Most of the marine platoon remained outside the interrogation room, but two Gok and two humans did accompany Keyes inside, along with Sergeant Caine.
No one sat. The three aliens stood against the far wall, opposite the interrogation table from Keyes and the armed marines.
“Well,” Keyes said. “What have you come to say?”
“I am Porah,” said the Kaithian who Keyes had mostly spoken to on their homeworld—she’d been his conduit to what they called their “Consensus.” Porah leaned back against the wall, her powerful tail stabilizing her stance. “Ochrim has convinced us that we must participate in your war.”
“If you’re truly participating, then it’s our war. Either way, it’s interesting to note that you’re willing to listen to an Ixan but not a human.”
“Ochrim offered the stronger argument. Additionally, he has been a friend of the Kaithe for a long time. He’s exhibited wisdom beyond anything we’ve witnessed from the other species.”
“What did he say to convince you?”
“He persuaded us that Baxa is truly a threat to all life.”
Keyes squinted at the blue-white alien. “That’s exactly what we told you.”
“I brought a new piece of information,” Ochrim put in. “One not yet known to you: Baxa is not the only threat. He wasn’t created by the Ixa—quite the reverse, actually. Baxa was sent by a separate species, unknown to us, who have deployed similar AIs to galaxies throughout the local cluster. Their mission is to secure all resources by eliminating each galaxy’s intelligent life in the most cost-efficient way possible. Baxa’s method for doing so was to engineer my species and implant himself in our genetic memory, though the other AIs may have different methods. He designed our brains so that they could easily be harnessed for additional processing power when the time came, which it seems it has. Baxa is now growing increasingly intelligent with each new Ixan he harvests.”
“How do you know this?” Keyes asked.
“Baxa told me. He wishes for me to rally the other species, and for us to do everything we can to defeat him. It’s in his programming to want to be tested, to determine whether he represents an optimized solution to his creators’ problem—namely, domination of the entire universe.”
Keyes grunted. “And here you are, doing his bidding once again.”
“This is different. Before, he tricked me into thinking your extermination represented the only way for life to continue existing in any form. Now, I realize that the future he strove for involved all life getting either assimilated or destroyed by him. Yes, I am still conforming to his agenda by opposing him, or rather his creators’ agenda, but what can I do but oppose him?”
Ochrim heaved a shaky sigh. “I have always acted in the way I considered most ethical, though I do not consider that an excuse for what I have done to your species, Admiral Keyes. I am truly sorry. However, I know that words are meaningless when considered alongside the atrocities I have perpetrated. If I can help you to win this war, I pray that it will earn me some modicum of absolution. Either way, even if we win, it seems we have a much larger project to attend to.”
“The other AIs.”
“Yes.” Weariness appeared to hit the scientist suddenly, and he took a seat at the interrogation table, causing the human marines to shift nervously. The Gok marines remained impassive, their small, onyx eyes fixed on the Ixan. “Whoever created them, they are playing a very long game, and so we must assume they’re incredibly long-lived. Otherwise, they would take on much more risk than they are. Instead, they’re evolving generations of AI that are forged in the fires of conflict. Copies of the strongest among them will proceed to the next galactic cluster to begin the process anew. If time truly is meaningless to the creator species, then why shouldn’t they exercise maximum caution, to keep the chance of defeat as close to zero as possible?”
Slowly, Keyes nodded. He, too, pulled a chair back from the table and took a seat, eyeing Ochrim as he did. After a time, his gaze shifted to Porah. “I’m not sure what the Kaithe’s involvement in the war will be, considering you seem to think of yourselves as pacifists. But before I agree to trust you in combat, there’s something I must know. Why is humanity the only species you’re able to link with?”
Porah and Aheera exchanged long looks, their expressions unreadable. At last, Porah turned to face him. “Humanity has done well.”
Shaking his head a little, Keyes said, “Excuse me? I didn’t ask you to grade us.”
