Inherit the Stars

by Tony Peak

  Sar lurched from his seat. “Kiv’s father? You knew him?”

  Bredine’s face smoothed over in fond remembrance. “Seneschal, swordsman, pilot, general. He raised the princess on Haldon Prime. Raised until she could send the queen’s message. Hmm? Ov family distracted prophets and protected Rhyer. Oh, Redryll, Redryll. Gushing hot love for a princess, a queen.”

  “What message?” Sar leaned toward her.

  “Vim signal, yes? Expecting a reply. Expecting someone like Kivita to send. Hmm? But she sent it to everyone. Now all are here to hear the Vim. Thedes, Rector. Maybe Sarrhdtuu.” Bredine shrank back in her seat.

  As he gripped the manuals, fear gnawed at Sar’s mind. Kivita had been preserved, perhaps even groomed, for a higher purpose. Even if he rescued her and they escaped, he doubted she’d ever take him back. Under Navon and Jandeel’s tutelage, she would’ve learned more from the datacores, as well as other things. She would not be the same person as before.

  In his racing thoughts, Caitrynn’s visage melded with Kivita’s. His sister had died long ago. The woman he loved could still be saved from the blinding Inheritor sun. Even if it burned him to ashes.

  Sar activated the console scanner, but the hull of Arcuri’s Glory limited the signal. It still showed the faint outlines of a gas giant, Luccan’s Wish, and a huge Vim derelict. Sar tried to fine-tune the frequency as the shuttle and airlock bay shuddered. Bredine floated off her seat a few inches, then fell back into it.

  “Redryll? Hmm. I’ll strap in.” Bredine buckled the restraints and tapped her fingers on the console. “Black void. Cold, cold. Ready?”

  The scanner flickered and beeped, while readouts on the terminal lit up. Studying the information, Sar frowned. The scanner beeped again.

  Luccan’s Wish had been hit, with the Inheritor battleship closing in.

  “Hmm. Sarrhdtuu? Maybe they are doing something.” Bredine drummed her fingers louder on the console.

  The chill spread from Sar’s spine to his stomach. The Sarrhdtuu’s plan still baffled him. “Dunaar, you bastard.”

  Bredine pointed at him. “Redryll? Do something!”

  He ran a hand through his hair. “Shut up a minute. Can’t act until—”

  The readouts indicated that shuttles had left Arcuri’s Glory, bound for Luccan’s Wish.

  “Hell with this.” He activated the shuttle’s main systems. The cockpit viewport opened and the engine came online.

  Outside the viewport, Inheritor soldiers in polysuits boarded the other shuttles, lamps reflecting off their yellow-tinted faceplates. Sar’s throat constricted. Hundreds of soldiers had been wakened from cryostasis. The Thedes would be lucky to have fifty armed defenders aboard Luccan’s Wish.

  Across the bay, Shekelor Thal entered Fanged Pauper and turned around before its airlock shut. Despite the distance, his eyes met Sar’s. A smirk spread over Shekelor’s face. Then he pointed and shouted.

  “Shit,” Sar muttered.

  “Redryll? Hmm?” Bredine’s eyes widened.

  Sar clicked on full engine control and steered the manuals. Their shuttle turned on the landing pad toward the nearest airlock doors.

  Shekelor shouted again. Soldiers rushed across the floor, weapons drawn. The bay’s lamps flashed red.

  “Redryll? You will do something?” Bredine stopped tapping her fingers and stared at the approaching soldiers. Shekelor exited Fanged Pauper, aiming a beam rifle.

  “As much as I can.” Sar clicked the airlock relay on his console and fired the thrusters. Something exploded behind the shuttle, but Sar pushed the manuals forward. The airlock bay doors slid open.

  “Yes, something. Yes, yes.” Bredine peeked from the viewport, then recoiled as kinetic shots pinged off the shuttle’s armored hull. A fine green beam sliced across the shuttle’s nose from Shekelor’s rifle. The airlock doors started sliding shut.

  Dunaar’s voice came over the console speaker. “Redryll? You sacrilegious offal! I will have you shot down as soon as you exit my ship!”

  Sar concentrated on the view outside the opening airlock.

