Baldwin's Legacy: The Complete Series Page 5

  Treena sat up, ready to put this foolish behavior behind her. She was the commander of the Concord’s flagship, not a new recruit. It was time to start acting like it. She emerged from the bathroom, returning to her seat beside the captain.

  He was reading something on his console, and she noticed him scanning through the ship’s personnel manifest, mouthing names as he stared at images. He was still trying to learn the crew’s names. He saw her catch him, and he gave her a slight shrug. “I didn’t have a lot of time to prepare. They sprang this on me a month ago, and I only made it to Nolix last week,” he told her.

  Did Baldwin know about her? She wanted to ask him but couldn’t bring herself to. He had to. He was the captain.

  They’d been traveling for a day now, and this was her second shift on the bridge. Treena wondered how long it would be before someone noticed she didn’t eat in the mess hall with everyone, or drink any liquids.

  The shift was coming to a close, and the door opened, the chief engineer walking through. She caught Treena’s eye and waved her over.

  “Go ahead. Things are running smoothly here,” Baldwin said without ever looking up.

  “Thank you, sir. See you tomorrow,” she told the man, and crossed the bridge to join Reeve at the exit.

  “I haven’t seen half of the ship yet, and I thought you might like the stretch,” Reeve said.

  As much as Treena wanted to return to her dark room and hide from the others while off duty, there was something comforting about Reeve’s inclusion. “Sounds like a good idea.”

  They stepped into the elevator, and Reeve asked the computer to bring them to Deck Four.

  “What’s here?” Treena asked her companion. She knew this was the deck where Medical was, along with the training facility, complete with a lap pool.

  “I haven’t formally met the doctor yet and thought we could do that together. See if he wants to grab a tea or something with us,” Reeve said, flashing a smile.

  Treena suppressed the panic she felt at the idea of beverages. She could drink if necessary. There was a way to drain the liquid later, but she’d only tested it in the early months after the accident.

  Signs along the walls pointed them to the medical bay, and Reeve didn’t buzz before entering. She walked assuredly through the doors, which sprang open on her arrival. It was quiet, and Treena stepped inside the bay, taking a look around. It was so clean, sterile like the rest of the ship, only amplified here. Everything was bright, and there were three solid exam beds in the open room; she saw at least five private rooms along the far wall.

  The doctor emerged from one of these rooms, a short, stocky man behind him. “The injection will help with your issue, and if it persists, come and see me in two days’ time. And, Mr. Clayton, can I suggest cutting back on the sugar?”

  The man rubbed his own shoulder and gave a sheepish nod to the alien doctor before glancing up and seeing there was an audience. “Commander,” he mumbled as he walked past them.

  Doctor Nee’s eyes sparkled as he saw visitors, and he instantly came over to greet them. “Well, I was beginning to wonder when I’d finally meet you two. I’m Doctor Nee.” He stuck a hand out, and Treena shook it without a second thought.

  Reeve gasped, and the doctor sighed at her reaction. “I have a glove on. Why does everyone have to be so afraid of touching a Kwant?”

  Reeve answered quickly. “Because you’re poisonous to us.”

  “There is that, but I’ll say it’s overrated. As I told your brother Brax, I have the antidote on me at all times,” he said.

  Reeve appeared to warm up to him at the mention of her brother. Treena took the doctor in. His yellow eyes were animated, his white-blond hair nicely styled. He carried himself well, more classy than some of the Kwants she’d been stationed with before.

  “I’m Treena Starling,” she said, fully aware he knew who she was.

  “Pleasure to meet you,” the doctor said. “Has Reeve been briefed?”

  “About what?” Reeve asked, but Treena stayed silent, unsure what he meant.

  “That Treena is an android,” Nee said matter-of-factly.

  Treena sighed, another human motion from habit, relieved of her secret burden. Of course the doctor was aware. He’d be checking on her human body in the room.

  Reeve stepped back, seemingly unaware of her action. “What do you mean?”

