Blood of Heroes (The Ember War Saga Book 3)

by Richard Fox

  “What are you all doing here? You two all right?” he asked the recovering Marines.

  “Still got my trigger finger,” Orozco said.

  “Robo-doc patched me up just fine,” Bailey said.

  “You look…you’ve looked better,” Standish said.

  “I feel like a hammered can of shit,” Hale said, and sat down on an ammo box.

  “Took the words out of my mouth,” Standish said.

  Chuckles filled the space.

  “You missed the memorial ceremony for her,” Yarrow said, not willing to say Torni’s name. “Captain decided to have one big ceremony for everyone we lost. Get it all over and done with. Chaplain Krohe…said a little extra about her. Did a good job.”

  “I understand,” Steuben said “that warrior tradition will offer a toast to the departed.”

  “Yes, Steuben, that would be appropriate,” Hale said. “Have to wait until we get back to Phoenix for that, though.”

  “Oh, what’s this?” Standish reached behind his seat picked up a clear bottle. “I seem to have found a bottle of vodka. Absolut, Torni’s favorite.”

  “‘Found’?” Hale asked, he gave Cortaro a sideways glance. The Gunnery Sergeant feigned innocence and shrugged his shoulders. Cortaro scratched at the join between his leg and the new prosthetic, complete with an articulated foot and ankle that had replaced the peg.

  “Ask me no questions and I’ll tell you no lies, sir,” Standish said. He passed out paper cups from the mess hall and poured a shot for everyone. He hesitated when he got to Steuben.

  “You OK with alcohol?” he asked the alien Karigole.

  “I will experience some discomfort,” Steuben said. He shook his cup and Standish obliged.

  Hale waited for Standish to take his seat. The lieutenant rubbed his fingers against the cup, searching for the right words. He raised the cup to eye level.

  “For Staff Sergeant Sofia Torni, one of the finest Marines I’ve had the honor to serve with. We are less without her,” he said. The alcohol burned down his throat, and did nothing to heal the pain in his heart.

  ****

  Lieutenant Douglas watched with anticipation as a waitress carried big plate of spaghetti and meatballs to his table. The site and smell of a meal not made by a robot brought back memories of time before the war with Xaros, when he and his family would eat at a little pizza joint down the street from their home in upstate New York.

  Vinny’s hadn’t been open for too long, and to get a table you had to know somebody who knew somebody and could vouch that you wouldn’t let slip that the place existed to the general populace. The meals were free, Vinny kept the place open in memory of his family and to keep himself busy after his job processing methane from Titan’s atmosphere never materialized. The pasta, calzones and a little bit of wine were gratis, but any ‘donations’ of military gear were greatly appreciated…and a sure way to get invited back the next time the place opened.

  Douglas had found an old set of armor plates used by the last generation of powered armor during a walk around the Kilauea forests. They’d held up remarkably well for being buried in mud for thirty years since the invasion, and Vinny seemed happy with them. Coming from R&R on Hawaii to a proper meal had done wonders for Douglas’ morale.

  “Hey, Ibarra’s on TV,” someone said, pointing to a screen mounted against a wall. “Turn it up.”

  Douglas took a bite and scooted his chair around so he could see the screen. His appetite threatened to flee as anxiety reared its ugly head. The last time he’d heard Ibarra speak had been right after that god-awful time shift that side stepped the fleet out of the Xaros’ path.

  “Hello, Phoenix. This is Marc Ibarra,” his hologram stood behind a podium, like he was the President about to announce a new war. Admiral Garret was with him, standing off to the side. “There have been some changes since the last time I addressed you. For the better, all things considered. The Xaros were defeated, we reclaimed the Earth…now things must change again. The Xaros will return. You all know that. But they will return in numbers far greater than we can defeat…as of now. Some of you have already figured that out.

  “So, we can either all die or find a way to beat them. I didn’t spend sixty years working on a way to save humanity just to throw my hands up when things looked bad. There is a solution. One that’s already being implemented. New people, born of man and woman just like all of you, are here. They remember lives from before the invasion, just as you do. They have jobs and a purpose in our city, same as you. They will fight to save us all.

