The Alliance Trilogy

by Michael Wallace

  But Svensen knew the Helsingors well, not only Jan, but his cousins, who had been famous raiders back in the days after the plagues, when pillaging and plunder became a Scandian way of life. The man could be touchy, quick to take offense, and as unlikely to take advice as he was to allow those under him to disregard his own. The thought that he’d humbly approach Svensen in an attempt to learn lessons about coordinating kinetic fire seemed doubtful.

  “I’ll bet he’s jealous,” Jörvak said. Boghammer’s second officer turned sour the instant he heard the request. “He’s going to argue that his raiders deserve the right to land on the leviathan, not us. That we shouldn’t hog the combat opportunities.”

  Jörvak was probably right. There would be glory for the first men to land on a star leviathan. If they destroyed the Adjudicator implant and somehow escaped with their lives, their feat would become legendary, a story retold around fireplaces for generations.

  “If he has a problem, it’s not with us, it’s with Tolvern’s marines,” Svensen said. “They’re the ones taking his place, not us.”

  “You’re right.” Jörvak nodded. “I’ll tell him.”

  “Nah, let him come over. If he makes the claim, I’ll do what Tolvern would do, and pump him up with nonsense about winning the battle with his ships, not his mech units.”

  A few hours later, he watched with a skeptical eye as Icefall pulled in a few hundred yards off Boghammer’s starboard. The other star wolf carried the look of an Albion warship, mainly up front and along the upper decks. Back in the years before the Alliance, one of Helsingor’s uncles or cousins—Svensen couldn’t remember who—had hauled a gutted naval destroyer to Viborg after a raid, at which point Helsingor’s father broke it down and rebuilt it to Scandian specifications.

  Under other circumstances, Svensen would have been wary of an ambush. Historically, the biggest victims of Scandian violence were other Scandians, both planetside and in space. Before the wars and the domination by Albion, he’d only fought the Royal Navy once, but fellow raiders several times, usually when they were trying to steal the fruits of his raids or he was trying to do the same thing to them.

  A small capsule catapulted from Icefall and soared toward Boghammer, even while the two star wolves were hurtling at thousands of miles a second toward Persia. A net and hook apparatus stretched out to snare the pod and haul it in. Both of these were adaptations from the Royal Navy; before the Alliance, a raider entered another man’s ship under more violent circumstances.

  Lund spoke up from his console. The signalman sounded worried. “It’s Blackbeard. They want to know what’s up.”

  Tolvern’s battle cruiser was a quarter million miles behind Boghammer and the other ships of the Second and Fourth Wolves, but the woman would be keeping a close watch on her fleet as she organized it for its approach to Persia. Up front, Captain Vargus would be doing much the same thing.

  “Tell Blackbeard we’re having a meeting of commanders to coordinate our guns,” Svensen said.

  Lund raised an eyebrow, and Jörvak let out a gruff chuckle.

  “That’s all we know,” Svensen said, “so it’s all they know, too.”

  Lund sent the message and got a response just as the netting snared Icefall’s away pod and hauled it in. “They want a report when we’re done. I don’t think they trust what we’re up to.”

  “I don’t trust what we’re up to, either,” Svensen said. To Jörvak, he added, “Tell the crew in the bay that I want Helsingor escorted up by at least two men.”

  Jörvak raised an eyebrow. “You don’t think he’ll start something, do you?”

  “That would be insane. And to remind him how insane it would be, I want him under armed escort.”

  Jan Helsingor arrived in Boghammer’s command room a few minutes later. The last time Svensen had seen the man, he’d been in his mech suit, one of the big, battering kind they called rollers, as much mechanized muscle as gun platform. His helmet was painted to look like a pink balloon with a smiley face, which somehow made him look more menacing.

  In person, Helsingor was short and slender, and in spite of his thick beard and flaming red hair, didn’t look like a threat. He didn’t even carry a sidearm. Neither had he brought anyone else with him from Icefall. Svensen allowed himself to relax.

  “Let’s talk,” Svensen said. “You want the council room or the drink hall?”