“Hear me, Admiral Keyes. Your species has begun to grasp at the ethical awareness we have hoped for you, for so long. As well, you are becoming pragmatic enough to make the decisions that higher ethics demand.”
“That you’ve…hoped for us?”
“Yes. Your species is both the great pride and the great shame of the Kaithe. When you first came to our planet, and Aheera tested your marines, she did so to test your mettle, to discover how far you’ve come, since…”
“Since what?”
“Since we created you.”
Keyes had nothing to say to that. He didn’t know Kaithe to have much of a sense of humor, but if this was a joke, it was a poor attempt at one.
“Long ago, the Kaithe had designs similar to those of the Ixa. We waged offensive war, for the purposes of increasing our own power, and of accruing more resources for the wealthiest among us. Eventually, elements arose in our society that pushed for peace, pointing to the depravity of our actions. But even they were misguided. They advocated for creating a weapon species, who would wage war for us, keeping our hands clean. That weapon was you. Humanity.”
“Wait,” Keyes said. “You’re serious, aren’t you? A weapon species…”
“Yes. We designed you to be fiercely competitive and individualist. We programmed the lust for battle into your DNA.”
“And the linking…?”
Porah nodded. “Your aggression, paired with our intelligence. That is what we propose to contribute to this war. When all of the Kaithe link together, we have access to cognitive power that rivals Baxa in his current form. And by linking with you, we can grant you access to that power. But Baxa’s intellect grows with every Ixa he adds to his neural network, and if we wait any longer, he will have surpassed even our capacity.”
A long silence ensued, and Caine was the first to break it. “Did you ever use us that way? As a weapon species?”
“No,” Porah said. “Some time after your creation, we came to our senses. We evolved beyond the desire to make war at all, limiting ourselves to only our Home, and converting all of our military might into the Preserver, to ensure we waged only defensive war. Humanity was left to its own devices, a young bloodthirsty species, confused about your purpose. We deeply regret what we did, and for a long time we worried about what you might become. Your actions, however—the actions of Admiral Keyes, and those aboard the Providence—your actions have given us hope.”
Chapter 55
Reckoning
Keyes decided to allow Ochrim his audience with the captains, but before that, he had something to say—not just to the commander of each ship, but to the entire fleet. He ordered his Coms officer to arrange for him a true fleetwide channel: not just one each captain could listen on, but a channel that would co-opt each ship’s broadcast system to relay his voice throughout the corridors of every warship in his fleet.
Once it was done, Keyes leaned slightly forward in the Captain’s chair to speak, as was his habit.
“Women and men of the allied fleet,” he began. “I look at our species today, and I like what I see. Humans, Wingers, Tumbra, and Gok, all working together to oppose a foe who has no interest in justice or peace—only domination. I see most of us dedicating ourselves to helping civilians flee oppression and death, and I see some of us volunteering to continue fighting the foe, even when we know the chances of victory are nonexistent. I see bravery and noble sacrifice.” Keyes paused. “I also see blindness.”
He shifted slightly in his seat, lettin
g his listeners digest that. “I’m not placing blame. I can’t, because I’m one of the primary sources of that blindness. But there is blindness nevertheless. During the last war meeting of the captains, I advocated for throwing ourselves at the Ixa; a course of desperation and even suicide. Many of you joined me, and I am honored by your sacrifice, which is why it pains me to tell you that I was woefully misguided. I pushed for that course of action out of hatred for our enemy more than anything else, and whether or not that hatred was justified, the course was the wrong one. We must fight to win—with the aim not only of defeating the Ixa but of preserving our species for generations to come. Our children must be given the opportunity to live and be prosperous. They must. We must settle for nothing less.”
Keyes slowly rose from his seat, knowing that his image was being transmitted to anyone in the fleet watching a viewscreen.
“Many of you agreed to join me on my misguided suicide run, but I no longer call for that. Now, I’m calling on every last warship in this fleet to join me in an attack on the Ixan home system, with the aim of destroying Baxa. If we can take out their AI, there will be hope for our species. I admit that it’s a long shot. But it’s also the only shot we have. If we flee, the Ixa will not rest until they hunt us down. And so we must fight.
