The Calypsis Project Boxed Set (Books 1-2 - The Echo-Alpha Duology)

by Brittany M. Willows

  “Neither do we,” Chambers pointed out.

  “But I do. Let me finish,” Orion said. “I dropped the Admiral a few hints to tempt him into joining us for a chat; some bait to lure him in. He agreed, and that is why he is here now. So I suggest you let him aboard immediately. Ah, and while I’m up here, I also feel it necessary to mention that Lieutenant Knoble was in on this conversation as well.”

  “Lance is alive?” Alana said, relieved.

  “Yes. From what I gathered, he is not in the best condition . . . but he knows we are searching for him. Knowing the Lieutenant, that will give him the strength he needs to hold on until we get to him. Now please,” Orion looked past the Doctor to the Ship Commander, “allow the Admiral to come aboard.”

  Alana had been expecting a little uneasiness amongst the team once the Admiral joined them, but this was just ridiculous. She stood next to Dr. Chambers on one side of the table, her body stiff and teeth clenched. Orion hovered in front of them, no emotion displayed on his holographic features as he stared in the Admiral’s direction.

  On the opposite side, the young warrior and his creature companion appeared to be equally as uncomfortable. Lithe swung her head back and forth as if she was waiting for someone to speak, then she took a couple of steps backward and removed herself from the meeting. And finally, staring each other down from either end of the holo-table with hatred burning in their eyes, were the Drocain ship commander and the Fleet Admiral.

  The air crackled with tension, and the bridge was so still that the Corporal was afraid everyone around her could hear the rapid thumping of her heart.

  There’s nothing quite so nerve-racking as being in the same room with two people who want to kill each other, Alana thought. Anderson has good reason to be angry, though.

  Levian had probably taken the lives of thousands of UNPD soldiers while he was still with the Empire, but he’d been led to believe that what he was doing was right. Alana was sure he must be feeling remorse for his killings now that the truth had been uncovered.

  But what if he really didn’t have a single regret about the lives he’d brought to an end? Alana didn’t want to think about that.

  “Rather than standing here like a bunch of deaf mutes,” Dr. Chambers broke the awkward silence, “how about we actually try to cooperate? You know, so we can get back to work before that planet down there is annihilated.” She looked to the Admiral. “You still don’t understand what’s going on, do you, Anderson?”

  “I was told by your mouthy AI that everything would be revealed to me once I arrived,” the Admiral muttered with impatience, folding his arms. “I’m honestly surprised he hasn’t thrown every damn detail out on the table already.”

  “Excuse me?” Orion said with laughter in his voice. He tilted his head back slightly, eyes glittering with gold in the shadow cast by his hood. “Do you take me to be some sort of babbling fool who is unable to hold his own tongue? That is an offensive accusation, Admiral.”

  “Just get on with it. I don’t have all day.”

  “Gladly.” Orion unclipped his spell book and flipped open the cover. “I will not be attaching a name to my source, so as to ensure the safety of those present; and for other security reasons. I also ask that you all listen very carefully as this information will not only be new to the Admiral, but to the rest of you as well. And I must warn that these findings might have been damaged in the decryption process, so their validity may be questioned. Each was found to have had a virus embedded in its coding; a fail-safe of sorts, I assume—to keep those without the proper authority from accessing the documents.”

  Please tell me you didn’t hack into BSI’s database, Alana thought. She wouldn’t put it past him to attempt such a risky move to gather important data.

  “What I found was a collection of journals, mission logs, and technical reports. There were a few in particular which stood out, so I will begin with those,” Orion said. “Journal entry zero-two-three-three, as written by Ben Filcher, S0-OT: Evidently, there is more to the planet than we can see from orbital observations. A week ago, our scanners started to pick up abnormal activity hundreds of kilometers below the surface. And upon further examination, the science team has discovered something truly remarkable. We have found what appears to be a massive network of tunnels winding beneath the ground. But the question that is plaguing the minds of us all is this: Where do these tunnels lead, and who built them? We hope to have an answer to this in the coming weeks.

