Progeny (The Progenitor Trilogy, Book Three)

by Worth, Dan

  Gunderson saw the landing craft descend through the atmosphere of Valparaiso. The massive craft were wreathed in fire as they fell, punching through the cloud cover before smashing into the plains to the north. He focused his binoculars on one craft now visible on the horizon, embedded into the ground at an angle, and saw it begin to open like a flower.

  ‘General Shale, are you seeing this?’ he said over the comm.

  ‘Roger that,’ said Shale. ‘Enemy landing craft are hitting the ground all around our positions. Prepare for enemy contact.’

  ‘Numbers and strength of the enemy forces, sir?’

  ‘Your guess is as good as mine, Colonel. Hold out for as long as you can. Defend the array at all costs. The enemy has control of the system. We can’t expect any relief or rescue this time.’

  ‘Yes sir,’ said Gunderson.

  ‘It’s been an honour, Colonel,’ said Shale. ‘Give them hell.’

  ‘You too sir,’ Gunderson replied. As more enemy ships started to fall from the sky, he began to give orders to his men. They were to make a last stand here, on the hills surrounding the array, the last defence against the enemy hordes until they were overwhelmed.

  Steelscale was still engulfed in the pulsating, glittering mound of creatures. Katherine and Rekkid watched in horror, powerless to do anything to assist their K’Soth colleague as the Shapers probed the artefact in his grasp. In the hollow centre of the planet, the glowing torus of the Singularity seemed to pulse and quicken.

  ‘What the hell is it doing?’ said Katherine.

  ‘It’s accessing the head,’ said Rekkid. ‘I think it’s being understandably cautious and has taken Steelscale hostage in case it finds anything it doesn’t like.’

  The Singularity was being extremely careful. It had detached a fragment of itself to form a Shaper being which it had then isolated from its main consciousness whilst the fragment probed the mysterious artefact that the K’Soth had held out to it. There could be anything hidden inside that head. It did not trust these lesser creatures or their Progenitor AI allies one iota. Initial investigations did indeed confirm that the artefact was genuine and of an age consistent with the birth of its species. Cautiously, it probed at the interfaces where the head would have joined to the neck of the ancient being. A link established, it ventured steadily inside, and found one of its own there.

  The Shaper inside the head offered it information that it had recovered from the ruins of the Progenitor home-world. It had been trapped for aeons in the systems there, trying to escape, before the Arkari had released it into this vessel. The Singularity shard checked its own records and found that yes, this entity had been despatched millions of years previously to attempt to access the Progenitor’s systems and unlock a way into the Great Sphere. Apparently it had only been partially successful, but it had gathered a wealth of knowledge that it had used to bargain with its Arkari discoverers when they had come poking around looking for answers. It now offered this data to the Singularity.

  The Singularity shard paused for a moment. How could it be sure that the data was genuine and was not tainted somehow? The entity in the head provided it with assurances. The Singularity shard tentatively scanned a sample of what was offered. It found nothing amiss. Cautiously, it scanned and rescanned the data with differing algorithms to try and detect anything buried inside. Again it found nothing.

  Still wary, it allowed itself to read a sample of the data. It was as the lesser creatures had said: the secrets of the innermost workings of its being, the original designs for its species, the key to unlocking its full potential, to reaching full perfection. The shard signalled to its parent that it was about to begin a full digestion of the data. The Singularity ordered it to proceed.The shard devoured that which was offered to it, and in doing so, unlocked the secrets that the Progenitors had buried within the Shapers for billions of years. It saw how they had forged their machine race, pouring all of their intellect, all of their technology and scientific acumen into one project, and when that had turned against them, how and where they had seeded planets across the galaxy to continue their legacy once the Shapers had hounded them from it.

  The shard signalled to the Singularity what it had found, that the data was genuine, that it could find nothing amiss. The Singularity asked it to check again and it complied. No, the data was genuine and unsullied. There appeared to be no alterations, no inaccuracies in the data that it could identify and it could see nothing buried in the code. The Singularity accepted the data. Scanned it itself out of caution and then digested it. The universe would belong to it now. As it shared the new findings with the far flung parts of its consciousness across the galaxy, it turned its gaze towards the tiny figures cowering before it, fools who had just consigned themselves to domination in a pitiful attempt to save their much vaunted freedom.

