“If I go, you’re going to seriously regret it.”

  “Why do you want me, anyway? As far as I know, Star Watch hasn’t dealt with your kind before.”

  “This standoff is preposterous and indecent. You are making me very angry. I have a mind to simply destroy your starship and be done with you.”

  “Soon,” Maddox said, “it won’t make any difference.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “The starship has already begun the self-destruct sequence.”

  “What. No. I don’t believe you.”

  “If you realize the holoimage was that of an Adok, you surely must realize this was an Adok-built vessel.”

  “Of course, I know that. It’s obvious by the ship design.”

  “I thought so. When the holoimage is deactivated as you just did, the self-destruct sequence for the starship automatically activates.”

  “I didn’t know that.”

  “Well, now you do,” Maddox said.

  “This is most unfortunate. I wonder if I have acted hastily. I should kill you now and be done with this. But…you have not seen the last of me, Captain Maddox. I will go for now so you can halt the self-destruct sequence.”

  “For your sake, Grutch, you’d better hope I never see you again.”

  “What a vain creature you are. I wonder why my sponsors desire you alive. It makes no sense to me.”

  “Well, them’s the breaks, Grutch.”

  “Bah!” And with that, the towering mass of pink-gray flesh faded and then disappeared altogether, teleporting, it would seem, from Victory to wherever it had originated.

  -35-

  Maddox wanted to collapse in relief as the bug-eyed monster teleported off the bridge of Victory. Instead, he rushed to Meta, kneeling beside her to make sure she was alive.

  Her chest rose minutely as she breathed shallowly. She was alive.

  Maddox wanted to hug and kiss her, but he recalled that Grutch had said he’d been watching him. Did that mean the monster had been watching the bridge all this time? It certainly could mean that, as the thing had teleported onto the bridge. That would seem to indicate Grutch had a viewing mechanism that allowed it to see where it was going.

  As Maddox went to the next unconscious crewman, he found that he was trembling. If this Grutch could teleport once, he could probably do it again. What had happened to Galyan?

  Maddox shook his head. He’d have to look into that later. Right now…Maddox’s eyes narrowed. This was a mess. How were they going to deal with an alien that could spy on them, trail them and teleport to them at any time?

  Maddox kept his back against a bulkhead as he kept his blaster ready. The only thing that had stopped Grutch was the threat to kill himself. It had been an instinctive reaction. Maddox used a sleeve to wipe sweat from his forehead.

  Once again, the new intuitive sense had come to his rescue. He owed Balron. That was for sure.

  After making certain everyone on the bridge was alive, and leaving his instructions with a wakened Meta, Maddox hurried to the professor’s science chamber.

  The professor was working on a project and was astonished when Maddox told him what had just transpired on the bridge.

  “The creature wanted you specifically?” Ludendorff asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Odd, very odd,” Ludendorff said.

  “We must repair Galyan right away.”

  “That’s right. You said the monster shot the holoimage with a pink ray, and Galyan vanished with a cackle of sound. I’ll need to inspect the main AI housing. That’s the first place to check and likely where to start any repairs.”

  The two hurried for the center of the starship, with Maddox entering the codes at each sealed hatch. Soon, Maddox and Ludendorff, with a small kit in hand, stood in the armored chamber of the AI Deification Center. There, in various computers and AI machines resided the essence of Driving Force Galyan.

  It took the professor a little more than twenty minutes to find the problem: burnt-out circuits in the hologram imager. The pink ray must have used Galyan to overload these circuits, the reason for the crackling or sizzling sounds. Ludendorff replaced the burnt-out circuits with similar but not identical spares.

  “Professor, Captain, it is good to see you are all right,” Galyan said, as he reappeared as a holoimage in the outer AI chamber, looking through the open hatch at them.

  Ludendorff exited the main chamber first, with Maddox locking the armored hatch behind him.

  “Do you remember what happened to you?” Maddox asked.

  “Most definitely,” Galyan said. “I am even now watching the bridge recording of the event. This is quite astonishing.”

