Valence (Confluence Book 4)

by Jennifer Foehner Wells

  Now she regretted that, as much as her exhausted mind let her.

  Her experience wasn’t unique. Her shipmates had been as busy as she’d been. There’d been quality-control checks all over the ship and simulations, seeking more speed and accuracy in response times and developing protocols. They had to know how to handle all kinds of frightening scenarios—hull breaches, power failure, system damage. The lives of the rest of the crew depended on their ability to seal off decks, repair broken equipment, and reroute power. Very few people had the time to indulge in the gatherings she’d seen on her way back to her quarters.

  She lay down on her bunk, fully clothed. She was too tired to change. She’d shower in the morning. Probably. It hardly mattered. No one would be sniffing her or commenting on her appearance.

  She stared at the ceiling in the dark. Hours ticked by. Sometimes a few tears leaked out. Her mind was too full for sleep. It just wouldn’t come.

  She wished she could talk to her parents one last time.

  Eventually she got up, showered, and dressed mechanically. She sat on the edge of the bed to collect herself.

  There’d been a service set up on the fleet’s intranet to collect messages for loved ones back on Earth, set to transmit once the lines of communication were opened again. It seemed like such a final act. Using it meant that a person was admitting to oneself that they might never see those people again.

  She logged on to the service and filled out the form with her parents’ cell phone numbers. She sent them each a single sentence: “I love you with all my heart.”

  51

  THE SPEROANCORA FELL over the lip at the other end of the wormhole and for a split second Jane felt like she was tumbling. Disorientation and fear gripped her, plunging her stomach into the seat. Then it was over.

  They were still.

  The viewscreen showed dark space, littered with stars. The phase shifts had ended. Her thoughts made sense again.

  She gasped for a breath. “Show the fleet on-screen,” she rasped.

  Instantly the viewscreen changed and she saw the other ships waiting. She counted five and allowed herself to exhale.

  We made it. We all made it through.

  “All ships report in,” she said.

  One by one every ship in her little fleet acknowledged her request.

  “Have we arrived at our target location?” she demanded, more sharply than she should have. Her fingers trembled from the adrenaline.

  Brai was already analyzing star maps. A second later he said, “Confirmed. We have reached target coordinates.”

  Through the anipraxic network, every mind was trying to reel itself in and assess whether they were okay, performing system checks.

  Jane slumped in her seat. “We’re going to take a break. No more jumps for a full standard day. Everyone get some rest. That’s an order.”

  Alan was hunched over his console, half out of his seat. He held a hand up in the air. “Hold on. Nobody go anywhere.”

  His voice sounded strained.

  The adrenaline reignited.

  Jane cleared her throat. “What is it?”

  He looked up at her. “We’re not where we wanted to be.”

  “Brai just confirmed—”

  Alan’s face had lost all color. “We’re in the right place, physically. But we are not in the right time.”

  52

  February 9, 2031

  WHEN ZARA ARRIVED on the command deck an hour earlier than her appointed time, things were deceptively business as usual. All stations were manned with quiet, industriously working individuals, most of them much older than her.

  She checked in with Compton in his office to see if he had any last-minute duties for her. He looked like he hadn’t gone to bed. His eyes were bloodshot and his skin was gray with fatigue. He sent her to the bridge to man her station.

  She relieved the first communications officer and took her seat. She was the primary liaison between the Aegis and the rest of the fleet. There was already a lot of chatter, but nothing critical yet.

  There was a countdown clock at her station, at everyone’s station. The minutes were going by far too quickly.

  When it was time, it would happen fast.

  The fleet had had already jumped to the approximate location of the battle and built the velocity necessary to match the Swarm’s. Now they were getting into position. When the Swarm came into range they would form what the tacticians were calling a three-dimensional defile.

  There would be three sizes of ship in play. The eight cruisers—smaller, much more agile, maneuverable, and able to respond quickly to changing conditions—had gone out to surround the Swarm. They would reach the outer limits of the Swarm’s ability to detect them at the same time that the Swarm arrived within range of the Earth United’s four dreadnought-class ships.

  The dreadnoughts would position themselves in a diamond shape around the Swarm’s projected vector, and would reach maximum velocity just hours before the Swarm passed through the defile. While the dreadnoughts opened fire, the cruisers would work to squeeze the Swarm down to a narrow band. As the Swarm reached the dreadnoughts, they’d release fighters, physically corralling any stray insects back into line, picking off stragglers, and chasing down any survivors one by one.

  They’d be hitting them from all directions. There would be nowhere for them to go. The dreadnoughts would kill as many as possible, using missiles and laser fire until the Swarm outran them. The individuals that made it through the defile would continue to be squeezed by the eight cruisers until every last one was dead. The hope was that it would be like shooting fish in a barrel. If it wasn’t, they would jump ahead of the Swarm and try another tactic. They could repeat this jump-and-attack sequence as long as there were ships left to fight, if necessary. Hopefully it would never be down to Earth’s orbital and dirtside weapons.

