“The bioprinters are only partly back on line, the few that is that we’ve been able to return to an operational state. The new bodies are printed dead. It appears that for now, I’m the giver of life, not Mother.” She continued checking out his opened thorax, after taking her hands off his heart, having evidently massaged it to get it beating again. Skyhawk looked up from her surgery in process to her face, a little too close to his for his liking. “How can Mother’s bioprinters be down? Or defective, for that matter?”
“Possibly she has deprioritized humanoid reanimation. This campaign has gone from a stall tactic to seeing what we can do to keep us and our fragile alliance alive long enough to escape The Menagerie. As for why we’re having trouble taking over the bioprinters ourselves, the theories are many. We have so many wounded Theta Team operatives throughout the ship…Who knows what their pissed off immune systems are doing to the structures of the Nautilus? That, or one or more of Theta Team is an imposter, pretending to be who he isn’t, and the viruses he’s releasing on the ship are behind the bioprinters failing.”
Again the Nun hadn’t slowed with her surgery one stitch as she continued briefing him. “It’s possible if it is sabotage, it was a single mission, aimed at the bioprinters, to cripple our ability to make reinforcements. We can only hope. The worse predicament is if there are numerous viruses meant to overwhelm Mother’s atmospheric and habitat controls as well.”
Skyhawk grabbed her hand, interrupting her surgery. “You’ve got to stop the transmission of learning from the dead clones to the live ones. Or I’ll be second-guessing myself for time immemorial. I don’t do well if there is the smallest dent in my cockiness. Trust me.”
“I’m sorry,” the Nun said, returning to her surgery, which his hand was powerless to stall. “Leon would never give that order. You are meant to learn from your mistakes and grow from them. It’s the only way he can turn you into seasoned fighters.”
“I beg to differ. Different psychologies call for different protocols. Perhaps if I could talk to him…”
“You will replace Omega Force someday. You know as well as I do, they’re operating on borrowed time. You are the next generation on line. Only experience and battle testing can help fill those shoes. Who knows? Live long enough—and you will, now that death is no longer an issue—you may become the next Leon.”
The bitch had said it like it was some kind of reward! Who in Techa’s name wanted that guy’s job? Skyhawk hated being responsible even for himself, far less anyone else.
He leaned back and hammered his head against the gurney. “Great! Just great!” He sat up suddenly. “Wait, I’m Skyhawk. The war effort depends too much on me. You said so yourself.”
She frowned disapprovingly at him. “Rhetoric and manipulations are the devil’s tools. But I’m afraid what logic there is in your position is not enough to change Leon’s mind.”
“How do you know!” He blared, feeling only half-alive. Whatever the hell was going on with those bioprinters, she wasn’t lying about their defective state.
“I know everybody aboard this ship better than they know themselves. It’s my job.” The Nun was matter of fact, as if trying not to be cruel.
And with that simple pronouncement, Skyhawk knew he’d never talk his way out of the new status quo. He was so screwed. As was all of Alpha Unit, for that matter.
ONE HUNDRED ONE
THE STARHAWK CARL SAGAN
“Sorry bastard.” Skyhawk was thinking of the version of him drifting in space forever. If it took until the end of time, he’d rescue him, and the rest of Alpha Unit from the Captiva, all spread out, drifting across however many stars. “And it’s all your fault! You dick! Could you have been a tad faster on the draw? It is what you’re known for. You useless paperweight!”
The elevator was climbing toward the bridge. By the time it got there and the doors dinged open, Skyhawk was so lost in self-flagellation he couldn’t remember why he was here.
To help him remember, the Carl Sagan shook so hard, Skyhawk was knocked on his ass. Someone had just hit them with an energy blast strong enough to ring the Starhawk like a bell.
He gazed around his bridge. No one was reacting. No one was moving in the slightest. No one was shouting valuable intel in his ears he needed to make a proper decision.
Shit! He knew what was going on. They were all as shell shocked as he was, thinking of themselves drifting out in space among the stars. “Snap out of it!” Skyhawk barked.
