by J. N. Chaney
Finally, Kai looked back up. “Do you know how many schisms and breakaways there have been in my Order?”
“Uh, no. How many?”
“I don’t know either. We’ve had major schisms, like the one that saw the rise of the Verity. But we’ve also had a multitude of smaller ones. And some of those have led to schisms of their own.”
“Okay. And?”
Kai leaned his elbows onto his knees. “If there’s one thing that has distinguished belief systems through history, it’s a reliance on faith. They’ve had no direct evidence of the existence of their particular god, or gods, or patrons, or whatever you want to call them. My Order is different. We knew the Unseen existed. After all, we were living amid their technology.”
Dash remembered his first meeting with Kai and his Order in a subterranean facility built by the Unseen on a planet named Shylock. He nodded, wondering where this was going.
Kai smiled. “You’re wondering why I’m telling you this.”
“You read minds now?”
“No, I just know you. So, let me get to the point. My Order’s conflicts have all been internal. We haven’t had to defend our belief system itself against others, but rather against ourselves. Just because we knew the Unseen existed and could see their works, not all of us agreed on what it all meant.”
Dash waited as patiently as he could.
“Each of these internal conflicts inevitably came down to a clash of personalities. The decisive moment usually came when proponents of one interpretation of the Unseen and their works confronted those of another. Whoever was able to present the rightness of their interpretation most convincingly would win—to the extent that anyone ever wins such a thing. But until that clash finally occurred, the conflict itself continued to simmer away.”
“So, what? You’re saying we have a clash of personalities going on here?”
Kai nodded. “We do. Whether you like it or not, the struggle against the Enemy of All Life has been distilled down to just that. It is Dash Sawyer against Pavel Hu. It is the Messenger against the Corruptor. Until that’s resolved, the conflict between you will simmer just as ours did. Everyone involved can only imagine the ultimate outcome. And since the Corruptor is an unknown entity—”
“He becomes larger than life. The off-stage bad guy,” Dash said, picking up the thread of Kai’s thoughts.
“Precisely. And it is human nature to catastrophize and assign the worst possible attributes to that which we don’t understand. Your Inner Circle is doing the same thing with the Corruptor. They know you. But they don’t know him. Therefore, they don’t know which of you is likely to prevail.”
“So they assume the worst.”
“It’s human nature, probably encoded right into our DNA. Assuming the worst makes us afraid, which makes us wary, which keeps us alive.”
Dash considered that for a moment, then gave the monk a broad smile of gratitude. “Thank you, Kai. Seriously, thank you.” Dash stood. “I know what we need to do.”
He started to turn to the shuttle but stopped and looked back, suddenly curious.
“Do you come here every day, Kai?”
“No. I would if I could, but I only occasionally manage to come here and spend some time in contemplation.”
“What brought you here today?”
Kai smiled. “If you’re asking if I was guided here somehow, I can only give you one answer, the only one that matters.”
“What’s that?”
“What do you think?”
Dash smiled at the monk’s wisdom, then waved and headed for the shuttle to return to the Forge.
“The key to this is Dark Metal Two,” Dash said, turning back to the Inner Circle from the 3D viewer. “DM2 is crucial to the war effort of both sides. If they can seize virtually our entire stock of the stuff, then not only do they set us back months, but the Deepers also gain months of production for themselves.”
Leira raised a hand. “Okay, Dash, that last sentence you just said? That’s the problem I have with this plan. You’re planning to actually use all of our DM2 stores as bait to draw out the Deepers.”
“Not just the Deepers. The Corruptor, Pavel Hu, too.”
“That’s if this Corruptor is Hu,” Viktor said.
“Is who?”
Viktor blinked. “That’s what I said.”
Dash grinned. Viktor just stared back blankly for a moment, then grinned back. “You got me, okay. But the point still stands.”
