by D. J. Holmes
On the bridge everyone was already being thrown about from the force of the proximity hits when the fourth missile exploded. The concussive force momentarily overloaded the inertial dampeners and James was hurled about so violently that he blacked out. The rest of the bridge officers didn’t fare much better and when the explosion from the fourth missile threw Endeavour into wild spin no one was in a position to correct it.
An eternity seemed to pass as James slowly regained consciousness. “We’re still alive?” he asked out loud, hoping someone else was more aware of what was going on than him.
“Yes,” Mallory said groggily, “I’m not quite sure how though.”
“We’re currently spinning out of control,” Julius said over the COM, “one of my Sub Lieutenants is correcting now.”
“We’re being hailed by a Kulrean ship,” Sub Lieutenant King reported.
James took a moment to sort himself out and then said, “Put it on my personal holo display.”
“Hello Captain,” a Kulrean said, James wasn’t sure but he thought this was a different Kulrean than Superintendent Hallock.
“My name is, Pemel, we’re here to give you an escort. My ships should be able to take a few hits from these Vestarians,”
The feed from the Kulrean ship dropped for a few seconds and then reappeared. Pemel looked startled but still alive. “Oh my, that was close, we just took a hit from one of their missiles. They blew a great hole in the side of my ship. But I’m still here, is your ship still functional? It looks to be in a bad way.”
“We’re still able to put up a fight but we can’t destroy all the Vestarian ships alone.” James replied still not sure how he was alive. “Your ships need to attack the Vestarians,”
“Don’t worry, we’re on it. I’m just the escort,” Pemel assured him.
When James looked at the sensors he had to blink a couple of times to make sure he was seeing things clearly. It looked as if all the space between Endeavour and Kulthar was alive and moving towards the Overlord’s fleet.
They can’t all be automated can they?” James asked Pemel.
“No, as soon as we got your signal we began automating our ships like you instructed Superintendent Hallock but we didn’t have enough time. When we saw the sacrifice you and your crew were prepared to make we decided to come to your aide. Your actions today have taught us something new for the first time in more than two millennia. For thousands of years our people have believed the most honorable way to live has been to eschew all violence and use of weapons. Now, today, we have seen a different type of honor. You and you crew were willing to give your lives for my people. That is something we can emulate. Many of us will die today. But far fewer of us will die because of you.”
Even as he was listening to Pemel, James was watching the holo display. Literally thousands of Kulrean ships shot past Endeavour, travelling far faster that he would have believed possible. When he played back the last couple of minutes of the battle he saw that hundreds of Kulrean ships had thrown themselves in between Endeavour and the missile volley he thought was going to end his ship. He couldn’t find many of them on the sensors now.
“Follow them in,” James ordered as a wave of emotion washed over him. “Use the plasma cannons Mallory.”
As Endeavour went to full speed the battle was already turning. Hundreds of missiles and lasers reached out from the Overlord’s fleet to wipe Kulrean ships off the plot. Yet for every one that was destroyed three took its place. Soon they got close enough to make kamikaze runs against the Vestarian ships. James had recommended that the Superintendent automate his ships and fly them into the Overlord’s fleet but as Pemel said there hadn’t been time. Many of those ships contained living crews.
At first it looked like the Overlord’s fleet would be able to fend them off. X-ray lasers, anti-ship missiles and AM missiles filled the space around the Overlord’s fleet, destroying anything that got close to them.
“They got one,” Malik called out as a Vestarian cruiser disappeared when a Kulrean ship finally managed to penetrate the Vestarian’s defensive fire and ram it.
“We’re in range,” Becket shouted, “opening fire.”
Endeavour’s plasma cannons picked off warships in ones and twos but within seconds there were hardly any targets for Becket to pick out. Hundreds of smaller Kulrean ships broke through the mountain of fire and swarmed the Overlords fleet like ants protecting their nests. Hundreds, perhaps even thousands, of Kulrean ships were destroyed but as soon as the main body of the Kulrean fleet got close to the Overlord’s ships both groups simply vanished off the plot.
“They are all gone,” Malik said, stunned, once the sensors were able to make out anything from the debris field that had appeared around them. There were hundreds of broken ships tumbling about in front of Endeavour but there was no sign of any Vestarian ships.
James wasn’t surprised, the drive technology the Kulreans had was almost unbelievable. There was no way the Vestarian ships could have avoided them once the Kulreans got through their defensive fire and close enough to ram.
“I’m getting a signal from the remaining thirty Vestarian ships,” Malik said. “They wish to surrender to us.”
“No chance,” James said in anger. “Tell them if they don’t want to face the same fate as their sister ships they must surrender to Pemel.”
“They have acknowledged,” Malik said.
“Get Pemel on the COM,” James said.
