Legacy Fleet: The Complete Trilogy

by Nick Webb

  His head exploded in pain again.

  “No!” he said. “No, no, no….”

  Maybe it was a fluke. He let his pants drop to the floor.

  The pain intensified. Pulsed with a regular, unnatural rhythm.

  With a sigh, he sat down on the corner of the bed and pointed to the door.

  “Out,” he mumbled.

  The woman hesitated.

  “Leave.”

  She swore, slid off the bed, and pulled her clothes back on before slipping out the door.

  His comm card beeped again, and with a reluctant sigh he reached down to his pocket near the floor and tapped it.

  The president’s voice grated on his ears. “Don’t worry, Eamon. You’ll get some action. But only when I tell you. And only if you’ve been a very, very good boy.”

  Chapter 84

  Volari Three, Volari System

  Sickbay, ISS Warrior

  The medics had carried Fishtail to sickbay, and with good reason: her face was smashed, her lungs collapsed, and her blood pressure was so low that the nurse said her heart would stop at any moment.

  Granger ran to sickbay with Zingano and Kharsa and a handful of marines in tow. At the door to sickbay a young man stopped him. A pilot from the looks of him, who eyed Granger warily.

  “Stand aside, son.”

  “You were there, Captain. You were there. With the Swarm. With the Russians. Just moments ago. And … and, now you’re here.” He struggled for words. “I … I—”

  “I understand your confusion, Lieutenant, I don’t understand it myself. But I’m here now. And so are you. And Miller.”

  Volz’s face contorted in grief. “Not anymore. Her heart just stopped.”

  With a curse, Granger shoved the young man aside and walked into sickbay. A nurse and his team worked frantically on the body of the pilot he’d sent to die, but from the looks of their faces, it was over.

  He was numb. The woman’s blood stained the table where she lay, spilling onto the floor and staining the gloved hands of the medical staff. He’d never had to face the consequences of his painful decisions with such … such viscerally gruesome immediacy. He’d always ordered from afar. The ships would receive his orders, and they’d fly against their targets, and it was over. He’d never seen the aftermath up close and personal. Not like this.

  Proctor stood in the background, apparently recovered enough that she could be out of bed. Her hand covered her mouth. Bandages wrapped her shoulder where Doc Wyatt’s bullet had struck, but she looked like she’d be just fine with rest and—

  Holy hell, he thought. Proctor. Doc Wyatt. He’d been infected with Swarm. But then Proctor had cured him.

  Granger had been infected by Swarm matter, which had cured his cancer. Kharsa said the matter acted like a virus that killed every other competing virus and foreign contaminant. That the Russians had injected him with it, saving him, and condemning him to Swarm control at the same time.

  But he’d been cured of Swarm control, too.

  And if he could be freed from the Swarm….

  “Proctor, you still have active Swarm virus?”

  She nodded, and produced a small vial from one of her pockets.

  “Then what the hell are you waiting for?”

  She shook her head. “I … I can’t, Captain.”

  He stepped forward and grabbed her arm. “What do you mean you can’t? I’m cured. Doc Wyatt was cured. We can still save her.”

  She shook her head again.

  He squeezed harder. “Do it. Inject her. While we still have time.”

  She looked at him. “Captain, Doc Wyatt is dead. The antidote didn’t work. It killed him.”

  Impossible. He looked at the body. The medical team had stopped their efforts, and the nurse swore before sighing. “Time of death, twenty-two hundred hours, five minutes.”

  No. He wasn’t going to have her here, alive, brought back from the brink of death, a fate that resulted directly from his decision, his actions, only to lose her again. He spun back around to the Vishgane. “You. You found a way to subvert Swarm control over your people. If we inject her with Swarm matter, you can keep her safe!”

  He shook his head. “I’m sorry, Captain Granger. Our physiology is quite different from yours. Our method would most assuredly result in her death, too.”

  He looked back at her. The broken body lying on the table, still dripping with blood. The bruises still blue and purple and the bones still broken.

  “Do it.”

  Proctor stared at him. “Captain?”

