The First Covenant (Dark Universe Series Book 2)

by Alex Sheppard

  “Lower your weapon,” Fenny shouted from outside the room. “You’re outnumbered four to one, Lieutenant,” she added. “Do the smart thing. Put that gun down.”

  “You like surviving, remember?” Ramya said. “Put it down and step away.”

  He smirked at her like he had won the fight, and for a fleeting second, Ramya was puzzled. She grabbed his Nihilator the moment he set it down on the floor and fell back to the far wall.

  “All clear, Fenny,” she shouted, taking a steady aim at the lieutenant.

  In the next second, Fenny was by her side, cradling a humongous Meson cannon. Behind her came Flux, as well as another man and a woman Ramya did not know, all of them armed generously. Fenny shot a quick glance at Ramya. “Are you all right, Rami?”

  Ramya nodded. “All good.”

  “Let’s get out of here then,” Flux said. “What do we do with this GSO guy?”

  “Leave him here,” Ramya said. “I’m sure Lieutenant Arlington can find his way out of the space station.”

  She followed the rest of the team out. The new man and woman led the way. Flux followed and Fenny brought up the rear with Ramya. Ramya slowed at the doorway and turned to look Gael in the eye.

  “I’m glad you didn’t fight back. Would’ve had to kill you otherwise.”

  “I don’t fight battles I can’t win.”

  “Ah, yes. You like surviving.”

  He flashed a careless smile. “You got that right.”

  Fenny prodded. “Come on, Rami. We gotta hurry.”

  Ramya nodded at Fenny, then turned to Gael. She couldn’t leave without a few more words. “Tell your master today just wasn’t his lucky day.”

  “We’ll see about that,” Gael replied. A mocking smile twisted his lips. In a voice so low only Ramya could hear, he added, “Run and hide, Kiroff. Run and hide while you still can.”

  There was something about the way he said it, something ominous in his tone. The words rang in Ramya’s ears as she sprinted with her crewmates through deserted corridors and darkened staircases to the gate where the Endeavor was docked.

  16

  ROSS WAS WAITING at the gates when Fenny and the rest of her team reached the docking port with Ramya. As soon as Ross saw them he spoke urgently into his comm. “They’re here, Captain. All accounted for.” He didn’t wait for a reply but simply gave them a quick once-over and barked orders. “To your stations, everyone. Fenny, we leave right now.”

  The crew dispersed in the blink of an eye, but Ramya hesitated a second at the doorway. Ross noticed it immediately.

  “Check in with the medic, Rami,” he instructed. “The captain will see you in his quarters in thirty.”

  “How are we going to get away from the space station? If the troopers were in here, they must have battleships around too.”

  Ross shook his head. “We’re lucky. There’s just one, an old and clunky Merlin 5 that’s much slower than us. Besides, it’s docked in the fueling port. If we can get out quickly, we have a chance.”

  “We ran into some GSO as well. The Cutlass has to be here. That’ll be—”

  “Go to med-bay, Rami,” Ross cut her off. “The captain will see you soon.”

  With that, he hurried away. Ramya stood there for another second or two before starting toward med-bay. She felt the telltale movement of the Endeavor leaving the space station as she clambered down the ladder to the level of the med-bay. She had barely taken a step or two when a loud squeal made her stop and turn around.

  Ahool rushed down the corridor, waving his arms wildly. “You back, Rami.”

  “Yes, I am.”

  “I am glad. They say you lost in firefight. I pray. A lot.”

  “Thank you, Ahool,” Ramya said, patting the young Mwandan’s shoulder.

  “I decide, I stay with you always from now,” Ahool declared.

  “That’s kind of you, Ahool. But it’s not necessary,” Ramya tried to calm him, but her effort was likely lost on Ahool, who simply stared, glittery-eyed at her. Ramya knew that expression—it meant he had made up his mind and nothing could budge him. She decided to let the debate rest, at least for the moment. She had to meet the captain soon. “I have to see the medic. I’ll talk to you later, all right?”

  “Can I come to medic?” Ahool asked. “I want to see her, but she does not talk.” Even though Ramya wanted to visit Sosa alone, she also knew shaking off Ahool now was next to impossible. The Mwandan was stubborn, to say the least.

