Star Clusters: New Arrivals (7 page)

“Look around,” Hatos said, “perhaps there is something buried beneath all this sand.”

After a brief search, Herrun found a small, worn out control panel underneath a massive pile of sand. “I found something.”

The drones analyzed the sand and the control panel, reporting to Hatos and Zeshaira - who, in turn, shared that information with Lanis and Herrun - that while there were traces of Xargan DNA in the sand, it appeared that no Xargans had touched the control panel. “Now what?” Lanis asked. “We can’t just randomly push buttons until something happens.”

“Actually,” Hatos replied, “this looks somewhat familiar. The layout reminds me of early versions of transporter technology. I cannot read the text, but if I can just remember...” After a brief pause, Hatos pressed a few of the grey, rectangular keys.

There was a blinding flash of light, and the team - along with some sand - found that they had been transported into an old facility of a design unlike anything they had seen up to that point - but sharing visual elements of Tarhedian and Petran technology at the same time. “What is this place?” Zeshaira asked.

“The source of our answers, no doubt; but look! Someone has been here since it was abandoned,” Hatos said, pointing to a small heap of sand which had not arrived with them. As usual, the drones scanned the area. “Whoever it was, they do not appear to have left anything we can identify,” he added upon hearing the report.

The entire complex seemed to be gradually coming to life with their arrival. The lights were slowly powering up, consoles and displays lit up under the layers of dust, displaying very little; just text written in a language that none of them could understand - it appeared as if the computer controlling this outpost was waiting for some kind of input. There were several doors leading out of the main chamber, one of which seemed to require an access code; sparks were flying out of the exposed power conduit where the keypad had been - whatever mechanism had reactivated the base was attempting to route power to something on the keypad - and the control panel above it was nonresponsive.

“We should spread out, find out what we can about this place,” Lanis said.

Hatos nodded. “Yes - I will investigate the damaged door and the consoles while you and the drones determine the size and location of this facility.”

Everyone picked a door and opened it. Lanis found that his led into a corridor; another door could be seen on the far side, but it was locked. After he pressed the buttons on the control panel in a random order, the door promptly slid open, revealing a Xargan which immediately pounced at him. He cried out for help as the impact knocked his pistol out of his hand, throwing him to the floor as the creature attempted to use its claws to penetrate his shield and rip him apart.

As the shield weakened, Lanis punched the beast in the jaw, followed by attempting to use his legs to kick his assailant across his head to get it off him; when it worked, he scrambled for his gun, placing a shot into the Xargan’s mouth as it tried to jump at him again.

Hatos charged in while the Xargan collapsed dead onto the floor. “Too late, he’s dead,” Lanis told him.

“This is most disturbing,” Hatos noted. “The drones’ analysis was clear; there should not be any Xargans here. I suspect that when the Xargan hives were bombarded by your fleet, a hole was breached in the facility’s walls - probably somewhere through that door over there.”

The two of them went up to the door, which opened into a large chamber filled with Xargan biotech; its guardians were nowhere to be found, but it was unlikely that they would be far from their location. “Zeshaira, Herrun, it looks like I’ve stumbled upon a Xargan-infested section of the base,” Lanis said into his comlink. “Hatos is with me, but you two should probably get here and bring the drones along - something tells me there’s quite a few of them here.” He switched the comlink off. “We should probably get back to the door - if they see us, it’ll be a lot easier to defend the door than it would be to fight them inside the room.”

“Agreed,” Hatos said. When the rest of the team arrived, there had been no Xargan activity yet - but shortly after they arrived, a small group of various creatures - two or three different breeds, Lanis couldn’t tell - entered the chamber. Herrun tossed a Petran grenade into the room; within seconds, the crystal detonated, killing most of the creatures - the rest were killed by the weapons fire that followed.

“Sounds like we got all of them,” Herrun said.

“Did any of you find anything?” Lanis asked.

“The door I examined is sealed shut and heavily shielded - I doubt we could breach it without severely damaging the rest of the facility, including whatever is hidden within. As for the consoles, the only thing I am relatively certain of is that the computer is requesting some sort of input before it can proceed. Probably a password or an access code, but before we can even guess what it is, we need to determine what the symbols are and what they mean.”

“Mine was a dead end,” Herrun stated. “Must’ve been for storage or something.”

“My door led into a laboratory. Unfortunately, what it was for is impossible to discern without knowledge of the language.”

“Well, I guess we’ll have plenty of time to study this while the Eagle’s being refitted… Come on, let’s see if there’s anything more interesting than a breached wall on the other side of that door,” Lanis said.

