Wings of Steele - Flight of Freedom (Book2) (46 page)

She leaned against him, “Besides, who would keep you out of trouble if I wasn't around?” she said quietly. Truthfully, in her heart, she felt she would die without him.

“That's twice today,” he whispered.

“
Twice what?”

“
Twice today that you scared the crap outta me. You're gonna have to quit that, my heart can't take it.”

She patted the armor on his chest, “Don't worry, I'll protect you, I'm a watchdog now.”

“Sheepdog.”

“
Yes, right,” she nodded, “one of those.”

■ ■ ■

Passing the control tower, landing pads and main terminal, Brian angled across the facility and landed the Invader near the entrance to the subterranean facility. It was an unassuming looking, flat concrete building between the two largest hangars on the port.

Lieutenant Zorvano was waiting for them outside the adjacent hangar to the right when they landed. The building's giant door was rolled open about a quarter of the way. Tusker stayed in the Invader, but Brian and Alité accompanied Steele.

“
Whadya got for me Lieutenant?”

“
A couple things, Captain. We got a report from the Task Force on the cause of that last storm that steamrolled through here.” They followed the Lieutenant into the building's open door, the overhead lights glowing brightly on the two-hundred-eighty-four foot long, black, Halceón Class research ship. “Which adds a whole bunch of new questions to this little beauty.”

Jack squinted, his eyes still adjusting from the darkness outside. “Holy crap, she looks brand new.” His eyes searched the hull for markings. There were none. “She was just sitting in here?”

“No, sir. She was in the subterranean hangar below it. The section of the floor she is sitting on,” he pointed at the seam and dotted yellow lines on the floor, “is an elevator. It took about thirty minutes to get her up from below...”

“
She's armed,” said Brian eyeing the forward gun batteries, “is she military?”

“
Research,” countered Zorvano. “We've spent all day searching for information on her... She's a ghost ship. There's no crew of record, no captain of record, she has no registered name or number. We did find who owned her though, McSuddeth Mining. She's been here a little over two months.”

“
Hmm.” Jack's mind was racing. “And you said the Task Force had a cause on that crazy storm system?”

The Lieutenant nodded. “Yes, sir. Astrometrics and meteorology were interested in seeing if they could find what caused it, and if they could predict future events. They were replaying and reviewing their sensor recordings and found the birth of the storm system, which revealed a GOD Drive initiation, in atmosphere, at about two-thousand feet. I've never heard of that, but they said
you
would know what it means.”

Jack and Brian shot each other a look, “Pirates!” they said in unison.

■ ■ ■

The puzzle pieces began falling into place, but the picture wasn't quite clear yet. Since all the administrative records, and pretty much records of
any kind
on Veloria, had been lost or destroyed during the revolution, no one knew where the mining settlement was supposed to be, who owned it, what the terms were, or what exactly they were mining for. Somewhere on the third continent was all they knew. And there was no indication to the disposition of the crew of the Halceón Class research ship. What they did find out, via research from the Task Force, was that there were no records of McSuddeth Mining in existence anywhere.
Maybe she truly was a ghost ship.

As far as Steele's experience was concerned, anyone who goes to those extremes to hide their identity or become invisible is usually up to no good. Or government spies.
OK, up to no good fits that too.

Morning had brought with it light clouds and an incessant drizzle, but that could not dampen Jack's mood. After all, they had a nice new ship with a clean record and no owner.
Finders keepers.

Brian had flown Alité back over to Boney's for a meeting with the Mayor of Capitol City and several of his surviving staff, in an effort to plan the beginning of organized recovery efforts. The short wave radio operators were busy communicating back and forth across the continent to follow through as best they could with Queen Alité's orders to inform the citizens of the emerging new government. Getting messages across the ocean to the other continents would be problematic until more sophisticated equipment could be restored or rebuilt. But they had to start somewhere and Capital City seemed the logical starting point.

Queen
Alité.
That
was going to take some getting used to.

The Freedom had informed Jack that the UFW convoy carrying the Army Engineers, their equipment and supplies, was in-system and due in orbit by the next morning. He was looking forward to seeing his sister.

“You ready?” asked Brian, strolling up behind him.

“
That was fast.”

“
Fast ship, short trip.
Hey that rhymes...”
he joked.

“
Was everyone there?” asked Jack.

“
Yes. And she'll be
fine...”
Brian cuffed his friend on the shoulder, “She's got an entire detachment of Marines guarding her.”

“
Yeah, I know...
I'm married to a Queen...”
He ran his fingers through his hair in dismay, “How did this happen?”

Brian laughed, “I don't know how you do it buddy, but it could
only
happen
to you.”
He pointed to the long black ship sitting under the lights across the hangar, “So what are we going to call her?”

“
I don't know, any ideas?”

“
How about, t
he Revenge.
To get even for all the crap that went on down here.”

“
I like it.
The Revenge
. It's got a nice ring to it. Let's open her up and see what's inside.”

