Page 111 of Alien Prince's Fake Bride
- Mareliux-
We arrive in Khav space after an agonizingly long time in hyperspace. It’s rare for me to feel anxious, but travelling as fast as possible without any way todosomething frayed my nerves. Umbra is alone on a planet under attack!
I walk restlessly around theGladiux, then spend a long time swordfighting with a training robot. Nothing works. I’m still worried. And in the frenetic attacks and parries with the robot, which is always one step ahead of my skill, I think I can hear Umbra’s voice, calling to me in distress.
When we finally arrive, I’m about ready to attack the Vyrpy fleet with my teeth and nails. But when I see Khav out the main viewscreen in the crowded control room, things are looking better than I feared. There are no Vyrpy ships anywhere, and no distress signals or other indications that things are going wrong here in the very center of the Empire.
Still, the worry doesn’t lessen. Rather the opposite. Something is wrong. I know it. Even the Syntrix feels wrong, dirty andalien.
“Contact traffic control,” I order. “Get a status report for the spacelanes.”
“Khav Control says there’s nothing much happening,” the communications officer says. “Space traffic is restricted because of the warnings about the Vyrpy approaching. We can land anywhere we want without any wait expected.”
Examining the display, I notice there’s barely any space traffic apart from satellites and stations. Only one of the blips looks like a spaceship. Its the one I noticed before when Umbra and I came to Khav. It’s an alien design, a ship either conquered or given to us by some other species. It gives me a strange feeling that something is wrong with it.
“That one,” I mutter absentmindedly. “Why is it still here?”
“That’s theMerxast, sir,” the tactical officer says from his station. “It’s been in that weird orbit for years, just circling pole to pole. I think it’s part of some old emergency system that was never activated.”
“Isn’t it just waiting to be scrapped?” the weapons officer asks. “That’s what I heard. It’s a useless old thing.”
“I think it works as a beacon ship,” the navigation officer suggests. “For smaller spaceships from the outer parts of the Empire when they arrive here. They use the old ways to navigate and like having a beacon to lock onto.”
“I heard it’s a prison,” my executive officer says. “For the very worst and most violent prisoners. It wouldn’t be possible to escape from it.”
I have a strong urge to land at the palace and hurry to see Umbra in that secure apartment. But something about theMerxaststrikes me as wrong. The Syntrix disturbance comes from there, I’m almost sure.
I lean back in my seat. “Let’s find out which it is. Hail them and ask for a status report.”
“Yes, sir.” The comms officer finds a frequency to contact the ship on.
“Is it a Navy ship”? I wonder out loud.
“It will probably only have an AI controlling it,” the nav officer says. “It’s been in the same orbit for so long that it will practically circle in a groove around the planet.”
The more I look at that ship, the more certain I become that there’s something wrong. It’s not logical at all. It’s just a strong feeling that I can’t back up with anything else. But it doesn’t go away. The Syntrix is broken here, and that sensation becomes stronger the closer we get to theMerxast.
“There’s a response, sir,” the comms officer says. “A normal status report, very short. Khav Control says they spoke to theMerxasta few hours ago, just a routine report of its position and status from its AI. Nothing unusual.”
“Do they know why it’s there?” I ask, starting to worry. That ship feels wrong. “Why has it been in orbit for so long?”
“They’re not sure, sir,” the comms officer says after a short conversation with Khav Control. “TheMerxastis listed as an Emperor’s Own Ship. They don’t want to ask it what it’s doing there. I’ll ask theMerxast, sir.”
I frown. “Emperor’s Own? What the Dages is that?”
“Prince, if I may,”Bellatriz says from her scabbard. “An Emperor’s Own Ship is any craft owned by the Emperor himself. Personally, as it were. There have been many Emperor’s Own Ships through the ages. I have travelled on six of them. They are usually very stately and ostentatious, nearly always gifts from another powerful emperor, king, or potentate. Most are useless and are broken up after a couple of years. If an old wreck like theMerxastis still an Emperor’s Own Ship, it must be because of some mistake.”
“It does seem strange,” I agree. “What does the AI say?”
The comms officer turns to me. “Sir, it claims to be in orbit as a defensive battle station. That’s all it will say.”
“Ridiculous,”Bellatriz snorts from my belt. “It looks like a museum piece. Entirely unarmed.”
“Sir,” the comms officer says, “Khav Control has gone through its records of theMerxast. It’s been there for many years, mostly going unnoticed. It’s been visited by small ships a few hundred times in the past three months alone, both coming from Khav and from out of the system. Old records show that Empress Juriniel claimed it as a storage ship for exotic plants. She has apparently visited it many times. The last ship to visit was a Calanian Guard ship coming from Khav just a few hours ago.”
I frown. “Calanians? In that old ship?”
“The Empress? Highly unlikely. That ship is at the center of a big, secret operation of some kind,”Bellatriz says. “If we had other ships around here, I’d advise sending a squad of loyal legionnaires to check. I don’t think the Calanians can be trusted anymore.”
