Shivuk stayed behind her, voice soft. “Your captivity is my disgrace. If I had spoken sooner...”
She allowed herself a small smile he would not understand as she signaled polite contradiction with her hands. “No. For you to,” she would not use the word betray, not speak of his father, “risk rescuing me was a hard decision. You needed the time. And so, to be honest, did I.” She did not seek to enlighten him. “And now, my Lord Shivuk, did you seek me for a reason today?”
He paused, fingers still. “Yes, Lady Ambassador. Our ships are ready and I would like to familiarize you with the flagship.” He gestured towards the garden gate. “Will you come with me?”
A flash, nothing more, of fear. “Of course, let us go.”
“A moment, if you would.” He reached out and snapped a long stem close to the edge of the bed and handed the scarlet blossom to her. “I do not think Lord Bunyir would mind.” He offered his arm. “Shall we go?”
She wrapped her hand around his forearm and marveled how accustomed she had become to the touch of hard shell against her skin.
Despite the mildness of the day he tucked a travel cloak about her shoulders. The quick flitter trip took them down the hill to a building formed of stone. Less decorative than Bunyir’s home, yet still graceful, soaring.
Sentries positioned around the perimeter saluted them and then one stepped away from his post and opened the door for Shivuk and Eleanor.
She entered the cool darkened room and gasped.
Inside endless doors of black reflected each other down the length of the hall, stretching into the deep shadows, gates to uncounted possibilities. Gates, the same as the one that brought her from Travbon to Tamker.
Shivuk inclined his head towards her, sensing her confusion. She glanced up at her escort. Like all Tamkeri his thin frame towered above her. She could not find the words to ask her question, but he guessed well enough.
“My Lady, how did you suppose we would cross to the ships? To break free of the gravity well to space beyond is difficult and expensive. Long ago my people discovered the secret of building the gates and we have employed them for all such work.” Shivuk guided her to a gate that ,to her, looked like all the others. “This one is tuned to the flagship. Are you ready?”
Eleanor recalled the biting cold of her first trip, felt thankful for the thick traveling cloak. “Yes.”
Arm in arm they crossed through the gate. Her fingers tightened on his arm and she held the stem of the flower in a clenched fist. Two, three, four paces through the dark and then they stood in a room.
Bright walls, ceiling, floor, pulsed with color. Three Tamkeri stood at attention before her, their fingers rested still at their sides.
Shivuk spoke. “In truth, I would like to show you the ship, but also think it wise for the crew to be aware of you and your foreign appearance. Few of us have seen your kind and I would be most displeased if discomfort at having an alien among us distracted the crew during battle. I have made sure that those who serve on this ship will understand Standard as well. It seems best.”
They passed down white corridors and emerged into a circular room. Holoscreens filled the front hemisphere, and the Tamkeri stood at small tables, manipulating colors and lights on their surfaces. “Here is where the ship is piloted, the primary heart of the shell. We are deep within the ship, but there is a secondary command center. We do not like to take chances in matters such as this.”
Eleanor wandered through the small room, peered at the tables and the screens, as the crew clearly expected such a performance from her. The bridge crew could have been playing games and she’d never know the difference. Surely they realized that as well. But each politely stood aside, gestured to their control station, made a few words of explanation as to what function they served.
She returned to Shivuk’s side and bowed to them all. “I appreciate your time and indulgence and will let you return to your duties.”
As one, they bowed back.
Shivuk crossed to a door to the side of where they had entered. “Through here is the communications area. If our plan is to succeed, you must understand the workings of this unit.”
She followed him into the center of a dimly lit room.
“Screens.” Shivuk ordered.
Holoscreens snapped into existence all around them, showing the arrangement of the Tamkeri fleet.
Oblong, sleek craft, no two colored the same. The exteriors spun colors into new shades and patterns, while the ships adjusted their positions. Tapered at the front, the ships bulged in gentle curves.
Hundreds, more than she could count at a glance, surrounded the pair in the communications room. Despite their beauty, Eleanor frowned. Even with this force massed against them, she worried the humans would still refuse to negotiate. If she didn’t know their reasons for ignoring the Tamkeri before, how could she hope to convince them now?
Shivuk did not notice her discomfort. “The color shifts you see are an effect of the armor systems. The field around each ship modulates its energy pattern constantly. You will be safe here.” He reached out a slender digit and tapped towards a blue grey vessel moving away from them. Immediately the ship filled the screen.
“This is the way for you to examine a ship more closely. To speak to all ships within range, you must command the system.” He spoke louder now. “Speak.”
“To speak to a particular ship, call it closer.”
Eleanor’s mind raced. “How can they hear me?”