  “I said, do it. Inject her.”

  “But the antidote will only—”

  “I know what the goddamned antidote will do! Inject her with Swarm matter anyway. We’ll figure out the cure later.”

  Shaking her head, Proctor fumbled in a drawer for a meta-syringe, and, loading the vial in, she pressed it against Miller’s bloody neck.

  He motioned to the nurse. “Continue life saving efforts. Get oxygen into her lungs. Keep it flowing.”

  The nurse looked confused, eyeing the captain warily.

  “DO IT!”

  The medical team sprang back into action, one of them shoving the oxygen tube back into her throat, the others pumping on her chest to induce blood flow to the brain, working just enough oxygen up there to keep it from dying before the Swarm matter had the chance to repair the damage.

  It didn’t take its time. To everyone’s shock, she suddenly breathed, gasping for air. Her eyes opened. Her chest rose and fell. She reached out and grabbed the arms of the two medical techs nearby.

  Proctor sidled up to him. “And what if we can’t find a way to counteract the Swarm virus, Captain? We can’t risk having her spread it. We still have no idea how virulent it is once inside a human host. If we hadn’t stopped Doc Wyatt and Colonel Hanrahan they might have been able to infect the entire crew. What if she tries to do the same?”

  He watched as the medical staff worked on Miller, sealing up the wounds, setting the bones, injecting her with what he assumed was pain medication and something to induce tissue repair. “Then I kill her again, Shelby. But at least this time I get to look her in the eyes when I do it.”

  The head nurse, who’d taken charge in place of Doc Wyatt, cleared sickbay. Vishgane Kharsa left, escorted by the marines, back to the shuttle bay where he returned to his ship. Zingano left, with instructions to Granger that they meet to talk within the hour. Soon only Granger, Proctor, and the young pilot who’d come back holding Miller’s dying body remained.

  “You did good, son.”

  Volz nodded, but said nothing.

  “Look, son, I may have been under Swarm influence when and where you last saw me. But that’s over. And we’ve just won the biggest battle with them yet. And they’re stripped of one of their most powerful allies. We’ve got them on the run.” He turned to look at the pilot—the young man didn’t look a day over twenty-five. Granger recalled distant memories of looking so thin and athletic. “We’re going to win this war, son.”

  The young man met his eyes. “Are we, sir? Only heroes win wars. All we’ve got are millions of dead. We get our heroes, but only as martyrs: they die in the very act of becoming a hero.”

  “Bullshit. People like us win wars. Not heroes, not legends. Us. Me and you.”

  They looked each other over, a momentary silence passing between them. Medical scanners beeped in the background.

  “She’s not dead, Lieutenant,” Granger said, pointing to the young woman on the table. “She’s a hero, and she’s alive.” He fingered Volz. “And you’re not dead either.”

  The pilot nodded. “No, sir. I’m not dead. And neither are you. The entire Earth watched you not die.”

  The Hero of Earth.

  Granger was about to respond with contempt at the idea that he was a hero, but he stopped, wondering if maybe the kid had a point. Sure, regular people won wars. That meant regular people were the heroes. He was ordinary. He could be a hero. Could he
be comfortable with that? Even knowing how many bricks he’d tossed, how many ships he’d ordered to their fiery deaths?

  He nearly retorted something back, but stopped: Miller’s eyes were open. And staring straight at Granger. He stepped forward and nodded at her, glancing to see that the restraints the medical staff had put on her arms and legs were secure to the bed. “How are you feeling, Lieutenant?”

  She smiled. He never met Miller before, but this smile seemed … off. Haughty. Amused.

  “Our good friend. We are overjoyed to see you again.”

  Granger frowned. He glanced at the restraints one more time before stepping right up to her bed.

  “What do you want?”

  “We’ve told you this before, Captain Granger. To be friends, that is all. We are safer that way. You are safer. We all are safer, and prosperous, and secure.”

  He scoffed. “Safer? One could say that slaves are the least safe of all. Neither they nor their masters. Didn’t work out so well with the Dolmasi, did it?”

