by Terry Mixon
Talbot pursed his lips. Two decades was not that long in the life of an interstellar civilization. Look at the Rebel Empire. They hadn’t pushed the tech past what was in use 500 years ago, though that was probably the AIs. And these data cores probably had far more information about the Singularity than anyone in the Old Terran Empire had ever dreamed of getting their hands on.
“That’s great, Carl,” he said. “Really great.”
“But you’re wondering why I called you down here?” his friend asked with a smile. “It’s because of something the Singularity called Operation Brutus. That’s a reference to a historical incident on Terra thousands of years before spaceflight. It’s also what the Singularity was calling their work with the Clans.”
That got Talbot’s attention. “Does it give us a clue what their goals were?”
“You bet it does,” Carl said grimly. “Not that I expect it’s going to be pleasant to hear. The Singularity found the Clans on one of their border incursions. It took a few tries to get them to talk without shooting first, but over the years they built enough of a rapport to become allies of a sort.
“This started about fifty years ago, by the way. This ship was destroyed in combat shielding a huge convoy of freighters bound for the Clans. Ones to build shipyards that would be more than capable of building battlecruisers.
“Based on some references, they intended to deny the Clans the ability to build carriers or superdreadnoughts, but I personally doubt that would’ve stopped the Clans for long. What it boils down to is that they were arming the Clans with advanced warships and technical advisors with the intent of having the Clans disrupt the AIs so that the Singularity could invade in force.”
Talbot blinked. That was bad. Really bad.
“Did they have a timeline on this plan?” he asked. “Did they intend for the Clans to go now, or did we kick things off prematurely?”
Carl smiled slightly. “You’ve hit upon the key. The Singularity had a timeline, one that they were using to build up their own forces in anticipation for. From what I can see, the Clans jumped off about two decades early. The Singularity isn’t ready for their follow-up invasion.”
“But that won’t stop them from trying,” Talbot said grimly. “It’ll just end up getting a lot of people killed and make completing our work that much harder. Is that it?”
“Not quite. The target for the Singularity strike was one of the most heavily protected systems in the Rebel Empire. One we’ve heard of before: Twilight River.”
Jared waited for Kelsey to react to what he’d just said, knowing that it had undoubtedly rocked his sister’s world.
“Something got wonky in the translation,” Kelsey said after a moment. “Say that again.”
“I said that I need you to meet another version of you. One from another universe, just like the bodies we found on Omega station. She came through there with some of her people looking for help.
“I couldn’t tell you about her because I have people here that don’t know about Omega and what he means to us. I’m going to leave the two of you alone to talk. She’s so much like you, and yet so different. It’s going to be hard for you both, so you don’t need anyone listening in. I suggest you clear the room on your end.”
“I’m already alone.” There was another long pause. “Are you being serious?”
“I’ve never been more serious, Kelsey. The next voice you hear will be hers. I’m leaving now to get some other work done, and I’ll let you two be about it. Goodbye for now.”
Jared rose to his feet, nodded to Kelsey Two, and headed out of the compartment to leave them some privacy. He really wanted to be a fly on the wall, but he couldn’t imagine anything more inappropriate than listening in on this conversation. They needed to make friends, and his presence would only make that harder.
As he walked, he activated his com. “Olivia, this is Jared. Where are you?”
“I was waiting for you. I’m about to go have a nice talk with the guard that you captured with Fielding. He knows what we need to know, and I intend to get it out of him.”
“On my way,” he said, changing course to meet her there.
She was waiting outside the makeshift cell, standing near Senior Lieutenant Laird. The tall, red-headed marine officer waited with two of her enlisted men.
“I thought you were going to hit him without me,” Jared said. “What changed your mind?”
“We make a good team, and I didn’t want to deny you the pleasure of being there when we broke him. Did you get the Kelseys to talking?”
He nodded. “I introduced them and then left. I expect that they’ll be there for a while. What’s the plan here? Same thing as before?”
Olivia shook her head. “A different kind of intimidation. The guards might be loyal to him, but they know the higher orders can turn on them in a heartbeat if it suits them. I’m going to play on that and see what information we can shake loose.”
That made sense to Jared. “He’ll also have whatever he expected to need when he ran from the Lords. It would be very amusing to deny him his lifeline. Shall we?”
The marines opened the door, and Laird went in, her hand on her holstered stunner. When Jared followed her in, he found the prisoner standing against the opposite bulkhead, glaring at them.
Olivia came in last, cool and collected. “Sit,” she said, pointing to the chair at the table.
The man puffed up a little. “Where is my Lord? Release me at once!”
“I’m not in the habit of releasing traitors to just wander about. I’m fully aware that your companions intended to sabotage my ship. All of you are in my custody, and if I do not get complete and prompt cooperation from you, I will see summary justice done. Do you understand me?”
The man wilted a little but then stood straighter. “We’re not the traitors. That man is, and the others. They conspired with the renegade Lord.”
“Do not think to meddle in the affairs of your betters,” Olivia said coldly. “We have our own goals and instructions that you are not privy to. Even if we didn’t, you aren’t fit to judge us. In fact, we are here to cast judgment on you.
