by J. N. Chaney
The Hecate shuddered as a KEW—rock with some ice and iron, a lethal mix—struck her a glancing blow. Distant alarms sounded; he heard Tanner, his voice as flat and calm as ever, order damage control to respond. A few seconds later, another missile struck, the reactive armor deflecting most of its blast; but another followed, slamming into much the same place as the spent armor and gouging a hole into the destroyer’s flank. More alarms sounded, their relentless howl adding to the unlimited chaos erupting across the big ship.
Thorn teetered on the edge. He simply had no more power to spare—his reservoir running dry, waves of nausea began contorting his psyche. His physical body was twisted as well, sweat sluicing in his uniform from a silent war being fought inside him.
His shield began to falter—
And silence. Blissful, perfect silence as the alarms died with a startled squawk over the ship-wide channel.
There were no more impacts. His power had faded, rendering the shield a ghost of its former self, but the Nyctus fire had slackened dramatically. When he opened his eyes, he saw why.
A massive battleship looming just ahead of the Hecate had suddenly gone rogue, pouring torrents of fire into unsuspecting and unprepared Nyctus battlecruisers, heavy cruisers, and destroyers. The powerful ship quickly crippled a swathe of the squid battle line, throwing the entire Nyctus flank into confusion.
In quick succession, three salvos of KEW shots tore into the Nyctus cruisers, each impact sending a plume of atmo, plasma, and dead enemy into the black in a cone of destruction some hundred meters wide. One cruiser detonated in a white-hot cloud, leaving nothing but an afterimage. The second Nyctus ship hit by friendly fire was a battlewagon hundreds of meters long; it too was raked by KEW but with a different result. In a silent howl, the ship cracked in two halves, each spinning wildly and crashing into yet another wounded Nyctus ship of the line—the space between the ships was filled with crew, and debris, and flashing lights from systems flaring into raw energy.
Dozens of Nyctus wriggled as they died, the hard vacuum freezing them to their twin hearts even as the fleet came apart around them.
Now the entire ON fleet was in range, and the big rail guns spoke with silent lethality. Ten meter rods tore into Nyctus ships, each impact shearing through the reactive armor like it was a paper toy. As holes opened in the targets, ON gunnery locked on with massive lasers, frying the interiors of Nyctus ships, leaving seared, molten decking and destruction along the way.
Thorn sensed death.
Not ordinary death, but the death of ships. The death of a fleet. The end of things for an entire battle group, each Nyctus mind shrieking into the void, their voices heavy with pain, rage, disbelief—music to Thorn’s ears.
And now, at that nexus of battle where will becomes reality, the battleship swung its ponderous bulk hard, locking itself on a collision course with a wounded battlecruiser, trying fitfully to leave on the power a handful of shamans could manage.
It would not be enough.
Thorn smiled. Kira had, it seemed, played her part perfectly.
But the battle was far from done. The center and far flank of the Nyctus force were still mostly intact, sending unshielded thoughts of panic and horror at the dramatic reversal they witnessed. Thorn measured every bit of mental data he could glean, stitching an image of the battlespace that he could use to help the fleet render every squid ship into drifting scrap.
The Nyctus were losing, but not lost—at least not in their cold minds, where failure at the hands of humanity had never been given a place to take root.
Taking a deep breath, Thorn readied himself to start ’casting again, using whatever strength he had left to help turn the battle—if not to a complete rout, then to a victory for the ON that would echo through the ages.
He lifted his hands, closed his eyes, and pushed.
More automated systems kicked in, while squids in other parts of the battleship frantically worked to reassert control. Kira saw the bridge consoles go dead as they were locked out, which meant she’d done all she could here. She began to withdraw but hesitated, then flicked her consciousness toward a shaman she recognized as an elder of its caste. It was still alive, but dying, its guts shredded by the warrior’s blade gun.
Looks like you lose, she said.
The creature’s awareness flickered, then solidified, focusing on her.
You’ve won nothing.
Kira’s mood shifted to feral glee.
