Search for the Saiph (The Saiph Series Book 2)

by PP Corcoran

  The room was still as the politicians tried to absorb what Keyton was telling them.

  Chairman Taarov was the first to recover. “Are you telling us, General, that the Nilmerg deliberately launched a nuclear attack on the Deres? A people they had never even met. That’s ludicrous.”

  “I never said it was deliberate, Mr. Chairman. The Nilmerg used the best of each nations’ current space technology to build their manned ships. To get the ship into orbit they used hypergolic fuel. A fuel that is composed of two distinct parts. When the two parts are mixed, they react and are highly combustible. They are also highly corrosive. The Nilmerg knew they couldn’t possibly carry enough fuel to make the journey from their home planet to Deres so they developed a very rudimentary nuclear fusion drive. It worked. But in their rush to launch, it was subjected to only minimal testing. I remind you of the radiation traces the second Nilmerg ship detected in the atmosphere before it was destroyed. I submit that the first Nilmerg ship suffered some kind of engineering failure, entered the atmosphere and exploded. If I was a Deres, all I would have seen was an unknown spacecraft entering orbit over a major city then…Bang!… A thirty five megaton nuclear atmospheric detonation.”

  In her mind’s eye, Rebecca saw the blinding flash followed by the fireball and shock wave. When she spoke, her unease was evident as she tried to control her shaking voice.

  “What would be the effects of a detonation of that size, General?”

  Keyton spoke without consulting his notes, this was something every human commander who studied his own planet’s past wars knew by heart. He showed no emotion as he spoke in a hollow tone. “Radiation pulse of 500 Rems out to about three kilometers. Those who receive this level of exposure will suffer between fifty and ninety percent mortality from the acute effects alone. Dying will take between several hours and several weeks. A nuclear fireball’s radius will be 4.61 kilometers. The amount of radioactive fallout will depend on whether the fireball makes contact with the surface or not. Out to nine kilometers from the point of the impact, the overpressure will either demolish or severely damage all but the heaviest of concrete buildings. Casualties will rise to 100 percent. Out to twenty one kilometers most residential buildings will collapse. Fatalities will be widespread. Out to sixty kilometers, those not under cover will most likely experience third-degree burns which will leave severe scarring and possibly require amputation.”

  Of the three races present in the room the Persai had had the power of the atom used on their home world by the Others, but only humans had witnessed the effects of nuclear weapons unleashed on a population center by members of their own race. The pale faces of Rebecca and Keyton aborted any questions that the others may have been about to ask.

  Rebecca forced herself to stop thinking of the millions of deaths that humanity had inflicted on itself in the ultimately futile national wars in Earth’s recent past and to concentrate on the present.

  “I take it the Deres retaliated, General?”

  “Yes, ma’am. They had no way of knowing that the explosion was most likely an accident. We believe at this point they hadn’t reached a sufficient tech level to develop their own nuclear weapons so they used the only weapon of mass destruction they had. They packed chemical-fueled missiles with a biological weapon, a highly contagious virus, and sent the missiles to Nilmerg. When they reached their targets they deployed their payload. Within a matter of weeks, the first Nilmerg fell sick with an unknown disease, which was fatal in up to eighty percent of those infected. The virus spread like wildfire and in a matter of months it was a global pandemic. Luckily for the Nilmerg, the disease was too efficient. As the casualty rates soared, those who had contracted the virus died so quickly that they didn’t get the chance to reach areas that were so far clear of the disease. By the time the virus burned out, over sixty percent of the entire Nilmerg population were dead. The survivors were too scared to make physical contact with each other for fear of reigniting the disease, so it took nearly twenty years before the Nilmerg became a viable space-faring population again. This gave the Deres time to develop their own space force, so when the Nilmerg returned to Deres looking for revenge they were ready. Both sides were so evenly matched that they effectively fought each other to a standstill. The most fitting analogy we’ve come up with is the trench warfare of World War One. Both sides just batter away at the other in a war of attrition that neither is ever going to win and both will eventually lose.”

