The Last Stand

by Jay Allan

  Otherwise, she’d just continue straight through the rest of the enemy fleet, and, if by some miracle, she made it through that unimaginable gauntlet, she would continue on past the transit point, right across the Sigma Nordlin system, and out into deep space. She’d get to watch the battle, some of it at least, before her life support was exhausted and she spent her last moments betting on whether she’d suffocate or freeze to death first. But she’d be frozen solid long before her ship began its endless voyage across interstellar space.

  Her eyes darted back to her screen. Another fifty of her ships had been destroyed just in the last minute. But her lead squadrons were finally beginning their final attack runs. The forward formations were battered, some of the lead units at half strength or less. But she knew Confederation pilot culture well enough to be sure those flyers were more focused on revenge than fear. They wanted blood for their lost comrades, and she was confident they would get it.

  She watched as the angular formations cut in, and then as the first ships let their torpedoes fly. She was pretty far out—without any torpedoes, there was no reason to advance farther—but she could see the squadrons were scoring hits.

  She watched one after another of the weapons slam into the Hegemony ships, waiting for the AI to develop some kind of damage evaluation program from the incoming scanner data. One of the Highborn battleships took no fewer than sixteen hits…and it was still there. She’d never faced anything, seen any ship that could take that kind of damage and still keep coming.

  She snapped out a series of orders, directing and redirecting incoming waves, trying to send her people in like packs of scavengers, to direct the smaller groups to take down the wounded and battered enemy ships, after the untouched ones within range had all been hit. She felt a quick rush as one of the Highborn ships disappeared, the attack’s first outright kill…the second overall against the enemy’s battleships, counting the one in Vexa Torrent.

  Then her heart sank as, almost immediately after, she saw a cloud of small dots appear on the display, moving forward from roughly half of the enemy ships, mostly the ones that had remained out of her squadrons’ range.

  Missiles. Hundreds and hundreds of missiles heading toward the strike force.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Free Trader Pegasus

  Somewhere in the Badlands

  Year 323 AC (After the Cataclysm)

  Andi looked down at Cassiopeia, and she smiled. The child was looking back at her with Tyler’s sparkling blue-gray eyes and laughing. Andi knew her daughter didn’t know where she was, that she was as content on Pegasus as she would have been back on Megara, in the opulent hotel suite that had been home for the first months of her life. Andi had no intention of allowing her daughter to get close to any real danger, but she was just as determined to make sure that Tyler got a chance to meet his daughter. She hated the fact that her resolution was driven by a fear he wouldn’t survive the latest conflict, but Andi rarely ran from difficult realizations. The pain of losing Tyler would be indescribable, but it would be even worse knowing he hadn’t even had the chance to hold his child, their child.

  Andi smiled as Cassiopeia looked up at her and giggled. She was a happy child, and Andi tried her best not to think that was only because she had no idea of the universe into which she’d been born. Did a life of strife and pain await her daughter, one with the losses and struggles she had endured, and the immense challenges?

  Or is there any future at all? If the war is lost, perhaps not…

  She extended her arm down and held out her finger, smiling again as Cassiopeia reached up and grabbed it with a level of strength that seemed almost impossible. Andi knew, intellectually at least, that some people had children and raised them in peace. They lived normal lives and watched their sons and daughters grow up in quiet surroundings. But, realization or no, she found it hard to believe, at least in a practical sense. Her own mother had given birth to her amid the worst destitution imaginable, and had fought and scraped to protect and feed her a decade, before the darkness and death of the Gut had finally claimed her. Had her mother had any moments, even as the one she was having now? Had there been even fleeting instants of joy? Or just constant fear and sadness. Had she only endured the unimaginable misery of listening to her child crying because she was cold and hungry?

  She felt a tear slip out of her eye and it ran down her cheek. She hardly remembered her mother, but she loved her, nevertheless. Andi remembered her later days in the Gut, when all she’d had to do was take care of herself, and she couldn’t imagine how it had worn her mother down, what it had taken from her. She must have been a strong woman in her own way. For all her own battles and hardships, Andi knew she was fortunate. She had survived, she had escaped from the deprivation…and she had found happiness with Tyler Barron. Born into grinding poverty, she’d become vastly wealthy. Had there been any bright moments in her mother’s life, even short instances of peace? She liked to thing so, but she didn’t really believe it.

  Andi shook her head, trying to pull her thoughts from such long past pain. She’d been thinking of her mother more and more, a natural enough thing, she suspected, now that she had her own child. She’d been ten when her mother died and, while she realized intellectually there had been nothing she could do to save the woman who bore her and protected her for that first decade of her life, she still felt guilty that she had gotten out of there…and her mother never had.

  She looked back at Cassiopeia. “I’m going to see that you meet your father, little one…and then I’m going to get you out of here, far away from this fighting and danger. I hope you never have to endure those things yourself.” She took a deep and ragged breath, and she leaned back, closing her eyes. She sat and rested…for all of thirty seconds. Then the comm buzzed.

