“A few short weeks ago I stood before you and made the case that Prime Minister Brennon did not deserve to lead us in a time of war. I believed it to be true, as did a majority of the Assembly. I do not regret that vote.”
He notched his chin up, high and tight. “Now, however, evidence has been brought to the Assembly’s attention calling into question the information upon which the Vote of No Confidence was based. In light of this new evidence a number of Representatives have requested the opportunity to change their votes. Such a procedure is not feasible under the Assembly Regulations. However, legal counsel has determined the Assembly may undertake a superseding vote, the results of which will override any prior vote on the precise issue at hand.
“Therefore, Mr. Secretary, I resubmit Special Assembly Resolution SGR 2322-3174 for an official vote.”
Miriam took advantage of the minutes required for procedures and rules and the casting of votes to enjoy a rare moment of peace—a moment when she wasn’t making decisions which saved and cost lives, when she wasn’t juggling 56,300 ships and 28.2 million servicemen and seventy megatonnes of supplies spread across twenty kiloparsecs.
Then she was reminded why she didn’t seek out such interludes. They only allowed her to remember her daughter was gone. Weeks had passed since anyone had heard from her. If her ship had been disintegrated in space there would never be evidence of it, never an answer to what had happened to her.
If she stopped to ponder the implications she might break. And Admiral Miriam Draner Solovy did not break.
The vote tally flashed on the oversized screen floating high above the chamber, saving her from further wallowing.
SGR 2322-3174: Vote of No Confidence in Steven Brennon
For: 78
Against: 432
Cheers erupted from those who had never stopped supporting Brennon, polite applause from the rest. She supposed the seventy-eight votes were opposition party members who simply refused to make an exception on principle rather than politics.
“The Vote of No Confidence in Steven Brennon having now failed to pass and the position being vacant pending investigation, Steven Brennon is hereby reinstated to the office of Prime Minister of the Earth Alliance to serve the remainder of his term.”
Brennon stepped onto the dais and met Gagnon halfway, greeting him with a firm handshake and clasp of a shoulder as if to show to the galaxy he bore no grudges. There was no room for grudges.
“Representatives, guests, citizens, I won’t waste your time with platitudes. We all find ourselves deceived and at the moment we face the greatest threat to our existence humanity has ever known. The full extent of the deception is only now beginning to come to light, but my administration will follow it to wherever it leads. In the next twelve hours I will review the state of the war against the Federation and determine whether its purpose remains valid.
“Most of all I pledge to turn the full wisdom, experience and strength of the Alliance government and military toward meeting the growing threat of an alien armada. These are our worlds. Our citizens. Our families and friends. We will not abandon them to suffer and die. We will not allow those lost to have died in vain. We will not let humanity fall.”
Miriam reminded herself to feel vindicated. Alexis was now unquestionably cleared of any involvement whatsoever in the bombing; the conspiracy to instigate the war with Seneca was exposed and being dismantled. Her personal reputation had never been stronger.
She was proud of the role she had played in these events. She had emerged out of the flames unscathed. Yet without David, without Alexis, it seemed a hollow victory and one she’d as soon not dwell on.
After the session concluded the people around her stood and began milling about while Brennon shook hands with the VIPs on the dais. She stood as well and had spotted a former colleague deserving of a greeting several rows back when a hand rested on her arm.
“Admiral Solovy? If you’ll follow me?”
She recognized Brennon’s Chief of Staff and nodded. She was happy to leave behind the suffocating pressure of politicians and glad-handlers.
The Chief of Staff guided her through the crowd to a side door and down several halls to a nondescript conference room. “Can I get you anything, Admiral?”
She noted the pitcher of water on the table and shook her head. “I’m fine, thank you.”
“The Prime Minister will be here momentarily. I’ll be right outside if you need me.”
Miriam poured a glass of water and began to prepare for the upcoming conversation, but she had barely taken a sip when the door opened. Brennon instructed his security detail to wait outside before allowing the door to close behind him.
“Admiral Solovy, thank you for taking the time to speak with me. I do apologize for asking you to travel to London. I realize you’re stretched thin and are doubtless needed elsewhere.”
“It’s not a problem, Prime Minister. You have a mountain of difficult work ahead of you. I’m happy to do whatever I can to ease your transition and help get you back up to speed on matters.” Her words felt unduly stiff; it wasn’t as if this was the first time she’d spoken to a Prime Minister, or even this Prime Minister.
Brennon chuckled softly, easing the tension in the room. “Matters, indeed. I wish I had the luxury of sitting back and appreciating the irony of being in this position once more. Instead I’m being asked to return in order to preside over the extinction of the human race.”
“Not a chance, sir.”
“Good. Which is in fact why you’re here. Forgive my fatalism.” He subtly adjusted his posture. “Admiral, you have served as the clearest voice of reason in the room from the beginning of this disaster. If we had listened to you weeks ago when you presented your data on the aliens we might have been better prepared. Lives would have been saved. For this reason and many more I won’t bore you by listing, I’m naming you Chairman of the EASC Board, effective immediately.”
