Space Dutchman: GALCOM Universe, #5

By Linda Maye Adams

Can a spaceship portend doom?

S.C. Kangjun probes the discovery of the legendary derelict, the Space Dutchman. A mystery spacers whisper about in secret.

Hope Delgado, while exploring the Space Dutchman, makes a disturbing discovery. The crew abandoned the spaceship. What danger could drive the crew away?

The answer puts her life on the line. She must use every skill to make it off the ship alive.

A heart-stopping adventure that continues the GALCOM Universe series.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Bad Gnome Press
• Release date: Nov 15, 2022
• ISBN: 9798215414637

Linda Maye Adams

Linda Maye Adams is published in Kevin J. Anderson’s anthology Monsters, Movies, & Mayhem.  She is the author of the military-based GALCOM Universe series, including the novel Crying Planet, featured in the 2018 Military Science Fiction StoryBundle, and is working on a superhero novel. 

Book preview

Book Description

Can a spaceship portend doom?

S.C. Kangjun probes the discovery of the legendary derelict, the Space Dutchman. A mystery spacers whisper about in secret.

Hope Delgado, while exploring the Space Dutchman, makes a disturbing discovery. The crew abandoned the spaceship. What danger could drive the crew away?

The answer puts her life on the line. She must use every skill to make it off the ship alive.

A heart-stopping adventure that continues the GALCOM Universe series.

Praise for Linda Maye Adams

Linda Maye Adams’s especially delightful ‘Alien Pizza’ features friendly aliens so enamored with low-budget monster movies that they make one of their own.–Publisher’s Weekly

Mask Pretty: Writers of the Future Silver Honorable Mention

Teddy Bear Man: Writers of the Future Silver Honorable Mention

Magic of Her Heart, Writers of the Future Honorable Mention.

Ticket to a Spaceship, Writers of the Future Honorable Mention.

Family Places: Writers of the Future Honorable Mention

Vagabond of Blood: Writers of the Future Honorable Mention

Map-Mage: Writers of the Future Honorable Mention

Watcher Ghost: Writers of the Future Honorable Mention

A Quartet of Clowns: Writers of the Future Honorable Mention

SPACE DUTCHMAN

LINDA MAYE ADAMS

Copyright Page

SPACE DUTCHMAN — GALCOM UNIVERSE: BOOK #5

Copyright ©2022 by LINDA MAYE ADAMS

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the express written permission of the copyright holder, except where permitted by law. This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination, or, if real, used fictitiously.

Cover artwork and design by Linda Adams, Graphics Designer

Planets and space dust © Shad.off | Deposit Photos and Spaceship © algolonline | Deposit Photos

Published by

Bad Gnome Press

Ebook Edition: November, 2022

SPACE DUTCHMAN / LINDA MAYE ADAMS — 1st ed.

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License Notes

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Chapter 1

Life went on, even on an enormous space battle cruiser like the S.C. Kangjun. After the crew got off duty, they walked their dogs or watched a movie in one of the many theaters. They played racquetball or tried zero-g dancing.

For Hope Delgado, the only civilian on board the military spaceship, she wanted to see the food.

Not the food after her section’s mess crew had cooked it and sent it to the serving line.

The food that the cargo freighter C.S. Bolivar had just offloaded to Section One’s mess.

She wished she could watch that, too, but no one was allowed in the Section One Food Bay when the two spaceships linked with a cargo tube. The tube was big enough for loaded forklifts manned by bots to drive through.

A risk if it breached to the vacuum of space. So bots only.

Dressed in comfortable jeans and an orange top that brought out her warm skin tones, she waited outside the entrance. When the light over the doors flashed green, she raced inside, her Franken military boots clomping on the buffed deck.

Because, nothing, nothing else was like the first moment walking into the food bay and getting the mingling of the wonderful smells. The spices all worked together in a harmony, an orchestra of savory and sweet.

Homesickness swelled inside her. She missed the warm spices of fall that she had grown up with. Nothing was exactly like cinnamon and nutmeg.

The massive room consumed two decks of the section. Even the triple-layered airlock was tall and wide enough to drive a heavily stacked anti-gravity lift through.

A safety chief, identified by his white vest and matching hard hat, hovered on a humming anti-gravity platform as he inspected the stacking of the upper pallets. Even with the safety fields buckling the crates to the walls, accidents still happened. If one of the towers fell, the ship could lose precious food.

Dutifully, Hope lowered one of the warning yellow hard hats near the entrance over her gray-streaked hair.

At five feet, she was small by everyone’s standards, so she added a fluorescent safety vest over her sleeveless blouse. She didn’t want anyone accidentally squishing her while she was admiring the spice.

Her quarry was stacked against the spaceside wall. Cinder block-sized bricks of spice filled the entire space, the clear packaging showing all the pretty colors and textures. She spotted needles and leaves, acorn-sized seeds, and rusty powders.

Yellow tape marked an entire tower. Dog crack, as the crew called it, who liked nicknaming everything. Dogs thought it was their version of catnip.

The mess and executive officer, Lieutenant Commander Christina Jian, chatted with a man in blue coveralls smeared with golden dust. Hope wandered over to visit.

Jian wore her combat tech uniform (CTU in military-speak) creased like knife blades, boots mirror shined. The uniform’s camouflage changed to match the spices behind her.

Black hair framed a square face, cut to chin-length. A sweep of bangs under the yellow safety helmet highlighted brown eyes. They lit up at Hope’s approach.

Came to admire the spices, Hope? she asked, GALCOM training flattening out most of the Hawaiian accent in her voice.

Hope grinned. You know it. It’s hard to believe this much spice won’t last very long.

It was a problem with space travel. The artificial gravity and environmental systems affected how you tasted food. It had to be aggressively seasoned, so the cooks used a lot of spice.

Got your coffee, Jian said.

Her gold wedding ring winked as she gestured at an anti-gravity supply lift. It was stacked with a small supply of shoebox-sized containers of coffee.

Hope’s was easy to identify. A clever artist had drawn a rather cute ghost on it, smiling happily over a cup of coffee.

She laughed, deciding to save the picture.

Other pictures identified owners. An eagle with its wings