by Barry Kirwan
“Meeting over?” Pierre asked. “I guess I should get back. They need me, I’m afraid.”
“I know.” Kat stood, looking a little sheepish. “But first… I asked for a little privacy.”
“But the Hohash is still here.”
She shrugged. “No Hohash, no us.”
She walked towards him, put her arms around him, and kissed him.
Pierre felt other feelings rise up inside him that he thought he’d forgotten. Logic be damned, he thought, and kissed her back.
Kat opened her eyes and found herself back in bed next to Antonia, who was leaning on her elbow staring at her.
“Hello sleepy-toes. You’ve been dreaming.”
“Oh,” Kat said, blushing. “Sorry.” She noticed the Hohash through the door in the next room.
“No need to apologise, especially as you were fondling me in quite an interesting way.”
Kat’s blush deepened. But she and Antonia hadn’t had sex since they’d gotten back from Savange. Antonia had said she couldn’t. Which meant they’d not made love for over two years, ever since Louise had taken Kat prisoner. Kat bit down on that thought, and made to get up out of bed.
Antonia caught Kat’s shoulder. “Where do you think you’re going?” Antonia slid on top of Kat, pinned her wrists to the pillow, almond eyes gleaming. “Promise you’ll never leave me, Katrina.”
“I promise,” Kat said. “Anything else?”
Antonia released her wrists, and began kissing Kat’s body.
Kat lay on the bed, listening to Antonia moving about in the bathroom next door. “Don’t worry, I’ll never leave you,” she said quietly, more to herself, as the noise of a bath running masked her words. She got up and tiptoed to the Hohash in the living room. She leant her head towards it and connected via her node, searching. After a while, she smiled, and kissed its golden outer frame.
“Our little secret,” she whispered, and headed to join Antonia.
Micah pondered the message from Louise, trying to see the deception. But he couldn’t. Nor could Sandy, Gabriel or Vashta. “Kill the Queen,” was all it said. Hard to read between the lines when there were only three words.
“Kill Louise first,” Sandy offered.
“Shiva believes it was a parting message,” Micah replied. “Transmitted just as she entered Transpace. Louise is probably long gone.”
“Then go after her,” Sandy replied. “Maybe Shiva can pick up her scent and we can change direction. She’s enemy number one, Micah.”
Micah wasn’t so sure anymore. The last time he and Louise had met, he’d sensed a change in her. She’d seemed genuinely upset about what had happened to her people on Savange. Her people. She’d become loyal.
Gabriel joined in. “We came here to the Q’Roth system to find out what deal she has brokered with the Q’Roth High Queen. It might only concern Louise, or the Alicians, or Esperia, or the fate of the entire galaxy. All we know is what Toran told Sandy, but Louise may not have told him the whole story, or may have even lied to him. We need to know. Hellera needs to know. The final battle with Qorall is coming.”
Sandy folded her arms. “I’ve watched this bitch lead men around her before, drawing them into her game. It never ends well – except for her.”
Micah tried not to stare at Sandy. The past few days, awake in Transpace, he’d seen more of her than in years. Although he’d given up hope long ago, he swore he’d caught her looking at him once or twice. He dismissed it; he needed to focus. Sandy was right, Louise was treacherous. But Gabriel’s line of argument was more immediate.
“We go in hot,” Micah said. “Most likely they’ll try to destroy us on the spot. Louise is half-Q’Roth, she may have gotten an audience. The only way we’ll get one is by a show of strength.”
Gabriel clutched the silver hilt of the nanosword in his hand. “I know I am a clone, that my memories – fragmented as they are – are not truly my own, but…”
“You want justice,” Micah finished.
He nodded, addressing both of them. “It is odd. The Gabriel you know – your son, Sandy – wanted so much to avenge his father, slain on Earth. I can… see some of those thoughts. It is like reading a letter: I can see how he felt, but these are not my feelings. Nevertheless, I have a strong sense of duty.”