  “You are too late to be a martyr for your cause,” Dunaar continued, mirth in his voice. “Kivita Vondir is already mine—”

  Sar punched the mute button, then fired both starboard and port-side thrusters. The airlock doors blackened, and warning alarms blasted Sar’s ears. Bredine tapped his shoulder and yelled unintelligible sentences.

  Kivita’s hazel eyes and easy smile beckoned him over the threshold.

  As the shuttle shot into space, Sar stabilized its flight path, just as the battleship’s starboard K-gun battery fired. The shuttle’s hull creaked as he dove. G-forces shoved him back into the seat and made his head throb. Bredine gasped, eyelids fluttering.

  Sar pushed the manuals to their lower limit. The shuttle’s proximity alarm resounded in the cockpit, tremors rocked the shuttle, and the star field outside blurred.

  The sabot rounds darted past the shuttle’s viewport.

  Sar righted the shuttle and flew toward Luccan’s Wish. The familiar shape of Frevyx, docked to Airlock Eight, caught his eye. Why no one had used it to escape deepened his anxieties.

  As he drew near, Luccan’s Wish tilted toward the gas giant. Debris and bodies floated into the eternal cold.

  Sar’s body sagged, and he lost his breath. Damn Dunaar to the deepest depths, damn him to—

  Bredine gripped his arm. “No void black for Kivita yet. She still sends.”

  Sar slammed the manuals forward.

  • • •

  While Aldaar’s hangar filled with Troopers for the boarding action, Seul cradled her helmet. On a nearby flat display, Vuul stared back at her.

  “Despite interference from the Vim signal, we have concluded the damaged human ship has not been evacuated,” Vuul said. “No beacon trajectories have exited this system. The fact that the Inheritor battleship remains reveals the presence of Kivita Vondir. Find her. We will hold off that battleship as long as we can.”

  “It is done, Commander Vuul.” The possibility of a Vim rendezvous made Seul feel lighter than cryo exhaust. Above all, she would find her red-haired friend.

  “The human craft has been damaged and breached, so stay in tight formation,” Seul called. “Each squad’s officer will have a brain-pulse analyzer in his or her polyarmor. Understood?”

  Dozens of Shock Troopers spoke in unison. “Yes, Captain Jaah.” Their voices echoed in the hangar.

  Seul stepped away from the boarding ramp. “Officer Kael, a word.”

  Kael paused while Shock Troopers loaded onto the shuttle. “Yes, Captain Jaah?”

  Taking his hand in her polygauntlet, Seul’s cryoports tightened. Though everyone aboard Aldaar had woken from cryostasis half an hour before exiting the light jump, she’d been too busy to see him until now. Her excitement gave way to yearning.

  “Remember what we discussed in the Medical Ward. . . . I don’t want you to remember me this way.” She touched her polycuirass.

  Kael frowned. “We’ll make it through this, Captain Jaah. Why are you acting like this?”

  Biting back emotions, Seul wanted to just tell him. Say the words, verbalize her feelings. Touch Kael and make him see. All the Shock Troopers in the airlock bay, all the flat displays where Vuul might be watching, buried the words in her heart.

  “Promise . . . promise me you’ll do what needs to be done. Don’t wait for me if something goes wrong.” Seul squeezed his hand.

  “As you command, Captain Jaah,” he whispered.

  Warmth rose in her chest as her cryoports clamped. Seul pursed her lips, then kissed Kael’s mouth so quickly, he blinked in surprise. Her polyboots bumped into his as she drew away.

  “As you were, Officer Kael.” Seul shut her faceplate, unable to look him in the eye. What a clumsy, fleeting kiss. She almost wished she sle
pt in Niaaq Aldaar’s cryo chamber.

  After striding aboard, Seul locked herself into a launch tube. Her heart hadn’t beat with such painful rapidness since her first combat mission. How foolish of her to strain her combat effectiveness—the mission mattered most, not her personal wishes. No matter how much she repeated it to herself, though, Seul’s heart grew heavier.

  Aldaar wouldn’t last long in this fight, but the Vim may be coming to save them. The Inheritors would be brutal, after coming so far for whatever prize the system held. All depended on saving Kivita from them and the Sarrhdtuu.

  Saving a daughter who remained ignorant of her mother.

  The shuttle departed Aldaar and made for the crippled starship. Its bulk would shield them from the Inheritor battleship’s guns for a short time, since they wanted Kivita, too.

