Relic of Empire

by W. Michael Gear

  I, more than any man in the Empire, know the horror we’re facing. Looking back now, I can only blame myself, for we’ve all addicted ourselves to the Companions. Despite the bravado I showed in the Council, I know the odds. We’ve built a military of pomp and circumstance—one capable of police work, but not of fighting the sort of brutal war the Companions will unleash against us. Where Staffa’s troops are sand tigers, mine are but siff jackals with worn teeth and loud growls.

  “At no time in my life have I suffered a despair as great as this. Oh, my poor, poor people. Here in the night, alone, I can see your worlds-blasted and cold. Where the grand edifices of Empire once rose, all that remains is the cold wind of war howling through gutted buildings as the snow blows over the broken bodies of the unmourned dead.”

  · Excerpt taken from Tybaft the Imperial Seventh’s personal journal

  CHAPTER 15

  The monitor had begun to blur in Skyla’s vision and her back had started to ache. A heada6he stabbed behind her eyes. How many rotted reports did she have to go through, anyway? Hadn’t Tap Amurka handled anything in her absence?

  Of course he had, and if he hadn’t sent these to her for her inspection it would have sparked her concern. Skyla worked in her personal quarters. She still kept most of her things here despite the fact that she’d moved in with Staffa. These rooms had her personal stamp and she worked better in the familiar environment. The oblong quarters stretched forty meters in length and had been finished in sculptured gothic arches of translucent white. Each contained holo tanks which she could program for any environment she liked.

  Skyla rubbed callused fingers over her hot eyes and sighed as she pulled up the remaining file menu in a window. Here was the real glory of being second in command of the Companions. Reports, management decisions, administrative duties, and the honor of working three hours a day longer than anyone else in Itreata did.

  She’d been at it now for three days, ever since they’d docked Chrysla upon their return from the Sassan trip. In that time, Staffa had seen Kaylla Dawn, and then ordered the fleet to prepare. Supervision of that process would occupy him for the rest of the week.

  What the hell else can he do? If Sinklar jumps on Sassa, we’ve got to be able to respond to keep the peace. And, yes, Staffa had been working even harder than she.

  “Message,” the comm announced.

  “Run it,” Skyla ordered, but instead of a message, she got one of the comm personnel from the central station. The woman looked ill at ease. ‘

  “Wing Commander? I have a message on line. The individual demands to speak to you in person ... and on a top secret circuit. Will you confirm?”

  “Who is it?” Skyla leaned forward, squinting.

  “He didn’t say. I have a visual.” A man’s image, slightly blurred, formed. Rotted Gods! Tyklat! “Comm, give me that secure channel.” Skyla waited while the reception cleared and her monitor finally read, “Secure.”

  “Wing Commander?” Tyklat asked. “By the Quantum Gods, am I glad to see you.”

  “Hear you’re on the run from Ily,” Skyla greeted. “If you’re ready to come in, I’ll alert Kaylla and have her-“

  “No!” Tyklat shook his head miserably. “Look, things are worse than they seem. It’s not Magister Dawn, but someone ... I don’t know who, has been doubled.” He reached out for her. “Skyla, listen, you’re the only person I know I can trust. I need to come in without any of the Seddi knowing I’m alive.” Skyla cocked her head. “Why me, Tyklat?”

  He seemed to harden, his dark face anguished. “Because I won’t live past the debriefing. I don’t know who Ily’s agent is, but he’ll keep me from talking ... one way or another.”

  “You’ve got to have a suspicion of who it might be. “

  He gave her a reluctant nod, expression sickly. “I think it’s Nyklos. Now, do you see why I can’t let any of the Seddi know I’m coming in? Listen, I know how tight your security is. I don’t have any problem with that-and I’d be suspicious of me, too. You can have your people put me under the scan, use Mytol, whatever. Anything to satisfy themselves I’m clean. Then you’ve got to get me to Magister Dawn without anyone knowing. “

  Skyla considered. Thrice curse it all, what had gone wrong? But then, for the Seddi, what had gone right? Ily still had Arta Fera. The Seddi covert network lay in shambles ... and Nyklos was integral in the efforts to restructure their system of communication. If he were compromised by Ily....

