The Firestorm Conspiracy (9 page)

Rebeccah frowned in consternation when she read the contents of the packet. Tucked in among the various messages from HQ was a short memo addressed to her. Innocuous enough, it appeared to be a simple request for a summary of her current diplomatic assignment. Such requests weren’t uncommon as HQ felt obligated to justify the money spent on equipping ships with diplomatic officers in times of peace, and most were accompanied with an attached form for the officer to complete and return. She opened the memo and bit her lip to keep from gasping.

Instead of the usual directives outlining the procedure for filling in the document, she found an anonymous message that set her pulse racing.

Information exchange: investigate and log all rumors. Attachment should prove ample compensation for your time.

Rebeccah opened the attached file. At almost fifty times the size of the standard form, Rebeccah estimated the document was close to two hundred pages long. She wondered why the sender hadn’t requested an investigation through proper channels. After downloading and decoding the document, Rebeccah wanted to know the identities of every person granted access to her logs. Someone in HQ was playing outside the rules.

Rebeccah stared in amazement at the confidential record of
Fleet Commander
John Thompson. Why would the government want her to read this?

* * * *

“Sir,” the technician at the engineering console said, “there’s a glitch with the quantum field generators in Gen Four.”

Rebeccah looked up from her reading.

“What sort?” asked Forbes.

“I don’t know yet, sir.” He consulted his readout. “The chief engineer says he and his crew are on their way to investigate.”

Cheng jumped out of his chair. “I’ll go give them a hand, sir.”

Rebeccah smiled. Cheng had never been good with sitting still during routine bridge shifts. This was just another excuse to get out from under the captain’s watchful eye.

“All right,” Forbes replied. “But I want a sitrep in five minutes.”

“Aye, sir.” Cheng winked at Rebeccah as he left the bridge. “One situation report coming up!”

Forbes shook his head and returned his attention to the remaining crew on the bridge. After a few moments he said, “Lt. Santiago?”

“Sir?”

“You’ve been bent over your console for almost two hours now. What on Earth is so engrossing?” He grinned. “Don’t tell me you’re analyzing the waste disposal outputs of transport vessels in an attempt to track human smuggling.”

She smiled in return and replied, “Nothing quite so grand, sir. I’m going over the personnel files of the latest crew to board the
Firestorm
. I haven’t had a chance to be as thorough as I’d like.”

“Have you found anything unusual?”

Only if one counted an officer who’d survived imprisonment and torture five times, lost his wife and child in a terrorist raid, witnessed the annihilation of thousands of civilians on various colonies, and was one of a handful of survivors of the battle at the Epsilon Sector as ”unusual.” Aloud she said, “Not a chance, sir. Only the best are chosen to serve on this ship.”

Forbes laughed. “That’s what I want to hear--”

The captain’s internal communications panel beeped. He shrugged at Rebeccah as he opened the channel. “Forbes here.”

“Sir,” Cheng’s disembodied voice echoed across the bridge. “I know you wanted a report, but quite frankly we’re not sure what to make of this.”

“What’s going on?”

“It’s what’s not going on, mixed up with what is going on but shouldn’t be going on, that’s the problem.”

“Commander, you’re not making any sense.”

“Neither is what’s going on with this reactor, sir.”

Rebeccah caught a hint of anger in Cheng’s voice. He prided himself on being brilliant, and anything he didn’t understand rankled. She had to agree though, as far as sitreps went, that one was about as nonsensical as they came.

“Commander--”

“I
think you better check this out, sir.” Cheng paused. “The chief engineer thinks we should shut Gen Four down just to be safe. We can still make our rendezvous running on the others
.
”

“Understood. I’ll be right there. Forbes out.” He rose from his chair and looked at Rebeccah. “Don’t get too sidetracked by those reports. I need you to watch my bridge until Cheng or I return.”

“Aye, sir.” She lowered her gaze back to the file as soon as Forbes disappeared through the aft doors.

Pathetic termites
.

Meredith absently slid the nails of her index fingers between her front teeth as traffic crawled beneath her high-rise windows. The inky shadows pooling in the recesses of her office matched her somber mood. Her gaze flicked toward the desk lamp as she contemplated turning it on before it got too dark
.

