by T. R. Harris
“The being known as Lila?” The awe in Dacus voice revealed his knowledge of Lila, as well as her powers.
“That’s right.”
“But how, she is rumored to be…different?”
“She is, and that’s what has us concerned.”
Dacus looked to Panur and J’nae. “You move in strange company, Adam Cain. Am I to assume your new companions are not typical species?”
“That’s not important now,” Adam replied. “What is important is finding where the Pogo Device was found.”
“How will that help? That was a fragment of a world destroyed long ago. There has been great galactic drift since then.”
“You’re right, but we feel we can trace the drift back through time.”
“And locate the creators of the orb?”
“Exactly.”
“And then what?”
“Well…we’re still working on that.”
68
Panur and the crew of the Najmah Fayd weren’t the only ones to notice the gravity anomaly. The Axel Prominence was more populated that the Radis Spur, so thousands of reports came in regarding broken CW links and other strange phenomenon as a result of the wave.
Allied forces on Formil had already concluded that it had something to do with the Nuoreans by the time Adam’s call came through. Panur had been able to pinpoint the location better than any of the techs working on the problem, so armed with this new data, a military response was hastily planned and units dispatched, including the two recently completed suppressor beam platforms.
The Axel Prominence was hundreds of light-years from any expected Nuorean entry point so there weren’t a lot of forces available in the region. Admiral Victor Ware was put in command and his hastily culled together force entered the AP thirty hours later with seven hundred twenty warships.
Six hours later they picked up the Nuorean fleet, under full gravity-drive and heading in-galaxy. Knowing the exact location of the entry point by this time, Admiral Ware sent a quarter of his fleet—and the beam platforms—to the coordinates, to set up a blockade. Then he set an intercept course for the main Nuorean concentration.
It had already been accepted that ship-for-ship, forces from the battling galaxies were pretty evenly matched. Enemy weapons and defensive systems were on par with allied systems, and vice versa. And once the Nuorean energy bombs had been countered with stronger circuit breakers, victory was now a matter of who could amass the stronger force and employ the most effective tactics.
The first contact between the fleets was awarded to the allies. Ware’s forces outnumbered the Nuoreans by a factor of five to three, which was enough to knock out seventy of the enemy ships compared to thirty-eight of Ware’s. Then the Nuoreans ran. They cranked their gravity-wells up to full and bolted into the galaxy proper. The admiral gave chase….
Admiral Ware stared at the captain not knowing what to say. That wasn’t good for a commanding officer, but he was truly torn by the report he’d just received.
“I understand, Captain Slater, but the suppressor platforms are lagging behind and will be there tomorrow. They don’t have the propulsion the rest of your units have. You’re to remain on station until their arrival and then assist with the deployment.”
“But Admiral, it’s been six days and still no jump from Andromeda. What if we’re sitting out here for nothing?”
That was Ware’s concern as well. He’d sent a hundred and fifty ships to the entry point coordinates nearly a week ago, expecting another alien force to enter a day after their arrival. Now a second time-period had passed, and still no invaders. The Nuorean mid-point gravity generator took three days to recharge, and from what the allies knew of their strategy, the aliens would send in a fleet around that time, with only a few minutes to an hour leeway. So far, the entry point was silent. This got Ware to thinking that the alien’s strategy may have changed, designed to upset any trap waiting for them at the other end. Just because the Nuoreans could send in a fleet every three days didn’t mean they had to. Once the seventy-two hours were up, they could launch any time after that.
This had the effect of heightening the tension within Captain Slater’s small fleet deployed at the entry point. In normal circumstances, the longer before an enemy arrived at a location, the better the chances he wasn’t coming. This wasn’t the case with the Nuoreans. Every minute that went by just meant one nearer to D-Day.
“I understand your concerns, Cliff,” said Admiral Ware over the CW link. “We’re chasing a Nuorean fleet while you’re stuck out there twiddling your thumbs, waiting for an invasion force that could come at any second. But once the platforms are there, we’ll require a much smaller force to guard the entry point.”
“You’re right, of course, Admiral. We’ll do our part, but I have to tell you, this waiting around is taking a toll.”
“Keep your crews sharp, Captain.”
“Aye sir, Slater out.”
The link went dead as Ware checked his watch. They were closing on the enemy fleet, with the trailing units coming in range within the hour. This was the moment of truth. Victor couldn’t believe the enemy would let their rear ships be picked off a little at time as they fled. At some point, they would turn and fight. And that moment was fast approaching.
He returned to the bridge of the carrier USF Albert Einstein and took his place in the command chair. As a practice, he buckled the waist strap and scanned the huge room, making sure everything was in order. It was; his crew was well-trained.
“Commander Radcliff, time to intercept?” he called out.
“Seventeen minutes, sir. Shields to forward.”
“Very good. Set the fleet at General Quarters, all hands man their battle—”
“Incoming, sir!” a lieutenant cried out from the threat console.
“All energy to the forward shields,” Ware commanded.
“Sir, incoming approaching on our flanks, wide array, targeting the entire fleet.”
