by Eric Warren
“When you picked up that weapon and tried to kill Box you gave up all your credibility. You disobeyed an order from your commanding officer. I guess we’re not that different after all.” Box had told Cas about how Evie had come to his rescue, stopping Page at the last minute from shooting Box by getting the drop on him.
Page balled his hands into fists. “The commander didn’t understand the situation. She’s been compromised because of her relationship with you.”
“The commander and I don’t have a relationship,” Cas said, on the defense. He hated Page for goading him, but he couldn’t stand the thought that Evie was giving him preferential treatment because of their brief history together.
“Oh please. I’m not blind. She never should have been the one to retrieve you from the Sargan Commonwealth. That job should have been mine. I wouldn’t have been as understanding.”
Cas hadn’t come down here to talk about Evie. He’d only wanted…what? Closure? The odds were Page was going to prison after a court-martial, just like Admiral Rutledge. Somehow, Cas was making an impact. Ridding the Coalition of its less-than-ideal elements. Was it pride he felt at coming here? At having accomplished something?
“Wipe that smirk off your face,” Page spat. “We’ll see who’s laughing as soon as Coalition Central hears my side of the story.”
Cas shook his head. “You idiot. You don’t even know what you’re arguing against. Do you understand the kind of people you’re working for? They won’t hesitate to toss you in jail and throw away the key. Believe me, I know.”
“You committed a capital offense.” Page turned his back on Cas. “I’d never put my own interests above those of my crew.”
“What about the interests of innocent people then?” Cas said, heat rising in his cheeks. “What if you were ordered to open fire on an innocent civilian ship? To capture it and eject its crew? Would you still be so high-and-mighty?”
Page glanced over his shoulder; a frown spread across his face. “Is that what Rutledge ordered you to do?”
“On a Sil vessel,” Cas replied. It had been a classified mission, and very few people in the Coalition had known about it, including Cas himself up until the moment when then Captain Rutledge had ordered him to fire on and disable the smaller Sil ship so they could capture it. The mission had been to obtain the Sil technology to bring it back to Coalition space in order to reverse-engineer it. To learn the secrets of their destructive weapons so the Coalition could build its own. The entire mission went against everything the Coalition stood for. Cas had refused his captain’s orders. And because of Rutledge’s stubbornness, it had cost the lives of twenty-four of their crew before they narrowly escaped.
“There must have been a reason,” Page said. “He wouldn’t have given the order without a purpose.”
Cas knew he shouldn’t be telling Page this, but he’d had enough of the man blaming him. “Rutledge was the face of those in the Coalition who wanted to get a look at the weapon systems. Build some of their own.”
“So it was to protect the Coalition,” Page said.
“By violating everything it stood for.” Cas ground his teeth together.
“That’s easy for you to say. You grew up on Earth, didn’t you? Never having to worry about anyone invading your perfect home? You never woke up in the middle of the night to marauders tearing through your home, looking for fuel or food or worse. On my homeworld I had to fight every day to stay alive. I didn’t have the luxury of taking the easy way out.”
“And yet you joined the Coalition,” Cas said. “An institution based on principles. We don’t attack civilian vessels and we don’t build weapons of mass destruction.”
Page laughed. “Listen to you. We. Like you belong to it anymore. No, we do what we need to survive. And if that means adapting to new threats then so be it. Admiral Rutledge did what was necessary to survive. And as one of his officers you should have seen that. Instead, you saw yourself fit to make a moral judgment over something you had no knowledge about. You were a bad officer.”
Cas screwed up his face. “I didn’t—”
“Did you know all the facts? Or were you just going off intuition?”
Cas hadn’t known what was going on at the time. He hadn’t known Rutledge and others in Coalition Central were trying to prepare the Coalition for future unknown threats, and they were trying to do it in the most clandestine way possible. All he’d known was his captain wanted him to fire on and disable an innocent vessel and Cas couldn’t get on board. No matter the reason. Unfortunately Rutledge’s fears came to pass when Coalition telescopes picked up an unknown alien threat headed their way a few seasons ago. Somehow Rutledge had known, or at least known they would need to be prepared. The entire reason Cas had been on the last mission had been to convince the Sil to help the Coalition. Despite the fact the Coalition had eventually succeeded in capturing one of their ships and attempting to reverse-engineer its weapons.
It hadn’t gone well.
