The Lost Star Gate (Lost Starship Series Book 9) Read online

  The possibility might have frightened Ludendorff before. Now, though, he was on the verge of death.

  Before that happened, the linkage severed. The polygonal stone broke contact, and the fantastic memories and connection to the greater nexus ended.

  Ludendorff’s heart immediately began slowing down. The sweat no longer oozed from his pores so readily. And he finally had the consciousness of mind to suck on the water tube in his helmet. He drank his water supply dry, but he likely saved his life by doing so.

  I need to get out of here, Ludendorff realized groggily.

  First, though, he had to create a hyper-spatial tube of his own to reach yet a different nexus far away from here.

  The professor closed his eyes, thinking, or trying to. He had absorbed so much knowledge. What was the right course of action now? If he—

  He reached for the stone. As his gloved hands touched it, the stone stopped shining. The professor put it away and shrugged on the pack. He floated in the substance. How was he going to get out of this vast chamber, as he lacked a thruster pack?

  Even though he was exhausted and his head hurt, the professor made swimming motions in the substance, slowly using friction to work his way to a place where he could make a hyper-spatial tube five thousand light-years in length.

  That was dangerously long. He really needed the stone’s guidance to do this, but at this point, relinking would surely kill him.

  What was the right thing to do?

  As Ludendorff struggled through the substance, he began a moral and philosophical argument with himself as to his next decision.

  -67-

  As Ludendorff arrived at his decision in the local nexus, hundreds of light-years away in a different area of the Beyond, the Nerva Hauler Sulla 7 orbited a Mars-like planet.

  The saucer-shaped ships Mako had seen before no longer rested in the cargo bays, but flew around the hauler in a protective screen. At the same time, heavy shuttles continued to move from the hauler as they bore their cargos down to the sandy red surface below.

  On the planet, winds howled as super-fine red dust whipped around six gigantic obelisks arrayed in a perfect circle. Each obelisk was shaped exactly like those found in ancient Egypt and later in old-style America in Washington, DC. One of the two key differences was that of scale. Those on Earth would have been puny compared to these giant structures. The alien obelisks with their strange symbols on the sides towered over the red desert and made the shuttles passing them look tiny, like miniature toys.

  The second difference was that each obelisk shone as if made of polished steel.

  The fine red particles swirling around the six obelisks slid off the smooth metallic surfaces. The dust particles had zero ability to mar the material or the symbols, although the wind and fine dust buffeted each of the heavy shuttles bearing Usan crystals and varth elixir.

  Each shuttle landed in the circle created by the gigantic obelisks. Bay doors opened, and heavily clad Spacers staggered through the howling wind. Each bore a box, bringing it to a trapdoor that sprung up as they approached. The bearer immediately climbed down ancient stairs, soon disappearing so the trapdoor snapped shut behind him.

  The procession seemed endless. Shuttles lifted off. More shuttles landed. Slowly, by degrees, the Spacers emptied the orbital hauler’s cargo bays, bringing down purified crystals and recalibrated varth elixir to the forbidden planet.

  Mako 21 and the Visionary landed on the third day of endless hauling. Like everyone else, they bundled up heavily and braved the howling wind and flesh-tearing sand. Each staggered, reaching the trapdoor, hurrying to the stairs and beginning the climb down.

  The trapdoor slammed shut above them, causing Mako to look up.

  “Keep going,” the Visionary said. “More people are on the way. I don’t want the sand to get a second chance to ruin my goggles.”

  The Spacers had rigged interior lighting down here. Ancient alien hieroglyphs on the walls followed the stone steps down. A few of the hieroglyphs could have been representations of humans. Those held swords or glowing spears.

  Mako now did as the Visionary asked, climbing down the steps—she shook her head at her stupidity and activated the anti-gravity meshes in her body. Mako floated off the stairs, although she continued to descend at the same rate as the Visionary. This gave Mako a better chance to study the hieroglyphs.

  “You do that well,” the Visionary said.

