by J. N. Chaney
Urbanek shrugged. “It didn’t fit with their bigger intel picture. I also think they just didn’t want to believe it. It was hard enough fighting the squids without having a whole other potential enemy out there.”
“Ah, denial. Human kind’s go-to for problems we don’t want to face,” Kira replied.
Thorn gave her a bemused glance. “Your philosophy is showing.”
“I keep telling you, I am not just another pretty face,” she shot back, smiling sweetly.
Urbanek raised a hand. “You two can keep your arguing, or flirting, or whatever the hell that was, for your own time. Right now, I have something a little more important for you to do.”
He waved them to follow, then led them across the bay, to the shroud-wrapped something. It sat on a cargo pallet, making it easier to heave, maneuver, and have brought aboard the Hecate from the Zenith. A pair of Marines guarded it, and at a gesture from one of Urbanek’s staff officers, they unstrapped and pulled back the shroud.
It revealed something not quite spherical, more like an egg, except equally sized at both ends. It was about two meters long, and a little less than that across. Thorn noted that it seemed to be made of some sort of alloy he wasn’t familiar with, something much more of a bronze color than the metallic bluish-greys he’d become used to. Dents, scratches, and small craters scored its surface, some looking like the regular micrometeorite damage that plagued all spacecraft. Some, though, seemed more egregious, including one large crater iridescent with heat discoloration, suggesting a weapons impact of some sort.
Thorn turned to Urbanek, but he had touched a round plate in one end of the object. A cylinder just a few centimeters across slid silently out from the surface. The Admiral glanced at Thorn, a wry smile on his face. “Took us about two weeks to figure out how to open that.”
“Okay, so you went carefully. What is it, sir?” Thorn asked.
“Something we found on a deep patrol, three years ago, into the edge of that zone you, Wixcombe, and your daughter have outlined.” He handed the cylinder to Thorn. It rested heavily in his hand, a construct of ceramic and metal, with odd scrollwork inscribed on the exterior. It looked like writing, but as soon as he thought that, the somber dirge he’d heard echoing among the stars flooded his head. Far louder and more distinct than it had been when he reached out to it on Nebo, it slammed through him like a roundhouse kick, making his knees buckle. Kira caught him.
“Thorn? Thorn, are you okay?”
He nodded, levering himself back to his feet with her help. Urbanek just waited.
“Why did you show me this?” Thorn asked, desolate pain tightening his face into a grimace. It wasn’t his own pain, though, but a bleak, vicarious suffering transferred from the cylinder. Whatever it was, it acted as a conduit, Thorn’s bones echoing with inarticulate howls of loss.
Tanner arrived, striding toward them. “Apologies for being late, but Admiral Scoville—” He stopped, his eyes on Thorn. “Something going on I should know about?”
Urbanek raised a hand toward Tanner. “Just a moment, Galen.” He turned back to Thorn. Somehow, Thorn’s reaction to the cylinder didn’t seem to surprise him at all.
“Do you believe in revenge, Stellers?” he asked.
“Sir?”
“Revenge. Although you might call it justice,” Urbanek said.
“With respect, sir, I would not. The two are different.” Thorn looked down at the cylinder, eyes losing focus as he worked the implications of what he held. “This is a cry for revenge, isn’t it?”
Urbanek said nothing but did look a little surprised.
Tanner chuckled at that. “Told you he was different, sir.”
Urbanek smiled, but it was thin. “Oh, I knew you were right, but I needed to see for myself,” he told Tanner, then addressed Thorn again. “What else can you tell me?”
Kira gave a derisive snort, earning a sharp look from Tanner. Urbanek again put up a hand, though, waving off any concern for the breach in protocol her snort represented.
“You’d like to add something, Wixcombe?” Urbanek asked, his tone mild.
“Sir, he can’t tell you much you don’t already know. And if I’m allowed to guess, then this—thing—is the reason why you’re here, and why you haven’t told us that we’re about to give the Nyctus an ultimatum containing some very unpleasant options.”
“You’re damned quick, Wixcombe. I like that. And you speak your mind. I like that even more,” Urbanek said.
