Ixan Legacy Box Set

by Scott Bartlett

  “Two hundred and sixty-five Banshees, thirty-six Gorgons, and as many solid-core kinetic impactors as you’d care to send into space, Captain.”

  “Let’s send them into Gok hulls instead. Start with just the closest destroyer for now, but mix in two Gorgons, and send two Gorgons apiece at the nearby Gok cruiser and frigate as well.”

  Husher’s hope was that the kinetic impactors would suggest to the Gok that he was following standard IGF doctrine left over from the Gok Wars: focus on mowing down one target then move on to the next. Ideally, that would make his other targets feel safe for the moment, rendering them utterly oblivious to the stealth missiles headed their way.

  “Sir, a squadron of Pythons just neutralized a corvette,” Winterton reported.

  “That wasn’t what I ordered Ayam to do,” Husher said. “Reprimand him for me, would you?”

  That brought a round of chuckles, but Winterton just blinked at Husher, completely impervious to the air of jocularity that had followed breaking free of the forcefield. The man was probably among the most serious people Husher had ever met, which wasn’t a bad thing in a CIC officer, and also not a bad reminder to everyone in the CIC. Restored freedom or no, they were facing down thirteen Gok warships. Despite the might brought by the Vesta to any engagement, especially one waged against warships with comparable technology, war should never be an object of amusement.

  Keyes would never have tolerated chuckling inside his CIC.

  In contrast with his sober thoughts, the engagement soon came to favor the supercarrier and her Air Group. The cruiser and the frigate were both obliterated by the Gorgons that found their hulls with no resistance, and the destroyer lost half its forward guns.

  After that, every last Gok ship turned about and began to flee for the relative safety of the asteroid field.

  “Should we pursue, Captain?” Kaboh said, voice neutral.

  “Yes,” Husher said. “I believe we should. Tactical, target down those ships.”

  Chapter 62

  Pieces

  Husher sat strapped into a crash seat across from Fesky, inside one of the Vesta’s combat shuttles, but one meant only for mass troop deployments. This shuttle didn’t have anything like the armaments on the craft Chief Haynes had flown down to the surface of Klaxon’s moon.

  Thinking of that mission made him wince, and he worried for a moment that his friend would take his expression the wrong way, until he realized Fesky wasn’t paying him any attention. At the moment, she was deep inside herself, as near as Husher could tell.

  Fourteen of our best marines. Gone.

  Military commanders spent what capital they had to accomplish vital objectives. Sometimes, that currency took the form of soldiers’ lives. The knowledge of how badly it would hurt him to spend that currency—of how it would haunt his quiet moments until the day he died—that knowledge hadn’t stopped him from spending it.

  This was war, and war was a bastard. It left everyone in pieces, including the survivors.

  “You all right, Fesky?” he said, as much to distract himself from his thoughts as to check on his friend.

  The Winger was trembling violently, and the intrusion of his voice made her start. “What? No, I’m not fine. She’s alive, Husher. She’s alive.”

  “That’s a good thing.”

  “Of course it is. But what am I to say to her? After all this time…after what she’s been through…”

  “She’s just another being, Fesky. And she’s your friend. She’ll be happy to see you.”

  But Fesky was shaking her head. “You have no idea what the relationship between Fins and Wingers was like, human. You have no idea what they were to us…”

  They’d been searching the planet for the better part of a week. The Vesta carried some watercraft, and the marines had been out in them for days, emergency lights on, scouring Klaxon’s oceans. Pythons had performed flyby after flyby, scouring the shores and the seas for signs of Ek.

  Husher had begun to consider how he was going to break it to Fesky that they’d have to end their search and return to the Interstellar Union’s core systems. The admiralty would want a full report on what had transpired here, and the bureaucrats would be eager to make Husher face the music for the decisions he’d made.

  Wouldn’t want to deny them that.

  But just as he’d been about to have the talk with Fesky, Ek had been found. And now, here they were, on their way to speak with her.

