Ruins of the Galaxy Box Set: Books 1-6

by Chaney, J. N.

  “Wait. You’re saying my Hunters are alive?”

  38

  “Where am I?” In a panic, Awen tried to sit up.

  “Easy, love. Easy,” a woman’s voice said.

  Awen felt a hand on her shoulder and another behind her head. She looked up and saw Sootriman’s tan face and consoling eyes. “Sootriman?”

  “Yes, love. It’s me.”

  “You’re—you’re alive.”

  “No small thanks to you,” Sootriman said, stroking the top of Awen’s head.

  Awen let out a sigh. “The last thing I remember was…”

  They’d been in the rotunda, separated from Sootriman and a man. Kane… and the other being. A chill ran down Awen’s spine. The memory summoned a sense of fear she’d never known before.

  She fought to distance herself from the dark face while trying to piece together the events in the rotunda. Awen had rescued Sootriman and blown apart the rocks blocking the archway. She’d done something in the Unity that she’d never attempted before. It had spent her. And it had scared her. He’d scared her.

  Then Awen remembered TO-96 picking her up. He carried her away from the light of a thousand suns and from the black-eyed monster.

  “The rotunda—it exploded.”

  “It did, yes,” Sootriman said. “But we managed to get clear. Something shielded us from the blast until we could find shelter.”

  “Shielded us?”

  “We thought maybe you had something to do with it.”

  “No, I…” Awen thought back. She didn’t remember putting up a wall. She’d been too exhausted. Maybe the memory was slow in coming, however. Or maybe it was… a reflex. “I don’t know.”

  “No need to worry, love. We’re all safe now, including you, and that’s what counts.”

  “Ezo and TO-96 too?”

  “Ezo and Tee-Oh too,” Sootriman replied. Her smile was warm and her eyes friendly, in stark contrast to the ruthless though beautiful warlord Awen had met on Ki Nar Four.

  “I’m so thirsty. Can I sit up?”

  “Slowly, yes.” Sootriman helped Awen sit up.

  She looked around the room. Along two sides of the room, large windows lunged away from the dusty floor and connected with the ceiling at an angle farther out. Purplish early-morning—or maybe evening—light poured through, giving way to a panoramic view of the jungle-covered city below.

  Awen felt like she was in a large corner office in some exotic administrative building. It smelled musty. Spiral floral designs covered the marble-like floors, and the ceiling was a patchwork of recessed honeycombs that had probably once housed lights. Strange-looking furniture was arranged along the walls, faded and dusty from ages of neglect. Awen was lying on some sort of cushions stacked on a desk in a makeshift bed. Her blanket and pillow looked like they were from the Indomitable—the ship that had brought them to the metaverse. She wore an oversized captain’s jacket, a tattered T-shirt, and green cargo pants, all surely holdovers from the Indomitable. Suddenly, Awen reached for the necklace around her throat, fearing it was gone.

  “It’s still there,” Sootriman said. “Don’t worry.”

  Awen breathed a sigh of relief. The Luma medallion offered her some sense of assuredness to this otherwise chaotic existence. “Where are we?”

  “Tee-Oh eventually found a way out of the rotunda’s tunnels and got us situated in this space. Ezo and I thought it would be more comfortable for you as you slept. Here,” Sootriman said, offering Awen a canteen of water. “Drink this.”

  “Thanks.” Awen sipped slowly. The canteen looked like it was from the Indomitable too. “How long have I been sleeping, then?”

  Sootriman took the canteen and capped it. “About a week.”

  “A week?”

  “Tee-Oh will have the exact duration, of course. The days are about nine hours longer here, so that takes some getting used to. We’re still trying to use common time so we don’t hurt our bodies.”

  “A week?” Awen repeated, looking at her surroundings again.

  “Seems you expended a lot of energy to do what you did for me.”

  Awen blinked at Sootriman. Was the effort to save Sootriman’s life really so costly to my body and soul? Did I hurt myself somehow?

