The Phoenix Darkness

by Richard L. Sanders

  “Okay, Miles, just be cool,” said Calvin. “We all have a mission to do, Alex included.”

  Also with them was Rafael, who stood, looking rather resolute with his one eye and eye patch, leaning against the ops console. He’d kept an unusually shrewd watch over Alex since they’d arrived in Rotham space, Calvin had noticed, but he’d decided that was for the best, since that duty had been assigned to Rafael when they left.

  “Rafael,” said Calvin, “tell me what, if anything, you can get on those scopes.”

  Rafael nodded, then turned around. As he worked the Wanderer’s decidedly low-tech instruments, Calvin motioned for Alex to take the pilot’s seat so there’d be more room, and Miles just stared at Alex, as if taking it upon himself to be Alex’s watchdog whenever Rafael had his back turned.

  Calvin had thought of this general area based on some Intel Wing knowledge he recalled regarding various war scenarios drawn up by them on request of Fleet Command should the nations ever return to war. It was determined that the likeliest location for the Rotham to group their fleets together to invade The Corridor, but keep them distant enough to avoid long-range detection by Imperial and Alliance listening posts and other instruments, was a region of space the Empire called “The Red Spot.” Alex, and presumably the rest of his people, had a different name for it, but the idea was the same. The fleet grouped up inside a cluster of three red giants, just barely far enough apart to have not formed into a single supermassive star. And, sure enough, their initial glimpse from a distant flyby seemed to reveal a mass of starships, difficult to identify, centered right in the midst of the star cluster.

  Now the Wanderer had cautiously crept to a new position, a vantage point that, after some discussion and disagreement, Calvin and Alex had compromised on, which would allow them to get a better picture of what the fleet of starships looked like without drawing undue attention to themselves. They positioned their tiny ship to be mostly invisible inside a vast, dispersed debris field.

  “Get me as good of images as you can,” said Calvin, trying not to hover over Rafael’s shoulder.

  “I’ll do my best…it’s really hard with this equipment. I wish we were on the Nighthawk.”

  “You and me both,” said Calvin.

  “Amen!” added Miles.

  Alex remained silent.

  “It’s definitely a formation of ships,” said Rafael. “And a lot of them. If they give me enough time, I can get some decent readings.”

  “Take the time,” said Calvin.

  “I will. Provided they don’t leave or, you know, discover us and come kill us, I think I can get some useful information for the queen.”

  “Excellent; keep me informed,” said Calvin. He started to scoot his way backwards and toward the exit.

  “You’re leaving?” asked Miles, sounding a little disappointed.

  “Yeah, I’d better check on the others below.”

  “Want some company?”

  “Nah, I need you here to keep an eye on this one,” Calvin said, motioning toward Alex with his thumb. This made Miles smile.

  “Gotcha, loud and clear, Cal.”

  Alex looked at Calvin with an unamused frown, but didn’t otherwise retort.

  When Calvin turned to exit the Bridge, he very nearly crashed headfirst into Rain Poynter who, evidently, was trying to enter the Bridge at the same time, probably to see what all the excitement was all about. Calvin stopped himself suddenly by grabbing the first thing he could find, part of the hatch lever, which also happened to have a very sharp edge. It sliced the top of his left palm, but he managed not to go slamming onto the deck and bringing Rain down with him.

  “Son of a—” he mumbled quietly, as the pain of, essentially, a giant paper cut shot through him.

  “Oh, no,” said Rain, instinctively taking his hand and opening it, which caused more pain, but he fought the instinct to react. “Here, come with me, I’ll get this treated.” She led him through the corridor and toward the cargohold that’d been converted into a makeshift infirmary.

  As he disappeared around the corner, he heard Miles call after him, “You okay, Cal?”

