“Your days are numbered, Donovan. You’ve not beat me yet.”
“Oh? What have you got in store for me? I am all ears.”
He refused to answer, simply glaring at me.
“Sounds like he’s got a plan,” said Hieron, standing up and walking over to him. Borges turned his ire upon the old man, giving him the same treatment he gave me. “Maybe we should interrogate him?”
“Torture me, if that’s what you filth do. You’ll get no plans from me.”
“So there are plans?” said Hieron, grinning mischievously.
Borges stared at him with open hatred, saying nothing.
“How will Koveli-Xue attempt to gain the Jump Drive?” probed Hieron.
Borges sneered. “Now who’s giving away information? You just confirmed the location of the technology.”
Hieron shrugged. “That’s knowledge that anyone who was watching this ship closely would know by now anyway. Tell me, how will you be getting out of this bind that you find yourself in?”
It was now that I noticed that Reza’k was watching the Captain closely, a look of intense concentration on her face.
Borges, unaware we had a telepath, simply glared at my grandfather. Hieron continued with his questions.
“You do think you’re getting out of this, don’t you?” he said, sparing a subtle glance at Reza’k. The Garz’a goiki gave Hieron the slightest nod.
Seeing where he was going, I stood and joined Hieron in front of the Corporate. “Smug, for someone in Protective custody. I wonder if you believe your Corporate benefactors would risk coming to your rescue? Is the prize of this technology so great that you think they would risk breaking the Treaties to come after it?”
Borges almost spat as he spoke. “The Treaties would be irrelevant, once we get our hands on this Drive. You think that…”
I held up my hand, as Reza’k’s face turned to me sharply. “It’s a trap!” she said in alarm.
Borges' face turned to a look of shock, then understanding dawned. His expression told me that what Reza’k had said was true.
I almost made it to my command chair before the alarms began to sound.
43.
“Report!” I called, unsure exactly who was meant to be feeding me information right then.
“Contacts!” called one of the sensor operators, “Four…correction, five high-velocity contacts bearing green one ten, north five degrees.”
“What class of ship?”
There was a pause before answering. “Not ships, Commander,” said Martine, “Missiles. I think.”
“Scramble the drones!” I called.
“Hold on, lad,” said Hieron, staring into his console, “Take a look at them. The drones won’t do a damn thing.”
I flicked my view to the sensor readouts, my eyes taking in what my brain was rejecting. “How big are they?”
Borges chuckled derisively behind me. “Big enough to be the end of you, fool.”
“Helm! Turn us about, full thrust. Martine, navigate us a path around Eovan, let’s get some velocity. Now!”
Why would the Corporates decide to destroy us, I thought, wasn’t their goal to capture this Jump Drive?
Something didn’t add up. I turned to Borges, sending a text to Reza’k. Read him. “Your masters wouldn’t destroy us, just to spite me, would they?”
“Of course they would. I would,” he snarled.
No, came the reply from Reza’k.
“This prize is too great a catch for them to throw away. This was part of their plan, wasn’t it?”
“Only a paranoid, delusional megalomaniac would think a Galactic Corporation would bend such resources just to stop one man. You overplay your importance.”
He lies.
“So they hoped I would attack you, a target too juicy for me to ignore. Lure me out here, spring their trap.”
“Tell yourself whatever fantasies you want. It changes nothing. Surrender this ship and I will deter the missiles. You have my word.”
More lies, he doesn’t believe he has the power to stop those weapons.
“Bullshit. We’ll take our chances. Martine, all data to the command suite.”
I got up from my seat, brushing past the gloating Corporate as I did. By the time I reached the table, the holographics were displaying a slew of data that Rego was hastily rearranging for me.
“What are they?” I asked him, as the ship began to vibrate with the heavy thrust we were starting to emit.
“I don’t know, sir. They’re definitely not regular warheads – I’m reading all sorts of exotic energy from them. I also can’t figure out how they’re guided.”
I watched as the missiles started to follow the orbit we had started as we tried to perform another slingshot of Eovan.
“There’s nothing on radio bandwidths, infrared, microwave, we’ve broken line-of-sight…hold on…” he started to manipulate the controls before him, his hands stabbing through various holographic indicators and buttons.
“What have you got?” I prompted.
“There’s a tenuous subspace connection between the missiles and us. I’ve no idea how they communicating.”
“Can you pick up what they’re saying?”
“Negative, just looks like data. Probably how they’re following us, they must have AI’s and are being directed by someone, or something.”
A coldness crept up my spine as I recalled our suspicions of a Corporate agent on board.
“How long before they intercept us?”
“Eight minutes, forty-nine seconds. The real question is how long before we enter their area of effect. They might not even need to get near us.”
An icy talon started to claw into my guts, a cold sweat broke out on my brow.
“Get the Professor up here,” I said, my throat suddenly dry, “We need his science brain.”
The minutes ticked by. We tried tightening our orbit, but the stresses on the hull caused the shaking of the ship to increase. We pulled away before Gannerson gave me a nasty call.
Hieron and Martine joined me at the table by the time Gaston arrived. He stormed up to us, about to launch into a rant when he noticed the contacts gaining on us and the serious looks on our faces.
