He went back to his room and climbed right back into the shower, and as he was standing there with the water hitting his face, he began to wonder once more what it was he was even doing there. Deep in his heart he still wanted to fight against Earth and those who supported her, and yet life seemed so different now.
I wonder what remains of the Krys Empire. Jafar has taken charge, but what of the old Lords? What of Erdogan’s family and his heirs? I can’t accept they have all fallen in line with Jafar.
He had a wealth of questions that he needed answers to but had to be careful how he went about it. He was far from free. He stepped out and pulled on his uniform before stepping out into the corridor. He walked and walked until he came to an artificial garden, much like he had fought his way out of just days before.
He paced up to a vast window that looked out into space and the fleet beyond. It was as though he was standing at a lakeside. He marvelled at the ships before him.
“Beautiful, isn’t it? The second largest fleet in the Alliance,” said General Lysenko.
She was standing beside him, and he hadn’t even noticed her presence. He had fallen into a dreamlike state.
“I guess,” he replied, looking back to see the well-equipped guards standing behind them.
“You still don’t trust me, do you?”
“Why would I? You are a criminal who was created and programmed to destroy life, as I know it. And yet you are conflicted, because you can see for yourself how much things have changed.”
“But you are willing to believe in me?”
“At this late stage in the war, I don’t think you can do any harm.”
“It’s going that well?” he asked sarcastically.
“Bolormaa is a powerful enemy. When she amasses forces, we can barely ever stand against her. But she has weaknesses, and when we can fight on the ground, and time of our choosing, we can make a difference. That is what I want you for. To carry out small sabotage missions that a larger force would not be able to.”
“Not be able to, or that you wouldn’t want to risk losing?”
“You aren’t expendable to me, but I am willing to take risks with the lives of you and your people that I would not any other unit.”
“Good to know.”
“I am not here to lie to you, and you’ll find out soon enough, but you are also no good to me dead. You could be a valuable resource to the Alliance, and your death would not help anyone. So know this. I will send you into hell, but I want you to come back, only so I can send you back there the next day.”
CJ gritted his teeth as he shook his head.
“Honestly tell me that Lord Erdogan treated you any better? He gave you a one-way ticket. You weren’t much more than a suicide bomber to him, a throw away device to hurt Colonel Taylor. You must have known you’d never really succeed in destroying him by yourself?”
He thought about the General’s words, but somehow he couldn’t bring himself to believing it.
“A soldier does what needs to be done, no matter the price.”
“Yes, and you will be that for us?”
“If it helps the Krys Empire to survive, yes, but I will never take orders from that imposter, Jafar.”
“Someday you may see him differently. He has been nothing but a power for good for the Krys people.”
CJ shook his head. “No, he has just made them more Human.”
“And that is bad thing?”
“Humanity is weak.”
“It defeated Erdogan and the Krys Empire.”
CJ grunted. He didn’t agree, but he wasn’t going to fight, not when he was so close to being truly free.
“Lieutenant King!” the General called.
She stepped into view and had clearly been brought there for a reason.
“Captain, I have every faith that you will do what is required of you, but I am also not a fool. You are a convict, leading convicts. You are the worst kind of scum, but scum who have a chance to redeem themselves and be part of something great once again. As you can imagine, I’d never let a ship of convicts sail off into the night, in the hope that they stand by their word. I do hope that you understand?”
CJ groaned once again.
“Lieutenant King will be attached to your unit as my Liaison Officer. She will operate independently in an oversight roll and will only be answerable to me, do you understand me?”
“You want me to have a babysitter?”
“Yes, I do, Captain. I want to think I made the right decision with you, and I am giving you a lot of leeway to operate in the way you think best, but that doesn’t mean I trust you. The Lieutenant will ensure you stay on task. If any harm comes to her, and I do mean any harm, it will be on your head. She is my representative, and you will treat her as though she were me. Do we understand one another?”
“Yes, we do,” he snarled.
He looked highly irritated by this development, but he was in no position to argue.
“We all have big decisions to make in this life, Captain. What sort of people we are going to be, what life we are going to lead. Some of us can change the world, we can change all the worlds, and I think you can be a key to all of that.”
“And if I don’t want to be part of your big plan?”
“Then you’ll not be put back to sleep. You’ll be hunted down and ended for good,” she replied sternly.
“So I have my freedom, providing I do what the woman with the gun says? How very tolerant of you.”
“Tolerance has a place in peacetime, but not in war. Colonel Taylor has shown us that. Our civilisation has become weak, and I just hope we have enough time to change. I wish there were enough strong men and women to lead this fight, and that we did not need to bring back dinosaurs like you and him.”
“We are nothing alike,” he spat.
She smiled in response, and it was just as discomforting as it was when he did it to others.
“You are more similar than you are willing to accept, and maybe one day when you see that, you could be as great as he is.”
“The day I become greater is the day that he dies at my hands.”
