Ghost of an Empire (Sentinel Series Book 3)

by Richard Flunker

  “At least were not being blown off,” Hosha joked. He looked back up at Deespa. “More of your magic?”

  The Queen rested her hand on the center console and leaned over a bit, rubbing her head.

  “You grew up on Earth, is that not correct?” she asked, suddenly changing the subject.

  “Yes, I was born and raised in Osaka. Lived there till I went off to Mars,” he replied, eyeing her carefully.

  “Your father was from there as well?”

  “He was,” he said.

  “Your father was an artist?”

  “An artist? No. He was a tradesman and lead designer for Tagashi Shipyards.”

  Deespa looked back up along the blue trail. “I’ve seen his designs. The Nakati and Minimoto line of personal cruisers were his design were they not?”

  Hosha nodded, still wondering why she was talking about his father.

  “Beautiful designs. A space vessel only needs to be a box and a drive, but he did much more,” she added. “He made them seem alive. They were a warm reflection of man in the cold of space.”

  “That’s,” Hosha said, softly, “What my father used to say.”

  “He was an artist. It seems to be it runs in the family.”

  “Thank you?” Hosha asked, raising an eyebrow.

  “How far back does it go?”

  “You have done your homework, I see.”

  “What do you think of your grandfather?” she asked.

  “He was banned and exiled. There is nothing more.”

  Deespa turned and looked deep into Hosha’s eyes.

  “Some consider what he did art,” she pointed out.

  “Most consider what he did illegal,” Hosha countered, “a crime. Creating fully formed AI is still incredibly taboo, even if you leave out the criminal aspect of it.”

  “Is that what you think?” she asked. She was studying him now, and Hosha could sense it.

  “Does it matter what I think? It was a crime,” Hosha replied.

  “It always matters what one thinks. If it didn’t matter, then why think at all?”

  “And here I thought I was the one that usually did the interviews. I must confess I am confused by this line of questions,” Hosha asked boldly.

  “You met one of his creations, did you not?”

  Hosha’s eyes narrowed.

  “How do you know that?”

  “You believed her to be real, did you not?” she continued asking.

  “Tricked.”

  Deespa turned and walked over to one of her Doomguard.

  “Tricks can be useful,” she said, tapping on the chest plate of the mech, “but not necessarily bad.”

  The mech split down the middle, opening up as any mech would to allow the pilot to enter. To Hosha’s surprise, there was no pilot. Instead, where the pilot usually stood, there was a small device, about the size of a small child. It was a cube, with a large glowing sphere set halfway into the top. The cube was connected to the mech by several dozen cables. She tapped the Doomguard again, and it closed up.

  Hosha looked up at the Queen.

  “AI?” he asked, in a hushed tone. He half expected Martian police to come crashing through the doors once again.

  “No, but you thought it was. Your fear stemmed not from what it actually might have been, but instead from a memory of your past. A fear built on having lost someone you loved.”

  “How? You know what, don’t answer,” Hosha stepped back. “Why are you asking me these things?”

  “Are you afraid of what might have been in this guard?” she asked, looking directly at the reporter.

  “They caused the death of billions,” he replied, thinking that was enough.

  “Did they?” she asked.

  Before Hosha could try to answer, Ogho came up to the Queen.

  “You should see this my Queen,” he pointed towards the edge of the platform.

  She stepped over to the ledge and looked down. The blue trail of light ended at a circular pad, lit up around its diameter. Just the right size for the platform. As they got closer, it became clear they were reaching the bottom.

  “Twenty nine miles Tech Elgers?” she asked, turning back towards the tech.

  She glanced down at her tablet and nodded.

  The platform settled into the lit circle perfectly. The raised edge of the platform lowered itself flat, and the Doomguard stepped out first, followed by Ogho’s pod. As Deespa waited for the troops to do their duties and surround the area around the platform, she turned to the reporter yet again.

  “Reporter, have you heard of the ten thousand vaults of Agrabah?”