  For a moment, she feared that the Visionary knew she understood some of the hieroglyphics. Then, she realized that old woman had meant her flight.

  As they continued to descend, the Visionary began to breathe hard from her labor.

  “Should we pause and rest?” Mako asked.

  “No!” the Visionary said, and there was bite in her word.

  Mako hid her smile. The Visionary had taught her many hard lessons. It thus did Mako good to see the old woman suffer, if only a bit.

  During the voyage here, Mako had learned even more precisely what it meant that she was the Spacer egg of destiny. All her ordeals until now had been in preparation for the coming event. Even waiting in the life-pod had been a lesson. Even now, even with her superior abilities and intellect, she marveled at the subtlety of the Visionary. The woman had prepared the Spacer egg of destiny with ruthless dedication.

  She has prepared me, Mako knew. Out of millions of Spacer candidates, she had passed the many secret tests better, proving that she had a greater chance of success later. The Visionaries, old and new, had watched and channeled her for many years already.

  Few knew the awful Spacer secret and thus the terrible responsibility that awaited her.

  The Visionary had told her a week ago, “This time we’re going to succeed. This time we have the means to defeat our enemies and ensure our wonderful progress into something completely new.”

  As Mako floated down the ancient stairs—those never made for human feet—she recalled the Visionary’s revelation.

  “Instead of allowing evolution to take its course,” the Visionary had said, “we’re going to shape ourselves into a higher form. We’re going to transcend even the Builders of old. Think about that, Mako. We’re going to be greater than our originators. We’re going to ascend the mountain and sit in judgment over all other beings. We will not be like the Builders, we will be something unbound by gravity and air. Every creature we have seen or studied has been planet-bound. But what are we, Mako? We are the Spacers. Is it not time to turn us into real Spacers?”

  Mako pondered that as she heard the workers toiling farther below. This planet, this place, was going to help them achieve the impossible. They were going to evolutionarily leap across millennia to produce the new form of the galaxy, the form to rule them all.

  In a sense, the Spacers were going to do it through force of will. Part of that will was learning ancient tech and applying modern technology in novel ways. The other part was in the sheer daring to attempt… maybe not godhood, but something akin to it.

  First, though, the workers had to achieve their task, repairing the ancient machines and using the varth elixir to awaken the Old One to perform the technological marvel that would propel her—

  Mako frowned. The Usan crystals and varth elixir were of paramount importance. She knew, now, that the antimatter radiation had been critical to transforming the substances to the correct settings. The Visionary had been searching future paths, working diligently to reach this chosen way. The radiation would ensure that the Old One did not survive his awakened use. He would be too dangerous otherwise.

  The crystals—

  “The time is near,” Mako said.

  The Visionary was puffing hard as she continued down the steps. She looked up at Mako, but did not have the breath to answer.

  They were almost to the bottom. The chamber ahead glowed eerily through the last arch. Many toiled and had toiled for weeks to prepare this dreadful place for her.

  Would the Great Machine be ready in time?

 
“Visionary?” asked Mako.

  The old woman looked up again.

  “What are our chances of success?”

  The Visionary seemed to age before her eyes. It was a sad sight.

  “Don’t ask that, Mako,” the Visionary said. “It is the Path. Success is assured.”

  Mako nodded absently. It was what she’d expected the old woman to say. With a pang of greater sadness, Mako realized that she had almost outgrown the Visionary. How lonely to become more than your parents, to see farther and know so much more than they could. There were many future paths, but not all would be realized.

  Yes. Mako believed she was ready. The Visionary’s company would become tedious in several more days. The others…Mako could hardly stand the others now.

  Except…she found the clone’s company interesting. The Strand clone knew more and understood with keener insights. Maybe she would speak to him again and ask him several questions.

  The Visionary kept the Strand clone very busy down here. The clone of the Methuselah Man knew things no one else did. He was the master technician that made all this possible. Wasn’t that strange?

  Mako shrugged.

  The clone would attempt his treachery soon. That was obvious. He was a devious little man. Luckily, she saw so much deeper than he did now that his treachery would be meaningless.

