The Complete New Dominion Trilogy

by Drury, Matthew J.

  The Light plunged into the slave, taking possession of him, and he immediately threw off the grasp of the Genome Soldiers, who knelt to pick up the dead body of Xam Bahr and calmly dragged it away.

  Lord Damarus walked over to a window to admire his new reflection. He was a younger man now, human, physically fit and capable. He pulled on a long, leathery robe handed to him by one of the children, turned to Eldo Drakar and seemed to smile. “Speak.”

  Drakar bowed slightly. “My Lord. The Nommos Empire is rallying a large force… the majority of its military might. Emperor Khonsu is determined to wipe out the Empyreal Sun once and for all. Your attacks on the Terran Alliance’s Outer Colonies has forced his hand.”

  “As I hoped,” Damarus said, and gave a light chuckle of amusement. He took a deep breath, as if savouring the taste of the air. “They have no doubt gathered their full strength, and in doing so have presented us with the perfect opportunity to annihilate them forever, like the insignificant bugs that they are!”

  Drakar looked uncomfortable.

  “They underestimate us at their peril,” Damarus continued. “I will give them one last chance to join our cause, before they are swept away.” He moved to stand in a nearby holographic projection field, waving one hand over a control, activating a secure communications channel.

  The viewer on the other end of the holographic connection would see a close-up of Lord Damarus’ head and shoulders, of his youthful face shrouded in the cowl of a dark robe that resembled snake or lizard skin. They would not see Drakar, though Drakar would be able to see them. It was a measure of Damarus’ trust that Drakar was allowed to be here while the conversation took place. The recipient of the transmission was, of course, Eldo Drakar’s brother - the Nommos Emperor Khonsu II. The air swirled inside the chamber in front of Damarus, coalesced, and blossomed into the image of the Nommos ruler sitting on his throne in Sieda’Kaa’s Royal Citadel on Nommon.

  Khonsu spoke: “What is the meaning of this? Who are you?”

  If Eldo Drakar could have hurled a power bolt through time and space to strike his brother dead, he would have done so at that moment without blinking. Wishful thinking: the Nommos Emperor was too powerful and well protected to attack directly, at least by him.

  “I am Lord Damarus,” the supernatural figure glowered beneath his hood. “I am the Resurrection, and Ruler of the Terran Alliance by Divine Right. I demand that the Nommos Empire join the Inquisition of the Empyreal Sun - or face destruction…”

  “Damarus?” Khonsu scoffed. “I don’t think so. Damarus is dead…”

  “I have swallowed up death in victory,” Damarus recited. “And the Lord GOD has wiped away the tears from all faces. I am the Resurrection and the Life. Join Me, or be destroyed.”

  Khonsu seemed to consider something, then turned serious. “The Empyreal Sun could never extinguish the Might of the Nommos Empire. You are a fool to threaten us. Our technology is far superior to yours…”

  Damarus smiled. “I think you’ll find many things have changed… since my Return. Your days as Nommos Emperor are over. Now, bow before your God.”

  “I do not think so!” Khonsu laughed. “However, I am willing to discuss the terms of your surrender.”

  “By refusing My generous offer, you bring devastation upon yourselves.”

  “If a war is what you want, Lord Damarus, then that is what you will get. If you are as powerful as you claim to be, you will know that we would never back down from the defence of our Realm. The Nommos Empire has stood firm for a million years. That will not change.”

  “So be it.”

  The holographic projection faded. Damarus turned back to Eldo Drakar.

  “He is playing stubborn, as I would have expected,” Drakar said.

  “Have the fleet disengage their battle with the Outer Colonies,” Damarus told him, “and move into Nommos space. Take it from them at all costs. Leave no survivors.”

  “As you wish.” Eldo Drakar turned, not looking too pleased at his instructions, and walked away.

