Stars & Empire 2: 10 More Galactic Tales (Stars & Empire Box Set Collection)

by Jay Allan

  He propped up on an elbow to catch and hold her gaze. “You will be. If you don’t do this job correctly, the whole damn operation falls apart. And besides…it would give me so much peace of mind while I’m out there to know you’re safe.”

  “But David—”

  “Hush. I realize I’m being overprotective—I don’t care. And you’ll be here for Alex, which will make me very, very happy. She needs you.”

  “Perhaps, but she wants you.”

  “Miri….”

  “I know, I know…I’m glad you’re her favorite, honestly. You’re my favorite, too, so it shows good judgment on her part.”

  She exhaled quietly. “Okay. If you’re so certain it’s the right choice, I’ll take the position.” She shifted to face him once more and run a hand through his hair. “But you better come back to me, you understand?”

  He smiled against her lips. “I will. I promise.”

  He had not kept his promise. But David had been right in at least one respect—she had excelled at the job. Now she oversaw logistics for the entirety of the Alliance military, and it wasn’t her sole responsibility.

  But she had just lost a significant percentage of the people who made it happen. She’d give it another full day, then start a recruitment search, keeping the hiring standards as strict as possible but—

  Startled, she spun at the sound of approaching footsteps. Richard hurried along the path toward her. Figures…he’d be the only one to know where to find her, after all.

  “Richard, you look terrible. You really should get some rest, or at least take a shower. I’m assuming you have let a medic take a look at you.”

  “Later.” He reached her and came to a stop, at which point she saw the expression on his face.

  “Is something wrong? What happened?”

  “We may have a problem. I think you need to see this.”

  CHAPTER 66: Earth

  London: Earth Alliance Assembly

  Every Alliance news feed and most of the Senecan and independent feeds carried the open session of the Earth Alliance Assembly live. Some fourteen billion people stopped what they were doing to watch, likely sensing an event of import was on the horizon.

  The Assembly met in the historic Palace of Westminster. It had been gutted nearly two centuries earlier, its foundation restructured to prevent it from sinking into the Thames then redesigned from the ground up to house a single congressional body and support the essentials of the modern world.

  What once had been the Central Hall now formed the core of the Assembly Chamber, an enormous fan-shaped auditorium modeled after the old U.S. Congress—the justification being semicircle seating provided closer vantage points for a greater number of people than the rectangular arrangement of the former British Parliament. Homage had been paid to the original styling in numerous ways, however, from dark oak beams adorning the ceiling to brass accents gilding the doorways and classic fresco paintings decorating the walls.

  The Majority Leader of the Assembly, Charles Gagnon, took the podium as the Secretary gaveled the session to order. In other circumstances it might have been the Speaker at the podium, but in the current situation such an act would have appeared unseemly and transparently self-serving.

  Gagnon’s gaze moved with deliberate attention across the cavernous chamber. “Ladies and Gentlemen, Senators and honored guests. I come before you now in this dark moment for the Alliance to raise a matter I never wished were required.

  “A few short hours ago we experienced a horrific loss in the terroristic bombing of Strategic Command Headquarters. The enemy struck at the very heart of our leadership structure, killing not only the Chairman of Strategic Command and three of its Board members but over 4,500 of our brave fighting men and women. Men and women who had committed their lives to keeping the Alliance and its citizens safe and secure.

  “While emergency responders were still pulling the dead and injured out of the rubble, ships from Northwestern Regional Command were ambushed by Senecan forces while on patrol, the victims of cowardly mining of an asteroid field. They suffered devastating losses which could have been—should have been—avoided.”

  He paused to sigh with dramatic flair. “The grim but undeniable fact is, Alliance governance now lies in chaos—within the military and within the administration. These latest events confirm something many of us had already begun to recognize. Prime Minister Brennon is not prepared to lead us in a time of war.”

  A low rumble rippled through the chamber; he waited for it to subside before continuing.

