War Without Honor

by J. R. Geoghan

  “A closer approximation would be one hundred forty-five human cycles.”

  “That’s a long time.” Deacon was growing concerned about the length of the conversation. Every moment that passed increased the possibility that they would be discovered by a passing Prax or nosy human who would turn them over—in a heartbeat—for a reward. “So where and when tomorrow?”

  “I have much to organize. When will you leave the Center?”

  Deacon considered. “I can be at the gate at 1830.”

  He saw a shadow of pensiveness drift across Axxa’s face. Perhaps the full weight of what he was planning was coming down on him. He knew that the alien was somehow an important part of the Center, and his role was within the orbit of the top leaders of the occupation. He would be a choice prize for Fleet Command. Would he now get cold feet?

  No. I want my payday.

  At last Axxa spoke. “The Prime Leader has a special project for the Center to attend in the morning. We shall meet outside the gate at 1845. Unless I find you inside first with new instructions.” He looked away dismissively.

  Taking his cue to leave, Deacon gathered up his tools and trundled out past the Prax, who ignored him as the hatch opened. In the corridor, a Prax was walking up and Deacon’s heart leapt into his throat. They were caught.

  But the alien passed by without even a glance at the human, and Deacon allowed himself a moment to exhale and think about what his first space flight would be like. Without looking back, the smuggler-turned-spy walked off towards his next room assignment.

  Chapter 3

  That Same Moment - Occupied Earth

  The Prax Sol System Command Center within Rat City

  “Enter.”

  Elexxan walked into the chamber with a furtive glance in either direction, alert for eavesdroppers.

  “We’re alone. What is it?” The Prime—the appointed lord of the Sol System—studied a tablet before him, his back to his visitor. Elexxan wondered how he’d known to say what he had.

  He swallowed quietly. “Your pardon, Lord. But I am happy to announce that the device is prepared and believed to be operational.

  “Hmm.” The Prime was still concentrated on his tablet.

  “And…we have identified a target.”

  The Prime spun in the seat to face his lead scientist. “Can this be true?”

  “Would you like to review the equipment and receive a briefing?”

  “Yes.” He pressed a control on his seat that Elexxan knew summoned a servant. “Now.”

  “Now?” Elexxan clearly hadn’t been expecting that short notice.

  The Prime stood. “Now. I will accompany you.”

  Elexxan put on a resolute expression. “As you wish, Lord.”

  The science facility was immense, and occupied a large central portion of the complex. As head of science operations, Elexxan ruled here over a contingent of hundreds of workers, almost exclusively Praxxans. Humans were never allowed in the science facility due to its sensitivity.

  When the Prime walked in ahead of Elexxan flanked by his personal guard and military advisors, every head turned and every eye dropped in respect, avoiding direct contact with the Praxxan leader. His entrance had been sudden and unannounced, and Elexxan had a concerned look on his face, clearly hoping that everyone in his command were comporting themselves appropriately busily. An execution for dereliction would derail an otherwise glorious briefing.

  “Show me.”

  “This way, Lord.” Elexxan led the entourage down several series of steps to a lower level packed with rows upon rows of computer servers and associated hardware. They made their way through several openings in the equipment to a bank of controls. Here several of Elexxan’s technicians busied themselves with their work at screens or wiring consoles. They tensed in the sudden, unusual presence of the Prime.

  Elexxan assumed a professorial pose and coughed slightly to break the tension in the space. His lead technician, Alexa, looked up and met his gaze. “Lord, I want to introduce Alexa, who is our lead on this incredible breakthrough technology.”

  Alexa looked part-pleased and part-scared as he straightened from his seat and bowed before the Prime, who waved his entourage back and stepped up to receive Alexa’s greeting.

  “You may proceed.”

