Hellfire: Mechanized Warfare on a Galactic Scale (Metal Legion Book 3)

by CH Gideon

  “That is correct,” Jem replied. “The Jem’un spent thirty-five thousand of your years inextricably bound to our homeworld, unable to break free of its gravity, which had an attractive force over seven times that of this world.”

  “That’s five and a half Earth gravities,” Podsy mused, knowing that rocketry would be immeasurably more difficult in the face of such a natural force.

  “As a result of our homeworld’s environmental impact on Jem’un technological development,” Jem continued, “we, perhaps unusually, discovered gravity manipulation technology before we ever built a single orbital colony in our home star system. Our research soon led us to design what we called a ‘gravity cannon’ matter transmission system, which required us to envelop our parent star in a power-harvesting array capable of focusing the necessary energies to transmit matter from one point in space-time to another. Using this technology, we conducted one-way faster-than-light transmissions and expeditions to neighboring stars, sending teams of colonial researchers and swarms of automated probes throughout the local region of the galaxy.

  “Eventually, we improved this technology to the degree that we were able to locate and contact two other species, and we lived in harmony with them for hundreds of your years. Jem’un society evolved, refining with admirable alacrity to our ever-changing relationship to the galaxy and everything in it. We had visited one in every ten thousand stars in the galaxy and encountered myriad species of high intelligence on the precipice of space-flight. We passively observed these species, never interfering in their development but learning much of ourselves as we watched them battle both their environments and their base natures. We called it ‘the Age of Harmony,’ and it was glorious. Then we discovered the Nexus, and harmony gave way to discord.”

  Podsy and Styles shared mutual looks of alarm before Styles asked, “Did the Jem’un encounter our species before the Jemmin holocaust?”

  “You were known to us,” Jem replied with a nod. “Unique among the sentient species for your peculiar lineage, which includes the incorporation of multiple distinctive but genetically-compatible subspecies which were highly competitive with one another, you were of great interest to us. Your world was one of the most beautiful in the galaxy, with a diversity of life rarely duplicated elsewhere. We took great pleasure in watching your struggles, for it is only through strife that organisms self-refine. My forebears would be pleased to know that you reached the stars, as they hoped you would. We never had the privilege of introducing a younger race to the wonder of the cosmos; the Jem’un absolutely refused to interfere on behalf of species like yours unless its biological and cultural distinctiveness was under extreme duress.”

  Podsy risked a glance Styles’ way; the other man seemed just as hesitant as Podsy was to pursue this particular line of the conversation. Do we tell this gestalt hologram that the Jemmin uplifted humanity? Podsy wondered.

  A few seconds later, Styles made the decision for them. “We believe Jemmin gave humanity the necessary tools to develop FTL technology.”

  “We were aware of this when we encountered elements of your technology,” Jem said with a serene nod directed at Styles’ data slate. “The likelihood of Nexus technology spontaneously arising on a world as primitive as yours is so remote as to be practically impossible. Your forthrightness in this regard will be reciprocated in accordance with my forebears’ wishes. I cannot adequately express our sorrow that your species’ development was interfered with by Jemmin.”

  “Wait.” Podsy cocked his head interestedly. “You’re saying Jemmin used technology from the Nexus to uplift humanity rather than using Jemmin… Sorry, Jem’un tech?”

  “Correct,” Jem agreed. “This was a component of Jemmin’s earliest tactical iterations.”

  “Tactical iterations?” Styles repeated.

  “Of course,” Jem replied matter-of-factly. “In accordance with the second postulation from which Jemmin arose, which states that life in the universe is fundamentally a zero-sum game, Jemmin’s efforts were to be primarily directed toward ensuring Jemmin superiority throughout the galaxy. In support of that project, the Nexus would be employed as both a social control and species-elimination system.”

  “You’re saying,” Podsy felt the color drain from his face, “that Jemmin uplifted humanity only to destroy it?”

