Unsanctioned Reprisal

by Eddie R. Hicks

  Pierce was smarter than that, however.

  He knew for a fact that Uelcovis system was approximately three hundred light-years from Paryo, the homeworld of the Hashmedai. Pernoy used to serve on Imperial ships and spent a great deal of time telling him about the Empire, and its exotic colonies throughout the galaxy. Taxah was one of those worlds she always wanted to visit, but never got the chance, especially after being stranded on Earth. Pierce shook his head, tossing his wandering thoughts aside.

  Since Uelcovis was three hundred light-years away from Paryo, Pierce needed to find a single star system within that range that was a blue super giant. But to do that, he had to find Paryo within the galaxy map as a starting point. Paryo was in the Uemaesce system, sixteen light-years away from Earth. And Earth? That was twelve light-years away from their location.

  He found Earth and the Sol system on the computers, and from there charted a sixteen-light-year path in the direction of Paryo and the Uemaesce system. From that point, he used the computer to bring up every star located three hundred light-years away from Paryo that was a blue super giant. The search results updated, and the screen zoomed in on a star system that had all the planets Pernoy mentioned that would be found in the Uelcovis system, including the Earth-like world Taxah.

  He double-checked his calculations, and ensured the computer saved the new labels he placed on the systems in question. They were good to go, unless he was wrong about the age of the backups he had used. In that case, Rezeki’s Rage might end up adrift hundreds of light-years outside the galaxy, or worse, inside a star or planet.

  “Get ready, you two.”

  48 Foster

  ESV Marcus Antonius

  Approaching Uelcovis Space Bridge, Uelcovis system

  October 17, 2118, 01:31 SST (Sol Standard Time)

  “We’re aboard with Foster now, sir.”

  “Excellent work, Chevallier. Take her to the brig; we’ll deal with her later.”

  “Understood.”

  Foster’s handcuffed arms were dragged across the deck and away from the docking bay and the transport Chevallier, Maxwell, and LeBoeuf used to bring Foster into custody. Her sore head looked up at the crew personnel of the Earth battleship. She noted the name of the ship via its name and logo painted on the doors of several shut rooms, the ESV Marcus Antonius. It was the lead ship that assisted them in the operation that took place in Kapteyn’s Star. Three intersection turns, and an elevator lift later, and Foster found herself being shoved into her dark lonely cell in the ship’s brig.

  Force fields activated, keeping her in place. Chevallier looked back at Maxwell and LeBoeuf. “I got it from here, you two can go.”

  “Whatever,” Maxwell snickered. “You just want your five minutes alone with her. Don’t you?”

  Chevallier was left alone when the two turned and left, disappearing beyond the sliding doors. She hung her rifle up on the wall and approached Foster’s cell, cracking her gloved knuckles.

  “Five minutes alone, huh? So that’s what this is about?” Foster said “You wanna beat me senseless for what happened to your mother—”

  “Take control . . .” Chevallier cut her off. “That’s all you needed to do when we first awoke in this century. Take control and act like a fucking captain. If you’d done that, she’d still be here with us.”

  “You don’t know that! The Draconians killed thousands on that day, who’s to say her ship wouldn’t have been targeted even if we weren’t in danger?”

  “Take control,” Chevallier reiterated. “That means using your instincts as a captain, rather than letting EVE tell you exactly what to do. Which was the copied version Marduk created if I’m not mistaken.”

  “Maybe, Rivera hasn’t gotten back to us on that.”

  “It had emotions like the copied one that tried to take control of the Carl Sagan. And why didn’t you have it deleted? Why the hell did you keep it aboard?”

  “It had data we wanted to study, and you know that.”

  “Was the Sirius system not enough for discoveries? You kept that thing aboard, it got released, and it told you to fight with EDF rather than hear them. You wasted time, time that put the Carl Sagan in danger, forcing my mother to end her life, her ship, and crew to correct your incompetence. Though, after what we’re seeing here, maybe you aren’t incompetent, maybe you are one of the dragons.”

