Starcaster Complete Series Boxed Set

by J. N. Chaney

  “Hang on!” Riley shouted over his shoulder. “I’m not sure what this is going to do—”

  There was a loud clang, followed by a surge of acceleration. Through a small viewport, Kira saw the outer airlock hatch suddenly begin receding amid a sudden cloud of vapor, then dwindle away into the flank of a squid cruiser.

  Kira spun around. “Holy shit, Riley, you know how to fly this damned thing?”

  “Hell no. But if it’s an escape pod, it’s probably meant to be used by anyone, not just a pro pilot, right?” He gestured at a panel. “I just pushed that big flashing control right there. One button, one function. Just like ours.”

  Kira nodded, taking a moment to catch her breath. Rainer slumped into what was probably meant to be a crash couch, but it was far too small for her, and not shaped for a human body at all. She looked at Kira.

  “I can’t believe this shit is real.”

  Kira perched on the next couch beside her, every muscle in her body singing with tension and residual fear. There were twelve seats, plus one at the lone control panel. She glanced back at the cruiser. Gaping rents in its hull were pouring out atmosphere in shimmering clouds; a few of them belched tongues of flame that briefly turned into incandescent spheres before dissipating into vacuum.

  Thirteen crash couches. That meant thirteen squids that wouldn’t be getting off that ship—at least, not on this lifeboat.

  Kira slumped back again, muttering.

  “What’s good?” Rainer asked.

  “What?”

  “You just said ‘good.’”

  Kira didn’t realize she’d spoken out loud. She gave a weary shrug. “Squids dying.”

  Rainer agreed, shaking his head lazily. “That is good, yeah.”

  Well, this sucks, Kira mused, summing up their situation. They’d survived an array of attacks, imprisonment, battle, and outright hand-to-hand combat, followed by the most daring escape she could imagine.

  Only to die of thirst, starvation, or asphyxia in space, aboard a squid escape pod whose tech they knew next to nothing about.

  “Sorry, guys,” Gillis said from where he drifted above the control panel. The pod was far too small to have any sort of induced gravity, so they all floated in no-g. “I don’t see anything here that might be a comm.” He tapped at the control panel, irritated. “Just a launch button and a few basic attitude controls.”

  Kira pointed at one of the small features, the movement making her begin edging toward one side of the little craft. “It’s probably broadcasting an automated distress beacon, like our life pods do.”

  “Great,” Rainer said. “So we can get rescued by the squids and start this all over again.”

  Kira looked out the viewport. The cruiser was now barely visible, just a speck against the starfield, detectable only because of the inconstant flicker of—

  It suddenly vanished in a dazzling flash. Kira blinked away the purplish afterimage and turned back to the others. “Well, they won’t be rescuing us now.”

  Rainer crossed her arms and closed her eyes. “Good. Hope it hurt like hell, too.”

  Gillis hissed in frustration. “There are a few other controls here, but I can’t tell what they do. I mean, I can’t even bring up a nav display, so I can’t tell if we’re in open space, or about to start falling into some star like orbital slag.”

  Something occluded the viewport. Kira tensed and pulled herself back to look out into what should have been deep space, her brows lifting in alarm when she realized there was no more starfield.

  Outside, there was a blank wall of something metallic.

  Kira murmured a curse, then turned from the viewport, her face grim. “Think we can probably drop worrying about crashing into stars or planets or anything else and start worrying about this.”

  Something made contact with their craft, and then the entire pod shuddered as it began a gentle acceleration. It went on for about ten minutes, with a few abrupt changes in the direction they were traveling. Painfully bright light flooded the ’port, followed by a final, hard bump, and gravity returned with a stomach-churning lurch. Choking back a frisson of alarm, Kira steeled herself and looked outside.

  A face stared back at her.

  A human face.

  She even recognized him—Carter, or Carson, she couldn’t recall which, other than that he was Security Chief aboard the Andraste, the ship she’d once, and briefly, commanded.

  Kira put her hand on her hips, sucked air through her teeth, and then said, “Well, I’ll be damned.”

