Solfleet: The Call of Duty (5 page)

Hansen sighed, then bowed his head
and closed his eyes, saddened by the loss of those Marines. Killed in action.
She’d said it so coldly, so matter-of-factly, as if the poor souls had been
nothing more than empty uniforms to be assigned a casualty number.

“
About half an hour ago,
”
she continued without pause, “
one of our best decryption and decoding
specialists, a Crewman Stefani O’Donnell—remember that last name, Admiral—came
to us with the following audio file, which she stated she’d just received from
her counterpart on the
Tripoli
minutes before. It’s a little difficult
to make out, sir, but give it a listen. I’ll be back after it plays.
”

Quinn’s image suddenly froze—she
sort of resembled a frosted ice sculpture with that pale white skin of hers—and
a moment later Hansen’s office filled with white noise and short bursts of thundering
static. Then someone began to speak beneath the noise. The voice sounded weak
and was barely audible, and not entirely understandable, but every few seconds
it came through just clear enough that Hansen was able to identify it as a man’s
voice, and the language he was speaking in as English.

“
I ho... ...can hear me,
”
the voice said, still dropping in and out, but suddenly breaking through the
white noise much clearer than it had been. “...
name is Ro... ...Donell. I
was... ...officer aboard the Earth starcruiser... ...
caliber
. ...alive,
somewhere in Vesh... ...ace. The
Excalibur
... ...NOT destroyed by... ...Vesh...
...epeat, the... ...ot destroyed... ...eshtonn. ...attack was carried out...
...cruiser
Albion
and two... ...star Corpora... ...ly by surprise. Those
of... ...vived were ta...
”

The message ended abruptly with one
final blast of static, but that, too, quickly fell silent. Then Quinn’s image
came back to life.

“
That’s exactly how Crewman O’Donnell
received it, sir,
” she reported. “
As I said, she brought it to our
attention immediately, along with some very interesting personal information. Turns
out her father, Lieutenant Robert O’Donnell, was assigned to the starcruiser
Excalibur
when it was lost twenty-two years ago. We’ve confirmed that, just so you know.
We also confirmed that neither he nor any trace of his remains were ever found,
and that his name does appear on the list of M-I-As from that incident.

“
As for why the information came
to Crewman O’Donnell in the first place, she and the
Tripoli
’s
communications specialist were classmates at their Tech School. Apparently, he
sent the Veshtonn computer data to her out of friendship instead of informing
his commanding officer like he should have. Otherwise, you’d have received this
a lot sooner.

“
We’ll do our best to clean it
up and see what else we can pull out of it that might be of some use, but the
old man wanted you to hear it right away. Let us know if you need anything
further, Admiral. Europa Field Office out.
”

The message ended and the wall
screen winked off and became indiscernible from the rest of the wall once more.
Hansen sat back—he hadn’t even realized he’d leaned forward—and gulped another
mouthful of his coffee. Was it really possible, after more than twenty years,
that a member of the
Excalibur
crew could still be alive, particularly
somewhere in Veshtonn space, where the speaker had sounded like he’d claimed to
be? Doubtful—the Veshtonn weren’t known for taking prisoners—but not
necessarily impossible.

And what of the rest of the
message? Was any of it genuine, or even partially so? True, the recording wasn’t
very clear, but it had sounded like the speaker claimed the
Excalibur
wasn’t destroyed by the Veshtonn at all, but rather by the starcruiser
Albion
and two other ships from some corporation—the something-‘star’ Corporation, it
had sounded like. Shining Star Builders, Home Star Development Corporation,
Newstar Corporation—who knew? But the idea that one Solfleet starcruiser had
led an attack against another and destroyed her with all hands? That was even harder
to believe than the possibility that one of the
Excalibur
crew still lived.
Again, hard to believe was not the same as impossible, but as far as Hansen was
concerned, that claim made the entire message as a whole a lot harder to take
seriously.