“The Kaithe have granted us a tool that may sway the coming battle in our favor. That is a matter to be discussed at a war meeting with every fleet captain present. But I can tell you this: when we attack the Baxa System, it will almost certainly draw the rest of the Ixa to us, who are now attacking our colonized systems. That will spare billions of living people from joining the billions that have already died. And once those Ixa come to us, that will be our chance. To fight for our lives. Our future. And our children. I cannot guarantee victory, but I refuse to accept defeat. Win or lose, I can promise you one thing. There will be a reckoning.”
Nodding curtly, he gestured for the Coms officer to end the transmission.
Chapter 56
A Terrible Soldier
Keyes’s boots clicked against the deck as he strode through Engineering, running his hands along the cool, metal bulkhead.
Everything I’ve fought for. Everything the Providence has meant to me.
For a time, he’d become unworthy of her. Unworthy to walk her corridors, let alone to captain her. He saw that, now. Keyes had treated her like a tool with which to impose his will on the universe, specifically the part of it that contained Ixa. He’d wanted nothing more than to point the supercarrier’s weapons at every Ixan warship he saw, firing until he ran out of ammunition.
I still want that. And yet…
It wasn’t only about fighting Ixa, now. It wasn’t about knowing they would die by the thousands to the Providence’s mighty guns. He’d finally let go of his blind rage, and he’d found his way back to his reasons for fighting.
This ship was never supposed to be about war. That was just a means to an end.
The Providence was about foresight. About justice. And about defending humans from aggressors, so that they could determine for themselves how they wanted their future to look.
“Ready to go into battle one more time, old girl?” he asked her.
The Providence responded as she always did—by abiding, as a solid presence that had never let him down and never would.
He opened a channel with his sensor operator in the CIC. “Werner, kindly locate Captain Husher and Sergeant Caine and ask them to meet me outside my office.”
“Yes, sir.”
Keyes kept his hands on his ship’s bulkhead as he walked, even as he entered busier corridors. He refused to break contact with his ship. I’ll never let myself fall out of touch with her again.
Husher and Caine were waiting for him when he reached his office, the latter wearing a blank expression. On the other hand, Husher all but glared. Keyes took a moment to wonder whether either of them had attempted to defy his order to discontinue their romantic liaison. Probably not. He might have expected that from Husher, but not from Caine. She was too good a soldier.
Husher, on the other hand, was a terrible soldier. Being a good soldier meant following orders without question, which Husher had no problems with, unless of course he objected to those orders, which was often.
He makes a damned fine leader, though. If I can prevent him from getting court-martialed for insubordination long enough to get him back in command of a warship…
But even then, the man would still have a command structure to answer to, providing one survived the war. Husher would just have to find his own way. Keyes truly hoped he managed to. The UHF needed more people like Vin Husher.
“Come in,” he told them, opening the hatch and walking around his desk to take a seat.
They both came to attention, but Keyes waved a hand. “At ease.” He folded his hands together atop his desk. “We’re not time-rich, and I have a thousand other matters to attend to before meeting with the other captains, but I consider this important enough to prioritize. Quite simply, I was wrong to stand in the way of you two. I was wrong, and I apologize.”
Shocked expressions sprouted on both their faces. “You’re…you’re serious, Admiral?” Caine said, and the hope in her voice told him how badly she’d wanted this.
“Yes. What you two are exploring is exactly the sort of thing we’re fighting to save. Maybe you’ll work wonderfully together. Maybe you won’t. Maybe your careers will take you down separate paths, and that might end your relationship altogether. Or it might not. But whatever happens between you, it’s the right to experience it, to live it, that I was wrong to take away. So I rescind my previous order. You’re free to fraternize as you will. Enjoy what time you have left together, because sadly, it may not be very long.”
