He chuckled and wrapped his arm fully around her to hug her closer. “That is a fairly accurate description of what I saw.”
“Touché.”
“If you want the relationship to change, one of you is going to need to let down those barriers.”
“I’m afraid to.”
He brought his other hand under her chin and lifted it so she met his gaze. “You’re not afraid of anything.”
Surprise animated her face. Did she imagine he hadn’t noticed? “Well, I’m afraid of this. If she doesn’t reciprocate? You have no idea how hard she can be.”
“I think I kind of do. Guns, handcuffs, authoritative orders to lock me away?”
She rolled her eyes in fleeting playfulness. “Fair point. But the fact is, I owe her an apology. A real one. So if we succeed in getting off this planet and back through the portal and don’t get instantly arrested or killed, I suppose I’ll have to take my chances.”
“I’d be willing to bet you won’t be sorry.” He placed a kiss on her forehead then hauled her to her feet. “Let’s get moving. These aliens aren’t going to come to us.”
The trees now grew so thick he was hacking limbs away using the sword. They were definitely headed in the right direction.
Alex’s hair caught on a branch, and after untangling it she paused to redo her ponytail. “The place where you found me—what did it look like? I was a bit out of my head at the time and didn’t notice much. Now I wish I’d paid more attention and investigated the structure.”
“There wasn’t much to it on the outside, but it looked as if it might be a type of holographic chamber. The walls were sheer white, like you’d see in a sim room, and photal conduits wove through all the surfaces.”
“That actually makes a shocking amount of sense. If I had to guess, I’d say they keep recordings of these events—or of every event—stored somewhere and can project them in the chamber.”
“It would largely explain your experience.” He tossed a meter-long limb to the side. “They certainly aren’t making this easy, are they?”
She ducked under the next limb after him. “I believe that’s the point.”
“Yeah?”
“I suspect this ‘player’ very much wants us to find it but feels compelled to make it nearly impossible for us to do so.”
“Compelled why?”
“An excellent question.”
He broke off a thinner limb, wrangled through two trees—and stopped. “Perhaps you should ask it.”
The forest evaporated away to reveal a stunning valley nestled between two mountains. The ground sloped down in rich grasses dotted by golden flowers billowing in a mild breeze. At the base of the valley the late-morning ‘sun’ sparkled off a large lake of glacier blue waters. The faint gleam of the water indicated come nightfall, the lake was sure to glow as radiant as a star.
But beyond the shimmer of the water, a far brighter sight shone. Above the lake floated—no, glided—a creature of light. It was the being from Alex’s prison but here it became so much more.
The same glacier blue as the lake, intricate patterns spiraled from a center similar to the scallops of a shell; filaments wound outward yet further to form wings with no membrane. Nothing artificial adorned it. No metal or cloth, nothing harsh or ungainly, marred its beauty.
“I’d say, ‘That’s not something you see every day,’ but when I’m with you it seems to be.”
She managed a tentative laugh. “Nah, I only see this sort of spectacle every third day or so.” Without tearing her eyes from the scene she reached over and grasped his hand. “I love you.”
He squeezed her hand in reassurance. “I love you. Shall we go introduce ourselves?”
“I don’t think we need to.”
It flew purposely toward them. On closer view the level of detail in its wings was extraordinary. The patterns seemed to have been painted at a microscopic level.
The alien alighted upon a small outcropping to the left. As it approached it began morphing until, ten meters away, it had assumed a vaguely human form to cross the remaining distance and slow to a stop in front of them.
Though more solid than it had appeared at the chamber, its shape was still amorphous, translucent and fluid. It resembled a watercolor representation of a human—hands but no defined fingers, a mouth but no teeth or tongue, an outline of eyes but no irises.
I am Mnemosyne. Walk with me.
43
SCYTHIA
EARTH ALLIANCE COLONY
* * *
THE SIGHT OF THE SHIPS IN HIGH ORBIT above Scythia was almost enough to make one believe they stood a chance.
From the angle of approach Malcolm’s transport was taking, the light of Scythia’s copper sun reflected off the lustrous slate hulls arranged in staggered diamond formations. He identified sixty frigates, twelve cruisers, eight carriers and numerous specialized craft too tiny to count. The fighters would be docked inside the carriers but they should total a minimum of fourteen hundred.
All these vessels were dwarfed, however, by the EAS Churchill. The dreadnought sailing at the center of the fleet was nearly five times larger than the cruisers. It measured 1.3 kilometers by 280 meters, though the alien ships they would be facing eclipsed it.
Here, surrounded by nearly a quarter of the NE Regional Command, it dominated the panorama. Over 21,000 people crewed the dreadnought, making it the equivalent of a small city.
And for the moment it was his destination.
The transport wove among the formations, providing him quite the visual extravaganza. But this was his last opportunity to get his head straight. The final breath before the storm. So he did his best to ignore the splendor and mentally reviewed what he knew, what he didn’t know and what he needed to know.
