by Larkin, Matt
Leah pursed her lips. “David, you define yourself through discipline, order, duty. She sounds like the opposite. I have to be honest, it doesn’t sound like something that would ever work. One of you would have to bend, maybe break. Opposites may attract, but matter and anti-matter still annihilate each other.”
Maybe she was right. Maybe all he could do for Rachel was help where he could and stay out of her way. She was the whirlwind, sweeping over all she touched, always changing it, never staying, never pausing. Never yielding.
Whatever drove her was something maybe he couldn’t understand. Maybe no one could, or maybe he wasn’t the one for her. The thought sent his pulse pounding through his head again. It rang of bitter truth, despite the beautiful memories they’d shared together. But if they weren’t meant for one another, why couldn’t he stop thinking of her?
Leah sighed. “So, the Asheran border?”
“Aye.”
“Guess I may need Med Bay for something more than treating headaches and heartaches soon.”
“Aye.”
Whatever insane mission Rachel had given herself, he had his own. He had an Empire to uphold. The heretics in Asherah pushed out their borders, maybe even violated the Commandments. And they’d murdered David’s mum. Justice, long-delayed, would find them.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
September 28th, 3096 EY
The quiet, the moments between trying to decode the Sefer, they give me too much time to think. If the Adversary attacked mankind thirty-one centuries ago, why have we never seen it since?
The Logos shot out of the Conduit Gate to the Akeldama System. David’s senses blurred from the sudden psionic deadening. The disputed system was clearly within Mizraim domain, but Asherah had questioned that claim for years—probably because of the ore-rich asteroid field nearby.
An Asheran Leviathan passed among that asteroid field, escorting a mining ship.
Waller growled, really growled. He stood beside David’s chair, watching the display screen. David set his jaw, barely surprised by the captain’s wrath, almost sharing it.
He shook himself. “Should we contact them?”
“That’s a Leviathan, a heavy battleship. You don’t send a battleship to protect a mining vessel unless you’ve come for a fight.”
“We’re a battleship, too.” David activated the holo display field, showing the system in three dimensions around the pilot’s chair. The Leviathan hadn’t made a move, still remained partially concealed behind the asteroid field.
“So we are,” the captain said. “Dana, target the Asherans.”
Phoebe’s pale eyes glanced back at David. “Both of them, sir?”
“It’s time we made it clear this system belongs to the Empire.”
David took a deep breath, then steered the ship among the asteroids, dodging the rocks. The Singularity Drive created kinetic shielding that would distribute the energy of impacts, but pelting the ship with asteroids would still damage it.
“Should I fire a warning shot, sir?” Phoebe asked.
“Yes, Dana,” Waller said. “Warn them with all ten pulse cannons, and missile tubes one through a hundred and twenty.”
“Sir. They’ll get the message.”
The Leviathan must have detected her target lock, because it leapt into sudden motion. The Logos hummed with energy as the pulse cannons and missiles fired. Phoebe must have focused fire on the Leviathan, since only a handful of missiles targeted the miner.
“Warning delivered, Captain,” Phoebe said.
David cruised through the asteroids, trying to give her clear shots. Missiles launched from the Leviathan, intercepting the Logos’s warheads. Defensive laser batteries carved out others, but the holo registered at least ten impacts.
David jerked the ship, trying to keep asteroids between them and enemy missiles. “They’re returning fire!”
Phoebe activated the Logos’s own defense batteries, annihilating most of the barrage. One slipped through. The impact blasted along the starboard side but sent a shudder through the entire ship. The kinetic shielding barely kept the matter-antimatter explosion from ripping a hole in the hull.
“Launch drones!” Waller said.
David tapped his console, sending out forty remote fighters. From the pilot’s chair he could reasonably control ten, twenty in a pinch. He took ten and assigned the others to fighter ensigns.