  As Mako approached the last arch to the glowing chamber, she anticipated her great elevation and evolution. She wondered if a caterpillar felt anything like this before it began to spin its cocoon to start the metamorphosis into something so much better.

  -68-

  Far away from the Red Planet of destiny, Captain Maddox had led a second shuttle from Victory and toward the nexus. Lieutenant Noonan could watch the three star cruisers for now. The greater danger was Professor Ludendorff.

  From the parked shuttle, Maddox maneuvered a space-sled, leading three others behind him. Meta was with him on his sled. Armored marines followed on two others. Doctor Dana Rich rode behind Keith Maker on the last sled. The marines did not wear spacesuits, they wore full battle armor. Everyone else had regular spacesuits.

  “How are we going to get inside the apex?” Meta asked via helmet comm.

  “We’ll blast our way in,” Maddox said past clenched teeth.

  “Blast in with what?” asked Meta. “You still haven’t said.”

  “A disrupter beam,” Maddox replied.

  “What? Is that…is that prudent?”

  “No.”

  “Oh. Well. At least—you could damage the nexus doing that.”

  “Yes,” Maddox said.

  “Husband—”

  Maddox cut her off. “Ludendorff has just become the most dangerous man in the galaxy, at least as far as humanity is concerned. We have to reach the other nexuses. What swindle is that devil Ludendorff practicing now? Did the stone hijack his mind? I deem that more than probable. We should have set up more safeguards.”

  “That’s true,” Meta said. “Why didn’t you?”

  Maddox almost told his wife to shut up. If anyone else would have dared question his orders like that—no. That was sheer pride snapping like that. He’d made a mistake with Ludendorff. If he wanted to win, he had to own up to his mistakes. To try to mask them, especially to himself, was suicide on such missions. Cold reality was the key. He had to see events for what they were.

  “I really thought he’d fixed his mind,” Maddox said. “The professor seemed so…genuine. I’m a good judge of character, but I failed the most critical test.”

  “You’re mad at yourself. That’s what this is about.”

  “Maybe,” Maddox said. “No. I am angry. I made a mistake. I should have—”

  “No one is perfect,” Meta said, interrupting.

  “That’s a poor excuse for not doing my job. But I’m not using the disrupter cannon because I’m so angry that—”

  Maddox cut himself off. He was the captain. He did not need to explain his actions to anyone, not even to his wife.

  “Sir,” Keith said.

  The ace’s voice was scratchy in the captain’s headphones. Whatever Ludendorff had done earlier was still in effect. They had more powerful transmitters than before, able to pierce the jamming at these short distances.

  “What?” Maddox asked.

  “Someone is coming out of the nexus,” Keith said.

  Maddox scanned the apex area that Meta had described earlier.

  “Are you sure?” Maddox asked. He didn’t see anything.

  “You’re looking in the wrong spot, sir,” Keith said. “It’s near the base of the pyramid.”

  Maddox looked down along the mighty object, using a zoom feature of his visor. He saw it then. A space-suited human had come from a small opening down there.

  “What in the—?” Maddox said.

  The sled team was near the apex, which meant it was difficult to scan the entire nexus, as the bottom was far away from their present location and they were almost to the pyramid.

  “What made you look down there?” Maddox asked, curious.

  “I’m a strikefighter pilot first of all, sir,” Keith said. “Too many fighter pilots concentrate on one spot. The place you don’t look is the most dangerous. Far too many dead pilots never see the enemy fighter that kills them.”

  “It’s Ludendorff,” Meta said, sounding surprised.

  “Of course it’s Ludendorff,” Maddox said testily. Then he realized that he had lied to himself. He was positively furious at the Methuselah Man. He wanted to throttle the man. It was like the time he’d pummeled Strand. That had felt so good…

  “Should I pick him up?” Keith asked.

  “Not with Dana on your sled,” Maddox said. “No. Return to the shuttle. Get her out of here.”

  “But—yes, sir,” Keith said.

