by Richard Fox
“We found one of their worlds,” Tuchilin said. “Not Navarre, as we hoped, but a decent-sized colony. Earth has no choice but to attack. Open warfare will follow and the Ibarras will be flushed out. If our projections on the Ibarras’ strength is correct, they should deal significant damage to Earth before being destroyed.”
“You would have Earth—not me—kill the Ibarras?”
“The end result is the same.” Tuchilin clacked his claws in annoyance.
“The Ibarras were there. With that…thing they used to destroy my world. They are more responsible for the Toth being driven to the edge of extinction than anyone else, and you would deny me this?”
“Your ego is not our concern, only the forces you command. We estimate it will take less than two years to wipe out the Ibarras. By then, your armada will be of sufficient size to make taking Earth relatively easy. Then the Kesaht will be welcomed onto the galactic stage as heroes. Your involvement needs to remain hidden, for obvious reasons. I cannot say that anyone grieves the Toth’s absence.”
“I grieve, you fleshy little maggot,” Bale said.
“Cease your raids and wait for our signal to attack Earth,” the Vishrakath said. “There. My work here is done.” He turned and marched back to the door, but a pair of Toth warriors blocked his path.
“One last thing before you go,” Bale said. “Earth is about to attack an Ibarra colony?”
“That’s right. We traced it through—” Tuchilin stopped. The skin around his eyes flushed purple. “It does not matter. We’ll be on our way. Now.”
Bale’s neural pathways twitched.
A Toth guard lunged forward and chomped on the head of an armed Vishrakath, swinging the body from side to side and sending the rifle flying. The other ant-like alien barely raised its rifle before a Toth polearm sliced through its arms. The Toth leapt on the Vishrakath and began tearing at its flesh.
Tuchilin backed away, watching as the Toth devoured his bodyguards.
Bale’s forelimbs snapped out, grabbed him by the shoulders, and twisted him around. The overlord lifted Tuchilin up, letting him see the brain and neural pathways wriggling inside the tank.
“I don’t know where it is!” Tuchilin shouted. “Wexil didn’t tell me!”
“We’ll just have to find out.” A spike-tipped arm rose up from the housing under Bale’s tank. The spike popped open and thin tendrils danced across Tuchilin’s skull.
“No! If you do this, the Vishrakath will—” He screamed as Bale broke his arms with a pinch from his claws.
“I don’t need you!” Bale shouted. “The humans will suffer and die at my hand. Mine!”
The feeder wires stabbed into Tuchilin’s skull and he began convulsing. He kicked and moaned for a moment, then Bale threw the body to his warriors.
“So…that’s where I’ll find the Ibarras,” Bale said. He walked back to the window, his neural system alive with pleasure, his mind racing with possibilities.
Chapter 14
Roland flapped his arms across his chest, then pulled them open wide to warm up his shoulders as he entered the dojo. He caught himself mid-exercise and frowned. Nicodemus and the racks were missing.
A woman knelt in the middle of the room, her legs hidden beneath the folds of a wide-legged martial-arts uniform. A white canvas gi top clung to her shoulders and folded across her torso. Her head was bowed, hands in a lotus position over her naval.
Beside each knee was a Templar long sword lying parallel to her body.
She looked up at him. An ugly patch of scar tissue made up the flesh around her right eye and stretched to her temple and hairline, where a shock of pale skin stood out from the light-brown hair pulled into a bun. Her right eye was pale, but still focused on him.
Without the scars, she looked to be in her late twenties, with delicate features. Even with the injury, Roland couldn’t deny that she was beautiful.
She motioned to the mat just in front of her. Roland shrugged and sat down, mimicking her position but keeping his hands on his knees. His eyes flitted over the two swords and realized that they were sharp, not training mock-ups like he and Nicodemus had used the last time he was there.
She looked him over. Lenses in the pale eye twisted to focus on him. A cybernetic replacement.
“Nicodemus is right,” she said, her voice soft and kind and faintly Irish. “You do remind me of him.”