Shortly afterwards, they had found the breach; as Hatos suspected, it had been created by orbital bombardment and allowed a few of the lesser Xargans to enter the heavily concealed outpost, avoiding detection and wandering mindlessly through what may very well have been the only functioning facility of its kind left in this part of the galaxy. Within a matter of hours, teams of scientists arrived at the facility to study every single part of it while Lanis and the others beamed back to the Tarhedia.

“So, that control panel in the cave really looked like old Tarhedian technology?” Lanis asked Hatos outside the transporter room.

“The layout was similar, yes - but the symbols throughout the base also reminded me of something we found near the Tarhedia.”

“How did you find it, anyway? Back at Anlara, you said you hadn’t designed it - that you only completed the ship.”

“In the aftermath of the Tarhedian Civil War, what few of us remained were forced to abandon Tarhedia and the few worlds our people had colonized before the war and search for a new homeworld. Eventually, we found a devastated, lifeless world in a star system a few days away from Anlara. The planet could have sustained life, and with very little effort, it could be repopulated; what had killed every living thing on it, I dare not speculate. In orbit, we found a small, badly damaged ancient outpost similar to the one here, and a massive, half-completed ship. While we were incapable of deciphering the symbols, there was one thing that we could see clearly - the outpost used to be much larger, and it had been used to construct the ship that remained nearby. The schematics - while not detailed enough for us to understand some of the key systems like the crystal powering it - were easy to comprehend even without an understanding of the language used to write most of it. Surprisingly, the ship had sustained very little damage despite its age. Someone had activated its shields before they left - or died - and those shields withstood everything the universe threw at them - it took a remarkable amount of effort for us to turn them off.”

“So you modified and finished the ship?”

“Exactly. It took us months to analyze the schematics in sufficient detail so that we could construct the required components, and it took even longer to actually finish the ship. The technological advances we made, however, were well worth the effort; we have improved almost every facet of our technology in the process. The plasma beam weapons on the Tarhedia, for example, were assembled using the original schematics; other Tarhedian craft typically use energy weapons similar to your own.”

“It sounds like your people have had plenty of contact with whoever built this outpost - first your early transporters turn out to be similar to the ones used in this base, then you stumble upon a nearly undamaged ship, and now this place…”

“Yes, it is rather interesting. I do not believe standing here and commenting on it will offer an explanation, though,” Hatos noted.

“Yeah…” Lanis said, and the two of them returned to whatever they were planning on doing.

*** About 42 hours later ***

The intercom beeped.

The intercom beeped again, and Rear Admiral Eugene Jackson got out of bed, hitting a button on the beeping panel. “What?” he asked.

“Sir, we’ve almost reached the Menlon system,” the officer on the other side answered.

“I’ll be right there.” He pressed the button.

Shortly afterwards, the admiral was in a turbolift towards the Orion’s bridge. The elevator opened, and he got out. “Drop out of hyperspace at the edge of the system - let’s see what we’re dealing with.”

The helmsman acknowledged; the Orion soon exited hyperspace with weapons standing by and raising its shields, and its accompanying fleet did the same. “Sir, sensors are detecting militia ships gathering near Menlon Four with all weapons charged - it looks as if they were waiting for... us? They’re moving towards us!” the tactical officer reported.

The militia force launched a salvo of torpedoes at the Orion. “Damn it!” Jackson cursed under his breath as the torpedoes (those that had not been shot down, that is) impacted. “Lieutenant, target the lead ship’s weapons and fire. Do
not
destroy them; I want to know what’s going on here,” he ordered. Several of the Orion’s laser turrets turned to face the approaching ships and fired; the militia command ship’s shields were easily overpowered and the remaining laser bolts impacted the front armor of the ship, causing a series of secondary explosions which ultimately destroyed it. “What just happened?”

“I’m not sure, sir - based on the schematics for that ship class, that shot should have knocked their main reactor offline.”

“It worked, I’ll give you that - it just happened to take the rest of the ship along with it. What about the others?”

“They’re still on an intercept course; they’ll be in firing range in fifteen seconds.”

“Hail them. It’s time to end this.”

“They’re not responding,” the comm officer said.

“Fire a warning shot, then hail them again.” The Orion’s forward lasers fired into the midst of the attacking group, deliberately missing all of their ships and dispersing harmlessly on their way towards Menlon Four.

The communications officer shook his head. “No response, sir.”

“Enemy ships firing,” the tactical officer reported.

“All ships,” Jackson commanded, “engage the enemy; shoot to disable.”

