No Man's Space 1: Starship Encounter Read online

  Starship Encounter

  Copyright © Nate Duke 2016. All rights reserved.

  Nobody likes engineers. We were social pariahs at school and we’re outcasts in the Navy too.

  I’m James Wood, Lieutenant of Engineers, and nobody takes me seriously.

  The problem? My captain’s dead, and I’ve ended up in charge of a modern ship of the line. I don’t know how command works, I can’t act like an officer, and most my men are twice my size. What? Want me to go back to my engine room and forget about command? Tough luck; I’m not leaving one of the midshipmen in charge.

  I’d expected mutiny and insubordination to be my biggest problems, but we’re under attack, outgunned and outmanned, and there’s no light at the end of the tunnel. We’re stuck in the middle of nowhere with a broken ship and a crew of misfits.

  Hate to say it, but we’re screwed. Is your escape pod ready?

  Contents

  Starship Encounter

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 1

  “Why do I always miss the fun?” Flanagan stared over the engineers’ shoulders and tried to make them hurry up. “There’s a fight out there, guys.”

  I would’ve admired his enthusiasm if he hadn’t repeated himself a dozen times.

  My engineering squad and Flanagan’s watchmen were trapped in the lower deck. Enemy troops had boarded the North Star in the middle of the night, and the Net had stopped working. The radars hadn’t noticed the enemy approaching and the alarms hadn’t sounded. An explosion in the inner core had disabled the vacuum axial elevators, and we’d lost life support. Everyone in the lowest deck was alive, but we knew nothing of the rest of the crew.

  “I should be killing Cassocks,” Flanagan insisted, “not waiting for anyone to open the axial elevators. I could’ve killed a dozen men by now if someone knew what they were doing.” He groaned and knocked on the axial elevator door to emphasize that he wanted to join the battle. “I want to fight and I’m going to fight today. Get me out so I don’t start punching people.”

  The engineers turned pale. Threatening their lives wasn’t going to make them work faster. They weren’t used to being coerced to get things done. And I, as an engineering lieutenant, wasn’t used to leading anyone aside from a team of techies who ate the carrot, cowered in fear before the stick, and hid their heads in the ground whenever they saw a man with twice their muscles.

  What? Did you expect everyone aboard the North Star to be tall, lean, and in perfect shape? You’ve watched too much propaganda, buddy. Sorry to disappoint.

  Unfortunately, I was the highest-ranked officer in the lowest deck, so I was in charge until we regained contact with the rest of the ship.

  Everyone had to place their lives in an engineer’s hands. Poor men.

  “Get it done already, will you?” Flanagan roared and paced behind the men like a trapped lion eager to devour something.

  We were trapped too. With him. He was a corporal, but he’d spent more years in the Navy than the entire engineering squad combined. He was a Navy vet, and he liked action more than anyone.

  Someone had to calm him down. Why didn’t we have any proper officers to keep the men at bay? I would’ve sworn that I’d seen a midshipman running around and giggling only hours before. Those kids were supposed to keep their squads quiet and under control so that the brutes don’t interfere with the intellectual branch of the Navy.

  In case you haven’t noticed, engineers are part of the intellectual branch. Not sure if that speaks well of our beloved employer.

  Huh? Yes, I know Flanagan was making everyone nervous. I was just trying to waste time to avoid facing him. Don’t judge me; his arms are bigger than my legs.

  “Stop complaining, Flanagan.” I didn’t sound convincing at all. I always lose my voice whenever I talk to someone who can rip my head off with his bare hands.

  Flanagan grumbled and leaned his back against the nearest wall, staring sternly in the direction of the men. He was a man of war: impulsive, violent, and eager to fight.

  I wasn’t fond of direct confrontation. Getting someone’s blood splattered over your face as you put a bullet through his heart must be overrated. I’m an engineer: I prefer to hide behind my gadgets and make drones fight for me. I’d rather avoid the fight if I run the risk of getting harmed. Call it cowardice if you like, but I’d rather keep my self-preservation instincts in shape. Impulsive men run risks that don’t lead anywhere.

  Some of my men tried to log into the Net while the others worked on physically getting to the bridge. The enemy had used frequency inhibitors to blind us, and our wired connections had stopped working too. The captain’s last message had warned us that we had hundreds of enemies on board. Most of our lads had been in bed, defenseless, when the enemy had arrived. The Cassocks took no prisoners.

  We wouldn’t know anything until we regained contact with the outside world.

  “We’re in, sir!” One of the hackers waved a tablet in the air and ran to hand it over. They’d bypassed the login screens, and I didn’t want to know how. We were back online and I could read the logs.

  “It’s useless paperwork.” Flanagan walked beside me and peeked over my shoulder to check the latest memos in case he was wrong. “Nobody’s going to post anything while they’re shooting.”

  He was right, but we could read the captain’s order logs. The systems automatically logged official orders and the captain’s movements. It wasn’t wise to head for the bridge if three hundred Cassocks had seized control of the North Star. If we knew what our men had done, we’d be of more help.