“Does it matter, though? Whether the Corruptor is Hu or someone else from the Novgorod’s crew, or a little old lady from Edge, it doesn’t matter. What does is getting them into battle, and the only way to do that is to give them a strategic target they can’t ignore.” Dash glanced around. Sure enough, he still saw shadows of doubt on the faces looking back at him, shadows that hadn’t been there a week ago. More than ever, it convinced Dash that they needed to do this. They didn’t even have to destroy the Corruptor. Hell, they didn’t even have to decisively defeat him. All they had to do was stop him from winning. That would poke a hole in his sinister mystique and, like a popped balloon, deflate it.
He hoped.
Somebody finally spoke up. It wasn’t one of the people facing Dash, though.
“The Messenger’s plan is a sound one,” Custodian proclaimed.
“Agreed,” Sentinel said. “This is a way to deliver a decisive blow against the Deepers.”
“I concur. There are, of course, details that have been glossed over, but overall, this an acceptable concept,” Tybalt put in.
“Yup, I’m down! Hathaway, how about you? You down for this?” Kristin asked.
“Notwithstanding your unwarranted enthusiasm, I am indeed in support of this plan,” Hathaway replied.
The last one to speak was Newton. “Hey, I think this plan is brilliant. Almost as good as something I’d have come up with.”
Dash just gaped up at the ceiling, the default place to look whenever one of the AIs was speaking. All six of them had soundly endorsed his plan. He looked back down at the inner circle. The effect of six hyper-advanced AIs all coming out in support was clear. Concerned frowns had smoothed a touch, giving way to more of the determined anticipation he was used to.
“Thanks, guys,” Dash said to the AIs. “I really appreciate the support.”
“You’ve earned it, Messenger,” Sentinel replied, and Dash found himself briefly a little choked up.
“Okay. Yeah. We can do this,” Amy finally said. “When do we start?”
The rest of the inner circle nodded, their mutterings now about how to make the plan work and not about how to stop it from going wrong.
Dash held up a hand. “Okay, there’s one last wrinkle.” He grinned his most infectious, roguish grin, the one that had so often gotten him both into, and out of, trouble.
Everyone stopped to listen.
Still grinning, Dash turned back to the 3D-viewer.
“You’re gonna love this.”
After the planning meeting broke up, Dash went to find Kai. The monk was squirreled away in the suite of compartments he and the fellow members of his Order had occupied in the Forge. It was where they buried themselves in old records and documents and archives, both electronic and hardcopy.
Dash almost felt like he should take off his boots in here, so his footsteps didn’t bother the monks buried in their work. He walked slowly among them, heading for the room Kai used as his own office and sanctum. Along the way, he was surprised to see some new faces, including a young man that couldn’t have been more than sixteen or seventeen years old.
He stepped into Kai’s sanctum. The monk looked up from a book and smiled.
“Messenger, to what do I owe the honor?”
Dash gestured behind him. “You been recruiting, Kai? There are some new faces out there.”
Kai shook his head. “Actively recruiting new members? No. However, we’ve had nearly a dozen come to us asking to join our Order.”
“Really.�
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“Believe it or not, Messenger, there is still a place for the spiritual in people’s lives amid all of this technology. In war time, perhaps that need is even greater. Our belief in the Unseen as more than just advanced aliens, but as a guiding force in our lives, simply seems to resonate with some of those looking to fill a spiritual void in their lives.”
Dash actually spent a moment thinking about that. He had never been a spiritual guy. The universe was what it was, a construct of chemistry and physics driven by dispassionate equations. You made your way in it, or you didn’t. But he was the Messenger, and how could the Messenger deny that there might be something…more?
He shelved the thought. That would be a good one to bring under the trees on the Greenbelt and ponder at leisure. Right now, he had a more important task.
“Anyway, Kai, I just wanted to thank you.”
“You already did, Messenger, back on the Greenbelt—”
“No. I want to thank you for what you did afterward.”
Kai narrowed his eyes slightly. “I’m not sure what you mean.”
