“I agree, Prefect,” Khai stepped in. “But I assure you we’re working hard to find the proof you want.”
Sibrex and Khai explained everything they knew so far, from Khai’s setup, to their escape; from Captain Brandarr’s publicized interrogation of Khai to the destruction of the Courage, that a programmer was headed there now to start his investigation, and that the events leading to where they were now had delayed the investigation greatly. At the end, Chuumdar seemed no less convinced than he did the minute his visage appeared in the Honorifical Office.
“… and this is why I beg that you give us another standard week to uncover the truth,” Sibrex finished.
“Very well,” the Prefect said. “Another standard week has been granted. But know this, at the end of that week, not second later, I will call in the attack and we will not rest until you are defeated. Am I understood?”
“Of course, my lord,” Sibrex said humbly with a low bow. “Thank you.”
With that the channel was cut and Prime Minister Puar let out a huge sigh of relief. “Well, that could have gone worse. Thanks, you two, for your help. I don’t know if I would’ve gotten anywhere with him without you guys here.”
“I’m glad I could help, sir,” Khai said while Sibrex simply bowed.
“Prime Minister,” Dah called out. “My top programmer is here!” Officer Jor’Ray Jorrar sauntered in, his lanky arms swinging with each step. “Prime Minister, this is Officer Jor’Ray Jorrar.”
The Seryysan Leader stood and shook the frail, trembling hand of the young programmer. “It’s a pleasure, Prime Minister.”
“Likewise,” he reciprocated. “So you’re the one who was able to hack the files from the Founder ship Khai and his friends found.”
“Y-yes, sir.”
“Well done. I hope you can prove to be as resourceful now. You may use the computer we provided for you over there,” he pointed to a workstation at the far end of the office. “I would like a progress report every few hours.”
“Right away, sir!” Jorrar saluted and got to work.
After hours of waiting, Khai got up and headed to the infirmary in the Hall of Justice, a few floors down, where Brix and Kay had been transferred after they were initially treated at the Prime Minister’s house. Now that he had cleared all their names, they no longer had to skulk about, hiding in the shadows trying to go unnoticed.
Dah and Puar joined him.
Sibrex stayed behind to watch the young programmer work.
“How goes your investigation, Officer Jorrar?”
With a frustrated sigh, he looked away from the screen for the first time since he got there and rubbed his eyes. “Not so good. Whoever did this was skilled. For every firewall I breach, three more pop up in its place. I tried writing a command that would trick the originating computer into thinking it had a virus, but that didn’t work. Now I’m writing a program that will monitor and track the firewalls’ programs in an effort to anticipate where the next firewall will pop up. Through that, I can be a step ahead of them, in theory. But the trick is to not let the program get too fast at predicting them. Right now, I’m just fighting another computer. If I break down too many firewalls at once, the user on the other end may take notice and then I’m fighting both.”
“A wise plan. May I offer assistance?”
“You’re a programmer?”
“I’ve done my fair share of hacking systems,” Sibrex said without an ounce of pride in his voice.
“Well, then, by all means,” Jorrar invited. “A second set of eyes and hands would be a great help right now. Thank you.”
Before Sibrex started working, he looked to the Prime Minister who was leaning back in his big comfy chair fast asleep. It had already been ten hours and if this programmer was as good as Jorrar said he was, it was going to be a long night.
“Prime Minister Puar,” Sibrex spoke in the softest voice he had.
“Hmm,” he stirred. “What? Have you found something?”
“No, quite the opposite,” Sibrex answered honestly. “Go home. There’s nothing you can do here tonight and we will be working on this most of the night and maybe well into the morning.”
“Okay,” the aged leader said, “If you crack it, call me immediately, regardless of what time it is. Understood?”
“Perfectly, Prime Minister.”
Brix was able to sit up and ask for something to eat. That’s when Puar, Dah and Khai knew he was okay and that his wound was healing.
