by Webb, Nick
A sick feeling came over Granger. He could tell from the look on Proctor’s face that she felt the same. It seemed their enemy was even more deadly, more powerful, and more pervasive and untouchable than they’d ever dreamed.
There really was only one hope. They had to hide. Get enough of humanity out of the reach of the Swarm so that they could return and fight another day, many years in the future.
“When is the cycle over?”
“Granger—” Krull descended into a coughing fit, not calming down for half a minute. “I thought you understood that. The cycles are over. The Russians interrupted the cycle, and it is no more. The Swarm is here to stay.”
She closed her eyes, and fell into unconsciousness. Through the Ligature, he could feel her slip away. The doctor sprang into action, pressing a meta-syringe into her, scanning her chest. “Her heart has stopped.”
And from the chorus of Children, terror. Their mother was dead, and soon, they would be too. He supposed that, normally, when a Skiohra mother died, her body would usually release some calming agent to the Children, to ease their passage too. But Krull’s normal body functions were corrupted from the millennia of dependance on Swarm matter.
And so they cried out in terror, until, one by one, by the dozens and hundreds, they too fell silent.
Chapter Sixty-Two
Executive Command Center, Russian Singularity Production Facility
High Orbit, Penumbra Three
Isaacson ran back down the corridor. His only thought was to escape from the scene of the crime. What were the chances someone saw what he did?
And did it matter? He passed through the atrium where the elevator doors hung open to receive him, but after a brief moment of indecision, decided against it. Instead, he aimed for the observatory, thinking to use the comm system to call down to ... someone. His security detail? Maybe they could escort him to his ship without being detained.
No, that was stupid. He needed to act like it was an accident. And the only way for that to be believable was to report it. Quickly. He raced through the doors to the observatory, and scanned the walls for a commlink. The walls were bare, except for the doors that led into the medical station, the lab containing the singularity equipment, and what he supposed were other labs and support rooms.
Except for the far wall, where through the window the planet Penumbra Three turned slowly, serenely, far below, unaware of the maelstrom of fire that was about to hit it. As he passed the window, still looking for a commlink, he noticed something odd.
Or rather, he noticed the lack of something. The cloud of debris, and the miniature moon at its center, was gone.
He turned back to Penumbra, scanning its surface, its atmosphere, waiting for the fireball that would announce the beginning of the bombardment. But it never came. Penumbra merely rotated, unscathed, untouched.
And yet the ball of debris was gone.
“Thank you, Eamon. You’ve saved us.”
He spun around. Volodin. Standing in the doorway.
“I—I—I—” stammered Isaacson. “I’m sorry, Yuri, there’s been an accident. We were talking, and he tripped, and I tried to reach down and help him but—”
“Shh ... shh ... Eamon, it’s ok.” Volodin hushed Isaacson, holding a finger to his own lips. “I know what happened. Believe me, it’s fine. You did us a great service.”
Isaacson breathed a sigh of relief.
“You’ve always been a good friend, Eamon. A good friend.”
Isaacson glanced back at the planet. “And the debris field? That small moon that Malakhov was going to hurl down there?”
Volodin approached, standing next to him in front of the viewport, looking down at the planet. “It’s gone. Thanks to you, our friend.”
“Where did it go?” Isaacson was started to be a little unnerved by Yuri’s repeated use of the word friend. Malakhov had claimed the ambassador was corrupted, but Isaacson hadn’t really believed him. He couldn’t believe a word Malakhov ever told him. Volodin was clean—certainly that’s what Isaacson had determined himself four months ago, in the command center outside Omaha, when he’d had the young commander scan the room for meta-space signals. At least, that’s what Isaacson had convinced himself of.
“To Earth, of course.”
Isaacson felt sick. “To—to Earth?”
Impossible.