  Maddox glanced at the professor.

  “What is it, my boy?”

  “You used the word astonishing earlier,” Maddox told Ludendorff. “I wonder if the word choices between you two indicate anything.”

  “Hmm. I find that doubtful,” Ludendorff said. “Sometimes a coincidence is merely a coincidence.”

  “Pointing the blaster at your head was quick thinking, sir,” Galyan said. “How did you know it would work?”

  Maddox shrugged.

  “But—oh,” Galyan said. “Yes. One thing seems conclusive. This Grutch can observe us from his stealth ship. I suppose you believe he can listen to us as well, and thus you are reluctant to answer.”

  “How did you arrive at your conclusion?” Ludendorff asked.

  “You mean about Grutch?”

  “Yes, yes,” Ludendorff said. “It’s obvious what I mean.”

  “The deduction is elementary,” Galyan said. “Grutch teleported to Victory to kidnap the captain, and he immediately did so when I found evidence of his stealth ship. That suggests Grutch attacked us in order to forestall any action against him we might have attempted.”

  “Say, that’s right,” Maddox said. “We must therefore assume Grutch is listening to us now.”

  “I said as much,” Galyan replied. “But I thought you already knew that, the reason for your shrug earlier.”

  “Astonish…” Ludendorff let the word fade into silence as he stroked his chin. “Yes. Grutch is listening or watching us, or doing both this instant. We must bear that in mind. I don’t recall reading about such a being during my Builder training days. Can you describe him again, Captain?”

  “There is no need,” Galyan said. “Here is a holo-projection of him.”

  In the outer AI chamber, the three examined a bridge recording of Grutch that Galyan brought into view.

  After a few seconds, Ludendorff snapped his fingers. “Now I remember. That’s a Morag.”

  Maddox glanced at the Methuselah Man.

  “In the old days, a Builder lecturer told us about them.” Ludendorff proceeded to explain some of what he recalled about Morags, their similarity to Yon Soths, their mercenary and solitary nature and their highly advanced technological mastery.

  “Why would a Morag want me?” Maddox asked.

  “I should think that obvious,” Ludendorff said. “Grutch is a mercenary, working for someone else.”

  “I would give that odds,” Galyan said.

  “Eh?” asked Ludendorff.

  “That is not the only possibility,” said Galyan. “There is a ninety percent chance he is a mercenary working for someone else. I have given you odds of the possibility.”

  “Oh,” Ludendorff said. “I see what you mean.”

  “It’s time we left,” Maddox said, shooing them out of the outer chamber, and locking the hatch behind him. He led the way down a corridor.

  “My point,” Ludendorff said, as he struggled to keep pace with Maddox, “is that Grutch likely desires to kidnap the captain and hand him over to someone for pay.”

  “Hand over to who?” asked Galyan.

  “I have no idea,” Ludendorff said. “Perhaps the Ardazirhos, or Yon Soths, or New Men, or—”

  “When did New Men learn about Morags?” Maddox asked, interrupting.

  “Spacers,” Galyan said. “That would be more probable than New Men. In their extensive travels, it stands to reason that some Spacers eventually came across Morags or a Morag.”

  “Possibly so,” Ludendorff conceded.

  “It doesn’t matter,” Maddox said. “Grutch isn’t getting me. Now that we know he’s there, we need to find his stealth craft. And once we find it, we need to destroy it.”

  Ludendorff glanced sharply at Maddox.

  “Did you say it that way to scare the Morag?” Galyan asked.

  “Galyan,” Maddox said. “I want you to remember that Grutch may be listening.”

  “I understand,” Galyan said, “hence, the reason for my question.”

  “I’m not sure you do understand,” Maddox said. “Don’t say anything that might aid him against us.”

  “Oh,” Galyan said. “Yes. I understand. We are working under—”

  “Galyan,” Maddox said sharply. “Desist.”

  “Yes, sir,” Galyan said. “I am sorry, sir. I understand your thinking now, or I think I do since your profile shows me—”

  “Stop verbalizing,” Maddox said, interrupting. “That’s an order.”