  A grin split Helsingor’s bearded face. “The drink hall, of course.”

  #

  “The Second Wolves were the last ships to make contact with the enemy,” Helsingor said a few minutes later, when Svensen had led him to a corner of the drink hall and each man sat with a tankard of ale. “Icefall approached the tertiary star fortress shortly before disengagement.”

  “Listen to you,” Svensen said. “‘Make contact, tertiary star fortress’ . . . speak some blasted Scandian, will you.”

  He took a long swig. He’d been on shift for twelve hours, and the drink tasted good.

  Helsingor grumbled. “It’s these navy sorts, they put that gibberish into you after a while, technical terms and the lot. So we charged in, gave the ghouls a couple of blasts with the guns while we scooped up escape pods from those ships that went down.”

  “Yeah, I was following the battle. You did what was expected. Maybe the Albion king will pin a medal on you when this is over.” Svensen leaned across and tapped Helsingor on the chest. “Right here, above your left tit.”

  “Do that again, friend, and you’ll have two stumps, not one.”

  Svensen laughed and leaned back in his chair. He plopped the wrist with the missing hand onto the table. “What’s a missing hand when you’re wired into a mech suit? It’s no more a handicap than being short and scrawny. Like you, for example.”

  “Dammit, Svensen, this is serious.” Helsingor drained his ale and waved for another, and the mess master brought it over, along with a refill for Svensen, who was only slightly behind.

  “I know, that’s why I’m softening you up with some friendly banter.” He drained his tankard and started in on the second. “So what happened when you engaged the so-called tertiary star fortress?”

  “We were close—too close, in fact. Easily inside the range of the monster’s spore cannons, never mind the carrier’s blasted missiles and cannons. But I’d spotted an escape pod with twenty poor fools stuffed into it that was about to get hammered by dragoons, and I had to get them out. Survivors from one of those destroyers that went down. Right there toward the end, we had every one of that carrier’s guns trained on us. I’m still not quite sure how we got the pod and pulled our own stones out of the fire in time.”

  “I remember that,” Svensen said, more seriously this time. “That was good work.”

  “I’m not looking for praise. Or medals pinned to my tits, either. Thing is, when we were in close, we got a good look at the carrier. Struck it hard with active scanners, and saw some things that we’d never picked up before.”

  Svensen leaned forward. “Yeah, like what?”

  “There was a temperature anomaly on the underside of the star fortress. The armor on those things is thinner than you’d expect.”

  “The torus rings give it a boost.”

  “Point is, it’s thin enough that we had a bit of a look inside. There’s a massive zone of stasis chambers on the underside, big enough to cram a whole lot of bodies. Ten, twenty thousand, maybe more.”

  “Probably for holding slaves.”

  “Most of it seemed empty. The fluid wasn’t circulating, anyway.”

  Svensen had a grim thought. “The ghouls are planning to fill them up at Persia, I’ll bet. Coming in empty and leaving fully loaded.”

  “Maybe, but that’s not my point.” Helsingor held out his left hand and drew a line across the palm with his right index finger. “There’s a thin wedge of stasis chambers right about here, close to an array of docking points, and these ones do have occupants. Except they’re warming. The ghouls were thawing whoever
was inside. Think about that for a minute.”

  He leaned back with his ale and studied Svensen, eyes narrowed over his thick beard. Svensen kept drinking as he considered this. A smaller number of chambers, thawing, and in the best position to unload them quickly from their star fortress. The conclusion seemed inescapable. Decimator units.

  “How many are we talking?” he asked.

  “Hard to say. It’s a small part of the whole, and I only had a glimpse. Not like we were one of them beetle ships, either—we can only see so far. Maybe only fifty chambers, or maybe as many as a couple of hundred.”

  “There are six different star fortresses,” Svensen said. “What if they’re all thawing decimators?”

  “Yeah, exactly. We might have three hundred on the lower end, and over a thousand on the upper. You think they know what we’re up to?”