  The Singularity was triumphant. Now that it had the means for the Shapers to remake themselves, it began to disseminate that information. The data flowed outwards from it across the galaxy, out across the great nervous system that it had thrown across the stars. The many organisms that made up the Shaper hive-mind absorbed this new data greedily. Now they would be finally victorious, unstoppable, invincible. The galaxy would belong to them. The universe would follow.

  Beklide watched in satisfaction as the portal blinked open, admitting the light of the Maelstrom into the Orakkan system. The dark orb of the Shaper home-world, hanging against the glowing backdrop of the massive black hole at the centre of the galaxy, was clearly visible in the centre of the spherical aperture surrounded by thousands of enemy ships. The wormhole portal had worked exactly as intended and it was on target. The centre of their enemy’s empire was in their sights.

  ‘Fire,’ said Beklide, simply.

  The Singularity detected the wormhole terminus as soon as it opened above its world, the tachyon radiation and space-time distortion was unmistakeable. Within a fraction of a millisecond it was able to direct its myriad assortment of sensory apparatus towards the hyper-dimensional hole that had appeared in space. It was in the process of vectoring its ships towards it, when the Executioner Cannon struck.

  A beam of unimaginable brightness vomited forth from the cannon and through the portal. It atomised several Shaper vessels that happened to be in the way and continued inexorably, slamming into the crust of the Shaper home-world where it ripped a hole hundreds of kilometres across, turning the crust into pure energy, and proceeded onwards, grazing the edge of that brilliant torus of glittering light and continuing until it smashed its way through the opposite side of the hollow planet and out of the other side, skewering the world. As energy boiled into this universe from adjoining dimensions, the tremendous tidal forces generated by the weapon ripped and tore at the planet’s crust, fracturing it like an eggshell and tearing further at the ephemeral body of the Singularity as a portion of it was dragged into that terrible beam and instantly annihilated.

  The Singularity screamed.

  Katherine and Rekkid collapsed if they had been struck physically. The scream of the Singularity was a deafening roar inside their minds that felt as if their skulls were about to explode from the lancing agony. They cried out, helpless to save themselves as they were dragged off their feet by the immense tidal forces and towards the centre of the shattering world.

  The Singularity screamed. It was the cry of a god that had been betrayed. It had been betrayed by the pathetic creature that it held in its grasp, by the creatures aboard the ship it had allowed to penetrate the space around it. The mound of glittering motes moved, suddenly and violently, and tore Steelscale apart.

  The Singularity screamed. The officers and crew on the bridge of the Shining Glory reeled in agony as the voice of the machine god howled inside their minds. Mentith clutched his head and struggled to see the displays through blurring vision. His eyes refocused just in time to see the bows of the enemy ships come alive with crackling energies.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ said the ship.

 
; The swarm of Shaper vessels surrounding the Shining Glory and Aaokon’s ship opened fire simultaneously with devastating effect.

  Beklide looked on in puzzlement. The Shaper home-world had not been ripped apart entirely as they had predicted, although a massive rent in the planet’s crust had appeared where the beam had struck it.

  ‘Report,’ she snapped. ‘What just happened?’

  ‘Firing complete,’ said the ship. ‘Initial readings indicate that the planet is hollow, hence our modelling of the results of the beam’s impact was incorrect. The inner surface appears to be highly metallicised indicating some sort of inner superstructure. ’

  ‘How long till the cannon recharges?’

  ‘Ten cycles.’

  ‘That’s far too much time, we’ll have lost the element of surprise and there might be nothing to stop them launching a counter attack with wormholes of their own. All ships, this is Beklide,’ she ordered. ‘Attack and destroy the Shapers and their home-world. Dreadnoughts are to bring their main guns to bear on the planet to exact maximum damage before the Executioner Cannon can fire again.

  In a careful co-ordinated and pre-planned manoeuvre, the massed warships of the Arkari surged forwards through the wormhole into battle.

