Meta stepped out of the bedroom, having put on more attire.

  Maddox massaged his forehead. On top of missing the old man, he wondered who would run Star Watch now. How would that affect— Maddox cleared his throat, studying Galyan. “I’ve been woolgathering. This has badly taken me by surprise.”

  “I can see that, sir. It is not like you.”

  “I miss the Lord High Admiral already.”

  “I do too,” Meta said.

  “Yes,” Galyan said. He would like to have said that he missed Admiral Cook as much as they did, but that would not be true. Galyan tried to stick to the truth, at least when he wasn’t trying to follow Captain Maddox’s example of lying while it gave an appropriate advantage to their side, and while on duty.

  Maddox breathed deeply as he sought for the Way of the Pilgrim. For once, he felt at a loss. He breathed again, more deeply, finding some of that calm. He realized Galyan had said something important earlier.

  “You said there were more facts,” Maddox said. “Tell me about them.”

  Galyan proceeded to tell Maddox about the four faint blips that had headed deeper toward the Earth. The blips likely came from a faulty phase unit in a ship.

  “Wait a minute,” Maddox said, “did you analyze these blips, as you are calling them?”

  “Are you all right, sir?”

  “What?” Maddox said.

  “I already told you they were some kind of phase emanation, or from a faulty phase unit.”

  “You’re saying a phase ship entered Earth?”

  Galyan stared at Maddox.

  “Right,” Maddox said. “You did tell me that. I’m woolgathering.”

  Meta stepped closer and put an arm around his back.

  Maddox swallowed. He missed Cook. In a way, Cook had been like a father to him. He’d lost a second father in this. Stunned amazement filled him, and now the stirrings of rage began.

  “I do not know for a fact the blips or pings came from a fault phase unit, sir, but the data would seem to imply it.”

  “Yes…” Maddox said. “And given that the Lord High Admiral is dead through exotic means… Do we have any video how that happened?”

  “We do. Would you like to see it?”

  “This instant,” Maddox said.

  Meta’s arm tightened around his waist. “Are you sure that’s the right thing to do right now?”

  “Yes,” Maddox said, with his voice hardening.

  Galyan looked from one to the other.

  “Do it, Galyan,” Meta said.

  Using a function within Victory, Galyan projected a holoimage before them in the house near Carson City. They saw what the secretary had seen, having a special pair of glasses that had recorded the event. There was no other recording of this. Thus, for those brief seconds, they saw the swirling substance over the Lord High Admiral’s head, which surely had suffocated him, as he died of asphyxiation.

  “What is that?” Maddox asked.

  “I have not been able to ascertain that, nor even the type of energy we are seeing,” Galyan said.

  Maddox nodded. “According to you, there’s likely a phase ship in Earth and we’re witnessing this exotic killing method. I give it a high probability the two are linked.”

  “Is this your intuition speaking, sir?”

  Maddox glanced sharply at Galyan. “It doesn’t have to be my intuition. It seems obvious, doesn’t it?”

  “I analyze things differently from your intuitive sense, sir. But given logic and probabilities, I give the connection a high probability, yes. I would say there is a seventy-eight percent chance the phase ship and exotic killing method is related.”

  “Right,” Maddox said. “Stokes has already started an independent investigation. I don’t think he’s going to be able to run it for long. Chief of Intelligence General Mackinder will likely take over soon. I want you to tell Stokes what you’ve told me. We need to find this as soon as possible.”

  “Do you want me to bypass Star Watch security like that?” Galyan asked.

  Maddox thought a moment. “No. It wouldn’t be good for them to know you can do that so easily. It might put you under suspicion. I’ll call Stokes. He’ll call the starship. Then you can relate what you deem appropriate to him.”

  “Yes, sir,” Galyan said. “May I say, sir, I am sorry for this grievous loss to Star Watch and to you.”

  “Yes, thank you,” Maddox said. “Now let’s get things moving. We don’t know this is the end of it.”

