Lieutenant Spacemage (Imperium Spacemage Book 3)

by Timothy Ellis

  “Very. Eagle, any of your pilots feeling sluggish this morning?”

  “Several. I don’t feel too good myself.”

  “Get all of you into a care unit on Haven. I don’t know yet if they’ll find anything, but it could be your brain waves have been altered.”

  “How are you?”

  “Not up to normal for me. I ran it off to some extent, but I’m drawing magic energy to do it. As soon as I move the ship, I’ll go into a care unit as well. But I want to check on the rest of the squadron before I do.”

  “Should we call off the diplomatic mission?” asked Tollin.

  “Maybe not, but we’re not doing it their way. Do we have a spare small station?”

  “Probably. I’ll ask.”

  “If we do, get it moved through the rift. I think we claim the system with the rift end in it, and use the station for the diplomacy, with the illusion of diplomats living on a docked ship. We make them come to us, so we have several days before they get there. At the end of the day’s sessions, we totally purge and disinfect the whole station. Open it up to space if need be.”

  “You think distance is needed from their planets to ensure we’re not infected?” asked Eagle.

  “I think it’s a good assumption. The Trixone don’t appear to be affected on the other side of the jump point. On the fungus side, they might be failing to take the system because they become more and more sluggish the longer they are in the system. But it obviously takes a while to happen, or else the Trixone would have found a way in. And there is no evidence they ever have.”

  “No evidence they haven’t either,” added Tollin.

  “True.”

  “What will you tell the fungus?”

  “The truth. Their environmental conditions on their station are unsuitable for our diplomats, who aren’t comfortable in heat and humidity. I’ll give my protection if the Trixone try to interfere. I won’t tell them, but I’ll block the jump points they have to come through. They’ll guess I’ve done it, especially if I need to remove some fleets in the process. But I don’t think it will matter.”

  “Approved,” said Eagle.

  “I do as well,” added Tollin. “Get the ball rolling, get your ships out of there, and then put yourself in a care unit. I’ll get the rest organized. Jane can jump a station through, and Syrinx should be able to do ship rifts and magic protections. I’ll bounce it off her and Tanith to see if they can come up with anything else.”

  “Good. Deal with Jill until I’m out of the care unit.”

  “Will do,” said Eagle.

  Their hollos vanished.

  “Open a channel to the station, please Leanne.”

  “Open.”

  The same bridge view appeared on the main screen. I was now wondering if it was a real bridge, or just the image they liked to use to give a wrong impression.

  “Greetings,” said the voice.

  “Good morning,” I said. “I passed on my recommendations to my government after our meeting yesterday, and they’ve only just got back to me.”

  “Your diplomats are ready?”

  “Not quite. They were distressed to find out the environmental conditions on your station, and have refused to hold negotiations there. But are quite willing to meet with all your diplomatic teams on a station of ours.”

  “You’d allow us to travel to your Imperium?”

  “That won’t be necessary. We’ll be moving a station to the place where we appeared in the nearby system, and setting it up as a pure diplomatic station. Our delegates will live on a ship docked to it, and so can be there for as long as negotiations take. The system itself appears to be neutral, and unused by the Trixone. I can ensure they do not intrude in any way.”

  “Is this really necessary?”

  “Yes, I’m afraid it is. It will take a day or so to get the station ready, but it will take you several days to reach it. Such negotiations as a first proper meeting of species should be done somewhere neutral. And we can tailor your environments on our stations, while not affecting our own. Thus both sides remain fully functional during the discussions.”

  “This is not the way we do things.”

  “It is the way we do things, and the way they have been done with other new species we’ve just met. I’ll be moving our ships out to secure the systems you will need to travel through shortly. There will only be a single docking port available for access to the station, and it doesn’t have shuttle support. It’s actually a very small station. But it’s easy for us to move, and will do the job.”

  “How many ships can we bring?”

  “You may bring as many as you wish, but the ship which docks should be of a design which allows others to dock with it, or has shuttle docking capacity for those coming from other ships. I’m sorry for the inconvenience, but unless we postpone diplomacy for some weeks, this is the best we can do for now.”

  “Disappointing, but acceptable. We will begin preparations, and depart soon.”

  “I look forward to seeing you when you arrive.”

  “As do we.”

  The channel closed.

  “Colonel Carter wants to see you,” said Leanne.

  “Where is she?”

  “With Serena.”

  “Tell her I’ll be there shortly. Get us undocked and moving out to the rest of the squadron. Get me the other captains.”

  “Confirmed.”

  The faint clunks of docking clamps releasing sounded from far away, and twelve hollo faces popped up.

  “Get ready to move. Anyone feeling lethargic?”

  “Yes,” said Jill. “You know why?”

  “Yes. The fungus are more powerful than we thought. We’re moving back to the rift, and putting a diplomatic station there. Serena didn’t wake up.”

  They all looked shocked, and Metunga’s face suddenly looked angry, showing a lot of sharp teeth.

  “She’s in a care unit with Colonel Carter in attendance. I’m going into one as soon as I get us moved. Jill?”

  “Sir?”

