Precursor Revenants (The Precursor Series Book 1)

by Cain Hopwood

  Jon took a step back. “I had to, he would have killed us all. That’s what we came here for.”

  The admiral said nothing at first. Then he turned slightly. He was now facing Jon. “Patron,” he repeated.

  Then Jon realized that the admiral was addressing him. There was probably something he was supposed to say in response, some kind of acknowledgement.

  Ahm-Wat stepped close and spoke softly next to Jon’s ear. “He is acknowledging that you have supplanted his old patron. And through single combat no less.”

  “What am I supposed to say?” Jon whispered.

  “Say ‘I see you’ and his full name and title.”

  Jon straightened. “I see you General Admiral Katona de Kuhn of Ahm-Wat.”

  Katona lifted his head. “Patron, may I speak?”

  “Please do, I’m struggling here,” said Jon. “In fact, I expect you to speak your mind at all times. But first, please explain what just happened.”

  “You defeated the former centarch in single combat. In fact, in single bladed combat, which is the highest form of patronage challenge.”

  “I didn’t challenge him.”

  “By not submitting when he attacked, you accepted his challenge. It is one of the oldest forms of patronage.”

  “The strong subjugate the weak.”

  “Yes. Unless they resist. When they do, and if they prevail, then the patronage transfers to them.”

  “But he was attacking you.”

  “Which is his right, he was my patron.” The admiral lifted a hand and touched the shoulder of Jon’s fatigues, where a deflected flechette from Shaiken’s initial fusillade had torn the fabric. “But he is not your patron, and this was made by his flechette.”

  “So now I’m your new patron?”

  “Yes, and the new centarch.”

  Jon took a step back. “No! No way. I wouldn’t know where to begin, or what to do. Melding with a ship is one thing. But, melding with a star ship?”

  “Everyone who takes the mantle of centarch says the same thing.” The admiral paused, then added. “Though most seem a little more eager than you.”

  As they were talking, a thin tendril snaked out from the purple mass surrounding the former centarch’s chair. The tendril meandered its way across the floor towards the dead centarch. It paused there, touched the body several times, then raised itself off the floor to stand erect, swinging back and forward like a cat’s tail. It seemed to be trying to choose between Jon and the admiral.

  Katona swept a hand towards the chair, surrounded by writhing purple tendrils. “The Doyenne must have a centarch. Without one to give her a destination, the ship will stay here until its fuel stores are exhausted.”

  “That would be a waste,” Jon said.

  His mind turned back to all those months ago, when Annelise’s slimy VP boss had intimated that it would be well worth his while if he could bring back any stray pieces of technology he could lay his hands on. He thought they might get to keep the Gaudin ship, but he never dreamed that they’d come into possession of something like this.

  “I can’t imagine that Stetlak would let me keep it,” he said.

  “Only centarchs can sit on the Stetlak Assembly of Centarchs. If you’re a centarch of a Stetlak starship, you’re Stetlak by association,” said the admiral. “There are politics involved of course, but do you think that Shaiken always did the assembly’s bidding?”

  “It’s tempting, but I wouldn’t be accepted,” Jon said. Then a thought occurred, and he allowed himself a sneaky little smile. “But you would be. And as you are under my patronage, couldn’t I order you to become centarch in my stead?”

  “You could. It’s rather irregular.”

  “Could you do it for me? Represent my interests, Earth’s interests, to the assembly?”

  The admiral bowed his head. “I could, though I’d hoped to be released from service, return to my retirement and the hatchlings I’ve been training.”

  Jon swallowed, if he forced the issue he’d be no better than Shaiken. But maybe there was another option. “Is that what you want to do?”

  “Yes, I had just settled into the task when Shaiken pressed me back into service. I was the combat master, it is a position of great respect, and it gives much satisfaction.”

  “Could you do it here? That chamber you had us billeted in is large. Build a training facility there, ship the hatchlings up. It could be like a boarding school.”

  The admiral lifted his head. His mouth was agape. “That… is… possible.” He gave a staccato snort. “In fact, it’s a good idea. They would flourish, and they could be exposed to a wide variety of environments and terrain.”

  With a sweep of his hand, Jon directed the admiral towards the centarch’s chair. “It is yours if you think you can make it work.”

  Admiral Katona took one halting step towards the chair wreathed in purple vines. Then he took another, and another, until he was standing in front of it.

  The lone tendril at Jon’s feet shuddered when Katona sat down. A moment later it sank down to the floor, then slid back toward the main mass around the chair. Though, just before it was completely swallowed up it stopped, then lifted its tip.

  To Jon, it seemed like the tendril was taking one last look at him. Then, it withdrew, to be absorbed up by the purple mass surrounding the centarch’s chair, Katona’s chair.