  “Do you think this alien assassin might strike again?” Galyan said.

  Maddox gazed into the distance, trying to use his intuitive sense. “Yes. I think this assassin will. That means we have to find him as fast as we can.”

  -9-

  Brigadier Stokes was an older, sickly man, not much longer destined for this Earth. The doctors had told him he had a degenerative disease. His face had more lines than when he’d been Mary O’Hara’s go-for. For a time, he’d run Star Watch Intelligence. Lately, as in the last few years, General Mackinder had taken Stokes’ place running Intelligence. Stokes had lesser duties these days, and had helped Maddox on his last mission.

  Stokes sat at his desk, coughing and sucking on his latest stimstick. When he was finished, he stubbed out the last of it, picked up another, and inhaled. The stimsticks stimulated his thinking but had been rotting out his lungs over the years.

  Stokes was hard at work, correlating all the information he could about the signatures from a faulty phase device, at least as far as Galyan had been able to determine. If anyone should know about phase mechanics, it would be the permanent fixture, AI entity of Victory. Maddox and his team had dealt with more phase technology than everyone else in Star Watch combined.

  Stokes inhaled deeply of the latest stimstick, held the smoke, and then burst out coughing, spewing the red smoke into the air.

  He was in his office working later than usual. He had been on the horn with the Earth data-net people. They couldn’t find anything odd around or in the planet. They’d searched for cloaked vessels and any phase signatures. They had found nothing, but their instruments weren’t as finely tuned to such things as those on Victory were.

  Stokes picked up a tablet and stared at the still shot of the patterns over the Lord High Admiral’s head. He noted Cook’s bulging eyes, dead eyes, he would assume.

  Thank goodness for the secretary who had recorded that on her glasses. That was a piece of luck, if you could call it that, in this horrible desperate situation.

  As Stokes contemplated these things in one of the securest facilities in Star Watch Intelligence, miles away in Lyon, France Sector, Venna the Spy got up from bed.

  It had been a week since she used the Phantasma Synth Crystals. She’d regained most of her vitality since then, and she had checked the crystals. Someone had recalibrated them. They and she were ready for another venture with this horrible alien technology.

  Venna felt soiled for what she had done. She didn’t want to do it again.

  Because of that, relays clicked in her mind, bringing forth more memories. She realized the Lord High Admiral hadn’t been the only Star Watch bastard to murder her family on Thebes. There had also been a smaller, chain-smoking, stimstick fellow by the name of Brigadier Stokes. In her memories, Venna saw him slip a knife into the back of her mother’s neck, severing her spine, and he had laughed while doing it.

  Hatred flashed in Venna’s eyes.

  She went to her closet and chose her clothes and shoes with care.

  Soon, like before, she wore a tight-fitting, short, revealing dress and high heels. She moved seductively that few could match when Venna wanted to lure a man. She strutted with rage. In her mind’s eye, she plotted what she would do to Brigadier Stokes. Yes. She was going to make him pay for the vile evil he’d done to her family.

  The fact that these were manufactured memories made no difference to Venna. The Intelligence arm of the Spacer Third Fleet knew what it was doing with these inducements and hypnotisms. They were masters at their craft, masters at the art of subterfuge and false memories.

  Venna was soon in a nightclub, swaying, dancing, laughing, and at first, she worried there wasn’t going to be one with the correct energy for what she had in mind. Then a pale-skinned Scandinavian man with burning blue eyes and wearing a leather vest entered. He was muscular, exceedingly tall, and she knew, yes, he had the needed energy.

  To make sure, Venna took out the device, aimed it at him so no one could see, and tested him. Yes. This was perfect.

  He looked her way.

  Venna used the device as if applying lipstick to her lips. She pressed her lips together, saw that he still watched, and made a pouting kiss in his direction.

  She slipped the item into her glittering purse and watched him stride across the dance floor. He spoke to her.

  Venna shook her head.

  He spoke again.