  “Fine,” Calvin yelled back. And, to be honest, part of him actually did feel rather fine, despite the searing, superficial pain. He wouldn’t have thought he’d like it so much, but the fact that Rain gently held his hand with hers, all the way to the infirmary, was surprisingly pleasant. Her long fingers were warm to the touch and slender, like one would expect of a pianist. As she cleaned the wound, applied disinfectant, and bandaged it, Calvin found his eyes moving upward from Rain’s sweet, tender hands and up her loose-fitting scrubs, I really ought to get her some better fitting scrubs, all the way to her wild tangle of red hair and eyes so pale-blue and majestic they could have disarmed a bomb.

  “There you go,” she said, letting his hand go. It might have been his imagination, but she seemed to let go of his hand more slowly than would be normal, almost as if her fingers wanted to linger there, holding his…

  Snap out of it, Calvin! He blinked, clearing away the beautiful image that was Rain’s eyes and pale face, and looked away. “Uh, thank you, Rain.”

  “You’re very welcome, Calvin,” she said. “Now, I know it hurts now, but trust me, it’ll heal quickly.”

  “Actually, it’s feeling quite a bit better already,” he said, though not quite sure why; the pain was as ever-present as before.

  “Oh, good, I’m glad to hear it,” she said with her trademark smile, which, Calvin swore, had the power to bring cheer to even a man on his deathbed. “So, where were you off to in such a hurry?” she asked. Clearly it was an invitation for Calvin to stick around and visit, something he’d been contemplating doing, but wasn’t quite sure how to make happen in a non-awkward way.

  “Well, one of my errands was to come check on you, ironically enough,” said Calvin. “To see how you’ve been getting by since we’ve entered Rotham space.”

  ***

  It had taken an entire shift cycle: white, red, and green, and still they'd not arrived at Izar Ceti. This had been expected, of course, once the distance was calculated, but nonetheless, Summers found herself on pins and needles while in the command chair and unable to sleep when relieved. The isotome weapons, the rest of them, were within their grasp.

  It is up to me to destroy them, she made herself promise. Calvin had done his part, he’d eliminated fifteen of the thirty weapons, now it was up to Summers to eradicate the last fifteen. Even if it meant sacrificing the Nighthawk to do it, she’d gladly pay the price. She only wondered if her crew felt the same way.

  “Attention all of you,” she said to those with her on the Bridge. Sarah, Shen, Mr. Roy, and Nimoux each looked at her, clearly expecting some new instructions. “I have an important question to ask each of you, and I would feel better knowing your opinion on the matter.” Even Pellew, who was there along with two soldiers whose presence Summers did not understand, looked at her with anticipation.

  “Yes, Commander?” asked Nimoux from her left. His presence on the Bridge still seemed to inspire a degree of awe and apprehension among the other officers, except for Pellew, who was on record as distrusting him.

  “When we arrive at Izar Ceti, there is a good possibility we will encounter the rest of the isotome weapons. I expect them to be aboard Zander’s ship.”

  “Isn’t that what we’re hoping for?” asked Sarah.

  “Yes, it is,” said Summers. “Now, I don’t think I need to tell you how very critical it is to the safety of the Empire that we succeed.”

  “No, Commander, you don’t need to explain,” said Nimoux. “Those weapons, if I understand what you’ve told me correctly, represent the single-most savage weapons of mass destruction ever designed. I think I speak for us all when I say we will do whatever it takes to eliminate them.”

  “Even if it means the loss of the Nighthawk?” she asked, looking at each and every one of them, “and potentially the loss of our lives?” This seemed to sobe
r them up.

  “I don’t see why it would come to that,” said Nimoux. “The Nighthawk has the Duchess heavily outgunned, and there’s no indication Zander has any knowledge we are coming. I don’t believe he's leading us into a trap. I think we can perform this operation without any loss of life on our end.”

  “True, that is the hope,” said Summers, looking Nimoux in the eyes. “But nothing is ever certain, and you know as well as I it might come to that.” She looked at the others once more. “So, what I need to know, from each of you, is whether, should that moment arrive, we are prepared to do whatever it takes, and sacrifice whatever it takes, to ensure those weapons are destroyed. Are we all of one mind?”

