The Founder's Strain (The Age of Man Book 2)

by David Brush

  “AI,” he said. The panel glowed to life.

  “What is your command?” responded the entity.

  “Get us to the temple ruins in Old Andalaria.”

  “As you wish.”

  The shuttle roared to life, soaring into the air as the Spire crumbled in on itself. The water in the great sea had receded, draining into the large cracks that had swollen beneath its surface. All that remained was a dry lakebed, desolate, below the wreckage of the fallen tower.

  The AI chirped. “Unknown starships detected, exiting warp space.”

  “Origin?” asked the doctor, swiping his finger across the display next to him.

  “Human. Unknown call sign.”

  “Put me through to them, now,” he said as the ground heaved beneath him. The ship flew over the ancient city’s ruins as they crumbled into dust below. Even the great temple was listing sideways, close to collapse as it continued to dump its lifeblood down onto the sundered terrain around it.

  “This is Dr. Johnathan Nightrick, do you read me?”

  The comm line was silent for a moment. “Dr. Nightrick? This is Admiral Claire Halsey of the First Fleet. We’re here to rescue Dr. Mudaw.”

  “Mudaw is dead,” he replied, swiping another area scan into the display next to him. “Listen to me very closely. There’s a massive dreadnought hanging in atmosphere in the same quadrant as this transmission’s origin.”

  “In atmosphere? That’s impossible, Doctor. A ship that size…”

  “This one can,” he cut in. “It’s technologically beyond what any known civilization is capable of. Onboard, there’s an alien probe that will annihilate the very fabric of space and time if it’s allowed to reach its destination. Stop that ship at all costs.”

  “But what about you, Dr. Nightrick?”

  “Don’t worry about me. It won’t matter if that ship leaves the system. I have to go,” he said, spotting the lone frigate rising up from behind the wreckage of the temple. He tapped the comm line shut. “Take us into the hangar of that vessel over there,” he said to the AI, reaching over to check the charge on his Tesla rifle. Content, he set it back down and closed his eyes for a moment as Dusk died beneath him.

  Commander Denova stood at the front of the deck on the Eternity, looking out on Dawn. “How many vessels left?”

  The green glow of Turing reflected off of the metal panels nearby. “Three frigates have surrendered. The rest of their fleet was destroyed in the initial strike.”

  She felt her jaw clench. “Corral them for now. We’re not doing anything else until I’ve spoken with Dr. Mercer. Did Zarnok go down with the White Talon?”

  “Uncertain. We detected escape vessel launches from multiple ships, which have since been picked up by the remnant.”

  She nodded, eyes fixed on the planet before her. “And on the ground?”

  “Based on our initial analysis, the sphingian landing party has been destroyed. The planetary defense grid is settling back into standby mode, signaling a successful campaign. Real-time feed of the medical transport’s flyover is available at your request. It should be touching down in Outpost Delta within the next few minutes.”

  “Good,” she said, glancing sideways at the entity. “And what about the Warden?”

  “The sphingian intelligence has been isolated in a makeshift holding cell on Deck C. I have cordoned off its network access to the best of my ability; however, it is still struggling with me to reestablish connection. It is under the impression that we will be taking it down to the surface in a short time.”

  “Keep it tamped down, Turing. The last thing we need is that thing realizing what just happened.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” replied the AI, flickering lightly. “Evac Team 4 has established contact. They are beginning their descent now.”

  James walked up the long set of stairs leading out of the command center, ignoring the throbbing pain in his chest as he lifted Haley a little higher. Overhead, the sound of the shuttle thrusters cut out as the ship finished its descent into the courtyard.

  Haley’s eyes fluttered open a sliver. “They came back for us?”

  He smiled down at her. “They did. You’re safe now.”

  “What happened with the sphinxes?”

  “Don’t worry about that, just rest. I’ll fill you in once you’re feeling better. Everything’s fine.”

