Star Angel: Rising (Star Angel Book 4)

by David G. McDaniel

  A hush had come over the room. Construct Icons?

  Someone spoke tentatively, “What if we go over, and the Kel take the Icons and use them to get here?” It was, however, a positive question as far as Zac was concerned, an intelligent question—and the first sign the group might actually be coming around.

  “We make them one way,” was Nani’s answer.

  At that the room grew quiet again. Nani clicked off the screen.

  Someone else spoke. “Send our soldiers to—”

  Nani shook her head. “No one gets abandoned.” She already knew the objections. “No one gets stranded. We protect our movement. With the Reaver, with other means. We send no one with the means to return, but we preserve the means to retrieve. Once the battle is won we go. The point is the Earth is already ruined. We make that our battlefield. We fight our war there. When it’s over we fortify it and reclaim our troops.

  “Particulars can be discussed.” Explaining things to lesser intellects had no doubt been a necessary part of life for Nani, and Zac could see she hated having to wait for people to keep up. “I’m on your side more than you know. I’m on the side of humanity. But know that I’m up here on this table because I’m not about to let this turn into a panel discussion or be sent off to an advisory board or ignored or deferred or delayed. I don’t care how much inertia we have to overcome, how many mountains we have to move or how many people we have to shove out of the way, the decision must be made and it must be made now. And so the issue before us is this:

  “Is anyone here not in full agreement to proceed?”

  Silence. As it settled Zac began to wonder why Nani chose that point, there at the bitter end, to revert to what amounted to a vote. She’d been so hard charging, why not just ram it all the way through? Issue instructions and send the good little leaders off to get things done. That certainly seemed where she’d been headed. Give them their tasks. Send them away. Now it almost felt like a vacuum had been thrown into the room, and all the eagerly forward-leaning faces weren’t sure what to do. It reminded him a little of the same tactic Jess used to get their small group engaged aboard the Reaver, and Nani’s use of it here surprised him.

  But it didn’t backfire.

  “Let’s get our new allies involved before we go any further,” the president said. Somehow he grasped the real nature of the situation and found the will to push past the usual reactions such a bizarre scenario would’ve demanded. He was making a decision based on the information to hand, not his own emotional bias. Zac appreciated him for that. Though looking around the room he could see the president was somewhat alone in this enlightened view.

  No matter. If the president was thinking it through then the others would follow.

  Their top official looked to one of his closer aides. Zac recognized the man as a former Venatres general and, if he recalled, now head of military operations.

  “Get Yamoto on the line,” the president told him. “Fill them in and get a meeting arranged.” Then to everyone: “We were all wondering what our first global action might be under this new alliance.” He sat straighter. “I think we have our answer.”

  From Zac’s position standing to the side, arms crossed, looking over them all, he noted Lindin’s reaction as he, in turn, surveyed the room. They were going to get the Dominion involved, they were going to rally the Venatres, and they were going to war.

  The Intelligence boss was working hard to keep up.

  CHAPTER 29: TRAITORS

  “This will be interesting,” said Voltan, and Cee couldn’t tell whether he was being completely sarcastic. Sarcastic, yes, but did he mean it at all? In discussions leading up to this meeting Voltan did indeed seem interested to learn what this small group of humans might have to say. The Esehta Bok, they called themselves, a name which, in itself, made Cee all the more curious. Esehta Bok came from the ancient Kel. It meant “Defenders of the Secret”. Literally, “Secret Defenders”. If nothing else that name alone, and how they might’ve acquired it, made her want to grant this audience. But there were other, far more compelling reasons.

  These Bok were making some truly fantastic claims.

  Cee looked up at her Praetor, who in turn gazed levelly across the large hangar bay, watching as the far set of heavy doors slid closed behind the shuttle that had just arrived. Voltan did not place as much stock in the Prophecy, at least as far as he seemed not to worry much over the corrupting effect it might have—if at all. He seemed content simply to let it be where it arose, not seeing any threat in its adherents, not sharing Cee’s ardent desire to root out all mention of it, every whispered breath in every private quarter and absolutely annihilate it’s merest memory. In fact, by her mandate of complete intolerance these Bok, these Earthlings they were about to meet, should be eviscerated for the few things they’d said so far. But they, according to their own assertions, wanted to see the Prophecy brought down as well.

  And they were not Kel.

  They were human. On a world that had never been Kel, yet, increasingly, showed signs of some distant connection. Perhaps a stronger, more significant connection than Cee might ever have imagined.

  She waited as the shuttle was brought forward on its track. The sound of the closing doors passed and soon the loudest thing in the bay was the quiet thrum of that heavy movement. There were other sounds; the dreadnought was alive, systems always active, power flowing, masses moving, distant vibrations traveling through the solid keel. But for the most part all else was silent.

  The shuttle stopped in its designated spot, just shy of where Cee and her group waited. A column of helmed warriors moved into place, the shuttle doors opened and the humans they’d been waiting on emerged. They were escorted to stand before her. Introductions were made. Cee noted their reactions, fascinated at their composition and poise. These were stylized humans, ones with a certain arrogance about them, a confidence she appreciated, their aesthetic far closer to that of the Kel than any she’d seen among the other Earth humans so far. Each was young. After introductions their leader addressed her.

