From orbit, the explosions on the surface reminded Kwed of the volcanic storms that raged above the newly-forming islands of the great sea back on homeworld. Kwed’s visual segment, when it was a lowly singleton, had flown over those raw lands many times. The sight had left his segment in a state of awe.
And now he commanded powers that dwarfed those natural forces.
Kwed switched to the ground view. He had ordered the dispersal of crawling recorders to evaluate the effectiveness of their bombardment. These machines wouldn’t last long, but the brief glimpses of what the natives perceived as their world was laid waste would raise the spirits of his own crew. He knew the images would be played endlessly on homeworld after their victorious return.
And all would know it was he who had wrought this destruction.
There would be another round of assaults soon, although these would not require direct supervision. After the firestorms burned out and the blast radiation subsided, the buried hunter mechs would burrow up from their underground lairs and attack whatever large, complex organisms survived. The world would be cleansed. The primitive singletons would never have the opportunity to spread to other worlds, never take resources rightly destined for the Otrid. They would be eliminated like the aberrations they were, one more failed experiment in a universe in need of cleansing.
Kwed’s mind turned toward the humans. The Otrid engineering corps was nearly done rebuilding the portal that had been damaged during the previous assault. Soon, he would lead the long-overdue action against the most irksome of singleton species.
He would turn the surface of their small moon molten. Their ships would be broken. Any surviving large ones would be his slaves.
The surface of the world below was still burning as he formulated his final plan.
Chapter 23
The Flush of Coming Battle
Lord Kwed Fighting Sea watched the gateway approach. The monitors in War Vessel 84 showed the great arch and struts gleaming in the stark light from the local star. His fleet was laid out before him like a miniature starfield, awaiting his command. The spores that drifted through his ship spoke of anticipation, resolve, and even slight traces of fear.
It had taken more cycles than he would have liked to repair the gateway after the large one that defended the human outpost damaged it—from the other end, even—but it was now more robust than ever. His fleet was the largest to have been assembled since the ambush of the large one named Faraway, and it was quite likely he would never again see such a massive assemblage of war vessels within his lifetime.
He took in the sight, committing it to the deep tissue memory of all four segments. Someday he would relive it for his amusement.
Spores from his second-in-command drifted across his receptors. He turned, and spied the commander waiting respectfully outside his chamber. Kwed motioned him to enter.
“Report.”
“All irregularities are minor, and I have instituted the necessary corrections. The fleet is ready to enter the gateway upon your command, Lord Kwed.”
“How goes the cleansing of the base world?”
“The planet is still aflame, my Lord. The primary singleton species is eradicated. May whatever new life bubbles up from the ocean depths a million cycles from now be less of a blight upon the galaxy.”
Kwed flicked his primary whip arm in acknowledgment of the report. “You’ve fulfilled your duties well, commander. You shall have the honor of leading the first assault group through the gate.”
“Thank you, Lord Kwed.”
“You’ll engage whatever fleet they have remaining and destroy it. I’ll follow immediately and lead a team to capture the sphere ship of the large one we once commanded.”
The commander shifted his weight from his left legs to his right, indicating discomfort. “Will the large one’s ship truly be a factor? I’ve studied the reports, and the abilities of a large one’s ship seem almost impossible.”
“It was heavily damaged in the last assault, and still carried many of our modifications. If it survived, the humans will have no choice but to keep it close. It represents great power for a singleton species. Too much, of course, which is why we expend so many resources on the humans. Our plan is to hit them with such overwhelming force that it doesn’t matter what they do, but we have to assume the presence of a large one and, at the very least, the damaged ship.”
The commander leaned forward in a hesitant show of assent.
“Do not let these unknowns trouble your mind. Every large one we’ve faced we’ve defeated, even if at great cost. I’ve destroyed one myself, and will do so again if necessary.”
The commander’s body language indicated satisfaction. He then made subtle glances to his left and right, indicating a desire for more secretive communication.
“You may speak freely.”
“I’ve heard you are receiving public praise from the council of Lords for your improvements to the gateway over the original design.”
“I would expect this.”
“Loyalty requires I tell you more. Privately, I’ve also heard through back-channels within the officer corps that many of those same Lords are eyeing your rapid rise with discomfort. Even the new First Lord.”
Kwed almost replied that he expected this also, but kept his comment to himself. The moment called for bravado and a display of confidence. “Let their sail segments shudder,” Kwed replied. “We will be too engaged defeating our enemies to listen to distant Lords gossiping.”
The commander’s sail segment flushed green in amusement. “The only words that matter are being said here,” he replied, before returning to a posture of attention.
For the next half-watch they discussed the details of the battle plan, and then Kwed dismissed him.
