The Lost Prince (19 page)

Ian shook his head, “You’re right. I’m not sure the Obelisk could withstand a FTL hardened missile hitting it.”

“I’m not sure they have it, Ian.”

“Well, they lost ships at the dead planet to them.”

“Actually, they didn’t.” Ian looked confused. “They sent members of the planet’s species to remove them; I suspect as a kind of lesson to reinforce their slave status. They sent them in ships that were more advanced than the ones at the planet, but not more advanced than their own ships. I’m sure the ships they sent had tracking devices and did not have any means to leave the ship short of landing on the planet. The tracking devices would have plotted wherever they went so there was no way to escape. They were ordered to kill that planet or be killed themselves.”

Ian nodded, “Since the planet’s location was uncovered, the ones sent to kill it would know that if they refused, it would be killed anyway. They really had no choice.”

“I wondered why so many of the advanced ships had been hit. I think they did have one choice. They chose to die there with their species on the planet. I also do not believe they would have taken an advanced weapon back to their masters. I noticed that none of the ships on the planet with the missiles mounted under the wings had any of them removed.”

“They could have done it in space.”

“Not without shuttles or the means to possibly escape the ship. No, they didn’t take them in space. If they were taken it had to be on the planet and I reviewed your records on the ships you found. Those that had surviving wing pods still had the missiles on them.”

“We have to go back and destroy them.”

“We do, but it’s not going to be easy.”

“Why?”

“Now they know we were there. That planet will be staked out by one or more of their ships.”

“If we start a disturbance here, the ships might be brought back.”

“I believe all those out near the core will be recalled, but those at the planet won’t.”

“Why are you so sure about that?”

“We brought in the miners and they’ll know we had a large presence there. The miner’s tracks will confirm that suspicion. They’ll keep a ship there.”

“And if we kill that ship they will start a search in earnest on that side of the black hole.”

Drey nodded.

“What are we going to do about it?”

“I’m still thinking about that.”

T
he giant grey ship appeared next to the outer planet of a ten planet system. It scanned the outer planet and began moving toward the next planet.

“Great job, Doc.”

“I just used the star chart Andi produced to come here.”

“Yes, but you’re getting good at sensing the pressure waves.”

“That ship makes a huge one.”

“Have you got their path plotted?”

“Yes, they are maintaining a strict distance from the planets they’re scanning. After they complete the next planet, they’ll jump to sixty thousand miles out and move in on the left side of the next planet.”

“Move us there and stay under cover.” The small ship jumped and Drey looked at the passive scanner. “Does Andi have our location?”

“She does and I know she has that ship’s trajectory plotted.”

“How do you know?”

“She’s just used a passive light beam to send me the location of our arrival.”

“I’m surprised the light isn’t detected.”

“It’s just a small wattage beam. The light from the star will blind sensors to its presence. It’s also shining perpendicular to that ship’s course.”

“You do know where to emerge.”

“I do. Andi sent that as well.”

“She is, if nothing else, thorough.”

“That she is.”

• • •

Andi watched her display and waited. She prayed her calculations were accurate but just didn’t know. Ian watched her and saw her fear.

• • •

Drey turned the bow of the ship to their intended escape path and heard Doc say, “Emergence in five, four, three, two, one, now!” Drey saw normal space and then it disappeared a moment later.

• • •

The Commander of the major battleship was leaning back in his chair when suddenly normal space disappeared. “We have a small ship running at FTL from our former location. The ship has the trajectory locked in.”

“Fire all blasters on emergence and start scanners running.”

The giant ship emerged into normal space and the five hundred giant blasters on each side opened fire with their thousand mile wide beams. Most of them overlapped at the ship, but expanded to cover a space around the ship that was more than twenty thousand miles wide. He looked at his display and then turned to his sensor leader, “It’s not here.”