“Thank you, Admiral,” Caine said, and Husher nodded at him respectfully.
“Dismissed,” Keyes said. They both departed.
He leaned back in his chair, and an unexpected impulse struck him—to contact Arsenyev, tell her to give Werner the CIC, and to come to his office so they could talk.
He brushed it aside. Maybe Husher and Caine could afford to entertain notions like romance in the scant days leading to the final confrontation with the Ixa.
Keyes could not.
Chapter 57
Into the Abyss
When Fesky caught Husher sharing a flask with Wahlburg inside a storage bay for spare Condor parts, he at least had the decency to look embarrassed.
“Madcap,” he said. He was the one holding the flask when Fesky walked in, but he made no effort to conceal it.
He’s caught, and he knows it.
“Didn’t you just get out of the brig?” she said to Wahlburg.
“Yes ma’am.”
“Then get out of my sight, before I send you back there.”
Nodding, Wahlburg shot the flask a final, longing look, then pushed off from the crate where he’d been sitting. At a leisurely pace, he left the storage bay and closed the hatch behind him.
Fesky turned back to Husher. “What are you doing, human?”
The corner of his mouth quirked sideways. “Haven’t we known each other long enough to stop addressing each other by our species names, Fesky?”
“I—” She clacked her beak, her feathers beginning to stick up all over her body. “Yes, we have. I’m sorry, Husher.”
“It’s fine. I know you don’t mean anything by it. I’m just a bit off, today. And a bit drunk.”
“What’s the matter?”
“It’s just…” He trailed off, took a swig from his flask, and then held it out to her. “You want some?”
“No, Husher it’s—” She’d been about to say it was illegal, but something made her stop. “Wingers don’t metabolize alcohol in the same way humans do,” she said instead. “It does nothing for us.”
Husher nodded. “I’ve just been unsettled, lately. Watching the admiral spiral the way he has. We seem to have the old Keyes back, which is good, but now that he is, I ha
ve this unshakable sense of…I don’t know. Dread.”
“I heard he split you and Caine up.”
That brought a sharp glance from Husher. “How do you even know we were together?”
“Rumor travels fast on a warship, even one as big as the Providence. Especially when the rumor involves high-profile officers.”
“Yeah. Well, anyway, he just told Caine and I that he was wrong to try to keep us apart. Said we’re free to do whatever we want. But that’s the thing. Now that I have her back—”
“You’re terrified of losing her.”
Husher’s eyes rose to meet Fesky’s. “Yes. That’s exactly it. How did you know?”
She settled onto the crate Wahlburg had vacated. “It’s how I’ve felt ever since learning Ek was still alive. Obviously it’s different, but after thinking the Fins were extinct and then discovering a single one remained…I’ve been on edge ever since, Husher. Especially now that she’s become such a vital military asset.”
“How do you deal with it?”
“I just do. It’s awful, I’ll admit that, but I can also see how much Ek is contributing. The truly awful thing would be to lock her away from battle, for her protection. Ek has so much to offer, and she needs to be allowed to offer it. There’s risk involved, yes, but that’s life. That’s why the Wingers haven’t tried to stop her from being Flockhead, despite how irrational we’ve always been about the Fins.” Fesky studied Husher’s face—the deep lines that creased his brow. Some of those were new, she felt sure. “You’re probably also worried Keyes will lose his footing again, aren’t you? That he’ll sink back into the hole he was in.”
“Yes. I am, Fesky. I really am.”
“Well, cut it out, okay? You need to stop depending on Admiral Keyes so much. I know he helped you regain your own footing, when you were first consigned to the Providence. And yes, he’s an amazing leader. If he were to slide back into that abyss, it would be a horrible loss. But listen, Husher, you have what it takes to be an excellent leader, too. You just need to acknowledge that, if only to yourself. Then you need to step up and become that leader. Right now would be best. Because our species may not have much time left.”
Reckoning: The Ixan Prophecies Trilogy Book 3 Page 17