Progeny (The Progenitor Trilogy, Book Three)

by Worth, Dan

  Chapter 6

  Chen’s left arm was almost entirely numb. The dressing that had been hurriedly applied to the wound was beginning to leak and the sleeve of her uniform was soaked with blood. She was starting to feel a little light headed.

  Outside the ship, the massive relief operation to rescue the survivors of the Amazonia Port attack was underway. Under Chen’s direction, those warships that had suffered the fewest casualties had docked with the massive structure, allowing hundreds of desperate civilians aboard. The medical bays of the warships were handling the influx of casualties, triaging the wounded and stabilising the more serious cases before they could be transferred to hospitals on the surface. Meanwhile rescue teams probed the interior of the shattered dock, pulling survivors – not to mention large numbers of bodies – from the mangled wreckage.

  The total number of casualties was as yet unknown. Chen expected the final figure to run into the thousands and had reported as such to the newly appointed President Sorenson. Sorenson had been the Minister for Trade who had avoided the cabinet purge orchestrated by Admiral Morgan by virtue of being in Esacir space at the time and had found herself the most senior surviving member of the government and thus President by default until elections could be held. She had seemed a little shell-shocked by events when Chen had spoken to her, as was everyone else, but she had a tough reputation that preceded her and lost no time in quizzing Chen on the situation and her requirements. Transport, search and rescue and medical vessels were already en-route both to Amazonia Port and to Jupiter space to hunt for survivors from the earlier attack on Galileo Station.

  The Churchill and a number of the more severely damaged ships had hung back from Amazonia Port. The carrier was unable to safely approach the dock under her own power due to the heavy damage she had suffered to her manoeuvring thrusters during the battle and she had enough casualties of her own to deal with, though her complement of transports and assault craft had been despatched to help the relief operation. The carrier’s forward sections had borne the brunt of the enemy attacks during the battle. The upper hull was torn and cratered in dozens of places where kamikaze fighters had struck home and a long, twisted scar of torn and melted metal showed where the Hector had struck the carrier with its main gun. Two ugly, gaping holes like the wounds from recently pulled teeth marked where two of the Churchill’s forward turrets had been obliterated by the impact of the plasma bolt. The remainder of the ship’s fighter and bomber wings had also returned and SAR missions had recovered a number of pilots who had ejected from their damaged craft during the battle.

  The carrier’s sickbay was overflowing with casualties, everything from vacuum exposure to burns, severed limbs and dozens of other traumas. Those that could be moved were being stabilised and then shipped down to Earth. The walking wounded would be kept aboard for now, and those that were less severely injured were, where possible, returning to their posts. Part of the hangar bay had been set aside for the bodies after the ship’s morgue had run out of space. It too was rapidly filling up.

  Chen was immensely proud of her crew, and those of the other ships under her command. She felt the burden of responsibility for their plight and wondered if she could have done more but, she reflected, if it hadn’t been for the timely appearance of the Nahabe ships she doubted whether any of them would have survived.

  The arrival of the Nahabe fleet was still something of a mystery. The Commonwealth had always enjoyed cordial relations with the notoriously secretive and insular aliens, but no military alliances had ever been formalised and the Nahabe had always given the impression that they were uninterested in wider galactic affairs. Still, she knew of the Nahabes’ hatred of the Shapers and their previous, and successful, defence of their worlds against them. Furthermore, their interference in the Hadar system via their proxy organisation known as the Hidden Hand was at least an indication that they had been extending their reach, but she wondered what had happened to finally coax the Nahabe out of their self imposed exile.

  Answers had not been forthcoming from the fleet of mysterious spherical warships. They had destroyed or chased off the remaining Shaper ships still within the Solar System and had now assumed what appeared to be a defensive posture between Earth and the Moon, but there had been no further communications from the Commonwealth’s unlikely saviours. Chen knew enough about the protocols of dealing with the notoriously sensitive Nahabe to know that it was far better to wait for them to initiate any dialogue. Whatever their motives were, she was intensely grateful for their intervention.

  ‘Ma’am?’

  She was tired, so unbelievably tired. She couldn’t remember the last time that she had had a decent night’s sleep, or any sleep for that matter.