  His name was Lorenzo.

  “Honored queen,” he bowed his head, raised it and held her gaze. The computer translators kept pace smoothly. “Thank you for granting this meeting.” He looked around the cavernous, green-metal space. “Are we to speak here?” Before Cee could answer he added: “I ask only to be sure.”

  “We will speak here,” she said, intrigued but wanting to remain curt. At least for now.

  He bowed again. “Very well.” The others could not hold their eyes from roaming, she noticed, looking about the interior of the Kel flight deck. For them it must be quite impressive. The humans had no vessels of this scale, certainly none that could fly. Again their easy composure intrigued her. “We are the Esehta Bok,” Lorenzo said. It was curious to hear the computer pronounce the Kel words for Secret Defenders among the alien tongue, even as Lorenzo’s own voice said them clearly in the same way. “Our name comes from your ancient language. Our formation was at the hands of one of your own. A priestess from your past, named Aesha, a thousand of our years ago. We have passed some of this information to you, in our request to be noticed and heard.” At this he tried to smile warmly. Cee maintained her stoic regard, disturbed by Lorenzo’s supposed pedigree. He continued. “There was something the priestess found, back then. The Codex Amkradus, it was called.” And Cee felt her stomach drop. To hear those words, spoken so smoothly, so abruptly out of nowhere … no mention of the Codex had been made at all … This was by far more than any human should know. Much more—too much, and she knew at once these Bok were for real. Lorenzo missed her reaction, thankfully, continuing his delivery, and it was only after several more words that she realized she’d not heard what he was saying. She chose not to draw attention to it by asking him to repeat. There would be time enough for that. Instead she strained to bring her attention back to the words spooling out of the translator.

  The Codex Amkradus!

  How could he know?!


  How could he possibly?

  She stared at this human, not believing one of them could be speaking of this—with apparently just as much understanding as she. Perhaps more.

  “And so it worked,” he was saying, “and did not work, as she planned. Earth did prove a viable hideout. The Kel never made it here. Not in force. Aesha and her small group, with our ancestors, were able to establish a secure place for what she planned. However, none of that mattered. The Witch abandoned us.”

  Before she could think better of it Cee asked: “You call her Witch?” It made her sound interested, which she did not yet want to do, but perhaps she should drop that pretense. This was interesting, very much so, and she determined right then to mine these humans for all they knew.

  Lorenzo shrugged. “I am the first among us. Previous generations referred to her as our priestess. However the truth is she abandoned us with her agenda and, in the end, we owe our ruin to her. To me she was no priestess worthy of our regard.”

  Cee raised her chin slightly. Pretended incredulity. “Why did she include humans in her plans? Do your records tell you that?”

  “Earth was to be a fresh start. The Codex was to be studied and understood, and we were to be given its powers and rule this world. We were to be the beginning of a new age. That never happened. She never returned.”

  “Where is the Codex?” The possibility of that, that this ancient, blasphemous record might actually have ended up here … on this world, right beneath her …

  “Did she leave it?”

  Lorenzo shook his head. “We don’t know.”

  “So you have come forward since then, on this world?”

  “We have. In the shadows. But no more. Even before your arrival we, my group here,” and he indicated the other young humans standing defiantly around him, so cocky, so full of themselves, “were beginning our siege. Not with force, but a siege nonetheless. Seeds had been planted. We would soon have ruled here, as their superiors.”

  There was an inordinate amount of confidence in this Lorenzo.

  “The elders of our group,” he went on, “those who merely carried on the secret legacy of all that went before, believed this a mistake. Under their ‘guidance’ we would never have changed. But I’m the leader now, and under my guidance we are changing. Evolving. To achieve what we were promised so long ago. The Witch failed us. We determined to make this world our own. After a thousand years, watching as the Earth advanced around us, leaving us in the wings, we were at last on our way to claiming that right.

  “However,” and he spread his arms wide, “things are now quite different. You’ve taken the Earth in the midst of our own bid for it and we, so far as you know until now, are little more than part of the herd.”

  Cee cocked her head. “And so you come here to betray your fellow humans?”

  “They are not our fellows,” Lorenzo seemed to take real offense at the implication. The translation was flat; his voice was incensed. “As I say we precede them. Our destiny has always been to rule them. We’re not selling them out,” a bit of his façade faltered and, though the translation of those words was odd, “selling them out” somehow made sense. He resumed his haughty delivery. “They are cattle to us as they are to you. The necessary machinery of society.

  “I am here to convince you we’re more like you than we are like them. To ask for a seat at the table. To be part of what you intend.” He held himself straighter.

  “To that end I bring knowledge in trade.”

  Cee waited. Wanting exactly that.

  This Lorenzo was good. He continued.

  “My guess is that you’re not the Kel you used to be. Though our records are fragmented, we know there was a wide-reaching war among the Kel and their worlds at the time of our abandonment. Since we’ve seen nothing of any outside force since then, for the last thousand years, my conclusion is that you fell. The last Kel dynasty. And that you are here, now, reborn. Not what you used to be, perhaps, but certainly far beyond anything the Earth can withstand. The ancient Kel, from where Aesha came, from where we were formed, are no more. You are their legacy.

