The Star Cross: The Dark Invaders (15 page)

Quinn let out
a deep breath. They were in a jam, and he didn’t see a way out. Before he could
say anything, the door to the hold opened, and a number of armed Tellurites entered.
They were very similar to Humans, only slightly shorter and with more skin
hair. Their eyes also seemed to be a little larger.

“Who speaks
for this crew?” one of the armed Tellurites asked in very stilted English.

Quinn turned
toward Captain Fulbright, but the captain just sat there with a glazed look in
his eyes. “I do,” Quinn said.

The Tellurite
nodded and, walking over, handed Quinn one of the egg-shaped communication
devices, telling him to put it on.

Quinn put it
around his neck and then looked expectantly at the Tellurite commander.

“Your ships
have been confiscated and now belong to my clan. They will be taken back to our
home world and refurbished for Tellurite purposes. All of their contents will
be sold.”

“What about
us?” asked Quinn. He already suspected the answer if the stories Fleet Admiral Vickers
had told were true.

“You will be
sold at the Kubitz slave markets,” the Tellurite commander replied. He looked
at Ensign Jones and continued. “Some of your women may be trained to work at
the pleasure houses.”

“If we
object?”

The Tellurite commander
shrugged his shoulders. “You will be killed. At least at the slave markets most
of your crew might be bought by a trader interested in acquiring some skilled
spacehands.” The Tellurite then turned and left, leaving Quinn with the
communications device still around his neck.

“What did he
say?” asked Barbara, her eyes filled with fear and uncertainty.

“They’re
taking us to Kubitz,” Quinn answered. “We won’t know until we get there what’ll
happen to us.”

“We’re never
going home, are we?” Barbara asked plaintively.

“Don’t give up
hope,” Quinn said, trying to sound positive. But, in his heart, he knew there
was very little hope. In all likelihood his crew, as well as the one from the
Yangtze
,
would be sold into slavery. However, women, like Barbara, would suffer a far
more humiliating fate. Quinn closed his eyes, wishing he had never volunteered
for this mission.

-

Two days later
Second Officer Quinn was crammed inside a large truck with other members of his
crew. It was nearly suffocating inside.

“Where are
they taking us?” asked Barbara. Then in a lower voice, she asked, “Will we be
sold as slaves? The rumors are the Profiteers do that.”

Quinn hated
lying to Barbara, particularly if they were taken to one of the slave markets.
“Possibly,” he said evenly. “I guess we’ll know when we get to where we’re
going.”

Barbara
reached out and took Quinn’s hand. “Don’t let them sell me.”

Quinn held her
hand but didn’t reply. Their future was out of his control.

After what
seemed like several hours, the truck slowed down, and Quinn thought he could
hear the driver speaking to someone. Then the truck moved forward again and,
after a few moments, came to a stop. He heard more voices, and then the doors
to the back of the truck were opened. Fresh air flooded in, and he blinked his
eyes. He stared out in disbelief. A full platoon of Marines stood outside,
their weapons held at the ready. A man in civilian clothes stepped closer to
the back of the truck, looking inside.

“I’m Marvin
Tenner, the Newton Envoy to Kubitz,” he announced. “Your ships were captured by
the Tellurites, and they brought all of you here to be sold at the slave
markets.”

At this
revelation everyone in the truck gazed at one another in alarm and started
talking. “Quiet!” Quinn ordered. “Let’s hear what Mr. Tenner has to say.”

“Thank you,”
Tenner said. “Fortunately for all of you, we were informed of your capture by
an acquaintance, and we’ve bought your freedom. We have facilities here where
you can clean up and stay until we can arrange for your safe return to Earth.”

“We won’t be
returning to Earth,” a gruff voice said, as Captain Fulbright pushed his way
through the crowded truck. His eyes seemed clear and his self-assurance was
back. “We have business to conduct here on Kubitz.”

Tenner gazed
at Captain Fulbright for a long moment and then gestured to several of the
Marines. “Your business on Kubitz is over. Corporal, take this man into custody
for questioning.”

“You can’t do
this!” protested Captain Fulbright in a loud and boisterous voice. “I’m a
representative of the European Union, and you have no authority over me or my
crews.”

Tenner slowly
shook his head. “No, Captain, in that you’re wrong. This is Kubitz, and here
you have no authority over anything.”

-

Later Marvin
Tenner spoke to Second Officer Quinn in his office. Quinn had come forward and
offered to explain to Tenner what their mission was about and what had
happened.

“You were very
fortunate,” Tenner said, after he had listened to Quinn’s report of the attack upon
the three cargo ships and what the Tellurite commander had told him about being
sold as slaves. “A number of Profiteer clans would have air-locked your crews
and just taken the ships. The Tellurites are one of the clans who believe in
selling their captives on Kubitz at the slave markets. We have an associate who
keeps track of such things and informs us when any Humans from Earth are up for
sale. We had to pay a fairly hefty fee to free both of your crews.”

