I paused a moment while I let themcontemplate that. No one liked the idea of turning our weapons onour own people; but if they were the Magi, they drew first blood,and we have no choice but to fight back.
“Now, the logical question is: What ispsionics? The honest answer is that we do not know. However, outhere even when we were still days away from the system, we began tofeel its impact. You must all have sensed it, that scent of fear onthe ship and the crew; that gnawing specter of doubt in your mindsthat you cannot shake off. It is not at all natural for hardenedwarriors to feel this way, but nonetheless you do. That is theimpact of the Magi’s weapon. It is becoming more intense the closerwe get to the planet.
“Fear will cause you to hesitate, to doubtyour own judgment and senses. Fear will cause you to underestimateyourselves, and overestimate them. You are all battle-hardenedwarriors. You know how to deal with fear, and this is no differentexcept in its magnitude. You will have to force yourselves to fightit. We do not know how this weapon works, and have no defense forit, so you must steel your minds and deal with it in your ownmanner. Remember it is not a natural fear; it is far more dangerousand crippling. You were chosen for this mission because GeneralZalith believes you are the best of the best. I assure you no oneless than that will survive this mission.”
I paused to gather myself for the next order.This was not an easy command to give, as it meant complete trust inthese men, whom I had never served with before. I looked each oneof them over and was impressed again with the power they radiated.These truly were the best the Empire had ever produced.
“The Empire has good reason to be worriedabout this colony. As of now, they believe the Magi are all on thisplanet. Two weeks after we launch the captain will destroy theplanet, whether we make it off or not. We simply cannot risk themspreading out. This could be our only chance to eliminate them. Whywait two weeks? Well, that is where we come in. Officially we aregoing to make contact with the Magi and attempt to make them partof the Empire. Obviously that is not the real mission, at least notthe orders we will be operating under. Our primary objectives areto learn how they are able to control fear as they do, and to stealone of their plasma cannons. Anyone, alien or not, who gets in ourway is to be eliminated. No attempt at communication will be madewith them. I must stress that these orders are extremely secret.Only the Emperor and ourselves know of them.” I could tell theywere very unhappy with that. They were hard-core military, and tothem the chain of command was sacred. To bypass it completely musthave left a foul taste on their forked tongues.
Now for the hard part. “As you know, I am ina position which gives me access to extremely sensitive informationthat could be very dangerous in the hands of a hostile force. If itshould happen that I am taken prisoner and you are unable to rescueme, you must kill me, even if you have to give your own lives to doit. We cannot risk even the slimmest chance that they mightsuccessfully break me and gain access to what I know.” This broughta look of respect from them.
Now I had to test my shocking little speechto see if it worked. “Men, I know that all of you have more combatexperience than I, and I will have to lean heavily on your skillsand knowledge. However, I must have your one-hundred- per-cent,unconditional loyalty. We are about to leave to penetrate intoextremely deadly territory, and I cannot have anyone questioning myorders at a critical time, even if they seem foolish. If you cannotgive me this loyalty, I will release you from your duty to thismission. I will fly it alone if I must. I will not allow anynegative marks on your records should you decide not to come, butby accepting this mission you are giving your word to follow me,into certain death if need be. I intend to complete our primaryobjective, regardless of the personal cost, and I will acceptnothing less from you. If you are leaving, this is your onlychance. We will be under total communications blackout until wereturn.”
Here I stopped. I knew none of them would bewilling to back down from such a challenge. They were warriors, andhonor was their life. To back down after such a speech would implyfear and weakness. It was a bit of a gamble maneuvering them likethis, but I needed them completely on my side or this really wouldbe a suicide mission.
The squad’s sergeant came forward.Surprisingly, at just over two meters tall he was the smallest ofthem, though not by much. He locked his steel-grey eyes on mine. Imatched his fierce gaze and said, “Speak freely, Sergeant.”
