HAB 12 (Scrapyard Ship) (3 page)

I’m not giving up Ricket, or anyone else. And tell your friends that their dynasty is quickly coming to an end.”

“The resources of the Craing are almost incomprehensible. The few hundred ships you’ve absconded with are but a fraction of their total capacity.”

“I don’t care,” Jason said, indignation rising.

“We’re talking tens of thousands of warships. Do you really want a force of that magnitude barreling down on Earth? And there’s something else: three ships discovered hundreds of years ago by the Craing—ships of a technology so advanced no one figured out how to power them on, let alone fly them. They’ve been stored beneath the ground, mothballed, collecting dust. Something’s changed. The ships came alive. Suddenly became operational. They are in orbit around Terplin as we speak, and from the reports I’ve heard, their capabilities are nothing short of amazing. Capabilities that aren’t dissimilar to that new ship of yours. With little doubt they’re of the same technology, and I’m betting have the same Caldurian origins. Anyway, the Craing are learning to fly the things, even calling them the Emperor’s Guard. My guess is they’re coming for their emperor or to destroy that ship of yours—perhaps both. I’d be proactive here. Hand over that old robot and be done with it. Do it now.

“That’s not going to happen,” Jason said flatly.

“They will not hesitate to unleash a hell storm on Earth. I’ve seen them do it time and time again. This time it would be Earth that would be uninhabitable for a thousand years, maybe more. Their newly appointed high priests have given them eight days to learn how to fly these ships, get familiar with their weapons systems.”

“Why don’t they just send the rest of their fleet, a few more dreadnaughts?” Jason asked.

“They still don’t understand how that ship of yours destroyed or incapacitated five hundred of their fleet ships. It’s an embarrassment they don’t want to repeat. No, better to send these three ships. Ships with comparable technology.”

“You mentioned the high priests. So they’re giving the orders now?” Jason asked.

Brian smirked. “High Priest Overlord Lom had always been in charge. Sure, the emperor is a living symbol to the people, but it’s the high priests that make the decisions. And unlike the emperor, they can be replaced. What happened with that robot of yours acting as Emperor Reechet won’t be allowed to happen again. Yes, they want to have him back, prop him up as a figurehead, but they certainly won’t let their masses blindly follow him.”

“It’s not up for discussion,” Jason repeated.

“You have eight days before those three ships, their new Emperor’s Guard, leave Craing space. I’m going out on a limb here even telling you this.”

“Careful, Brian. I certainly wouldn’t want to get in the way of your cozy relationship with the Craing.”

“This is bigger than just you and me, Jason. You need to bring this to the attention of the right people: Washington, other world governments. You need to prepare. Please make the right decision.” The screen went black and the bridge went quiet.

“XO, what’s the earliest
The Lilly
will be ready for flight?”

“Early tomorrow morning, Captain. Where to?”

“The Chihuahuan desert. The Alliance outpost.”

* * *

Back up top, it was Jason’s turn to make dinner—spaghetti and meatballs. Smoke filled the kitchen from the first batch of garlic bread scorching in the oven. As Jason ran around opening windows and flapping a dish towel, he thought about his father. Admiral Perry had become even quieter, more reclusive. In fact, Jason couldn’t remember him saying more than three or four words in days. Jason had hoped that some downtime revisiting the scrapyard, his old stomping grounds, would provide Admiral Perry the necessary time to heal his inner conflict. But there was something else disturbing the admiral. Perhaps, in his view, he had failed the Alliance. On top of that, Jason was able to accomplish what his father could not: defeat the Craing in open space. But the admiral wasn’t taking into account that it wasn’t so much Jason’s extraordinary skills as a commander as it was his taking advantage of the resources around him—namely
The Lilly
. Where the admiral had kept the ship hidden and protected, Jason had exploited its phenomenal resources.

As the smoke cleared, he opened the oven door and checked his second batch of bread. What his father didn’t get was that the Alliance would soon fall apart without the admiral’s strong presence. Fifteen years of work. One by one, Admiral Perry Reynolds had made planetary alliances across multiple sectors, committing even the most reclusive of planets to come together to unify against the Craing. What his father wasn’t considering was that, without himself at the helm, the Alliance’s chances of defeating the Craing were nil.