“I didn’t think so,” Page said. “You disobeyed an order without knowing all the facts. And it resulted in the deaths of your crewmates. If that doesn’t define a bad officer then I don’t know what else would.”
Cas wondered if Page was right. What if he had followed Rutledge’s order? They would have captured the ship and begun the experiments earlier. Rutledge had revealed the entire reason Cas had been chosen to be on the crew was his extraordinary engineering experience. Rutledge had wanted Cas to head up the team that reverse-engineered and constructed the Coalition version of the Sil’s weapons. As it turned out Cas hadn’t been there, so when the weapon had been tested, it had resulted in the loss of all hands on his old ship. If Cas had been there maybe he could have figured out how to make it work. Or at least prevented a catastrophe.
It wasn’t right. The Coalition wasn’t like that, at least he had believed that back then. He’d since discovered the Coalition was just as corrupt as any other massive space-faring organization, they just hid it better behind messages of peace and goodwill. It was the whole reason he’d fled to the Sargan Commonwealth as soon as he’d been released on parole. At least the Sargans didn’t pretend they were something they weren’t. The Commonwealth was a massive crime syndicate and everyone knew it. You expected them to try and kill you. Up until his parole Cas never would have thought the Coalition capable of such a thing.
But was working to make a corrupt organization better than leaving it in the hands of those who would only make it worse? After all, not all the trillions of citizens of the Coalition were bad people; most didn’t even know what was happening within the inner politics of the system. Cas had been a Lieutenant Commander on a starship and even he hadn’t known. But instead of staying to help combat the corruption, he’d fled. And the all the innocent souls who were part of the Coalition didn’t deserve that. They deserved to have someone fight for them; to stay inside the system and work from within to make it better. Wasn’t that what he’d tried to do from the beginning?
“Not so sure of yourself anymore, huh?” Page smirked. “Like I said, let’s just see what happens when the review board hears my side of it.”
Cas knew it wouldn’t matter. Evie would back him up and all the evidence pointed to Page disobeying orders. The Coalition couldn’t sweep that under the rug. The Tempest had become too important in regards to the encroaching threat. Even now they were due for a stop-off on Eight before moving on to the next leg of their assignment.
“I hope it was worth it,” Page called as Cas moved to leave, pressing his finger against the pad beside the door. “I hope setting the program back a couple years and getting all those people killed was worth an eased conscience.”
Cas ignored him, allowed the door behind him to slide shut, cutting the man off. Once in the corridor Cas closed his eyes and took a deep breath.
“Well?” The voice made Cas jump as his eyes shot open to see the robotic body of Box standing beside him. He could be scary quiet when he wanted to be.
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“Well what?” Cas asked, trying to keep his heart from thrumming out of his chest.
“What did he say?” Box asked, his yellow eyes blinking in anticipation.
Cas narrowed his eyes. “Aren’t you supposed to be on duty?” Over the past few weeks Box had ingratiated himself to the ship’s doctor and had provisionally become part of the medical crew. Just until they left again. Though he seemed to enjoy the work more than anything else Cas had seen him do.
“I took a lunch break.”
“You don’t eat.”
“Are you saying I shouldn’t get a break?”
Cas couldn’t help but smirk. “He’s as dickish as ever. He agrees with Rutledge; can you believe that?”
Box turned toward the door, though he didn’t go through. “Considering he tried to have me disassembled…yeah, I can. Even though I’m practically a doctor now, I have a strong urge to reach through that force barrier and choke the life out of him.”
“Don’t let Xax hear you talk that way; she’ll take you off-duty for sure.” Cas moved away from the door and down the hallway. Page’s words rang through his head. What if he hadn’t disobeyed orders? How might things be different? “How long until we reach Eight?”
“Two hours, fifteen minutes.” Box fell into step beside Cas.
“Sounds like the perfect amount of time to visit the bar.”
To be continued in DARKEST REACH, available soon!
You’ve found a Map Piece! Turn the page to see where it fits in the overall universe!
You found map group T13 through W16!
Check future volumes in the series to uncover more of the Sovereign Coalition Universe!
