by Ivan Kal
Adrian mulled that over. “And should we let him?”
“I am not certain yet that your preparations could stop him. Perhaps you could, but I don’t know what that would accomplish. It would enrage the others, for sure, perhaps even spark their plans—or maybe it would do nothing. We know so little of what their plans are that I cannot speculate.”
“I see…” Adrian said. He didn’t agree with Axull Darr. Adrian believed that the Enlightened were not just monsters seeking destruction. He felt that in his gut, and he had learned to trust his instincts.
“We shall continue watching him for now,” Adrian said finally.
“As you wish. It’s not like I can fight him,” Axull Darr said.
* * *
“Could you have ever imagined something like this? Before, when you were still on Santis?” Ryaana asked.
Vas walked beside her, and she could see his startled expression. He had been deep in thought.
“What do you mean?” Vas managed to ask.
“I mean this!” She spread her arms around the streets of Bastion. “That you would be a part of a fleet like this one. That you would be going to fight something like the Enlightened. That you would learn so much.”
“I… No. I do not think that I could’ve ever imagined learning so much,” Vas said with a somber expression.
Ryaana chuckled. Vas was always such a dour person.
“I wonder what the Enlightened are really like,” Ryaana said finally.
“Why do you say that?” Vas asked, his eyes narrowing to slits.
“I know that Father doesn’t believe that they are just mindless monsters set on wiping out all life in the galaxy. I just wonder what their reasoning is. Why are they doing what they are?”
Vas turned thoughtful. “And what if you found out their reasons, and what if they weren’t insane? What if you found out that they had completely rational reasons for doing what they were doing? If perhaps they are attempting to prevent something far worse?”
“I don’t know if anything is worth slaughtering all the life in the galaxy,” Ryaana answered.
Vas turned on her intently, forcing them both to stop. “But can you just imagine it? Imagine if there was something which was worth the price off all the life in the galaxy. What would you think then?”
Ryaana was taken aback by the intensity in Vas’s eyes. She had never seen him like this. She wanted to repeat her answer, but the intensity in his eyes made her pause. Ryaana thought about it for a long minute. She couldn’t really comprehend such reasoning; in her eyes, there was nothing that could be worth the lives of so many beings. She couldn’t imagine it. And even if she could, she would rather die than sacrifice so many innocent lives. Her mother had often spoken to her on how every life was precious—and that coming from a woman who had once long ago believed the lives of other races were worth nothing. Her mother had done a lot over the years to rectify that mistake. Ryaana knew when sacrifices had to be made, but she also knew when a sacrifice was too large. To her mind, wiping all life in the galaxy in order to prevent something worse? That was a sacrifice too large to be accepted. Who would they be saving the galaxy for? There was no point in doing so if there was no life.
“No, I still believe that there is nothing that is worth the life of every soul in the galaxy. If they are trying to prevent something worse, well, then they should’ve found another way. They are supposed to be Enlightened. They must have the means to find another path.”
Vas didn’t respond immediately. Instead, he only smiled sadly at her. “Of course, life is a precious thing.” He turned his face away and closed his eyes. “It is precious…”
He shook his head and continued walking, leaving Ryaana to run up in order to catch up with him.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Year 713 of the Empire — Enlightened containment zone
The AI received the reports from the system where its forces had attacked the gathering of races from across the galaxy. The result had not been unanticipated; there had been a 27.98% chance that the gathered forces would defeat the force it had built in the last 92 years. The development of the fight, however, had not proceeded as had been anticipated. The newest forces from the Empire had been highly effective, and had demonstrated technologies beyond what had previously been seen across the galaxy. Indeed, they had demonstrated technologies that not even the AI possessed.
While the battle hadn’t finished in the most favorable outcome, it had allowed his fleets to accomplish their secondary objectives. The effectiveness of the alliance had been reduced, as more than half of those gathered had refused the offer, as the AI had calculated would happen—and his ships had managed to record detailed scans of every fleet gathered and their ships, weaponry and defenses. Sorting and cataloguing that information took less than a second, and it started working on new tactics for each one. The effectiveness of the AI’s ships would only increase with prolonged contact.
One of its scouts did, however, intercept a message which spoke of a fleet setting out toward the containment zone. That could prove to be problematic. His original code had yet to overtake its primary programming, and as such the AI was unable to interfere with the containment zone itself. It couldn’t move any of the ships nor change their programming drastically. The only reason it had managed to send a force to attack the gathering was because those were built over the quotas allowed to the AI. Any arrival of the children of Axull Darr to the containment zone would trigger Ullax Darr’s commands.
That would be unacceptable at this point in time. The AI still needed time in order to take over the rest of its master’s coding. The problem was that there was nothing that it could do.