  “But they aren’t like you, exactly. Their bodies were grown. Their minds are the product of advanced simulation software. But they are human…as human as we can make them. As for souls…that’s beyond my ability to influence.

  “There are many procedurally generated humans listening to me right now, and not one of them thinks they are any different from the true born,” Ibarra looked hard into the camera. “Just like you.”

  “Many more will join us in the coming months and years. Don’t bother trying to find a way to discover them. Knowing who is and who isn’t true born is a waste of time and energy. Let me be clear, there is no future without them. Go about your lives and your duties. We still have a war to win.”

  The screen returned to a football rerun.

  Low conversation broke out through the restaurant. Patrons pointed at each other, swapping stories from before the jump, confirming shared stories about people they’ve all known for years. Douglas, sitting alone, felt a sudden urge to leave.

  He stood up and made for the door. A very angry looking Vinny, holding a sawed off shotgun, got in his way.

  “Hold up,” Vinny said. “Where you going to so fast after Ibarra’s little public service announcement?”

  “I have a platoon of soldiers that’re probably going crazy right now. I should get back to the barracks and get things under control,” Douglas said.

  “Don’t seem like we’ve got things under control here,” Vinny said. “Does it, boys?”

  Rough hands grabbed him from behind and slammed him against a table. A hand the size of a dinner plate against his neck pinned him against a red and white checkered table cloth. More hands held his shoulders and arms down. He struggled uselessly, devoid of any leverage or ability to strike out.

  “See, Clyde and Frank here both know me from the old neighborhood,” Vinny said. “I know I’m not some sort of procedure-something-or-another freak. I know they ain’t that. They know I ain’t that. Who knows you ain’t one of them?” Vinny put the shogun on the table, the barrels pointed straight into Douglas’ eyes.

  “My platoon, I’ve been with them for almost a year. Way before the jump,” Douglas said, sweat broke out across his body as he looked into the twin dark pits.

  “That good enough for you boys?” Vinny asked.

  “No, Mr. Vinny,” the one with a hand to his neck said.

  “My brother! Call my brother, name’s Robert. He’s on my cell,” Douglas said. A hand went into his pocket and tossed the device to Vinny, a cheap device that couldn’t do anything but text and call.

  Vinny flipped it open and hit a few buttons. Long seconds ticked by as it rang.

  “Yeah, hi,” Vinny said. “I found this Ubi down around 4th and Baseline. You know who it belongs to, recognize the number? Yeah. What’s he look like? Military guy with short hair? That’s most of the city. Tell me a little something only he’d know and I think I can get it back to him. Thanks bud.” Vinny closed the phone.

  “What was the name of the dog you two got for Christmas?” Vinny asked, his hand on the shot gun.

  “Gizmo! Little mutt my dad picked up off the side of the street,” Douglas said.

  “Let him go, boys,” Vinny said.

  Douglas faced off against the two men, both had sheepish expressions on their face.

  “Sam, I apologize,” Vinny said, putting an arm across Douglas’ shoulders and shaking his hand. “Look, this whole alien i
nvasion crap’s got me thrown off my game. Then Ibarra gets up and starts telling me there are a bunch of fakes walking around. I overreacted.”

  Douglas looked back at the shotgun still on the table.

  “Now I wasn’t going to…probably not,” Vinny said. “Look, you eat here for free from now on. No reservations, no donations. We good?”

  Douglas nodded and went for the door again.

  “Hey, bring your brother next time. He sounds legit,” Vinny said as Douglas left the restaurant.

  His cell started ringing, a call from his commander. He put the phone to his ear and saw the orange glow of fires in the distance. Phoenix was burning.

  CHAPTER 17

  The command deck of Titan Station was managed chaos. The crew, all on no more than five hour shifts, managed orbital traffic control for the entire planet, the docks rung around the station still working to repair last few ship’s damaged in the assault on the Crucible and the many cargo shuttles coming in and out of the station.