  Prime Minister Bezled cleared his throat quietly. “Are you telling me, General, that both sides are fighting a war they cannot win and that the war was started by accident?”

  “I know it seems bizarre, Mr. Prime Minister, but as an impartial observer it would seem to fit. It certainly wouldn’t be the first time in human history that a conflict had been started by mistake or by a misinterpretation of the available facts. What are you going to do about it? That is the question before you. The Commonwealth forces could intervene and put a halt to the conflict. As I’ve already said, the Nilmerg weaponry isn’t of such a quality that it would provide a substantial threat to one of our heavier units. That would lead to the conclusion that our ships wouldn’t have much to fear from Deres weaponry either. Militarily, we could do it. The question has to be whether or not there is a political will for us to intervene. My own opinion is that an attempt should be made to broker a peace before the Commonwealth even considers getting involved in a war that, frankly, is none of our business.”

  “Very succinctly put, General,” Taarov growled from the far end of the table. “But… and this is an important point I feel, we went to 23 Librae to find out what happened to those peoples that the Saiph had manipulated and we have found them killing each other over an accident.” Taarov looked slowly around the room meeting each person’s eyes. “Do we not have a moral responsibility to put an end to the fighting? Even for a short time? And allow both sides the opportunity to view the facts from an impartial observer?”

  Rebecca took the time to gauge the feeling in the room before replying. “Would you Mr. Chairman and you Mr. Prime Minister be willing to support a decision to instruct Ambassador Isa to make contact with the Deres and attempt to broker a ceasefire with the view to organizing peace talks under the auspices of the Commonwealth?”

  The military men had had their say. Now it was up to the politicians to decide on the way forward. A decision that didn’t take long.

  Prime Minister Bezled was the first to decide. “Garunda agrees.”

  Taarov nodded slowly. “As does Pars.”

  Rebecca relaxed slightly as she allowed a smile to cross her face. “Very well, I shall have the appropriate instructions drawn up and dispatched forthwith to the ambassador. Now, General. For the last item on the agenda and one that has been the cause of major concern amongst the Commonwealth Council. The situation in Messier 54.”

  The image in the holo cube changed to show the close-up taken by the Southern Cross of the cruisers bearing the symbol of the Imperial Alonan Navy.

  “Madam President, our analysts have been going over the images and data recorded by the Southern Cross with a fine-tooth comb and we have little to add from our original analysis which was distributed to the Council. Each of the cruisers comes in slightly heavier than our own Talos light cruisers but we believe the Alonan have gone for a heavier energy weapon armament as opposed to missiles. That may be because they haven’t been able to reduce the size of the gravity drive down to a sufficient size to make it practical for missile use. What’s interesting though, is that although all of the cruisers are running what appears to be a modified merchant gravity drive, one in particular stands out.”

  “Oh. How so, General?” asked Taarov.

  “The circumstances of how the Alonan have managed to get their hands on gravity drive technology is still under investigation by not only our own Naval Intelligence Service but by the Federal Investigation Bureau. We believe that we may have a break in the investigation.”

  Reb
ecca leaned forward, anxious to hear more. “Care to share, General?”

  Once more, Keyton touched a control on his PAD and in the holo cube two oscillating waves appeared, one above the other.

  “What you’re looking at, ladies and gentlemen, is the output of two gravity drives. The top one is of the Alonan cruisers. The bottom one belongs to the Zurich Lines merchant vessel Sea Hawk. Now, every gravity drive has an individual signature. A fingerprint, if you like.”

  The display zoomed in on a single peak on the cruiser’s oscillating wave. It wasn’t quite as regular as it first appeared.

  “That, my experts tell me, is a fault in the drive lining. A small crack, not worth repairing, but that crack makes this cruiser the easiest to identify, and this,” the image zoomed out only to zoom in again on the trace of the Sea Hawk, “is the same portion of the trace from the Sea Hawk. As you can see, they are identical.”

