A Taste Of Despair (The Humal Sequence) Read online

  “Check right back to the start of the database. Whatever this is, it’s been out here a long time, by the looks of it.”

  Michaels nodded and fiddled with his console some more.

  Rames drew a deep breath, visions of two people fused together and frozen in a tube springing unwanted into his head. “Very well. Send the marines in.”

  Grimes nodded and began issuing the order.

  *****

  Major Miko Harvan waited patiently as the lock cycled, allowing the access to the derelict. His armored space-suit was a dull green color, save for a flash of bright yellow where his rank insignia sat on his arm.

  He stood at the front of his seven man squad, as always.

  Lead from the front. His old man had always advised him. The men will respect you for it.

  Miko wasn’t sure about that last bit. But being at the pointy-end was where his natural inclination told him to be. He hefted his standard issue stun pistol as the door began to open. It wasn’t much of a weapon, but for boarding actions it served well, with enough power to take down lightly armored foes, but not able to drill a hole through the hull or damage equipment. Not that lack of atmosphere would bother either him or his men. The suits saw to that. But it was a standard tactical doctrine adopted when man first felt the need to carry firearms of any sort into space. Only a complete idiot would field something capable of causing a hull breach.

  The door slid open rather hesitantly. Miko knew the derelict had very little power at the moment, but the lock mechanism had drawn its power from the Ulysses via the umbilical tunnel they had crossed through.

  Odd. The mechanism is either damaged or very old. He thought.

  Miko stepped through into the ship’s main corridor. The power feed from the Ulysses gave them minimal gravity. Enough to keep them on the floor, but not enough that you’d want to go doing acrobatics in it. To the right, he knew, lay the freighter’s bridge, tiny and cramped, more of a cockpit, really. Lining the corridor in which he stood were the crew quarters, toilet facilities and rec area/galley. To the left was the engine room.

  That was all there was to the main habitation section. The bare minimum.

  Silently, he motioned his men to split up and search the tractor section of the freighter. He could have just told them, via the suit radios, but he liked to practice non-verbal commands. You never knew when it might come in handy.

  In truth, there were too many of them for the cramped ship. As they set about searching, they got in each other’s way, which was not to his liking.

  The larger of the cabins had seen quite a bit of use, much more so than the rest. Likewise the galley was heavily abused, meal-wrappers strewn everywhere. All of it was ancient looking stuff, as if whoever had used it last had not used it for years.

  The search did not take long. It was a small space, after all. No signs of life.

  Miko formally relayed the findings back to the Ulysses. They already knew everything he told them, but it was procedure. They were, no doubt, following every step via video link.

  “Move through and check the cargo modules.” Rames told them over the radio.

  Miko acknowledged the order and gestured to his men. They made their way aft towards the hatch to the cargo spine.

  The artificial gravity in the spine was as weak as it was in the rest of the ship, but the circular corridor which was the spine had gravity plating around its entire circumference, allowing a person to simply walk up the curved sides of the spine and seemingly stand on the ceiling. The reason for this were the three large elevator plates sat at equidistant points around the tunnel circumference. The elevators were designed to take their passengers safely down to the bottom of each cargo module. Up and down, top and bottom, it was all relative in space.

  Miko split his men into two pairs and a group of three, and then joined one of the pairs at random. The elevators operated obediently at their touch and soon the three teams were each heading down to the bottom of a cargo module.

  When the elevator doors opened, Miko and his two companions were surprised by what they saw.

  The module was vast by modern standards. At least one hundred meters long, thirty across and twenty high. It was like a warehouse.

  A warehouse packed with goods. Miko thought.

  Shipping containers, chests and boxes of every conceivable size and shape filled the space almost from roof to ceiling. A catwalk ran around the edge of the module, ten meters up, with a cross-walk reaching from one side of the module to the other every twenty meters along the length of the structure.

  There has to be thousands of tons of goods here. Miko realized in awe. And there are two other modules just like it!

  It was the immediate foreground, though, which caught the attention of the three Marines. The area around the elevator had been turned into a makeshift living area complete with tables, chairs, beds and a kitchen area. Free-standing partitions helped to separate areas and beds and give an illusion of privacy. Judging from the number of beds, at least ten people had made this place a temporary home.

  Had there been stowaways aboard? Miko wondered. Or had the freighter taken on passengers for a little extra money?

  “Spread out.” He told his two men. “Take a look around. See if you can find the people that were here.”

  They nodded and got on with it. He didn’t have to add that they’d likely find corpses. The life support in the module was currently at a minimum. No one could survive in it for long without a suit. Minutes at best. His men weren’t fools.

  The residual gravity was present here, too, making the search that much easier. He noted with amusement what appeared to be a decontamination booth that seemed to have been converted into a shower unit.

  He checked in with the other two teams. They had found similarly full modules, but no trace of passengers or crew so far. There were certainly no signs of makeshift camps in the other two modules.

  Looks like we got the short straw, then. Miko observed as he wandered about the camp.

  There were some personal effects scattered about. Clothes for the most part and here and there an info pad lay where it had been discarded. On the whole, though, the area was devoid of personal touches.