  Kira felt like she was dreaming again.

  She stepped out of the ground car that had brought her from the airfield and spent a moment taking in Code Nebula.

  Riley grinned, a guileless expression of relief and joy. “You know, I think I’m happy to be back.”

  “Happy. Huh. Well—yeah. Happy,” Rainer added.

  Kira tried a grin. “Thank you, Commander Redundant.” She felt a moment of sheer dislocation—a few days ago, she’d been in the same spot, preparing for a mission. She was here again, but the space between was filled with nightmares.

  She shook away the memory. “What I don’t get is why they brought us back here to be debriefed. You’d think that Fleet would bring us somewhere like Code Gauntlet, or a spook shop hidden away on some planet somewhere—”

  Her voice trailed off. “Hm.”

  Rainer, who was heaving her duffle bag out of the ground car, glanced up at Kira. “What?”

  “They managed to rebuild—” Kira began, but broke off. She’d just seen the barracks that had burned down, killing one poor Scorch, and almost killing Riley and herself, intact. Somehow, she’d thought, in the few days she’d been away, they’d completely rebuilt it. But no, there was just a blank foundation, cleared of debris and wreckage, which made a lot more sense.

  “I’m seeing shit,” Kira said. “Although I wouldn’t mind seeing more food. And a cot. And then more food.”

  “Damned right,” Riley agreed.

  “But first, HQ and check in. Then, we see what we’ve missed,” Kira said.

  They made their way around the edge of the parade ground, past the barracks where she and the others had been living while at Code Nebula, to the HQ building. Inside, they found Narvez and Fielder waiting for them, along with the expected spook, a Commander who somehow managed to be the most nondescript man Kira had ever seen. She doubted she could even remember his face a few seconds after looking away from him, so forgettable was the cloud surrounding his presence.

  Narvez and Fielder looked different, setting alarms off in Kira’s mind when she placed their expressions.

  They weren’t angry, or blank, or even bemused. Both officers looked pleased to see her, like she was the missing piece of a puzzle. Then someone new spoke, and the room got small in a hurry.

  “Hello, Kira.”

  She turned to the voice.

  It was Thorn.

  “Thorn—” she began, then shook her head. “What are you doing here?” She moved to embrace him but made it only a quick hug, given the professional setting. Her body vibrated with unspoken relief—at his voice, his face, and knowing he was alright—that they, the survivors, were alright.

  “The powers that be decided that I could help debrief you. Anything you learned about the squids can be useful, but anything about their magic in particular could be vital.” He shrugged. “In a departure from my usual duties, I’ll be the detail guy. Since we know each other, command thinks that—”

  “I’ll spill more. Got it,” Kira said, but she wasn’t even mad. The decision made sense, and she was still immensely happy that Thorn was there, in the flesh.

  “I hate to break up this touching reunion,” Narvez snapped, “but we’re here for a purpose. Wixcombe, come in.” She turned to Rainer, Gillis, and Riley. “The rest of you will be debriefed in turn. You are not to discuss anything you experienced, in order to avoid contaminating one another’s accounts any more than they are already. Is that understood?�
��

  A chorus of “yes, ma’am” followed as the three made themselves comfortable to wait—or, more like, to engage in the time-honored military tradition of sleeping when you didn’t have to specifically do anything else.

  Kira stepped into the Training Company Commander’s office, the same place she’d been first introduced to the op that had gone so disastrously wrong. Narvez, Fielder, and the spooky Commander sat on one side of the conference table, Thorn on the other, and Kira at the end.

  “Alright, Specialist Wixcombe,” Fielder said. “In your own time and words, tell us what happened from the moment you started the op rehearsal.”

  Kira hesitated a moment. It seemed strange, now that she thought about it, to be debriefed by Narvez and Fielder; they were training officers, not part of the intel cadre. Yes, the mysterious Commander was here, but he seemed content to leave the debriefing to the others, remaining a gray presence at the periphery of her awareness.

  After taking a breath, Kira began to speak. “We were ambushed.”