“Yes, Eamon. Thanks to both you, and your President Avery. You see, I know what she did to you. Implanting all those devices. And when she sent you out here, she uploaded a new program into them. A program that reached out to any meta-space scramblers in the area, and disable them. And with the scramblers gone, the Concordat finally had access to the friends aboard the station. Ever since you stepped aboard, the Valarisi have been busy. And we’ve been listening, Eamon. We heard everything Malakhov said.”
Isaacson stepped back in horror, realizing what he’d done. And for once, he was speechless.
“We’ve suspected his plans for awhile now, of course. But hearing it from his mouth confirmed it for us. He thinks he been using us for years, but in truth, we’ve been using him. And you Eamon! You saw through him! You saw how he was manipulating you, trying to use you to accomplish his goals. You realize you would have never left the Constitution alive, right? He would have used you to destroy the Skiohra—who are now in open rebellion against the Concordat—kill Avery, then use that as a propaganda victory, demonstrating to the surviving worlds that even the highest levels of United Earth government weren’t to be trusted. That they needed to cast their lot with the Russian Confederation. To trust Malakhov, their savior. Once you’d served your purpose, Eamon, he would have killed you. Just like Avery wants to kill you.
“But now you’re a hero, Eamon. The greatest hero Earth has even known. You stood up and cast off your oppressors. It is through you that your people will finally be made friends. And know an eternity of fellowship and communion with us. Once Earth is gone, we will call a ceasefire, and allow an orderly surrender of the rest of the Adanasi, and, finally, you will be united with us.”
What the hell do I do now? thought Isaacson. And the only answer he had, the only thing he could even think of, was to run.
So he ran. He turned and bolted toward the door, flying through, desperately trying to make it into the elevator before—
To his surprise, he felt a burst of wind blow over him and when he blinked again, Volodin was standing in front of the elevator.
“Remember when I told you about the initial contact with the Swarm during the Khorsky incident? How those men that went into the Swarm carrier came back ... changed? Stronger? Faster? Smarter. Wiser. Better. I neglected to tell you, I was one of those men, Eamon. I was one of the first to know friendship with the Valarisi. And now, it is your turn.”
Before Isaacson could jump back Volodin reached out and grasped his arm. The ambassador’s hand was damp with sweat—even as the fingers closed around Isaacson wrist, he could feel it.
Oh my god, I can feel it.
The Swarm virus rushed through the pores of his skin, entered his blood, and immediately started reproducing themselves and targeting his spinal column, his brain stem, his cerebrum, his entire brain, all the automatic centers in his limbic system, his respiratory system, his gastrointestinal system....
He knew all this because the first thing he noticed after Volodin touched him was that he could hear the other man’s thoughts, then he could hear the thoughts of the Swarm virus penetrating his body, targeting all his systems. He could hear them as they went about their work, faster than he ever expected. And as his eyes grew wider, he began to be aware of something else.
Isaacson was happy. Blissfully happy. The virus—hell, it shouldn’t be called a virus.
It should be called deliverance.
But something was wrong. He was one with the Swarm. One with the deliverance circulating through his body, but his living link to the Valarisi was butting up against something it didn’t understand. Something metall
ic. Something ... electronic. That was doing ... something.
The implants. Avery’s implants.
The virus immediately began attacking the tiny pellets embedded in his flesh—we can cure all disease, lengthen the natural lifespan of these mortal carriers, surely we can disable Avery’s—
All at once, the implants, all thirty of them, exploded. Even as the blast waves tore Isaacson’s body apart, engulfing not only him but Volodin as well, ripping them both to shreds, the last conscious part of his Swarm-enlivened mind screamed out, cursing Avery.
There was more than one program uploaded, he knew, in that final moment. The program that disabled the meta-space scramblers had been very helpful. This program, the one that detonated the implants at the first sign of Valarisi communion, was less helpful.
Curse that woman. Out of reflex, what was remained of his left hand tapped out the defiant rhythm he’d grown so accustomed to repeating.
Tap, tap-tap, tap.
Earth will die, and Avery with it, within the hour. They will all be made friends. Or they will all die.
