Legacies: The First LoxTech Novel

By Xavier Phoenix

Welcome to the future, where humanity still struggles with the same old problems, and even has to overcome new and terrifying obstacles to survival.

This is the first in the LoxTech series of science-fiction titles, which follows the exploits of members of the LoxTech Corporation, and others, as they battle with themselves, the universe around them, and also new, existential threats never seen before.

---The First LoxTech Novel---

It is 2367 and Thadius Lox, a young starship captain of the United Terran Federation, has his career in the Space Force cut short after the death of his father leaves LoxTech Corporation without a leader.

LoxTech, part of a group of big businesses called the Templar Alliance, is all that stands between the Federation and a formidable insurgency known as the Brotherhood of Delgrath.

With his reluctant move from soldier to businessman, Lox – a veteran of the recent Border War against the Brotherhood – is unable to avoid new battles that play out across outer space and also much closer to home.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Apr 20, 2022
• ISBN: 9781471721403

Book preview

Prologue

∞-Grid Data-∞

Date: 16th August 2367 (10:21 UST)

Location: Mesex System

Polity: None; Freespace

Safety Rating: Unregulated

The heart of the system was blue; a light hue that sent a cold shiver down the spine. Although this bright young star was burning at 20 million degrees at its core, from 75 astronomical units away (approximately 11.2 billion kilometres), external sensors were registering near to absolute zero.

Tiberius Lox checked the readouts in his cockpit to find that most of the other spacecraft had exited the wormgate. He could see them as small, fast-moving dots in front of the swirling blue event horizon of the artificial alien portal, hanging in space before him. Tiberius was in charge of a small mining expedition into this dangerous area of freespace, a system with no civilised governance and no law enforcement. There were three other combat frigates like his and the main prize, a three-hundred-metre-long spaceship, which materialised from the gateway as he watched. It was one of a fleet of mining barges that Tiberius’ company, LoxTech Corporation, owned and operated. This one was named Rock Call.

‘Check in,’ he transmitted over the comm system.

‘Jump complete. All systems A-OK,’ the lead mining engineer, Harvey Peacock, replied from on board the barge.

‘Very good, set destination for asteroid belt designated Gee-Three and go to warp.’

They all disabled their ion engines to initiate their translight drives. In the blink of an eye, they all seemingly flashed out of existence, as they shot off at speeds greater than that of light.

En route, Tiberius activated the holographic heads-up display (HUD). The view from the cockpit – black with twinkling stars, through the phasing effect of the warp tunnel – was now being superimposed with multiple hollow white squares, with associated descriptors and distances. Each one of these blips marked a major landmark, or rather spacemark, within the local volume of space.

He had spent most of his life in unregulated systems like this, scouting out resources to exhume that probably no one else in the universe had come across before. It was exciting to be out in regions so empty of established civilization, and to have the freedom to do what he did best: asteroid mining.

As he travelled, the HUD highlighted the azure, main sequence star and its three orbiting planets. The closest was one of the two Jovian planets, similar in appearance to Jupiter in the Sol System, but according to the translucent overlay, it was seven per cent larger. Any bigger, Tiberius thought, and it probably would have ignited into a brown dwarf, which would have made this a binary system, billions of years ago.

The only rocky planet lay in the system’s Goldilocks zone, which meant it was capable, and in-fact did support human life. Its official designation was Mesex I, but the inhabitants – a three-hundred-thousand strong reclusive colony – called it Nekong. No one knew the real meaning of the word, or where it derived from, as the elders of the colony had rejected their place in the Federation and insisted that there would be no outsiders allowed onto their world. Mesex was a freespace system, not under the influence of the Federation, or any government, and so their privacy was respected.

Mesex was one of the three star systems that were networked, by the alien wormgates, between the United Terran Federation and the multi-million strong Byzantine separatist group, known as the Brotherhood of Delgrath. This group of outcasts, mainly pirates and criminals, had either left or been thrown out of the Federation to live their lives without, what they called, tyranny and oppression. As both sides expanded, the gap between their borders diminished. Tensions had risen and the occasional skirmish grew into full-blown conflicts.