  “Not ‘only,’” Jem corrected. “The earliest iterations of the plan would involve inducting younger species into a social conglomerate including Jemmin and between three and five other species. Manipulating younger species to support Jemmin would be relatively simple. By using a species like yours as additional leverage in a distributed authority framework similar to that employed by the Jem’un, Jemmin would coerce compliance from more powerful species in the conglomerate, ultimately isolating rival nations and dispatching them with the assistance of younger species.”

  “We’re the immigrant voting bloc…the illegal immigrant voting bloc?” Podsy deadpanned.

  “An accurate summation.” Jem nodded. “But this plan requires all members of the conglomerate to remain unaware of its existence lest Jemmin find itself surrounded by openly hostile nations.”

  “You make it sound like Jemmin is unstoppable,” Styles said bluntly. “With fifteen thousand years to expand and the ability to send expeditions wherever in the galaxy it wants, it could have spread Von Neumann probes throughout the galaxy and wiped out every species in existence before initiating the process of converting every star into a power generator. Even if every other Nexus-connected species bands together against it, how do you stop something like that?”

  “There are limits to Jemmin’s ability to expand,” Jem explained. “First, Jemmin is intensely xenophobic, which consequently means it is extremely technophobic. It believes, perhaps correctly given its base nature, that modifying its fundamental architecture in any way represents an existential threat akin to a catastrophic failure of the entire system. It would therefore be extremely reluctant to expand beyond its original configuration since doing so would be to violate the first precept from which it arose: that social systems must be afforded the right and ability to self-preserve, as we Jem’un afforded biological entities the right to self-preserve. Jemmin is a social system more than it is an organism with a central directive neurology, so adding to or subtracting from itself is inherently incompatible with its fundamental nature. It believes itself perfect…or, if not perfect, then unique and therefore worthy of preservation.”

  “That doesn’t rule out the possibility of it sending self-replicating drones throughout the cosmos,” Podsy observed grimly. “What better way to wipe out species than that? Even three hundred years ago, with our ancestors putting the first bootprints on the moon, there’s nothing humanity would have been able to do against the simplest Terran-built self-replicating mechanovirus.”

  “Jemmin believes in superiority, not isolationism,” Jem said pointedly. “When my forebears last visited your world, communities of your ancestors were just beginning the process of domesticating certain forms of life to service its various communities. Jemmin views itself in a similar fashion to your ancestors gathering livestock, but that was intended to benefit humanity. Any benefit to the livestock would be largely incidental.”

  “Jemmin views us as livestock?” Styles asked in bewilderment. “They have an edge, sure, but we did just fine against them when we fought on Shiva’s Wrath. The tech gap isn’t that wide between us.”

  “And that is a factor which Jemmin seeks to control above nearly all else,” Jem agreed somberly. “To maintain superiority, it must eliminate potential rivals before they become capable of destroying it. However, it also views itself as a steward of life in this galaxy due to the marginalized yet inextricable elements of Jem’un philosophy that became part of its matrix. Respect for the sanctity of organic life, appreciation for diversity, and recognition of sovereignty are the last echoes of what was, for a brief time, the greatest civilization in the galaxy.”

  “And
much as it might want to,” Podsy mused, “it can’t excise those annoying little pieces.”

  “A crude but functionally accurate description,” Jem replied irritably.

  “Ok, so it doesn’t want to wipe everything out,” Styles pressed, “but why hasn’t it sent probes all across the galaxy…or hell, even the universe by now?”

  “The gravity cannon is an unstable system,” Jem explained. “So unstable, in fact, that its employment led to the absolute destruction of one of the Jem’un’s two neighbors. Of the 492 sovereign Jem’un whose life experiences and personalities comprise my consciousness, fewer than two in three believed this destruction was accidental.”

  “It happened after the Jem’un discovered the Nexus,” Podsy concluded, drawing an approving nod from Jem.