  Chevallier tapped the holo controls to Foster’s cell. The force field sparked for a second and vanished, allowing Chevallier to back Foster into the corner. Foster saw nothing but vengeance and hatred in her eyes.

  “Chevallier, this isn’t who you are—”

  An armored fist struck Foster in the gut. She felt the food in her stomach turn, while she crashed to her knees.

  “Neither are you.”

  A one-sided brawl broke out. Chevallier, still in her protect suit, versus Foster, still handcuffed and bound. She gave up trying to defend herself after the three punches and kick to the face, followed by Chevallier grabbing her by the hair with one hand, while the other held onto her arm.

  Chevallier tore off a piece of Foster’s sleeve to her uniform and gawked at the alien tattoos that glowed blue like the oceans of Earth.

  “I’ve read the reports, seen you in action,” Chevallier said. “You want this to end? Then scream like the dragon that’s within you—”

  Chevallier’s communicator beeped. She grunted, pushing Foster into the wall before answering the call.

  “Change of plans,” the voice said. “Bring her to me.”

  Saved by the bell.

  “Sure, not like we have anything else better to do,” Chevallier said, yanking Foster by her bound arms.

  Chevallier dragged Foster into the bridge, forcing her to stand before its commanding officer. Foster looked at the officer, it was a man whose nametag on his UNE admiral’s uniform identified him as Furnadjiev. He stepped away from the command chair, keeping his hands behind his back in a proper and professional manner, and clearly ignoring the trickle of blood that dripped from Foster’s nose.

  “Captain Foster,” Furnadjiev said. “I wish we were meeting on better terms, but you’ve left us with no choice.”

  Furnadjiev’s hand beckoned her attention to the view screen, and the conflict brewing around Taxah, its space bridge, and the struggling Imperial fleet off in the distance getting rammed by the Draconian bio-ships.

  “C’mon, there are lots of choices,” Foster said. “You could let me do my job and save this galaxy.”

  “You’ve unleashed the dragons into this system,” Furnadjiev said. “You’ve been playing us along.” He turned his back on her to watch the view screen. “Protecting humanity? That’s our job now.”

  “So, you’re tellin’ me this whole fleet conveniently arrived after we opened a vortex to the maelstrom, y’all knew I was here, and drew up plans to arrest me on the spot. Why do I get the feeling we was set up?”

  “Admiral, the Johannes Kepler just changed course,” said one of the bridge officers. “It’s on a direct intercept course with us and its weapons are powered on.”

  Furnadjiev remained idle for a moment, most likely reviewing the new data with his HNI that beamed into his head.

  “On screen,” he ordered afterward.

  The view screen switched to the Marcus Antonius’ forward external camera. It zoomed in on the Johannes Kepler barreling to it without a hint of fear for what the mighty Earth battleship could do, or what the smaller gunships and fighters closer to it were dishing into its overshields. Saressea must have taken control and ordered her to be recovered, she figured.

  “The Kepler’s actions are only proving what we suspect is correct,” Furnadjiev said. “Your crew is blindly following your lead, Foster.”

  Warning shots from various UNE destroyers and gunships streaked past the Kepler. It remained on course with its weapons ports open.

  “Ask them to stand down and surrender, Lieutenant,” Furnadjiev said.

  “I’m trying,
Admiral, they are ignoring us.”

  Furnadjiev sighed while sitting on his command chair. “Have the ships closest to it scramble fighters.”

  “Aye, Admiral.”

  “I’d rather not have such a fine ship destroyed.”

  Multiple squadrons of UNE fighters deployed from their respective carriers and ships, swarming the Kepler, greeting it with rail guns and plasma missiles.

  The ship remained on course, taking evasive maneuvers to dance away from the assault they weren’t going to able to survive. Foster had to do something.

  “They won’t stand down that easily,” she said to the admiral.

  “Ask Commander Williams to do it, he’ll listen to you.”

  “He’s probably dead thanks to her,” Foster said, gesturing to Chevallier. “Saressea must be in command now.”