She didn’t move.

She continued to sit with her back to the deepening gloom, tapping her foot to the rhythm of her thoughts as she stared at the congestion below. They had no idea, scurrying around, worrying about meals and school and sex and rent. What did it all boil down to? Money. They thought money would make their worries drift away. That fortune brought a carefree lifestyle with no burdens, no responsibilities.

She snorted.

She refused to be the Llewellyn who destroyed the company. Her father’s mocking laughter still haunted her despite his death almost a decade ago. She’d kill herself keeping the business afloat before giving the bastard the satisfaction of seeing her tossed out like slag from the refinery. She out-worked him, out-earned him, shattered every milestone he ever set in the twenty-five years he ran the company; each accomplishment a tiny dagger of revenge against the man she could never please.

Her scowl melted as the last of the light bled from the room. Her obsessive determination to erase all traces of her father’s disdain was something Patrick Brooks understood far too well. Her ex-husband--third ex-husband--was the only man she’d ever met who refused to be cowed by her. They’d come together with the force of two atoms colliding. They’d parted two years later in an explosion of anger, lies, and betrayal. Yet, somehow beyond all reason, they’d remained friends.

Which was why he’d approached her three weeks ago as she exited her mother’s long-term care facility. He followed her into the company shuttle without an invitation and gestured for her to activate the privacy screen between the pilot’s compartment and their own luxurious cabin. After directing the pilot to cancel her earlier plan to return to Llewellyn’s main office, she instructed him to take them on a flight around the countryside.

She settled back in her seat, freshly-pressed orange juice, with a shot of vodka, in hand, and waited for Patrick to speak.

“How’s Diana?”

“Fine.” Her mother had lost all connection with reality years ago. The doctors had yet to determine its cause or cure. Meredith blamed her father and his decades of domineering abuse.

“Is she awake?”

“Yes.” She would slip into a catatonic state for months at a time, lost to the world until, just as suddenly, she’d return with no recollection of ever having been gone.

“I’m glad.”

“She doesn’t understand why she’s in there.”

“I thought she didn’t remember anything from before the first coma.”

“She remembers
him
.” She made no effort to hide her bitterness. Her mother recognized Meredith as the “nice lady who visits on Tuesdays.” The one person who loved her for who she was, who showed her kindness in the face of her father’s contempt, now treated her like a hospital candy striper or charity volunteer.

Silence built steadily around them.

Meredith shoved the melancholy thoughts about her mother away, and turned to the more pressing concern of Llewellyn Industrial’s fiscal solvency. As she sipped her drink, waiting for Patrick’s bomb to drop, Meredith wondered how long she had before she’d have to put the shuttle up for auction.

“I need your help.”

Meredith nodded. She’d do just about anything for him, short of toasting the bride at his next wedding.

“It could save Llewellyn Industrial.”

She hardly dared to breathe.

“I need you to get your workers back on the floor.”

Meredith almost choked on her lungs. “And what the hell do you expect me to pay them with? Magic beans?”

“Your mother still has the proceeds from his will--”

“Have you lost your mind? That money’s the only thing keeping her--”

“You’ll make it back a thousand-fold.”

“It’s not an option.”

Patrick leaned forward and removed the glass from her hand. He wrapped her slender fingers in his cold hands, breaking their long-held taboo on intimate gestures.

“Mere--”

Startled by the contact, but determined not to let it fluster her, she said, “What the hell would possess you to suggest such a thing?”

“I think I just started a war.”

She’d wondered why he wasn’t wearing his uniform. Patrick was a publicity hound. He rarely went anywhere without informing the newsfeeds. If he didn’t make the prime networks at least three times a week he sulked for days.

“You’re joking, right?”

“Mere, I’ve never been more serious in my life.”

“No.”

“Yes.”

“Shit. Do I want to know--”

“No.”

“Shit.”

He smiled weakly. “Yeah.”

“What do you need me to do?”

“I need you to start producing munitions.”

