by Dan Worth
‘Jesus, you went into the Empire? You’re out of your fucking mind, you know that? What is it with you? And what if the Navy start sniffing around your business dealings?’
‘The money was good, real good. There might be more where that came from too.’
‘What sort of mission was it?’
‘Getting some refugees out. I can’t really say any more right now. It was quite a ride though. Fucking weird too. Ask me about it someday’
‘God, I hate it when people do that.’
‘What?’
‘Set up a story, then refuse to tell.’
‘Sorry man. I’m under orders.’
‘If you like taking orders, how about you work for me?’
‘What, serving drinks and cleaning glasses? No thanks.’
‘Nah, you know. A little flying here and there. Transporting a few quality items to trusted customers.’
‘Not a good idea I’m afraid. I got the distinct impression these Navy types I worked for will be watching me for a while to make sure I don’t snitch. I’ll bear it in mind though.’
‘Alright, fair enough.’ Shigs finished his beer and burped loudly. The sound echoed in the blank walled room. ‘So listen, about Anna.’
‘You know where she is?’
‘Not exactly.’
‘She figured you might come by here eventually. She was here for about six months, but before she left she asked me to give you this.’ He fumbled in his pocket and produced a key chain. He sorted through the various electronic and metal keys until he found a slim key card and removed it, then passed it to Isaacs. ‘That’s her apartment key. She wanted you to have it. Apparently there’s something in there for you.’
‘What?’
‘No idea. Must be important since she still rents the place. All she said was; ‘Shigs, you know when Cal has too much to drink and he gets that thousand yard stare and won’t talk. Well it’s to do with that.’ I was none the wiser, although she was right, you do get a weird look in your eye sometimes.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I dunno like… like you can see something that the rest of can’t.’
‘Probably the beer talking.’
‘Yeah. Weird message to leave though, huh?’
‘It is. Look…’
There was heavy knock at the door. A deep voice outside, muffled by the wood of the door, spoke:
‘Mr Toyama?’
‘Come in!’ Shigs replied. The door opened and a different bouncer, a squat, powerful looking man with a neatly trimmed beard stepped through.
‘Thought you ought to know. There are a couple of Nahabe in the bar.’
‘What?’
‘Yeah, the pair of them came in ten minutes ago or so.’
‘Are they cops?’
‘I don’t think so. They just came in and started floating around the place. It’s like they’re looking for something, or someone.’
‘I thought Nahabe didn’t come into bars?’ said Isaacs.
‘They don’t,’ said Shigs. ‘That’s what so unusual and what makes me so suspicious. Alright Larry, keep an eye on ‘em for me will ya? Last thing I want is those fucking coffins ruining my custom.’ The man nodded and left, Shigs turned back to Isaacs. ‘One or two of those Nahabe get a little too evangelistic for my taste. A bar up the street had a couple come in a month or so back and start preaching to the customers about ‘the evils of decadence’. Then they started with all this ‘end of civilisation’ bullshit.’
‘Fucking hell…’ said Isaacs in commiseration as Shigs switched on a small wall screen and scrutinised the image until he saw the two box shaped forms gliding around between groups of revellers.
‘Yeah, apparently were all going to be enslaved by evil and damned forever unless we forsake drink and drugs and…’
‘Live in a box?’
‘Something like that,’ Shigs chuckled. He toyed with his empty beer can for a moment, before reaching for a fresh one from an opened crate. He passed another to Isaacs who accepted it gratefully.
‘So Shigs,’ said Isaacs. ‘What was my wife doing here? Where did she go?’
The other man looked a little uneasy and scratched his beard thoughtfully before answering.
‘You know, I wish I could tell you the whole story. The truth is, I’m not entirely sure what she was up to.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘When Anna first came here, there was just her and her ship, a nice one too, one of those new Colt class yachts.’
‘Guess that’s what the loan was for.’
‘Yeah, some of it I guess. Anyway, she happened to come in here and we got talking. She told me about the situation between you and her, although she didn’t tell me why you guys split up and I didn’t like to pry… anyway I put a few jobs her way, cargo runs, courier jobs and stuff, nothing risky.’
‘So what happened?’
‘I dunno. Suddenly she had a lot of friends. People would come in here asking for her all the time.’
‘Men?’
‘Well, men, women, aliens… nah, this was strictly business. But I’m telling you, most of these guys were pretty serious types. Not the sort you’d want to get on the wrong side of, if you know what I mean, and whenever I saw her, she was flashing a hell of a lot of cash around. Whenever Anna came in here, it was drinks on the house all round.’
‘Great, she’s buying booze whilst I get jumped by mobsters.’
‘Yeah. Well this went on for a good three or four months. Then she comes in here and tells me she was going away for a while, and she gave me the key to her apartment to give to you if you stopped by. I figured what the hell and that’s the last I saw of her. She never said where she was headed.’
‘You said she has her own ship, did you catch its name at all?’
‘Yeah, uh… the Jilted Lover.’
‘Nice, she always did have a wonderful sense of humour,’ said Isaacs.
‘Sorry man.’