He had slept the last two days, all night and well into the morning. The miracle of modern medicine had made it possible for the bullet to be removed and the wound to be closed, repaired from the inside out with medical nanites. Within hours of being brought to the infirmary at the Hall of Justice, he was completely mended. Why this technology wasn’t shared with the general public? Cost. Only the richest of the rich and government dignitaries such as the Prime Minister had access to such tech. Most of the common people didn’t even know that it existed and for good reason. Knowledge of such a medical advancement that could cure cancer by actually attacking the cell directly was a tech worth rioting for, worth fighting for, worth dying for and worth killing for.
Within the hour he was on his feet and getting dressed.
“How long was I out?”
“A couple days,” Dah said. “Nothing too serious.”
“What’s our next move?” Brix asked.
“Not sure,” Khai answered. “Sibrex and I were able to buy another week of ceasefire.”
“Ceasefire? Between who?” Brix asked.
Khai continued. “And now we’re headed up to the Honorifical Office to see if Dack’s programmer has made any progress tracing the person who falsified data saying the Prime Minister ordered an assassination on Prefect Chuumdar causing a breakdown of the treaty.”
“Assassination?” Brix asked, confused.
“Problem is,” Puar continued. “The person who ordered the hit was on the Courage when it exploded.”
“Exploded?”
“Yeah. Come on, get ready. We’re leaving now,” Dah said.
“‘A couple days,’ you said. ‘Nothing too serious,’ you said,” Brix retorted mockingly.
Once they reached the top floor of the Hall of Justice, Brix was fully apprised of the situation. They stepped out into the office from the lift and found that Sibrex was there with Jorrar helping out.
“Khai, Dack, Brenan! It’s good to see you. Come in,” the Prime Minister waved them in. “It’s truly remarkable to watch them work!”
“How long have they been going?” Dah asked.
“All night,” Prime Minister Puar said. “I only got back about an hour ago.”
“Wow,” Puar said. “They’re like machines.”
“Got it!” Jorrar shouted, throwing his hand up in the air in victory.
“The programmer who did this is a Junior Officer fresh out of the Academy. His name is Alex’Xander Alarr. He’s stationed right here in Seryys Orbit.”
“Where?” Khai asked.
“Hold on,” Jorrar said. “I’m getting to it.” He kept clicking away at the keyboard. “Here it is. He’s at the Naval Training Facility on Orbital Base Three. He’s good, really good.”
“But not as good as my programmer,” Dah said with a big smile.
“So we need to get this guy to clear things up, right?” Brix asked.
“Yeah,” Khai said.
“So, what are we waiting for?” Brix asked.
They loaded up onto the Star Splitter and got underway. From the air, the city was a wreck. The bottleneck leading into Seryys Heights was literally a battlefield. Even from where they were, they could see explosions from detonite packs and vehicles. The rest of the city was empty. Sharks Stadium, the original staging area for evacuation, was ablaze, coughing large billows of smoke into the air.
As they got higher, they could see the smoldering fires from other surrounding cities where the Reapers had invaded. Initial reports sugg
ested the death toll was in the tens of thousands so far with two cities nearly evacuated (Seryys City and Tanbarder), and two more in the process of evacuation.
And, to make matters worse, with hostilities rising between Seryys and the Vyysarri, most of the military had been pulled from Reaper duty to be on call for a Vyysarri invasion that might never come. It was enough to make a sane man commit himself for a lobotomy. Khai knew that now, even though the Reaper hole was closed for good, they would never truly be rid of the Reaper menace. They would be beaten back, hunted to near extinction, even pushed into the forests outside Seryys City, Tanbarder and Klomehaven, but they wouldn’t stay there for long. They would reproduce and make little Reapers that would grow up and reproduce. Their need to eat would push them to expand beyond those boundaries and start to hunt off Seryys’ food supply. Seryys Combat would have to build a team designed and armed specifically to hunt down and exterminate the Reapers. It would be decades before people could roam out into the wilderness without the fear of being torn apart and eaten.
He grimaced as the thought brought bile to the back of his throat.