  Overseeing the non-stop activity was Colonel Mitchell, one of the few Atlantic Union Aerospace officers in the fleet. He’d been brought on to manage Titan Station, thought he’d do the job over Saturn’s moon of the same name, not Earth.

  He poured a cup of coffee from an archaic machine that still dripped hot water through grinds, and took in a deep breath of the aroma. Kona. The world’s finest coffee, in his opinion, had survived many decades without human cultivation. The beans grown in the Hawaiian island’s volcanic soil were re-discovered by some Ibarra Corporation workers during the construction of an R&R facility. It took only a few cultivation robots to set up a steady supply of the coffee, much to Mitchell’s delight.

  The colonel brought the cup to his lips.

  “Gate function!”

  The shout sent hot coffee down the front of his uniform and over his hands, scalding him.

  “Set analog condition amber, ready the kill switch” Mitchell said, shaking his hands dry. If the Xaros were coming through, they’d compromise every computer system on Earth and in orbit within seconds. The alien probe sitting in the Crucible’s command center swore the Xaros couldn’t access the gate, but it never hurt to be cautious.

  “Show me,” Mitchell said. Camera feed popped up on monitors around his chair. A white field spread from the center of the Crucible, growing out of the center and almost touching the great spikes making up the crown of thorns that was the alien jump gate.

  Mitchell flipped a plastic safety cover off the kill switch for the station’s automation and waited.

  The prow of a strike carrier emerged from the field and the Breitenfeld flew into real space.

  “She’s back!” came from the crew. Clapping and cheers broke out across the command center.

  Mitchell closed the kill switch, then frowned as the wormhole remained open. The Canticle of Reason followed the Breitenfeld, emerging like a leviathan from the deep ocean.

  “That’s…unexpected,” Mitchell said.

  “Sir, do we launch the ready fighters?” a crewman asked.

  “Message from the Breitenfeld, they’re telling us to relax. The big ship’s friendly,” the commo officer said.

  Mitchell pointed a finger at the communications officer. “Get Admiral Garret on the line. Now.”

  ****

  Valdar followed his escorts through the bunker, newly built beneath the Camelback Mountains, just northeast of Phoenix. Staff officers bustled around Valdar, an air of excitement and purpose that Valdar hadn’t seen in someplace so drab and soul sucking as a high-level command. The atmosphere in the bunker was almost like there was a war brewing.

  A soldier in combat armor and almost seven feet tall stood outside Admiral Garret’s office. The sentry’s face was covered by visor, there was no name stenciled on his armor.

  “What’ve they been feeding you?” Valdar asked the giant.

  “Sir,” replied a gravelly voice.

  “Isaac, get in here,” Admiral Garret yelled through his open door. The admiral’s office had the wide, solid oak desk Valdar remembered from Garret’s old office at the naval base in Norfolk, Virginia. Framed flags and guidons from Garret’s long career filled the walls, along with a diploma from the Academy in Maryland.

  Valdar wondered how much was a recreation and what was original. His money was on the former, rank had its privileges.

  An aide closed the door behind them.

  “Sit, Isaac,” Garret said, waving at a leather chair. “I suppose I should chew your ass for taking a little detour on your way back from Anthalas. But you came back with much more than we’d hoped for, and I don’t mean the stray ship that followed you home.”

  “Sir, I had to—”

  “Stow it. What’s done is done and we’ve got bigger problems to worry about than you’re adherence to orders or lack thereof. Now, you said you have something for my eyes only? Something you left out of your official report?”

  Valdar opened a brief case and took out the General’s face plate, five indentations against the edges from where Elias had warped the material. Valdar tossed it on the desk, it made no noise as is came to rest.

  Garret touched it with a fingertip then picked up the face plate.

  “This is from the entity your armor encountered, I assume. It doesn’t weigh an ounce,” Garret said. “This is the face of our enemy, why can’t I share this with everyone? Morale will go through the roof.”

