Exodus: Empires at War: Book 3: The Rising Storm

by Doug Dandridge

  “Are you getting this to HQ?” Bryce asked the Com Officer.

  “Yes, sir. Both the translation and the raw data.”

  “Be nice if they gave us some coordinates to go with this,” said the Tactical Officer.

  Might as well wish for their complete strategic plan, thought the Captain, happy to be getting what they were.

  “You go in fourteen hours,” said the Admiral, tilting his horns in some incomprehensible, at least to the humans, gesture.

  “I hope that’s enough time for HQ to do something,” said the Helm.

  “It’s gotta be,” said Tactical, looking over his shoulder at the Captain. “It’s gotta be, right sir?”

  “It doesn’t have to be anything,” said Suttler, looking at the screen. The Cacada moved a bit, reaching for something, and the holo revealed behind him looked interesting. “Send that holo over to my screen, and computer enhance,” he ordered the Tactical Officer. Moments later the holo was on his screen, enhanced as much as the computer could make it. He enlarged a section and almost whooped for joy. There were stars labeled on the holo, and lines connecting them with symbols. He didn’t know all what that meant, but was sure the people in intelligence would figure it out, especially if they kept feeding them more information on top of it.

  “We will be moving the station before you return,” said the Admiral. “The planet is well and truly pacified. My staff has suggested that we would better serve the Fleet by stationing outside the hyper limit, so that incoming vessels don’t have to waste time going into the system.”

  There was some more of what could be called chatting, nothing of real military interest, but enough to send back to intelligence for analysis. One could never tell when the most trivial of information could actually be of supreme importance. And it was all verbiage for the translation programs.

  Fourteen hours later, the force began to move. The warships were in three groups, heading for the hyper barrier on a bearing that would take them into the Empire. The base began to move outward on a much reduced acceleration, on a heading that would take it about half a light hour from where the stealth ship was stationed. Sea Stag sent all of this info up the line, filling headquarters in on an enemy that thought it was in a totally secure system, away from the prying eyes of the opponent.

  * * *

  On the fourth meeting with the Great Admiral, as she learned he was called, Jana had no more defiance. She knelt on the floor before the male, cringing at the thought of more pain. The nightly visits by Ben were almost as bad. Jana enjoyed sex, on her terms. Having it forced on her by someone she despised as a traitor was not her terms.

  “So this Sean is nothing more than a spoiled male of your species,” said the Great Admiral, looking down on her. “A child of privilege, who was serving time in the military to enhance his reputation.”

  “That about sums it up, my Lord,” said Jana, using a calming mantra to keep her heart steady, so the monitors of the aliens would not catch her in a lie. And judging from the dearth of punishment they have meted out since the questioning began, it must be working.

  The shiver of pleasure caught her off guard, and she gasped, then moaned as the intense waves moved through her body, her reward for being forthcoming. She looked forward to the pleasure, telling herself that she was not becoming addicted to it, and knowing it was a lie. It would be a hard habit to shake if she ever got out of here, not that escape was likely to happen anytime soon.

  “And his father, Augustine was it, was actually a formidable Emperor, before his assassination by one of his own guard?”

  “Yes, my Lord,” answered Jana, looking down at the floor, ashamed that she was cooperating as much as she was.

  “You humans are vermin,” said the Great Admiral, turning away from the portal and walking to stand over her, all four fists balled. “How could one of you have killed someone divine, like an Emperor? You deserve to be wiped from the Universe. And you will be.”

  “We don’t consider our Emperors divine,” said Jana in a low voice, waiting for a blow to fall, almost hoping for one that would end her life.

  “And so they aren’t,” said the Great Admiral with a gloating smile on his face. “Only the Emperor of the Cacada is truly divine, and all the Universe must bow before him. But to consider your own Emperor as a mere mortal in barbaric.”

  Jana kept her head down, refusing to make eye contact with the big male, even as she wished to look up and see if the fists were coming for her. So far the Cacada had not given her any physical punishment, only the pain and pleasure inducer.

  She could hear the male moving away with heavy footfalls on the floor. When she looked up she saw him accepting a drink from another slave, this one a slim purple skinned humanoid. They’re always drinking, she thought, watching as the male chugged the beverage down and throwing the glass at the slave. She had gotten a smell of the drinks several times, even served them herself when they wanted to reinforce her subservience to them. And they were very heavy on what smelled like alcohol. And from what she had learned of Cacada physiology, and she shuddered at the thought of how she had learned that, they ingested the same proteins as humans.

  Are they a race of alcoholics? she thought, wondering how that could be used against them. Humanity had purged the alcoholism gene from the pool centuries before. There were still drunks, but they were drunks because they wanted to be, not because of some genetic compulsion.

  “So this Sean will not make a strong leader?” asked the Great Admiral, gesturing for the purple skinned slave to fetch another drink.

  “No, my Lord,” said Jana, again trying to calm her heart. “The Sean I worked under would never be able to handle the responsibility.” And may God grant that he learns quickly, and becomes the man we saw below the surface.