Still, he couldn’t just dismiss it
outright, no matter how ridiculous it might have sounded. To do so would be an
act paramount to sacrilege in the Intelligence community. The message had to be
followed up on like any other scrap of information would be. It had to be run
through the gauntlet. It had to be confirmed or positively proven false and
dismissed if at all possible. The life of at least one hero and possibly more
from the earliest days of the renewed war might depend on it. And if it
was
true—if forces from within Solfleet itself had in fact led the attack against
Excalibur
,
then Solfleet still had one very big problem on its hands.

But first things first. He leaned
forward and tapped the intercom ‘call’ button.

“
Yes, Admiral?
” his
secretary’s voice flowed from the speaker hidden in the center of the ceiling.

“Vicky, I realize it might be a
little difficult right now, but see if you can get me an open channel to the
captain of the
Tripoli
. If he has a few minutes, I need to discuss one
of his people with him.”

“
Right away, Admiral.
”

“He’s in the middle of a combat
zone, Vicky, so make sure you give him the option to call me back later
instead, whenever he has time.”

“
Will do, sir.
”

‘A lot of them were killed in
action’, Quinn had said of the Marines who’d recovered the data from the enemy
ship. Cold and emotionless, as if they were nothing more than pawns on a chessboard.
Icy words to complement here icy complexion.

Perhaps they were pawns in the
grand scheme of things, but they were also Solfleet Marines—comrades in arms,
sons and daughters, brothers and sisters, husbands and wives, and perhaps
mothers and fathers as well. Gone, like candle flames in the wind. Snuffed out,
leaving only the wisps of their spirits to drift off into eternity.

Tears welled up in his eyes as he
thought back over the decades. So much death. So many young men and women...

“
I have the captain of the
Tripoli
for you, Admiral.
”

By the time Admiral Hansen finished
filling the
Tripoli
’s captain in on what Stefani O’Donnell’s former
classmate had done, he felt confident that the young man, whoever he might be,
would quickly receive an education regarding the error of his ways. To say that
his captain had been very unhappy about the whole situation would have stood a
gross understatement. Understandably, no commanding officer wanted to hear
about his people’s misdeeds from an admiral, whether that admiral fell into in
his direct chain of command or not, but no sooner had Hansen explained the
reason for his call when this particular commanding officer had turned beet red
and clenched his jaw tightly enough to bite through the hull of his own ship.

Upon seeing the captain’s reaction—granted,
he was in the middle of combat operations and really didn’t need the
distraction to begin with—and speaking strictly off the record, Hansen had
recommended that he not bust the crewman down in rank over what he’d done,
provided his previous track record warranted such leniency. After all, he wasn’t
out to destroy the poor kid’s career. But in the end that decision lay with his
captain, and while Hansen had no reservations at all when it came to providing
information, he would never consider actually interfering with another
competent officer’s command.

That done, it was time to get on
with the business at hand.

“Good morning, Hal,” he said as he
turned on the coffee brewer built into the wall behind him, knowing without
having to check that Vicky had already prepared it for the day—yes, it was good
to be an admiral.

“
Good morning, Nick,
” the
computer responded in the soft melodic male voice of the artificial
intelligence featured in Hansen’s favorite classic science-fiction film, old as
it was—the
Discovery
’s HAL-9000 from ‘2001: A Space Odyssey’. Not long
after his wife’s tragic death, Hansen had considered reprogramming the voice to
match that of the sequel’s female sounding SAL, but his grief counselor had
strongly advised against it. Probably for the best, he’d eventually come to
realize. Over the ensuing years he’d come to think of Hal almost as a living
being and a friend, and although he’d never lost sight of the fact that he—that
it
—was just a machine, he’d fast discovered that single fatherhood could
be a very lonely world. The idea that he might actually develop feelings for a
female artificial personality, as preposterous as it had sounded to him when
the counselor brought it up, had begun to make a certain amount of sense.

