Francescan War Chronicles 1: Space Knight Denxeiter

by C. K. Pershing

  “Yeah, you were right.”

  Caron chuckled. “The fact is we don’t know what happens in that extra microscopic bit of percentage. We do know that coming here is part of the process. You didn’t get here last time. But since you’re here now, you’ve risen a few decimal points from before. As for what happens if you achieve full Resonance— if you achieve it— we don’t know.

  “This is completely alien territory to us, but getting there is likely dependent on your Companion just as it was to get here. It may well be that this is as far as you’ll ever get. It’s much farther an anybody else, but still not full Resonance. Maybe one day she’ll get you there.”

  “Aaltskog was only able to hold it for a short time before,” Feln said. “Can she hold it longer now that I’ll be imprinted into Denxeiter’s mind?”

  “Yes,” Aliss answered, “But not for too much longer. Ironically, it seems like the longer you stay near Resonance, the worse it is on the Companion. We think that achieving full Resonance is better for the Companion’s survival.”

  “Are you saying this can kill her?”

  “If she’s not careful, yes.”

  Feln nodded. “I see.” He laughed mirthlessly. “Damn—why are Hyper Battle Machines even designed this way? How did they come up with this whole concept?”

  Aliss shook her head, Vogel shrugged and Caron said, “That is a question we unfortunately can’t answer. Being here hasn’t made us privy to all of Denxeiter’s secrets. For that matter, we’re not sure Denxeiter himself knows the answer to these questions. It would be like us trying to figure out why God made us the way He did. That is how Denxeiter likely comprehends his creators.”

  “You keep referring to Denxeiter like an an actual person. Aaltskog does too. I find myself saying ‘he’ and ‘him’ sometimes myself— usually around Aaltskog. But I also refer to him as ‘it’.” Feln said. “Is it— he— sentient? I’m never really sure.”

  All three nodded. Aliss said, “Oh, most definitely. It’s just his sentience works in a different way to ours. Sometimes it surfaces in ways that we find familiar and other times it’s completely alien. Considering the three of us are now parts of his mind, that just goes to show how alien he can truly be if we don’t even understand him.”

  “I could swear he’s actually spoken to me once or twice.”

  “That’s a distinct possibility. I wouldn’t be surprised.”

  “What we know of Hyper Battle Machines is what you know,” Caron said. “Which is to say almost nothing. Their creators are very secretive and the Dragon Crypts of the Academy where the Machines are built are sealed to all but the Emperor or Empress— whoever is the actual ruler at the time. And even then, we’re not sure the creators truly reveal all their secrets.”

  “Hyper Battle Machines mix science with magic, and some kind of tech from the Ancients found in the Dragon Crypts. And Companions are supposed to be the bridge.” Vogel said.

  “Yeah, that’s what I’ve always understood,” Feln said.

  “Well, that’s all we know too,” Aliss said. “But this’ll be the first time a Space Knight actually came back from any kind Resonance involving a Machine’s mind. With any luck, this little bit of information you take back with you might help somebody figure out how to deal with this problem and unlock the full potential to what Resonance brings.”

  “That’s assuming I actually survive when I come back,” Feln said. “It’s not looking good.” He suddenly thought of something. “Also, if the Companion provides the link, what happens if the Companion loses contact with the Space Knight during Resonance?”

  Vogel waved his arm around the room, “You end up like us.”

  “I ask because this enemy we’re fighting, they had some kind of array that jammed our signals. I was in combat for two weeks without being able to communicate with Aaltskog. She kept me out of trouble with Resonance before because we were close by. And of course, she’s in the cockpit with me now, so that explains this time. But what happens if we come across another array or something similar. I mean, the thing even jammed psychic and magic transmissions.”

  Caron frowned, “That sounds like a truly frightening weapon then. It would negate being able to achieve and return from Resonance then.”

