction of the missiles it had deployed at Tau Ceti. How could humanity use that to halt the Swarm Invasion?

  -4-

  The days passed with furious activity.

  The Kai-Kaus chief technicians led their squads through the fifty-kilometer-long Destroyer. The neutroium hull-armor meant the neutrons were packed side by side. It meant the Destroyer had more mass than the rest of the Combined Fleet put together. The five-kilometer-wide firing aperture meant the eventual beam would be like nothing the New Men, the Homo sapiens or even the Spacers could think of having. It would pour amazing destructive power upon the enemy.

  Some of the Wahhabi ships had videos of the former Destroyer annihilating life on Al Salam. They had video of the Destroyer obliterating the main Wahhabi Home Fleet. Star Watch officers and selected New Men watched those videos in order to plan better.

  The Kai-Kaus soon reported that they had restored the Destroyer’s power sources. Now, they were working on relinking the main cannon, if that was even the right word for it.

  Meanwhile, according to the Builder Scanner, the bulk of the Swarm Fleet was moving in the Tau Ceti System. The 60,000-plus warships headed for the Laumer Point that linked Tau Ceti to Epsilon 5, the empty star system.

  The Lord High Admiral called a meeting of the highest-ranking officers. There were Star Watch admirals and rear admirals and two New Men representatives, Golden Ural and Lord Drakos. There were Syndicate and other high commanders. A few Spacers had shown up. They were heretics to the prevailing Spacer cult. The Vendel commander of the Juggernauts sat at the conference table. Three chief strategists were there, Ludendorff, Galyan and Captain Maddox, as well as Brigadier O’Hara.

  Surprisingly, no androids had shown up to help.

  “They’ve run far away if I know the androids,” Ludendorff whispered to Maddox. The two of them sat together at the large table. Galyan stood at Maddox’s other side. The holoimage had leaned near to hear the professor’s aside.

  The Lord High Admiral now opened the meeting with an acknowledgement of the Builder Scanner. It had been an open secret until now. Cook did this partly because he showed the assembled officers the moving Swarm Fleet on a holo-recording.

  “We’re going to know in several weeks, maybe two months at the most, whether or not Earth stands,” Admiral Cook said in a grave voice. “I have instructed the admiral of Epsilon 5 to begin preparations for a main force Swarm advance. Hopefully, Admiral Quinn can inflict staggering losses against them. She knows her duty, and I doubt any of her squadron will flee.”

  Cook turned to the New Men. “Do you have anything to add so far?”

  Drakos scowled as if Admiral Cook had blown bad breath into his face.

  Golden Ural made a lazy gesture. “Are you thinking about anything specifically?”

  “If the Swarm breaks through to Epsilon 5 with minimal casualties,” Cook said, “that will diminish our chances of victory.”

  “An interesting observation,” Ural said.

  Drakos stared at Ural.

  “They know,” Ural told Drakos.

  “Know what?” Drakos growled.

  “About the alien jump ship,” Ural said.

  Drakos shook his head.

  “It doesn’t matter if I tell them,” Ural said.

  “No!” Drakos said. “My spies…” He let his voice fade away.

  “Please,” O’Hara said from farther down the table. “Tell us what your spies have uncovered from us.”

  Drakos gave her a burning stare.

  O’Hara turned to the Lord High Admiral. “I believe Lord Drakos was about to tell us that his spies have uncovered knowledge of Captain Maddox’s journey to the Builder Dyson Sphere. It was there that Thrax’s saucer-shaped vessels escaped. Drakos knows that we know those ships likely have star-drive jump tech.”

  “Ah…” Ural said, as he turned to the Lord High Admiral. “That’s why you’ve gone into such depth about the Builder Scanner.”

  “What are you talking about?” Drakos hissed at Ural.

  “It’s clear they used the scanner to watch our operation earlier,” Ural told Drakos. “They know we have captured a saucer-shaped vessel.”

  There were no murmurs at the table, no shocked looks in any direction.

  “Yes,” Ural told Cook. “I would like to give you the specifics of the saucer-shaped ship. I would also like to warn you about the danger of those ships appearing near the Laumer Point at Epsilon 5. That would be an excellent use of the four hundred jump-capable enemy vessels.”

  The Lord High Admiral nodded sagely.

  “Better late than never,” Ural added.