  “So very bad for your people,” said the smiling Cacada. “And so very good for ours.”

  Just keep that arrogant attitude, thought Gorbachev, nodding her head. And may it bite you in the ass.

  Later she was back in the room she shared with Ben, not due to her own desires, but instead to his. She had discovered that he was an unenhanced human, one she was much faster than, and even though a woman, she was at least as strong as the well-built man. He lay down beside her and put his hands on her, and she stopped herself from shuddering at the touch of the man she considered the worst kind of traitor. After he used her she would go to the local bathing facility and scrub for hours, trying to get him off and out of her.

  “How many of your people are there?” she asked him one night, forcing herself to wait for her cleansing session.

  “Several thousand,” said Ben, looking far off as if imagining his home. “Maybe ten thousand. The masters were very generous to allow any of us to survive after the treachery of our people.”

  Ten thousand slaves raised and brain washed to worship these demons, thought Jana, putting her head against his shoulder when she wanted to grab his head and snap his neck.

  “Do you know why they spared you?”

  “So we could serve them,” said the man, almost shivering with ecstasy as he thought about that service. “So we could be here to aid them when they finally contacted our recalcitrant brothers.”

  “And what are their plans for us?”

  “To crush you, of course,” said the man, his face showing no distress at that thought. “The Galaxy is theirs to rule by right of Divine will. We were wrong to oppose them.”

  Jana stared at the man, now feeling sorry for him more than hating him. Not that I still wouldn’t wring his neck if given a chance, she thought, but the story of his people was tragic.

  “The masters are divine, and any race would be proud to serve them,” continued Ben, and Jana forced herself to listen and act fascinated, playing the part of the spy, and hoping that one day her information would be of use to the human race.

  Chapter Nine

  War first, one hopes to win then one expects the enemy to lose then, one is satisfied that he t
oo is suffering in the end, one is surprised that everyone has lost. Karl Kraus.

  RED DWARF SYSTEM, SPACE BETWEEN MASSADARA AND CONUNDRUM, MARCH 23RD, 1000.

  “Right there,” said Commander Maurice von Rittersdorf, the Captain of the Dot MacArthur, pointing a finger at the score of asteroids clustered on the screen. “That’s where we need to be.”

  The Captain looked over at the Sensory Officer. “How long till they translate out of hyper?”

  “Estimate eighty-six minutes,” said the officer. “But that estimate is based on them coming in right at the hyper limit.”

  “Which is the way that we have to think,” said the Captain, glancing back at the Prince/Emperor. “To think any other way is to give in to despair.” The Captain looked at the helmsman. “How long for us to get inside that cluster at best decel?”

  “Eighty minutes,” said the officer, a worried look on her face. “They are about four light minutes from us, on a course away from our position.” She turned back to her control board and started the ship on the planned course.

  “Almost like it was fated,” said Sean, his expression still worried, but a slight smile creeping across his face.

  The next seventy minutes were tense, as crew looked from holo to countdown timer, following the tracks of the enemy vessels as they forged closer. If they translated too soon they would catch an image of the destroyer and know exactly where she was. Then they would have to speed across the system, and hope they could find another place to hide. They might be able to outrun the alien warships in normal space. They would not be able to outrun the missile those warships would fire at them. And no one had any illusions about being able to intercept all of the missiles that two four million ton warships could send at their destroyer.

  “They’re very close to the barrier,” said the Sensory Officer, looking over his shoulder at the Captain.

  A lot closer than I would want to get before a translation, thought the Captain, staring at the holo of the tactical plot, then back at the real time vid of the asteroids that were almost around them. And we still need to get to cover five minutes before they come into the system, or they will still see our image.

  “That one,” said the Captain, pointing at the big rock to their left, an asteroid that had to be over twenty kilometers in length. “Behind it, now.”

  “Hold on,” yelled the Helmsman, at the same time as acceleration warnings sounded over the intercom.

  MacArthur could handle a little over three hundred gravities on her inertial compensators. The Helmsman now applied three hundred and ten gees to a combination acceleration, deceleration, slowing the destroyer and slipping her sideways behind the large asteroid. It felt like an armored giant was standing on the Captain’s chest, and he couldn’t draw breath for several seconds. The ship slid to a near stop and the pressure was gone, and everyone looked at the timer that showed five minutes and several seconds to go before the enemy ships hit the barrier. It was still a tense wait, like playing hide and seeking and wondering if the cheating little brother was sneaking a peak.

  “I have never liked that,” said the Emperor, running a hand over his shoulder and grimacing.

  “It beats being blown out of space,” said the Captain, looking at a splitter holo of the asteroid they were now parked behind. It was a lumpy rock, full of cracks and crevices, most too small to do them any good. And still the timer ticked down.

  The translation alarm went off before the timer hit zero. Still probably time enough for the light from the destroyer to have made it past the enemy ships. The Captain looked at the tactical display, then at the visual, which showed one of the enemy ships coming through the hole it had ripped in space, transmitted on tight beam from a small drone that had left the destroyer just before she started on her difficult maneuver.

