Nightfall

by Jay Allan

  Nightfall

  Blood on the Stars X

  Jay Allan

  Copyright © 2018 Jay Allan Books

  All Rights Reserved

  Contents

  Blood on the Stars Series

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  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Chapter Forty

  Epilogue

  Appendix

  The Crimson Worlds Series

  Blood on the Stars Series

  (Available on Kindle Unlimited)

  Duel in the Dark (Blood on the Stars I)

  Call to Arms (Blood on the Stars II)

  Ruins of Empire (Blood on the Stars III)

  Echoes of Glory (Blood on the Stars IV)

  Cauldron of Fire (Blood on the Stars V)

  Dauntless (Blood on the Stars VI)

  The White Fleet (Blood on the Stars VII)

  Black Dawn (Blood on the Stars VIII)

  Invasion (Blood on the Stars IX)

  Nightfall (Blood on the Stars X)

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  www.crimsonworlds.com

  Chapter One

  Planet Calpharon

  Sigma Nordlin System

  Year of Renewal 263 (318 AC)

  The screaming was almost deafening, the shouts of the fleeing—the dying—filling the air, assaulting her ears like a relentless tide. The streets were flooded with the terrified throngs, howling in vain for deliverance from the unimaginable nightmare that had descended on them…at least where the shattered roadways hadn’t begun to buckle under the impacts of the orbital bombardment and buried them beneath incalculable tons of rubble.

  Children were wailing in their high-pitched tones, clinging desperately to the hands of parents, siblings…anyone they could find…until they, too, succumbed to the massive bolts of energy striking the ground or the avalanche of steel and concrete as the buildings of the city came down. All around, rising into the darkening sky, were great, billowing fireballs of nuclear obliteration. And, below the great rising clouds of doom, all conceived and built by mankind vanished, reduced to molten slag and gray dust, with barely a hint remaining that an intelligent and sentient race had dwelt there.

  The world was dying, and its people with it.

  A small boy ran across this vision of hell, his face covered with tears and half-dried blood, his hand clutching the tattered remains of a cherished stuffed animal of some sort, no more left of it than an arm and the scorched remnants of half a tattered body. She thrust her arms out to him, seeking to draw him away from the fury, to pull him closer, keep him safe, but he was too far, beyond her reach. And, then he was gone.

  There were blasts of energy firing up into the sky as well those coming down, and volleys of rockets and missiles ascending as well, but their intensity and numbers were rapidly diminishing, the dying power of a world’s defenses, once mighty, and now mostly blasted into wreckage and radioactive slag.

  It was a scene of despair unimaginable, of a darkness so profound, her eyes filled with water, and tears streamed down her face. There was nothing to feel but a sense of doom, no emotion save utter and complete despair.

  Then, something else, a sudden change. The images were gone in an instant, replaced by near darkness, illuminated only by the vaguest hints of dawn sunlight trickling through the window. And something else, too. Peace. Near silence. The explosions, the screaming…all gone. All that remained was the solitude of her private chamber.

  Akella turned abruptly over to her side, reaching out, frantically at first, to the small comm unit, thinking for an instant to call for help…help for the child she’d seen. But, she stopped before she commed her guards or servants. It was just a dream, she realized. A dream of hell.

  The same nightmare had plagued her for weeks, now.

  She blinked, once, and then again, trying to clear her head. Yes, it had been a dream. She was alone, in her bed in the villa, nude save for the light gauzy cover she always wore at night, the thin and soft material now pasted to her skin with sweat. She pulled herself up, raising her head and shoulders above the pillow, and she reached again to the small table, more slowly this time, grabbing for the pitcher of water she always had placed there.

  The dreams weren’t new, but they were definitely getting worse, horrible visions of the death of the empire, of the billions who’d been exterminated when that great polity had collapsed in on itself in an orgy of bloodletting. When its great ships of war and godlike technologies were turned on its own people like the wrath of an enraged deity whose thirst for blood defied quenching.

  She took hold of the elaborate crystal decanter—she’d have been as happy with a simple container, but her position as the Hegemony’s Number One had surprised her in no aspect so much as the virtual requirement it carried for her to dispense with simple tastes and become far more wasteful and decadent than her desires craved. The marriage of authority and luxury, the notion that those who wielded power should also indulge their every whim, often with almost shameful disregard for waste, was a disturbing attitude that survived from imperial days, and she saw it manifesting itself ever more deeply in Hegemony culture.

  She didn’t like it, not one bit, and she saw it as one of the seeds of decline, of a path that led the empire to destruction. Now, she feared, such impulses pushed her own people not toward the enlightened dominance—and protection—of mankind that they sought, but only to a replay of the subject of her recurring dreams, the firestorm of warfare and bloodletting known in the Hegemony as The Great Death.