  “A Radiance officer?” Furnadjiev said with intrigue. “Then you need to get her to stand down at once, humans fighting a human ship is one thing. But Radiance . . .”

  Foster brought to his attention she was still cuffed and needed access to her wrist terminal. Furnadjiev nodded to Chevallier, she removed Foster’s bindings, and kindly reminded her she still held her rifle.

  Foster spoke into the wrist terminal. “Foster to Johannes Kepler, stand down. Do not engage the UNE fighters.”

  There was a three second communication delay before she heard a reply. “Captain? Are you all right?” Saressea’s voice asked.

  “I will be if y’all turn tail and run,” Foster said. “Look, this is the UNE fleet that was with us in Kapteyn’s Star, you saw firsthand what they were capable of. Think of what they could do to you guys.”

  “We’re not leaving you behind.”

  “You got to do it! That’s an order!”

  “I work with you, not take orders,” Saressea said. “You want me to stand down? You’ll have to get the Radiance Union navy on the line.”

  “Saressea!”

  “Captain, you don’t understand! The Terran—”

  The comm link cut suddenly as the view screen lit up with white light. The Johannes Kepler ate four back-to-back plasma missiles. It responded with aggression in the form of its forward rail guns firing in combination with its particle cannon. Six fighters were hit with shields flickering. One fighter wasn’t so lucky and exploded, as three others dove in to retaliate, and then vanished from the screen after numerous explosions. Chang was trained to be a fighter pilot, his skills with the Johannes Kepler wasn’t surprising at all.

  Foster lowered her arm and the terminal that was wrapped around it. The feeling of utter defeat punched her in the gut worse than Chevallier did.

  “Good job, Saressea, you just declared war on the UNE, on behalf of Radiance . . .”

  “Four fighters down, sir, no escape pods detected.”

  “Human lives once again extinguished by the command of aliens,” Furnadjiev said. “Have the Wendell Priestley, Tallie Bolkey, Langston Ingham, and Tremaine Gates escort us to the space bridge.”

  “Aye, Admiral.”

  “Keep the fighters on the Johannes Kepler; do not let them get within teleportation range of us.”

  “Aye, Admiral.”

  “And remind all fighters to disable, not destroy the Johannes Kepler.”

  The action continued to unfold on the view screen. The Marcus Antonius pulled away from the conflict the Kepler found itself in, while the four other ships Furnadjiev requested formed a small formation, taking up orbit around the space bridge.

  The remainder of the UNE fleet repositioned to face Taxah. Each ship was positioned above one of Taxah’s continents, most of them near the north and south poles of the planet. Not one ship was facing its oceans, reminiscent of the positions the Imperial fleet took during their invasion of Earth a century ago.

  “Foster,” Furnadjiev said. “Keep trying to hail your crew and make them stand down; let’s reduce the amount of human lives being lost here.”

  She made a number of attempts to do so, there was no reply. The intense combat had everyone on edge she suspected. Foster pretended to make calls at a slower pace when the Kepler managed to create some distance between itself and the battle. Her hope was that she could remain on the bridge a while longer to observe what was going on. It’s probably the sole reason they hadn’t removed her, they wanted to confirm she was doing her part to make the Kepler stand down.

  “Remove her.”

  She thought too soon.

  “Ready to scream?” Chevallier whispered into her ears as she dragged Foster back the elevator.

  Important bridge chatter began while the two stepped aboard the elevator. Foster listened in closely to catch what she could before the doors shut.

  “Confirmed, Admiral, the dragons made landfall on Taxah.”

  “That’s a shame, I guess they’re going to build another breeding construct on this world and annex it.”

  “Orders?”

  “Nuke Taxah; it’s the only way to be sure the dragons don’t spread.”

  “The whole world?”

  “Don’t tell me you guys give a shit about bunch of un-evacuated Hashmedai, do you?”

  “No argument from me, Admiral.”

