Talisman of Earth Read online

  Talisman of Earth

  By

  Anthony S. Deller

  PROLOGUE

  The ride to the Port Olympus Launchway took only ten minutes on the maglev train. As the train wove through downtown Port Olympus, eleven year old Valia leaned her forehead on the window and scanned the cityscape with her big brown eyes.

  The efficient dome-shaped concrete dwellings and shops were laid out in city “blocks” shaped like ovals, with dark, glistening solar panels covering over half of their surfaces. Interspersed between the buildings were tall, sleek, white wind turbines extending hundreds of feet into the sky. Each windmill had half a dozen large rotor hubs with three wide blades each. Between solar, wind, and geothermal power sources, Port Olympus produced all of the electricity needed to run a city of over 100,000 people. This left their one fusion reactor to power the maglev rain system and the launchway.

  Port Olympus sat at the foot of Mount Olympus Mons, greatest mountain in the Solar System. It was the smallest of four Martian cities. Valia learned all about how Mars was terraformed beginning over two centuries before she was born, transformed from a vast, cold, red desert into a world with an atmosphere humans could breathe. Green plants grew in and around the cities and dozens of smaller settlements. Fusion reactors still had to run atmosphere processors all over the planet to keep the fledgling ecosystem from crashing, but it was estimated that Mars could be as green and wet as Earth within her lifetime.

  She had grown up on Mars, as had all of her friends. This was home. She turned and looked up at her mother, Kina, sitting next to her father. They were holding hands, and Kina was resting her head on Dad’s shoulder. That made Valia smile every time.

  The train came to a smooth, noiseless stop, and Kina took Valia’s hand as everyone disembarked.

  A few minutes later, Valia waved enthusiastically back at her father as he stood in line. The bullet-shaped ship that was about to blast him into space awaited. Valia’s shoulder-length black hair whipped about in the chilly wind of Mars. She didn’t mind the wind; the pretty violet-hued sky filigreed with wispy yellowish clouds more than made up for it. She loved living on Mars, but she definitely wanted to visit Earth one day. Mars had lakes, but the oceans and beaches of Earth looked amazing.

  She smiled as big as she could for her dad as he looked out his little window at her. Valia squeezed her mother Kina’s hand as her sense of pride welled within her. Dad was the second in command of a starship. He was a great father, and one day he might be an admiral and then they would all get to move to Earth. Maybe she could even swim with a dolphin, and talk with them, too.

  CHAPTER ONE

  “Now,” began Captain Lancer, “Who else would like to challenge my authority on this ship?”

  Chief Petty Officer Greg Hu pushed himself up to his knees as he rubbed his jaw and scowled at the rest of the bridge crew. Deputy Commander Gray Rhodes stood behind him, eyes narrowed. He shook his head at Hu, but reached out with his cybernetic left arm to help him up anyway. Hu grabbed the cold metal hand and was pulled to his feet effortlessly by Kenek-designed polymer musculature.

  Rhodes was 6’2”, broad shouldered and fit, with a light coffee complexion, dark mahogany eyes, and the wide nose of his long-ago African ancestry. The XO wore a dark navy blue uniform, like all the officers and enlisted crewmen. Each crew member’s last name was written on their upper left chest, with their rank insignia underneath. Officers of the United Powers Star Navy bore an angular, stylized gold eagle in profile, wings outstretched. Under one wing their rank was represented by a series of platinum stars, one through nine, with nine being a fleet admiral. Under the other wing, the crew member’s specialty was represented graphically: an arrow pointing up for pilots, crossed fists for fighters, a rocket for munitions experts, the traditional caduceus for medics, and so on. Rhodes had six stars and the crossed fists.

  Greg couldn’t bring himself to even glimpse at the poker face the taller man was giving him.

  Hu looked all around. Lt. Sorakith seemed not to notice what had just happened as she sat still and stared at her communications panels, but he knew she didn’t need to use her limpid tangerine eyes to know everything that happened in a room. Her frills, varied shades of late autumn leaves, waved slowly above the bronze-hued skin of her neck.

  Astrogation officer First Lieutenant Carly Ming looked tense as she glared at Hu. Dr. Kyra Weller stood by with a med kit ready, which had seemingly appeared out of nowhere. She rolled her eyes at him.