“It’s over,” James said to him once his face appeared on the holo display. “The remaining ships have surrendered. You have saved your people and your planet. It was a brave sacrifice your ships made.”
“No Captain, you have saved us. My people will owe you an eternal debt of gratitude,” the Kulrean replied.
“It was our pleasure,” James said bowing his head, “now, let us see to our dead and wounded,” he continued before his emotions got the better of him.
“Certainly,” Pemel agreed.
After the COM channel shut down James let out a long breath. He had been sure that had been the end. Once before he had thought he had faced certain death. Then he had been filled with many regrets. This time he had known his death would have served a purpose. He had been doing his duty. I hope I am doing your memory proud, James said to Admiral Jensen in his mind.
Duty never ends, was his next thought as he turned his mind to Endeavour and the dead and wounded he had to care for.
Chapter 29 – Homeward Bound
Captain Somerville’s discovery and intervention into the Vestarian and Kulrean civilizations sent shockwaves throughout the human nations. Many people and groups would become very fearful and suspicious of the aliens. Yet without them, the Empire might never had been formed.
- Excerpt from Empire Rising, 3002 AD
24th August, 2466 AD. HMS Endeavour, in orbit around Kulthar.
Two weeks after the battle for Kulthar, James was sitting in Endeavour’s conference room with Pemel and three other representatives from the newly formed Kulthar Union. Their old way of governance had fallen apart when Pemel had abandoned the Kulrean’s insistence of pacifism.
The Kulreans had abided by an ancient code of laws that their forefathers had written thousands of years ago. Everyone was simply expected to follow them and the Superintendents were just there to deal with the extraordinary. Apart from their occasional intrusion into the running of the Kulrean civilization, life within the Kulthar system had gone on in the same way for centuries. The only real change had been when they had made contact with the Vestarians and decided to try and spread their ideals there as well.
Now things had been thrown into turmoil. There were new factions springing up throughout the system as the Kulreans woke up to the possibility of life without their ancestors’ rules. Pemel and those who had followed him had taken charge for the present. His leadership had saved their entire civilization and the people were giving him a lot of leeway. It also helped that he ran one of the largest shipping
companies in the system. His years of experience hashing out business deals had prepared him well for handling an ever-growing number of political groups who were all vying for his attention.
In the conference room with James and Pemel were Lieutenants Mallory, Julius and Becket along with Jil’lal. James knew this had been a historic meeting, it was the first time members of each race had met each other face to face. Although nothing would be decided from the hours of talks they had just gone through it would still go down in history.
“Let me give you our people’s thanks one last time,” Pemel said. “To you Captain Somerville, your crew and to you Jil’lal. We know this fleet that attacked us does not represent your entire race and we hope to open peaceful negations with your people once again. Negotiations that don’t just happen through a satellite in orbit.”
“I do not deserve your thanks,” Jil’lal said. “I was just an observer in the end. But I know I speak for my people when I give you our sincerest apologies. We hope that you will allow us to do whatever we can to make up for what the Overlord’s warships did to your people and your system.”
“Forgiveness will take time. My people are still in shock at what has happened. However, your presence here has already gone a long way to showing us that the Overlord’s fleet does not represent the true Vestarian people. I am sure in time our people will be able to become friends. The last two weeks have shown that we can work well together,” Pemel said.
James nodded at that. The last two weeks had been hectic. After spending a few hours doing essential repairs, James had placed a couple of marines or armed crew members on the bridge of each of the Vestarian ships that had surrendered. Then he had taken Endeavour to Kulpath and joined the rescue operations. In total more than twenty million survivors had been lifted off the broken planet. Endeavour had played a very small role in achieving such a great feat but they had done all they could. Jil’lal had even managed to talk a number of the Vestarian captains into helping relieve the humanitarian crises.
Now there was nothing left for them but to return home and report on everything that had happened. All the lives that could be saved had been and the Kulreans were going about the business of resettling the survivors and considering their futures.
James knew Endeavour would need at least a few weeks or even a month or two in a repair yard before she was mission ready again and they had now lost over forty five crew members on this mission. James hadn’t got to know all of them personally but their loss still weighed heavily on him. It was time to go home, see to Endeavour’s repairs and inform the families of their loss.
Pemel had taken the names of all the crew who had died fighting the Overlord, at Haven, Vestar and Kulthar and a monument was being erected for them on the Kulrean homeworld. Pemel had also promised to visit Earth to open formal communications between their two peoples. Though Pemel still seemed reluctant to trade technologies that could be used for warfare, he was willing to trade a great deal of the other advances the Kulreans had made in the last thousand years.
“I guess there is nothing to say now but farewell,” James said. “I look forward to welcoming you to Earth when you arrive.”
