Then again, Isabela wasn’t just anyone. She was his sister— intelligent, strong, loving and understanding, but not foolish. And Alex…well, she wasn’t just anyone either. To say the least.
He had told her she was insane for wanting to go through the portal—and she was. But if she hadn’t suggested it he likely would have, because in truth he viewed it as the only strategy worth a damn.
It was one of the most fundamental lessons in his line of work, if one many never managed to learn: when you find yourself under siege, outnumbered and out of options—attack. Don’t play defense; the enemy’s superior numbers or position will whittle you down until you have nothing left. Don’t run away; the enemy will only shoot you in the back. Once you’re backed into a corner, you’ve already lost.
While you’re still strong, still have weapons and will and time, do what the enemy least expects—attack. Turn into the punch, grab ahold of the gun, leap into the arena. Take control of your own fate. If you’re quick, good and lucky, you just might survive and be out the other side before the enemy realized what had happened.
Thus far in his life, when it truly mattered, he had been all three. Now, though….
Now the enemy was maddeningly elusive. Hidden in the shadows and presumably spread across numerous worlds. There was no target he could locate to attack in settled space—and one very clear one at the edge of it. Every instinct he’d relied upon for almost twenty years to survive seemingly impossible situations told him the real enemy, the ultimate enemy, lay on the other side of that portal.
Alex intended to go through the portal to search for answers. He intended to go through the portal to win.
He stepped in the Siyane and found her at the data center, the Metis data spread in front of her yet again. He set his bag on the couch. “Kennedy leave already?”
“Yeah. The new module installed no problem, and she needed to head out. I’ve set diagnostic tests running, but everything checks out so far.”
“Well at least you were able to—” In his peripheral vision he sensed an…incongruity. Something was different. His gaze shifted toward the cockpit.
To the right of the pilot’s chair sat another chair. A bit more minimalistic in design than hers, it fit snugly but completely within the margins of the cockpit space.
He approached the cockpit curiously. “Alex, what is this?”
She briefly diverted her attention from the data to glance over, an uncertain smile tugging at her lips. “I got you a chair.”
“You…you got me a chair.” It was less a question and more a statement of incredulity.
“It’s only so I don’t always have to be looking over my shoulder to talk to you. It’s not safe, honestly. And I’m sure you must get tired of leaning against the wall.”
His hand ran along the top of the headrest; the chair glided smoothly beneath it. His gaze returned to her, a vaguely stunned expression on his face. “Alex….”
Her eyes slid away from him and her voice turned formal tinged with a hint of awkwardness. “It’s magnetically grounded, so it’s not like I tore up the floor or anything, and we can move it if we need to. It’s just practical.”
But it wasn’t just practical. It was touching and kind and an exceptional gesture on her part. Giving him a place on her ship, even if only a simple chair—hell, especially a simple chair—was tantamount to giving him a place in her life. A real place, in the form of a chair.
He crossed the cabin and wound his arms around her, pulling her away from the data and into him. “Of course it is….” His lips met hers. “Thank you.”
No, she wasn’t just ‘anyone’ at all.
72
EARTH
VANCOUVER, EASC HEADQUARTERS
* * *
MIRIAM PACED IN TIGHTLY COILED AGITATION around the temporary office space. With a frown she nudged the temporary hutch flush to the wall.
Nothing had been salvageable from her office. Not the antique bookcase and certainly not the antique books, of which there remained none in existence to replace them with. Not the leaded glass tumblers that had been a wedding present to her and David and not the heirloom china tea set that had belonged to his grandmother.
She picked up the teacup—part of the set she had brought from home—off the temporary desk and took a long sip, then set it back down. Too hard; it wobbled unsteadily. Unless the desk was uneven….
She looked over at Richard. He leaned against the wall, quietly watching her flutter about. “I don’t care how angry Alexis may have been after the Board meeting. There is no way she was involved in the bombing.”
“Absolutely not. It’s an absurd idea. She’s not a killer.”
“No, she’s not. But this Marano character?”
“Oh, he definitely is a killer. His file says he took out two dozen criminal insurgents and blew up an entire hangar bay two months ago, and it’s merely his latest exploit. Conveniently enough he has something of a history of using explosives to get a job done. But he’s not a terrorist. He infiltrates and eliminates dangerous criminal groups in the service of his government. His record indicates no deviation into more questionable activities.”
She crouched and adjusted the rug beneath the desk. Perhaps it was the source of the unevenness. “We’re at war. Maybe he didn’t consider it terrorism?”
“From the Senecan perspective, arguably it wasn’t. But regardless, Alex swore he was never out of her sight except while he was in custody. Miriam….”
Recognizing the tone in his voice, she stood up and met his gaze.
“In the end it comes down to one very simple matter: either you believe her or you don’t.”
She sighed and let her eyes drift to the window. Logistics was all of twenty stories tall; outside were only other buildings. “I believe her.”
A smile sprung to life on his face, possibly in relief. “So do I.” The smile didn’t linger as his hand came to his jaw. “Which means we have a different problem. She said he was framed, and she’s right. The evidence was doctored to implicate him, and by extension, her. By whom? And even more importantly, why?