  “But… that’s not possible. Is it?” said an exasperated Bezled.

  Keyton shrugged his shoulders. “The experts tell me that the chances of two gravity drives having the exact same signature are in the tens of millions to one.”

  Taarov weighed in. “Well, surely all we have to do is locate the Sea Hawk and recheck her drive. There must be some mistake.”

  “That, Mr. Chairman, was my first thought. Unfortunately the Sea Hawk was removed from service ten months ago and sold for scrap. It should be sitting in a parking orbit alongside the Pathos reclamation yards.”

  “Should be, General?”

  Keyton gave Rebecca a noncommittal look. “I’ll be honest with you, Madam President, until we physically check, I’m not holding my breath. I have my best men on the job and I have the utmost confidence that they’ll get to the bottom of this.”

  Rebecca slapped her palm down on the table in frustration. “Well, I think it’s high time we found out what the Alona are up to, don’t you?”

  #

  ALONA – MESSIER 54 – 50,000 LIGHT YEARS FROM EARTH

  Aaron Beckett stood patiently in the ante-room outside the throne room of Emperor Paxt the Ninth. Over his decades of diplomatic service, Aaron had been forced to wait at the beck and call of many an important dignitary and he had devised a simple method of keeping himself occupied as he did so. Aaron had noticed that the majority of these types of people liked to surround themselves with magnificent pieces of art. Be those paintings or sculptures. Aaron would start in one corner of whatever room he was waiting in and work his way around each wall, carefully examining each piece of art as he went. With the amount of practice he’d had over the years, he’d actually become a bit of an expert on the subject of fine art and more than once had been able to spot a fake much to the embarrassment of its owner. Aaron was on his third wall when the large double doors opened and a uniformed Alonan usher beckoned him forward.

  The imperial palace had been built by the first emperor, Emperor Paxt the First, in the aftermath of the series of wars that had threatened the very existence of the Alonan people. Emperor Paxt at the time of the wars had been a leading general in the army of the Northern Confederation. He’d become sickened by the orders of his political masters who were squandering the lives of his troops, so he led a coup that overthrew the government and took sole command of the nation. Through a series of trusted officers, he reached out to the military leaders of the other major powers, offering to bring about an immediate cessation of hostilities. The politicians of the other powers had witnessed the execution by General Paxt of his predecessors and had been terrified that their own military would follow suit, so they began a series of purges to weed out any officer whom they didn’t believe was politically reliable and would not continue the war. That was when General Paxt decided to go public with his offer to end the war. He broadcast an appeal to the ordinary soldiers to not only do the right thing for themselves, but for their families and for their planet as a whole. In a tide of revolution, the old political houses fell and for the first time in a generation, the planet Alona was at peace. With the politicians out of the picture, the soldiers looked to their officers for guidance, who in turn looked to General Paxt. Paxt seized the moment. With the skill of the great general he was, he reorganized the various armies into labor battalions who set to work repairing the damage the war had caused. Homes, schools, and hospitals went up in record time. To feed his soldiers, he sent them into the fields, not to forage and steal from the farmers but to provide labor to plant and harvest the crops. The government would take a percentage of the farms’ produce to feed the soldiers but whatever was left, the farmer was free to sell to whomever he wished. Borders were dispensed with and with it individual nations were swallowed up into the greater whole. Within a decade, Alona was a radically different place. No one went hungry. No one was cold. People cared what happened to their neighbors and if you ever needed help, of any kind, you found a soldier. A soldier whose duty was no longer just to fight for his people, but to care for them to the best of his ability. None of this would have been possible if it hadn’t been for General Paxt. In a show of gratitude and faith in his leadership, the people by popular decree declared him Emperor Paxt the First. In an amazing feat of foresight, Emperor Paxt put in place a law that the position of emperor could never be hereditary. Paxt himself designed the system of government to ensure this. Normal citizens elected District Governors and they in turn elected one of their own as Emperor. But to remind people of their duty to Alona as a whole, it was decided that the only citizens who would have the right to vote would be those who had served in the uniform of the empire for no less than three years. Whatever the Commonwealth thought of the system, it had been in place for over 300 years and nobody seemed interested in changing it.