  — 66 —

  It was the last leg of what had been a long journey back. For the majority of the regiment it had been uneventful. Jon had assumed company command, and dealt with the details of bugging out from Marbel, and setting up again in a starship chamber. This time though, they opted to take up residence in the unused chamber adjoining the starship’s nexus. It was a little cold for the Ka-Li, at twenty seven Celsius, but very comfortable for humans. And, importantly, it had a proper day night cycle.

  Jon didn’t spend a great deal of time with them though. He had his hands full getting to grips with what Shaiken had been doing. Admiral Katona’s conflict at Marbel was only one of many little regional wars, and unproductive systems, that Shaiken had been saddled with. It seemed to be a political ploy by some of the Stetlak assembly centarchs, presumably to keep the previous centarch so embroiled in regional issues, that he couldn’t cause problems for them. At least that was Katona’s opinion.

  Whatever the reason, Shaiken had been stretched so thin that the starship was also running on a fraction of its usual energy reserves. So Katona’s first task would be to address that. Afterwards, he needed to report to the Stetlak Assembly of Centarchs, register the patronage change, and divest themselves of their transport obligations for all those troublesome systems. Those systems had been Shaiken’s fights, not theirs. The other assembly centarchs could squabble over them. Katona just had to ensure that they retained control of enough planetary systems to maintain their current forces.

  Jon didn’t know exactly how he felt about that. It was clear that the ship fuel the Galactics had supplied had ruined the economy of Marbel. Who knows what it was doing to the other systems. Or had done, he thought. All those economies were probably completely dependent on regular shipments by now, and many would have been that way for thousands of years.

  As Earth’s would be before long. That would change a few things.

  But for now, his main concern would be trying to figure out why Shaiken had seemingly begun the process of annexing Earth, even though it was very clearly off limits. They also needed to figure out how that was connected with the mystery starship that supplied the Marbelites with so much equipment. Most of which now had disappeared.

  Jon felt there was more to discover on Marbel, but the best thing to do for now was withdraw, and let them be. Admiral Katona was of the rather mercenary opinion that as soon as the Marbelites started running out of the fuel that regular starship visits supplied, they might be in a more co-operative mood.

  So it was with a sigh of relief, that Jon lay back into the flight couch in his ship for the fi
nal flight down to Trenton. It was the ship he’d taken from the redoubt, he’d named it Etsee, after a mole like creature that lived on the Ka-Li home world. He thought it appropriate, and it didn’t seem to mind.

  “Etsee, are we ready to depart?” he thought through the meld.

  ~All systems nominal preceptor. Where you-me go?

  “Give me options for the nearest planet.”

  A virtual image of Earth swam in his mind. He spun it with a thought, then zoomed in to bring Trenton into view. “There,” he thought.

  A small selection of options appeared, and he chose the least time. There wasn’t much difference between them as it was.

  “Etsee, notify the Aquina of our route, and have them follow.”

  ~Confirmed.

  Jon reached out into the ship itself, and with a smile lifted it off the docking platform, retracting the landing skids. He’d only flown occasionally in the months the return trip had taken. Flight was a welcome escape from the mundane administration of both company and starship. He eased out into the bay, then accelerated down towards the bay doors. The Aquina followed, close behind with the rest of the company. Well, what was left of them, anyway.

  As he’d done often in the last few months, he thought of Annelise; he had so much to tell her, and show her. Through the meld, Etsee picked up his eagerness to be home and increased their speed.

  “Let’s keep it nice and slow in the bay, huh?”

  ~You-me eager to move.

  “I am, but we’ll be there soon enough.”

  Moments later they passed through the huge bay doors, and into clear space. That flank of the starship was in shadow, and all along its length lit bays and view ports twinkled.

  For Jon though, the size and scope of the vista barely registered. He had eyes for only one thing. And, as he accelerated his little ship up the side of the vast starship and over the top, it appeared. From this distance out it was still small, but even so, it was clearly brighter than the surrounding stars.

  And it was blue.

  Epilogue

  The Doyenne shifted restlessly as she eased the bulk of the starship into the mouth of the field embrasures that would take her into the heart of the red giant to feed. The urge to bud had been growing over the last few cycles, and the anticipation of an influx of stellar matter strengthened that impulse.

  Up until recently, she had been looking forward to this moment. She had led a long life, nearly a thousandth of a grand cycle, and the vast majority of it had been pleasantly uneventful.

  She eased her main engines down to a mere token of their potential output, then nosed gently against the flank of the station. Momentarily, the feeding fields would caress her port and starboard sides. It was one of the most visceral and pleasurable sensations a doyenne could experience, and the first any of them could recall.

  The Doyenne settled as the first of the feeding fields found its foramen in her flank. Shortly after, several others did the same. She relaxed and nuzzled into the feed station.

  Then her thoughts turned back to budding. Once she was at full strength, full of the life-giving stellar plasma, she would be ready. It would be the last act The Doyenne would perform. All her energy, wisdom, and knowledge would be distilled down to its very essence to form the bud, leaving her a husk of her former self.