* * *

Their evening ritual was sitting on the porch, plates on laps, and a six-pack shared between them.

“Progress with the rebuild?” Jason asked, passing his father the basket of garlic bread and expecting a one or two word answer.

Admiral Reynolds took the basket and placed several pieces at the side of his plate. He thought for a moment and shrugged.

“Got it to turn over.”

“Seriously? That’s something,” Jason commented.

“Timing’s still shot to shit, but … yeah.”

“So, a few more days under the hood?”

“Need to scrounge a few more old parts from the yard. There’s another old F1 pickup out there somewhere—think it’s a ‘48er, though,” his father replied.

Jason nodded and said, “Northeast corner of the yard. Look for the old blue Econovan. You’ll see it.” Jason took another slurp of spaghetti before continuing: “I’m headed back to the outpost tomorrow. You okay here by yourself for a while?”

His father didn’t answer right away. “Hmm … I don’t know. I mean, after sixty years of wiping my own ass, I might need your help.”

“I just meant—”

“I know what you meant. Go. I’m fine.”

Somewhere, not so far away, a dog barked—then two others barked back. A woman’s voice yelled “
Dinner!”
farther off in the distance.

“I talked to Brian this morning,” Jason said. He noticed his father looked up from his plate for the first time.

“What the hell did he have to say?”

“Just that Earth will be free of the Craing forever. All they want is their emperor back.”

“Emperor being Ricket…?”

“Yep.”

“Your mother, God rest her soul, must have been screwing the milkman, because there’s no way I share the same DNA with that boy,” his father said with a smirk and a shake of his head.

“He honestly believes in what he’s doing,” Jason replied, encouraged by his father’s unexpected chattiness.

“He’s thinking from a flawed perspective. He’s thinking with his head up his own ass.”

Jason thought about that for a moment and started to laugh. Then so did his father. They sat together laughing a little while longer as the sun dipped behind the San Bernardino foothills.

Chapter 3

Jason awoke early the next morning. He’d started sleeping in his childhood bedroom again and wondered why he had been so reluctant to do so. While it was still dark out, he stumbled his way to the hall bathroom and got the shower going. The old water heater had seen its best days, taking longer and longer each morning to come back alive. It would be easier to just stay on board
The Lilly
, but he wanted to provide Mollie with some semblance of a normal home life when she stayed with him. Both Mollie and his ex-wife Nan were returning from a prolonged trip to Washington later tonight. Part summer vacation for Mollie, part work for Nan. Reluctantly, she had agreed to become the legal envoy between the Earth Outpost for the United Planetary Alliance and various allied governments around the world, but mostly from Washington’s directive.

As Jason stood beneath the now steady stream of hot water, he noticed several inches of water accumulating at his feet.
Terrific, roots!
They’d begun to invade the old pipes under the house years ago, but lately the problem had worsened. Just one more thing needing fixing around here. Maybe he should rebuild the house. He’d think about it when things got back to normal. If things got back to normal.

To Jason’s surprise, his father, dressed in his admiral spacer’s jumpsuit, was sitting at the kitchen table.

“Here, I made you a cup of coffee,” his father said, sliding the still steaming cup across the table.

“Thanks.” Jason, standing, took a long sip. Eyeing his father’s uniform, he asked, “So, had enough of the old ‘49?”

“For now. It’ll still be here after we crush the Craing.”

“Yes, it will … Hell, I may even help you with it.”

* * *

All eyes were on them as Jason and the admiral entered the bridge together.

A bosun’s whistle blew and The Lilly AI announced, “Captain on deck.”

Jason took the command chair while Admiral Reynolds sat to his right and slightly behind him. Ensign McBride, XO Lieutenant Commander Perkins, and Ricket were seated at their stations and awaiting instructions. With the exception of engineering—Chief Horris and a skeleton crew scattered around the ship these past few weeks—everyone else had been deployed to the Alliance outpost to provide training and support for the newly acquired Craing ships. Jason, like his father, kept within close proximity to
The Lilly
. With their latest exploits in space and victories against the Craing fleet, word had gotten out.