At the sound of his voice, they did seem to come out of the catatonia that was cutting off their ability to access the present, and the rest of their minds and bodies.
He took his seat. He more or less fell into it. You’d think he was eighty and not eighteen. “Report?” His voice sounded hoarse and feeble, as if the Sagan’s chief supersentience monitoring him might want to consider putting him on life support—if only it were online. Even now, Leon—that bastard—refused to OK supersentiences affecting the equation. Stalling for time was still more important to him than the heavy casualties they were taking. Bastard!
Slower than normal, intel started percolating Skyhawk’s way, but at least his crew was partially back on line.
Not in time to keep them from taking another hit though. “Shields at eighty-percent,” Ariel informed them. “Dropping exactly ten percent with each hit. Am I the only one that finds that the least bit curious?”
“It’s another Klash ship,” Satellite informed them, overlaying the specs of the ship on the big screen port. “They use this technology to penetrate the shields around entire planets they’re getting ready to carve up.”
“Something useful! Instead of merely demoralizing!” Skyhawk snapped, not believing what a belligerent asshole he was turning into. As if it weren’t enough that they were all berating themselves now for their stupidity. These emotions were new to him, as if he’d been born yesterday. He’d been so brilliant and so talented all his life, never knowing what failure felt like, how was he to know what the hell to do with the inrush of toxic emotions? Great, Skyhawk, we can add making excuses for yourself to the list of your asshole-in-charge CV.
“I’m making full use of the Sagan’s evasive maneuvers and countermeasures,” Motown said. “They’re matching us move for move.”
“Even the stuff that’s getting through the Klash ship’s shields is having minimal impact,” Ariel said, piling on.
Did Skyhawk ask for piling on in the middle of his breakdown, no? But why should she cut him a break when fate couldn’t be bothered to? He managed to hold his tongue all the same and curtail his increasingly abusive nature. It wasn’t as if he didn’t ask for them to dump everything of any value they could think of on him. All mind you because he was having trouble pulling the same information off his mindchip. His prioritizing algorithms for which fire to put out first had been compromised along with his confidence. It had become Alpha Unit’s job to bark at him to make sure he didn’t keep ignoring the writing on the wall.
“Satellite? Tell me you’ve drilled through their COMMS enough to ascertain the true nature of that diffused laser weapon.”
“I’ve hacked my way into their ship’s chief AI, a mixed blessing at best.” The Carl Sagan took another hit, forcing the bridge crew to grab hold of anything to keep from being tossed from their seats. “It’s AI speak, so it’s not easy to make much of. But there’s some rare-earth element that drives that laser—that’s not on our elemental table—or the one Solo added for us recently, after the encounter with the Kang goo.”
Skyhawk rubbed his temples.
“We’ve gotta stay alive long enough to ascertain the nature of that element, where it’s found, and get that intel back to Mother,” he said leaping out of his seat.
Everyone took note of the lowered benchmark for their performance, swiveling sharply toward him with penetrating looks they should have been saving for the enemy. Maybe it would take some stress off rather than demoralize Alpha Unit further. “Otherwise,” Skyhawk continued, “it’ll
be open season for those bastards in the Gypsy Galaxy. They’ll carve up our planets, even the ones they have little use for, just to exterminate Omega Force faster than their ground troops can take up position to slow the Klash invasion.”
He took another step toward the big screen, refusing to be cowed by the image of the Klash ship on the portal, pushing down his fear at the sight of it—it made the Sagan and the Starhawks in general look like birds of paradise, not birds of prey. The Klash ship, manned by the Klash this time, not the Tinka who had merely appropriated one of their vessels, was four times their vessel’s size. When this bird opened its beak to expose its gullet, the planet coring laser it fired was wider than the Carl Sagan. One bloody intimidating ship was one bloody ridiculous understatement. “People, even if this stall tactic of Leon’s, meant to buy him time for his prison escape, which has turned into a Gypsy Galaxy genocide lasts long enough for us to escape, someone’s gotta be left alive for the effort to have been worth it.”