  “Correct,” Jem agreed. “And somewhat more concerning that the eventual creators of Jemmin’s fundamental components, who were supposed to be in the star system when it was destroyed, had the suspicious ‘misfortunes’ of significant illnesses in their families which required them to postpone an important business trip there mere hours before the system failed.” Jem’s holographic eyes lowered to the floor in shame. “It was the saddest day in Jem’un history…a tragedy caused by our reckless employment of technology we did not sufficiently understand. If only it had been the last such day…”

  Podsy eyed the hologram. “You speak as if you’re programmed with emotions. Are they real or simply emulated?”

  “I am not ‘programmed’ with anything, Lieutenant Podsednik,” Jem said with disdain, causing the hairs on Podsy’s neck to stand and the flanking troopers’ grips to reflexively tighten on their weapons. “I am a gestalt intelligence comprised of 492 distinct records of Jem’un lives and their personalities. I have no more choice in how my cognitive systems operate or how my emotional expressions manifest than you do. When I think of the death of that star system and the twelve billion sovereign sentients who lived there, I am filled with sorrow so profound that it resonates within all of my forebears.”

  “How do you know his name?” Styles asked warily.

  “After a few minutes of conversation and observation, it was not difficult to deduce the enunciation of the lettering on your uniforms.” Jem gestured to Podsy’s envirosuit, which had his rank and name printed on the right side of his chest. “Lieutenant Podsednik.” Jem gestured to Podsy’s name patch before doing likewise to Styles. “CW4 Styles. Corporals Henrikson and Choo.” The hologram waved a long bony-looking hand at the troopers. “You are all part of a group called the Terran Armor Corps, which is military in nature, but given the lack of robust protective gear I surmise that the ‘armor’ for which your group is named was too large to fit through the passage that brought you here, making such devices large enough to contain one or more humans within them. You are indisputably not residents of this world, owing to the lower-than-background radiation levels in your body tissues and the ablative nature of the protective films encompassing your environmental protective garments. That means you were brought here by a ship, almost certainly arriving via the Nexus gates. If early Jemmin tactical theory has proven out, then your ship is incapable of FTL flight without using the gates. Indeed, it is my suspicion that no Terran ships are capable of independent FTL flight without Nexus access due to energy and infrastructure constraints. Shall I continue?” Jem asked pointedly.

  “No, you’ve made your point,” Styles said flatly.

  “Good,” Jem replied. “Because now we come to the purpose of the expedition that brought you here. I calculate a ninety-three percent probability that you wish to recover evidence that corroborates the theory that Jemmin interfered with the natural evolution of your species. I can provide that and more,” Jem said, piquing both Podsy’s and Styles’ interest as it continued, “You are not the first visitors I have received. An aquatic species called ‘Vorr’ arrived here and conversed with me via remote some thirty-nine of your years ago. They were the first species to breach this tomb, and the fact that they did so means that its location was revealed to them. There is only one way this could have occurred.”

  The pregnant pause dragged on for several agonizing seconds before Podsy finally quipped, “We’re on pins and needles here.”

  Jem laughed, and for a moment it sounded very much like a human. “Before coming here, my forebears contacted a species they felt indebted toward. It was a species whose future, and whose very home, was destroyed by Jem’un carelessness. This species hated us so passionately, so completely, that the last of the Jem’un knew they would prove instrumental to the Correction.”

  “What ‘correction?’” Podsy asked ominously.

  “The Jem’un failed, Lieutenant Podsednik,” Jem replied grimly, “and by now, perhaps dozens of intelligent species’ unique impressions have been irrevocably erased from the cosmos. Their deaths are the direct fault of the Jem’un failure to self-govern, and as the final echo of that long-dead people, it is my obligation to correct that failure.”

  Jem waved a hand, which Podsy thought looked distinctly more human than it had initially appeared, and beside the misshapen hologram appeared a bizarre-looking thing like some kind of insect. It had four spindly crab-like legs beneath its torso, and a pair of tri-pincered arms at what Podsy assumed was its front. He had never seen anything like it, but a glance at Styles suggested the other man knew precisely what it was.