He said, “Sir, the Dark Knights were hesitantabout this mission when we were first briefed. We did not like theidea of following a green leader to try and negotiate with theMagi. Now that the mission parameters have changed to includewiping out the Magi, we no longer have those hesitations. You neednot worry about us; if by death or life we can serve you, we will.”With that he stepped back into place with the rest of theKnights.
“Thank you.” I was very pleased by thatresponse. It was better than the begrudging reaction I hadexpected. “Then, men, complete your preflight. We leave the instantyou’re ready. Operation Quiet Storm is now officiallyunderway.”
“Yes, sir!” was their reply, in perfectunison, and they immediately went to work. I took what little gearI had, stowed it on board and did my best to stay out of theway.
Chapter Eleven
The Dark Talon was a Kessler-class vessel,often referred to as a mini-battleship. It had an impressive arrayof weapons and tactical sensors. It was specifically made for thiskind of solo penetration mission. The bridge crew was made up of amission leader, pilot, tactical officer, and gunner. Each positionoverlapped the others so that there were at least two crewmen ableto handle any given function at any given time. Their stations werefanned out in a half-circle with the mission leader’s position inthe center. This allowed the mission leader to keep on top of whatwas going on and communicate freely with his crew. Once I hadboarded, I took my seat in the mission leader’s chair and asked,“Is all ready for departure?”
“Yes, sir,” was the pilot’s reply.
“Computer, execute program Vydor FinalDeparture, authorization code Victor — Igloo — Nancy — Charlie-Eggplant — Nancy — Tango. Pilot, as soon as the way is clear,launch the ship. There will be no clearance to launch from thecommand, since we do not officially exist. At first possibleinstant, engage full stealth and take us out of the gravity wake ofthe fleet.”
“Yes, sir,” came the reply.
The planet was still almost three days away,but the Dark Talon was equipped with the newest generation ofmicrojump drives and could dramatically reduce that distance.Indeed, we would be in orbit in about an hour.
There was a slight lurch as the craft wasreleased from its moorings, and ahead on the viewing screens Icould see the bay doors opening and a rush of air escaping the bayas the energy screens dropped. The pilot gracefully accelerated usout of the bay and into open space. As we cleared the doors all thecomputer displays dimmed as the shipped slipped into the low-powermode associated with complete stealth.
“We have cleared the bay doors, acceleratingto the tidal exit point now,” reported the pilot.
“As soon as you can, make the jump. Targetthe jump’s exit so that we come out in the moon’s gravitationalshadow,” I ordered.
“Yes, sir, path already laid out. We shouldbe able to jump in twenty minutes,” replied the navigator.
I wanted to get to the planet as soon aspossible to give us the greatest amount of time to complete ourmission and get out of there before the planet was destroyed. This,of course, made the next twenty minutes feel like an eternity.Finally the pilot called out, “Jumping in three, two, one …”
Jumping inside a star system was a trickybusiness, and something only a smaller ship like ours could pulloff. A larger craft like the Dragon Claw, or most of her fleetcould only jump in interstellar space, and even then they needed tobe at least a couple of weeks away from any major gravity well atboth the entrance and exit points.
Long ago it was discovered that the speedlimit of the universe was equal to the speed of light. There was noway to break it, but it needed to
be broken or interstellar travelwould be impossible. This brought on the invention of the jumpdrive. It was a very strange technology that I did not fullyunderstand, and I am not sure anyone does. It grew out of thediscovery that gravity could bend time. It seems that everythingthat we know of is affected by gravity, nothing is immune. The jumpdrives take advantage of this by using a gravitational bubble toforce the ship out of time while still moving through space. Sincethe ship stays stationary with respect to time, but moves in space,it effectively bypasses the speed-of-light limit. To say the shipmoves through space is not quite true because it is a half step outof sync with reality while jumping. This technology allowed us totake the most direct route to our destination without worryingabout small things in our path. Big items which create largegravity wells are a real problem and need to be avoided. This iswhy we needed to get out of the gravity wake of the fleet, as anylarge gravity well we passed would pull us back into time, andwould place us directly in the center of mass for that well. Inmost cases this would be catastrophic for all involved.
