Chapter 11

I checked, rechecked, and double checked my recheck. All the sensors were reading smooth surface. Instead of a smooth surface, however, in front of us was a gaping wound in Aeneas large enough for a Black-Sky class battleship. There were only two in existence and neither one was anywhere near us.

Black-Sky class battleships were massive behemoths. They were blocky and rectangular measuring just over two kilometers in length. They had an almost square front that measured five hundred meters tall by five hundred fifty meters wide. The bottom then stepped a bunch of times to its center and then repeated the steps in reverse to its rear. This meant that at its center, a Black-Sky was just over seven hundred meters tall. Each of those steps was covered in cannons of different kinds and also contained ports leading to flight decks and also worked as docking ports for cruisers and destroyers.

The first Black-Sky I knew of was an Earth based ship named The Zhanshi. It patrolled the entire solar system, but most days it could be found orbiting earth or deep in the Kuiper Belt. The Saturnians had The Stheno, a stripped down version which never left the Saturnian system. It had a lot less firepower but carried two old Echo class exploration craft retro-fitted into destroyers: The Ma’Cho and The Vuk. It also carried a compliment of almost one hundred Razor class fighters.

So the question became: if those two were nowhere near us and never did come anywhere near us, why was there an obviously manmade hole in the side of our moon big enough to fit one?

My sister cleared her throat like she was about to say something. I looked at her, expecting words. Instead she looked back at me and accusingly said, “what?”

”I thought you were going to say something.”

“If I was going to say something, I would have been speaking.”

I clicked on the coms to the back and said, “Senator? We’ve arrived at the coordinates you gave us and we’re holding orbit.”

“Excellent!” he replied. “Please forward any incoming transmissions to me back here.”

“Yes Sir.” I clicked off the coms and turned my chair toward Erika, letting Kappa-One drift. “Why are you mad at me? I didn’t put a big hole in the side of the moon.”

Her head snapped in my direction, taken aback that I had suddenly changed tone and subject. She spun her chair toward me with a greater level of frustration and anger than I was feeling. “Sol! You are the dumbest brother in existence!” Her voice suddenly doubled in volume. “What the gret do you think I’m angry about? I gretting told you not an hour ago!”

“Is that what this is about?!” I matched her volume and anger even though I wasn’t really feeling it. “You tell me you are upset and leave me to stew about it when I have no easy way to respond, like a child, I might add, and now you think you can yell at me about it too?”

Erika turned back toward her displays and punched the external coms button with more force than was certainly necessary. “This is Kappa-One,” Erika said in her professional voice, “carrying Senator James Lacy.”

A deep woman’s voice replied, “Kappa-One, identify personages aboard and the reason you are here immediately. Plasma and missiles are currently locked onto you.” She pronounced it, miss-isles.

Erika muted the mics. “Missiles?” we said in unison mimicking the woman’s pronunciation. They hadn’t been used since the advent of plasma cannons. I quickly checked our sensors which should show a weapons’ lock of any kind, but saw nothing. I shook my head at Erika.

“As stated,” Erika said after un-muting, “we are a Senatorial Protectorate craft carrying Senator James Lacy. He was the one that ordered this boat to these coordinates. If you would like, the Senator is ready for your communication.”

“Very well,” the woman replied and Erika transferred the coms.

Erika snapped off her seat belts and stood. She suddenly towered over me; the volume of her voice matched the height difference. “How dare you?! We discuss everything! Everything! We are brother” –she poked me hard in the chest- “and sister!” she poked herself in the chest just as hard. “But more than that, we are partners! We put our lives on the line every day together! We do it for our jobs, but most importantly we do it to protect a man we both love! Today, instead of discussing things with me, you suddenly discuss it with his Granddaughter, of all people, and make decisions about what to talk to him about without even consulting me first! Then to make matters worse, you bring a couple gretting cadets aboard! What in Sol’s name were you thinking?!”

“I wasn’t,” I said quietly turning back to the controls.

Suddenly derailed, my sister’s accusing gesture fell to her side and her reddening face went slack. “What?”

I reached up and put one finger over her lips and clicked on the coms. “Go ahead, Senator.”

Jim’s cheerful voice came over the speakers. “Thank you, Red. Go ahead Nebula base.”

I mouthed, “Nebula?” to my sister who shared my quizzical look.

