Enigma: A Far From Home Novel (2 page)

“I still can’t believe we have Hawk Nowlan aboard,” Greene said. He drained the last of his coffee and set the cup on the table in front of him. “I mean, I used to have that guy’s posters up on my wall as a kid.”

“I know what you mean,” Jessica said, lightening somewhat. “It was a shock to me, too. But you know the orders. It has to remain top secret.”

“How do you even function, knowing all of that went on? And I mean it’s not like it’s an elaborate hoax. We saw the ship they stole get destroyed along with the
Inflictor
. And we have Hawk, of course. Living proof,” Greene said. “I think it’d drive me nuts.”

“It did in the beginning. You know, when we first set out on our new mission. But Grimshaw advised not to think about it too much. Just consider myself lucky to have some forewarning of things and move on.”

“Swogger…” the Commander said. “That was handy, knowing one of our own was about to go nuts.”

“Not nuts, Del,” she corrected him.

Greene laughed. “Okay, okay. Wrong word. But you know what I mean. A little unhinged.”

“
Unhinged.
Yeah. Something like that. All I know is that it saved us from a situation aboard ship. And Lieutenant Dunham’s proven to be a good replacement for him down in munitions,” Jessica said.

“Yeah,” the Commander agreed. He checked the time. “When’s your meeting with the Admiral?”

“Another hour or so. Hence the coffee. I’ll have a quick shower and shoot on over there. I’m sure he’ll want a full debrief on everything we’ve catalogued this past year. There’s a lot of ground to cover.”

That should have been Greene’s cue to leave, but he remained seated.

“Jess…”

“What is it?”

His eyes brimmed with sadness. “You know what day today is, don’t you?”

She shook her head, then realisation dawned. “Yes. I’m afraid I do.”

“A year today. Doesn’t seem possible, does it?”

“No,” she whispered and looked down at the floor.

The Commander now recognised the need to give her some privacy and got up to leave. He walked to the door.

“Del?”

He turned around. “Yeah?”

She smiled. “Thanks. For, well, you know . . .”

“Sure. I know,” he said and left.

Jessica dealt with the coffee things and ran for the shower. Soon she was enveloped by the steaming hot water. It felt good. She managed to wash most of her troubles down the drain.

More or less.

3.

The last time they’d docked at Station 6, the
Defiant
had borne the scars of a battle – the very same battle in which Captain Singh had perished and Jessica had wound up assuming command. And though the
Defiant
was not battered and bruised this time around, she was in need of a general overhaul in places. Her stores were almost depleted, too, despite their reasonable use of the replication technology aboard. Though perfectly edible, the replicated food did have two things against it.

One, it was created by recycling human waste, a fact that a lot of people couldn’t get past. And two, no matter what they did with it, the replicated food always seemed to come out tasteless, bland.

The machines could reproduce a programmed version of a steak from the matter fed into them, but they could not recreate the taste and texture of one. She supposed that on something like a prison barge, such a thing would not be a concern. But on a year-long mission into unexplored territory, being able to feed her people a good meal was important to her.

And there was only so much the Chef could do with the pallid vegetables grown in the hydroponics chambers . . .

Jessica walked through the decontamination jets of the airlock and out to the station side. She spotted groups of
Defiant
crew on their way toward the promenade, and in a way she envied them. What she wouldn’t have given for a drink in Mickey’s right now. But the Admiral was expecting her. She found a half-empty buggy and sat at the front.

The buggy moved, racing along a specially laid track that allowed fast and convenient travel of goods and personnel around the station.

King glanced behind her at the
Defiant
through the view ports. Unlike last time, her ship looked in good shape.

You’ve served us well,
she thought with pride. Something lifted within her chest at the sight of her ship, of the one place they all called home. It was more than simple pride, more like love.

She turned back around, a smile on her face. The buggy sped along the track and Jessica arrived at the centrifuge in no time at all.

4.

Admiral Grimshaw perched himself on the edge of his desk, arms folded.

