The Army Of Light (Kestrel Saga)

by Fender, Stephen

  My dearest Melissa,

  If you are reading this letter, then the outcome of my mission is uncertain, and you will need to take up my assignment where I failed. I’m so sorry for this, but you must consider this my final order.

  I wish I could have seen your smile one last time. It is difficult to say with any certainty if the OSI will be able to decipher the true nature of what I’ve discovered, let alone the scant amount of personnel in Sector Command that have been made privy to it. My darling, please know that there is a fundamental truth out there, and the foundations of the lives we’ve made for ourselves are built on shifting sands. If this mission is a failure, the entire sector may well be in jeopardy, if not mortal danger.

  My only request to you in this matter is that you find a man named Shawn Kestrel. He saved my life on more occasions then I can remember. While I consider you one of the strongest people I have ever known, and certainly one of the brightest, his help will be invaluable in the task I’m laying before you. His last known location was in the Antara islands on the planet Minos, near the Outer Rim

  It is absolutely vital that my mission be completed, and I have full confidence in your abilities to make sure that it will be. I’m sorry to have laid this heavy burden upon your

  shoulders, but you and Shawn are the only people in the galaxy I can trust.

  Love always,

  William

  Shawn breathed deeply as he processed the weight of the words, still holding the letter loosely in his fingers as he conjured the image of his old friend in his mind. William was really missing, or worse, dead. The cryptic message to Melissa meant one of two things: either she knew more than she was revealing about Bill’s mission, or she truly had no idea where to turn to from here. Were he to go with his gut instinct, Shawn would agree with the latter, but he’d been wrong before. He began to rub his chin absently as he contemplated their next move, regretting that he hadn’t shaved that morning while he did so.

  While it was true that he’d saved William in the past, the admiral had likewise done the same for him. Shawn owed his life to the man several times over, of that there was no question. Unfortunately, Shawn was stuck at the moment with a broken ship—powerless to do anything to help his friend or his somewhat frazzled daughter. He looked across the desk to Melissa, who sat silently staring at him, her stoic countenance possibly the result of any number of emotions.

  “So, you’re William Graves’s daughter?” he asked rhetorically. He hated rhetorical questions, so he wasn’t sure why he’d asked it at all.

  She rolled her eyes, probably at Shawn’s lack of verbal prowess. She swallowed, then straightened her blouse and held her chin high, obviously very proud of the distinction. “I am.”

  Shawn’s eyes shifted back to the letter.

  “My father never mentioned he had a daughter?” she asked as if he didn’t believe her claim.

  Shawn pursed his lips and shook his head once before he answered. “No. Then again, it wasn’t common to talk about our families during the war. Most everyone considered it bad luck.”

  “How dreadful,” Melissa said with a shocked expression. “It’s ridiculous that people were afraid to talk about their loved ones because of silly superstitions.”

  Shawn placed the letter back on the desktop separating them. “Well, it may be a silly superstition to you, but I never talked about my family and I made it through the war just fine. Others… well, they weren’t so lucky. So whether you believe it or not, we believed it. And, if it helped get some rookie pilot back to the carrier to fight another day, then I say we did the best we could.”

  She hesitated thoughtfully before responding. “A moment ago you said ‘our families’. Does that mean you also had loved ones that you—”

  “No,” he snapped with a scowl, then softened his voice and expression. “No disrespect, but I don’t believe the details of my life outside of the friendship I had with your father are on the table for discussion at the moment.” The words were delivered far more harshly than he’d intended.

  Melissa’s mouth open slightly as she looked down at her hands folded in her lap. “I’m sorry, Captain. I should have known better. My father hardly ever spoke of anyone in his command, at least the ones under him during the war. It’s probably as hard for you to believe that I’m his daughter as it is for me to believe that you—”

  “Are a good man?”

  She raised her eyebrow in consideration. “Are a good pilot.”