  Without another word, he felt her head dip back against his chest as he walked into the courtyard. The shadow of the valley hung low over the carnage, but even up the hill he could see the splintered trees and smoke dancing out of the former sphingian camp. Scattered around the outpost itself were at least a hundred bodies, occasionally entangled with the metal husks of the few droids that had fallen in the battle. He scanned the piles for any signs of life, finding nothing but blood, feathers, and singed metal.

  “Dr. Mercer,” called one of the EMTs, stepping down from the evac shuttle. “We’ll take Dr. Hall from here.”

  James handed her over to the man, who set her down on the stretcher his team had rolled off of the ramp behind him.

  “Whenever you’re ready, sir,” said the technician.

  He nodded, watching as Haley disappeared back into the shuttle with the rest of the crew. The wind rushed down into the valley from overhead, mixing the scent of smoke and blood with the sweetness of sappy pine. James gave the fallen warriors at his feet one last glance, then started up the shuttle’s ramp behind the crew.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  Sergeant Tennyson tightened his grip on the stability bar running over his head as the shuttle his team had deployed in shook its way down into the atmosphere of Dusk. All around them, fighter planes blasted by, engaging the ships of the Shadow Fleet as they tried to fight their way off of the dying world below. Another shell detonated over the transport, jolting the occupants.

  “Everybody better hold tight,” said Traygar, flicking another switch above her head. “There are a shit ton of those fighters surrounding the dreadnought. This is going to get a little hairy.”

  “A little hairy? I’m already close to vomiting from your erratic piloting,” said Evans, hunched over in the co-pilot’s seat. “Any hairier and I’ll be storming that ship without my lunch.”

  She grunted. “Oh, am I swerving too much for you? Maybe I could just gently glide us down into their missiles. Would that work better for you?”

  “For my stomach, maybe.”

  “You won’t have to worry about your stomach anymore if I keep the ship nice and steady. What the hell do you think is keeping us in the air right now? And Tennyson, how long have we got?”

  The soldier looked down at the datacuff built into the wrist of his armor. “Maybe five minutes. The warp distortion is getting stronger. We need to hurry. If we lose track of that ship, we’ll never find it again.”

  “Well who the hell ever heard of jumping in atmosphere?” said Spyrion, looking out the port at the metal behemoth below them. “How do these nut jobs intend on coming out in the same vector? They’re not even jumping together. It’s just one big, disorganized mess.”

  Tennyson shrugged. “All Admiral Halsey said is that this stuff is more advanced than anything we’ve ever seen before. It’s not like we’ve had a lot of time to analyze it.”

  The shuttle jerked again, angling down towards the large battleship hovering over the sundered world.

  “Well that’s great,” said Evans with a half-cocked smile. “Another brilliant plan. Let’s throw ourselves onto the alien ship that’s about to jump into god-knows-where and hope that when we arrive, we can stall their entire military for an undisclosed amount of time. No problem.”

  The alarm sounded in the cabin, blaring over the sounds of the battle outside.

  “Shit, one of those fuckers got a lock,” said Traygar, punching the anti-ordnance button again. The missile exploded off to the left of the ship as the hull-mounted laser bisected it.

  Spyrion leaned forward. “Any closer with that, Jane, and th
ey’ll be scraping our ashes off the side of that dreadnought on their way out.”

  “Bitch, bitch, bitch…” she said, pushing the steering column forward again. The ship plummeted straight down through the horde slaughtering each other across the sky. After a minute, she pulled the steering column back up, swinging underneath the massive hull of their target.

  “Ok everything’s…” she started as she felt the back engine explode. “Never mind. What the hell was that?”

  “Plasma blast from the dreadnought,” said Tennyson, staring up. “It’s got underbelly cannons.”

  “Well shit,” she said. “We’re going in hot, I guess.”

  She yanked the steering column up, sending the smoking ship into a violent cartwheel. As they reached the apex of the arc, she spun the wheel, righting the transport just in front of the dreadnought’s hangar.

  “Oh shit, that did it,” she said, slamming her hand down against the instrument panel. “I think I just burned the engines out.”