“Between the nonsensical Summit assassination, the Palluda attack nobody ordered and now this? Something is severely wrong with this entire situation. The explosives used on the upper levels had to be assembled inside Headquarters. Marano may not have done it, but someone did. They both claim the war has been manufactured by someone, and I’m beginning to suspect they’re right about that, too.”
She crossed the temporary space and placed a hand on his shoulder. “Luckily, conspiracies and subterfuge happen to be your area of expertise. Richard, get to the bottom of this. And most of all, do whatever you need to in order to clear her name. Please.” She patted his shoulder and returned to the temporary desk, her voice dropping in volume and perhaps in confidence. “I wish I knew where she’s gone.”
“You never know where she goes.”
“This is different.” Her gaze drifted once again to the windows, but the view had not improved. She took a deep breath and squared her shoulders. “Nevertheless, there’s nothing I can do about it for the moment. And now it seems I have to find a way to win a war.”
“There’s no way Seneca can stand up to our military strength in the long run.”
“It’s not that war which has me concerned…at least, not only that war.”
“Well, one thing at—”
The priority pulse forced itself into her vision.
Acting Chairman O’Connell requests your presence in his office in five minutes.
Her lips smacked in annoyance. “It appears I am being summoned to kiss the feet of the new Chairman.”
“He doesn’t waste any time, does he? He’s been here all of, what, half an hour?”
“Less than.” Another sigh found its way past her lips. “You know, Alamatto was a weak leader, but I’m afraid O’Connell is going to get everyone killed. You’re correct—Seneca can’t stand up against our military strength. But if
he’s in charge, they just might outsmart us.”
She stood formally in the doorway while O’Connell discussed something with an aide. After twenty seconds she decided he was deliberately dragging it out in an attempt to make her uncomfortable. Silly, petty man.
After another thirty seconds he finally dismissed the aide and glanced at her. “Ah, Miriam.”
“Yes, Liam? You wanted to speak with me?”
He scowled and bowed up his stance in an apparent attempt to intimidate her with his towering, burly build. Also, slow to learn. “You’re as insubordinate as your daughter. I believe you meant ‘General.’”
“And I believe you meant ‘Admiral.’ You may be head of the Board for now, but you are not my superior officer. In public I will grant you the respect of your position. In private I will grant you the respect you have earned. Thus far you haven’t earned any.”
His eyes narrowed in blatant hostility. “You arrogant bitch. Your lax security allowed those explosives to be planted. Your daughter gave that fucking Senecan cocksucker inside access and caused the deaths of thousands. You aren’t worthy of your position or your rank.” He paused, as if to see the effect of his intimidation. She refused to flinch.
With a blink he continued. “I may not possess the authority to fire you, but I plan to do everything in my power to ensure you soon find yourself out on your ass. No rank, no title, no power.”
The corners of her mouth curled up in a cold, malicious smile. “We’ll see, won’t we?” She turned to go, not waiting or wanting to be excused. When she reached the door she paused to look back at him.
“Oh, and Liam? Thank you for the warning.”
73
GAIAE
INDEPENDENT COLONY
* * *
SERAPHINA BREATHED IN THE COOL MORNING AIR, drawing it deep into her lungs as her diaphragm expanded. And hold…hold. With a slow, steady exhale she opened her eyes.
She floated a meter above the water, suspended by the resistance of the magnetic field generated by Gaiae’s waters against the fibers woven into her stockings. Indigenous fish danced in the waters beneath her, their iridescent scales reflecting brilliantly in the dawn light. They were poisonous to humans, but it was no matter; neither she nor any of the other residents would have stooped so low as to impinge upon Gaiae’s precious ecosystem.
The glowing pastels of the nearby fauna lingered in her vision when she closed her eyes and inhaled once more. Her ocular implant was enhanced to expand the spectrum of her sight beyond visible light into the ultraviolet range. The effect was spiritual in its beauty, but the odd hues tended to leave halos in their wake.
And hold…hold.
She opened her eyes to a shadow.
It broke her meditation, and she suppressed a frown as she twisted around—careful to engage her core—and looked up.
The shadow slithered across the landscape until it reached the water’s edge. Her frown deepened. Gaiae had no moons; there could be no eclipse.
What appeared next was of a nightmare. An impossibility. An evil blackness—harsh, bleak, cold metal surely made of the void itself.
It continued to grow in the sky, and soon veins of blood slashed the blackness like the war paint of ancient primitives.
Even as the breadth and length of the blooded darkness grew ever greater, another materialized alongside it. Then another. Soon a dozen phantasms—devils of Hades come to life—blanketed the sky, blotting out the sun and turning morning to dusk.
Seraphina stood to balance unsteadily atop the magnetic resistance. What horror might this be? She only rarely accessed the so-called ‘exanet,’ but she did not believe even the most powerful governments possessed ships such as these.
Gaiae was a peaceful planet. Its residents strived ever to be in harmony with all living creatures, with the land and the air and the stars. What sin against nature could possibly have brought such devils down upon them?