  It would be the triumphant culmination of a long life. Her budding would contain all the language matrixes her translators had developed, the full stellar maps for all the regions she had visited, and updated plots of the galactic quantum manifold. It would contain everything a new doyenne would need to both navigate through the sections of the galaxy The Doyenne had frequented, and communicate with all the races she’d encountered.

  Her bud would meld with the station gestalt, and sometime many thousands of cycles hence, it would be gathered together with others to form the kernel of a new doyenne. She didn’t remember the lives of her forbearers, but she knew what they knew, and where they’d been. That repository was a vast store of knowledge she could dip into at will.

  The Doyenne settled back, this feed would take time, it had been far too long since she’d replenished herself. Through the meld with her new centarch, she could sense his urgency to be moving. It was an infectious desire, but in no way could it overwhelm her need to feed. He would just have to wait.

  Meanwhile, she dove into her knowledge stores. There was a new race inhabiting her starship. One with a pattern and taste of haunting familiarity. But familiar from where? Several of this new species had melded with transport and sting-ships as they’d come and gone, and those vessels had instinctively called them preceptors. An expression that had never been used in The Doyenne’s lifetime. But somehow the term had been embedded in the deepest essence of those ship’s minds.

  Strangely, her knowledge stores were empty of the term. There were also precious few entries on this new race, and all of those from her own relatively recent visits. She dove deeper and deeper, losing herself in the wealth of information. Her attention flicked from race to race, surveying the design and purpose for all current and past species.

  In all her time she had never encountered a race, caste or species missing from the great repository. It was, purportedly, complete, and had been compiled by the precursors themselves. Even the few wilding species she’d encountered had been listed, or anticipated in the repository.

  Except this one. That was odd.

  She cast her mind back to the singular time she’d had one of them in her presence. Its taste, and that of its fellows, had a heady seductiveness, and she’d instinctively approached it. That was odd too.

  She ruminated on much as she fed, but she kept returning to this new race. However after combing through every morsel of knowledge in her vast repository she was none the wiser than when she started.

  It took a long time, but eventually The Doyenne’s feed was complete. Now her desire to bud was at its strongest. This was the time she should begin the bud, but she didn’t.

  She was curious, and that feeling was new as well. After countless thousands of cycles of existence, and many centarchs impelling her, she’d finally encountered something she’d never encountered before. And while the urge to bud was great, she just couldn’t end her days without knowing more about this new race.

  There had been many novel experiences in her last few twilight cycles. The conclaves, static and stable for eons, were embroiled in conflict. There was even talk amongst the doyennes, of starships with centarchs that seemed to be actively undermining the stability of the conclave system itself. She wondered if that was her centarch, but it was hard to tell. She’d had two centarchs removed through violence during her time. That was unusual, very unusual.

  So many atypical occurrences, she thought. And, right there and then, she made up her mind. She wouldn’t bud just now, she would wait. She would suppress her urges, she couldn’t possibly bud until she discovered what purpose this new race, these humans, had in the grand scheme of things. The precursors must have had some purpose for them, as they did for all the races. And, there must have been purpose in hiding them as well.

  They were new, and the novelty of that feeling gave her a verve and enthusiasm that had been missing from her existence for hundreds of cycles. It was heady; it was exciting. Then something occurred to her, maybe they weren’t new after all.

  Maybe, just maybe, they were very, very old.

  More From the Author

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  Published Science Fiction

  Precursor Revenants

  (The Precursor trilogy, book one)

  Published Fiction

  The Tango

  Upcoming Science Fiction

  The Preceptors (coming 2018)

  (The Precursor trilogy, book two)

  A Quantum Chronology (coming 2018-19)

  For more details, visit http://www.cainhopwood.com/

  About the Author

  Cain Hopwood grew up in country New South Wales and now lives on a farm in Australia’s Snowy Mountains. Yes, Australia has snow. It’s not all heat dust and flies you know. Just mostly heat dust and flies.

  He’s been dancing argentine tango for well over a decade. Which is long enough to discover that tango is one of those activities which will have you learning it, and struggling to improve it, for your entire life. If you allow it to get under your skin. Like jazz, or skiing.

  Cain has worked as a farmhand, ski coach and also done a bit of tulip koping. Though he’s worked for most of his life in the software industry. Now he also writes.

  Precursor Revenants is his second novel, and the first in the precursor trilogy.

  Acknowledgements

  Firstly I would like to thank everyone who read this book in it’s various rough stages: Ken Gowlett, Scott E Douglas, Scott Hopwood, David Simpson, Robbie Faulks, Adrian Marzo, Bradley C Hughes, Kyla Hopwood, Mary-Jane Smyth, and of course my mother Wilhelmina Hopwood. Your comments and insight helped make this a better book.

  I would also like to say thanks to Tony Murray who helped immensely with blurbs and summaries. Finally, thanks to my ever patient wife Elle.