  ‘Ma’am?’

  She turned, a little groggy; one of the ship’s medics was standing patiently at her side. The woman’s nametag read ‘Collins’

  ‘Yes, what it is Lieutenant?’ Chen replied.

  ‘I need you to come down to sickbay so we can have a proper look at that arm.’

  ‘I’ll be fine. I have... a lot to do here, I...’

  ‘Admiral, with respect, you don’t look fine. You’re very pale, and your uniform is soaked. You’re losing quite a bit of blood. You were shot, after all. Dr Anderton said that if you didn’t come then he would come up here and order you down to sickbay for your own good.’

  Chen knew that her Chief Medical Officer wasn’t kidding. He would come up to the bridge and scold her if she didn’t take the hint, and Collins was right, she was starting to feel pretty bad.

  ‘Okay, Lieutenant. I take your point. Maybe I do need patching up. Mr Singh, you have the bridge until I return. I’ll be in medical if you need me,’ said Chen and stood up. The room swam and she staggered, hit by a wave of nausea. Collins grabbed Chen’s good arm to steady her.

  ‘Shit,’ said Chen under her breath as the room came back into focus. ‘Okay Lieutenant, let’s get me down to sickbay. It wouldn’t do to have me passing out on the bridge now would it?’

  With Lieutenant Collins’ help, Chen made her way down to sickbay in the bowels of the vessel. By the time she arrived, her forehead was slick with sweat and her arm had begun to throb terribly. Upon entering sickbay, she had to steel herself against the scene that greeted her. The facility was overflowing with casualties. Men and women, some bearing terrible injuries, were crammed together in rows whilst the overworked staff triaged and attended to them. There were screams and cries, pitiful pleas for aid and the sounds of sobbing. Doors leading off the main central space led to the isolation wards, where the burns and vacuum exposure victims were being held. Chen didn’t doubt that they too would be full also.

  A number of her crew saluted her as she passed or offered her congratulations on the victory. Despite feeling fragile she returned the salutes and chatted briefly with her injured crew where she could, exchanging greetings or words of encouragement with them, thanking them for their bravery. It amazed her that so many of them could remain in good spirits despite what they had been through, and it made her immensely proud, and a little ashamed that she should be troubling Dr. Anderton with injuries that seemed to slight in comparison, even if he had ordered her down here.

  She found Dr Anderton waiting for her at the back of sickbay. He seemed remarkably composed, all things considered, though his eyes betrayed the horror of some of the things he had had to deal with today. He indicated an empty chair and she sat down heavily. Collins saluted and left to attend to other patients.

  ‘So,’ said Anderton. ‘We finally managed to drag you down here. I was starting to think I might have to shoot you again myself so that it would sink in that you’d been injured.’

  ‘Sorry,’ Chen replied. ‘There was so much to do, the rescue operation...’

  ‘The people under your command know what they’re doing for now. Let them get on with it. Now let’s take a look at that arm. Can you take your jacket off?’

  Chen tried to move her arm and foun
d that it had stiffened completely. ‘No.’ She shook her head.

  ‘Okay, not a problem,’ said Anderton and produced a small pair of scissors which he used to cut the entire sleeve from her uniform jacket and the shirt underneath. ‘Apologies for the uniform,’ he said. ‘But I think the damn thing was ruined anyway.’

  ‘I can always get another, don’t worry. Look, doctor, couldn’t one of your staff handle this? I’m not the most badly injured person here. Surely you’d be more useful elsewhere?’

  ‘I decide who I treat,’ said Anderton, concentrating on his work. ‘Besides, you’re this ship’s commanding officer. I’d be remiss in my duties if I didn’t ensure your wellbeing.’ With infinite care he finished snipping away the fabric of her uniform and then peeled away the temporary dressing, revealing a bloody gouge in her upper arm almost a centimetre deep in places. It was oozing gently.

  ‘Messy,’ Anderton commented as he started to clean the wound. ‘If he’d used a laser weapon it would have cauterised it. Still, I doubt that was uppermost in his mind.’

  ‘What’s Haldane’s condition? Did he survive?’ said Chen, suddenly alert.

