by Ken Lozito
“All right, so how do you want to do this?”
Connor leaned back in his chair and pressed his lips together in thought. “I think we should do several flyovers of the city, looking for signs of recent use and ryklar activity. Also, see if Cerot and the others spot anything worth investigating.”
“Were there a lot of ryklars the last time you went there?”
“There was a large pack, but they don’t seem to stay very long. There are most likely different packs that rotate from place to place, and they vary in size. So the ryklars that were there a few months ago might not be there anymore. However, the ones that were used as watchdogs in the attack were under Ovarrow control. We don’t know where those are or how many of them there are,” Connor said.
Samson studied the map of the city for a few moments. “If they were breeding ryklars, we should be able to find some evidence of that. They’d have to feed them, dispose of their waste, things like that. They’d also have to go out for supplies.”
The troop carrier accelerated to breakaway speeds, but the inertia dampeners prevented them from feeling the acceleration.
“I don’t remember seeing anything like farmland, but you’re right. We should look for evidence of someone actually living in the city. I just don’t think they did,” Connor said.
“Then what were they doing there?”
“We weren’t even aware of them until we started salvaging parts from the arch. In fact, there were no remnant power cores in standby anywhere. That can’t be a coincidence. So, the real question is: where do they live and why maintain a watch on an arch that didn’t have any power anyway?”
Several of the Ovarrow made surprised noises and gestured toward a wallscreen that showed a low-orbit view of New Earth. They were beyond the atmosphere, which gleamed with a shimmering blue glow. The ring that encircled New Earth was made up of the shattered remains of a third moon and was maintained by a smaller moon orbiting closer to the planet and a larger moon farther away. The gravitational pull had spread the remains of the third moon so thin that the vertical height was typically seven meters.
The Ovarrow continued to gasp in surprise, speaking with multi-toned sounds from their intricate vocal cords. They had two distinct vocal cords, which allowed them to communicate in such a way that there was very little chance of any human being able to duplicate it.
Some of the Ovarrow looked away from the wallscreen, but Cerot and Esteban couldn’t stop looking at the planet below. Connor noticed that Dash was quiet, letting the Ovarrow have this moment to themselves. Connor couldn’t remember the exact date of when human beings had first left Earth, but he knew it was well over two hundred years before the Ark had left the Sol System. Early astronauts and engineers had pushed the boundaries, pioneering the effort for humanity’s next great frontier. They hadn't been brought into it by an alien species. By the time Connor was born, going into space was commonplace. There were space stations engaged in robotic asteroid mining, as well as colonies on various moons throughout the solar system. This was a rare opportunity to witness a species' first time leaving their planet.
Several cargo ships flew within view of them on their way to the lunar base where the CDF shipyards were. The orbital defense platforms were farther away, but they wouldn’t be able to see them. Connor hoped the experience would spark a flame within the Ovarrow to push past their limits.
They were able to see the reentry into the atmosphere. The video feed on the wallscreen glowed red on its edges from the heat dispersal. Connor watched as the Ovarrow winced away from it, and he heard Dash try to calm them down.
“I don’t know why you put so much stock in the Ovarrow,” Samson said.
“They're our link to the past and our only link to the Krake.”
“I understand that. We’ve learned some things, but you’re pushing for an alliance. There are only ten thousand of them in that city, and let’s say there are two or three times that number in stasis that haven't come out yet. That’s not much of an army if we’re looking for an alliance.”
“I see what you’re saying,” Connor replied. “Think of it this way: either they might never have awakened because of the faulty tech they used to go into stasis, or they might’ve awakened in the middle of our war with the Krake, only we didn’t know as much as we needed to and the Krake surprised us by coming back here. We know they routinely check, however many worlds they keep track of.”
“Yes, but the arch that they were using was under water, so it was inaccessible. I read the report.”
“So, what are you saying?”
“I don’t know how much help the Ovarrow can be. I mean, think about it. Their entire strategy for dealing with the Krake was to hide themselves in stasis. Are we going to do the same thing?”
Connor shook his head. “No, we’re not going to hide in stasis.”
“I didn’t think so. So, what are you hoping to get from this other group of Ovarrow?”
“We need to find out more about them—confirm their history. If they didn’t go into stasis, that puts this whole situation in a different light. They were survivors of an ice age on a planet where everyone had almost wiped themselves out fighting each other and the Krake.”
“Not exactly the kind of person I want guarding my back or fighting at my side. So, the same question applies,” Samson said.
“The answer doesn’t change. They might know the Krake better than anyone who went into stasis. The records we were able to uncover indicate that the Ovarrow who went into stasis didn’t all go at the same time. Ultimately, we need to get them to talk to us. We don’t know how many there are. Maybe there are a lot of them—enough to make a difference in a war.”
Samson was quiet, and Connor regarded him for a few moments. “What would you do?”
Samson frowned. “About what? There are so many moving parts to this, but I don’t know if I’d go looking for the Ovarrow here. If the Krake are the real threat, then I'd want to know about them—where they live, what their capabilities are, what their weapons are, their tactics . . . probably all the things you already said in those Security Council meetings you and Nathan frequent.”