  Feln looked at Aaltskog. “She said there’s a good chance the array was built by the Ancient Enemy. Hyper Battle Machines supposedly uses technology from the Ancients. I wonder if one of the array’s true purposes isn’t just to suck ships out of jump and jam comms and navs, but to also neutralize Hyper Battle Machines…”

  The other three looked at each other. “That would mean the Ancients also had Hyper Battle Machines or something similar,” Aliss said.

  “Well, would it really be so surprising to find out they did?” Feln asked. “Maybe not exactly like ours, but something similar. Compared to some of the legends of the other things they could do, a Hyper Battle Machine actually sounds pretty simple in comparison. We know the Machines use some technology patterned after stuff the Ancients used.

  “For all we know, the creators of our Hyper Battle Machines somehow stumbled across plans for an Ancient version in the crypts and did some reverse engineering. And this array we just destroyed was something the Ancient Enemy came up with to stop them.”

  Feln looked at the other three. They all had grim expressions, “That, I think, is a very astute observation, and likely not very far from the truth,” Caron said. The other two nodded.

  “Hell, we don’t even know who or what you’re fighting out there, but if they had something like that, you’ve gotta make sure they don’t build another.” Vogel said.

  “Well, even though they managed to get it to work, the things we’re fighting didn’t seem to know everything about it themselves. But they were originally sent by the Ancient Enemy to fight the Ancients, so they might still manage to cobble together another one someday. Or find one,” Feln said.

  Aaltskog’s sleeping body shifted for a moment and she coughed. The room they were all in went out of focus and the imprint Space Knights disappeared until Aaltskog stopped coughing.

  “She’s waking up,” Aliss said. “She’s powerful, but still not completely there yet to make the Resonance work in this state, much less completely.”

  “Do you think she ever will be?” Feln asked.

  “I don’t know. I was just a Space Knight. Only her creator might be able to answer that, but even then, who knows? He might be able to make an even better Companion for this sort of thing with his next creation, or she may be able to achieve these things herself.”

  “I hope it’s the second option. The first one’s out because her creator killed himself.”

  Aaltskog coughed and the room lost focus again.

  “Dammit, I had so many more things to ask. What makes me special? Why did they pick me to be her partner? How did they know she’d work so well with Denxeiter? Or that I would work well with both of them?”

  “We don’t know the answers to those questions,” Caron said. “I think the creators of Denxeiter and your Companion would know the answers.”

  “But they’re both dead— one from old age and one from suicide!”

  “Then someone in the Space Knight Academy’s inner sanctum must know.”

  “Those people are almost as secretive as the creators of the Hyper Battle Machines themselves. They all work together.”

  “It ain’t gonna be easy, kid,” said Vogel, “But you get outta this situation you’re in now, I figure you’ll be able to convince the sanctum to tell you what they know.”

  “Thanks for the vote of confidence, because I’m not so sure.”

  “Captain Koenig, time is running out,” said Aliss. “Your Companion will wake up any moment here. When she does, you’ll be back in the real world. But you’ll be in the accelerated state of time you found yourself in before. We’ll do everything we can to prolong the effect to give you more time to finish off your enemies. But I can’t make any promises of just
how much more time you’ll get. It still all comes down to your Companion.”

  “Okay, I understand,” Feln said.

  The three stood up and saluted. “Captain, good luck,” Aliss said.

  Feln also stood and saluted. “It was an honor to meet all of you. I promise to do my best to live up to your memories.”

  They each nodded in turn and faded from view. Feln was left alone with Aaltskog. He sat down and took her hand in his and squeezed gently. “Darling, wake up.”

  Chapter Seven

  Aaltskog tossed her head back and then forward. Her eyes shot open wide and she sucked in her breath. Feln saw the white star designs in her purple eyes spinning around her pupils in a blur. The effect was almost as if there were white haloes in her eyes. As the stars started to slow, Feln heard a massive bang and was blinded again by the bright light.

  He was sitting in Denxeiter’s cockpit. He was still holding Aaltskog’s hand over his shoulder as he’d been when they went into Resonance. He looked ahead and saw the enemy ship filling his screen, a collision imminent and he yanked Denxeiter hard right to avoid the craft.