  The vessel resembled an ancient human-colony ship, with multiple decks and a bridge tapering into a cone from the bow. Two precise sabot hits had struck near the aft engines and an airlock. Chunks of hull, crates, and bodies floated toward the blue-green gas giant and its ice rings below. Seul turned away from the humanoid forms.

  Vuul’s voice came over the cockpit speaker. “Enter through those two punctures, Captain Jaah. I want two shuttles to infiltrate each. So far, our analyzers show that no datacores or Savants have exited the hull’s breaches. Kivita and the Juxj Star are still inside.”

  “Commander Vuul, how long will we have until the planet’s orbit reveals Aldaar’s position behind the ship to Inheritor fire?”

  Static crackled over the connection as the shuttle’s artificial gravity shuddered from the gas giant’s propinquity. Seul waited for Vuul to answer, unused to any hesitation from him.

  “Perhaps half an hour before the ship’s orbit deteriorates into reentry. Inheritor shuttles are nearing the vessel now. Do not seek engagement with hostiles. Retrieve Vondir and coordinate a fighting retreat back to your transports. Aldaar will standby, but should things go wrong, light-jump back to Aldaakian Space with Vondir.”

  The Troopers aboard glanced at Seul and gripped their rifles tighter, the resolve in their stares swelling her chest with pride. Aldaakians had long inured themselves to sacrifice. Now it could mean something again.

  “Officer Kael, drop us at the earliest opportunity next to the ship’s hull.”

  Kael glanced back at her, a gleam in his eye. “Coming up now, Captain Jaah. Five, four, three . . .”

  She didn’t hear him count the last two numbers. Lips trembling, Seul closed her eyes and imagined a world with a yellow sun, shining over snow drifts and glaciers. Her daughter running in the cold wind with arms outstretched. Seul reclining in Kael’s arms, dressed in swath robes . . .

  The launch tube ejected Seul into the vacuum right alongside the human starship. Her polyboots magnetized and snapped to the hull. The action of her fellow Troopers making contact with the hull vibrated up her body. The shuttle hovered nearby, awaiting recovery.

  “Squad A, form up behind me and keep your rifles ready. Remember to minimize breaths to conserve air. If any of you experience gravity sickness, alert the rest immediately.” Seul walked down the hull toward a hole shot through an airlock. With each step suctioning to the metal surface, her leg muscles pumped harder just to propel her along.

  The hull stretched hundreds of feet in either direction, its smoothness broken by other airlocks, orbital thrusters, and sensory arrays. Far below, the planet dominated the view with its opaque turquoise atmosphere. The yellow-white ring of dust and ice twinkled. In the distance, the gray sticklike Vim derelict stretched at least eight miles in length.

  Were they in that derelict, waiting for the right moment? Seul had to look away from the craft. The mission. Must remain focused on the mission.

  Near the breach, supply crates drifted out into space, along with metal shards, melted globules, cooled slag, and one human body. No wounds or envirosuit, but the eyes stared at her with horror. Vacuum frost already coated the corpse’s mouth.

  Seul pushed aside smaller debris and gripped a protruding girder. Lifting her feet off the hull, she pushed herself from the girder into the breach, where her boots stuck to the ruined airlock’s metal floor. Walking forward, she swept the area with her rifle.

  “Jaah here. I’m in. Airlock is clear. Squad A, enter one at a time and form a ranging party, single file.” Seul examined corners for any survivors or lurking enemies.

  “Captain Jaah . . . is Vuul. The signal from . . . derelict is interrupting our scanners even more. Beware of . . . and blackout. Give me regular updates on . . . progress . . . possible.” Vuul’s transmission broke up.

  “It is done, Commander Vuul.” Seul clomped toward two circular doors, while Troopers filtered in through the breach. She tried one door, but it had clamped shut. Through a small window on each door, humans gaped at her with shocked faces, then fled.

  “I have a visual on live occupants, apparently unarmed,” Seul said. “Judging from their movements, the station still retains adequate gravity in certain areas.”

  “Understood. Proceed and . . . Inheritor soldiers inside, but . . .” Vuul’s reply broke up again.