“And who would that be?” Roland raised an eyebrow. “And who would you be?”
“I am armor.” She lowered and twisted her head enough for him to glimpse the plugs at the base of her skull.
“You’re…Morrigan, aren’t you? I had your sword. That’s where you were hurt, wasn’t it? You lost your sword there and the legionnaires gave it to me.”
“It was mine to give, not theirs,” she said. “I saw iron in you during the fight with the Kesaht. I did not think you were so young. You fight with the fury of an older soul. Gideon has trained you well.”
“You and Nicodemus knew him?”
“He never spoke of us? Of his old lance?”
“Never. Gideon focused on our mission, our training. It never occurred to me that there was more to know…”
Morrigan brushed a strand of pale hair away from her face.
“We knew he would take the three of us leaving badly. I wanted him to come with us, but he would never have accepted. I remember the look on his face during that last vid call. That man has no capacity for forgiveness, which serves him well in the armor.”
“You said three of you. Who’s the last?”
Morrigan’s lips twitched. The skin around her milky eye crinkled.
“Does it bother you?” She brushed her fingertips across her scars.
“No, not at all.” Roland shifted in his seat. “I know someone that can’t get vat replacements. He’s…stronger for it.”
“The Ibarra Nation has the medical know-how to replace damaged tissue. I could have this taken away,” she said. “But why would I? I earned my scars. To deny them is to deny myself.”
“Like Gideon,” Roland said as he traced his lance leader’s scars down his own face.
“You are of Mars. You’ve been to Olympus…is Saint Kallen’s tomb still there?” she asked.
“Of course.” He frowned. “Why would you think otherwise? Because Templar defected with the Ibarras? That was before I ever got my plugs. Saint Kallen fought and died on Mars. She’s buried there with the memento mori of all those who died on the Xaros world. Why would that ever change? Just because some of you—”
Morrigan grabbed his hand.
“You’ve seen her?” Her one green eye looked at him with hope.
“Once. Tongea took me to the tomb.” Roland looked down at her hand on top of his and almost pulled away. “It was…was…you’ve been?”
She smiled and nodded slowly.
“I’ve never been religious,” Roland said, “but Saint Kallen’s statue made me feel something…different. I can’t explain it. Then a drop of water from the ceiling ran down the statue’s face and—”
Morrigan pulled her hand back and covered her mouth.
“What?” he asked.
“If the Saint wept for you…you know what that means.” She frowned, her remaining eye full of emotion.
“That I’ll die in my armor? That’s just a story.”
“The last time we saw her,” Morrigan said, brushing her hand across her eye, “she wept for him…and now he’s with her.” Morrigan snatched up a sword and rolled backwards. Momentum carried her to her feet and she stopped in a fighting stance, weapon level with her shoulder and pointed at Roland.
“Nicodemus says you fight ungrounded. That your footwork is atrocious. Get up. I’ll not let one who’ll bear the cross embarrass it by being sloppy. You’re not leaving this dojo until you meet my standards.”
Chapter 15
Admiral Lettow watched the force field over the entrance to his small shuttle bay. The Crucible and Ceres hung just beyond
the edge, a thin crescent of Earth in the distance. He knew what was coming, knew—intellectually—that it wasn’t a threat, but his heart was racing and his hands kept brushing past his hip where his sidearm should be.
A shadow flitted past the open bay. Lettow felt sweat drip down his face as he bent slightly at the knees.
A gray-black Xaros drone rose up and passed through the force field. The eight stalks bent forward and morphed together by twos. The oval-shaped body shrank and reformed into a human body, fractals swirling over the Keeper’s shell as she stood up. A simple jumpsuit and boots formed over her shell as short blond hair framed a face riven with wrinkles.
“Hello, Admiral,” Keeper said. “Still not used to this, I see.”
“I get my orders from High Command through sealed and encrypted channels. That’s what I’m used to,” Lettow said.