Kelvar and Talor, the other two systems, were under the control of a massive alliance of corporations and businesses that worked alongside the Federation to keep the Brotherhood at bay. LoxTech was a major player within the Templar Alliance.

Tiberius decided that it was better to keep this current mining operation small. Even though it would have been safer to work in a more secure system like Talor – with the presence of a heavily-armed Templar gatestation by the alien wormgate – these asteroid fields yielded rarer and more profitable metal ores and minerals.

Usually there would have been a more even ratio of mining barges to armed escorts, but with another of the portals linking this system to the Brotherhood controlled Fiora System close by, security and safety of assets with personnel was top priority. Besides, with what he had unearthed about certain elements within the Alliance recently, he wanted to make sure he was around people he could trust.

Coming out of warp, Tiberius had to immediately reconfigure the proximity alarm to go off with the detection of other vessels only, as it would be constantly ringing in his ears as he flew at close-range around the asteroids in the belt. He sent orders to perform a preliminary scout of the local volume while the much larger and slower barge moved into position to start the extraction process. If it were possible to hear anything in space, the current manoeuvres would have sounded like multiple fighter jets flying ahead of a huge bomber. There was no sound however, but it still appeared impressive to Tiberius.

‘Rock Call to Alpha-One: Proceeding with survey,’ Peacock reported.

‘Acknowledged,’ Tiberius stated. ‘Alpha team: report.’

‘This is four: all clear.’

‘Two: clear.’

‘Alpha-Three here: No sign of any vessels, but I am picking up a strange signal emanating from…’ The channel stuttered and closed.

‘Come in Alpha-Three,’ Tiberius banked up over the field, just in time to watch the remnants of the frigate glimmer in a fading plasma explosion. ‘Rock Call: Emergency abort. Return to the Talor gateway immediately.’

‘Roger that, Alpha-One. It’ll take a few moments to recall our survey drones and realign to the gate,’ Peacock replied.

‘Gotcha.’ Tiberius turned his ship to return to the barge as several new contacts appeared on his HUD, from behind one of the largest rocks in this volume of the field; the square icons flashing red to indicate an enemy. ‘Alpha Team, regroup. We’ve got multiple bogeys inbound.’

Suddenly the HUD flickered, and the information displayed blurred and spat out nonsense, before going dead. Warning beeps sounded as his systems began to fail one by one. The comm system stuttered, ‘Alpha…one…attack…EMP mines…unable to…’

The channel went dead at the same moment Alpha-Two was hit by the shockwave of a hidden mine. The wrecked ship flew athwart of Tiberius’ bow trailing plasma fires. Tiberius could not gauge what was going on as the HUD was disabled, along with the communication system. He looked out of his cockpit to see enemy combat frigates surrounding the Rock Call. The barge was approaching the field as it was turning away in a slow arc, when several missiles struck the stern of the three-hundred-metre-long ship, mangling the main engine housing. Tiberius smashed his fists against the failed instruments in anger at himself for not sending an advanced group, with real firepower, to clear this volume out. He caught a good view of one of the aggressors and could tell from the distinctive shape of the hull that these were Boomerangs; Delgrathan light attack frigates.

All I had to do was send a single battlecruiser to squash these rats. And why the fuck was that mine not detected? Only an idiot would miss that.

It was a basic enemy tactic to attach electromagnetic pulse mines to ore-rich asteroids so that they could swoop in afterwards and salvage disabled vessels, and their valuable cargo, without having to engage in combat.

Tiberius’ flight controls were sketchy at best, but he managed to avoid weapons fire from two fighters, and banked around towards the barge, which was now ablaze and heading out of control into the dense asteroid field. Although flying aimlessly, the Rock Call’s basic short-range laser cannons were spitting their anger and, although these weapons were relatively low power, they had already dispatched a few of the attackers. The mine had affected Tiberius’ firing control so he could not provide any support. Even if he could, it was already too late as the Rock Call was drifting and its ventral surface was moments away from impacting into an asteroid.