Sandy walked up to Gabriel. Micah knew it was difficult for her: the clone looked just like her dead son, and his features resembled the original Gabriel, but it wasn’t him. In the past few days Sandy had kept her distance from this Gabriel even more than from Micah.
“Then do your duty,” she said, then added, “Gabriel.”
He nodded, as a son to a mother. This time she didn’t look or walk away.
The interaction reminded Micah that he himself had just narrowly missed becoming a father, and he felt a gnawing in his guts. Shiva contacted him via his resident.
Micah turned his head to Vashta, who stood regally as usual, her mane of black fur framing quicksilver eyes that betrayed nothing. He gave her a small nod.
He turned back to Sandy and Gabriel. “Let’s do this,” he said. “Everyone take their stations.”
Shiva emerged from Transpace to find herself surrounded by a dozen Q’Roth warships. They bathed her in fire without warning. As instructed, Shiva returned fire only to disarm the warships. Three Crucible Class vessels lashed out their anti-matter cables, trying to saw through Shiva’s shields, but her artillery chopped off each strand at its base. More warships joined the fray, some jumping in from outside the system. Transpace conduits opened up like silver rips in space, disgorging ships around Micah and his crew.
Micah thought it was excessive, but then he recalled what Shiva had done to the Q’Roth warships guarding the orbital space station above Savange, cleaving them in two. They think we’ve come to strike at their homeworld.
“Stop firing,” Micah said.
“Are you crazy?” Sandy asked.
“I want to talk to the Queen. I need to get her attention. How long will our shield hold, Shiva?”
“A while,” Shiva answered.
“That was a little enigmatic,” Sandy said. “I think Shiva’s sulking, Micah. She’s a warship, too, remember.”
Micah said nothing, knowing that Shiva was Level Fifteen, augmented by Hellera herself. The shields were multi-layered, poly-phasic and regenerative, capable of shifting at the pico-second level, and harnessed a percentage of the inbound energy to reinforce themselves. It reminded him of the old aboriginal trick of cyclical breathing, which enabled ancient musicians to play wind instruments continuously, as if always breathing out. But it wouldn’t last forever.
Gabriel left his station, stood next to Micah, and stared at the viewscreen, hundreds of ships now deluging them with beams, missiles, and anti-matter cables. Some of the frontline ships had to draw back or risk being fried in the radiation backlash.
“What are you searching for?” Micah asked him.
“I am not sure. I sense something out there, in the background, waiting.”
“You sense something?”
“I am a creature of Hellera, Micah. Sandy is right on that point. You should not trust me. Sometimes…” He tore his vision away from the screen, and stared intently at Micah.
“Sometimes it is as if I can sense my mind hiding something from me. Other times it is as if someone is watching behind my eyes, seeing what I am seeing.” He returned to searching the enemy fleet.
Micah rubbed the stubble on his chin. Then he got up, gestured for Gabriel to take his seat, and walked to the arch leading to the common room.
“Where the hell are you going?” Sandy asked.
“I need to think, and the battle is distracting me. I’m going to get an ultresso. I’ll be back in a while. Want one?”
Sandy looked exasperated, but followed him.
He sipped the bitter, grainy coffee while he leaned against the wall, facing Sandy. There was a distant hiss, the only sound generated by the onslaught of Q’Roth enemy fire impacting Shiva’s shield every second.
“How long are you going to keep this up?” Sandy asked.
“Until the Queen makes her next move, or Shiva tells me we need to fight back.”
His resident was processing Sandy’s body language and other parameters, analysing her. He switched it off. Micah sensed his own death approaching, and he needed some closure if he was to focus. He put his cup down, and spoke softly.
“Why, Sandy?”
Sandalwood eyes blazed beneath her fringe. “Why what?”
“For years you’ve refused to talk to me.”
“Really? You want to do this now?”
He said nothing.
She clutched her cup near her lips without taking a sip, and spoke to the floor. “You had plenty of company, Micah, plenty of lovers over the years once you ran out of Alicians.”
He placed his cup down on the table. “Louise and Hannah. Is it about them? My God that’s ancient history, Sandy. Don’t tell me you’re still living there?”