  “Probably not. Probably they’re going to land them on the orbital fortress, fight their way into the lower levels and dig out the defenders. Or maybe use them for a planetside assault. But that’s not the problem. The decimators will be thawed and ready to fight when I go in, and it won’t be hard to send them down to fight us on the leviathan. Seems like they’ll figure out quickly enough what we’re up to.”

  “How many are you going in with?” Helsingor asked.

  “One hundred and twenty raiders and a couple of hundred marines.”

  “Not enough to be sure, is it? If you took another hundred raiders from the Second Wolves, it would make your job a lot easier.”

  “Ah, now I get it.” Svensen eyed the other commander. “I couldn’t figure out why you needed to tell me in person. Why not make your case to Tolvern? Wouldn’t she agree?”

  “Agree to send more men, sure. But she’ll go with the blasted Third Wolves first. Doesn’t think we’re well integrated enough yet. Whatever the icy hells that means. I need you to tell her that it’s me you need.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I discovered it! It’s mine by right.”

  “That why you think you deserve it. But Tolvern doesn’t care about that, she only wants to win the battle. For all I know, she won’t agree to send any more Scandians,” Svensen added. “A star wolf doesn’t fight half so well when it’s unloaded half its crew in a raid, including its commanding officer. She might send more marines instead.”

  “The marines don’t have enough mech units for that.”

  That was true enough. Royal Marines had been outfitted with Scandian-style mech suits for some time, but they were still short of a full battalion. It wasn’t even the lack of armor that made the difference under the current circumstances, but an inability of non-mech units to fight in vacuum.

  “Argue your case,” Svensen said. “Tell Tolvern that your mech units are the best in the fleet. That your grinning balloon head armor is enough to scare off any number of ghouls.”

  “Come on, Svensen, I’m being serious here. You know I don’t speak their gibberish language. If I tell her, it will be through one of those cold-blooded Chinese translators. You know they’ll make me sound like I’m whining.”

  “Imagine that.”

  “Make the case for me. Please.”

  “Did you just say ‘please’? It must be serious.” Svensen nodded. “All right, I’ll do it.”

  Chapter Twelve

  Fontaine and Al-Harthi stood in the launch bay, waiting. Cavlee trundled by, using their knuckles to haul themselves forward in an ape-like fashion. They carried tool belts strapped across their chests, with plasma torches and electric wrenches slung over their shoulders. Humans drove tractor-like vehicles that followed rails set into the floor, pulling carts loaded with equipment.

  The humans and Cavlee worked on the hull of a small cargo ship that lay stripped open in the middle of the bay, with bits of engine and decking stretched out alongside. The hull was pitted from kinetic fire, and blackened portions of the interior were visible when three human workers with a crane pulled away a stretch of the damage shields.

  “A human ship,” Al-Harthi said. “Terran. Look at the lettering aft of the bridge. That’s a Martian registration number.”

  “I used to fly one like that,” Fontaine said. “Running cargo from the myrrh harvest, mainly to Patagonia. May as well take a closer look while we’re waiting.”

  “Go ahead, if you can. Feels like my feet are made of concrete blocks.”

  He gave it a try and learned she was right. The artificial gravity was only about .5 g, but even a single step forward made his muscles strain, and sweat popped out on his forehead when he took a second. Continuing further was impossible, and his legs were trembling until he fell back to stand next to Al-Harthi, at which point he was fine again.

  She turned her head. “Is this the ship that’s carrying us to Earth?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe.”

  Fly them in on a small transport ship, and then . . . what? Since the meeting, the Adjudicators had housed the two humans in a single room, far from the filth of the recycling plant, near where the skilled workers were housed. Rations increased, and there was even salt and seasoning in it, as if someone wanted them to eat. The implant induced hunger, and they ate ravenously. Only a few days had passed since they’d been summoned, and both were still bony arms, sharp hips, and lean faces, but Al-Harthi had lost the gaunt, sunken look, and Fontaine felt more energy than he had in months.