As Tiberius’ ship flew through the remaining fighters, his systems rebooted and came online all at once. Warning klaxons sounded, and his HUD reported severe damage from enemy railgun cannon fire as it slammed into the back of his frigate. His ship jolted as the shockwave from the Rock Call’s destruction emanated from the twisted metal and ore fragments that were all that remained of the multi-million credit investment and four crew members. He grinned manically. The HUD dropped two more red markers; the Delgrathans' vessels may have been numerous, but their cheap construction made them fragile, and they could not withstand the massive blast.

The readout indicated there were only two Boomerangs left, and they were right on his tail. He ducked and dived between the rocks to avoid the projectiles and checked the status of his warp drive. It was functional but the railgun bombardment had diminished the structural integrity of the nacelles. If he activated the drive like this, it would blow his ship apart like a bullet would through an apple.

He was considering what he could do when Alpha-Four appeared on his HUD, as a green square, and took out the pursuing fighters. Tiberius released the breath he had been holding since the start of the engagement and wiped the sweat from his wrinkled forehead.

‘Thank you,’ he broadcast, but was stalled by his display going crazy. Flashing red markers of varying sizes started building up as a massive enemy fleet came into sensor range.

‘Sir, I think we need to get out of here ASAP,’ Alpha-Four suggested, an edge of panic in his voice.

‘I can’t. My warp drive is damaged,’ Tiberius sighed. ‘Hank, I want you to get back as quickly as possible and warn the Templar of this incursion.’

‘I can’t leave you here, Mister Lox. I must…’

‘You must do as I say, Lieutenant,’ Tiberius implored.

He tapped out some quick commands into his console and hit the broadcast button. ‘Get the fuck out of here. I’ll lead them away from you, now go.’

‘Yes, sir. It was a pleasure knowing you. Fly safe.’ His ship turned about and flashed out of sight as he entered warp.

Tiberius watched Hank go as his HUD filled with prophesised pain, and he knew that this was it. As his ship vectored towards the blue diamond at the centre of the system, he wished he could say goodbye to his son, Thadius. He disabled his visually noisy display and looked down at his hands, his old hands.

I’ve had a good life, he mused, and the company will be in safe, fresh hands if he decides to take over from me.

The only ship in the convoy that had a gridlink – making it capable of instant super-range communications – was the mining barge, so he could not contact anyone outside of the system, and he knew that the black box would not survive his destruction. He wanted to leave another message, so he activated his local-communications system and targeted the signal at the planet Nekong, with the hope his message would eventually make its way to its intended recipient.

After it was sent, Tiberius, his ship, and everything but his legacy, were no more.

Chapter One

∞-Grid Data-∞

Date: 16th August 2367 (14:42 UST)

Location: Kelvar System

Polity: Templar Alliance

Safety Rating: Unregulated

After leaving the Federation Space Force, Lieutenant Hank Mica moved to live on the Templar space station, Goldport, where he had been now for nearly two years. It was the headquarters of the Alliance, and the main hub for freespace trading within Sector Seven. As a combat pilot for LoxTech Security Division, his apartment was located just a few minutes’ maglev journey from the naval hangars, but it was still on the edge of the civilian section.

Mica placed his palm on the biometric scanner, and his front door slid open a moment later. His girlfriend was waiting on a stool by the breakfast bar. As soon as he entered, she put her wine glass down and rushed over to embrace him.

‘I heard what happened baby. Are you okay?’ She ran her hands over his pilot coveralls, checking for obvious injuries.

He took her arms and pushed her back slightly. ‘Hey, hey it’s alright Tira I’m fine, honestly. I’m just a little shook up is all.’ He kissed her and wiped away a tear that had rolled down her cheek.

‘I’m so glad you made it back alive. I don’t know what I would have done if you had been…’ She started sobbing and cried into Mica’s shoulder.

