Death Haunts the Stars Read online

  Back in the stasis pod compartment, the stasis techs were prepping pods for the three prisoners. The first pod's diagnostic sequence came back clean and its cover opened, ready to receive its occupant. Soon all three pods were ready.

  Bradley stepped to one side of the compartment, pulled out his comm unit, and contacted Captain Rivers; letting him know that they were about to put the prisoners into the stasis pods. Captain Rivers responded and said that he would be there in a few minutes.

  When all three pods were prepared, Dr. Rivers indicated to Bradley that they were ready to put the three prisoners into stasis. Bradley put his comm unit away and signaled his officers to bring Mrs. Delacroix and the Woffords out.

  When the three prisoners arrived, he told them simply, "Captain Rivers will be here momentarily." Several minutes later, the compartment's primary hatch opened and Captain James Rivers entered.

  Rivers walked over and stood in front of the prisoners. "Under my authority as captain of the TCV Conestoga, pursuant to Fleet Regulation 7.7.1 and with the agreement of Colonial Liaison Officer Aleida Van der Zee, you are hereby remanded to stasis until you are returned to Earth and transferred to Colonial Fleet custody. Do you have anything you wish to say?"

  Initially, the man and two women were silent. Suddenly, Dereck Wofford lunged at the captain. "You son of a bitch," the man yelled, "you have no right to do this to us. We shouldn't even be out here in deep space!" Angela Delacroix and Christina Wofford both hissed at him to silence him. Mr. Wofford relaxed and fell silent.

  Captain Rivers stepped closer to stare directly into Wofford's eyes. "Yes, Mr. Wofford, I do have the right...and the responsibility and the authority. And...as for humans being out here in deep space. That is not for you or me to argue. We are, in fact, out here! Mr. Bradley, carry out the sentence!" With that, Captain Rivers spun and marched out of the chamber.

  Commander Bradley stepped forward. "Officers, standby to place the prisoners into the stasis pods. Dr. Rivers, Dr. Cahill...please administer the stasis drugs." Rivers and Cahill stepped forward and touched med-injectors to the prisoners' necks. After a few seconds, Bradley nodded to his security personnel and they lifted the now semi-conscious prisoners into the pods. Once they were in place, the stasis technicians activated the deep stasis sequence for each pod. Moments later all three prisoners were safely in stasis.

  **********

  The door chime broke James' concentration. "Come on in!" he called out. The door slid open and Mac Bradley entered the captain's ready room. "Mac! Grab a drink and a chair," Rivers said to his old friend.

  Bradley stepped over to the sideboard and poured a cup of coffee then held the carafe towards Rivers. The captain nodded and held out his cup for Bradley to fill. Bradley set the carafe back on the sideboard and sat in a comfortable chair next to Rivers' desk.

  "Well, Skipper, that was something we've seldom had to do on a voyage," said the security chief as he examined a tattoo on his left arm. Rivers recognized that particular tattoo. It represented a trip to the Draco Colony when both men were much younger. A small group of crewmembers had tried to mutiny and take control of the ship. Lieutenant James Rivers and Lieutenant Junior Grade McLelland Bradley played crucial roles in putting down the mutiny, earning the respect of their captain and some major awards and decorations in the process. Bradley lifted his coffee cup in salute. "To those who didn't make it," he said solemnly.

  Rivers raised his cup in return, "To those who didn't make it." Several personnel on board their old ship had been killed during the mutiny. Some of them had been good friends of both Rivers and Bradley.

  "Skipper, what do you think of Wofford's comment before we put him in stasis?" asked Bradley. He took a sip of coffee and waited for Rivers to reply.

  Rivers put his cup on his desk and rose from his chair. He stepped over to a view port and looked at the stars streaking by for several seconds before answering. "He certainly sounded a lot like a member of the Earth Only Movement. I guess we could consider the EOM to be a descendant of the old Environmental Movement back on Earth back in the late 20th and early 21st Centuries. Back then, they felt humanity was destroying the planet through pollution, deforestation, and so forth. So initially, they held protests against those they felt were destroying the environment. Later, unhappy that they weren't having an impact, some of the more militant members of that movement made low-level terror attacks against companies they labeled polluters."