  Elexxan wasn’t about to give up all the glory. “Lord, as you know, we have been working diligently to extrapolate out the human time-space propulsion drive to new uses. Per your instructions,” he hastily added, not wanting to appear to take credit. “One of those uses was a device to manipulate the time-space for the purpose of moving objects through the timeline rather than physical space.”

  “Yes, yes, I remember this. What have you found?” The excitement in the Prime’s voice was clear.

  “Lord, we have completed the device.”

  The Prime looked through Elexxan. “How have you tested it?”

  Alexa coughed slightly. “Lord, we tested it on me.”

  He had the Prime’s attention. “Oh?”

  The technician swallowed, his red face even redder as the blood rushed up to it. “Yes, we moved me from one solar day to the next.”

  Elexxan stepped in. “We targeted the field beam into the past one day and fixed it on Alexa’s position,” he tapped the console. “Here, as a matter of fact. When the field released him, he had moved from the past to the present.”

  Alexa nodded. “I lost an entire day.”

  The Prime was incredulous. “And your internal chronometer?”

  Alexa nodded again. “Is one day off.”

  Elexxan waved his hands at the banks of equipment. “Beneath us is a large jump drive that we re-engineered from one of our own models, the reactor powering the field beam that cuts through time to a set of coordinates anywhere we have the ability to discern—this is critical. The device creates a window through the interposed time…and space distance…to another location in our present, where we can deposit the target.”

  “But not to the future,” The Prime mused aloud.

  “Not at this juncture; we need to have exact assurance of the composition of the deposit space, which is by definition impossible in the future.”

  The Prime’s Second Advisor interrupted. “Why was the Center not made aware of this project? Its scope seems incredible.”

  The Prime glanced at the source of the outburst—a look of irritation, it seemed to Elexxan—and shrugged vainly. “Need to know. Elexxan and I have many projects and experiments underway, all to the glory of the Prax.” He glared at the Advisor momentarily. “And remember…I am the Center. You serve at my pleasure.”

  “Yes, Lord,” the Advisor properly replied.

  “What of the proposed target?” The Prime returned his focus to Elexxan after a last stare at the Second Advisor’s lowered face.

  The science head motioned for the Prime to share his view of a screen. Alexa was typing in commands and the monitor flared to life, showing scenes from old Earth history. Black letters flashed on a white background as Alexa scrolled through documents.

  “These are recovered human documents from their servers, most several hundred cycles old. Before their civil war destroyed much of the planet. Here,” Elexxan raised a hand for Alexa to slow the feed. The screen displayed an image with text.

  The Prime leaned in, excited. The photo was of a watercraft, with uniformed humans standing both on it and along the dock where it was berthed. “Is this one of them?”

  Elexxan. “I am sure it is. Normally, as you know, this nation kept the location of its offensive water vessels—known as ‘submarines’—extremely confidential. This, however, is a dated image with enough contextual evidence of location within the time-space for us to acquire it.”

  The Prime’s face was red with blood flow, his mind racing at the possibilities. He took in the image, imagining the cache of wonderful weapons embedded within the walls of the vessel. “Do we know more about its armament?” He knew enough to hope.

  Alex
a coughed again. He was reading his monitor. “Columbia-class ballistic missile submarine. Launched in 2029 in Seattle, Washington of the old Earth nation of the United States of America. A full complement of hyper-velocity intercontinental ‘pure fusion’ nuclear missiles, called…” He read further on his screen. “Hyper-Trident is their name. The vessel should be carrying twenty-four of the missiles, each with twelve independent warheads.” He looked up. “They could reach anywhere on the planet in a very short elapsed flight time.”

  “Amazing. All in one vessel…the humans had indeed built powerful weapons even hundreds of cycles ago.”

  Elexxan looked smug. “I believe we can successfully recover the missiles using the beam.”

  The First Advisor, The Prime’s lead military liaison, spoke up. “Lord, explain the term ‘pure fusion’.”

