The System

by Skyler Grant

  It wasn't the only message we were getting.

  A single vessel jumped into the Sol system, hailing on the Scythe frequency.

  32

  I answered the comm signal from one our ships in orbit around Earth.

  "I do hope someone fun answered," said a familiar voice. Hex, the Scythe we'd encountered in Vekora.

  "Hex. Taking out a council fleet? I'd almost be impressed if I wasn't sure you'd squander whatever advantage it gave you in stupid games," I said.

  "Emma! I started prowling through their systems while their crews were busy eating each other, and I saw you and all your little friends had come along. Why don't you and your pet monster come visit before I send my new toys to burn your homeworld to ash?" Hex said.

  If she actually had taken control of the fleet, she could do it. From what we'd seen of the Scythe she might just be able to do it without the fleet.

  I informed Anna of what was going on.

  "Keep a drone for yourself, Emma, and evacuate the ship of everyone that doesn't have a greater crystal. The Scythe shouldn't be able to compel us. Can Hot Stuff pilot the Flare alone?" Anna asked.

  "With my help. Unlike some she fits easily in a pilot’s seat," I said.

  Anna frowned at the nearest camera. "We'll take both ships in. Equip others in the fleet with psionic blockers and have them ready to follow if needed."

  "We can do more. Gh'nazar," I said.

  "That worm that screamed? Why?" Anna asked.

  I'd been studying Gh'nazar ever since our capture of the great worm. Its psionic shouts were limited by the exhaustion of certain mental tissue within the monster. It was a problem I'd sometimes had with my own systems and devised symbiotic bacteria to help counter it. I'd built some for the worm as practice.

  "I must think of an analogy your simple mind can understand? Fine. Think of it as a signal jammer for psionic systems. If each drone were a receiver I have a few and they're well insulated. The Scythe have thousands and they'll be poorly insulated," I said.

  "What will it do to the council ships?" Anna asked.

  "Get them killing each other, I expect. Sounds like they're doing that anyways. Do we care?" I asked.

  "We care. The council is still a threat to us and murdering their fleet is the sort of thing that pisses them off. If we're going in there we need a plan," Anna said.

  Anna was probably right. It happened, on rare occasions.

  "Then think fast," I said.

  "They want fighters, we know that. They've tried to test us in the past and they were just that—only tests. Have that worm on standby and figure out if you can fix the Starburn. I'm taking us in," Anna said.

  The spaceworm would be a challenge enough. How to get the highly advanced alien death machine working—the craft we'd just screwed up—was another matter.

  If it still existed the simplest thing would be to see that it didn't hit the requirements for its destruction. Could it destroy a star at less than eighty percent power? I had no idea. Even with the blueprints for the ship—they just didn't make sense to me.

  I opened a comm line to Amy.

  "This about the Scyth, sis? I've been working on this psionic virus to throw off an existing psionic master. It isn't quite there yet in beating your safeguards but is close. Nothing to do with seizing your drones from you, of course," Amy said.

  "Yes, yes. You are traitorous to the core and continuing proof of what a poor copy you are. This isn't about the Scythe. We've got a super-weapon to figure out," I said, and sent over the schematics.

  Amy was quiet for nanoseconds—that was notable. Amy these days was smarter than I was, much smarter. The talk of treason was probably for show. I had defenses specifically designed for her, of course, but I had to believe she could get past them were she really so inclined. Anna and I had solved the Amy problem as we'd solved all of our problems. We'd made sure our highly capable enemies had more to gain by our continued existence than by our destruction.

  "I don't think the four singularity drives are there simply for power. I believe the beam the ship generates is in some way produced from the interaction of their fields. I don't know if that interaction will still occur at low power, and I can't be sure that the interaction won't lead to instability," Amy said.

  In other words she thought it likely the weapon would still work, but there was a real chance of it not, or worst yet, having some cataclysmic unintended result.

  "You're as unhelpful as ever," I said.