The following battle was a brief one, as the militia forces were ill-equipped to face the Orion or the fleet accompanying it; however, there were no survivors despite Jackson’s orders. “So much for figuring out what’s going on… Helm, plot a course for Menlon Four.”

“Sir,” the tactical officer said, “there’s a large fleet coming out of hyperspace behind us - US transponder codes.” Indeed, a considerable quantity of warships of all kinds had dropped out of hyperspace and was forming up around Jackson’s task force.

“We’re being hailed.”

“On screen.”

The viewscreen displayed a Terran captain in his forties. The man was clearly disturbed by something, and the cause of his concern soon became apparent. “Rear Admiral Eugene Jackson, you are under arrest for falsifying orders to launch an attack on a member of the United Systems, performing said attack, deliberately and completely destroying ships belonging to
three
different interstellar governments and various other crimes. Stand down and prepare to be boarded; if you refuse to comply with these instructions, you will be fired upon,” he announced.

Throughout the entire speech, the admiral stared at him in confusion and increasing surprise. When it was over, he slowly asked: “Have you lost
every shred of sanity you ever had
?!”

“I have my orders, Admiral, and unlike yours, they’re genuine.”

“Well then, I suppose I’ll just have to ignore them and get out of here,” Jackson said.

“If you’re going to jump to hyperspace, I should warn you that we have an experimental ship-based hyperspace disruptor. You aren’t going anywhere.”

The admiral looked at his science officer, who simply nodded. He sighed. Fighting wasn’t going to do them any good, even if they managed to disable the disruptor and jump to hyperspace. “All ships, stand down.”

“Sir?” the tactical officer said confusedly.

“You heard me - lower our shields and power down our weapons. We surrender.”

“I’m glad you’re being reasonable,” the captain said.

“I just wish I could say the same...”

The transmission ended as shuttles launched from the arresting fleet and proceeded to board Jackson’s ships.

Chapter 5

Shattering

“I think… Okay, try now!”

Lanis started powering up the Ivory Eagle’s sublight engines. The port engine promptly threw up a bunch of sparks into Fanra Kaa’nt’s face; fortunately, her shield generator protected her, though it didn’t keep her from jumping backwards and knocking some of her equipment over. “Shut it off, shut it off!” she cried out, and both engines powered down again. “Well,” she said, inspecting the damaged engine, “that power surge fried the crystal. Again.”

“How many crystals do you have left, anyway?” Lanis asked through the intercom. They had spent the past two hours attempting to replace parts of the Eagle’s engines with Petran crystals, but each attempted test failed as the port engine refused to be compatible with the crystals.

“Uhhh… I’m not sure. I had quite a few, but between the ones used in the rest of the ship and the ones I ruined, I kind of lost count.”

Lanis sighed. “Can you at least grow new ones? Or fix
some
of the ones we already have?”

“I think so. I mean, I don’t have the right equipment, but with enough time, I might be able to put something together.”

“You do realize we’re on a tight schedule, right? Poteran’s already gone, Hatos is going to take the Tarhedia out of here soon, and we can’t even
try
to leave - and the sooner we’re out there looking for answers, the more likely we are to actually succeed.”

“Rushing this is precisely what’s causing all the problems in the first place!” she argued.

“We’re running out of options! I don’t even care if you can get the crystals to work anymore; just put the ship back together!” He paused and looked outside into space. “Hold on… why are there Petran ships moving towards the Tarhedia…?”

“Did you say ‘
Petran
ships’?”

Lanis looked back down into the hangar, noticing a squad of heavily armed Terran soldiers approaching the Eagle. “Yeah, and I think we have company. Not of the pleasant variety, from the looks of things… Try to stall them!” he ordered, running into the transporter bay.

“Me?! Why me?”

“Because unlike you, I happen to know how to control the transporter. Now go!”

“How did I ever get myself into this mess…?” she muttered, heading towards the exit ramp. When she got out, the Terrans pointed their guns at her. “Hey,” she started nervously, “are you the guys we were told to expect? The ones with the extra crystals? Great timing - we just shorted out the last one, I can’t make more… Wait a second, you’re not carrying any crystals! How do you expect me to fix this hunk of scrap without crystals? Don’t you know how delicate this technology is?! I
need
--” The soldiers had clearly had enough, and the frightened Petran ran back inside, followed by a barrage of laser fire.

The door closed behind her, but the sound of lasers hitting the Eagle’s hull made it clear that they weren’t giving up. “I couldn’t hold them!” she yelled into the ship, running towards the engine room.

