The targeted pilots crashed to the ground. The troopers grabbed them and quickly pulled them out of the room. Some of the seated pilots started to stand up, especially those from the large group. Clay realised in confusion that two of those singled out by the officer had come from their group. But that didn’t make sense; weren’t they from this ship?
“Sit down!” screamed the officer.
Everyone did. Clay hadn’t started to stand. He’d gone cold inside. He was certain at least one of the downed pilots was dead. He couldn’t say why, but he was sure. And he would have put money on the fact the others wouldn’t live for long after they left the room.
Once the last of the incapacitated pilots were dragged out the remaining troopers took up positions at the sides of the room. No more was said, but the threat was clear.
“Now that is out of the way, let me officially welcome you all aboard,” the officer said, as if nothing significant had happened. “Whether you came alone or with other pilots you know, the Clanar’s Sword is now your home. Get used to it. You’ve seen the alternative. I trust none of you will be stupid enough to follow the path they chose.”
Silence greeted her words. She smiled slightly. Clay realised the large group wasn't from this ship. He guessed they were survivors, like him. Seeing so many from one ship hurt. It reminded him of those he had failed to save.
“All right,” the officer snapped out. “All of you came from ships which weren’t attached to our fleet, so I need to bring you up to speed. You all know about the Tainted. You all know how hard it has been to hold them back. What you may not know is that the Empire is losing the fight.”
She paused, letting that news sink in. There were gasps from around the room, and muttered denials. Clay simply sat quietly. It matched what he had worked out for himself. The officer caught his gaze again.
“I see a few of you were already thinking along those lines. For the rest… get used to it. It’s a fact. The Empire is losing.”
She slammed her hand down on the desk beside her, making everyone jump, and switched to a parade ground roar.
“The Empire may be losing, but it has not lost. Nor will it. This fleet will play a crucial role in turning the tide.”
She paused, then spoke in her normal tone again.
“There have to be sacrifices. The Empire is too spread out. There are too many small stations and ships in out of the way places. That makes it easy for the Tainted to infiltrate, to wear us down, to defeat us. We tried fighting the war on their terms. We lost. It’s time to change the rules.
“The only way to beat the Tainted is to create a small, solid and easily defended area. An area that is self contained and isolated. If the Tainted can’t approach then they can’t make progress. Senior command has designated a group of sixty systems as that area. Nothing goes out or comes back into any of those systems unless it is one of our fleets, or is accompanied by one of our fleets. That applies to travel between the systems too.
“Taken together the systems are self sufficient. No contact with the rest of the Empire will be necessary to survive. They also include ample resources and the facilities required to build and maintain fleets.”
She paused, judging how the room had taken her words. So far everyone seemed to be accepting what she told them. Clay suspected something worse was coming. He was right.
“We have a problem. The settlements around the outer worlds of those systems are spread too thinly. They represent an easy toehold for the Tainted. They endanger everything we aim to build. Therefore they must be destroyed. That is our mission. All installations and ships outside of the approved area will be wiped out.”
More gasps from around the room. Clay just nodded slightly. It made sense, in a twisted kind of way. It also underscored how far the Empire had fallen, how small its scope had become. Despite the officer's spin it was clear the Empire was fragmenting. Sixty systems? That was nothing, just a tiny fraction of the total Empire. And that was all they thought they could hold onto?
The officer soon signalled for their attention again. She didn’t elaborate on what she’d said before. Instead, she started reeling off their next set of targets and the parts the pilots would play. Clay sat numbly, taking it in but not processing it. Their first targets would be a mining colony, a small station specialising in ship repairs, several bulk freighters and then a sizeable station. She spoke in terms of assets and defensive capabilities but all Clay could see in his mind was parents and children.
As the briefing came to an end, he worked hard to keep his body language neutral. He had no desire to draw attention, to seal his own death. He also knew he had to get away, and do it soon, before his soul was burned away by the things he was ordered to do.
Chapter 35
As they cautiously skirted around another wrecked ship in case its weapons were still active, Jess frowned at what the Wanderer’s sensors were telling him. It made no sense.
“That’s odd,” he muttered. “We can reach jump space.”
“Why is that odd?” Ali asked.
Jess was thrown for a moment. He hadn’t realised he’d spoken out loud.
“Um… look at the screen. We’re nowhere near the edge of the conflict. Why were they fighting outside of the tar pit’s range?”
“Maybe they weren’t,” Dash said. “The tar pit is on a ship, probably a damn big one. The defending forces will be desperate to keep that ship safe. They probably had to start falling back before the assault, which would move the tar pit’s area.”
“Or it’s been destroyed,” Ali said.
“Yes, that would do it,” Dash said. “We’d never spot it with all the fighting and wreckage between us and it.”
“I don’t think it’s been destroyed,” Jess said. “We’ve been through that once before, when we rescued Elizabeth. I didn’t feel anything like it this time.”
“Just out of their range, then,” Dash said with a shrug. “We should take advantage of it.”
Jess nodded. He reached out with the Wanderer’s jump engines and dragged them into jump space.
“Is that it, do you think?” he asked Dash. “Will that be the last blockade we have to deal with?”