  Bradley nodded his understanding before continuing the captain's train of thought, "And with humanity moving out into deep space, some of them split off into a group who say that humans have no business being out here. We are from Earth and on Earth we should stay; not out contaminating and destroying other worlds. I'm familiar with their basic history and ideologies. But...do you think they somehow got an agent, or agents, aboard the Connie? I mean, could our saboteur be a militant EOM agent?"

  "Could be, Mac!" said Rivers. "What if they are trying to discredit the Colonial Fleet or show how incredibly dangerous it is out here? Or they could be trying to force us to abandon our mission and turn back? Or they may want to put us adrift...or worse?"

  Security Chief Bradley rubbed his 5:00 o'clock shadow while thinking some very dark thoughts before answering. "James, just how fanatical do you think these EOM people might be?"

  "Well, one of them was willing to detonate a bomb aboard a Colonial vessel while its FTL drive was in operation? Think how much damage that could have caused. If the Woffords and the Delacroixs are EOM, they obviously had a falling out resulting in the death of one of their members. Maybe due to jealousy or maybe Jean-Pierre was hoping to break from both EOM and the open marriage lifestyle by taking his wife to another planet? Maybe we should have questioned them more. Then again, maybe not. I'm content that they're in stasis and can't harm us any further."

  Bradley fidgeted in his chair. "But what if they aren't the only EOM members aboard?"

  "Well," Rivers began, "I think you and I need to research whatever we can find out about the Earth Only Movement in the ship's library computer then examine our passenger list carefully to see if there are any potential EOM members amongst them. I'll contact Aleida Van der Zee and let her know that we're going to be accessing the colonists' records."

  "Oh, she'll love us for that!" said Bradley.

  "It can't be helped," responded Rivers. "We gotta do what we gotta do. Our ship, crew, and the rest of the passengers depend on us." Bradley nodded.

  Chapter 8

  Ship's Log

  Terran Colonial Vessel Conestoga

  Earthdate: November 4, 2219

  Captain James B. Rivers, Commanding

  Day: 043

  It's amazing how much data is stored in the Conestoga's computer library system! And on so many esoteric topics! I can understand having some historical data on the Earth Only Movement but Mac and I were totally overwhelmed by the sheer volume of information available on the topic!

  Fortunately, things have been quiet aboard the ship for the last few days as Mac and I started to wade through the info. The EOM have, like their predecessors, eventually moved beyond peaceful protests and tried to sabotage at a number of space training centers, Colonial Recruiting Offices, and even a couple of Earth-to-orbit launches! It's such a shame they can't see that Earth cannot continue to support billions of people. World War IV was bad enough and the Yellowstone Mini-Eruption showed us just how fragile existence was on our homeworld. Still, humans began repopulation with a vengeance, even in the face of limited food supplies and the potential for more natural disasters.

  Humans had to move off of the Earth and not just to the Moon and Mars. We had to reach out to the stars and the development of the FTL drive by Dr. Karl Johanson made it possible. Over the ensuing decades, the Colonial Fleet has discovered new worlds that can help us ensure the continuance of the human race should Mother Earth or other colony worlds become uninhabitable. The Colonial Fleet provides transportation to those new worlds as well
as protection for the colonists.

  I fervently hope we have no more EOM members on board...but I'm not willing to bet anyone's life on it. If they're here, they pose a risk to all of us. We have to stop them before they can...

  "Captain Rivers from Cargo Bay Two! Urgent! Captain Rivers from Cargo Bay Two!" The call interrupted James as he was recording his log entry at the command console. He turned off the recorder and pressed the intercom button. "This is Rivers! What's going on down there?"

  "LT Shelton, Captain!" came the reply. "We have a situation down in Cargo Bay Two. Security has been notified and is responding."

  "What kind of situation, Mike?" Rivers asked.

  Shelton quickly responded to the captain's query. "Sir, Shields and his buddy, Holcroft, have attacked Joe Jenkins again. Only this time, they tried to use a forklift to drop a crate on him!"

  "Is Joe okay, Mike?" asked Rivers rising from his chair on the bridge.

