The alien shattered his statuesque pose, and the glowing red eyes of his helmet turned. He warbled something.
“Yess?” Hoff’s translator hissed in his ear.
“Could you tell me if there are any other Gors nearby? Maybe we can get some reinforcements.”
“If they are nearby, they are with Zithianzz, and we need rescue them before they help us.”
“Ah, yes, you make a good point. Well, all the same, it would be good to know if there are Sythians nearby. Would you check for us, please?”
“I try.” A few moments later Roan replied, “None of my crèche mates are close enough for me to speak with them.”
“I see. Thank you, Roan.” Hoff turned back to his XO. Donali’s real eye was thoughtfully narrowed. “He’s lying to us,” Hoff whispered. “Why do you think that might be?”
Donali shook his head. “This has gone on long enough. They’re endangering our mission, and if we keep them aboard, they’ll endanger Dark Space, too.”
Hoff touched his comm piece and whispered into it to put a call through to one of the sentinels standing guard over the bridge. The sergeant commander standing at the entrance answered.
“Admiral?”
“Sergeant Thriker—Code 12.”
“Code confirmed.”
Hoff watched the sergeant signal to the soldier standing beside him. They turned in unison, raised their rifles, and fired. Blue fire screeched out and hit Roan in the chest and neck. The alien tried to react, instinctively lifting his arms to fire back from his forearm gauntlets, but his weapons had been disabled long before he’d been brought on board, and his knees buckled before he could even take one step. Thriker fired once more and Roan toppled to the deck with a thud.
“Take him to the probe rooms,” Hoff said. “It’s time we found out what the Gors have been hiding.”
Sergeant Thriker and his squad mate headed for Roan.
“The probe is useless on Gors, sir,” Donali said. “You’ll just kill him.”
“Who says I want him to live? But before we try that, we’ll be sure to exhaust every other option.”
“What are you going to do when Tova realizes we’ve turned on them? She could make a mess of the Interloper if our crew isn’t ready and waiting to stun her.”
“Petty Officer Ashron!” Hoff turned to his comms officer. He was still busy at his station, eyes down, hands busy. The rest of the crew was the same. They hadn’t skipped a beat. If they were shocked that Hoff had ordered Roan stunned, they weren’t showing it.
“Sir?”
“Tell the Interloper to arrest Tova, and be careful about it. Have them send her here. As soon as you’re done with that, send a scout back to Fortress Station with a message. They are to evacuate Ritan, and make sure our transports are rigorously screened for any stowaways. Once our people are off world, they can drop the shatter bombs and head to the colonies. We’ll meet them there when this is all over.”
“Yes, sir,” Ashron replied.
Donali nodded. “So the alliance is over.”
Hoff shot him a quick look. “It never really began. They weren’t on our side, Commander.”
“So what were they waiting for?”
“Maybe this. If they don’t know exactly where Dark Space is, then maybe all they needed was for someone to lead them there.”
“If that’s true, then there will be a whole cloaked fleet hot on our trail.”
“Our tachyon trail will be cold long before they can get here to pick it up again. Nav!” Hoff bellowed. “Start spooling for a jump to Dark Space. As soon as our messenger is away, punch it.”
“Yes, sir.”
Hoff and Donali turned to watch as the Sergeant Thriker used his grav gun to levitate Roan off the deck.
“It’s a pity the Gors weren’t on our side,” Donali said absently. “With their help we actually could have turned the tide in this war.”
“Cold, hard truth is always preferable to a comforting lie.”
“What if the lie is all you have?”
Hoff frowned. “What do you mean by that?”
“We can’t stay hidden forever, Admiral, so what happens when they find us? That lie was our only hope.”
“Then hope was the real lie. . . .” Hoff turned to gaze out the forward viewports at dark, glittering space. “Death came for us at last—” he said, speaking softly. “Her strokes were swift and cruel, and nary a man was left standing, but we found hope in the ashes, for the ashes buried our bodies and covered our blood, and for a moment they allowed us to pretend that the horrors we’d seen were not really there.”
Donali blinked. “Waxing poetic, are we, sir?”
“It’s a line from an old holo play—Origin at the End.”
“Ah, the great war of legend.”
Hoff turned to his XO with a small smile. “Of legend? No, Commander, not just legend. It was very real. Sometime I should show you your heritage.”
Donali frowned. “That would be an honor, sir.”
“Be sure that you are worthy of it when the time comes. Knowledge can be a dangerous thing, if it is shared too freely. We must be careful who we tell and how much we say.”
“Yes, sir.”
“As for hope—take heart, Commander—we’re not dead yet, and death is not the end. It’s a new beginning.”
Commander Donali smirked. “I’ll have to take your word for that, sir.”
* * *
Tova heard the screech and felt the stab of betrayal mere seconds before she lost consciousness. When next she awoke she was naked and strapped down on a table, wincing up at a bright light. When she tried to rise, strong cords held her down and seared her exposed skin, so she lay back, gasping for air. She turned her head and saw Roan lying on a matching table beside hers, hovering a few feet above the ground. He looked badly beaten. His eyes were only half open, and as his head turned toward her, and he hissed softly, she could hear his pain.
