The Last Days of Lemuria, page 4
part #5 of Perry Rhodan Lemuria Series
"Carry out the repairs on the modulator banks," he ordered. "The work has top priority. Inform me as soon as we're capable of hyperflight again."
The chief engineer seemed to have expected that reply. She nodded with a sigh and broke off the connection.
Bardon turned his head and looked at Palanker. In the murky glow of the emergency lighting, the broad face appeared carved out of gray stone.
"Detection?" he asked.
"Passive detection negative," Palanker said calmly. "No Beast ships in sensor range."
But that didn't mean anything, Bardon told himself gloomily. The Beasts had highly advanced sensory jamming systems that couldn't be penetrated by passive detection. If the Lemurians scanned the interstellar surroundings with their more powerful active sensors, it would leave behind perceptible Hyperdim traces that might attract the enemy.
They were blind and deaf and had to trust their luck.
Bardon leaned back in his command chair and thought about the long road that lay behind them, the difficult and dangerous search for the legacy of the Suen Project and of the half dozen secret research stations that they had tracked down so far. He wondered what had become of Tam Councilor Markam and the scientists of Project Time Machine. Were they actually dead, killed or lost in the chaos of war? Or were they keeping themselves concealed on Torbutan and continuing to work on their research into time?
But if they were still alive, why hadn't they informed the High Tam Councilors of the progress of their work? Why this extreme secrecy? Because they feared the Beasts would follow their trail and destroy the time machine before it could be employed for the salvation of the Great Tamanium and the Lemurian people? Or had they had to struggle—as Bardon had—against the ignorance and lack of imagination of the civil and military leadership, who preferred a mass evacuation to Karahol over an unpredictable experiment with time?
The thought was so seductive ... Transporting a powerful fleet into the past, into the Beasts' early history, and destroying their home planet before their civilization could become a galactic power. Then there would be no more enemy that could threaten the Great Tamanium and drive it to the edge of extinction. The course of history would flow in a different direction.
Jercy and his children would live.
Unease seized Thore Bardon. He leaped up, turned the command over to Palanker, and made the rounds of the ship. Everywhere the work on the repairs was proceeding feverishly, and the crew—although exhausted and showing every sign of the stresses of what they had recently endured—seemed more determined than ever to continue the mission.
Every single one of them knew that they had to succeed, no matter what the cost.
The crew's unshakable determination touched Bardon. He had handpicked the men and women who accompanied him on this mission, and he seemed to have made a good selection. With such a crew he could accomplish miracles. Because they had nothing left to lose, they had everything to gain. New optimism flowed through him as he continued on his way, but the elation faded when he entered the sickbay and saw the injured in the regeneration tanks and the terrible wounds they had suffered.
Wounds inflicted by the Beasts.
Bardon talked with the injured, spoke consoling and encouraging words to them, and saw the pain in their eyes. Their pain had nothing to do with physical agony, but with what the Beasts had taken away from them: their homes, their families, their future.
And he sensed anger.
Helpless and hot, mixed with puzzlement.
This war had raged for nearly a hundred years. In all that time they had never found out why the Beasts had such hatred for them, why they wanted to destroy Lemurian civilization by any means possible. Perhaps it really was only because they wanted to eliminate a competitor for dominance in Apsuhol, as the exopsychologists and the Fleet's strategists said. But Bardon did not believe that. The Galaxy was large. It had enough room, enough worlds that could be settled for two star-faring races. More living space than they could use in many thousands of years.
There had to be something else behind the Beasts' hatred and merciless compulsion for annihilation. There had to be a logical, rational explanation for their behavior.
It's possible we'll learn what it is when we go back into the past, he told himself as he left the sickbay and stepped into the main antigrav shaft that would take him back to the command deck. If we go back into the past, he added.
There was no certainty that a time machine was actually waiting for them on Torbutan. They had only clues, fragmentary pieces of information, vague hints ... and the hope of success.