  “An ill-advised Trade Summit led to the tragic assassination of Mangele Santiagar. Anemic defenses on one of our most important Alliance worlds led to the annihilation of the Forward Naval Base on Arcadia. An inexcusable security lapse allowed high-powered explosives to be smuggled into EASC Headquarters, resulting in the death of thousands and the destruction of Strategic Command.

  “This morning, the Prime Minister issued an executive order appropriating significant production outlays from a number of large Alliance-friendly corporations. Though it pales in comparison to so much loss of life, this move suggests he views this war fundamentally as an opportunity for a power grab rather than the grave threat it is.

  “In these events and more, the Prime Minister has proven himself utterly incapable of responding to the realities of war. Nor can he provide the leadership necessary to drive us to victory over the rebels calling themselves a ‘federation.’”

  He nodded, as if he had only now convinced himself of the necessity of his action. “Therefore, I find I have no choice but to call for a vote of no confidence in Prime Minister Brennon and his administration. Let us adopt new leadership while there is still time to ensure the Alliance remains strong and unbowed. Mr. Secretary, I submit Special Assembly Resolution SGR 2322-3174 for an official vote.”

  The thin young man in black formal attire nodded and loaded the resolution into the Assembly voting system.

  Perhaps cognizant the galaxy was watching, the vote went swiftly for 510 politicians. Four minutes later the vote tally flashed on the oversized screen floating high above the chamber. A low cheer erupted in the chamber, the dissonant contrast of boos echoing beneath it.

  SGR 2322-3174:

  For: 267

  Against: 243

  Within seconds the Majority Leader had returned to the podium. “Thank you all for following reason and logic in performing your solemn duties. Per Constitutional mandate, until the next election the Prime Ministership shall pass to Speaker of the Assembly Luis Barrera, a man I have known for many years and in whom I can confidently entrust the safety of the Alliance. Speaker?”

  Barrera appeared out of nowhere beside Gagnon at the podium. They exchanged a firm yet collegial handshake; then Barrera stood alone.

  “Citizens of the Earth Alliance, of all free space, in service of the future of this great Alliance I humbly accept the position of Prime Minister. Under my leadership and the guidance of a new administration, we will not allow terrorists and insurgents and rebels to threaten our way of life, our freedoms or our safety. We will take the fight to them, we will show them no quarter and we will emerge victorious.”

  In an archway along the left wall of the chamber, offstage and off-camera, Marcus Aguirre smiled.

  CHAPTER 67: Space, North-Central Quadrant

  Border of Senecan Federation Space

  Alex rested her elbows on her knees and a palm at her chin. She felt far, far better this morning. Better than she had expected. Of course, she’d never been shot before so she didn’t exactly have anything to compare it to. She doubted she’d be running a marathon or hiking mountains today, but only a very observant person would notice she was injured at all.

  “So what are we going to do once we get to Romane? I mean if we’re truly being hunted, I damn sure want to find out why.”

  She felt his hands rest on her shoulders from behind. He began kneading the muscles up to the curve of her neck. “At this point we h
ave to assume we are being hunted. I can’t get a handle on why, though. A number of people are aware of the alien threat now and—”

  She frowned and twisted around, ignoring the dull twinge in her side. “You think this is about the aliens and not the war? Why—”

  In an instant his expression morphed from thoughtfulness and affection to…horror? Cold hardness and perhaps even fury.

  He backed away from the couch in an explosion of movement. “What in the bloody hell is—Jesus!”

  “What’s wrong?”

  His hand ran violently down his face. “Turn on the news feed….”

  “What is—” Her message indicator began flashing angrily, along with an unfamiliar yellow alert. She waved the news feed on as she opened it.

  Earth Alliance Military Police Order:

  You are requested to report to Military Headquarters in San Francisco for questioning regard—

  On the embedded screen, front and center, floated an image of Caleb.