Shivuk laughed. “They will not just hear you, they will see you. The system will project your image, as you stand in this room, to the communications systems on the bridge of each craft. They will hear you and you will see them, as you do these ships, and hear their responses. It will be advisable for you to examine as many human captains as possible while you speak. Technicians have modified our listening system to your language. It will pick up and project voices directed at your image. We can only hope that one of them will behave reasonably.”
Eleanor shook her head, uncertain how she would ever sort out so much information at once.
“I have arranged for you to spend time with an experienced communications officer. He will train you better than I could and show you how to filter the images and sounds from so many streams.”
She felt relieved, then another question came to mind.
“I see how this will work with your own ships, but what about the human ships? They weren’t built to receive this sort of signal, so how will they get the messages?”
Shivuk glanced away from her. “We have had time and opportunity to study their communications and systems. Please trust me, my lady. It will work.”
The missing trade ships. Eleanor speculated on the likely fate of the crews and grew cold. “I would like to return home at once.”
“Of course, my Lady.”
She ignored his proffered limb and instead wrapped her arms tightly around her waist under the concealing folds of the cloak. The wilted scarlet bloom lay discarded on the floor behind her.
Bunyir found her in the garden. “It is time.”
She remained on the bench, facing the flowers.
“Eleanor?”
“Where are the crews? Of the human ships you studied? Are they imprisoned like I was? Were they killed? I need to know before I go.” Her voice sounded flat and dull, even to her own ears.
A pause, clicking from Bunyir, “I am sorry that Shivuk’s words gave you such distress. He was unclear as to what he said to displease you so.”
She remained still.
He clicked, but continued. “You knew human shipping had fallen under attack. Early on we did not realize how fragile your ships were. Our charges opened their hulls. After battles we towed their craft here for study. No humans survived. None languish in prison.
I promise this.”
She still could not look at him.
“If we had access to survivors I might have tried to find an ambassador to speak for us sooner. If you do not believe this, if you do not trust me, then we have gained nothing.”
Eleanor felt the ice that had formed in her stomach on the communications bridge begin to thaw.
His next words froze her again.
“Those assigned to monitor the human communications have reported news of interest. They come. There may never be a better chance to end this.”
End this. Eleanor rose and this time reached forward herself to snap a slender stalk.
“Shall we go?”
Mikka met them outside the garden and together they escorted her to the hall of gates. As she stood before the endless black that would take her to the ship, Bunyir put a hand on her shoulder.
“Farewells would only be appropriate if you did not plan to return. Go with our hopes.”
Mikka bowed deeply to Bunyir and waited to enter with Eleanor.
Eleanor restrained herself from embracing his dignified form. She compromised with signals of fondness.
“We will be home soon. Please care for yourself here.” She glanced at Mikka, still uneasy at taking her capable assistance away from Bunyir with the council still unsettled.
He followed her eyes. “We have already discussed this. And I believe a fleet anticipates your arrival.”
She stepped back into a formal bow then strode through the dark.
Shivuk waited for them on the other side, small twitches of apology hidden from the soldiers by the fold of his robe.
“My Lady, we await you on the bridge.”
He guided her through the glowing corridors and waited until she settled into the padded chair installed expressly for her comfort.
The silent room seemed to hold its breath. Shivuk glanced down from where he stood at her side. At her signal, he spoke.
“Proceed.”
Chapter Nineteen
Adam fired, waited for the charge to rebuild, and fired again. His eyes no longer tracked his shots. He knew they would hit the enemy’s ships, like all his shots so far, but feared they would barely scratch the enemy’s hull, like all his shots.
Not only had the guns of the Galileo proved ineffective, but the entire armada had managed to do very little damage. In hours of battle there had only been a handful of confirmed kills and he feared they were flukes. No patterning program seemed to be able to recreate the successful shots and so the human ships fired blindly.
When the human armada had launched, Adam had felt his heart jump. He still harbored his doubts about the government on Claro and felt the recruits had been abominably manipulated while in training; none of those feelings had altered. But to see the armada soar through the sky, more ships than he had imagined, the planet’s surface dropping away below them… the sheer scale of the endeavor forced something in him to respond despite his fears. The glow of the journey had soon shattered around him into shards that held only distorted reflections.
More personally disconcerting was that Doug had also been assigned to the Galileo. As bridge crew, Adam reassured himself that he would be unlikely to run into a ground troop, but like his own personal demon, Doug had been assigned one of the guard positions outside the bridge hatch.
Adam almost wished for a return of their old hostility. Every time he passed, Doug looked on the verge of saying something, but never did. Their duty rosters synchronized often enough that when Adam reported in he was never sure if Doug’s questioning gaze would be there to meet him. At the beginning of the voyage, Adam had hesitantly approached Mr. Houghton, the first mate, and asked in a low voice about changing the rotation. The question had been met with a short shake of the head.
“We won’t be up long enough for it to matter, son.” Houghton had been dismissive. “In and out, crush the greenies in their beds. We’ll be home too soon for you boys to notice each other. Fighting over some girl, were you?”