"No changes," Palanker reported tersely when Bardon entered the control center.
The commander suppressed a relieved sigh. Apparently they had escaped the Beast ships. But he didn't dare surrender to the feeling of false security. The Galaxy was a dangerous place. There was a risk everywhere of stumbling on Beast units that cruised all through the Tamaniums and searched for scattered ships of the Lemurian fleet.
Much could happen by the time they reached the 87th Tamanium. Many things could make their mission a failure.
Bardon let Palanker continue in command and went back to the positronic room where Ruun Lasoth still sat at the computer terminal. He was evaluating the mutilated data files they had salvaged from the Suen Project's secret research station on Zalmut. The scientist's hawk-like face seemed more somber than before.
"I've completely analyzed the Zalmut data," he said, as always without a greeting, and without mentioning the Beasts' attack and the brief semispace phase. "And I have to admit that I'm starting to have some serious doubts about the point of our mission."
Bardon's eyebrows rose in puzzlement. Lasoth had doubts? It didn't fit the man who had been all but obsessed with Project Time Machine and had made this mission possible at all thanks to his connections with the High Tam Councilors and Fleet Command.
"What kind of doubts?" the commander asked.
"If we find the time machine, risk the time mission, and neutralize the danger from the Beasts in the past—shouldn't we be feeling the effects already? Shouldn't the Beasts be long gone?"
It was a rhetorical question and Bardon didn't say anything. He limited himself to just a brief nod that expressed agreement, and sat down at the neighboring terminal.
"The fact that nothing has changed could mean that our mission will be a failure," Lasoth went on in a low voice. "That there isn't a time machine or we won't be able to destroy the Beasts in the past."
Bardon stiffened. "I won't give up," he said tensely. "Not on the basis of some theoretical arguments."
"According to the Zalmut data files, Markam also doubted the point of a time mission," Lasoth said. "Are you familiar with Levian Paronn's theory of multiple worlds?"
"Of course." Bardon shrugged. He had heard of the scientist. Paronn was good, yes, but he was by no means one of the most brilliant representatives of his profession. "If I remember correctly, Paronn thinks that the universe is only a tiny part of an infinitely branched multiverse. Every action, every event leads to the universe splitting—into one world in which the event took place, and one in which it didn't happen."
"Roughly stated but quite accurate," Lasoth said with his usual condescension. "If that theory is correct, it could mean in our case that our planned time mission will also lead to a split in the universe. To a world in which the mission succeeded and to one in which it failed. And we—" he raised his voice for the first time—"live in the branch universe in which the mission will fail. In which the Beasts are still on the rampage."
Bardon said nothing for a while. Lasoth's doubts were contagious, but he couldn't allow himself to be swayed. He thought once more of his wife and his children, of all the dead of Gunrar II, and of all the other victims of the long war. The Great Tamanium lay in ruins, and only he could make the phoenix rise anew from the ashes.
"We knew from the beginning that it wouldn't be easy," he said at length. "We had only the hope of undoing what happened, and we will let that hope lead us onward as well."
"But hope is perhaps too little to guarantee our success," the scientist warned. Sympathy gleamed in his cold, dark eyes. "We should also be prepared for failure."
"Failure is something we can't even consider," Bardon replied abruptly and stood up. "We will succeed because we must succeed."
He had hardly spoken the words when he realized how desperate they sounded. But the mission had been the product of desperation from the start, a last act of defiance against the inevitability of fate. Even if Lasoth calmly expressed his skepticism—Bardon would not be deterred from his goal. Only when they reached Torbutan could they say with any certainty how their plan would turn out.
Until then he would continue as he had, letting nothing and no one stop him.
His com-wristband hummed. It was Palanker.
"We're receiving a distress call, Commander," the First Officer said excitedly. "It's coming from the ZURUGAT, the flagship of the 7th Fleet. Distance just sixty light-years. The ship is disabled and most of the crew are dead."
