by K A Carter
Beyond them was a genuine star, dim but still radiant enough to dance on the ships in the armada.
Sarjana was big. So big that the desert-like bolder littered with clouds hugged the sunlight Peering itself into the lower edge of the armada belt, so much that the lower line of ships stagnate as smaller ones darted around them, was clear in front of the elemental planet.
“S’tiri hit the com node again and said “The stealth generators still in clear levels?”
“Everything is clear. The generators will work so long as we stay below half impulse. Remaining Irinan ships have just pierced the nebula. Everyone’s ready.”
S’tiri waited a moment trying to make sure there was nothing he had forgotten. To the best of his abilities, he hadn’t and stalling wouldn’t make things any more coherent.
“Tell everyone to move in. Full impulse.”
Chapter 39: Jericho
“Take these coordinates,” Jericho said.
Freya glanced at the small hand terminal he had given her and back up at him. “Where is this? It doesn’t look far from this position.”
“They are coordinates home.”
Freya frowned. “We have a way home already,” she said. “Al, those guys you brought aboard can’t be trusted.”
Jericho turned his back and made his way toward engineering, knowing she would follow in a scolding manner.
“I am not going to leave our chances of getting home in the hands of a damn ship A.I.”
“No, you would rather hand it over to the same people whose ship we’re actually riding in.”
Jericho waived his hand. “This isn’t up for discussion Freya. Do me a favor and grab everyone and meet me in the galley.”
She was silent behind him and the taps of her footsteps stopped which could only mean she returned to the airlock where most of the crew remained.
The engineering door was closed shut. As Jericho approached it, the door panel chimed and opened. A small mess of tools riddled the floor. Gideon sat off the edge of a workbench.
“Ah, Cap glad you’re back,” Gideon said. It was in some way oblivious. As though he hadn’t noticed the rest of the crew missing.
“Gideon.”
He hopped up from the workbench pacing around the engineering room. “I have been cross referencing data on what it would take to get us back. Nexus has been helping plot an optimal course. I just need to find a way to unshackle its central matrix.”
“We’re not using it,” Jericho responded.
Gideon strutted over, his shoulders raising themselves as though there was a point to be made. He dropped the tablet he had been working with on a nearby piece of the bulkhead the protruded at the bottom. It was firm enough to sit on without sliding off the edge.
“Captain, how does that make sense? Are you insane?”
Jericho scoffed. “We have a way home that doesn’t involve trusting a damn A.I.”
“What way?”
“If you had been monitoring our channel link to the ship, you would’ve known it was broken and could’ve saved us the trouble of almost dying.” Jericho leaned slightly against the bulkhead, his legs felt like steel barely bracing a heavy weight above his waist. He hid it well but couldn’t stand letting the exhaustion consume him.
“We ran into Zael,” Jericho continued. “He was there… and I can imagine he is going to keep coming until he gets what he wants. You see? So, I don’t have any time for this. Nor do you, to calculate the probability of making a jump similar to the first that brought us here. That was programmed in. Anything else beyond is marginal at best.”
Gideon had the look of disappointment. It couldn’t have been due none other than to the fact that in many ways, Jericho was right. Still, Jericho could see that Gideon’s fascinations wouldn’t help him let go. It was one of his characteristics that made him a good engineer.
“I would have to agree with the Captain,” Nexus interjected. Her face conjuring from thin air.
“So, then what?” Gideon said, throwing his hands onto his waist.
“We found survivors. A small outfit of Orcus trained military. We’ve come to an agreement that given a safe berth to the GAW, we get home with no questions asked.”
“That sounds all dandy, but what will be waiting on the other end. We can’t know for sure.”
“We can’t if we use your way either,” Jericho shouted. “This is not something we can debate about.”
Gideon backed away slightly in a sense of shock, “I think we need to vote on this. As a crew.”
∆∆∆
The galley was a considerably sized deck that only sunk in half a level lower than the Ops deck. Rows of tables with collapsible benches on each side. If ever at full capacity, at least a crew of forty could fit in with relative ease. The kitchen area rested at the very far left. An unsuspecting corner full of high grade refrigeration and a small self-sustaining hydroponics unit, which bulged with the growth from an overextended period without any harvesting.
Most of the crew chose to stand. With the exclusion of Araime, whom Jericho could only imagine was in the airlock with Rain and her group. He couldn’t recall how he knew that but the thought planted itself in his head as he gathered the words to speak.
“So, we have two choices,” Jericho started. “While planetside we picked up some stragglers. They have agreed to help us get back.”
“How do they intend to do that?” said Freya, only asking the question for everyone else.
“A gate accessed wormhole rests at these coordinates Rain gave me. There, we have passage without restriction.”
The crew looked distraught to say the least. Jericho couldn’t tell whether it was from all of the near-death experiences or the fact that all of them were so close to being somewhere familiar. In some ways, he didn’t know why he wanted to go back. There wasn’t much left for him there. All that he cared about was standing right in front of him.
“There is another option.” Gideon shuffled away from the group and opened a triangle panel next to the galley kitchen entrance. Nexus appeared in a blue hue of pulsing lights.
