by Nick Webb
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Ganymede, High Orbit
EFS Santa Maria
Conference Room
The conference room on the Santa Maria was silent. The wreckage of Bogotá Station swirled in the distance, just visible through the windows. Busy Perseverance Station loomed nearby, high above Ganymede. Larsen, looking at each of the captains in turn, saw defeat and anger. They were consumed with it. No one spoke, for what would they say?
Some distant part of him knew that they had to miss a target eventually. Tel’rabim’s fleet was too big to match. And, these days especially, too fast. Remarkably fast. They had only barely been keeping up as it was.
Walker, however, seemed strangely calm—even happy. She was careful to keep her face grave, but Larsen caught the tiny twitches at the corners of her mouth. What did she know that he didn’t?
“So.” She laced her hands behind her back and looked around at them. “We caught word of Tel’rabim’s fleet en route to Enceladus. We followed, at top acceleration. We should, by all accounts, have beaten them there, given that Delaney was already close by. But we did not. Why?”
No one answered. Delaney actually looked away. Larsen had never seen the old man looking so close to defeat, and he was surprised by how much it shook him.
“It was not your fault, Jack,” Walker said quietly.
Heads came up.
“Now, wait a minute.” Delaney’s voice was a rumble. “If it wasn’t ours, it wasn’t yours.”
To everyone’s surprise, Walker smiled. “I know.”
The captains exchanged quick looks.
Walker began to pace. “In the past few weeks, we have seen that Tel’rabim’s fleet is larger than we ever imagined. The ships seem to be everywhere on our scans. No one could give me an answer on where they had come from. There weren’t shipyards we could find that could have produced them so fast.”
Larsen felt his fingers working nervously over the rim of his coffee cup. He didn’t understand where she was going with this. He found himself bizarrely fearful.
At least Pike wasn’t here.
“I began to suspect the truth when we received word of the impending attack on Enceladus,” Walker said. “I was told that our comm buoys had picked up the Telestine fleet in motion, and that the readings were off somehow. I had my suspicions about what that might mean, and when we reached Enceladus, I decided to do more research.”
She looked around the room, waiting for someone, anyone, to voice her conclusion, and Larsen felt an overwhelming frustration that he could not be the one to voice it. He could picture her smile if he did. They would be the only two that understood.
As it was, he was just one more clueless captain.
“The fleet hasn’t grown at all,” Walker said finally. “Tel’rabim has not been building new ships. In fact, our fleets are still evenly matched. In reality, those are all the same ships, popping up in different locations in the solar system, sometimes attacking and sometimes not. And let me tell you, we’ve been very, very lucky that we were able to stave off any of the attacks at all.”
“They can’t be the same ships,” Delaney said. “To get to those systems, they’d have to be traveling….”
The answer came to Larsen in a flash. “Faster than light,” he said.
Walker smiled at him, and he basked in the moment. “Yes,” she told them all simply. “Faster than light.”
There was a dumbstruck silence.
“But they’ve never used FTL before,” Delaney said quietly.
“Now they are. And you’re partly wrong—they used FTL to get here from their own star system. Then, for whatever reason, they mothballed it. It seems to be the Telestine way with technology—as soon as they don’t need something, it’s archived.” She crossed her arms. “Why they’ve dusted it off and added it back into their ships now, I couldn’t tell you—or, frankly, how they did it so quickly. Capturing one of those ships and figuring it out is going to be one of our top priorities at this point. But it’s not our first priority.” She looked around the room. “Whoever took my ships was kind enough to leave all of the carriers and all of my best captains, but we were already barely holding off the Telestines as it was. Now, with this new FTL advantage, we simply can’t match them with only half our fleet, as was so tragically demonstrated at Enceladus.”
“You’re going after the mutineers,” Delaney said quietly.
Silence overwhelmed the conference room as a hush fell over the assembled captains and officers.
“Ma’am, with respect,” began Captain Shin, his brow furrowed, “word has it that less than half of the people on those ships are actual traitors. Most are just innocent kids that got caught up in the mutiny. If we go after those ships in force, we’re risking thousands of loyal crew.”
“I’m going after the mutineers,” she said, with a nod to Delaney, then turned towards Captain Shin. “I understand that, Captain. Most of those people are just in the wrong place at the wrong time. But given Tel’rabim’s new FTL capabilities, we simply can’t afford to wait. Now that he can strike us anywhere he wants, and then turn around and immediately strike us again halfway across the solar system, we must act now.”
“Are you planning to talk to them?” Delaney looked interested by this. He met Larsen’s eyes briefly.