She had known it was why she was here. Not in the sense that anyone had come right out and said it, but it was the most logical conclusion. She and Brennon had a decent working rapport before the world had gone mad. In her opinion Rychen arguably made a better choice—his character qualified him and his combat experience exceeded her own—but she imagined he would have to be dragged kicking and screaming out of the field.
“I’m humbled, sir. I’ll strive to serve to the best of my abilities.”
“You’re not serving anymore, Admiral. You’re leading. Which is why I’m also using my executive authority to promote you to Fleet Admiral.”
“Sir?” That she had not been expecting.
“I’m sure you’ll use the power with proper judiciousness. But the simple fact is, I need your unvarnished, undiluted advice and opinions. And because I’m likely to be a horrifically busy man, I need you to be able to act without consulting a committee when the situation requires it.”
For the first time in a long while, she found herself overcome by uncertainty. Of herself, of whether she was up to the challenge.
Naoborot dushen’ka, I think you will be spectacular at it.
“Understood, sir. Thank you for your trust. I assure you I will endeavor to be worthy of it. I realize your time is short, as is mine, but allow me to give you the first piece of unvarnished advice right now. Make peace with the Federation. Not a cease fire or a truce or an armistice, but true peace—and do it quickly.”
Amusement tinged the curve of his mouth. “My Chief of Staff was contacted several hours ago by a representative for Chairman Vranas, proposing a summit of both governments’ leadership.”
“Accept the proposal, sir. They were as much victims of the conspiracy as we were, and I have every reason to believe they are amenable to ending the war. If we expect to be able to fight these aliens, we need their help and they need ours.”
He considered the matter for several seconds, then nodded. “If humanity is annihilated because we were too busy squabbling with one another to manage a proper sta
nd, we probably deserve the annihilation. I’ll begin making the arrangements tonight.”
“I’m glad to hear it, sir.”
“I meant what I said out there at the podium. Don’t leave our soldiers exposed to a surprise raid by Senecan forces until we untangle this war, but otherwise every person, ship, weapon and tool should be focused on these aliens. We must slow them down until we can find a way to stop them.”
Finally a politician deserving of her respect. “I’ll begin implementing new directives as soon as I walk out the door. And may I say, best of luck, sir. We are all going to need a great deal of it.”
SENECA
CAVARE, MILITARY HEADQUARTERS
Commander Morgan Lekkas leaned against the wall in the entry area. A foot tapped the floor in a brisk dance of redirected energy. The secretary had told her she could sit while she waited, but she’d done far too much sitting today on the transport flight from Krysk to Seneca, the shuttle to Cavare and the levtram to Military HQ.
The screen on the opposite wall displayed a live news feed from of all things the Earth Alliance Assembly. She had caught scraps of news the last few days here and there, but hadn’t paid much attention until it concerned her, which now it perhaps did.
It seemed the Alliance Prime Minister had committed suicide? Hadn’t the previous PM been killed in an explosion the week before? There were questions surrounding the events leading up to the war, which was why it interested her, but no one was making definitive public statements as of yet.
Someone turned up the volume on the feed and Morgan closed her eyes.
She didn’t know if or when the war with the Alliance was going to officially end, but most of the 3rd Wing had been pulled off the Federation border and sent to Seneca to await further orders. No explanation was given but it clearly related to the aliens advancing on the eastern front.
She highly doubted they’d be able to fight the Alliance in the southwest and aliens in the east, though as near as she could tell they hadn’t been doing much fighting of the aliens so far. Mostly they had been fleeing. The Cavare spaceport had been jammed with refugees from the eastern colonies, and rumors were flying that every colony east of Seneca not already under siege was being evacuated.
She hoped the military would muster up a fight soon; she hoped that was why she was standing around waiting outside some sort of conference room or other. As for what or whom it held she hadn’t a clue, but it was where she had been directed to go. The quality of the decor and extensiveness of security indicated it might hold someone or thing of importance.
The volume on the feed increased again and her gaze flitted to the screen.
“The Vote of No Confidence in Steven Brennon having now failed to pass—”
“You can go in now, Commander.”
She nodded a curt thanks to the secretary on her way to the door and stepped inside—then froze in the doorway.
This wasn’t a conference room. This was a command center. This was the command center.
The air buzzed as soldiers huddled around groups of screens or bounced from one group to the other. Three conference tables scattered around the room were occupied by more soldiers. The far wall was dominated by a large map.
Every settled world was marked on it, most of them colored the usual red for Federation worlds, blue for Alliance ones and green for the Independents. But not the eastern colonies.
Regardless of affiliation, to the right of a diagonal line cutting 320° down the map, the worlds were either marked by a black ‘X’ or highlighted in orange. Three columns helpfully ran along the right side of the map:
* * *
Morgan hadn’t joined the military because she was a patriot or because she had a deep and abiding desire to protect the citizens of the Federation. She was pleased enough when she did so successfully, but even then it was for mostly selfish reasons. She had joined the military for the sheer thrill of it.
