He looked out into the blackness of space, and part of his mind noticed how bright, almost touchable, were the colours of the Reaper ships, and the flashing beams that danced out from the warships and Javelins.
Then he realised he was not going to die.
One by one, the crew on the command deck walked over to the invisible shield that was protecting them from the vacuum of space. The navigation officer touched it, and drew his hand back.
“It tingles, like an electric shock,” he said wonderingly.
Cagill took a deep breath. The shield was, apparently, containing the ship’s air. Another thick tail of fire from the command ship blasted past them, and engaged a Javelin behind them.
There was no time to waste, and Cagill ordered the crew back to their stations. It didn’t take them long to realise the Javelin had no star drive, and no communications capability. Cagill activated the slim compartment that had been fixed on the inside wall of his console, and found the sub-space radio was still working. He contacted Cordez moments later, and outlined their predicament.
“Has to be Druanii,” said Cordez, without hesitation. “The tricky little blighters could have told me they were going to do that.”
“All the Javelins, or just mine?” said Cagill.
“Just yours,” said Cordez. “Too many of our ships have been destroyed without similar stories from the survivors. It seems to be a Druanii way of thinking – you are in command of a part of Finch’s forces, and he’s part of mine. The Druanii seem to protect the chain of command.”
Cordez broke off and said something to one side.
“I’ve relayed a call to one of the Javelins that has sub-space, so get your team ready to abandon ship. It might pay to use the lifeboat. You’ll be easier to pick up, and less of a target for the Invardii. What’s left of the Javelin might still be a target for enemy ships near to it.”
“Understood,” said Cagill, who had been thinking along the same lines. He broke the link and gave the order to abandon ship.
Racing through the lower decks, the Javelin crew were amazed to see corridors end abruptly in the blackness of space, but still full of air. One cargo bay lay completely open to the hostile environment of space, but not one item in the capacious bay was out of place.
Backtracking several times to find a way past junctions that had been blasted away by the command ship, they arrived at last at the rudimentary shuttle that served as an escape pod for crew. All of its systems were still working, and they slipped into the blackness of space a minute later.
The lifeboat coasted with lights off and energy signature at a minimum. With any luck the Reaper ships would think they were debris from the battle, and their rescuers should arrive soon and get them out of here.
“Was that strange shield there all the time?” asked the comms officer in a whisper. “The barrier that protected us from space?”
“There’s no need to whisper,” said Cagill with a smile. “Just don’t activate anything electronic, we want to stay as invisible to enemy sensors as we can.”
“Oh, right,” said the comms officer. “It’s just that I didn’t pick up any communications interference when we were fighting. I think I would have picked up something if the shield had been on.”
“Passive system I think,” said the weapons officer, and the others looked at him.
“Imagine a shield system so thin we thought it was part of the hull, something perhaps made out of the same materials as our hulls. We would never have found it. No power source, I think, it wouldn’t need that.
“When it detected hull damage and activated itself, it would repair or maintain a power source from the ship to feed off, and then get on with the job of maintaining a liveable atmosphere. It would also, I imagine, work at keeping the remaining hull intact.”
Cagill nodded thoughtfully.
“When it detected no further life signs on board, it might perhaps dissipate itself into space as microdust. Completely untraceable,” finished the weapons officer.
It all made sense, as far as conjecture after the fact went. Cagill made a mental note to promote the man. There were depths in him that weren’t being used, and Cagill wasn’t going to let talent be wasted under his command.
Then a Javelin swept in beside them, and the lifeboat was drawn into its cargo bay.
While Cagill and his crew had been removed from the fighting, most of the alliance ships had evacuated safely into star drive. Cagill could see the last of the Sumerian wings and Javelin squadrons some distance away from the planet, initiating star drive in orchestrated waves.
There was only a fraction of the allied force still needing to jump into star drive, and Cagill rejoiced at this. But his heart fell as he saw how many Reaper ships there were between the Javelin that had rescued him and his crew, and the remnants of the alliance forces. As he watched another Invardii command ship left the enemy fleet and came toward them.
Twisting desperately to avoid the lethal fire from the command ship, the Javelin tried to find a way through to join the rest of the evacuation force, but it was too late. Reaper ships had cut them off from the alliance stragglers, and the Javelin found itself completely surrounded.
One last salvo of fractal slugs drove the Reaper ships back momentarily, but the command ship ignored the barrage as it closed on the Javelin, and stabbed out with its thick tails of destructive fire.
To escape miraculously with our lives once, but lose them now, was a bitter irony, thought Cagill. He turned to look at Ayman Case. The same look, that such a miracle should be such a waste, was in Ayman’s eyes as well. Cagill thought for a moment of saying something profound, or at least thanking these brave men and women who had served with him.
There was a discordant burst of impossible colours around the ships, and Cagill was left completely disoriented. He stumbled, then regained his balance. All eyes on the bridge looked up at the overhead screen, thinking the Javelin had been hit by the attacking command ship. But the armada now lay behind them.