  “Well everyone,” said Evans, turning back into the cabin with a sloppy salute. “It’s been a real pleasure serving with you…”

  “Oh stop, you drama queen,” she cut in. “I’m taking us down with the thrusters. Watch and learn.”

  The tiny shuttle lurched through the massive, nearly empty hangar. With a light dip, they tore through one of the lighting pylons that rose up out of the deck. The pole dragged along the undercarriage, catching as they ground into the deck, thrusters firing all the while to slow the descent. In a flurry of sparks and smoke, the transport scraped to a halt, nudging into one of the control rooms on the far side of the hangar.

  “See, I told you we’d be fine,” said Traygar, pushing up out of her seat. “No problem.”

  Spyrion rolled his eyes. “Yeah, that was a real five-point landing you did there, Jane.”

  Tennyson knocked the damaged door away with his exosuit and hopped down onto the deck of the Shadow Plane, followed by his squadmates. They watched as the massive bay doors at the entrance to the hangar ground shut, sealing them in.

  “So, what now?” asked Evans as the dreadnought heaved, plunging the group into warp space.

  “Now we try to stall these fuckers until the fleet can catch up,” said Tennyson, turning to face his team. “Let’s see about finding that engine room.”

  Nightrick turned down the umpteenth poorly lit hall on the frigate, trying to remember the ship’s layout from the schematics he’d seen years ago. While the Dread Lord had retooled the dispersal vessels that had flown as part of the Lost Fleet decades earlier, their basic arrangement was still the same. The doctor held the Tesla rifle high as he moved from room to room, listening for any soldiers that might be wandering the halls. The sharp sound of a metal door sliding up reverberated down the corridor, causing him to duck into one of the throughways. He peered out at the source of the commotion, finding two black-clad soldiers stepping into the corridor, cradling Andalarian energy cannons across their chests. He took a deep breath, steadied his hand, and spun out, sending an arcing bolt of lightning into the patrolling soldiers. The men convulsed violently for a moment before collapsing onto the ground in a smoking heap. Nightrick walked down the hall, stepping over the bodies into the storage bay they’d been guarding. Large containment vessels lined the chamber, marked with hazard warnings all along their surface.

  “Your life’s work,” said Dr. Karich, walking in behind him. “Your great contribution to mankind.”

  “If I had known…”

  “You’d have done it anyway,” finished Dr. Karich.

  Nightrick’s jaw clenched. “He made so much of it. Billions upon billions of people will die if this ship leaves Dusk.”

  “Then for once in your life, do the right thing, John. Destroy your creation.”

  He nodded, turning towards the door that he knew would lead him to the reactor. “This ends here.”

  The doctor sprinted down the hall, keeping his rifle up in front of him. All around the hull he could hear the sounds of fighter planes flying back and forth, unloading into each other as the frigate ascended. The stench of spent munitions permeated the ship, which continued to shake every time a stray shot knocked against the armored exterior. Nightrick slowed as he approached the two guards standing in front of the sealed chamber that he’d been searching for. They tried to raise their cannons the second they noticed the intruder, but they couldn’t get them up before feeling the electricity cook their insides. He stepped over their smoking husks as he approached the locked door.

  “You’re running out of time, John. If this ship breaks the atmosphere, the pathogen might escape. You designed it that way, didn’t you?”

  Nightrick studied the terminal for a moment, then raised his rifle and blasted it with electricity. The panel sparked and the door slid open, revealing the pulsing green reactor core, shielded within the confines of its containment unit.

  “I hope you’re still able to run,” said Dr. Karich, standing in the doorway. “You won’t have much time.”

  Nightrick turned to face him, but his mentor had disappeared.

  “Typical,” he muttered, turning his eyes towards the system in front of him.

  For the first time since leaving the Spire, he realized how sweaty his hands were. He tightened his grip on the Tesla rifle and aimed it at the stability unit tucked underneath the core, unloading the last of the weapon’s juice into it. The deck began to shake, and the light from the chamber got brighter and brighter until it finally exploded in a brilliant flash, which forced the doctor to look away despite the blast goggles covering his eyes. Off in the distance, the alarm sounded as the ship heaved in the air, rising no more.