Bardon swore under his breath.
"The survivors will also die if we don't help them," Palanker added.
Bardon turned away from Lasoth and went back to the control center. Shadne, the communications specialist, looked up from her controls as he came in.
"The distress call is being sent at full strength," she said. "Sooner or later the Beasts will also pick it up. If we don't act quickly ... "
Bardon interrupted the stocky, dark-haired woman with a curt motion of his hand. He was only too well aware of the precarious situation that a disabled ship was in. The Beasts knew no mercy, showed no compassion. He sank into his command chair and activated the video connection with the engine room.
"I was just about to call you, Commander," Guras said as her face appeared in the monitor window in the lower right corner of the main vidscreen. She had shadows under eyes reddened from lack of sleep. "The repairs of the modulator banks have been completed and the storage cells are being charged."
"Excellent work," Bardon told her. "When can we enter semispace phase?"
"The storage cells will reach their minimum charge in ten minutes," the chief engineer replied. "Our range will be limited, however, until they're fully charged."
"How large is our current operational radius?"
"About 100 light-years," she replied.
Bardon breathed a sigh of relief. Enough to pick up the survivors of the ZURUGAT and change position in case the com signal attracted the Beast ships.
"Prepare for semispace phase," he said and broke off the connection. He turned and faced Ronnok, the navigator. The thin, slender man raised his head expectantly. "Set our course for the ZURUGAT," Bardon ordered. "Maximum speed."
"Understood, Commander. Semispace phase commencing in ten minutes."
Bardon leaned back in his chair and listened as Ronnok informed the IBODAN's two sister ships of the planned maneuver and passed on the destination coordinates. He had a queasy feeling in his stomach. The ZURUGAT was a GOLKARTHE-class battleship, a leviathan of space, heavily armed and protected by massive semispace fields. Only the firepower of the Beasts' most powerful units could damage her to the point of being unable to move on her own. If they were still in the vicinity ...
He pressed his lips together. Rushing to the aid of the ZURUGAT was a huge risk, but one they had to take. Officers of the Lemurian Fleet did not abandon their comrades, never, no matter what the circumstances. Even when it delayed their own missions.
There had already been enough deaths.
Every life was worth saving.
Ten minutes later, the IBODAN and her two sister ships entered semispace phase. The shining globe of the blue star disappeared from the main vidscreen and was replaced by the reddish streaks of the intermediate dimension.
Thore Bardon tensed.
There was no turning back now.
5
"Detection!" Palanker exclaimed as the IBODAN and the other two units of the small squadron re-emerged into the normal universe. The red seething of semispace gave way to the blackness of the cosmos and the disc of a star only the size of a coin, stood out from the star-rich background. "Object at 12-Yellow-A, distance twenty light-seconds. Identification running ... Object identified as GOLKARTHE-Class battleship!"
He looked up from the sensor controls and over to Thore Bardon.
"It's the ZURUGAT, Commander. The transponder signals are unmistakable."
"Shadne, make radio contact," Bardon ordered the communications specialist.
The stocky, dark-haired woman obeyed. With a tense voice she spoke into the communications console microphone. "Heavy cruiser IBODAN here. We have come to help you. ZURUGAT, please respond."
They waited but there was no reply. Bardon suppressed a curse. The main vidscreen showed the detection echo representing the ZURUGAT along with identification symbols and a schematic diagram of the star system in which they had materialized. An Apsu-type yellow sun with one hot, airless inner planet and three widely spaced asteroid belts. The ZURUGAT drifted through space near the middle belt and above the ecliptic. There didn't seem to be any other ships in the area.
Palanker confirmed his guess. "Passive detection negative, Commander," he announced. "The system is clean." His voice trembled slightly. "I request permission to employ the active sensors in order to verify the passive detection."
