Orion Rising: A Military Science Fiction Space Opera Epic (The Orion War Book 3)
Page 32
The sound of it sent shivers up her spine and she appreciated the work it took to create that sort of auditory mod. It was deliciously understated, not brash like ones so often encountered.
“Oh, my dear boy, I would love that later, but for now, just something refreshing and then some peace.”
“Yes, madam.”
Andrea let herself drift off, not even noticing when the young man returned with her drink. She dreamed of her days as her father’s right hand back on Airtha, the work she had always planned to do there, her eventual plans to remove her father from his eternal throne and take the reins.
It all seemed so distant now, so unnecessary. Why would she even bother with such things, what purpose did that control serve? Was it not better to be happy with what she had? To take joy in the little things?
Her dreams changed, taking her to thoughts of living a simple life, helping others, taking long walks in the evening woods. In her half-sleeping state, she thought perhaps she would find a man who loved the simple life as she did, and settle down and have kids.
“Andrea,” a voice whispered into her dream.
She peered through the woods in her dream, wondering who has spoken, perhaps they were hiding in the foliage?
“Andrea, wake up,” the voice came again, a touch louder this time.
It slowly dawned on her that perhaps she was asleep, that the forest was not real. She forced herself to wake, once more finding the view of the beach and the deep blue ocean before her.
Andrea looked around, wondering who had spoken to her, who had interrupted her slumber.
But there was no one nearby, not for a hundred meters. This little swath of paradise was all hers. She closed her eyes once more, and then the voice came again.
“Andrea, wake up.”
Her eyes snapped open. “Who’s there? This is getting tiresome.”
“Andrea, wake up. C’mon already.”
She heard the words loud and clear, as though someone were standing right beside her, but there was no one….
“Maybe she’s too lost to whatever they’re doing here,” another voice said, and Andrea frowned.
“What are you talking about?” she asked the disembodied voices.
“There, she mumbled something,” the first voice said.
“Doesn’t mean she’s waking up.”
Something touched her shoulder and she recoiled.
“Seriously, Andrea, the program’s off, you’re just dreaming. Wake up already!”
The feeling intensified, and she became certain that it was a hand on her shoulder, though she couldn’t see it. She reached up to push it away and her hand ran into something solid. It was an arm!
Andrea gripped it and took a deep breath.
As she breathed out, the beach, the warm sun, the soft sound of the surf hitting the shore, they all faded away, and she found herself in a white, sterile room with two figures hovering over her.
She couldn’t get their shapes to resolve properly, and blinked furiously in the muted light.
“Where…”
“Finally!” the first voice said, and she assigned the sound to the slightly larger of the two blurry shapes. “We have to get you out of here. Shit’s going down and the Transcend is going to need you.”
“How did I get here?” Andrea asked. “I was just on a beach…”
“You were being reconditioned,” the voice said. “It’s going to take a bit for you to get your bearings again. We ended the round early and it hasn’t released its hold on you yet.”
“Conditioning…” Andrea recalled what that was…. A process for making people more compliant, making them toe the line. She had sent many people to be reconditioned.
“That’s right, but shit’s going down and we need you. You still have a lot of connections, and we’re going to use them to stop Sera.”
“Sera…” Andrea whispered as the memories of her younger sister came rushing back.
“Yes, and I’m Justin, and this Roxy.”
Andrea blinked again and the larger figure began to resolve into a Justin-like shape. She remembered him, the former Director of The Hand—until Sera came back and made a mess of everything. Then, she glanced over at the woman, Roxy. A waif of a thing, but probably good for getting in and out of tight places.
“Where am I?” Andrea asked.
“Jokar, but not for long. Think you can walk?”
Andrea rolled onto an elbow, pushed herself up, and swung her legs over the edge of the bed.
“Even if it kills me, yes. Let’s get the fuck out of here.”
NIETZSCHEAN ADVANCE
STELLAR DATE: 07.13.8948 (Adjusted Years)
LOCATION: Imperial Palace
REGION: Charlemagne City, Prussia, Nietzschean Empire
Emperor Constantine reached out, took the goblet from the young boy, brought it to his lips, and breathed in the deep aroma before taking a sip.
Despite their many failings, Genevians made fantastic Kvas—one of the few reasons he had accepted their surrender rather than grinding them into dust.
They seemed content enough as members of the empire, though no Nietzschean ever made the mistake of considering a Genevian an equal—and neither did the Genevians, for that matter.
“What are your orders, Emperor?” General Hansmeyer asked from across the table.
The emperor noted how Hansmeyer took care to school any impatience from his voice, even though Constantine had made him wait for the boy to prepare his goblet of Kvas before even considering the question.