He held her tightly to reassure her. ‘I’m here and I promise I’ll never do that to you,’ he whispered into her ear.

‘What happened out there?’ Tira sniffed, ‘The local news channel had virtually no details.’

‘They wouldn’t be able to say even if they did honey. The Templar Executive Council wouldn’t want to raise a panic before they knew exactly how to handle the situation.’

‘Handle what?’ She moved away from the comfort of his warm body. ‘What’s going on Hank?’

‘I’ve been ordered not to say anything Tira,’ he said sincerely.

She let go of him and stepped back, her face a portrait of both pain and fury.

‘Ordered?’ she blurted, ‘I nearly lost you today and you’re going to blank me because of orders? We’re supposed to be getting fucking married in a matter of weeks.’

‘Honey, it’s not personal…’ he tried in vain.

‘Don’t honey me, Hank. I deserve to know what nearly killed you. I think it is pretty personal.’

‘Okay, okay, but don’t flip out you hear? This is currently top-secret intelligence...’ Mica knew this was a weak argument, as Tira had been an intelligence analyst for the Federation Space Force for a decade, before they met, and she undoubtedly had inside her head way more incendiary secrets than that of a relatively insignificant industrial corporation.

‘Stop stalling and start spilling.’

Mica sighed. ‘Our mining operation was ambushed by a Brotherhood advance party.’

‘An advance party for what?’ Tira interrupted, worry and confusion spread across her face.

‘Well, as I warped out, I detected an enemy armada heading through Mesex towards the Talor gateway.’

‘What?’ Tira went over to gulp down what was left in her wine glass and refilled it to the brim from the bottle. She slumped on the stool. ‘They’re coming here?’

‘It certainly looked like an invasion force.’ He went over and took the seat next to her. ‘I managed to alert the gatestation on the Talor side of the gateway, so the defences have been fired up. If they try to come through directly then they would have little chance of success. That doesn’t stop them travelling through interstellar space but that would take them a while longer.’

‘I knew it. I fucking told you that boss of yours was putting you at too high a risk. You should never have joined LoxTech. You should have found a safer job after you left the Space Force.’

Mica bristled. ‘That boss you’re talking about sacrificed himself this morning to save me, Tira. If he hadn’t let me go, you would be talking to a couple of Security Division officers, with their hats in their hands, instead of me.’

‘I’m sorry but that’s just not good enough,’ Tira started. ‘He knew those mining missions into unregulated space were extremely dangerous and he led you into that situation.’

Mica could not believe what he was hearing.

‘As you well know, those missions are what bring in the hard credits that pay for your constant shopping sprees and our nights out. I get ten times more money doing this than what I did in the Space Force. You knew what I signed up for, and the risks involved. Tiberius gave his life for you as much as me, Tira. If I had stayed, then I wouldn’t have been able to come back and warn the Alliance of the imminent threat and you and everyone else here would have been swarmed and killed. Nothing would have survived, including your fancy shoes and expensive clothes. That man deserves your gratitude, or at least just a little fucking respect,’ he roared.

Mica got up and left the apartment in a rage, after swiping a lamp off the counter and shattering it against the opposite wall in a shower of sparks and glass.

Tira was left staring at the mess, the wine glass shaking in her hand. She knew he was right and now she wondered if he’d forgive her and come back. She wished he could understand how his job was affecting her though. Tira loved Mica and she would have gladly sacrificed all her possessions to keep him safe and by her side forever. Of course, she liked Tiberius, and his death was tragic, but she realised with shame that if there was a choice and one of them had to go then she would always want Mica alive.

She took another swig of the now bitter tasting wine hoping that it would calm her nerves.