  “Is that true?”

  It was indeed true. Cee gauged this human. He was not being petulant. He was, however, attempting to exert a bit of leverage. She couldn’t blame him for that. But she must direct it.

  “We have risen from a fall,” she agreed.

  He nodded. “Then you may or may not be aware of the Prophecy.”

  These open, blatant mentionings of such heretical things were driving her inner cringe so hard she was certain it was making it to her expression. Surely she must look as if she’d tasted something bitter.

  “We are aware of it.” She glanced with apprehension at those around them, at her Kel warriors, the handful of ranking officers, Voltan, regretting her decision to speak there; not wanting to be having this discussion in front of them. At the same time not wanting Lorenzo to notice it bothered her.

  “I am a man grounded in reality,” he went on, the computer continuing its translation at a perfect pace. It was as if the Bok leader timed his words to fall within its limitations. He’d figured out the system and was working it to his advantage. “However,” he said, “reality can, at times, be quite fantastic. I believe the Witch truly was onto something back then, with her Order of the Adeptus, what she intended here on Earth, with us, the promise of the Codex and all else. I believe she did see the future, at least bits of it, and fantastic though the thought of that might be, I believe she did see things, and I believe that future is now. This is the time she predicted.” He paused; shifted posture. “Not only that, and as I have stated, I believe the herald she predicted is among us even now.

  “This is the time of the Prophecy.”

  Cee worked to keep her breathing steady.

  “We’ve contacted the herald,” Lorenzo moved to that aspect of the so-impossible yet so-real scenario unfolding before Cee’s eyes, “a girl from Earth, a simple child who may well be the one Aesha foresaw. We believe it is. Witch though Aesha was, though she abandoned us on this forsaken world, I cannot deny the fact that she was likely quite powerful. She saw this day, and the one from the Prophecy who would come. I believe that herald is here.”

  By now Cee’s curiosity could not be masked. “And she is to expose the Codex?”

  “According to the Prophecy, yes.”

  Cee knew this, of course, but to hear Lorenzo confirm it, this descendant from that very antiquity …

  “Further,” he added, “we know where she’s gone.”

  Cee was, yet again, taken aback.

  “The herald?” It was a needless question.

  Lorenzo nodded. “She eluded us.”

  Cee fought to remain impassive. Innards churning. This was at once so horribly blasphemous, so beyond anything for which she’d already had people killed, and yet so …

  She did not know how much of this buffeting storm she might continue to bear. From the sheer thrill of the conquest of a new world, the expansion of the Kel back to the stars, coupled with clear signs that the dreaded and long-dismissed Prophecy might actually be at hand.

  To what she knew, deep down, it promised.

  She stared hard at Lorenzo.

  How does he know these things?!

  She hated that the leader of these Bok had gained the higher ground in the exchange, but as the facts of these alarming possibilities continued to flow the deeper part of her, something far beneath the fear—greed, perhaps, desire for absolute power—gnawed at her very core. Never had she imagined a day the Codex might be uncovered. Never! Even in her wildest fantasies. Those legendary things were long gone. A part of history so far lost they weren’t even worth remembering. Dangerous promises at the root of the Heresy itself. The Codex Amkradus. The very thing the priestess sought to bring to the worlds of the Kel empire so long ago, to make their secrets known far and wide, such that all might have freedom. Such that all might have individual power.

  The v
ery thing that started the Wars.

  The Witch very nearly succeeded.

  But the Codes were lost. And the frightened response of the Kel hierarchy back then, too late, led to the Wars; a desperate effort to stop the dissemination of that knowledge before it could reach the people. After all, how could you rule a populace that had absolute power? Absolute freedom? Individuals with self-determinism and the power to make it real? It would’ve marked the end of the Kel. The end of any empire as they knew it.

  And so it did. Though ironically not from the Amkradus itself. From the very effort to stop it. The Kel brought about their own ruin in their desperate overreaction. A civil war that spread like fire across their stellar dynasty, bringing down world after world until their collapse was complete. Once the promise of the Amkradus spread the revolt was overwhelming. The people wanted what the priestess promised. Wanted what the Codes promised. The Kel leadership would not hear of it. The dividing lines became chasms, those bottomless disagreements filled quickly with hatred. And so the Great Wars ignited and consumed them.

  The details of that period were, like the Codex itself, mostly lost.

  But perhaps these Bok knew more. Suddenly it seemed they might. If Aesha truly formed them as the bearer of her legacy, if they were the last organized group to share her purpose … surely they must hold information? Surely they must know things unknown to the Kel? Perhaps Lorenzo did, indeed, have knowledge to trade. Perhaps—and this was the mighty struggle building within her, as she stood there before them with no way to redirect, no way to turn away, no way to take a moment and sort through this cascading flood of possibilities—perhaps, if the Amkradus could be discovered, if it were still around … a controlled discovery, very closely guarded, its secrets could be unlocked …