  “I… I’m still Treena Starling. My body barely survived the attack. I was the last remaining crew member alive when they found us, and they kept me breathing. My brain worked, but I was trapped inside the husk of my withering vessel.” Treena cringed at her casual dismissal of her real body. Vessel. Was that all she was?

  “That’s… amazing,” Reeve said, coming closer. She moved a hand toward Treena’s arm. “May I?”

  “...Sure.”

  The woman felt the skin on her hand and tapped it slightly. “You feel human.”

  “They did a good job,” Treena admitted.

  “No wonder we hadn’t heard anything about you for so long. This must be some top secret stuff. You know, with all the ethical ramifications involved with android avatars out there,” Reeve said.

  Treena had heard it all and didn’t care. “I’m still alive. This is the only way for me to be a contributing member of the Concord, and I’m doing my job in whatever form possible.”

  Reeve raised her arms in the air, a sign of supplication. “I’m on your side. I’m glad you’re here. We need a Treena Starling on board. You’re a legend already. Can you imagine? A Baldwin, and Treena Starling controlling an android. The Concord sure went all out. Not to mention a telekinetic Zilph’i and a poisonous doctor,” she added with a laugh.

  Doctor Nee laughed with her, though Treena didn’t quite see the humor of the situation. “I suppose word will get out now. Can I count on you two to support me?”

  “Of course you can,” Doctor Nee said. “I think you’re a true inspiration, and I’m honored to be your doctor.”

  “Good. When you visit me, just be sure to wear gloves, okay?” Treena asked, her face impassive for a moment before succumbing to a smile.

  This made Nee laugh again, and it seemed like they were old friends. “I have to be honest, it feels great to have this off my chest. It’s been a trying couple of years.”

  “Has Baldwin been informed?” Reeve asked, her red eyes squinting.

  “I’m not sure,” Treena admitted.

  The doctor appeared about to say something on the subject, when the lights flashed white, then red. The computer’s neutral voice carried over the ship’s speakers. “This is an alert. All scheduled officers to your stations.”

  “I supposed that means us,” Reeve said. “Nice to meet you, Nee. Maybe we can have dinner this week.”

  He smiled at them. “You know where to find me.”

  Treena separated from Reeve as she moved for Engineering. The Constantine commander raced through the corridors, heading for the elevator to the bridge.

  ____________

  Yur Shen peered up at the blinking red lights and shuddered. Was the alarm because of him? Had he been found out?

  As crew members ran through the hallways, not giving him a second glance, he relaxed. Why would anyone care about a maintenance crew member being added to the roster at the last minute? If he was going to last the long haul on Constantine, he needed to be calmer.

  He tried to recall the orders he’d been given, and the main thing that stuck out in his mind was the command: stay in the shadows.

  Yur did just that as more officers walked past with purpose, holding tablets and discussing the anomaly their ship’s sensors had uncovered. His ears perked up, and he ran a hand over his ridged brow. No one ever noticed the man in the gray jumpsuit, walking around with an I-7902 maintenance cart. Standard procedure, standard work duty, standard uniform. Nothing about Yur was out of place, and he preferred it that way.

  His orders appeared on his cart’s screen, and he tapped at it, finding a
map to the room that held the Star Drive. There had been a contained fire in one of the ancillary power cases, and his work detail was to wipe the blackened cabinets and repaint. Didn’t they have robo-servers for this purpose? It didn’t matter. He was used to doing menial tasks, but the fact that he’d one day be elevated to a new position, one far more powerful than a spy on board the flagship, kept him going.

  The alarms continued to chime softly as he headed to the lower level, pressing his cart into the maintenance elevators. He was alone in the lift, and smiled as it settled to the bottom floor. His benefactor would be proud of how well he was doing.

  He fought the urge to send a message to her, knowing it might be intercepted here. He needed to be careful, she’d told him. This ship had an AI unlike no other, and Yur had felt how much that scared her, even if her messages hadn’t said so.