Tova hissed back, angrily, and she fought her restraints once more. Sparks flew as her restraints crackled, but she ignored the lancing waves of pain.
“Good, you’re awake,” a human voice said. The translation warbled into her ear a moment later and she struggled to find the source of the sound. “What is thiss?” she hissed.
“Isn’t it obvious?” Now the speaker came into view, but she smelled him long before his features became clear. He stank of fear. “Hoff,” she said, trying to approximate his name with her vocals. What came out sounded more like, Woss.
“You remember my name. I’m touched.”
“What you do to Roan?”
“I hurt him. A lot. He didn’t want to cooperate. Maybe you can save him some more pain by answering my questions.”
“We answer questions without pain. You need not hurt us.”
“On the contrary, Tova. The two of you have been lying to me.”
“Lying? We do not lie.”
“When we dropped out of superluminal space, we detected telepathic communications coming from this ship.”
Tova’s slitted yellow eyes widened. “You detect us?”
“Yes,” Hoff replied. He pushed away the glaring overhead light and his features came into clearer focus. He was baring his teeth as humans liked to do when they were happy. “I detect you. I detect all of you. I apologize for the deception, Tova, but you and your kind started deceiving us first.”
“We do not lie,” Tova repeated. “I do not know what you detect. Perhaps Roan tries to contact Gors on Ritan?”
“He couldn’t, Tova. Neither could you. Unless you were lying about that, too. We were more than ten light years from Ritan at the time, and he said there were no other Gors around. How do you explain that?”
“Then I do not know what you detect, but it was not one of usss.”
Hoff made a loud noise as air escaped from his lungs. “I wish I could believe that, Tova. I’m going to give you one chance to come clean, just as I did with Roan. After that, you’re going to understa
nd just how much rage and hate we’ve built up since your kind destroyed everything we’ve ever known—Sergeant Thriker here lost his entire family when his home was blown to bits by a Sythian missile. I’m sure you don’t want me to let him ask you questions.”
“Your mind is damaged, Woss,” Tova said.
Hoff’s pale eyes sparkled. “I assure you, my mind has never been in a healthier state. Now listen carefully, because I’m not going to repeat my questions. Why did your people invade us?”
Tova hissed. “Because we are slavesss!”
“Very well. What are the Gors planning?”
“We plan to work with humans to free ourselves. Now no longer. That is at an end, Woss.”
“I see.”
Tova could tell the admiral was not happy with those answers, but he remained smiling as he asked his next question. “And what about the Sythians? Why have we only ever seen one of them?”
“Because they are not all here, and you do not look. Their home is gettizz. The others—I do not know why they come. I do not know what they want.”
“It’s very easy to get through an interrogation when you claim to know nothing.”
“I tell the truth!”
“Of course you do. Sergeant Thriker?”
“Yes, sir.”
“You can finish this now.”
Tova hissed loudly once more, and her gaze turned back to her mate lying glassy-eyed beside her. He was alive, but barely, and she noticed clear white blood dripping in a steady pitter-patter from the table where he lay to the floor.
She saw another man come into view. He was tall and half his face was burned to a shiny mess of scar tissue. She assumed this was Sergeant Thriker. He picked up a glowing stick that crackled and hummed. He traced it lightly over her exposed abdomen and she hissed in agony, her back arcing against the searing, sparking cords which held her down. She tried to distract herself from the searing waves of pain by cursing the humans and imagining how she would tear them apart when she broke free, but those fantasies only gave her the illusion of hope.
There would be no escape from this.
Occasionally the sergeant would stop burning her exposed skin long enough to ask a question, but the questions were all the same ones that Hoff had asked, and after a while she decided to tell them what she thought they wanted to hear, but that only seemed to make the humans angrier. She endured for what felt like an eternity until the torment passed. At that point she was so drained and so numb that she felt as though her life were slipping away from her.
The humans would pay. They would all pay for this with their lives! That thought gave her strength to hold on a little longer—long enough to see the admiral loom over her once more. He was no longer baring his teeth.
“You were very brave, Tova,” he said. “I congratulate you for holding on this long. By now you must be wishing for the end, but I don’t think it’s that simple anymore. Watching Thriker have his fun, I’ve come to a conclusion. You and Roan will have to stand trial for your crimes. It’s not fair to give one man justice and deprive all the rest. Someone needs to pay for the trillions you killed in the war.”
“So kill usss,” Tova said. “And you have your blood price.”
“Blood price . . . that’s a nice turn of phrase. Yes, we’ll kill both of you, but it needs to be a public execution, and I’m afraid it won’t be either quick or painless. Monsters like you must be seen to suffer first, and it is not enough for you to suffer here where nobody can see it.”
“Humanzzz are the real monsters,” Tova managed. “Gorz do not . . . play with their food,” she said between gasps for air.
“Yes, that’s right. You just skip straight to eating it. Isn’t that what you did with the survivors on the worlds you conquered? Well, don’t worry; we’re not going to eat you. We’re not that barbaric.” Hoff turned away and Tova heard him speaking to someone she couldn’t see. “Dress their wounds and put them in stasis. Make sure they don’t die before their trial. Once we have Brondi and the imposter overlord, we can have all the war criminals strung up together.”