“We’re just now beginning to compile the masses of data transferred from the
Defiant
‘s memory banks,” she said. “It’s going to take some time to make sense of it all. The stellar cartographers will have a field day going through it all.”

“Well . . .” Jessica said, about to begin recounting their mission.

Grimshaw held up a hand. “If you think you’re here for a debrief, I’m afraid you’re wrong, Captain.”

“Oh,” she said, taken aback. “I just assumed…”

“No. We will go through your log entries, star charts, and data in due course. They’ll be a great asset, not only to the Union, but the many races and worlds that will make use of them. For now it can wait. I’m afraid you’re here for another purpose.”

He got up, walked around the desk and sat in his chair.

“Lights.”

At the simple spoken command the lights dimmed. Admiral Grimshaw activated a holo-projector on his desk. It showed a star system.

“What’s that?” King asked.

“It was, at one time, the Namar system. You’ve heard of them?”

She shook her head.

“It doesn’t matter. They’ve been gone for a thousand years or more. Lost.”

“Lost?” Jessica asked. “I don’t follow.”

As Grimshaw spoke, the display changed to show the different planets of the Namar system. It zoomed in on one in particular, showing brutal landscapes of ruined cities and poisoned seas.

“The Namar were once a powerful civilisation. They’d begun to invade and conquer surrounding star systems when something happened. A great tragedy struck their race and, within a century or two, they destroyed themselves. All trace of them, apart from what you see here . . . completely lost,” Grimshaw said. “We have little to nothing regarding their culture.”

“Wow. So, what does this have to do with me?”

The Admiral smiled. “Always to the point, Captain. That’s why I like you.”

Jessica blushed.

At Grimshaw’s command, the holo-display zoomed back out and shifted to show a planet a little farther out, surrounded by several planetoids. It reminded her of a planet in the Sol system: Jupiter. And the smaller planets in orbit around it were very much like Jupiter’s own Europa and Ganymede.

“Here,” Grimshaw said.

The view crept closer and closer to one of the small planets to show something circling it.

Jessica sat forward. “What is it?”

“Exactly sixty kilometres long, twenty kilometres wide, and in a pitch-perfect orbit,” the Admiral explained. “A featureless black cylinder, the likes of which we have never seen before.”

“Is that my mission?”

He nodded.

“How did you find it?”

“A survey probe passed by that way. Command had it redirected to do a sweep of the Namar system. The probe apparently carried some new kind of visual sensor. That’s what allowed for these immersive holo-maps. It was only when they went through its footage that they saw it, otherwise it might have gone unnoticed forever.”

“So there’s nothing of real interest or value there otherwise,” Jessica said. “Just a bunch of wasted planets.”

Grimshaw nodded in the direction of the giant cylinder circling the planetoid.

“And that,” he said. “Your new assignment will be to investigate it, find out what it is, how it got there, and why.”

“You don’t have any ideas?” she asked him.

The Admiral shook his head. “None. We literally know nothing about it. And seeing as you have a window before your next exploratory mission, I thought it prudent to redirect the
Defiant
and have you investigate. Call it a little diversion.”

Jessica laughed. “Yes sir.”

Grimshaw smiled. But when he looked at the display again, his smile faded. “This thing is an
Enigma
. That’s what we’ve dubbed it. Be careful, Captain. Proceed with caution. There’s an old saying, ‘Know The Ledge.’”

“Strange saying. What does it mean?” King asked with a frown.

The Admiral fixed her with a serious expression. “An old one from Earth. It means know what’s going on around you, and most important…
watch your back
 . . .”

5.

The Admiral poured them each a glass of water. He handed Jessica hers.

“Thanks.”

“How’s your… uh… condition by the way?” he asked her.

“Fine for the moment,” Jessica said. “Doctor Clayton is about to try something new that he thinks will be successful. I’m not worried.”

Grimshaw’s expression remained unchanged. “You must be concerned. There are no masks in this office, Captain. Remember that. And I’ve been around longer than anyone knows. I see a lot.”

She looked down, unable to keep his gaze. “Yes sir.”