“Maybe. Any further blockades might have been destroyed. On the other hand, they could just have been overwhelmed by much large forces. Maybe they weren’t able to stop the assault but are still operational. If we hit another tar pit then we know the answer. If not, we’ll cruise through and never really know.”
“We can scan real space from jump space, remember,” Jess said. “If there’s been a battle like this one we should be able to spot the wreckage.”
“Great. Just stay in jump space, though, and remember that we don’t know what they’re fleeing from. Or if whatever it is has tar pits of its own.”
“All right. Our friends in the cargo hold are on the move again. I still can’t spot any pattern to it. If we’re in jump space longer this time then we should find out what their plans are.”
“Makes sense. Let me know if you need my input. For now, I’m going to check on Sal.”
Jess felt a twinge of guilt. He’d been too caught up in keeping the ship safe and had forgotten about her.
“She’s still sitting by the escape pod,” he said.
Dash just nodded grimly. “Hell of a risk trusting an escape pod in this environment. Probably only a fifty-fifty chance of surviving all the wreckage and fighting. Then the odds of being picked up are tiny. Her mother must have been desperate.”
“You saw the ship,” Jess said. “Or what was left of it. A slim hope must have seemed far better than no hope.”
“It always does,” Dash said, his eyes focused on something only he could see.
* * *
Dash approached Sal slowly. She was sitting by the escape pod, head buried in her hands. He crouched beside her, tentatively putting his hand on her shoulder.
“Hey,” he said softly. “How are you doing?”
Sal slowly lifted her
head and blinked rapidly, almost as if she was waking up. Her eyes were red from crying but she seemed calm now, almost tranquil. She blinked a final time, then her attention snapped into place. She treated Dash to a dazzling smile, though one tinged with sadness. Dash couldn’t help but smile back.
“Better,” she replied. “Finding Shola had died was hard, but I realised it doesn’t matter.”
“It doesn’t?”
Dash was cautious now. This wasn’t the reaction he’d expected. He’d seen enough people affected by traumatic events to know he had to step carefully.
“No. We couldn’t change that. We couldn’t save her from dying. But we still saved her.”
Sal’s eyes were shining now. Dash found himself staring into them as his breathing quickened. Her gaze was hypnotic.
“I don’t understand,” he managed to say finally.
“If we hadn’t come along she’d still be floating in space, alone forever. She would never have found any peace. We saved her from that fate. Now she will never be alone.”
Dash was having trouble thinking. His head felt full of cotton wool. His eyes were still locked with Sal’s. A small part of his mind was thinking rationally. It was telling him they couldn’t carry a corpse around with them forever. Somehow the words just wouldn’t reach his mouth.
Suddenly Sal broke eye contact. She leaned forward, hugging Dash close. He clung to her in turn. His head was spinning and he felt dizzy. Was it having Sal so close that did it?
His thoughts slowly returned to normal, but he kept his hold on Sal. She showed no intention of letting go either. Dash didn’t want to do anything to risk the sudden thaw in their relationship so he remained where he was, even as his legs began to ache from crouching so long.
Finally Sal pulled away. Dash stood and helped her to her feet. She smiled at him again, a smile that warmed his heart even as something in her gaze made it beat faster.
“Should I cover her?” Dash asked, nodding towards the escape pod.
Sal thought for a moment, then shook her head.
“No. She’s gone but that doesn’t mean we can’t remember her.”
“OK.” He looked into the escape pod. The little girls eyes were open, staring sightlessly back at Dash. He leaned over and gently closed them. A shiver ran down his spine. Stepping back he found Sal looking at him with a strange expression which quickly faded to a smile. She held a hand out to him.
“Come on… we’d better go see what the others are up to.”
* * *
Jess glanced over his shoulder as Dash and Sal entered the flight deck. He was surprised when Sal smiled at him. He smiled back, his heart feeling a little lighter. Despite their arguments over Dash, the way she had withdrawn into herself had worried him.
Sal sat down. Dash took the seat next to hers. Another good sign. Sal had been withdrawing from Dash as much as from Jess, even as she had defended Dash’s right to stay aboard.
The Wanderer nudged into his consciousness, drawing his attention to the area of normal space they were passing. Jess stiffened, drawing in the information.
Ali sensed the change.
“What is it?” she asked.
“Wreckage,” Jess answered. “Huge amounts of wreckage. I’m not detecting anything moving or showing signs of power.”
“There’s no tar pit?” Dash asked, leaning forward.
“No. No disturbances in jump space at all. There was a mammoth battle here, though. There must be wreckage from tens of thousands of ships. Some of them were really big, battlecruiser sized at least.”
“What happened to them?” Ali asked. “Was it whatever had everyone on the run?”
“I don’t think so,” Jess said. “There’s no sign of anything unusual. All the wreckage is from Imperial or civilian ships.”
“The fight we just left wasn’t the first, then,” Dash said, shaking his head. “That’s amazing. The forces trying to escape would have to be massive. I’m really not keen on meeting whatever has them that scared.”
“You think we can avoid it?”
“No. Not really.”