Connor twitched his head to the side. “You wouldn’t be wrong about that. The real question is: how long do we have before the Krake come here? And what do we do when they come?”
Samson looked at him for a few moments. “No wonder they don’t want to work with you. I understand you're trying to bring awareness, but you know people don’t think straight if they’re scared all the time.”
“Then they’ll just have to learn how to cope better. I didn’t create this situation, but I’m damn well going to do something about it,” Connor said.
“Works for me,” Samson replied. “And I’m sure they’ll appreciate the hard line from you.”
“They appreciate things like facts and data. We need something that’s irrefutable. Otherwise . . .” Connor said, pausing for a few moments, “. . . I really am crazy to keep pursuing this.”
“They thought you were crazy about a threat coming from Earth, too, but who am I to judge?”
Samson got up and walked away, and Connor shook his head. Samson had lived outside the colony on his own for years, deep in the New Earth frontier, and Connor wasn’t sure if Samson was the best judge of his mental status. Samson was good with tangible threats—a combat situation or achieving an objective—but he lacked some of the finesse for intelligence gathering.
There was an open space in the middle of the troop carrier that was commonly used for briefings. Connor had Dash bring their Ovarrow guests to that space so he could watch their reactions to the city and ask them questions.
They’d come up with a way to categorize Ovarrow cities by size, and a capital was the largest. The city they were heading to covered an area of over six thousand square kilometers.
Samson brushed up against Connor’s elbow as he leaned toward the holoscreen. “That’s gotta be over a hundred kilometers across.”
>
Connor nodded. “Not quite a square but close enough, even with a big river running almost through the middle.”
Fragmented spires pierced the overgrowth, but they could see more of the bronze-colored buildings the closer they got to the coastal area.
“We could’ve used Flint and the 3rd to help recon these ruins,” Samson said.
“They’re on a training exercise at the lunar base,” Connor replied.
“War games on the moon,” Samson replied. “I’m sure that’s the only reason they’re not here,” he added sarcastically.
“Gotta keep those skill sets sharp, and if you’re implying that I deployed them in the wake of recent events, I can neither confirm nor deny any such actions.”
Connor highlighted the northeastern part of the city. “Send word for Layton and the other carrier to begin scouting this area here,” he said and then looked at Dash. “Do they recognize anything?”
Dash looked at Cerot and repeated the question.
“None of us have ever been here. There were pockets of fighting that divided the continent,” Cerot said.
Connor took control of the city map on the holoscreen and zoomed in closer. “This is the area where we found the arch.”
Cerot and the other Ovarrow peered at the map. “It looks like a Mekaal research facility,” Cerot said, gesturing to the barely discernable perimeter.
Once the Ovarrow pointed it out, Connor saw it—an Ovarrow military research facility. That made a lot of sense.
“Recon drones aren’t showing any ryklar activity and no deterrent signal,” Dash said.
Connor nodded, brought up a recon drone feed, and put it on the holoscreen. The drone flew through the dimly lit corridors, racing to its objective. The Ovarrow watched its progress intently. It entered a vast chamber and increased its altitude, giving them a higher vantage point.
“Where’d it go?” Dash asked.
Connor frowned and watched the video feed. Where the Ovarrow arch had once been was nothing but rubbled remains. “Someone destroyed the arch.”
“Why would they do that?” Dash asked.
“They didn’t want us coming back here,” Connor said.
“They probably didn’t want us turning it back on,” Samson said.
Connor frowned in thought. “The whole city is dead. There isn’t any power here. Besides, we took critical components from it, so it wouldn’t have worked anyway.”
“Yeah, but still,” Dash said. “Why go through the trouble of destroying something that already couldn’t work?”
Connor peered at the holoscreen, trying to think of a reason but couldn’t.
“It’s simple,” Samson said, his deep voice drawing their attention. “It means 'go away.'”
Connor scratched his eyebrow. “That’s not going to work. We’re not leaving. Have the pilot find us a place to set down and we can begin searching for them.”
8
Trident Battle Group orbited around the New Earth candidate. The NEC had experienced an extinction-level event that was so catastrophic that most of the planetary surface was uninhabitable. Gabriel, the Vigilant’s AI, estimated that the cataclysm had occurred within the last thirty to forty standard years.
Sean had sent salvage teams over to the orbital bombardment platform where a derelict ship had been docked. He was heading toward the main hangar bay where a combat shuttle waited to take him over to the wrecked ship. Bill Halsey, the lead engineer aboard the Vigilant, insisted that Sean come see the Casimir power core. The man lived for ships and knew them backward and forward, particularly their power cores.
Salvage teams had been exploring every inch of the ship. Sean thought Oriana would’ve preferred to be on one of the away teams, but she had all but locked herself in her lab with her team. She’d review the information the salvage teams found.
Sean entered the main hangar where an eagle class combat shuttle was ready to be launched. Captain Chad Boseman stood by the loading ramp and gave him a salute as he approached.
