by T. R. Harris
Adam swallowed hard. “We’re getting there, sir.”
“Listen, Captain, I have to admit I’m pretty pissed, but it’s a little hard to stay that way considering the success you’ve had in the Frontier. This is a secure link, so tell me, how did you power the Mark VII? Was it with the energy orb?”
“Yessir.”
“The same device you said was destroyed when the Klin colony ship exploded?”
“Yessir.”
“You had it all along?”
“Yessir.”
Adam could tell the admiral was trying his best not to turn into that fire-breathing dragon. After a moment—and with no outburst—Hollingsworth continued. “Captain, I’m willing to overlook your blatant insubordination if you will return to Earth…and bring the orb with you. You’ve proven the Mark VII is capable of incredible things, with the proper power source. Let our scientists unlock the secrets of the device so we can build a fleet of Mark VII’s. After that we’ll have nothing to fear from the Juireans, or anyone else for that matter.”
“Until the technology spreads and then everyone will have ships like the Mark VII.”
“In that case—just like with every new advance—we’ll figure out defenses against it. Listen, son, the Juireans are leaving Kidis. You did your job, and singlehandedly, I might add. Bravo. But now’s the time to end this crazy vendetta and return home.”
“Admiral, the Juireans have Sherri and Arieel. They’re on their way to Juir, with another three months of transit time. You know what Synnoc will do to them when they arrive.”
Hollingsworth bit his bottom lip. “I was wondering why you didn’t come straight back from Worak-nin. And you think you have a chance of getting to Juir and saving them? This is Juir we’re talking about, Adam. Mark VII or not, you won’t make it. And if by some miracle of fate you do, how do you save them and make your way back home? Just think for a minute. Look at the problem as a tactical operation. Would you authorize someone in your command to undertake such a mission?”
“I’ve been trained to carry out search and extraction missions, sir. There’s always a way.”
Hollingsworth laughed. “You don’t have a plan, do you? You’re just winging it.”
“I have a plan…sort of.”
“And what is that plan, Captain?”
“It’s still a work-in-progress, sir. But believe me, I wouldn’t be pursuing it if I didn’t think we had a chance.”
“Let me see if I can figure it out your strategy: Burn a path to Juir and then go in guns-a-blazing and kill every alien in sight?”
Adam forced a smile. “It’s worked so far, sir.”
“You know the Juireans have begun to withdraw their ships even from the Fringe and other places. Either they’re really afraid you’ll succeed or they’re up to something else.”
“They’re leaving other parts of the galaxy?”
“That’s right. Came as a shock to us, too. Doesn’t seem to be any reason. They have a four-to-one advantage over us, even taking into account what you’ve done in the Frontier.”
“Are they massing at a single point?”
“Not yet, just bolting for the inner galaxy. Hyben seems to be the new line of demarcation. Nothing beyond there is leaving, but still no staging area that we can tell.”
“What are you doing? You’re going to advance, aren’t you?”
“I’m sending ships into the Frontier to survey the area. It was never Union territory to begin with. Some of the hot heads in the government are now talking about doing their own annexation of the area, just to rub it in the faces of the mane-heads. I think that would be a mistake.”
“I mean the other regions—the Fringe, the Dannon Divide and the Reaches.”
“All options are on the table at this time. On one hand, if we occupy a region twice as large as what we currently have, our forces will be spread so thin that the Juireans could slip a five-thousand-ship fleet past us and park it in Earth orbit before we’d know about it. On the other, we would have a buffer zone to work with. So far, no decisions have been set in stone.”
“Excuse me, sir, but we didn’t start this. We’re at war, and simply sitting back and waiting for the mane-heads to have a change of heart won’t help. If their pull back is to stop me from reaching Juir, what do you think’s going to happen if they succeed? Do you think they’ll leave everything the way it is now? No, they’ll pick up the war right where they left off and be back huffing and puffing at your door. Sir, we haven’t won anything. The Juireans aren’t surrendering. Maybe they know how timid we are, how we’d never risk moving into the areas beyond the Union, not with our current strength. Maybe they know they can regain all the territory they’ve surrendered after I’ve been taken care of. And if I did return to Earth, wouldn’t that take away the threat Synnoc’s feeling right about now? Wouldn’t that cause the Juireans to bounce right back? And what about Sherri and Arieel?”