Governments and militaries from virtually every nation, as well as the world’s largest science and technology companies, were all applying what political juice they had to pressure Washington and the Alliance for more access to the newly acquired Craing fleet, but more so to
The Lilly
. That may well happen with the Craing fleet. But not
The Lilly
. It was obvious to Jason that no one nation could control this technology, especially the phase-shift capabilities, without causing a total imbalance. Even the Alliance outpost, which was a self-contained entity separate from any of the U.S. military branches,
had become more and more politically inclined, and
having several hundred Craing warships in its arsenal, it had quickly become the most powerful military force on the planet. Jason had insisted that Admiral Cramer break all ties to her Navy commission before being placed in charge of the outpost
.
But Jason knew she still had a lifetime of prior loyalties—loyalties that would be hard to ignore. For the most part he trusted her, but he wasn’t stupid. Jason and his father agreed
: The Lilly
needed to be kept under wraps—hidden underground here in the aquifer or at other secret locations around the country.

“Status, XO?” Jason asked, pulling up his virtual tablet and reviewing the ship’s daily systems report and crew roster.

“All systems are operational. Last of the hull repairs were completed yesterday. As requested, Ricket and I found another potential subterranean drop location.”

“Dry? Big enough for
The Lilly
’s wide keel?”

“All the above, sir.”

“Distance from the outpost?” Jason asked.

“Just under three miles. Actually, closer to two,” Perkins replied.

“That should work.” Jason closed down his tablet and looked up towards the large wraparound display.

“One other thing, Captain. It may be a systems glitch, and Ricket is checking on that, but we’ve been out of NanoCom contact with any of
The Lilly
’s crew since last night.”

“I’ve been using my NanoCom all morning,” Jason said, shrugging.

“The problem seems to be with those at the outpost or still in orbit. Their vitals are normal, we just can’t communicate with them.”

“Keep me appraised—I don’t like being out of touch with our people.”

“Aye, sir. There’s something else.”

“What is it?”

“The military, all branches, are on high alert. Something’s up with the outpost.”

“Let’s find out. Secure the gangway and disconnect umbilicals. Helm, once you’ve determined that things are clear above—go ahead and phase-shift.”

Within several moments,
The Lilly
was less than a hundred feet above the scrapyard. “Take us into the stratosphere, Ensign.”

The scrapyard disappeared in a blur and
The Lilly
reached for the sky. Jason felt the internal dampeners engage as G-forces increased. He noticed the admiral had gotten to his feet, turned, and was watching as their home disappeared behind them. Bright blue skies transitioned to grey and then to the blackness of space. The ship leveled off for several moments and began its descent back towards Earth.

The familiar landscape of the Chihuahuan desert came into view. Jason had ordered McBride to approach the outpost from the east. At fifty miles out, they were skimming thirty feet above the desert floor. Jason wanted to keep their visit unannounced. Fortunately, unless you were looking right at her,
The Lilly
was virtually impossible to detect with any technology currently available on Earth, or anywhere else for that matter. The ship slowed and then came to a complete mid-air stop. Hovering two miles from the outpost, Perkins said, “We’re right above the subterranean cavern, sir.”

Ricket scurried over to another station, entered something on a keypad, and the wrap-around display changed to a virtual below the ground landscape.

“Captain, what you’re looking at is a best-guess representation of what lies approximately one mile below us,” Ricket explained. “The cavern walls are solid granite. The floor of the cavern isn’t quite level, but we believe this area here to be no more than a three or four percent grade.” Ricket pointed to an area of the cavern highlighted by a red circle.

“A mile down, solid granite.” Jason stared at the display for several more moments. “How do we know this doesn’t push the limits of
The Lilly
’s phase-shift capabilities? Hell, we could get marooned down there.”

Ricket removed his LA Dodgers baseball cap and placed it onto the console. “If our calculations are correct, we have adequate leeway for three to four times that distance—even into solid rock.”