  It wasn’t an outright apology, but if she shared the blood of William Graves, then it was probably the best her DNA could muster under the current circumstances. Shawn leaned back in his chair, shifting his eyes to the far corner of the overhead as his thoughts began to wander to the past. “Don’t worry about it,” he said absently, wondering why he had yet to kill the overly large spider residing there. Maybe he can help pay the rent.

  After a moment of silence between the two, Melissa sensed Shawn was lost in thought. “Mister Kestrel?” she asked softly.

  Echoes of the past were indeed reverberating against the walls of Shawn’s memory. “I thought I was going to die, I thought… that was going to be it,” he heard himself say aloud, realizing only then that the words were not just in his mind. His eyes turned back to Melissa. “Your father… he was amazing; A real hero. And it wasn’t just a onetime thing, and it wasn’t just my ass he saved.”

  She sensed the weight of Shawn’s turmoil behind his simple words. “He must mean a great deal to you.”

  The words didn’t do the man justice, not that any ever could. “More so than most,” he responded, trying to sound aloof.

  She nodded in understanding. “So, are you going to help me?”

  What was he supposed to say? I didn’t want to get into this kind of mess again. Coming to Minos was about starting over, not about replaying the past. I’ve done my bit for King and country, and in doing so lost everything I cared about in this universe, so why put everything else I’ve worked so hard for in jeopardy? ”I’ve got to say, this whole situation is pretty damn confusing.”

  She rolled her eyes at his comment. “You and I are in agreement on that point.”

  “I haven’t seen your father in years. Why would he send you here?”

  Melissa scowled, narrowing her brilliant green eyes at him. “It seems fairly obvious to me, Captain.”

  “It does, huh? Well, I must be dense, so perhaps you’ll enlighten me?”

  She waved a hand dismissively toward the ceiling. “Sector Command isn’t out there searching for him right now, that’s a fact. It’s just as well, too, because my father didn’t expect they would be. Likewise, he felt that what he was searching for was something more important than Sector Command could be trusted with.”

  “Or the OSI,” Shawn added, pointing back to the letters reference concerning the Unified governments intelligence agency.

  She shrugged away his comment. “In any event, it was important enough that he wanted his mission to be completed—and without the knowledge of the government.”

  “Or there interference.”

  She nodded in agreement. “More than likely.”

  “So, he sent you to me, someone with experience in dealing with Sector Command, but who was also outside of the bureaucracy.”

  “There, you see?” she all but clapped her hands. “It’s not so hard to figure it out once you put a little effort into it.”

  He scowled at her retort. However, since the jibe was spoken softly—and she’d finished it with a disarming smile—he decided to let that one slide. The captain shook his head, then withdrew the bottle of whisky from his desk and poured himself a glass. The woman had an aura around her, and it flashed the word ‘trouble’ in a rainbow of colors and in three languages. I’m going to regret this in the morning. I know it. Giving it a second thought, he produced another glass, poured it, then offered it to Melissa. “I can’t deny that I owe your father a lot.”

  She raised the glass to h
er lips, giving the drink a tentative sniff. “Does that mean you’ll help me?”

  He raised his glass in a toast. “Well, I don’t have a clue what I’ll be able to accomplish, but yes. I’ll do what I can.”

  A faint smile—the first genuine one of happiness he’d seen, and quite and attractive one at that—crossed her face. “Thank you, Captain”

  He took a sip of his drink before setting down his glass. “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. Don’t thank me yet. I haven’t done anything. Besides, how do you propose to fund this little expedition?”

  “What do you mean?” she asked innocently, but then her face contorted into disgust. “Are you… are you going to charge me for your assistance?”

  The thought has more then crossed my mind. ”No. No, of course not. I mean… well, yes. In a manner of speaking.”

  She leveled her eyes at him as if she was a bull about to charge on his position. “You’ve got ten seconds to make up your mind before I do something I regret.”

  Despite a vague curiosity, in the end Shawn decided he didn’t want to know what that meant. “What I mean is, no, I’m not going to charge you, per say. But, there is going to be a cost for supplies, food, fuel… those sorts of thing.”

  She waved her hand facetiously. “Don’t concern yourself over trivial things like credits, Mister Kestrel. Focus on the job of finding my father.”