I think you’re all going to die, and we’re going to see it happen. Thorn is coming for you. We are all coming for you.
As she spoke, she remembered those awful seconds when she felt the squid approaching, murder in their alien minds because she had outlived her usefulness. If it hadn’t been for Thorn, she would have been this squid, about to die and helpless to do anything but know it.
The squid’s thoughts remained defiant, but Kira could feel the mounting terror behind them. Its arrogance was now a façade.
There it is, she said. There’s the fear. Yeah, that’s all I wanted. Your fear is a perfect betrayal, here at the end.
She started to break the Joining, but spared another moment.
Can you hear me still? Kira asked.
I hear an upstart—a race destined for slavery and death at our touch. A servile animal who has taught itself tricks—
Kira laughed across the miles, and the Nyctus fell silent.
You will only serve as debris. Die badly, coward, she sent.
The Nyctus said nothing, but Kira sensed its life draining away. She watched the battleship crash into the cruiser, both ships ringing with the tortured impact as mass and velocity came to bear on things that were not built to last forever.
Kira let the Joining end, saying nothing else as the lingering flame of Nyctus spirit was snuffed out. Extracting herself from the shaman was complicated. The squid was dead, she was not, and as she emerged from her place between their minds, she blinked, bewildered but smiling.
With alarm, her smile faded. Mol was maneuvering hard to avoid a squid missile.
“Mol?”
Mol glanced at her. “We done? Because if so, the Flag’s ordered a general engagement, Hecate at the point. This whole squid flank is falling apart, and it looks like the rest of their fleet is starting to pull back.”
“They probably don’t know what happened, exactly, and don’t want it to happen again,” Alix said.
Kira sagged. “I’m done. Just a passenger now,” she said, her voice thick with fatigue.
“Roger that,” Mol replied, her fingers dancing over the controls as she powered the Gyrfalcon toward the thick of the fight.
Kira looked back at Alix. “How’s our friend?”
The leader of Tiger Team Three shrugged at the Nyctus shaman. “As dormant as ever. This has actually been a pretty boring trip for us.”
Kira looked at Toff. The man’s eyes were still closed, and—was he snoring?
“Unbelievable,” Kira muttered, chuckling.
Alix looked at Kira. “So, I know these bastards had you, Kira. I know that had to be rough.” She glanced at the shaman. “Do you want this damned thing to survive? Or should we, you know, lose control of it and have to put it down?”
Kira gave a tired smile. “I’ve had my fill of killing squids today. Let’s bring this one back and see if we can figure out what makes them tick.”
To herself, Kira thought, You won’t like the new me, friend. Or Thorn, for that matter. Gonna be a long day for you . . . soon.
The shaman remained quiet, though Kira thought one of its tentacles twitched.
Perched in the witchport on the Hecate’s prow, Thorn realized he was further forward than anyone else aboard the destroyer, which was itself leading the Fleet on a charge that was breaking the Nyctus battle line.
He was literally the tip of the spear.
Inside him, his reservoir began to fill, energized by the collected victories around him. Sailors shouted, cursed, and prayed—all of their
hopes and thoughts pouring across space in a storm of will that lit a fire in the place where Thorn’s magic bloomed, like new shoots under the soft rains of spring.
He was renewed. Rousing himself, Thorn gathered his power and began to ’cast, laying destruction about him as the spear plunged deep into their enemy.
He drew focus on a massive airlock amidships on a Nyctus ship, rolling hard to port. With a thought, he opened a crack—small, but then small cracks are just as lethal in the hard vacuum of space. Then he shorted the electrical systems along a bulkhead, sent the Nyctus against each other in an orgy of violence, and watched, placidly, as the enemy vessel began to spit fire before collapsing in a nova of white light.
“Next,” he muttered, bringing his attention to an enemy ship nearly five hundred meters long. A planetkiller, he thought, feeling the shamans aboard as they put up a wall of defensive magic against his incursion.
But they were distracted by the battle.