Piloting transports or scout ships would never have offered her the rush of diving at 0.3mms through space in an inverted spin. It would never have enabled her to command weapons in the form of fighter jets with a thought or outmaneuver foes through asteroid fields or skim the buffeting edge of an atmosphere. It would never have allowed her to become so integrated with her ship that the ship may as well not exist at all.
She knew what others called her when they thought she wasn’t listening—adrenaline junkie, speed addict, bat-shit cracked—but she had never cared. Even if they were right, it was what she wanted. It was what she was alive for.
Now, staring at the list of fallen colonies in utter shock, for the first time in her life she felt brazen, primal outrage against an enemy. She felt a profound, elemental yearning to protect all the people out there from these invaders, from these monsters stealing their worlds and their lives.
“We’re in a fair bit of trouble, I’d say.”
She jumped, then hurriedly turned to find the speaker.
Field Marshal Eleni Gianno—the Supreme Commander of the Senecan Federation Armed Forces—stood next to her, arms crossed over her chest.
Morgan snapped her feet together and hand up in a hasty salute. “Ma’am. Marshal Gianno. Commander Morgan Lekkas, 3rd Wing, Southern Fleet.” Clueless as to what to do next, she glanced back at the map. “I had no idea it was this serious, ma’am.”
“Few do. It became this serious very rapidly. Far faster than we’ve been able to react.”
“Ma’am…Brython is less than a kiloparsec from Seneca.”
“Yes, it is. I suspect the aliens can be here in hours if they so choose. The one factor acting in our favor is as they advance, they reach more worlds—and larger ones—in need of destruction. Slaughtering entire planets takes time.”
The two of them stared silently at the map for a while longer. Finally Gianno looked to her. “Thank you for coming, Commander. We’re at last beginning to piece together data on the aliens’ capabilities and tactics. I’d like to review some of the analyses STAN has generated with you.”
She frowned hesitantly, not at all clear why the Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces wanted to review anything with her…then arched an eyebrow in spite of herself. “STAN?”
“Strategic and Tactical Artificial Network, the military’s state of the art synthetic neural net.”
“But…STAN?”
Marshal Gianno shrugged. “The Alliance is calling theirs ‘ANNIE.’ The warenuts in Tech weren’t about to be outdone and spent two weeks coming up with an acronym that resulted in a silly name. So what do you think?”
“I’m glad to help, ma’am. But may I ask why me?”
“Word is you’re the best fighter pilot in the Federation, possibly in the galaxy. You’ve refused promotion three times in four years, ostensibly because you didn’t want to give up the cockpit. And in my mind with good reason, because your superior officers insist you control the battlefield like no one else. Your biosynthetics and personal ware are bleeding edge, and that’s just the upgrades we’re aware of.”
Morgan started to protest that she wasn’t hiding any gray-market ware—which of course she was—but Gianno held up a hand to silence her.
“It doesn’t matter. In fact, you’ll probably need a few more upgrades before long. Whether in days or weeks, these aliens are going to come for Seneca and we have to be ready for them. There are numerous pieces to the puzzle of doing so, but one of them is determining how to take out their multitude of small interceptor ships.”
They had reached a cloistered space containing three separate screens, two control panels and a circular table. Two of the screens looped footage of what appeared to be an engagement by a military force of the alien ships above a planet. The vid focused on the sea of strange insectile vessels swarming the region.
She dropped her hands on the table and leaned in to study the screens, forgetting she probably should still be standing at attention. “That’s a lot of ships. Far too many for frigates to destroy. They’d be decimated befo
re taking out a tenth of them, assuming frigates could take out that many. The alien vessels are larger than fighters but faster and more maneuverable. Still, our fighters are the only craft which stand a chance of going toe-to-toe with them.”
She eyed the Marshal beside her. “Ma’am, where is this? Are we engaging the aliens somewhere? New Riga, or Lycaon?”
“New Riga and Lycaon are gone. This is from Messium, yesterday.”
“Messium? The Alliance sent us this data?”
Gianno gave her a mysterious smile. “As I said, events are moving very rapidly.”
“How did their fighters do against these ships?”
“Better than the frigates, but at too high a cost. Three times as many fighters were lost as alien ships destroyed.”
“In a war of attrition, we lose.”
“Quite. We have analyses of their structural weaknesses, minimal though they are, as well as their flight patterns and tendencies. Commander, I’d like you to study it and work with the Artificial to devise a strategy for besting them.”
“I’ll need full-sensory immersion for the data and a remote interface with the Art…uh, STAN.”
Gianno motioned toward a door on the left wall. “If you’ll follow me, everything is set up for you.”
56
SIYANE
UNCHARTED SPACE
* * *
FOR THE SECOND TIME IN a month, the Siyane rose to carry them away from an inhospitable planet which shouldn’t exist. As before, the ship would carry them home as bearers of vital information which could well mean the difference between the survival or destruction of humanity. But not yet.
“Before we leave this space, I’d like to try to find the other portal. If this is a ‘lobby,’ there’s another gateway here somewhere.”
Beside her Caleb swung his chair around to face her, his expression unreadable. “Okay.”
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