Glossary
Planets
Quaval – One of the few charted systems in Sil territory, discovered by the USCS Achlys
Cassiopeia Optima – Sargan homeworld (settled by humans millennia ago)
Claxia Prime – Claxian homeworld
Earth – Human homeworld
Atrax – system where Captain Soon overwhelemed a Sil civilian ship
Starbase Eight – Coalition stronghold and first line of defense against Sargan incursions
Meridian – non-aligned colony world subject to raids by the Sargans
Thislea – Sil homeworld, inside the Taurus Epsilon star system
Kathora – Coalition planet used for cyclax mining
Species
Human – one of the founding members of the Coalition and central to its operation. Humans can be found on any of a hundred different worlds in the Coalition and often hold high positions of power within the organization. Worked with the Claxians to be the founding members.
Claxian – Founding members of the Coalition and pacifists with advanced technology. Lived as isolationists until first contact by the humans two thousand years ago. Helped form the Coalition to spread peace through the galaxy.
Untuburu – Early members of the Coalition. Highly religious to their god Kor. Untuburu are the only Coalition members not required to wear uniforms as their religion requires the sacred blue robes be the only garments worn off world.
Yax-Inax – Early member of the Coalition. Studious, have perfect memory and can retain huge amounts of information. Often integrate themselves into other cultures to learn as much as possible.
Sargans – Generally human but can also pertain to other species who have joined the Sargan Commonwealth. Sargans are humans who want to be lawless, or at least out from under the thumb of the Coalition.
Sil – Unknown species of great power. The Coalition has reached a tentative treaty with the Sil not to violate their borders under any circumstances. Their empire is large.
Miscellaneous
Scorb – a heavy-type drink
Firebrand – liquor close to whiskey
Rank – a drink brewed from the hops of Caldonia
Galvanium – a type of metal used in ship construction
Cyclax – a type of metal used in ship reinforcement
Yaarn - protein synthesized to approximate the texture of an animal on Earth
Ackmel - a lumbering mammal known for its use on desert worlds
Author’s Note
Thanks for reading TEMPEST RISING! Crafting a universe as large and complex as this is no small feat, but the challenge has been one of the greatest of my life. Back when I first began writing I wasn’t even sure if I could write a trilogy and now I’ve not only written a five-book series but I am hard at work on making the universe of the Sovereign Coalition expansive to hold many, many more stories. But I couldn’t do this alone. Despite the fact most of my time is spent at my desk, there are always other people who have helped me along the way.
To my beta readers and ARC team: Meenaz, Kay, Katie, Brian, and Lori in particular, you keep me on my toes and do the hard job of searching for all my mistakes. Thank you for all the time you dedicate to making my work better.
To the Charlotte Writers Group: when I joined back in 2014 I had no idea what kind of path this career would take me on. Thank you for all the insight and advice you gave me over the years. It made my writing excel far beyond what it was when I began.
To the Sterling and Stone Team: your enthusiasm for story and willingness to help others no matter their skill level was a game-changer for me. Before I found you, I found it daunting to write more than two books a year. You made the process so much better for me and without it I never would have gotten this far. Thank you.
To my family: you have always supported me, and never believed I would achieve anything other than what I set out to achieve and beyond. Thank you for always being there and never giving up.
To Tiffany Shand and Dan Van Oss: you guys turn coal into diamonds. Without you, this would be a rough smattering of words and Tiffany made them better while Dan brought beauty and images to my ideas.
And finally, thank you to my very patient wife, you’re the reason I do what I do and I love you more than anything.
Until next time!
-Eric Warren
About the Author
I’ve always been an author, but I haven’t always known I’ve been an author. It took a few tragic events in my life and a lot of time for me to figure it out.
But I’ve never had a problem creating stories. Or creating in general. I wasn’t the creative person in any of my classes in school, I was always the kid who never spoke but always listened. I was the one who would take an assignment and pour my heart into it, as long as it meant I could do something original.
I didn’t start writing professionally until 2014 when I tackled the idea of finishing a novel-length book. Before then I had always written in some capacity, even as far back as elementary school where I wrote pages of stories about creatures under the earth.
It took a few tries and a few novels under my belt before I figured out what I was doing, and I’ve now finished my first series and am hard at work on my second (which you hold in your hands now!). I am thrilled to be doing this and couldn’t imagine doing anything else with my life.
I hope you enjoy the fruits of my labor. May they bring you as much joy as they bring me.
Having lived in both Virginia and California in the past, I currently reside in Charlotte, NC with my very supportive wife and two small pugs.
Visit me at my website