  Sootriman reached out and held Awen’s hand with her own warm, strong one. “Thank you, Awen. Thank you for saving my life. Thank you for saving all of our lives.”

  Awen looked up at the woman, whose wavy brown hair glistened in the lavender sunlight. “You’re welcome.” She swallowed. “So, where are they now—Ezo and Ninety-Six? And why didn’t you just take me back to the ship if it’s been a week?”

  Sootriman pulled a tall stool over and sat, finding the appropriate piece of furniture for her generous figure. She’d ditched the red-and-gold dress Awen remembered from Ki Nar Four, but she still opted to keep her legs bare. Now she wore a pair of green shorts cut from military pants, a black shirt that she’d pulled the sleeves from, and a pair of black trek boots—all items that seemed to have been pulled from the Indomitable.

  Sootriman brushed strands of hair over her ear and took Awen’s hand again. “The Indomitable was disabled.”

  “Disabled?”

  “The boys salvaged what they could, but we couldn’t go back.”

  “Who? Who would have…?” Awen’s mind filled in the blanks. “Kane.”

  “That’s what the recovered holo-footage showed.”

  “You said Ezo and Ninety-Six were able to salvage some things,” Awen said. “Why didn’t they just blow it up?”

  “If it were me?” Sootriman put a hand to her chest. “I would have done it to insult my victims.”

  Awen stared at her for a beat. “Remind me never to cross you.”

  Sootriman nodded and winked. “You’re beautiful and smart. My kind of woman.”

  She thinks I’m beautiful? Awen thought, astonished. Sootriman wasn’t exactly the type of person to dole out compliments haphazardly, so that was high praise coming from the likes of her. That, or Sootriman felt sorry for her.

  Either way, I’ll take it right now, Awen thought. Then the deeper implications of the Indomitable’s condition hit her. “Wait a second. That means we’re stranded.”

  “It does.” Sootriman took a deep breath. “That it does.”

  “Do they—do we—have a plan, then?”

  “Not yet. The boys are out exploring the city for that very reason. Hoping to find solutions. They had to wait a little bit at first. Seems that Kane and his troopers were wandering the city, too, looking for who knows what. But after a few days, we watched their dropships leave, and then their starships left the system—most likely went back to our universe.”

  “So they didn’t suspect we survived the explosions in the rotunda?”

  “It’s doubtful. TO-96 said that madman put enough trinitex in that tunnel to punch a small hole in a Goliath-class destroyer. Even if we survived, they probably figured we wouldn’t be leaving anytime soon without the Indomitable and would live out our days here.”

  “We’ll get back,” Awen said, clenching her fists. “We have to get back.” She thought of Willowood and the rest of the Luma, wondering how many had remained loyal to the order and how many had been seduced by So-Elku. Then she thought of Kane and shivered. There was no telling what that man was capable of. Clearly, he was looking for something here in Itheliana that he needed—that he wanted for some destructive purpose. He knew about this place, but how?

  Awen’s thoughts turned to the Jujari. She wondered if they had not inadvertently provoked the violence in the mwadim’s palace. Did Kane approach the mwadim about the stardrive earlier, and did the mwadim see through him and resist? Perhaps the ambush had been Kane’s way of forcing the mwadim’s hand and getting what he wanted.

  All this speculation still didn’t help Awen answer the biggest question: why give up the stardrive at all? She didn’t understand why the mwadim would do such a thing, given its clear significance to eve
ry sentient life-form in the galaxy. The fact that Kane knew the answer to this question and she didn’t made her nervous. Who knew what that madman, as Sootriman had called him, was capable of.

  Awen’s thoughts turned to her parents. The prospect of never seeing them again put a lump in her throat. They’d fought for months before she left to attend observances on Worru. They’d never see eye to eye on the Luma and on what the “proper way” to serve the galaxy was—that much they’d made clear. Truthfully, when she left, she didn’t care if she ever saw them again. But that had just been the sentiments of impulsive youth. Confirming the reality of never seeing them again forever, she was sad—perhaps even afraid. This wasn’t like getting stuck on the other side of a quadrant for a year or two. At least in that scenario, you could send transmissions and share some semblance of life’s happenings. The planet of Itheliana was as removed as two people could be this side of death.

