Far From Home: The Complete Second Series (Far From Home 13-15) (30 page)

"Yes."

"Whoever it is, they are the enemy. The
real
enemy. It strikes me as no surprise that one of my own would desire to see one war roll into another. I myself, for what it's worth, prefer the peace."

"I agree with you," Jessica said.

"We must discover the traitor. Weed him out. It must be someone with power, to have classified it the way he or she has. Whoever is responsible, they have a lot to answer for. I don't care who they are. I'll go after them either way . . . but I need evidence."

"Understood, Admiral."

"I have given everything I have to Doctor Gentry. I should think that by now he is busily poring over it all, looking for the clues."

"I'll check in with him," Jessica said.

"Oh and there is something else to tell you," Grimshaw said. "I am leaving. Within forty-eight hours I will be on a starship out of here. Another assignment apparently. I know it's really to get me out of the way, stop me meddling. Get me away from the rest of you."

"Sir, I'm shocked. I really don't know what to say."

He waved her off. "Bah. There's not really anything
to
say. Just promise me you will follow all leads. Stay the course, Captain. We will find out who is behind all this. And what it all means. I promise."

She stood. Saluted him. Grimshaw saluted back, then walked her to the door.

"They're shipping the replacement in. He'll be here tomorrow so I can show him the ropes. He not only inherits this station, but all areas of my responsibility, including fleet ops. It seems they want my energies elsewhere in the galaxy. Another region, another fleet. I'll be sure to introduce you before I go. This tells me higher powers are involved."

"Who is it? Your replacement, I mean."

"Admiral Kerrick. You heard the name?"

She shook her head. "No. I'm afraid not."

Grimshaw licked his lips. "Well, let's just say he's a little . . .
unpleasant
."

5.

It's all too convenient,
she thought as she strolled along the station promenade watching people come and go.
All of this happens, and now Grimshaw is to be replaced by someone else. Sent off somewhere he can't continue his investigation.

She turned a corner, saw the signposting for docking bays six and seven. She followed it
.
So why did he want me in there? Not just to tell me he was going. It was to make me aware of the task he's assigned Captain Shaw.

Shadow Force.

All commanding officers knew about them, though few had ever seen one of the Shadow Force operatives, nor for that matter been able to confirm their existence as a black ops unit employed by the Terran Defence Force. On the QT.
Hush hush
.

The Admiral wanted me to see the kind of game that's being played here. Sending us to investigate the
Enigma . . . it was all a mistake. We weren't meant to go there. But before whoever is pulling the strings could act, the Defiant had been readied for launch. By then, events were already in motion. So now, this is all damage control. Tighten the operation here, put the Defiant out of action, get Grimshaw out of the picture.

Jessica went right, headed up a long corridor toward docking bay seven.

So where does that leave my crew? All assigned different ships, perhaps? Out of trouble, sent to different corners of the galaxy. What needs to remain buried kept from those with idle hands. Hands that can dig, can unearth, can excavate to find the truth and drag it up from the dirt, dust it off, show it to all.

Now she saw it. A class of ship she'd never seen before. Long but narrow. Almost submarine-like in appearance. A mass of communications arrays poking out at the top, some of them at the front end like whiskers. It was a dull grey colour, no markings whatsoever.

The data panel on the bulkhead outside the airlock didn't list a name. Only a classification that resembled little more than a random scramble of numbers, none of which held a passing resemblance to anything she'd seen before.
As if generated at random by a computer,
she thought.

The airlock was sealed tight. She pressed the comm. button to call through to the inside.

"Captain Jessica King to see . . . Will Ardai, please," she said into the audio pickup. Jessica had hesitated momentarily as she tried to determine Ardai's rank.

Did he even have one?

The airlock clicked open, with no confirmation from the inside to say they'd acknowledged her credentials, or her reasons for being there. She stepped through and heard it lock shut again behind her.

*

It was quiet in there. A compact, claustrophobic corridor ran to the left and right. One way the bow, the other the stern.

"Hello?" Jessica called. It was bright and airy. Systems whirred; the ship's reactor hummed; and there was the general sound of a starship at a standstill. Nothing out of the ordinary.