  She mimicked his scoff. “A minor setback. They’ve been replaced in the Concordat of Seven by the Adanasi, our truest, most faithful, profitable allies. Of which you are part. Peace has already been made, Captain, on behalf of your entire race. Submit now, and join with the rest of the Adanasi. Take your place at our side. The friendship of the entire galaxy awaits. We will ally with worlds without number. And they will rejoice.”

  He puffed a mocking breath of air. “No deal.”

  Miller sighed. “It was worth a try.” She fixed her eyes on him. “Captain Granger, just as with you, we now know everything this person ever did. Every fact, every bit of knowledge, and every turn of phrase. Every colloquialism. I’m sure you’ll recognize this one.”

  “And what’s that?”

  Miller’s gaze turned cold.

  “You ain’t seen nothing yet.”

  VICTORY

  Book 3

  Of

  The Legacy Fleet Trilogy

  Chapter 1

  Cadiz Refugee Camp #127

  Outskirts of Gunaratana City, Indira, Britannia Sector

  Lieutenant Rodriguez stepped into a murky puddle in the middle of the street, wrinkled his nose, and swore. Oh, for hell’s sake. It was the 27th century, technology had launched humanity to the stars, dozens of planets had been colonized, and galactic civilization had, up until four months ago, flourished on a scale few had ever dreamed of.

  And now there was raw sewage flowing freely through the streets.

  The refugee camp was bursting at the seams, having accepted over double the half million refugees from the Cadiz sector it had been designed to hold. As Lieutenant Rodriguez made his way down the muddy, sewage-infused street, the wails of sick babies rang in his ears. Small, dirty children huddled forlornly under their equally-harrowed mothers’ arms, peering out the doors of their temporary shelters, looking for the next shipment of food and water from the city.

  It wasn’t coming, Rodriguez knew. The shipments had slowed to once every several days, then to once a week. The next one would not come.

  Something else was coming instead.

  They were coming.

  Dusk began to color the sky. The sun had set several minutes ago—possibly for the last time, Rodriguez thought. Time was short. In spite of the crying children in the background the refugee camp was eerily quiet as he crossed the final hundred meters of mud, refuse, and sewage to reach his family’s shelter. His own children would be waiting for him—hopefully with their bags packed, like he’d instructed.

  As he opened the door to his family’s shelter, the refugee camp’s sirens began to sound, adding their urgent wail to the children’s cries. That could only mean one thing.

  They were here.

  “Papa!”

  His daughter Elsa ran up to him and hugged his lower torso. Tomas sat in the corner, hovering over his grandmother who was supposed to be taking care of them but instead had fallen sick with an illness that had left her feeble and coughing, lying weakly on the shelter’s only bed.

  Lieutenant Rodriguez peeled Elsa’s arms off and approached his mother. Her face was ashen, but she managed a weak smile.

  “Are they ready?” he asked, leaning down close to her.

  She gave a small nod.

  “Are you?” he added.

  Her shaking hand reached out to his. “Go,” she said, with some effort, and descended into a fit of coughing. Her hand came away from her mouth, spattered red.

  “I’m not leaving you, mom.” He stooped over to pick her up, but the woman, with surprising strength, pushed him away.

  “I said, go. They’re ready. You’re out of time. Get them to safety. I’ll be—” she glanced at Tomas and Elsa, forcing out a grimaced smile for their sake. She always was a wonderful actress. “I’ll be fine.”

  The sirens wailed outside. Crowds shouted in the dusky air.

  Rodriguez breathed a silent curse, but sprang into action, grabbing the two bags sitting by the door. His own belongings were in his hangar at the fighter base on the other side of Gunaratana City. As a fighter pilot he, as a general rule, packed light. But there was no time to retrieve his own things. There was no time for anything. Except to run.

  They were coming. In force. He’d seen the scans play out on the monitors of the hangar bay just over half an hour ago. Twenty Swarm carriers, plus something new: the unthinkably-massive super dreadnought that had made its first appearance the week before in the Swarm’s invasion of the Mao Cluster.