Isaacs shrugged. ‘Alright. Well, I’ll poke around the space ports - see if I can dig up anything.’
‘She rented a bay on this asteroid. You might want to try asking around there.’
‘Thanks. Hey, it’s been good seeing you again. I guess I’d better be going.’
‘Yeah, listen, where are you going to stay, Anna’s apartment?’
‘Nah, her landlord will still be poking around. He’d be on to me like a shot if I went in there. It’ll have to wait till morning. I was going to return to my ship, it’s a bit of a trek though.’
‘Stick around here. We have a few rooms upstairs. What do you say? Have a few drinks with us, swap a few stories.’
‘Yeah. Fuck it. Why not, eh?’
‘That’s the spirit! That’s the Cal I know and love. Hey, I gotta introduce you to this new girl that works here; she’s your type alright…’
Shigs put a chubby arm around Isaacs’ shoulders and propelled him back towards the bar.
Chapter 8
To the military eye, the Arkari Sphere lay like a vast, thousand light year wide orrery to the west of the Commonwealth, its concentric shells of defensive installations, bases and fleet dispositions expanding outwards from the Arkari home world at its heart. It seemed a strange irony to many that one of the spiral arm’s most benign races (at least according popular belief) were in possession of the largest collection of advanced military hardware belonging to any species yet contacted. The Arkari, of course, were generally of the opinion that they managed to exist in peace with their neighbours largely because they were in possession of such a sophisticated deterrent and because their particular form of meritocratic democracy ensured that, in general, their government was capable enough to avoid the majority of conflicts via intelligent resolution.
It was also the case that given their race’s longer history and advanced technological capabilities, the Arkari often had a better idea of what was going on in the galaxy. Many amongst the less advanced races, humanity included, often
liked to speculate about what the Arkari knew about the vast, largely unexplored tracts of space that lay outside the known regions and why it was that such an advanced race had restricted itself to such a strictly delineated patch of the galaxy. The Arkari seemed to be prepared for something, but what?
Had these armchair historians and bar room politicians really been allowed an insight into exactly what it was that the Arkari knew about the wider galaxy, particular those benighted regions at the galactic core, where the close-pressed dying stars whirled about the central all-consuming black hole, they would have shrunk from further speculation in terror.
Only a few select humans were privy to the truth, courtesy of their enigmatic allies; those who had seen first-hand what lay in store for humanity and who their true enemies were. Not the warlike empire of the K’Soth, or a dozen similar hostile races waiting to be uncovered, but something far, far worse. Ancient and malevolent things that skulked and plotted in the darkest reaches of the galaxy, and which were now emerging from the shadows, unified at last into a coherent entity.
Within the Arkari Sphere there were secret places, places that most Arkari had no knowledge of. Within the quadrant of the Sphere given over to the military there were numerous places such as these; secret research facilities and training areas, storage bunkers and defensive installations and even places of confinement.
Some places were more secret still. Kaggorak – the name meant ‘black rock’ in the Arkari language - could be classed as all of the above. It was a dark matter object, a rogue asteroid a thousand kilometres long that had floated between the stars for billions of years, flung out of whatever star system it had originated from to drift silently in the inky darkness. It was the perfect place to conceal that which needed to remain hidden from others or to imprison that which should never, ever, escape. The Arkari had found the solitary rock millennia earlier and had hollowed it out into a warren of caverns that suited their more secretive purposes. The rotation of the asteroid had been gradually stabilised, docking facilities fitted one end and the entire site ringed with defences that faced both outwards into space and inwards towards the rock itself. They had also fitted it with jump drives. The rock was able to move across space, shifting from one hidden place to another. Some things were so secret that they should not remain in one place for too long.
The Meritarchs had commanded that Kaggorak be moved into position between the two sundered halves of the Progenitor Dyson Sphere to co-ordinate the research program, to make use of its advanced research labs and to defend the habitat from any unwanted interlopers. Throughout its day and night cycles, a steady stream of ships loaded with personnel, materiel and archaeological evidence moved between the rock and surface of the sphere as Arkari science teams sifted the wreckage and dust for some clue as to the fate of the habitat’s creators. Ships, sentry drones and stealthed weapon platforms now surrounded the broken Progenitor sphere for a light year in every direction.
Three ships were now docked at Kaggorak, their forms outlined by the glow of their running lights, the huge, sleek bulk of an Arkari Nightbringer class dreadnought, an Arkari destroyer and the much smaller, angular form of a Commonwealth Saturn class carrier.
Chen exited the transit tube deep inside the bowels of the asteroid and walked purposefully down the broad, curving corridor towards Mentith’s office. The white, curving, seamless walls echoed to the hollow sound of her booted feet on the hard flooring, whose glassy surface reflected her slight form. She passed a few Arkari on the way, calmly going about their secretive business in the depths of the base, their slender bodies clad in the dark uniforms of their Navy. She couldn’t help but wonder what mysteries this lonely rock contained, what dark secrets its custodians hid from prying eyes within its deepest chambers. She had been promoted to an almost unique position, one of the most senior Humans within the Special Operations Command, the secretive military organisation maintained by the Arkari and the Commonwealth dedicated to the single goal of defending the spiral arm from wider, longer term threats. However, Chen didn’t doubt that there was plenty that was hidden, even from her.