“Perhaps.” Walker’s smile was very cold. “How much I talk to them—whether I talk to them—depends on them. I do not have time to spend patting them on the head and telling them I understand their concerns. If they won’t do what is right, I will take the ships back. By force if need be.” She stood up. The other captains and assembled officers followed suit. “In fact, I want you to draw up a plan, Mr. Delaney. And you, Larsen. We’re going to Neptune, and we’re taking enough of our remaining ships and soldiers to get the job done. You have six hours. Dismissed.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
Ganymede, High Orbit
EFS Santa Maria
Admiral’s Quarters
Pike was dozing on the couch, most of his shins over one end and his body still crumpled awkwardly to fit, when Walker slammed her way into the room, still fuming over the news of Tel’rabim’s FTL capabilities, and running through the possibilities for an assault on the renegade fleet now somewhere near Neptune. But she shook it off—that was Delaney’s and Larsen’s job for now. Let them plan. She needed to fit at least an hour of sleep in before some new emergency required her attention. They’d presented a few preliminary possibilities, and they’d chosen the ships to make the trek out to Neptune, but the tactical details were still up in the air.
Pike jerked awake and rubbed at his neck.
“Everything okay?”
“Yes. No. It’s not important.” She unbuttoned the collar of her uniform, slung a towel over her shoulder, and went to go wash her face in the small bathroom.
She heard him get up and begin to pace as she splashed the water on herself and studied her reflection in the mirror. She was tired. Her face was thinner these days. And she wasn’t sure she liked what she saw in her eyes. After a moment, she wiped her hands on the towel and left the room, shaking her head.
The Telestines were coming for them, no matter what she looked like. She couldn’t waste time on trivialities.
Pike’s shoulder was still hunched awkwardly as he walked up and down in the tiny room.
“Why didn’t you take the bed?” Walker asked, amused. “You don’t even close to fit on that couch.”
“It seemed….” He gave her a look and, uncharacteristically, blushed.
She swallowed. “No,” she said firmly. “Not overstepping your bounds at all.” That wasn’t what he had been going to say and she knew it, but it was probably best if they didn’t acknowledge any of that.
She devoted her attention to tidying the room.
“So.” Pike sat back down cautiously, and immediately stood again as she tugged a shirt out from under him. “What’s been going on?”
“Initial warning,”
a computerized voice informed them. “Acceleration begins in five minutes.”
“Well … that,” Walker said. “For one thing.”
“So we’re going.”
She looked at him, really looked.
She had shut him out of all of this, because of course she had. In the midst of a mutiny born of split loyalties, she had not felt comfortable asking Delaney and the others to accept Pike’s presence in the conference room.
From the overhaul of the ship’s captains, newer captains replaced with those she had known for years, to the planning for the attack on Neptune—she still couldn’t believe she was leading an assault on a human colony rather than their true enemy—she had done everything she could think to keep the fleet safe and loyal.
And it might still not be enough.
That was the terrifying thing. Nothing she had done might be enough, because she had no idea what she was facing. The temptation to stay and throw herself at the Telestine fleet, FTL or not, was overwhelming.
Never had she gone into a confrontation with so little information. There had been no demands—in fact, there had been no communication of any kind. If there was a rhyme or reason to the ships Nhean had chosen to take, beyond the lack of attempts on the carriers, she could not see what it was. It hadn’t been all his ships, or all the older ships, or all the newer ones built at the Mercury shipyards. It hadn’t been the ships in best repair as of the time he left the fleet. It hadn’t been the ships with the best weaponry.
All he had done—all he had done—was split the fleet. And bring half of it to Neptune, of all the godforsaken places in the solar system.
What did the man want?
She sighed.
“What is it?”
“I hate this,” she admitted. “I hate Nhean for doing this to us.”
“We don’t know who it is yet,” he cautioned her.
She didn’t look over her shoulder at him. He was determined not to believe the worst of that man, and it baffled her. He, of all people, had reasons to hate Nhean Tang—more so, she would think, when the Dawning had chosen to ally herself with him instead of Pike.
And now it occurred to her to wonder just why, exactly, he was so sure it wasn’t Nhean.
“You keep saying that,” she said quietly. She still didn’t look at him, but she settled back against the desk and crossed her arms. “Why, exactly—”
She heard him stand up, and turned to face him—and managed to forget everything she’d been going to say. Pike was close, close enough to feel the heat from his body, close enough to smell the lingering traces of the soap they all used. Mixed with the scent of his skin, the smell was oddly intoxicating.
From the look on his face, he hadn’t realized quite how close he was, either.
Like a dream, she felt one hand come to rest on her hip, heat burning through the uniform.
And then, with a sudden smile, he had her other hand captured, and he brought her in a slow turn.
“What are you doing?” She couldn’t seem to stop smiling.
“When was the last time you danced with someone?”
“This is hardly the time—”
“This is exactly the time.” He pulled her closer.
The floor shuddered under them as the engines kicked into high gear and to her surprise, Walker rested her cheek against his chest and let her eyes drift closed. She didn’t need to know the steps, because there really weren’t any. It was just the two of them, klaxons and warning messages fading into the background, and she could hear his heartbeat.
“Now.” She felt as much as heard his voice. “What’s wrong?”
There was one secret she had guarded even more carefully than that of her plans, and a chill ran down her spine when she opened her mouth. She had to admit it now, or it would kill her.