“
How may I be of assistance this
morning, Admiral?
” Hal asked.

“Sorry, Hal,” Hansen said,
apologizing to the computer as if it were a living being. Hell, why not? “I
need you to run a records check for me.”

“
Certainly, Nick. I would be
happy to do that for you. What are the parameters?
”

The
Lieutenant Commander on Europa—Quinn was it?—had told him that her office had
already confirmed the assignment of a Lieutenant O’Donnell aboard the
Excalibur
.
Nevertheless, he decided to start from the beginning and do so again anyway. “Check
the crew roster of the starcruiser
U.E.F.S. Excalibur
, destroyed in
combat near the Caldanra star system in late June, twenty-one sixty-eight. I’m
looking for someone by the surname of O’Donnell.”

“
Checking.
”
Then, almost instantly, “
Confirmed. Lieutenant Robert William O’Donnell is listed
as tactical officer. Current status: Missing In Action.
”

“Call up his
personnel record and read off the names and current status of any listed
dependents, please.”

“
There
are four dependents listed. Spouse and primary beneficiary: Helena Marie
Carter-O’Donnell. Current status: Living. Son and co-secondary beneficiary:
Robert William O’Donnell, Junior. Current status: Living. Son and co-secondary
beneficiary: Thomas Patrick O’Donnell. Current status: Living. Daughter and
co-secondary beneficiary: Stefani Marie O’Donnell. Current status: Living.
”

“Cross-reference
with Solfleet personnel database and identify any commonalities.”

“
Checking.
”
Then, “
Two commonalities identified. There is currently a Lieutenant Junior
Grade Thomas Patrick O’Donnell assigned to the One-hundred seventeenth Tactical
Interceptor Squadron aboard the starcarrier
U.E.F.S. Victory
as an
IF-thirty-six starfighter pilot. There is a Crewman First Class Stefani Marie O’Donnell
assigned to the Solfleet Intelligence Agency’s Europa Field Office as a
Decoding and Decryption specialist.
”

“Thank you,
Hal.”

“
You’re
welcome, Nick. May I be of any further assistance at this time?
”

“Yes, you
may,” Hansen answered as he spun around to refill his mug. He pulled the
old-fashioned glass decanter out of the slot and asked as he poured, “What was
the official status of the starcruiser
U.E.F.S. Albion
in June of
twenty-one sixty-eight?”

“
Checking.
That is odd.
”

Hansen froze
briefly in mid pour, then finished, put the decanter back in its place, and
turned back to his desk and asked, “What’s odd, Hal?”

“
According
to fleet records, the starcruiser
U.E.F.S. Albion
was decommissioned on
four February, twenty-one sixty-two, and dry-docked at the Mars Orbital
Shipyard facility until three April, twenty-one sixty-nine.
”

“Why is that
odd, Hal?” He knew of one reason of course, but it was always possible that Hal
had found something else that he wasn’t yet aware of.

“
That
information conflicts with that contained in the recording that was attached to
the message you received earlier this morning.
”

Then again,
maybe not. “The authenticity of that recording has yet to be confirmed,” he
told his soothing, silicon-based assistant. He gently blew across the surface
of his coffee and took a tentative sip—it was extremely hot—as he considered
what to do next. Not that it really required much thought. A basic rule of any
investigation stated that when faced with conflicting accounts of any given
incident or event, an investigator should seek out eyewitnesses. “Hal?”

“
Yes,
Nick.
”

“Do me a
favor and compile a list of all personnel who were assigned to the Mars Orbital
Shipyards during the time period the record indicates the
Albion
was
dry-docked there. I want both civilian and military personnel listed. And do
your best to determine each person’s current status and whereabouts as well.”

“
Certainly.
It may take several minutes to recall pertinent information from the civilian
database, but I will inform you as soon as I have completed my task.
”

“Thank you,
Hal.”

“
You are
welcome, Nick.
”