He took another sip of the drink before setting the goblet down on the table and peering into the depths of the holoprojection hovering above the table.
Thousands of pinpoints of light hung in the space between himself and the general, dots representing single-star nations, federations, alliances, and empires.
The stars in the center, filling an area highlighted by a nimbus red glow, comprised the ever-expanding borders of his empire, nearly doubled in size since the Genevian’s defeat.
Coreward of Nietzsche lay several small alliances in the Pleiades star cluster, but those were not his for the taking. His arrangement with the Trisilieds king precluded his expansion in that direction.
Antispinward of Nietzsche lay the small, fractured nations of Bernard’s Alliance, a ripe fruit ready for picking before his war against the Genevians, but they had since banded together, strengthening their fleets.
His navies, on the other hand, were still weak after the war with Genevia. The victory against their worlds had come at a steeper cost than he had initially anticipated, but once his people were invested in the war, victory was the only acceptable outcome.
No, his target would have to be something small—something that would be an easy target to give him a sure and decisive victory. His eyes settled on a ripe target, and gave a predatory smile.
“Next, we move into the Praesepe cluster, General Hansmeyer. The gateway into those stars is the Theban Alliance. If we take their systems, we can move into the rest of Praesepe with impunity,” Emperor Constantine pronounced before reaching for his goblet once more.
He peered over its rim at General Hansmeyer as the man frowned at the stars hovering over the table. He made a brief gesture and the view of the five stars comprising the Theban Alliance filled the space between them.
“Thebes is small, but powerful,” Hansmeyer said. “I can imagine a number of ways to launch our forces against them, but I think most will work better if their leadership is destabilized first.”
“What did you have in mind?” Constantine asked.
“I prefer to go to the top,” Hansmeyer replied. “We should assassinate their president and as many of their top generals and cabinet members as we can.”
Constantine took another sip of his Kvas as he pondered the implications. Thebes had a very complicated transfer of power built into their constitution. However, the idea of assassination was distasteful to him.
“We’re Nietz
scheans, we do not skulk about assassinating foreign heads of state,” he finally said with a dismissive wave of his hand.
“My Emperor, of course we do not. It is why no one will expect it of us. We will select some other nation to use as our scapegoat. Maybe even have the assassins get captured to improve the fiction,” Hansmeyer replied equably.
“You obviously have some plan here, General. Please, explain it fully.”
“It is really quite simple, my lord. We present ourselves as agents of another alliance, perhaps Septhia, to a Genevian mercenary company. No one would ever believe that Genevians would carry out an assassination on our behalf. Then, when the mercenaries are captured—as we shall ensure they are—the blame lies far from us. Even better, the Thebans will fortify their borders with Septhia, and we will sweep in behind them. Nietzsche will control their stars within a matter of weeks.”
Emperor Constantine stroked his chin as he considered the implications. There would be complications to manage, but nothing difficult. The plan had merit.
“I assume you have a company of Genevian mercenaries in mind?” he asked the general.
“I do, my Emperor, they’re called the Marauders.”
THE EMPIRE
STELLAR DATE: 08.06.8948 (Adjusted Years)
LOCATION: Scipio Diplomatic Complex
REGION: Alexandria, Bosporus, Scipio Empire
Petra Cushing rose from her desk and walked to her office’s window. Below her, stretching for hundreds of kilometers in every direction, lay Alexandria, capital city of the Scipio Empire.
She took in the sight, hoping its familiar lines would calm her nerves. The Imperial Palace stood on her right with its thousands of spires that reached clear into space. On her left, the Hall of Heroes crouched ominously, a complex of buildings constructed from the bones of Scipio’s enemies.
She had spent the better part of the last thirty years here, operating as a diplomat for the Miriam League, a small alliance of worlds a thousand light years from Scipio—right at the edge of the Transcend.
But now she would need to expose her true purpose to Empress Diana.
Petra hoped that the long friendship she had carefully cultivated with Diana over the years would hold up to such a revelation.
Petra turned and leaned against the window, closing her eyes and reading the messages from Sera…or the Seras, she supposed.
The first was simple, a missive from The Hand Directorate providing encryption key changes and a warning not to accept any messages from anyone, including Sera Tomlinson utilizing the prior set of keys.
All the transfer protocols matched, and there was no reason to suspect the message at all. Even the specific mention of Sera didn’t stand out—it was common for messages to include similar admonishments.
Until a message from Sera came in using the old keys.
And that message was the message. The Great Unveiling was happening, and it was starting in Scipio with Sera’s arrival in four days.
Sera Tomlinson and Tanis Richards.
This wasn’t her first time in a position like this, not knowing who to trust in her own government, but the message from Sera came in with the presidential seal, and an unusual packet.