  He moved through the halls, his pace even and slow, and eventually, he stopped at the main engineering wing.

  Yur composed himself. A guard stood there, armed and bored. “ID,” she said without interest.

  He moved his hand toward her scanner, and it beeped. She stepped aside without another word. No one wanted to talk to Yur, the gray-uniformed maintenance man. He was invisible.

  The room was amazing, even to his untrained eyes. This was his first visit here, and his gaze settled across the space at the crackling lines of energy around a miniature black ball. It floated there in the center of the container, drawing his attention. He wanted to touch the glass, feel the power. Instead he moved to the cabinet with scorch marks and began to wipe it with the special spray.

  His benefactor had been clear in his mission. Yur glanced around, seeing a dozen or so screens showing various components within the bowels of the ship, each more complicated and elaborate than the last. He didn’t understand what most of them did, but he recognized the device on the third screen. That was it.

  Yur finished his task, painting the gray cabinet, and he stood back, admiring his work. He’d done a good job. He moved the cart forward, slowly walking behind it. No one paid him any mind, an older Callalay man with paint on his sleeves.

  There were six people in the main engineering room by the time Yur reached the third screen, and he glanced across the space to where everyone had gathered, pointing at something on the main viewer. He covered his face as he spotted the Tekol chief engineer. He’d been warned to stay away from her. Something about a photographic memory.

  “It’s a ship.”

  “Why would there be a ship out here?”

  “It looks dead.”

  “I’ve never seen anything like that.”

  “Everyone stop fussing about, and make sure we’re ready for anything,” the Tekol woman said, hands on hips.

  Yur tried to ignore their nattering, finding that this was the opportune time. The image he was focused on showed glowing tubes, five of them intertwined and funneling into one output. He saw the location of the video feed’s source, and he keyed it into his maintenance cart’s computer. ER-1.96514. He shut the screen off, smiling as he secured the location of his target.

  He knelt on the ground, fiddling with his pants leg, and he made sure the device he’d hidden under his cart was intact. It was concealed among various other devices, not that anyone would ever care to check his supplies. They’d have to see him to stop him.

  Yur moved across the room, watching the viewer from afar, seeing the long, unmoving ship. He didn’t know what it was, but it didn’t concern him, so he left Engineering with one last glance at the heavy black ball that powered the entire Star Drive.

  That something so small, seemingly insignificant, could affect so much gave him hope for himself. He smiled as he pushed his cart through the corridor, the guard not bothering to look up as he left.

  He had the location. Now he just needed to bide his time until he was called to Deck Two.

  ____________

  Tom Baldwin flipped the console screen off as the stars slowed around them. “Are you sure it’s a vessel this far out?”

  “That’s what the sensors are saying,” Brax told him from the edge of the bridge.

  “Impulse speed, Ven,” Tom ordered, and watched as they came toward a halt over a few minutes. “Where is it?”

  The viewer zoomed from the image of empty space to a tiny speck that grew with each degree of magnitude. “What class ship is that?” Baldwin asked, not recognizing it.

  “Scanning now,” Ven said. “Sir, it’s not on record in our files.”

  This startled Baldwin. “Excuse me? What do you mean, it’s not on record?”

  Ven turned in his seat to stare at his captain. Tom forced himself to meet the strange telekinetic’s gaze. “I mean it’s of unfamiliar stature. The shape and energy readouts aren’t in our database.”

  Tom stood, stalking toward the viewer. The ship was long and thin, reminding him of a Kwants skimmer, but there were subtle differences. There were no visible markings he could see from this angle, and it was rougher than the skimmers. Perhaps an older model?

  “Run it against a skimmer to compare, then show them to me side by side,” Tom ordered, and Brax did this, pushing the results on the viewer.

  “The skimmer is half the size, sir. This is most definitely alien,” Brax said.

  Alien. They’d left the docking bay less than two days ago, and already they’d encountered a mysterious vessel along their path to Greblok. There was so much riding on them arriving to their destination world, and Tom understood the ramifications of failure. He’d lose his new station, and if he was lucky, they’d probably demote him and stick him on some hundred-year-old freighter, making supply runs between Nolix and some backwater world famous for the galaxy’s best animal fertilizer.

