Impulse: Lightship Chronicles, Book One (Lightship Chronicles, 1, Band 1) - Hardcover

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Dave Bara was born at the dawn of the space age and grew up watching the Gemini and Apollo space programs on television, dreaming of becoming an astronaut one day. This soon led him to an interest in science fiction on TV, in films, and in books. Dave’s writing is influenced by the many classic SF novels he has read over the years from SF authors such as Isaac Asimov, Arthur C. Clarke, and Frank Herbert, among many others.

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DAW TRADEMARK REGISTERED U.S. PAT. AND TM. OFF. AND FOREIGN COUNTRIES—MARCA REGISTRADA HECHO EN U.S.A.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

On Quantar

The long walk down the hallway to my father’s office at the Admiralty had never seemed so endless. The only other time I had been here was three years ago, when I’d been told the news that my older brother Derrick had been killed in action. It was not a pleasant memory.

I pulled myself together one last time, hoping I looked presentable in my Quantar Royal Navy uniform. I hadn’t even taken the time to shave. My father’s message, when it had come, had been short and to the point.

Get here. Now.

I had grabbed my cap and uniform and rushed out of the navy barracks, hoping to catch the 0900 base shuttle across New Brisbane to the Admiralty. I shouldn’t have worried. Outside I found a ground car waiting to take me to a private flyer. From there we had streaked across the New Briz skyline, weaving between the skyscrapers with our emergency flares lit, with me trying to squeeze into my uniform inside the cramped two-seater aircar the whole time.

The call, coming just a day before I was due to be commissioned on Her Majesty’s Spaceship Starbound as the ranking senior lieutenant and chief longscope officer, had me concerned. It couldn’t possibly be good news, and I could only hope that it wasn’t as disastrous as the news of Derrick’s death only three short years ago.

The pair of guards at the door to my father’s office faced me as I approached, ceremonial swords snapping to attention in acknowledgment of my arrival. The guard on the right sheathed his sword and pivoted, opening the door in advance of my entrance, then held it open as I passed through into the office reception area. I nodded to acknowledge the guard as I passed, then headed straight for the desk of Madrey Margretson, my father’s secretary.

Madrey had been in my father’s service for more than a decade, and I’d grown used to her pleasant smile and warm hugs during our infrequent social visits. She stood immediately as I came in, meeting me well in advance of her workstation with a worried look on her face. She waited until the guard had closed the door again before she began speaking, her tone all business.

“There’s something going on, Peter. Something serious,” she said. “Your father’s been in a conference with Admiral Wesley since before 0500. They’ve raised the alert status of both the Royal and the Union Navies in the entire system to maximum readiness.”

“Over what?” I asked.

“I don’t know,” she admitted, practically whispering. “But I do know Starbound’s christening has been canceled and she’s been put on a twenty-four-hour launch clock as of 0800.”

“Is that what this is about?” I wondered aloud. She shook her head.

“I don’t know. My instructions are to see you in immediately upon your arrival. I’m not privy to the rest.” She pulled and tugged at my navy blue uniform, trying to take out the creases, and brushed it with her hands to clear off any lint. She ran a hand through my mussed black hair to smooth it and then took a step back to give me one last look when her office com chimed. “He knows you’re here,” she said. “You’d best go in.” She went around behind her desk and buzzed me in, the massive wooden double doors popping open as I stepped up.

“Be careful, Peter,” she said to me, so quiet I could barely hear her.

“I will,” I replied. Confused and more than a bit nervous at her tone, I stepped through the office doors and into my father’s office.

Grand Admiral Nathan Cochrane of the Quantar Royal Navy sat behind his enormous redwood desk, his back to me as I entered. The face of Vice-Admiral Jonathon Wesley, Supreme Commander of the Unified Space Navy, was projected onto the longwave plasma viewer taking up most of the back wall. From the look of the room behind Wesley he could only be calling from his navy office on High Station Quantar, hanging three hundred miles above us in geosynchronous orbit. Wesley’s gruff voice was magnified by the longwave and tinted with a heavy New Queensland accent. It filled the room as I came in and sat down on a sofa placed against the back wall facing the screen, I hoped out of range of the viewer. I could see my father’s bald head sticking up just over the top of his office chair. From what I could glean they were in deep conversation about some sort of particulars regarding postings.

“. . . and then that should do it, Nathan. How long until you make the announcement?” asked Wesley.

“No point in waiting, Jonathon. I’ll announce it via longwave to the cadet classes at noon,” my father said. Wesley nodded twice, then looked up at me.

Not quite out of range, I thought.

“I see your son has stepped in. Time to get down to business,” Wesley said.

My father swiveled his chair just far enough to catch my eye, then gestured to one of the two chairs facing the front of his desk. I walked over and sat down, fully aware of the fact that I was on duty and my father was my superior officer. I waited for him to speak or react, and started to grow anxious as the silent moments passed. Something was very wrong.

Finally he swiveled around to face me. His desk was by far the largest I had ever seen, and my father was every inch its equal. Wesley’s oversized image peered at me from over my father’s shoulder. I felt like I was in a fishbowl.

My father pulled off his old-fashioned wire-rimmed glasses and rubbed deeply at his eyes. When he pulled his hand away I could see his eyes were puffy, with deep red lines running through the whites. I’d only seen him look this way once before—when my brother had died. He reset the glasses, the silver of the wire offset by the white-tinged hair at his temples. I tried to remember what he had looked like with a full head of hair, but found that I couldn’t summon the memory.

He looked down at his desktop and then up to me.

“As you may have guessed, son, there’s been some news,” he said. I shifted uncomfortably in my chair. My father took in a deep breath, then exhaled.

“There’s no real way to soften this, Peter, so I’ll just come straight out with it. There’s been an attack on one of our Lightships.” I felt a lump forming in the pit of my stomach.

Admiral Wesley cut in at this. “What I’m about to tell you is classified, Lieutenant,” he started, then paused, clearing his throat roughly. “Five days ago, two shuttles from H.M.S. Impulse were on a First Contact mission to the Levant system when they were hit by a rogue hyperdimensional displacement wave that went on to hit Impulse herself. The damage was severe. Nine dead on Impulse, ten on the support shuttle and all twelve on the survey shuttle.” His words struck me like a coil rifle round to the gut. Though Impulse was officially a Union Navy vessel, she was manned almost exclusively by Carinthian Navy personnel. The survey shuttle, however, would have been manned by officers from the Quantar Navy.

“All twelve?” I asked, looking to my father and then back to Wesley. “Our First Contact team?” Wesley nodded, a grim look crossing his face. I swallowed hard. Natalie Decker, my first and only girlfriend, was a member of Impulse’s First Contact team. She’d left only six weeks ago to join the crew of Impulse. But...