  Then she thought of the person she was least expecting to think of: Lieutenant Adonis Olin Magnus. Admittedly, she’d been pretty rude to him when they first met. But her experience with the Galactic Republic’s Marines in the past hadn’t exactly filled her with confidence about their humanity. “Blaster fire and funeral pyres” went the old adage among the Luma, and that about summed it up as far as Awen was concerned. But Magnus had shown more concern than she expected. His kindness had caught her off guard. As did those green eyes and that bearded baby face, she thought. He had, she also reminded herself, saved her life. Though that was a mutually shared gift. She recalled the falling concrete slab and Abimbola’s jail. We’re probably even, she concluded.

  Despite her speechless delight at being the first Luma to ever journey to Ithnor Ithelia—and discovering the metaverse!—she had a visceral desire to get back to her native universe as soon as she could. She would return to explore this spectacular new world. Hopefully, the quantum tunnel would remain open for several more years. But discovery paled in comparison to survival, and she had to get back to save her people—and to save the galaxy from whatever So-Elku and Kane were planning.

  “We just have to get back,” Awen whispered.

  “It’s not looking great for that, love.”

  “What do you mean?” Awen looked up.

  “Well, it’s safe to assume that Kane was looking for alien tech, probably starships. He’s an admiral, after all.”

  He’s an admiral, of course! Why didn’t I think of that sooner?

  “No ships, then?” Awen asked.

  “Plenty of ships,” Sootriman corrected. “Thousands of ships, actually. Quantity is not the problem, however.”

  “It’s quality,” Awen concluded.

  “Exactly. As far as Tee-Oh can tell, this entire civilization has lain dormant for more than a thousand years. Maybe much more.”

  “They’ve been extinct for over a thousand years?” Awen asked, wondering who else knew about this race. Were we the first to explore the city? Her mind swam with the implications. “So that means the Jujari have had that stardrive in their possession for… for…”

  “For a very long time, unless they got it from another species, of course. Either way, it’s safe to say that it was in circulation long before the Galactic Republic, the Sentient Species Alliances, or even the Star Faring Council.”

  “So we’re late to the date.” The large room suddenly took on a melancholy air. This place would not yield the discoveries Awen had hoped for—namely, life. There would be no encounters with any sentient species here. No one was coming back to greet them. Awen knew, of course, that there was no price to be put on what they might take away from future archeological expeditions. But in terms of finding sentient life, that hope was gone. “Maybe TO-96 can cobble together something,” Awen said, trying to cheer herself up.

  “That’s the hope, yes. But, Awen, you have to remember, a thousand years. The fact that these buildings are still standing is a testament to the Novia Minoosh’s ingenuity.”

  “And maybe it will be that way for the starships they find too.”

  Sootriman looked out the windows. The white purplish light from the sun was growing stronger, marking the beginning of the alien day. “I hope you’re right,” she finally said. “I really do. But a thousand years is a long time for anything to sit dormant and deteriorate, love. I think you need to prepare yourself for what we’ve already accepted.”

  “And that is…?” But Awen already knew the answer.

  “We’re going to be here for a very long time.”

  * * *

  Read on for a bonus short story, THE NIGHT OF FIRE.

  The Night of Fire

  A Ruins of the Galaxy Short

  The Night of Fire

  A Ruins of the Galaxy Short

  Magnus should have been more concerned with the blaster bolts flying over his head than he was with what his drill sergeant had called “the weaknesses of the flesh.” But he wasn’t.

  Incoming blaster fire was still a problem. A big one. The enemy was holed up in a small mountain in the center of the island. Routing them out was going to take all night. But right then, Magnus’s body was complaining more about an entirely different enemy. No, it wasn’t the sand and salt that had managed to find their way into every crevice in his armor; parts of him that he didn’t know could go raw were chafing. He was tired, sore, hungry, and done with being shot at. But none of those were as bad as the enemy currently wreaking havoc in his gut. No amount of discipline, armor, or team readiness had prepared him—or any of them—for the squirts.