The words flowed from Adam like a torrent. He was frustrated, not only at his current situation and how it had changed the dynamic within the galaxy, but also by his commander’s lack of vision and courage.
“Admiral, the only option is for us to win. The only peace we’ll find is when the Juireans are destroyed. We tried to play nice with them, giving them the benefit of the doubt that they weren’t our enemy, just pawns in the Klin’s galactic chess game, just as we were. But now we know their true colors. They’re a vicious, savage race who fear anyone that can challenge them. As long as the Union exits, the Juireans will be plotting our destruction. Sir, we have an opportunity to end this once and for all. Let me lead the way. We don’t need to conquer the Expansion, just Juir. There’s enough grumbling among their member worlds that I’m sure no one would mourn their defeat. And we don’t have to go back being the boss of the galaxy. Any number of other races could take over, or a coalition of them. We can still keep our identity, our Union. But don’t fall for the belief that this thing is over. It will never be over, not as long as the Juireans exist as a power within the galaxy.”
Admiral Hollingsworth stared back at Adam for several seconds before a thin smile stretched across his face. “Very passionate speech, Captain Cain. I see we have a differing of opinion.”
“Admiral—”
Hollingsworth raised a hand to stop him. “I’m not saying you’re wrong and I’m right. The difference between me and you is I have command authority and you don’t. What I decide affects millions, even billions of souls.”
“I realize that, sir. But either we fight the Juireans now or we fight them later. And if I’m right, that may be sooner than you expect. Like I said, this isn’t over. It’s just beginning.”
“And you’re the trigger point, Captain. You’re the person driving the agenda and the one Synnoc wants to kill above all others.”
“He didn’t declare war on the Union just to kill me. That came up later. He declared war to destroy the Union, to destroy all of us.”
The admiral looked to his right for several seconds as he considered Adam’s words. Adam Cain was not a patient man.
“If I am the trigger point, Admiral, then let me be the lightning rod. Let me blaze the trail. That’s what a scorched earth campaign is designed to do. Not only destroy the capabilities of the enemy, but to also open a breach for others to enter. I could plow the row, sir.”
“What do you have left aboard the Mark VII? I’ve seen the reports about Woken. With one torpedo used at Worak-nin and another six at Woken, you should only have two left.”
“That’s right, sir.”
“Hardly enough to plow the row with, wouldn’t you say, Captain?”
“Our laser beam weapons are fully functional.”
Hollingsworth raised his eyebrows. “Which is encouraging. It seemed like a valid method, but probably not enough to carry you all the way to Juir.”
Adam didn’t tell the admiral that the Juireans were programming into their defenses automatic responses to his jumps, firing salvos of
flash bolts before he could even get his bearings. The laser weapon was effective, just not as effective as it had been at first.
“Where are you now?” Hollingsworth asked.
“We’re about a three thousand light-years beyond Woken, in Expansion territory. We’re having to zig-zag so our exact jump course can’t be plotted.”
“And what would you do if you run up against a wall of Juirean defenders?”
Adam smiled. “Go in guns-a-blazing and kill every alien in sight…sir.”
“That would be funny if I didn’t know you were serious.”
“I would be serious…if I knew the fleet was backing me up. Like I said, we don’t need to defeat the Expansion, just Juir. We’ve used this strategy before—or Admiral Tobias did. He called it the Medieval Method. Take the castle and you control all the lands around it without having to fight house-to-house. Juir is the castle we have to take.”
Hollingsworth nodded. “Let me take this up with my advisors. It makes sense, and I’ll be pushing for it.” Then the admiral smiled. “Believe it or not, Captain, I’m also the hard-charging, take-no-prisoners type. It’s just that I have others I’m responsible for.”