  “Wearing expensive clothes like that,” he said gesturing to her outfit, “it might be trivial to you, but I’m not sure you understand the expensive nature of space travel.”

  She momentarily looked down to her dress before looking back to him. “Is there something wrong with my clothes?”

  She obviously didn’t get it. Why do rich girls have to be this way? With all there money and their superior education, you’d think they could afford to get a clue. ”Forget I said anything.”

  She shrugged, apparently content to do just that. She reached into her bag and produced another letter. “Here. I received this last month.”

  Shawn stood up and retrieved the letter, glancing at the postmark on the envelope, “From Felda?”

  “The capitol city on Corvan.”

  “I know where it is,” Shawn replied matter-of-factly as he withdrew the letter from the envelope and began reading. Most of the correspondence seemed pretty harmless. William mentioned fly fishing in a newly discovered stream, and he wrote about the quiet nights sleeping under the stars. However, one innocent phrase caught Shawn’s undivided attention. “Special projects?”

  Melissa nodded, fixing a lock of auburn hair that had fallen in front of her left eye yet again. “I have no idea what he was talking about there.”

  “Hmm,” Shawn murmured, flicking at the letter gently before handing it back to Melissa. “Corvan. That’s a long way to go without a ship to get us there.”

  She recoiled her head in surprise. “But, what about that… that ship in your hangar? Please don’t tell me it’s ornamental only.”

  “If it’s all the same to you, Melissa, there’s—”

  She leveled her eyes coldly at him. “It’s Miss Graves, if you please.”

  “Fine, Miss Graves. I think there are some things you need to be made aware of about the state of my ship.”

  Strewn across the table before Melissa were the remains of the starboard engine, and all at once her hopes of a speedy departure were dashed to pieces. After an initial outburst concerning her utter disgust over their current situation, she’d decided they’d be better off formulating a plan than complaining.

  Shawn had scoured his collection of star charts and located a map of the Trinity quadrant, with the Corvan system directly in its center. He pressed a finger against the system and the image zoomed to show the only inhabitable planet. Felda was a port city about fifteen miles south-west of a major spaceport, situated on the largest continent on Corvan. Before the war it was a booming trade metropolis. Since then, its popularity had drastically declined, mainly due to the fact that it was both dangerously close to the condemned Second Earth and to Kafaran space. Melissa, however, found no comfort in staring at the image of a system she couldn’t get to.

  “I’m not too happy about our destination’s location, if you get my drift?” Shawn then pointed to the wavering line that marked the ill-defined border of Kafaran space. While the border had never been formally established after the war, it was true that no ship or probe had ever ventured past that point and returned to tell about it. And Corvan was only three light years from it.

  “I understand that, Mister Kestrel. However, I’m sure a man of your piloting prowess can get us there with no problems.”

  “It’s not my abilities I’m concerned about. It’s the natives.”

  “Oh, be sensible. We haven’t heard a stitch from the Kafaran’s in years, Mister Kestrel, and I doubt our journey to Corvan will stir up a galactic incident.”

  “Let’s assume for a second your right, and that’s a big assumption, mind you. Sure, I could get us there, but my ship isn’t going anywhere. I’ve got a busted engine, and that means no go. Now, I want to help you, I really do, but I’m grounded until we can get the parts we need.”

  Her expression was the exact opposite of joy. “You’re trying to tell me that you operate one of the only interplanetary transportation services in these islands and you don’t carry spare parts for your solitary vessel?”

  “We only make a finite amount of money here. I don’t have enough credits to have spare parts for every conceivable problem I could have with this ship. I certainly don’t account for space pirates, but I’m thinking about starting. Besides, even if I did have the parts, where would I keep them? This isn’t exactly a storage depot you know?”

  She looked up despondently; convinced that somehow the universe was intent on working against her at every turn. “Unacceptable.”

  “It’s worked so far.”

  Her simmering frustration suddenly boiled over. “Well, it doesn’t work right now, Captain!”

