Whispers of Earth: Pirates of Clew Book Two (The Pirates of Clew 2)

by Taylor Smith

  She closed her eyes and shook her head at what she perceived would be a weakness she needed to overcome, and activated a small panel on the wall. “We’ll be entering subspace in nine hours. You don’t need a tank aboard my ship,” she said, and closed the channel.

  ***

  A day and a half later, Strix-9 dropped from subspace with a light shudder. The guidance mirroring system had worked flawlessly, and apparently had kept itself from being detected by the pirates aboard the Reaper.

  Haley was sitting at her command console as she observed subspace-dropout. As she predicted, they were in the middle of nowhere. She checked her scanners, still working at very low power as to not be detected, to find the Reaper just off her port side. Nothing else was in range.

  She knew that would be a possibility. They’d reentered normal space out of range of Clew station, just as they had three years ago aboard the Reaper.

  Her thoughts drifted to that time in her life, and she quickly stamped the memories back. This was no time for reminiscing.

  The low hum of Strix-9’s engines told her that the pirates were moving and her ship obediently followed. She should have the information she desired in less than an hour.

  Haley turned to the holding cell monitoring system and found Saundi awake and eating. As long as Saundi replaced the water and food containers back into the small cabinet next to her bunk, the ship would refresh its contents every six hours. The food contained within was a simple ration bar. It wasn’t tasty, but it was sustenance and loaded with all the nutrients the human body needs to survive.

  She hadn’t spoken with Saundi since their first conversation. She needed time to think and try and realign herself from the shock of the girl’s earlier outburst. “How are we today, Miss Adair?” she asked into the cell’s comms.

  Saundi stopped mid-bite and looked up. “What’s going to happen to me?” she asked in a quiet tone.

  Haley narrowed her eyes at the screen, and found the woman legitimately scared. She thought about it for a moment. Saundi would be interrogated when they returned to Lordell for as much information as could be wrung out of her, then killed. At least that was standard operating procedure with prisoners of Strix Agents. “I don’t know,” she responded.

  “Liar,” Saundi whispered.

  Haley found familiar demons creeping upon her, invading her training. The woman on the screen had been her best friend once, and she still loved her deep down. She still loved all of them, especially Cade. But she’d locked all that away, and for a good reason. Her mission was all that mattered now, and she couldn’t allow personal feelings to infringe on that.

  “You never know,” She replied with a more upbeat attitude than she expected. “You may find –“.

  Claxons blared, and the holding cell system winked out of existence. Haley jumped at the interruption and turned to find all of her systems had gone into suspension. The dozen screens that surrounded her chair had all gone black, and each displayed only two words: ‘Eclipse Protocol.’

  “Eclipse Protocol activated,” a voice from Strix-9 echoed from the speakers.

  Haley sat even straighter and cut the alarms. She’d never heard of such a protocol. “Display protocol information,” she ordered.

  A new screen materialized before her, and she began to read. Her eyes widened until they hurt. She swiped her hand through the screen, and it faded into nothing, and then reactivated her scanners as quickly as possible.

  Clew was now in range, but that wasn’t what had tripped her computer’s alarms. The ancient Alliance battleship Leviathan sat awkwardly in its cradle atop the station, but this was also not the reason her systems were so worried. Nestled against the cylindrical space station was a mammoth-sized battleship of a class that Haley had never seen. It was clearly superior in size to the Leviathan, and any other warship she knew of.

  Strix-9 however, had identified the new starship quickly; Haley stared wordlessly at a Sol Fleet battleship.

  Chapter 13

  “What is that?” Cade asked as he stared in awe at the main view screen.

  Clew Station was as they left it. The damaged sections around the Leviathan and her cradle were still present, but the debris had cleared.

  However, moored snug against their home floated a behemoth of the likes he’d never seen. The vessel was clearly a warship, its broadside cannons awash with a dim red glow. Its hull was long, thicker in the aft and coming to two parallel points at the bow. The dorsal hull of the ship also bristled with weapon emplacements, but toward the rear, a crescent-shaped command center was raised above its armor.