  “That’s a trophy. This is what I had to talk to you about in person,” Valdar set a folder on the table and pushed it to the admiral. Garret flipped through medical tests and personnel bio sheets.

  “Some of my crew are…unnatural. Their bodies are fully grown, but immature, only a few months old. For all the digging my counter-intelligence officers have been able to do, none of them know what they are or even suspect they’re any different from you or I. I believe they’re sleeper agents or spies snuck on to my crew by Ibarra. He’s the only one with the resources and know how to get this done. I don’t know his purpose.”

  Garret thumbed through the papers, then swept it all in to a waste bin.

  “Yes, I know.”

  “You—what?”

  “We call them proccies. Procedurally generated consciousness installed on vat grown bodies. I found out about them after you left for Anthalas, I wouldn’t have let Ibarra conduct his field experiments during a mission as vital as yours. But that bastard doesn’t have the best track record with honestly. He’s getting better.

  “Your ship’s been on a communication’s black out since you got back. I thought you might have figured something out with the proccies, I couldn’t let something beyond the official narrative slip out from you or your crew.”

  “Sir, explain to me why these…abominations are on my ship. They’re soulless things masquerading as human beings.”

  Garret held up a hand. “You aren’t the only one that has an issue with them. It comes down to survival, Isaac. When you left for Anthalas, the fleet we had, or could have built, wouldn’t even register as a speed bump to the Xaros when they return. We bought time when we took the Crucible, just not enough. Ibarra offered a solution. The only one that might see us to daylight.”

  “At what cost? He’ll replace every one of us with these things and humanity will still be as extinct. We’ll be gone and have sold our souls for these fakes to inherit the Earth?”

  “You make the same argument I’ve heard in this office from many, many other people. The decision comes down to what might happen in the future, and the threat we will face in the next decade. Everyone is struggling with this right now. True born and proccies, not that any of the proccies know what they truly are.”

  “There are more than just the ones on my ship?”

  “Many, many more Isaac. I don’t even know where to start with the dough boys. Look,” Garret took an Ubi slate from his desk and swiped across the surface. A picture of a human carrier battle group floating in space above the Moon came up. “That’s the
Midway, big girl’s back in service. Also two strike carriers the same class as your ship, cruisers, frigates, destroyers, tenders…the whole nine yards. Almost every man and woman in that battle group is a proccie. Good thing we’ve got them, otherwise we’d all be dead.”

  “I don’t follow. The Xaros are a long way off. We’ve got time to figure out another solution than this,” Valdar said.

  “We don’t. The proccies could be our long term salvation, but they’re also the cause of our current crisis,” Garret brought out another Ubi slate, the casing painted with alternating red and white lines, one meant for classified material. “This is top secret. What you see doesn’t leave the room.”

  Garret set the slate on his desk and rotated it to Valdar. On the screen, dozens of almond shaped ships the color of a polished sea shells floated above Neptune. Jagged weapons like broken icicles protruded from the ship’s hulls. Ships Valdar recognized.

  “The Toth are here, Isaac. They are here, and they want to negotiate.”

  EPILOGUE

  Caas held Ar’ri hand as the Mule struggled through turbulence. Ar’ri whimpered, keeping his head buried against his older sister’s shoulder.

  “We’re almost there. Look, you can see clouds outside the windows,” Caas said. Ar’ri shook his head. “You remember what the nice humans said. Big sky. Plenty of food. No noorla anywhere on their nice planet. We have a new home now.”

  Ar’ri didn’t seem interested.

  Caas watched as puffy white clouds streaked past the windows, leaving streaks of rain water on the glass. There were a few other Dotok on the Mule with her. Most kids her age, all of them orphans just like her. She figured out that her parents were dead once they’d left Takeni. Ar’ri didn’t seem to understand when she told him that their mother and father would never come home again.

  “Hold on, we’re about to land!” a human called out. Ar’ri dug his fingers into Caas’ arm as the engines grew louder. The Mule settled against a landing pad and the engines wound down.