One junior officer faltered—just a wobble, really, and Thorn was there, piercing the defenses like a javelin as he made a crewman send the power system into overload with the touch of a single tentacle. In seconds, the spike cooked off wires and conduits, sending flames and searing chemicals through the air, into the water of their tanks and through their bodies.
The ship died in a series of explosions along the flank, each section venting to hard vacuum before the hull shattered in three uneven pieces, whirling like the edge of a demented knife.
Railgun rounds, lasers, and a lone missile launched from an ON destroyer flared around Thorn in a symphony of silent, lethal violence.
And then there were no more Nyctus ships to target with fire or force.
The Hecate, battered but still flying, had broken completely through the squid force, scattering it. The rest of their fleet lost its nerve, their resolve broken by an attack they couldn’t understand, by a magical manipulation that had turned what had seemed to be decisive victory into a suddenly uncertain outcome. Thorn didn’t need Joining to know their thinking.
The risk was too great. There would be other fights.
One by one, the Nyctus ships began to vanish as their trans-light drives lit. In moments, the surviving ON fleet was alone, left with only a few, crippled enemy ships to mop up.
Thorn?
It was Kira, her voice wafting through his exhausted mind. He smiled. She was still alive.
I’m here.
Guess it worked, huh?
Guess it did.
Mol’s on her way back. We should be aboard soon.
Good. Oh, and Kira?
Hmm?
You’re definitely top ten Joiners. Top ten?
In this engagement? Easy.
He felt her laughing. I am so going to kick your ass, Stellers.
He closed his eyes, slumped back, and smiled.
Bring it, Wixcombe.
Epilogue
Thorn stood with Kira, Tanner, and Mol, watching as the Nyctus shaman was unloaded from the Hecate for transfer to a shuttle down to Code Gauntlet. He had no idea what would happen to the creature after that, but he didn’t need to know—at least until somebody decided he did. The docking concourse of the orbital component of Code Gauntlet was strangely quiet, emptied out by the security detachment escorting the Nyctus prisoner.
“Surprised the thing made it back aboard alive,” Tanner said, glancing at Kira sidelong. “Figured it would probably end up dead. You know, a casualty of the battle.”
Kira shrugged. “Who knows, sir? We might learn something useful from it yet. If its brains haven’t been entirely scrambled by all this time being drugged, that is.”
Thorn understood. His gaze slid away from the shaman, and he regarded Kira, watching her with mixed admiration and concern.
Tanner turned to Thorn and Kira. “Between the two of you, you’ve nearly wrecked my ship and flung it halfway across the galaxy. I’ve got every right to be pissed at you about that—and I am.”
Thorn and Kira both nodded. “Understood, sir,” Thorn said. Was this a preamble to having him reassigned somewhere else? Had Tanner had enough Starcasting aboard his ship?
“Between the two of you, you also almost got the Fleet wiped out, and then made the Hecate instrumental in turning that around, taking what would have been a huge defeat and turning it into a not-too-bad victory. So there’s that, too.”
Thorn looked at Kira, who gave a slight shrug. “Sorry, sir, but is there something you’re trying to tell us here?”
“Fleet wants you moved to a capital ship,” Tanner said. “Both of you, in fact. But being Captain of the ship that turned a major battle gives me some clout. I can use a chunk of it to keep you aboard the Hecate, at least for now. But I’m not going to do that if you want to move up, Stellers. Not going to stand in the way of that.”
Thorn saw the squid shaman loaded through an airlock farther up the corridor, its inert body strapped to a rolling gurney pushed by a pair of armed personnel. He shook his head. “I’ve only just got the cushions in the Hecate’s witchport arranged how I like them, sir. I’d hate to give that up.”
Tanner gave him a wintry smile. “Not sure whether to feel dread that you want to stay aboard my ship, or be happy about it. Maybe some of both.” He turned to Kira.
“Can’t say where you’re going next, Wixcombe. I know you were given an on-the-fly debriefing on our way back here, but Fleet wants you for a detailed session once you’ve had a couple days of leave. You’ll be given a new assignment after that.” His eyes narrowed slightly. “Rumor is that you might be assigned to work directly under Captain Densmore.”