  The shuttle landed on the shore of a bay, and Husher slowly unclasped his crash seat’s restraints. Fesky was still fumbling with hers, and he suppressed a smile.

  “Need a hand, there, Madcap?”

  “I’m fine, human,” Fesky grumbled. At last, she ripped them off her with a jerk and stood, storming past, the breeze from her wings wafting against Husher’s face.

  He followed her into the airlock, trying to catch her eyes, but she stared steadfastly at the hull while the airlock cycled through the usual processes.

  The outer hatch opened, and Fesky took a halting step toward it, then another. At last, seeming to steel herself, she exited the craft.

  Just outside, she fell to her knees.

  “Honored One,” Fesky said with a sigh.

  Meters beyond, Husher spotted Ek, sitting in shallow water up to her chin, just above her gill slits. He hadn’t been there the day her breathing apparatus had been removed, and seeing the Fin without it didn’t square with his memories of her. Her mottled skin continued where her suit had once been—the suit that had kept her body constantly moisturized. And like other Fins before her, she wore no clothes, and Husher had to fight the urge to avert his eyes, reminding himself that this had been considered normal for her species.

  “I thought I told you not to call me that, Fesky,” Ek said.

  “I—I—”

  “If we are to have a conversation at all, it will be as equals, and if you do not start acting like mine, then I will turn around and swim back into this ocean. Now, stand up.”

  Still trembling, Fesky stood.

  “That is better,” Ek said. “I will not have you groveling the first time you meet my children.”

  “Ch-children?” Fesky said, but Ek didn’t answer.

  Instead, she lowered her mouth below the water’s surface, and bubbles rose as she spoke. Presumably she was speaking, though to Husher it just sounded like burbling.

  Ek lifted her head, then, spreading a finned arm toward the water behind her. Six fully grown Fins broke the surface.

  “Children, meet my dear friend, Fesky. And this is Captain Husher, another close friend. “Captain, Fesky—meet Sarl, Ohm, Rah, Mei, Ki, and Zin.”

  “How is this possible?” Fesky asked.

  “When we parted ways twenty years ago, I told you I was not doomed to live alone in these oceans. Did you not surmise my meaning?”

  “I mean—it did occur—but I assumed—”

  “I was artificially inseminated during my last days on Spire, Fesky. I have never had a mate, as I never connected with another Fin on that level, but I still carried a desire to procreate. It was an exceptionally foolish thing to do, considering my status as the only spacefaring Fin, and the deterioration of my health at the time. But all has worked out well, and I am not the last Fin after all.”

  Fesky’s legs seemed to give out, then, and she hit the grassy bank with a thud. “I’m so happy,” she said.

  Husher couldn’t contain himself—he laughed, and the Winger turned to glare at him. But her expression quickly softened, as she no doubt realized that he wasn’t laughing at her. He was laughing because he felt just as much joy as she did, at the resurrection of the Fins, and at how earnest and true his friend Fesky was.

  He felt his laughter settle into a smile, which faded as his gaze settled on Ek. “I hope you know I can’t leave you here,” he said.

  She inclined her head. “The Ixa knew that we were here. They hunted us for months. That was why you had such trouble finding me…because my fam
ily and I were in hiding, deep beneath the ocean. It is by mere chance that I glimpsed one of your fighters as I ventured to the surface to see how things were.”

  “The Vesta won’t leave until we figure out a way to safely transport you and your children,” Husher said. “Ochrim is with us, and he just made a breakthrough that will likely revolutionize—well, everything. If he can do that, he can surely find a way to bring you home with us. I’ll put him on it.”

  “I thank you,” Ek said.

  That wasn’t all Husher had to say on the subject of Ek and her family joining them, but for now, he held his peace. The truth was, he wanted Ek in his CIC. Her uncanny perception had gotten the Providence out of some incredibly tight jams during the Second Galactic War, and they needed her now more than ever.

  “I trust you know what the Ixa’s reappearance means for the galaxy, Captain,” Ek said.