  When the waterborne virus first started hitting the Marines, Magnus had been concerned with manners. They all had. His unit had dug small latrines and tried giving one another some privacy. But as the days turned into weeks and the infection spread, they’d abandoned all sense of decorum. Now the Marines went whenever they had to, most going right in their armor if they were in a firefight. Like they were right now.

  “Splick! There I go again,” Chico yelled over their TACNET fire team channel. “Dammit!”

  Private Miguel Chico was stacked up behind Magnus, along with two other members of his newly formed fire team: Private Michael Deeks and Private Allan Franklin. The four of them had taken cover behind the remains of a bamboo hut on the south side of the island.

  Magnus had been given command of the fire team after Sergeant Cartin took a high-energy blaster round clean through the helmet the night before. Magnus could still see the wisps of smoke around the hole floating up through his memory. Cartin had been one hell of a Marine, taking out his share of ’kuda before meeting his end, even saving several lives in the process. As a corporal, it was Magnus’s job not to get blasted in the head—and to try to keep his guys safe while staying on the mission objectives.

  “Wash it out when the sun comes up, Private,” Magnus replied.

  “Yeah, but just don’t do it upwind of me again, would ya?” Deeks asked. “You nasty, boy.”

  Chico punched Deeks in the shoulder. “Not as nasty as what your mom said to me last night.”

  “I swear to all the mystics, if you talk about my momma one more time, Chico…”

  “You’re gonna do what?”

  Magnus had to break it up; he knew where it would go. That was part of why he was growing to love these guys so much. They were fast becoming like brothers to him. And he didn’t need to lose any more of those in this war.

  “Who’s ready to make a run with me, boys?” Magnus asked.

  That got their attention. Almost.

  “Chico doesn’t need to,” Franklin replied. “He’s already got plenty of runs of his own.”

  Chico stiffened. “I swear to all the mystics, Franklin…”

  “Tighten it up, boys,” Magnus said, muting their respective TACNET channels. If these three guys weren’t the most aggressive fighters he’d seen in Bravo Company yet, he would have asked to be reassigned. As it was, they were crass smack-talkers who had terrible comms discipline, which verged on being belligerent. But they coul
d fight; that was for damn sure. Magnus had already watched them put down more ’kudas individually than most fire teams were doing collectively. And that was just the kind of fire team he wanted to lead.

  “We have orders to get this island cleared by sunup, and I don’t want to disappoint First Lieutenant Vanderbilt when he comes walking down the northside beach head.”

  Magnus saw a comms request icon in his HUD coming from Deeks. He opened the channel.

  “With all due respect, Corporal, but ain’t no way I’m interested in impressing the LT,” Deeks replied.

  Magnus had a mischievous tone in his voice. “I know that, Deeks. And you know that. But Chico and Franklin are still hoping he’ll ask their mommas out on a date.”

  “Corporal Magnus for the win!” Deeks said, punching Chico in the side of the arm.

  “Punch me one more time, Deeks. Go ahead.”

  “Let’s stay focused,” Magnus said, smiling through the sand, salt, sweat, and splick filling his helmet. “We have a job to do.”

  * * *

  The jabs at Lieutenant Vanderbilt weren’t completely misguided, though they certainly would have been met with severe consequences had anyone been listening over comms. Vanderbilt had made some seriously boneheaded decisions over the past several weeks, at least as far as Magnus was concerned. The officer had ordered Marines into some downright asinine scenarios that could have easily been avoided. The one they were in right now was a great example.

  The small island of Mo’a Ot’a had a small mountain summit in the center, leftover from some ancient volcano. All approaches to the summit consisted of a gentle rise through a lush jungle. That was, of course, except for a ravine carved by a mountain stream that ran down the south side. As was to be expected from the lieutenant, he had ordered Magnus’s team to move up that very ravine. Magnus had tried to protest—respectfully—but Vanderbilt had “no time for the backassward opinions of grunts.”