  Cade had never seen anything quite like it. The ship wasn’t sleek; it didn’t tout the smooth lines of the starships he was used to seeing. Instead, it radiated its sole function: to kill its enemy.

  “Mr. Beck, you’re relieved. Leave the bridge,” Andy said the moment the station came into view.

  The young helmsman sat wide-eyed and unmoving.

  “Terry!” Andy shouted for his attention.

  Confused, Terry stood and left the bridge stealing glances back at the main screen as he left.

  Once they were alone, Cade turned to Andy again, who was sitting quietly in his command chair with his hand on his forehead and his eyes closed. “Andy,” Cade said slowly. “What is that?”

  Andy opened his eyes to his brother and shrugged. “My mother’s here.”

  Cade stared at him for another moment in shock, then turned back to the scene before them. As they closed on the station, the details of the warship that held his attention became more apparent. The ship was well armored, but it seemed almost incomplete. Thick plates jutted protectively over certain areas of the ship, while others were left seemingly unprotected. He also noticed another smaller control center toward the front of the ship that also rose above the hull.

  “Are those windows?” he asked in disbelief as he stared at the raised structures. However menacing this new warship looked, one shot to the bridge and the entire ship would be useless. “Who does that?”

  “Clew control,” Andy said into the channel he’d just activated. “This is Reaper requesting approach vector and docking.”

  “Reaper, this is control,” came the voice of Ronald Borden. “Approved. Be advised that we have some guests.”

  “We saw, Ron,” Andy replied dourly. “We also have a medical emergency. One of our crew has been shot and is in critical condition.”

  The channel was silent for a moment before the response came. “Ok, Reaper, medical is on their way. They’ll meet you in the bay.”

  “The station is on lockdown,” Andy said as he closed the channel. “That’s why there are no repair crews around right now.”

  Cade whirled on Andy with an anger he could no longer contain. “Start talking.” He was done with Andy’s secrets. Whatever the answer, he needed to know right now.

  Andy leaned back as if he had no more energy left to spare and sighed. “Ok. I’ll tell you what I know.” He gestured to the seat beside his command chair and said, “Sit down.”

  Cade hesitated, and then sat heavily.

  “I imagine that we’re fixing to hear the whole story, which I don’t even have. My father knew it all, but I’ll tell you everything I know.”

  Cade narrowed his eyes. He trusted Andy in almost everything, but anything about his mother seemed to turn him shady. He supposed he didn’t have a choice but to simply hear him out.

  “My mother’s name is Adrianna Nyest. She’s…” Andy paused and shook his head. “Empress Adrianna Nyest.”

  Cade laughed. He couldn’t help it. Of the years he’s known Andy, his running jest toward his brother was whole-heartedly true. He found that with the mixture of confusion and anger, all he could do was laugh. “So…” he said as he tried to control himself. “You really are a space princess.”

  “Stop,” Andy said quietly.

  Cade’s laughter came to an abrupt halt. He knew Andy’s demeanor well enough to know that something was v
ery wrong. “Sorry, it’s just...” He finally nodded and said, “go on.”

  “If my mother is here, we’re in trouble, Cade. My father told me several years ago that a day would come when Clew would find itself at a crossroad. He said a decision would have to be made: honor the past or protect the future.”

  “What does that mean?” Cade asked.

  “I don’t know completely, but I know it has something to do with my mother. He said that either way, people would die.”

  “How?” Cade pressed.

  Andy looked him in the eye and seemed to hesitate before he finally said, “War.”

  Cade relaxed back in his chair and shrugged. “Andy, we’ve been at war for three hundred years. This isn’t new. And I think Clew has gotten pretty good at –“.

  “No,” Andy interrupted him. “You don’t understand. My father wasn’t talking about hit-and-runs against Allied shipping, or brawling with the Deshi in bars.” Andy lowered his voice and spoke with a deadly seriousness. “He was talking about full-scale, intergalactic war, Cade; the kind of war that people can’t run or hide from. He told me of a war that will change people, and everything we knew about the galaxy.”