  “Andi, it’s Sy. I’m sorry to disturb you, but if you have a few minutes, I’ve made some progress on the fourth chip. I’m only about five percent of the way through the translations, but I think you’ll want to see this. I’m getting closer to a real idea of just what the Highborn are, and where they came from.”

  “I’m on my way.” Andi stood up and took a last look at Cassiopeia. The child was still awake, barely. Her eyes were closing, even as she still fought off the sleep that seemed inevitable. “Don’t fight it, little one. There will be enough times when you can’t rest. Now, sleep…and know I will do whatever I have to do to protect you, and to make sure you have a real future.”

  She turned, and she slipped out into the short corridor, gesturing to Lita Mareth as she walked onto the main area of the lower deck. The nanny nodded and stood up, moving back toward Andi’s cabin.

  Andi watched her go for a few seconds, and then she turned toward Sylene Merrick. The computer expert was hunched over the center table, with two workstations and half a dozen tablets strewn out in front of her. There were three cups, all empty, with just the slightest residue of the Combalian tea Sylene favored. Andi had lost track of the last time Sy had slept, or even taken a break, but from the looks of things, it had been a while.

  A long while.

  “Sy…”

  Sylene hadn’t even noticed Andi coming into the room. “Oh…Andi. This is fascinating. The Highborn are definitely not aliens. They were some kind of imperial creation. I’ve never seen such detailed information about imperial affairs before. This folio is one of the greatest finds ever, at least in terms of studying late imperial history. I’m glad you kept it.”

  Andi nodded. “Well, I’ll give it all to the Troyus Institute when we’re done with it.” Assuming there is an institute, or anything else, left on Megara when all this is through.

  “If you can help me translate more of this, I think we might be on the verge of some useful information. If we can determine exactly what the Highborn really are, we might be able to figure out their weaknesses.”

  Andi nodded, in complete agreement with her friend, save for one nagging worry hovering among her thoughts.

 
If they have any weaknesses…

  Imperial Secret Police Headquarters

  Planet Samara

  Tirion Vega System

  Year 11,691 IR (Imperial Reckoning)

  Year 43 BC (Before the Cataclysm) by Confederation Calendar

  366 Years Ago

  “The Highborn? We’ve encountered that term several times, in communications intercepts and the like. But we haven’t been able to match it to any other data. What is it, some group of nobles?” Velan Tragonis tapped a small switch on the edge of his desk, and the door closed. An instant later, a sequence of small blue lights flashed in succession. “We’re completely secure in here, Trellic. Please speak freely.”

  “I have been investigating Lord Andros for the better part of a year, Colonel. I became suspicious almost immediately, but then I began to hit a series of dead ends. He is up to something, I’d bet anything on that. But I couldn’t find any solid evidence, not even a rough idea of the nature of his secret operation. Finally, I was able to gain some information from one of his aides.”

  “Do I want to know how you did that, Trellic?” A pause. “No, nevermind, I’m sure I don’t. But by all means, tell me what you were able to find out.”

  “The Highborn is a group of some kind, but not just of other nobles. They were creations of Andros’s, or at least of those in his employ.”

  “Creations?” Tragonis stared back over the desk, an inquisitive look on his face. “What do you mean by that? Clones? Cyborgs?”

  Trellic shook his head. “No…I don’t think so, at least not entirely. Something like that, perhaps, but far more complex. My source suggested the program that resulted in the Highborn has been in operation for more than sixty years, that it was started by Andros’s grandfather.”

  Tragonis leaned back and rubbed his forehead. “I remember the old Lord Andros. I was young, just starting out, but the Bureau was investigating him for some kind of financial chicanery. The Andros family didn’t get as wealthy as it is running those vast megafarms they control. There’s only so much profit in feed grains. A fair amount of what they have was stolen in one way or another.” Tragonis spoke matter-of-factly. His statement was nothing overly of note. Half the noble families in the empire owed their fortunes to some ancestor’s misdeeds.

  Tragonis’s expression hardened. “Perhaps this is something of greater concern than we anticipated. Is it possible Andros is…creating…some kind of army?”

  Trellic looked at the sector chief with a blank look on his face. “I don’t know. I checked as exhaustively as I could, but I didn’t find any large bases, or for that matter, excessive purchases of weapons. Some, certainly, but nothing that could outfit an army capable of destabilizing the empire. You’re thinking, of course, he might be planning some way to seize the throne?”

  Tragonis glanced down at the screen in front of him. “That would make any links to the various disturbances make sense. Creating disorder and then coming in as the one with the solutions…it’s a classic strategy. But if there is a plot of that magnitude, I find it hard to believe we have missed it so badly. Andros would need tens of millions of troops, and he would need ships, too. He’d have to have a fleet admiral at least on his side. And we’ve seen nothing disturbing in our surveillance activities on the military. So, we would have had to miss that, as well, if Andros is planning a rebellion.”

  “Perhaps he has some other kind of plan, something more elaborate than simply a military coup. What if these…whatever they are…are some kind of specialists, perhaps elite troops who have received some form of biomechanical enhancements?”

  “I don’t know. What would he do with a small number of soldiers, no matter how effective they are? He’d still have to get them to the capital, wouldn’t he?” Tragonis paused, but he continued before Trellic could respond. “An assassination team, maybe? A coup might involve targeting the emperor and a number of the other top imperial officials.”