  “Sir! Over here! We’ve found them!”

  Miko checked his HUD, locating the caller’s position, then hurried over.

  This is the bit I wasn’t looking forward to. He reminded himself; visions of bodies smeared like jam filled his mind’s eye.

  The caller was Alvin, young and impressionable, on his first tour about the Ulysses. The Marine was about half-way down on the right-hand side of the cargo module. Here, the makers of the camp had cleared another space.

  In contrast to the sprawling nature of the camp, this area was utilitarian and business-like. Three rows of four cryo-tubes arranged in an area perhaps twenty feet square.

  Miko was no expert, but the tubes looked old to him. Not old as in “been there for years”, but more that they were an old design. Obsolete. Primitive.

  Despite their apparent obsolescence, eleven of the tubes were operational, green lights flickering to show their stable state. The twelfth tube, though, glowed with a baleful red, emergency state.

  “What have we got here.” Miko muttered. Without thinking he moved to join Alvin at the malfunctioning tube.

  “Looks like the power cell on this one was faulty.” Alvin told him. “According to the log, power failed completely about four years ago. The occupant is long dead.”

  Miko glanced at the display panel on the side of the tube. There was power to the electronics, but the screen showed the main chiller cell had drained years before. With no power to keep the body cooled, the flesh had warmed up and simply rotted away inside the tube. It was doubtful the occupant had ever known anything about it.

  “Don’t you dare open that!” Miko warned Alvin. The young Marine had a tendency to meddle. They might be in suits, but he didn’t want to see what was left of the poor soul inside particularly.
He’d not long had breakfast.

  “I won’t.” Alvin agreed.

  Miko scowled inside his helmet. “How come the automated systems didn’t revive the body when the power began to fail? Was the cell failure that fast?”

  Alvin shook his head. “Looks like someone over-rode the safeties. They set a specific time for this guy to reanimate. A time years back, not long after he went into the freezer. But, the cell failed before then. No safeties equals no safety.”

  “Why would anyone do that? That’s crazy.”

  Alvin shrugged. “Civvies. They do dumb-ass shit like that.”

  Miko frowned. The young Marine’s dismissal was too convenient. There had no doubt been a reason why the failed coffin had been set the way it had. But figuring it out was above his pay-grade.

  He called in to the Ulysses and asked for further instructions.

  *****

  On the cutter’s bridge, Rames had followed the Marines progress through the ship and cargo modules. The discovery of the still living bodies complicated his life. A derelict was one thing. A ship with cryo-frozen people on board was a headache. He could see the paperwork mounting up higher with each passing second. Major Harvan was asking for further orders.

  “Grimes! I want Anderton and Fuller suited up and over there asap!”

  The exo nodded and began speaking into his wristcomm. Anderton and Fuller were the cutter’s medical staff. Mostly they dealt with injuries inflicted through clumsiness, but occasionally a boarding action would provide a little excitement for them in the form of bullet wounds or knife cuts. This would be right up their alley.

  “Harvan! I’m sending Anderton and Fuller to you. Get a couple of men to escort them to the capsules. And see if you can get some power on in there. Ulysses can’t sustain this big a power drain for long.”

  The cutter was providing as much power to the big freighter as it could spare through the umbilical. But the freighter was old and tired and sucked greedily at the teat of its smaller companion. The sooner they got the vessels own generators going, the better.

  “Sir! I think I’ve got something. But you’re not going to believe it!” Michaels voice was full of disbelief.

  Rames turned to him. “What is it?”

  Michaels frowned at his display. “I was getting nothing through the ship recognition database, and the ID number on the hull was coming up as unknown, which is weird. But I fed in some of the shipping numbers on the crates the Marines have been passing. I got something.”

  “Well?” Rames demanded. Michaels liked to build up suspense, apparently.

  “It’s a container from a company called TerraPharm Inc. A medical equipment supplier that went out of business nearly thirty years ago. But you know, we are a customs vessel, after all. Our database of lost and stolen merchandise is vast. Turns out this particular shipment was logged as lost over fifty years ago. It’s listed as being bound for the colony on Alpha Centauri.”

  Rames scowled at his second. “Alpha Centauri? That can hardly be called a colony. Must be several million people there.”

  Michaels nodded. “Absolutely! But fifty years ago it was a colony, just a few thousand inhabitants. The major exodus hadn’t started from Earth yet.”

  “Okay. Thanks for the history lesson. But get to the point!”

  “Sure!” Michaels agreed, noticing his Captain’s increasing irritation. “The thing is, the manifest lists the container as lost, along with the transport vessel, the Morebaeus.”

  And there it was. The name that had been prickling at Rames’ brain all along. The Morebaeus!

  Every one of his age had heard the story. The first big freighter from Earth to do a supply run to a fledgling colony. It all came back to Rames now. Childhood history lessons in school. The ship had vanished without trace on its maiden voyage, loaded down with goods for the new colony.

  Why the Hell didn’t I remember that?

  Rames frowned. He wasn’t that old that he could forget something so easily, even if it was a childhood memory.

  Not a memory. He reminded himself. An infatuation.

