Tonight it was perfect, and the man known to the Underworld as The Angel of Death was enjoying the sight of the city, feeling its pulse as he watched the chain of lights that were aircars moving across the night sky. The city, with over three billion inhabitants, truly never slept. At any time of day or night there would be at least a billion sentient minds awake, if not always sober and alert. More during the day, of course, but the night life was legendary. If he had not been such a wanted man he might be enjoying that night life himself.
Since leaving the Fleet, where he had served as a Naval Commando until being thrown out for reprisals against sentients on some shithole world, he had always gone first class. There had been exceptions, during a mission, a contract. But since money had been plentiful he had always enjoyed the life that was his when he wasn’t planning and executing a hit. The Imperial Government had frozen as many of his assets as they could find, but he had too many hidey holes, purchased under too many aliases, for them to find everything. And now his lifestyle was at risk, since he was turning his back on contracts. After his last run in with the Imperial authorities, after he had decided that the Emperor did not need killing, his name was anathema in the Underworld. Now his hide was wanted by both sides of the law.
And what the hell is Sergiov going to think when I give her the information I have, he thought. Ekaterina Sergiov, recent Director of the Imperial Intelligence Agency, now overall Commander of Imperial Intelligence, had wanted him to come in and serve the Empire. She had said the Emperor need not know that he was now on her team, since the Monarch might still want his neck. He didn’t really trust her enough to put his life in her hands, since with a word the most powerful man in the Empire could overrule any deal she made.
He thought of what had been waiting in the interrogation room located under a small building fifty kilometers from where he now stood. Was she serious? he thought, thinking of the woman who had been his prisoner for some months. Or was it just the delusional thinking of a madwoman? Fucking time travel? Who the hell would try fucking time travel?
As far as he could tell, Countess Esmeralda Zhee had been telling the truth. Or what she thought was the truth, which wasn’t always the same thing. He had questioned her for months, using every technique in his repertoire. He had been a master of his trade, and getting information out of unwilling subjects had been a useful tool.
Well, Countess, your days of manipulating people in the Parliament are over, he thought with a slight smile. They would never find Zhee. Her disappearance would remain a mystery. High powered lasers had taken care of the body, incinerating it down to the molecular level. Those molecules had been whisked away and dumped into the city sewer system by his filtration system. Not even a cell remained, and absolutely no DNA. She was gone as if she had never existed.
Am I a monster? he thought. He didn’t think he had been one when he still served the Empire. The Lasharans he had killed had butchered some of his men, after wiping out an entire missionary village of their people who were trying to distance themselves from their death cult of a religion. When he had killed those guerillas, burning them at the stake, it had been an act of rage. The killings he had done since were without passion, simply cold and calculating. He had thought he had lost all of his emotions.
Zhee had changed that perception. He had hated her, and had brought untold agony to her before her demise at his hands. That had been satisfying at the time, hurting the noble who had tried to have him killed for failing in his mission to take out the Imperial Family. Now he had to wonder if he had lost touch with reality himself.
Time to make the call, he thought with a slight feeling of anxiety. His com system was supposedly untraceable, but he also knew the capabilities of the people he was dealing with. He took one last look around the luxurious townhouse, then summoned his car to the rooftop landing pad.
Five minutes later he was in his vehicle, cruising at random through the air pathways along the traffic patterns. With a thought he coded his com unit to contact the central hub installed in his townhouse. It was connected to another hub ten kilometers away by supposedly untraceable laser optics. After use the cable would be disassembled by the built in nanites, and while it might be possible to eventually trace its former path, it would be difficult and time consuming. That secondary hub would send coded signals out to forty external connections that would route into the citywide com net. One at a time, switching around every couple of seconds, it would be a nightmare to try to trace any one of them. IIA could and would do so, given a few minutes, and then would come the toil of tracing up the path. All they would find in the meantime would be the townhouse that was no longer his habitat.
“Director Sergiov,” he said into the com, activating the coding that would put him through directly to the head spy. It still took a moment for her to activate her end.
“Angel. What can I do for you? Have you decided to come in?”
“Don’t bother tracing the call,” said Angel. “It will do you no good. And I think I prefer staying out and free at the moment.”
“We won’t try and find you, Angel,” said Sergiov.
And I’m supposed to believe that? thought Angel with a chuckle. “What I have to tell you is very important, so listen. Countess Zhee was very forthcoming with a little persuasion.”
“So you had her. We wondered where she had gotten off to.”
“I had her, and after a little conversation she told me everything. I let her go, on the condition that she leave the capital and disappear from public view.” There was no way he was going to confess on the com to a capital crime, no matter what promises were made. “The tale she told me was like something out of a bad holo vid. But under the pressure she was at during the moment, I believe her.”
Angel was silent for a moment, letting Sergiov digest what he had already told her, and then started into the story.
“Time travel,” exclaimed Sergiov. “Are you flippen kidding me?”
