The Terra Gambit (Empire of Bones Saga Book 8)

by Terry Mixon

  More interestingly, the com signal wasn’t being logged the way it should be. Electronically, there was no indication it was happening at all. If he hadn’t been directly tapped into the outgoing signal, he wouldn’t have noticed it at all.

  Before he could dig into the contents of the call, the additional signal terminated. Perhaps they had been adding some raw information to the end of the verbal communication. Still, why hadn’t it been logged by the computer?

  Sean used his concealed access to Athena’s systems and began searching. He quickly found a small program that had been inserted into the computer to hide communications on a certain frequency.

  He sent an implant signal to Admiral Mertz.

  Sir, we might have a problem. He explained about the concealed transmission.

  The admiral sent a mental grunt back to him. I feel pretty confident I know who to blame for that: your wife.

  Sean blinked. My wife?

  I’d be willing to bet a month’s pay that she signaled the resistance on the main world even though we told her not to.

  Now that Sean thought about it, that did sound like his wife. When Olivia decided on a course of action, she’d execute it over every objection. She was stubborn that way. Of course, in his new circle of friends, that was a common trait.

  What do we do about it?

  The admiral sent a mental shrug. We wait. Hopefully, the wrong people don’t become aware of our presence.

  Jared crouched in the maintenance passages around the bridge and considered their situation. It was obvious the intruders were preparing to leave El Capitan. They’d spent a decent amount of time going through the systems and disengaging computer control.

  At this point, they really did have full control of Athena, though his people could take it back far faster than the enemy would’ve dreamed possible.

  They only had control of the critical systems, to be sure. There were only three dozen people on their team. Barely enough to run a destroyer. They’d focused on propulsion and power. They’d left the automated systems controlling the weapons in place, but inserted themselves as the initiators of action rather than the ship’s computer.

  He really wondered what was in the crates they’d brought aboard. Harrison’s World was completely suppressed according to all the information they had. The population was under the heel of the System Lord. What could they bring that would assist in that or how did they intend to change it?

  Well, he’d find out as soon as they left this system. Unknown to them, Jared still had complete control of the antiboarding weapons via altered control interfaces. Once they made that first flip, he’d stun every single one of the intruders and resume control of Athena.

  Janice Hall edged her way past some of the others in the maintenance tube until she was beside him. “Sir, we have a problem.”

  “What’s wrong?”

  “We just left orbit and we’re heading for the wrong flip point.”

  He pulled data from the passive sensors and double checked their course. They were indeed making way for the other flip point in the El Capitan system. ETA five hours at this speed.

  While it was certainly possible to work around to Harrison’s World from the new target system, it would make for a much longer trip. No, these people had another end destination in mind.

  “Pass the word that we might have to kick this party off early,” he said. “We’ll have to work out a new rendezvous with the fleet.”

  “Aye, sir.”

  They really didn’t have a choice now. If this supposedly automated destroyer suddenly changed course, the powers that be at El Capitan would have a conniption. They’d quickly dispatch ships to catch up with Athena and find out what had gone wrong.

  And then there was the force surrounding the flip point leading towards Harrison’s World. One they’d never be able to slip past if the System Lord figured out something was wrong.

  No, they were stuck taking a side trip.

  “I want you to start looking into potential destinations,” he continued. “Once we have something workable, send it to me for verification. Then we’ll use the FTL com to send a burst packet to Invincible.

  “This has to have something to do with the cargo these people brought aboard. We’ll find out what that is once we flip to the next system and take them out. If, of course, it’s safe to do so. What exactly do we know about the system we’re headed toward?”

  The woman shrugged. “We have information from the Old Empire databases, but nothing recent. In the old days, the next system over was used for heavy mining. Asteroid belts and moons primarily. Lots of heavy metals and even some rare elements. Now? We won’t know till we get there.”

  “Go get me what you can.”

  Once the woman was gone, Jared sighed. A lot of systems in the Rebel Empire were abandoned. What had once been populous and productive systems in the Old Empire, were abandoned under the control of the AIs. Hopefully, that’s what they’d find when they flipped.

  Then again, it might be possible to find out before Athena left El Capitan.

  He opened an implant channel to Olivia West. They’d relocated her to a maintenance tube just off engineering.

  Got a minute?

  Her response was immediate. Of course. What can I do for you, Admiral?

  Aren’t we being formal today? Tell me, did you just signal the resistance on El Capitan? Or more pertinently, did they respond?

  That was a long moment of silence over the implant link. How did you know?

  Surely you expected me to monitor all communications. A good commander is always aware of what’s going on aboard his ship.

  Her tone held a hint of chagrin when she responded. As it turns out, I did send a message to the resistance. I’m sorry, but the opportunity was too good to let pass by. Our visitors were sending a message of their own, so it was very easy to piggyback on their signal.

