They did not belong in this galaxy and he would…eject them…the way his men had been ejected from the outposts. It was foolish of them to destroy the outposts. Perhaps, like Sara, they turned on something they couldn’t control. It belonged, by right, to his people. Perhaps that is why they could not control it.
He had held back for too long and he did not know why he had waited to take back what belonged to them.
He had the men, he had the ships and he had the will.
And he wanted Sara’s people gone. He wanted nothing left to remind him of her. When they were gone, then he would be able to get her out of his head.
He would be able to take another companion, be able to take many of them.
He would be able to sleep with his bond mate again.
He would be able to see his life through his own eyes, instead of hers.
He could stop looking at his people’s ways and wondering, if things had been different, if he had been different, there would have been a different ending for him and for Sara.
He could stop wondering if any woman had ever looked at him the way Sara looked at that Ionian.
He could stop longing for the…warmth and…lightness of heart…he sensed when he was around her. It would weaken him, if he were not careful. This fun they talked and sang about, it was a lure and a trap. Life was cold, it was hard and only the strong survived.
He would forget her, if he had to set this whole galaxy on fire to do it.
“My Leader?”
It was his aide, Kamelan, on his internal communicator.
“Yes?”
“You need to access the communication network grid, my Leader. We are receiving an…unusual transmission.”
The distraction was a relief. He needed to stop thinking about Sara. He tapped into the feed, taking his time to work carefully through the many threads.
He controlled all of them. Most of the time it was easy to manage the flow of information. During battle it was more challenging. He could only give his commanders limited control. There was always the risk of one of them doing what he had done. He had not become Supreme Leader by right, but by force. It was their way.
Since the beginning of known time, the Dusan and Gadi had gone to battle against each other. Usually the Dusan won, because they could throw more men and ships into the fight. But no matter who won the battle, there were certain…protocols each brought to the battle. He always knew what to expect from them. Just as they knew what to expect from the Dusan.
These earth people had changed that.
They followed none of the established protocols of battle. The loss of a ship had been annoying and it had forced him into the deception. He had not enjoyed pretending to be Gadi, but had needed to study them, learn how to fight them. That had not gone so well either, but he did know he would have to monitor the battle closely. If he could not anticipate their moves, he could respond to them. And he would bury them in men and ships.
They would be sorry they had tried to take him on.
He found the right feed, studying it for a long moment, trying to determine what is was he was seeing. It almost looked like one of the outposts…no, not one of them, the one where Sara died.
That was not possible. He had seen it destroyed with his own eyes…had he not? He considered it and realized what he had seen was a flash of light, a flash like the one that had stopped their attack on the earth ship when he tried to take Sara the first time.
“Is there anyone there—” Before he could finish the question, a figure moved into view.
Sara.
Her face filled his mind, just as she had filled his night visions since he watched her die. It was not possible. It had to be some kind of trick. A deception. He had held her in his arms and felt her last breath leave her body. He had seen life fade from her eyes.
She lifted her cap, ruffled her hair, then put it back on again. She was dressed for battle in the same clothes he had seen her wear last time. They fit her loosely, but she could have worn anything and he would still want her.
He might even need her.
It was an…astounding thought.
His insides, his thoughts twisted.
What did this mean? Was it possible she was not dead? Was it possible the destruction of the outpost was a deception? If she could do these things, then she was more powerful than he had thought possible.
She pulled a stool into place in front of a console and sat down, her elbows propped on her knees, her head tilted to one side. Her fingers pressing on the screen in front of her.
She tapped something on her ear. “Home Plate, this is kilo1. Phase one is successful. Repeat, we have a go.”
She was testing something, perhaps a Garradian weapon. If they succeeding in mastering the technology the Garradians left behind, would numbers be enough to defeat them?
What was she doing at that outpost? Why would she be there and not with her people’s ships? Unless…was this outpost somehow more important than the others in the chain? He would have to assume they were all intact. That their “destruction” had also been a trick.
Sara had done all this. She had unlocked the wonders and evicted his people from the outposts they held.
“There’s some pretty cool shit here. I can see why the Dusan and the Gadi wanted it.” She smiled and nodded, as if she heard someone else speaking. “It’s crazy, but if the Dusan hadn’t shot me down in the first attack, we’d never have known about any of it. Now that’s ironic.”
What was it Sara had said about red hair and a nasty temper? He did not have red hair, but she was about to learn what a supreme temper was like.
“Prepare my ship.” Adin’s voice cold and hard.
“My Leader—”
“Launch the attack on the earth ships now. And Kamelan?”
“Yes, my leader?”
“We take no prisoners, but I want their ships taken intact.”
Kamelan frowned. “Not even the women?”
His commanders would be disappointed. It had been a few years since there had been a fresh influx of women into the companion pool.
“They are a contagion that must be eliminated. None of them can survive.” He applied a bit of pain with the order and felt Kamelan flinch.
“As you command, my Leader.”