“Oh, you do so. You went and talked to the AIs and convinced them to get behind me about this plan to draw out the Corruptor.”
Kai smiled. “Actually, Messenger, I didn’t. I did speak to them, but there was no convincing involved.”
“Kai’s correct. Your path forward is a sound one,” Custodian said.
“It really wasn’t just propaganda,” Sentinel added.
“You guys really believe that,” Dash replied.
Custodian’s reply was immediate. “We do. If we have learned anything from you and the other humans of the Realm, it’s that the psychology of war is every bit as vital as the technological one.”
“Probably more so,” Sentinel put in.
“Indeed. The Creators fought the Golden to a standstill two hundred thousand years ago. That was the best they could achieve because, both in terms of technology and psychology, they were much like their enemies. They needed something new.”
“Which is why they saw that you, humans, came about and were able to take up the mantle of war when the time came,” Sentinel said. “Psychologically, you stand apart. You are mercurial, often unreasonable, frequently illogical, and always passionate. It has almost led to your destruction. It has also enabled your greatest accomplishments.”
“The Archetype is not the Creator’s greatest achievement, Messenger,” Custodian said. “Neither is the Forge, nor the Silent Fleet. It is you. It is humanity.”
“Which brings us back to where this conversation began. We genuinely believe that the path you walk is the one to victory, Dash. Kai merely asked us to help you, and your inner circle, to remember that.”
“There really is nothing special about the Corruptor. He is just another enemy for you to defeat,” Kai said.
Dash could only stand, stunned into silence.
He finally nodded. “Alright. Let’s get to it then.” He smiled at Kai and, by extension, the remarkable AIs.
“Let’s go win a war.”
23
Conover kept a careful eye on the tactical display. He especially watched out for the Wolfhound, carrying virtually their entire supply of Dark Metal Two. She was no tramp but a combat freighter, as big and fast as a heavy cruiser. In fact, she essentially was a heavy cruiser, based on the same schematics, but with most of her internal space given over to cavernous hold-space. She was meant to ferry critical supplies into and out of combat zones, resupplying deployed task forces, sometimes even in battle. For a cargo ship, she was both heavily armed and armored. But she was still no warship and wouldn’t stand up to a determined attack for long.
Which was why the rest of Task Force Conover accompanied her. Besides the Pulsar, Amy and Jexin were in formation in their mechs, while Wei-Ping in the Stalwart led a potent array of ships including her own sister ship, the Resolute, the battlecruisers Spearpoint and Daggerfall, and three squadrons of four heavy cruisers each. Another sixteen light cruisers and destroyers acted as a screen, while another half-dozen corvettes ranged ahead, behind, and out to the flanks to give early warning of any potential threats. Finally, bringing up the rear of the main body of the task force and acting as Conover’s reserve was essentially their entire fleet of Orions and Perseids, twenty-eight mechs in all, commanded by Lori. All of it enclosed the Wolfhound in a protective sheath of combat power.
Ostensibly, the force was on its way back to Edge to launch a new shipbuilding campaign that relied heavily on Dark Metal Two. Conover had worked with Custodian to work up what seemed like a sound rationale, based on a detailed plan for expanding the fleet—all of which was entirely fictitious. Ironically, the most difficult part of it all had been making it convincingly insecure. If the Deepers suspected a trap, they might not take the bait. Ragsdale had come to the rescue there.
“We’ve got two people working on the Kingsport, a shift boss on section fifteen, and a laborer in fabricating, who are both on the take with a criminal syndicate back in the League,” he said.
Conover just stared, nonplussed. “You know about these people? How come you haven’t arrested them?”
“Because sometimes you want the bad guys to get their hands on bad information. Hell, back on Gulch, there were a half-dozen criminals who didn’t even realize they were working for me. I’d feed them all sorts of interesting tidbits of info, then watch to see what came out the other end of an otherwise very black box.”