  Finally, Venna shrugged and slid off the tall stool. She followed him onto the dance floor. They danced so that most of the couples watched in awe. They had such grace and beauty. Here was femininity at its utmost, and here was masculinity to match. The two attracted everyone’s eyes like super-magnets, as if every person’s pupils were made of steel filings.

  Venna laughed. The Scandinavian man laughed. He would have been a Viking chief of old.

  Once more, like a week ago, they left together, entered a taxi, and went to his house. There, he began laughing, and tried to ply her with drinks.

  “We don’t need that. You know what we do need?” Venna looked at the ornate wooden box that she had brought along.

  “What is that, anyway?”

  “Would you like to see?” Venna said.

  He gazed at her in an engaging way. “Yes,” he said.

  For a moment, Venna felt a pang of regret. Here was a man to match her. His was a masculine power, and hers was feminine. She wanted to yield to him, to truly yield. But then the murderous image of Brigadier Stokes entered her mind.

  Venna opened the box.

  He looked at her. “What are those for?”

  “Pick one up,” she said. “I dare you.”

  He laughed, and he did.

  Venna picked up her crystal. “I know you won’t do this, but repeat after me.”

  He laughed again, and he repeated after her.

  This was too easy. Were all men such idiots? Maybe at this point, they were.

  So began a horrible, wicked repetition of the last time. Color bled up into his hands and up his forearms. He stiffened when the color glowed from his chest.

  Venna did as before.

  Far too soon, she watched him shrivel and shrink as the etheric energy, the electromagnetic pulses of his body, exited him in a bizarre manner, filtering through the crystals.

  As before, scintillating energy appeared over him as he was reduced to nothing.

  Knowing better how to do this, Venna took control of the etheric creature. It was alive after a fashion, and had a hint of the man, the Scandinavian Viking chief that he had been. Eyes appeared.

  Venna sent his energy on its way.

  Soon, in ghost mode, it slipped through the Intelligence Arm of Star Watch, searching until Venna found Brigadier Stokes in his office, chain-smoking, trying to figure out things.

  Stokes looked up and cried out as he saw the ghostly, swirling thing settle over his head. He tried to run, but Venna added substance to the etheric creature. It weighed down poor Brigadier Stokes. The attempt to run strained his weak heart. It started to flutter. A second more, and a heart attack struck. His eyes glazed over as he gasped.

  As before, Venna used the etheric power, choking him until Brigadier Stokes flopped onto his desk, causing his ashtray of butts to spew onto the floor.

  In France Sector, in Lyon, in a house, Venna staggered, spent from her actions.

  She gathered the implements, and a sob escaped her. What she had done tonight—she felt drained and torn from it.

  Venna glanced at her thighs. There were blemishes, clots under her smooth skin. This was sickening and horrifying. Was using these crystals killing her?

  Venna fled the house. Because of her intense training, she covered her tracks to a degree, but she fled, knowing that she had two more people to kill. The next would be Mary O’Hara, the former Chief of Star Watch Intelligence.

  First, though, she needed to sleep this off.

  -10-

  Maddox strode purposefully through the desert near his house in Carson City, Nevada Sector. His long strides covered the distance quickly. Birds flew past occasionally. Mostly, the wind blew and the sun beat down.

  Maddox did his best thinking walking long distances in solitude or taking a hot shower at the end of the day. He wasn’t in the mood for a shower now. He needed to move.

  He wasn’t quite a New Man, although he’d received many of the treatments and heritage. Erill spiritual energy filled him, giving him something akin to a New Man’s vitality and endurance. Therefore, he had trouble sitting still and doing nothing. He thought better while moving. It was as simple as that.

  Thus, he covered ground thinking, correlating, trying to piece things together. First, the Lord High Admiral had been killed in a foul alien manner. Then Stokes had died the same way. Obviously, there was a connection. The two knew each other. Maddox knew both personally. Could that have any bearing on the situation?