  The doors slid shut, blocking out the rest of their conversation. Though, the strategic position the fleet took made a lot more sense having taken in the conversation. They were here to start a war with the Empire. The dragons on the surface, were just an excuse to wipe out billions of Hashmedai lives.

  49 Peiun

  Rezeki’s Rage

  En route to Taxah, Uelcovis system

  October 17, 2118, 01:15 SST (Sol Standard Time)

  Minutes earlier . . .

  Blue and white bolts of psionic energy flashed and danced about within an empty pocket of space. Soon afterward, the Rezeki’s Rage appeared back into existence from the space bridge jump, entering the Uelcovis systems. Doctor Pierce’s recalibration of the space bridge was a success, as was the joined psionic powers of Chloe and Alesyna.

  What wasn’t a success was where in the system the Rezeki’s Rage arrived. It appeared four AUs away from the UNE fleet under control of the Terran Legion. At full sub light speeds, it would take them a little over an hour to reach that location. The fleet would have completed their objectives at Taxah at that point, or at least started them. Of course, none of that data was made available to the Rezeki’s Rage until after their first thirty minutes of being in the system once their scanners came into use.

  Peiun considered themselves lucky to receive the data in the first place. The Rezeki’s Rage’s scanners had picked up the Terran fleet location because it already arrived in the Taxah sector. Had the fleet still been in FTL, the Rezeki’s Rage wouldn’t have had any data to work with until the fleet came to a stop. Scanners worked at the speed of light, the Terran fleet had the power to outrun a sensor sweep if they moved quickly enough.

  Sarah made an unexpected appearance on the bridge with the aid of an exosuit normally given to Imperial warriors. Her footsteps were slow, almost robotic-like, she was using a remote-control device to force the suit to move, thus making it appear she could walk. Her determination to see things through to the end was impressive. She would have made a fine Imperial warrior had she been born a Hashmedai.

  “So, we were right,” Peiun said, as the first wave of sensor data beamed into his HNI. “These human ships have entered our space. Sarah, what sort of armaments do they have?”

  He enlarged the imagery that appeared over his eyes into a large holo screen and pushed it over to Sarah. She viewed the sensor data in regard to the Terran fleet. Her sighs released white mist from her lips. “They got rail guns out the ass, forward particle cannons, lots of fighters,” she said, then swallowed before revealing the last detail. “And nukes, lots and lots of nukes.”

  “I was afraid you’d say that,” Peiun said.

  “After the Imperial invasion, nukes became standard on all UNE warships,” Sarah said. “What’s their course?”
/>
  “The first wave of data is coming in now,” he told her. “They seem to be taking up position near Taxah, as we suspected.”

  “You realize by going after them, we’re jumping into a situation we know nothing of.”

  “I know . . .”

  Sub light speeds, fast-as-light scanners, and no shipboard psionic would put the Rezeki’s Rage at a great disadvantage until they closed the gap. They needed the ability to remove the interstellar fog of war that blanketed the entire system. Human atomic weapons could be heading toward the Rezeki’s Rage now, and they’d never know it until it was too late. The fleet could be moving to take up positions behind gas giants or large moons to block sensor scans, and they would end up flying into a trap.

  Should they survive that, then they’d be forced to use similar combat tactics the pirates they fought in the belt of Morutrin used. UNE ships had a least one psionic aboard, much like Imperial vessels.

  He looked at Penelope who sat a vacant station on the bridge, tinkering with the many holographic screens around her. She may not have been a psionic, but she did possess skills that could give them the advantage they needed, the ability to peek under the fog of war and better prepare for what lurked ahead. Or at the very least, prepare their allies.

  “Penelope, how are those reprogrammed QECs?” he asked her.

  “We’re connected to the UNE network now,” Penelope said. “As for the one in your transport, it’s linked with the ship we flew past, but it is deactivated.”

  “Sarah, do you mind contacting your people on our behalf?”

  Sarah smiled at Peiun. “Thought you’d never ask.”

  “Let them know everything that’s happened,” he said. “Perhaps they can put a stop to this.”