Mica walked along to the maglev station with his heart pounding in his chest. He had been with Tira for the best part of three years. They had met while he was an FSF Lieutenant, at a bar he used to frequent when off-rotation. She had been wearing a red sequined dress that hugged her slender 27-year-old body. He offered to buy her a drink and had expected to be rejected straight off but, to his surprise, she accepted and after only a few dates, they had got together. It had been a happy relationship ever since and they had rarely argued, except when it came to Tira’s long and expensive shopping runs. Never had he imagined that she could react so apathetically to Tiberius’ death.

Shortly after Tiberius had personally offered him a job as a security officer, both he and Tira were invited to one of the Corporation’s shindigs where staff, crews and pilots got together with the upper echelons of the company, to meet each other and socialise on an equal standing. Mica loved the set-up; it was so unlike the Space Force, where officers barely acknowledged the lower ranks, other than to order or berate, let alone party together. LoxTech was like one big family with Tiberius as the father figure and Tira had often expressed her affection of the man.

Now he was gone, and the family was broken. Was it possible that their relationship was also broken?

Mica arrived at the platform as a maglev pulled in; its destination was the Core. He boarded and sat by the window. Views of the space station’s internal structure whizzed by, and a few minutes later the train slowed to a halt in the central hub. It was the area that afforded access to most sections of the station. After stepping off into a crowd of station personnel and civilians, Mica checked his WristBuddy – a highly-popular, miniaturised computer that served as a communicator, timepiece, planner, health-checker and any number of other functions there was an app for. The pop-up holographic display alerted him that his debriefing was due to begin in a matter of minutes. He ran over to one of the empty elevator pods dotted around the Core and verbally instructed it to set destination for the Command Centre.

‘Restricted: Please Identify…’ The synthesised female voice of the station’s AI filled the pod.

He placed his palm on another biometric scanner, identical to the one used to gain access to his apartment, and it beeped at him.

‘Authorisation Accepted,’ the AI reported before the pod shot up vertically, towards the tip of the space station, to where the highest commanders and leaders of the Templar Alliance were waiting to debrief him properly.

It took less than a minute for the pod to ascend several kilometres up towards the tip of Goldport. It slowed and stopped, and then Mica stepped out into a high-security lobby area. The walls were as bare as the floor and ceiling, and the only other exit was a tapering corridor ahead. There were a couple of automatic gun turrets hanging from the ceiling, covering the entrance. They tracked him silently as he stepped into the metre-wide corridor.

‘Halt.’

The station’s AI initiated several security scanners. As they passed over him one of the laser bars almost blinded him as it read his retina.

‘Scan Complete. You May Proceed.’

He moved forward out of the narrow passage and back into a wider corridor. To his left stood several armed security officers, one of whom stepped forward.

‘Good day, Lieutenant. If you’ll follow me?’ He motioned towards a large set of reinforced double-doors.

Mica noticed the insignia on the officer’s epaulette; he was a commander. ‘Thank you, sir,’ he replied, and followed him.

‘I heard what happened out there, son. It’s a damned shame so it is.’ The commander was clearly about the same age as him – early to mid-thirties – so Mica put the son down to the man’s outlook on rank. ‘None of us know what to do now the boss is… gone.’

‘What about Director Kreshenkov?’ Mica asked as the doors opened into a larger corridor, which was lined with digital bulletin boards and offices.

The commander glanced at him. ‘Huh? Come on, the man must be over a hundred years old. Dimitri may be one of the most experienced and skilled security officers in the known universe, but I don’t think he could actively manage a whole corporation like Mister Lox did.’ Mica was somewhat confused as to how informal the commander’s speech was concerning their big boss. As they walked along the corridor, several staff were gathering and whispering amongst themselves, clearly paying Mica a lot of attention.

‘However,’ the commander continued, ‘Director Scater could take over. He may have dropped out of the Federation Space Force academy, but that man is responsible for all the research and development of most of our kick-ass technology.’

More people were coming out of side halls and offices as they passed. Mica looked around at them.

‘Don’t worry about them. You are not only the last person to see the Chief Exec, but you also managed to escape an enemy armada alive. I think they consider you a miracle.’