  The bridge hatch slid open with a whisper of air and Lt. Grekkon Rax stepped in. The huge, olive-tinged saurian crossed his heavily muscled arms in the common Kenek way that implied that one may appear relaxed but was merely reserving energy for a lightning-fast attack that could leave an enemy in a state of needing Dr. Weller’s med kit.

  Hu looked away quickly, and met Commander Rhodes’ gaze. Rhodes said, “You’re going to the brig to cool down, Chief. You may want to apologize now so the Captain can cool down, too.”

  Rhodes had the uncanny ability to make everything he said nail exactly the right target, whether it be logical or emotional, and Hu immediately knew it was over. He looked to his feet, then back up and directly into Captain Lancer’s cyan eyes, as blue as a clear winter sky. Hu saluted, held it, and said, “Captain, I sincerely apologize for insinuating that you are not doing everything you can to get us home.”

  Rhodes cleared his throat. “What about the part where you called her a ‘soulless bit—“

  “That’s enough, Commander,” Lancer interrupted, before looking back to Hu and saying, “Chief, I know that it has been a very long and uncertain four years. We’re all very tired. We’re all done with patching up this gravity matrix, or that quantum regulator, or those Sagan inspirators. This ship has been our home for all that time, and it’s falling apart.” Lancer moved even closer to Hu, and was barely two inches away from him as she continued, “But we are on the way back to Earth. Every second, we’re getting closer. And if we give up scrubbing the air regenerator, even just for a day, we run the risk of never getting back.”

  Lancer swung her gaze to Rhodes, “So, no brig for Mr. Hu. He’s going to be scrubbing the air regenerator for the next two weeks. Is that okay with you, Chief?”

  Hu sighed, and inexplicably felt his eyes moisten as he nodded, “Yes, Captain. Yes.”

  “Go to work. You’re dismissed,” said Lancer as she turned away to review something on her chair’s information panel.

  Hu dodged around Rhodes, avoided Lt. Ming’s withering stare, and squeezed past Rax and through the hatch. Rax smiled, which to a non-Kenek looked like the most threatening expression one could see on the face of a large predator with two overlapping rows of 97 needle-like teeth each. “What are you so happy about, Rax?” Lancer smirked.

  “It is pleasant to see Chief Hu in such a state of embarrassment. You acquit yourself well with such small arms, Captain,” answered Rax. Rhodes couldn’t help but grit his jaw whenever Rax spoke. The big Kenek always sounded as though he was gargling limestone.

  “He wasn’t expecting it. But, thank you, anyway, I guess,” Lancer said. She turned to her helmsman, Lieutenant Lille Altzen, a pretty and athletic blonde with short hair. “Helmsman, how fare the skies?”

  “Faring well, sir,” Altzen replied.

  In its original incarnation, the Talisman was a somewhat simple looking craft, appearing much like one of the nuclear submarines that once trolled the oceans for the navies of the Earth. At its bow and stern were various sensor arrays and a few limited armaments. A constant one G was sustained by a rotating cylinder around the middle of the ship, which surrounded the rec facilities, galley, bridge and crew quarters. Engineering and stowage existed in aft zero G environments.
All was connected via a maze of passageways, ladders, compartments, air circulation pipes, hatches and air locks.

  The refitting of the Talisman encircled the ship with two massive rings, held to the hull with large spars and smaller struts, with the antimatter engine centralized in the main body of the ship. The tremendous power generated from that engine effectively separated the Talisman from space-time and sent it hurtling along at amazing speeds.

  Arno Jecky had been an Ensign when he was first assigned to the Talisman. In the past four years he had been promoted to Lt. Junior Grade and finally to Lieutenant, and had hit the ceiling to promotions during this voyage. Arno specialized in the ship’s weapon systems, which were rather limited, and was also an intelligence expert who had studied Alliance tactics in depth.

  No matter if it took five more years or fifty before they made it back to Earth, Jecky would never be able to rise above his current rank, barring something terrible happening to those above him. He was fine with this, but just like most other people on the ship the situation got to him. Even though they were zooming toward Earth, they were so far away that it could take nearly a century to get back. Most of the crew might be able to live to see Earth again, thanks to the League’s advanced technology, but they would still be very old, and most of their friends and family would probably be gone by the time they docked again.