“If we maintain the status quo, the Juireans will always be a dark cloud hanging over everything we do. You have a responsibility to make that cloud disappear, forever…sir.”
The admiral’s thin smile turned into a smirk. “I’ll be in touch, Captain. In the meantime…stay alive.”
“That’s my primary mission, Admiral.”
“Somehow I doubt that, Mister Cain. Hollingsworth, out.”
The screen went blank.
Chapter 21
Sixty million years before, a red giant star went nova and unleashed a cloud of dust and stellar debris that now stretched across forty light-years in the region of the galaxy known as the Dannon Divide. Over time, some of this stellar ejecta began to bind together in larger and larger clumps of material that would someday become stars of their own. To feed their growing appetites, these relatively tiny points of gravity gobbled up huge amounts of the red giant’s remains, and as the stellar winds continued to blow, long spires of shadowy dust, ten light-years in length, now dominated the landscape. There were four main pillars, resembling fingers on a hand, which gave this particular stellar formation its common name: The Hand of Creation.
The entire region was a star-birth factory, and the confluence of intense radiation, stellar winds and budding stars ignited space for a hundred light-years in all directions in an iridescent glow of red, green, yellow and purple—all the colors of the spectrum— representing the various temperatures and chemical composition of the excited gases.
The Hand was beautiful to observe, yet treacherous to navigate. Most star travelers skirted along the edge, content to experience this incredible wonder of the universe at a safe distance while pronouncing their admiration in a myriad of alien languages. Some enterprising entrepreneurs even took tourists to see The Hand, at least until war came once more to the galaxy
Located twelve hundred light-years from the planet Hyben—the new line in the galaxy separating the Expansion from the farside territories—a steady stream of Juirean warships now traveled the region, most bypassing the inner turbulence of the huge nebula. Once near Hyben, some continued farther in, to Sanias and Bondic-nur, while others journeyed all the way to mother Juir and the core stars of the former Seven World Common Alliance.
The dark, towering pillars—besides being beautiful and foreboding—were also perfect places to hide huge masses of starships. The radiation and near-constant eruptions on the surfaces of the newborn stars made energy signal detection virtually impossible. A thousand ships could be hidden without a trace of their existence leaking beyond the stellar interference.
Adam knew this as he maneuvered the Vengeance toward the gargantuan spires. But with time to kill before Sherri and Arieel arrived on Juir, he was looking for something a little more substantial to kill other than time.
He realized it could be a trap, but the small cluster of forty-one starships near the tip of the third finger was just too inviting to pass by. These ships had come in from the Fringe, so they had no first-hand experience with Adam and the Vengeance. Unless Fleet Command provided every Juirean ship with the automatic defense program to counter his dimensional hops, these ships might have to react the old fashion way, by entering in targeting coordinates and pressing buttons. If that was case, then most of them wouldn’t survive the next fifteen minutes.
With a nonchalant flick of a switch on his control stick, Adam initiated a short hop—only about a quarter of a light-year. When the screens shifted, the Vengeance appeared three hundred thousand miles from the first alien ship in the group. Tom Paulson was ready at fire control and Pogo had done his part to power the laser weapons. The first target would be in range in nine seconds.
To Adam’s surprise, none of the ships along the first line made the slightest attempt to evade the incoming vessel. Shields were raised…but engines remained dormant.
As Paulson’s enhanced laser beams burned through shields and hulls, something odd didn’t happen to the targets. They didn’t explode.
Adam knew only two things could cause this anomaly: Either all the atmosphere had been purged from the ships and the aliens aboard were in environment suits, or…there were no crews aboard, and the ships were decoys.
Pre-placed field dampeners came to life across fifty light-years, preventing any vessel within range from creating light-speed gravity-wells. Adam’s jump-drive wasn’t affected by the dampeners, not entirely—and the Juireans should have known this by now. Since the jump-drive produced a hybrid field disturbance, the Vengeance could still jump, but only about eight-tenths of a light-year at a time. In most cases that would have been sufficient to get them out of danger. But not when the field of battle was a ball in space fifty light-years in diameter—and the Vengeance was right in the middle of it.
