Cydonia Rising

by Dave Walsh

  “You’ll need us for the transition,” she said, standing up and doing her best to remain regal in the face of distress. “There is dissension, I’ll admit, but if the people see I am working with Cronus they will be at least partially at ease. We were prepared for today—well, mostly. We didn’t expect any sort of attack being launched on the palace outside of by yourself and your troops, but we were prepared for your inevitable arrival.”

  “So you were aware there was a gate built on your doorstep then? My, oh my, have I underestimated you.”

  “Not exactly, no,” she said. “But we knew you’d be back. My son here made a number of grave mistakes—not honoring his agreement with the Earth Ministry may have been his worst.”

  “Quite the mistake.” Navarro stood in front of Cronus, shaking his head. He snapped his fingers and motioned for a soldier. “Pick him up, clean him up; he needs to look presentable, like an emperor, not like some sniveling bastard who was just bested and beaten down.”

  “I am the proud emperor of the—”

  “Cronus,” she looked to him. “Listen to them, we are in no position to negotiate right now.”

  “But I will not bow down to any—”

  “You will or they’ll kill you just as easily as they did your uncle.” She wiped back a tear. “I don’t want to lose anyone else today if I don’t have to—now go with them.”

  “Fine.” He tugged at his jacket, trying to wrestle free from the grasp of the soldier, a few more joining to lead him out of the room.

  “I may have underestimated you,” Navarro said, sitting back into Cronus’s throne, crossing his left leg over his knee. “In fact, I didn’t account for you at all.”

  “We all make mistakes,” she said, folding her hands in front of her dress, trying not to let him see her hands trembling.

  “I may have.” He stroked his chin with his gloved right hand. “I may have not, that remains to be seen, I guess. So where did everyone else go, Empress Regent?”

  “I’m not sure, High Admiral,” she said. “I was focused on all the problems you were creating.”

  “See, there is the problem. I didn’t create these problems, oh no. I’m the cleaner here, the fixer. I’m here with a fleet of warships to fix this small indiscretion. You were aboard the Omega Destiny, were you not?” She nodded in reply, which made him smile. “So you knew what the mission was and how vital it was for the survival of humanity.”

  “Yes, although there were no assurances of these technological advances.”

  “Of course it wasn’t an exact science. This Andlios was to be a colony of Earth, you see, not its own intergalactic superpower.”

  “Then I’m curious, what were we supposed to do if there were no HyperMass drives?”

  “That’s not relevant,” he shook his head.

  “What about for finding humanity on this very planet? What was the plan for that?”

  “There was a plan, of sorts. You see, there are still doubts as to where humanity actually originated. Most of science and history points to Earth, but as I’m sure you’ve heard, there is that whole missing link nonsense and a few minor grey areas. We’ve been able to fill in the gaps, but there was a period of rapid acceleration that could have simply been environmental or, well—ah, this is probably boring you.”

  “Not at all,” she said, noting how he was amusing himself. “Please continue, I’ve always been curious.”

  “So there are some who believe that Andlios here is possibly the home for humanity. It is a bit far-fetched to believe that humanity in nearly identical forms blossomed and evolved on two planets at the same time without some intermingling.”

  “That’s the argument, yes.”

  “Naturally, a part of why Andlios is so valuable to us is to find these answers, Empress Regent. While I’m sure there have been resources dedicated to this here already, we would be a lot more comfortable having control over it. Then, of course, there is the matter of resources that brought us to where we are today.”

  “You can travel faster than ever before; you don’t need us for resources any more.”

  “True, although, there is already a mass of humanity here,” he explained. “There are already systems in place to harvest these resources and even transports. We will build more gates—some will serve as shipping lanes and humanity will be together once again, if not for the first time ever. These are exciting times and you get to be a part of that.”

  “This feels like that part where the villain explains his evil plan because he believes he’s already won, I must say, High Admiral.”