  An overwrought title, drama masquerading as history, she might have called it…if the deadly series of conflicts and disasters hadn’t rated it in every particular. Humanity had come close to extinguishing itself entirely almost four centuries before, and leaving the galaxy—all of it known to human exploration, at least—a somber and silent graveyard, filled with the slowly decaying structures and machines of an intelligent race—the only known intelligent race—that was no more.

  She drank the water, gulped it, more accurately, and she took a few deep breaths, focusing on herself, compelling relaxation, and feeling the rapidity of her heartbeats gradually slo
wing. Then, she stood up, pulling herself out from the light cover and walking toward the great windows overlooking the ocean. Sleep was impossible now. She knew that from experience. It was close to time to rise anyway, and there was little point remaining in bed.

  She looked out at the crashing waves below the low cliff behind her villa. The sea was her vice, and the one luxury she’d gladly accrued to herself. Past Number Ones had resided in the city, near the centers of power over which they ruled. But, Akella preferred the calm of her villa, typically silent save for the sound of the waves beneath the bluffs. She spent most of her time there, residing in her apartment in the capital only when affairs of state compelled her presence.

  Which had become far too often since the Rimdwellers were discovered. Her people were at war, a crusade to undertake their sacred duty. Hegemony forces had fought many times to bring the wild and untamed survivors of humanity’s attempted suicide under its protection, but the conflict far out on the Rim was orders of magnitude vaster and deadlier.

  She stared out as night continued its daily retreat, driven back by hazy shafts of fresh morning light. Her nightmares once again pushed aside, she plunged deep into thought. Chronos’s report weighed heavily on her mind, as it had since she’d first read it. She had to make a decision, and she’d put it off for too many days already. It wouldn’t wait any longer. She would have to send back her response, and she would have to do it before the day dawning outside her window had ended.

  But, she still hadn’t decided what her answer would be.

  The commander of the Grand Fleet, and her colleague on the Supreme Council, Chronos had been clear and concise, and he’d pulled no punches in his analysis. Refreshingly, neither had he made excuses for himself nor tried to overstate the gains he had achieved…or diminish those that yet eluded his grasp.

  The fleet had seen success, certainly, by every conventional benchmark of war imaginable. Chronos’s ships were only two transits from the Confederation capital, and, despite losses that exceeded projections, and a substantial and unexpected delay while the commander refit his damaged ships and modified more escorts to the new anti-small craft configurations, there seemed no doubt the Confederation forces would soon be defeated and their capital occupied. It would come later than she had hoped, later than Chronos had expected as well, she knew…but it would come. If she let it.

  But, what then?

  Would the enemy collapse when its primary system was taken, as most of her advisors had expected? Would the Rimdwellers’ sue for peace, and their leaders accept their places within an expanded Hegemony?

  When she’d issued the orders that sent Chronos and most of the Hegemony’s military might far out to the Rim, she’d believed as earnestly of any of her colleagues, that the answer to that question was yes. Now, doubts began to form. She saw strength in the Rimdwellers she hadn’t expected, a power of will that her people hadn’t seen in any other pockets of human habitation they’d yet encountered. The Confederation forces were outnumbered, outgunned, overmatched in every way…and yet they continued to fight.

  The Hegemony had absorbed many worlds, even nascent interstellar nations that had begun to grow tentatively from the ashes of the Great Death—including one from which many of her own bloodlines had originated—but in almost every case, faced with the overwhelming might and technology of the Hegemony, those planets and polities had quickly yielded. Wars—save only for the one against the Others—had been quick, relatively low-cost endeavors, and even the delays normal logistics might have imposed had been largely eliminated by the great Support Fleet. So it had seemed to be in the Confederation, too, as Chronos’s forces pushed ever forward, across distances no Hegemony fleet had been compelled fight over before. Yet, now, even with the vast supporting forces, he’d been forced to slow his advance, to prep more ships to face the enemy small craft—fighters, they call them, she reminded herself—and to repair damage the fleet had suffered in amounts that had exceeded all expectations.

  All of that meant delays, and yet more delays. Akella had hoped to receive word that the Confederation had surrendered by now. Instead, she had the fleet commander’s vague assurance he would finish the campaign as quickly as possible after the pause…along with a request for authorization to do just what he had already done on his own. Push back the timetable.

  Chronos wants to cover his ass…he wants me to tell him to go forward, not to cancel the operation and fall back…

  She’d always liked Number Eight, and she considered him a capable commander. Indeed, he was one of the top ten genetic specimens in the whole of the human race…yet, he’d always been a bit cautious in how he conducted things, and he’d never failed to make sure his own interests were protected.