Chapter Sixty-Three
Sickbay, ISS Victory
Interstellar Space, 2.3 Lightyears From Sirius
Granger didn’t speak for several minutes. The doctor pronounced the alien dead, and left, leaving Proctor and Granger alone with the body.
“We can’t win, Shelby. How do you fight against incorporeal meta-space beings? Beings who can reach across the void of space-time and completely control another race? And through that race, control us all?”
“I don’t know,” she replied, quietly.
“If they’re meta-space beings, then they’re everywhere. It doesn’t matter how far we run, they’ll be there. Even if we wipe out every Swarm carrier, they’ll still be there. If we go on a campaign to neutralize every single gram of Swarm matter, they’ll still be there. We’ll miss a few spots here or there, or maybe a stray Swarm fighter blown off course in a battle will land on a planet somewhere, and they’ll multiply, and the Swarm will rise again. It’s hopeless.”
They sat in silence another minute before Proctor stirred. “Tim, it’s never hopeless. It’s just a puzzle to be solved. A science problem. A logic problem. And human beings, that’s what we do. Figure out the solution to the logical quandary, and we defeat the Swarm.”
Granger rolled his eyes, “Well, shit, why didn’t I think of that?”
“I’m serious, Tim. Think about it. Krull said that the Russians broke the cycle. That the Swarm is here to stay? If they broke the cycle, then that means the cycle can be affected. It can be restored. Or it can be shut down completely. Whatever the Russians have done, it proves one thing. That the link to the others, the ones in meta-space, is a natural, physical thing. A thing we can affect, a thing we can touch, or the Russians never would have been able to interrupt the cycle and make it permanent. And if they can do it, we can do it too.”
Granger was shaking his head. “How? We’re out of ships. We’re out of people to fly ships. And more importantly, we’re out of will. Did you see the looks in the faces of the bridge crew when we left? It was a good speech, but it wasn’t that good. Those are people on their last leg. Do you really think they’re going to let us fly off, away from Norton and the brass and Avery, off on some implausible quest to stop boogey-men who don’t even live in our universe? No. It’s over.”
More silence. The moans from the main floor of sickbay crept through the closed door. “The singularities. It has to be,” she said.
“Excuse me?”
“How the Russians interrupted the cycle. Something about the singularities lets the others reach into our universe and re-exert their control over the Swarm—the liquid, the Valarisi. There’s no other explanation. There was probably some natural cycle, somewhere, that let them into our universe every one hundred and fifty years. But with the singularities, they don’t need that anymore.”
Granger nodded. “So, shut down all the singularities, and we close all the doorways into our universe?”
“All the man-made ones, at least.”
Granger stood up. “Right. I guess that’s all we’ve got. Let me guess. Penumbra Three? The Russian singularity fabrication facility?”
“And it’s where the Skiohra first came into contact with the Valarisi—the liquid. That’s where I’d start. And maybe we’ll even learn what exactly it was you did when you showed up there four months ago.”
Granger grunted. “That’s if we can even convince the Victory’s crew to go along with it.”
The door slid open, as if on cue. Commander Oppenheimer strode in. Two marines stood behind him.
Dammit.
“Captain Granger, sir,” began Oppenheimer. The two marine guards looked tense, and they glanced behind themselves periodically into sickbay.
“You here to arrest me?”
Oppenheimer smiled. “No, sir. They’re just here for protection. In case any among the crew don’t think the same as I do.”
“And what exactly do you think, Commander?”
“That you and Commander Proctor are the best shot we’ve got at winning this war. The Victory stands ready to serve, Captain. Just give the word.”
Granger breathed a sigh of relief and reached out to shake his hand. “Commander, the word is given. Set q-jump coordinates for Penumbra Three. We’ve got an enemy to destroy.”
Chapter Sixty-Four
Bridge, ISS Lincoln
High Orbit, Earth
General Norton counted down the seconds until the final q-jump toward Earth. Damage to his ship was significant—a repair and resupply was desperately needed and the IDF shipyard at the still-under-repair Valhalla Station stood ready to receive them.