  The Adok holoimage glanced at him and nodded.

  Maddox strode down the corridor, Ludendorff trotted to keep up with the longer-legged man and the holoimage floated effortlessly beside the captain.

  “We should immediately change course, leave the nebula and take a hyper-spatial tube back to Earth,” Ludendorff said.

  “No,” Maddox said.

  Ludendorff glanced at him.

  “We’re on a mission in the nebula,” Maddox said. “We’re going to perform the mission no matter what. Do I make myself clear?”

  “I understand,” Galyan said.

  “Professor?” asked Maddox with a significant glance.

  “I think I do as well, my boy. Such being the case, I will head elsewhere. Trying to keep up with you is too tiring.”

  Maddox nodded curtly. Then, he and Galyan took a turn in the corridor, heading in a different direction. The captain’s gun-hand kept brushing the holster with the blaster in it. He needed to keep this ready to threaten to shoot himself in case Grutch was thinking of trying again. What would happen, though, if Grutch realized he’d been bluffing?

  Maddox’s eyes narrowed. They needed a solution versus Grutch, and they needed it immediately. But how could they go about acquiring it if the…the Morag watched them all the time?

  It was a conundrum, a puzzle, and one that needed solving pronto.

  -36-

  Grutch seethed inwardly as he floated in his mud bath aboard the scout ship. He couldn’t believe he’d let Maddox outfox him. Aiming the blaster at his head had been a simple but elegant solution. He should have foreseen the clever captain coming up with that.

  There were ways to nullify the effect, of course. One would be to render Maddox unconscious before attempting to kidnap him. Two would be to find a threat that would force Maddox to remain alive of his own volition. Was there a third way?

  At that point, a klaxon blared throughout the small ship.

  Oh dear, that was going to cut his soak short. What was the problem anyway?

  Grutch inflated his mass and shoved up from the bottom of the mud bath. He used the suckers on his tentacles to pull himself onto the landing. Then, using his roller-like locomotion, he moved into his operational chamber.

  There wasn’t a particle of mud on him, all of it having slid from his bulk. He tapped panels, let his eyestalks grow and observed from screen one, from screen two, from screen—

  Grutch made warbling sounds as he detected a ship gliding through the dense gases. The vessel was one-third the size of Victory and came from deeper within the nebula. A quick scan showed Grutch that his sensors couldn’t pierce the craft’s collapsium hull armor. The strange vessel did not have a force field of any kind, just the dense hull armor for protection.

  Wait a minute. There were more vessels, not just the one. Grutch counted four warships altogether, all nearly the same size and all with the extra-dense hull armor.

  Why would the four vessels appear here in the middle of the nebula? Had they detected Victory? Was there a star system nearby?

  Grutch hated the gas cloud, as it severely shortened the range of his sensors. A new thought struck. Could these vessels have received the pulse sent out by the memory-stick satellite?

  He ran more scans on the vessels. While he was unable to penetrate the collapsium hull, he did detect their thrusters—fusion power thrusters; they used fusion power instead of the antimatter drive of Victory or the gravitational propulsion his lovely ship used. That meant in normal acceleration and deceleration, the new ships would be much slower than the modified Adok starship. Their propulsion was more primitive than Victory’s drive. Yet, their hull armor was superior.

  The four ships also had inferior sensor systems. That was clear by the sensors they presently used.

  Grutch leaned back as his eyestalks lowered toward his main bulk. Who crewed the new vessels?

  The failed confrontation against Maddox still rankled. Now, the influx of inferior warships into the mix—

  No. He was Grutch. He was a Morag. Maddox had proven cleverer than expected. That meant new elements into the game would help rather than hinder him, as he could adjust faster than a mere human such as Maddox could.

  He needed to wait, observe, recalibrate, and then act decisively. The only real danger would be the four ships jumping Victory and destroying the vessel, thereby killing his prize and costing him wealth.

  Did Victory’s crew see the four vessels?