Thorn glanced at Kira, then nodded to himself and ran his fingers over the cylinder. “These people, whoever they are, are gone. But we have this, and it’s evidence enough to blame the Nyctus and the Bilau for their deaths. And that means all of their deaths, doesn’t it, sir? They’re all gone, totally wiped out.”
“All. Six worlds that we know of, and that’s only by remote survey. None of this has ever been marked on any ON charts. And we’ve never touched down on any because we think the Bilau used a sterility prion to kill their entire race,” Urbanek said.
“Wait. The Bilau—killed off their fertility? So they couldn’t reproduce?” Thorn asked. His cheeks flashed red with anger at that, and his knuckles turned white on the cylinder. Kira touched his shoulder. As parents, they both knew what a deep, existential horror being unable to conceive offspring would be.
“They were a tri-racial species, we think. Emphasis on think. We won’t ever know, because they’re gone, but we do know who did it. Which brings us to this moment,” Urbanek said.
After a long moment, Thorn spoke. “Then I have an answer for you, sir. To both of your questions, in fact.”
“Both?” Urbanek asked, eyes narrowed. “Clarify, please.”
“Justice to the Nyctus. Revenge to the Bilau. Both,” Thorn said, his voice flat and cold.
Urbanek gave a hint of a smile and looked at Tanner. “Told you he would see. That both of them would. Although, you were right, by the way, Galen.”
“About Stellers? Rarely,” Tanner said.
“Sir? Right about what?” Thorn asked.
Urbanek sighed and crossed his arms. “About who gets what, justice or revenge. I’m here to negotiate the surrender of the Nyctus. You’re here to negotiate the end of the Bilau. Whether we can do it depends on many things, but first, a question. You can control the environment around you with complete impunity, yes?”
“I don’t know if complete impunity is right, sir. There are costs, and complications. But, yes, I generally can, sir.”
Urbanek returned a terse nod. “Good. Then you’re going to a planet, a small world, and a dead one, and you’re going to bring me something, Stellers. You’re going to explore this world of bones, and you’re going to find and bring me a specific object. The Bilau use a characteristic ceramic casing for their missile technology, so I want you to secure a piece of glorified pottery from a city that once held a billion people. Those are the people speaking to you through that cylinder, Stellers. You’re going to bring back a piece of the thing that contained their ultimate destruction and then do exactly what I tell you with it.”
“I will, sir,” Thorn said, then he stood, ready to listen.
“This Gyrfalcon has had nav data uploaded as of five minutes ago. One of my people is briefing the pilot now—Wyant, as I recall. You’ll go with her, and no one else. It’s too dangerous on the surface, so I don’t want to risk anyone unnecessarily. When you come back with what I need, here’s what you’re going to do—”
Urbanek gave Thorn three simple commands, then leveled a gaze at him to make sure he understood.
“We’re going to win this war,” Urbanek finished. “Of that, I have absolutely no doubt. And this is what it’s going to take.”
Thorn gaped for a moment, then a smile crept across his face. “Sir, I understand and will absolutely comply to the letter and spirit of this order.”
Urbanek and Tanner exchanged a look, but Kira spoke first.
“Sirs, if this goes badly—”
“Yes, Wixcombe?” Urbanek asked, his face neutral.
She looked at the cylinder, and Thorn saw her shudder. “Maybe we should inscribe a message like this one, too. I don’t want to be forgotten.”
14
“Okay, sir, before you fling us across space with your mojo, let me show you what my Gyrfalcon can do,” Mol said.
Thorn leaned back in the co-pilot’s crash couch. “Is this going to hurt?”
“Only if something goes badly wrong.” Mol tapped at her controls. “Okay, Trixie, confirm that the new drive is on standby, and the new g-system is online.”
“Both! We’re ready to show Thorn what this baby can do!”
“You sound, ah, excited,” Thorn said, smiling, albeit a little nervously. He had to admit, even though he’d been instrumental in acquiring both the Nyctus drive and the Imbrogul g-system, it was still alien tech and relatively new. And new meant unproven. Yes, the Gyrfalcon had already done a bunch of flight tests, but sometimes failures only became obvious with time.
And explosions. And screaming.
“Okay, then,” Mol said. “Three, two, one, mark.”