  Shawn put his hands to his hips. “Unless you have some kind of magical way to produce a wad of credits that you haven’t told me about, we’re grounded for at least two weeks or until less expensive units arrive from the borderlands. Or, like you said earlier, should I just not worry about it?”

  “So, you’re telling me someone on this God-forsaken plot of soil has the parts you need, and all you’re waiting for is the credits to purchase them?”

  “Yep, that’s what I’m saying,” Shawn agreed with a smile and a nod. “Once we have the parts in our hands, Trent can get us into space within a few hours. And of course, I still have another shipment that needs to get to the Port of Welga on Persephone before we can begin to think about going anywhere else.”

  Truth be told, she considered the fact that she didn’t have the same regard for credits that most people had. To her, they were simply a tool for getting something done, and there had never been a point she could recall where not having enough of them had been an issue. “You’d really put a cargo shipment over finding my father?”

  “The owner of the cargo made it pretty clear that I need to make this shipment in order to live. I can’t be of much help to you if I’m dead and, considering the value I place on my own life, I think we’d both be better off just getting the job done.”

  This is why I never leave the Core Worlds anymore, she thought with frustration. “How much?”

  Trent, who up to this moment had sat unobtrusively in the corner, turned to look out at the stack of weapons. “Sixty crates.”

  “No, not how much cargo! I meant how much money?” She watched with annoyance as the two men exchanged looks, holding an entire conversation with mixed facial expressions. It seemed neither one of them was going to take the plunge until Shawn spoke up.

  “You’re the one who opened his mouth, Trent. Go ahead and tell her.”

  The mechanic shrugged. “Two thousand—give or take a few odd singles.”

  “Two thousand… cr
edits?” she spat. “You can practically buy a new engine for that!”

  Shawn looked back to the table of busted engine parts. “We don’t need a whole new engine. We only need a few parts, and they do have what we need.”

  Melissa looked to the two men in astonishment, then reached down and began to rifle through the leather bag slung over her shoulder. “This isn’t a legitimate business; this is piracy,” she mumbled to herself. After a moment she produced a stack of gleaming credits held together by an elastic band. She tossed it onto the desk in front of Shawn. “There you are. No more excuses. Fix your ship and let’s go.”

  The glint of the credits whirling through the air had caught Trent’s utmost attention. “That’s a lot of dough,” he sighed with desire and then shot Melissa’s bag a desperate look. “That must have been one fat piggy bank before you broke it open.”

  She narrowed her eyes at the scruffy mechanic. “I’ve been saving for a rainy day.”

  The captain smiled, but Melissa wasn’t entirely sure why. She watched as he slowly leaned forward and picked up the silvery stack, then quickly tossed it to Trent as if it were a hot potato. “Call Jacques and tell him we’re on our way. Then go and get the skimmer ready.”

  Trent peeled his eyes away from the money and looked to Shawn apprehensively at the mention of their small craft. “The skimmer? Are you sure about that? I mean, maybe he can meet us here?”

  “Just do it.”

  Stepping aboard the hovering utility craft a half an hour later, Melissa was beginning to have second thoughts about the reliability of the vehicle. What had looked like a dull coat of red paint at a distance was actually a thin coating of exterior rust. The twenty-four foot hover truck, with the word Lexy hastily painted on the curved forward section of the vessel, groaned under her weight as Melissa stepped aboard.

  The craft had a small, four person cabin with a wide windshield occupying its forward half, and a slightly longer flattened area for cargo in the rear. Mounted on either side of the stern of the vessels—at the ends of seemingly inadequate pylons—were tube-shaped engines that barely looked adequate to propel the work shuttle. In fact, those same engines were currently producing a substantial haze of smoke as Melissa took an empty seat behind and to the right of Shawn who sat impatiently at the controls. Melissa turned to see Trent, sitting in the bed of the truck with an open toolbox at his side, which didn’t increase her faith in the crafts dependability. When Trent had first mentioned to her that Lexy—the shorthand name for Lexington—always seemed to break down at the most inopportune times, she understood now that the statement hadn’t been made in jest.