“I’m more scared of us than I am of the Telestines.”
She felt the way his body tensed, but he didn’t stop dancing. “What d’you mean?”
“The reason I fight….” She bit her lip, and to her shame, felt tears on her cheeks. “Is to keep us from killing each other. The Telestines … I hate them. I do. They came here and they took everything and they had no right.” She could feel her voice shaking. “But they were saving their own kind, and I can kill them. I’m allowed. Because I’m saving my kind.” She looked up at him. “Do you see?”
He tilted his head at her. His hand splayed over her lower back to hold her close. “I … don’t know.”
“Everything they do to us is because they want their own kind to survive,” she explained. “They’re my enemies, they need to die, and I hate them for what they’ve done—but I understand it, and I can fight them. Everything humans do to each other, though … there’s nothing noble about it. There’s no grand reason. They’re just screwing each other over because there isn’t enough for all of us.”
“That’s why I fight, Pike. Because I’ll be damned if humanity dies because we killed each other instead of the Telestines killing us. And … we’re getting close. It’s getting uglier, year after year, and I can’t just kill the people who do things like this. I can’t—because they’re ours. They’re us. And then I wonder what I’m even saving and—”
The kiss was sudden and sweet, and it took her breath away. She wound her arms around his neck and tried, with everything she had, to forget what she’d been thinking about.
What was he doing?
What she doing?
“It won’t always be like this,” Pike whispered finally. “There was a time before the Telestines, and there will be a time after them—”
“We killed each other even then. From everything I’ve heard, we were quite good at it, too.” Her tone was humorous, but there was a dull pit in her stomach.
“No one expects you to make a perfect world.” His eyes flamed like they always did when he was concentrating on something. She couldn’t guess at what he might be thinking. “There is no perfect world. There’s only better. And when the Telestines are gone, that will be better. One thing at a time.”
She bent her forehead against his chest. She was so damned tired of this.
“I have to get the fleet back.”
“The fleet, and then Earth.” He said the words quietly. If he felt her tense in his arms, he gave no sign of it. “You have to see it, Laura. To believe it. I can’t believe you’ve fought so long without seeing it.”
No. Her lips formed the word silently. She didn’t want to hear this.
“You know when you watch a ship disappear after undocking? How it flies off into the distance until it’s just a tiny dot, and then, nothing?” he murmured.
“Yeah?” She had no idea where he was going with this now.
“You can do that on Earth, and everything that ship flies across is fertile land, places you can run without needing air filters, places you can farm for your food. When you have the fleet back, that’s what you can give humanity—more land, more safety, more resources than they’ll know what to do with.”
She stayed silent. The strength of her own convictions held her still.
“And the first time you see the sun rise,” he whispered, “you’ll know it was worth it. Laura, it’s so beautiful. It breaks your heart.”
She refused to breathe, refused to sigh at the beauty Pike described. Nostalgia for a lost past would not save humanity.
Secure for acceleration, the automated voices told them, and Walker clung to him as the familiar inertial pull dragged at her bones, and she pressed her lips shut rather than lie to the one person she loved most in the universe.
Lie … or worse, admit the truth that he would never see Earth again.
There was a whole galaxy out there. Just waiting for humanity to discover it.
Why couldn’t anyone else see that?
When the comm link beeped, she wrenched herself away with relief.
“Yes, what is it?”
But it wasn’t Larsen’s voice in her earpiece, or Delaney’s.
&nb
sp; “Admiral.” Nhean’s static-riddled voice was as calm and collected as ever, but it had an edge to it. “We need to talk. Now.”
She smiled. The traitor had undoubtedly called to offer bait.
And she intended to take it.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Triton, Geosynchronous Orbit
Koh Rong
Bridge
There was the low murmur of voices on the other end of the line, and then a video channel opened. Nhean saw an empty room, unusually messy for Walker, and the admiral’s annoyed face.
“So you’ve decided what your demands are,” she said simply. “Well, tell me. I hate wasting time.”
Nhean allowed himself a small smile. To his surprise, he was glad to see her looking well. She showed unmistakable signs of stress and exhaustion, but he had been bracing himself, he realized now, for the sight of someone completely worn down. He was glad that she still had anger and energy.
“There is a group here on Neptune known as the Funders Circle. They are now in possession of some of your ships, and would like to meet with you—which I offered to arrange.”
She looked away, and he could see the calculations going in her head.
“You gave the ships away. You stole them from me, and then gave them away. Unbelievable,” she said at last.
“I would like to point out that although much of the ship design was my own, the Funders Circle contributed substantially to the project. There would not be a fleet of ships without them.” He took a deep breath. “And just to remind you, it was you who took my ships away from me. But to return to your original point—I was not the one who took them. I had no hand in what has happened.”
“You expect me to believe that?”
“It is the truth.” Nhean lifted one shoulder. “But nothing I can say will convince you either way on that. I am calling only to place you in contact with the rest of the members of the Funders Circle. They want to … bargain with you, and I believe them to be sincere.”