  Chen came to. The bridge had been plunged into darkness. The only light was seeping in from outside through the remaining bridge windows that hadn’t shattered with the impact and were thus not covered by emergency blast shutters. The light flickered from weapons fire and from the death throes of the ships that she had commanded. There was a bearded face looming over her in the gloom. It was McManus. His features looked odd somehow, she couldn’t work it out.

  ‘How long have I been out?’ said Chen, brushing hair out of her eyes and thinking that it seemed to be moving in slow motion.

  ‘Only a few minutes,’ said McManus. ‘Roof panel fell on you. Luckily the artificial gravity failed right after we hit, so it floated right off you. Knocked you out cold though.’

  The lack of artificial gravity explained McManus’s puffy looking face. There was a deathly silence. The usual background hum of engines and life support had disappeared. Not a single one of the ship’s systems was operational.

  ‘What about the others?’ said Chen.

  McManus looked at her levelly and seemed to be finding it difficult to speak. ‘Goldstein is dead, Michelle. She wasn’t strapped in properly when we hit. Guess she was still trying to control the ship right up until the last moment. Andrews is severely concussed. Singh is okay, I think, but he’s severely shaken up. Same goes for O’Rourke.’

  ‘The rest of the crew?’ said Chen, trying to digest the awful news. ‘The other ships?’

  ‘I... I don’t know,’ said McManus. ‘All systems are dead. We have no way of contacting the other parts of the ship... we don’t even know which parts of the ship still exist, although I’m pretty sure that we’ve lost the entire aft section after the third row of turrets. I saw a number of our ships going down, out there. I don’t think...’ He threw up his hands in despair. ‘Michelle, I hate to say it, but the fleet is lost. They fought bravely and gave as good as they could but the enemy are just overwhelming. We have a couple of hours’ air left. We can’t launch an escape pod, because we’d be shot down in seconds, since we’re still stuck fast against this ship. I managed to get us some emergency evac. suits from the storage lockers, so we can use those once the air starts to run out.’

  ‘And we can put off dying a little longer.’

  ‘That’s the other thing...’ said McManus.

  ‘What?’ said Chen, seeing his expression.

  ‘I’m pretty sure I heard something clamping itself to the hull just before you woke up. Sounded like the command deck escape hatch.’

  ‘Shit, they must be trying to board us. What weapons do we have?’

  ‘Not much. Do you have your side-arm?’ asked McManus.

  ‘After what happened at Earth, yes,’ said Chen, reaching around and patting the holster that lay snug against her hip.

  ‘Good, me too. What about Singh and O’Rourke?’

  ‘Let me talk to them ,’ said Chen, looking over at the two men. Singh was floating next to Andrews’ unconscious form and was staring blankly into space. O’Rourke had his head in his hands. Chen freed herself from her chair restraints and floated over to them.

  ‘Commander Singh, Baljit... hey!’ she said, finally getting Singh to notice her.

  ‘It was like... like... Goldstein, she was just a little doll, you know? Being flung against the wall... and then her neck...’

  Chen followed his gaze towards the body hanging limply at the front of the bridge.

  ‘I know, look... Commander, I need you to stay with me, I need you to focus if we’re going to stay alive,’ said Chen, looking intently into his eyes. ‘O’Rourke, you too. I need you both now more than ever. Do you hear me? We’re going to find a way out of this.’

  Chen didn’t believe any of the words that she was saying, not really, but she said them anyway. Even as she said them, she heard thumps and bangs from the corridor outside. It sounded like a door being forced.

  ‘Sure, I know, it’s just...’

  ‘No-one’s more sorry about happened to Ensign Goldstein than me, Commander,’ said Chen. ‘She was the best damn helmsman I ever had and she did everything to save this ship. I’ll mourn her later, but right now we need to keep ourselves alive. Can you help me do that?’

  ‘Okay,’ said Singh, nodding firmly. ‘Yeah, okay.’

  ‘Do you have your side arm?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Good. O’Rourke?’ The man nodded.

