Shepard felt a slight pressure sensation when Stynx’s finger made contact with a soft, gentle touch. Stynx pulled back quickly, seemingly afraid to damage the crystalline entity who was 1.7 times the toughness of diamond on the Mohs hardness scale. Shepard felt no adverse effects, only elation at meeting the alien creature that had become its friend.
“It is a pleasure to see you, also,” Stynx said.
Ritch smiled. “Well here we are, the three musketeers.”
Stynx gave the boy an inquisitive look, antennae raised, head tilted to one side. “Define musketeers.”
“The musketeers were three friends in a story that took place many years ago. They had amazing adventures together, just like us.” Ritch looked over at Shepard. “Speaking of adventures, have you told Stynx about our Great Escape?”
“Yes, I have,” the AI replied. “There is also a new development that will enhance our escape plan. The hijackers are modifying Argo’s shuttle to transport Stynx’s pod off the ship. Instead, the shuttle will carry all of us to safety.”
Ritch nodded his approval. “How nice of them.”
“Yes, it is.” Shepard had been monitoring both viewplates and the tactical screen continuously, but the battle, it seemed, had moved on without them. Fox Company and the troop carriers were kilometers away, pressing the attack westward toward the Sonoran capital. “Where are the fire beasts?”
“Both the Feds and K’klacken have big fleets up there.” Ritch gestured at the sky. “So if fire beasts show up, they’ll have to fight their way past all those warships above us first . . . or so I hope. That’s why I selected this sim.”
“Clever.” Shepard received an emergency pulse that intruded through the simulated stimuli, materializing next to the AI as a flashing sphere of red light. Shepard had set it to interrupt if anyone approached Ritch’s bedroom. “Datch is en route to you, Ritch, for another check-in.” Datch did this four times a day to make sure the boy was okay, Shepard had noted, although the time of each visit always varied to avoid predictability. “We must return to reality, and quickly.”
The three of them gave each other hurried goodbyes, then Ritch ended the simulation, causing the Maus tank and war-torn Sonora to fade away.
First Mother was euphoric as she conveyed Stynx’s consciousness back to his scout pod. Yet another successful―albeit simulated―encounter with the bipedal youngling named Ritch. Truly an auspicious indicator that a Meld was possible.
Despite this, First Mother dared not let herself become too optimistic, as forces beyond her control would soon collide in Stynx’s wake. Fortunately, he was gone from the battle zone, his journey with Ritch just begun.
She and the other Matriarchs would continue their astral observations as events unfolded, but the Seers were now involved. They would engage in battle against the bipeds and AIs as they were spawned to do, testing them, learning their strengths and weaknesses. It was the part of her intentional contact First Mother detested, but it was an essential part nonetheless. Only if the bipeds and AIs were deemed a threat would the Seers halt their War of Retribution against the Suij'Crai'C. Survival of their Form depended on this.
And wherever Seers were involved, the Prime Organizer of her own nest would watch closely, ensuring First Mother and her sisters did not hinder them. Only he, Precision-Key-Alpha, knew of their earlier, failed scheme to stop the Seers. Only First Mother’s promise to never interfere with the Seers again had kept him from revealing that scheme to them. And so, sadly, she and her sisters must now watch from afar.
As a result, from this point forward Stynx was on his own.
Xi Sequence:
Caught in the Wake
Scaveer, Flagship of the Amber Spar
The null portal swirled into existence 230 million kilometers from the orange star known as Cirtus Beta, snapping open to become a pale-grey hurricane whirling in space. At the portal’s center was a black, empty void nearly twenty kilometers across. A void that was part of the null dimension where energy and matter simply did not exist.
From it, Scaveer emerged. All around the massive dreadnought, other null portals formed, and from each a warship burst through into the local space-time continuum as the Amber Spar Legion arrived, spread out in a vast, globular formation.
Each of those warships had an ovoid shape, their hulls composed of thick armor resins that gave them a smooth and glossy appearance, like polished jade. The longsail drivers around their equators glowed with bright, neon-purple hues as they propelled the warships toward Cirtus Beta.