“What happens
to us now?” Quinn couldn’t believe how lucky they had been.

“We’ll summon
a passenger liner from Newton,” Tenner explained. “It will take several weeks
for it to get here with the next ship exchange. We keep at least one warship in
orbit at all times. When the next replacement comes, I’ll arrange for the
passenger liner to accompany it.”

“How long will
we be here?”

Tenner thought
about that. Captain Watkins could take the request back to Fleet Admiral
Vickers. Kurt would be angry over the Tellurites destroying one of the cargo
ships. He also wouldn’t be happy about Earth making the attempt to go to Kubitz
after he had warned them not to. Finally, he would have to arrange for a fleet
to protect the passenger liner on its trip to and from Kubitz.

“A month,”
Tenner said evenly.

Quinn nodded.
At least they would be going home. However, he still felt uncomfortable with
Captain Fulbright’s actions. Something didn’t feel right, and he had mentioned
that to Tenner.

-

After Second
Officer Quinn left his office, Tenner called in Captain Briar. “This whole
thing smells. Captain Fulbright is hiding something from us as well as his
crews.”

“I expected as
much after talking to a few of them,” Briar responded. “What do you want me to
do?”

Tenner
grinned. “Let’s have Grantz talk to him. Maybe he can make the Captain reveal
why they came to Kubitz.”

Briar nodded
and grinned in anticipation. “We’ll let Grantz scare him a little.”

Tenner nodded.
This would probably cost him another gold coin or two. However, Grantz had a
way of getting people to talk, and Tenner really wanted to know what was going
on. The only way to find out was from Captain Fulbright.

“I’ll call
Grantz,” Tenner said. Looking at Captain Briar, he shook his head. “He’ll probably
enjoy this.”

-

Later Tenner
sent a message to Captain Watkins aboard the
Vindication
. Captain
Fulbright, under Grantz’s interrogation, had confessed to being hired by
someone in the NAU to travel to Kubitz. This individual had paid for the updates
for all three cargo ships. Tenner strongly suspected this lead would go back to
Marlen Stroud. Fleet Admiral Vickers and Governor Spalding would be highly
aggravated when they heard this.

Tenner hadn’t
told Quinn a small fleet of Newton ships was currently in orbit. Tenner could
have easily enough arranged the two crews transportation back to Earth on
Watkins’s ships, but Tenner wanted to teach them a lesson, and the best way to
do that was to strand them on Kubitz for a month and let them think over how
close they’d come to never returning to Earth again. Such an action might
discourage the Earth governments from trying this in the future. With a deep
sigh, Tenner leaned back in his chair. There was never a dull day on Kubitz.

The Vorn Mothership
Reaper
dropped from hyperspace in a small lonely star system just outside
galaxy X241. Around the mothership, other spindle-shaped cruisers appeared
until the entire force of 412 ships was assembled.

Fleet is
present
, thought Military Commander Mardok toward Vorn Prince Brollen,
standing in the center of the large Command Center. The area remained quiet as
the Vorn did not voice their words but thought them. They did have a spoken
language, but it was very seldom used among the upper castes unless they were
in the home system. There, verbal communication was encouraged to prevent an
overload of telepathic messages where over one trillion Vorn were present. Spoken
language was sometimes necessary to give directions to the nearly mindless
drones. They seemed to respond better to a voice command rather than a
telepathic one.

Prince Brollen
turned his triangular-shaped head toward the military leader.
The Collector
Ship
? The ship was supposed to be in this system, waiting on the return of
the prince from his sampling survey.

Already
evident on the long-range sensors
.
We can be at its location in four
hours
.

Make it so
,
Prince Brollen commanded.
We must send word back to our Hive Queens that this galaxy is once more ripe with food
. It would be a message that would
bring joy and relief to the Vorn Queens.

Our fleets
will come and begin the harvesting
, the military commander acknowledged.
Our
food reserves are running low, and this galaxy will serve to replenish our
stocks
.

It is the
will of the Hive Queens
, answered Prince Brollen in reverence.
It is our
destiny to continue as the dominant race of this universe
.

-

The mothership
and her fleet proceeded deeper into the system until the ships arrived in orbit
around the star’s only planet. The planet was a dead husk without an atmosphere
or even a single moon. Above the planet were two other massive ships and a
swarm of the spindle-shaped cruisers. One of the large vessels was the
Collector Ship that dwarfed the mothership. The second large ship was the
vessel used for intergalactic travel. All ships in the fleet had to be docked
to it in order to be transported intergalactic distances. It was powered by
Zero-Point Energy and capable of traveling much faster than a ship in
hyperspace. A hyperspace journey of one week could be done in hours with the
Zero-Point Energy drive.