The Keeper walked up to him, her bearing and pace of a much younger woman than her elderly face suggested. She held up a palm and a data chip emerged from it.
“I’ve got that,” she said. “The Ardennes has been on commo blackout since New Bastion. Any reason to believe there’s been a breach?”
“We’ve been back for an hour,” Lettow said. “I’ve got the ship on a gunnery drill. If anyone’s screwing around, my chiefs will notice. No breach.”
“Good. Since your encounter on Oricon, we’ve been screening out anyone that may have been…tainted by the Ibarras. Your fleet was the first place to be cleared. You shouldn’t have any other difficulties for what comes next.”
“‘Difficulties’? You mean when Ibarra activated sleeper agents and my artillery ships mutinied and opened fire on the Kesaht on Oricon? That kind of ‘difficulty’?”
“After a thorough investigation, intelligence determined that the Ibarras altered up to fifty thousand procedurals while they were still in the tanks. They’ve been removed from key positions across the system. Your 14th fleet and the 30th are clean,” Keeper said.
“Fifty thousand? Someone’s going to raise questions. Some spring butt in an important career position gets reassigned to passing out basketballs…it’ll come out.”
“The president and I know that, but what should we do? Address the entire Terran Union and tell everyone that some of their fellow citizens are unwitting sleeper agents that might turn on them at any moment? I’m not saying we’re French and have a Huguenot situation on our hands, but it won’t be that far off.”
“A what situation?”
“Sorry, I don’t sleep and have been reading a lot of history looking for a solution to our situation,” she said. “You and the 30th will lead the assault on the Ibarra colony. As Keeper, I’ve examined the activity through that Crucible gate—minimal. Only a few dozen ships have ever been in and out of there in months.”
“You’re certain my ships won’t jump in on top of an Ibarra armada? We still don’t know how they escaped us on Oricon,” he said, taking the data chip from her.
“Your fleets will jump to DE-882, unoccupied space in the neutral zone. From there, you’ll wait until we send a probe through the Crucible in the Ibarra system. It’ll have a few seconds to gather data and get a message back to me. They’ll button up the Crucible after that, but I’ll know if you’ve got enough ships to present overwhelming force.”
“What do you want done to the colony?”
The Keeper crossed her arms over her chest. “What do you think?”
“We show up with enough guns and Marines that they have no chance to beat us in a fight. Get them to surrender without a shot being fired or anyone killed. You’re not sending me there to occupy the system, are you?”
“No. You’re to detain every illegal settler and bring them back to Earth for internment on Mars. Destroy all critical infrastructure.”
Lettow’s jaw worked from side to side.
“This is an eviction followed by prison. You think they’ll just run up the white flag and come along willingly? We’re talking about possible civilian casualties, not a straight military engagement.”
“You’re to use all force you consider necessary,” Keeper said. “There’s no perfect solution, and yes, you’re being rushed into this before the Ibarras’ spies can get this news back and make our job even harder. Earth needs to show Bastion that we’re not in league with the Ibarras, that we’re committed to the Hale Treaty.”
“How committed are we, Keeper? I read Gideon’s report. I know about the Omega Provision. Exactly how far does President Garret need to go to keep Bastion happy?”
Keeper’s surface rippled.
“The Provision hasn’t been ratified by the Senate. The procedurals on that planet are safe.”
“For now.” Lettow’s face darkened. “How do I convince them to give up without a shot if they think they’re boarding trains to a death camp? Tell me that! How did we ever agree to do this to our own kind?”
“Calm down, Admiral. I…you’re not the only one that sees things that way. But Earth has her back against the wall. We don’t know how strong or aggressive the Kesaht really are. The Vishrakath are on the verge of turning the rest of the galaxy against us and the Ibarras are not our friends. We need to buy time. Negotiate our way out of the Omega Provision, maybe have it become effective at some date in the future—a date after the Ibarras have been brought under control.”
“You promise me that any civilians I capture will be safe,” Lettow said. “Military defectors will get their justice through court martial.”