  “What are we looking at?” his commander’s voice asked, and she came to stand shoulder to shoulder with him in front of the massive viewer.

  “Unidentified ship,” Tom told her.

  “Unidentified…?” she started.

  “Perhaps if you were on the bridge, we wouldn’t have to go over this a second time, Commander,” Ven suggested plainly.

  Treena frowned, but she stayed silent. Tom knew it was an honor to have an Ugna on board, but he’d speak to the man privately about rank when the two were alone.

  “Have you attempted communication?” she asked, rather than playing into his games.

  “Not yet. Junior Officer Zare, reach out to them with our standard Concord communication. Inform them we’re here to assist should they need it,” Tom said, and he returned to his seat. He silently hoped they returned communications stating they were fine and not in need of assistance. Then Constantine could continue on its planned journey to Greblok.

  “I’ve sent the package, sir.” Zare snapped her head back to her console, as if waiting for a reply.

  “Keep repeating it. If there’s anyone aboard, they’ll eventually reply,” Tom said.

  “Sir, if I may?” Brax asked from his seat at the edge of the bridge.

  “Go ahead,” Tom said. He didn’t know the man well but was looking forward to working with him. He liked the deference he gave, and from early impressions, Brax was diligent and hard-working.

  “Constantine has some new features, and I’ve already run a scan of the exterior using drones I released as soon as we arrived,” Brax said.

  “Go on,” Tom urged.

  “Their hatch… it’s different than our standard four-prong attachment.” Brax showed him on the viewer, using a corner of the screen to demonstrate his results. “If we wanted to board them, we’d have to use a force generator.”

  “Captain, this supports our findings,” Ven said. “Every ship within this galaxy uses the same hatch attachment and has for over five standard centuries.”

  “That’s right. Either this ship is from another galaxy or… it was manufactured before the Concord established guidelines on manufacturing space vessels,” Tom said. This was growing stranger by the minute.

  “I have a h
ard time imagining this ship has sat here for a long duration with no one stumbling over it,” Brax suggested.

  “You could be right, but how often did we have envoys traveling between Greblok and Kevis VII? There’s almost no recorded data to suggest the two races have ever interacted,” Treena said.

  Tom nodded along. “She’s accurate. There’s a chance it has sat here. We won’t know until we hear from them.”

  Zare turned, her long dark ponytail waving behind her as she shook her head, indicating there was no reply.

  Tom had to make a decision. There were too many uncertainties, and he couldn’t rightly leave the ship there without learning something about it. It would only take a few hours. They could make the time up. Reeve Daak had claimed this ship had the fastest engines ever created. He’d have her prove the theory.

  “Lieutenant Commander Daak, you’ll lead the team to investigate. Take the doc with you, in case they need medical attention,” Tom said.

  Brax appeared shocked at his orders, and Tom almost repeated them when the big man stood, nodding his acceptance. “Yes, sir.”

  His chief of security left the bridge, and Tom glanced at Treena.

  “I’d like to go as well, Captain,” she offered.

  “Very well.”

  ____________

  Brax closed his eyes as their shuttle released from Constantine’s belly. He was in the front seat, piloting the vessel and trying to forget the vacuum of space beyond the five-inch-thick viewer, showcasing distant stars and nothing else.

  “Everything okay, Brax?” Treena asked him.

  “Sure. Fine.”

  “I have to say, I wasn’t expecting to be sent off on an expedition so soon,” Doctor Nee said. He sat beside Brax, and his slotted yellow eyes darted around in excitement.

  “You don’t have to seem so thrilled to be advancing on an alien ship, Nee,” Brax said with a grin.

  “What joy and luxury will we find at the edges of the Universe? Only the Concord knows.” Nee was quoting an old Academy textbook, one Brax had studied with for his entrance exam.