Exodus - Empires at War 04 - The Long Fall (Exodus Series #4)

by Doug Dandridge

  “Have you considered our request for an Embassy, your Majesty?” asked the Ambassador.

  “You may have your compound, alien. Your ship may send down your personnel and equipment, as long as we are allowed to inspect your devices.”

  “Of course, your Majesty,” said the Ambassador, nodding his head. “And if I might make a request. There is a human Embassy here?”

  “For now,” said the Emperor. “From two of their powers. But we will make sure that your presence is not known to the humans. And if they do happen to discover your presence, we will make sure that the word never reaches their Empire, until we have decided to act.”

  The Ca’cadasan Ambassador bowed again, hiding his smile. So far everything was going according to plan. And if he had his way, there would soon be another axis of attack into the human Empire.

  *

  “This must get through,” said the Lothran agent to the Brakakak ship’s captain. The Lothran towered above the avian, his reptilian form common among the landing fields of the capital. He was a slave, of a very progressive master who actually hated the institution. And both master and slave worked for the New Terran Empire Imperial Intelligence Agency.

  “It will,” said the small, plumaged being who was captain of an Elysium Hyper VI cargo vessel, and who also worked for his government’s intelligence service. He accepted the data chip from the slave, hidden in the manifest of a cargo of Fenri liquors that were being loaded aboard the heavy lift shuttle.

  The slave nodded and moved off, and the captain thought about how he could get the information to human intelligence, as it would add a month to time the data would get delivered to the New Terran Empire if he made directly for home.

  Later that day the freighter unobtrusively left orbit and headed out. The captain watched the new ship in orbit as he left. It didn’t look like the ships he had heard of from the humans, but he didn’t expect them to come here in one of their twenty-five million ton battleships. Those would come later, when the Fenri inevitably signed an alliance with the Ca’cadasans.

  Chapter Eleven

  I cannot trust a man to control others who cannot control himself. Robert E. Lee.

  CAPITULUM, JEWEL, DECEMBER 25TH THROUGH 27TH, 1000.

  Doctor Jennifer Conway still considered herself a doctor first, even though all of the news outlets were calling her the Imperial Consort. At least that’s better than Sean’s Whore, she thought, holding onto his arm as he led her to the Imperial Box at the Opera House. Security had gotten even heavier than before the assassination attempt. Now every agent and Marine guard was scanned on a daily basis, and anyone missing from duty for more than a day, for any reason, was biopsied.

  Tonight there were no armored Marines in evidence, but the Secret Service Agents were as thick as fleas on a stray cat. They all looked like normal young men and women, except that their suits gave them much better protection from lasers and pellets than the normal formal wear worn by the other patrons. They were both in a cluster around the couple and scattered through the crowd.

  The Imperial Box was just as she had expected, pure opulent luxury. Their seats were back from the opening looking over the stage, and there was a slight shimmer to the air right at that point.

  “What is that?” she asked Sean, pointing at the shimmer.

  “That, my dear, is a combination holo field and electromag barrier,” said Sean. “It projects the image of the occupants of these seats, making it look like we’re closer to the opening than we actually are. I used to love getting close to the field and projecting my image out into the air. Needless to say, mother and father weren’t amused.”

  Jennifer laughed, imagining the irrepressible little boy causing havoc with the security system.

  “They’re starting,” said the Emperor, grasping her arm. “Now quiet that laughter,” he said with a smile. “I just can’t take you anywhere.”

  The singers came onto the stage, while the light show and holographs placed the setting around them. Sean had wanted to pass on the invitation to this performance, even when told it was written in honor of his father, Augustine I. Jennifer and Samantha had talked him into it. It would honor the men and women who were putting on the performance, and it would show the capital that the assassination attempt had not frightened the Emperor to the point where he was afraid to show his face in public.

  Jennifer sat enraptured by the production. The singers were fantastic, the best in the business, as would be expected in the heart of the Empire. The light show and holos played the audience’s emotions like a virtuoso. The Doctor knew the theory behind using light to elicit a response from the limbic system. That didn’t prevent her from falling completely under the spell of such techniques.

  The opera went on for hours, and there was very little in the way of shifting in seats or nervous motions, even in the children. When the curtain, itself a holograph, closed, Jennifer felt as if she was being ejected from a fantasy world she wished she could continue to inhabit. She looked over at Sean, and was not surprised to see tears on his face. This was, after all, the story of his father, and if it elicited a strong emotional response in others, it was not surprising the response would be even greater in someone who knew Augustine so intimately.

  Later that night, while lying next to the sleeping Monarch, she saw tears rolling down his sleeping face. His eyes were in the midst of rapid movement, and she knew he was in the middle of a dream. She thought it must have been a dream about his parents, until his eyes opened wide and a scream left his lips. Followed by a single word. Cimmeria.

  *

  Director Ekaterina Sergiov watched a holo of the interogation proceedings through the real time of a wormhole link. They are such a boon, she thought of the new technology. It definitely made her job easier, as information didn’t have to crawl its way to her. And it’s a damned bane as well. The information transfer could go both ways, and Imperial Intelligence no longer had the luxury of time on its side. If a breach was found it needed to be sealed, immediately, no matter the cost.

