Books One to Three Omnibus (Armada Wars)

by R. Curtis Venture

  “Warming,” said Throam. “I feel welcome.”

  “Might as well get comfortable,” Caden said. “We may be here for a while.”

  As he sat down his link chirruped.

  He clicked the link. “Caden.”

  “Shard Caden,” came the reply. “This is Intelligence Operator Occre Brant. I believe you’re responsible for the package that just arrived?”

  “We haven’t found the person responsible yet,” Caden said pointedly.

  “Controversial,” said Brant. “Well, it’s certainly one of the larger packages I’ve received lately. By the time you’re out of quarantine I should have her name.”

  “Where will I find you?”

  “Arrivals know who you are. There’s only one place you can go from the lounge; when you check in they’ll send you my way. You won’t need to report to anyone else.”

  “What’s your involvement exactly?”

  “I’m liaising between Eyes and Ears, and Fleet Command. I can’t get into it right now, but as you probably gather there are common interests in this situation.”

  “Yes, I imagine there are.”

  “Ha. I’ll see you in a couple of hours.”

  “I’m very much looking forward to it,” said Caden, and closed the channel.

  “Occre Brant? I’m sure I know that name.” Throam said.

  “Never heard of the man,” said Caden. “I expect he’ll be the usual cagey interrogator.”

  “He sounded very cheerful for an interrogator.”

  “True. I’m not expecting miracles though.”

  “When have you ever?”

  Caden smiled slightly. Throam was right; he was typically quite pragmatic in his expectations of people and organisations alike. Once Caden had a good view of the rules that governed a personality or a role or a committee, he was usually able to get an accurate feel for how each would react to certain circumstances. Prediction was one of his most useful skills.

  “How long do you think?”

  Caden looked across at Eilentes, who had sat down on one of the plain sofas so thoughtfully provided by Arrivals. She had crossed her legs and was now toying with her raven hair as she waited for his reply.

  “Probably a few hours,” he said. “The air system will be monitoring what we’re exhaling. I’d guess we’ll need to provide blood and saliva as well, if they want to make a proper job of it.”

  Right on cue, a panel opened in the far wall and out slid a sampling station. The recorded voice delivered a new message.

  “Biological samples are required for threat screening. Please provide the samples, following the instructions on the holo.”

  “I’ve never had to go through checks this thorough before,” said Throam. “Usually it’s swab and go at the desk.”

  “You’ve never come back from Gemen Station before.”

  “You think its something to do with whatever they were up to out there?”

  “I’m certain of it. It makes sense; there’s a chance we’ve been exposed to something, and somebody who knows what that is doesn’t want to take any risks.”

  Throam and Eilentes provided their samples, each using swabs to collect saliva and lancets to draw tiny amounts of blood. As they bagged and labelled their samples, Caden waited in silence for his turn, his mind working constantly. There was an oddness about this mission he had been sent on.

  The Empire maintains a secret facility.

  They build and test weapons there.

  Someone attacks it, and steals the fruits of their labour.

  The Empress sends me to find out why.

  We find an oddball woman and nothing else.

  On our return, Eyes and Ears are expecting us.

  We’re tested for a contagion.

  Those are the facts.

  Sometimes it helped him to get the main points together in a neat list, but this was not one of those occasions. Something was missing from the puzzle, and it was not a trivial piece. Many questions formed in his mind. The only thing of which he could be relatively certain was that Shard involvement had been inevitable: neither E&E nor Fleet Command would want to sully themselves by dealing directly with whatever dirty little catastrophe they had brewed on Herros.

  But then it could always be worse: it might be that he was now involved because they suspected an inside job. Occre Brant was going to have to explain one or two things.

  • • •

  Santani was staring at Klade when he looked up from the system overview. Holding her compact holo in one hand, resting the other hand on her hip, and just staring.

  He flashed her a brief smile and raised his eyebrows; in response she flicked her eyes briefly towards the wardroom. Then she walked nonchalantly across the deck and disappeared through the hatch. He gave it a moment before he followed her, tapping away at his holo, scheduling repairs to the minor systems they had not deemed a priority after the damaging jump to Herros.

  He looked casually around the command deck, saw nobody was paying any particular attention, and went after her. Finding the wardroom empty he walked across it towards the hatch that led to the captain’s own office. He stepped through, and remained silent until the hatch had closed fully behind him.

  “Captain?”

  “The data the sensors collected when we jumped to Herros… you did transmit it before we returned?”

  “Yes, it went in the first databurst after we dropped at this gate.”

  “Good.”

  “Is something wrong?” He knew even before he asked. The captain’s face was the same as it always was when she was troubled.

  “It’s too early to tell, but I do know one thing. I’ve never been comfortable with the idea of Eyes and Ears crawling all over my ship.”

  “They had me scrub every sensor reading we’ve taken since we first left Kosling,” he said. “They also checked through navigation and transmission logs.”

  “So they’ll know that you’ve passed the sensor readings to Tech and Systems?”

  “I presume so, yes.”