  ‘Despite two gunshot wounds to his upper abdomen, yes he did. He had a collapsed lung and I had to pick a lot of bone fragments out of him from a shattered ribcage, but he should pull through.’

  ‘Is he human?’

  ‘I could find no evidence to suggest that he isn’t. There’s no sign of parasitic infection anywhere in his body and from what we’ve seen lately, I doubt a couple of bullets would have brought him down if this weren’t the case.’

  ‘I need to talk to him,’ said Chen and winced as Anderton began to clean the wound with an antiseptic spray which stung as he applied it.

  ‘You can try,’ said Anderton. ‘He slips in and out of consciousness. Commander Blackman has posted a couple of armed marines outside his room and has tried talking to Commander Haldane a couple of times but he didn’t get very far and I ordered him to stop when it was clear it was becoming too much for my patient. So yes, you can talk to him, but no interrogations.’

  ‘Doctor, he’s a traitor and he tried to kill me.’

  ‘True enough, but he’s my patient. Besides, I imagine he’ll be far more use to you alive than dead, so go easy on him. Now, hold still,’ said Anderton and began to close and seal the wound in her arm. ‘You’ve lost quite a bit of blood and this is a nasty hole you’ve got in your arm. A centimetre or so to the left and I doubt you’d have got up again so quickly. You were damn lucky. You need to take it easy, at least for a few hours. Get something to eat and get some rest.’ He began fixing a surgical dressing over the wound.

  ‘Not yet,’ Chen replied. ‘I have to talk to Haldane. I have to know whether he was telling the truth about his motives, and about Admiral Morgan.’

  ‘You just don’t know when to quit, do you?’ said Anderton, shaking his head despairingly.

  ‘Maybe not,’ replied Chen. ‘But it goes with the job, sorry.’

  ‘Alright,’ Anderton replied. ‘But I insist that I sit in on any questioning of my patient.’

  ‘Agreed,’ said Chen. ‘We’re finished here. If you’d care to take me to him, Doctor?’

  ‘Yes ma’am,’ said Anderton, then muttered: ‘This should be fun.’

  Chen still felt a little woozy, but determination was driving her on. Anderton led her to a side room usually reserved for patients who required isolation and knocked on the door. A Marine Corps sergeant peered through the door’s glass panel, saw Anderton and Chen and opened it, saluting as his commanding officer entered the room. Another marine stood at the far side of the room along with Commander Blackman. All three men were armed, though the figure lying slumped in the room’s only bed didn’t seem to pose much of a threat.

  Haldane lay at the centre of a web of sensors and drips from the medical machines that surrounded his bed. His upper body was swathed in bandages and his skin was pale and wore a sheen of sweat. However, despite being badly injured and pumped full of drugs, he was awake and aware of his surroundings. Chen saw her former XO focus on her as she entered the room. Her arrival caused Blackman and the two marines to salute smartly. Blackman pulled over a small chair to the side of the bed for her to sit on.

  ‘I’ve tried talking to the son of a bitch,’ said Blackman. ‘But he hasn’t given me anything so far. Says he’ll only talk to you. I’d have pressed him harder but...’

  ‘But you’ll risk killing him,’ said Anderton sternly. ‘Commander Haldane is a prisoner of war and he’s my patient. There are rules.’

  ‘Indeed there are, Doctor,’ said Chen. ‘So, Commander Haldane: give me one good reason why I shouldn’t instruct these men here to toss you out of the nearest airlock?’

  ‘I told you,’ Haldane said weakly. ‘I’m not one of them. I’m not a Shaper agent.’

  ‘Yes, Dr Anderton has confirmed that for us,’ Chen replied. ‘But you were working for them all along, weren’t you? You and Admiral Morgan and god knows who else.’

  ‘No!’ Haldane rasped. ‘No we never intended to be... Things... things got out of hand. We were only trying to protect humanity.’

  ‘Well you’ve got a funny way of showing it, taking a shot at your commanding officer right at the point when the Shapers attacked Earth. You fucking worthless traitor! You were supposed to be my right hand on this ship...’ Chen struggled to contain her rage, fighting the urge to strike her former XO. ‘You’ll be handed over to Commonwealth Intelligence for interrogation, once you’re fit enough to withstand it. You’ll be tried by a military court for your actions as well. I’d start talking now, Commander. Anything you can tell us will maybe make them look more favourably on you.’

