Star Angel: Rising (Star Angel Book 4)

by David G. McDaniel

  And there was yet another twist in this convoluted tale, one that was news to them:

  The Dominion and Venatres had signed a truce.

  In theory, at least, Anitra was no longer split. As monumental as that was, it was a point that was still developing and had, in light of the extreme urgency of the Kel threat and Nani’s insistence, been mostly glossed over. As a former soldier of the Dominion Zac was intensely curious to know more, but for now did his best to be there for Nani and support her plan. Which, of course, was probably the biggest weapon in her unique position.

  Him.

  On top of everything Nani had the mighty Zac. Not a minor point. And so Lindin and company were listening, for now, whether they wanted to or not, and at this meeting the president would listen as well. Zac only hoped Nani had something worth saying. As yet he had no exact idea what she intended—she’d kept quiet on the whole thing, even among their little group—but he could almost feel her determination. Like an intense field of willpower or something, beaming off of her up ahead, silent yet powerful, focus on what was about to transpire as they tromped along the barren corridors of the mountain complex.

  In the wake of all that had happened Zac was calmer than he expected. In particular where Jess was concerned. Much of the intense hopelessness had passed. She was long gone, no Icon, no way, no more real hope to go directly to her, but enough time had passed that he found himself with no choice but to believe, to believe with all his heart that she’d found a way to survive and that she was fine. That Bianca was right. That Jess was okay. She did survive and she would make it until they were re-united. It was all he had and, to his great relief, it had at last become the calm certainty that would get him through.

  They reached their destination and entered.

  Zac recalled participating in planning meetings in this very room—what seemed an eternity ago, in truth not that long ago at all—back when he was the defected Kazerai, the Dominion traitor among the Venatres, worrying over local wars and enemy invasions, plotting how best to use his strength to add to the equation. Now those things seemed so trivial. Now all the other Kazerai were dead. Now the Dominion was an ally. Now an ancient alien menace had been discovered that threatened them all. Starships were a reality, traveling among worlds.

  How things had changed.

  Absently he rubbed his bearded cheek, as he’d gotten in the habit of doing, the stiff beard an odd distraction. He looked around, taking stock of the scene. The room was filled with important people. He knew many. Nani went to the seat waiting for her at the opposite end of the long, oval table and stood beside it. The Venatres president was sitting at the other end. Bianca and Willet took seats off to the side. Zac found one nearby, and when Nani didn’t sit decided to remain standing. He was there for her. He positioned himself away from the table, closer to the wall.

  “Mister President,” Nani nodded to that end of the table. She gave a few more nods to the others in attendance. A brief glance to Lindin.

  Then, for an awkward moment, everyone kind of watched for her to take her seat. Everyone else was sitting. But she didn’t, and when it became clear she wasn’t going to, the president delivered the opening salvo. “You stole our starship,” he said. “I hope you have a good explanation.”

  “I don’t need an explanation,” Nani replied, setting the tone. She looked around the table, making eye contact with as many uniformed necks as she could. “Whether Lindin bothered to relay all the details to you or not,” she told them, “there is something far bigger going on than stolen starships.” Silence hung in the room. A few traded looks among themselves, bored or uncertain. Nani made what appeared to be an assessment of their stodgy expressions and came to a conclusion.

  “I don’t think I have your attention.”

  At that she raised a leg and …

  Stepped into the chair, then up onto the table.

  It was completely unprecedented, completely unexpected, and Zac felt his eyes go wide along with everyone else’s.

  Suddenly Nani had their full attention.

  Zac looked around, checking for threats. Trying to keep up with whatever Nani was about to do. Most everyone leaned back in their chairs as she boldly stood there atop that end of the table. Then she started walking, down the length of it, shiny black boots clacking on the heavy wood.

  “Each of you came here,” she said as she stepped to one guy’s spot and kicked his notebook onto the floor, “and for that I thank you. Mister President,” she looked to him even as she kicked two more notebooks to the floor—and a glass of water that shattered as it hit. They all cringed or jumped in their seats. “Thank you for coming up.” No one moved. Several of them looked to Zac. Would he stop them if they protested? Nani turned to the woman whose water she’d just knocked away, speaking directly down to her: “You can get a drink when we’re done.”

  On impulse Zac came a little closer to the table. Seemed like the right time to make his presence felt. To back Nani up, shocked by her actions though he was. He sincerely hoped she wasn’t actually losing her mind. He crossed his arms, having no idea where this was going as she continued around the table, kicking the rest of everything off. Notebooks, pens, water glasses—everything got kicked to the floor, small shatters and quiet thumps filling the stunned space.

  Where did this Nani come from?

  “We’re here to listen,” she said, “not take notes. Not doodle or sip water.” She finished at the far end, right down to the president himself where his own things got kicked off, then turned and strode back to the middle of the table.

  “The future of our world depends on it.”

  She paused.