  “I have already won, don’t you see that? We gave Andlios its independence for how many years? Your son’s foolish attempt to outmaneuver us was the final straw and the order came down that we were to retake Andlios at any cost. I understand your son has been building a fleet, which is cute, but the Fourth Fleet alone could handle them. Plus, with the gate in place, we can have reinforcements in a matter of hours. The dream is over, it’s dead, as dead as O’Neil over there.” He motioned toward Peter’s body, and Kara felt a pit growing in her stomach, refusing to turn to see his lifeless body again, even if the image was burned into her mind.

  “I see,” she said, staring down at her hands.

  “You don’t, but you will soon enough.” Navarro hopped off the throne, straightening out his uniform. “Now come, it is time.”

  “Time?”

  “To face your Republic and concede to surrender publicly.”

  “Oh, right, that time,” she said, feeling utterly defeated.

  “Oh come now, it is clear that you have no options here. It is surrender and live or be defiant and have the Fourth Fleet carpet bomb this city into extinction. We are comfortable either way, as was your late husband. It’s all cyclical, my dear. Everything comes back around in the end.”

  It felt like another punch in the gut and it ended their conversation, and a pair of soldiers came in and escorted her out of the room and through the palace. Bodies and blood stained the once-pristine walls, elite guards sprawling out lifeless in the halls while Earth Ministry forces idled, glaring at her as she walked past with her captors. There was an eerie quiet filling the palace, more so than usual while she met up with Cronus, wearing the same blood-stained jacket, his right arm with a bandage wrapped around it.

  That was what they meant by clean him up, she gathered. They wanted him to look weak, injured and as if he had been defeated. She almost laughed out loud, considering that it would be perhaps the only time in Cronus’s reign that he ever appeared as a sympathetic figure to the people of the Republic. It took many cycles for him to finally appear as a human being who cared about his people and of course, it came at the end. She knew exactly where they were and what was being planned; they were by the balcony that hung over the front of the palace. Cronus would be giving a speech, even if it went against the very fabric of his being.

  Navarro strode up behind them and motioned for them to step out onto the balcony, Kara taking her place at the left of her son and gently pushing for him to walk out first. He stepped out onto the balcony, overlooking what was a sea of humanity beneath them. Cronus had his head held high but she saw the look on his face while he scanned the crowd and it struck him what was happening and that he had failed. Kara stood next to him, trying to remain composed while her son held his hand up and a silence hushed over the crowd. There was no need for silence, considering there were devices to capture the entire event with audio and video, but it was the closest thing he had to control.

  “People of Andlios,” he said, his voice slightly cracking. Cronus cleared his throat, holding his hand over his mouth but forgetting his injury. He cursed under his breath. “I stand here as your emperor on this day as a humbled man. This was a day we all knew would come from the day my father founded the Andlios Republic and drove away Earth Ministry forces; they have returned and we simply find ourselves outmatched. We are told that the transition should be a smooth one and you will not be
harmed. I, Emperor Cronus Freeman concede control of the Andlios Republic to the Fourth Fleet of the Earth Ministry. I’m sorry.”

  The crowd remained relatively silent, the murmurings hardly audible from so high up above them, but it was clear that there were discussions going on down there. Kara watched as her son skulked back in from the balcony and wondered how much of that was fed to him and how much of it came from him. He’d kept the public appearances to a minimum and opted instead to let others speak for him. In a way, she was shocked that there wasn’t an attempt on his life just now, but the day was full of surprises.

  “Welcome back to the Earth Ministry.” Navarro stood before Kara, and she felt the pit in her stomach only growing. They had failed—more importantly, she had failed. She had let Jonah down.

  042. Escape

  Jace

  Are you fucking kidding me?” Jace shouted while they stumbled their way through the dark tunnels underneath the palace.

  “Are you talking about these tunnels or what?” Loren asked, trying to keep his cool, but he was clearly distracted.