Plasma toroids rocked over the Logos. There was no shooting those down, and evading meant keeping asteroids between the two ships. The toroids ravaged the kinetic shielding, overwhelming it with thermal energy. If a missile hit them at the same time…
Dave steered the Logos behind an asteroid the size of a small moon.
“Prep the ion cannons,” Waller said. “Use the MAGs to clear a path.”
“We have to let the shields stabilize!” David said.
“Then get those drones targeting that miner. I do not want them escaping. It’s time to make a statement.”
A statement had been made already, David expected. They had opened fire on a battleship. And the surge of terrible adrenaline was like a tonic. These people had destroyed the Balthazar, killed his mum. Retribution, served cold, was inevitable.
David reached into the hologram, his fingers contacting the image of the drones. With a shift of his wrist, or a jerk of his arm, he sent five of them targeting the miner. It would be enough to distract the Leviathan while the rest of the drones intercepted missiles.
“Ion cannons charged,” Phoebe said. “But there’s an energy buildup on the—”
A particle beam shot from the Leviathan at the asteroid David hid behind. The ion stream traveled at close to the speed of light. There was no evading, and no matching that destructive power. The beam struck the asteroid, releasing an instant torrent of explosions. As the thermal energy built, the asteroid sundered, even before David could get out from behind it. The sudden explosion hurled massive chunks of rock onto the Logos, pelting the hull.
The impacts overwhelmed the kinetic shields. Hull breaches flared all over David’s display. Angels above, anyone in those sections was already dead. The readings indicated dozens of power ruptures. God only knew how many would be injured.
“Return fire!” Waller shouted.
Two ion cannons erupted, sending their own barrage of particles at relativistic speeds into the Leviathan. Unfortunately, the weapons drew enormous energy. The Singularity Drive could generate near limitless power, but only so much at one time. What was left of the kinetic shielding flickered out.
“Captain!” David flew as erratically as he could, trying to keep behind cover again.
An ion stream punched through the Leviathan’s shielding and ruptured the hull. A cascade of explosions rushed over the craft from bow to stern.
“Bring us in there, MAG cannons ready,” Waller said. “All MAGs fire.”
The Leviathan tried to head for the Conduit Gate on the system’s edge. The miner had already reached it and was slipping out of the system. The Leviathan launched more missiles while recalling its fighters. Its missiles were barely targeted, a barrage of distractions that would, nevertheless, cripple the Logos if even a few of those hundred struck.
“Drones, full defense,” David ordered. He moved his own drones into position, shooting down missiles all around. Phoebe’s laser batteries cut down a few others. One slipped past the ensigns’ drones. The ship shook. Another hull breach registered on David’s display. More good men, probably dead.
Eighty MAG cannons sent an endless stream of slugs at the Leviathan. At first, kinetic shields sent the rounds skittering off, then they started to punch through, creating hundreds of minor hull ruptures. A hundred-meter-long section of the Leviathan’s hull ripped away from decompression, flinging men and debris into space.
“Get a missile in there, Dana,” Waller said.
Phoebe fired from what David guessed were the last loaded missile tubes. The Leviathan’s laser batteries shot down ten, maybe twenty. But o
ne missile rammed right into that hull breach. An antimatter explosion blew out both sides of the Leviathan, and the ship’s power went dead.
Asteroids collided with the ship, punching more holes in the hull.
“Pulse cannons.”
Phoebe followed Waller’s orders. The pulse cannons unleashed a barrage that engulfed the Leviathan in explosive energy. A second later, the entire ship detonated.
They had just destroyed a Leviathan. Angels above, they’d just destroyed a Leviathan. The Asherans claimed their battleships were invincible, and the Logos had taken one out.
But at what cost? Based on the holo display, David would guess the Logos would be vulnerable for days. And the lost crew? How many were dead? A hundred? More?
David piloted the Logos out of the asteroid field. It would take days, maybe weeks to repair the damage done in this battle. As far as he knew, it was the first full scale battle between a Leviathan and a Tribulation class Sentinel warship since…
His mother.