Adin hesitated, perhaps it would be…wise to give a bit of hope with the lash of pain. “When we begin to retake Gadi planets, there will be many women.”
“Yes, my leader.”
In his mind, Sara smiled, the curve of her mouth making his hands curl into fists. She turned toward…someone…perhaps the soldier she must have captured, the one sending information into the network.
“So, do you have a name?”
She was smiling at him. Rage traveled along the connection—and it went dead.
No matter. He would have the real thing soon. This time there would be no persuasion, no waiting. There would only be taking until he no longer wanted her.
* * * *
Sara barely had time to break her connection before the transmitter went down.
“Okay, that’s pretty cold.” Sara tapped into the monitoring system and studied the readings. Dang, if that had been in someone’s head, they’d be dead. At least she knew she’d hit a nerve—hopefully hard enough to bring the Supreme leader hot-footing it their way, diverting some ships from the main battle while he was at it.
The other thing she’d learned from the brief connection, she couldn’t kill Adin as soon as he got here, she had to do more than take down his link to the network to have any impact on the battle. Like them, the Dusan didn’t put all their eggs in one basket. There definitely was a command structure. Adin was at the top, but there was a small group of…minds that could step in. Best case scenario, they got into a pissing match, giving them time to win the battle. Worst case, next in line already knew who he was and could take over immediately.
Best outcome would be for her to take down the entire network, using a power
surge like Adin had used to take out the transmitter. All she had to do was feel her way through a million plus connections, tap into the one Adin was using and…neutralize it, before Adin figured out she was there. And before he…well, better not to think about that.
She tapped her radio. “Fyn?”
He didn’t respond. She frowned. He should have reached the cloaked ship by now. Sara started to contact Henderson…but something, a tingle of her spider sense maybe…stopped her.
“Fyn, please respond.”
The room went dark.
She cursed as she tried to tap into the outpost. Nothing. With the power down, she couldn’t access the outpost’s resources either. Panic tried to fill in the gap left by the loss of the data stream. It was like losing a limb—a limb she needed to find Fyn.
“Fyn, please report your location.” It surprised her how…calm her voice sounded.
“Hello, Sara.” It was Helfron, the Gadi leader. “I’m afraid Fyn is…indisposed.”
Sara didn’t feel her knees buckle.
She did feel them hit the floor.
Helfron, no Kalian.
Kalian had Fyn.
Kalian who wanted him dead.
Who may have already killed him.
She wrapped her arms around her middle, trying to breathe, trying to think. Vaguely she knew Helfron was still talking, but she couldn’t hear. Or see. Or talk.
She’d known Fyn could die. She’d faced it last night, as she lay in his arms, holding him while he held her. But not like this.
She felt something wet ooze through her fingers. Blood. She recognized the smell. Her palms stung where her nails had dug in.
It wasn’t enough.
She bent over until her forehead touched the cold floor. Her hands spread out, welcoming the cold into her body as the nanites healed those wounds, that pain. Ice flowed through her body.
“Sara?”
It wasn’t right. It wasn’t fair.
Life’s not fair. Evie spoke in her head.
Does it have to be this unfair?
She didn’t want to, but she made herself sit up. Her body felt stiff and old. A hundred years old.
She wiped her face. There was one thing she could do for Fyn now.
She keyed her radio. “I’m going to kill you.”
Her voice…sounded dead. Dead as Fyn.
Fyn is dead.
She repeated it out loud.
“Fyn isn’t dead. He’s just stunned.” He didn’t sound worried. He sounded…patronizing. Patient. In control.
That was going to change.
“Yankee Foxtrot Oscar.” Sara gave the code to switch channels on the radio and made the change herself.
“Henderson?”
“Charlie foxtrot. What do you want us to do?”
“We got to get the power back on or this op is a bust.” Fyn would have died for nothing. “Can you see their position on your sensors? I’m dead in the water.”
Sara had gotten so used to being tapped in to the outpost, she felt lost with out the connection. Made her situational awareness crap, too. It was a pointed reminder how easy, and dangerous, it was to rely on tech instead of good, old-fashioned soldiering.
“I’ve got ‘em.”
Sara mentally tapped into the fighter’s computer, even as Henderson briefed her. No surprise they were in power control. She counted twenty bogeys, probably all Ojemba. He’d want his best men with him.
“They’ve got the stairs covered,” Henderson said, “but I see some shafts. Probably transport shafts on either side of their position.”
“If they’re like the Dusan, they’re not trained for urban fighting.” Sara hesitated. “How many guys do you think?”
“Three should do it, if you’re going, too.”
“Oh, I’m going.”
He told her where to meet up with Perkins and what to do.
“Roger that.” She hesitated. “The Old Man is counting on us. If I don’t make it out, you have to take out Xever. Destroy the outpost if you have to.”
“What if Fyn is still alive?”
“He’s not.”