Bardon hesitated. Could they take that risk? Every Beast ship in the interstellar neighborhood would register the stray Hyperdim radiation of the active sensor system and draw the appropriate conclusion. But on the other hand, the ZURUGAT had been broadcasting its hypercom distress call for some time now.
"Permission granted," he said with a nod.
"Commander," Shadne said, "the ZURUGAT is not responding. She is continuing to send the distress call, but that is all."
"Put it on the loudspeaker," Bardon ordered.
Crackling and hissing sounded at once from the control center's hidden loudspeaker fields, accompanied by a distorted woman's voice. " ... ZURUGAT. To all Lemurian units—our ship has been severely damaged by a Beast attack. Sublight and semispace engines have failed, most crewmembers are dead, and the lifeboats have been destroyed. Anyone who is out there and hears us—rescue us. This is the flagship of the 7th Fleet, the battleship ZURUGAT. To all Lemurian units ... "
Bardon gestured for Shadne to terminate the transmission. A recording, he thought. And no one knows how long it has been broadcasting. Perhaps the survivors have all died. Perhaps that's why the ZURUGAT isn't responding to our messages ...
"Active detection complete," Palanker said, tearing him out of his thoughts. "No enemy ships in the system."
That's one bright spot, Bardon thought. He had privately half-expected a trap, but the sensors allayed his fear.
"Active detection of the interstellar vicinity running," his First Office added. "Results negative so far."
But that could change at any second. Bardon knew from painful experience that Beast ships always appeared when one least expected them. And as long as the ZURUGAT was broadcasting its distress call, it could attract the Beasts. They had to silence the transmitter, and fast.
"Still no response from the ZURUGAT," the communications specialist said.
"Bioscan of the ZURUGAT complete," Palanker reported a moment later. "No measurable readings. Energy readings also negative. The ship is a derelict." Sorrow and anger made his voice sound hoarse. "There is no one left alive on board, Commander. I'm sorry."
Bardon shook his head sadly. They had come too late and had pointlessly wasted valuable time. He looked at the main vidscreen, at the point of light representing the wrecked battleship that had become a tomb for countless brave men and women. His hate for the Beasts flared up hotly. He would see to it that the mortal remains of their comrades would not fall into the enemy's hands. If the Beasts detected the explosion, they would assume that the ZURUGAT had blown up as a result of the massive damage.
"Ronnok, bring the IBODAN into point-blank range of the ZURUGAT," he ordered the navigator, who tersely acknowledged his command. "Helot," he then said, turning to the weapons officer, "destroy the wreck with a counterpole salvo." He was silent for a moment. "May the old gods have mercy on their souls," he added softly.
His words were drowned out by the roaring of the impulse engines. The IBODAN and its two sister ships accelerated, heading for the wreck. The remaining distance shrank noticeably and Bardon's subconscious nervousness gradually eased.
"Active detection still negative," Palanker announced, loudly enough to be heard over the engine noise.
"Still no response from the ZURUGAT," the communications officer said.
A few moments later, Ronnok the navigator reported: "We are now in point-blank range."
The loud rumbling of the engines in the equatorial rim abruptly broke off. The IBODAN drifted in free fall towards the wreckage of the flagship of the Seventh Fleet.
"Counterpole cannons loaded and ready to fire." Helot, the weapons officer, lifted her head and looked expectantly at Bardon.
The commander hesitated for a second. In normal circumstances they would have seized the ZURUGAT with their tractor beams and towed it to the nearest spacedock for repairs. Warships were in short supply now. But their mission could not tolerate any further delay. They had to be on their way to the 87th Tamanium where the time machine awaited them. Where they could undo all the horrors and suffering of the nearly century-long war.
"Open fire," he said.
A moment later, a 100-megaton fusion bomb exploded like an expanding ball of light, swallowing the derelict. The sun-hot fire vaporized the Seventh Fleet's proud flagship while individual pieces of the debris were hurled out of the death zone and flew like meteors through interplanetary space.