Thorn felt a slight thrum in the Gyrfalcon’s bones as the drive lit, but that was it.
“That’s thirty g’s of acceleration,” Mol said. “Let’s try fifty.”
She touched her controls, and the thrum intensified a notch. Again, though, that was it—just a small sensation.
Thorn looked at the flight management system. Sure enough, it read fifty g’s. Without the Imbrogul tech, Thorn would weigh about 9,000 kilograms, but he felt absolutely nothing. The old inertial dampers could offset anything up to about twenty-five g’s, but the old drive could only crank out about thirty. But here they were racing along at fifty, and they might as well be sitting docked inside the Hecate.
“How much acceleration can you manage?” Thorn asked.
“I’ve got her up to seventy-five g’s. Even burning that hard, I still don’t feel any forces at all. The Gyrfalcon does, though. I don’t think her engine mounts will take much more than about eighty-five,” Mol replied.
“Yeah, that sounds plenty fast.”
“Oh, it’s not just the straight line flying. Watch this,” Mol said, her fingers dancing over the controls.
The Gyrfalcon banked. It banked hard. The only way for a ship to do that outside of atmo was to expend enormous amounts of power changing its direction and maintaining its velocity simultaneously. But Mol and her upgraded Gyrfalcon made it look easy. That deep thrum might have ratcheted up another notch, but that was the only noticeable effect.
Thorn shook his head in wonder. “Okay, I’m convinced. This is a game changer, at least as far as fighters are concerned.”
“The big brains are working on scaling it up for capital ships, too,” Mol said, once more tapping her controls. The engine cut out, leaving the Gyrfalcon racing along unpowered. Mol sat back, looking pleased with herself. “Trixie, SITREP on the ship.”
“Little bit of fluctuation in the starboard fuel feed, but nothing outside the green limits. And everything else is green as grass, so we’re ready to rock and roll!”
Mol rolled her eyes and Thorn chuckled. “Anyway, sir, that was the show,” she said. “If you’re happy with it, you can catapult us across half the universe whenever the mood strikes you.”
“Okay, then,” Thorn said, extracting his talisman and settling back in the couch. “Next stop, the saddest place in the galaxy.”
“Beg to differ, Thorn,” Trixie interjected.
“You—you do?”
“The saddest place in the universe was during the Emo Phase, a musical period largely ignored by modern artists. For our trip, I’ve prepared a selection of emo classics guaranteed to make you feel as desolate as—”
“The Ghosts?” Thorn asked helpfully.
“Exactly! Let’s get maudlin,” Trixie announced as dark guitar chords thrummed to life.
“Glad we got the faster drive,” Mol quipped.
After about thirty seconds of singing by a misunderstood youth who was doubtless wearing all black, Thorn nodded in agreement, his head tilted to one side in mild discomfort. “Um. Same.”
“How’s that nav fix coming, Trixie?” Mol asked.
“It’s coming. Sheesh, talk about impatient. I need to find two more reference pulsars and then do a whole pile of really complex math to account for—”
“We believe you, Trix,” Thorn said. “You just go ahead and do you.”
The Gyrfalcon hung on the edge of a star system close to the far side of Nyctus space, as seen from the Allied Stars. Thorn had decided to do the trip in three hops, and this was the end of the second. He didn’t have a good sense of distance to, or even the true location of their intended destination, a star known to the ON only by its chart number. He could have done it in one hop, but his uncertainty about the true location of their objective would require him to expend more effort, and more magic, to compensate. He really didn’t want to drop into the creepiest place in the galaxy exhausted, and maybe even temporarily unable to ’cast at all. This way, he could rest along the way while refining their location.
Even then, it would have been faster to cut through Bilau space, but they’d decided against that, too. Given the chaos that had engulfed the Nyctus, it was less likely they’d be able to interfere.
Almost the very instant he thought that, a chime sounded, and two red icons appeared on the tactical display. It was the Nyctus, and they were here to interfere.
“Two corvettes. They just popped back into normal space. Pretty damned close, too.” Mol glanced at Thorn. “No one’s that lucky.”
Thorn had already reached out with a flicker of perception, sweeping it across the two ships. One of them carried a shaman, which explained it.