  “Fucking everything!” Jace couldn’t even begin to comprehend what was happening all around them. “The Earth Ministry? The Fourth Fleet? The fuck!”

  “Jace,” Katrijn said, trying to sound calm, but it was just grating to Jace, who was still partially in shock.

  “Now we are walking through secret fucking tunnels underneath the palace, I mean, fuck!”

  “Jace,” she said again.

  “What?”

  “We need to get out of here. Is the Pequod fueled up and ready to go?”

  “Yeah,” he said, trying not to trip over himself while staring at Loren, who was hunched over in front of him, leading the way. The tunnels were narrow and dark, but Loren refused to turn any of the lights on, claiming they had to be as quiet and hidden as possible. “I guess so, but we’ll never get off the planet. This isn’t Cyngen.”

  “No, it’s not,” Loren said ahead of them. “But my access codes still work; I’m still plugged in. I can get us the access, but you’ll have to get us past that fleet out there.”

  “What happened to Cronus’s fleet he was building?” Jace was starting to feel anxious. “I can’t fight off an entire fleet, that would be a mighty fine distraction, I’d say.”

  “I gave the order to launch twenty minutes ago, but it’ll take some time.”

  “You gave the order?” Jace tugged on Loren’s belt with his good hand, stopping the man in his tracks. “You?”

  “Yes, now please let go of me before I break your goddamn hand.”

  “Boys,” Katrijn said from behind Jace. “We need to get out of here, not bicker.”

  “Since when is Loren giving orders to an entire fleet of warships?”

  “Since…” He paused, shaking his head. “Just, I did, alright?”

  “I don’t care if it was Odin himself,” Katrijn said, smacking her palm against Jace’s side, and he yelped. “We need to go.”

  “Gods.” Jace felt the sting in his side from where Giger had slashed him. “Be careful—I’m injured, you know.”

  “Just keep moving.”

  “If you two are done,” Loren said, reaching one of the intersections that littered the tunnels. “We’ve gotta go right to get to the hangar.”

  “Alright, sorry,” Jace said, feeling both of their eyes on them. “Why didn’t we stick with Alva, Oystein and Trella, anyway?”

  “She needed medical help.” Loren led them down the hallway. “I don’t know about you, but I have no clue how to repair some of her systems. I can just patch together whiny would-be heroes like you, Krios.”

  “But us splitting up doesn’t seem like—”

  “Jace, look,” Loren turned to him, stopping their forward motion. Jace almost ran into him but caught himself. “This is the plan. If you don’t like it, that’s tough. This is what the Old Man wanted.”

  “Well, where is he? We are gonna need him for this,” Katrijn said, Jace feeling a lump in his throat and a sense of foreboding.

  “He, well…” There was an awkward pause only for Loren to start moving again. “C’mon, the entrance to the hangar should only be another twenty or so meters ahead.”

  Jace was starting to read between the lines as to why Loren felt so tense, but he wasn’t sure if Katrijn was or not. Chances were that they had left everyone up in that audience chamber to die, which included Katrijn’s mother, brother and uncle. They wanted Katrijn off the planet and out of their reach, although there didn’t seem to be anywhere they could really run to, especially with that gate opened up and hostile ships pouring in from it.

  “Be ready,” Loren was reaching up overhead at a small hatch. “We’re gonna have to really blast out of here.”

  “Just make sure we are clear to take off,” Jace said.

  Loren popped the hatch, letting the rope ladder that was tied up next to the hatch unravel before climbing up it and disappearing from the dark tunnel. “Alright,” he whispered down to them. “We’ve got a few guards here, but nothing extreme. You two get up here and make a break for it and I’ll cover you.”

  “Loren,” Katrijn said. “This is not the time or place for heroics; we need to get out of here now.”

  “I’ll be right behind you,” he said while Jace pulled himself up and slid behind a crate, looking out at the Pequod. Loren reached down and grabbed Katrijn by the wrist and tugged her up while Jace peered over the crate and swore under his breath.