“I am not, Director. And if you think about it for a moment, it will make sense to you as well. Her faction believes they can go back in time and destroy the Cacas before they ever became a power, and therefore rescue humankind from what history has wrought.”
“But, everyone born since the coming of the Cacas will cease to exist. The Empire will cease to exist. Her people would erase trillions from the timeline, including themselves.”
“The crazy fools think it worth the sacrifice, and they don’t care who doesn’t agree. Anyone not on their side is against them, including the Imperial family.”
“You mean?”
“They, along with a party whose origins are unknown to them as well, think it is worth it, that humankind will experience a golden age of expansion.”
“My parents. My grandparents. All of our ancestors, wiped from history. It must not be.”
Angel could tell that Sergiov was horrified. That was the emotion he had wanted her to take from this com. Now, if she could only spark the same feelings in the Emperor.
“I’m going now. I predict you will locate my first relay at any moment, and then it will only be a matter of seconds before you start the trace.”
“Wait,” shouted Sergiov, but Angel had already severed the connection. His car ejected the com box into the sky, where it fell apart on the way to the ground, disassembled by its internal nanites.
They will have some kind of plan to get the resources they need, whether from the Emperor, or from some other source, he thought as the car left the pattern and headed out of the city, changing its transponder code several times along the way. He didn’t have any love for the Cacas, and wished them hell and fire. But he also had no wish to have never existed himself. That was something that his ego could not stand.
* * *
“Do you believe him Director? I mean, Admiral.”
Sean still had trouble remembering some of the new titles his people sported. Ekaterina Sergiov had been the Director of the Imperial Intelligence Agency, the pri
mary civilian spy agency for the Imperial Government. She had served under his father for almost two decades. Sean had decided on advice from his cabinet to link all of his intelligence agencies under one administration, to make sure that all necessary information got to where it needed to be. So Sergiov had been given the nod. And the rank of a four star full admiral, so she would be able to command military operatives.
“I don’t know, your Majesty. He sure seemed to believe it. Voice stress analysis implies truthfulness. But then again, he is a psychopath, and the same rules don’t always apply.”
“It sounds so unbelievable,” said Sean, hoping that it was all just fiction. “Time travel? Is it even possible?”
The Emperor knew that many of the species that had occupied this region when the humans showed up certainly believed it was possible. All had their stories of the Ancients, the technologically superior beings that had ruled this space and bootstrapped so many other species out of their stone ages. It had been said that they had experimented with wormholes, then with time travel, going back into the past to right the wrongs other beings had suffered. With disastrous results. There were eighty-three confirmed nebula in the region that had been formed by stars too small to go supernova blowing up anyway. There were many theories about that phenomena, including mystic interpretations that the Universe would not tolerate a paradox and had struck back, to the more scientific explanation of space compression waves causing a spike in fusion. And when the humans had started building the Donut, over a hundred years ago, many of the governments in the region had issued dire warning that the Ancients had once built such a station, and it had destroyed them.
“We have nothing on record to suggest that it’s possible, or impossible for that matter, your Majesty. At the moment I would just have to say that we don’t know.”
“Well, at least they don’t have any wormholes to experiment with,” said Sean, waiting for the agreement from his Spy Master. None was coming, and he felt hollow in the pit of his stomach. “They don’t have any, do they?”
“Well, your Majesty, I, er, have to admit that we are missing four wormhole pairs.”
“And how in the hell did that happen, Admiral?” shouted Sean, his temper spiking.
“It happened before I was given my current position, your Majesty,” stammered the woman. She breathed out a sigh, obviously calming herself. “No excuses. I did not realize they were missing until I ordered a complete scan of the records. Someone had appropriated the four under a shipping order that specified a Fleet experimental station, for top secret testing. Those wormholes never made it there, though information was placed in the system indicating that they had.”
“Just wonderful,” growled Sean, jumping up from his seat, the cat on his lap jumping off at the last moment, its hind claws digging in and wounding the tops of his thighs. He glared at the cat for a moment, which showed good judgement by running out of the room. “So, parties unknown have four of our wormholes. And from what we can gather, wormholes are needed for time travel. But how in the hell would they use them to go back in time?”
“I have no idea, your Majesty. There are some hints in the research literature, but nothing definite.”
“Hold on, Ekaterina,” said Sean in his best attempt of the moment at a calm voice. He sat back in his chair and sent an order over his implant into the com system. It took a minute or so for the person at the end of that request to answer, time in which he hoped his intelligence director was sweating. I really can’t blame her for something Naval Intelligence should have been on, and before her watch. Someone else needs to be crucified for this, and at least this will make her and the people she drags over the coals more alert in the future.
“You Majesty,” said a voice over the com, as a second holo opened in the air over his desk, showing the face of Lucille Yu. The woman was obviously just out of bed, fatigue in her eyes.
“Sorry to get you up, Lucille. But we have a bit of a problem here. Admiral Sergiov is also on the com, and I’ll let her explain the problem.”