  "He's alive but injured, Captain! He jumped out of the way just in time. In rolling away from the crate, he slammed into a beam and hurt his shoulder."

  "Where are Holcroft and Shields, now?"

  "They retreated back into the cargo stacks bound for Camadin. Security has the bay sealed off but those two could be anywhere back in all those crates and cargo containers, Skipper," Shelton said, anger and frustration evident in his voice.

  "Mike, let Mac and his personnel know that I'm on my way down there," said Rivers as he moved toward the bridge's elevator. Lieutenant Commander Jon Bynes met Rivers at the elevator doors and handed him a freshly charged a comm unit and stunner. Rivers nodded his thanks to Bynes for anticipating that he might want a stunner. Hopefully, I won't have to use it! Rivers thought.

  "Commander Polewytewa, you have the conn!" Rivers called out just before the elevator doors closed.

  "Be careful, sir!" Wynona Polewytewa said, too late for Rivers to hear.

  Moments later, Rivers was met at Cargo Bay Two's main hatch by Commander Mac Bradley and Lieutenant Mike Shelton. The two officers quickly briefed their commanding officer on the situation.

  "They're definitely up in the stacks!" Shelton said. "And they must have some cargo hooks or poles with them. We could hear glass breaking and the lights above the stacks have been going out. They're trying to make it difficult for us to get in there and locate them."

  Bradley quickly outlined a search plan to locate the attackers. Bradley looked at his captain sharply when Rivers drew his stunner and prepared to enter the bay with Bradley and his team. He pulled the captain to one side and spoke softly to him. "James, this isn't one of your old-time Star Voyage episodes where Captain James T. 'Whoever' wades bravely into the fray! Besides, if you get hurt in there, your lovely wife will take it out of my hide...quite possibly with a dull scalpel!"

  Rivers chuckled and smiled at his friend's joke. "That's 'Star Trek' and 'Captain James T. Kirk', ol' buddy. And right now you need every hand you can get! You've got your personnel spread thin throughout the ship watching for potential saboteurs. You've got officers covering every hatch into and out of the bay on this deck and the decks above and below. I'll pair off with you, hang back, and cover your six! We'll use our command implants to communicate where they might hear us."

  Bradley paused for a moment then nodded. Got your 'ears' on, Skipper? Bradley asked through their neuroelectronic implants and command linkage.

  Rivers 'heard' Bradley's words in his mind and replied, Read you five by five, Mac! Let's go!

  Security Chief Bradley signaled his personnel to move into the cargo bay. Working in teams of two, they spread out across the bay before moving towards the stacks of cargo containers, crates, and bales along one end of the bay. The cargo had been loaded into the bay in a predetermined sequence to assist with later removal and transport down to Camadin's surface in an orderly fashion. The stacks were separated by narrow 'corridors' or 'aisles' only a few feet across. As they approached the narrow openings, the security specialists slowed their advance. Some began to climb up ladders attached to floor to ceiling supports to reach the upper levels of the stacks, while others remained on the deck searching the darkness above for signs of anyone who might attack them.

  Bradley and Rivers slowly entered one aisle between two tall cargo stacks, letting their eyes adjust to the darkness. As their vision improved, they picked up the pace and moved deeper into the stacks. They constantly scanned the areas ahead and above on either side.

  They had penetrated about seventy feet into the stacks when they came across sections of cargo containers on either side that stair stepped upwards. Should we climb up? Rivers asked through their command linkage.

  No! We've got people up there in the catwalks and on the containers, James. Let's let them do their job while we work our way to the back wall and clear this aisle. Bradley responded silently.

  As Bradley began to move forward once again, Rivers saw a dark form rise up on one of the shorter cargo containers on the left and swing something at Bradley...a cargo hook! It was a 14-foot long fiberglass handle with a pike-like hook on one end for catching and guiding cargo being hoisted by wire or straps. The edge of the hook struck Bradley's left shoulder with enough force to spin him around and knock him to the floor. Striking the ground caused Bradley to lose consciousness briefly. His stunner fell from his hand and went spinning across the floor into the darkness.