“You’re putting conditions on your orders?”
Lettow grabbed the admiral’s stars sewn onto his collar.
“As an officer in the Terran Union, I swore to uphold the Constitution and the rights secured by that document. I will not deliver human beings to a summary execution nor will I command my ships to do the same,” Lettow said.
“You have my word,” Keeper said.
“And the president’s?”
“Not mine to give. Listen to me, Admiral. If we drag our heels on this operation, then the Vishrakath and every other species that’s terrified of the proccies will have all the ammunition they need to demand a full implementation of the Omega Provision. The Ibarras aren’t just on that one small colony. There are many more lives at stake.”
Lettow dropped his hand to his side.
“We had it,” Lettow said. “A détente with Bastion. A whole galaxy to settle…then the Ibarras decided they knew better than everyone else and wrecked what could have been centuries of peace and prosperity. This is their fault. Any blood we have to spill is on their hands.”
“No one ever said this would be easy…or fair,” Keeper said. “You’ll make your jump in two hours. Additional personnel transports and limpets to disable the Crucible are being delivered to your fleet.”
“Hours. You’re giving me hours to put this operation together.”
“The Omega Provision is not final and is not common knowledge. Keep it that way. You’re one of our best, Admiral. Don’t let us down.” Keeper backed away, then morphed into her drone shape and flew out of the hangar.
Chapter 16
A blade flashed through the air. Roland swung his own sword around and deflected the strike before it could hit his shoulder. He shoved Nicodemus’ weapon away and lowered his shoulder. Roland ducked his head and lunged toward his opponent, intending to knock the larger man off-balance. Roland anticipated the impact…but felt nothing as he advanced.
He did feel his lead foot trip over Nicodemus’ shin and then he pitched forward. He lowered his shoulder and turned his fall into a forward roll. He kept his head ducked and thrust his sword behind him as air whooshed over the back of his neck and his sword jammed against something solid.
“Touch!” Morrigan shouted.
Roland spun around and brought his sword up to high guard. Nicodemus backed away, a red line on his chest padding.
“Point for the left,” Morrigan added from where she sat along the edge of the dueling square.
“Sorr
y, what did you say?” Roland asked, his blade still en garde.
“It was luck.” Nicodemus removed his helmet and wiped sweat from his brow.
“You always press the attack after knocking him off-balance,” Morrigan said. “He anticipated and used your aggression against you. Isn’t that right, Roland?”
“It was more instinct and opportunity…I didn’t plan on it,” he said.
“Luck!” Nicodemus struck a hand against his padding and the red mark faded away.
“You’re just mad he finally got a solid hit on you,” Morrigan said. “Which is something I struggle with, but after so long, I thought Roland would have scored a point before now…even by accident.”
Nicodemus grumbled, brought his sword hilt up to the front of his face, and swiped downward in salute.
Roland relaxed and returned the courtesy. The pain of the many bruises and raw welts beneath his padding faded away as a warm feeling spread through his chest.
Morrigan rose to her feet.
“I’m due back at the Keep,” she said. “The supplicants have the Feast of Saint Kallen and I’m to bless the wine.”
Nicodemus gave her a nod and tucked his helmet beneath his arm.
“I forgot about that.” Roland took his helmet off, the chill air of the dojo a relief from the damp protective gear.
“You forgot about one of our holidays?” Nicodemus asked.
“Forgot what day it is,” Roland said. “I was in my womb for who knows how long before I was dumped in that cell. Then all I’ve had since then to tell the time are meals and these training sessions. Sleep. Exercise. Study the primer. I didn’t think the calendar had flipped to April yet.”
“To get you out of the cell took some doing,” Nicodemus said. “If you weren’t a supplicant, we would have never let you out.”
“How long will I be here?” Roland tossed his helmet to one side. “What does Ibarra gain by keeping me around? She wanted information from me about the Kesaht. An exchange of information that I agreed to. When will I go back with what you know? That was the deal.”