  Three frigates had appeared in the middle of the night, but our radars hadn’t noticed them. Hundreds of Cassocks had boarded us and killed our lads before anyone warned them. My men and I had been working on the lower decks, and the explosion in the core had alerted us. The logs showed no trace of the men on watch, no sign of struggles. Just the captain’s desperate words to the commander.

  Captain O’Keeffe had gathered most of his lieutenants on the bridge. They’d tried to keep the North Star afloat and in our hands, but their efforts had been useless. The Cassocks didn’t even use lethal force on our lads; they acted like sadistic kids and saved their new toys to torture and dismember them later on. They liked to hear the officers scream to death. They didn’t care about ransoms.

  In one last act of loyalty to the country and to his men, Captain O’Keeffe had ordered the North Star to release toxic gas through the life support systems. Better dead than in the
hands of Cassocks. He hadn’t warned the crew so that the Cassocks didn’t get any chances either.

  Shit. Everyone was dead.

  Losing life support had saved us.

  Flanagan finished reading after me and gulped loudly. “Congrats for your promotion, sir,” he said. “Don’t expect anyone on the bridge to greet us.”

  Promotion? I couldn’t be an acting captain. I was the only lieutenant in the lower deck, but I wasn’t even a real officer. I was an engineer! How could I be the seniormost survivor?

  Why was I thinking about my rank if my men’s lives were at stake? Everything had happened only minutes before; we could still find survivors. We needed gas masks and we had to get to the bridge before the frigates realized that their men were dead. The North Star was defenseless until we manned her defense systems.

  I ignored Flanagan. I couldn’t act like a captain before even knowing what had happened.

  “Gentlemen.” I stepped forward to talk to the men. “Get your gas masks.” A few of the engineers glanced at me but continued working. None of the others reacted.

  Flanagan observed the men’s reaction and shook his head, disappointed. “This ain’t right,” he murmured. He clapped his hands twice and stepped before the men to get their attention. Nobody hesitated when they listened to him. “Baker, fetch me some gas masks. Minsk, warn everyone else on this deck. We’re walking straight into toxic gas. I catch you without a mask on, I’m beating you to death before you lose your brain to the gas.”

  The men jumped up and ran off to complete their duties. Men didn’t run when I gave orders. Had the threats done the trick, or was it because Flanagan was twice my size?

  Flanagan returned to me. “Can’t let the men think you’re soft, sir,” he said. “The lads need a loud voice and a threat or two. They ain’t no engineers.” His eyes moved to Baker, who was struggling to put on a mask he’d fetched from one of the arsenals. “Baker! Stop wasting time and dodging work. I have an eye on you!”

  The man put his mask on almost instantly and hurried back to help with the door. Flanagan faced me again with a weathered self-satisfied smile. He was old, and his gray hair gave him extra credibility with the men. He had signs of the pox on his right cheek when he talked, and his cheeks wrinkled around them. I hadn’t noticed it sooner.

  Flanagan was rough and imposing, the kind of man that you didn’t want to encounter in a dark alley. In the Navy, though, he was the image of experience and authority. The men squared up before him and listened. The men would never respect me like they respected him.

  “Want to borrow my baton, sir?” He brought his hand to his hip, where his electric baton hung from his belt. “Nothing more persuasive than a good zap.”

  Corporals carried batons instead of officers’ swords. A baton was less lethal and more intimidating to the crew. Nobody was going to slash a man’s chest open in a fit of anger, but a zap from the baton kept everyone in their places.

  Threatening the crew with physical violence? I’d seen officers resort to it, and it wasn’t pretty. Treating the men like animals makes them retort and bite back like animals. I’d rather treat them like people. Keeps the men happier and the officers safer.

  Know what? I’d never given orders to anyone but my engineers. The three-week officers’ boot camp had prepared me for absolutely nothing. But letting one of my officers swing a baton at the men? Not a good idea. I took Flanagan’s baton and placed it neatly on my right hip. I wasn’t going to use it, and neither was he.

  Flanagan tilted his face to complain about the location of the baton: it was impractical unless I carried it on my left hip. He shut up instead of complaining. Old-school crewmen didn’t speak up to officers.

  At least someone considered me a real officer.

  Tiny feet ran towards us from the other side of the deck, and we both turned around.

  Midshipman Gomez appeared with a broad grin on his small face, messy dark hair, and over-alert eyes that looked everywhere around him. He was one of the younger officers, no older than twelve or thirteen, and he still hadn’t grown used to naval discipline. He stared excitedly at the metallic walls, floors and ceilings, the emergency lights along the corridors, and the men working on the axial elevators. Brown marks stained the corners of his lips and part of his cheeks.

  Damn him. He’d assaulted the pantry again, and he didn’t even bother to hide it. How did Captain O’Keeffe handle the kids? They were always running around, breaking rules, and making noise. They should’ve been banned from boarding starships.