  ‘Yes, yes of course,’ replied Haldane and nodded.

  ‘Commander Blackman, make sure you record all of this,’ said Chen to her security chief, who produced a small device from his webbing and set it on the bedside table.

  ‘Okay, talk,’ ordered Chen.

  ‘Originally I was posted aboard this ship to keep an eye on you,’ said Haldane. ‘Admiral Morgan didn’t like the fact that Admiral Haines was essentially running his own secret army along with the Arkari. It was very irregular and unofficial. Haines’ reputation seems to have allowed him to get away with things that others would not. He certainly had the ear of President Rheinhold and this may have allowed him to appropriate some of the Navy’s black budget for his own use without going through his superiors. Morgan wanted to know what he was up to. Our families go way back so...’ Haldane started wheezing from the effort of talking.

  ‘I get the picture,’ said Chen. ‘So why had Morgan allied himself with the Shapers?’

  Haldane took a moment to recover before continuing.

  ‘He was forced into it. Command has known, or suspected for years, that there were highly advanced races out there in the unexplored parts of the galaxy. A number of deep space exploration missions had come across things that they couldn’t explain - phantom ships, mysterious ruins and so on, and there were always the usual stories amongst the civilian space communities, particularly along our borders. The Maranos Incident at the start of the Second K’Soth War confirmed this, and of course it made it plain that at least one of these ancient races was hostile to humanity and may have pushed us towards war in the first place. Of course now we know all about the Shapers.’ Haldane sank back further into the bed, gasping for air.

  ‘It's alright, Commander,’ said Anderton. ‘You take your time.’

  Haldane nodded, wheezing and seemed to wince in pain. He asked for water and Blackman poured him a cup from the jug on the bedside table. Sipping it, Haldane continued.

  ‘Okay, so now Command are on the lookout for any signs of Shaper activity, technology whatever, anything that would give us an edge if we needed to fight them, plus there’s always been some resentment among the upper echelons, Morgan particularly, that the Arkari are unwilling to share technology. We were still fighting the K’Soth when
that ship was found in the Hadar system. Morgan knew what it was, I think. In any case, any ancient advanced alien technology would be a prize worth having and Morgan has always been an ambitious man. He can’t go any further up in the military, but there have been rumours for a while that he was thinking of entering politics, even running for President. A prize like this would have allowed him to leave the military and begin his new career in a blaze of glory. He used Cox, I think...’

  ‘Seems about right,’ said Chen. ‘Admiral Cox always struck me as an insecure and bitter man. This would have boosted his career as well.’

  ‘Except it all backfired,’ said Haldane. ‘The damn ship was bait laid by the Shapers. Cox and his fleet were enslaved. I think the plan was to enslave Morgan as well, but it didn’t work out like that.’

  ‘What happened?’

  ‘Morgan went to the Spica system to meet Cox who was arriving with his prize. I’m not sure, but from what Morgan told me it seems that he was initially captured by Cox and his men when he first boarded the Germanicus. They revealed what they now were and what the Shapers’ plans for the Commonwealth were and they were prepared to implant him also, but it seems that Morgan begged for his life and cut a deal: that if he helped the Shapers overthrow the current administration and form a puppet government in its place then humanity would be spared mass enslavement. All we had to do was submit, and life within the Commonwealth would continue much as before.’

  ‘Except without any form of democracy, or freedom and being essentially the proxy soldiers of a malevolent alien empire,’ spat Chen.

  ‘It’s preferable to the alternatives! Your actions may have doomed us all! Do you think that the Shapers will take this defeat lying down? Morgan convinced them that he could deliver the Commonwealth to them on a plate. All you’ve done is make him look like he was lying to them. The Shapers will return in greater force and this time, humanity will not be spared! They have vast fleets of warships at their disposal, millions upon millions of troops all drawn from the races that they have enslaved. Do you think that the Commonwealth can possibly stand against that? When I tried to stop you, I was trying to save you, save us all, Michelle!’ Haldane cried and subsided into a fit of coughing.