  “I think I do. But I’d be interested in hearing your perspective.”

  “During the Second Galactic War, you defeated a single AI—the one that created the Ixa. That AI’s project was to dominate this galaxy, just as its counterparts were assigned with dominating the local galactic cluster. I consider it unlikely that very many of the AIs failed. On the contrary: I believe that this galaxy was one of the very few who successfully resisted them.” Ek’s gaze drifted to the sky. “If I am right, then in order to complete their domination of this galaxy cluster, they will need to stamp us out, once and for all.” Slowly, Ek shook her head. “This time, victory will require more than defeating just the Ixa, or even just defeating an AI. This time, victory demands that you find the creators of the AIs themselves, and it demands that you render them unable to perpetrate these actions against any sentient species, ever again.”

  “Agreed,” Husher said after a brief pause. “But ‘render them unable’ sounds kind of sanitized. You mean that I need to kill them, or enough of them that they become a pale shadow of what they are now.”

  “We do not yet know what form their society takes,” Ek said. “But at the very least, you will have to destroy the parts of that society which enable it to wage war.”

  Nodding, Husher turned back toward the shuttle. “I think I’d better go talk to Ochrim about getting you back to the Interstellar Union. There are some politicians I’d very much like to introduce you to.”

  Chapter 63

  Not the Time

  On his way across the desert into Cybele, Husher came across a woman sitting in the sand, her hands covering her face. Sobs racked her body, and she didn’t seem to notice him until he spoke.

  “Penelope?”

  Her hands jerked away from her face, which was red and puffy. “Husher,” she said, having apparently dropped her frequent use of his title, which she’d always delivered with a note of disdain, to his ears.

  “You’re…” He shook his head. He’d been about to remark on how her overlay wasn’t turned on, but she no doubt knew that already. In truth, he had no idea what to say. Snyder had caused him no end of trouble, these past weeks, and she’d been one of the main obstacles between him and doing his job. Even so, he took no satisfaction in seeing her like this.

  “What happened?” he said at last.

  “I added the wings of a Winger to my overlay. I’ve always had such respect for the Wingers…I’ve always related to them so closely. I’d been thinking about adding the wings for a long time, going back and forth on them, but finally, I decided they were the truest expression of who I am. So I added them.”

  He shook his head. “And?”

  “And the narrownet exploded. They said I was appropriating Winger culture, making a mockery of it, by acting like I could understand the oppression they’ve been through. They called for my resignation, and at first I just ignored them, but the pressure kept building and building until there were students outside my door and outside my window, screaming, and cursing, and…”

  Snyder trailed off, replacing her head in her hands. She resumed sobbing. “Well?” she said, her voice made scratchy and wet by her crying. “Are you going to gloat about this or not?”

  “No,” he said quietly, and Snyder lowered her hands, frowning. Her red-rimmed eyes met his. “I don’t take any pleasure in what’s happened to you, Snyder,” he continued. “It only makes me fear for the future. With crisis on our doorstep, now is not the time for our society to be devouring itself.”

  He continued walking, then, toward the city. But he paused, and he spoke again without looking back.

  “If you need somewhere to stay, away from Cybele, while you decide what you’ll do next…message me on my com. I’ll find you somewhere in the crew section.”

  She cursed him in reply, and Husher nodded, continuing his walk toward the city. His lower lip tightened as he fought the urge to weep as well—not because she’d cursed him, but because of what it signified about humanity: the bitterness and the folly. The readiness to answer failure by tearing one’s self apart, along with anyone within arm’s reach.

  It reminded him of his conversation with Ochrim in the Ixan’s living room, and it made him want to weep, in a way that not even being stripped of command had done.

  Brushing the back of his hand across his eyes, he continued toward Cybele. He needed to speak with Ochrim, but first, he would find his daughter, to sit and talk if she was willing.