Chapter Twenty-Six
As OB 3 loomed up in the canopy of the Star Splitter, the flight control master’s voice came over the communications console.
“Star Splitter, this is Orbital Base Three. We have been notified of your arrival and you have been cleared to land in Hangar One.”
“Roger that, making approach and awaiting hauling beam.”
“Uh, negative, a policy regarding civilian craft states that use of a hauling beam is prohibited.”
“This is General Khail,” Khai snapped angrily, he hadn’t actually piloted a ship into a parking spot in a hangar since he was in the academy and wasn’t about to try it again. “And who do I have to thank for this ‘new policy’?”
“This order came from the Minister of Planetary Affairs. I would imagine it has to do with your last trip to an Orbital Station aboard a civilian vessel.”
Brix, Puar, Sibrex and Kay all looked incredulously at Khai and then Dah. Neither of them made eye contact as Khai piloted the ship into the hangar and dropped the ship between two Shark-Class interceptors. Khai hid his discomfort well, and quickly wiped the sweat beading at his forehead away. The ramp lowered and the party walked down. There, they were greeted by Commander Joor’Dann Jaill, the facilitator of the Naval Academy.
“Officer on deck!” he shouted and everyone stopped what they were doing and came to attention.
“At ease!” Khai shouted, then murmured under his breath, “Please.”
The hangar went back to its hustle and bustle.
“Follow me, please. I will lead you to the reception lounge where we can talk in private.”
“Lead the way,” Khai said waving his hand forward.
As they left the hangar, Commander Jaill continued, “I must admit I was a little surprised to have received a communiqué from Prime Minister Puar himself announcing your arrival. But apparently, it is a matter of great importance—so important in fact, he couldn’t tell me over an unsecured channel.”
“Indeed,” Sibrex added. “We should refrain from speaking of it until we have arrived at the lounge and it has been swept for listening bugs.”
“I assure you, Sibrex, there are no leaks here. Not on my watch.”
“I sympathize, Commander, but nonetheless…” Sibrex insisted.
They arrived at the meeting area. It was a small room with a polished dark wood table surrounded by chairs. A viewport to the left of the lounge lined the length of the wall. From there, they could see Seryys spinning in the distance. From here, it looked so peaceful—from here there were no Reapers, saboteurs or protesters; just a quiet, spinning globe of blues, whites and greens. Khai longed for the day when there wasn’t a conflict of some kind threatening to unravel everything and plunge the galaxy into war… again.
They all sat while Sibrex ran a scanner over almost every square inch of the lounge. When he was satisfied that there were no bugs, he gave Khai a slight nod.
“Okay,” Khai said, breaking the silence. “Now we can get down to business.”
“And what is this business, General?” Jaill asked.
“Unfortunately, you do have a leak,” Sibrex answered, sitting down next to Khai. “A young man by the name of Alex’Xander Alarr, he’s a junior officer-”
“I know who he is, Sibrex,” Jaill said curtly. “What evidence do you have that one of my star pupils is a spy?”
“This,” Dah said, handing him the evidence that his programmer uncovered.
He read it over, equal parts surprise, disbelief and pity displayed on his face. “I…” he fought for the words. “I can’t believe this! Alarr is one of the brightest boys I’ve had in decades! His aptitude tests were off the chart.”
“I know this must be hard to accept,” Sibrex said sympathetically.
“I told him the other day that if he continued to impress me and the other instructors, he would have his own command in a matter of years instead of decades. He has an ability to see things that even I missed. His Tactical Strategic Thesis for Graduation was to breakdown and critique Admiral Tarr’s decisive victory over the Vyysarri at the battle of Tallhoom.
Thirty years ago, the Planet of Tallhoom—a Seryys Colony named for the indigenous species of sentient four-legged mammals—was attacked by a massive fleet of Vyysarri ships that was on a war path for Seryys, destroying everything they encountered. Admiral Tarr, vastly outnumbered, two to one, used what he called the “galactic terrain”—a term now commonly used in training, to destroy the fleet with minimal losses. The planet was orbited by what were once two planetoids. They collided, creating an asteroid belt so thick that the Seryysans had to blast their way through to the planet below.