Connected up and hard-wired to the Revenge with umbilicals, the Marine in the control room logged into the ship's systems and opened the cargo ramp, his fingers dancing across the flat glass keyboard. “She's close to a full charge now, Captain. Her cells were almost bottomed out from sitting so long. Air should be good, we've flushed the atmosphere and been running the filters since last night. Computers and systems are booted up and on line...”

■ ■ ■

The ship was as clean inside as it was outside. The corridors, quarters and bridge were absolutely spotless. “Has this thing ever flown?” asked Brian sitting down at the First Mate's station, flipping on the screens and controls.

“It had to come from somewhere,” said Jack examining the tactical station. “But where the hell did the crew go? And why would they have left the ship here?”

“
Think they got caught up in the revolution?”

“
Mmm, maybe.” Jack was standing in the center of the bridge with his arms folded across his chest, scanning the stations. “One of the shuttles is missing, but it's only a four man job, the crew had to be bigger than that...”

“
Twenty five or thirty at least.” Brian was nosing around the systems, flipping through the options. He decided to check the navigation records to see if there was a file of routes or gate transfers.”Son of a bitch...”

“
What?”

“
They scrubbed all their travel routes. The maps are clean. Zero records.”

“
You're kidding?” Steele pinched his lower lip. “Man, I'm starting to think
Black Ops.
These guys are
way
too thorough.”

Still nosing around, Brian visibly stiffened in his seat,
“Dude,
this thing's got a
GOD drive!”

“
You're
shitting
me.” Jack was instantly at his side, looking over his shoulder,
“Holy crap!
We've hit the jackpot!” As silly as it was, they executed an exploding fist bump with sound effects.

“
Wait, what's this? I've never seen this before...”

“
Call up the stats, maybe that will tell you.”

Brian swept to the ships schematics, “See, the system is there...” when he touched the image of the system on the screen the shape of the hull on the schematic changed, growing slightly wider. “Valkyrie.” He looked over his shoulder at Jack.

Jack shook his head. “Never heard of it.”

“
Captain?”

Jack keyed the mic on his earpiece, “Steele here.”

“Sir, whatever you're doing, please stop.”

“
What's going on Sergent?”

“
It looks like you've just opened an anti-ship missile bay... and her carousel is completely loaded.”

CHAPTER TWENTY

UFW 77, VELORA PRIME :
HELLOS & GOODBYES

Lisa was busy packing her duffel bag. Her German Shorthaired Pointer, Gus, was lying next to it on the narrow, twin-sized bed. He wasn't taking any chances that she'd forget him, he was staying with that bag. “Relax Gustafer, I'm not going to forget you. See? Here's your chewy bone and your tennis ball, I'm putting it in the bag.” His stubby little tail wagged vigorously. When the door chimed she didn't stop folding clothes, instead calling over her shoulder, “It's open, c'mon in!”

The door slid open and Truck's sizable bulk stepped into the room. He was just barely shorter than the doorway but ducked out of reflex, the dog jumping off the bed to greet him. “How're you doing Mr. Gus?” he said, dropping to a knee. The dog leaned into him and snuggled, while Truck's big hands patted him down. “You getting everything squared away Ms. Lisa?”

She stopped her task and plopped herself on the edge of the bed. “Yeah, I guess...”

“You don't sound so sure.”

“
It's not just a matter of packing, Truck. I'm... kinda...” her eyes watered.

“
You're not scared, are you?”

“
No. Yes, maybe. I don't know.” She watched his face plump as he smiled. “No, it's just that everybody's been so good to us...”

“
You have friends with us.”

“
Yeah,” she said, standing up.

He stood too and moved over to her. “You need a hug?”

“Uh, huh,” she nodded, tearfully. His arms wrapped around her, squeezing gently. She felt like she was being hugged by a grizzly bear, her arms only reaching half way around him. “I'm going to miss you, Truck.”

The door swished open and Nina entered hand-in-hand with Layora Cress. “Oops,” said Nina, “didn't mean to interrupt...”

“We're just saying goodbye,” sniffed Lisa.

“
She needed a hug,” offered Truck.

“
Hey, whatever,” replied Nina, “no judgment.”

“
No
really...”
insisted Lisa.

Nina shrugged, “I just stopped in to tell you I'm not going...”

“What are you talking about?”

“
I'm staying here, with Layora...”

Lisa watched Layora shrug, her hands waving outward in dismay. “You can't stay here, Nina, this is a military ship.”

“I keep trying to tell her that,” volunteered Layora.

Truck shifted his bulk. “Ms. Lisa's right,
Commander Ribundell would never allow that, she's very by-the-book. She's never been fond of civilians on her ship.”

“
That's not fair,” stomped Nina, “I finally find someone I love and I have to leave her.”

Layora hugged Nina, comforting her, “It's a small universe, Ne-Ne, we will be seeing each other again. Don't worry.” She steered her gently toward her bed, “Now you really need to pack, sweetie, or the Commander will have my head. Let's go Truck, they need to finish up.”