  “Caleb Andreas Marano, an agent with the Senecan Federation Division of Intelligence, has been named as the prime suspect in the horrific bombing of EASC Headquarters in Vancouver, Earth yesterday. He should be considered armed and extremely dangerous, so approach with caution.”

  Her focus started to shift to him, but froze mid-motion when the image on the screen transitioned—to one of her.

  “Mr. Marano was last seen in the company of Alexis Mallory Solovy. Ms. Solovy is the estranged daughter of EASC Director of Operations Admiral Miriam Solovy and the deceased Commander David Solovy, a well-known hero of the First Crux War. Ms. Solovy is being sought for questioning, but is not currently considered a suspect in the bombing itself.”

  “’Estranged’? Thanks, Mom….”

  Her eVi continued to blink and beep as an avalanche of messages rolled in; she silenced the entire interface to concentrate on him.

  He paced in even greater agitation than the previous night, his eyes dark and ominous. She found herself reminded of her very first impression of him: dangerous.

  “Caleb, what the hell is happening here?”

  His jaw had clenched into a razor-sharp edge. “Apparently since they failed to kill me, they decided to frame me for mass murder instead.”

  He sank against the wall and brought his hands up to seize his jaw in a death grip. “Goddammit! This is fucked up beyond all reason.”

  “I’m sorry. This is my fault. I shouldn’t have forced you to go to Earth.” She stood to go over to him.

  His hands fell away from his jaw. “No.” He met her halfway and grasped both sides of her face. “It was worth it, no matter what happens. And you didn’t force me—I chose to go.”

  A smile pulled at her lips, but refused to materialize. “Is it possible EASC is blaming you solely because they have evidence you were there? To put a face on the enemy?”

  “Maybe….” He resumed pacing, though it had gained a more methodical, deliberate quality. “The thing is, the information I saw—before I was locked out of Division’s network, as it appears I now am—indicated we had no idea who ordered the bombing. I’m not at all convinced Seneca is responsible.”

  “Who else would do it? Terrorists, taking advantage of the war as an opportunity to sow chaos?”

  “Conceivably. Still, that scenario doesn’t jibe with the hit on us or Volosk.”

  “You think they’re related to the bombing?”

  He came to an abrupt stop. “They are now.”

  With a deep breath he visibly willed himself in control. More of the barely restrained rage seeped away. “Okay. We already suspected someone or a group was manipulating events to trigger the war. The bombing could easily be part of it. Any reluctance on the part of the Alliance will evaporate if they believe Seneca attacked their military leadership. And killing me would obviously prevent me from proving I didn’t do it. In which case I’m only a pawn, a convenient patsy.”

  “Why kill me though?”

  “Same reason.” He gave her a smile, yet his expression was so troubled. “You know I didn’t do it.” The smile faded into concentration. “But why kill Volosk? It’s impossible his murder is unrelated.”

  She found she had joined him in pacing, worrying at her lower lip while they crisscrossed the cabin. There was something ticking at the back of her mind….

  She grabbed his shoulder as they passed one another, her eyes lighting up. “You know what you and I, Volosk and EASC Headquarters have in common? The Metis report—” and darkening again “—but others have it, too. Dr. LaRose, for one.”

  “Well, what’s his status?”

  She queried the exanet and scanned the results. “No mention of an attack…hold on.” The scan had also picked up an unread message in her eVi…so she was a little behind in reading her messages. She had been shot.

  “I have a request from him for another hard copy of the data. It seems one of his researchers took the disk home—and never returned.”

  “To work?”

  “To anywhere.”

  A frown grew across his face, tugging his mouth downward. “Okay, that’s…suspicious.”

  The frown deepened into a full grimace. “But still, you were right before—a lot of people have seen the information. Director Delavasi, analysts and scientists on both sides, the rest of the EASC Board, probably our Director of Defense and Field Marshal. The secret’s out. And they didn’t try to kill LaRose—the report is simply missing.”