She reached the door of Mentith’s office, pressed her fingertips against its surface to open it and entered. She found Mentith lounging casually in a chair behind his desk, an organic looking item of furniture whose graceful lines were slightly marred by the piles of documents, data-pads and storage slivers that cluttered its surface and stood in semi-random piles around its base. The War Marshal was framed by a large curving window that gave a view of a tiered garden chamber beyond. The sound of the artificial waterfall outside was just audible through the open doors to the room’s balcony.
Mentith looked up from the data-pad he was perusing as Chen saluted smartly in front of him.
‘Ah, Admiral Chen. Always a pleasure. You’re a little earlier than I’d expected.’
‘We made good time on our journey here. My Chief Engineer has been optimising the performance of the Churchill’s jump drive.’
‘You have a good crew Admiral.’
‘The best. I hand-picked them all myself. One of the luxuries I was afforded when I took this job.’
Mentith smiled. ‘Of course. Now, to business. I expect you’re wondering why I summoned you here?’
‘Naturally.’
‘Firstly, we’ve decided to take the rather bold step of fitting a human vessel, namely your ship, with an Arkari distortion cannon. The engineers here assure me that this is entirely feasible, and have modified such a weapon to work with your power systems. The cannon will replace the rather less effective plasma cannon that your vessel is currently equipped with as its main gun, and it should give you an advantage in a fire-fight with just about anything that you’re likely to come across. The Churchill and her crew are a useful asset to SOC, and I feel it is only proper that you be given this boost to your combat capabilities as well as a chance to test this device.’
‘Thank you sir, I’m sure Chief Kleiner will be eager to have a new toy to play with.’
‘I thought as much,’ said Mentith with a touch of amusement. ‘But remind him that the technical specifications of that weapon are, of course, classified. Giving away technology is not something that we Arkari take lightly.’
‘Of course, sir. Were there other reasons that you wished to see me?’
‘Yes. As one of our more senior officers, I felt it was important for you to be briefed on some of the more recent developments, as well allowing the two of us to have an informal chat. Plus, if there’s anything you’d like tell me about feel free to do so, once I’ve said my piece.’
‘Yes sir.’
‘Very well.’ Mentith pressed a few keys on the console embedded into the surface of his desk, causing a three dimensional map of local space to appear in the air above it with the territories of each race marked out in coloured transparent bubbles along with tags denoting the principal systems.
The Arkari Sphere lay in the west marked out in green. Against its eastern face lay the haphazard blue sprawl of the Commonwealth like a collection of loose soap bubbles clinging to the surface of the larger body. Darker blue bubbles to the south and east denoted the Commonwealth’s alien allies - many of whom had pledged ships, troops and other resources during the war against the K’Soth Empire, whose vast expanse lay marked in red to the north where it abutted the Commonwealth’s border.
A great swathe had been gouged from this gargantuan realm. A rough hemisphere over two hundred and fifty light years deep had been bitten from the Empire’s southern quadrant by the Commonwealth during the war, though many systems had also had broken away as Imperial rule had collapsed. Within the remaining volume of the Empire, systems were flagged with different colours to denote the principal factions now vying for control of the throne in the escalating civil war that had engulfed the K’Soth.
‘What would your current assessment of the Commonwealth be, now that the war with the K’Soth is over?’ said Mentith.
‘My assessment
?’ Chen replied. ‘Well, we’ve conquered our old enemy at long last. We’ve smashed their military and caused their power base to collapse in on itself. The current state of civil war within the Empire is proof of that. We’ve seized or liberated thousands of systems from the K’Soth, systems that we can incorporate into our domain or develop as trading partners. I’d say the Commonwealth is, potentially, stronger than ever.’
‘Hmm, interesting,’ said Mentith. ‘From a certain perspective, you are correct. However I believe that when one considers the wider implications, the Commonwealth is more vulnerable now that it was before the war.’
‘How so?’
‘Consider this: The Commonwealth may have seized vast areas of territory, but this territory is, for the time being, a vast drain on its resources. The Army and Navy are stretched far more thinly than before as they are embroiled in policing and even governing a huge number of systems, many of which were devastated in the fighting or by the ‘slash and burn’ tactics of the Empire, or are in the grip of civil strife as their inhabitants settle old scores and punish those who collaborated with their former imperial masters. The finest tactical minds of the Commonwealth are currently bogged down resolving or preventing such brush fire wars, as well as being forced to defend a far larger territory than before. In addition, the cost of rebuilding such ravaged systems is sure to prove a great economic burden upon the core systems, even if the end result is to be increased prosperity in the future. The Commonwealth is very vulnerable. Now would be the ideal moment for a hostile power such as the Shapers to make its move, either via an external attack or by engineering an internal revolt.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘You are aware of the excavations on the Progenitor sphere?’
‘Yes sir, I understand that Cor and O’Reilly are in charge of the project.’