  As he throttled back, he looked around. As before, everything else around Denxeiter was in a state of extreme slow motion and was essentially frozen.

  Aaltskog’s hand suddenly jerked. “Huh?”

  “Are you awake?”

  “Yeah…did we go into Resonance?”

  “Yeah, pretty much.”

  “We did? What was it like? How did we come back?”

  “I’ll tell you all that later. For now, we’re in that Resonance slow motion effect like before. Try to keep us like this as long as you can.”

  “I’m not sure I’ll be able to.”

  Feln thought about the fact that staying at near-Resonance for too long could kill Aaltskog and said, “See what you can do. It might be a little easier this time, but don’t try too hard.”

  Aaltskog was quiet for a moment before she said, “Because I’ll die. I know. But we were ready to make this a suicide run anyway, so what’s the difference?” She smiled. “But yeah, maybe this’ll work. Somebody’s helping me, aren’t they?”

  “Yeah, but I don’t have time to explain.”

  “That’s fine. I think I know who it is.” She grew quiet again. This time for a few seconds before Feln finally turned to look at her.

  “Hey, are you with me? We've still gotta kill these guys.”

  “Right. Sorry. I thought I heard my father, er, my creator talking to me.”

  “What?”

  “Never mind. Okay, first fly in front of their beams and deploy the Den Aegis as you go by. Even though it’s mostly destroyed, at the speed we’re going, it should magnify the Den Aegis’ effect and spread it over the distance we travel. That’ll save our people from being hit, at least.”

  “Okay.” Feln pushed Denxeiter forward and flung out the Den Aegis from the tattered remains of Denxeiter’s cape. He shot around the battlefield as fast as he could, and made sure to place Denxeiter between the Francescan ships and all incoming enemy beams. The entire experience was so surreal as he flew past active beams and crossed in front of them as if they were glowing cylinders floating still in the air. As he finished, he said, “Alright, that’s done. Now how do we destroy the enemy?”

  “Well, we’re going to pierce their shields by vibrating Ganxeiter’s sword at the same frequency their shields are vibrating. Normally, the vibration would be too fast to do anything about, but it just so happens we’re moving a little bit faster than usual.”

  “How do I do that?”

  “Just jam the sword into the enemy. I’ll take care of it.”

  “If you say so.”

  “Trust me. Okay, this one here, stab its hull.”

  Denxeiter was heading toward one of the enemy ships and as it drew near, Feln did as instructed. Ganxeiter’s sword slashed down at the enemy and just as Feln was expecting the weapon to bang off of the ships’ shields, there was a flash and the sword sliced into the hull as if the shields were never there. Feln started laughing as he sliced the enemy ship apart— it simply hung there in space and Feln felt like he was carving up a large statue. As he did so, he asked, “What was that flash before the sword went in?”

  “The shields popping. Too much vibration and they overload.”

  “Speaking of that, I didn’t feel any vibration.”

  “It’s happening so fast, you won’t notice it.” Aaltskog coughed and said, “But Feln, you have to hurry. I can feel things slipping. Just pop their shields and destroy their main weapons. The beams from our fleet will kill them since they won’t have shields and they can’t fight back.”

  “Yes ma’am,” Feln said and he flew through the group of enemy ships doing just as Aaltskog said.

  “Hurry,” she said in a whisper, “Even if I die, we gotta save the fleet.”

  He noticed the world around him slowly starting to move. It wasn’t in real time yet, but he knew he didn’t have long without Aaltskog telling him.

  “Don’t talk,” he said. “We’ve got two more.” He jammed the sword through the first ship’s shield and was greeted by the telltale burst of light that the shields were down. He proceeded to slice into the enemy’s weapons bays, destroying them as he went along. If any ship was in the process of firing, the catastrophic blowback of the energy in its destroyed weapons would blow up the rest of the ship.

  He flew over to the last ship and as he went to jam the sword in, it moved much slower and the flash of light didn't happen. Everything around was starting to move at about half its normal speed. No, not yet! Feln thought.

  “Sweetheart?” he called.