  Grutch leaned toward a set of sensors, his eyestalks stretching and his tentacles manipulating holographic controls.

  He spied Captain Maddox sitting in his commander’s chair aboard Victory. The bridge crew were at their stations. A short stout science officer was explaining the situation of the four new ships to Maddox.

  Good, good, the Star Watch people were aware of the new vessels. Ah. The communications officer hailed the ships.

  Grutch grew interested in the response, hoping to catch a glimpse of the crews servicing the four new ships. Therefore, he didn’t pay as close attention to what happened outside his ship as he might have otherwise.

  -37-

  Driving Force Galyan in ghost mode ranged outside Victory as a dim holoimage. He used his supercharged holo-imager, unwittingly employing an advanced feature. In truth, Galyan hadn’t activated the advanced sensor mode. Ludendorff had done so while repairing and refitting the burnt-out circuits with similar but different ones. Galyan had activated them by going into ghost mode and searching manually for Grutch’s stealth ship.

  Galyan had replayed the bridge recording of Grutch’s appearance and threats many times already. He had studied the tele-phenomenon and used everything he had learned throughout the many missions. He now glided through the compacted gases, personally studying the areas where he ranged.

  As Galyan did this, he was fully aware that Captain Maddox was attempting to verbally engage with the four newly arrived, heavily hulled warships.

  Concentrate on your present mission, Galyan told himself.

  Grutch must have followed Victory from the Balder System. That meant—or it most logically meant—Grutch had been with them in the hyper-spatial tube. If that was so, Grutch had been with Victory from Balder to Earth and then from Earth to outside the Glenna Nebula.

  Galyan searched his databanks for anything about Morags. He had nothing except for what Ludendorff had told them. This was a new species, although the Builders had known about them. According to Ludendorff, they were similar to Yon Soths.

  Galyan would have shuddered, but computer-generated beings did not do so. Instead, he focused and ranged as fast as he could from one location to another. He used logic programs, circling the starship at a ten-thousand-kilometer range.

  Soon enough, Galyan concluded that Grutch had heard him tell the captain about the ten-K range. That meant Grutch had likely repositioned his craft. That showed the Morag wasn’t utterly arrogant, as the creature took precautions.

  That was too bad. It would be better…

  Galyan slowed his advance as subtle wave distortions seven thousand kilometers away from Victory drew his attention.

  Could that be Grutch’s stealth ship?

  Galyan paused as he calculated upon the correct course of action. Should he appear back on Victory and convince the captain to launch antimatter torpedoes at the possible stealth ship? The Morag would likely detect that. Grutch might be able to teleport his stealth ship elsewhere, or shoot down missiles. Beams, though—the disrupter ray might be the answer. But that would take time to energize. Presumably, Grutch watched what happened on the starship. If he could teleport his ship or move stealthily elsewhere—

  I must go and look for myself.

  Galyan thus activated another secret Adok-Builder technology, hitherto unused, in the starship. He sped toward the possible stealth ship in ultra-ghost mode.

  In seconds, he reached the targeted area, slowed—as he pierced the cloak, he saw the stealth ship, a teardrop-shaped vessel. The ship was smaller than he would have suspected. Galyan was surprised at the lack of a force field or shield.

  Was that a cause of the compacted gas cloud? It seemed likely, which gave Galyan his edge.

  Yes. This was the moment to take advantage of everything he could. He eased through the special alloy hull. Back in the Crowder System, his old holoimage had been blocked by certain substances. This alloy would have blocked his old self. The new technology he employed…Galyan oozed through the hull and found himself in the corridors of a Morag stealth ship.

  He recorded everything, as the holo-imager linked him to the core of Victory. He spied the Mud Room, the cargo hold with its odd cargos and tiptoed into the control chamber.

  Grutch was a blob of pink-gray mass in the center of the chamber, his tentacles lashing at speed and his eyestalks whipping back and forth. It was both an impressive and disgusting performance. The Morag watched Maddox speak with the Fusion flotilla director.