  Does he resent me? Akella knew Chronos had desired to mate with her, and she wondered for a brief instance if some kind of wounded pride had intervened in the fleet commander’s actions, even subconsciously.

  No, she decided almost immediately. Not Chronos. He would never do less than his best, no matter what factors pulled at him.

  And, he does not hate me. Wounded pride or no, he will follow my orders to the best of his ability, even as he will rush to my bed if ever I agree to his desired pairing.

  There was only one true concern that cut at her, and it wasn’t the ultimate outcome of the war on the Rim. Whatever fight the Confederation, and the other Rimdwellers, might put up, they would be conquered. The true worry in her mind was one she wasn’t even sure was real, the return of a deadly enemy she herself had never faced, that few alive had, the nightmare from the outer reaches of explored space known in the annals only as the Others.

  It was to face this threat that the Grand Fleet had been built…and, now that great force was hundreds of lightyears away, fighting an entirely different—and previously unknown—enemy.

  And, by all accounts, suffering significant losses in the process.

  Akella stared out at the growing light, at the waves reflecting the morning sun, and she pushed back against her thoughts. There had been no sign of the Others, almost within living memory, and she reminded herself that Chronos’s delays were not long in the scheme of such a massive conquest. Would another year really matter? Wasn’t the addition of billions of new humans, of bloodlines almost uncountable, of DNA branches that had been spared the grievous damage of radiation and bacteriological warfare, worth the extra time, and the small risk the continuation of the campaign carried?

  It was, of course, worth it. She knew that, in every way she could logically analyze the situation. And, yet she had to fight the unease in the back of her mind.

  And, the nightmares weren’t helping.

  She turned and walked back to the bed, sitting down and activating the comm unit. “Basha, I will have a communique ready in ten minutes. Order orbital command to have a Tachyon ready to depart immediately.

  The Tachyon courier ships were the fastest things in space. Antimatter-powered, they could accelerate at over 200g. The lack of a human crew—the vessels were entirely AI-controlled—eliminated a lot of impediments to extremely fast travel. The Grand Fleet was many months away, at least in terms of large unit maneuver, but the Tachyon would make the journey in a bit over three weeks, just as one had brought her Chrono’s report had done.

  She knew what her orders would be, deep inside, at least, though she still had to force out the words once she activated the comm.

  “Commander Chronos…you are authorized to continue your campaign, as much in accordance with the established plan as possible. In all matters, you are to use your judgment and remember our sacred duty to steward all humanity, even in the face of their foolish resistance. I support you fully in all things, and I wish you a speedy victory and a triumphant return. Akella, Number One, speaking for the Hegemony.”

  Chapter Two

  Prime Base

  Orbiting Megara, Olyus III

  Year 318 AC

  “I still can’t believe he’s gone.” Tyler Barron sat
in the plush chair, staring at the once steaming, but now stone-cold coffee he’d barely touched. The executive officer’s club on Prime Base was luxurious to say the least—the top navy brass that inhabited the environs of the capital had shown little sign of controlling wasteful expenditures any better than the politicians down on the surface.

  The row of tables and deeply upholstered chairs lined up in a single row along a clear hyper-polycarbonate wall that offered a stunning view of the blue disk of Megara down below the high planetary orbit of the great Prime Base. No flag officer was denied a magnificent view, nor tasked to endure the head of a fellow admiral blocking any sightlines.

  “I can’t either. I keep expecting him to walk through the door.” Gary Holsten’s tone matched the grimness of Barron’s at least while discussing Van Striker. Holsten wasn’t supposed to be in the club, not officially, at least, but in the aftermath of the civil disruptions that had almost brought the Confederation government down, the chief spy went just about anywhere he wanted to go, even more than he had before.

  Admiral Striker had been one of the great heroes of the Confederation, and he’d been shot down in the street just days after Holsten’s people had rescued him from captivity. He had been the last victim of Ricard Lille, the greatest assassin ever to have served Sector Nine and the Union.

  Barron seethed with rage, with searing hatred for the Union. He’d been opposed to the peace treaty that had stopped the navy from pushing forward several years before, from recovering the systems lost in the first Union War, and from making sure the despotic regime never again threatened the Confederation. Now, such a short time later, and in the midst of another, even more desperate threat, the Union proved yet again it could not be trusted. Even before it could rebuild its shattered fleets to the point where they could again pose a credible threat, their machinations and plots still struck hard, and caused irreparable harm.

  He didn’t discuss his thoughts, though. There was no point with Holsten, not again. The reinstated head of Confederation Intelligence agreed with him in every particular. Barron would have known that, even if Holsten hadn’t made it painfully clear more than once. But, as much pain as he still felt for the death of his mentor and friend, Tyler Barron knew his own sorrow was irrelevant. He had a job to do, one that would be even more difficult without Striker.