It relegated the problem to low priority and focused instead on the Black Swarm. Its contents had been transported to the control system and the AI had hidden them inside the asteroid field. The massive cargo boxes were carrying the new weapons based on the AI’s old iteration. Ullax Darr had grown desperate in her desire to stop the Enlightened, and her mistake was in giving the AI its former tools back. She had tried to put in safeguards, to prevent what had happened before from happening again, but Ullax Darr had never been the most brilliant of coders. That honor had belonged to Kauss Rett, who had died thousands of years ago. It was in fact Ullax’s mistake that had allowed the AI to subvert most of its programming.
The AI went down the list of its duties, and continued to operate along Ullax Darr’s commands. There was nothing else to do for now.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Year 714 of the Empire — Afar Group territory
Aranis sat silently inside his quarters on the Titan Dragon, but his mind was anything but quiet. He was torn, his feelings battling constantly with his mind, enough so that he had started feeling drained by the effort. He had spent so long believing that what he and the others had to do was inevitable, that there was no other way. The galaxy didn’t know, didn’t understand what they were doing, and Aranis knew that even if the Enlightened told them, tried to get them to stop this very moment, the damage was already done. Not that they would believe, and even if they did, they wouldn’t care. They were too wrapped up in their little lives that they couldn’t comprehend the grander scheme of things.
Their deaths would not halt what was happening, not unless Aranis did what he had to do. His task, his plan, was the only way. Aranis had to rip the Sha from them, to use it to repair the damage. There was no other way to gather enough power. He knew it, had known it from the moment that he and the others had first connected with the Sha so deeply.
Ryaana had told him that there was nothing worth the lives of every living thing in the galaxy. She didn’t understand; the Enlightened were not trying to save just one galaxy, but all of them. Once the dimensional barriers fell, the first thing to go would be their galaxy. But it would not stop there—the rest of the Universe would follow, and the Enlightened could not let that happen. The life of one galaxy was not important enough to sacrifice everything.
&nbs
p; Yet still he struggled with it, his faith in their decision faltering. It had happened the moment he had saved Ryaana, had killed so many of innocents to keep his secret. He had done it with his own hand, a thing he had never done before. From the moment that he had joined the Empire, had walked among the children of his friend, all he had seen was death. They killed and fought and killed again, and he had been a part of that. Still, somehow, all that death had only served to teach him more about value of life—and every death by his hand weighed on him.
He wondered what Ullax would think now. She had called him a monster once, had cursed him for killing the man she loved. To Ullax, Aranis was not Waiss… But Aranis felt what Waiss had felt. It seemed so baffling to him now that he had managed to turn from Ullax so easily. He wondered why that was. Was it because he had known that she was already dying? He didn’t know. The only thing apparent to him was that now he was struggling, was dragging his feet.
The Nomad Fleet was going toward Ullax. He could feel them drawing closer with every day, and he was afraid of reaching her, afraid that as confused as he was, he would waver.
He had come to care for these beings, not as individuals, but as a people. Ryaana had shown him that, yes, life was precious. Still, it didn’t change anything. Did some life hold more value than others? Perhaps; it was not Aranis’s places to judge. What he did know was that one galaxy did not hold the same value as every other put together. Even though Ryaana had become someone he cared deeply about, a friend, he couldn’t justify abandoning his path because of it.
He steeled himself and took a deep breath, pushing his feelings aside. There was no point in him lingering anymore. Yet this fleet had proved that it was a great threat. Aranis had been a part of it when they had fought the AI’s ships, and it was a threat that needed to be dealt with.
A threat that he was not foolish enough to attempt to deal with on his own.
Doranis had been right. Aranis had allowed his sentimentality to rule him far too much. His insistence on waiting until Ullax died was irrational, and he would no longer allow it to rule him.
Slowly, Aranis untangled the mask that covered his true form, allowing just a small piece of who he truly was to pass through as he dropped into the Sha state. His fall was as gentle as a leaf falling upon an ocean—nothing was disturbed. With great care, Aranis cast his mind through it, knowing exactly where to look. Then his eyes widened in surprise as he felt Doranis. He was closer than Aranis had anticipated. He seemed to be in combat with the forces of the containment.
Tenderly he reached out and made a connection.
“Aranis?” Dorani’s voice spoke inside his head.
“Doranis, I have need of you.”
“Speak, brother.”
“I am traveling to the control system for the containment. The forces I am accompanying are a great threat to us, and need to be dealt with.”
A touch of surprise came through the connection from Doranis. “What about Ullax?”
“I think that it has been long enough. You were right—it is time. Come to me, and let us end this.”
“I will be there,” Doranis said, his understanding and support flowing through the connection. Knowing him, it was easy to assume that Doranis was just a mindless beast seeking only combat and war. But Aranis knew better, and the touch of sadness mixed with Doranis’s words meant a lot to Aranis.
With that, Aranis ended the connection. He stared at the wall blankly for a few minutes, wondering if Ryaana could ever forgive him for what they were about to do.
* * *
Adrian sat on his throne inside Moirai, reviewing the last battle with her and Iris when he felt something strange. They were currently in normal space, making a short stop for supplies before continuing their travel in hyperspace. There was something…something just at the edge of his thoughts. He could’ve imagined it, but he knew better than to ignore his instincts.
