by Неизвестный
Lise fell into step beside the man, who, in tandem with admiral Jay’salan, essentially controlled every move of one of the greatest fleets ever assembled. “Yes, sir,” she said, taking a chance to look more closely at the figure she saw so often on a cruiser or base-bridge from afar. The fatigue clearly showed on what were otherwise boyish features. She was certain, were it not for the neatly-trimmed beard, that his flowing blonde locks of hair and his round, smiling cheeks would have combined to make him look much too young and much too charming to be the man he truly was. Every survivor of Sparta followed the Admirals into the unknown after some of the worst destruction anyone should ever have to see, and admiral Jo’seph more than any other man was so often their guiding light. But the tides had turned once again, and even Jo’seph’s temper was beginning to show during the aftermath of each battle. Some of the higher-ups had noted his sarcasm becoming more biting and his mood more somber as each day wore on. But Lise could hardly blame the man; he simply had the fate of the Galaxy in his hands, pitted against the very force that had laid waste to his own world.
The admiral caught her looking at him, and Lise turned her eyes to the looming elevator door ahead. “You, ah, studied the reports concerning today’s activities, commander?”
Lise looked at him with a mustered seriousness and nodded. “Yes, admiral. I’ve read the reports several times.”
Jo’seph smiled. “Good,” he said. “I’m glad that makes one of us.” Lise shot him a nervous look before she’d even realized it, and then blushed. “Gotcha,” he said.
She was almost nervous, being this close to him and what had become his notorious sense of humor, but there were bigger diplomatic concerns this day, and she wasn’t about to be put off by her own admiral.
The couple made their way into the diminutive elevator. They descended to the flight deck of the Spartan cruiser in an uncomfortable silence. Finally the admiral looked at Lise, his face a mask of mock contemplation. Clearing his throat, he almost stammered as he tried to sound as nonchalant as possible. “You look very nice, commander.”
Lise simply stared forward, still standing at attention. “Thank you, sir.” She tried to sound as bland as possible.
Admiral Jo’seph grinned as he shook his head. “At ease, commander. I’m only the bloody admiral.”
Suddenly feeling sheepish, Lise again tried to relax and made an attempt at a smile that she was certain came out looking as foolish as she felt. “Sorry, sir.”
The shuttle deck smelled of ozone and fighter fuel. Just as commander Lise and the admiral stepped out of the elevator platform, the hanger door opened and flooded the deck with fresh air and light. Lise’s ears popped as the deck’s pressure stabilized. She cleared moisture from her dark eyes and peered across the hold as the sun’s light illuminated it. Several of the new so-called Bat fighters rested next to the smaller, older style wedge-shaped Interceptors. Lise looked at them with delight but couldn’t help but wonder if even the Bats’ new design and armaments would be enough to fend off total destruction at the hands of the Lordillians. The cruiser she was about to disembark, the ‘Return’, was one of the newer, sleeker ships in the fleet. Like the Bats, they were still few in number. Constant combat had meant little time to supply the demand needed to even the playing field against their bitter foes.
Lise saw the larger transport Bat with its boarding platform down and smiled. Admiral Jo’seph was making a show of their recent technological advances by showing up with so much new hardware, and Lise for one was glad to be riding to the planet below in style. She looked to the skyline beyond the launch portal, marveling at the pink clouds against the purple atmosphere. “Join the Coalition, see the Universe,” she said to herself. She broke her momentary reverie and headed past the ancient shuttles and equipment to the waiting Bat fighter beyond.
She set her bag down next to the other equipment and took her place with the soldiers and diplomats set to accompany the admiral. Letting out a breath, she smiled and nodded to the others about to board, hoping that she was more prepared for whatever might happen on the surface below than she really felt inside.
The admiral was giving a momentary briefing to each member of the team going below. When he finally got to Lise he again smiled. “I suppose you’re wondering how you got lucky enough to come along on this mission, commander?”
Lise tried again to loosen up a little, so she returned the smile wryly. “I was lead to believe it had something to do with my aristocratic upbringing,” she replied. “That or my charm.” Namely my ass, which everyone comments on, she thought, but decided not to voice aloud; she didn’t think that she was quite at that frank of a level with the admiral’s sense of humor just yet.
“Partially, commander” he said quite simply. “In just two years you’ve proven yourself a competent officer and soldier, quickly attaining your current rank. A formal upbringing combined with your guerilla and military training makes you a perfect support member of this team.” He leaned in a little. “In other words, I not only intend for you to help advise me on matters of state, but as you can never quite be sure what might happen during political negotiations, I intend for you to watch my back as well.” Admiral Jo’seph inclined his head to the soldier on Lise’s right. “You’ll be issued a small weapon upon arrival within the city that you are to keep secreted. Understood?”
“Sir!”
“Very good. Carry on, commander.” And with that, the admiral boarded the craft.
