Talcon Star City
by
Gary Caplan
Copyright 2012 Gary Caplan,
All rights reserved.
Published in eBook format by eBookIt.com
ISBN-13: 978-1-4566-0904-7
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author. The only exception is by a reviewer, who may quote short excerpts in a review.
Dedication
I would like to dedicate this book to all the great authors who wrote in the science fiction genre who inspired my imagination, eventually inspiring me to write. I have had these ideas since I was a young boy, watching the Apollo launches, as well as watching science fiction programs in the late sixties and early seventies. Even with a busy career, I found some time to write. I would also like to dedicate this to my friends and family who helped with some ideas and concepts back when we were younger. To Brian, David, Robert, and Mark, each for their helpful and creative contributions to the story. I would especially like to thank Basil for his helping create several of the main characters. Also, thanks Basil for the inspiring science fiction artwork on the characters and all the starship drawings. Lastly, I would like to thank my parents Martin and Merri who inspired me to learn.
The Talcon Star City
Chapter 1
Events Aboard the Phoenix
The battlecruiser Phoenix and three other starships that were part of the twelve ships in Task Force One moved through a series of intensive maneuvers after coming out of hyperspace. The ships made full-speed arc turns and then half-speed turns to check maneuverability against the engineering specs. Some starships in the task force were still undergoing the testing maneuvers after assisting in the mission to the Quellus Borealis star system. After completing the series of maneuvers and sub light engine tests, the essentially rhomboid-shaped Phoenix slowed as it approached an Alliance of Worlds outpost colony, while some of the other ships in Task Force One prepared to gather hydrogen from one of the giant gas planets in the system as fuel for their fusion reactors and as the ships’ secondary power for operation.
Commodore Robert Sheppard, the overall commander of task forces one through four and the acting commander for the rest of the sixth fleet, was sitting in his secured chair, since part of the testing was for additional evaluation of the inertial dampening system following the ship-wide system’s enhancement. Glancing at the data briefly through his interlink to the bridge, he noted that the dampening system was again exceeding the previous specifications. Sheppard was in his command office near the bridge as the United Alliance of Worlds starship Phoenix completed another series of operations testing following its restoration after the battle and the strange events at Quellus Borealis Seven. Robert Sheppard was a tall, robust man with a light complexion, slightly graying hair, and blue eyes. He was a human with ancestors originating from the planet Earth; he was also a member of the Order of Star Knights. In the Alliance of Worlds, the Star Knights were gifted with psionic abilities, and as part of their code, they tended to use their metaphysical or psionic abilities and disciplines to aid them in preserving civilization.
While reviewing the data files of the encounter at QB7, Sheppard contemplated what had happened there a few weeks ago. He was also relaxing and listening to some old digitally synthesized recordings of Monteverdi, including the Orfeo Suite, and then to Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto Number Four. Sheppard’s father had interested him in the classics when he was young.
The problem with the “victory” at QB7 was that it was a strange victory. Alliance of Worlds starships met their old nemesis the Varlon and were at a stalemate, even though the Alliance had brought three times as many ships to QB7; the Varlon had more durable hulls and shields and more powerful weapons. It’s what would be expected from an encounter with the Varlon, one of the more ancient and technologically advanced but xenophobic, space-faring civilizations.
The Varlon threat was one of the reasons for the formation of the Alliance of Worlds, since it provided mutual protection in numbers as well as in technological exchange. Now there were two hundred, fifty civilizations in the Alliance of Worlds with systems scattered across the Milky Way galaxy, although most of the allied members were located in the alpha and beta quadrants. The Varlon were expansionists, and by Earth reckoning, they were a highly intelligent Arthropod Coelenterate-like species. Recently they had resolved an internal political situation and were back in their expansion mode. They had also gained an ally, the Accad, who were a reptilian-type of race. This alliance between the Accad and the Varlon made the few other advanced, space-faring civilizations wary. It worried most of the more senior groups enough to consider working with the younger civilizations in the galaxy. Some were affiliated with the Alliance of Worlds, such as the group called the Hegemony, which was composed of four of the more advanced of the older, space-faring civilizations.
Most considered the Hegemony the first alliance; it included the Estrians, Karratins, Lyramenians, and Quarran. The Varlon had never succeeded in defeating or even really inflicting any lasting harm to them, and as time passed, the Hegemony became more secluded and tended not to interfere in the affairs of the younger civilizations. They did, however, transfer control of one of their older hyperspace communications systems, which they later dubbed the COMNET, to the Alliance of Worlds.
Not long ago Sheppard had commanded part of the sixth fleet that had been sent to defend a valuable Alliance of Worlds colony. Quellus Borealis 7 was a habitable Alliance member world with excellent and extremely rare mineral deposits, not to mention an ancient Calyx archaeological site. The Varlon had attacked QB7, and Sheppard and another commodore had gone to defend the planet. Then the Accad, who had recently become allies of the Varlon (the primary enemy of the Alliance of Worlds), arrived at QB7. In an unprecedented event, the Varlon pulled out and gave over the colony that Alliance of Worlds was in the process of acquiring to the Accad, or Accadians, as they were sometimes called. Later Sheppard learned from one of his previous Star Knight mentors, a Karratin, Garfield, what the Accad wanted and about the treaty they had made with the Varlon. As he continued to review the records, Sheppard pulled up the information Vice Admiral Garfield had provided. Garfield was now an exchange officer assigned to the sixth fleet as technical advisor and science officer.
“The Alliance is probably unaware that this system is actually a special site,” Garfield said. “In alternate dimensions, it is a support for certain boundaries. The Quellien crystals in this system have a purpose. Part of that purpose is that the Quellien be used for protection and support of the interdimensional and interspatial boundaries. The Accad removed some of the central crystals. Had they been selective, they could have removed some useful adjacent crystals, and the support aspect of the Quellien would have been intact, even if most of the planet were destroyed. However, they took some of the active pieces that have been there since that world was made. That severely diminished the protective and support functions of the remaining Quellien crystals.” Sheppard continued to watch a recorded version of the information provided by his mentor and friend, who had been, for a period of time, the Karratin Ambassador to the Alliance.
“The Karratins discovered this long ago, and we did not disturb the chambers with the central elongated crystals,” Garfield continued. “Even the Alliance of Worlds accepted the Calyx site as an archaeological site, and that area was placed off-limits for mining. The Accadian mining ship must have separated the section and removed a portion. Zeloc’s further scans indicated it has been repaired using the surrounding auxiliary crystal mass, and now conservation is in effect. The Accad mined only one level, where a particular special grade of resonant crystals could be found.”
Sheppard knew that, as a species, the Karratins were generally more genetically advanced than many of the other Alliance of Worlds members. Essentially, the Karratins