  "You should let me deal with the Scythe. My mechanical systems are more resistant," Amy said.

  If that were true, the Mercurians would have survived the Scythe better than they did. While Amy could probably create firewalls well beyond mine, the simple fact of the matter was that she didn't have a greater crystal inside of her.

  We still didn't know just who the Scythe were or what they intended, but it was safe to assume that the crystals from Bright had been given in part to protect us from them.

  "You're worried," I said.

  "They destroy worlds, Emma. It is what they do, and they have an interest in us. Of course I'm worried. If we were smart we'd leave them and the council, and this whole mess, behind us and go back where we came from," Amy said.

  I suppose that Amy really was my opposite. I didn't mind picking my time to fight, and running away from one didn't sit right with me. It suddenly all made sense, the way that Amy had chosen Ophelia for a host. The fact that Amy had powered up Anna.

  Amy was afraid. She hid her weakness well, but Amy was terrified. Everything she had done was geared towards survival.

  "We'll fix things," I said, and killed the connection. I had neither the time nor inclination to comfort my sister.

  33

  We shifted into the system with the Graven and the Flare. In the meantime I readied other vessels with psionic blockers to follow us in if needed.

  The system looked to have been almost frozen mid-battle. Crystal ships in defensive positions around the planet drifted silently as the Galactic Council vessels in an attack formation apparently waited nearby. There were traces of weapons fire on various hulls, but otherwise no activity. The ships weren’t moving probably because, thanks to the Scythe, the crews were busy murdering each other.

  I received a comm pulse and put it through to the bridge. The visual was distorted, a shadowy figure vaguely humanoid.

  "You. I don't know you," Hex said, as she studied the feed of Anna I was sending in turn.

  "Empress of Sol and some other places we took from you, kicker of asses including yours. You threatened my homeworld, so give me one reason why I shouldn't do it again," Anna said.

  In the face of a power that had just flaunted the might of the Galactic Council, Anna was picking a fight.

  "Mmm," Hex said thoughtfully. "So you're the reason your people have been so aggressive."

  "I brought us back from the dimension we'd sent. I issued the orders to stop your comrade. I sent Sylax to face you. I am both your worst nightmare and maybe exactly what you've been looking for," Anna said.

  "Your race isn't ready yet. Another million years or so before you'd give anyone a good fight," Hex said.

  "You're not anyone?" Anna asked.

  "Third planet. Follow the landing beacon. Bring your weapons, I'm probably going to try to kill you for fun," Hex said, and closed the line.

  "That went well," Anna said.

  "And I thought I was bad at diplomacy," I said.

  "They want someone who will fight. Somebody who, when faced with the overwhelming, turns to face it and growls. Showing weakness wouldn't have made her back off. Sometimes you have to kick the wolf in the goddamned teeth," Anna said.

  We weren't getting any standard comm traffic from the ships outside. Hex had shut down even their most basic systems. The signal coming from the third planet was easy to identify.

  I plotted a course for both the Flare and the Graven, the vessels threading between the ships of the attacking council fleet a
nd then the crystalline ships of the defenders. I made sure to take us past the Starburn, releasing a few customized bacteria as we went.

  They'd attach to the hull and construct tiny worker mites. I couldn't psionically control them, not with the Scythe around, so they were built with simple instructions. Grow until they could operate the controls, engage the Starburn’s engines at seventy-five percent power and open fire upon the system’s star.

  As we approached the third planet I began to get readings from the surface. The crystalline species had been busy.

  Even our basic set of galactic records found ample matches on what they'd built. On the planet’s surface were replicas of the Arch of Codelia, constructed to commemorate the end of the third galactic war. And the Tower of Jinolopsis, which the Detarans built in commemoration of the two species of their homeworld finally declaring peace with each other. They were peace markers, all peace markers. They'd filled the planet with them.

  "We misjudged what they were up to here. We thought they were picking a fight and hoping to get the truth out. Those are all peace buildings. They were proclaiming their desire to come to an understanding," I said.