“Say again, lieutenant.”
“Bolts approaching on our flanks, first intercepts in fifteen seconds.”
“Realign the shields!”
“Underway, sir,” Commander Radcliff announced. “Fleet readiness at one-hundred percent.” What Radcliff meant by his announcement was that the fleet was ready for something they hadn’t expected.
“Strength of incoming Lieutenant Keller?”
“Sir, numbering in the hundreds.”
“Source?”
“Unknown.”
“Unknown?”
“Yessir. Bolts originating from ships in dark status.”
Admiral Ware had already surmised that, confirming that his fleet had run head-long into a trap.”
“Ships emerging from dark, count….” The young officer looked back at the fleet commander. “Sir, over thirteen hundred distinct contacts.”
The ship thundered and rocked as the first wave of plasma bolts contacted the Einstein’s diffusion shields. Some of the balls of energy impacting the ship were of the type designed to overload the shields. Although the Nuoreans knew by now that the allies could counter this weapon, they still used them to sap as much energy from the system as possible. By themselves they wouldn’t overload the shields, but they would shorten the battery life.
“Fire at will, Mister Radcliff.”
The ship rocked again as the first bolts were launched from the Einstein’s cannon. The admiral was under no false illusion that he had the means to defeat a force over twice his size. And when word was received that the fleet they’d been chasing had just changed course and was headed his way, it left him will no other option.
“Comm, send word to the fleet: Scatter. Scatter the fleet. Take all evasive action to get clear and then contact the nearest allied command center. Do it—do it now!”
“Aye sir,” a voice called out through the din on the bridge.
Victor pressed a button on the arm of his console. “CIC, open a link to Juir.”
A moment lat
er, an blue-haired Overlord appeared on the small inset screen in the arm of the chair
“I am Overlord Zonus, proceed, Admiral.”
“We’ve been lured into a trap by the Nuoreans. I’ve just given the order to scatter the fleet.”
The Overlord looked down at a datapad in his hands. “All Nuorean forces in the galaxy are accounted for, including the force you encountered six days ago. What force is this that is attacking?”
“Unknown, but it numbers over thirteen hundred. Lord Zonus, I’m afraid there’s a lot more of these bastards around than we thought.”
Juireans are not known for showing emotion, so the seconds-long pause from the Overlord was unusual. “Where did they come from?”
“A quarter of my fleet has been waiting at the entry point. Nothing’s come through. It’s my belief that the Nuoreans are not hanging around one entry point for long before switching to another. Even the slightest shift of the mid-point generator can mean hundreds, if not thousands of light-years between locations. This has to be their new strategy.”
“But the platforms—”
“Yes, Lord Zonus, that plan has just gone up in smoke.”
“Smoke?”
“It’s no longer valid. We can’t waste suppressor platforms waiting for something that probably won’t happen.”
“They are nearly on station.”
“I understand. What we have to do now is deploy a platform with each major fleet, as well as speed up the conversion of individual units into beamships.”
“There are only two completed platforms,” said the Overlord. He looked off-screen and conferred with someone. When he came back, he reported. “I am told that since we now have facilities in place to construct the platforms, a new one can be completed every ten days. And the beamships can be converted in sixteen hours once a vessel reports to a work center.”
“That’s good news, Lord Zonus.”
The fleet flagship thundered and shook again from a series of plasma bolts striking the hull. Lights flickered on the bridge as smoke oozed from between bulkhead panels. Alarms clanged with crewmembers engaged in a dance of organized chaos.
“What is your condition?” the Juirean asked.
Ware smiled. “Grim. Power is cycling down.” He nodded off screen to someone. “I’ve just given the order to abandon ship.”
“Then I shall not keep you any longer,” said the Overlord.
“No rush, my friend; I’m not going anywhere. There are many more among my crew to leave first.”
“Yet you are of superior position; you are more valuable to the command structure than are the lower ranks.”
“That may be true, but that’s not how we do things around here. I will wait until the bulk of my crew is safely away before I depart. It’s our tradition.”
“It is a foolish tradition, to waste talent and expertise when it is not necessary.”
“We will have to debate this at another time, Lord Zonus. Until then, get the factories working overtime. The only way we’re going to defeat the Nuoreans is through superior technology.”
The CW screen went blank as the receiving dish on the hull evaporated. That same bolt melted hull metal and entered the Einstein just aft of the bridge and directly into the Combat Information Center. The resulting explosion blew off the front quarter of the huge carrier, killing all who remained on the bridge—including Admiral Victor Ware.
The crews were ecstatic. A wealth of immunity points had just been awarded throughout the two fleets and spirits were high. Although this wasn’t how the invasion of the Kac had been originally planned, it would do for now. Once the unified forces of this alien galaxy were suppressed, then the practice of individual challenges would be introduced on a much grander scale.