“What…what are those?” he stammered out.
“If Borges here is to be believed, this is the end game play by Koveli-Xue.”
“But…why would they destroy us?” he looked incredulously at me and the Corporate Captain. Borges looked away.
“I don’t think they would,” I said, “But I can’t work out what they are.”
“They’re too big for boarding pods,” offered Rego, “And I can’t work out their guidance. They don’t have hull piercers on their fuselage, anyway.”
“Are they emitting any energy at all?” said Gaston, trying to work out the table in front of him.
Rego dragged a block of data in front of the Professor, who started pawing his way through it at an advanced pace.
“Those are farnian pressures, I’m sure of it,” he said after a while, “Too bad we don’t have any Votus crew members.”
“Are we within range of the Dreaming of Atmosphere?” I asked Martine.
She shook her head. “Not since half way through that battle.”
“Farnian…why does that term sound familiar?” I asked the Professor.
“Oh, there are several Corporations that use the principles. Calazyne, Yand-Gur, Malfor & Castein…”
“Yand-Gur…type G?” I said, snapping my fingers. “They disrupt spacetime?”
Gaston blinked. “Yes. Sort of. That’s an over simplification but…”
“The Blade of Xerxes had those as part of its railgun arsenal,” I said, turning to face Borges, who was doing his best to not look interested.
“I’d be interested to see how farnian pressures interfere with the Jump Drive’s escape bubble…” mused Gaston.
“So we know that Koveli-Xue has technology that affects spacetime, and they have experime
nted with Jump technology,” I said, “Would it be a stretch to assume they have a way to stop us from Jumping away?” I said this last while looking directly at Borges.
Reza’k nodded to me. “He believes you are correct.”
“Professor, get on station. We’re going to Jump as soon as we’re able.”
“This close to Barris Doon…” he started, “Might not be able to navigate so easily through Phase Space…unless…”
“Out with it!” I said, as Gaston ran down the ladderwell to the operations deck and threw himself into his console chair.
“We should be able to point ourselves orthogonally to the Vanhoeven blackhole,” he said, punching commands into his computer, “Calculating shift parameters…this may take some time.”
“We don’t have time!” I called, watching the countdown on the command suite fall.
Borges, unable to contain his moment of triumph over me any longer, barked out a harsh laugh. “Jump! Jump all you want! The farnian pressures will pop your bubble and strike you wherever you go!”
I turned on him, “They won’t be able to track us once we enter Phase Space. Whoever is guiding those missiles won’t be able to see them anymore…”
“I’m guiding them, you fool!”
I pulled my sidearm from its holster, levelling the sights square between his eyes. “Call them off.”
“I can’t! They’re homing in on a beacon implanted in the base of my skull. You’d have to kill me to get it out, and you can’t kill me while I’m in your custody.” This last he said while grinning from ear to ear. The guy literally rocked back on his heels with glee.
I thought about doing it. I really did. My finger twitched on the trigger ever so slightly, but Reza’k intervened. “He’s right, Commander,” she said, her hand resting on my arm, “He is under our protection, he legally surrendered himself to the Protectorate. To kill him now would be an act of murder, that’s not how the Protectorate acts. We need to surrender…”
I lowered the gun, despair clutching at my heart.
“Good thing I’m not Protectorate then,” said Hieron. Before anyone could stop him, he grabbed Borges by the scruff of the neck and hauled him back towards the starboard bulkhead.
“No!” screamed Reza’k, lunging after him. She was too late.
Hieron slapped an emergency panel, the bulkhead sliding open on one of the bridge’s several life pods. He tossed Borges inside, who started screaming obscenities at Hieron. With Reza’k clawing futilely at Hieron’s arms, my grandfather hit the release panel. A red light strobed and a warning klaxon sounded briefly, before the hiss of the ejector drowned out the noise. In a split second, he was gone.
“Detonation detected!” called the sensor operators.
“Shifting!” called the Professor, almost at the same time.
The ship felt like it suddenly flipped end over end, I was tossed through the air and landed heavily against a guard rail. I clutched on for dear life, the forces not yet finished with our ship. I tried to catch my breath and my fingers slipped on the rail, I threaded my cybernetic arm through and held on. Somewhere along the way, we lost power. In the dark, we rolled around and crashed into bulkheads, consoles and each other. I heard a cry of pain near my left, but could not see who had made the noise.
When it was over, I could hear a distant alarm over various moans and groans. There was a ringing in my ears and a warm liquid covered the left side of my face. I was still dangling from the rail. I had no idea which way was down.
With a whir, the emergency lighting turned on. The scene before me was bedlam – I was dangling from the railing, my feet hanging above the starboard side of the bridge. People were untangling themselves from the debris that had fallen to the side. Starboard was our new down as if we were within a great gravity well…
“The black hole!” I called, climbing onto the rail and reaching for the foot of my command chair. I pulled myself up to the armrest and keyed a button. “Gannerson! Engineering!”
There was no answer for almost a minute, I kept calling regardless.
“I’m here,” came the burly Chief eventually, “What in the galaxy just happened?”
