The Ninth: Invasion

by Benjamin Schramm

  The group of children quickly grabbed one another’s hands and formed a human chain down the length of the cargo bay. The girl at the far end started laughing uncontrollably as the Wall passed over her. The Wall slowly moved down the human chain, passing from one child to the next. Each one burst into laughter or uncontrolled giggling as the Wall moved over them. The captain and his small group were so caught up in their surprise at the children’s actions they didn’t notice as the Wall passed over them. Hiroyuki and Brent formed the tail end of the chain and watched eagerly, as the Wall grew closer and closer.

  He felt a nervous hand grab his as the Wall neared. Turning, he found Cassandra holding his hand, shaking as she watched the Wall approach. In her eyes he could see the reflection of the nothingness edge closer. He smiled warmly as he gripped her hand tightly. Brent could hear Hiroyuki start to laugh. The laughing was cut short when the Wall passed over the boy’s mouth. Cassandra wrapped both her hands around his. As he kept his gaze locked on her, he could feel the tingle as the Wall slid over his hand other hand.

  “Don’t worry, I’m right here. I won’t let go,” Brent said.

  Cassandra’s grip tightened as the Wall passed over his head. He watched as the back of the ship was replaced by empty space. Looking down, he found his arm ending prematurely, as the Wall slowly revealed more and more of him. Cassandra’s grip was growing painful as the Wall started passing over her hands. When they were exposed on his side of the Wall, Brent leaned over and kissed the back of one of her hands. Her grip relaxed instantly. When the Wall completely passed over her, Cassandra leapt forward and hugged him tightly. The children broke the human chain and started running back to their parents, laughing and playing. Brent and Cassandra returned to the captain, a stupefied look on his face.

  “I’ve been on a ship for almost twenty years now, and I’ve never gotten over my anxiety. That was the first time I wasn’t terrified of a jump . . .” The captain was lost in thought.

  Angela shot a glance at Dante.

  “Don’t look at me; I didn’t feel a thing. Whatever he did, he did it without using any Weaver abilities.”

  “He’s amazing enough without them,” Liz said shyly from behind Marie’s back.

  “I’d agree to that.” Owen was still pale.

  “Too bad he’s already taken,” Penny said as she winked at Cassandra.

  Mrs. Lucchesi raised an eyebrow as Cassandra’s face turned as red as an apple. With a smile, she grabbed Ronald’s arm and pulled him close. Mrs. Lucchesi leaned in and whispered something in his ear. Tyra’s brow furrowed. She then grabbed her daughter by the shoulder and pressed the two together.

  “I promise not to interfere. The choice is yours to make.” Mrs. Lucchesi kissed her daughter’s forehead before returning to her husband.

  Tyra stared after her mother in wonderment. She quickly realized she was still wedged up against Ronald and took a step back, a mild blush on her face. Hiroko and Penny immediately started giggling and whispering to one another.

  “Don’t get your hopes up yet,” Angela said with annoyance in her voice.

  Doug’s head dropped as he let out a frustrated sigh. Erin patted his shoulder sympathetically. Hiroko stuck her tongue out at Erin.

  “Not that I’m complaining about being saved and all, but where exactly are we headed?” Humphrey mumbled his question.

  “Eos,” the captain said as he eyed the mumbling boy.

  “Where?”

  “It’s the Core Industries’ home world,” Rhea said despondently. “Their administrative offices and the bulk of their command staff live there.”

  “Eos of the dawn,” Brent said.

  Cain shot a questioning glance at him.

  “Who of the what?” Erin asked.

  “Mythology,” he answered. “Eos was the goddess of the dawn. She’d use her ‘rosy-fingers’ to prepare the way for a new day.”

  The gathered group stared at him in confusion. It was apparent none of them had any clue what he was talking about.

  “So how far is it?” Brent asked as they continued to stare at him.

  “Twenty-seven jumps. More if we have to avoid any Union ships.”

  “But you told that girl . . .”