“You will not touch Taylor. You will not dare. Whatever grievance you have with the Colonel, you can settle it after the war is over.”
He didn’t seem willing to accept that.
“If you go anywhere near Taylor, or make any attempt to harm him, you will be executed immediately. I already have that order signed by the President of the Alliance. I need but issue that order, and it will be carried out, without question.”
“If you’ve got anyone with the balls to go through with it.”
“Don’t think that because we need you that you are the only strength we have. You are going to play ball, Captain, because if you don’t, I’ll make sure there is a bullet put between your eyes. If you don’t like that deal, then I can have you shot here and now! So what’s it going to be?”
His mood seemed to change rapidly as he turned face-on to her with a smile.
“I’ll play your game because I want to live, same reason you brought me back.”
“Good, I am glad that we understand one another.”
A light flashed out of the corner of his eye. A ship had just arrived beside them and filled half of the view window. It was a sleek vessel, with a narrow fuselage, and engines twice its size on either side of its body with stout little wings. It looked like it was built for speed, and was as small as the smallest frigate. It glimmered as though made of some special alloy unlike the rest of the ships that surrounded them.
“Beautiful, isn’t she?” Lysenko asked.
Jones couldn’t help but laugh. It was a brutish and ugly ship that looked as though it was entirely utilitarian.
“The first and only of her kind. Using Human, Krys, and Aranui technology to make a ship that is faster, stronger, and better than anything that has come before it. She is just a prototype, and we won’t see production models for months, if not years to come. Bolormaa destroy
ed the facility she was being designed in, and she is all that remains, a stray that is in need of a new master. We call her the Phoenix, and she is yours, Captain.”
He admired the vessel now, as he realised it was his ticket to freedom. He had doubted he would ever be free of that place, and there it was.
Phoenix, you are beautiful.
Chapter 8
“You men and women have been given a second chance. A second chance not just to do your duty, but to make a difference in this life!” Lysenko declared.
They all stood to attention on the docking bay floor beside the transports waiting to take them to the Phoenix. CJ just couldn’t wait to leave. He could almost taste freedom now as she continued.
“This isn’t about one world, or one race, it is about the survival of us all. Captain Jones is one of the most competent combat leaders in our history. You are in good hands. Stay the course and do your jobs, and not only can we win this war, but you will have earned your freedom. Good luck to you all!”
“Fall out!” CJ yelled.
They began to pour into the boats as CJ waited for the final words of the General.
“I have sent your orders to your Mappad,” she said, looking at the device attached to his forearm.
“You’ll start small. A surveillance outpost that was established by Morohtan forces last week. You are to engage the enemy and destroy.”
“That simple?”
“No reason for it not to be. I expect you to return for evaluation within eighteen hours. Don’t disappoint me, Captain. You don’t want to see me disappointed. Good luck with your mission.”
He said nothing as he ran aboard the nearest craft and took his seat. He slumped back down into it, overcome with excitement. He was finally getting free. He found himself sitting across from Kaner.
“Sir, you met Erdogan, did you not?” he asked.
The engines roared as they began to lift off, and CJ did not respond. He was watching from the window. When they were clear of the docking bays, he turned his attention to the Lieutenant.
“Yes, I did.”
“What was he like? Was he really the monster that history has made him out to be?”
CJ shrugged. “Honestly, I couldn’t tell you. I was on his side, and we lost. History is written by the winners, is it not?”
“But you still stand by his beliefs and by him? Even after his death?”
“Of course, that is the man who I was born to be.”
“Then you must hate Jafar?”
CJ looked over to King. She was listening in to the whole conversation. He turned to look out of the window and didn’t reply. He still felt like a slave.
But my time for freedom will come.
It seemed to have been no time at all when they were once again setting down, and the ramp lowered into their new home. CJ was first out of the door. The ship’s Captain was awaiting them.
“Welcome aboard. I am Captain Marks.”
He was in his mid-thirties and vaguely non-descript, but he did have an educated American accent.
CJ didn’t like him already.
Why is a Human at the helm?
But he shook the man’s hand anyway. He didn’t want to give the impression that anything was off.
“Impressive, isn’t she, the next generation of super fast frigates, better than anything that has come before us? Sadly, it may be some time before we see another like her. It is quite an honour that she has been given to you.”
CJ grunted as in agreement, but he wasn’t convinced. He could see little evidence of Krys tech in the ship, and it didn’t look like anything he could call home as he surveyed his surroundings. He noticed support beams of the ship were pulsating just very slightly, as if they were alive.
“You’re not dreaming, Captain. The Aranui use living components in their ships. The Phoenix is a hybrid of that technology and our own. It’s what allows us to run on such a skeleton crew. Just twenty personnel for the entire ship, and six of those are purely for security purposes.”
He looked as if he expected CJ to be impressed, but all CJ could think was the ship was chosen because it risked as few lives as possible. It would also make it easier for him to seize control, when and if he needed to.