  “Entry zero-two-four-zero, as written by Jahel Cadera, S1-OT: I regret to inform that we have lost all contact with the exploration team. The last time they were heard from was almost seven hours ago. The Director has forbidden any further attempts to make contact with them. While I, and the rest of the observation team, believe it could be nothing more than a technical problem, he has suggested that there could be some thing down there that has brought harm to the exploration team. All we can do now is hope and pray that they are alive.

  “Entry zero-three-five-seven, as written by Akito Takahiro, S1-OT: It has been three days since we last received word from the exploration team. Director Bishop is organizing a search party. I will be monitoring the video feeds.

  “Entry zero-three-six-two, as written by Ben Filcher, S0-OT: Bishop has lost his damn mind. I want to get off this planet and get back to my family before he puts my head on the chopping block.

  The search party found the exploration team . . . they were all dead. Their bodies were stuck to the goddamned walls—trapped in some kind of organic material.

  Bishop was right. There is something down there and it does not want us here. We would all leave if it weren’t for his insistence that we continue with our work. He’s willing to risk the lives of more than three hundred men to get to the bottom of this.

  “Status report zero-two-three, entered by BSI AI XVR0666-3 Xavier, S0: ‘For what we seek is what we fear . . . But with great ambition comes greater sacrifice.’ One hundred sixteen injured, forty-eight missing, ninety-six dead. Director William Bishop to initiate peaceful contact with foreign life forms at 2300 hours.

  “William Bishop was the founder of the Bureau of Scientific Investigations, for those of you who were not already aware.” Orion looked up from the book. “And before you bring up the fact that he would have been long dead by the time Calypsis was discovered, allow me draw your attention to the timestamps on these journal entries. They have been dated between October and December twenty-eighty-seven—three hundred and thirteen years prior to the day the United Nations Planetary Defense discovered the planet.”

  “You also said that the validity of these findings may be questioned,” Anderson said.

  “The dates are correct, I can guarantee you that. Moving on,” Orion said. “Judging by the physical description of the foreign life forms given by Bishop, it would seem that they are, without a doubt, the very same alien race we encountered recently. I’ll have you know that the Director was not heard from again after that. Let’s skip ahead then, shall we? Next we have a message. Sender goes by the name ‘Stallion,’ recipient is unknown. Date is August twenty-four-twenty-eight—roughly ten years ago.

  “We’ll do the same thing we always do when secrets get out. Dispose of those who uncovered them, form a plausible story, hide the treasure again and do a better job of keeping it under the covers. We learn from our mistakes. This is one of those mistakes; it’s just much larger than any we’ve made before. The big fella’s got a plan. He wants to start a war. I’ll give you the honor of igniting the flame if you’d like.

  “Last message. Same sender, unknown recipient. Date is December third, twenty-four-thirty-eight—earlier this morning.

  “So the key has been found, and guess where the bloody idiot is right now? Heading straight into the hands of the Nephera, completely oblivious. Preparations for standby sequence have begun. We will soon witness the final, grand moments of this war, the dramatic climax we’ve all been waiting for—the ending where humanity
stands victorious. I hope you’ll be watching.

  “And finally, Admiral Anderson, we come to the story of this misfit group. The UNPD’s Alpha Team and a Drocain squadron were assigned the task of seeking out and recovering a private communications unit that appears to be a device used by those associated with the Calypsis Project. The unit was first retrieved by the Drocain, taken aboard the Legacy of Night, and soon after the ship’s crash-landing, Echo Team was sent out to investigate. Echo Team found the PCU among the wreckage, and Alana Carmen listened to one of the recorded transmissions stored within the device. Though she was unauthorized to do this, we would not be standing here had she not.”

  Alana’s ears burned, hot with embarrassment. She was thankful that the Admiral was too caught up with the information Orion was handing out to pay any attention to that small detail.