  Trellic nodded. “That is certainly a possibility. With your permission, I will resume my efforts to gather information.”

  “Yes, do that.” Tragonis reached down and scooped up a small tablet laying on the desk. His tapped at it for a few seconds, and then he handed it to Trellic. “Here, I’m upgrading this case to level one priority. That will increase the resources at your disposal. Requisition any personnel you require, any equipment you need…but get me more information on what is happening.” A pause. “I don’t need to remind you that success in a mission like this is the kind of thing that builds a career.”

  “You can count on me. I will find out what Andros is up to.”

  “I know you will. Meanwhile, I am going to send a recommendation to the capital to place the imperial court on increased alert. I still find it hard to believe Andros is going to move against the emperor, but far better to be cautious and prepared. Just in case.”

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  CFS Dauntless

  Sigma Nordlin System

  Year 323 AC (After the Cataclysm)

  The Battle of Calpharon – Forward to Engage!

  “We need those primaries, Fritzie! You’ve got to get them back online somehow.” Barron sat on Dauntless’s bridge, his head leaning forward, doing what he’d done almost as long as he could remember.

  Urging Anya Fritz to keep his ship functioning and in the fight.

  There was an absurdity to it, of course. Barron’s days as a ship captain were well behind him, and Anya Fritz had long been a flag officer and commander of the fleet’s entire engineering establishment, a position Barron had invented just for her. But Barron was still on Dauntless—and Admiral needed a flagship, after all—and since he’d bumped Atara up to admiral and chief of staff, he’d managed to open up a way for him to act as the battleship’s commander once again. He could have named a flag captain, of course, but there was still part of Barron that couldn’t give up the feeling of leading his own ship. He was an admiral, a successful and decorated one, but in his heart, he was a ship’s captain.

  And Fritz’s role as fleet engineering commander ceased to have any real meaning once the fleet went into combat. Ships fought and were damaged as individual units, and there was precious little Commodore Fritz could do to help the hundreds of individual teams on the fleet’s ships. So, she also fell into old routines, effectively bumping Dauntless’s official chief engineer, and immersing herself in her old job with the same deep satisfaction, Barron suspected, that he did.

  Taking a hit at such long range had been a surprise, and a very unwelcome one. Barron hadn’t been careless on the approach. He’d implemented full evasion routines, and done everything he could to protect his ship. It was a stark reminder that luck stood tall next to skill, experience, and courage on the list of things determining the outcome of a battle.

  “I’m on it, Admiral. I’ll have them back before we’re in range.” Barron knew Fritzie enough to pick up the doubt in her voice. She wouldn’t lie to him, he was sure of that. But she was also less than her usual one hundred percent sure she could get things back online in time. And that was unsettling.

  “I know you are, Fritzie. Keep me posted.” Barron was frustrated. He wanted to shout, to insist that she get it done. But if he’d ever commanded anyone who didn’t need to be driven or pushed, it was Anya Fritz. The engineer had performed her wizardry time and time again, and Barron had never seen anyone who drove herself—or her people—harder. He’d seen her engineers more than once, wandering the corridors with a distant, vacant look. Anya Fritz exhausted her people in a way Barron had never seen before.

  He turned back toward the display. The bomber attack was still underway. Reg Griffin had done a masterful job at directing the fight, leading the squadrons toward the most vulnerable enemy ships with staggering precision. But the squadrons had already paid a terrible price for their success, and the intensity of their losses was rapidly escalating. Missiles volleys were tearing into their ranks, and almost a quarter of the ships launched had been destroyed
or disabled. That sounded bad enough on its face, but it only got worse when Barron reminded himself that added up to nearly a thousand ships. A thousand pilots.

  The old Dauntless, his first large command, had carried sixty fighters. He’d just seen more than fifteen times that number taken down…and the losses were still mounting.

  He felt the urge to get on the comm, to order Reg Griffin to pull her people out. But he couldn’t. He needed them out there. He needed every hit they could score, every enemy ship they could take out. Even if they were wiped out in the process.

  It was a cold view, one he’d struggled with in his earlier years of command. Combat presented a dark and unforgiving calculus, and any commander worth the stars on his collar agonized over the losses his forces suffered. But Barron’s realization was a broad one. He cared deeply for the pilots, for all of the almost quarter of a million spacers in his fleet, but he also knew he would have traded every one of their lives—his own included—to save the hundred billion or more in the Confederation, all of whom faced death or slavery if the Highborn were allowed to prevail.

  He winced slightly as he saw a flash on his screen, another of the enemy’s long range beams coming too close. He suspected the accuracy of the Highborn fire at Dauntless was coincidental, but it was disconcerting, nevertheless. He knew he should pull back, that his ship was only one of hundreds in the fight, that he shouldn’t risk the fleet command vessel in the front line. But Barron had never fought that way. He could make some concessions to tactics, to combat realities, but he couldn’t make himself someone he wasn’t. He had come to Calpharon to lead his people into the fight, and that’s just what he was going to do.