Conover had to admit the logic in it. They’d made sure that key bits and pieces of the plan made their way to the two marks, as Ragsdale called them. He was even able to watch as they fed it back into the seedy underworld of League organized crime, where at least some of it would inevitably end up getting back to the Deepers.
But there was one more element to this, the one that bothered Conover the most. Benzel led the bulk of the remaining fleet on a sweep around the edge of League space, threatening to roll up the Deeper spy ships and patrols that kept nuzzling up against the fringes of their long-range scanner coverage. It made sense to try to blind the Deepers while they were moving the DM2, while also blocking a major Deeper incursion from their most likely avenue of approach. Dash had insisted that that was the most logical place for him and Leira to be. The debate over that had persisted even after h-hour, the time the operation launched, over the comm. Dash had finally, curtly, and decisively cut it off.
Which left Conover in command.
Dash made it clear he had complete faith in Conover’s ability to not just command, but to lead. He wished he did, too.
“Conover, Wei-Ping. It’s time for my routing SITREP. Guess what I have to report?”
“Um, nothing?”
“Just like the last half-dozen reports, yeah. I’m starting to wonder if the Deepers aren’t going to bother putting in an appearance.”
“Let’s just hold the course.”
“Roger that.”
Conover got Wei-Ping’s concern. It was quite possible that none of their planted information had even made it back to the Deepers, at least in time for them to react to it. Or some of it might have, but not enough for them to have assembled a coherent picture from it. Or, maybe the Corruptor, Pavel Hu, had a gut every bit as good as Dash’s and just wasn’t going to fall for it—
“Yo, Conover, something happening at our one o’clock, high,” Kristin said.
Conover followed the indication. Sure enough, the Pulsar’s scanners had detected a sudden pulse of gravitational effect. It was similar to the signature of a distortion-cannon firing, but much more powerful and more persistent.
He instantly knew what it was.
“All stations, Conover. We’ve got a gate opening at our one o’clock, high. Wei-Ping, deploy into formation right-forward—”
The purplish flare of a gate cut him off. An instant later, Deepers began to stream through it.
It had to be the largest Deeper force Conover had ever seen.
Two dozen Bishops, forty-eight
Battle Princes, and at least fifty warships, battlecruisers, heavy cruisers, and smaller craft.
And one massive Bishop, or something like one, but much bigger and bulkier. Conover didn’t need an introduction. It was the Corruptor himself.
“Guess the Deepers got the memo after all, huh?” Amy said.
“Looks like it,” Conover replied, his mouth as dry as the hardpan of his Penumbran home. He accelerated the Pulsar, intending to throw himself in the way of the swarm of Deeper Bishops and Battle Princes. They were outnumbered—almost hopelessly so. But he had a job to do, and he was going to do it.
“Wei-Ping, I think this counts as the decisive moment, don’t you?”
“If it’s not, and the real Deeper force isn’t committed yet, then we’re screwed—well, more than we already are, right?”
“You know what to do.”
“Roger that.”
A light cruiser immediately broke ranks from the Realm fleet and accelerated away from the battle. She was brand new, on her first operational sortie. Her name was the Taffy, and she was commanded by the newly promoted Captain Ellsworth. Two more light cruisers, and two destroyers, also appeared to turn tail and run.
Conover watched the Taffy race away. The whole battle ultimately hinged on two, specific pieces of the plan. The Taffy’s mission was one of them.
On impulse, Conover spoke up. “Taffy, Conover.”
“Go ahead.”
Conover opened his mouth but closed it again. Ellsworth knew her job. What could Conover say that wouldn’t come across as condescending?”
“Conover, Ellsworth here. Just wanted to say thanks.”
“For what? I didn’t say anything.”
“Yeah, you did, just by taking a second to call us up.”
Conover smiled. These were damned good people.
“Roger that.”
“Just hold ’em off for a few minutes, and we’ll do the rest. Taffy out.”
Conover flicked his attention back to the onrushing horde of Deepers. None of them seemed even the least bit interested in the fleeing ships.