Still he jumped, leaving the cluster of decoy starships far behind, not even visible by the most powerful telescopes.
But then things went from bad to worse.
A stream of hundreds of Juirean warcraft emerged from behind the vast, glowing pillars of gas. They came on maneuvering wells, just under light-speed, and in such numbers that their signals combined to form impossibly large blobs of white on the Vengeance’s threat screen. But it didn’t end there. This huge river of starships was soon joined by two more, these appearing from behind other fingers of The Hand.
Adam didn’t panic—at least not initially. Instead he set the ship at General Quarter—sealing compartments and dumping atmosphere from all compartments except the bridge—while he kept jumping, shifting his position within the huge gravity ball. Even with hops of just under a light-year at a time, the Juireans were filling the space within the sphere with more and more ships, giving him less room to maneuver as the minutes clicked by. It was as though the crew of the Vengeance was inside one of their nuclear spheres, only this one full of alien warships rather than radiation and clouds of deadly fire.
“They’re going through a lot of trouble to kill four people,” Adam said softly.
“Excuse me, sir,” said Sergeant Morgan. “I believe they’re doing this trouble to kill only one of us—maybe two. Commander Paulson and I are just along for the ride.”
Light flashed through the forward viewport as Paulson fired on a couple of ships that were within range following the last hop. Flash bolts were launched at them, but Adam was gone before they could reach the Vengeance.
“I’m glad you can maintain your sense of humor, Sergeant Morgan,” Adam replied, “especially in the face of such imminent danger.”
“Captain Cain, sir, I’m not worried. I’ve been watching you long enough to know that you’ll save our asses. You always do…sir.”
“Oh no, not you, too? This belief in my abilities could get us all killed.”
“I’ll believe that when I see it, sir.”
Riyad t
apped his screen, getting Adam’s attention. “You’re doing a great job of keeping us out of range of the enemy, but we’re rapidly running out of options.”
“Should we use the last torpedoes?” Paulson asked.
“Unfortunately, we’d be in range ourselves, and with no moon to hide behind this time. And the dampeners won’t let us jump the torpedoes more than a million miles away. Their drives aren’t as powerful as in the Vengeance.”
“We don’t have a choice, Adam,” Riyad said. There was no humor in his voice this time.
Adam relented. “All right. We’ll send them out along a line,” Adam offered. “It could break the sphere, but then well have to plunge right in after detonation.”
“Either we die here or we die there. There is farther away.”
“Tom, Pogo, prep the torpedoes. Stagger the jump range for maximum effect. Launch when ready.”
Twenty seconds later, a graphic on the forward screen—along with a slight bump through the hull—signified the weapons were away. The torpedoes would jump, appear and detonate—now!
The crew was disappointed. Except for computer indicators, there was no signs that anything had happened. That was because the light from the explosions was still several seconds away, even after a jump of only a million miles. The crew would have to trust in the computers and have faith that the torpedoes had detonated.
“Here we go. After this hop, we should be close enough to see something—”
—Adam pulled back on the stick, but it didn’t help.
The Vengeance was tumbling, riding the crest of a radioactive wave of nuclear fire as if she was a surfer at the North Shore of Hawaii. An ungodly eight seconds passed before Adam could jump again. He didn’t even know where they were going.
A split second later the men were thrown against their restraints, as an ear-splitting squeal sang throughout the ship, worse than the most-horrible fingernails-on-chalkboard scratch one could imagine.
The inertia compensators were no match for the sudden shift the ship experienced as it collided with the other vessel. Fortunately, since most starships didn’t have to withstand the same stress and pressure as rockets from a bygone era, their hulls were not as rigid. When the ships came together, their skin bent and then rebounded, propelling both craft away from each other.