  “Carmen discovered a covert alliance between the Drocain Empire and a small portion of the UNPD,” Orion said. “In our case, formed behind the backs of those in positions of leadership. Unfortunately for many within the Empire, it was their own ruler who betrayed them. And now it seems that a secondary alliance is in order if we are to put a halt to the total destruction of our home worlds.” Orion closed the spell book and let it hang at his hip again, then folded his hands in front of himself and looked at the group gathered around the table. They were speechless, paralyzed.

  “Calypsis is a weapon created by the Nephera, now set to standby status. And their target? Our galaxy,” the AI said. “But the question remains: what is the key? Find it, and the Nephera will be unable to carry out their mission.”

  “They’re planning to destroy our entire galaxy?” Chambers exclaimed. “What the hell did we ever do to make them want to eliminate every being in the Milky Way? And if that’s true, then why is anybody in this galaxy working with them in the first place?”

  “It is likely that they have been deceived,” the Ship Commander said. “And the Nephera have a long history in this universe. Whatever feelings of resentment they may hold could be thousands of years old.”

  “That’s not fair!”

  “Evenhandedness is not their concern,” the warrior cut her off, leaning with his elbow on the arm of his gravity throne. “We must hunt down the key they require.”

  “We don’t have any leads to point us in the right direction, let alone know what we would do with the damned thing if we even managed to get our hands on it,” Admiral Anderson put in grimly, then added to Chambers, “Doctor, have you come up with a cure for the plague yet?”

  Dr. Chambers looked at him, not trying to hide the fact she thought his question was ridiculous. “If I had, do you honestly think I would be standing here? What does this even have to do with what’s going on now? You want to try to bribe the damn aliens with a cure for a plague they’ve probably never even heard of?” she retorted sharply.

  “Never mind, it was nothing,” the Admiral dismissed the subject, which obviously infuriated the Doctor. Her face was flushed with anger; she crossed her arms tight against her chest and looked away with a shake of her head as he continued. “We can’t risk taking any drastic courses of action until we get a location on that key.”

  The Ship Commander trained a malicious glare on the Fleet Admiral as he stepped down from his throne. “Your people are in danger, as are mine,” he hissed. “Ten years we have fought, ten years you have defended your colonies and not once have you fled from a battle—yet you stand here, on my bridge, and you whine like a helpless child!”

  The Doctor stepped over to Anderson and grabbed ahold of his forearm as he raised a white-knuckled fist in the air. She met his icy stare and said sternly, “Think before you do something stupid.”

  He snatched his arm from her grasp. “What right do you have to speak to me in that tone? You’re a civilian, for God’s sake!”

  “I’m a BSI employee—Sector Three! I should have more authority than you!”

  “But you don’t because you’re only a BSI employee when it’s necessary. If you want power, start acting like you deserve it.”

  Dr. Chambers laughed, not out of amusement, but out of aggravation. Flexing her fingers, she slapped the Admiral across the face—hard enough to leave a bright pink handprint on his cheek. Anderson nearly lost his footing, taken off-guard by the unexpected strike.

  The Corporal rushed between them with her arms outstretched to prevent their dispute from escalating into a full-blown fist-fight.

  “No one here has the time or patience to deal with this bullshit! We’re supposed to be cooperating, not wasting valuable time arguing and bitch-slapping admirals!” She looked at Anderson, who cut her off as she opened her mouth to speak.

  “There’s nothing you can say that will make me forgive these alien bastards for what they’ve done to humanity,” he said, hand pressed to his cheek. “Do I need to remind you of the countless lives they have taken from us?”

  She let out a long breath and brushed her hair from her face. “Look, sir, I’m not asking you to forgive them. Hell, I’m not even asking you to shake hands with them—but right now, we need them. Our galaxy is at stake here, our home. We need all the help we can get. And if it all blows up in our face, then at least we can say we gave it our best shot.”