“With the help of Gideon Arkatal, I have properly calculated the necessary adjustments to the warp navigation array in accordance to your original position,” Nexus began. “With the authorization of the crew we may initiate a dart drive output.”
“Wait, what?” said Freya. “Dart drive?”
“Yes,” Nexus replied. “The proper project alias given to the prototype engine that this ship operates with, is referred to as a dart drive. Capable of an 11.2 warp output when primed.”
“How is that possible?”
“It would appear it was a dart drive initiation from your navigation system that brought you, us, here.”
“Alright Gideon!” Morris yelled. He approached and patted Gideon on the back. “We’re finally going home.”
“What about the guys in the airlock quarantine?” Zen added.
“We need to vote,” Gideon said.
Jericho held his tongue for a moment and pondered what could happen. He still couldn’t bring himself to decide whether trusting the calculations of an A.I. were justifiable.
“All in favor of using dart drive?” Gideon. “We just have unshackle Nexus’ and she can help me crack the navigation system and unlock free drive priming and bring us to our original coordinates.”
Freya raised her hand, Morris only a second after. Not nearly enough of the group to decide to move forward.
“You’ve gotta be kidding me,” Gideon said. “You want to put our lives in the hands of the same people that probably want us dead when we get back?”
Jericho knew it was his time to be silent and let the crew hash things out. Typically, it would take up to a day for decisions to be made with a vote. Those were different. Those weren’t life threatening. Whether to invest in new thorium modulators or tweak the ones already on the Gilroy didn’t compare to deciding which way to die.
“We can predict human behavior,�
� Zen said. “We can’t gage what a shackled A.I is thinking.”
“Why don’t you can it? You aren’t a part of this crew.” Gideon gritted.
“She is as much a part of this crew as you Gideon,” Jericho stated lightly.
“She’s right. Right now, we are in a place where we can perceive the lesser of two dangers. Only that staying here is more dangerous. We need to stick with what we know Gideon.” Anda’s voice was consoling and gentle.
Gideon’s eyes shifted down, like he just heard sad news. He looked up again and then to Jericho. “If we die…or worse, get imprisoned for some fucked up reason. It won’t be because of me.” He stormed off toward engineering,
“I would like to assure the crew that I only mean the best in the interest of preserving this ship and its constituents,” Nexus said. “I mean no harm.” The lights displaying Nexus faded into a clear form and soon were gone.
∆∆∆
Jericho’s cabin had a sullen silence that if left lingering for too long felt like the subtlest torture. At least to him. Growing up around such noise and constant stimuli, to be left alone to his thoughts without any interruption almost seemed too much to bear. He sat at the foot of his bed, reading through a data tablet on the dart drive. All that he could find in the memory banks. And because the ship was in unknown space, all subnet frequencies were too far away to get a hold of. All the data he had was the theoretical explanations for how it would work and the experimental diagnostics the ship had previously undergone. It all seemed plausible after reading, but it still couldn’t convince him. The odds of getting thrown even further away seemed too likely.
The door node chimed and a soft voice came through it. “May I come in,” Araime said.
“Come in.”
She was uncloaked. The brightness of the skylights bearing over her scared skin and color fluid eyes. She sat next to him, not looking entirely in his direction, something about it giving the impression of endearment and respect.
“Where were you during the crew meeting?” Jericho asked.
“I felt the need to keep an eye on the ones you brought aboard,” she said. “I sensed no malice from them, but their intentions are still unclear.”
Jericho laid the tablet behind him. “You can sense all of that? You can read minds?”
“Not in the context of what you understand. I can perceive extra-sensory information at a heightened ability but it isn’t to the point in which warrants the ability to read minds. What I can do, is communicate telepathically by projecting my thoughts. This causes me great pain however.”
“Can all Vennokians do this. Could Petra when I met her?”
“No, this is a symptom of my illness. Which in itself isn’t life threatening, but is considered taboo in our culture.”
“I won’t ask you to do it when we arrive on the other side of the wormhole.” Jericho said. “That I promise.”
“You won’t have to,” Araime looked at him. “I will for your safety. I will kill them if it ever came to that.”
For a moment, it worried Jericho. The thought of the young girl killing. Then all the facts streamed in again. It wasn’t a young girl exactly. At least not in any traditional sense. And as a street born Titanian, the thought of someone having his back always felt new and warm. He smiled. “Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.”
“The crew seems divided,”
“It’s always been that way. We all clash heads when it comes to some things. We’re all from such different places. We can’t help but to butt heads. I know they understand I am only trying to do what’s right”
“I believe that if they truly do, they would not question so much.”
“That’s not how we do things, Araime.”
“It is the only way I know. But, I understand.”