  The Prime didn’t look up from the image of the submarine. “In our research of old Earth history, in particular the causes of the obvious destruction in planet’s northern hemisphere, we uncovered references to weapons of unprecedented destructive power called ‘pure fusion’ that dated before their civil war. Apparently the humans successfully destroyed them after that conflict and have no such weapons today. Nor do we.”

  “But what do they do?”

  Elexxan answered, rubbing his palms together. “The ‘pure fusion’ weapon was their greatest achievement—orders of magnitude more powerful than conventional nuclear weaponry. Also the one that left half the planet obliterated after their civil war.”

  The Advisor stepped forward, the light in his green eyes indicating his interest. “And this Earth vessel launched them? At other humans?”

  Alexa looked up from his monitor. “At one point the humans warred against each other, many tribes and nations who lived in distrust of each other.”

  The Prime straightened. “Not unlike the history of Prax. And now,” he looked around at all assembled, “we will bring this vessel of total destruction into our own time and use the weapons against the human fleet and colonies to win this war once and for all. The clan of my father will receive great honor.” He fixed a hard gaze on the First Advisor; a warning.

  The First Advisor fell back to his place among the others as Elexxan stepped forward. “Lord, our plan is to fix the beam on this vessel and deposit it in the waterway outside the complex.”

  “I assume that the size of this vessel won’t be a challenge?” The Prime was looking contemplatively at the overhead grid of metal.

  Alexa shook his head. “The mass of the target should be irrelevant. In theory, we could move this entire complex and all within it to a location in time-space, using the field beam we have constructed.”

  “How soon to acquire the water vessel?”

  “At your command, Lord.”

  “Immediately is my command.”

  Alexa glanced at Elexxan, who nodded at the technician. “We will being the calculations at once. My estimate is ten hours to complete the process and initiate the beam.”

  “Make it so.” The Prime turned away with a gloating gleam in his eye. All the cycles of research and reverse-engineering of alien technology was paying off…and he was in the forefront of this budding victory, his plans and those of his father coming to fruition.

  First, the Prax had successfully recreated the jump-drive technology from captured human vessels, allowing them the ability to leave their subjugated star system and take the war to the human’s star systems. And when the time came to assault a relatively-unguarded Earth, capturing it in a lightning strike, he had been chosen as the Prime over this prize system.

  By then, their research into human pulse weapons had also allowed them to configure comparable firepower into the fleet. Despite the human tenacity, the Prax forces had defeated their attempts to reclaim Earth time and time again, leaving space between their planet Mars and Earth littered with destroyed ships and frozen corpses. The population of the solitary moon had been eliminated in the early days of the battle. Indeed, the Prime’s network of informers assured him that the once-powerful human fleet was ebbing in strength and resolve.

  The jump-drive reactor technology had also enabled the Prax to develop a new, deadly prototype vessel that would be tested in battle soon, once his prize captain Traxxus arrived deep within the human’s supply line and began to drive a wedge into their logistics.

  And tomorrow, in a crowning achievement that will cement the Prime’s ascent among the Praxxan leadership for all time, he would acquire horrific new weapons to unleash upon his opponent’s defenses based on the planet Mars.

  He stopped walking, realizing that he’d been lost in thought. “Elexxan, keep me appraised.”

  As the entourage began to follow the Prime back to the stairs up, The Second Advisor—Axxa—paused at the monitor to concentrate on the photo of the human water vessel. His eye fell on the human in the center of the image, standing atop a tall, central section of the ship with several other men around him. Dressed in a uniform of mottled green and with the air of a leader, he looked down at the device recording the image with an expression of remorse, as if he already knew of his ship’s impending doom.

  “Nothing more than wild drachinas to be put down,” commented Alexa as he noticed Axxa’s gaze. He referred to the wild creatures that roamed Prax’s interior continents, whose populations needed to be culled from cycle to cycle.

  “Humans…” noted Axxa. His eyes said little as he turned to catch up with his Lord.