  “You’re in charge until I get out of the care unit. Send Gitte and Haynes to figure out which jump points need to be closed to ensure the Trixone don’t crash our party, or the path the fungus need to take to get to the new station. Any Trixone inside that area, put a rift in front of them and send them back outside the closed points. If the job is too big, and they need moving in a hurry, see if Syrinx will help you. See if Jane has a freighter available she can drop cloaked comnavsats throughout fungus space. We need to know their ship movements, and where the Trixone have them bottled up, and we don’t want them knowing we’re looking, or they’ll try and break into the network.”

  “Aye, sir.”

  “Ready to jump,” said Leanne.

  “Jump now.”

  It was a matter of a few seconds to relocate, and the use of normal propulsion rules be damned.

  Down in the medical bay, Carter was waiting.

  “She has fungus attached to her skin,” she said. “You probably do to. In.”

  “Can you remove it?”

  “Already in progress, but both her bloodwork and brainwaves are seriously messed up. Why aren’t yours?”

  “I’m fighting it, using magic.”

  “Keep doing that. Does anyone need you for a while?”

  “No. Jill has the squadron while I’m in there. Eagle and his squadron should already be in care units back on Haven.”

  “They are. No fungus, but their brainwaves are messed up. Not as bad as Serena’s though.”

  She pointed at the opened care unit, and I climbed inside. The lid closed.

  Everything went black.

  Forty Four

  It was almost a full day later when I woke.

  I was still in the care unit, but the lid slid open as soon as I moved, and I hopped out, shifting into a flight suit. Serena was still in her care unit, and still sleeping. There was no sign of Colonel Carter.

  The wall opposite me lit up with my statu
s screens. There was a small station nearby, the squadron were in a defensive formation around it, but nothing else was in the system. The local cluster of space was all live, showing fleets of ships at seven jump points, with Trixone fleets heading for six of them. The seventh was the one we’d gone to first, and the nearest Trixone fleet was sitting at a jump point several systems away, marked by a red cross, marking it a closed by a mage in both directions.

  There was a small fleet of ships tagged as diplomatic heading towards us, but still more than a day away. A few hours behind them was another fleet, tagged as fire ants. It looked like they’d taken the majority of the ships from jump point defense at our battle site, and sent them after the diplomacy ships. No surprise there.

  “Leanne?”

  “How are you feeling, Bud?”

  “Better, but not normal. How’s Serena?”

  “Also better, but still hasn’t woken up.”

  “Any idea why not?”

  “Sensors show frozen fungus on the hull. There is a debate going at the moment about if a frozen fungus is still functional.”

  “Why a debate? I’d say it’s a given. How much is there?”

  “Most of the front of the ship has a light covering, as if it was spreading in a covert manner in order we didn’t detect it.”

  “Makes sense. I’ll be on the bridge shortly.” I started walking. “Any other ships have any on their hulls?”

  “Not that we can detect, and before you ask, everyone else is back to normal, including Eagle and his pilots. But they’re not returning to the ship until Serena is back to normal.”

  “Good call.”

  Conversation lapsed as I rushed up the stairs. The others were already popped up on the console when I walked in, and there were smiles to see me stalking as fast as I was.

  “Anything I need to know? Jill?”

  “Nothing major. Jane had the area added to the network. The local systems were blocked to keep Trixone out. Investigation is underway to determine how fungus made it through your suits. It seems all the species in their space have sent a diplomatic ship, and most of them are too small to worry about. The fire ant fleet on the other hand, is a real threat. How are you feeling?”

  “Not a hundred percent, but up near there. Serena is still asleep, but that’s probably a good thing. Is everyone sure they don’t have fungus on their hulls? I wouldn’t put it past them to have passively shot an infiltration mass at each of you.”

  “Not as far as we can determine.”

  “There is a way to be sure,” said Woof. “But no-one’s going to like it.”

  “What?”

  “We give the ships a bath in something hot enough to burn off anything sticking to the hull.”

  “You’ve got to be kidding,” exclaimed Mel.

  “He’s not kidding,” said Gitte. “I’ve tried magic to remove what’s on Long Water, but I can’t move it in any meaningful amount. I could do it by removing a layer of the hull, but that’s not a good idea.”

  “I’m not even game to try magic that focused,” added Haynes.

  I thought for a moment.

  “There probably isn’t a choice. I’ll be right back.”

  “Seriously?” asked Leanne. “You want me to jump us into the local sun, with no shields?”

  “Just for a millisecond. I’m hoping that’s long enough to fry anything on the hull, without hurting the ship itself.”

  “Now?”

  “Now.”

  “Done.”

  What I could see of the ship through the main window was obviously hot now. So was I, but not because of outside heat. I lowered the amount of energy I was taking from the dark sun almost to nothing. And felt normal again.

  “How long were we in there?”

  “Seventeen milliseconds. Took that long to be sure.”

  “Any damage?”

  “I’m still working on that. Super heating and then super cooling is not a good way of treating a ship. I’ll know when hull temperatures are normal again. But I don’t think it was long enough for actual damage.”

  “Should we do the same thing?” asked Jill.