  He shook his head. “I’m not convinced it isn’t about the war. If there is a conspiracy, the conspirators would absolutely want to eliminate us before we exposed it. And Volosk had the assassination autopsy reports…is that what got him killed?” He pinched the bridge of his nose in frustration. “Is he dead because I pulled him into this mess?”

  “He’s dead because they’re bad guys. And while they haven’t tried to kill LaRose, what if they killed his researcher?”

  He nodded. “Right, the report. I wonder—”

  She was pacing rapidly now, any ache from her wounds forgotten and fire now animating her irises. “Not the report. The hard copy of the raw data. Others saw the report, but I only made four copies of the raw data: for us, EASC, LaRose and Volosk.”

  Her gaze shot up to meet his. “We missed something.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “There’s something else in the data I captured. Something important.”

  He stared at her, slowly letting out a weighty breath. “Do you realize what you’re saying?”

  “That the aliens are already among us, or at least have agents working on their behalf? Yes, I do.”

  “Just making sure.”

  “Do you disagree?”

  He shrugged gamely. “No…I don’t believe I do. Because you know what? Last night wasn’t the first time on this mission someone’s tried to kill me. With everything that’s happened I had almost forgotten about it, but three merc ships attacked me on the way to Metis. That’s why I opened fire on you in the first place—I thought you were one of them.”

  She groaned. “And that’s what the job was about….”

  “What job?”

  “Right before I left for Metis, I was offered an absurd amount of money to go to work for the government overseeing the Alliance’s deep space exploration program. The Minister for Extra-Solar Development practically fell on his knees begging me to accept the post, and accept it immediately. I don’t see how anyone knew where I was headed, but it has to be related. Dammit, I knew something was up with that.” With a sigh she flopped down on the couch and opened an aural.

  He resumed a more leisurely pacing, and after a moment gave a wry laugh. “Are we actually saying there is both a conspiracy to foment war and a conspiracy to conceal the nature of the aliens? Stretches the limits of credulity a little far.”

  His eyes rolled at the ceiling. “Unless it’s all one conspiracy—they instigate a war to soften us up ahead of the invasion and ensure we’re so busy killing each other we
’ll be unable to mount an effective response. Nope, that’s crazy. Right?”

  She glanced up distractedly. “Hell if I know. You’re the spy.” She had begun scrolling through the data files, looking for the answer. The reason.

  And with a blink it leapt out at her. In retrospect, it was blindingly obvious and she was a svoloch for missing it. “I found it.”

  “Seriously?”

  “Perhaps not all of it, but I found one rather important detail we missed. It’s the TLF wave. I pegged the terahertz as communications in part due to the way it permeated, spreading out across the area as if to blanket the ships. The TLF though….”

  She met his gaze. “It’s coming from the portal. More specifically, from the inside of the portal. See, here? The furthest the wave can be traced back to is the center of the portal, at which point it’s mid-waveform.”

  “Damn. But is it enough to kill over?”

  “For one thing, I’m not sure it’s necessarily a high threshold—see Exhibit A, the fleet of superdreadnoughts. For another, if it draws attention to the portal itself—and to whatever is on the other side of it—then to them it very well could be. Remember, nothing in the universe emits waves at so low a frequency. So the question becomes, what does?”

  She fixated on the aural as her fingertips drummed a staccato étude on her thigh. “There’s one way to find out.”

  “You want to go back to Metis? It’ll be risky.”

  “Not that risky. I’ll need a new dampener field module though. Ken can probably bring one to Romane and—”

  “Ken? Another ‘good friend’ of yours?”

  She returned his smirk in full. “Ken is a she and yes, albeit not in the way you’re implying.”

  He chuckled, but she saw the strain still pulling at the corners of his eyes and the edges of his mouth. “Okay. This is a good plan. I’m in.”

  Her voice dropped to a tentative whisper. “I’m glad…but I’m not certain you grasp the full extent of the ‘plan.’”

  An eyebrow rose. “And it would be?”

  “We’ll see what we find when we get to Metis, but…I expect to find answers we will need to go through the portal.”