Suddenly the giant ship was rocked as the ship’s defense blasters on top of it were hit and blown apart. “Commander, the force field is out, the hull has been breached at the top blaster’s location, and the ship defense blasters on top of the ship are unresponsive.”

“Roll the ship to bring the lower blasters to bear. Launch missiles.”

The giant ship suddenly rolled and brought the high intensity blasters over to fire at the single small ship. Twenty large missiles ejected and rushed around the hull, seeking the ship that had damaged the giant vessel.

• • •

“The ship is rolling.”

“I see it. I’m hitting the blasters on this side before I pass.”

“They’ve launched Missiles.”

Drey felt his heart go into his throat and expected to be killed until Doc said, “the missiles are coming over the top and have us sited in.”

Drey turned his ship and flew the length of the vessel as the missiles came roaring in and gave chase. Drey fired his blaster at the giant ship and the long line of giant blasters on the side of the wounded ship began exploding. Drey saw the huge ship continuing the roll and the still functioning blasters on the bottom moved over the top and started moving down at them. “Doc, I need a target to end this. I’m going under the ships to avoid the blasters on the bottom that have rolled our way.”

• • •

Ian watched Drey fly his ship and was amazed at how fast he maneuvered to avoid the giant ship’s weapons. When the missiles were launched he stood up and held his breath. He let it out when he saw they weren’t FTL.

• • •

“I’ve put a designator on the area above their reactors.”

Drey looked through the eyepiece on his combat control helmet and saw the bright red circle on the rear of the ship. He arrived just before the ship’s defense blasters on the bottom of the ship rolled over the top. A bright light flashed as Drey fired both beams at the red circle. He watched them hit and blow through the hull. He twisted the ship and flew under the bottom of the ship which was the blasted top of the giant vessel. A blue field appeared around the ship and Drey saw the giant ship fifteen miles behind him as Doc submerged out of normal space. Thirty of the giant ships emerged into normal space around the stricken ship just in time to have it blow up in their face. Six of the giant rescuers had massive pieces of the exploding ship blow through their force fields and hit their hulls. Four of them started burning as hundreds of the smaller warships began appearing.

• • •

Drey watched his display as alien ships began pouring into the scene. Suddenly Ian, Violet, and Andi appeared on his secondary panel. “I do trust the two of you don’t have anything in normal space that could be detected.”

Doc said, “The two centimeter ball on the end of the antenna is all that’s there.”

“Be ready to get out of here is one of them starts moving this way.”

“I don’t think they’ll come this way. We’re above the site of the battle and out of the planet’s orbits.”

“Just be ready; E, see if you can listen in on their communications.”

“They’re really ticked off at what you did to their ship.”

“Can you feed their discussions to us?”

“I’ll interpret as I send.”

“That would be good, E.”

• • •

There was total disorganization until a Fleet Admiral arrived. “Someone tell me what happened here!”

Silence descended on the alien’s frequency and a ship’s commander said, “I received a call for help and responded to this location.”

“How long did it take you to arrive?”

“The message arrived at the Ship Facility and the Hub Computer dispatched me; it took five minutes to back out and make the jump.”

Drey noticed Andi write something down.

“What about the rest of you?”

“We were notified by the Hub fifteen minutes after it received the message.”

“Did any of you receive the ship’s distress call?”

“No Admiral, the message was sent to the Hub’s frequency.”

“You can’t tell me that none of you heard the distress frequency.”

“Sir, it wasn’t sent on the general distress frequency. It was sent on the Hub’s channel.”

“Sir, I saw the top of the ship before it exploded and it was heavily damaged. I suspect the automatic distress beacon was damaged before it could send a message. All of us are connected to the Hub and I would guess if the beacon was out, they sent it on the open channel they were using.”

“Who did this?” Silence greeted the question. “Who damaged the six ships?”

“Admiral, we jumped in to assist and arrived just as the ship exploded. The damage done to the six ships was caused by pieces of the battleship blowing through their force fields.”