They had, impossibly, leapfrogged through the Reaper ships, and joined the last of the evacuation force. The navigation officer swore, unbelieving, but then turned hurriedly to his console to initiate star drive.
Cagill turned to look at the overhead screens.
Like a synchronised mechanical ballet, the remaining warships and Javelins blinked out of sight in orderly rows, and then it was his Javelin’s turn.
A grainy, grey nothingness surrounded the ship. That meant they were in star drive, and that meant they were safe.
CHAPTER 28
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While the navigation officer tried to find out where ParapSanni intended to take the evacuation fleet, Cagill opened a sub-space link to Cordez. It took a little longer for the sub-space radio to lock on to Cordez’ location from star drive coordinates, but he got through eventually.
“So you were surrounded by Reaper ships one moment, and then you were at the tail end of the evacuation fleet,” said Cordez thoughtfully, as Cagill described what had happened to the Javelin. “A little jump through space doesn’t sound like star drive.”
“I know,” continued Cordez. “It has to be some sort of Druanii technology, even if it’s impossible for us to understand how they did it.”
Cagill brought his attention back to the bridge of the Javelin for a moment as he saw a hand signal from one of the officers.
“I’ve adjusted our course to match that of the others,” called the navigation officer. “We’re headed for Seenirok.”
Cordez heard that, and smiled to himself. ParapSanni had told him earlier that Seenirok would be the first destination for the evacuation fleet. It would be the new home of the refugees, though it wouldn’t be the new seat of the Sumerian government.
Nearly fifteen hours later, the outermost ice planets in the Seenirok system picked up star drive signatures. The mining bases relayed the signals to the satellite systems around Seenirok. A message arrived in the governor’s o
ffice that star drive signatures had been detected in the outer planetary ecliptic, followed by a further message that planetary comms was trying to identify the ships.
This was followed a little later by another message. “Notification that Sumerian warships are now entering the Seenirok system. Confirming three full wings, comprising 24 ships.” There was a pause. “Wait, add another two wings.”
It wasn’t long before another message arrived in the governor’s office, notifying him that multiple star drive signatures had appeared on the edge of the system.
And so it proceeded for some time, as less than half of the original Sumerian force, around 180 warships, and most of the 140 Javelins sent from Prometheus, all crammed with refugees, came out of star drive inside the Seenirok system.
ParapSanni had, indeed, decided to come to the Seenirok system first, but only to unload refugees at the cities around the dry, high plains of the colony world. The warships would then continue on to the mineral moon Rok’H’Rok, and there ParapSanni would set up his new Sumerian government.
The governor walked out onto the balcony of his mansion, and looked up at the sky. The bright points of cooling towers shone high above him as the warships gathered together, like stars forming a new galaxy.
Shuttles were already coming in from other cities around the Seenirok highlands, and being drafted into holding flight patterns. They would soon start the job of unloading the ships above them as fast and as efficiently as possible.
Pre-fabricated dormitories were already being set up on the edges of the capital, and medical tents established to revive the newcomers. The tools and machinery they would need to build whole new cities in the highlands were already being calculated. Those supplies would come in from the other Sumerian planets, and from K’Sarth, and from Earth, over the days and weeks to come. It would be the largest, and most rapid, building project in the history of the Sumerian race. And it was only the beginning. Many more factories were needed. Factories to build motherships, and faster, more powerful warships.
Little did CarsaParBrahmad know that other things were about to change too, and his role as governor was about to end. The Par’Sanni, or Seconds, ruled Sumerian politics now, and the governor was about to find out how much the old order had shifted to the new.
CarsaParBrahmad met his replacement, SarSanni, the next day, but there were few changes in the beginning. SarSanni wisely chose to leave the handling of the refugees to the governor and his team. They knew where the resources were and how to connect services to the new dormitories speedily.
But from that time on the balance of power slowly shifted to SarSanni. In particular the siting and construction of the new cities, and warship factories, took more and more of his time. The months passed, and then one day Sarsanni just had to get out of the office for a break.
An hour later he stepped from his gyrocopter and walked to the edge of an impressive bluff, one that looked out over a broad valley in the endless Seenirok uplands.
The gyrocopter was an indulgence, a toy he had dabbled with in his youth – and a most unsafe mode of transport by Sumerian standards. It was a primitive machine, certainly, but he had built it himself, and he was fond of the temperamental old thing.
As he’d grown into his mature adulthood he’d kept it, for personal reasons, and now he preferred it to the ponderous battle cruiser offered him for transport as the new governor. This was just one of the changes to his life now he was a FrereSanni, or high position holder in ParapSanni’s government.
The gyrocopter enabled him to move quickly about the camps that housed the evacuated Sumerians from Uruk, and others who had come in from colonies razed by the Reaper ships. He was also able to check on progress at the underground cities being built in a web around Seenirok. At least he was able to check if they were within flying distance for the gyrocopter. The population of Seenirok had more than quadrupled, and the huge building program within the new cities was sorely needed.