Then the bellies of the beasts wrent apart, and all legions spewed forth. Creatures born of the bowels of Tartarus, their arms counted greater than those of Mahākālī and writhed madly around blazing crimson eyes—a cyclopean blood-gorged eye for each creature in the legion army.
Their multitudes descended from the sky, and at last she screamed.
74
SIYANE
METIS NEBULA
* * *
THEY APPROACHED METIS AS QUIETLY and furtively as the Siyane permitted. Their route was circuitous, winding around the Nebula until their trajectory was nearly opposite of before.
All her instincts screamed at her to hurry, to get there faster and to generally get on with it. Yet along about the time her fingers stretched out to hover above the controls, Caleb’s hand found its way to her shoulder or the curve of her jaw. She wouldn’t have expected him to be the calm one…though if she pondered it she had to concede he had often been the patient one.
When the golden-blue wisps of Metis’ outer bands at last surrounded them, she initiated the sLume drive a final time. One final run for the core at maximum speed, as swift as any human could travel across the stars.
They would drop out of superluminal 0.1 AU from the portal’s location but still within the thickest of the towering pillars of gas and dust. The instant the sLume drive idled the dampener field would kick in. She had paid a princely sum for a barely legal power allocation optimizer, and now the dampener field could operate at full strength without them being forced to freeze.
Still the trip took hours upon hours. As many hours as it had taken when they had previously made the journey, in fact. Unlike the prior journey, however, this night they spent together.
They passed the hours as couples facing the unknown yet temporarily powerless to influence their fate do: they made love as if it were the first time, murmured secrets to one another in the darkness, slept for a bit, and made love as if it were the last time.
Then there was no space left to travel and their fate returned to their hands.
They returned to the cockpit as the sLume drive idled and the scene beyond the viewport sharpened into clarity. The ship hovered in luminous, dense fog; as it did not actually travel forward under separate propulsion while inside the superluminal bubble, on exiting it the ship was already at rest.
Instantly she was a flurry of activity, confirming the dampener field had engaged, beginning scans for threats or any movement whatsoever in the area and attuning the spectrum analyzer across all bands.
The flare from the pulsar leapt to life on the spectrum display. The gamma beam pulsed in a regular, rapid spin. She filtered it out—and immediately frowned. “It’s gone.”
“Everything?”
Her head shook minutely. “The gamma radiation, the local one whose source we weren’t able to pinpoint. The terahertz radiation, too.”
He leaned closer to stare at the spectrum display with her. “But not the TLF.”
“But not the TLF.” She blew out a long, slow breath. “Okay. Nothing to do but find out why.” She started the impulse engine.
The nebular clouds soon began to thin, then abruptly evaporate as before. Yet in stark and rather disturbing contrast to before, the clouds evaporated to reveal only the void.
The ships were gone. And so was the portal.
Neither of them spoke. They simply regarded the empty blackness in stunned disbelief. She had prepared herself for a number of scenarios. None of those scenarios involved the portal being gone.
Because that was impossible.
He dropped his elbows to his knees with a heavy sigh. “So, new plan then.”
“No. The portal is there.”
His attention shifted from the viewport to her. His voice held calm conviction—and trust, she thought. “Okay. Why?”
“The same reason we’re here.”
“The TLF signal is still being generated from somewhere.”
“Correct. Now the question is….” With her left hand she strafed until the ship was positioned exactly perpen
dicular to the direction the wave propagated. She focused the spectrum analyzer sensors in on a point in space and took two snapshots. Then she threw both measurements to a waveform screen.
A wondrous breath fell from her lips as she sank into the chair. She was looking at a phase shift across the portal.
When measured given the precise point where the portal had floated as the origin, the TLF wave exhibited a 4.65° phase difference in each direction. On its own it didn’t tell her anything about the nature or breadth of the realm within the portal, as any number of cycles could have occurred inside—but it did tell her there existed a realm within the portal.
Caleb’s eyes narrowed at the screen for a moment before he shook his head and chuckled wryly. “And space falls back into alignment with the rules of the universe. The portal is there.”
“Told you.” She gave him a teasing if weighty smirk. “Now we just need to trigger it.”
“Which you’ve already determined how to do.”
The smirk softened to a smile. “Harmonics.”
He glanced at the row of screens and back to her. “The gamma radiation was a harmonic of the TLF, wasn’t it?”
“It was, though the frequency disparity was tremendous. I think the gamma frequency was an activation code. It kept the portal open while our alien friends traversed it and shut off once they no longer needed it. But I can mimic it.”
His gaze met hers, and the look in his eyes sent her stomach into somersaults and a delightful tingle rushing along her skin. She wanted nothing more in the world than to wind her fingers in his hair and pull him close and ask him if he might tell her what the look in his eyes meant.
Instead she swallowed and focused on the HUD. Her fingertips danced on a holographic panel to her left as she built the gamma wave. Once it was prepped she maneuvered the ship so it lined up directly on the invisible point which represented the center of the former portal.
Starshine: Aurora Rising Book One Page 48