The same deep woman’s voice from before replied, “This is Fleet Admiral Utkin,” she said and my jaw hit the floor. I’m fairly certain I felt Erika’s do the same. Admiral Utkin was the head of the Venusian Protectorate, overseeing both the Senatorial and the Governmental Protectorate. There was no one more powerful within the ranks. Furthermore, she only responded to Senators and the Governor, but all final Protectorate decisions were hers and hers alone. “You have the go ahead to dock. We are uploading a trajectory into your NavCom as we speak. Follow this line exactly and at one-eighth thrust.”

“Aye Sir,” I replied and turned off the com.

I took my finger away from Erika’s mouth. “I wasn’t,” I repeated at the same volume as before. “I’m sorry, Erika. The truth of the matter is: questioning the prisoner wasn’t even my idea. Nor was it my idea to bring the cadets along. I’m not trying to pass off the blame, because as soon as Celina suggested we do so I jumped at the chance both times. I was still really angry that our request to be assigned to the case had been denied. I wanted to know what was going on so badly I wasn’t thinking about anything else.” The information needed for our flight path appeared on a display in front of me and I started following it at one-eighth thrust. “After we got the poetic gibberish my brain just started churning, trying to figure it out. You know how smart Celina is, and how curious she is about everything. This was a puzzle for her to figure out and I didn’t mind one bit getting drug right along with her in her frenzy to solve it.”

I looked back into her eyes to emphasize what I was about to say. “I’m really sorry, Erika. I knew better than to tell the Senator anything before talking to you so we can make a coordinated front. I certainly should have after I found out the Celina had already tried to talk to him about it. But that’s not the worst of it. Because what I should have done first thing when I stepped foot on this ship was get a full report from you about what happened when we separated and above all else, made sure you were okay.”

Erika, now completely deflated, sat down on the edge of her seat. “I’m fine,” she said. “Really, I don’t care anything about that. You did ask Jim and me if we were okay.”

“Not the point,” I said. “You’re right, we’re sister and brother and partners too. My first thoughts should have been about your safety. After that was resolved, the safety of the Senator should have been priority. I’m sorry.”

“There’s no reason to apologize for that, Erik. Seriously.” She looked out the window at the hole we were moving toward ever so slowly and then back at me. “I was just upset that you didn’t talk to me about what you found out first. I would have loved to hear that from you. I can’t tell you how great it is to see you excited about something again.”

“Well,” I began slowly, “I apologize for not talking to you first.”

I unbuckled and stood, holding my arms out. Erika stood and we hugged.

“Erika?” I said softly.

“Yeah?”

I gently pushed her back to arm’s length and looked her directly in her eyes. “If you’re upset, talk to me.” She looked away from me. “I love you, sis. More than I’ve ever loved anyone ever, and you should know just how strong of a statement that is. But if you ever sucker-punch me like that again, leaving me to stew in my own thoughts, I’ll hit you for real.”

She smiled devilishly. “We’ll see about that.”

We were both strapping ourselves back in when the doors opened and Celina strolled in. “What the Sol is going on up here?” she said looking out the front screen.

“What do you mean?” Erika asked.

Celina stepped up next to me and put her hand on my shoulder. “You two don’t find it strange that a Fleet Admiral is on the coms?”

Now that she mentioned it, it was awfully strange. It was by no means unheard of; I could think of a few times when our commanding officer had commed us directly instead of going through a coms specialist. My next thought was spoken aloud by my sister as I thought it.

“I would assume this ‘Nebula’ base is a secret base,” she said. “You’d think she would want to keep as much com traffic as possible to a minimum and stay off the coms herself at all costs.”

“Yeah,” I replied a little embarrassed that I was behind her in our identical train of thoughts. Then I froze. Celina noticed it instantly, still holding my shoulder. “What is it?”

Erika looked over at me. “Erik?"

“For the last two days,” I began, “the voice over the coms has been someone I recognized but couldn’t place. I pretty much blew it off because they replace the coms specialist so often it’s impossible to know who you’re talking to. I figured he just had a voice that sounded like someone else I knew. But I think I just figured out who it was.”

When I finished I looked right into Erika’s eyes and saw she had had the exact same experience. I started the words, but she finished them with me. “Rear Admiral Stratten.”

“Wait a minute,” Celina interjected. “Why would a Rear Admiral be on the coms?”

“The same reason a Fleet Admiral would be?” I suggested.

Erika, not to be outdone, gestured out the front screen. “The two of you are missing the most important question in mind. Why is there a gaping hole in our moon?”

“Something tells me none of us are going to like were this is going,” Celina said quietly and squeezed my shoulder.

I didn’t say anything, but I couldn’t help but agree with her.

Next Chapter: Chapter 12