"Hello?"

Footsteps approached from the right. She waited and saw, with relief, that Will approached. "Sorry, I got caught up. I just had time to hit the access button to let you in," he said apologetically.

Ah,
she thought.
Mystery solved.

"Quiet in here," she said. "The ship's not what I expected."

"She's not much to look at. But trust me, she's just about the best ship out there. Loaded with everything you could think of."

They started to walk in the direction Will had come from.

"It's so small in here," she said, noting the fact they had to walk one behind the other, not side by side as she'd grown accustomed to on the
Defiant
. Not that she was about to complain. It allowed her to see that Ardai had not let himself go in the years since they'd been together. His derriere seemed just as perfectly formed as she'd remembered it. Of course, there was only one way of finding out for sure . . .

"Most of her square footage is assigned to cargo and systems. If you consider her size, she should be able to carry a complement of thirty or forty. But she only holds a crew of eight. And even that's a squeeze. As it is, there's only ever five of us on here at one time," Will explained. He opened a door to the right. It revealed a small, but serviceable, officer's mess. The lights flickered to life as they walked in. "Coffee?" he asked her.

"Oh, yes please," Jessica said. She sat down in one of the available chairs. "This tub reminds me of an old submersible from Earth's history."

"Yeah I've often thought that," Will said. "She's fast, too. Maximum velocity rated at nine Jumpquarts."

Jessica couldn't hide the surprise from her face. "Nine?!"

Ardai laughed as he handed her a steaming cup of coffee. He remained standing, though he leaned back against the counter. His own coffee sat on the side next to him. He looked at her, his smile still there.

"So do I get the grand tour?"

"Sure. Once we've had our coffee. The skipper's still off ship. Probably lost on the promenade somewhere."

Yeah, and I, no doubt, walked straight past him earlier without realising it,
she thought.

"It's like that, is it? Commanding Officer stretching his legs, getting up to mischief?"

Will sipped his coffee. "A tradition I think. Hasn't it always been?"

"I guess," she said. "Anyway, what's this boat called? I noticed a pretty suspicious registry out there."

"Thought you might see that. Regular Joes don't, to be honest. On the most part. When they do, we have to pull out our security clearance to get them to back off."

"How high is your clearance?"

Jessica thought of her own, which allowed her to view anything level six and under.

"Fifteen," Will said.

"Jesus."

He grinned. "It's good to see you, Jess. It's been so long."

"
Too
long," she corrected him.

"Yeah . . ."

"I never thought I'd be sat on a black ops ship, drinking a coffee with Will Ardai," she said, shaking her head.

"That makes two of us," Will said. "I never thought I'd be having a coffee with myself one day, either. But here we are."

Jessica laughed. "Still the same Will. Bad jokes and all."

"You're not the same as I remember you," he said, now serious.

"I'm not?" she asked. She got up, stepped closer to him, put her own cup on the side. "What's changed?"

"You're more serious. Like you've seen stuff. Experienced things. I can spot it a mile off. The years have been eventful for you, haven't they?"

If only you knew, Will. The years have been hard.

"What else?" she asked, moving closer. Will put his cup next to hers. Out of the way. Reading the signs.

"You look different in another way."

"How d'you mean?"

Now it was his turn to move close to her. Their faces were mere inches apart. "You're not a girl anymore. I see a woman. A strong, confident, beautiful woman. More beautiful than ever I remembered her."

His hands went to her hips. He held her there, his mouth so close to her ear his breath tickled as he whispered: "The girl she was pales in comparison . . ."

She responded with a kiss. Deep, passionate. As if the years weren't an empty gulf between them. As if the time that had passed had not done so at all.

They held each other in a tight embrace, and she sighed in his arms. Somehow, it felt like a weight had been lifted from her shoulders. The simple comfort of being in his arms, after so long, had worked its unique and inexplicable magic on her. "Will . . ."

He kissed the top of her head. "By the way, the ship? We call her the
Spectre
."

"
Spectre
as in shadow," she said with a giggle. "Imaginative."