  “I am,” said Nimoux; it’d taken him all of half a second to think it over. “I don’t want to die or lose the ship and, as I’ve said, I don’t believe we’ll be faced with that situation. But, if we are, then I think our responsibility is clear. We each took oaths to protect and defend the Empire, including at the cost of self-sacrifice, and I can think of no nobler way to go out than eliminating the greatest danger ever conceived.”

  “Hear, hear,” said Mr. Roy.

  “I don’t think we’re going to die,” said Sarah. “Not if I’m flying the ship. And if Calvin taught me anything, there’s always a way. We can do this without losing the ship.”

  “But if it came down to it, Lieutenant?” asked Summers, looking sternly at her helmsman.

  “Then, yes, of course, I would do it. Imagine the alternative. What if we didn’t and those weapons got used on some system? Billions of people…I couldn’t live with that on my conscience.”

  “Neither could I,” said Summers.

  “Nor I,” said Nimoux. A somber look came over him, and he looked down at his hands briefly. When he looked up again, a moment later, the somberness was gone, but Summers had seen it. There’s something he hasn’t told me, she thought. He's carrying some kind of burden; some kind of guilt.

  “I’m not afraid to die,” said Shen in a tone that made it seem he’d almost welcome it. “And if it means the chance to help some people on my way out, well, it’d be hard to say no to that.”

  “Thank you,” said Summers, extremely proud of her bridge officers. It was then that she heard a small cough and noticed Pellew, leaning against a console, raising a solitary hand as if waiting for permission to speak.

  “At the risk of presenting an unpopular opinion,” he said, quickly adding, “now, just hear me out. Please have an open mind.”

  “Very well,” said Summers, folding her arms in disapproval. Doubting she was going to like hearing whatever he was about to say.

  “What if, instead of destroying the weapons, we took them for ourselves?”

  “What?!?” Summers was flabbergasted. “What sort of criminal do you take me for?”

  “Now, wait a moment, you said you’d hear me out,” said Pellew, clearing his throat. “Think about it. Right now we have many military threats, both inside the Empire and outside of it. There’s the civil war going on, the threat of Rotham or Polarian invasion. For all we know, the Dread Fleet could be on the move, ready to purge all of us from existence.”

  “Yes, there are a great many threats,” said Summers. “Which we will stand against in turn as we are required.”

  “Which is admirable and noble and all of the above,” said Pellew. “But what if this: what if instead of having to stand against threat after threat, with increasingly reduced forces, and ever longer odds of success, we didn’t have to?”

  “How do you mean?” asked Summers.

  “Simple. If we have the most dangerous weapons in the galaxy, no one will dare attack us. No one would dare mess with us for fear of what we could do to them!”

  “You, sir, are suggesting we take isotome weapons for ourselves so that, should anyone offend or attack us, we could respond by destroying an entire star system, slaughtering billions of innocent lives?” Summers remained un-amused.

  “No, don’t you see?” urged Pellew. “If we have the weapons, and everyone knows we have them, then we’ll never have to use them, because no one would dare attack us.”

  “And suppose they did anyway?” asked Summers. “What then? We’d be required to respond. Otherwise, our threat would mean nothing anymore, and our response would necessarily be brutal. It’d be worse than brutal. To use those weapons…it’d be a crime against all life itself!”

  Pellew sighed, looking quite frustrated. He pointed at Nimoux. “Captain, you were a military man before you put on the black-and-silver, you’ve led soldiers into battle like I have. You understand the power of deterrence. No one attacks an enemy they know is so overwhelmingly superiorly dangerous that your destruction is assured.”

  “I’m familiar with the strategy,” said Nimoux. He too looked un-persuaded.

  “Go on, then, be useful. Explain it to her,” Pellew pointed at Summers.

  “Actually, Captain,” said Nimoux in a tone which was not disrespectful, but also clearly not friendly. “I happen to agree with the commander. These weapons are too deadly to exist. The fact that they do is an affront against all principles of morality, and they should never be used, never even be threatened to be used.”

  Pellew looked like he could not believe what he was hearing. “Are you serious?” He looked from one of his soldiers to the other. “Can you believe this?” he looked back at Nimoux. “Maybe your days in Intel Wing have made you soft, Captain, but if you were still in Her Majesty’s armed services, I’m sure you’d agree with me.”