  Epilogue

  Jake Price

  Seaman Jake Price stalked the corridors of Tartarus Station daily, trying to get some good out of the bureaucrats stationed there whenever he glimpsed them out in the open. That was rare, and whenever he did see them, they were usually accompanied by a bodyguard or two, who stared Jake down until the conversation came to an end.

  He could hardly believe the way he and his companions were being treated. They’d been required to relinquish their ships and military hardware, which they’d done, as a gesture of goodwill. Then, they’d been shuttled here to “wait on word” to come down from the Interstellar Union, the new governing body for the Milky Way.

  But word never came, and the bureaucrats brushed him off with weasel words. Their skill in saying empty things that amounted to artful dodges of every question he asked…it was unlike anything he was used to, after growing up in the Steele System. He’d heard all about the liberals who’d taken over the Milky Way government just before Darkstream’s exile from the galaxy, but he’d always taken those stories with some skepticism. People tended to descend into caricature when describing those they viewed as their political opponents, so Jake had never quite believed that the Milky Way politicians could be anywhere near as controlling, wishy-washy, or pretentious as the old-timers said.

  But whether their stories had been caricatures or not, the people on this station exceeded them. The number of times he’d been condescended to or smarmed in the phoniest ways…it made him want to vomit. He’d never been much for politics, but these people were almost forcing him to cement his position on things, to become just like those old-timers had been.

  The civilians Jake and his teammates had saved from the Progenitors’ onslaught had been transported and housed at Imbros, a planetary colony nearby. God only knew how they were faring.

  Worst of all, the bureaucrats had Jake’s mech, and the longing he felt for it contributed in no small part to his constant irritation. He dreamed about it every night, but never about piloting it, strangely. In his worst nightmares, the mech walked away from him, to turn on those he considered friends.

  He took lunch every day with Ash Sweeney, his best friend and fellow mech pilot. She’d been one of the original members of Oneiri Team, the eight Darkstream soldiers who’d piloted the first MIMAS mechs. Half of the original Oneiri Team were dead or missing after the war they’d fought back in the Steele System, but the members who remained were closer than ever.

  “You remember how Roach used to talk about Vin Husher all the time?” Ash had asked him at lunch earlier that day. Roach had been the original commander of Oneiri Team, before he’d gon
e insane and murdered one of the pilots under his command. He’d tried to murder Ash, too, and he’d very nearly succeeded—Ash was still recovering from being impaled on Roach’s blade. Oneiri Team had abandoned their old commander in the Steele System, which had been in the process of getting torn apart by the Progenitors at the time.

  “Yeah,” Jake said. “I remember. Liberal pansy, he usually called Husher.”

  “Well, I heard some guards talking, and apparently Husher is bogeyman number one for the government, these days.”

  “Are you telling me Roach’s ‘pansy liberal’ is not liberal enough for this government?” Jake shook his head. “Roach has to be rolling in his grave.”

  “Assuming Roach is dead.”

  Jake’s mirth died down, then. “Yeah.”

  Now, Jake was back to marching through the station. His favorite question was to ask whether he and the other former Darkstream soldiers were being officially detained—and, in turn, it was the question the bureaucrats were getting the best at avoiding answering. He also liked to ask them whether they considered he and his fellow soldiers guilty of any particular crime.

  At an intersection of corridors up ahead, a four-legged alien strode into view. Her presence, as well as that of her brethren, probably played a big part in the bureaucrats’ reluctance to let the arrivals from the Steele System join the rest of galactic society, but Jake didn’t hold that against her. He was finally starting to trust Rug, which was the human word the alien had chosen to name herself. Rug was a Quatro, and Quatro didn’t have names.

  She glimpsed Jake, then she made for him at once, at a speed that made him think something was probably up. Rug was larger than the largest horse, with a royal purple coat and midnight eyes. She roughly resembled a bear in shape, though her broad head and powerful tail put Jake more in mind of a panther. Not that he’d ever seen a panther in real life, or a horse, for that matter. But when someone had told him that was what Quatro resembled, he’d looked them up, and he basically agreed.