  “I didn’t want her to worry; didn’t honestly expect her to enjoy the idea of multiple jumps.”

  “So, Captain how long will the trip take us?” Sanderson asked.

  “Given our capacitors were at full charge and our rate of power generation . . . not longer than three days. If we don’t run into trouble of course.”

  “Twenty-seven jumps in three days?” Dante asked. “That’s outstanding for a trade ship. What’s your generator’s rating?”

  “Company secret, sorry. I’d lose my position if I gave out details like that. Speaking of which, we should be jumping again shortly. If you’ll excuse me, I’m going to make sure we are on course.” The captain nodded to Cain as he left the cargo bay.

  “Well, that’s odd,” Angela said as she watched the captain leave.

  “What’s wrong now?” Cain asked.

  “You worry him. It’s like you are his superior or something. Exactly how high up in the corporation is your father?”

  “High enough,” Cain said with the blissful smile of an idiot.

  “So we have quarters set up for us?” Brent asked with a yawn.

  “Of course!” Cain’s grin thinned slightly. “They are nothing fancy, but I doubt Mr. Sneaky will be able to knock down these walls.”

  The troopers chuckled to themselves. Dante took the lead as they headed to their quarters. They paused in the center of a passageway as the ship jumped. Cassandra shook a bit less than the others.

  “Twenty-six more,” Dante said as he continued on.

  “Three solid days of jumping,” Owen said, kneading his hands. “I don’t know if my heart can take it.”

  “Brent seemed to calm Cassandra down; why don’t you try cuddling up to Hiroko before the next jump?” Penny winked as she pushed Hiroko toward Owen.

  Hiroko stumbled over a crate along the floor. Owen quickly moved to catch her before she fell. Hiroko blushed as he helped her get her footing.

  “Not again.” Doug moaned openly. “Am I the only one who remembers we are at war?” he demanded with a sigh. “Can we please put the match making on hold – at least until the fighting is over?”

  “Might as well ask them to stop breathing,” Kindra said with a smile. “Girls will be girls.”

  “That reminds me, what did the Governor’s wife say to you, Ronald?” Cain asked.

  “Looking for more secrets?” Dante shot a glance at Cain.

  “Always,” Cain said with a grin. “But you can’t tell me you aren’t the tiniest bit interested yourself.”

  “Who cares if he’s interested, we are.” Penny poked Ronald’s arm. “Spill!”

  Ronald’s composure didn’t break for a moment; a neutral expression remained firm on his face. He looked at Tyra. She shrugged.

  “She told me to take good care of her daughter,” Ronald hesitated, “to make her . . . happy.”

  “Wow. You two want to share a bunk tonight?” Marie asked as she nudged Tyra.

  “You want to run laps?” Tyra asked frostily.

  “Told you,” Cain said with a smile as he nudged Angela. “Emotions aren’t written in stone.”

  “Can he run laps, too?” Angela asked.

  The troopers chuckled as they reached the crew quarters. Cain had been right about the rooms; they were anything but fancy. Brent had to crawl into the vertically stacked alcoves carved out of the wall. There was enough room for him to recline, but to sit up would have knocked his head against the roof of the alcove. As Brent struggled to get comfortable, he wondered if it would even be possible to squeeze a second person into the small space. Stealing a glance at his pocket watch, his stomach churned as he realized he’d have to get up in a couple of hours at most. His eyelids were incredibly heavy. Maybe in three days he’d be l
ucky enough to get a proper bunk – if they didn’t run into any trouble.

  “Are we still alive?” Nathan asked hesitantly.

  “Yes, yes we are,” Jack said slowly.

  In the dim illumination of emergency power he could barely make out Jack’s face. His friend had the most intense look of concentration Nathan could ever remember him having. Nathan knew better than to distract Jack when he was focusing. He knew next to nothing about Weaver abilities, but he knew that Jack hid the strain of using them well. If he was showing strain whatever he was doing had to be incredibly difficult.