She slammed down her cup and went to leave, but the door wouldn’t open.
“Not my doing,” Micah said.
“Shiva!” she shouted. But the door remained closed. She faced it, her back to Micah.
“You had plenty of lovers on Esperia, Micah.”
“Two,” he said, hearing the pathos in his own voice.
She uttered a single staccato laugh. “I heard it was eight.”
“I didn’t know you were listening.”
She didn’t reply for a time. “Antonia. You were always interested in her. You –” She cut herself off.
Micah felt blood rising to his head. Sandy must have known about Antonia’s lost baby.
“What? Say it, Sandy. Or shall I say it for you?”
“Drop it Micah. Forget it.” She banged her fist on the door.
He walked up close, right behind her. “At least you had a son. And you have a second chance. He’s standing on the bridge right now.”
“That… clone… is not my son.” Her voice was quiet. “Please ask Shiva to open this door.”
Before he had a chance, the door slid open. Sandy stepped into the corridor then paused, still facing away from him.
“I’m sorry about what happened to Antonia. And you, Micah. Really.” She reached out a hand and grasped the doorframe, as if for support, her voice unsteady.
“I will tell you something I’ve never told anyone, Micah. All these years, Ramires and I wanted another child. He deserved it more than any man I know, and I wanted so much to give him his own son... But we couldn’t. That is, he couldn’t.”
“But the Ossyrian doctors, surely –”
Micah saw her grip tighten. “They couldn’t help, not this time.”
Micah’s mind reeled as he tried to imagine what that must have been like for them, for her.
“So, Micah, I have an inkling of what you must be feeling, to almost have something you might have wanted for a long time and then lose it.” Her grip loosened. “But sometimes, even when your life turns to shit and everything seems lost, then out of the blue fate throws you a second chance. But if it’s not the real thing… sometimes you just can’t settle for it.” She let go of the frame. “This Gabriel isn’t my son. He’s Hellera’s. You’ll see, Micah, before the end, of that I’m sure. So, please drop it.”
All of Micah’s angst had evaporated. She’d been through too much all those years, he’d had no idea. He wanted to comfort her, to hold her. But he had no right.
“It’s dropped, Sandy. Thank you for telling me what you just did. It couldn’t have been easy.”
“It’s never easy, Micah.” She paused a moment, then left.
Shiva re-activated Micah’s resident.
He started walking. “Don’t ever do that again, Shiva.”
Just before reaching the bridge he realised the continuous hiss of fire against Shiva had ceased. Gabriel vacated the command chair and Micah took it. The front barrage of Q’Roth warships parted, revealing a single black and white ship with long chequered spines.
Nchkani.
“Shiva, can you take it on?”
“Technically, no. The Nchkani vessel is more powerful. But Hellera sent me certain enhancements while we were on Esperia, Level Nineteen algorithms for new shield harmonics. Nevertheless, the odds are not in our favour.”
Sandy moved next to Micah. “I thought their ships were all destroyed? I know Toran said Louise would offer them technology, but a ship?”
Her proximity distracted him.
“Shiva, is there only one?”
“That I can detect.”
That was something. Also, it wasn’t firing; a definite bonus, given that Shiva’s shields had taken a battering in the past quarter of an hour. Shiva fed Micah’s resident with a piece of Level Fifteen-only information from Hellera, concerning the ability of the Nchkani to replicate fleets in a matter of days, something about a resurrection protocol. Micah joined up the dots: Qorall’s plan with Louise as messenger, the Q’Roth Queen as recipient, and Nchkani ships as payment. A fleet of Nchkani ships was an offer the High Queen was unlikely to refuse. He had to do something to make her wary of the deal.
“Vashta, transmit a message to the Q’Roth commanding that vessel. Tell him the following message is for the Queen: ‘Louise lied: she is going to betray the Q’Roth.’ Transmit as corroboration the message Louise sent us.”
Sandy stood in front of Micah. “You’ve changed, Micah. That was… Ramires would have approved; Vince, too.”