“Yes, sir.”
* * *
It was late. Atton stood in the Hestons’ garden, watching a setting sun splash the artificial sky in shades of ruby and carnelian. It was as though Hoff and Destra weren’t living on a ship at all, but he supposed that was the point. It was unusual to find so much luxury aboard a military vessel, but if Hoff had paid for the renovations himself as he’d said, then it wasn’t against fleet regs—it was, however, a slap in the face for everyone who was struggling just to get by. Atton had never been so self-indulgent, even as the supreme overlord of the Imperium, but not everyone shared his views on equality and sacrificing oneself for the common good.
Swish.
“Hello, Atton,” a warm female voice said. “Beautiful, isn’t it? Like one big light painting.” Atton tried to be diplomatic, but when he smiled it looked thin and papery, and Destra saw right through it. “He’s very wealthy, Atton,” she said, sounding defensive. “You can’t begrudge the man that.”
“Why not?”
Destra sighed and she walked out to the edge of the synthstone terrace. Her gaze slipped sideways to a swing bench with black cushions and gleaming duranium frame which stood below the dining room window. “Why don’t we sit down for a while? Hoff will be back for dinner soon, so we should make the most of the time we have alone. There are still some details to go over.”
“Good idea.” Atton followed her to the swing bench and they sat down. “You found something to get into the lift tube?”
“A cutting beam. I hope you know how to use it.”
Atton nodded. “Don’t worry. What about an escape plan?”
“I have a ship ready, Hoff’s corvette. Its main purpose is for Atta and I to escape in an emergency, so it won’t require any clearance codes to launch.”
“How far is the ship from here? Can we get there in a hurry?”
“You can take the lift tube right outside the front doors. Deck 24.”
Atton let out a long sigh. “How do you feel about all of this?”
“I’m hedging my bets, aren’t I? So whatever happens, I can deny my part in it.”
“I wish you’d agree to come with me. Whatever’s down there, I have a feeling you’re going to have to see it for yourself. If you don’t, you might not even believe me when I tell you.”
“Atton, there’s no way I’ll be able to deny my involvement if he catches me on the holocorders down there.”
“I guess it all depends on whether or not you want to continue living with the secrets and the lies.” Destra frowned and looked away. Atton went on, “Think about Atta.”
The back doors swished open, and both Destra and Atton jumped.
“Hello,” Hoff said as he stepped outside.
Atton smiled up at him.
“Hello, darling,” Destra said matching Atton’s smile. “We missed you at lunch.”
“I told you I couldn’t come. We had an emergency to deal with.”
“What kind of emergency?” Atton asked.
Hoff turned to him with a sarcastic smile. “I’m glad you asked. Your pet Gors were caught calling for backup.”
“What?” Atton bolted to his feet.
“That’s right. I caught them making unscheduled contact with their so-called crèche mates.”
Atton shook his head. “How?”
“While you were turning a blind eye to them, I found a way to detect their telepathy, and I detected it coming from this ship as soon as we dropped out of SLS.”
“What? Hold on, even if your technology is perfect, he still could have been contacting a friend on Ritan.”
“He and Tova denied all the reasonable explanations, leaving just one possibility—they betrayed us.”
Destra gasped. “What are we going to do?”
“I’ve had both Roan and Tova put into stasis, so there won’t be any more unscheduled communications from them.”
> “I mean what are we going to do about the Gors,” Destra replied. “They’re everywhere.”
“And they’re on my fleet,” Atton growled. “If you do anything—”
“Then that’s your problem.” Hoff pointed at him. “If you hadn’t trusted them in the first place we wouldn’t have to deal with this mess now. For the sake of your men, I hope the Gors still make a distinction between your fleet and mine, but if not . . . the blame for their deaths sits squarely on your shoulders. I’m pulling the plug on Ritan.”
“What?!” Atton shook his head. “There are tens of thousands of Gors on Ritan!”
“Exactly. We’re still a few trillion short before that will make us even for the war, but it’s a good start.”
“Are you positive they were giving us away?” Atton said. “How does your detector work? Maybe it’s not that accurate, or there was some kind of interference.”
Hoff waved his hand dismissively. “How it works is classified, but I can assure you the technology has been thoroughly tested.”
“Hoff,” Destra rose to her feet now, too. She walked over to him and took his hand in both of hers. “Listen to Atton. If you turn on the Gors now, thousands of men will die. At least give Atton time to tell his fleet so he can protect his men.”
Hoff gritted his teeth and shook his head. “How do you propose we do that? With our nonexistent commnet, perhaps? I’d love to warn them, but it’s too late for that. The Gors have already turned on us, and if we don’t act now, Ritan will be overrun. Right now we have the chance to strike them fast, and strike them hard. If we have to lose a few ships for that, then count them as acceptable losses, and rather think of how many lives we’ll save by killing that many Gors.” Hoff turned to Atton and scowled. “You know that this means I was right. All along, I was right about your so-called allies. I only hope that your blind trust in them hasn’t already exposed Dark Space, or we’re about to relive the Exodus.”
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