  “All right, let’s go,” she said. Ahool grinned happily as they strode toward Sosa’s lair.

  The med-bay door was ajar. Ramya rapped the panel as she entered. “Domina Sosa,” she called. The open door was odd. Sosa was usually fiercely protective of her dominion and selective about allowing people in.

  “Rami,” Sosa’s voice came from somewhere deep inside the bay. She emerged soon after seemingly from within one of the cabinets on the far side.

  “Why she inside cupboard, Rami?” Ahool muttered. Ramya shook her head. She didn’t know. To be entirely honest she had a sneaking suspicion. Perhaps Sosa had yet another hidden room behind that closet just like the one she had stashed away the Stryker’s injured pilot Habardein and Ramya in when the SLH troopers came aboard.

  “Are you all right?” Sosa almost pounced on Ramya, patting her cheeks and squeezing her fingers and arms to make sure she was still alive.

  Ramya extricated her arm from Sosa’s grasp. “I’m fine. Absolutely fine. Maybe I got a scratch or two. It’s nothing.”

  “They told me you got separated in a firefight. What happened?”

  Gael Arlington happened. Long, tiresome arguments happened.

  “Rami!” Sosa patted her cheek, pulling her out of her thoughts. “You look shaken, child. Let me give you some Pax. It’ll help.”

  That she couldn’t dispute. Soon Sosa had handed her a large goblet filled to the brim with her signature blue-and-red concoction. Ramya sipped at it as if her life depended on it. As expected, a warm, soothing calmness spread over her as soon as the Pax coursed down her throat.

  “Thanks, Sosa,” Ramya said with a long sigh. “I needed this.”

  “Of course you did,” Sosa said. “I made a special mix for you as soon as Terenze told me about the new plans. I thought—”

  “Can I have Pax too?” a glittery-eyed Ahool cut Sosa off.

  Sosa frowned at the Mwandan, while Ramya’s thoughts lingered Sosa’s unfinished sentence. New plans? What did she mean by that? She couldn’t get to ask the medic because Sosa and Ahool had embarked on a fierce verbal battle over Pax.

  “I’m enough old,” Ahool declared to a finger-wagging Sosa. “I drink Gommo extract at home.”

  Sosa’s brows shot up. “Gommo extract? What’s that?”

  “It’s drink. Like this Pax.”

  Sosa waved dismissively at Ahool. “I have never had a Mwandan drink my Pax, let alone one so young. I don’t know enough of your physiology to predict what the effects will be. So, no.”

  Ahool wasn’t giving up just yet. “I’m doctor-in-training. I explain to you Mwandan physiology,” he started. As the duo animatedly discussed Mwandan organ functions, Ramya settled down into a chair and watched and sipped at her Pax. Ahool, she realized, would make a good assistant for Sosa. Ahool was not only training to be a doctor, but he matched Sosa well in temperament as well—stubborn, curious, and loyal to a fault.

  Her thoughts drifted right away. Gael matched her father in a way too. Like a playful foil to Trysten Kiroff’s cold cunning. Jealousy twisted inside Ramya once again. What did Gael have that she didn’t?

  He had pluck. He had the nerve to make light of a situation even when Trysten Kiroff was breathing down his neck. Like the time he praised her skills with the Stryker.

  Ramya’s anger at Gael abated a little at the thought. It wasn’t his fault that her father hated her. He was as much a victim of galactic politics as she was. Maybe even worse things happened to him. Didn’t he say something about
someone he lost? Maybe he loved someone, but they forced him into this arrangement with her instead. Oh well, such was the state of things everywhere.

  Her father’s words came back and lingered painfully. Scrubbing floors, was what he had said. Ramya’s fists clenched. How dare he? She shifted uncomfortably in her chair. How in the stars was she ever going to prove her worth to him? She had started with a plan of sorts, but that plan was all but lost in this affair with the Locustans and the Stryker. When, if at all, she could get to find the Moanus and wrest the Kiroff hearth back from them, Ramya had no idea.