  Mao Prime no longer existed.

  Eight billion people no longer existed.

  Scouts reported that the surface, once the glittering cosmopolitan jewel of the Chinese Intersolar Democratic Republic, was now a sterile, fiery wasteland.

  He pushed his children through the door and cast one last glance back at his mother, still on the bed, wan and pale. She mouthed, I love you. He blinked back tears and could only nod a curt reply before turning back out into the rank, muddy street.

  The transport would be leaving soon; they had only minutes to spare. As they navigated the busy streets—which had erupted into a frenzied mob of panicked refugees now that the emergency sirens were wailing in force—he wondered if he’d be court-martialed for abandoning his post. But really, he thought, what good would one more lone fighter craft be against the unstoppable force that was coming? How could they court-martial a man just trying to get his kids to safety? Could one man really make a difference against such incontestable power? Such reckless hate?

  Granger had. The Hero of Earth—he supposedly died, and returned, beating back the Swarm in the process. So the rumors said, though Rodriguez didn’t quite believe them, video proof be damned.

  It didn’t matter. He looked up at the darkening sky, and his stomach clenched as he focused on a small cluster of bright lights above the eastern horizon that steadily grew clearer—twenty small dots surrounding the larger one.

  They were coming.

  So was the Hero of Earth. He’d heard chatter that Granger’s fleet was on its way, coming to the rescue. But he’d seen the tactical scans. There was no way he’d arrive in time. The man may have been a miracle worker, but it looked like his lucky streak was over. By the time The Bricklayer showed up, the entire world of Indira would be a wasteland, just like Mao Prime. Just like the Cadiz Sector. And the Veracruz Sector. Merida, New Oregon, and Calibri—all gone.

  Five minutes later, they arrived at the local spaceport. After a few panicked moments of desperate searching for the transport he started to wonder if it had left without him.

  “Are we too late, Papa?” asked Tomas.

  Rodriguez swore under his breath, but breathed a sigh of relief as they rounded a corner and saw it: a small freighter, its captain waiting impatiently on the still-open ramp.

  “Come along, Elsa,” he coaxed his daughter forward. Tomas followed close behind.

  He climbed the ramp, but not before glancing back up at the sky, looking for the cluste
r of bright lights that signaled their world’s certain doom. They were bigger, closer, and more spread out. Several were still near the horizon while others had risen high into the sky overhead.

  The ground shook, starting as a low tremor, and escalating into a moderate shaking that rattled panels inside the freighter. Rodriguez watched the horizon with a sickening feeling, and felt his face go white as he saw a mushroom cloud rise in the distance, hundreds of kilometers away.

  “Stop gawking and shut the damn hatch!” yelled the freighter captain from the cockpit. Lieutenant Rodriguez hit the ramp retractor and ushered his kids to the rows of seats. All were full, except for three. They settled into them after fiddling with the restraints.

  “Hey,” said a teenage girl sitting across from him, “is that a pilot’s uniform? An IDF pilot?”

  He looked away, ignoring the girl, and busied himself with Elsa’s seat restraint.

  “Why aren’t you out there? Why aren’t you fighting for us?” The girl was visibly distraught—she shook, her eyes were wild, darting back and forth from the closed hatch back to Rodriguez and over to the cockpit. “They’re coming! They’re coming! Why aren’t you out there? They’re coming! They’re—”

  The woman next to her grabbed the girl’s arm—her mother, or grandmother. “Quiet. He’s getting his kids out. He’s just the same as us.”

  “But he’s a fighter pilot! He could stop them! He could—”

  The woman shook the girl until she fell silent. “Nothing can stop them! One more won’t make a difference. You just mind your own business.”

  Nothing can stop them.

  Rodriguez pulled a necklace out from beneath his uniform and began thumbing the beads, whispering silent rosary prayers. He knew they were rising through the atmosphere now, well clear of any of the dreaded singularity weapons that were now ravaging the surface.

  But making it through the perimeter of the Swarm fleet would be another feat entirely.