“What was your Lord doing on the station? What did he bring back? And don’t think to lie to me. I will not hesitate to put you to the question and drag the answers from you. If I cannot get the truth from you, I will kill you and start on the pilot, so do not think you are indispensable.”
Jared had to admit that her tone chilled him deeply. Olivia West could be a scary, scary woman. He hoped she knew what she was doing.
The man opened his mouth, perhaps to deny her, but he hesitated. He closed his mouth, examined Olivia more closely, and then bowed his head. “Mercy, Lady. I will comply.”
“See that you do, and I will release you and your fellows in a different system than your Lord, with sufficient funds to disappear. Now, what did he do on the station, and what did he take?”
The man took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “He sabotaged a fusion plant, just as he told the Lord. He also went to a different compartment and pulled data off one of the Lord’s data cores. I don’t know what he copied, but I could see enough of the screen to know it was a significant amount of data. Once he had it, we returned briefly to the cutter before coming to find your man and his companions. That’s all I know.”
Olivia stared at him a long while and then nodded. “I will accept that for now. If we find no evidence of this data, we will speak again, and you will regret your deception.”
The man bowed his head. “I’m telling the truth, Lady.”
“For your sake, I hope so.”
With that, Olivia turned and walked out of the compartment. Jared followed her, and Laird closed the hatch behind them.
“What could possibly be worth the risk of coming here?” Olivia asked, turning to face him.
“I have no idea,” he said, “but we’d best go take a look.”
26
Kelsey sat in shocked silence for a few moments. �
��Is this some kind of joke?” she finally asked. “If so, I’m not getting it.”
“It’s no joke,” the artificial voice that Carl had rigged up for the FTL com interface said. “Mertz is gone now. We are, it seems, doppelgängers. I knew there was a possibility that I’d run into you when I came across the universal barrier, but that didn’t prepare me for this moment. I’m sorry for the surprise.”
Kelsey sat back in her seat, stunned. She’d always known this was possible but never imagined it would actually happen. Certainly not after they found so many dead versions of Carl, Talbot, and the marines with them.
She’d expected more of them would come across, but not her. And even then, no other visitors had materialized. It had been over two years since they’d found Omega, and no one had come. Until now.
“You’re really me?” she asked in a whisper.
“A version of you,” the other woman confirmed, her voice sounding more like Kelsey’s own in her mind. “Our history diverged. It’s pretty close up, but the last few years in particular have gone worse for me than you. You, it seems, got all the good luck. I’m trying not to hate you for that.”
“And you’ve come for help?” she asked. “You’ll have it.”
The other woman gave out a short bark of laughter. “Mertz said you’d say that. He also said to remind you to ask for the details before you promised help.”
“That’s how Jared is,” Kelsey admitted. “And how I am. Why are you calling him by his last name?”
There was a long pause. “That’s one of the differences between our universes. In mine, he really was the Bastard. He fomented rebellion and killed my father. Ethan rules now.”
Kelsey’s mouth went dry. “Are you sure it was him? Here, Ethan was the one that went mad. Paranoia and megalomania. He tried to poison my father and blame me.”
“I’ve gone over everything that I know. I haven’t made it home in my universe to see what is really happening there, but Mertz came to Pentagar. He fooled Captain Breckenridge, killed him and many of his officers, and stole Courageous. He struck out into the unknown in a direction that I now know leads toward the Rebel Empire.
“Am I sure that Ethan is completely sane? No. I’ve worried about it since I spoke with your friends, but I haven’t seen anything in the communications I’ve exchanged with him that makes me think he’s gone crazy. What I am sure of is that the Mertz in my universe is not the same man as in yours, and that’s still causing me grief in trying to relate to him.”
That made Kelsey sad. Jared had fought so hard against being bitter. Maybe in that other universe, he’d lost that struggle. Then again, maybe the other version of her was wrong.
“Why haven’t you made it home?” she finally asked. “Wasn’t Omega able to help you?”
“No, not that way at any rate. It never occurred to me that it was possible to create artificial flip points, so that never came up in conversation. Based on what I’ve heard, it takes a long time to gather the energy to make one, and he couldn’t for a few more months, even if you were inclined to let him.”
Kelsey chuckled. “I think you misunderstand our relationship. We don’t tell him what to do. He decides what to do, and we’re just grateful. If you asked him, he might do that for you next.”
“But that would mean you can’t have him help you for another six months.”
“For the life of me, I can’t think of where we’d need any more artificial flip points. If he could help you, that might be a help to us, too. Two New Terran Empires are stronger than one.”
“But that’s not the case,” the other Kelsey said. “I wasn’t joking when I said you’d gotten all the good luck. We didn’t find a graveyard of ships at Harrison’s World. The AI there murdered everyone on the planet and probably dropped all the ships into the sun. It’s not even on Boxer Station anymore. The place was stripped bare.”
“There are some battlecruisers that might still be hidden in the system,” Kelsey said. “Around one of the gas giants.”
“Sean found them for us,” the other Kelsey said. “Your Sean. He gave us the codes, and we’re working on figuring them out. Scott is sort of mad he isn’t there to get one.”