Behind them the null portals swirled shut, vanishing into the nothingness from which they came.
Aboard Scaveer, far down in the command core, Jokin`Dor―the Dominant Seer SubForm of the Amber Spar―held center position a meter or so above the control dais. The eight Seers who formed the secondary rank were arrayed in a circle around him. All were suspended in acceleration web harnesses, ready for harsh battle maneuvers.
Half a kilometer aft, in a chamber shielded with heavy induction baffles, Temporal subForms lay in liquid-support tanks that neutralized the sudden jolts, thrusts, and sharp accelerations often experienced in a warship―sensations that impaired their unique abilities. Six of them had linked, reaching out from their support tanks to clasps hands with the Temporals beside them. Once their minds were aligned together, they reached out to the null, searching for and quickly finding the minds of Temporals aboard Krevjak, a super-dreadnought some 1,210 light years toward the galactic core. Null portals just a few centimeters across were created on each side of the connection, and from Krevjak a marble-sized sphere came through, falling into the waiting hand of a Temporal.
The massive size of a legion warship limited null jumps to nineteen light years at most, even with seventy-two Temporals linked in flawless alignment. A tiny message sphere had a much greater range. The smaller an object, the farther they could hurl it through the null.
The Temporal gave the little sphere to a Sentinel battleForm, who swiftly took it to the command core and its intended recipient.
Receiving it, Jokin`Dor stared down at the message sphere pulsating with urgency in the palm of his hand. He gave it a hard squeeze, and his hand tingled as the message surged down his arm, up through the shoulder and neck, then onward into his cerebral cortex. In Jokin`Dor’s mind a face appeared, vividly real. He instantly recognized Taach`Rel, the Warlord of Vaj Nest.
“Hoy, Dominant,” Taach`Rel said with a deep, gravelly voice.
“Hoy, Warlord.” Jokin`Dor replied. Even though he knew this was a message, his head still bent lower when he addressed the Seer who lead all Seers. Both antennae rose to a 65-degree angle of esteem. A Warlord had earned the highest rank possible through Ousting, defeating other Seers in ceremonial contests of skill and strategy. Only the victor survived. To become a Warlord, many, many victories were required. Such an accomplishment warranted respect.
“These are your mission objectives,” the Warlord proclaimed. “First, you will find the Scouts sent to reconnoiter the star system you have just entered. If they are alive, bring them home. If not, find the cause of their demise.”
Jokin`Dor nodded his acceptance of the first objective. The Warlord could not see or hear him, he knew this, but it was a reflexive response after years of adherence to the protocols of communication.
“Second, the dropship Tazaral has detected alien emissions radiating from this system, so proceed accordingly. If a hostile life form is there, determine its threat level. If it is benign, retrieve our Scouts and depart.”
Once again Jokin`Dor nodded.
“Deploy and advance, Dominant of the Amber Spar. Your mission awaits.” The Warlord disappeared as the message ended.
Jokin`Dor needed only a few moments to deduce his strategy. “Attack formation Amethyst,” he ordered. “Extend ranks to sixteen standards.”
The secondary Seers sent out the commands.
With smooth course corrections the fifty-one warships of the Amber Spar shifte
d positions, forming an elongated, spear-like formation. Xangth took point position. As the smallest warship it would lead the way. An unknown force had trapped the scout pod they had come to rescue. Jokin`Dor must know if it could entangle a warship as well.
Three marginally larger vale cruisers followed 1.28 light seconds behind Xangth. Behind them, at the same interval, came five more. The cluster of nine that followed consisted of dreadnoughts and heavy battlecruisers. The rest of the legion formed the handle of the spear: a long column of eleven warship trios all separated by the same sixteen-standard interval.
The Amber Spar had become a javelin thrown at Cirtus Beta.
Zeres Able
As rig manager of the orbital mining platform, Sorenson had to deal with every problem. No matter how big, small, or wherever in between that problem fell, they all complained to him about it. Not entirely true, of course: his sector chiefs dealt with or deflected most of the trivial stuff, he realized that, but too much of it still got through to him.