  As a boy, he had heard the story and become completely obsessed with it. It was all there now. Clear and vivid, every detail. He’d even written an imaginative story explaining what had happened to the crew.

  Aliens and monsters! He thought with a grin. He could even remember all the details of the tale. The characters, the plot, the works.

  “Sir?” Michaels had noticed the distant look on his Captain’s face.

  Rames nodded. “I’m just remembering the stories.”

  “Stories?”

  “About the Morebaeus. How it disappeared. Why? That sort of thing.”

  Michaels frowned. “I’ve never heard of it.”

  It was Rames’ turn to frown. “I know you’re not as old as I am, Michaels, but surely you heard the tales? It was as famous as the Marie Celeste!”

  Michaels shook his head. “Marie Celeste? Some old time Earth ship, right? Nobody aboard. Yeah, I remember that. But this Morebaeus…. This is the first time I’ve heard of it.”

  “You gotta be kidding me? Grimes! Tell this fool about the Morebaeus.”

  Grimes wandered over and looked at his Captain with concern. “I’d love to, but all I can remember is that it was some early ship that vanished without trace.”

  “Sorry Cap. Guess I should’ve paid more attention in school.” Michaels said.

  “Never mind.” Rames muttered. “At least she’s been found now.”

  Grimes pursed his lips. “So what about the people in the cryo-tubes? The crew?”

  Rames shook his head. “Some of them, perhaps. But as I recall, the crew numbered six people. I may be off by a couple, but it sure wasn’t twelve.”

  “Maybe they picked up a few passengers.” Michaels suggested.

  “No,” Rames told him. “There aren’t any passenger berths. Strictly cargo. And a cargo module is no place to spend a hyperspace trip.”

  “Looked like somebody was living there, though.” Grimes stated.

  Rames was silent for a moment. “Well, we won’t find answers yapping about it. We’ll see what Anderton and Fuller make of it all. Maybe we can thaw one of the survivors out and ask him.”

  *****

  Anderton and Fuller reported back to Rames within half an hour.

  “The good news is, apart from the one failed tube, all the others are alive.” Fuller told him. “Bad news is, we don’t have the facilities aboard to revive this many people, let alone the bed space to house them. Recommend you call it in as an emergency and get Tantalus to send out a rescue ship to offload the tubes.”

  “They can be revived better at Tantalus, anyhow.” Anderton added. “These tubes are practically prehistoric. No telling what medical problems may have come up. The logs indicate they’ve been frozen for over five years. That’s a hell of a time to be freeze dried, even in a modern capsule, let alone these dinosaurs.”

  Rames acknowledged their advice. “Good work. Any ideas as to the identities of the people? Any information in the pod logs?”

  Anderton shook his head. “Nothing. The best we can do is transmit their likenesses from our suit-cams and hope something comes up on the databases.”

  “Okay. Get to it with the pictures, then transmit them back to Ulysses. Then get yourselves back here.” Rames told them.

  “Roger that.”

  Rames repeated the order to return to the ship to Miko and his Marines, then sat back in his command chair.

  “Hell of a weird day.” Grimes observed. “A derelict with no database entry that only you’ve ever really heard of. People who can’t all be the crew, frozen for years. All very odd.”

  Rames nodded, turning to his display as a beep signaled the arrival of the sleepers mug-shots from Anderton’s transmission. “It beats me, too. I don’t understand why there’s no record in the database. Who the people are is a mystery. On the other hand, we thought we might have to beat up a few pirates, so a missi
on without any casualties is always a pleasant change.”

  “True,” Grimes smiled. “The quiet ones always make you appreciate….”

  “What the Hell!” Rames’ voice was incredulous. His fingers flicked over the seat-mounted controls for his display panel.

  “Sir!” Grimes asked, startled at the outburst. He looked over his Captain’s shoulder. “What is it?”

  Rames was staring at the image on the display. His fingers flew over the controls. The displayed face, one of the sleepers, sharpened and became more defined.

  “I’ll be damned!” Rames finally said, sitting back and staring at the image.

  “Sir?” Grimes repeated. “You sound as if you know that person?”

  Rames nodded. “I do. I really do! God knows what he’s doing there, though.”

  Grimes thought his Captain sounded confused. “Who is he?”

  Rames chuckled. “The luckiest man I ever came across.”

  Grimes noted the database had already matched the face to census records.

  “James Arthur Hamilton.” Grimes noted. “Is he important?”

  Rames looked at his exo. “Trust me, wherever this guy shows up, there’s always something funny going on.”

  The captain hesitated a moment, then jabbed the comms button. “Harvan! Change of plans. Anderton, I want you to get working on reanimating one of these people. Specifically, this one.” Rames re-transmitted the image of Hamilton back to the medic. “I want him reanimated and in the med-bay able to answer questions asap. Is that clear?”

  Harvan and Anderton acknowledged the order, then Anderton began to add his concerns about the old technology and its reliability.

  Rames rode over him. “I’m not interested in how problematic it is, just get it done. Rames, out.”

  Behind him, Grimes raised an eyebrow. The Captain never ended a conversation with “Rames out” unless he was rattled about something.

  “So, you were about to tell me about this Hamilton fellow?” He prompted.