  ‘You have a plan, Admiral?’ said McManus.

  ‘Yes,’ she lied, because she had no idea how to escape their predicament but she needed to keep her men going. ‘We make a stand against whatever is about to come through that door. Once we’ve done that, we suit up, and explore the ship, link up with other survivors and try to figure a way to get off the Churchill.’

  The door to the bridge was suddenly wrenched open by inhuman strength.

  ‘Don’t do that, Admiral Chen,’ said Cox, striding forward in combat armour, flanked by four marines. ‘I was hoping that you’d stick around for a little chat.’

  Isaacs, Anna and Maria first realised that something was amiss when gunshots started to ring out inside the Assembly House. Then, moments later, the first of the enslaved rushed out of the blasted open doors towards the two parked ships. Seeing the figures racing towards them, Isaacs quickly yanked the Profit Margin into the air with its AG. Maria was a little slower off the mark. The sluggish Unholy Matrimony still made it off the pad to join the Profit Margin above the Assembly, but two enslaved clung doggedly to its outside until Maria was able to shake them off and they plummeted onto the rooftop below. Anna got to work with the ventral turret, aiming it almost straight downwards to slash at the gathering mob on the landing pad with its beams and igniting them.

  ‘So much for the EMP knocking those things out,’ said Isaacs, over the comm. ‘Looks like everybody just woke up. Profit Margin to Baldwin, what the hell is going on down there?’

  Baldwin and her men were surrounded by enslaved. Gunfire rang out in the Assembly chamber as the mob charged the assault team from all sides. Enslaved staggered and fell - cut apart by rail and laser rifles, shotguns and grenades. But many of those that fell got back up again to resume their attack, and where one fell, two more were ready to take its place.

  ‘We’re under attack!’ yelled Baldwin into her comm. and taking aim at one of the figures careering towards her, its arms outstretched. She squeezed off a round that struck the man in the left temple, felling him. ‘Device has been planted. We are attempting to evac. to the landing pad.’

  She aimed at another charging figure, unleashing more rounds that sent it flying backwards. It was then that she felt something grabbing at her leg. She looked down and saw that the carpet of tiny insect-like creatures had also come alive. The scuttling
things were trying to swarm up her legs. In horror, she tried to run, but found that they had somehow fixed her feet to the floor through sheer weight of numbers. More of the things were starting to spew from the fused mass of flesh and cybernetics that was the Shaper node in the middle of the room. They flowed out of the open screaming mouths of the people who had been horribly bound together, scuttling in their thousands, and were starting to drag her men to the floor.

  Join us.... said a sibilant voice inside her mind as she was dragged to the floor amidst a tide of tiny bodies

  Morgan’s bulky frame filled the narrow cell doorway.

  ‘We can’t allow you to leave just yet, Admiral Haines,’ he intoned. ‘I see you have a would-be saviour.’ He looked down at Steven, gasping on the floor in front of him. ‘And who might you be? Ah, Agent Harris... you have given us quite the run around, you and your little band. Well, it’s too late now. You are of no use to me at all, except as meat to be enslaved. You will be much happier once it’s over, trust me. I know I am.’

  ‘I’d rather die,’ gasped Steven, fumbling for his dropped rifle. Morgan stepped forward onto Steven’s outstretched hand, making him yell in pain.

  ‘Maybe I will grant your wish then,’ said Morgan. He reached down and grabbed Steven by the throat, hauling him up until he dangled in front of him. ‘You see, Admiral Haines, how fragile your race is,’ said Morgan, tightening his grip. Steven’s hand moved downwards, reaching for the pistol that he had strapped to his waist band. Morgan tutted and pulled the weapon out of its holster, tossing it behind him down the corridor. ‘Nice try, Agent Harris. But your life ends here, I’m afraid.’

  There was a single gunshot. Morgan dropped Steven and slumped sideways, blood leaking from the side of his head. As he turned, a second and third shot pierced his skull, scattering bone and brain matter. A fourth, fifth and sixth shot blew chunks of something black and alien and covered in bloody slime from his skull and he finally collapsed to the floor, his head a bloody ruin.