  And began. “Now that I have your attention, forget—forget—anything that has gone before. Wipe your minds clean. All your pre-conceived ideas, your cherished institutions, your vested interests; forget it all. This is a new age. This new age begins with war and if we’re to survive, if we’re to come out with any freedoms whatsoever, if we’re ever to have any new institutions, we have only one choice:

  “Fight.”

  “What is all this?” one of them finally got past the shock to complain.

  “There’s no time for pleasantries,” Nani told the man. “Too much has to happen too fast and we’re already days behind just being here having this little talk.”

  “This is ridiculous,” the man spoke to the others as if they must surely feel the same outrage he did. “I’m not about to—”

  “Out.” Nani pointed over his head to the door. The man looked at her like she was crazy. Had been looking at her like she was crazy, only now he really seemed convinced she’d lost it. “Out,” she repeated when he didn’t move. Then: “Get. Out.”

  The man continued to look at her blankly. Zac realized that was his cue. He started toward the dissenter but made it only a few steps before the man snapped to and showed himself hurriedly from the table and out of the room, tripping over his chair in his hurry to avoid whatever Zac had planned. The slam of the door marked the end of that awkward moment in time.

  Nani continued as if there had been no distraction.

  “We’ve just come from Earth,” she said. Zac resumed his place near the table. “A world vastly unknown to us but, as it turns out, in many ways like us. Like Anitra.

  “Earth has been overrun. The starship we took is Kel. We know that. The Reaver was made a thousand years ago by the race that ruled this world. What we did not know, and what we discovered, is that the Kel have been reborn. We found their homeworld. They, in turn, found their way to Earth. Where they promptly invaded. No questions, no compromise. In that short time between when we made contact and they followed us to Earth they mounted a full invasion and, just before we escaped, Earth was overrun. That easily, that quickly. Earth, a world just like Anitra, is no more.”

  She looked around the room from her elevated position, looming over them.

  “The Kel are coming here next.”

  One of them was raising a
hand to protest, as if asking permission to do so, eyes flitting nervously to Zac. Nani ignored him and pressed on.

  “The particulars of our little adventure are unimportant. We are looking only to the future and the preservation of what we know. I believe the Kel found the Icon when Kang and Zac arrived in their system. That Icon connects the Kel system and Earth. That means they know how to get to Earth but not yet here.

  “The Kel have rebuilt. Since the Great Wars they’ve rebuilt and, after a thousand years, they have massive fleets capable of star travel that are geared explicitly for war. They control their home system utterly, dreaming of worlds for conquest. Staging war games on a planetary scale. To them the Icon was a godsend. They found a way to understand the device, to exploit it. We witnessed their arrival. We witnessed their invasion.

  “Anitra is the next stop on their road to empire. They want colonies. Subjugated worlds like they had in the past.”

  The presumably smart people in the room were struggling to keep up.

  “So when are they coming?” one of them stammered. That man looked around the room, at the doors—as if imagining the Kel might be waiting outside even then. Or, more imminently, if he would be forced to rush for the exit for having spoken.

  “As soon as they find the way,” said Nani. “This is the urgency we’re working against. This is what you need to understand. There is no time.”

  “How will they find us? How will they know how to get here?” Those around the table exchanged glances.

  “The fact that they don’t yet know where we are is all that’s saving us. This is our one positive. They would be here even now otherwise. Once they do find us … they have the might to take us in a day.”

  “But how will they find us?”

  Rather than grow annoyed, as Zac expected, Nani said instead: “Things were left behind. A device from the starship,” and Zac thought of the tablet, lost by he and Jessica, “a fighter from the starship. All with information on Anitra that could be cracked.” They looked at her, putting together what that meant. “On top of that they’ve captured Satori who, while she has no direct knowledge of how to get here, could yield other clues.” The mention of this brought the only softening of Nani’s expression Zac had seen in days. She looked painfully at Willet, who seemed numb by then.

  “This is all your fault!” one of them raised his voice and put his hand over his mouth as soon as he’d spoken. Terrified.

  But it was true. Nani, Zac … this whole mess was triggered by their actions.

  Again Nani ignored the interruption. “There may be other Icons,” she said. “On Earth. We think there are. Also the Kel could simply follow our trail. If they can follow us …” She let that sink in. Of everything she’d mentioned so far that possibility was perhaps the most real.

  The most frightening.

  Everyone was sitting very straight by then, leaning forward and looking up with anticipation at what Nani might say next.

  “There are many ways they could find us. At any moment. We’re in grave danger. The cause of that danger makes no difference,” she conceded. “We can’t sit here and wait. They will come. They want Anitra, and in fact thought that’s where they were going when they reached Earth. I know this from their own data. They will come here, by whatever means they can exploit, and when they do there will be nothing in our current arsenal to prevent a massacre. Everything we know will be lost.

  “I, however, have a way.”

  “So what are you suggesting?” asked the president, working to maintain his composure. To roll with everything Nani was throwing at them, not least of all her table-top sermon. “What do you propose? You claim they’ll destroy us, yet you suggest we attack them? How?” So Lindin had told him things.