Rain stood in front of Jericho looking at a screen display of the upcoming coordinates. Her being in the cockpit made it a little more crammed and uncomfortable for Jericho. Only enough room to share space behind the pilot seats with one other person. The pilot’s seats were wide and took up the rest of the space. The co-pilot seat, unused for the most part still had the same length of space. At the moment, most of the monitors that hung in place of the auxiliary pilot seat were black without power. Considering Jericho hadn’t had much of a chance to assess the amount of weaponry the Icarus had, he thought of it as a clear gunner spot. If he was wrong, it would be a mild comfort to know he could at the very least, shoot his way out. Granted he had no idea what was on the other side. Not to mention, he knew almost nothing about the Draul – as Rain had called them.
“Right there,” Rain said. “Approach at a narrow vector here.” She pointed at the screen
Freya typed away at her controls and said. “Approaching.”
“How will we get in?” Jericho asked. His arms crossed peering at the back of Rains small strain hair.
“This is an Orcus ship so they will hail us once we –“
A noise from the console cut her off.
“Captain we are being hailed. No locked signature but it’s subspace.”
“Answer,” Jericho said.
“Vessel 21-509, this is Field Operator Nas Corum. You are in approach to Gate A. Please give your ORS codes.
Chapter 40: Nario
It was a frightening sight. Even for a seasoned fighter such as Nario. He had seen the likes of standoffs with corporate militias on multiple moons. Nario had fought aside his fellow soldiers in incursions on Ganymede and the likes of Callisto and Europa. And as a young recruit when the Mercury Brigades were an issue. All of them had similar things in common. All of those battles and many more he had taken part in, were for resources primarily. The other fact being that it was against other humans.
Halle panted.
Nario peered down at her shaking palms gripping tight at helm controls and then releasing themselves. “I don’t know what your plan is but I hope it involves an alternate route.”
Nario heard the words but kept staring. A sight of at least a few thousand ships all hanging in place like a painting of shiny objects amidst a clear black background. It was something he didn’t plan or anticipate. Not as many as what was displayed.
“Hold here,” he said.
Halle halted the slow drift using retro-thrusters. “Captain we have ships incoming from behind us.”
More of them, he thought.
“On screen.”
Behind them, approximately eighteen ships cut through the veil. The outer hulls the color of bone. One bigger than the others. A destroyer class of whomever it was.
“Raise shields,” said Nario instinctively.
“We are being hailed,” Halle replied.
The clear image shot up on the screen and a lovely face smiled like a grim portrait. “Ah well, you have more balls than I thought. Doubt the fed will deal lightly with high treason.”
“Rowland,” Nario said. “Why am I suddenly worried?”
She smiled again, her neck down covered in a grey armor coveted with streaking maroon markings; polished and ready. “Relax,” she said trivially. “I am making sure my investment doesn’t meet a tragic fate. Though, it looks like you dream big.”
Nario didn’t like the joke nor the fact she was there. She had ulterior motives. Those that stretched outside the boundaries of his life.
“The Eye of Zi is merely here to help you succeed. I am here to help you succeed. It’s in my best interest.”
“I don’t think that will work. Not without an army in the thousands.”
She chuckled maniacally. “I don’t need an army. I have a weapon on this ship that should suffice in battle. This ship. The Vosburgh should clear a way for us in that cloud of Draul.”
Nario paused. “Then lead the way,” he said.
The feed cut off, back to an outside view of the upcoming fight ahead. The Vosburgh streaked ahead slowly its bowel towering over the Venture. A thick contraption lowered out of a hull opening. The smooth metallic barrels extended
from one place outward, exposed parts glowing a vibrant yellowish tone. It’s edges mimicking distant lightening. The weapon charged slowly, flickering on the screen.
Another transmission came in; only audio. “The Calik Cannon will be charged in two minutes. I’d suggest you go to red alert. The Armada is mobilizing.”
Nario nodded to a marine ensign standing at an open terminal. Alarms buzzed and traditional red lights slowly flickered. On the screen, the left quadrant of Draul ships disconnected from the cloud, each of them slowly gaining size. Bright flickers of light charging in separated dots on the forward hulls. Weapons were charging in the split seconds before bursts.
As the speed picked up, a thick ray came from the cannon hoisted under the Vosburgh and blasted toward advancing ships.
There was little known about Draul technology aside from the fact it was highly advanced. The idea that a cannon from one ship could incinerate groups of ships at a time was inconceivable by governmental standards. Five corvette-like ships, all of which were distinctly different in shape but possessed the same glossy black materials with green shielding were engulfed in the flash. Shockingly it worked. Debris appeared and stretched outward, the flash had masked the destruction only uncovering the aftermath.
“That’s five down,” yelled Rowland on the open hail. “Just a few thousand more to go.”
“You’re surprisingly calm about this,” Nario replied.
“I specialize in no win scenarios.”
The cloud of ships erupted. Dreadnaughts and smaller ships alike. It was odd to see the motions of such an enormous number of ships move in a semi-unison manner. A wall of ships moving toward the Venture and the Eye of Zi ships.
A rush came under Nario. A tightening of the chest that let him know he was in battle. It took him a moment to realize that Halle had been speaking to him from the cockpit. Her soft voice became clearer.
“Shouldn’t we start firing?” she said agonizingly, almost as though she had said it multiple times over.