  He felt the Adjudicator’s presence before he saw the creature. His muscles tensed, hair rose on the back of his neck, and his senses were suddenly alert. He and Al-Harthi turned at the same time to see a gray figure walking toward them. It was the Lord of Lords, armored, except for the helmet. Its dead eyes scanned the bay floor, and disgust fairly radiated from it.

  It crossed the rail lines and the colored, chemically-infused lines laid down by the insectoids. Workers moved out of its way like water flowing around a stone. As the Lord of Lords approached, warmth rose in Fontaine’s cheeks, and tears welled in his eyes.

  “Oh, glorious one,” he said, “thank you for gracing us with your presence.”

  Al-Harthi said something incomprehensible. Her tone was high, excited—the babbled Arabic punctuated with bits of English. Fontaine found that he was speaking French as he continued his praise.

  “Enough.” The thought entered Fontaine’s mind. He and his companion fell silent. “The worship of your race is loathsome. Fawning and insincere.”

  Yes, you bastard. You’ve stimulated our brains, nothing more.

  “Can you fly this ship?” it asked.

  “Yes, of course,” Fontaine said. “Assuming all systems are intact.”

  “Will it be captured crossing into the Earth System?”

  He hesitated an instant. Didn’t their master know already? Wasn’t this the sort of detail it would have worked out ahead of time?

  “Unlikely, but possible. Quarantines are never complete, and there are no doubt thousands of small-scale smugglers coming and going. But Earth will be watching for tricks, and there’s a chance they’ll board the ship to make sure it hasn’t been compromised.”

  “Do you concur?” This time the question sounded whispered, and Fontaine realized it was directed to Al-Harthi.

  “I could fly a ship this small right through a Terran fleet,” she said. “There is maybe a one in ten chance I’d get caught. Without the Merchanting Federation to patrol the lanes, someone would have to be actively searching for us.” She nodded. “Yes, I can take it through.”

  “Good. It is time to end this war.”

  The creature stared at them. Its limbs may have been freshly grown in a tank, but its face remained long and haggard, with such deep age in its dead eyes that Fontaine wondered how many civilizations it had snuffed out, how many devotees it had worked to death. And even though the words had been transmitted, not spoken, he swore he could hear exhaustion in them.

  “Follow me.”

  They departed the loading bay through a small side door that led to an escalator-like ramp. The
incline was steep enough that the humans had to grasp hooks jutting from the side and use their arms to help haul themselves up. At the top of the ramp the Adjudicator led them down a slightly wider hallway lit with a garish red light. There were several other Adjudicators up here, coming and going from side rooms.

  None of them wore armor, Fontaine realized, startled. In fact, the Adjudicators in the hallway above the ramp wore no clothes at all, and he stared at their gray bodies, taking note of the ropy musculature and bones that seemed assembled in unusual ways. None of them had any visible gender that he could see.

  The Adjudicators in the hallway shrank against the wall as the Lord of Lords approached, tilted their heads to one side, and spoke to it in a language that sounded like crackles and throat clearing interspersed with snorts through their nose slits. They eyed the humans as they passed, and Fontaine couldn’t meet their gaze. Something like shame struck him, and he was relieved when a door slid open and admitted them to a large, circular room.

  There was no furniture in the room, and the walls and domed ceiling were smooth. The harsh red light had diminished, but not disappeared. It suffused every surface, emitted from no visible source.

  “Many planets have I sanctified,” the Adjudicator said. “Many races have I judged and ordered reduced. My people are lords who dispense justice to the sinners. And I am the lord over all.”

  “How is it justice?” Al-Harthi said. There was a surprising note of defiance in her voice. “How are we sinners? We’d never met your kind before, we don’t worship your religion or your gods.”

  “We have no gods. We are the gods.”

  Fontaine was surprised to discover that he could speak, too. And argue. “You aren’t gods. You can’t see everything, and you are not all-powerful. You can die, like any mortal creature.”

  “We are gods.” Its tone was flat.

  “A god is a creator of life, not a destroyer,” Al-Harthi said.

  “We are creating. We create through healing and purification.”

  Fontaine shook his head. “That makes no sense.”