“I don’t care if Markovsky requisitioned all your repair ’bots,” Sorenson snapped, straining hard to keep a lid on his temper. “You’re rated a master mechanic, Mister Hebgard. Act like one, damn it, and fix that docking tube.”
“But you should see the damage,” Hebgard stammered. “It looks like they tossed a grenade in there.”
Sorenson had been ambushed by Hebgard in a corridor, on his way to the head to take a much-needed piss. “I’m aware of that, but they also wrecked the control room on their way out, which is why Markovsky has your ’bots. It’s all about priorities. We’ve got spare parts for every key piece of equipment on this platform, plus two AG synthesizers to fabricate components for those we don’t. Now get back to work and do your job, or I’ll find someone who can.”
Hebgard cowered. “Understood, sir.”
Sorenson hurried around him, making it to the head just in time. Bladder empty, he returned to the control room. It wasn’t fully operational yet, wouldn’t be for another few days. Because of this Sorenson and the first-shift operations crew had to work around busy repair robots that didn’t care whether or not they got in your way. Markovsky and two of his techs were busy here also, hammers banging as they tore out a ruined control console and replaced it with a new one.
The thieves who’d overrun the platform while Sorenson was off-duty and asleep did a damn fine job of disabling it before they left. All six of the control room consoles had been burnt to a crisp with a fusion rifle. Three were working now, and Markovsky had sworn a fourth would be by shift end. The comm links had been repaired and they were connected to the CA-10 defense grid again, so excellent progress there. Best of all, the platform AI was back online, allowing mining operations to resume.
Nevertheless, they were seventy thousand tonnes behind on ore extraction now. Thieves or not, Corporate HQ wouldn’t care about his excuses. Production quotas were all that mattered to them.
Sorenson should, hopefully, get some compassion from HQ due to the fact an alien spaceship of unknown origin had crossed the defense perimeter, getting snared by the CA-10s. The alien ship was gone now, stolen by the same thieves who wrecked his platform and hijacked Argo. Greedy thieves they were. But an enforcer corvette was in pursuit and should, with a little luck, haul them in.
An hour or so later, Markovsky declared the new switch-4 console was in and fully operational.
As Sorenson was walking over to take a look, the shrill wail of an alarm went off. He turned, looking at Sato behind the security console. Sato tapped an icon on her primary monitor, muting the alarm, while her eyes stayed locked on something moving across the CA-10 tactical display. She looked up at Sorenson with a terrified expression that gave him instant goosebumps.
“Inbound object approaching the perimeter.” Sato looked back down at the display. It was linked to the CA-10 defense grid, providing real-time telemetry from the guardian satellites. “Object velocity is 4.2 percent lightspeed. Estimate of alien origin: 94.5 percent. Length―” Her terrified gaze returned to Sorenson. “It’s over three kilometers long.”
Sorenson walked over, putting a hand on the back of Sato’s chair for support as he stared down at the tactical display. “Looks like the big brother of that little alien ship the CA-10s snared last week is paying us a visit. Unfortunately for us, that ship’s no longer here. I hope big brother doesn’t get too angry about that.”
Scaveer
“Alien spheroids,” a secondary Seer warned with urgent tones. “Three detected, all converging on Xangth.”
“Full battle mode,” Jokin’Dor ordered in quick response.
Across the hulls of fifty-one legion warships, weapon batteries arose from armored recesses.
Zeres Able
Shivers rippled through Sorenson’s shoulders and neck as he stared at the display. The little alien ship didn’t have just one big brother―it had eighteen!
“Three more,” Sato noted. “That brings the count to twenty-one. Same gap between them and the previous group, roughly 384,000 klicks. We saw a single ship first, then three more appear, then five, nine, and now three again. I don’t know what the significance of their formation is, but I’m sure those ship groups are staggered like that for a reason.”
Sorenson looked up. “Anyone have military experience?”
There were eight people in the control room. Only one, Markovsky, raised his hand.