  Jecky had a temper, and it got him into trouble just a few days before Chief Petty Officer Hu tried to pick a fight with Captain Lancer and lost. Tall and thickly built, with pale skin and short copper-colored hair, Arno could hold his own in a fight, and he knew it. Overconfidence was his one main fault. It was because of this that Jecky found himself kneeling alongside Hu as the two of them sweated buckets working to scrub two miles of air regenerator tubes. They were almost halfway done. With this round.

  “We’re moving along in a warp bubble that’s constantly expanding space-time behind us as it contracts in front of us, powered by 250 pounds of antimatter, at almost 100 times the speed of light, and it doesn’t matter. We’re worthless out here,” Jecky said.

  Hu breathed deeply to help stay calm and said, “I get where you’re coming from. We all feel that way sometimes, and—“

  “No, you don’t,” yelled Jecky as he dropped his molecular brush onto the deck.

  Hu cautiously put a hand on the younger man’s shoulder. “I’m sorry that you just got married before this mission. I’m sorry that we got stuck out here. Most of the crew has people waiting for them, and most of those people think we’re all dead,” Hu picked up the brush and handed it back to Jecky as he continued, “But if there’s one thing we know for sure, the galaxy is not empty. There is a good chance we run into another race that could help us.”

  Jecky grinned, “Coming from the guy who got knocked out by the Captain.”

  “Hey! I did not get knocked out! Who told you that? Who’s saying that?”

  “I swore I wouldn’t tell you, but I think a certain Geneng is just taking advantage of the situation to pull your chain,” said Jecky.

  Hu grunted and shook his head. “Falken. That belcher toad’s ass.”

  Arno laughed, “Don’t go and start something with her, too.”

  “I’d consider it, if we didn’t need the Chief Engineer to keep this rusty bucket afloat.”

  “I sure wish the Hartford had made it through that wormhole with us,” Jecky opined. “Be nice to have a battleship to back us up.”

  Hu said, “We were the back-up, remember? Moderator class ship, packed to the gills with scientists and a handful of real soldiers, and here we are stuck 1000 light years behind enemy lines.”

  “There’s also a good chance we run into Valgons... or Malign... or something new,” Jecky said, as he started scrubbing again.

  Hu chuffed, “If we do, they’ll have to deal with one pissed off crew.”

  CHAPTER TWO

  Deputy Commander Gray Rhodes started awake with a low growl as he sat bolt upright in his bunk. A sheen of perspiration glistened from his face in the darkened cabin. The background noise of the ship was there, as usual, various hums and vibrations falling across most of the spectrum of sound.

  As he stood and unsteadily made his way to the head and filled a cup of water, he went over it again. The nightmare was the same as always.

  He stood on the launchway for the magnetic accelerator flight to the United Powers Earthdock, as he had done a dozen times before, with his wife Kina and 9 year old daughter Valia arm in arm, and the gigantic mass of Mons Olympus with its shining silver manmade Arch of Time in the distance. Kina brushed her long onyx hair from her eyes as the always-cool breeze of Mars blew over them. Tall, thin Valia looked just like her mother, but with larger, darker eyes. She was beautiful, and she would probably end up a foot taller than her father due to the light gravity of the world she was born on. Mars had proven to be a fine home for humankind, after more than a century of terraforming, but if one grew up there one would need to spend nearly a year acclimating to Earthlike gravity before a visit to the human homeworld would be safe.

  Rhodes kissed them each on their foreheads, smiled once again at his perfect family, waved, and boarded a small craft along with twenty other passengers that would be shot out of orbit toward Earth. He looked out of his portal one final time, hoping to catch their gazes, when it happened.

  The Arch collapsed, and Mons Olympus followed. The largest mountain in the Solar System imploded, falling in on itself before finally bulging upward, over thirty miles into the indigo and ochre sky. Rhodes leapt to his feet inside the bullet ship, but the hatch wouldn’t budge. He railed against it with his fists and shoulders and feet. He screamed as Kina ran, pulling Valia with her, into a crowd of panicking well-wishers who had also come to see their loved ones off before they flew away into the endless void.