  Hosha knew the story well enough. “Everyone has heard of it. Old Arabian tale that was converted to Dominion legend. You think this is the vaults of legend?”

  The Doomguard returned and bid the Queen to follow them. As she stepped forward off the platform, Hosha followed.

  “And about its origins, what do the legends say?” she asked.

  The tech came off the platform as well, and the two ordinary humans followed the Queen as she strode along a small pathway in the dark. Ahead of them, the headlamps of the Doomguard and the mechs lit up the way dimly.

  “Uhm, you are better off asking someone who has expertise in Dominion history.”

  “Humor me reporter,” she requested.

  “Well, the common story is that it was hollowed out of the earth by the first ten million slaves that Ergos the first brought to Coran.”

  “Tell me,” Deespa said, as they followed the path to its end at a wall that seemed to climb forever into the darkness, “Does this look like the product of slaves? Even ten million of them?”

  “I don’t really know.”

  “I don’t think so.” At the wall, Deespa called the tech over and had her stand right next to the wall. “I think, that like everything else Dominion, this was stolen as well.”

  The Queen stepped right up to the wall. It was rough, like rock. She reached out with her hand and grabbed onto a chunk of rock. With her fingers, she scraped against the wall once. Then she did it a second time, and this time, she cut chunks of the rock with her hand. They came crumbling off like dry mud. Beneath the rock was a smooth surface. She stepped back and motioned towards Ogho, who, along with a few other of his mechs, came forward and started chipping at the wall with their hands and kicking with their feet.

  Deespa stood back and watched as the layer of filth and crust came crumbling off, revealing a clearly artificial wall. While the men continued to scrape off the cover, the Queen stepped forward and put her hands on the smooth surface. As she felt around, she found a spot, and sank her hand into the wall. Calmly, she pulled back, and the wall came with her, like a gel. After she pulled it a foot out, she removed her hand, and then touched the tip of the protrusion she had pulled out. It lit up, then formed a flat surface.

  “Ms. Elgers, the reader, please.”

  She handed it over, and Deespa removed the small device and cable from her forearm again, and attached it directly to the reader. She waited for a moment, then disconnected it. After handing the reader back to the tech, she reached towards the small display screen she had pulled from the wall, and attached her own device to it. It lit up immediately, and the display came to life. It began to stream data in a swirl, then the screen darkened. Her device fell off and the screen liquefied and slinked back into the wall, where it fused with the smoothness.

  The outline of a door took shape in front of them, which was followed by a hiss. The door slid open, leading into a well-lit hallway. Deespa took one step forward, then stopped.

  “First Tennant, secure the area and await my return. Keep your guard up and be ready to evacuate immediately should the need arise.”

  “I will not leave unless you are on the platform my Queen,” he replied.

  She nodded, then motioned the reporter to follow her.

  “I would not record anything here,” she pointed out, “But I do need you to remember everything you
see here.”

  “What is this place?” he asked, stepping through the door after the Queen.

  “A garden of Eden.”

  Hosha half expected to have to follow an incredibly long hallway, but instead, after just twenty feet, they found themselves in a small room. It was perfectly spherical, as best as he could see. The walls were white, almost luminescent, which contrasted incredibly to the dark object in the middle of the room at the very bottom of the sphere. It was roughly the shape of a diamond, and it had a black surface that appeared to absorb the light, as there was absolutely no reflection of any kind.

  The Doomguard quickly spread out around the room, their rifles aimed towards the object. Deespa entered the room and walked slowly down towards the object, stopping ten feet short of it. Hosha remained behind at the edge of the entrance to the room.

  “What is it?” he exclaimed. “What is this place?”

  “I know not what it is,” she said, “but it was what called me here.”

  “Wait,” Hosha said, surprise in his voice, “That thing, whatever it is, it called you?”

  “No. Actually, it did not call me, but I did hear its message. It was how I was able to find this place.”