The ship flew to the surface below with speed and ease. Lise could see the capitol city of the planet Moonshau on the horizon. The initial landing point was on the outskirts of the city, among endless fields of tall grass and rolling clouds. She watched the sunrise colors dim to the morning hues from the small view slit in the transport’s side until the sky was at last a startling blue. Then the green hillsides loomed into view for their landing approach. Lise smiled to private Zhade, the soldier sitting next to her, all of her preconceptions and nervousness forgotten. Zhade smiled back evenly, probably seeing less novelty or interest in yet another planet fall. He had been in Lise’s strike team a month now, and while she was impressed with his skill with the rifle, Zhade’s lack of enthusiasm made it hard for her to like him sometimes. She turned back to the view of the surface, the landing nearly complete.
As soon as the gear touched ground, the cargo hatch opened and the armed soldiers rushed down the ramp to secure the landing zone. They stood at attention to either side of the ramp as the admiral, Lise, and the other delegates walked down to step foot at last on Moonshau soil.
Lise quickly took stock of her surroundings; a table sat not ten yards away, several men standing before it, waiting for their guests. On either side of the transport Bat landed two of the new fighters flying escort, their tail-mounted canons curling up under the fuselage of the ships for the long landing gear to reach the ground and then lower exit hatches. As the escort pilots climbed down to also stand at attention, Lise briefly looked up, finding the ‘Return’ floating some forty thousand feet above them. Even from that height she could discern the sheer size of the near half-mile long battle cruiser.
As the engine noise and winds finally died down, the Moonshau delegates came forward. “I am Daysuan, Prime Minister of the providing Government of Moonshau. I am honored by your presence, Admiral Jo’seph of the Galactic Coalition.” He held out his hand and smiled. Lise watched as the admiral took the hand of friendship, studying the humanoid faces that greeted them. Their skin was blotched with subtle color, but seemed fairly common otherwise. Moonshaun hair, while apparently the same texture as a Spartan’s, was brilliantly more highlighted, with three or four ranges of color mixed in.
There was a brief moment of awkward silence before the Admiral at last spoke. “Sir, the honor is mine. Allow me to introduce commander Lise.” Jo’seph released Daysuan’s hand to motion to Lise. She stepped forward, smiling pleasantly. The alien delegate’s hand had six fingers, and was colder than a Spartan’s sk
in, shaking hers lightly.
The admiral finished introducing the representatives he had brought from the Coalition and soon they were shown to the table where more Moonshaun men waited. Papers and computer consoles were set on the table, and it was soon apparent that there were a number of official documents to be ratified before the proceedings could continue. Lise waited patiently with the others, knowing from her briefings that the Moonshau were a fastidious race and that their politics, procedures, and lives alike were often an endless debate. But their technology was great, and their armies battle-hardened by those debates over the centuries that had gone awry. Even if it took months, Admiral Jo’seph was determined that today would be the groundwork for accepting the peoples of the Moonshau into the Coalition.
Finally the paperwork seemed complete, and soon they were escorted to waiting transports that took the Coalition members into the city. Outlying simple buildings lead into a central metropolis of towering skyscrapers of a very modern design. Transparent exteriors housed communities, commercial districts, and offices. Each section was woven by sleek transport rail tubes that curled around between the exterior shielding and the levels within. Distribution nodes began and ended at either end of catwalks that connected the structures over the clean streets below. Glass and steel surrounded her, and everywhere there was technology with both form and function. Each hard line of the city was glossed over by appealing colors or commercial signs, but nowhere was there anything but the highest level of craftsmanship. Hanging above it all were the airships, slowly moving between the massive structures, watching.
Within the hour they were at last in the council chambers where the debates could begin. Lise found herself both relieved and feeling slight trepidation at this fact, but she kept her posture and her smile from fading, shaking each new hand and remembering each new name as best she could, and when all backs were turned to her for just a moment, already past any detectors, Zhade slipped her a small sidearm.
Servants walked into the room in single file, each one bearing a tray of fruit or drinks. Lise watched the delegates from both parties smile and pick up refreshments to nurse while they made small talk before the more serious matters at hand could begin discussion. She looked around the room at the politicians and soldiers, the senators and servants, and she was reminded of home. The moment was as close to anything she could call ‘normal’ in her memory since before she had even heard the word ‘Lordillian’. Lise’s smile faded, and a brief moment of melancholy replaced an even shorter time of anger. Sparta’s fate now laid at the very doorstep of Moonshau, and yet they were blind to it, just as Sparta had been. Replacing the frown that had crept onto her features with a forced pleasantness, she smoothed down her uniform and tried to keep her emotions from making her fidgety.
At last everyone was seated, and the talks had begun.
“The governments of my world have watched the events of the last decade unfold with deep concern, and its peoples have watched in fear.” Daysuan addressed the small throng of people that had fit in the chambers, speaking loudly so that all could hear but with a voice full of assuredness. “The Lordillian menace has spread like a plague, a great horde of destruction that has arisen like a barbarous force to crush all before it. Once we feared for our neighboring star systems, but ultimately chose to keep our forces at home for our own ends. Now the battle lines threaten to spill into our star system, and many now ask if we have already waited too long to become involved. They say that it may already be too late to keep that horde from battering down our door and destroying all that we have built and loved. That if we had already helped an honorable cause to defeat the Lordillians, that we would not see this menace so close to our home.”