  “Ambushed?” Narvez asked.

  “Yes ma’am. And by . . . things. Constructs, unlike anything I’ve seen, or even imagined. Mobile, tentacled, armored, and deadly. They came in force, attacked us during our exercise, and overwhelmed us. We were taken, one by one, and after we’d exhausted our ammo. The fight could only end one way, and it ended badly.”

  “Taken to where?” Fielder asked, his tone bland. There was something suspicious lurking behind his eyes. It made Kira angry, then she stilled herself.

  “I don’t know, sir. I know less than you think, and probably more than I can imagine. We were prisoners, and we’d still be prisoners if not for some damned lucky shooting on the part of the Navy. We ’jacked an escape pod, took a couple excellent guesses as to what the controls were, and managed to get somewhere that we could be picked up by the Andraste. The truth is, nothing of our actions was anything other than dumb luck, and the squid kept security so tight I couldn’t—I mean, none of us could Join with them and peel away any useful intel. Most of our, ah, stay is just a damned blank. It’s like they suppressed my memories as we left, or maybe I’m just having recall issues,” Kira said.

  Thorn leaned forward, his face kind. “What can you tell us about the squid’s magic? Anything beyond our knowledge of it from where we sit?”

  “Not much, unfortunately. This was all about firefights and physical action. There really weren’t many opportunities to use magic.”

  He smiled. “It was a massive screwup that you got taken, and frankly, the fact you’re alive and can remember anything at all is a victory.”

  Kira wanted to argue that she didn’t see her situation as a victory at all, but she just smiled, because Thorn looked so earnest.

  “In any case, Wixcombe,” Narvez cut in, “you’ll be delivering a briefing to some new officers here at Code Nebula. It’s why you’ve been brought here.”

  “Sorry—a briefing, ma’am? About what?”

  “About everything. You’ve been out there, done more than most. We want you to recount everything, brief these new officers on every piece of knowledge and experience you have. Any of it could prove useful to them.”

  Kira blinked. “That’s it? That’s all?”

  “We’d like you to begin that immediately, Wixcombe,” Fielder said. “We can have the class assembled and—”

  “Excuse me, sir, but I really need a bit of time to, well, finish recovering. Can we take a day or so?”

  Narvez, Wixcombe, and the silent Commander all exchanged looks, which made Kira even more curious. It wasn’t an unreasonable request. The checkup she’d received from the ship’s surgeon aboard the Andraste had been surprisingly cursory; basically, he’d looked Kira over, listened to her heart, took her pulse, then declared her fit.

  “I don’t think that’s an unreasonable request,” Thorn put in. “Sirs, ma’am, it would give me a chance to do a little more work with Wixcombe, maybe glean a little more about the squids’ magic.”

  Kira said nothing, just kept her eyes on the superior officers arrayed across from her on the smooth, empty table.

  Narvez scowled. Fielder, though, finally nodded. “Alright. When you’re dismissed from here, Wixcombe, you’re on free time until tomorrow at zero-eight-hundred, at which time you are to report to classroom twelve-A to address a class of trainees. You’re not to leave Code Nebula in the meantime. We want to ensure these new officers are as ready as possible when they head out to meet the squids for the first time, so your briefing is to be complete and comprehensive.”

  “You are not in possession of any information that would be considered sensitive enough to be protected from them, so you’re cleared to present and discuss essentially everything you know, and answer whatever questions they may pose to you,” the voice said. It was mild, new, and belonged to the Commander who blended into the walls. Like his utterly forgettable appearance, his speech left no impression in her mind whatsoever. She was left with the memory of what he’d said, but no sense of how it had sounded. The man took plain to a whole new level; Kira suspected some sort of magical psychic effect.

  As for what he’d said—

  “Sir, if I may,” Kira replied to him. “The op I was recently involved in—the one we were preparing for when we were attacked by the squids—was classified Secret-Three. That means I can’t reveal anything about it, Commander?”