  He ran down the halls he could remember towards the escape pods, trying his best to stay on his feet as the ship went crashing back out of the sky. The soldiers he passed were scrambling too, not sparing him so much as a sideways glance. A loud groan filled the halls, and the whole deck tilted forward. As Nightrick slid down the incline, he wrapped his hands around the outer rim of one of the escape vectors and rolled sideways, dodging another soldier that fell helplessly down the slope. He pulled himself up into the sideways hall of one of the open vessels.

  “The whole ship’s turning over!” boomed a voice from some unseen quarter. Screams and fighter planes drowned out the other voices. Nightrick crawled into the pod, doing his best to strap into one of the tilted seats lining the cabin. He waited for a moment until the vessel was aimed as skyward as it ever would be, and then leaned over, pushing the eject button in. The metal door screeched shut, and he felt the whole unit tumble as the pod fired away from the crashing ship and up higher into the atmosphere.

  “Warning,” came the automated voice from overhead. “Environment error: escape vessel designed for zero-G. Atmosphere detected. All systems failing. Warning…”

  The doctor leaned over to the panel and slammed his hand down on it. The system started to sputter out another analysis, failing halfway through. Content with the silence, he eased back into his seat and closed his eyes, hearing pieces of the small craft breaking off as he ascended. After a moment, he looked out again, finding himself sitting across from Dr. Karich.

  “I wondered if you’d be back,” he said, sighing as the escape pod rattled up through the atmosphere, away from the imploding terrain below. “Come to watch me die?”

  “I couldn’t leave you in what might well be your final hour, John. No one deserves to die alone.”

  Nightrick nodded. “The more the merrier.”

  “So tell me, knowing what you know now, would you do it all again? Was your empire worth the suffering?”

  “Every bit of it,” he replied, looking down at the dying world below him.

  “Do you think you’ll make it into orbit?” asked Dr. Karich with a small smile.

  Nightrick leaned his head back against the metal hull behind him. “It doesn’t matter anymore. I’ve done everything I could. It’s up to the others now. James and Haley wil
l stop Francis. Together, they’ll finish what I started all those years ago.”

  And with that, he closed his eyes again, imagining that the rapidly failing pod was taking him home at last.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  Commander Denova approached the sealed lab, pausing in front of the blast door for a moment before buzzing her way in. “I’m sorry to interrupt…”

  “It’s fine,” said James, looking up from the display screen he’d been staring at for the last fifteen minutes. “What do you need, Commander?”

  Denova stepped forward a bit, trying to find a place where she wouldn’t be blocking the other scientists rushing around the room. “It’s the three frigates that surrendered, Doctor. What would you have me do with the respective crews?”

  James frowned. “Why were there prisoners taken? I thought I told you in no uncertain terms that every sphinx in this system was to be eradicated.”

  Denova shifted. “Sir, I’m not comfortable committing atrocities without so much as a simple explanation for why. The sneak attack you ordered was bad enough, but we did it because you signaled that they were on the march. This is a different story. These people have unconditionally surrendered. If you wanted butchers with you, you should have brought the Sixth Fleet.”

  “Everyone out,” said James, turning towards his research team. “We need the room.” He waited until the blast door sealed again behind the last chemist to start in. “When I give you a goddamn order, you’d better just step in line or you won’t be commanding so much as a fucking garbage barge by the time I’m done with you.”

  Denova stood expressionless. “There are plenty of bastards in the navy that’ll prostrate themselves to you if that’s what you’re looking for. I have to admit though, I never took you for a war criminal, Dr. Mercer.”

  “You don’t know the half of it,” said James, looking into her eyes. “There are things that you don’t understand, Commander. You think I like killing? Every single life I take tears away another little piece of my soul. I never forget the people I’ve harmed; they’ll be with me for the rest of my life. So don’t stand here and give me some self-righteous bullshit about how you conduct yourself with honor, whereas I’m a monster. We’re all monsters, some of us just realize it.”