  Ramya took another sip of her Pax, suddenly realizing something new. How much had she thought of the Moanus since boarding the Endeavor? Not much. Not much at all. To be honest, she didn’t care about the Moanus as much anymore. The cause she was fighting for now was far bigger than her own little life. How did it matter what her father thought of her when the fate of the entire galaxy was at risk?

  Ramya’s fingers curled determinedly around the stem of her goblet. She had to remember that there were greater things at stake than her value in her father’s eyes. She had to remember. Ramya sucked in a lungful of air and held on to it, repeating the pledge. Next time she came across Trysten Kiroff she had to take it in stride.

  Ahool’s jubilant voice broke Ramya thoughts for a second. “See, we have thing like your enzyme also. It helps us handle Pax,” he said. Sosa had pulled out a drawing pad now and Ahool was scribbling enthusiastically all over it. Ramya checked her watch. The captain had asked her to stop by his room and it was almost time to get going.

  “I’ve to go see the captain,” she announced. Sosa and Ahool were now in a deep conversation about molecular structure of Pax. They both looked up at her. Sosa nodded distractedly and Ahool flashed an acknowledging smile.

  Perhaps the Pax Sosa had given her was extra potent since it took Ramya a lot of strength and focus to walk out of the med-bay. She reached the captain’s room after a relaxed walk along the ship’s corridor, lost in thoughts.

  She turned the final bend in the corridor not a moment too early. Captain Milos stood at his doorway, watching curiously as she approached. “There you are, Rami. Come in. We have much to discuss.”

  As soon as she stepped inside the room, he said, “Sit.” The place looked messy as usual and a fat flask of blood-red noja sat next to the captain’s favorite couch. He settled into his couch while Ramya slid into a seat across from him. “We have a slight change of plans.”

  Plans had been changing around her like a chameleon’s skin and Ramya had gotten used to it. Intriguing was the fact that Captain Milos called her to his chambers to discuss a change. She was not as high up in the hierarchy to talk strategy with the captain unless she’d accidentally became part of it somehow. Like after the Stryker’s pilot had spoken to her and later the Stryker itself. Both resulted in her being pulled into discussions with the captain. Barring those, she was a lowly entity on the Endeavor.

  What had she stumbled into now? Ramya couldn’t figure. She grabbed the cup of noja he offered and took a long sip. Bitter and biting, the noja jolted her senses, as always. That was pretty timely since it cleared the mist of Pax from her mind in an instant.

  “We’re going to make a brief stop at Posci and then go to meet Chief Mifek,” the captain said. He looked expectantly at Ramya.

  She didn’t know what to say. For all Ramya knew, Posci was a rogue planet. Some called it a wandering planet. Others called it a starless planet. Posci didn’t belong to a particular star or a planetary system. Instead it orbited the galaxy itself. Mostly unclaimed by the houses and the corporations, such planets were free of settlements and were often used as transient bases along freight routes.

  “Aren’t you wondering why I’m telling you this?” the captain asked.

  “You must have a reason,” she said. “You always have a good reason.”

  The captain chuckled. “Do I? Well, I’m meeting with Trysten on Posci. What do you think of that?”

  For a second or two, Ramya’s heart thudded. There was no denying that she wished what the captain had just said was her imagination and only that. That she was afraid. But Ramya didn’t let the fear get hold of her. She forced another gulp of noja down her throat and soon the distracting buzz in her ears faded.

  “Like I said, you must have a good enough reason to want to meet him,” she replied as calmly as she could.

  “I do,” Captain Milos said. “I wouldn’t have called you to explain why, but you’re a valued member of this team and I have not forgotten what brought you to my ship.”

  He paused to take a sip at his noja. Ramya’s mind was sprinting at a furious pace. One question burned on the top of her head: When did the captain talk to her father and decide to meet?

  “I’ve known your father for a long time, Rami. Your grandfather Abelei Kiroff and I were friends, so I heard a lot about Trysten from him even before I met Trysten.” Captain Milos stopped and looked around the room, his eyes narrowed as if they were looking at some distant point in the past. “Trysten and I have seldom looked eye-to-eye. I would’ve avoided this meeting if I could. But there’s no way forward without this.”

  Captain Milos leaned over and tapped a button on the side of the center table. Ramya heard a creaking sound before a holographic image formed above the table. It was the image of space—three stars hung in the distance and right in front was the hulking shape of an enormous starbase.