  Gomez wore the officers’ navy blue double-breasted jacket with white cuffs and collar to mark him as one of the junior officers. Midshipmen earned blue stripes around their cuffs as they progressed through the ranks, and they needed three stripes to sit their lieutenant’s examination. This boy was green and young. He wasn’t going to be of much help.

  Gomez squared before me and gave me an army-like salute. “Midshipman Gomez reporting for duty, Mr. Wood, sir,” he said.

  I waved back with two fingers.

  Isn’t the salute good enough for you? Tough luck. I was an engineer, and I was busy trying to get out of the lowest deck. I’m sorry if I don’t waste time with formal silliness.

  I told him everything that had happened, and the kid was overexcited with my explanation. It was his first real fight, but to him, the Navy was about heroism and adventure. He regretted the captain’s actions, but he was eager to fight.

  “That’s awful, sir.” Gomez spoke quickly and didn’t even finish saying one word when he started with the next. “Do you think they’re all dead? Are we on our own against the Cassocks? What can we do to fight them? And what if they come down here before we control the North Star?” He paused to breathe and wiped the chocolate on his mouth with one of his sleeves.

  Flanagan suppressed a grin and turned his back to us to avoid making fun of an officer. Corporals were below midshipmen in both rank and class. A midshipman couldn’t discipline the lower crew, but you never knew how well-connected he was. Flanagan didn’t know if the kid could crush him with his little finger. Engineering lieutenants like me lacked the connections or the social influence, so the crew only worried about immediate consequences.

  “Calm down, Gomez,” I said.

  The lad didn’t calm down. He kept nodding his head at nothing in particular. He was making my engineers nervous.

  Officers send the kids on menial tasks to keep them out of the way.

  “Gather the men and make sure that they’re wearing their masks,” I told him. “And look lively, man!”

  “Aye, sir!” Gomez ran off, laughing excitedly and hopefully burning the excess sugar in his system.

  Perhaps being an officer wasn’t too hard. I was getting better, wasn’t I?

  “We’re in, sir!” One of my lads finished opening the hole to the axial elevators.

  The lads had pressurized the axial elevator conducts to climb to the upper decks with ropes and escalating equipment. I put on a harness and got ready for the action. I wouldn’t have risked it if I’d had the choice, but the men expect officers to show courage. This wasn’t a good time to act like a pizza-obsessed engineer who never leaves the couch.

  Whatever awaited us, I’d be the first to face it. If I was lucky, I’d earn the crew’s admiration with my reckless risk. If I wasn’t, I’d encounter several Cassocks and they’d slowly kill me.

  “I’ll go first, lads,” I said, trying to sound as energetic as Flanagan. “Follow me as soon as I’m out.”

  The men didn’t jump up or cheer at me. I got a couple of acknowledgment nods from my own men, but nothing from Flanagan’s squad. They either trusted me enough to go first or they wanted me to die horribly and get rid of me.

  Probably the latter. No crewmen wanted an engineer as their acting captain.

  Chapter 2

  “Why aren’t you wearing your gear, sir?” Flanagan stared around in case I’d gone mad when I’d started stripping out of my protective g
ear.

  No, I hadn’t lost my mind. Yet.

  The first tests had shown a perfectly clean artificial atmosphere. The captain must’ve known that some of us were trapped in the lower decks, and he must’ve set the venting system to filter the air once everyone else had died. I’d taken off my protective gear because it limited my movements and my sight. Have you ever seen an engineer trying to wield a sword? I didn’t need to make my life any harder.

  “Air’s clean,” simply I said. The men would never follow me if I started explaining the science behind everything I did. To them, engineers were like wizards, and nobody wants to get close to someone who can cast a curse upon you.

  “Could’ve told me sooner!” Flanagan pulled off his protective helmet and threw it aside. It landed on one of the dead Cassocks’ stomach. He kept walking towards the bridge as if he hadn’t shown a complete disregard for death. He noticed me staring and shrugged. “What? He won’t complain.”

  The corridors and rooms were plagued with corpses, friend and foe alike. The Cassocks outnumbered us at least three to one, but the captain must’ve faced something worse than a mere boarding. I refused to accept that Captain O’Keeffe had killed his own men without giving them a chance to fight. The Cassocks were dangerous and merciless, but committing suicide before fighting was hardly a captain’s style.

  “You won’t like this, sir.” Flanagan stopped before entering the bridge and let me go in first. “Too messy for my liking. Haven’t brought my boots with me.”

  At least a dozen Cassocks had fallen near the entrance, and another twenty had fallen inside. Captain O’Keeffe and the commander had died defending our last bastion aboard the ship. I couldn’t see the subcommander, but he’d probably died elsewhere. We hadn’t spotted any survivors.

  I knelt beside O’Keeffe and closed his empty blue eyes that stared straight ahead. I placed his hands on his chest to cover the blood and placed his gun in his right hand. His gray hair had stains of blood in it. He’d probably fought until his last breath, even after ordering his men to poison everyone aboard the ship.