The Admiral looked at his display and knew that the explosion had to be massive to penetrate the other ship’s force fields. “In the future, you will not jump in so close to the ship you’re coming to assist. Did any of you receive any of the ship’s data before it went up?”

“Admiral, I received some information.”

“Hub, what happened here?”

“A single small ship attacked and destroyed the ship.”

“How big was the ship?”

“It was one tenth the length of a Ship Destroyer.”

The Admiral and all the other ship commanders were shocked. “How big?”

“I’m still examining the data. However, it was smaller than any ship in our fleet and had beams three times stronger than those used on our strongest ships.”

“Did you manage to get a reading on its force field?”

“It wasn’t hit by any of the ship’s weapons where a reading could be taken.”

“Did you get a line on which direction it went?”

“No, the directional scanner was destroyed with the beacon. I did get an image of it as the ship rolled and the bottom scanner saw it briefly.”

“Send that to me now.”

The Admiral looked at the ship flying along the hull firing a blaster at the blasters it was approaching and was stunned. “Hub, that ship is smaller than most of our shuttles.”

“It is clearly from an advanced civilization we have not previously encountered.”

“What are your instructions?”

“I will communicate what happened to the High Council. Please investigate and see if there is anything you can determine about what happened. I would highly recommend that all search craft be brought here and start a search for whoever did this. We have not done a real through scan of this area and there may be an enemy here. I would also highly recommend that no ship should go out alone.”

The Admiral looked at his control board, “I want to know what caused the destruction of our ship. Investigate the debris and find me some answers.”

The warships scattered as support ships jumped in to put out the fires on the six damaged ships.

• • •

Ian looked at Drey and said, “I’m glad you suggested doing the attack there.”

“It made sense. That area is around the curve from the Union.”

• • •

“That was some flying,”

“Thanks, Violet.”

“Why were you and Ian worried so much about missiles?”

“Uhh, no reason.” Andi looked at Violet and furrowed her brow. Drey looked at Ian on the display and knew he saw what was coming. Drey turned down his volume as Andi looked at him and yelled, “Are you that dumb?” Violet looked at her sister wondering what was going on. “And you knew about it and didn’t tell me!?”

Violet said, “What?”

“They could have been using the FTL missiles we loaded on our ships. If they had, he could not have escaped.”

“That’s where your inexperience as a pilot confuses you.”

Andi jerked her attention at Drey and he said, “If they were FTL, how would they have been able to hit me?”

Andi sat down and put her head on her hands. Ian and Drey waited and she finally said, “They would have to have had a homing device.”

“And?”

“They would have had to stay at a low speed to come around the ship to get at you.”

“That’s exactly right.”

“But they did get behind you and give chase.”

“Yes, but Doc determined they did not have a blue field around them. He was set to jump if they did.”

“Doc, is that true?”

“Just a moment, I’m working on something.”

“Don’t try to put me off, Doc!”

“The Hub is communicating and I want to hear, be quiet.”

The four looked at each other and waited. Then they heard, “That is correct. Leave that planet and join the search.”

“Do you want all three of us to leave?”

“Yes, you can return in two days.”

“We’ll power up and go.”

Ian said, “That’s great, we can go and destroy those old ships with the missiles.”

“Be quiet. This is not easy.”

Ian looked at Drey and he held up his hand telling him to wait. A moment later they heard, “…thought you just told us to leave.”

“No, stay there two days and, if nothing happens, you can leave.”

“Powering down.”

• • •

Ian said, “What did you just do, Doc?”

“That Hub Computer is a very suspicious creation.”

“What do you mean?”

“She broadcast that first message on the frequency used to communicate with the ships here. The second communication was on a completely different frequency and encrypted with a tricky algorithm. It took me some time to work it out.”

Ian said, “You expected it to do that?”

Drey chuckled, “He does think like me.”

“Then we can go and destroy those ships.”

“No we can’t; especially not now.”