“Less then a hundred men and women on one ship, and they think we can make a world of difference?” Mirov asked.
There was doubt in his voice.
“Can’t we?”
“I am told we have everything you now need to carry out your first mission. Your accommodation is ready for you. All operational data has been sent to your personal Mappads, and you’ll find ammunition and supplies there,” he said, pointing to a vast pile of crates. CJ walked over to them and lifted the lid on the first. It was packed to the top with ammunition. It certainly brought a smile to his face.
“That’s what I’m talking about!” declared Ross in his thick and growly Scottish accent.
CJ opened the next box and the one after it. Every single one was full of ammunition, as was every one after that which he opened.
“What are they expecting us to do, fight a battle or the whole war?” asked Mirov.
“Something tells me that wherever they are sending us, they don’t expect it to be a walk in the park. If they did, they’d have sent someone else. Load up, everything you can carry!”
The fifty men and women of his unit swarmed over the boxes.
“The General really is expecting to use us as an expendable asset, isn’t she? She might not admit it, but it’s true, isn’t it?” CJ asked, and as he looked into King’s eyes, he could see she couldn’t deny it with good conscience.
“That’s what I thought.”
It left a bitter taste in his mouth as he stuffed his armour with as much ammunition and as many grenades as he could.
“If you would join me on the bridge, Captain,” said Marks.
“Sure,” he replied with no enthusiasm at all. “Mirov, Ross, Rivera, with me,” he added.
The ship’s Captain led them to the bridge. It wasn’t far to go. There were just three decks on the ship, and none of them were particularly large. The ship looked as though it was built for performance, and not for comfort. The corridors were cramped, and every room was not a millimetre larger than it needed to be to function.
“A lot smaller on the inside than she looks on the outside, isn’t she?” Marks asked.
“You could say that,” he responded.
“Power and protection; that is where the space has gone. She’ll take more than most battleships could hope to, and outrun most fighters. She is an incredible piece of technology. She truly is the next generation, and the future of our Navy, if the Alliance can survive long enough in the face of Bolormaa and all that follow her. You believe we can win, right?”
“I don’t know much. Never met her, don’t know her, haven’t fought her or her followers,” replied CJ.
Mirov smiled at seeing how uncomfortable that made the ship’s Captain. A door opened before them to reveal the bridge. There were just five personnel aboard, and the room gave a three hundred and sixty degree view of all that was around them as it was projected onto the walls.
“Welcome to the twenty-fifth century, Captain Jones.”
He took up his chair and swivelled around with a smile.
“What are your orders?”
CJ didn't look too happy. He would never get used to that name.
"What is it, Captain?"
"Just called me CJ."
"Yes...yes, Sir."
"Sir, General Lysenko is hailing us directly," one of the crew said.
"Put her through," he quickly responded with fear in his voice.
She appeared before him. "What can we do for you, Sir?"
"I just wanted to say a few words before you left, not to you, to him."
CJ just nodded for her to go on.
"Captain, you have a new chance in life, and so do all those under your command. Please remember what it is you have been given. Ther
e are a lot of people counting on you. Don't let us down. None of us can afford the price of failure."
He nodded in agreement at the shallow veiled threat and wondered why she even bothered. The General had made her position quite clear before. Do what she asks or die. It wasn't much of an offer.
"Good luck to all of you, Lysenko out."
As the transmission ended, it became clear that Marks was not fully aware of their deal, and he looked most confused.
"She talks like you are not to be trusted."
"Maybe I'm not."
The Captain couldn't tell if he was messing with him or not, so he just smiled and went along with it.
"Your orders?" he asked.
"You know our coordinates and what we are about to undertake?"
"I do."
"Then why waste any time? We have work to do. Set a course and jump when ready. Just be sure to bring us in a good few klicks away from our target."
"Sir? Don't we want to utilise our element of surprise?"
"I hope so, but I'd like to know what kind of shit we are being thrown into before diving in head first."
"Yes, Sir," he replied suspiciously, "The course was already plotted before you came aboard. We are ready to jump."
"Make your adjustments and do it."
He paced back to Kaner who clearly had some doubt on his face as to the orders he had given out.
"Giving us some distance to investigate. You do not seem like that kind of man," he whispered.
"No, I do not."
Kaner could see he had some plan he was working though in his head, and that made him curious.
"Tell me, Lieutenant, do you see yourself as continuing on with a gun to your head, or as a free man?"
"The former, but I would gladly be the latter."
"Then why don't we make that a possibility?"
Kaner smiled in response. He openly had no loyalty to those in the Alliance.
"Tell me, what was your crime?"
"I killed my CO."
CJ smiled. "That's good to know."
"We didn't agree with one another. He was a coward, and he got five of my friends killed. I don't have any tolerance for his sort."
"You wouldn't try the same again, would you?"
Phoenix Odyssey Book 1 (Battle Beyond Earth) Page 6