  I haven’t received a response yet. Frankly, I’m not certain that I will. Nevertheless, it was worth taking a chance. Other than identifying myself as a visitor from another resistance cell, I asked for basic information that they would be willing to share with any resistance group. Both about El Capitan and this area of the Rebel Empire.

  Which they call El Cap in most of the local communications, by the way. I’m not sure why.

  He considered what she’s done. It was far too late to do anything about it except hope for the best.

  If the situation was reversed, would you respond, Olivia?

  It would probably take several hours before I made up my mind, but I’d answer. Any chance to help overthrow the AIs is worth taking. It’s not going to put them in any danger sending a response. Not really.

  They have communication cutouts. Even if the AIs became aware that they sent a signal, it would never be able to trace the response back.

  Jared considered that for a moment before responding. That makes sense. Do you expect them to send a general signal that we’ll be able to pick up? Or will it be something directed specifically at us? Do they even know where your signal came from?

  I never said, but they’d have to be fools not to guess. Athena just arrived in their system. I’d wager they’re fairly certain at this point where we are.

  He wasn’t exactly happy with the risk that she’d taken. Frankly, if the resistance had a mole in their organization, someone could make sure the System Lord found out.

  Jared made certain to insert a strong note of disapproval into his mental tone. I had very good reasons to turn down your request to initiate contact, Coordinator. I like you very much, but rest assured that there will be serious consequences for violating my orders.

  If the resistance responds, I expect you to pass that information to me immediately. And Olivia, this had better never happen again. Right or wrong, this is my mission and I set the rules. Cross me at your peril.

  Her tone became conciliatory. I swear that I’ll follow your orders going forward. Next time I’ll just argue more strenuously
.

  Wasn’t that going to be fun? Well, since the die was cast, perhaps their response could shed some light on one of the things that confused him.

  When they answer—if they answer—maybe they’ll tell us why the AI decided to use this ship. It had to be planned long in advance and I don’t get it. There are a lot of ships already here. Why us?

  Oh, I can tell you that now, Admiral. If they used a local ship, they’d have to displace the entire crew for security. Word would get around. This way no one has a clue what Athena is being used for.

  That made sense to him.

  Well, I’ll leave you to what you’re doing. Contact me the moment you receive a response of any kind.

  I’ll do that, Admiral.

  Perhaps in the end, it’ll turn out that you’re right. I guess we’ll find out.

  25

  Elise watched the Rebel Empire personnel working in engineering through concealed video pickups the New Terran Empire crew had left scattered around. The tiny units were far too small to be noticed unless someone was specifically looking for them, so she wasn’t concerned the enemy would spot them.

  She was no military expert, but it was apparent these were not Fleet personnel. They wore no uniforms and their demeanor was not what one would expect from someone in a military organization. These were civilians.

  High-ranking civilians, certainly. Undoubtedly members of the higher orders. Not one single person lacked an implant. The Rebel Empire didn’t give implants to anyone unless they were either a member of the higher orders or a Fleet officer.

  That raised some interesting questions. Why were members of the nobility running a warship? Better yet, how did they know how to do so in the first place? These people were obviously very familiar with the systems on this ship.

  From what she’d seen of the higher orders, Elise didn’t believe they’d had a burning desire to learn how to fly spaceships. That meant that these people had been specifically trained for this mission.

  Their conversation thus far had been obscure, at least to her. These people obviously knew one another very well and limited their conversation to the duties at hand. That would probably change once people started going off shift, but thus far everyone was proving remarkably uncommunicative.

  The pickups had very sensitive audio receptors, so she was able to hear every word uttered in the large compartment. With her implant processing power, she managed to keep track of all the individual conversations at the same time.

  “Jocelyn, could you take a look at this?” one of the men standing beside the main engineering console asked.

  “What is it?” an older woman asked as she stepped over to him.

  “Look at this maintenance log. Does it look off to you?”

  The woman leaned forward and examined the screen. “Off in what way?”

  “It’s too clean. There should be more errors listed.”

  Elise felt her stomach sinking. This was the kind of thing that Jared had worried about. That they had all worried about.

  The woman raised an eyebrow. “So let me see if I understand you correctly, Austin. You’re concerned because the equipment is operating too well. You think it should be more problematic?”

  The man smiled a little. “Not precisely. I’d expect an autonomous destroyer would have more minor system errors. Particularly in life support. After all, the system should have been shut down until we ordered it brought online.

  “And speaking of that, look at the reserves. The oxygen levels are particularly low considering how they haven’t been used. I would’ve expected the tanks to be virtually full. They’re actually down by about ten percent.”

  The woman frowned. “It’s conceivable that some of the reserve has bled off through small breaches in the system over time. I don’t think we should read too much into this, but you’re right to bring it to my attention.