  “That’s Anomaly Point,” Ramya exclaimed, recognizing the distinctive horseshoe shape of Starbase Zeta that the Confederacy had put in place after the Locustan invasion.

  “It is indeed,” the captain said. “That’s where the wormhole had opened the last time and let the Locustans in. That’s also the likely point where they’d come in again. We need to guard the place like it’s the last thing worth saving in the galaxy.”

  “Space Command has squadrons stationed in Zeta. Don’t they?”

  “They should. I’m not sure how many.” Captain Milos leaned back into his couch and exhaled noisily. “I don’t know if they’re prepared for another invasion. I’d tell them but they aren’t prepared to hear me. They’re more worried about us than the Locustans.”

  “I know,” Ramya said, recalling the zeal with which Admiral Kanaa had attacked them. “They will think we’re imagining an invasion.”

  “They definitely will,” the captain said. “And if they’re not ready, that starbase will fall in a matter of hours, if not minutes, when the Locustans come in.”

  Ramya’s fingertips had long turned cold. Now she felt the chill all over. “It’ll be like the last time. We’ll have to scramble.”

  “It will be worse than last time,” the captain pronounced direly. “If Zeta falls, and if Space Command has as many squadrons homed there as originally planned, that’s the end of a third of our squadrons. We’ll be even more outnumbered. And then, if what Mifek said is true, I worry that the missing Strykers are already raising a Locustan army somewhere.”

  Ramya placed the cup back on the table. She didn’t trust her cold fingers to keep holding it for long.

  “An army? How? Why?” she whispered.

  “I don’t know. But remember what Chief Dal told us? According to reports from Chief Mifek, people are disappearing from the Fringe. What’s happening to them? I think . . . I think they’re being captured and turned into a Locustan army. Why else would colonies full of people vanish overnight?”

  “The Confederacy needs to know that.” Ramya barely managed to get those words out of her parched throat. “And . . . act.”

  “I would meet them and explain to them, Rami, but they’ll throw us in prison before they hear a word from me. I thought of sending them a message, but that’ll help them track us down and come after us. So I’ve been sending information in roundabout ways. Haven’t got one response back.”

  “But you’re forming an alliance. The Mwandans are with us.”

  “Trying to,” the captain replie
d. “The Mwandans—at least the Berkari faction—is on our side. But we can’t fight the Locustans on foot. We need space fighters. That’s where your father comes in.”

  The Kiroff factories could easily manufacture space fighters and every other craft that was needed to prepare for an invasion. The captain was right—her father could be a valuable ally. But first, he had to agree to be one.

  “You think he’ll accept your proposal?”

  “He might,” the captain said with a hesitant smile. “Knowing Trysten, I have to pitch him the right way. Provide him with the right incentive.”

  Ramya chuckled. The captain couldn’t be any more correct. Her father would need a powerful incentive beyond the lofty goal of saving the galaxy to get into this. Ramya held Captain Milos in very high esteem, but she still had serious doubts that the captain could entice Trysten Kiroff into backing this cause. But he had gotten him to agree to a meeting, and that was something.

  The thought brought on another thought that had slipped through the cracks of her mind. “My father hardly goes out of his way to meet people. And he’s coming all the way to Posci? How did you get him to do that?”

  The captain took a long sip at his noja and shook his head. “I can’t take credit for that. That’s all Gael’s expertise. He’s the one arranging the rendezvous.”

  “Gael?” Ramya had to struggle to get the name out of her mouth. “Gael Arlington of the GSO?”

  The captain’s eyebrows crinkled. “Yes, the same. He stopped by when we were docked at Nebeca. This was partly his idea.”

  A million questions bombarded Ramya’s brain but she could only get one out quickly enough. “You trust him?”

  “Gael is an honest man,” the captain said. “Something I won’t say about his father Tuck.”

  “I see,” Ramya muttered. She hardly saw at all. Things could get real messy from here, but was there another way? No. Not one she could see anyway.

  The captain’s eyes had turned to slits, his gaze piercing as it scanned Ramya’s face. “You don’t approve of Gael?”