  The Queen raised both of her hands and closed her eyes. Hosha watched, a bit confused, until he saw the light shimmer in front of her. She was manipulating gravity with her hands again, like she had done at the executions. The light distorted everywhere, shimmering and waving. It reminded Hosha of the feeling one had when first waking up, and their vision was just a bit blurry. She continued doing that for a minute, then stopped.

  “Who,” Hosha began, “WHAT... are you?”

  Deespa turned around, her mouth open to respond, when a voice shook the room.

  “An aberration!”

  Both Deespa and Hosha turned about, looking around the room for the source of the voice.

  “I awoke from this gentle slumber, again. I called out to my servants, but the first I find is anything but.”

  The voice echoed through the walls, through the floor and through the air. Hosha clapped his hands over his ears, but the voice vibrated through his skull. He turned, and saw Deespa doubled over, her hands over her ears as well. It reminded him of the previous night on the roof of the depot.

  “I was awoken once. Your primitive forms had arrived here. How they fell through my program, I have yet to understand, but I will. I was defeated then, but I will not this time.”

  A nearly inaudible buzz filled the air. Hosha watched as the Queen threw her head back and screamed. The sound was nearly as piercing as the phantasm voice that echoed through the room.

  “You are of a kind, yet not. Strange that I find you, or better, that you found me. Perhaps, you are the tool I require to finish off your kind. Yet you struggle, you fight me. You cannot fight an eon of power. You are but a speck among the vastness of the universe. You are not allowed to remain among the living.”

  Deespa continued to fight with the unseen invader. She trashed and threw herself on the floor, her screams almost unreal. Hosha watched the Doomguard, half expecting some kind of reaction to defend their Queen, but they stood there, frozen. Hosha ran up to one of them.

  “DO SOMETHING!” he shouted, banging on the metal frame to no avail.

  “You continue to defy me? I can sense what you are,” the voice continued to thunder through the room, “you are nothing of either world. Can you not feel that I have already taken control of the machine? Release your physical body to me and I will lift you from your pain. You will be my herald. You can usher in a new era of creation. These primates and simpletons will be exterminated and order can return.”

  Hosha watched as the Queen suddenly stopped struggling. The reporter didn’t have any idea what was going on, but he was utterly terrified. Whatever it was that they had found here was attempting to use the Queen, probably one of the most powerful people in the galaxy, for its own designs. He half expected her to stand up and murder him.

  She did stand, but she didn’t turn.

  “You betray yourself ancient one. I have seen your designs and am free of them. I will not be yours, and your enslavement over my kind will end. I sense your fear, for even in your greatest program, there is no code for what is before you. I am a ghost. I am the daughter of man and machine. You cannot have me, nor man, nor machine.”

  She brushed her hair back and stood up tall. Sweat poured down her forehead and all over her body, blood poured from what appeared to be burn marks and cuts in her skin.

  “Foolish creation. Feel the wrath of my hand now. If you will not bow, then you will have to perish.” The voice thundered in anger.

  “I have seen your hand before. Before we are finished, I shall cut it from you,” Deespa shouted at the black object in spite. She turned and gave Hosha one look and said: “Run!”

  She did a back flip, landing on her feet at the entrance of the room. Hosha turned to run down the short hallway. The Doomguard turned and faced the Queen and raised their rifles. With one motion of her hand, a guard closest to her went flying back into another, smashing it a clump against the mech. Moving as fast as lightning, she reached out and snatched the rifle from the guard on her left, smashing through its arm. She spun around and kicked it right in the torso, throwing it back. With the rifle in hand, she fired one shot, then dashed down the hallway. It had all taken two seconds.

  Hosha came rushing out of the hallway and into the dark vault. He could hear the buzzing clash of plasma bolts being fired down the hall way. As he ran though, Ogho looked up in surprise. He turned his gaze back down the hallway just as the Queen came crashing through.

  “The Doomguard are compromised. We must leave now,” she said, rushing past them.