Kira frowned. “Oh.”
“Oh, indeed. You ever need a bunk, though, Wixcombe, there’s one aboard the Hecate for you. After you . . . observe Densmore for a while.
“Observe, sir?” Kira asked.
“Let’s call it that. For the moment,” Tanner replied, his face giving nothing away.
“Thank you, sir. I might just take you up on that, and I’m in the mood for some observation, given my recent history,” Kira said, matching his bland tone. They were saying little, but each understood what was happening. Densmore would be rooted out, but it would be done outside channels. Quietly, until the need for stealth was past, and then Alys Densmore would be dealt with in a manner befitting her status.
“I’ll help,” Thorn said, earning a small grin from Tanner.
“I welcome the assistance. Travel safely. Oh, and Stellers?”
“Sir?”
“Don’t lose your temper. Every time you do, I end up on the other side of the galaxy.” Tanner tapped Thorn on the chest and walked away, whistling. His task was huge—fixing the Hecate and rejoining the fight.
“Observe. Interesting term,” Thorn murmured.
“And chosen for a reason. Let’s keep this quiet,” Kira said.
“My thoughts exactly.”
“Consider me dumb on this one. I don’t do spy shit,” Mol said brightly. “Happy to space a spy for you, though. Now about the next two days—you guys looking for a ride?” I’m heading planetside. The Gyrfalcon still doesn’t have a working Alcubierre drive, so I’ve got some shop time lined up for her down in Code Gauntlet.”
Thorn looked at Kira. “I’ve got a couple of days of leave. Think you do, too?”
“Yeah, I do.”
“Got room for us?” Thorn asked.
“Sure, but crowded, mind you,” Mol went on, turning to start back into the Hecate, to her hangar and the waiting fighter. “Bringing Tiger Team Three down, too. Apparently they have a post-op ritual of getting wildly drunk and . . . well, let’s leave it at that.” She grinned. “Alix says she can drink me under the proverbial table. Isn’t that adorable?”
Thorn laughed. “She doesn’t know what she’s getting herself into.” He turned back to Kira. “Care to spend our first day of leave hungover with me, hating the sun and life in general?”
Kira grinned back. “First you yank me out of trouble, and no
w you’re going to lead me right back into it.”
Her grin faded, though. Thorn knew she was suddenly remembering the ones that had been left behind—Rainer and Riley.
It was quick, Thorn told her silently.
You think?
I know. I don’t feel them. Doesn’t make it hurt less.
I—yeah, Kira said, a plastic grin on her face so Mol wouldn’t sense their grief.
Together, they followed Mol back into the Hecate. Behind them, the docking concourse, now released by ON security, was starting to come back to life.
Thorn walked slowly, reaching out to the shaman as he did. It took a moment, but then he sensed its mind—fuzzed, but present.
I’d get used to this if I were you, Thorn sent.
Moments went by, then an answer, dripping with arrogance.
Used to what, you larva?
Thorn felt his lips curl, then sent a final word. Losing.
Keep reading to continue the story in CRIMSON SUN.
Prologue
The screen door banged behind her as the little girl came tumbling out onto a broad porch, her small feet busy as she laughed her way through a cloud of fat, indignant insects that buzzed away at her approach. Their green bodies shone in the bright light. She leapt off the bottom step into the lush grass, landing awkwardly, then she stumbled and pelted ahead in the way that only children can, somewhere between joy and chaos.
She kept her feet pumping and ran on, leaving a wake of clacking, buzzing bugs roused into flight by her flailing passage, their only accompaniment her silvery laughter. It was late morning, and behind her in the grass, the girl left a trail of passage. Overnight dew, now burning off in the brilliant sun. A path, wandering as she did, her eyes lifted up into the sky, where the angry bugs dispersed in fading metallic sounds.
“Lookit!” she said, raising the doll she’d been cradling in her arms—a smiling boy with wild, dark curls of hair and crude insignia patches sewn to each arm of its tattered shirt. “Lookit, Mister Starman! Lookit the bugs!”