-

Dock us to
the Collector Ship
, ordered Prince Brollen as he gazed at the massive
vessel on the viewscreen with his multifaceted eyes.
We must unload the
results of our harvesting to be analyzed by our scientists. If found
acceptable, then the harvest of this galaxy can begin
.

If approved, the
food would advance the standing of the prince with all the Hive Queens. Perhaps
high enough that someday he might be allowed to mate with one, and his progeny
would become an important component of the Vorn.

The military
commander bowed slightly and then passed on the orders to the command crew to
begin docking procedures. It would take two days to unload and process all the
organic cubes the ship had on board. As the cubes were unloaded, they would be
classified as to their purity. Only the purest would be set aside for the Hive
Queens to sample.

-

Prince Brollen
had gone to the Collector Ship to check on the processing. He was part of the
Royal Court of the primary Hive Queen and, as such, was ushered immediately
into the main processing facility, where several scientists and technicians of
the Vorn race were busy analyzing the food cubes that had been unloaded.

How goes
the processing
? asked the prince, broadcasting his thoughts directly toward
the lead scientist.

More than
satisfactory
, replied the scientist, bowing toward the prince. He clicked
his mandibles.
I have tried several samples of the processed food cubes, and
all are acceptable. Nearly 12 percent of the cubes thus far processed are
suitable for the Royal Caste and 2 percent for our Hive Queens
.

Prince Brollen
gazed around the huge processing facility. Members of all three castes were present.
Scientists and technicians operated the equipment. The military stood guard;
and the nearly mindless drones ambled about, keeping everything clean and
sanitary. One of the drones suddenly staggered and fell down. It lay on the
floor, twitching, until one of the military walked over and shot it with an
energy pistol. Two other drones scurried over and quickly carried the lifeless
body to a disposal chute, depositing it to be fed to one of the ship’s
antimatter reactors.

We have a
problem with the latest batch of drones
, the lead scientist projected,
noticing the prince’s focus.
Our food supplies are getting low, and I fear
they are greatly malnourished
.

Feed them
some of the cubes we have processed and classified as suitable drone food
,
ordered Prince Brollen.
No need for anyone to go hungry now, not even the drones
.
While the drones could be reproduced in abundance, the prince saw no point in
wasting resources needlessly.

-

Two days later
the prince was on board the mothership, watching the ship’s main viewscreen.
The Collector Ship was docked to the Intergalactic Transport Vessel. It would
take the food gathered to the artificial habitats the Vorn race occupied to be
sampled by the Hive Queens. If they approved, then a general harvesting of this
galaxy’s organics would begin.

As the prince
watched, the transport vessel accelerated away from the planet as it could not
activate the intergalactic drive near a body of mass. For nearly an hour, the
ten-thousand-meter-long vessel headed outward, away from the star, and then
suddenly the space around the transport seemed to shimmer. In the blink of an
eye, it was gone, along with the Collector Ship docked to it.

Soon there
will be plenty to eat once more
, projected Military Commander Mardok.

In recent
months even the prince had heard of the growing dissatisfaction about the
shortage of quality food. Some of the military had been forced to eat food
cubes normally reserved for drones. While distasteful, they were nourishing
enough to allow for survival.

Other
nearby galaxies lack quality food for our race
, thought back the prince. He
had been involved in a general discussion among several of the Hive Queens as
well as other princes.
There is more in abundance in this galaxy than ever
before, if our brief sampling is an indicator of what resides around its stars
.

The military
commander was in agreement.

The princes
and the Queens had discussed recently how major deletions of the drone
population might be necessary if the needed quantities of proper quality food
were not found. Several of the upper-level scientists had claimed the nearby
galaxies had been harvested far too often, and enough time had not been allowed
for their worlds to recover and to develop proper life-sustaining food. It had
even been suggested that the Vorn race consider moving to another location in
this universe.

The Hive
Queens had been hesitant as this would mean abandoning the massive artificial
habitats the Vorn race occupied. Habitats that had taken thousands of years to
build and had been their homes for millions more. A compromise had been reached,
and, after the harvesting of Galaxy X241, the time between harvests would be
substantially increased. Several more distant galaxies would be harvested to
allow the nearer ones to recover sufficiently.

The
transport ship will be gone for ten days
, Prince Brollen projected to the
military commander.
When it returns, we shall begin the harvest in earnest.
Prepare our cruisers for long-term deployment to Galaxy X241. I expect this
mothership to exceed any other in our entire fleet in the amount of
high-quality food procured
. As one of the leading princes in the Hive Queen
hierarchy, he expected superior effort from all who served him.