  Zac glanced to Nani, standing over everyone atop the table. By then he’d lost track of how odd the scene was. She’s standing on the conference table. Talking to the most powerful people on this planet like they were difficult children.

  He was starting to think that, to her, they were.

  “Two things. One, I noticed what I believe is a weakness in their forces,” she said. “At least inasmuch as it plays to one of our strengths.” She began pacing the table again, a little less strident now. As if finally arriving at her point. “Believe it or not we may have an edge over the Kel. A long shot, but I’ve had plenty of time to evaluate their technology and tactics and I feel we have an answer. Though the Kel are unquestionably more advanced, we can stand against their forces.

  “At least long enough. And we must do it on Earth.”

  She waited as they digested that. Zac could almost see their minds trying to imagine taking a battle to another world.

  His was churning too.

  “Yes,” Nani confirmed. “We need to take this fight to them. To Earth. Where the Kel are now. Overturn that invasion and beat them back. There. Before they come here. Earth is already overrun. Earth is already a battlefield.”

  The stares only got more blank, not less.

  “The Kel infantry are well armed,” she moved on, “but there’s a significant gap between them and their first level of fighting machine.” She paused. “I do not believe the Kel have a good answer for our highly-mobile, mid-strength forces.

  “I’m speaking specifically of our Anitran powered armor. Skull Boy and Astake.

  “We use those here in great numbers. Great numbers. It has been our way of fighting for a long time. We’ve got huge forces of powered armor, both the Venatres and the Dominion. It’s how we fight our wars. The Kel, surprisingly, don’t have a good answer for it. From what I now know our powered armor is far more maneuverable than the larger Kel machines and, importantly, powerful enough to deal damage. We should win those engagements. At the other end of the spectrum the Skull Boy and Astake are far more powerful than the Kel foot soldiers and should win those engagements as well.” She was giving specifics, and while specifics were unimportant for that meeting Zac appreciated the effect. Giving these military-minded leaders something of substance to chew on was helping. “I’ve run simulations,” she said. “With the Kel forces assembled on Earth our Anitran forces—perhaps even in conjunction with whatever might be left of Earth forces—could win a ground war.

  “Which brings me to the second point of our strategy.” Zac noted, too, how Nani was making this prospect theirs and not just hers. “Their starships. This is what gives them absolute domination, no matter what we accomplish on the ground.” She paused. “And for that I also have a solution.”

  “A solution to fighting starships?”

  “My data is sound,” Nani told them but said no more. “I’m fully informed of both our strengths and weaknesses and theirs. They know nothing of us. I know most everything about them. I have a way. We can win an engagement and set and equip ourselves for the next stage.”

  “But—”

  “If this were a discussion of how to plan and initiate a war then everything I’m saying would be foolish. It would be insane to initiate such a conflict.”

  She stared at them; to a man, to a woman.

  “But we’re not initiating this war,” she said. “This war has already been started. And if we don’t respond, however much of a long shot that response is, we will be absorbed by the Kel and killed and made their subjects. Anitra, as we know it, will be over.

  “This is our only chance.”

  “What if we negotiate?” someone offered. “Why do we need such a massive, violent response? If the Reaver is more advanced, go back and force a negotiation.”

  Nani reached in her pocket and took out a clicker. She pointed it to a screen on the far wall and an image came up. Video of the invasion of Earth. Something she’d prepared, no doubt. More images cycled, showing the absolute might of the Kel, their technology versing the Earth’s, the overwhelming force they wielded, how weak was the human response. Obliteration piled upon destruction, no answer for the power of the Kel. Zac looked at the faces around the table, each captivated by the
footage, mesmerized by the violence it portrayed—and by their first sight of the aliens. The presentation of the video was nearly too perfect, throwing a visual stimulus into the mix right at that moment, right on the heels of what had, until then, been nothing but talk.

  “The people of Earth tried to negotiate,” said Nani. “This is what happened.”

  Silence around the room as the horrific images continued to scroll. Zac noticed the sadness on Bianca’s face. For the rest of them this was happening to someone else. Yes, the threat was there, but it hadn’t yet hit home.

  For Bianca it had. These images were of her world.

  “How would we even get there?” The president, at least, seemed to be considering the idea of what must be done. It seemed as if he wanted to understand what Nani was saying; how it would work. “I mean, to field an army of that size … we can’t fly them over on the Reaver.”

  “Icons,” said Nani. “I can construct Icon units. Correctly designed we can use them to outfit each suit.” The prospect of this, of creating Icons, raised more than a few eyebrows. “I have coordinates and we can create and program basic devices for each suit and send them over. I can even calculate variances for global separation. We can insert our forces at select points on Earth and take the battle to the Kel.” She took her first deep breath since the meeting began. “While I’ve been on this little adventure my learning curve has been in hyperdrive,” she said, a glimmer of the Nani Zac knew rising to the surface. The geeky Nani, as Jess and Bianca might say, and he was happy to see it. “I’ve been figuring things out faster than I ever did in the lab. I know now what I can do. What we can do. And we can make the devices that will make this possible.”