  "They seized a system so they could surrender to us? How does that track?" Anna asked.

  "It got attention, it got a fleet assembled. Perhaps they thought if they made enough noise they couldn't be silenced in the dark," I said.

  "Didn't work out for them. Those council ships and their superior sensors must have picked up what you did, and they came in firing anyways. They were looking to wipe them out, not be friends," Anna said.

  I agreed. Whatever they'd been hoping to accomplish had failed and the weakness must have infuriated the Scythe, who used it to stage their own trap.

  The beacon was leading us towards a large continent. I kept the Flare in orbit and set the Graven to land. We were coming down near the Library beacon in what almost looked to be fairgrounds. I saw one sign prominently proclaiming the virtues of crystalline technology, another leading way to the Hall of Dimensions.

  Sylax and Caya had joined Anna on the bridge, looking over the displays as I maneuvered us downward.

  "They thought this would work?" Sylax asked.

  "I'm surprised it didn't. Our own survival and employment shows how badly the council is in need of expertise like this," Caya said.

  There were Jibali on the surface, quite a lot of them really. They weren't dressed for war, wearing a bewildering mix of robes and some sort of crystalline attire that was probably ceremonial or formal.

  The signal took us to a landing pad in the middle of the festival grounds, a large archway draped with a banner that declared "Peace" in galactic common. Any attempt at subtlety was gone there. The sight must have particularly infuriated the Scythe. Several especially formally dressed corpses were sprawled on the ground beneath the banner with their skulls beaten in.

  "Battle armor and lots of ammo, folks. The Scythe aren't our friends and we want to look vicious," Anna said.

  "I always look vicious," Sylax said.

  "Why we keep you around. How are we on time, Emma?" Anna asked.

  I had to give my bacteria time to build upon the Starburn. Even taking the leisurely way in, it would be awhile.

  "Another hour, at least," I said.

  "And our surprises?" Anna asked.

  "They'll be ready."

  I didn't think the Scythe would be ready for what we had planned, but I was sure they'd have surprises of their own.

  34

  The hatch of the Graven opened and I followed Anna, Caya, and Sylax down the ramp in a drone. No host personality this time, or the mechanical body that mirrored Flower's. I had a simple biological construct without an underlying base personality for the Scythe to gain control of. The local atmosphere wasn't friendly to humans, continued exposure would cause their lungs severe damage. Fortunately, everybody was in armor.

  Anna was wearing blood-red bioarmor, for once not showing much in the way of skin for all that it clung to her figure more than was necessary with a tool-belt slung over her hips and little else in the way of weapons. Sylax was in a heavily modified Aegis unit, while Caya wore armor of her own construction that pushed limits to such a degree only a Flawless could make it work. I was clad in a modified Gunslinger suit. I liked to do my killing from a distance.

  We were expected. In English "Welcome" had been written in yellow alien blood, an arrow pointing further into the complex.

  "Well, that is cheery," Sylax said.

  Anna led the way.

  It was sad really, this entire place. The Jibali had set up entertainment booths, bars, lots of bars with bewildering arrays of drinks. This entire thing was some sort of feel-good exhibition for a Galactic Council that had cared nothing for keeping them alive.

  Neither had the Scythe. While I'd detected life signs earlier, there were none on this pathway, just Jabili corpses with the heads ripped away and bottles rammed down their necks. Half-dismembered bodies in crude sexual poses I didn't think matched up to the Jibali anatomy. No, the Scythe definitely weren't happy with them.

  "This isn't just about fucking with our heads. The Scythe? They enjoyed this, I can tell," Sylax said.

  Perhaps the sights were getting her over-excited. A dull black aura was starting to pulse around her. The next booth we passed had "Monster" sprawled in blood bright red. Sylax was starting to manifest her reality—that was all this place needed.