  17

  Lorelei Chen felt a surge of tremendous power rumble through the Daedalus as nearly all reactor power was fed straight into the engines. The one-hundred-and-fifty-foot warship moved across the hangar bay toward the magnetic airlock, which opened slowly, giving her an unrivalled view of Earth’s atmosphere, a bright, crescent reddish-green ball hanging in the eternal darkness. It gave her a curious sort of feeling. It was, after all, the home world of her entire race - her birthplace, the Seventh Faction City of Einek clearly visible even from 3200 miles away - and yet now, she felt a strange sense of detachment from it. Her entire family - her mother, father, even her late husband, Lenton Yaka - were all long dead. Her ties to the planet were few. If she had a home now, it was this Earth Tower, this ship, Machiko and Paramo, her job on the Special Frontier Force which had kept her from going mad over the past decade. It gave her purpose where none other now existed. She knew that this insane adventure she was setting out on was motivated in part by her allegiance to the Terran Alliance and for the protection of the world in front of her. She was doing this for them, but she realised as well that if she were doing this for anyone it was for herself: somehow, she believed that Cris wanted her to do this.

  For ten years now, she had believed in Cristian Stefánsson. That somehow, he was not really dead - only transformed. She believed that the love they had shared all those years ago had been captured in time and space, like some cosmic photograph, and was still out there, waiting for its time to be reanimated, rekindled… for a time when the two of them could be together again. For ten years, she had waited for him.

  I still love him.

  Sometimes, it felt like more than that. She often wondered if these feelings had turned into an obsession; perhaps she was being completely irrational, delusional even - waiting for someone to come back to her when the real chances of it happening were slim at best. Was it an empty hope? After all, Cris had transformed into Lord Damarus, a being who transcended the laws of physics and the material universe. Was it irrational to hope that somehow, he would transcend the barriers that existed between them?

  The appearance of Cris’ ‘ghost’ several weeks earlier had given her tired hopes a shot in the arm. Everything she had believed in seemed to be legitimised now - that yes, he was still out there, waiting to find his way back into our world from whatever non-corporeal existence he had disappeared into. It had never been confirmed that Damarus had ever died… only that he had disappeared. Somewhere within him, Cris still existed, and now…

  Follow the crimson stars.

  She gritted her teeth as the Daedalus moved forward, out of the hangar bay and into the blackness of space, the artificial gravity cutting in. A moment later, the curvature of the Earth dropped out of sight, and the ship twisted and came about as Machiko set a course for Alpha Centauri into the navigation computer.

  Poor Machiko, Chen thought. She had no idea of the true extent of Chen’s feelings for Cris. She had some idea, at least; Chen had relayed the story to her many times - how Cris had been the only survivor in a twenty-first century cryopreservation facility, how Chen had helped him regain lost memories, fallen in love with him, and witnessed first-hand as he transformed into Damarus - but Chen had never let on just how much her heart still ached for the man. Why - she didn’t really know. It seemed silly that she should feel that way for a man she only knew for a few short months, such a small window in her life… but matters of the heart had never made much logical sense to her. Perhaps it was a form of madness - a weakness, maybe. There was just something about him which captivated her. She couldn’t explain it.

  Machiko was also, of course, very important to her. She loved Machiko, just not quite in the same way that she loved Cris. They’d first met three years earlier at an official function at the Silver City, after Paramo had arranged for Machiko’s release from Daam K’Vosh at the behest of her father. They’d been naturally drawn to each other that day, and it w
as only a matter of time before their relationship had changed into something more than professional. Chen had only ever been with men previously, and had never considered herself as bisexual, but physical intimacy with Machiko felt natural and right, like the fact they were both women didn’t matter. Perhaps Lora had always been that way, and simply didn’t realise it before.

  Whatever the case, Machiko really deserved to know what Lora was feeling right now. But finding the right words was difficult. Chen had never found it easy to talk about her innermost feelings with anyone, especially when those feelings had the potential to hurt somebody she cared about.

  “Five seconds to hyperspace,” Machiko said from the pilot’s chair to her left.

  Chen looked at her, a haunted smile etched across her face. Then a kaleidoscopic stream of rainbow colour and light opened all around them, appearing to swallow the ship whole, and the Daedalus jumped into the roaring, circular event horizon.