  “Begin a systematic review of all engineering systems and provide me with a status on them by the time we reached the flip point. Not that I think there’s something wrong, but we’re going to be on this ship for a while. I’d like to know for certain that everything is in order.”

  “I’ll start that at once,” the man said with a nod. “I should have a preliminary report ready by then. It’s going to take significantly longer—on the order of several days—for us to do a complete systems analysis.”

  “That’s good enough. Thank you.”

  The woman walked back over to stand beside the flip drive where she’d been earlier. The older man she’d been speaking to earlier raised an eyebrow.

  “Is something wrong?”

  “Austin believes he’s found something of concern. He seems to think that the maintenance logs are too clean. Unusually so.”

  The man studied her for a long moment. “Are you concerned?”

  “Not overly so,” she said with a slight shrug. “This destroyer came from Harrison’s World in an unoccupied state. The System Lord there has likely been using it for any number of purposes. The fact that the maintenance logs are not as we would’ve expected doesn’t necessarily mean anything.

  “It’s entirely possible that the Lord keeps these vessels in a higher state of readiness and in better condition for peripheral systems then we’d believed. It’s also possible that it felt no need to fully top off the oxygen reserves. Honestly, we have no way of knowing.”

  The man looked away from her for a few seconds. “I assume you told Austin to research it further.”

  “Indeed I did. He should have a preliminary report by the time we make flip out of El Capitan. A detailed analysis will take several days longer. One of the downsides of having a small crew.”

  “Stay on top of it. If there’s something unusual happening, I want to know about it before we leave the system. See if you can pry any other personnel away from their normal duties to assist in checking the critical systems.”

  The woman nodded. “I’ll take care of it.”

  Elise immediately passed word to Jared that the intruders had spotted something that concerned them. She really hoped they didn’t find anything else that raised their suspicions even further.

  If they did, Jared had positioned the marines so they could flood the critical compartments in short order. Hell, he could just trigger the antiboarding weapons and drop them all in their tracks.

  The trouble would come if someone was expecting these people to send a final communication before they flipped out of the system. If that were the case, there was more than enough force present at El Capitan to chase Athena down.

  She’d just have to hope that they managed to keep these people in the dark for just a little bit longer.

  Olivia had made the conscious decision not to watch the Rebel Empire personnel inside Athena. Rather, she focused her attention on gathering as much data through the ship’s passive scanners as she could.

  They weren’t going to have another opportunity to visit El Capitan, so it behooved her to make the data collection as complete as possible. The ships here might very well make the journey to Harrison’s World and visit war upon them.

  Also, she kept hoping that they’d receive information from the resistance cell here. If her message had been convincing enough, the locals could provide them with far more data than she’d be able to collect on her own.

  With her attention focused outward, she was able to catch the message she’d been hoping for as soon as it arrived.

  Her respect for the resistance cell on El Capitan notched higher as she reviewed what they’d sent. This was clever. The message header indicated the transmission was a data set for a mining ship out in the belt. It “only happened” to pass close enough to Athena for the ship’s receivers to pick it up.

  The data was encrypted, but the audio message attached to it gave her clues as to the key. Yet another of the code phrases the resistance used in communicating between systems.

  She applied the decryption key and was dismayed when it failed. Had she done something w
rong?

  Olivia considered potential variants to the code phrase. With decryption, every single letter was important. Thankfully with her implants, she was able to try multiple different passes and one of them unlocked the data.

  She let out a slow breath and opened the file.

  The contents were more than she’d hoped for. Not only did the data set contain observations of the Fleet vessels stationed at El Capitan, it also held data about the surrounding system, including the one Athena was currently headed toward.

  Olivia skimmed the data and quickly determined the system was occupied, but not heavily so. Seemingly, it was heavily stocked with rare elements useful in constructing flip drives and other complex equipment, so there was a mining presence, but not much more.

  The flip point was guarded, though only on the El Capitan side. Perhaps even more heavily so than the one leading toward Harrison’s World. She wondered what they were worried about.

  Perhaps the ghosts—the strange raiders that Kelsey had learned about at the Dresden system—were the reason. The New Terran Empire’s working hypothesis was that those people were remnants of loyal fleet units still hiding inside the Rebel Empire.

  With as much force as the rebels had at their fingertips, Olivia wasn’t certain why they hadn’t crushed the ghosts already. They’d had over five hundred years to hunt them down. Still, if the loyalists were still able to fight, she wasn’t going to worry about how they’d managed it. The important thing was that they were still fighting.

  As one of the leaders of the resistance on Harrison’s World, she was somewhat surprised that she’d never heard about the ghosts. That was the kind of juicy rumor she’d have expected to at least have some clue about.

  It seemed that the rebel Empire had gone out of their way to make certain that talk about the ghosts was minimized. It was also possible that the other resistant cells deeper in the Empire didn’t consider rumors worthwhile enough to pass on.