  Cade froze at Andy’s words. There hadn’t been full-scale war since the Divinity Wars over five hundred years ago when the Earth’s government had failed. The new power, or attempted power, was a theocracy led by the Church of the Divine Voice. They demanded that everyone adopt the new religious belief, and that resistance would be death. It didn’t go over so well, and the Alliance was born to overthrow the new regime.

  Star Systems hopped on the Alliance band-wagon as quickly as possible, even if it meant giving up many freedoms in the process. The Alliance was the less of two evils, though.

  Cade eyed Andy. A bad feeling had worked its way into his gut. “What is your Mother the Empress of?”

  Andy looked back to the screen and the growing form of their home. “Earth.” He pointed to the warship docked with Clew Station and said, “That ship is named Memory of Earth. It’s the flagship of Sol Fleet.”

  This was bad. Sol fleet was the powerhouse of the old Earth government; it was how they kept the colonies in line. “But Sol Fleet was destroyed during the Divinity War. The Alliance won!” Cade exclaimed. “And Earth has been blockaded for half a millennia; it’s a wasteland!”

  Andy threw his hands up. “I don’t know!” Andy closed his eyes again and rubbed his forehead. “That’s all he told me. Somehow, Clew is part of it all..”

  Cade shared Andy’s frustration. It was precious little information to go on, and if a war on the scale of, or even near, the Divinity War was about to take place, then they had best come up with a plan. That brought him to his next question: “Where does Clew, or you for that matter, fit into all this?”

  Andy let a humorless laugh escape before saying, “Let’s find out.”

  The Reaper approached the station and glided over the damaged areas in a slow arc. There was no traffic to avoid, only the beast of a warship anchored very close to the stations docking bay. As they rounded the Sol warship, Cade watched on in nervous dismay as every one of its portside cannons slowly tracked them through space.

  Cade let out a sigh of relief as they entered Clew’s docking bay and he gently settled the cruiser onto its cradle. “Docking clamps engaged,” he reported. “Umbilical attached, and I’m opening the main hatch for medical.”

  “All right,” Andy replied. “Let’s go meet my mother.”

  As they disembarked the ship, Cade was glad to not see any sign of the medical team, or Dr. Grant, which meant they’d already taken Criss to the hospital. He desperately wanted to go with them but knew he would just be in the way. In any case, they didn’t make it out of the docking bay before they were met by a group of people led by a strikingly beautiful woman that held an air of unsurpassed superiority. Cade knew immediately that this was Adrianna Nyest.

  Cade stopped in front of the procession with Andy, and noticed Ronald Borden and Kyle Wade behind the two uniformed people in front. Adrianna wore a black uniform trimmed in gold, and the man beside her wore a similar uniform trimmed in silver. Six armed and very dangerous looking soldiers flanked the group closely.

  “Andrew,” Adrianna said with a warm smile, and reached up to lovingly touch Andy’s cheek. “It’s wonderful to see you, though the circumstances are dreadful. I’m sorry about your father.”

  Andy smiled back, but Cade recognized the forced smile he usually used to seem civil, when dealing with the council. “Hello Mother,” Andy replied. “It’s good to see you, too.”

  “And this must be Dorian Cade,” Adrianna said as she turned toward him. “I’ve heard a lot about you.” She extended a hand toward him.

  Cade glanced at Andy, and then shook her hand. It wasn’t lost on Cade that the guards around the woman seemed to twitch wearily as he returned the handshake. “I’ve heard next to nothing about you,” he replied.

  A small grin made its way across the Adrianna’s face. “That’s good,” she said slowly with a glance to Andy. “Allow me to introduce Douglas Pierce, Captain of the Memory of Earth, my flagship.”

  The tall man beside her seemed to focus his eyes only briefly on Cade and Andy. He nodded a curt greeting before his eyes drifted away again, obviously paying more attention to his implant’s field of view than introductions.

  “You both know Mr. Borden and Mr. Wade,” she said with a graceful sweep of her hand toward the two nervous-looking Clew council members behind them. “Now, I understand that my daughter is missing. We need somewhere to speak privately.”