“I know!” Lanis yelled back.

“This door won’t work, either!”

“Tell me something I don’t know!” He finally got a lock; Herrun and Zeshaira appeared on the transporter pad. “Herrun, go help Fanra with the engines. Zeshaira, see if you can’t get somebody from the docks or the Tarhedia aboard before we leave; and contact the research team, tell them to get inside the outpost and lock it down as well as they can,” he ordered before going towards the cockpit.

Upon reaching the cockpit, Lanis powered up the ship’s ventral laser turret, fired a shot into the hangar forcefield to attract some attention, and turned it threateningly towards the attacking troops. The soldiers simply scattered, hiding behind the landing struts where he couldn’t fire at them. On the far end of the hangar, he could see that its blast doors were slowly closing. “Guys, I need engines
now
!”

Meanwhile, in the engine room, Kaa’nt was rummaging through the small heap of crystals she had left, looking for the right one, when Herrun picked one up. “No, it’s the wrong one, you can’t just jam it--” she protested; Herrun just jammed it in.

“Try now,” he said into the intercom. The engines flawlessly powered up.

“... in,” Fanra finished. “How did you do that?” she asked as the ship sped towards the rapidly shrinking exit; the doors closed just as it got through.

Herrun shrugged. “I have no idea. That almost never works.”

“Then why--”

“Because we had to do
something
.”

“I cannot transport anyone aboard,” Zeshaira said over the intercom. Outside, Lanis could see several fighters launching from the station, and one of the Petran cruisers seemed to be turning away from the Tarhedia to pursue them.

“Alright then - Zeshaira, Herrun, man the turrets. Fanra, see what you can do about the hyperdrive.” The Eagle turned around and started maneuvering along the station’s hull in an attempt to discourage the Petrans from shooting at them. One of the fighters promptly rammed into another while trying to avoid a collision with one of the facility’s communications antennae; the approaching cruiser simply opened fire.

“I thought they were on the same side!” Herrun remarked as several shots missed the Eagle and damaged the station’s shields instead.

“They’re trying to start a war, remember? Besides, if nobody survives, they can pin it on the Tarhedia, say they came too late,” Lanis said. “Kaa’nt, how’s the hyperdrive coming along?”

“I think I’ll have it in fifteen minutes!”

The station’s shields - as well as those of the Eagle - were faltering under the cruiser’s bombardment. “We’ll be
dead
in
two
minutes!” he said as another shot slammed into the ship.

“If I don’t check everything and figure out which crystal to use, the power fed into the drive’ll just make it blow up!”

“At least we’ll take a few of them with us if it blows! Just guess!”

Fanra reluctantly took a crystal and put it in. “Okay, try it!”

Lanis dodged a few more shots from the cruiser before breaking away from the station and turning on the hyperdrive. To Kaa’nt’s surprise, there was no explosion as the hyperspace window opened; they had escaped. The Petrans turned their guns on the Terran facilities.

A couple of minutes later, when Lanis decided that they had gone far enough to remain unseen, they emerged from hyperspace and plotted a course towards Daserus Three before reentering hyperspace.

******

“Captain, we’re receiving a transmission from the Tarhedia,” the communications officer said.

“Put it through,” Poteran ordered. The crystals in front of him reformed into a screen and displayed the Tarhedia’s auxiliary control room; there was nobody inside but a distressed Hatos, but it was clear from the background noise that somebody was trying to force their way in.

“The Tarhedia has been lost - send your fastest ship to these coordinates, retransmit the data I’m transmitting so that--” The door was breached and the first shot fired destroyed the console; the message ended.

“Did we get the data?”

“Yes, sir - based on the structure of the files, I’d say it was research data, ship’s logs and a short message, but it’s all in Tarhedian,” the science officer reported. “The coordinates point to a star system outside known space; it could be anything, but if the hyperdrive calibration data’s right...”

“Perhaps it’s a Tarhedian settlement?” one of the other officers proposed.

“Whatever it is, Hatos seemed to think getting the message there will help somehow. What’s our fastest ship, and how soon can it get there?”

“The Unieais, sir - its hyperdrive’s rated at 6.0, so it should reach the system in about two days,” the tactical officer answered.

“Transmit new orders to the Unieais. Instruct them to go to Hatos’ coordinates and provide the Tarhedians - or whoever is there - with the data we received.”