-

Military
Commander Mardok bowed slightly and then left the Command Center. While he had
a good relationship with the prince, it was always prudent to be aware of how
callous the Royal Caste could be at times. To the Royal Caste, all other castes
were tools to be used and then discarded. Too often, valuable members of the
military, scientists, and technicians had their lives ended on a whim of a
Royal Caste member.

With the
worker class, it was even worse. The average worker drone, once it reached
maturity, lived for only six years. To the Royal Caste, worker drones were
easily replaceable. It was not uncommon to see one eliminated for just being in
the wrong place at the wrong time. The military commander, while perfectly
willing to sacrifice his life for his Hive Queen, did not want to die a
needless death.

-

Four days
passed, and, deep in the space between galaxies, there was a shimmer, and then
the transport ship appeared from what seemed to be a rift in space. The
intergalactic drive allowed the vessel to travel in the space between the
bubble universes, where physical laws were virtually nonexistent. While it
wasn’t possible to leave this universe completely, it could skim along the
border that separated this universe from others.

On board the transport
ship, Prince Ortumad watched the main viewscreen attentively. Hundreds of stars
seemed to appear, but he was well aware these were not individual stars but
entire galaxies. A few had distinct spiral shapes, and others were globular,
but many were so far distant they appeared only as a single point of light. A
few red dwarfs were in the immediate vicinity, and the transport ship had exited
near one of them.

Transition
to normal space successful
, thought the Vorn, standing at the helm
controls.

Take us to
the Conclave Habitat
, Ortumad ordered.

The Conclave
Habitat was where all the Queens would gather to taste samples of the food he
had brought. He had already tasted several himself, and he was confident the Queens would agree to the harvesting of Galaxy X241.

On the main
viewscreen, a number of huge black constructs appeared. One of the viewscreens
showed a close-up of the nearest massive spherical object. Each was over ten
thousand kilometers in diameter, and the same dark metal that covered the hulls
of the Vorn warships covered this metal behemoth as well. Ortumad knew 116 of
these massive habitats were in orbit around the red dwarf star. A number of
these small long-lived stars had been located in this region of intergalactic
space when the Vorn had first arrived. Many of them once had planets or
asteroid fields in orbit. Those planets and asteroids had been pulverized and
used to build the habitats where the Vorn race lived.

On the
tactical display, thousands of icons became visible. Most were spacecraft
traveling back and forth between the habitats, and a few were large cargo
ships. Less than twenty thousand light-years distant was a small globular
cluster rich in planets, moons, and asteroids. The Vorn had established a
number of massive mining operations there millions of years in the past after
annihilating the one spacefaring race who resided in the cluster. Now the
cluster was void of life and only served as a source of valuable minerals, used
to expand the habitats and build more Vorn warships.

“Queen Alithe
has requested your presence,” the Vorn at Communications said in a voice filled
with clicking sounds from his mandibles.

Near the
habitats, most Vorn used their spoken language as it could become quite
stressful with over one trillion Vorn broadcasting their thoughts. The use of
telepathy inside the system was strictly controlled. Only members of the Royal
Caste were allowed unrestricted use of that ability or caste members who were
within eyesight of one another where the telepathic broadcast could be easily directed.

Prince Ortumad
nodded.
Inform Queen Alithe that I will be at the Conclave Habitat shortly
and will bring a large number of food samples for her and the other Queens
.

There was no
doubt in Ortumad’s mind that, once the Queens had sampled the food, they would
order the immediate harvesting of Galaxy X241. When he returned, he would bring
a fleet of motherships with him. Once enough motherships and cruisers were
gathered, then the harvesting could begin in earnest.

-

Back on Earth,
President Mayfield looked around the large conference table where all fourteen Cabinet
members sat in stunned silence. Some feigned shock, while others were truly
upset by his announcement. A select few had been called in earlier to the
president’s office and briefed on the proposal.

“What the hell
do you mean by proposing we grant Newton its independence?” demanded Secretary
of Labor Marlen Stroud, rising to his feet and pointing an accusing finger at
the president. “There’s no way we should even consider this proposal.”

“Newton owes us too much money to even consider granting them independence,” added
Secretary of the Treasury Dwight Michaels. “When you figure up what Fleet
Admiral Vickers and Governor Spalding have spent on ships, their defenses, and
that embassy they set up on Kubitz, it will be decades before we get all of our
money back. No, there can be no independence until they have repaid their
debt.”

President
Mayfield leaned back in his chair and took a deep fortifying breath. “Over
twelve million people reside on Newton, and it is a self-sustaining colony. It
no longer needs supplies or other materials from Earth. It’s time to let them
go their own way. They have earned their independence after what they have done
for us.”