  Andy took a deep breath and nodded. “Follow me,” he said and led them out of the docking bay and into the station’s heart.

  Nothing was said as they walked through the eerily quiet station. Red lights faded in and out everywhere they looked, denoting that a lockdown was in effect. Cade knew the drills, but had never seen a lockdown before, and had certainly not been out and about during one. He’d spent most of his life aboard a starship, but he knew they took place from time to time during large-scale maintenance, or station moves. He wondered how many past lock-downs had been due to a Sol Fleet battleship latched to the station.

  He suddenly felt sad. With the Leviathan so heavily damaged, the station would never move again. He had some ideas, but they needed a plan quickly. If they were discovered now, it would be a worst-case disaster.

  They reached a large conference room that looked out over the main spine of the station, and before they could all enter, Adrianna stopped them and said, “Andrew only, please.”

  Cade looked to the floor and shook his head, anger threatening to override his tact. The other two councilmen with them also looked perturbed.

  “Not without Cade,” Andy said with a finality that didn’t invite argument.

  Adrianna looked at Cade and shrugged. “Very well. I have news for him, anyway.”

  Cade glanced to Andy, who nodded to him, and followed them into the room. The door shut behind them, and they all took their seats. Andy sat at the head of the large table, and Cade sat on his right. Adrianna and Captain Pierce sat at the opposite end, Adrianna taking the opposing table-head.

  “I suppose you have a lot of questions,” Adrianna began. “First, let me address Dorian.”

  Cade’s brow knit in curiosity. He had no idea why she would want to speak with him personally. “Yes?”

  “You’ll report to my flagship the moment this briefing is over,” Adrianna stated matter-of-factly.

  Cade laughed humorlessly and leaned back in his chair. “Is that so?”

  “Yes,” she replied with a hint of worry. “I’ve seen your medical scans. Your doctors have nearly destroyed the implant site in your brain, and their clumsy efforts to reinstall it have done even more damage. I’m worried that, unless treated properly, the damage may be irreversible. My staff can correct that.”

  Cade’s brow shot upward, surprised that she even cared. “Okay,” he said slowly. He
wasn’t sure if he trusted her, but he more than agreed with her that something was very wrong in his head. “Why would you do that for me?”

  “You aren’t the only one I’m concerned about, Dorian,” Adrianna continued to both he and Andy. “Criss Hulbert has been transferred to the Memory, as well as three others from your station’s medical facilities.”

  Andy held his hands up defensively, and was about to contest it, but he ended up turning to Cade and said, “She’s right. Their med-tech is far beyond ours.” Andy gestured reluctantly to her. “Thank you, for caring for my people, Mother. But I would appreciate it if you consulted with me first.” Andy waited until he received a curt nod from Adrianna to continue. “So let’s get down to it then. How about you start from the beginning,” he said. “Cade and I know very little, so don’t leave anything out.”

  The woman sitting across from them laughed lightly and tilted her head. “Tall order. Where to begin?”

  “The Divinity War,” Cade said suddenly.

  Both Adrianna and Captain Pierce turned their heads toward Cade, and he suddenly felt as if he shouldn’t be in the room.

  “Very well,” Adrianna said slowly. She stared at the table for a moment and gathered her thoughts before looking back up at them. “I assume you’ve been taught that the war was started due to an oppressive new regime on Earth demanding religious fealty, and that the gallant new Alliance of colonies rose up to defeat this threat on human freedoms.”

  Adrianna mirrored their nods and said, “That is a lie, of course.” At their outward confusion, she said, “Well, it’s a monstrous bending of the truth, at least. In any case, the fact remained that humanity had become so spread out that the current form of government couldn’t keep up. Planetary governments were writing their own laws and governing regulations without the knowledge of Earth, or with substantial bribes to the powers that be at the time. That became so commonplace that the government no longer functioned for the people. It became a cesspool of materialistic men and women only looking out for their own personal interests. The colonies became very splintered.”