About half an hour later, Poteran’s fleet - with the exception of the Unieais, which had dropped out of hyperspace earlier to change its course - emerged from hyperspace in small groups throughout the Vaanle system. “All ships, proceed as planned,” Poteran ordered. The fleet maneuvered into position, attacking the weakly defended facilities on the outer edge of the system; the Hippasrus’ group launched a large quantity of assault shuttles while making sure it was directly between the shuttles and the turrets on the nearby shipyards.

The leading ships’ captains started reporting their progress. “Meerte Manev here; local resistance is as expected. Enemy shields down to forty percent.”

“Piluams is also encountering expected resistance levels. Shuttles en route.” Some of the more powerful groups had overpowered the defenses more rapidly than the others, and their shuttles had moved out of the relative safety of their formations to board the stations.

“Soscut reporting in - the shuttles are aboard, but we’re picking up the defense fleet - they’re in an attack formation and headed this way.”

Poteran looked at the portion of the map where the enemy reinforcements were coming from. “Soscut, Piluams, move to engage the enemy forces. Meerte Manev, move to assist them as soon as your shuttles reach their destinations.”

Concern soon became visible on the Hippasrus’ tactical officer’s face. “Captain, sensors are detecting multiple battlecruisers dropping out of hyperspace and heading towards us!” he said.

“That was fast. All ships, prepare to scatter into hyperspace as soon as your shuttles are aboard; rendezvous as planned.”

“Piluams’ shuttles returning to base. Jumping back for retrieval.”

“Soscut’s jumping to prepare for recovery operations.” All the ships in Piluams’ and Soscut’s groups entered hyperspace for a few seconds to get closer to the stations they had attacked.

“Meerte Manev holding position, shuttles are away.”

“Sir, our transports have only just boarded the station,” the tactical officer reported.

“Get us away from the station - engage the enemy battlecruisers until the shuttles are ready to depart.”

“Piluams’ shuttles are aboard. Moving to assist Hippasrus.”

“Soscut here, commencing recovery.”

“Meerte Manev reporting shuttle arrival. Jumping to engage system defense fleet.”

“Enemy ships are opening fire!” The Hippasrus shuddered moments after the tactical officer said that.

“All units, concentrate fire on the nearest battlecruiser!”

“Piluams here, merging with Hippasrus’ group.”

“Soscut’s recovery is complete, heading to assist Hippasrus.”

“Meerte Manev’s boarding parties are encountering heavy resistance.”

“Our own teams are also having difficulty securing their objectives. Should I order them to retreat?”

“No. Keep fighting - we’re still holding.”

“Shields are down to sixty percent!”

“This is Soscut, merging with Hippasrus.”

The Meerte Manev’s shuttles finally left their station’s hangars. “Meerte Manev moving to recover boarding parties.”

“Target ship’s shields are down to forty percent, ours are at thirty!”

“What about the station?”

“Still nothing, sir.”

Something had to be done quickly or the operation would be a disaster. “Soscut, Piluams, break formation, execute maneuver Poteran Delta Three.” The Hippasrus’ group turned around and headed towards the station as quickly as possible, while the Soscut and Piluams led their groups left and right, respectively - also heading towards the station, but with a more curved route. The opposing fleet moved straight for the weakened Hippasrus - the tip of the V-shaped formation this maneuver created.

“Meerte Manev here, shuttles recovered. Moving to assist.”

The hostile battlecruisers soon found themselves between the Soscut and the Piluams. “Collapse!” Poteran ordered, and the formation imploded. The only ships that didn’t turn back towards the lead enemy ship were the Hippasrus and its group, which maintained their course. To make matters worse for the Petran defenders, the Meerte Manev and its task force had finally arrived; soon, their flagship’s shields failed.

“The transports are finally launching,” the tactical officer reported.

“Excellent - have our group move to take them in. All other ships, proceed with withdrawal.” When Poteran said that, all of the ships in the other groups jumped into hyperspace as quickly as possible with no specific destination. Meanwhile, the shuttles returned to the Hippasrus’ group, which followed the example set by the others.

While all this was taking place, the Ivory Eagle silently sped through hyperspace towards the Daserus system. Fanra Kaa’nt was tinkering with some of the Tarhedian tech installed in its cargo bays, trying to discover how it worked when Zeshaira entered the one she was in. “I hope you intend to reassemble that when you finish,” the Tarhedian commander calmly said.

A startled Fanra tried to get up from under the transporter control panel - forgetting about its presence - and hit the panel with the back of her head. “You really shouldn’t sneak up on people like that,” she complained, getting up and turning towards Zeshaira. “Anyway, yeah, I’ll put it back together. At least I think I will - I’m not entirely sure
how
to do it. I don’t suppose you have schematics or something…?”