But the thing that occupied his mind most was Granger's treachery. Avery’s eyes would finally be opened. They’d finally be able to move on from this nonsense of trusting an openly-compromised Swarm asset. For hell’s sake, the man practically admitted to being in open communication with their mortal enemy.
“Final q-jump now, sir,” said the ensign at helm.
The viewscreen shifted, revealing their blue, cloud-speckled home, its moon hovering distant and white in the background.
“Comm, open a frequency to Frigate One. The president should be waiting for us.”
“Aye, aye, sir.”
Moments later, President Avery’s glaring face filled the screen. “General? Report.”
“Not good, Madam President. The operation failed. The dreadnought escaped.”
She swore.
“And Madam President, I think you should know that the dreadnought escaped with the assistance of Captain Granger.” Norton went on to recount the entire botched mission to take the dreadnought, finishing with the moment the ship disappeared with the ISS Victory. “And furthermore, shortly after they left, I received a brief meta-space message from someone on Colonel Barnard's team indicating they went in the direction of the Penumbra system.”
Avery’s eyes flashed wide for the briefest moment. “Interesting. It just so happens our most useful tool is there now as well.”
“And his mission? Are you sure it will bear out? We can’t afford to keep losing like this.”
“I’m confident that no matter what action Mr. Isaacson chooses to take, a decisive blow will be struck against the Russian Confederation and the Swarm. The two programs I uploaded into his implants should ensure that.”
Norton rubbed his eyes—it had been a long, long day, with too much loss. “Care to fill me in?”
Avery nodded, hesitantly at first, as if she were deciding whether he, the damn chairman of the friggin’ Joint Chiefs of Staff of IDF deserved to be let in on her secret plans. Bitch.
“Very well. The first program will compromise the system the Russians have in place to keep out Swarm influence from their highest levels of government. My intelligence reports indicate that the entire Penumbra station is filled with meta-space dampeners. Isaacson’s implants will interfere with them. Mr. Ma
lakhov is about to get a taste of his own medicine, and may soon regret playing with powers beyond his control.”
“And what if that backfires on us, ma’am? Opening up Malakhov to total Swarm control could bite us in the ass.”
“He deserves it, General. Any discord and confusion we can create on their side can only serve us.”
“Fine,” he said, not wanting to argue further. What was done was done. “And the second?”
“The second is just a failsafe. If the Swarm decides to make our Mr. Isaacson a friend, the implants are programmed to explode. Should take out anyone close by, too. Hopefully Volodin, if not Malakhov himself. If we’re lucky, he’ll be near a singularity containment system and destroy it. Who knows, maybe there’ll be a chain reaction that will take out the whole damn station.”
That's a big if, you friggin’ petulant politician.
“Very well, ma’am. In that case, I recommend we—”
“Sir! New sensor contact!”
His head snapped toward the rattled officer at the sensor station. “What is it?”
“Unknown, sir. Whatever it is, it’s big. Putting it onscreen now.”
The image of Avery switched to a splitscreen view. Her face contorted to one of dread shock, while the other half of the screen showed something impossible.
A small moon, surrounded by a shroud of swirling dust and debris, had suddenly appeared several tens of thousands of kilometers away, surrounded by a fleet of Swarm carriers, moving incredibly fast in their direction.
Toward Earth.
Chapter Sixty-Five
Bridge, ISS Victory
Interstellar Space, 2.3 Lightyears From Sirius
It turned out the marine escort was not as necessary as Granger feared. When he stepped onto the bridge, he saw some friendly familiar faces mixed in with the Victory’s crew. Lieutenant Diaz conferred with the officers at the XO’s station. Ensign Prince, head still bandaged, sat next to the Victory’s helmsman. Ensign Diamond had replaced one of the tactical officers who Granger remembered as bleeding from the forehead. For the most part, stern nods met him as he walked toward the captain’s chair.