  “Do you know what this is?” Jem asked lightly, but Podsy suspected this was a pivotal moment in the conversation.

  Styles nodded. “It’s Zeen. We encountered them on Shiva’s Wrath where we engaged Jemmin.”

  “Zeen,” Jem repeated approvingly as it looked at the hologram reverently. “They were the Jem’un’s first failure. Their homeworld was destroyed by our carelessness. My forebears, the Jem’un for whom I am the last living legacy, were stewards of the last surviving Zeen. Zeen bio-diversity and social harmony, despite their fundamental differences, was so exquisite…so unparalleled in the cosmos…that the few specimens we preserved were barely sufficient in number to reproduce. We deposited them on a life-bearing world before coming here in the hope that they might arise once again, but before we left them behind, we bestowed upon them two gifts.”

  “The first was the knowledge of this place,” Styles ventured, drawing an approving nod from Jem.

  “Indeed. And the second, Lieutenant Podsednik?” Jem turned expectantly to Podsy, and at this point, Podsy saw that the hologram’s features had taken on a decidedly human appearance. No longer asymmetrical and elongated, they seemed midway between human and Jemmin. They even featured eyes with pupils, which all by itself seemed to make the creature half-human in comparison to a true Jemmin.

  Podsy thought he knew the answer to the hologram’s question, but he faltered briefly before giving it. What Jem was discussing was nothing short of an interstellar war which would soon be waged between many, if not all, of the starfaring nations known to the Illumination League.

  And it seemed the Terran Republic had a significant part to play in this coming war.

  Podsy mustered his wits and cleared his throat before replying, “The second gift was your gravity-cannon technology.”

  “Correct,” Jem said with another nod. “Given the extremely low rate at which Zeen reproduce, we surmised it would take them eleven or twelve thousand of your years before they could develop a functioning gravity cannon, but we could not give them Jemmin’s location for fear the Zeen would be destroyed by a cleverer, better-positioned adversary. And we were not heedless of the dangers of giving our most prized and dangerous technology to a species understandably consumed with hatred for the destroyers of their homeworld,” Jem added, and its shoulders slouched in resignation. “We simply saw no other option. Had my forebears traveled the cosmos, found a distant star, and attempted to rebuild in the hope of defeating Jemmin ourselves, Jemmin would have inevitably found and eradicated us as it did the rest of our society. We had no choice but to incorporate the Zeen and
then come here to await their ascendance.”

  “I do appreciate the history lesson,” Styles said cautiously, “but how does any of this help us? We came here for evidence of the Jemmin conspiracy, but all you’ve given is hearsay…which we already had from the Vorr and Zeen.”

  “Evidence I can provide.” Jem nodded approvingly, and a panel silently receded into the wall opposite the door through which they had entered.

  A seemingly endless hallway stretched deep into the darkness beyond that open panel, and a faint whirring sound filled the room as a meter-wide disc-shaped platform floated up the tunnel and came to an unnervingly gentle and precise stop just inside the chamber. The panel returned to its place behind the disc-shaped platform, upon which rested a pair of tinted but translucent four-sided objects measuring about forty centimeters on each edge.

  “Please.” Jem gestured to the device on the left. “This is yours, as it has always been.”

  Podsy stepped forward, still crouching below the two-meter-high ceiling, and peered into the tinted panel. His eyes widened when he saw its contents: a human skull.

  “My forebears,” Jem explained, “were specialists in the field of biopreservation. Their studies took them across the galaxy, where they observed the great tapestry of life on a thousand different worlds. They catalogued notable species, collecting samples for documentation and preservation. This particular male,” the hologram pointed to the skull in the triangular box, “possessed a peculiar genetic mutation that proved immensely beneficial to immunological function. His offspring survived epidemics that eradicated entire populations unequipped with his particular genetic device. His remains have been preserved to the best of our ability, and should provide satisfactory evidence to corroborate the fact that the Jem’un visited your world long before humanity mastered the written word.”