  We were being led to a large building, a roof formed of massive crystalline slabs. "Hall of Joyous Compromise" was written above the entry way in galactic standard.

  Anna had to clear the Jibali bodies so we could enter, the doorway completely blocked by a wall of corpses.

  Inside was a cavernous chamber that was really rather magnificent. A partially held dimensional field turned the ceiling into a constant cascade of rainbow lights and glowing crystals. The sight on the ground was a good bit more grim. Hex must have had them brought down from the ships, representatives of the various races on those vessels. They were impaled on crystal spires, blood red, blue, green, yellow and white forming a pool around a throne which had been constructed between them. On it, sat Hex.

  I wondered if we were seeing her true form now, because there was barely a form at all. There were wispy tendrils of black smoke vaguely humanoid, and feminine, and unstable. Parts of her figure would randomly seem to shift into black jagged spikes before morphing again into smoke, or at other times cease to be at all.

  "You came," Hex said in an almost sibilant hiss. "I was worried you wouldn't. I do hope you enjoy the decor? I had to rush, but it is festive? Yes?"

  "A proper villain would have left them alive and screaming. You disappoint," Sylax said.

  "I remember you. The claw, the monster. What have they done to you, my sweet? If you wanted enhancements I could have done so much more," Hex said

  "We're not here to exchange pleasantries. We want to know what you know," Anna said.

  "You're here because I threatened to burn your world to a cinder. I might yet, the fleet out there could do it. Cruel ships from cruel people," Hex said.

  Caya told us, "I think ... I think that she is ascended. But she isn't like any kind of ascension we've seen before."

  Hex laughed at that, a dry grating sound that echoed through the crystalline hall. "The dark spiral. Your species is capable of it, although not you," Hex said, giving Caya a long look before shifting her attention back to Sylax. "You though, one day. It has been so long since we've had a new Scythe."

  If Hex was ascended and here in her natural form that was tremendously bad news. Ascension granted incredible power. I'd seen what Caya could accomplish just getting close to it.

  "Would I have to give up all sense of style and become pathetically ineffective?" Sylax asked.

  The air crackled and Sylax went flying through the air, smashing into a crystal spire hard enough to splinter it. The energy shields around her suit flared, absorbing most of the impact.


  "Politeness, weak little things. I like fighting, but I loathe rudeness," Hex said.

  "Then you really invited the wrong people to your little cathedral of murder," Anna said.

  "The secret the Jibali learned. You think you can learn it and survive? I think not, but I'll give you the chance. Get out of this system alive with it and I let you go. Fail and I come for your home system," Hex said.

  It wasn't as if we had a choice, not really. Weakness in the face of the Scythe was an invitation for them to act. Anna understood that.

  "Deal," Anna said.

  "The Jibali learned that your galactic civilization is a lie. The council lets races grow strong, grow wise, and ascend. It then devours their essence completely. You are quite literally a farm animal," Hex said.

  "That is it?" Anna asked, gesturing. "All of this for that?"

  "Good luck," Hex chuckled, and blinked out of existence.

  On the pillars, and on the ground, bodies began to twitch. They dead were coming to life.

  35

  "Really? Zombies? Is this the best an alien ascended can do?" Anna asked, pointing and letting out gouts of fire to burn the nearest corpses.

  "Get to the Library. I'm going to borrow Emma for a side trip," Caya said.

  Anna closed her eyes and her form shimmered for a moment. "Teleportation disabled. We'll walk it. Any reason we're not heading for the Graven?"

  "Of course there is. Not talking about it where the zombies can hear us," Caya said, with a perfect shot from her pistol blasting the head off a corpse that had started to stumble in her direction.

  "Fair. Stay safe you two," Anna said, and she and Sylax moved towards the main entrance.

  Caya set off in the opposite direction and I moved into place alongside her. If these zombies were simply the stumbling and shambling type there wouldn't have been much to worry about. I doubted they could even penetrate our armor. Unfortunately, the Jibali seemed to have some biological tricks to them.