  Not Nyklos! Skyla remembered the long trip from Etaria to Itreata when he’d been her prisoner, hostage, and self-proclaimed ardent admirer. Or had that all been bluff as she’d originally suspected?

  “Where are you?”

  He looked down at the monitors on the small bridge she could see in her screen. “I’m about three and a half light-years from Ryklos. I’ve got this transmission narrowed to as fine a beam as I can manage. “

  “Ryklos? That’s Sassan space. “

  He gave her a deadpan look.” Would you rather I tried to broadcast from Ily’s tiny room of horrors under the Regan Ministry of Internal Security? Not to be flippant, but Regan space isn’t exactly healthy for me. The nav coordinates for Itreata aren’t in this navigational system, and Ryklos was as close as I could come to your borders-and I’ve been lucky to make it this far. We didn’t dump Delta V with a lot of fuel left. Skyla, listen, this vessel took a hit on the way out of Rega. I’m running out of time. “

  He paused, expression grim. “I don’t have many options left-and maybe the Seddi don’t either. Skyla, I’m calling in that favor due from Etarus. You’ve got to come and get me ... and the Seddi can’t know. I’ve got to come in under the wrap of total secrecy. “I’ll tell Staffa.”

  “I have no problem with that-so long as he doesn’t tell Kaylla, or Nyklos. Bring all the security you want. Polluted Hell, come get me in Chrysla if you want.”

  Skyla leaned back, chewing on her thumb. “No, that would stir up too much speculation. If I come, how will I find your vessel?”

  “I’m sending the nav coordinates as clearly as I can determine them. The pilot for this crate isn’t exactly reliable, as you can no doubt guess, since he doesn’t work unless I have my pistol stuffed in his ear. “

  Skyla noted the coordinates and saved them. “Rough trip, huh?”

  He slumped then, exhaling. “After what I’ve been through ... found out ... if you only knew how glad I am to finally reach you. Skyla, you’re the only person I can trust. This is big, but when we break it open, it could be the key to ending Ily’s tyranny.”

  “How many people with you?”

  “Me and the pilot. We’ve got a month’s worth of antimatter to keep the systems going if we don’t try to maneuver. Since my departure was a little rushed, I didn’t exactly have time to shop around. I grabbed the first vessel I came to.

  “I think I understand. What about the pilot? You said he wasn’t cooperative.”

  “I think he’s given himself up for dead, but I told him he was free to go if we lived through this mad adventure. “

  Skyla had already called up Tyklat’s position on the charts. Getting there and back wouldn’t take much. She studied the plot on one of the lower monitors and squinted. “Uh-oh. Tyklat ... how are you fixed for bad news?”

  A slight tic at the corner of his lips betrayed strained nerves.

  Then Skyla chuckled and added, “The bad news is that I’ll tend to a couple of things here and be coming for you in a couple of hours. Stay off the subspace nets, and keep your head down. Tell your pilot we’ll treat him right and ship him back to Rega first thing.”

  Tyklat seemed to wilt as he closed his eyes. “If you only knew how good it is to hear that. “

  “Yeah, I’ve been on the short end a time or two myself. And once, old pal, you were there when I really needed you. The Companions don’t forget.”

  Staffa wiggled around the strut, a length of titanium-alloyed graphsteel two meters thick, thai braced Chrysla’s hull ag
ainst lateral stress-and crawled out of the narrow black hole into the inspection shaft. Like a wormhole under bark, the shaft curved under the ship’s outer skin to allow inspection of strakes, struts, and beams, all of which compressed and stretched under the fifty g acceleration Chrysla could produce. Artificial gravity field generation eased some stresses, but nothing comes free in the movements of physical bodies. Chrysla’s bones bore the strain of every gram of mass she accelerated, and regular inspections of her structural members were essential.

  Staffa glanced around the cramped tunnel, his headand-shoulder-mounted lamps sending eerie divergent shadows off the fittings. Frost patterns gleamed in the light, and the chill ate at his face. He climbed a couple of the rungs up the shaft to make way. One of the engineers, Dee Wall, followed him, stopping to anchor himself on the narrow ledge, legs dangling over the curving shaft as he looked up. A headset held small inspection lights just over the young man’s ears. Condensed breath puffed whitely before him in the bitter cold.