"I originally suggested
Rosalita
, but the skipper wasn't having any of it. Can't imagine why. I love that song . . ."

*

He led her through the ship by the hand. It should have felt awkward. Unreal, perhaps, to have an old flame holding her hand as if they were lovers.

But there it was. It didn't feel strange. His hand, bigger than hers – the skin rough to the touch – didn't feel out of place in hers. It was like a warm glove.

As much as it seemed so natural, it also hadn't left the back of her mind how surprising it was that their passion for one another had returned so quickly.

"Here's the crew's quarters. As you can see, there's barely room for a bunk and some shelves. There's a communal shower and head. It's not ideal, but there it is."

They continued on. She didn't need him to tell her they were headed for the
Spectre
's bridge.

"Go on, have a nose," Will invited her. He stood to one side at the door as she walked in.

A viewscreen extended from one side to the other, a curved sheet of glass. A helm console down the front, a station for weapons and tactical to the left. Sciences and communications on the right. In the centre, the captain's chair.

"Small, but perfectly functional. I take it you have three crew up here, plus the Captain. Two crew in the back, with the engines and reactor."

"Correct. It's pretty simple. She's not a complicated ship, to be honest. The viewscreen is the latest display. A prototype. She's packing weaponry you've never heard of, Jess. I can't even tell you what some of them are, they're so far above your security clearance," he said.

"Wow," she said, impressed. "So even the tech on a classified ship is classified."

"I man the weapons and tactical. We've got a great guy, he's called Kalar. You know, a Xantian. He flies. The advantage to him is that he never sleeps because, you know, the Xantian's . . . well, they just don't. And he has six arms, so controlling the helm is a piece of cake. I don't think the Union has a better pilot," Will said.

"A Xantian pilot. Makes sense," Jessica said.

"Come on, let's get to the engineering room. I want you to see something."

*

It was as small and cramped as the bridge, but she hardly noticed. Jessica's attention was drawn to the furious light emitted by the
Spectre
's reactor core. It sparkled and shimmered, emitting a deep yellow light from the observation windows to either side of it. To the casual observer, the core might have looked like a simple column in the middle of the room but for the pipes leading away from it at the top.
It's the tree that feeds the whole ship,
she thought.

"And this," Will said. He took her to the far end of the room. A unit stood dark against the wall, showed no sign of life at all. But she'd have been surprised if it had. "Know what it is?"

"Is that your Jump drive?"

He nodded.

"Obviously I recognise the tech, but I've never seen one like that. You say she gives you nine Jumpquarts?" Jessica said with a shake of her head.

"Yep. What does the
Defiant
do?"

"I think between four and five, depending."

"So whatever journey you make, we'd do the same in half the time. In fact we could theoretically fly to your destination and back again in the time it took you to get there," he said.

"All right, don't rub it in," she said with a smirk. "I already feel outdated."

"Trust me, every ship in the Union is, compared with some of the stuff we've got on here," he said. "This new tech, some of it you won't start seeing in Union ships for another couple of years."

They left the engineering room. "Where's the other crew? Are you on here by yourself?"

"I'm afraid so," he said. "They like to get out and about when we moor up anywhere. A regular bunch of sightseers, that lot. Roughneck tourists," Will said.

Jessica stopped. "So we're alone?"

"Yeah . . ."

She moved in close. "Then there won't be anyone to see us do this, will there?"

Jessica didn't wait for him to respond. Her mouth once again found his. Her tongue caressed Will's, her hand going to the side of his face. She felt his well-defined jaw, the scratchy day's worth of stubble there. The back of his neck.

He broke it off. Looked deep into her eyes. "Jess, where's this going?"

She didn't have an answer. Instead she searched
his
face for one, but found no solace there. Just a strangely familiar comfort. "I don't know. Why don't we see what happens?" she suggested.

"Yeah. Sounds good to me," he said.

*

He walked her to the airlock and kissed her one last time.

"I really must go," she said. "I need to break some news to my crew."

"What sort of news?"

"The kind they won't want to hear," she said. "Will I see you again?"

"I'd like it if you did," he said.