  The ace’s sled peeled away from the others, making the turning maneuver and picking up velocity.

  Maddox twisted the controls of his sled. “Follow me,” he told the rest.

  “What’s the plan?” Meta asked him.

  Maddox did not reply. He didn’t have one yet, and he was tired of being…off. Ludendorff had done something in the nexus, and now, the Methuselah Man fled the place. What did that indicate?

  Maddox couldn’t figure it. They needed to capture Ludendorff and interrogate him good and hard. But maybe the Methuselah Man had already played his trick. If the stone guided the Builder-enhanced human…

  What would a Builder device want out of Ludendorff?

  Maybe the device had warned the Swarm in some way. The Builder in the Dyson Sphere had claimed the bugs were the superior species—that the Imperium deserved to thrive because it’s realm had grown fantastically larger than Human Space.

  Maddox pondered shooting Ludendorff while he could. He would kill the professor, not because the man had tricked him, but because the alien stone had likely used Ludendorff. The captain remembered their last voyage all too well. If he’d acted sooner then…

  “I can’t do it,” Maddox said.

  “Can’t do what?” asked Meta.

  “Marines,” Maddox said, ignoring his wife’s question. “Keep your weapons trained on the professor as we approach. If any of us dies from something in the nexus, kill Ludendorff and annihilate the stone.”

  “I don’t see a stone, sir,” the marine lieutenant said.

  “If you happen to see the stone, destroy it.”

  “Yes, sir,” the marine lieutenant said.

  Maddox felt strange sledding down the side of the gigantic pyramid. The silver structure—its ancient cracked side—slid past at an ever-increasing rate. The sled team zoomed after the floating Ludendorff. The professor did not seem to have a source of propulsion. Rather, it seemed he’d shot out of the nexus like a cannonball.

  What had happened in there? Had Ludendorff been trying to slip away from them unnoticed?

  “Captain,” Maddox heard in his headphone. It was a very scratchy noise, worse than ever.

  �
�Professor?” Maddox asked.

  “Can you hear me?” That was definitely Ludendorff speaking.

  “Barely,” Maddox said. “What did you do in there?”

  There was no answer.

  “Can you hear me?” Ludendorff said, his voice a little more discernible than before.

  “I can hear you, you slippery bastard. What treachery did you practice today?”

  A hoarse chuckle was the reply.

  “Are you sane?” Maddox asked. “Did the stone suborn your will?”

  “A reasonable conclusion,” Ludendorff said, his voice sounding better than ever. “I had to do it the way I did, as I needed the Builder stone to properly access the nexus. I knew you would never agree to that.”

  “You’re right,” Maddox said.

  “I see your team. You must hurry. We’re running out of time.”

  “Is the nexus going to explode?” Maddox asked.

  “What?” Ludendorff asked. “Why should it explode?”

  “What did the stone force you to do?”

  “No, no, my boy, you have it all wrong. I used the stone. The stone did not use me.”

  “You played us false on your own then?” Maddox asked.

  “Think, Captain,” the professor lectured. “We have a gargantuan task before us. I simply lacked the brainpower to know what to do. I needed the stone to help me, as it’s a brain enhancer.”

  “It must be something more,” Maddox said.

  “A reasonable conclusion but quite wrong,” Ludendorff said, sounding grumpy. “Now quit arguing with me and hurry. Pick me up. An unstable hyper-spatial tube is about to appear. We must enter it. That means we all must be aboard Victory. If we don’t enter the tube in time, I doubt I’m going to be able to create another that long any time soon. This is a one-shot event.”

  “Does he think we’re going to trust him now?” Meta asked, cutting in.

  Maddox almost looked back at his wife. Yes. That was the question, wasn’t it? Ludendorff had just made a wild claim. Why would—?

  “Why is the tube going to be unstable?” Maddox asked.

  “Length, my boy, extreme length,” Ludendorff replied. “The nexus is charging up to create it. That will expend—I don’t have time and the right language to explain it all to you. Either we get in that tube, or you can forget about stopping the Swarm. We have to act before they do.”