The jump drives make interstellar travelpossible, but it still takes a very long time to travel. Thedistance each ship can jump is limited by the size of the gravitybubble it can create, which is a function of the amount of energythe ship can generate and the size of the ship’s own gravity well.Fleets of ships can combine their gravity wells and link theirdrives for extremely long jumps, but on the scale of the galaxy itstill takes many jumps, with significant time to recharge thedrives between each jump. A naval fleet is not expected back to herhomeport for several years at a time.
While traveling in jump space time has nomeaning. This has as-yet unexplained effects on matter. Allphysical matter is frozen and unable to be affected by anything.For example, if there was a pot of boiling water at the beginningof the jump, during the jump it looks like it was flash-frozen withall the steam and bubbles trapped in their exact relative positionsuntil the end of the jump when it returns to boiling as if nothinghad happened. That is not the really odd part; what is strange isthat sentient beings, even though their bodies are unable to move,have a complete awareness of their surroundings. It is almost as ifsomething about life is not part of the physical world.
Whenever I jumped, I looked back over myshoulder and my constant companion was always there: a tall, darkfigure with a sickle, dressed in long, black flowing robes and witha skull for a face, sunk deep in a black hood. He always stoodthere patiently waiting for me, as if to say, “In time, you will bemine.”
This time was different; there was anotherbeing with us, one I had never seen before. This was a being ofpure light. He differed completely from the dark figure in everyway. This new being held his arms open wide as if to say, “Come tome.” As I studied him, he and the dark figure faded away and timeslowly took hold of us again.
“We are clear of the jump, all systems showgreen,” came the call from the navigator. How did they recover sofast? I was still working my way back into reality. As I regainedall my senses I saw the Dark Knights already at work making sureall was as it should be around the ship. Exiting this close to amajor gravity well was very dangerous. Parts of the ship could havebeen pulled into it. “All Clear!” came a call from behind me.Good.
“How do you recover so fast from a jump?” Iasked as I finally regained control of all my senses.
“Sir, you are the only other pilot on thismission. Should something happen to me, you will have to take over.I ask you not to share this with anyone, but you should know incase we have to fight our way out. The secret is meditation, sir.That’s why I do the countdown. I set the computer to make the jumpfor us, and we all slip into a meditative state just before thejump. When the jump is finished we have no ill effects,” answeredthe pilot.
Amazingly, they had just let me in on one oftheir most closely-guarded secrets. They had often used theirextremely fast recovery as a major advantage in combat, jumpingright in the middle of a fight and coming out with guns blazing. Itwas an extremely effective tactic that many tried to mimic, butwithout the nearly instant jump recovery of the Dark Knights, noone could pull it off.
“Thank you, I will keep that secret safe. Iam honored you have shared it with me,” was the only reply I couldgive. I was sure I would never forget this moment. I had no moretime to think about it, as suddenly the ship’s alarms went off.
“Five incoming fighters,” came the call fromtactical.
I felt a wave of fear pass over the ship. Iknew it could not be from the five enemy fighters. We could takethem, but nonetheless everyone was very much afraid. Suddenly thehonor guard, and others I had seen who were seemingly immune to thefear weapon, came to my mind. Larath’s comment finally made sense.“FOCUS! That’s the key!” I called out. “The Magi have found us!Dark Knights, listen to me very carefully, FOCUS on my words! TheMagi have brought their deadly fear weapon against us; you must notlet it overcome you. You can beat it. Everyone who is not neededfor the dogfight, go into your meditative trance; it should protectyou from the weapon. The rest of you, FOCUS! Focus is the keydefense. You must focus everything on your job and push out allother thoughts. You can beat this weapon. You are the Dark Knights,the best of the best of the best!”
I looked around and most of the crew wasbuckled in and looking almost asleep, but each of the three bridgeofficers was hard at work at his station. “Tactical, report,” Iordered.