  “I know,” she said. “I’m…”

  The sword suddenly went through and the shields burst into light. As that happened, everything slowed down again just for an instant, but as soon as the sword penetrated, the world was back in real time.

  Various enemy ships exploded behind Denxeiter— the one that Feln first cut up, as well as some of the ships that had been about to fire just as he destroyed their weapons. Other ships that had been shielded were instantly blown up by beams fired by the Francescan ships into hulls no longer protected by shields.

  As Feln jammed the sword into the weapons bay of the enemy ship, he flew along the length of the ship and cut the hull open just as a group of beams from the Tannhauser slammed into the open gash left behind. The ship exploded into a ball of bright light and Feln hurriedly got out of the killing zone of beams fired by the Francescans. He was also happy to see that Aaltskog’s plan with the Den Aegis worked. Not a single friendly ship had received any damage since he performed the maneuver. Flying away from the enemy ships, he was satisfied to see all of them on fire and exploding. The danger was over.

  “We did it!” Feln said.

  Aaltskog didn’t make a sound.

  “Darling? Are you okay?” he asked.

  Silence.

  He brought Denxeiter to a stop over the Tannhauser’s deck and unclasped his seat belts and got out of his chair. He spun around to Aaltskog’s chair behind his. She was sprawled back in her seat with blood coming out of her nose and the corners of her closed eyes.

  “Oh, God, no,” Feln said. He pulled her into his arms. “No, come on, wake up. We won. All because of you.” She wasn’t breathing and she had no pulse. He knew that those were things that she didn’t have to do to be alive, but she’d always done them unconsciously. To not do them now terrified him.

  Kesh appeared on Feln’s screen. There was cheering from the bridge crew behind him. “Captain, I don't know what you did, but you’ve saved us. Thanks to—“ Kesh stopped abruptly when he saw what was happening in Denxeiter’s cockpit. “Oh. Oh, what happened?”

  Feln didn’t want to answer. He held Aaltskog’s limp body against him. Tears streamed down his face. “She pushed herself too hard,” he finally answered. “She’s why we made it out of that battle. She saved us.”

  “Feln you have to get back to t
he hangar,” Valisia said, also appearing on Feln’s screen, her Alden showing the damage received just before Feln entered Resonance. “They can help her if you get her into the medical bay.”

  “No they can’t!” Feln snapped. “Ever since Maass killed himself, nobody knows how his creations work. Turning her over to those people would be like asking cavemen to repair a starship.” He gently wiped the blood from Aaltskog’s face.

  “You have to let them try,” Valisia offered.

  “I don’t have to let them do a damn thing,” Feln said.

  “Thats enough, Captain,” Kesh said flatly. “Do what Lt. (jg) Nonn suggests and bring your companion to the medical bay immediately. That’s an order.”

  Feln whirled on the admiral with an angry retort about how he didn’t have to follow his orders. But that retort died on his lips when he saw tears in Kesh’s eyes. Feln blinked and immediately swallowed his own tears. He didn’t even know that Ssalss had tear ducts much less that they could cry. He suddenly realized how childish he’d been. That he wasn’t the only person who cared for Aaltskog— that many people loved her. Even if nothing could be done for her, she’d have wanted her other friends to also have the chance to say goodbye.

  “Yes sir,” Feln said softly. He didn't want to let Aaltskog go but he had to. As he strapped back into his seat, hope started to well up inside of him. Maybe Valisia and Kesh were right. Maybe something could be done for Aaltskog in the medical bay. “I’m sorry for my behavior,” Feln said. “Both of you. Please forgive me.”

  “It’s perfectly understandable,” Kesh said wiping his eyes. Feln saw Valisia nod while doing the same. “Please just bring her back as quickly as possible so we can get her proper care.”

  “Yes sir,” Feln repeated and he flew Denxeiter over the opening hangar doors.

  Just as he was about to lower Denxeiter inside, the space in front of the Francescan ships began to shimmer. It seemed like it was happening in Feln’s entire field of view. Something big was jumping into the system.