  “I think we should,” said Norden. “We need to be sure. If there is damage, we’ve got a day for shipyard repairs if need be.”

  “I’m not sure the shipyard would agree,” said Loren. “But I don’t like the idea of something affecting me without me knowing. I think we do it, and if the ships need repairs after, so be it.”

  “I agree,” said Metunga. “Has to be done.”

  “Fine,” I said. “I’m definitely feeling better, so I think it worked. Coordinate to do it all together.”

  I didn’t even notice it happening.

  Forty Five

  Serena woke up a short time later.

  She walked onto the bridge as if nothing had happened, threw her arms around me, and kissed me long and hard. There were wolf whistles and catcalls from the others, but she didn’t appear to care. She took her seat.

  Instead of training, everyone came over for an early breakfast, which began with a Serena group hug. We batted ideas around, and decided someone needed to check out the ships heading towards us. Of course, that someone had to be me. The question was how. While I figured I could focus my magic sight enough, Serena suggested we needed actual evidence the ships were fungus infested. And to do that, we needed sensors close enough to pick up fuzz on hulls.

  Leanne supplied the how. The Lightning on board could be fitted with a belt, which would offer a measure of invisibility. I told her to go ahead and have it fitted, but figured I’d need to do some magic as well. Lightnings moved too fast to be completely invisible.

  I’d never flown one before, so once jumped out into space, I was amazed at the speed actually available. The cruising speed was more than twice the top speed of an Excalibur. The database said it was designed for moving people around comfortably and rapidly, back before the Darkness War. They were largely obsolete now we had the jump drive, but I could see courier pilots loving them. They also made a great gig, albeit a big one.

  Leanne engaged the cloak mode on the ship suit, jumped the Lightning to a position above the civilian fleet, and engaged enough engine power to keep station on them. I immediately put a cloaking shield around the ship as well, as that much engine use would otherwise be detectable if anyone was looking. And given we’d shown we could appear and disappear at will, they probably were looking. I would have been. The ants definitely would be.

  The resolution needed to pick up a single blade of grass on a hull, no, even less than that, required I get as close as possible without touching shields. I let Leanne do the flying, while using my magic sight to look. The fuzz wasn’t hard to find if you concentrated enough, and the chosen ship in the middle of the formation was covered. Not thickly enough to show a green covering like the bridge image they used did, but enough so that the ship itself was obviously enclosed enough for their telepathic field to function at full strength.

  Leanne started taking images, and I let her document all the ships one by one. We had to move around the ships to get a look at them from every angle, but no-one seemed to notice us. Every ship had the same coverage.

  On a whim, I had Leanne jump us back to their station, and we checked there as well. Now we knew what to look for, it was obvious the station was the same. The concentrations at the airlocks was higher than anywhere else. Next I had Leanne park us next to some of the debris still floating freely from the last battle, and it too was showing signs of fungus.

  We checked each planet in the system which wasn’t a gas giant, and found fungus everywhere. The asteroid belts were seeded as well. And while everywhere with no air and freezing cold had fungus, and it shouldn’t have been able to function at those temperatures and without an atmosphere, apparently it did.

  We documented everything, and jumped next to the ant fleet. It too had ships covered with enough fungus to control them. I had wondered if the fungus were controlling the ants, or the a
nts were using the fungus to control everyone else. It was still a good question, but my gut told me the ants were totally under the fungus’ control.

  The next question was what I should be doing about the ants themselves. They were now well out of their space, and a formidable threat to anyone they found. There was civilian traffic around, but they were keeping well away from an obvious war fleet they hadn’t seen before.

  I had time on my side for that one though. Leanne jumped us back to the ship, and I moved myself to the bridge, where Eagle and Tollin were waiting for me on the console. Instead, I walked into my ready room, and Leanne moved their hollos to my desk.

  “I hear you’re feeling better?” asked Eagle.

  “Yes. Much better. But the threat the fungus project is much worse than we thought. They actively seek to infest the hulls of ships, and once they do, they influence those on them. Once they dock to our station, the station itself will become infested.”

  “Isn’t infest the wrong word to use?” asked Tollin.

  “This is not just a plant. It’s a hostile life form, and as such, infest is exactly the right word.”

  “You think they are hostile?”

  “You think they’re not?”

  “No. I agree they are a potential threat, but I’m not convinced they’re actively hostile.”

  “I am. I think they’ve been bottled up by the Trixone for so long they’re desperate to escape, and we came along as a gift from the gods. If it was me in charge, I’d send them back to their space right now, and bottle them up permanently.”

  “Isn’t that taking things a bit personally?” asked Eagle.

  “Of course it is, which is why I’ve not done it. But I will need to do it, I know it. I’d go as far as suggesting that if you allow their ship to dock at the station, the station and any ship we have docked to it need to be considered expendable.”

  “Expendable?” exclaimed Tollin, although Eagle looked merely concerned.

  “Yes. The only way we’ll be able to ensure nothing of the fungus survives outside their space is to destroy the station afterwards. I’ll drop it in a sun. If the ship we use to simulate accommodation ever opens its airlock while the fungus are on the station, I’d be dropping it in the sun too.”