  “I understand they’ve also been to sickbay?”

  “Swarmed through it. Every part of it scanned; no idea what for.”

  “It’s where she was.”

  “Whoever she is, they’re certainly going to some lengths for her.”

  “They are at that.”

  Klade waited while Santani drummed her fingers pensively on the edge of her desk. He was accustomed to her reflecting for minutes at a time; although he had only served with her for five Solars, his term as the ship’s first officer had been long enough for him to learn her habits and moods. He sensed that a bold decision was being made.

  “Okay, we let them carry on until they’re finished. I’ve never had my ship grounded before by Eyes and Ears, and I’d like to see how these matters generally pan out when they get their way.”

  “But… that’s not all?”

  “Not in the least bit, no. The moment we’re free to communicate off-ship, you get on to Tech and Systems and see what they’ve made of those sensor readings. Don’t lose a second — you can bet your ass that they’ll also be getting a visit from our inquisitive little friends.”

  “As you wish, Captain. I’ll see to it myself.”

  • • •

  “Apologies for being late, after you’ve already spent the past three hours in quarantine.”

  Occre Brant smiled apologetically and gestured for Caden to sit down. The Shard had been waiting alone in the spacious office, scrutinising the various paintings Brant had chosen to display.

  “Half of my job seems to be spent waiting for something or other,” he said, matter-of-fact.

  “Yes,” Brant said. “Well, you’ll be pleased to hear that all of your tests came back negative. For all three of you.”

  “I don’t suppose you’re going to tell me what we were tested for?”

  “Nope. Sorry.”

  Caden sighed under his breath, and sat down in the chair that Brant had indic
ated earlier. He took a long look at the man opposite.

  Brant was about the same age as Caden, perhaps slightly older. His black hair was cut short, emphasising a strong brow and solid jaw. He had a stocky build, and an air of physical confidence which Caden suspected was backed up by capability. His clothing was neat, clean on, and not decorated beyond the identification of his rank. Other than that he was essentially unreadable. Caden had not encountered anyone who gave out so few signals in a long, long time.

  Except for one thing: his facial expressions were entirely genuine. Caden had seen enough liars and fakers to know when a smile was true.

  “I’m actually late because I’ve had a little difficulty getting an ident for your survivor,” Brant continued. “She wasn’t on the staff roster for Gemen Station, although of course that’s exactly what we were expecting.”

  “We?”

  “You and I.” Brant smiled. “Well I certainly wasn’t expecting her to be Gemen staff; from your records I think you’ve also seen enough to know it couldn’t ever be that simple.”

  Caden nodded in agreement, noting with interest that Brant had looked up his service records and wanted him to know it.

  “I’m guessing there was no local DNA match either?”

  “You’re not wrong. No match on the records held at Kosling. We’ve got a DNA query running now on all the civilised worlds, expedited of course. I expect a result within the next hour.”

  “That soon. Why ‘survivor’?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “You called her a survivor. Why is that?”

  “Simply because she’s obviously been through some kind of trauma.”

  “No other reason?”

  “None.”

  “Where is she now?”

  “Medical, getting the most thorough examination of her life. The doctors down there are not going to leave anything to chance.”

  So there it was; Brant had not expected them to return with a survivor, and so accordingly he had not been prepared for it. Medical were checking her out in detail because they had no idea who she was, or what she carried with her.

  I’m not the only one with questions then, Caden thought.

  “Anyway,” Brant said. “To business. Eyes and Ears have a forensics team at Gemen Station now, along with a computer interrogation unit. Fleet are naturally beside themselves at having lost an entire task force, and they’re sweeping the system with a fine-toothed comb. Fearless, Resolute, and Keeper are out there right now.”

  “They won’t find anything, will they?”

  “I doubt it. Whoever hit Herros did a very good job of it. No alarms raised, nothing left behind. Except for your strange lady of course.”

  “Of course.”

  “So, Shard Caden. Tell me what you found there.”

  Caden related the details of the expedition to Brant, describing how they had found the station intact but abandoned, how the security systems had been wiped and the research databases locked down. He recalled the storage room full of empty containers, finding the woman standing alone in a laboratory, getting her to the shuttle with Throam and strapping her safely into a flight seat before returning to complete their search. The labs devoid of life, the holos empty of data, the storage spaces stripped of contents. He left nothing out, save for his hallucination in the storage room… if that was what it was.

  Brant listened intently, his eyes never leaving Caden’s face. At length, when the Shard had completed his account, he nodded slowly.

  “Well, this is disturbing,” he said. “It sounds like a very surgical strike. I’m not sure which is more worrying; the theft of the weapons or the abduction of every soul stationed on Herros.”

  “How many people?”

  “Should have been sixty-eight when we lost contact. That’s comparing the last roster they filed with our newest transit logs, so it could be slightly inaccurate.”

  Caden grimaced. Sixty-eight people, all of them vital resources. But more than that, they were also wives and husbands, parents and children, friends, carers, and lovers. Brant was looking at him; saying nothing, doubtless expecting nothing. Caden knew just by the expression on his face that they both understood the loss in exactly the same way. It did not need saying.