  When it came to warfare, there were so many more variables in space than on a planet. Humans were new to thinking of three-dimensional combat on this scale. Zara worried that they were just adapting ground-level techniques to space. She hoped that there hadn’t been any egregious errors in their assumptions about how the Swarm would move or react.

  There were one hundred and twenty-one adults and sixteen subadults in this pod. That meant each ship had to take out eleven to thirteen individuals. Aegis, being one of the four dreadnought-class ships, was slow to accelerate and lumbering to change course, but had lots of firepower and plenty of fighters. It would likely make the most kills in the first volley, but the eight cruisers would be doing the cleanup.

  The Aegis was also tasked with coordinating the movements of the rest of the fleet and the fighters, as well as collecting sensor data that could be analyzed and used in future battles.

  “Captain on the bridge!” someone barked. Everyone stood at attention until they were put at ease to resume work.

  Walsh moved from station to station, speaking in hushed tones to every officer. When he got to her, he said, “First Lieutenant Hampton. Report.”

  She gave him a concise briefing on the comm chatter, the gist being everyone was ready and in place.

  He nodded. Eventually he came back to the central command chair and sat down. “Ready missile bays. Warm up the lasers.”

  The bridge was absolutely silent for the next ten minutes as they waited for the bugs to come in range.

  Walsh said, “Open a channel to the rest of the fleet, on speaker. Ask for a report. Be ready for translation.”

  Zara completed the command. “Aye, sir.”

  There was a brief moment of static, then a crystal-clear connection. She spoke into the mic in Mensententia. “Every vessel, report.”

  “The Yoroi stands ready.”

  “The Zirh stands ready.”

  “The Píngbì stands ready.”

  In turn, each ship sounded off. The Bronya, the Dhaal, the Ritter, the Caballero, the Bouclier, the Guardião, the Paladin, and the Vincitore. Each one replied in Mensententia and Z
ara repeated the phrase in English, though after the first two it was clear what they were saying.

  Zara waited to see if Walsh was going to give a speech. He didn’t. He said, “Standby, until my signal.”

  Long minutes passed. The countdown was closing in on zero. The fight would begin as soon as the Swarm came into missile range.

  When the countdown reached two minutes and eleven seconds, Major Sokolov, the sensor specialist, calmly said aloud in English with a thick Russian accent, “Contact. First target is coming into missile range in ninety seconds.” She knew from their talks that the extremes of their range were quite far because there was no air resistance to slow anything down or cause missiles to veer off course.

  Walsh pointed a finger at her. “Repeat that for the fleet.”

  She did. She didn’t know how many seconds had passed, so she repeated it verbatim. Her heart beat erratically in her chest.

  Walsh leaned forward. “Can we get a visual?”

  “Yes, sir. It’ll be grainy, sir.”

  Walsh waved a hand. Zara translated the conversation into Mensententia for the rest of the fleet.

  The big screen zoomed in from the star field that had dominated the space for the last few hours. Zara squinted. Occasionally she could see stray reflected light off of the carapace of one of the insects, but that was all. She wished they could see them better, to put a face on the evil that wanted to use them as food.

  “Any deviation from their original trajectory or travel pattern?”

  “None, sir.”

  She translated that. Someone on the Bouclier forgot to mute their mic as they translated the Aegis conversation into Mandarin. Zara fumbled to take them off speaker for a few seconds, then brought them back on the line when they finished speaking. She sent the Bouclier’s communications officer a quick text to remind them to turn off the mic during translations. She didn’t bother with pleasantries. There wasn’t time for worrying about hurt feelings right now.

  “Fire missiles at your assigned sector of the pod on my mark,” Walsh said. Zara translated. It would begin soon. Her breathing sounds seemed so loud in her own ears. She hoped the mic wasn’t picking that up. She swallowed against a dry mouth, getting ready to translate the moment Walsh spoke. She had to sound crystal clear and not hesitate.

  “Fire,” Walsh said.

  “Jiacti,” Zara translated, her voice as clear and true as she could have hoped.

  She could hear the distant vibrations of the missiles in their loading tubes. The atmosphere was tense and absolutely silent as every head craned forward, watching the main screen in an attempt to see what was happening. Zara couldn’t see anything but blobs. The fleet fired three separate volleys.

  Zara’s fingers trembled. She breathed shallowly. How many had they killed? How would they react?

  Walsh leaned back in the command chair. “Major Sokolov, report.”

  Sokolov shook his head. “Sir, I register one hundred thirty-seven objects maintaining velocity.”

  Zara looked down at her hands on the console. Her heart sank. Not even one?

  Walsh rose from his seat. “What?”

  Compton stood up too. “They dodged every missile?”

  Sokolov remained impassive. “That appears to be the case. There were momentary minor deviations in their courses but their overall trajectory is unchanged.”

  Walsh slammed his body back into the command chair.

  Zara’s earpiece chirped. Someone was reminding her to translate. She turned to the mic and translated the conversation word for word, except for Walsh’s colorful muttering. She hoped they couldn’t hear that.