  But now it was allowing her to watch a real time interview that could possibly be the most important of her tenure as head of the intelligence gathering apparatus of the Empire.

  “And here we see the nanobot network that is in place in the alien’s mind,” explained the scientist in charge of the prep. A scanning holo showed the interior of the large alien head. There was a lot of bone in that skull, the brain was no larger than that of a human, and much better protected. The brain was much differently structured than a human brain, with a series of frontal lobes, the composite of which was smaller than the human equivalent. The ancient complex, what in humans was called the reptilian brain, was much larger. Another holo showed the neuronal structure of the Ca’cadasan brain, less dense than that of a human. That in itself didn’t prove that the creature was less intelligent than Homo Sapiens. The neurons, after all, were not human, and could be more efficient.

  “It took us two weeks of concentrated assault by our nanobots to overwhelm the creature’s own nanotech defenses, which were quite sophisticated. It took another week to infiltrate the creature’s gray matter to the point where the nanites formed a complete imaging system of the brain. It then took another two weeks of light and sound stimulation, both external and direct, to make a guess on the creature’s reaction patterns.”

  The creature’s, thought Ekaterina, wrinkling her nose in disgust. Such a clinical term for a living being. This kind of invasive procedure had always bothered her. It was a violation of the very being of the sophont, which was more than just a creature. But it beats torture, or drugs, in getting the answers we need. And we definitely need these answers.

  Now the holo showed the Ca’cadasan sitting in a room, while the second holo looked into its mind. Holographic images played on the wall to its front, and the electrochemical potentials of the brain were shown in glowing light on the second holo.

  “It took another week to get a sense of what these reaction
s meant. And finally, we were able to get to the actual questioning.”

  And the poor sucker didn’t even know it was being questioned, thought Sergiov, watching as holographic images were flashed in front of the battleship captain who had been captured in the Sestius system. The images appeared to be in no order, though in fact they were specifically programed to get the information required. Butterflies and birds, natural views and urban structures, the globes of planets and the map of the galaxy. And between them all the random holographic flashes that were programing the mind to be receptive.

  “My God,” said Ekaterina as the filled in map of the galaxy appeared. She recognized her own empire, and the nations around it. And a massive Empire taking up the rest of the spinward Persius Arm and a great portion of the Sagittarius Arm. At least twenty times the size of her Empire. Dots began to fill in on the map, population centers, industrial complexes, naval bases, the capital of the Empire. Numbers began to appear below some of the dots, the numbers of warships that were stationed at those points, or at least as they had been the last time this naval officer had seen information about those deployments.

  “What’s this here?” she asked, pointing at a bow in the border on the opposite side of the Empire, with a number of naval bases. And a number of red dots that seemed to indicate battles.

  “It looks like they are involved in a war on the other side of their Empire,” said the scientist on the Donut. “From the emotional response of the subject, it seems not everything is going their way in that war.”

  “Interesting,” said Ekaterina, continuing to watch the interrogation that the Ca’cadasan would leave with no idea of how much information he had given. “I need to get this data to the Emperor.” And maybe he can let me know how Len is doing, out there on the spear point. She understood about the need to know, and that she was not in a position where she needed access to the day to day battle reports of the Fleet. But she had once been married to the man, and still cared for him. And sometimes she needed to be just a normal person, and know that the other people in her life were OK.

  *

  “So we have no wormhole connection to Cimmeria?” asked Sean of his CNO over the com. “Fucking wonderful. And whose idea was that?”

  “This is what it comes down to, your Majesty,” said Grand High Admiral Sondra McCullom. “We simply don’t have enough wormholes for every need. There is one on the way to that system, and should be there within the next couple of days.”

  “Crap,” said Sean, pulling up the map of the Empire in his mind. Cimmeria system was the home of two habitable worlds, Cimmeria itself, and Aquilonia, named after references in some obscure Earth fiction from pre-space times. It was located over in the direction of Sector IV, not as far out as some of the Core Worlds, only a hundred and sixty light years from the capital. Seven billion inhabitants between the two worlds. With antimatter production and shipyards that made it an important system to the war effort.

  “There’s really no reason to believe that they will strike that far in,” said the CNO. “Not with so many other Core systems closer to the sector. And if they do move, we should have plenty of advanced warning from the wormhole equipped scouts.”

  “I still believe they are going to strike at Cimmeria,” said Sean. “And they will challenge us to stop them, and to keep them from leaving. That’s what they want. A decisive battle to gut our forces.”

  The Emperor looked at the holo that showed the area around the Central Docks Station. Almost all of the older construction was out of assembly docks and being made ready. The assembly docks had doubled since the start of the war, and new ones were going up in the ring outside of them. And none of those capital ships will be ready for another nine or ten months. The cruisers a little sooner, the scouts sooner still. But will there be an Empire for them to guard?

  “How are you so sure, your Majesty?”

  “You know about the gift of my family. Admiral?”