****
Kwed’s battle plan was different from that of his predecessors, partly by intent and partly by necessity. He did not have the tactical advantage of controlling one of the ancient parasite aliens, and he no longer had a captive human large one to guide his way. He did still have a quantum signature of the warship from the large one known as Faraway, which should make locating it in the system easy, if it still existed. He needed to neutralize that powerful weapon, but the bulk of the plan involved simply overwhelming the human defenses and eradicating every human settlement before any could escape.
An additional factor that could hobble his efforts was the limit of mass that could transit the gateway at any one time. He would have to open several wormholes to move his fleet into the human system, but even using the same coordinates did not guarantee his ships would all arrive in the same area of space. It was simply the nature of jumping across such distances—the gravitational pull of so many celestial bodies, and the rotations of the home and target stellar systems, inevitably resulted in different exit points.
He allowed himself a moment of grudging admiration for the Lords commanding the previous assault, despite their failure. Opening a portal inside the domed human settlement, inside a specific chamber even, was a spectacular feat that he could not duplicate. His technical staff had been utterly unable to solve that challenge without having captive large ones available from which to extract information.
He’d been forced to the unwelcome conclusion that all the best technical minds the Otrid possessed had been lost in that failed assault. The most talented had been assigned to controlling the alien parasite or crewing the gateway, and both of those war zones had taken heavy losses.
And yet, as he surveyed his fleet standing by to enter the gateway, absorbing the excited communications traffic, he felt a rush of power and purpose race through his segments. To be at the vanguard of the most advanced species in the galaxy, imposing its will against lesser beings in distant systems, leading such a powerful collection of war vessels, was a heady feeling that few others would ever experience.
Kwed allowed himself a private moment to reflect on how far he’d come since the days he was but a group of pitiful singletons search
ing for compatible segments that would make him whole. He remembered the first time he looked to the sky and was able to finally see the orbiting cities of the homeworld and comprehend what they were.
This life was so much higher than he could have dreamed. How could lesser beings ever grasp the heights of unified consciousness…
He opened a channel to all ships.
“As Lord of the fleet, I send blessings to you all. The time is upon us. We shall accomplish what two previous expeditions have failed to do—forever vanquish a malignant species of singletons from our sector of the great wheel. They will oppose us, using what low singleton resources they can marshal. Some of us will fall. But it will not matter. We shall sweep them aside, purifying new territories for the betterment of us all.”
He paused to let his words be absorbed. On War Vessel 84 he could hear the battle cries of his warriors, and taste the spores of anticipation that floated through the air. He slid his whip arms across the ship’s command panel, activating the gateway.
“The order is now given. First group, transit speed to the portal. May the luck of the hunter be with you. You shall be four times blessed, and your actions today will be remembered forever!”
The energy field shimmered as the first ships passed through the gateway.
Chapter 24
Gravitational Forces
“Geostationary Skyra orbit achieved,” chimed the melodious voice of the lesser AI that controlled basic functions of Apollo’s godship.
Apollo acknowledged the report with a mental wave, and then grunted in disgust. His concentration was broken. He severed the ship’s neuro-connection links and extracted himself from the central command orb, the deepest, most fortified part of the ship.
He stretched, not that his body really needed it. The regeneration systems in his body kept his muscles in peak form at all times, regardless of his level of activity. Stretching was more of a mental tic, an instinctive response to emerging from confined surroundings rather than an actual need, yet he couldn’t help but notice how it actually seemed to help.
He was grateful for anything that eased his mind, no matter how small.
Prior to arriving in orbit, Apollo had been working furiously to construct the array that would shunt power from the Lodias system’s G-type star that would be necessary in the coming trials. He’d captured a small asteroid for raw materials and then launched the necessary core structures in orbit around it. He left behind an army of self-replicating robots to build out the rest to his specifications. It was already more than fifty percent functional. When complete, the array would be larger even than his godship.
The possibility that his actions might damage the star saddened him. He remembered scouting the star in the early years after the fall of Earth, and presenting his recommendation of this system to the other gods, back when they used to hold regular councils.
But there was no getting around it—the energy for him to do what must be done had to come from somewhere. The star that warmed Lodias and its moon Skyra was the only viable source. The possibility the star might not survive created a terrible ethical dilemma, but he had long since decided that he would do whatever it took to protect the human race from extinction. What was the use of being a god, otherwise?
Apollo could see The City, glowing like a living jewel through the thin atmosphere of Skyra. It looked so small and vulnerable, this remote outpost that contained almost the entirety of the human race.
Everything was in the balance, and it was up to him to make sure it all worked as planned. He found himself grappling with emotions he hadn’t felt since the fall of Earth, when one wrong step could doom humanity. It had been a long time since he’d felt such pressure. Before the Otrid found The City, he’d shared the burden of protecting humanity with six other powerful beings, each bringing astonishing abilities to the collective defense.
Now the responsibility was mostly on him.