  A second shape rose up, holding another cargo hook like a harpoon. Before the man could throw the hook, Rivers shot him with his stunner. The man dropped the hook then doubled over slowly before falling head first from the crates. Rivers had to jump backwards to avoid being struck by the falling man.

  In that moment, Bradley's assailant jumped down from his perch, using shorter and shorter containers to break his fall. Reaching the deck, the man charged into the darkness deeper in the stacks hoping to find Bradley's stunner. As the man raced past the fallen security chief, Bradley reached up with his right hand and grabbed the man's ankle. With a sharp yank, Bradley managed to trip the man and send him sprawling to the deck!

  Bradley got to his feet and advanced on the fallen thug. In doing so, he positioned himself between Rivers and the culprit, preventing Rivers from covering him with the stunner. As Bradley reached the man, the thug kicked out with one booted foot and connected solidly with Bradley's right knee. This caused Bradley to pitch forward which he turned to his advantage by diving upon the downed assailant.

  The two began to struggle in the darkness. Bradley's left shoulder and arm were numb and virtually useless in the fight. The tight quarters to either side prevented much movement by both fighters. Kneeling above the thug, Bradley drove the elbow of his right arm down onto the man's sternum then brought his right forearm down and forward, striking the man in the face. The man pushed Bradley away and struggled to his feet. Bradley staggered upright continuing to go after the man.

  The thug shoved Bradley backwards, spinning him in the process. Bradley used the energy imparted by the spin to come fully around and drive his right elbow against the man's jaw. The security chief heard a satisfying crunch as the force of his blow broke the man's jaw. All the fight went out of the thug and he collapsed to the deck unconscious.

  Throughout the fight, Captain Rivers had been unable to draw a bead on Bradley's attacker. With that attacker now out of action, Rivers took a moment to check the man he had shot with his stunner. He's dead! Shields! Killed by deceleration trauma, Rivers thought sardonically. One problem taken care of.

  Rivers quickly stepped over to check on Bradley.

  "Here," said Bradley pulling some zip tie cuffs from a trouser pocket. "Put these on 'im!" Rivers passed his stunner to Bradley then took the zip ties and fastened them tightly around Holcroft' wrists and ankles.

  Rivers pull out his comm unit and called the other security personnel then called for a medical team. Kneeling next to Bradley, he helped his friend to a seated position on the deck. "Lean back against this crate, Mac! Medical help is on the wa
y."

  Several security personnel quickly reached their position and checked on their captain and security chief. Two of them walked further down the aisle to try to locate and recover Bradley's missing stunner. Moments later, two medical teams arrived, led by Dr. Charlotte Rivers.

  Two security officers lifted the unconscious form of Crewmember Holcroft and carried him out into the open area of the cargo bay. Captain Rivers carefully helped his friend, Bradley get to his feet and walk out of the aisle to waiting medical assistance.

  "Good job, Mac!" Rivers told Bradley.

  "Yeah," Bradley began, "I did a good job of keeping you safe, getting the crap beat out of me, before taking out just one of the bad guys. Not exactly a smooth operation."

  With the help of two med techs, Rivers lowered Bradley onto a gurney. "Well, it could have been worse," said Rivers.

  "How?" asked Bradley.

  "Well, we both could have gotten our butts kicked and the bad guys could have gotten loose on the ship!" replied Rivers, frustration evident in his voice. "Shields didn't survive the fall after I stunned him and you captured Holcroft. I'm convening a Captain's Mast ASAP and Holcroft will be going into stasis, headed for a trial back on Earth! Shields bought himself a burial in space. End of story!"

  "Damn, you're a tough son of a bitch, James!" Bradley said with a grin.

  "Only when I'm forced to be," Rivers replied with a grin.

  Charlotte Rivers moved closer to examine Bradley's injuries. After a moment, she sighed and said, "Mac, you're getting to be as bad as James! I've given up a very lucrative, private practice back on Earth just so I could enlist in the Colonial Fleet and take care of you two troublemakers."

  "Charlotte," Bradley grimaced through the pain, "you should be thanking me! I got these wounds protecting our boy here!" He nodded toward the captain.