  “ Your opinion?” Staffa asked, hooking an arm and oating in the zero g. wit I’d say we ought to patch those hairline fractures. e haven’t gone over the ship since before the Myklenian contract. If she has any hard use, the cracks will grow. Instead of a small problem, you’ll have a big one. In the meantime, the old girl’s bones are sound, Lord Commander.”

  “It won’t take more than a week, will it?” At the man’s shake of negation, Staffa said, “Fix it. Commandeer whatever you need from supplies. Route the request through comm.”

  “Right, sir. “

  ‘Anything else, Dee?” Staffa glanced around, noticing scale where the ceramic lining of the shaft had begun to slough. She’s beginning to show her age. Too many hard years and not enough gentle treatment.

  “No, sir ... uh, sir?”

  Staffa glanced back at the engineer. “Yes?” “We’re going to war again, aren’t we? I mean, the whole complex is talking. Jinx Mistress is being gone through from one end to the other. They’re doing a minor refit. Supplies are shuttling out of stores. The Companions are running drills, getting fit. We’re going to take all of Free Space, aren’t we?”

  “Would you like that?”

  “Yes, sir. It’s about time we wrapped it up, isn’t it?”

  Staffa gave the man a wink. “If it comes to that. I’m hoping we can bring it all together now without having to fight.”

  Wall gave him a skeptical squint. “Uh, sir?” “Go on.”

  “Well, there’s talk going around. Just scuttlebutt, you know. Talk that you’ve turned Seddi.”

  Staffa laughed and cocked his head. “And how does this talk run? A good thing, or bad?”

  The engineer scratched at the side of his neck with insulated gloves. “People just wonder is all. They wonder if everything’s still the same. And then we’ve got these Seddi who are walking through all the time.” “Do you talk to them?”

  “Uh-huh. And I guess they don’t seem to be such bad sorts. You know, they’re just like us. And a lot of what they say, well from the point of view of an engineer it makes sense. You know, about the way the universe is.”

  “And how is that?”

  The engineer frowned, warming to his subject. “Well, you take anything. Let’s say materials, since that’s my specialty. I was talking to a Seddi the other day. Cute girl, too. Anyhow, she was telling me about the quanta, about the change in energy when something is observed. She told me that the ability to observe is shared God Mind, that by looking at something, you change nature at the atomic or subatomic level. Nuts and neutrinos, we’ve known that for a long time, but no one has ever looked at the physical world as being a reflection of God before.” “And what do you think about that, Dee?”

  The engineer shrugged. “I don’t think much about God, Lord Commander. At least, not until I got to talking to Cheetah-she’s that Seddi I was telling you about. That business about the quanta being God’s joke on the universe, well, sir, as a materials engineer and nanotech specialist, I can tell you it makes sense.” “And how do the others take it?”

  Dee brushed at a stain on his insulated coveralls. “Some shake their heads and wonder if you got hit on the head during that fight on Targa. Others are mildly amused and a little curious. Another bunch have started reading Seddi stuff, accessing reports, and pestering Seddi for information. I guess it breaks down in even thirds.”

  Staffa’s belt comm beeped. He activated the unit. “This is the Lord Commander.”

  “Staffa?” Skyla’s voice came through. “Something’s come up. I need to see you immediately.” “Affirmative. Where are you?”

  “In my quarters. But -let me meet you in Bay Twenty-two.”

  Staffa frowned. Her personal yacht? “I’m on my way. “

  The comm went dead and Staffa quelled a sudden sense of unease. He looked back at Wall. “Just for the benefit of the scuttlebutt, tell the troops I didn’t get hit on the head while I was on Targa. And for your information, Dee, I think the Seddi are right. The quanta are God’s joke on the universe. Talk to your Seddi a little more. I think the more you know, the more fascinated you will be.”

  “Right, sir. And I’ll have those cracks repaired posthaste.”

  Staffa pulled himself up and pushed off. As he sailed along, he tapped each tenth rung to match his trajectory with the arc of the hull.

