Free A Planned Improvisation by Jonathan Edward Feinstein Page A

wanted to observe secretly it would have made more sense to leave without setting off a distress beacon.”
    “Unless, they did so by accident,” Marisea added from on board Phoenix Child .
    “That may be what happened,” Park decided. “There must have been a lot of smoke in here when they burned the files and if that didn’t do it, leaving the place open to vacuum would have set off an automated beacon for sure. They may not even have realized they did it if they were in that much of a hurry to get out of here.”
    “They panicked needlessly then,” Iris remarked. “If not for the beacon we would have never known this place was here.”
    “Uh oh!” Tina’s voice sounded over the radio. “Skipper, you all had better get back to the ship. I just detected something breaking out of Other Space and headed this way.”

Eight
     
     
    It may have taken an hour to reach the surface of Proteus, but only a few minutes to scramble back to Phoenix Child and lift off. “What’s on the scope?” Park asked as Tina handled the ship.
    “If the range is right,” Marisea replied, but Park cut her off.
    “Why wouldn’t the range be right?” he demanded.
    “If I’m reading the range correctly,” Marisea began again, “then it is a small ship; maybe half the size the Hudson was, only very dense. I’m worried it might be a missile.”
    “A missile with a star drive?” Park wondered.
    “Why not?” Ronnie shrugged. “We have one on the engineering deck. Targeting across interstellar distances must be a good trick though.”
    “Not if it was sent to destroy this base,” Park replied. “If that’s what it is, let’s see if we can knock it out of the sky.”
    Phoenix Child continued on toward the unknown radar blip for only half an hour until they finally slighted a mostly black, arrowhead-shaped object whose silver edges gleamed in the dim light of the outer solar system. “Not easy to see is it?” Park observed.
    “The instruments are having trouble too. It looks like that object absorbs most of our radar signal,” Iris informed him.
    “Can you get a fix?” Park asked.
    “Of course,” Iris nodded. “We don’t rely on radar alone. Our gunnery computers also use the visible spectrum to sight a target.”
    “Well, keep that, uh, ship, I think, in the crosshairs,” Park advised. “Marisea, hail that ship and order it to identify itself.”
    “Aye aye, skipper!” Marisea replied crisply. Briefly Park wondered at the response. He had never been a stickler for military protocol and the younger Mer had always called him “Park.” Then too many things happened at once.
    As Marisea hailed the other ship it suddenly changed shape, broad silver wings growing out of its matte black body. Shouldn’t need wings in space , Park thought, but then he realized those wings were sprouting weapons as the approaching ship adjusted its course to head directly toward Phoenix Child .
    “Dannet, Sartena,” Park asked tensely. “What is that?”
    “Never seen anything like it, Park,” Sartena replied.
    “I’ve never even heard of anything like that,” Dannet added.
    “Scanning,” Ronnie reported from the lower deck. “Park, I could swear that ship is alive. I’ve getting heat signatures that could be blood vessels in those wings, but they are definitely metallic. Park! They’re powering up their weapons!”
    “Iris,” Park ordered his wife, “Fire at will!”
    Iris had already locked in her target, but before she could do anything else, the other ship shot first. A bright orange light glowed at the black tip of the on-coming ship and a dozen wing-mounted weapons fired. The hull of Phoenix Child began to creak as though being torn apart and then the stasis plating activated.
    Park had been in battles with the stasis plating before, but had never grown used to the kaleidoscopic view he was forced to endure as the plating would deactivate for microseconds, testing for safe conditions and then immediately