When Tarr arrived, the battle around the planet was almost over. The defense fleet was mostly obliterated and a bulk of the Vyysarri fleet was bombarding the planet. Tarr had the element of surprise as the asteroid belt masked his fleet’s signature when they jumped into the system. Though it was a calculated risk, Tarr bided his time and placed his ships within the asteroid belt on the far side of the planet and the rest of his fleet on the far side of one of the moons that orbited Planet Tallhoom. He then sent less than a third of his fleet—all smaller, more maneuverable ships—into orbit around the planet to bait the hook.
When the Vyysarri detected the bait ships, they gave chase immediately, following them around the planet into the trap. As the smaller Seryys ships hit the belt and the Vyysarri ships followed, Tarr’s ships within the asteroid belt opened fire. The sheer number of Vyysarri ships began to overwhelm the outnumbered Seryys ships and Tarr ordered a general retreat to the second staging area. With the Vyysarri fooled into thinking they had the Seryysans on the run, they threw caution to the wind.
The remaining vessels made their way to the moon where the second trap was set. Half of his fleet, including his ship, laid in wait. As the first Vyysarri ship rounded the moon, a fourth of Tarr’s ships opened fire taking down several of the Vyysarri ships at once, while the other final fourth of the ships rounded the other side of the moon and flanked them, taking them completely by surprise.
In short order, and with the loss of only thirty ships of two hundred, Tarr delivered a fatal blow to the Vyysarri Navy. The fleet of three hundred vessels was completely wiped out. Tarr was offered a Grand Admiral Position, but he turned it down to stay on the bridge of a starship out from behind a desk at OB 1 and Fleet Command.
Commander Jaill explained that Lieutenant Alarr analyzed the battle from start to finish and ran a simulation with his own ideas, one of which was using the ships’ hauling beam to lob asteroid fragments at the Vyysarri ships as they rammed through the belt, which freed up a third of the fleet lying in the asteroid belt. Then he allocated those extra ships to the main assault at the moon. Also, instead of having the ships round the moon from just the equator, he had them attack from the north and south poles, too. When all wa
s said and done, the losses were a staggering fifteen fewer ships in the battle. On many occasions, Admiral Tarr stated that he had thought of that, too, years later, but “hindsight gives you clarity you don’t always have in the heat of the moment,” he would say.
Though impressed with his skills, it didn’t change the fact that he was a traitor.
“Where is he now?” Khai asked.
“Computer,” Jaill called out. “What is Lieutenant Alarr’s current location?”
“Lieutenant Alarr is in his quarters.”
“That’s weird,” Jaill commented. “He’s usually in the library studying if he’s not in class. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him in his quarters except after lights out.”
They all exchanged worried looks. That could’ve meant a couple of things: he could have removed his locater chip like Widwarr; it could’ve meant he realized they cracked his code and committed suicide rather than being caught; or it could’ve meant he was packing up and about to make a run for it. Khai hoped to hell that it was the last one and they could catch him before he jumped ship, as it were.
They hustled to his quarters on one of the lower decks. As they rounded the corner and approached the door it slid open and the young lieutenant ran headlong into Khai who caught him and snatched him by his arms, putting a little of that Antaean strength behind it.
“Whoa there!” Dah shouted. “Leaving in a hurry are we?”
“Let go!” the kid demanded.
When he realized that he couldn’t, and would never be able to break Khai’s grip, he sagged almost like a child being told no for the last time.
“Let’s talk,” Dah said, binding his wrists behind his back.
Khai led him back to the lounge where they could all interrogate him in private.
As soon as Alarr sat, Puar was in his face. “Ok, kid. Spill it!”
That was all it took. The kid, in his early twenties, literally started crying right there in his chair. They all looked at each other with half bewildered, half sympathetic looks.
The Seryys Chronicles: Of Nightmares Page 17