  Trying not to dwell on the dim lighting, Nathan’s mind wandered backward as he tried to figure out how he had ended up on a half dead academy on the edge of the Commonwealth. When he had been assigned as the Administer of the isolated academy he figured it was a form of exile. Over his long years as a researcher he had learned far too many secrets to ever just retire and live a simple life. In the dimness he started to wonder if his assignment as been more of a punishment.

  Ever since that first day when the troublesome boy had arrived on the academy Nathan’s life had become a nightmare. First Jack had demanded they replace the standard placement exams, ones used for well over four hundred years no less, with specific ones to test the boy. By the end of the day most of the recruits were in Medical clinging to dear life.

  Nathan paused for a moment. Even he had to admit he was exaggerating. The recruits were in Medical, but they weren’t that close to death. Despite the brawl in the mess hall and a disastrous combat exam they were just a bit bruised with only a few broken bones. He sighed openly. If only he could go back and tell his younger self to enjoy that first day, as it only got worse from there. It seemed like the boy had a special ability to attract chaos.

  Nathan shook his head as he thought about it all. Exams going crazy and getting stuck on reenactments from the Great War, Weavers trying to kill the boy, division leaders trying to kill the boy, and even an assassin sneaking a live weapon into a trial. The boy was more trouble than he was worth.

  “We are in the clear,” Jack said as his entire body relaxed.

  “Maybe if we had more than mood lighting I might be able to take your word for that,” Nathan grumbled.

  “Are you afraid of the dark?” he asked with a small grin. “Would you like me to turn the lights on for you? Perhaps while I’m at it, I could make a giant ‘shoot here’ sign in brilliant neon.”

  “Mock me all you like, I still get to say I told you so in the end. I told you the ITU was up to no good.”

  “Yes you did, Nathan. Would you like a cookie?”

  “I’d like to be off this blasted academy and away from the walking black hole.”

  “Who?”

  “The boy! Brent!”

  “You’re blaming him for all this?” Jack asked with an amused grin. “How do you figure that?”

  “How can I not? I haven’t had a good night’s sleep since that boy set foot on this station.”

  “That’s a bit of an exaggeration.”

  “Let me put it this way, Jack. If I got the boy health insurance, I’d be convicted of fraud from all the near death claims I would have had to file up to this point.”

  Jack laughed and patted his friend on the shoulder.

  “Are we really safe?” Nathan asked after a few deep breaths.

  “For the moment. The ITU is searching Deriso, but their hearts aren’t really in it. They aren’t finding anything valuable and they won’t hang around much longer.”

  “And the boy?”

  “I lost track of him some time ago. My guess is that he jumped away.”

  “The boy can jump?” Nathan shouted. “He can fold space on his own?”

  “I mean in a ship,” Jack laughed heartily. “You watch too many plays.”

  Chapter 4: The Subira

  A harsh tone woke Brent. He held still as the images from his dream lingered. He had dreamt about the fifth exam again. His mind had taken the complex finish of his first day on the academy and twisted it into a nightmare. The command exam hadn’t been the most difficult test he had faced that first day, but it was the one that left the greatest impression. He had been tasked with defending a stronghold against an army. What left its imprint on him was the fact that stronghold happened to be a Shard Citadel. He had to fight alongside the mechanical foe of humanity as he kept the other recruits at bay. When the instructor grew tired of the exam, she ended it by destroying the entire world. The image of the warships in orbit jumping away and the massive maw filling the sky over the Citadel sent a shiver down his spine.

  Slowly but surely, the images faded into the mist of half forgotten dreams and he took a deep breath. He remembered where he was and pushed off the grogginess of sleep. The harsh tone wasn’t as gentle as the three tones of the academy but not quite as annoying as the sunbeam had been. Without thinking, he started to stretch and immediately rammed his arm into the wall of the small alcove. Any trace of grogginess was instantly replaced by tremendous pain. Checking his pocket watch, he was startled to find it was an hour before lunch. As he adjusted himself in the small space, he wondered why they were being awakened at such a late hour. Minding the walls, he gingerly stretched. He couldn’t hear any sounds of stirring from the other troopers; they were no doubt still asleep.