Maybe if Skyhawk could give Alpha Unit something to occupy their minds besides recollections of recent failures, besides being haunted by the thought of them enduring yet another lasts-forever-torture…they might be able to step it up a gear. Certainly, his stating the facts as baldly as he just had, had certainly pushed a lot of the clutter out of his mind.
“I’ve modified the shields,” Ariel advised, “to slow the inevitable. Sorry if I had to hack the Sagan’s backup brain to do it. There were just too many moving pieces to line up in time.”
The Carl Sagan took another hit, but shook less from it. “Shields now only at seventy-six percent,” Ariel informed him. “It’s working, and with the backup brain’s help we should see improvements from hit to hit.”
“Backup brain?” Skyhawk sounded perplexed for a reason. “I didn’t design any such thing.”
“Mother overrode your designs where she felt improvements were needed. It’s a DNA-backup brain, like the DNA algal soup on the Nautilus that serves the same purpose. And it occupies an entire deck of the Carl Sagan that feeds to all engineering decks, so we can manufacture new tech on a dime, and the robots on the assembly lines can get that tech into place.”
“Nice,” Skyhawk nodded, relaxing further. But that didn’t last long. The Klash ship was increasing its rate of fire to neutralize any gains made by the Carl Sagan.
“I’ve isolated the intel on that laser,” Satellite apprised them, “and gotten the information off to Mother. But I don’t know how taxed she is now, even with the Mars war gods to offload some of her computing to.”
“That’s okay. I think I can do you one better,” Skyhawk said. “Let’s manufacture the same laser on each of the Starhawks along with a tweak to get through their shields, and start carving up these ships. And let’s get enough of the Starhawks cloaked and behind enemy lines. Maybe now that we know what element to look for on their worlds, and what their own ships are looking for, perhaps we can extract it before they can, cause them to pull back, if they don’t want to lose their all-important lifesaver—the element that allows that planet-carving laser to work its magic.”
The rest of them smiled. “On it,” they all said at once, each of them taking a piece of the problem related to their expertise, to hurry things along. And, of course, the DNA brain was engaged now, allowing everyone to make more progress in less time.
“I’ve tapped Omni to help us pinpoint the worlds in the Klash galaxy to get the drop on,” Ariel said.
“I’ve put through the message and the intel to the other Starhawks,” Satellite said.
“I’ve already plotted the wormhole courses to get them to their new destinations in no time,” Motown chimed in.
“With the DNA soup’s help, I’ve got a lock on their cloaked ships guarding those worlds,” Ariel advised. “So long as our Starhawks can get the jump on them…”
“Seeing to it,” Motown uttered, his hands flying over his console.
“We did it.” Skyhawk smiled. That comment might be a bit premature but…“Time to die, ladies and gentlemen. And nice work, by the way.” Hopefully his mock bravado in the face of death would carry over to them and to him in their next incarnation. Fake it till you make it, huh? Why not? Worked for one school of professional actors anyway.
The comments and line of reasoning were triggered by the sight of two other Klash ships decloaking and overwhelming the DNA-soup’s brain’s capacity to counter the increased barrage. Even if it could think fast enough to stay ahead of the blasts, its hands were tied by the speed of manufacturing by the computer printers, and the robots’ abilities to get new components into place in time. As efficient as that process was, this Carl Sagan anyway, was not going to get that new laser on line in time to avoid its own destruction. But the other Starhawks would on account of what the Carl Sagan’s crew had accomplished here, and those other ships would be in Klash territory where they could do the most damage.
Skyhawk sighed as he watched the inevitable approaching on the port screen.
It was better than sobbing, his response last time, as clone-to-clone memory served.
Winning in losing might well be the latest lowered expectations standard. He shot the thought to the others mindchip to mindchip, again to help them weather the next reincarnation better than the last.
It was the last thought he had time for. Hopefully he’d ended on a positive note.
The Carl Sagan blew.