Alastar said, worry lacing his voice.
Alastar replied,
Petra trusted that Alastar believed his words to be true. However, ten minutes ago he would also have said that he was not the victim of subversion at all.
Petra shook her head. She could tell by Alastar’s tone that there would be no convincing him. He was certain that Airtha was working against them.
She would play along for now, but Sera better be able to convince her that Airtha was the enemy, and explain why she was using the presidential seal, or she would follow the orders sent along from Airtha.
A NEW, OLD FRIEND
STELLAR DATE: 03.28.8948 (Adjusted Years)
LOCATION: High Airtha
REGION: Airtha, Huygens System
“I release you.”
Her father’s words poured through her mind like molten lead, burning away a film that had always laid across her thoughts, something she had never even been aware of until that very moment.
The mech at her feet twitched, and she kicked it down the ramp before scampering away from the pinnace’s entrance. It took her a moment to wonder why her movements felt wrong, and then she recalled her missing arm, still on the deck behind her. She glanced down at her side, grimacing at the sight of bloody carbon and muscle hanging out of the wound. One of her wings felt broken, as well—she couldn’t force it to fold behind her properly, try as she might.
Not the issue right now, a voice said in her mind and she knew it was right. Her father had told her to go, he’d released her—something that was only just starting to make sense to her.
Find Sera. That had been his final order.
She could barely fathom the thought of leaving him behind, but he had told her what to do, and though it went against everything she believed, she felt that she must—no, that she could—do it.
Abandon him to save him—or so she hoped.
The ship’s drive systems were still active, and Kara brought them to full power without any warm-up, rising into the skies as fast as the ship was able, though taking care not to pass directly over her father...or the body of her brother.
The mechs on the ground fired at the pinnace, and she activated the shields, amazed that she had forgotten to do so as soon as she had boosted into the sky.
None of the mech’s beamfire did any notable damage to the pinnace, but it was handling strangely as she ducked behind an incoming freighter.
Then, a flashing indicator on the console caught her attention, and Kara realized that the ramp was still lowered.
“What the fuck, Kara, get it together,” she muttered as she closed the entrance.
As she reached across the console, blood dripped from her missing appendage, and she turned to grab an emergency med kit. Managing the flight controls with one hand, she used her other two to open the kit and pulled out a biofoam applicator. She jammed the end into her gaping wound and pulled the handle, screaming as the foam flowed into her, pinching the broken arteries shut and sealing the wound.
When it had done enough, she threw the canister aside, bringing her full concentration back to getting off High Airtha.
Ahead, the slope of the long arch rose before her, and she turned to fly perpendicular to the spur-station’s motion, pouring on full thrust as the ship’s scan system began to signal that they were being targeted.
Kara dipped behind a passenger tran
sport, and then another freighter as turrets across High Airtha opened fire on her.
A plasma beam hit the freighter and then another lanced across space mere meters from the cockpit, narrowly deflected by her ship’s grav shields.
She pulled around another descending ship, and her shields flared as a proton beam struck near the engines.
Kara screamed in frustration as she dove over the edge of the High Airtha into open space while turret fire flashed all around her.
She knew that it still wasn’t safe, and her scan lit up, detecting the signatures of a dozen fast intercept craft streaking through space toward her.
“Shit! Shit! Shit!” Kara swore. Her pinnace had small point defense beams, but nothing that would do any damage to those interceptors. They, on the other hand, could tear her ship to ribbons.
She cast about, looking for anything that could give her cover, but nothing useful was in range—just a few more freighters coming in to dock on High Airtha.
Still, some cover was better than none, and she dove toward the ships. As she approached, her scan showed two of their ships raising shields and powering weapons. She closed her eyes, knowing that this would be the end. Then, the ship’s scan suite registered the destruction of ships—ships that weren’t hers.
“Whaaaaa?“ Kara whispered she opened her eyes once more and saw that the freighters had fired on the interceptors chasing her.
A comm signal came in from one of the freighters and Kara accepted it. A moment later, the stern face of an older woman appeared before her.
“Damn, you’re a weird one! Are you Adrienne’s daughter? Is he aboard?”
“What? Yes! No! She took him!”
“She? Airtha?” the woman asked, and Kara nodded vigorously.
“Damn! Well, we’re exposed anyway, might as well save your ass. I‘ve opened our bay doors. Get in here. Fast!”
Kara didn’t have to be told twice as she saw which of the freighters had opened its doors. She banked her pinnace sharply, fired its engines to brake and lined up with the ship. Less than thirty seconds later, her pinnace was skidding to a halt inside the freighter’s docking bay.