  Looking contemplative, he agreed reluctantly once he’d had a chance to weigh the odds in his head. “Fine . . . I’ll call in reinforcements to lend a hand. But I suggest you all pray that this plan succeeds, because if it falls short . . . God help us all.”

  “Well that was fun,” Dr. Chambers muttered once he had gone. She looked to the Ship Commander, whose lips were twitching with irritation, and she said, “Come on, let’s head planetside before there’s nothing left down there to save.”

  Alana sat atop a Drocain supply crate in Legacy’s hangar bay, her feet kicked up on another crate in front of her. She was finishing up her earlier task of prepping and packing weapons, readying them for transport. The last of the armaments were nearly ready to be loaded onto the dropship hovering a little ways off.

  Lithe was curled up on the floor beside her, looking like a dejected puppy who’d been left in a dark and empty house all by herself. The energetic hybrid wasn’t going to be coming along for the ride this time; she would stay aboard the assault carrier until Kenon decided what to do with her.

  The young warrior was considering returning her to Calypsis or sending her off into the forests of Dyre—someplace where she would be able to hunt as she pleased. It would be sad to see her go, but releasing her into the wild would probably be her best chance for survival. If she continued to tag along with the team, sooner or later she would end up taking a bullet.

  The soldier looked up from the alien sniper rifle in her lap when she heard a barrage of metallic pounding. She turned her head toward the three Falcon dropships parked in the hangar twenty feet away. Omega Team had gathered their gear and were now thumping up the ramp into their dropship, which had obviously seen its fair share of battles. She was a pretty banged up piece of machinery.

  It appeared that teams Sigma and Zeta were getting ready to move out as well.

  These Falcon dropships were “gifts” from Admiral Anderson, and he’d made sure to send ordnance and three eight-man teams along with them to give Alana and Kenon some support on the ground. This would serve to slow the Nephera whilst they searched for any clues that might lead to the location of the key.

  A full complement of UNPD ships would arrive in a few more hours.

  More footsteps, to her left. Kenon had entered the hangar, carrying with him a satchel full of medical equipment and a portable crytal turret that was almost as big as her body. Judging by its bulk, it probably weighed about the same too.

  “Time to move?” Alana asked as she withdrew her legs from the adjacent crate to let the warrior through.

  “We leave once the supplies are onboard,” he replied, and continued on to the Drocain dropship.

  Alana packed the sniper rifle into a long case and s
tood, slinging her backpack over her shoulder; the weight of the equipment she’d stuffed into it nearly pulled her over. It hadn’t been this heavy since her relocation from Anahk to Calypsis.

  The Corporal headed over to the gravity lift and was taken up into the huge, empty cabin. She imagined that if it were full of massive Khael’hin warriors it would feel just like a crowded nightclub on a weekend. While their presence would be greatly appreciated at this time, she was glad she didn’t have to walk by them to get to the fore compartment.

  Alana set her things down outside the doors and entered the cockpit where the young warrior had already taken his seat in front of the command console. She slipped her helmet on over her head and tucked her hair up inside it, then raised the visor.

  “Do they know we’re coming?” she asked.

  “The High Council?” Kenon murmured. “No, they do not. I have not been able to make contact with them. It seems their communications outpost has been taken offline.”

  “So this is kind of a surprise homecoming thing then?”

  “It will not be a pleasant visit, not with a battle blazing so close to the city. And the last time I spoke with them—”

  “It’s in the past,” Alana said. “I hope to hell you’re not still thinking you’ve got something to prove to them.”

  Alana stood with the toes of her boots sticking out over the rim of the dropship’s open door, the pale desert speeding by thirty feet below. As the sands began to thin out, giving way to a floor of cracked stone, the dropship decelerated and dropped five meters, coming to a stop outside the City of Ceida.

  The Corporal got her equipment together and descended the gravity lift. Her faceplate polarized to shield her eyes from the bright sun sinking behind one particularly tall structure rising from the city’s center.