He gave a small nod to acknowledge the compliment, but knew full well it could be premature.
“That depends on what happens next.” Micah noticed the Spider and Hohash enter the bridge, the Spider taking up position directly in front of the viewscreen.
The Nchkani vessel retreated slowly, and opened up a path through the Q’Roth fleet, towards Korakkara, the Q’Roth homeworld. Shiva followed through a seemingly endless tunnel of Q’Roth warships, until a planet emerged in front of them. Micah had seen an image of the Q’Roth homeworld once before, during humanity’s Trial. But seeing it grow large on the viewscreen was something else. The world was dark, scarred by a dozen lava rivers, scarlet curves scratched across thousands of miles of black desert, terminating in magma seas; open wounds, as if pockets of flesh had been gouged from the planet’s face. Extinct super-volcanoes rose tall enough to breach the upper atmosphere.
“How can even Q’Roth live there?” Sandy asked.
Gabriel answered, reciting something presumably lodged into his memory by Hellera.
“Their homeworld was once beautiful, purple oceans and forests of blue-woods that reached two kilometres in height, green snows in winter flushed away by rainbow rains leading to the amber period, when the forests produced a highly nutritious honey prized as a delicacy throughout Grid Society. This planet was once one of the galaxy’s jewels. But it was attacked by the sole survivor of a Level Nine species the Q’Roth had helped to eradicate during one of the Grid Wars; one reason Q’Roth culls tend to be complete. The damage to the planet could not be repaired, nor could the degenerative terraforming process be reversed. The Tla Beth offered them a new homeworld, but the High Queen refused. The Q’Roth became nomadic, this planet a badge of honour. The core of the planet is now hollow, the High Queen living underground in catacombs with only a handful of guardians.
Micah studied Gabriel. At first the information seemed technical, but the last part was tactical. He would definitely have to keep an eye on him.
The Nchkani vessel hovered next to a gaping hole leading down inside the planet.
“Take us in, Shiva,” Micah said.
Sandy put her hand on his shoulder. Whether it was for his or her benefit,
he didn’t care; he was glad for it.
As Micah suspected, the Nchkani vessel stayed behind, blocking the only way out.
They set down in a vast cavern bathed in green light, several tunnels leading away from it, one directly in front barred by the largest Q’Roth warrior Micah had ever seen.
“Vashta, Sandy, stay here, I have a feeling we might need a rescue and a quick getaway. Shiva, please work out how to destroy the Nchkani vessel.”
He nodded to Gabriel, and they departed.
The air outside in the cavern was dank but breathable. They approached the guardian; Micah was sure its six eyes were a deeper red than those of a normal Q’Roth. The four-metre-tall warrior turned and led the way, Micah and Gabriel having to break into a trot to keep up. The tunnel twisted and turned, always descending, as they threaded their way through many intersections; Micah hoped his resident was keeping track of their pathway through the catacombs. As he’d expected, it grew hotter the deeper they went.
Finally, they emerged into a dome-like chamber, empty except for a square dais upon which stood two black pillars the height of a tall man. Four guardians stood in front of the dais, each carrying a three-metre barbed spear that shone like titanium.
There was a dragging, clomping sound, and Micah turned to see the High Queen enter, taller than the guardians. Her ribbed belly reached all the way to the ground and tapered off a couple of meters behind her in a coarse tail with three spikes. Her back was different to other Q’Roth he’d seen: two long bony rods hung straight down from either shoulder, corrugated translucent skin nestling in between. Wings. He hoped they were defunct, a throwback to a former Q’Roth age. She hauled herself onto the dais and leant on the two pillars using her mid-legs, leaving her forelegs free.
“The one you call Louise has given us Nchkani ships. You say she will betray us?”
She spoke in Q’Roth, Micah’s resident translating; he hoped Gabriel understood. Glancing at the Youngblood clone, he noticed something odd about the way he was standing: completely relaxed, and his face… his expression was as if he wasn’t really there.
“We are enemies of Louise,” Micah said, “but the message we relayed to you comes directly from her, just as she left this system.”