  Grabbing his pad, Brent started searching for any information on the war. There wasn’t a single bit of new information. Everything from financial reports to news fluff about lost kittens was time stamped at least a week old. Most likely, the ITU had started interfering and blocking all news outlets long before they officially started their campaign. As he was about to put away his pad, he noticed the clock at the top of the page. It clearly read nine a.m. GST. Pondering the meaning, he remembered the day they had left the academy. Their departure had been three hours after breakfast, but they had arrived only a few hours before dinner. Jumps were instantaneous, so the time differential couldn’t be blamed on their trip. Tapping on the time at the top of the screen brought up a larger display. The day, month, and time were all displayed along with various important dates coming up. With the increased space, the abbreviation changed and spelt out complete words, Galactic Standard Time.

  Brent took out his pocket watch and reset it to the proper time. Different worlds had different rotational and seasonal periods, so it made sense they’d have a local time. The pads must automatically update to the appropriate time whenever they enter or leave a ship. As he put away his watch, he had the uncanny sensation he was being watched. Turning to look out of his alcove, he found a head peaking in from the bunk above; the hair hanging listlessly was obviously female. The illumination from the hallway behind the head cast a small halo of light around it, making it impossible to see the face clearly.

  “You awake?” the head asked in a whisper.

  “Of course.”

  “Always been an early riser?”

  “I suppose so. Is something wrong?”

  “Not exactly, I just wanted to thank you.”

  “Thank me for what?”

  “For everything. I don’t even know where to start.”

  “You can start by letting me know who I’m talking to.”

  The head let out a soft chuckle and disappeared. A moment later a hand was reaching in to help him out. Once free of his crawl space, Brent stretched properly. Tyra was standing near the doorway and gestured for him to follow. She took him to a small room with a couple of tables. The walls were just far enough away from the edges of the tables for a person of average dimensions to sit down. One size fits none.

  “You don’t really need to thank me,” he said, taking a less than comfortable seat along the left table.

  “Of course I need to thank you!” she said in exasperation. “First, you leave your division for a perfect stranger, then you lead us through the Gauntlet but give me credit for the whole thing, and just last night you saved my parents while everyone else was thinking only of their own survival. D
on’t you think that deserves some recognition?”

  “I’m never going to be able to convince you that you led us through the Gauntlet, am I?”

  “Probably not.”

  “Fine, thanks accepted,” Brent said with a resigned sigh. “Now that we’ve settled that, what did your mother mean when she said she wouldn’t interfere?”

  “That’s a long story.”

  “Those are usually the best kind.”

  “You did give in, so I suppose I owe you at least a story.” Tyra sighed and glanced out of the small eating area. It was obvious she didn’t want anyone to overhear. “When I was a young girl my family lived on a core world. My father was one of many, mostly unimportant, government employees. He would come home every night with long boring stories about his day. We would talk for hours about our days, my boring studies and his boring job. My mother would brag about his position to all her friends, embellishing it just a tad every time someone asked what he did.”

  “Sounds like you enjoyed it.”

  “I really did. It wasn’t much, but those were the best days of my life.”

  “So what happened?”

  “Deriso applied for full membership in the Commonwealth. Up until that point it was a rim world with too small a population for full membership. As luck would have it, my dad was the one who had been in charge of trade relations up to that point. When the Commonwealth offered him a more prestigious position on the world, my mother made him take it.”

  “Is that why you have a grudge against her?”

  “Not exactly.” Tyra shifted uncomfortably. “It was hard at first, but in time I adjusted to life on a rim world. My dad worked with the planet’s leaders, gaining their trust, while my mother devoured her new status. When Deriso’s membership was finally approved, the region officially joined the Commonwealth. As time went on, the leaders of Deriso found they were constantly confounded by the policies of the Commonwealth. Eventually, they elected my father as Governor since he knew more about the workings of the Commonwealth than the rest of them combined.”

  “And your mother got drunk off the power?”