“Are we ready to leave?” Sean asked.
“Now that you’re here, we are,” Boseman replied.
If any of the scientists were lagging behind or running late, they wouldn't be going. Sean kept to a tight schedule that didn’t include waiting for anyone who couldn’t arrive on time.
The loading ramp closed and the combat shuttle was cleared for launch. As Sean ambled up to his seat, he was greeted by the rest of Boseman’s team. He recognized Sergeant Benton, who had a philandering reputation; however, since they were about to fly over to a Krake ship, he was all business-focused, just like the rest of the Spec Ops team.
Sean could always count on Boseman to come up with creative solutions to what others would consider impossible objectives. It had been Boseman’s idea to use communications drones to storm the Yorktown during the mutiny. When failure wasn’t an option, they didn’t.
Sean glanced at the Spec Ops platoon and felt a slight pang of regret. He'd led his own Spec Ops platoon for years, and they'd been a small, tight-knit, highly capable group that had been given objectives by their superior officers—mostly Connor and, later on, Nathan. But the more he thought about it, he supposed very little had changed over the years, with the exception of the resources at his disposal. He’d gone from leading a platoon to a company of soldiers, then to a brigade, and now Trident Battle Group. They represented the CDF fleet’s offensive line until they could build more ships.
The combat shuttle flew toward the derelict Krake warship. It was a smaller-class vessel than the destroyers they’d encountered in previous combat engagements. The ship had no power, and there were several sections that had been impacted by Krake combat drones. They hadn’t found any space gates in the area, which worried Sean. Why had they been given these coordinates if they weren’t going to be contacted?
There was a significant hull breach around the middle of the ship where they'd inserted an emergency docking tube. The pilot flew the combat shuttle and docked with the tube. Sean wore a Nexstar combat suit, but he wasn't armed. He didn’t expect any trouble aboard the derelict ship. Search teams hadn’t found any latent systems on standby, waiting to be triggered by the next hapless visitor.
The Krake were of similar size to the Ovarrow, which made them slightly taller than the average human. The pale interior of the ship held the remnants of organic matter that had been combined with the Krake version of a nanorobotic composite. The structure seemed solid, and the floors of the corridors contained enough metal for their magboots to work.
They headed for the main reactor room. He’d been in a number of main reactor rooms aboard CDF ships and even Vemus ships that had once been part of the NA Alliance military. They were massive constructs for the larger ships, but they all had certain similarities among them. There were containment systems, coolant systems, and emergency shutoffs, but Sean didn’t see any of that in the Krake power core.
Captain Halsey came over to Sean, positively bursting with excitement. “Colonel, what do you think?”
“It doesn’t look like one of ours. What am I looking at here?”
“We believe this is a Casimir power core. It draws energy from a vacuum and is much more efficient than even our fusion-based reactors. Zero-point energy creation is the holy grail of power generation.”
Sean wished he understood what he was looking at. “So, they can generate more power, which means everything else stems from something like this. I’m surprised the Krake don’t use more energy-based weapons, given their superior power core.”
Halsey bobbed his head. “Maybe they do, and we just haven’t found those systems yet. But I’ve been over to one of the main engines, and there’s evidence of overwearing. We’ve done some preliminary analyses of the materials they use, and with that kind of power output, these engines won’t hold up for extended voyages. We’ve also had teams that have seen stress fractures at key load points on the hull, which we think is directly related to their powerful engines.”
Sean frowned in thought for a moment. “Was this power core retrofitted to this ship?”
“I was thinking that as well. Maybe they had some kind of technical leap and started outfitting their ships with these,” Halsey said, gesturing toward the power core. “We’ll need more time to figure that out.”
Sean nodded. “Understood. Any idea how long the ship has been here?”
Halsey shook his head. “That’s outside my area of expertise. I did hear a couple of the science teams mention that the ship has been here as long as the planet's been unlivable.”
Sean took another look around at the area.
“We’ve been scanning everything we can find in here and recording things we don’t understand, but in order to really understand how this power core works, we need to bring it back with us. Take it apart,” Halsey said.
“You’ll have to do the best you can. I don’t know if we could take the ship with us.”
“I thought you’d say that, sir. But if we could bring this ship back with us and reverse-engineer some of their systems, it might make our weapons more effective against them,” Halsey said.
“Do the best you can, and I’ll see what kind of options we can come up with. For now, keep trying to figure out how that thing works, but don’t turn it on,” Sean said.
He expected Halsey knew better, but the man was excited about this find. Sean thought it better to remind him to pay attention and be careful.
“Understood, sir,” Halsey said.
Sean left the main reactor area, and Boseman led him toward weapons operations.
“They didn’t leave much behind,” Boseman said. “I would love to have found some of those attack drones so we could figure out how they work.”
“Agreed,” Sean said.
They spent the next few hours going over the Krake ship. The bridge of the ship was nothing like the bridge of any CDF ship; it was a multilevel, circular room. Sean guessed the CIC was above normal ship operations.
A comlink request came from the Vigilant.