ONE HUNDRED TWO
THE UFO
“This is exactly what I was afraid of.” Leon beheld the armada closing in on the Raj of the Mirage world. The port screen didn’t just give him a view of what was in front of them, but what was around the entire planet. Not only did the Tinka have it completely surrounded, the Klash were close on their heels, every bit as keen on getting their hands on Mirage. The best Leon could hope for was to buy time while the Klash and the Tinka slugged it out for ownership rights.
Or maybe not.
He turned toward Cassandra. “Take them out. Take them all out, before a single shot gets fired.”
She craned her head sharply to him as if seeing a weapon flying at her out of the corner of her eye. “Are you mad? The only humanoid ever known to evince such power was a Blue—while pregnant.”
“You’re the next generation on line. I’m sure you can do better—even without child. But figure it out fast. I suggest you find that place of inner calm inside you that typically eludes you. To access power like this, I’m guessing your makers wanted to make sure to protect you from the residual karma of using it inappropriately.”
He could tell by the way her eyes were glazing over that she had already backgrounded his wordy sermon. There wasn’t enough time to do anything but take it in and act on his initiative by entering multitasking mode.
Leon returned his eyes to the screen. He knew why the Tinka were here. They wanted this planet destroyed. The feel-good chi energy of Mirage was permeating all of the galaxies in The Menagerie, which was likely driving the Tinka, and many other dark empires, mad. Leon had figured it would be a quick way to sort the wheat from the chaff, let him know which galactic empires could be reasoned with, who could still respond to something beside the call of the blacker side of their natures.
The ploy was also an excellent way to starve The Collectors of the psychic energy they needed to grow more powerful still. It was Leon’s belief that if they fed off conflicts, it must be for a reason. They were likely psychic vampires bred very high up the food chain where nothing else but galaxies full of negative emotions could possibly keep them alive for long. The race itself may have been bioengineered as some new tool by one or another oligarch for securing his control of the heavens.
Intel reaching Leon from Omega Force Clone Team One, by way of Mother, all but confirmed as much. The creature being pumped for information couldn’t exactly be trusted to tell all, versus withholding some of the truth, if not distorting the truth altogether, but Leon had no choice but to trust his people in the field.
/> Even on Earth, they had been experimenting with far more primitive mind rays to disable an enemy with an overflow of toxic emotions, beaming certain wavelengths of energy at them to immobilize them with fears and demented notions. Very possibly, the energy vampires needed a similar device to first exacerbate hostilities, which they could then feed on. But they didn’t want to incapacitate their enemy, just keep them fighting.
Leon had no idea what tool The Collectors were using, in concert with their abilities, to give them a lock on multiple galaxies at once. Nor did he know if The Collectors were indeed energy vampires, or more technology created for this purpose, such as a battery storage device that fed the actual weapon, off of the stored surplus negative energy it had farmed off its subjects during times of plenty, where hostilities were at their peak.
But he couldn’t wait around for The Collectors to grow more powerful at the Nautilus’s and its crew’s expense. The Collectors’ doubling down on their psychic vampire games was analogous to piling more guards on at an ever compounding rate, the closer the Gypsy Galaxy got to affecting their escape.
As to the Klash…. They likely wanted the Mirage planet because it was another source of a precious resource to them, perhaps the very same element mined on a world Sonny had seen them destroy to get at, or perhaps Mirage gave access to some other vital element upon which the Klash cutting-edge technologies depended. The element itself might very well be the source of Mirage’s Gaia-like magic and the reason for the Raj’s existence, empowering their ability to work with cosmic chi like no other race before or after.
The intel Mother had forwarded of Sonny’s exchange with the Klash made Leon believe no mercy could be shown them any more than the Tinka, unless he was ready to lose this planet, which he most certainly was not.
But coming out here with Cassandra alone, as part of her initiation, to help her with the unfolding of her powers… that was a hell of a gamble. He was regretting the decision already. Both the Raj and Cassandra were just too important to lose, and he may well lose both if this proved to be one colossal faux pas.
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