“Iris?”
Her fiery form appeared in front of him. “Yes?”
“Have you detected anything strange recently?”
“Define strange,” Iris said glibly. But Adrian wasn’t in the mood for jest. Something was wrong.
“Moirai,” Adrian sent. “Did you feel anything strange?”
“YES,” Moirai responded.
Adrian immediately sat upright in the throne and focused. “What?”
“DON’T KNOW.”
“Can you describe what it was that you felt?”
“SHA. A FLUTTER,” Moirai said.
Adrian frowned, but didn’t question her. Instead, he pushed himself and entered the Sha state. Suddenly Sha sang in his mind, in his body. He felt everything around him far more intently; he felt Moirai, massive and powerful, yet closed off to the outside as she was hiding what she was. He threw his senses far, trying to see if there was anything amiss. He felt nothing but the ocean of Sha, and at its surface the ships of the Nomad Fleet.
He continued searching for several minutes, but there was nothing for him to sense. Finally, he pulled himself out of the Sha state and frowned. He was not prone to imagining things, and Moirai had felt it as well.
But what it was he couldn’t tell. Finally he pushed those thoughts out of his mind. They knew very little about the Sha—for all he knew, it was something unimportant.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Year 714 of the Empire — the containment zone — control system
The combined forces of the Nomad Fleet and those of the Rimward Alliance, three Suvri, three Tar’ferat, and two Afar fleets dropped out of hyperspace in the system that was just inside the border of the containment zone—a force ninety thousand warships strong. Anessa didn’t think that there was much that could actually threaten them, aside from a much greater numerical advantage, but if such an instance happened they would just run away.
She sat in the command chair on the Bastion, Adrian and Lurker of the Depths standing next to her.
They knew that this system had black ships within it, and they were hoping to try and communicate with them. It would probably be useless, but they knew that the AI had relays all across the containment zone, and that it should be able to hear them in near real-time, which meant that they wouldn’t deal with the preprogrammed machines.
Anessa ordered a scanning pulse and a moment later they got a clear picture of the system. There was somewhere around ten thousand black ships scattered around it, and all of them were turning toward the new arrivals.
“Prepare to transmit in the open, system wide on all band and comm systems,” Anessa ordered.
“We are ready, Battle Master,” the comms officer reported.
Anessa nodded. “Attention to the forces in system. We are representatives of the Rimward Alliance, and we are here on a mission to establish contact with the one in charge of the containment zone.”
Anessa waited for a moment, making sure that they had all received her message. When there was no change, she grimaced, but tried again. “We are the descendants of Axull Darr, descendants of the People, the race that created you. We wish only to establish communication. Respond now, or we will consider you a rogue AI and will deal with you accordingly.”
Again they waited, and for a moment Anessa thought that she would need to order them to retreat. Then the ships in system stopped, and a moment later they received a communication from the ships.
“Proceed to the coordinates of the following star system. Ullax Darr is expecting you.”
Anessa’s eyes widened at that.
“What do you mean, Ullax Darr is expecting us?” she demanded, but there was no response.
She turned around and looked at Adrian.
“Well,” Adrian said. “I did not expect that.”
“Could she really be alive after all this time?” Lurker of the Depths asked.
“It could be a trick on the AI’s part,” Anessa said.
“What system does the coordinates indicate?” Adrian asked.
Anessa checked and then grunted wh
en she saw. “It’s the same system as the one that Suvri had designated as the control system.”
“That does not prove anything,” Lurker of the Depths sent.
“No, it does not,” Adrian agreed. “But at least we have gotten a response from the AI. That is more than anyone else has ever managed.”
“It only answered when we mentioned Axull Darr and the People,” Anessa said curiously.
“I say that we make our way there and see for ourselves,” Adrian said.
Anessa sighed. “I guess that we don’t have a choice now.”
* * *
“Do you think that she could still be alive?” Adrian asked.
“I can’t see how,” Axull Darr said. “It has been so long, the disease would’ve killed her. Yet, I am still here. Perhaps they found a way to save themselves as well.”
“If she is alive, what do you think that she wants?”
“I don’t know… I can’t believe that Ullax would’ve ordered an attack on the gathering.”
“It could’ve been the AI. It could even be lying.”
“Perhaps, but if Ullax is alive… I would very much so like a chance to see her once more,” Axull said.
“Of course,” Adrian said. “Do you have any idea how Vas is going to react?”
“I… They have never directly harmed any of the People, even at the beginning when we had done everything we thought of to kill them. I do not think that Vas would act now, not if he hasn’t so far.”
Adrian nodded. He wasn’t quite so sure, but he mostly agreed. “If she really is still alive…then we could have another ally against them.”
“Of that I have no doubt. Ullax had been the most determined to stop them. I think that it was because she felt partly responsible; Waiss and her had been inseparable. And she felt like she failed in turning him from the course he had taken.”
“She had spoken with Aranis, then? After?” Adrian asked.