Adam wished he shared the first mate’s optimism as he scrambled to grip the edge of his station in an effort to stay upright as another shot from “the greenies” rocked the Galileo.
When he glanced from his targeting screen to the observational holo, he winced. The armada that had left the skies of Danbro a few days ago in such majesty was battered, ragged. A quick look at the info panels to the side showed him few ships had been outright destroyed.
But all the ships had taken damage. The Galileo remained maneuverable for the moment, but the Newton and the Morpheus, two of the large troop transports, appeared to be adrift. The cruisers Hercules and the Rembrandt reported engines crippled but usable, main cannons destroyed.
Adam went back to his work, futile though it felt. His trainers had been right. He was a good gunner, enjoyed the mathematical precision. Target, fire, move to the next. If only he could see results. None of the training, none of the simulators had prepared him for an enemy that shrugged off each of his shots. He clenched his jaw and glanced again at the overview, aware his hope that another ship in the armada might have found a weakness in the enemy bordered on the irrational.
“Wait!”
He hadn’t meant to speak aloud. Adam wasn’t sure if the pattern he saw on the screen was accurate, but he couldn’t take the chance without notifying Captain Bullfinch.
“Cole, tell me you sank one of the bastards.”
Adam’s jaw tightened further, he forced himself to speak. “Sir, look at the screen.”
“Cole, I am looking at the screen. What exactly do you wish to bring to my attention?”
“Sir, look at how the enemy is arranged around our ships. At how they’re moving.”
Adam switched the screen into tri-D and pivoted the point of view. The pattern became clearer.
“They’re herding us, clustering our ships into the middle of them, forcing those of us who can still move closer to the disabled transports.”
Houghton scoffed. “It’s a theory, Cole. Only a theory and you’re giving the greenies a lot of credit for brains.”
Adam stared at the ravaged scraps of their armada and said nothing further.
Bullfinch made his decision. “Mr. Houghton, open a channel to the other captains.”
The knot in Adam’s chest loosened a fraction. Maybe a way to win through still could be found. The original plan would have to be tossed aside, but something might still be salvaged. He kept firing while Bullfinch talked, then a shout from the navigator froze them all.
“What are those?”
They all stared at the screen. Beams of energy streamed out of the alien ships. Adam braced for impact then gaped as nothing came. The enemy wasn’t aiming at the humans at all. None of the armada was struck. Confusion reigned on the bridge.
Captain Bullfinch saw it first. “A net. It’s a net.” The enemy ships drew closer, crept towards each other. The bands of the net grew tight around the fleet. As the net constricted, more beams flew between the ships, crisscrossing, forming a tight latticework, one section built up at a time.
After a stunned moment, Bullfinch shouted. “Navigation! Get us out of here, now!”
The navigator’s face twisted in concentration as she coaxed the balky ship towards the opening, the walls thrummed in response to the effort required of the engines, punctuating the mutters Adam could hear under the Captain’s breath.
The hatch behind him swung open and the sound of pounding feet entered the tension of the room.
“Captain, what’s going on?” Doug’s familiar voice shouted.
“Get back to your post, you fool!” The First Mate’s rage at the interruption did not mask the strain in his voice as the ship inched towards the goal.
Adam could not tear his eyes away from the monitors, did not hear Do
ug leave, forgot his existence, forgot to breathe. He noted the captain of the Knute, furthest at the edge of the trap, must have had the same idea. The sleek bomber raced towards the narrow gap. A muted cheer rose on the bridge as the smaller ship edged towards escape. Then her starboard engine crossed into the path of one of the beams. The force of the explosion rocked the surrounding craft.
A gasp, then a wail of tortured metal as a massive fragment of the doomed ship’s hull slammed into the Galileo. Screams and smoke filled the bridge, a section of the ceiling collapsed as a wall buckled. Broken circuits flared and sparked.
Emergency lights flickered and fans whirred to life, sucking the noxious smoke from the room. Adam pushed himself upright, felt a warm wetness over his left eye. He gingerly prodded his forehead and felt no surprise at the blood.
The captain pulled himself up by the arms of his command chair. His words choked out. “We can’t avoid it now. Back to the others.”
The remaining ships of the armada had been convinced by the Knute’s destruction and edged as close as they could to each other. Huddled together as if sheep in a pen, too close to maneuver, too close to fire without the risk of striking one of their own.
The Galileo limped away from the glowing lines, away from honor, from escape. Bullfinch called for a damage report and murmured voices from around the ship recited their bare facts in response.
Adam stood, surveying the devastation of the bridge. Then saw the rubble by the hatch and an arm, outstretched from underneath a sheet of permisteel fallen from the ceiling.
He dove towards the body, dug through the debris, unsure even as he hurled pieces aside what his own heart held, what he wanted to find.
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