  They were following the red stars now.

  What they would find when they reached Proserpina was anyone’s guess.

  Ninety minutes had passed since they entered hyperspace. During that time, Lorelei Chen had spent as little time as possible with Machiko, preferring to closet herself away in one of the ship’s private quarters. Machiko understood; ever since the encounter with this so-called ‘ghost’ five weeks earlier, Lora had become increasingly withdrawn, undeniably frustrated, restless. Certainly, the encounter had stirred up some deeply rooted emotions and memories inside of her - and raised questions. Was this all the work of Lord Damarus, acting from whatever extradimensional realm he now inhabited? The thought of encountering Damarus again terrified Machiko, as it surely would any sane, sentient being. But the thought of waiting around uselessly while the Empyreal Sun launched unprovoked attacks on the outskirts of the Alliance’s territory, and perhaps eventually Earth itself, horrified her even more.

  Machiko drew a breath and stepped forward. The door to the private quarters whispered open, allowing a blast of dark, thunderous music and anguished voices to assault her senses. She gritted her teeth and entered. So skull-shatteringly loud was the music that a vein in her forehead began to pulse in time to its beat.

  As for Lorelei Chen, she stood staring out at the stars from a porthole window, her back to the door; the tension coiled in her shoulders and tightly crossed arms telegraphed her mood more eloquently than the agonised opera. Discontent seemed to emanate outward from her body into the air, riding upon each blaring, furious note.

  Machiko neared the perfectly-made bed in the middle of the room, but Chen had heard neither the gentle sound of the door opening and closing nor the sound of her lover’s footfall. Only when Machiko’s transparent reflection became superimposed over Chen’s view of the stars did she turn to face the other woman.

  Without a word or a change in her taut expression, Chen waved a hand over a nearby computer console; blessedly, the opera dropped in volume. As it did, Machiko felt her face relax and realised she had been wincing.

  “I’m not familiar with that piece,” she said, with the faintest of smiles. The music played softly on, speaking to Machiko of utter loss, destruction, despair.

  Chen did not return the smile but replied curtly and without humour, “‘Dissolution of Eternity’, an Alpha Centurian opera composed by Vitivius the Younger in 67 ND. What is it?”

  Machiko took a deep breath. “We’ll be entering the Proxima Centauri system in around twelve minutes.” She was about to ask what was bothering Lora when the troubled woman interrupted, her voice taut with an undercurrent of heavy emotion.

  “Why is it so hard, Machiko?” Her emerald-green eyes narrowed and stared deeply into Machiko’s with an intensity that would have made any less loyal or determined friend and lover flinch and turn away. “Why is love so complicated?”

  Machiko met her gaze firmly with her own and saw that it held not just a question, but an invitation. There was something hidden there, something deeper than she was letting on. Pain, she decided. “What’s wrong, Lora?”

  Chen averted her gaze. “Oh, Machiko. I feel… torn. There is something growing inside of me, something I haven’t really told you about. An obsession, a passion, for…”

  “Cris,” Machiko said, nodding. “Yes, Lora. I know. You already told me that you still love him. And I hear you talking in your sleep, almost every night. You’re dreaming about him a lot, aren’t you?”

  Chen nodded. “I dream that we’re looking at each other across a long table. We’re both experiencing mamihlapinatapai. We both want to reach across the table and touch each other, make love, but aren’t able to…” She blinked. “I can’t stop thinking about him. It feels like my love for him is intensifying. And since the visit from his ‘ghost’, it’s getting stronger.”

  Machiko drew back slightly, lips parted in shock and sorrow. Lora was agonising here, that much was clear. She had endured many horrors during the time she had spent with Cristian Stefánsson in person; chilling, obscenely inhuman things, and it must have affected her on a deep psychological level. “It’s all right,” she said tightly, clasping her hands behind her. “These things happen. We all have our… obsessions. Some affect us more than others at various times in our lives. I understand, Lora.”