And so she’d done it. Robert still didn’t know where she’d found the money, but he grew more suspicious each day. She wouldn’t be able to keep him in the dark much longer.

She sat in her darkened office, the glow from thousands of lights reflected across her pale skin, wondering if she’d made the right decision. She hadn’t had the courage to visit the hospital since that first meeting with Patrick.

How could she tell her mother she was penniless and was being moved to an overcrowded government shelter for the mentally ill?

Her father’s laughter echoed throughout the room.

A violent explosion rocked the ship. Alarms wailed throughout the corridors and cabins, bouncing off the bulkheads, echoing and reverberating on already stressed ears. Another explosion sent John lurching, and now smoke tickled the back of his nostrils.

The avian cruiser launched a squadron of raptors. The deadly craft buzzed around the wounded warship like hornets at a barbeque. Looking to strike her most sensitive areas, they remained out of the reach of the ship’s cannons. John ordered the flyers scrambled to meet the challenge, but the main hangar had been badly damaged in the initial blast. Even if he could get some out to take on the raptors, he didn’t know how many crafts or pilots he had in serviceable shape. Reports flooded the bridge--along with a stronger tang of ozone--indicating heavy casualties on the lower decks.

He coughed on the smoke. “Get that damn alarm silenced. I know we’ve got problems.” John stood behind his tactical officer and asked, “What have you got for me?”

The man looked up and hacked to clear his lungs. “We’re a sitting duck, sir.”

“That’s not good enough.” John paced the deck. “I’m not going to stand here while this ship gets taken apart by those bloody vultures. Get the thrusters online, and get me some damn flyers out there.”

A grey pall thickened and pooled around them as the crew worked to meet his orders. Choking and holding the sleeve of his shirt over his face, he added, “And get the air filters back online. We won’t have to worry about an avian boarding party; the smoke will kill us first!”

John coughed hard to clear his burning throat.

* * * *

He opened his eyes and found himself staring at the video screen in his cabin. His lungs spasmed again and he realized the avian attack had been a dream, but the smoke and alarms were real.

Boot steps pounded by his door. Muffled voices, filled with stress and fear, carried into his quarters. Despite his heart pounding in his ears, he was able to make out certain phrases: “Captain,” “quantum,” “malfunction,” and “bad.”

Moving on instinct alone, he threw on a shirt, trousers and shoes, and rushed headlong into a living nightmare.

John sprinted down the corridor, following a group of crewmembers heading for the site of the incident. He passed several crewmembers lugging plasma torches and used snippets of their conversation to piece together some of what had occurred. Apparently an explosion had damaged the doors to Gen Four so badly they needed to be cut away.

Word always travels faster than emergency equipment
, John thought as he ran by a medic lugging a portable surgery.

He dropped through the access hatch between decks like the veteran he pretended not to be and almost landed on a young enlisted soldier huddled at the bottom of the ladder.

“Hey,” John yelped. “What are you doing in here?”

The youth looked up, tears lining his smoke streaked face, and began to shake. He trembled so violently the canister he cradled in his arms threatened to fall to the deck at his feet.

“Hey, soldier,” John said, keeping the stress out of his voice, “there’s a lot going on right now. Everyone’s got to do their part.” He gazed pointedly at the canister. “Where are you supposed to be?”

The soldier gulped.

He couldn’t be more than eighteen or nineteen. A baby.

“I, uh…” He shuddered and gasped for air. “I’m supposed to take this to Gen Four, sir.” His hands played across the smooth surface of the fuel canister.

“Well, lad, they’re going to need it if those rumors are even halfway true.”

“But there’s so much smoke.” He sniffed. “How can the
Firestorm
survive damage like that?”

“Are you kidding? The
Firestorm’s
one of the fleet’s finest warships. She’s built to withstand far more than an explosion in a generator room. Just you wait, Captain Forbes will have her fixed and running at one hundred percent in no time.”

“That’s just it, sir,” the boy gulped. “They’re saying the captain’s dead. Him an’ a bunch of the crew.” Fresh tears began to flow. “What are we going to do? We’re in avian territory and we’ve lost our captain.”