If he wasn’t dead, Kalian would kill him as soon as he got what he wanted. He couldn’t afford not to. He had to be the one person who knew how dangerous Fyn really was.
“I’m sure he suspects you’re there. He might be counting on you for his ride off this rock.”
If one of the cloaked fighters was missing, the Old Man would have known about it. They weren’t invisible to each other. And tracking would have picked up any other ship in the area. He’d had them drop him off and leave.
“Don’t give it to him.”
“Roger that.” A pause. “Good luck, Tall Girl.”
“Same to you.”
* * * *
When Halliwell was tasked to command the Doolittle, they told him that it would be more like commanding a naval ship, than an Air Force vessel. He was glad now for the time he’d spent studying naval tactics.
In addition to the two earth ships and the four Garradian ships brought up from the island outpost, the Gadi had kicked in eight of their battle cruisers, not the ten he’d been hoping for.
His consultations with Commander Gaedon and Emerson had been…interesting. It took a while to get Gaedon to quit talking about protocols and understand there was nothing polite or neat about war.
The tactics Gaedon proposed reminded him of a dance…the waltz maybe. Stately moves and counter moves. Everyone doing what they were supposed to do.
“This is a fight for our survival,” Emerson finally told him. “We kill them or they kill us. We can’t afford to play fair, sir.”
“Has Xever ever sent so many ships into battle, Commander?” Halliwell asked him.
“No.”
“Then he’s thrown your protocols out the window. Now it’s your turn.”
Gaedon had sighed. “What do you want me to do?”
So Halliwell told him.
* * * *
Sara pulled out her flashlight, propped it so it would shine on her equipment. Night vision goggles. Knives. Grenades and flash bangs. Magazines for P-90, M-4 carbine, and nine mil.
She emptied her vest of everything that couldn’t kill, maim or disintegrate the human body.
It surprised her how cool her thoughts were, and how cold her rage. She took off her cap and put on the goggles, but didn’t pull them down yet. She switched her radio back to the frequency Helfron was using.
“Sara, talk to me.”
“Got nothing more to say.”
This was her fault. Sara had wondered where Helfron was. She’d felt uneasy about it, but she hadn’t done anything. Hadn’t taken precautions. Hadn’t tried to find out. He must have had Ojemba watching the outposts and noticed the activity. He’d come. And now he’d killed Fyn.
“Don’t be hasty.”
She stowed her flashlight, hung the M-4 off her shoulder, and picked up the P-90, flicking on the light.
“I’m long past hasty.”
“Fyn walks out of here alive, if you promise to come with me, promise not to leave.”
“I know who you really are. I know you can’t let him live.”
“I give you my word—”
“Your word means nothing to me.” Sara fought back the flash of hot anger. She had to stay cold. “If you’ve got some gods somewhere to pray to, now would be a good time to start, because I’m coming for you.”
The sound of her voice sent a chill down her back. Dang, she sounded scary.
Nineteen
Halliwell positioned his ships along the corridor the Dusan had used to come at them before. The smaller ships with cloaking capability were positioned to flank the Dusan fleet along the expected attack vector.
He arranged the four big ass Garradian ships into a claw shaped formation with his own ships in the center position to concentrate their fire power on the Dusan ships when they arrived. They’d be cloaked, but would have to de-cloak to fire.
He had the Gadi ships take up positions behind the planets and moons, poised to ambush at the right moment. One thing spacecraft had over ocean ships, they could pop up out of hiding a lot faster.
There was already an opening salvo in the form of a minefield right where they expected the fleet to drop out of hyperspace.
The Doolittle and the Patton were waiting right where they expected the brunt of the Dusan assault. Donovan’s boost to their shields should allow them to withstand the initial bombardment long enough for the rest of the fleet to deploy.
He hoped.
And then they just had to hold out long enough for Donovan, or the geeks, or both, to disconnect Xever from his communication network.
“The Dusan armada is on the move, sir.”
Halliwell nodded and took his seat on the bridge and pulled up the HUD. Xever was throwing everything he had at them. The screen was thick with ships.
“Let me know if…when any of the ships break off for the outpost.”
And may God have mercy on their souls.
* * * *
“I know you’re there, Sara. Talk to me.”
Kalian was starting to sound worried. Good.
The elevators had to operate in shafts, even if they did move faster than light. She shone her flashlight on the floor and found a thin line. Applied her knife to it and a panel popped out. Once it was out, it was easy to pop out a few more. While she was working on it, her jarhead found her, the light from his M-4 shining into the deep dark.
“Captain?”
Sara shone her light on him. “Perkins?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
He moved forward to help her, sticking his head down in the shaft and shining his light around.
“There’s a ladder on the side of the wall. I think I can reach it.”
That would save time. She’d been worried they’d have to rappel down. They both shut off lights and pulled down their goggles.
As she eased into the hole after Perkins, she heard Kalian again.
“Fyn wouldn’t want you to do this.”
She made it onto the ladder and started down.
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