For most of his life he’d hated the Asherans because of her, because of what they’d done to the Balthazar. He’d spent his life without a mother, and his career in the shadow of a captain considered a failure. And now he’d blown the void out of a Leviathan.
“Did we just start a war?” David asked.
Waller turned away and left the bridge. But David thought he’d caught a glimpse of the man’s emotions, his own psionic potential maybe reaching out. A silent promise with no record. The promise that, if they hadn’t yet, they would.
David’s throat was dry.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
October 2nd, 3096 EY
Why did the Angels never teach us their language? Why retain their unfathomable symbology? They gave us technology, or pieces of it, but never quite revealed all their secrets. They told us just enough to allow us to build intergalactic ships harnessing singularities, and yet, everyone knows they held back. Redeemers claimed they kept back what mankind was not meant to know. I’d expect they merely never wanted us to become a threat to them. And they enforced their will with their dreaded secret police, the Gogmagog. Of all the Races of Man, only the Gog and the Magog are universally hated and feared. It was the Gogmagog that sought out those who opposed the Angels and exiled them to worlds like Gehenna.
Repairs had been underway for four days. They didn’t dare take the Logos back into the Conduit until such activities were complete. No matter how good a pilot he was, David wouldn’t take a chance in there unless he had no choice. If something went wrong, if the course was lost inside the Conduit, God knew where they’d end up. Some said the Conduit folded in on itself infinitely, that once lost you could fly its pathways for all eternity and never find your way out.
David’s ear comm flared. “McGregor, I’ll see you in my quarters.”
He hadn’t seen much of the captain in the last few days. Why would Waller summon him like this? Though the captain’s quarters were just down the hall from his own, he’d never even seen the inside of them. David strode through the passageway and buzzed Waller’s door.
It slid open after a moment, and he stepped inside and saluted. The captain had the lights low. Dozens of photographs decorated the walls. An older woman with long hair stood among young children. Further down the wall, those children grew older and older, until finally, they stood with children of their own. The captain’s grandchildren.
Waller sat at a table and motioned for David to join him. The Codex was there, a fine leather-bound copy, opened to a page illuminated in the old style.
When David had sat, Waller folded his arms. “Commander McGregor.”
“Captain?”
“How soon until we’re ready to head out?”
David scratched his head. “We could probably take the Logos back in tomorrow, if we had to. Better if we wait an extra day, though. The Asheran ion cannon is a bit more powerful than our own.”
Their plasma cannons were clearly meant to emulate Sentinel pulse weaponry, but they did a mediocre job of it at best. Still, there were rumors of handheld ion rifles. If that were true, the Asheran Confederacy clearly had a leg up in some areas of weapon’s design.
Waller shook his head. “They’ve broken the Covenant.”
Maybe. Hard to be sure without prisoners to examine. “Is there evidence I haven’t seen?”
The captain scoffed. “McGregor, please. Everyone knows cybernetics are rampant in the Confederacy.” Everyone claimed that, and, honestly, David believed it. But believing and proving were different things.
“The Sentinels need every edge to face such a foe, McGregor. They’re a threat to the very fabric of our society. A threat to the entire human race, even. They must be brought to heel.”
David nodded. He had no love for the Asherans, but he didn’t need to tell the captain that.
“I’d hate to think you’ve been holding out on me.”
What the bloody void? “Sir?”
“It’s probably best if you tell me all you know about the Sefer Raziel, McGregor.”
David’s mouth hung open. How did the captain know about that? He felt a bit lightheaded. The Med Bay?
“That’s an order, Commander.”
David shut his mouth. No choice now. He’d never disobey his captain. Order, duty, loyalty. These things were who he was. He was a Sentinel. He was a soldier. “Sir. The Sefer Raziel is a possibly mythical book written by the Angel Raziel some time prior to the Vanishing. It’s said to contain secrets of the Angels, including, possibly, the hidden location of the Angel’s Ark.”