  Seul waited until all Troopers had entered, then activated the brain-pulse analyzer affixed to her right polyvambrace. As soon as she cut through the door, those on the other side would lose their air. They would die. Seul fidgeted with her rifle, then checked her readouts on the inside of her extended collar.

  The analyzer revealed the presence of five Savants on board the doomed starship. One emitted a more powerful signal than the rest, from the ship’s fourth deck. Any enemies would be headed in the same direction.

  “Captain Jaah?” a Trooper asked.

  She cleared her throat. “Squad A, the station’s compartments are pressurized. If we continue, occupants may perish. Point One, start hailing short-wave radio frequencies to alert all nearby passengers we mean no harm. Point Two, slice this door open. When you finish, weld it back.”

  Several minutes later, Seul waited while Squads A and B entered the corridor. Point Two finished sealing the cut door back into place.

  “Don’t demagnetize your boots yet, and maintain ranging order. Do not fire unless provoked. Is that understood?” Seul met each Trooper’s gaze. All assented.

  “Good. Remember—we are here to retrieve Kivita Vondir. Alive.” Seul approached the next circular door and held her breath. It hissed open.

  The room was empty, but a viewport displayed an open area in the underside of the ship for cargo bays and an exhaust trench. On the opposite side, the viewport to an observation deck was also open.

  Seul’s heart sank.

  Several unmoving forms floated on the deck. Human, Ascali, even an Aldaakian woman. Beside her floated a small Aldaakian boy, dressed in Tannocci-style leather clothing. Seul hadn’t seen any Aldaakian children since viewing her infant daughter in the Pediatric Ward.

  Here, on this starship, an Aldaakian mother had been rearing her child. Away from Aldaakian society, free of strictures and routine. Now they’d both joined Niaaq Aldaar on his frozen journey.

  “Keep moving.” Seul gripped her rifle tight.

  31

  After squirming through buckled girders and cracked insulation, Kivita entered the next corridor. Whoever had fired on Luccan’s Wish, their weapon had sliced through the entire ship at a diagonal angle. She feared even more damage had been done, with many passengers dead. Navon, Jandeel, Cheseia, Basheev, Rhii, Maihh, and two dozen others followed her past charred bulkheads and melted flooring.

  A deep fear lingered in her gut. Their attackers hadn’t finished off Luccan’s Wish—which meant more was to come.

  “The impact must have sealed some of these compartments due to the heat.” Navon pointed at the corridor’s ceiling. A blackened line ran above them, with cooled slag hanging in fat droplets.

  “We’ll need
envirosuits,” Kivita said. “We’re still half a deck away from the next lift, and who knows what shape it’s in.”

  “There is a maintenance shaft beyond this corridor,” Navon said. “It might be even more dangerous.”

  “What if the next corridor has been compromised?” Maihh clicked once. “When we open that door, we’ll all be sucked in!”

  Jandeel helped Rhii over a sharp bulkhead crease. “It’s our only chance now. Try the intercom again, Kivita. Maybe the communication systems have come back online.”

  As Kivita neared an intercom panel beside the doorway, Luccan’s Wish tilted again. Everyone scooted toward the viewport, where the gas giant loomed closer than before. One man slammed into the viewport, and Kivita held her breath. All grew quiet, as if fearing their weight might shatter it.

  “We’re not going to make it!” Maihh wailed.

  Kivita crawled back to the intercom panel and pressed several buttons. Nothing but static answered her.

  All those faces filled with hope, all the Thedes who believed in her—all of them dead or doomed now. Her heart sank into her stomach. A constant throb grew inside her head.

  Kivita mashed the buttons again. “Hey!” she called into the mic. “If anyone can hear me—”

  “You are doing no good like this. There is nothing that can be done.” Navon placed a hand over the mic.

  Kivita glared at him. “Some are still alive, and you damn well know it.”

  “I believe so, too,” Navon said, his face calm. “That is why we must focus on those around us. The maintenance shaft, Kivita. Please.” He gestured at Basheev. “For their sakes.”

  Jandeel, Rhii, and the others watched her with determination mixed with fear. Cheseia’s jaw tightened and her muscles flexed.

  “Yeah. Let’s do this.” She crawled toward the door and straddled the viewport below her. The next corridor lay empty through the door’s small square window, but she’d no clue what the conditions were like. With a hull breach, each room and corridor might contain their deaths.