  Maddox strove to use his intuitive sense on this.

  He’d gained the useful intuitive sense from Balron the Traveler, an energy being from a parallel universe. He’d helped Balron get home. Before that, Balron had done something to him, bequeathing this intuitive sense. It did not always operate. It was most helpful regarding things that concerned him personally. Did this concern him personally?

  That was one question. The other was: who was the alien or the assassin using alien tools going to strike next?

  Maddox had found Stokes’ notes. They mainly contained information the brigadier had learned from Galyan.

  Who was next on the list? How had whoever achieved the process? The attacks had been a week apart. Did that have any bearing on it?

  Maddox strove to understand. This did not seem like something a New Man would do. He did not think anyone from the Swarm Imperium had done this. The obvious culprit would be from the Sovereign Hierarchy of Leviathan. They had sent spies to the Commonwealth before. They had captured him and made a clone of him to send back to Star Watch. Leviathan threatened a fleet invasion. The best thing an alien intelligence service could do would be to decapitate the decision-making heads before the start of an invasion. Why go after Brigadier Stokes then?

  Maddox shook his head. The critical issue was who were they are going to kill next? He had to stop them. How could he do that? If this entity had slain the Lord High Admiral and then gone after Brigadier Stokes…? Could his grandmother be in danger? She also was in Intelligence. She was related to these two.

  And she knows me.

  Maddox had a sense that this had something to do with him. Was it vain or arrogant to think that? Most people believed things that happened to them happened because they were important. Maddox knew the difference was that it was true about him. He was important. He was a di-far, one of the few or the only one in the Commonwealth.

  That was a vain thought even while it was a true thought. Still, if Maddox had the power to stop this, if he had the ability, then he had a duty to stop this.

  What wasn’t he seeing? What was he missing?

  “It doesn’t matter what I’m not seeing,” Maddox said. “I need to—”

  Galyan appeared beside him.

  “Why are you here?” Maddox said.

  “I felt like you needed company, sir.”

  “Oh?”

  “I’ve been running my personality profile on you. It told me you should not be alone right now.”

  Maddox scowled. “You’ve been watching me from Victory.”

  “You know I’m watching you, sir. You know I’m watching the others. But you I watch in particular.”

  “Why wouldn’t you watch Meta and protect her in particular?”

  “Of course, Meta is dear and important to me. But you hold all this together. You are the link, and I think you are working through the situation.”

  “You know that I am,” Maddox said.

  “I do know. I have been eavesdropping on you, sir, and I know I’m not supposed to do that.”

  “Forget about that,” Maddox said. “That’s not germane today. What’s going on, and how can we stop it?”

  “We must find the phase ship,” Galyan said.

  “Are you convinced a phase ship is hiding inside the Earth?”

  “I am certain, sir, as all the data points to it. All the correlations, all the logical possibilities point to a phase ship parked in Earth.”

  “Because of the four strange blips?” asked Maddox.

  “Why else would I say that?”

  “I don’t know what to do,” Maddox admitted. “I don’t know how to stop this. I don’t even know how to find any of the players.”

  “I realize that, sir, and that is why I have come to tell you that you need someone who can find your enemies for you.”

  “Okay, yeah, that’s a good piece of advice, Galyan,” Maddox said sarcastically. “Who would that be? Do you have a person in mind?”

  “I do, sir, but I do not think you are going to like it.”

  Maddox stared at the small Adok holoimage. Galyan was a good friend, even if he was only a deified AI.

  “All right, tell me.”

  “You need someone who can read minds, who has telepathic abilities.”

  Maddox stopped walking. Galyan stopped beside him.

  “You can’t possibly be talking about Captain Becker,” Maddox said.

  “Precisely, sir, you need Captain Becker.”

  Maddox shook his head. Becker had been a dangerous freak.

  Becker was from the time when Admiral James K. Fletcher had taken control of Star Watch. The Liss cybers had attacked secretly through a being called Nostradamus.