“Listen, you know I think a lot of you. Just as much as I thought of Andrew, rest his soul. If there’s anything I can do, just tell me.
Anything
. I’ll do my very best,” Grimshaw said. “I already knew about the medication Clayton’s dabbling in. It was I who approved the payment.”

Jessica looked up. “Thanks, I appreciate it. Don’t worry about my health. Between Doctor Clayton and me, we’ve got it covered. It doesn’t affect my work.”

The Admiral nodded once and sipped his water. “Good.”

“What’s the situation with the Draxx? I heard they gave a total surrender a few days ago? Is that true, or is just the newscasts chattering?” she asked him, eager to move off the subject of her MS.

“It’s all true. For once, the media are right. The Draxx have fully surrendered to us. It’s taken nearly a year to get a complete withdrawal of their forces from Union space. We’re in the process right now of securing their leadership and negotiating the dismantlement of their military. It’s going to be a long process, but the key here is that it’s over,” he said. “Sounds so strange to hear myself say that. ‘The war is over.’ Doesn’t seem quite possible, but there it is.”

“It would’ve made Dad happy.”

Grimshaw smiled. “Yes it would. There are a great many Captains and Admirals who would’ve happily seen the conflict go on forever. But not me. And not Andrew. We always wanted it to end.”

She raised her glass. “Shall we toast, then? How about to peace?”

“Peace.” The Admiral chinked his glass against hers and downed the water. “God I wish that were whiskey… Oh, I nearly forgot. I have taken the liberty of assigning you our resident expert on this kind of phenomena. Doctor Gentry has had a hand in several of these kinds of situations before. He’s an historian at heart, and a bit of a nut if you ask me, but I think he’ll be a great asset to have on the mission. If there’s anyone who can offer an informed opinion on something like the
Enigma,
it’s Doctor Gentry.”

“Okay,” Jessica said. “I’ll have him put up in one of the ambassadorial suites.”

Grimshaw laughed.

“What’s so funny?” she asked him.

“Nothing. You’ll see when you meet him. Trust me, that’s when you’ll understand why I’m laughing.”

The Admiral showed her to the door. “I’ll check in with you in a day or so, let you get stuck in to fixing up the
Defiant
,” he said.

She saluted and he returned the gesture.

“And about Doctor Gentry…” Jessica started to ask, unable to contain her curiosity.

Grimshaw just chuckled. “
Good-bye,
Jessica.”

6.

She wanted to make the most of the journey back to the
Defiant
, so she went on foot. Although it would take a long time to get back to her ship, it felt good to have a little breathing room. Some space in which to think about things.

The Admiral had told her he would authorise any and all repairs and upgrades she wanted done, as long as the
Defiant
was ready to go in a week’s time. Whatever that was out there, Grimshaw wanted the
Defiant
there to claim it first. Not that there was any chance of another species stumbling upon it in the time it would take them to get the
Defiant
shipshape. But you never really knew.

They’d discovered it by chance and there was nothing to say someone else wouldn’t do the same.

The re-supply of ship’s stores would take only a matter of days. The replacement of certain systems, and the renovation of others, a little longer than that. But she was confident the
Defiant
would be ready to go on schedule.

However, that wasn’t what bothered her.

I lied to Del when I said I’d let it go,
she thought.
It bothers me. It scares me that I’ve lived another life. That I’ve died.

She remembered starting the video . . .

“Jess, I know you must be surprised to see me. Believe me, if this were as strange as it was ever going to get, you’d be lucky. I have a lot to tell you, and I’ll be brief as possible. You have an entire galaxy to explore and I don’t want to stop you – us – from living that dream. A dream of a simpler time, an age of peace. When we can revert to being explorers again. See what’s out there…”

The woman on the screen took a deep breath.

“Jessica, there’s only one way to tell you all of this. Some of it will be hard to hear; some of it will confuse you. But you must hear it. So let me start at the beginning…”

And how many times had she watched it? How many times had she listened intently to the words of her doppelganger, digesting every factoid of information?