  Nimoux looked on the cusp of saying something quite angry. Apparently something in Pellew’s words had stung him in some way, although Summers was not entirely sure how. Yet, despite the wound, Nimoux did not allow himself to be baited and his response was as calm as before. “Captain Pellew, the strategy you describe is a very old and ancient one. And one which, among civilized nations, with tremendous security, has, historically, been proven to work.”

  “You see,” said Pellew.

  “But,” added Nimoux. “Only for a while. In the mid-post-industrial age on Eurosis, there were three large national superpowers which each stockpiled tremendous arsenals of nuclear weapons.”

  “Yes, exactly, and none of the three went to war with each other because of mutually-assured destruction. The nuclear option saved them during a time of high tensions from having their world erupt into another bloodbath of a world war which would have claimed the lives of hundreds of millions.”

  “Yes, the nuclear option did seem to work, for a time,” said Nimoux. “But it was an unstable solution. With each new nuclear weapon manufactured and added to the stockpile, a new liability was created. And all other nations, in order to remain viable, had to create such arsenals of their own. Before long, everyone had vast stockpiles of nuclear weapons which no one wanted to use and everyone wished would go away, but instead they were trapped in a cycle of creating ever more of them. And do you remember what happened then?”

  “They didn’t have a world war, that’s what happened,” said Pellew.

  “Correct, although what they had was almost as bad. Eventually, some of the regimes became weaker over time, yet stockpiles of nuclear weapons remained high and, eventually, before too long, one of those nations had much of its nuclear inventory stolen. Those weapons, in the wrong hands, in the hands of an enemy with nothing to lose and no nation to protect, had no qualms about putting them to use. The resulting nuclear blasts killed millions in the most brutal way imaginable for that time period. And the aftermath of it set off a chain of nuclear retribution and paranoia which nearly led to a nuclear holocaust that might have wiped out the entire population. If that’d happened, what do you suppose it would have meant for us here today?”

  Pellew had no response. He didn’t look happy, and Summers could tell a part of him, probably his pride, still clung to the thread that his plan of isotome deterrence held greater wisdom. But he also seemed to accept the arguments of Nimoux, and the fact that the
rest of the crew stood against him ideologically.

  “Well, then I suppose I’m outvoted,” said Pellew, almost casually. “Commander,” he looked at Summers, “it’s your decision. If you want those weapons gone, then I’ll see it done. I just thought I’d give you another option, if you saw any wisdom in taking it.”

  “Thank you, Captain Pellew,” said Summers, “but we are now committed to our course of action. We shall destroy those weapons, no matter what the cost is to us.”

  “Understood.”

  With that, Summers turned her attention back to the status of the mission. “Report, all stations.”

  “All defense systems are go,” said Mr. Roy. “As for the stealth system, it’s engaged and functioning normally.” He seemed out of place here, amongst the elite officers of White Shift. But with Red Shift understaffed and Summers’ decision to convince Calvin to take their main gunner, that idiot Miles Brown, with him on his mission, that left a vacancy at the defense post for White Shift. Initially, Summers had intended on filling the spot herself and indeed, depending on Mr. Roy’s skill, or lack thereof she might still exercise that option. After all, she’d trained as a defense officer before accepting promotion into command. However, at Cassidy’s suggestion, Summers had reluctantly agreed to give Mr. Roy a shot. With the stakes as high as these, he’d damn sure better not mess this up.

  “All systems operating within expected parameters, sir,” said Shen. He answered the question politely and matter-of-factly, but it seemed to Summers something was missing in their brilliant Ops chief or, at the very least, different. Like someone had drained out all the hope and cheer and replaced it with nihilistic glumness. Unfortunate, tragic even, but none of Summers’ business. She wasn’t any kind of accredited therapist and so she knew she could be of no help to Mr. Iwate. As long as he attended shifts in a timely fashion and performed his duties with the level of excellence that’d come to be expected of him, Summers had no quarrel with him.