Maelstrom would help, commanding Faraway’s godship, but he was a diminished force and Apollo still wasn’t sure how useful he’d be in battle. Talia had proven resourceful and capable, but she was merely a pure human plugged into The City’s vast network, not a being of godlike powers. She had done a good job directing the creation of a small fleet of warships within a very short timeframe, but Apollo knew it wasn’t a force that could seriously challenge an Otrid incursion. Maybe the Hightower would be effective, but who could say?
Apex was still whole and healthy, but he would never leave the world he’d created, and Apollo’s plan required him to stay there anyway.
As for Grey Wolf…
He was still smarting from his failure to enlist Grey Wolf on the most important undertaking in the history of the human race. The recalcitrant god had clung to her “two branches of humanity” creed like an actual forest wolf grasping a bone in its teeth. No help would be arriving from her in the coming battles. It had been all he could do to get her to agree to help with the evacuation plan that would carry the human race to the new world.
The disappointment in The City when he returned without Grey Wolf had been palpable. He’d made no public pronouncements on the subject, but expectations had been high, and the continued absence of Grey Wolf was not something that anyone could miss.
The entire episode had dampened the joy that had spread throughout The City upon Mik’s return. Mik had come home the conquering hero, bearing the grand news of the completion of Apex’s new world. The simple Fixer from the tunnels was now being lionized for successfully undertaking not just one, but two crucial missions to locate long-missing gods and bringing them to The City’s aid.
Mik’s tidings that the new world was ready for mankind had been a sensation, and everywhere the man went he was inundated with questions. His duties as admiral kept him occupied, but tales of Mik making clandestine appearances at ale houses had filtered their way to Apollo. Apparently, people lined up to buy him drinks.
Apollo shook his head to clear such thoughts, another retrograde tic from an earlier time. He’d locked himself in the ship’s command orb in order to focus on all the steps required to pull off the coming exodus from this system, while at the same time planning for the defense of The City should the Otrid arrive one last time.
Placing his godship in a highly visible orbit above The City had been part of that plan. Let the people see their protectors. They would hear from him directly.
Not all of his actions were so visible, however.
He’d also been working on hardening the connections that held the various segments of his godhood together. The way that the Otrid had broken down Tower and Faraway and peeled away their powers was the most worrisome of their weapons. Apollo had been experimenting with a series of shunts to spirit his essence away in the case he felt the beginnings of a split. It was an exercise that might not be necessary. The strange alien that wielded those powers had been set free from its Otrid masters, so the reports said. The Otrid might not have another.
Then again, they might.
Best to be gone from this system and to the new world before the implacable alien enemies returned.
With luck, if the Otrid returned they’d only find an empty system.
****
The days went by in an ordered blur. To his great surprise, Apollo found a kind of peace in the constant thrum of activity. For so long he had been his own master, working at his own pace, beholden to no one, that the feeling of being so needed fed his soul in ways he hadn’t felt in ages.
Inspired by the focused activity, he even segmented a part of his conscious mind to compose a new symphony. It wasn’t his best, he conceded to himself, but it did an excellent job of capturing the feeling in the air. It was a feeling he would want to remember in the future.
The array that would power the coming voyage surged to life in stages, and so far had passed every test. It harnessed an incredible amount of energy—the defensive battery alone was nearly as fearsome as that of a godship. But its primary function was to dr
aw energy from the star sufficient to warp the deep gravity well that Lodias formed. The gas giant was even larger than Jupiter in Earth’s old system. The gravitational forces, both apparent and underlying, were the key to Apollo’s plan to deliver humanity to its new home.
That all seemed easy compared to the message he’d been composing for the people. Under normal circumstances, pairing his thoughts with words or music was his favorite pastime.
But these weren’t normal circumstances, and this speech wasn’t for entertainment.
Apollo had even been researching his audience. He devoted some of his attention to observing the news and entertainment vids, absorbing the rhythms of speech and fashion of The City. The popular culture had taken another shift while he’d been absent these many years, and even in the current crisis he found the changes fascinating.
He took more public stances as well. More people had been crowding his temple, and he took time every few days to answer questions through an Aspect.
All of these activities helped him craft the sentences necessary to make people believe he could actually pull off what sounded like an impossible journey.
At last the day came when the array reached its full potential. He ran the first of a series of tests wherein his godship channeled the energy captured from the star by the array to open an aperture into Divine Space.
He sent probes into the alternate space realm to alert Apex and Grey Wolf that the time was near. They raced along the strange currents of gravity following the trails he’d mapped out. The probes would hold positions as beacons and amplifiers to keep the tunnel that would swallow Skyra from collapsing, although most of that stability would be provided by Apex and Grey Wolf from their respective locations. The most astonishing of all the gifts from the Benefactors was this intrinsic ability to access gravitational subspace, making rapid travel through the galaxy possible. Without it, the human race would likely have perished long ago.
Apollo hoped he could find the Benefactors one day and thank them personally.
Gods and the Stars (Gods and the Starways Book 2) Page 16