“And I look forward to seeing your homeworld,” Pemel said. “Our exploration ships visited it more than a thousand years ago and I’m sure it has changed a lot.”
“Indeed it has,” James said, “I hope you will be impressed.”
“I don’t doubt it,” Pemel responded. “I don’t know yet when I will be able to leave but the FTL communicator I gave you will allow us to stay in contact once you place it in orbit around your planet. I will let you know exactly when we will arrive through it,” he added.
“Farewell my friend,” he said as he shook James’ hand just as James had taught him to.
“Farewell,” James said again.
*
20th September, 2466 AD. HMS Endeavour, in orbit around Vestar.
Three days after arriving at Vestar James stood on the bridge of Endeavour looking down at the planet. They had returned to drop Jil’lal off at and update Tak’ar and his new government about the events from Kulthar.
When they had opened communication with the planet they had found that Tak’ar was fully up to date on everything. The Kulreans had opened up full communication with the Vestarians through their FTL satellite and the news Endeavour had brought hadn’t been a surprise to anyone. On the other hand, what James and his crew had found on Vestar had been a real shock.
In just two short months Tak’ar and the Resistance leaders had managed to completely reform their government. A planetary wide government was now in place, one that vaguely resembled the federal system of the old United States constitutional government.
Tak’ar had turned all the old nations of Vestar into their own federal states. Each state could elect its own local senate and senate director while the entire planet elected one parliament led by the parliamentary President. James suspected that Tak’ar had spent more than a few hours reviewing the histories of Earth that Scott had supplied him with for the setup seemed to take some of the best bits of Earth’s lessons in democracy and apply them to the Vestarian people.
The one thing that hadn’t been a surprise was that Tak’ar had been elected as the first Parliamentary President. As such, his schedule had been very busy, yet he had made ample time for James over the last three days. Tak’ar, Mul’li’la, Jil’lal and most of James’ bridge crew all had a private meal on board Endeavour the night they had returned. The next day Tak’ar had insisted on holding the Vestarian’s first state dinner to officially welcome James and Endeavour to Vestar. Between both meals Tak’ar had also spent a lot of time picking James’ and the officers’ brains regarding the different democracies on Earth and how they worked. Freedom was something completely new to the people of Vestar and Tak’ar was trying to make as few mistakes as possible.
One of his first acts as the new Parliamentary President had been to seize the Overlord’s secret construction yard. The Vestarian’s space industry was small but they did have some shuttles that could make the journey to the construction yard. Tak’ar had taken it over and was in the process of re-tooling it so that the first Vestarian defense fleet could be constructed.
When James had first heard what Tak’ar had done he had been concerned. It would take years for the Vestarians to build a fleet that could be a threat to even the smallest of the Earth powers. Yet the very fact the Vestarians were still building warships would concern everyone back on Earth. Not to mention the Kulreans.
Tak’ar had been ahead of him though for after informing James about the new construction project, he had handed James a data chip. It contained all the technical details on the Overlord’s fleet. Including the technical details on how to build the x-ray lasers and the powerful energy reactors that supplied them. Tak’ar wanted it to be a symbol of his peaceful intent. Both James and Tak’ar knew that with the technical details of the Vestarian warships it would be much easier for a human nation to defend themselves from any future Vestarian aggression, not to mention allow an Earth power to invade Vestar. It was a great risk Tak’ar was taking, but the gesture was appreciated.
Neither the Overlord nor any of his scientists appeared to know exactly how the lasers and energy reactor worked. There were no theoretical descriptions within the designs, just technical instructions on how to build them. It seemed that whatever had been going on in the Omen facility, the Overlord had somehow gained access to technology far beyond what the Vestarians understood. Even James wasn’t sure how the technologies worked but he was certain there would be scientists back on Earth who would. Once they figured it out it would no doubt bring about a revolution in energy production.
Already a vast number of scientists from different nations were working on alternative energy reactors to the fission ones used throughout the Human Sphere. James was sure the technical plans he now held would advance much of that research by decades or more.
He wasn’t su
re the x-ray lasers would be just as revolutionary. After Chief Driscoll had looked over their designs he had dismissed them. They got most of their added range and intensity from the colossal power that the energy reactor fed them.
James had enjoyed his few days on Vestar. It had been vastly different from his first visit. The populace was repairing the damage Endeavour had caused in her orbital bombardments and James had been delighted to be given a tour of the Overlord’s palace. It was being turned into a museum on the history of the Vestarian people. Even though museums weren’t James’s thing, he had enjoyed the tour, if only for the fact that he had received a far warmer welcome than his first visit to the palace.
Now it was time to leave Vestar just as they had Kulthar and James was keen to get back to Earth and inform the Admiralty about what was going on.