  Moments later the second ship entered normal space, and they coasted along into the system, glowing with the heat of their deceleration. That they didn’t immediately head toward the small asteroid field was a good sign. They hung there in space, decreasing their speed until they had a destination, looking over the system with all of their sensors.

  “Helm,” said the Captain. “See any good places where we might be able to lay low?”

  “I’m looking, sir,” said the Helm, her eyes darting as she looked over the holo that hovered above her board. “Not anything that would hide us well.”

  “Well look quicker,” said the Captain, glancing up at the main viewer, which was showing one of the ships vectoring toward the asteroids, while the other moved much more slowly on a path that would take her right behind the cluster. “Because I think we’re running out of time.”

  The surface of the asteroid continued on below them. They were barely moving in relation to the rock, which was only a couple of hundred kilometers in diameter. Much further and they would have to reverse course, or appear around the other side of the rock, where the enemy would probably see them.

  “What about there,” said Sean, pointing to a deep shadow on the surface of the asteroid.

  “What is that?” asked the Captain, looking over at the sensory officer.

  “Some kind of deep crevice in the surface,” said the officer, looking at his board. “Maybe a little bigger than the others.”

  “Dimensions?”

  The Sensory Officer played with his board for a few moments, then looked back at the Captain. “About one thousand and fifty meters by three hundred meters. And to an average depth of two hundred and fifty meters.”

  “So we could fit inside it?’ asked the Captain, the possibilities flying through his mind. “Since we’re nine twenty five by two seventy by two thirty meters.”

  “It might be close,” said the officer. “And we might scrape off some alloy.”

  “Scraping’s better than being vaporized,” said the Captain, nodding at the Helmsman. “Can you get us in there?”

  “I really don’t like this idea, sir,” said Lieutenant JG Lasardo the Tactical Officer.

  “If you have a better idea, Tac, tell me now,” said the Captain. “No. Then get us in there.”

  “We’re picking up more hyper traces,” said the Sensory Chief over the com. “Trying to firm them up now.”

  What the hell now? thought the Captain, a sinking feeling in his chest. More of the bastards? He looked back at the young man who was his to protect, wondering if they would get out of here. Not if they send ships around the system to cut off every escape vector. Maybe I need to just fire up the grabbers and run as fast as I can.

  The viewer showed a split screen, one side the large crevice that was to be their hiding place, the other a tactical schematic of Dot McArthur sliding toward that crevice. Like all grabber equipped vessels, meaning all Imperial warships, the destroyer could move at any acceleration on any vector in any orientation. She could move sideways across the system at a full three hundred gravities if that was necessary to keep a weakened side away from the enemy. The Captain leaned forward in his chair, still wondering if this was the right thing to do, or if it would just put his ship in a position where she couldn’t use most of her weaponry while an enemy pounded them, then boarded.

  “They're ours,” yelled the exultant voice of the Sensor Chief.

  “What are they, Chief?”

  “Imperial destroyers,” said the Chief, trying to calm her voice tone. “Four of them, coming this direction in Hyper VI. I picked up their translation from VII to VI, and their stair stepping their way into the system.”

  “They must have picked up those Caca bastards,” said Lasardo, a smile stretching his face. “And they’re coming in to see who they are, and what the Cacas are doing.”

  There was a slight bump, followed by a deeper rumble, then some more bumps.

  “Easy does it, Lieutenant,” said the Captain to the Helmsman.

  “It’s mostly the computer, sir,” said the young woman, frowning. “It’s way too tight to try a manual entry.”

  There were some more bumps, and
the Captain could just imagine what was being done to the nanoskin of the ship. Of course, McArthur was harder than the rock and metal veins of the asteroid, and the skin was self-repairing. And it’s better than getting blasted out of space.

  Von Rittersdorf allowed a smile to break across his face. The situation had changed. It had turned into a hide until either the enemy found them or moved on situation, to a case of hiding long enough for the help to come to them.

  * * *

  “There are enemy ships coming down Hyper behind us,” said the Sensory Officer.

  “What kind of ships?” asked the Group Leader, feeling some panic as the thought of entering a trap came to mind.

  “Four of the small enemy warships,” said the Sensory Officer, listening closely to the earphones.

  “Nothing we can’t handle,” said the Tactical Officer, a carnivore’s grin on his face. “They just come to die with their comrade.”

  “If that’s all there is out there,” said the Helm Officer, his own forehead wrinkled in worry. “What if this is a scout force for a larger squadron?”

  “Now is the time for bold action,” said the Tactical, giving the Helm a withering glare.

  “Have you located the prey?” asked the Group Leader, staring at the tactical display. There was nothing out there close enough for them to have reached outside of the small cluster of asteroids straight ahead.

  “They are nowhere in sight,” said the Sensory Officer. “Not in open space.”

  “And if they are using stealth systems?” asked the Helm Officer.

  “Our technology is better,” said the Sensory Officer, sneering at the Helm Officer.