Sergiov rushed the story, hurriedly filling in details as she went. Yu’s face went from disbelief to horror during the monologue.
“Is it possible, Director Yu?” asked Sergiov, her tone hopeful that she would get a negative answer.
“Oh, it’s possible,” said Yu in a hushed voice. “We actually had a man lecturing at the Donut some months ago about time travel. He was requesting a wormhole to use to test his theories. When I checked out his theory, it turned out to be nonsense.”
“Well that’s a relief,” said Sergiov.
“Not so fast, Admiral. I dug a little deeper, and found that Dr. Kenji Guatarrez was a highly respected physicist with Imperial University, who had published several papers on alternate dimensions, including one he surmised moved in the opposite temporal direction from ours.”
“And that means?” asked Sean, his forehead furrowing in thought.
“That there was a possibility of another dimension in which time moves in the opposite direction. If you were in that dimension, considering its suitability for supporting life, you couldn’t tell the difference, since to the occupant of that dimension time would seem to flow on the proper path. But if you returned to our dimension you would find yourself in the past.”
“How far?” asked Sean, the sinking feeling growing.
“It depends on several variables. The correspondence of the passage of time in each dimension. One second to one second, or an hour or year for each second. And of course, how long you spent there.”
“And you say this Dr. Guatarrez was lecturing on the Donut. Did he go back to the Imperial University? And to which branch?”
“Some operatives from Naval Intelligence took custody of him right after I shut him down for lecturing on a forbidden topic. I would have to assume that he is in Fleet custody, or had been and has since been released.”
“We have no record of this Dr. Guatarrez being taken into custody by Naval Intelligence,” said Sergiov. “No record of interrogation or incarceration. And several months ago a missing person’s report was filed by the Imperial University Capitulum’s physics department, and by the good doctor’s wife.”
“This is damned peculiar,” said Sean, shooing away the recalcitrant cat that was walking back into the room, a plaintive meow coming from its mouth. “We need to find this man, as soon as possible. Before he and the people who took him can do too much damage to the time line.”
“How much could they do?” asked Ekaterina, again the hopeful note in her voice. She was not destined to get any hope from this conversation, thought the Emperor.
“It depends on how far back they go?” said Lucille. “If they go back far enough they could disrupt the entire time line, erase everything we know of today.”
“Get your best people on it, Ekaterina. No matter what you need to do, find him. And make sure some of the Imperial Judges know that we may need warrants at a moment’s notice, and what is at stake. Or at least as much as I’m willing to tell them.”
“I would like to put Angel Martinez on this, your Majesty.”
“The assassin? The one who was going to kill her Majesty and myself?” Sean felt the anger rising again, forcing it back, knowing that he needed to keep a clear head here and make good decisions untouched by emotions.
“He has the Underworld contacts that we don’t have. And I wouldn’t be surprised if these people are somehow tied in with the Underworld. If just to get what they need outside of official channels.”
Sean thought for a moment, reasoning past his emotions. The man could have killed he and his wife, but had hesitated until the opportunity was past. Men like him didn’t hesitate without reason.
“Very well, Admiral. Recruit him for this mission. Offer him full amnesty for all crimes, past and present, if he succeeds in giving us information that leads to our finding Dr. Guatarrez and the people who have taken him.”
“I want to say one more thing, your Majesty,” said Yu
as soon as Sergiov had dropped off the com. “And please don’t take it the wrong way.”
Sean nodded, and waited for what the woman was about to drop on him.
“As tempting as it may be to mess around with the time line, as satisfying as it might be to go back in time and put it to the Cacas, saving humanity for all time, you must resist that temptation. It is most likely to result in a disaster.”
“Don’t worry, Director. I doubt there is anything that would make me want to tread that path.”
Chapter Three
If a man consults whether he is to fight, when he has the power in his own hands, it is certain that his opinion is against fighting. Horatio Nelson
IMPERIAL SPACE. DECEMBER 1ST, 1002. D-31
They picked up the approaching scout pair well outside the range of normal commercial sensors. The Captain watched his crew closely to make sure no one gave away the game as they watched the two destroyers coming toward them. But his crew did as they had been trained to do, making the ship appear to be a harmless merchantman on its way to deliver a cargo.
“What do we have?” asked the Overlord, the large Ca’cadasan male who was on the ship with a trio of his fellows to make sure the humans did as they had been ordered.
Bastard, thought the Captain. He and his people were loyal members of the Empire, and the Masters had no cause to treat them as unreliable.
“We have a pair of destroyers on approach, my Lord,” he forced himself to say in a subservient tone. “They don’t appear to be adjusting their course.”
The destroyers forged on in hyper VI, moving at point nine light. If they had been planning to match vectors they would have already started to change their courses.
“We’re receiving a signal from a ship identifying itself as the Roger Corman,” reported the Com Tech. “They’re asking us to verify our identification signal.”
Exodus: Empires at War: Book 11: Day of Infamy (Exodus: Empires at War.) Page 3