Waller leaned forward, locking David with his blue eyes. “And where is it, Commander?”
Rachel. If he told, Rachel’s situation could become even more complicated. If facing down the Redeemers weren’t enough, now she’d likely have the Sentinels after her. And how could he betray the woman he loved like that? How could he place her in danger?
Acid burned in his stomach. His psionics flared, and for a brief moment, he saw her face, alone and afraid.
He had no choice.
She was running down a polluted street, running from someone trying to hurt her.
But there was no choice. None. He was a Sentinel. He was duty. And he could not break his oath. He could not, God save his soul. “Possibly on the world Gehenna, in the Pegasus Dwarf Galaxy. I have reason to believe the Lazarus Group is searching for it there.”
“And your friend.”
“Aye, sir.”
“And you were going to tell me this?” The captain’s words seemed almost a growl.
“I didn’t believe it relevant. Sir.”
Waller leaned back at last, scrubbing his beard. “Not relevant?” He slammed his hand on the table, the sudden motion making David jerk. “If the Sefer, or God forbid the Ark, falls into the hands of another government, do you have any idea what that will mean, McGregor? Whoever controls it would be able to unravel the mysteries of creation. With that kind of power we could crush Asherah! The Ark could change the course of human history, and if someone else finds it first, it won’t be in our favor.”
“Aye sir. If you believe it exists at all.”
“I’m not willing to take that chance! Set course for Gehenna first thing tomorrow, as soon as we’re able.”
David shook his head slowly. “Captain, we’ve no jurisdiction there.” And Rachel… If she was already in trouble, the last thing she needed was Waller after her prize. A sudden flutter in his stomach left him woozy, and a sense of danger almost toppled him from his chair. She was in danger, or she would be. He could feel it. His vision had been real. His heart told him it was. Normally, he wouldn’t sense these things unless in the Conduit. “Gehenna is an independent world. We can’t just—”
“I don’t want to hear shit about jurisdiction, Commander. We’re talking about the fate of the universe.”
David tried to keep a straight face at the hyperbole. “Captain, we’d be starting something we might not be able to contain. We should at lea
st contact the Tabernacle—”
“I already have. You have your orders, Commander. Bring me the Sefer.”
Angels above, the Sanhedrin had sanctioned this. His own government had ordered them in. Maybe he could do nothing for Rachel. But he’d have to try.
Waller had heard him mention it all to Leah. This was his fault. Waller wouldn’t have left the Asherans until he’d taken them out, that much was clear. But with the Leviathan gone… How long ago had he contacted the Tabernacle? Had it taken them this long to sanction the mission?
David stood and saluted.
“Dismissed.”
At that, he spun on his heel and trod out into the hall. It took a conscious effort to keep walking, head high. A wave of psychic disruption tugged at his mind, a siren of impending doom. They were set on a course that would alter everything, and for the life of him, he couldn’t see where it would end. But without a doubt, the feelings would strengthen in the Conduit. Maybe he’d be able to sense his way free from there.
Until then, he had no choice. His paused at the door to his quarters, not waving it open. David scratched his head, then turned and went down to the Med Bay. Leah was there, examining a few people injured in the battle with the Leviathan. Twenty-two dead crewmen. Most of the injured had been long since healed, but a few of the worst cases Leah wanted to examine again.
So absorbed in her work, she seemed not to notice him. He waited quietly, his mind swirling with possibilities, all leading into darkness. Just after the battle, this place had been filled with burned, bleeding victims of their aggression. Never for a moment did he allow himself to doubt the Asherans deserved the results of their incursion, and every crewmen on this ship had taken the Sentinel’s oath, knowing what it meant. But…
“David?” Leah asked.
He hadn’t even noticed the rest of the crew leaving. “My psionics are flaring.”
She led him to an exam table and sat him down. “What do you mean flaring? What do you feel?”