  This was the first time Aaron had been in the imperial palace, located in the hills overlooking the planetary capital of Bozra. As the capital city had grown, it had spread around the walls of the imperial palace so that the palace grounds from above looked like the only greenery in a sea of gray and brown buildings. The building itself covered some 67,000 square meters and was a testament to Alonan architecture. When Emperor Paxt the First had the building commissioned, he ordered that the building was to incorporate art and design from each of the old nations to show that though each of the constituent parts of Alona were individuals, they had come together as a whole. Great idea, Aaron thought but the clash of styles could be taxing on the eye.

  As Aaron walked in through the ante-room doors and entered the throne room, he was struck by the amount of light in the room. On both sides the walls were made of sheet glass giving spectacular views of the palace gardens. Rather than intimidating a visitor, the sight of so much greenery was relaxing. The exact opposite of what any dictatorial military leader would want. Aaron advanced toward the waiting emperor, seated on a small raised dais at the end of the room. His footsteps deadened by the plush carpet. Apart from the emperor himself, Aaron could only see Grand Admiral Raga and the foreign minister, Minister Hozal, in a room that could easily hold hundreds. A sense of foreboding came over Aaron as he approached the base of the dais and halted at a respectful distance.

  “Your Majesty, Minister Hozal, Admiral. The Commonwealth Council is grateful for you making time in your busy schedule to see me.”

  Emperor Paxt nodded by way of greeting, leaving Hozal to speak for him.

  “It is not every day that I receive a call from Ambassador Calvin requesting a personal audience with the emperor himself for a Special Envoy of the Commonwealth. We are intrigued to hear what you have to say. Ambassador Calvin would not be drawn into explaining the reason behind the meeting, just that it was of the utmost urgency that a meeting be arranged at the emperor’s earliest convenience. So, here we are, Mr. Beckett.”

  So you’re not going to admit that you know exactly why I’m here. Oh well, I didn’t really expect you to straight off the bat.

  “A week ago, a Commonwealth courier ship carrying urgent diplomatic mail for our embassy on Alona arrived unex
pectedly at your system’s outer marker…”

  “In violation of the standing agreement between our two governments, Mr. Beckett, as I’m sure you well know, all scheduled arrivals or departures from the Alona system must be cleared through the appropriate authorities. We have no record of any clearance being granted to this courier.”

  Ah, so you did know I was here about the courier!

  “You’re quite correct, Minister. But as I’m also sure you’re aware there are provisions within the agreement for urgent diplomatic traffic, which this courier was, to make unscheduled arrival in the Alona system as long as they hold at the system’s outer marker. Inform approach control of their arrival and wait at the outer marker until given permission to enter the system. Exactly what this courier did. To the letter.” Aaron emphasized the last part.

  Minister Hozal’s face remained impassive but Aaron caught Admiral Raga clench his jaw. Looks like nobody told the navy about that particular clause. Oops.

  “I seem to remember a courier requesting permission to approach the inner system and then for some unexplained reason it made no further contact with approach control.” Hozal gestured toward Admiral Raga. “I believe the navy launched a search and rescue operation in the area of the outer marker in an attempt to locate the courier, believing that it may be in difficulty. An exercise that tied up valuable naval resources for quite some time and at considerable expense, I may add. I take it your courier made it safely back to Commonwealth territory without incident?”

  “It did indeed Minister, thank you for your concern,” Aaron said graciously.

  “In the circumstances, I suppose we can overlook the fact that yet again the courier violated our agreement by not seeking permission to leave the system,” Hozal said dismissively.

  In the circumstances? Aaron jumped on Hozal’s slip.

  “And what circumstances would those be, Minister?”

  Hozal immediately realized his mistake. “What I meant to say Mr. Beckett was…”