“Then we’d better hope we can outrun it. I don’t think we have much chance of outgunning it.”
Jess kept monitoring normal space. The amount of wreckage was mind-blowing. All the time he was watching for anything unusual, any hint of danger. Suddenly normal space was clear again. Able to remain in jump space they had covered the area of the battle far more quickly than he’d expected.
“We’re past,” he said.
“You didn’t find anything else? Anything unusual?” Dash asked.
“Nothing. What do we do? Just keep on going until we reach the next tar pit?”
“If there is one. There might not be. I can’t imagine that force somehow bypassed any defenders. Either they smashed through them all, which seems unlikely, or something else did and they took advantage.”
“If it was something else, then where is it now?”
“How do I know? We have no idea what it even is.”
“We come back to the same question,” Ali said. “What do we do? Just keep going?”
“We could go back,” Sal said.
Jess was startled to hear her speak, and to do so in something approaching a normal tone. Then what she had said sank in.
“We can’t,” Jess said. “You know that. Think of all the blockades we’d have to break through. There’s no way they’d just let us past. And we’d be almost certain to run into the fleet that has been chasing us.”
“I don’t mean on our own. Think of all those civilian ships trying to get through, trying to reach safety. They’ve already gotten this far. If we helped them they could make it, and they’d give us enough firepower to see off the fleet that’s chasing us.”
“But it’s just a civilian fleet with some military ships mixed in. They can’t break through all those layers of blockades.”
“How do you know? We could only see a tiny part of the battle, and most of what we could see was confusion. They’ve managed to get this far. With some help they could make it all the way through.”
Jess could only sit there staring at Sal. Her idea was ridiculous… but he couldn’t find any words to explain why. Sal leant forward, eyes intense. She clearly believed in what she was saying. The longer he stared at her, the harder it was to counter her argument.
Dash came to his rescue.
“Sal, we can’t do that,” Dash said. “We have no idea the size of the forces involved, or how the battle is going.”
Sal seemed about to argue then closed her mouth, just nodding slightly. Jess started to worry the strain had become too much. Was Sal losing touch with reality? Did she somehow imagine that she knew how the battle was going, and how many forces were involved?
“Even if you were right,” Dash continued. “Helping that force smash through the blockades would leave the way wide open for whatever it is that they are fleeing, whatever it is the Empire is afraid of.”
“Maybe that’s a good thing,” she said. “Why assume that whatever it is will be such a danger? Maybe the only danger it brings is to the Empire. Maybe it would be a good thing if it got through.”
“That’s one hell of a maybe to risk untold billions of lives on. I’ve got no love for the Empire but I can’t think of anything that would have them so scared and still be good news for humanity. We can’t take that risk.”
Sal looked ready to argue for a few seconds, her eyes locked onto Dash’s. Then she let them drop and seemed to shrink back inside herself. Jess wasn’t sure whether he felt relieved or sorry for her.
“So we just keep going, I guess,” he said.
“Jess,” Ali said. “The troopers seem to be settling on a rough direction now. They’re heading for the jump engines.”
Jess quickly checked.
“Looks like it,” he agreed.
“Can they get to them?” Dash asked.
“Possibly. The walls are much thicker, they have to be to shield th
e engines, but I think they could get through. If they do, there’s plenty they could damage in there.”
“Which would put us back into normal space and waiting for their fleet to catch up with us.”
“Pretty much. If they destroyed the engines while we were in jump space we’d be stuck there. I don’t think we can risk that. The moment they get access to the jump drives I’ll have to drop us back into normal space.”
“You haven’t figured out any other ways of slowing them down?”
“No. They’re very careful about applying the explosives now. By the time they pull their hand away the explosives are out of their gloves. The best I can do by targeting the explosives is sting their hand a little and save them the effort of triggering the explosion.”
“Why wait?” Ali asked.
“Because I can’t see anything to fire at otherwise.”
“Yes, but why fire? They’ve got their hands pressed against the wall. Why not use the wall to set off the explosives.
“That’s brilliant,” Jess said, grinning back at her. “Not too difficult, either. We’ll need a few hours in normal space so we can keep them in one spot. That should be fine. We must be a lot more than that ahead of the fleet chasing us by now.”
“You probably won’t be able to stop them,” Dash warned.
“I know. But we can slow them down even more. Now I know where they are heading I can bulk up the defences around the jump engines too. We can drop into an empty region of space right now. Let’s get started…”
* * *
Dash stared at the screen in front of him. The Wanderer was nowhere, or the next best thing. Nowhere near a planet or even a star. Nowhere near any other ships, stations or other signs of civilisation. Nowhere near any passing traffic. If something went wrong there would be no one passing by to help.
He’d been in similar locations before, but only ever in jump space. Rushing from one location to another didn’t feel the same as this. Nowhere near it. The thought that the nearest outposts of humanity were so far away was both terrifying and exhilarating. Even through the screen he felt a deep connection to space around them. He found himself wishing the Wanderer had at least a single real window, no matter how small.
Wanderer's Odyssey - Books 1 to 3: The Epic Space Opera Series Begins Page 75