‘Forgive me but that’s bullshit Commander; I escaped because Tiberius saved me. I should have done more to save him,’ Mica looked away. ‘I not only failed him but everyone here too.’

The commander stopped before the entrance to the main operation centre and turned to him.

‘Lieutenant, if you had stayed and tried to fight your way out of that shitstorm then you both would have died for nothing. As it is, he is dead, and you lived to warn us of what’s coming. Now, get in there and make sure that his death was not in vain.’

The commander placed his hand on the palm-lock and the doors slid open. Mica was greeted by the sights and sounds of a massive chamber filled with computers, screens, and people – lots of people. He was ushered inside and led towards a set of steps that went up onto the central platform.

‘Ah, Lieutenant Mica, please come.’ A tall chubby man with long, messy black hair beckoned him over. Mica recognised him as Graham Scater, the aforementioned Director of Research and Development for LoxTech.

He moved over to the central command table which was surrounded by men and women he didn’t recognise and exuding an air of authority with their suits and uniforms pressed and adorned with various trinkets of office or honour.

Scater placed a hand on his shoulder and pulled him close. ‘It’s good to see you made it back safe. Welcome to Templar Command. Don’t worry yourself about all this commotion; because of you we are ready for those Delgrathan bastards.’

Mica spent a moment taking in the surroundings. He was on a large, raised platform in the centre of a massive cylindrical chamber. It was encompassed by holographic displays and on the lower level were hundreds of consoles that were manned by personnel seemingly from all companies and corporations allied under the Templar umbrella.

The outer walls were made of toughened windows giving a 360-degree view of local space and the ring of the station below. Mica could see the system’s star as a small green dot and at 180, the verdant glow of the Jovian planet Tireno, which Goldport was currently orbiting.

He felt out of his depth. This was where orders were actually formulated, and he was usually just following them out there in his fighter once issued. He turned back to the Director who was using a panel on the central table to reorganise orders for some LoxTech forces.

‘Um, sir, I’m really sorry about Mister Lox… there was nothing I could do. He wouldn’t let me help…’ Mica blurted.

Scater turned to him. ‘It’s Hank, right?’

‘Sir, yes, but…’

‘Look, no one blames you for Tiberius. He was a great man, who gave us all hope and direction, but he was also headstrong, and that has got him into trouble on many occasions. He will be missed by everyone but right now we need to halt the advance of the Brotherhood, or we’ll all suffer the same fate. Come…’ Scater guided Mica to an office overlooking the lower level.

As they went through the glass door, the noise of the outside cut off and other than the occasional beeping of the desktop computer, it was silent. Next, Scater went over to the food synthesiser and tapped in a code. A few seconds later a couple of glasses materialised, which he picked up and offered one to Mica.

‘Try this. It should settle you a bit,’ Scater said, sipping the brown liquid. Mica sniffed it and recoiled.

‘It’s not as good as the genuine thing I admit, but sometimes whiskey needs to be just that, whiskey.’

Mica took a small sip and felt the warmth as it trickled down the back of his throat. Scater sat on the edge of the desk and turned the monitor towards him. He tapped at the screen, and the inscrutable face of Dimitri Kreshenkov appeared.

‘Mister Scater?’

‘Lieutenant Mica has arrived.’

‘I’m on my way.’ Kreshenkov’s face disappeared.

Scater downed the rest of his whiskey and placed the glass on the desk. ‘So, what happened out there?’

‘I don’t know what to say really. One moment there was nothing wrong, and then we were ambushed,’ Mica said now sipping larger measures of his drink.

‘Take your time, Hank; we need all the fine details.’

It took several minutes for Mica to recount what he could remember, during which Kreshenkov had come in and was listening intently. ‘I don’t believe it,’ he said at last.

‘It seems weird,’ Scater began, ‘to think that Tiberius is gone and won’t be coming back.’

Kreshenkov perched on the desk by Scater, resting both his hands on his cane. ‘Lieutenant, please write up your report and submit to the mainframe. Your account is the only one we have. I’ve already