  The Brazilian scientist Lieutenant Colonel Rossi said in Mensententia, “The Sectilius never mentioned their eyesight was so good.”

  Zara translated quietly. She didn’t think the timing was great.

  Walsh glared at Rossi, then turned to Zara. “Announce a video-conference call in two minutes.”

  A room full of physically present officers had been difficult enough to manage, but a video conference of those same officers was ten times worse. Without a physical room to contain them, they spoke over each other. They accused each other of assuming this fight would be simple. One of them said little more than, “This is a disaster,” over and over again. Another repeated, “I told you all that long range was a bad idea and none of you would listen to me.”

  Everyone quieted momentarily when the Swedish captain of the Guardião, who was normally very soft-spoken, said, “We would not be scrambling in the face of this threat if we had simply worked together from the start. I wish to go on the record stating this disarray is the fault of a lack of cooperation between nations. The attributes that the Sectilius believed made us strong have also splintered us, putting our very existence at risk.”

  The quiet didn’t last longer than a moment’s hesitation, and they were back to yelling and sniping, no matter what Walsh said to try to hush them. Eventually Walsh growled at her to mute anyone who hadn’t been given the floor and she did so gladly. The conference suddenly became easier to manage, though the silenced officers looked angry enough to bite.

  After everyone calmed down, the consensus of the conference was that it would be best to save ordnance until the pod was much closer. The insects wouldn’t be as likely to dodge something coming at close range—and there was no dodging something you couldn’t see. Lasers would be their best offensive weapon. They had time to change tactics. It would be an hour wait until the pod came into laser cannon range.

  Since they would be forced to use more laser power than they’d anticipated, that hour gave them time to get every ship’s engineering department working to divert power from anything that wasn’t absolutely necessary in order to recharge the laser cannons as quickly as possible.

  The conference call ended more calmly and more positively than it had begun. They had a new plan. They knew from analyzing historic encounters between the Swarm and the Sectilius that they had a tough road ahead. The long-range missiles had been an experiment that hadn’t been found in the sectilian logs. Now they knew why. It must have been common knowledge among the Sectilius that it wouldn’t work.

  Some analysts reported they just barely had enough resources to give them a seventy percent chance of defeating the Swarm. Other analysts were more pessimistic. An average of all the predictions gave them a fifty-fifty chance.

  Zara reminded herself, when she started to feel really scared, that the bugs might be resourceful, but humans were too.

  And no one could calculate an average for that.

  53

  ALAN PINGED the nearest communication relay point to get an accurate date and time, something they did with regularity. It wasn’t unheard of to lose a few seconds inside a wormhole. The ship’s clocks would reset automatically when the ping bounced back.

  He waited for that to happen, rubbing the back of his neck self-consciously. All eyes on the bridge were on him.

  He heard Jane unlatch herself and stand. “What do you mean?” she asked.

  “I can’t tell yet,” he said brusquely. “All I know is that the ship’s computer is very confused about the time and date.”

  “That happens sometimes with rough transits,” Murrrsi said. “It’s normally minor. Nothing to worry about.”

  Ouvaq turned in her seat. She looked terrified. “That didn’t feel minor to me.”

  Feig reached out to touch her reassuringly. “We’re all here together. We survived. That’s what’s important.”

  The ping came back. The ship’s clock reset.

  Alan bellowed involuntarily when he saw the readout. “Holy fucking shit!”

  Jane was at his side in an instant. “Oh, no.” She sat down in his seat, her eyes wide with disbelief, staring at him.

  “Eleven point eight-nine standard years. Stolen from us inside that goddamn fucking wormhole.” He instantly started converting from standard years to Earth years in his head, though why that would matter now, he didn’t kn
ow. That was ten point five-eight years on Earth.

  The entire anipraxis network was stunned. Alan was glad for the internal silence.

  “Yliriu said the Swarm was twelve to thirteen standard years away. There’s still time to make a difference in the outcome on Earth,” Ron said via the anipraxic link.

  Alan shook his head in disgust. If Yliriu was right, the Swarm might hit Earth any fucking minute. There might not be time to grow another crop of particles. They might have wasted their best defense on those stupid fucks at Vendal. Damn it.

  Feig said, “Excuse me, please, for my ignorance. Is it possible to reverse the wormhole, reproduce the effect, and go back?”

  No one answered her. It was a stupid question. But Jane was looking at him expectantly so he kept his face blank and just said what anyone with any knowledge of the problem was thinking. “We don’t know which thing caused the time dilation. It could have been that we were too close to a gravity well, or it was the extra mass that snuck in, the warp bubble, the laser fire, the explosion, or all of it together. We don’t know and we have no way of knowing unless we devote about five lifetimes to studying wormhole anomalies.”

  Celui spread his hands. “Those moments when it felt like we were winking in and out of existence probably had something to do with it. We were skipping through time.”

  Alan shrugged. “Maybe. That was just our perception of an event beyond our sensory comprehension. For all we know, we could have been jumping through parallel universes. We might not even be in the same universe we started in.”