  “Everyone has heard of it,” said McCullom, nodding on the com holo. “I’m not sure how much faith I have in it.”

  “Believe me, it’s real. And it’s stronger in me than it has manifested in many generations. This is the second dream I have had about Cimmeria, and both times it was identical. So humor me, and prepare for an attack on that system.”

  “And if it doesn’t fall, we are out of place and hurt somewhere else, your Majesty.”

  “The rules of the game in naval warfare,” said Sean, shrugging his shoulders. “We don’t have enough to cover everything, and sometimes must take risks. Who was it who said he who guards everything guards nothing?”

  “It was Fredrick the Great of Prussia, your Majesty. And the exact quote is, in trying to defend everything, he defended nothing.”

  “So we have to choose what we protect, and what my gift is telling me is that Cimmeria has a more than even chance of being the next target. Which is greater odds than any other target.”

  “We may not be able to stop them, your Majesty,” said the CNO, looking down as if ashamed of her admission.

  Something the officers of the Fleet are not too happy to admit, thought the Emperor, looking at the line of hyper VI battleships that were going through the final preparation for shake down. And then the hundred battleships and the many more smaller ships would join the Fleet, attempting to fill the hole made by thousands of ships that had been destroyed in the meantime.

  “Then sting them,” said Sean when the officer looked back up to make eye contact. “Do as much damage to them as you can, while preserving the Fleet. Who’s the closest commanding officer to Cimmeria?”

  “Mgonda, sir.”

  “Then tell Mgonda I want him to hurt them without losing his force.” And everything he has is hyper VII, which gives him some ability to maneuver. “Now, how long till we get a wormhole to the Bolthole system? I want us to have real time com with them as soon as possible.”

  “That system is a month away from our spinward border at hyper VI, and the ships carrying the wormholes are not even at the border yet. Say five weeks.”

  Five weeks. Until then we have no idea how they are doing, only how they were over a month ago. And that’s unacceptable.

  “Did I tell you what a fine job you’re doing, Sondra,” said Sean, looking at the stressed face of the woman. “I know it might not seem like it at times, but that has more to do with my worrying than how you are performing the duty.”

  “Thank you, your Majesty,” said the Admiral, smiling. “I know all of us are under a lot of stress. I almost wish I had command of Home Fleet back, and that you were sending that fleet into battle.”

  The com went off, and Sean thought about the other two big problems on his plate as they headed past the docks and out to the vessels he had come to see. One problem was what he had just talked with the Admiral about. He had been pulling units out of the Core Worlds for almost four months. And if a Core world, or several, were hit hard, the Parliament would be raising holy hell. He would be faced with either chaffing under their restrictions as they passed resolutions, or face the possibility of raising Martial Law to Level 2, effectively cutting them out of the war making process. Which didn’t mean they couldn’t make things more difficult for him anyway.

  The other was the information he had received from IIA Director Sergiov this morning. It wasn’t unexpected, but it was unwelcome nonetheless. To learn that their worst fears about the size of the enemy empire were correct was daunting. And he didn’t know how much hope to put in the proposition that their enemy was involved in another fight on their far frontier. Was it another roll over, the Ca’cadasan Empire conquering a large but lesser opponent. Or was it a serious fight that was drawing off resources that would otherwise be used against his empire.

  And then the ships he had come to see were ahead, seven of them, six years in the building under the orders of his father. Each ship was in the thirty million ton range, and was armed as heavily as a battleship. They were not warships though. They were exp
lorers. The large arrays of hyper VII projectors were mounted top and bottom. They seemed to be deficient in grabber units as compared to other hyper VII ships. That was part of their design, ships made for the long haul, accelerating at a hundred gravities until they got up to point nine c, and cruised for tens of thousands of light years to their destinations.

  And my Admirals wanted them converted to warships, he thought as his shuttle swept around the nearest of the explorers. Three of them were slightly different from the other four, the Magellanic Cloud explorers, scheduled to make the two and a half year flight out to the dwarf galaxies. Each carried six destroyer sized hyper VI exploration ships, allowing them to explore the entire super cluster. The ships each had a wormhole installed for com and refueling.

  That had been the main problem with both the missions. It had come down to either making each of the ships into an antimatter tanker, and all the risks that entailed, or experimenting with zero point power. Zero point was a nonstarter, as no respectable scientist wanted to fool with something that might destroy the Universe by collapsing space. Zero point modules using their own baby universes had been proposed, but were prohibitively expensive as far as energy was concerned, needing ten times the amount to create them as they would generate, compared to a one point one to one ratio for antimatter. The wormhole had solved the problem, as new cylinders of AM could be sent through the hole throughout the voyage.

  The other four were scheduled to explore the galactic core. That was a trip in the year to year and a half range, depending on what got in the way, well within reason and planned. That is, until the information had come from the interrogation that their enemy might be fighting another opponent, which made it important to get in touch with that foe. So now only two of the ships would go to the Galactic core, while the other two would go on a three year or more voyage to the other side of the Ca’cadasan Empire. A wide roundabout path that avoided the space of the enemy.