“And there are those who believe that we still have no business getting involved in a fight that is not our own.” Another Moonshau senator had stood, speaking evenly but with an obvious hidden anger. “Indeed, that this war would most probably never be ours, the Lordillians having no reason or real reach to attack Moonshau.”
“Then I would tell such persons,” answered admiral Jo’seph as he stood, “that they should pay closer attention to the events that led to the previous attacks and subjugations of the other worlds the Lordillians have already conquered.” He turned to the men and women who now were forced to listen to him, waiting for the rumble of conversation to die down. “I know you all wish to protect your own interests, be they those of your governments, or peoples, or gains.” The throng again began to mutter at this, but the admiral continued unabated. “And it so happens that unless your world allies itself with the Coalition now those interests will mean nothing the moment the Lordillian heel sets its mark on any world or moon in this system.
“Daysuan does not exaggerate when he describes the Lordillian horde as a plague. They spread just as quickly and suddenly, and with just as little regard for those it can use as those it can simply destroy. They multiply their forces with the speed of an infection, destroying from within.” The admiral’s fist slammed into his own hand to help drive home his point, his spirit evident on his features with each word he now uttered. “This is not simply the fears of a paranoid nation or man, this is the proven truth; that Chebonka’s machine nation, the Lordillian horde, does not discriminate as it works its way across the galaxy to make each system its own, whether that system has strategic significance or not. A policy of anchorite neutrality can no longer be exercised or seriously considered by a world that is literately within the path of a plague that travels ever forward.”
“What admiral Jo’seph suggests,” helped Daysuan, “is that we join the Coalition now and commit what help we can before the Lordillians have the chance to land their forces on our colonies or, disastrously worse, on our home planet.”
“Help the Coalition may soon be in desperate need of, as I understand it,” said another senator, this one old and angry sounding. “Your war goes badly, admiral. Shall we commit out men to simply die beside your own?”
“There is strength in numbers, sir,” supplied Lise at last. She felt her own anger over this ignorant debate rise along with the constriction in her chest as she stood to address the court. Taking a deep breath, and finding that all eyes had turned on her, she continued. “Ladies and gentlemen, I have seen firsthand what it is to be invaded by the Lordillians. They know no mercy and have no conscience. They are simply programmed to crush all resistance in their path and take what they know is now theirs. For each one that you may have the firepower to knock down, another rises in its place.”
Lise took another breath, turning so that each delegate and senator within the chamber could hear her voice and see her face. “But I have also seen what it means when the few who remain rise to the challenge of facing those things and work towards kicking them off of their world. I’ve seen it in the faces of my friends as they died destroying hundreds of those metal monsters. Men and women who were simply people defending what was left of their home. Not soldiers, just defiant people. But I’ve seen that same look in the face of every single one of my fellow soldiers and officers alike within the Coalition.” She paused, coming to stare at the old senator. “All it takes is strength and the heart of nations defending what they believe in. Do you believe in your way of life, sir?”
“I do,” said the old senator. “And I still have no reason to believe that our current comfort and security will not continue.” He turned once more to the throng in their seats. “Why should we enter a war with these alien races and their Coalition that may fail when the Lordillians may never even enter our star system? Why commit our resources and soldiers to battle and bring their wrath upon us when we could be negotiating a treaty with Chebonka at this very moment, insuring our current way of life does continue into the years to come? Instead we sit here and debate spending billions in currency and possibly in lives.”
There was a rumble of agreement among many of those seated, and Lise watched, tears kept barely in check, threatening to run onto her blushing cheeks as hi
story again prepared to repeat itself.
“Enough!” Lise had almost screamed it, slamming a palm onto the table and causing every face to turn to her in surprise. Her rage was unabated, passions surging as she stared back into each set of eyes locked with hers. She swept her arm wide. “All of this will be gone. No deals, no treaties, no mercy will be shown! When the Lordillians want this corner of space, either for what you possess, what you know, or simply because you’re in the way of the next parsec they want, then they will come and they will take it.” At last the emotions flowed without shame, yet Lise showed them with pride, her chest swelling with the words as they came. “My father and the politicians of my race once thought as you do. But that power out there is not simply someone else’s problem, nor is it an issue to be bargained with. When they came, the Lordillians killed not only my father, but also my mother, my friends, their children.
“Were it not for the foresight of this man,” she said, pointing to the admiral, “then all would have been lost. He and admiral Jay’salan had already mobilized and begun planning a defense against what they knew was coming. Yet still it was too late, for if there is anything that so featureless and spiteful a race as the Lordillians possess in spades, then it is speed and surprise. The small portions of our fleet that had been allocated to Jo’seph’s cause returned to a world under siege, a race being wiped out, and a planet in flames. They became the Admirals of the Fleet by default, for everyone else was dead.” She stood there, pleading with them for their own lives, her eyes brimming with moisture, arms out, and hands that balled into fists or opened in gestures of hope or despair. At last the feelings flooded out of her, and she sighed, relaxing a little, placing her hands on the table before her to lean on them. She shook her head at the waiting delegates. “Why don’t you see it? Why didn’t they see it? Why don’t you realize that some things that are right must be fought for, that some things out there truly are the evil in the dark that will devour your children just as surely as your neighbor’s?”