“Semper fi,” he said, walking over. Big Mar, as Markovsky was called by most, glared down at the tactical display. The lead alien ship appeared as a red oval, moving toward the dotted orange arc that represented the Cirtus Beta defense perimeter. Three more red ovals, slightly larger than the first, followed it. Then came five more, even bigger. The next group of nine ranged in size from seven to twelve kilometers in length. “Typical reconnoiter-in-force formation,” Markovsky said. He jabbed a finger into the red oval that led the others. “That one’s point, an advance scout that acts a pathfinder for the others. Standard pattern for entering unchartered enemy territory. If the point runs into any trouble, let’s say a minefield, the rest can react in time to avoid it.” Markovsky’s finger slid across the display to the group of nine. “Those must be their capital ships, close enough to provide major firepower if needed, but also far enough back to slip away if they run into something they can’t handle.”
Sorenson cringed. If Big Mar was correct, an alien battlefleet was moving toward them.
“The alien ships have ignored multiple warning messages,” Sato reported. “Estimate of hostile intent exceeds ninety-six percent. The CA-10 targeting grid has energized, all weapons are powering up.”
On the wall above Sato’s console, a large monitor displayed the status of various platform systems. She switched it to the telemetry feed from the CA-10 defense grid so everyone could watch. The eight men and women in the control room gathered round, staring in silence as the red ovals crept closer.
Guardian 20243 was closest to the point of contact and thereby assumed primary control of the targeting grid. Once 20243 had dutifully transmitted the obligatory number of warning messages to the inbound objects with no response received in return, it sent encrypted commands to Guardians 20241 and 20247. The three satellites fired graviton thrusters, accelerating into position. Weapon capacitors inside their spherical hulls sizzled with electrical discharges as they built up a full charge. Their 225mm fusion lances went into tracking mode and swung toward the lead alien ship.
Sorenson knew corporate policy dictated the satellites detain the intruder before they fired on it, but detainment seemed quite improbable since the alien ship out-massed all three guardians more than seven-to-one. Nevertheless, they must make the attempt. Sparkling-blue snare beams shot out from the satellites, grabbing onto the alien ship as it passed between them.
The intruder’s reaction to this was swift and violent. Pinprick-size flashes appeared along a curved edge of the red oval as it fired alien weaponry. Purple snowflakes bloomed around a green dot as
blasts from those weapons detonated near Guardian 20243. All three satellites fired in retaliation, and the battle for Cirtus Beta was on.
Sorenson saw thin orange lines flicker to life as fusion lances fired, connecting the green dots to the red oval. The targeting grid evaluated the lances when they struck, analyzing effects and adjusting beam frequency and focus to maximize the damage. The grid also synched the fire-control of all three satellites, bringing multiple lances to bear on the same target point. Guardian 20243 noted the intruder’s hull withstood the fusion beams remarkably well, suffering only minimal surface melt even when three lances struck simultaneously. More firepower was needed.
Upon the spherical surface of each guardian, a blast door slid open and a missile burst forth from the launch tube underneath. Streaking out on powerful graviton drives, the Scorpion-R anti-ship missiles accelerated at 7,800 standard gravities, executing evasive corkscrew trajectories designed to foil anti-missile systems as they sped toward their target. Time-to-impact was 370 seconds.
The alien ship fired again, and Sorenson saw Guardian 20243 engulfed by another barrage of purple snowflakes. Once the bursts faded away, the satellite was gone. Just an expanding cloud of shimmering debris remained.
Guardian 20247 took immediate control of the targeting grid, and the call for reinforcements went out. Only the implementation of blunt-force stratagems could prevent unauthorized entry. The six nearest guardians fired twelve lances, causing brilliant orange beams of tightly focused, incandescent fusion energy to sizzle against the alien ship. Even after a half minute of continuous burn at full power, only shallow pits had been gouged.
The alien ship fired a third salvo. Numerous on-target hits blew Guardian 20241 apart, and after a flash of twinkling green light it faded from the tactical display.
The Sphere Imperium: Book Two of the Intentional Contact Trilogy Page 13