“Five Peregrine class fighters, sir. Theyknow we are here but cannot target us. I suspect they will soonbegin firing at random to draw us out,” was his report.
“Where did they come from?” I asked. “Thecolony did not have any shuttles, never mind any combat vessels.”Peregrine class fighters were light attack ships. They weredesigned to be extremely fast, nimble and work in small groups.Their primary attack plan is to fly in unpredictable patternsaround their target, making themselves as hard to hit as possiblewhile continuously firing on their own target.
“Best guess would be a moon base, sir, but Isee no sign of one,” was his answer as the fighters began torandomly fire in our general direction.
“As soon as you get a solid lock on one ofthem, break stealth and take them out,” I ordered.
They brought the Dark Talon around and movedtowards one of the fighters while still hidden. Once they closedthe distance, I felt the Dark Talon roar out of its low-power modeand the swishing sound of two antimatter missiles launching.Immediately after firing those, they banked the ship hard and firedthe ship’s forward high-energy particle cannons on a second ship,quickly destroying both craft, probably before they had evennoticed our attack. The three remaining fighters came at us fromthree different directions at once, all guns blazing. The pilotthrottled up the Dark Talon’s engine to full thrust and turned awayfrom their attack. The Peregrines quickly closed the gap and cameup behind us, which was exactly what the Dark Knights wanted themto do. Immediately I was slammed forward in my harness as theship’s rear engines were cut off, and the forward braking thrusterswere fired at maximum power. All three fighters flew past us, andright into a spread of weapon fire that the Dark Knights had laidout. One fighter was quickly destroyed, a second damaged but thethird escaped unharmed.
The Dark Talon’s primary engines were broughtback up to speed and they quickly moved to take out the woundedPeregrine. They were able to down that one quickly, and moved toengage the last fighter. Before they could, the tactical officercalled out, “Fifteen more Peregrines just appeared at 270 degrees,in a tight bravo formation.”
A bravo formation? That meant they had justjumped in and would still be recovering! Apparently the Knightsrealized this too as they broke off their attack and headed towardsthe new group of fighters, launching a large spread of antimattermissiles and all forward weapons firing. Eight of the enemyfighters were destroyed before they could take any evasive action,but that left us with eight more to fight.
“This makes no sense! Where are they comingfrom?” I asked.
“Sir! Five Falcon-class ships just came outfrom beh
ind the moon!” called out the tactical officer.
This was bad. We could take the Peregrines,but we would be completely out-gunned by the five Falcons.Undaunted, the Knights moved to engage the Falcons when thetactical officer called out, “Sir, a Condor class destroyer hasjust jumped in!”
“How is that even possible this close to theplanet?!” I exclaimed. “We need to get out of here. Disengage theenemy and come about to Z minus 90 degrees, maximum thrust, fullweapons spread to the rear.”
“Yes, sir!” called out the pilot as heexecuted my order.
“Navigator, prepare the jump drive. Charge itto 18.473 % and target the far side of the moon; prepare to executeon my mark. Pilot, I am counting on your ability to come out of thejump with all your senses. As soon as we clear the jump you willneed to take control of the ship and keep us from crashing. At thefirst instant that you can, re-engage full stealth mode.” Icarefully watched the ship’s tactical displays. This course we wereon must have looked like a suicide dive right into the planet. Onlythe Peregrines were keeping up with us. My timing had to be exacton this. “Execute in four … three … two … NOW!”
When I finally came out of the post-jumpconfusion, I noticed that we were safely on the far side of theplanet in a stable orbit. “Excellent work, pilot.”
“Sir, if I may ask, how did you know that wewould be thrown over here? There is no way you could have triedthis before,” said the tactical officer.
He was right. The move was impossible withoutthe Dark Knights’ ability to operate immediately after a jump. “Istumbled upon it in a video game that allowed me to use yourpost-jump recovery skill. Later I tested it in countless computersimulations and it worked every time, but this was the first time Iwas able to try it in a real situation.”
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