  Ogho’s pod came to life immediately, three mechs jumping forward. They began to fire down into the hallway, their bullets smashing sparks into the wall. Two Doomguard came bounding out. A plasma bolt hit a pod mech right in chest and it crumbled in a mass of molten metal and burnt flesh. Ogho returned fire, hitting several shots to the head of the Doomguard, but the armor was too strong.

  A third Doomguard came out, shooting shards of green energy after the Queen who was nearly at the platform. Two mechs dove in the way, only to get hit. Ogho began to retreat, unloading his weapon on the Doomguard with little effect. As the three continued to cut a path of death through his soldiers, Ogho felt panic for the first time in as long as he could remember. He had seen the Doomguard in action. They didn’t stand a chance. He kept retreating until he backed right up to the heavy.

  A whistle pierced the chaos, and a bright light blinded everyone as a laser beam cut through the darkness and pulverized one of the Doomguard. Two more shots followed, taking each of the other two out, and then a third shot hit the doorway, collapsing it. The heavy mech continued to blast its giant weapon down onto the wall as Ogho’s men ran back and retrieved their men, dragging them back to the platform. As the last of the soldiers was pulled back onto the elevator, Deespa looked back at the tech.

  “Get us out of here fast,” she ordered.

  The soldier in the heavy mech opened his torso and stepped out. He tapped a few buttons on his consoles, then did a back flip onto the platform as it rose up into the darkness. Hosha watched as the heavy mech continued to fire on the doorway. The smell of overheating metal wafted up to them, and he could see the large laser beam begin to glow red from overheating. The pilot stood next to him, and when the mech was shrinking away, he tapped on his wrist. The heavy mech began walking forward, still firing its laser at the ever crumbling wall. Ten feet from the wall, the overheated weapon finally gave out. It sizzled in a bright light, and the metal sank through the mech. When it reached the reactor, it exploded. Even in the darkness of the vault, the explosion was bright, and within moments, the shockwave reached them. Hosha held on to the ledge with all of his strength. Then the darkness returned.

  He stepped away from the ledge, and through the moans and groans of the injured m
e. Those that could, exited their mechs and threw them off the side. Many were not able to, and a few would never be able to. Ogho and his men had managed to get everyone back though. Hosha made his way over to the Queen, who was standing next to the center dais, leaning on it with her hand.

  “Ms. Elgers, can you establish a link to the surface?” she asked of the tech.

  The young woman looked down at her tablet, and nodded her head no.

  “We are just too far away. Sorry.”

  “Stay on the comm. As soon as you have a link, I need you to get a broadcast to Union HQ and Harmoa command. Here is my authorization code,” Deespa leaned in and typed something on her tablet.

  “What is the message my Queen?”

  “Evacuate Coran. Every single man woman and child, off of the planet immediately.”

  The young tech stood there shocked, unsure of what she had heard. Ogho stepped forward, realizing the gravity of the situation.

  “My Queen, what can I do?”

  “Prepare your men. The enemy is coming,” she said, looking away distractedly.

  “From down there?” Ogho asked, pointing back to the darkness.

  “No. From everywhere else.”

  The super soldier took a step back. The usual confidence in him drained away. He then turned and began talking with some of his men. Hosha took the window to stand next to the Queen.

  “That thing down there, what was it?”

  “Something old. Older than any one of us.”

  “But you know what it is?”

  “It’s something I saw, in another life,” she replied, looking down at the center console. Looking up, there was nothing to see but the blue trail of light.

  “Down there, you said you were man and machine? It tried to control you? All that talk about AI. Are you one?” Hosha asked, unsure if he would like the answer.

  “It is far more complicated than that.”

  “You can’t expect me to keep that all to myself do you?”

  “Perhaps not. But I don’t think my story is the most important thing right now.”

  “What is then?” he asked. If the Queen was some kind of AI, some type of cyborg creature, certainly there was no other story as great in the entire universe.