  Chapter 4

  That Same Moment - Struve Star System - 11.53 LY from Sol System

  Aboard Prax Warship Trellixan

  “Engage the drive once Science Officer Torstar returns.”

  “As you command, Captain.”

  Traxxus turned in the command chair, one hand on the frame. “And send him to his quarters.”

  The bridge crew smirked privately as he checked the monitor for the officer Torstar’s arrival in the airlock. “Yes, Captain.”

  “That Prax will be the death of us,” commented Traxxus dryly, to no one in particular, as he was handed a log tablet by another member of his crew.

  “Yes, Captain.”

  Traxxus didn’t look up. “See to your station.”

  “Captain,” said the navigator. “We have the shuttle on its way up from the surface.”

  “Always the last one back from a planetary stop.” Traxxus was fidgety and eager to be away from here. They’d stopped at this far-off ball of rock to secure water and minerals for their journey, which was still in its infancy. Traxxus wanted to get to the glory at the end of the mission, and needing to stop at all was a tremendous annoyance to his warrior mind.

  And Torstar. That idiot “science officer” was another annoyance. On every landfall they made since he’d been assigned to Traxxus’ crew, the ever-frustrating Prax just had to go off on his own, investigating and collecting samples of whatever flora or fauna struck his professional fancy. Not every Prax warship had a science section aboard, but Traxxus had been cursed by the seven suns—and his Prime, Talxen, now ruling on the human Earth—for his apparent failures in battle and assigned with his crew to serve with one. A massive distraction from the path to glory…

  “Shuttle secured, Captain.”

  He stood and strode to the navigator station, looking at the coordinates input for the jump-drive engine. As his officer pushed back to allow him access to the panel, he paused for a moment to marvel at the human’s ingenuity of inventing the device that allowed faster-than-light travel, albeit for limited distances. It had taken the Prax fifty cycles to understand how it had worked and finally replicate a functional version of their own. But this ship, his ship—one of the newest in the secret clan fleet…it was so much more than a mere replica. Traxxus longed to bring it into battle, to end the skulking around the perimeter of human activity. Soon. They had a mission to complete first.

  Several keytaps later, he pressed the engagement button and the crew manning the reactor in the bowels of the ship resp
onded. Traxxus stepped back as the Navigator resumed his spot; only the Captain had been allowed the knowledge of their waypoints through space and their ultimate destination and mission. Of course, now the Navigator knew where they were headed next. The officer gave a low gasp of understanding when he saw the coordinates and glanced up, meeting Traxxus’ eyes. The Captain nodded; he knew his officer had been sworn to secrecy and was trustworthy.

  He returned to his command chair and settled in it as the view of the planet below—a yellow-brown dustbowl with a brutally-high average temperature, even for a Praxxan—began to move to one side as the ship turned its nose toward the stars. Leaving orbit.

  Several of the bridge crew were curious about destination; his team was the best in the armada and always itching for action. That was why the Prime had selected Captain Traxxus for this mission. He glanced around at them with a smile on his face, seeing the brand-new bridge as well; he’d been given one of the newest, most powerful destroyers in the armada, fresh from the Praxxan homeworld’s shipyards. He would succeed and his ship and crew find glory to spare.

  “Engage the jump drive,” he said to the helmsman sitting across from him. The ship would now move rapidly through space until the assigned coordinates were reached and the drive automatically disengaged. Traxxus didn’t understand how the jump drive worked at all, but it mattered little. All he concerned himself with was maneuvering the ship the moment it returned to normal space operations. He knew that this jump was taking them to another star system deep within the human sphere of influence, where the Prime had been staging a small fleet on a remote base carved from an asteroid, waiting for his ship to arrive. He frowned with the thoughts of the effort that had been made to quietly move warships across the galaxy. The humans had much better logistical minds than Praxxans. They were still cycles ahead of his kind in mastering faster-than-light travel. But in battle, they still fell before the Praxxan’s superior will.