“It’s not luck. Or, it is luck, but only because the shaman aboard one of those ships must have sensed us arriving here and was near enough to actually do something about it. Shit.”
Mol gestured at the Alcubierre drive panel. “We could just hop away.”
Thorn pursed his lips, then shook his head. “If that squid shaman’s any good, she’ll be able to track us. That’s going to leave us trying to cat-and-mouse our way away from them.” He looked at Mol. “How confident are you that your spiffy new tech isn’t going to crap out in the middle of a fight?”
“Sir, I am never confident my tech isn’t going to crap out in the middle of a fight, spiffy and new or not.”
“Hey, I’m right here, guys,” Trixie said.
Mol grinned. “That wasn’t a shot at you, sweet girl. In fact, if it wasn’t for you riding herd on the collection, I’d have no confidence at all.”
Thorn raised an eyebrow. “Collection?”
“Yeah. Every ship’s just a collection of spare parts, all flying in really close formation.”
Thorn gave a bemused grimace at that, and Mol shrugged.
“Okay, I’m a pilot, not a comedian,” she said, but her face turned serious. “So what do you want to do, sir?”
Thorn looked at the display again. “I don’t want these guys behind us.”
Mol nodded. “Roger that. Trixie, get ready for things to redline.”
Trixie laughed. “You mean pushing this ship to the limits and threatening to have it rip apart under its own power? I have a name for that.”
“Oh? And what’s that?”
“Tuesday.”
Thorn laughed. “Okay, Trixie is a comedian.”
Mol blew a raspberry while her fingers flew over the controls. The Gyrfalcon’s drive came humming to life, the ship accelerating to forty g’s and starting a hard turn back toward the squid corvettes.
“Mol, I’m going to leave the one on the right to you. I’ll take care of the one on the left,” Thorn said.
She nodded but kept her attention flicking between the flight management system and the tactical display.
Thorn threw his consciousness ahead of the racing Gyrfalcon, zooming his attentio
n onto the enemy ship. Each corvette massed about three times what the fighter did, making them formidable opponents. He was counting on Mol being able to use the Gyrfalcon’s amped-up tech to keep them out of trouble long enough for him to do what he intended.
His mind brushed across those of the squid crew, including the shaman. He had to smirk at their consternation over the Gyrfalcon’s sudden attack. From their perspective, the fighter had come about and raced toward them with preternatural speed and maneuverability, already only moments away from railgun range. Both squid ships frantically loosed a volley of missiles. Mol, in turn, began jinking, taking advantage of the Gyrfalcon’s ability to abruptly change direction to confound their seeker heads.
Thorn focused briefly on the shaman, flinging a barrier of denial around her. The squid suddenly found herself unable to ’cast and began to desperately batter at his mental containment. He let her, knowing she’d eventually break through, but that was fine. He had another target in mind.
He found it. The helmsman. Thorn drove hard into the squid’s mind, flooding it with images of heat, sand, and dust, a desiccated landscape that should, to a Nyctus, be a literal hellscape. For good measure, he threw in a few images of once-lush hydro planets reduced to stinking swamp worlds, inspired by his memories of the two that he’d visited after the Bilau had terraformed them. The squid helmsman utterly forgot his duties and panicked. This left the corvette stuck partway through the maneuver it had started, burning at full power off in a random direction.
A few seconds later, Mol opened fire with the railgun. She pumped out shots that slammed into the second corvette, at the same time deftly dodging the Nyctus return fire. The hypervelocity slugs tore through the ship, in seconds reducing it to an unpowered hulk spewing silvery clouds of atmosphere.
“Mol, take out the second one before the squids regain control over it,” Thorn growled, his face a mask of controlled effort.
She obliged, spinning the Gyrfalcon around in a tight bank and coming up at the second corvette’s six o’clock. The railgun snapped out more shots, each accompanied by a heavy thud of recoil that shook the fighter. The rounds ripped through the Nyctus ship’s stern, traveling fast enough that the incandescent exhaust plume barely had time to warm them up before they impacted. After a few seconds of that, the corvette exploded in a spectacular flash of uncontained plasma.