While he had been scrambling around taking potshots at the Senecans in the northwestern region, an armada of alien ships had been slaughtering their way across the eastern third of settled space. Communications went dark in advance of the aliens’ arrival, thus hard information on them—tactics, strengths, defenses—was scarce. Most of the data they did possess was courtesy of Alex, of all people. He doubted she had chosen to be in the center of this crisis; he imagined she was rather pissed about it, in fact. Wherever she was.
Now someone had devised a method for restoring rudimentary communications inside the aliens’ sphere, which increased their odds of defeating them from nil to infinitesimally small. But it wasn’t as if humanity was going to roll over without a fight. They had to try.
So Messium, six hours away, would be the site of the first true battle against these mysterious invaders and the first chance to discover just how screwed they were.
When he looked up the dreadnought had overtaken the viewport. The transport banked toward the open shuttle bay, passed through the flicker of the force field and settled into an open slot. He shook the pilot’s hand and stepped out.
Controlled chaos ruled the bay as technicians, mechanics and operators hustled in every direction. An aura of urgency permeated the air, and he felt his pulse quicken, infused by the energy and purpose of his fellow soldiers.
A young woman hurried up to him. “Colonel Jenner? If you’ll follow me, I’ll escort you to Admiral Rychen.”
“Thank you, Corporal. I suspect I’d be lost for weeks on my own.”
She shrugged as he matched her rapid clip. “It’s a big ship, but once you understand the layout you can walk it in your sleep.”
The lift ascended for an eternity—long enough to reach the penthouse of a high-rise groundside. When it finally came to rest the Corporal waved him forward as the door slid open. “You’ll find the Admiral on the lookout, sir.”
Malcolm gestured a thanks, stepped onto the deck of the bridge and paused in awe. The bridge was as large as the entire EAS Juno. The ceiling rose ten meters overhead and triple viewports at the far bow provided an unobscured view of half the assembled fleet above the glow of Scythia’s profile.
Dozen
s of stations lined both walls, sporting some of the most advanced tech he had ever seen. The low din was more controlled and restrained than in the shuttle bay but no less urgent. He quickly snapped a visual with his ocular implant and sent it to Veronica; he thought perhaps she’d be proud of him when she saw it. Next he squared his shoulders and wound through the personnel toward the raised platform two-thirds of the way down the bridge.
Admiral Christopher Rychen stood alongside three officers reviewing a large screen listing the various formation groups, including states of readiness, outstanding issues and weapons strength. Malcolm waited at the edge of the platform at parade rest.
Once the officers were dismissed he stepped up with a crisp salute. “Colonel Malcolm Jenner, reporting for duty, sir.”
Rychen returned the salute then extended his hand. “At ease, Colonel. I’m glad you made it.”
Malcolm shook his hand and promptly decided he liked the Admiral. He had been predisposed to like him, but the man’s world-weathered brow, vibrant eyes and easy demeanor conveyed warmth.
Rychen indicated for Malcolm to join him at the railing. From here the platform overlooked the navigation pit and the viewports beyond; in that respect it was not much different than the design of the Juno’s bridge.
“I trust you’ve had an opportunity to study the briefings?”
“Yes, sir, several times.”
“Thoughts?”
So he was being put on the spot straightaway. He supposed there was hardly time for building a rapport. “The reports back from your scouts confirm the adjustments to communications work, which is welcome news. If I understand correctly, the scouts recorded the presence of thirteen of the alien superdreadnoughts. That’s a good number of ships but it isn’t anywhere close to the majority of their forces, so we should assume the aliens are currently traveling to or hitting other worlds as well. It means they recognize Messium is not Gaiae, but it also means they aren’t expecting a fight. If we move fast we can gain a temporary advantage by taking them by surprise.”
“Then we find out if we can do any damage to their ships.”
Malcolm grimaced. “It would be nice to know the answer to that question ahead of time, sir, but I recognize we don’t have the luxury of engineering a test case.”
“Wouldn’t it be though?”
“Yes, sir. So we’re faced with a dilemma. We have to hit them hard and fast but doing so exposes the bulk of our forces to significant risk. My recommendation would be for all vessels to keep their sLume drives charged and ready for the initial minute following contact. It draws a lot of power, but if one of those superdreadnoughts vaporizes a cruiser in a single shot? Well, with respect, sir, we probably need to bug out and devise a new plan.”
Rychen nodded. “Excellent suggestion. I’ll set a rendezvous point near Pyxis as the fallback location. Their government has cleared us for any stellar traversals we require.”
“Do we have any intel regarding what’s happening on the ground?”
“Very little. Further attempts at communication have proved unsuccessful. The brief scans the scout ships were able to take show activity is concentrated around the two major cities. If I had to guess I’d say the aliens aren’t interested in destroying the planet, merely its inhabitants and infrastructure. Once the battle begins I’m sending three stealth craft to Headquarters. I want to send them ahead, but I can’t risk tipping our hand. And let’s be honest, they are likely to find nothing but rubble.”
Malcolm’s gaze drifted to the screen on their left, where the fleet status updated every five seconds. “Sir, if I may ask…what is our short-term goal? Obviously liberating Messium is our ultimate goal, but realism dictates we accept it might be unattainable.”