“We got hit by Koveli-Xue, some sort of Jump disruptor. We made it, but not without consequences.”
“That’s an understatement. I got casualties down here. I’m guessing there are more elsewhere…”
“It’ll have to wait – we need power restored, we need to find out how close we are to the black hole.”
“The wha…the gravity?”
“Get power back online, make that your top priority, Chief.”
“Yes, sir!”
I rested against my chair, wiping my hand over my face and noticing the blood that came off. I looked around, trying to gauge the level of carnage.
“Is anyone hurt?” I called. It was a stupid question, I could see people were hurt. “Help each other, if you can. We need to get back online, we’re not out of danger yet. Hieron!” I called, looking amongst the fallen crew, trying to make out my grandfather. “Hieron! Where are you?”
“He’s here,” came a weak call from below me. I couldn’t make out where it came from, so I clamoured down the vertical command deck to stand on the starboard bulkhead. The slope of the hull made a short hill before I could see Reza’k and Martine kneeling over my grandfather. There were tears in their eyes as I rushed to them. He didn’t look good.
“What happened?” I asked, stupidly.
“He…he shielded me. He held me to him…” said Reza’k, sobbing openly.
He was barely conscious, his blood-flecked lips muttering weakly. I took his hand into mine. “Hieron…” I said.
“B…boy…” a ragged cough interrupted him, “Do what…needs…”
Several crew had recovered first aid equipment and were moving between the wounded. Martine called one of them over to us. The first-aider, one of the Orlii sensor operators, scanned Hieron with a handheld device. The look she gave Martine spoke volumes.
“Internal bleeding…ruptured organs…his spine…” she broke off in a sudden sob, her eyes fading a deep shade of brown.
Martine waved her away.
Reza’k kept pawing at him, stroking his face and arm, tears streaming down her face. “I’m so sorry…” she kept saying.
“Boy…” said Hieron, softly, motioning me closer.
I leant in, putting my ear near his face.
“Do what needs…a Donovan…”
The last of his breath came out in a bubble of blood, and then he was gone.
44.
I sat in the hangar, my head in my hands, as they brought out the dead. Despite my earlier alarm at how close we were to the black hole, once power had been restored and sensors were operational Gaston assured me we were in no immediate danger. I put it down to my first time in the vicinity of the singularity.
A despair washed over me as the first reports had rolled in. I had known we had suffered casualties during the earlier battle, but the damage from the Corporate retaliation had inflicted far worse. The incident reinforced in me the need for more training, above all. During combat, the crew below decks were supposed to secure themselves within one of the many retractable seats located throughout the ship, devices known as a crash harness or acceleration couch. These protect the crew during high-g manoeuvres, they stop them from bouncing around the passageways and breaking their necks on bulkheads. Having believed the initial combat was over, many had continued to perform their after-action duties and were not within the crash harnesses. Of the four hundred and eighty-three crew and marines that had followed me from Collumus, forty-two had perished within the last few hours. Over three times that were injured in some way.
“And for what?” I mused, gazing down at the corpse of my grandfather.
A sudden gasp escaped the lips of the body, causing me to start. I stood up swiftly, stumbling backwards.
“Gah…” murmured Hieron’s body.
“Corpsman!” I called
when I realised it was more than simply escaping gases.
A trio of medical people ran over to me, instruments scanning Hieron as he stirred, moaning in pain. I stood back, dumbstruck, while they worked. A flailing hand waved the one nearest me back and I peered in to see Hieron awake and fighting to be rid of them.
“Get off me, you louts!” he said. I started grinning like a madman.
“We thought you were dead, old man!” I cried.
“Hrmph. Probably was,” he said when they pulled back enough for him to breathe, “How long was I out?”
“Two, maybe three hours. You were dead. What happened?”
“Three hours? Damn lying brochures. I think I need to change clinics.”
“You mind telling me what in the galaxy is going on?” I said, helping him sit. He still winced in pain, but his grip on my arm was strong.
“Lazarus augments. Never heard of them?”
“No.”
“The ultimate in life insurance, they said. Body goes into trauma, brain function is kept safe in a cranial implant casing. Redundant organs kick in, supposedly within the hour.”
“Your spine was broken…”
“Yeah, that’ll do it,” he said as if talking about a broken shoe.
I shook my head in wonder. “You’re a tough man to kill, you know that?”
“I sure do. Made lots of enemies very bitter.”
“So you’re going to be okay?”
“I guess so. I can’t feel my feet right now, but the nerve endings should reconnect with bed rest. Why am I in the hangar?” he said, looking around him for the first time. His gaze rested upon the open hangar doors, the vista before it showing the grand view of Vanhoeven’s blackhole.
“Seemed a better place as any to count our fallen.”
His eyebrows shot up in surprise. “You were going to toss me into the blackhole?”
I shrugged. “It’s what you wanted, after all.”
“I really dodged a bullet there, didn’t I? Maybe next time I die you just leave me on a slab somewhere for a day or two, hmm?”
“Hey, no one but you knows how many augs you have. Next, you’ll be telling me you can fly.”
Frontier's End: A Seth Donovan Novel Page 28