“Scott?” Kelsey blinked. “Scott Roche? He’s alive?”
“In my universe, yes. He’s here with me on the destroyer with Mertz and your people. Let me be frank. We figured out what we need to stop the computer in my universe. The override. That’s why I came. In my universe, Mertz stole the scepter.”
Kelsey frowned. “I didn’t know what it was until I got home and interfaced with it. How did you find out?”
“The message I found from Emperor Marcus had a secret message coded into it. I only found it by accident, but it provided just enough information for me to put the pieces together.
“Mertz in my universe doesn’t have implants—at least he didn’t when he ran—so I don’t know that he even knows about the secret function of the key, but he’s the only one with Imperial blood there. I can’t get into the old Imperial Vaults on Terra without help, even if I could find some way to get there.”
Kelsey tried to get a handle on what the other woman’s situation was. “Do you have implants?”
“Sadly, yes. I’m the only one. Rather, I was until your people shared the technology with us. Now we’re implanting everyone in the expedition.”
“Why sadly?”
“I didn’t get rescued right away when the mad computer at Erorsi took me. I became a Pale One, and it controlled me. It made me fight and kill.”
Even though the artificial voice held no tone, Kelsey could easily hear the bitterness in the words.
“I’m so sorry,” she whispered, knowing intimately how devastating that would be to her.
“What’s done is done,” the other Kelsey said. “At least Doctors Stone and Guzman were able to give me an artificial eye and regenerate me so that the pain of the implant process went away. I didn’t realize how much of a haze I was in because of the drugs.”
Her heart ached for the other woman. “I can see why you might hate me. God, you caught all the bad breaks, but now we can help you. I can help you. I’ve learned so much about using my Marine Raider implants.”
“That’s one of the big differences between us, Kelsey One. That’s what they call you so as not to confuse things, by the way. Predictably, I’m Kelsey Two. Anyway, I’m not a warrior. I’ve seen what you can do, and that isn’t me.
“I can fight, but the implants terrify me. I don’t want to give the computer in my head any control at all. I can’t get past what it made me do. I don’t want to be a Marine Raider. I’m more than happy letting people like Angela Ellis do the fighting for me.”
Kelsey felt her heart drop. “Do you know someone named Talbot?”
“He’s not on my expedition,” the other Kelsey said. “I’ve heard how you and he bonded, and I’m honestly happy for you. That’s not going to be what happens for me. Frankly, my version of your Carl Owlet sounds more intriguing. If I have the chance, I’ll introduce Angela to this Talbot and let them bond if they do. I’ll look up the scientist when I get home.”
“Ewwwww!” she said before she could stop herself. “I’m sorry, but Carl is like a little brother. He’s not my type at all.”
“More proof that we aren’t the same person, I suppose,” Kelsey Two said. “He sounds perfect to me. Of course, I didn’t have the opportunity to bond with him like you did. We might not be suitable, but I’m not saying no until I get home and see what he’s like.
“Well, I’ll probably form an opinion when we meet at Terra, but I’m not the kind of girl that poaches from her friends. Your version of him is safe.”
Just the thought of such a union boggled Kelsey’s mind. Carl was a great guy, but she just didn’t feel anything romantic towards him. Which was a good thing, since Angela would twist her into a pretzel if she did. Well, her doppelgänger’s love life was none of her concern.
“Okay, we’re obviousl
y going to have to have a long talk about what we need to do for you after Terra. What can we hash out now that might be useful?”
“Mertz,” Kelsey Two said. “How sure are you that he’s really trustworthy?”
“Absolutely. I have no reservations whatsoever about him. I was wrong in how I saw him as a kid. It took me a while to accept that I’d seen him differently than he was, but being at his side for the entire expedition and beyond leaves no room for doubt. And though this might seem weird to you, I love him. In a brotherly sort of way, mind you.”
“That’s hard for me to process,” the other woman admitted. “He’s a snake in my universe. How can people with the same background be so different?”
“How can the two of us be so different? Admittedly, we’re closer together than I expect the two Jareds are. We have the same background and many of the same experiences up until the expedition. Jared had no one. I’d imagine it would’ve been easy enough for him to slide into hatred in my universe, so I got lucky. Again.”
The other Kelsey was quiet for a few seconds. “I hate to be paranoid, but I want to ask you a few questions that only the two of us would know the answers to. I need to make sure you’re really a version of me and not someone pulling a trick on me.”
Kelsey understood and approved of that kind of caution, but it had some potential issues. “We know we’re mostly the same, but I can’t be sure if my experience is the same as yours with everything we experienced.”
“Really, it will only take one right answer to convince me that you’re also me. At least until we meet, and I see you with my own eyes. Since you trust Mertz, I’ll assume his word that I am who I am is good enough.”
“It is,” Kelsey said. “Shoot.”
“When we were kids, I loved reading about the Old Empire in the Imperial Library. There was one old book that I found there that talked about a specific world in the Empire that fascinated me. I never spoke about it to anyone. Honestly, I considered it my own private getaway in my mind. It wasn’t Terra, so I know that no one else will be able to guess what it was.”