  Chen looked out at the stars, then drew herself back into the present and visibly worked to release some of the tension in her face and voice. With a sigh, she glanced into Machiko’s grey eyes. “I’m so sorry,” she said at last. “You don’t deserve for me to be feeling this way. I love you, Machiko, and you’re here, now. I want to be with you. Cris is long gone. It’s like I have an absurd fantasy in the pit of my heart that one day he’s going to come back into my life, and I haven’t been able to shake that feeling in ten years. I don’t want to lose you over it.”

  “Come here,” Machiko said softly, moving closer. They embraced tightly, and Chen released a great, silent sigh, overwhelmed by guilt and sorrow, letting her face sink into Machiko’s shoulder. “It’s okay,” Machiko cooed, running the fingernails of her left hand through Chen’s smooth dark hair. “You’re not going to lose me, Lora. I will always be here for you.”

  And then Machiko suddenly found herself kissing her, pulling her even closer than before. When their lips finally parted, Machiko held Lora in her arms as they looked at each other. For a long moment there was a peaceful kind of emotion between them.

  Night was becoming dawn on Proserpina’s western hemisphere.

  As the Daedalus began its approach through the planet’s atmosphere, it soared past several of the planet’s many moons. The planet itself glowed with the same soft yellowy hue of dawn that tinted the hull of the powerful warship. As the ship neared, it swerved to avoid a billowing canyon of clouds that swirled up around the planet’s stratosphere.

  When Machiko Famasika finally lowered the ship through the clouds, she and Lorelei Chen got their first glimpse of the world’s barren surface, and Rhino Colony on the distant horizon. At length, it appeared as a huge spider’s web, comprised of two octagonal structures connected end-on-end, north to south. Each structure consisted of a central ‘core’ surrounded by six struts. Despite being the oldest of all the Extrasolar Colonies, the planet had little in the way of high technology, having changed little in the past two centuries. Their energy economy was based on wind power, a most archaic technology, and interstellar trade was limited to the precious ores that were mined here - but everybody knew that the natural resources were drying up on Proserpina. It was common knowledge. Nobody really came here anymore.

  With impressive finesse, Machiko navigated the Daedalus to a soft landing in the sand, where it nestled, hidden from a view of the colony by an imposing dune. They donned their Rãvier suits then made their way out of the craft, struggling to the crest of the dune to get a better view of the settlement ahead.

  Chen lifted infrared binoculars to her eyes to get a better view. “Nothing unusual,” she said, “at least not that I can see from here.”
She scowled as she stared through the binoculars. There was nothing between the Daedalus and Rhino Colony but a flat, unbroken expanse of sand. Then she saw a group of silhouetted human figures emerge from the nearest structure some several hundred yards away, heading their way with purposeful intent. “Somebody’s coming to meet us,” she said finally. “A greeting party, by the look of them.”

  A rugged-looking group of colonists scampered toward the Daedalus, carrying a variety of tools and dragging equipment behind them. Chen assumed they were some sort of ground crew, dispatched to service their vessel. Behind them glided the stately form of a Nasak Yamanian in the official attire of a Viceroy - a heavy full-length robe of deep green that had a lapel collar so tall it concealed his vestigial ears. The Viceroy’s white scalp glistened with a sheen of moisture, and he walked with the aid of a staff.

  “That was quick,” Machiko muttered. “Almost like they were expecting us…”

  “Greetings,” the Viceroy said gravely in a thick accent. “I am Siot Rar, the Viceroy of Proserpina’s Rhino Colony, and master of port administration here. Please state your business.”

  Chen sensed no malice in him, so decided to tell the truth. “Greetings, Viceroy. I am Lorelei Chen, and my companion is Machiko Famasika. We are operatives in the Special Frontier Force, sent by Warmaster Paramo,” she said, “on official business of the Terran Alliance.”

  “The Warmaster?” Siot Rar snorted. “What possible interest could the Warmaster of the Terran Alliance have in our insignificant little colony?”

  Machiko kept her eyes directed at the Viceroy. “We followed a strange cosmic phenomenon here. A group of red stars. Something we cannot yet explain has been leading us to this planet. We need to know if anything unusual has happened here recently.”