The Sumerians had learned from the K'Sarth example, and were building these cities underground, where the Invardii ground ships couldn’t get at them. But then he felt a stab of cold uncertainty as he remembered how the Invardii had destroyed Rokar with a moon taken out of orbit from the fifth planet of that system.
At least Seenirok could give the appearance of a minor colony with a small population – nothing for the Invardii to bother about. The old cities would eventually be replaced, and left as decoy targets for the Invardii to destroy – if they should ever come. He hoped the ruse worked.
SarSanni was now the governor of the planet, and whatever happened to it was his responsibility. He felt that responsibility deeply. In the beginning he had protested that his only aim was to fight the Invardii, but ParapSanni had told him he needed to be a governor for a while. There would be a reckoning with the Invardii sometime, and he could choose his role in that.
It didn’t make the destruction of the Ragnaroth space station, and the deaths of most of the Sumerians on board, any easier to bear, but he reminded himself constantly that his time for revenge would come.
The previous governor was now his Second, and that was confusing too. The Par’Sanni caste had always been Seconds to the titular Par’Brahmad leaders, and the reversal of roles made them both uncomfortable. However CarsaParBrahmad was proving determined to make the best of the situation, and had won SarSanni’s grudging acceptance.
SarSanni straightened his back, cramped from the confines of the tiny gyrocopter, and stretched to his full two point five metres. He turned his massive, bullet-nosed head to the right, and located the foundations for See’Targos, which would in time become his new capital.
Shuttles descended intermittently from the highland plains into the valley, bringing components for the buildings that were going up. A combined airport and spaceport had been constructed to one side of the valley, and heavy transports were constantly bringing containers of machinery and materials to be broken down into manageable orders that the shuttles could take down to the city.
The outline of the city – rubble from the sides of the valley fused to make an extensive platform – took up most of a wide plain beside the shallow, sandy river that had created the valley. The city sat between two rocky spurs, and it would be buried under a deep layer of rubble when it was finished, to hide it from the Invardii ground ships.
The scenario was the same right across Seenirok, a series of high plateaus dissected by occasional rivers that ran down to long lakes that meandered across the surface. Continental plates had started to drift apart here, but then stopped, aeons ago. There was little moisture to erode the high plateaus and fill in the deep lochs that were scattered around the planet.
It was a dry climate, unpleasant for the originally deep water Sumerians, but one of the few planets still left to them. Little grew on the wide uplands, mostly scattered grasses and a few small bushes that managed to survive because they had tuberous roots to store the sparse rain.
Wind storms occasionally blasted across the highlands, bowling grey wanderweeds along the surface in great leaps and bounds, tumbling them end over end until they disintegrated under the onslaught. But still, it was home to many Sumerians now.
The first of the city walls were being extruded onto the spiders web of foundations below him, and SarSanni was pleased to see the progress. He scribbled a shorthand note into his personal diary. See’Targos would take shape quickly, and then it would be filled with evacuees. Then Sumerian life would hopefully get back to some sort of normalcy.
A shuttle dropped momentarily onto the plain behind him, and left a single Sumerian behind as it soared away. SarSanni turned in response to a hearty halloo.
CHAPTER 29
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The Sumerian who walked toward SarSanni was of similar height to him, but a little less bulky. As with all Par’Sanni, there was little difference between male and female.
FlerSanni, thought Sarsanni. I wish she wouldn’t do that! As the breedin
g partner of a FrereSanni, she could demand privileges, like a ride to the highlands, but it was taking shuttles away from their tasks when every moment of building time was precious.
Par’Sanni females had to make a decision early in life. Some would become Seconds, advisors to the Par’Brahmad leaders, or even in these changing times leaders themselves, and some would become breeding partners to powerful males.
Most of the rest would find themselves a position that suited their skills somewhere in Sumerian society. The great majority would choose to have their sexuality remain in a latent state throughout their lives, for the promotions and financial advantages it gave them.
As an important male in the Sumerian government, SarSanni had been expected to take a breeding partner, though it was not compulsory. FlerSanni was a prime female, slight swellings along her sides and a marginal leanness to her legs showing her attractiveness as a breeding mate.
She ran quickly to SarSanni’s side, and leaned into him. He sighed deeply. She was a beautiful creature, and almost worth the frustration she caused him. Almost. He ran his hand across her clothing above the sensitive dorsal line, the pressure-sensitive line of dots along Sumerian sides that were part of their underwater past.
She pushed him away, but crooned her pleasure. He pulled her toward him, and expertly tapped his fingers along her side. She would have fallen if he had not held her up, and her skin flushed a kaleidoscope of colours. He held her close as the colours slowly faded away.
She was ready to breed, and would deliver almost a thousand eggs tonight. He sighed again. It was up to him to fertilise every one of them, taking most of the night. He would be no use for anything tomorrow.
His communications wheel vibrated on his wrist. SarSanni patted FlerSanni apologetically on the arm, and turned to see who it was.
CarsaParBrahmad looked out from the small screen in the middle of the wheel.
Invardii Series Boxset Page 35