  Suddenly Rhodes’ entire vision blurred as the craft was magnetically propelled over miles of open plain, and then launched from a long titanium tube where it gathered even more speed. His eyesight returned to normal as his body became used to the steady antigravitational pulse that prevented him and his fellow passengers from becoming so much spaghetti on the walls.

  But he wished he had remained blind, because he would never forget the sight of Mars being blasted by hundreds of planetary crust-breaking seismic warheads. Mushroom clouds of red dust and fire looked like bubbles breaking through the surface of a once-calm purple and gold swirl of sky.

  The Valgon battleships that dropped the bombs stretched from one horizon to the next, a swarm of thousands of gleaming alien alloy vessels. They kept their geosynchronous orbits even as they were set upon by squadrons of elite League and Martian space fighters. Glory’s Path was the nearest League battleship, and it was seventy-five light minutes away. Even if it had been there—- even if the Glory’s Path and five other League battleships had been there—- the attacking Valgon fleet would have wiped them out of existence with a hail of superluminal missiles, lasers, and plasma jets.

  Mars was lost, and so was his family. Rhodes could do nothing but weep as he watched the ruined planet recede further and further. He plummeted onward into darkness of both the real and imagined kinds.

  In the now, Rhodes looked at himself in his bathroom mirror. He hadn’t shaved in four days. He hadn’t seen his wife and his daughter in over four years.

  Reina Lancer found herself wandering the passageways at 2 AM once more. For weeks at a time she would only be able to sleep fitfully at best. Eventually she would make an appointment with Dr. Weller and have her inject a dose of Somnelol, which would put her in good shape for a week. And the cycle would repeat.

  It was never enough that Lancer cared for her crew in ways that few Captains in the United Powers Fleet did. Endless foreboding and longing combined with tedium and anger that went on and on kept everyone aboard the Talisman in a constant state of disrepair. As they continued to fall apart, the ship followed. Everything worsened, day by day.

  Lancer turned the corner
and paced through the hatch into the galley, where she gasped when she saw Lt. Rax lounging across two entire mess hall benches in a corner. He smiled that toothy, frightening smile again, which didn’t help Lancer’s heart rate. “Ahh, Captain,” Rax said, “Would you care to join me for a bit of a snack? I am boiling two rictathid sacs!”

  “No, thank you, Grekkon,” Lancer replied, attempting, and failing, to hide any disgust, “I’m not in the mood for reproductive organs tonight.”

  “Mmm. Well, they help me sleep. My parent forced me to eat them as a young wiggling, and I hated them for the longest time. But I’ve come to find comfort in them again these past years.”

  Lancer nodded, ”I have been sleeping less than I’d like, lately, as well. Do you mind playing a game of chess with me for a bit?”

  “Not at all, Captain,” Rax said as he shifted his huge bulk into a sitting position.

  Lancer sat across from the mess table from the Kenek, whose head towered almost a yard above her even sitting down. She unfolded her personnel tablet onto the space between then, and unfolded it again into a large square mat. “Open Chess. Players Captain Lancer and Lt. Rax,” she spoke. Nearly photorealistic chess pieces blinked into existence on a black and white grid on the tablet: two rows of eight pawns, four rooks, four knights, four bishops, two kings and two queens.

  Rax’s pieces were white, so he moved first. Reaching out with one of his sinewy, grayish-green fingers he nudged the pawn in front of his queen two squares toward Lancer.

  “So. The Queen’s Gambit. Again,” she said wryly as she flipped a lock of cinnamon-red hair that had loosened from her short ponytail.

  “I only open with that when I’m playing against the Queen,” Rax grinned.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Dr. Kyra Weller, Chief Science Officer of the Talisman, was a Jill-of-all-trades. She held PhDs in Quantum Engineering and Astrophysics, as well as in Bioengineering, and was an MD specializing in emergency medicine. Born on the last real Navajo reservation on Earth, to a father who was one-half Navajo and a mother who was one-fourth Navajo, her Native American heritage shown through in her honey brown skin and straight licorice-dark hair that framed her hazel eyes. She looked more like her grandparents than her parents, in that respect. Kyra learned at a young age that one must work hard to achieve what one wanted, and that if one gave up doing so at any point the future was changed unalterably.