“A force of this size and strength should not be the one to discover our enemy’s strengths and weaknesses, Colonel, but it is what it is. We try to destroy as many of their superdreadnoughts as possible. If we can’t destroy them, we try to damage them. If we can’t damage them, we try to draw them away from the planet long enough to give civilians on the ground a chance to escape. In this scenario at some point our losses will become so severe the sole rational choice will be to retreat and save the remainder of the fleet for future operations. We just need to try our damnedest to force that point out as long as humanly possible and to be ready to change the entire plan at any minute.”
“Understood, sir.”
“To that end, in the last hour we’ve received some interesting ideas from the governor of Romane.”
“Sir?”
“It seems their best and brightest citizens have spent the last several days studying the same data we have on the aliens and brainstorming about ways to both defend against and attack them. I don’t know how they got their hands on the data in the first place and I don’t care. I will take all the help I can get. My XO is incorporating the new information into our battle plan and will forward it to you as soon as it’s ready.”
Rychen reached over and input a series of commands on his control panel. “I’m giving you command of the EAS Orion. She’s the newest cruiser in NE Command and comes with a full complement of bells and whistles. You’ll supervise four frigates in this sector.” The map zoomed in to an area southeast of the capital city.
A cruiser? With four frigates at his command as well? “Sir, I’m honored you would trust me with so much responsibility, but you do realize I’ve only commanded a single frigate, and for all of twenty-nine days?”
“I do. During those twenty-nine days you showed better strategic and tactical decision-making than any other frigate captain in the entire Northwestern campaign. I’m of the opinion it doesn’t matter whether you’re on the ground or in space—you understand the battlefield in a way few soldiers do. You can think on your feet and aren’t afraid to roll a gutsy call when the circumstances require it. I need commanders out there who can make decisions and act on their own if I am to have any hope of succeeding here today.”
“I’ll do everything in my power to help ensure that happens, sir.”
Rychen smiled; it carried an air of authenticity rarely seen among four-star officers. “The times make the man, Colonel. I’m confident you will.” His expression bore a tinge of wryness as he turned back to the fleet status screen. “Now go see about a shuttle to the Orion, because we leave in two hours.”
44
MESSIUM
EARTH ALLIANCE COLONY
* * *
IN THE MID-21ST CENTURY THE ENTERTAINMENT industry had produced a number of self-styled ‘post-apocalyptic’ films. Dressed up as fictional dramas and horror flicks, they were thinly veiled propaganda designed to warn of the dire fate which awaited humanity if they didn’t either get pollution, energy demands and industrialization under control, or else vacate the planet.
More than two hundred years later the films were shown in school to tout mankind’s success in taming Earth and its ecosystems, as well as its success in making vacating the planet an option. The films differed in the details but they unfailingly portrayed cities reduced to smoldering ruins, skylines of broken, sheared skyscrapers, bridges wrent in two and highways shredded to rubble.
The first thought to pop into Kennedy’s head when she crawled through a shattered window of the Palaimo headquarters and stepped onto the street was, the filmmakers had no imagination.
The utter wreckage of Messium’s capital city spread before her like the closing shot in one of those films. Though it was evening, enough light remained to reflect infinite prisms off the numerous metallic shards jutting out of the remains of buildings.
To the left an entire block had been vaporized. Eradicated, plainly, for not a single beam of a single structure protruded above ground level. Yet in front of them scaffolding of buildings still stood, though stripped of their covering except for scattered pieces clinging to the frame.
“This is not going to be good for the Messium tourism industry.”
She glanced back to roll her eyes at Noah
and was shocked to find an amused expression on his face as he hefted her bag—now even heavier with the addition of gear scavenged from the lab—over his shoulder. “Is there anything you take seriously?”
“Not so far.”
“And how’s that working out for you?”
He licked his lips. “Well, I’m alive when it appears a hell of a lot of other people are dead, so I’d say fairly well all things considered.”
She elbowed him in the ribs…but he was right.
They had discovered the fate of a good portion of the Palaimo employees during their trek out of the bowels of the building. At the opposite end of the basement from where they had camped, the ceiling had collapsed. They used the rubble as a path up and out, only to learn a large section of the first and most of the second floor had also collapsed.
She remembered a large conference room being located in that corner on the first floor. The pools of coagulated blood which had leaked out beneath the slabs of shattered walls and ceilings painted a fairly stark picture. If it hadn’t, the odd hand or foot sticking out, skin mottled and partially desiccated, would have done so well enough.
Now bodies littered the street and sidewalks. While a few were killed by falling debris, most had been…roasted. Scorched to a crisp, presumably by some weapon. Bile rose in her throat at the thought they may have been burnt alive.
She covered her mouth and spun away as she tried to block out the images swimming in her head of people running for their lives while knowing they were sure to die, then doing so in such a horrific manner.
“Hey…you okay?” His hand rested gently on her arm, his voice uncharacteristically tender.
She swallowed hard and raised her chin. “Not in the slightest. Let’s get out of here.”
“You got it, Blondie.” He started off down the sidewalk, and she scrambled to catch up. She hadn’t decided whether she liked or loathed the nickname but all attempts to get him to stop had resulted in renewed usage.
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