  “That’s not a few,” he said, trying to keep his voice down. “That’s a lot.”

  “I guess we have to disagree, then.” Loren smiled at him while Katrijn looked out at the horde of guards.

  “Yeah,” she said. “I’m with Jace on this, Loren. That isn’t just a few. There is no way we are getting out of here without a huge firefight.”

  “I’ve still got a few tricks up my sleeve,” he assured them. “You two just get ready to dash after the signal, I’ll be right behind you.”

  “What’s the signal?” Katrijn asked.

  “Just gimme a few.” He fumbled with his holoscanner, taking a deep breath and giving a nod before a loud alarm roared over the docking bay, causing the guards to look around, covering their ears. “Now go!”

  Jace tugged on Katrijn’s sleeve while grasping at his side trying to pull her out from behind the crate. Loren hunkered down behind cover with his gun out, looking focused. The Pequod’s bay door sat 20 meters away from them, and Jace tapped on his holoscanner dangling from his belt to open the door and tugged again on Katrijn. “C’mon, let’s go!”

  Jace finally pulled her out from behind the crate and pushed her in front of him; she stumbled into a run toward the door, keeping her head down while shots started to ring out. Loren was blasting away, trying to bring the attention away from them but Jace could feel the heat of the shots whizzing by them. “We can’t leave him,” she said when they reached the door. “We can’t.”

  “He’s coming!” Jace shouted over the sounds of gunfire. “Loren, c’mon!” he called into his holoscanner, only for Loren to keep firing.

  “I’m not leaving without him,” she said.

  “He said he’s coming—has he ever not?” He pulled himself into the ship, but not fully. “I gotta get this fired up; your uncle said my main priority was getting you off this rock, and I intend to do that.”

  “I’m going back for him,” she said, and Jace understood that he wouldn’t be able to convince her not to.

  “Fine,” he said, reaching over toward the blaster he kept by the door, unhooking it and holding it out toward her. “But you cover yourself.”

  She snatched it from his grasp and ran, firing blindly while she charged out, back toward the cover. It took everything in his power to not rush out there himself, but he charged up toward the cockpit and reminded himself that he had to somehow outrun the entirety of an Earth Ministry fleet, which was going to be no small task. Jace dashed through the cargo bay and up the stairs, bo
unding two steps at a time and slid into the captain’s chair, firing up the engines.

  The ground locks were off, which was a good thing—Loren had done that much. Jace knew the planetary defenses might have fallen to the Earth Ministry forces, but he had to just hope they hadn’t. “Katrijn, we gotta get out of here,” he shouted over the comm. “We gotta go now, get Loren and let’s get outta here.”

  “We’ve got a problem,” her voice crackled over the ship’s comm.

  Katrijn

  “C’mon, Loren, stay with me.” She stood over Loren, who was slumped over behind the crate, blaster in his left hand while his other arm was a bloody mess. There was blood everywhere and Katrijn could feel herself start to panic. “Stay with me, Loren!” She tore at the sleeve of her shirt, having to pull out a blade to slice it and get the tear started.

  “Ah, shit,” Loren coughed, trying to pick himself up but failing.

  “No, stay down, I need to patch you up.”

  “You are a godsdamned fool, you know that?” He pushed out a pained chuckle. “If you don’t get offa here then this is all for nothing, Katrijn. Leave me behind, I’ll be fine.”

  “Not with those wounds, you won’t.” She got to work fastening a sling for his arm, tightening it while shots fired off all around them.

  “You are just as dumb as the Old Man,” he groaned while she took his good arm over her shoulder.

  “Can you pull a trigger with that bum arm?” she asked.

  “Probably.”

  “Good.” She handed him a blaster, keeping one for herself. “Jace,” she called into the comm.

  “What? Where the hell are you two?”

  “Coming, but we are going to need a distraction; Loren is pretty banged up.”

  “I don’t have any guns on here, you know that,” he said, sounding panicked.