  “Yes, I am a Commander.” A hint of smile appeared and vanished, the only thing resembling an emotion she’d seen from the man. “It is no longer classified Secret-3. The op itself never occurred, and never will.”

  Kira looked at Fielder and Narvez. She seemed to disapprove; he simply nodded.

  “If you need this to be ordered in writing, Specialist,” the Commander said, “that can be arranged.”

  “No, that won’t be necessary, sir. I’ll be ready to brief the trainees at oh-eight hundred.”

  She was curtly dismissed. Kira stood, while Thorn excused himself and followed her out. Rainer and the others were still sitting in the outer office and gave her curious looks as she walked past. She simply shrugged and offered a reassuring smile.

  “It’s okay,” she said. “They’re being very gentle.”

  “Narvez and Fielder, gentle?” Rainer chuckled. “This I gotta see—”

  “Lieutenant Rainer,” Narvez’s voice snapped from the inner office. “You’re up.”

  Rainer’s smile vanished; she stood and headed for the door. Kira continued in the opposite direction and stepped outside into the warm afternoon sun.

  “You done well in spite of the shitstorm, Kira,” he said, smiling.

  Kira began to walk, Thorn in step beside her. “Wasn’t hard, since there was no actual debriefing—just me telling them what happened, then getting out. As to the aftereffects, I can’t even begin to process this. We lost, Thorn. We got our asses handed to us, were taken as POWs, and then somehow disgorged into the middle of a transit lane that let us find the Andraste. Or they found us. You get it, but—what happened back in there? Felt like an afterthought.”

  Thorn shrugged. “That’s how it works. The first session is, to use your word, gentle. You’ll have another couple of sessions coming up that’ll drill down into more details.”

  Kira returned a nod. It made sense, actually. Still, though, something about it had seemed slightly off. It was as though there was more going on here, like she was seeing the surface of a pond, but not into its depths.

  “Anyway, I was hoping we could take some time this evening together,” Thorn said.

  Kira smirked. “Fraternizing—and doing it here, right in Code Nebula?”

  Thorn laughed. “No, I actually meant in a professional capacity. While you’re going to be answering their questions, I’d like to get a closer look at the source material for them and do some Joining with you.”

  Kira started to nod, but stopped herself and just said something that popped into her mind. “I didn’t think you had much use fo
r Joining,” she said, remembering every nuance of their discussion back at Code Gauntlet. Finding common ground about the value of Joining was one of the moments that saved Kira, because she knew he understood her—and valued her as well.

  Thorn shrugged. “It has uses. This happens to be one of them.”

  “It has uses.”

  “Many uses, and in some circumstances, it can be critical. I mean, we can’t really base a war on it—”

  “The squids sure seem to think you can. They’ve done some of their most devastating stuff to us with Joining—probably their worst attacks, in fact,” she added, glancing at Thorn sidelong.

  He shrugged again. “You can’t really compare them to us. They’re different.”

  She smiled. “That’s true. Anyway, I’ll let you know if I’m up to it tonight. I have to prepare for that briefing in the morning, and I’d really like a little down time.”

  “Fair enough. I’ll come and check in on you later—say, around twenty-hundred in your barracks.”

  “Thorn?”

  “Yeah?” He paused, coming back to her, if only a half-step.

  “I’m glad you were here. For the first—just, glad you were here for me, is what I meant to say.”

  “I wasn’t there when you needed it, but I am now,” Thorn said. “Go burn up some miles. Get a hard sweat going, and get your head right. Then, see me later. We can keep talking then. I know it’s not over for you, not in your head and not here.” He pointed past her, to a squad of trainees ranked up in PT gear. “How about them?”

  She looked over her shoulder, catching their complaints on the wind, then smiled. “They’ll do.”

  Kira stopped in the clearing where she and Rainer broke away from the stolen map image.

  This is where it happened. The decision.

  The early evening sun slanted through the trees; it was still pleasantly warm, but no longer hot. She turned to the uphill trail, the one that led the correct way, to the end of the route. Then she turned ninety degrees and started down the other one, the one that apparently headed into the dreaded Fire Swamps.