  Admiral Fletcher slapped a big hand against the table. “This is too much—”

  “Fletcher,” the Lord High Admiral said abruptly. “That’s enough of that.”

  “But, sir—”

  “I said it’s enough,” Cook replied in a stern voice. “These men are our allies. Like any human,” he said, staring at the New Men, “they have flaws. I can forgive a man a flaw if he fights in my defense.”

  “Are you saying we’re just like you?” Drakos asked in a dangerous voice.

  “No,” Maddox said.

  All heads turned toward the captain.

  “You’re not like us,” Maddox told Drakos. “You lack the same honor.”

  Drakos rose from his chair, with his balled fists resting on the table. “That is a slur directed against a superior.”

  Maddox stared at Drakos and slowly stood as well.

  The Lord High Admiral traded glances with Brigadier O’Hara. She shook her head. The Lord High Admiral did not intervene this time. He watched and waited like everyone else.

  “Do you know what it signifies to stand as I stand?” Drakos asked.

  “Of course,” Maddox said. “It means a duel.”

  Drakos’ eyebrows shot up. “Do you believe yourself my equal because a New Man sired you?”

  “No,” Maddox said.

  Some of the tension eased from Drakos’ wide shoulders.

  “I consider myself your superior,” Maddox said.

  For a moment, shock twisted Drakos’ face. Then, a cruel smile slid into place. “That is the worst slur of all. I demand satisfaction.”

  “Since you have challenged me,” Maddox said. “I have the choice of weapons.”

  “I see you are knowledgeable concerning Throne World customs.”

  Maddox dipped his head slightly.

  “What is your weapon choice?” Drakos asked.

  “No!” the Lord High Admiral said, intervening at last. “This is an improper use of a high-level strategy meeting.”

  Drakos seemed reluctant, but he tore away from looking at Maddox to face Cook. “This is a personal matter. I demand that you do not interfere in our affairs.”

  “It is not a personal matter when I need both of you,” Cook said. “You will wait until the emergency is over before indulging yourselves in duels. Is that clear, Captain?” Cook asked.

  Maddox inclined his head, although he never took his eyes off Drakos.

  “Then I bid you sit down, sir,” the Lord High Admiral asked Drakos. “And I order you to sit down, Captain.”

  Maddox sat without another word or gesture.

  “What’s gotten into you?” Ludendorff whispered.

  “His
face…” Maddox said, and after that, he could say no more.

  Ludendorff covertly studied Drakos’ features as the New Man sat. Ludendorff leaned near Maddox, whispering again, “So the New Man looks a little like you. Do you think that’s significant?”

  Maddox did not answer, but the emotional heat radiating from him said enough.

  In the meantime, the Lord High Admiral showed another holo-vid. Perhaps he did so to get everyone’s mind off the Maddox-Drakos incident. As the holo-vid progressed, the number of people glancing slyly at the two dropped off until the tiff seemed to have been forgotten.

  There were more discussions, arguments and some dismay at the disparate strength levels. The vast missile attack in the Tau Ceti System was supposed to have destroyed more Swarm ships. Star Watch had hoped for greater than 100 to 1 ratios. Instead, they’d only had 54 to 1. Could the Destroyer and Juggernauts make up the difference this time?

  “It’s going to depend on how hard we can hit the Swarm ships coming through the Laumer Points,” the Lord High Admiral said at the end. “We have some traps in case any Swarm jump-ships show up. If those traps don’t work…”

  “Whatever happens,” Golden Ural said into the silence, “the time for planning is almost over. That will leave us facing the time for hard fighting.”

  -5-

  Commander Thrax Ti Ix outperformed himself on Tau Ceti Prime.

  The industries poured out missiles, with heavy lifters roaring into space almost every seven minutes, each with a new cargo-load for the fleet. Thrax broke his captured humans and downloaded reams of information on Star Watch, the Commonwealth, the Windsor League, Spacers, New Men, the Patrol, the Destroyers—

  The Reigning Supreme summoned Thrax to the command ship.

  Soon enough, Thrax stood before her. AX-29 seemed agitated. There were no feeders in evidence, and the buffers sulked in the corner. It seemed as if soldiers had struck several, an almost unprecedented occurrence.

  AX-29 began speaking immediately. “What did you discover about these Destroyers?” she demanded.

  “One invaded the Solar System several years ago,” Thrax said. “The Destroyer—”