  What could have possibly come up that Skyla needed to meet him at her yacht? Pus-Rotted Gods, she wasn’t planning on going anywhere, was she? At a time like this? Baffled, he used friction to kill his inertia as he neared the hatch. His breath puffed before him as he stepped into the hatch and cycled it.

  He floated out into a brightly lit corridor and closed the hatch behind him. The warm air tingled on his flesh. He could hear clanging somewhere as he pushed off to the lift and pulled himself inside, ordering, “Main hatch. “

  As the lift entered the increasing gravity near the center of the ship, Staffa noticed a slight wobbling. A problem with the magnetic fields? Moving out toward the main hatch it seemed to diminish.

  As he stepped out into the bustling hatch area he wound through stacks of sialon crates, chattering workmen, and snaking cables. He paused only long enough to thumb the comm. “Tap? Staffa here. Have someone run a check on Lift 7-C. It feels like one of the superconductors is starting to fail. Probably a microfracture in the ceramic lattice somewhere.”

  Then he stepped through the giant quadruple doors of the hatch and into the umbilical dome. The umbilical consisted of a giant stalk of interwoven graphite fiber cables which rose six kilometers from Itreata’s pockmarked surface and mated with Chrysla’s main hatch. Seven smaller graphite fiber cables attached to Chrysla along the ship’s structural supports to even the strain and keep her from oscillating. In such a fashion, the huge ship rode easily at anchor, held in place by the angular momentum of Itreata’s rotation while stress and structural fatigue were countered by the moon’s weak gravity.

  As Staffa waited for a lift, he stared out at the shadowed face of Itreata. Below, clusters of lights marked the major installations that poked from the rocky surfaces. This portion of Itreata remained in perpetual shadow, protected from the waves of radiation blasted out of the Twin Titans’ fury. In the distance, the lights of Viktrix blurred the darkness above a sprinkle of installations. Beyond the crater-ragged curve of the horizon, similar graphite fiber tethers and umbilicals hooked Simva Ast; Slap, Sabot, Jinx Mistress, Black Warrior, Holocaust, and Cobra-the rest of the Companions’ deadly fleet.

  How many times had they fitted out for war? How many times had the crews swarmed through those powerful machines, inspecting structural members, running diagnostics on the comm, initiating power-ups on the reactors? How many crewmen had walked the corridors, radiation detectors in hand? How many grav specialists had powered the gravity generators to maximum, balancing the fields to perfection?

  And how many times did we space to kill billions? Staffa could remember them all, from the very first Phillipian
contract he’d accepted, to the Myklenian mobilization. He’d taken that first contract so many years ago. He’d had a single ship and a band of freebooters-nothing more than pirates like himself. Yes, long ago, before Itreata, before the fleet and the industries. Before Chrysla ... and his son. Before the miserable dead had invaded his dreams. Before the Praetor stole his love. Before Myklene and the disaster it had brought him in the midst of victory.

  Staffa turned away, waiting his turn as the lift opened to disgorge a band of techs, all armed with various diagnostic gear.

  Staffa entered, locked in his memories. As the lift accelerated him toward the moon below, he stared at the walls, unease growing within. Skyla wanted to meet him at the bay where she kept her personal yacht?

  He stepped out more than a kilometer underground into a sea of noise as machinery whined and moaned, and men and women hollered. Thumps and booms rolled over the immense workshop and overhead cranes shuddered along railing while antigravs whirred in every direction. The chatter of a mechanical hammer drowned everything for a moment, then the usual din resumed.

  Staffa palmed the security transport lock plate and entered as the duraplast door slid back. When it closed, the noise dropped by a half, then faded completely as Staffa gave comm his destination. Then he boarded the pneumatic transport capsule and slid the hatch closed.

  Hands locked behind his back, he rocked from heel to toe while the twenty-man capsule whisked him through the vacuum tunnels on superconducting magnetic cushions. Throughout the long ride, his bewilderment increased.

  “It’s probably nothing.” But his feeling of foreboding refused to release its hold on his soul.

  The capsule shifted slightly as it came to rest and settled. The hatch slipped soundlessly to the side and Staffa palmed the lock plate before emerging into Skyla’s bay. The gray concrete room smelled of chemicals and the air carried a chill. Off-white sialon crates lined the cut-rock walls while security monitors watched protectively over the long bay.