  “The weapons they were developing,” he said. “What were they?”

  “For the most part, they were chemical in nature.”

  “Is that it?”

  “That’s all I am authorised to tell you.”

  “You do realise that I carry the authority of the Empress?”

  “As does Eyes and Ears, and by extension as do I.”

  Caden raised his eyebrows, genuinely surprised. Most of the time a mention of the Empress, or even the mere suggestion of Her expectations, was enough to guarantee cooperation. But now twice in the same day, the comments had been brushed off as meaningless. Like Santani, Brant did not appear to be impressed. Perhaps out here, near the border with the Perseus arm of the galaxy, the idea of Imperial rule was taken less seriously than it was in the core systems.

  Well maybe by you, he thought.

  Brant seemed to sense his feelings. “Look, I’d like to share more with you, really. But there are limits — severe limits — placed on what I can divulge about this.”

  “I insist.”

  “Insist away, I still can’t tell you.”

  “So let me get this straight,” Caden said, “I have been sent to Herros to investigate why it went dark, because the Empress would really quite like to know. Meanwhile there is another organisation also working directly for the Empress, with a fairly good idea about what’s been going on, an idea it just won’t share.”

  Brant looked amused. “No, you’re not reading the situation correctly at all.”

  “So explain it to me,” said Caden.

  “The Empress knows full well what was going on at Herros, as we have been operating under Her instructions. She hasn’t shared it with you because you don’t need to know. You aren’t instructed to solve the mystery of what the Empire was doing there; you’re instructed to solve the mystery of where the weapons and people went, who has them, and why.”

  “You don’t think the nature of those weapons might have a bearing on things?”

  “Not really, no.”

  “You really are difficult, aren’t you?”

  “I’m just stating the facts.”

  “You remind me of me, only much less so.”

  Brant laughed, and gestured at Caden. “Sit on this.”

  “Not while I’m on duty,” said Caden, not missing a beat. “Look, is there anything you can tell me that would help me do what I was sent to do?”

  “Yes, there is.” Brant’s face became serious.

  “I’m all ears,” said Caden.

  “This is not the first blackout.”

  “You mean other stations have gone dark?”

  “Stations, colonies, and also ships.”

  “So what happened with the others?”

  “No idea. Gemen Station was the only one classed as a high priority.”

  “Tell me you’ll be following up on the others?”

  “Not personally, and my superiors feel that’s a routine task for the Navy patrols to see to. Communication failures happen all the time; there’s nothing to indicate that this sudden spate is anything other than a statistical fluke.”

  “You’re kidding, right?”

  “I didn’t say I agreed with it. I’m just telling you what I’ve been told.”

  Caden was silent. Multiple blackouts were not a good sign. As Brant had suggested, it could have been a simple coincidence of technological failures. Incidents did occur together sometimes, without any actual connection between them, hence the word ‘coincidence’. But although he had his own views on coincidences, something did not feel right; at least one confirmed attack on an Imperial facility, and who knew how many others had occurred. More worryingly, who knew how many were occurring right at that very moment.


  “I would strongly urge you to reconsider. Feed it back up your chain of command: those blackouts need to be investigated.”

  “Oh I already have,” said Brant, “but it’s falling on deaf ears, if you’ll pardon the pun.”

  “Try harder.”

  “There’s no point. Eyes and Ears is very much a top-down organisation. If it makes you feel any better, chances are my superiors have a very good reason for whatever it is they’re thinking.”

  “It doesn’t make me feel better.”

  “I didn’t really think it would, if I’m honest. Believe me when I say that I sympathise.”

  The doors to the office opened, and a woman walked confidently into the room. She was tall, almost as tall as Caden, and slender. Thick red hair cascaded over her shoulders, framing an angular face with pale, almost perfect skin. She wore the same uniform as Brant, and despite her severe expression Caden had to admit that it certainly looked better on her. Bright green eyes speared him for a brief moment as she strode defiantly across the room and thrust a holo at Brant.

  “We have her,” she said. “The Blank Woman.”

  Brant took the holo with a curt nod and turned back to Caden. “This is Intelligence Operator Peras Tirrano, my colleague.”

  “Colleague, friend, some would say natural complement.”

  Caden sensed an immediate change in the air, to which Tirrano seemed oblivious. All of a sudden, while she had been talking, Brant’s open manner and friendly expression had disappeared entirely. Caden took in her movements, the subtleties of angle and poise, the briskness of her motion and the ferocity in her voice and eyes. Efficient, but impatient. Calculating, relentless, and almost certainly vindictive.

  “Not those who know me well,” said Brant.

  “You can be cruel, my love,” said Tirrano.

  “The Blank Woman?” Caden intervened carefully. Brant looked at the Shard as he drew Tirrano’s attention, and Caden saw clearly the appreciation in his eyes.

  “That’s what they’re calling her in medical,” said Tirrano. “The woman from Herros. You know; because she’s blank.”