The forces standing against the Nuor had been effectively outmaneuvered, and now it was only a matter of time before the enemy ships would be either defeated or confined to small, yet well-defended regions within the galaxy. At that time, the Nuor would have free reign of the bulk of the Kac and all the immunity worlds therein. The trouble spots would eventually be overrun, but that would not be the priority. Consolidating Nuor presence in the Kac was the most immediate goal.
As was the practice of any good gamer, fleet commander Sanelis (314) took a moment to place himself into the mind of his enemy. It was obvious they had underestimated Nuorean strength and would be questioning how they could have been so wrong. It would be a logical step to conclude that his forces were now entering through various points, and not just one static location. If he were of the Kac, what would he do to counter such a strategy?
He thought back to the conversations he had had with the three captive Humans—who oddly came from a planet with the translated name of Dirt. They claimed to be part of a survey taking place along the outer edge of the Kac comprised multiple vessels. To Sanelis, that would be the only way of detecting entry points as they became active, yet a very inefficient way. And by immediately transitioning to minimal-output—dark status, they called it—his fleets could be hidden from all but the closest survey vessels.
That was well and good; however, the operation of the transit generators was impossible to hide. It created such a disturbance to local space that even from ten light-cycles away the effect was noticeable. Even then, by the time an enemy fleet could be deployed, the point would be closed and another opened.
Sanelis smiled. It was fortunate he did not have to devise a defense against the strategy his people were employing. He very much doubted he could.
69
Adam’s emotions were tied in knots when it came time to leave Incus. He had tried a dozen times more to reach Sherri and Riyad, still with no success. They were past due and out of communications.
If it wasn’t for Lila, he would be on his way to find his friends, rather than his daughter. Unfortunately, he could only do one rescue at time. And if he was able to save Lila, she would certainly come in handy in his search for his friends.
The Najmah Fayd lifted off and entered a conventional gravity-well ten minutes later. All the time on the planet, Panur had been bombarded with even more questions about his suppressor beam platforms from the engineers on Formil, until the time when the first ones were completed, tested and deployed. Even then, the Formilians still wanted to tweak his designs. A day out from Incus, the mutant put his foot down, declaring a stop to such communications. Just follow the plans…and then repeat. It was as simple as that. He would refuse to take any more of their links.
On Incus, they had learned that the personal service module—Zee—had been found embedded in an ancient rock wall, which was itself part of a small, metal-rich asteroid in the Zaniff Asteroid Field. As Dacus explained, the field was located in Cadonic space and the Incus had taken the huge rock illegally. Since then, the Cadons had fortified their border between the two planetary confederations. Rumors about what the Incus had found on the asteroid had filtered back to Cadon, launching a mini gold rush of sorts to find other ancient treasures within the Field.
Panur became concerned that the Cadons might disrupt the orbits of certain asteroids crucial to his calculations. Adam was more worried about the presence of Cadon forces in the Field who might not be anxious to have more so-called treasure hunter in their midst.
With the engineers on Formil no longer a factor, Panur hopped through space with his trans-dimensional drive, first entering a parallel universe, then reentering the Milky Way at another point hundreds of light-years farther along their course. They skirted the Cadonic border guards this way and ended up on the outskirts of the Zaniff Field fourteen hours later.
All four members of the team were on the bridge, studying survey maps of the Field.
“I’ve been meaning to ask,” Adam said to Panur. “Since the Incus took the Aris asteroid away, how are you to trace its path back to their homeworld without the original?”
“Fortunately, the Incus miners kept a detailed recorded of where the original fragment was found within t
he field. But you are right. We cannot track its orbit to carry back our projections. However, since the original asteroid was made of exceptionally old material, I’m anticipating we’ll find other remnants that ended up in the field. By scanning the remaining asteroids, I hope to find another one that we can track.”
“That’s assuming a lot.”
“It depends. Once the orbits have been plotted, patterns will be revealed. Not every member of an asteroid belt is independent of the other. The majority originate from a common debris field, most often material from an unformed planet. Additional pieces entering the field would have come from outside and making up only a fraction of the total. These rocks will stand out. We will then match their orbits with what we know of the location of the Aris asteroid and search for ancient rock along the same path.”
“Oh…is that all. And here I thought it was going to be complicated.”
Panur smiled. “Trust me, Adam, compared to some of the other things I’ve done, this is child’s play.”
“Cadonic ships in the vicinity, Adam,” Trimen reported from the pilot seat. “They are challenging us.”
Adam looked at the others on the bridge and smiled. “Well, looks like it’s time to see if my name carries any weight around here.” He sat down at the comm station and opened a link.
“This is Adam Cain, I wish to speak to your unit commander.”
A moment later the screen before him lit up. The alien on display was a Prime, but with almost glowing yellow skin and radiant red eyes. The face was extremely narrow and covering in thin scales. Adam recoiled slightly from the unexpected nature of the Cadon. He was even more surprised when the skin color shifted to a soft blue before settling on a light brown. He waited a moment for the color to shift again, but it stabilized at something very close to Human skin tone.
“I am Simic Lor, authority administrator for the Zaniff Field. What is your purpose here? I have no record of your entry into Cadonic space.”
