Supernova

by C. Gockel

  Sixty’s eyes widened.

  Dr. Patrick scoffed.

  Carl sniffed. “Don’t be an arrogant, idiot doctor. Volka does have the ability to compel humans.”

  Young went cold. She could?

  Dr. Patrick scowled. Not me, he thought, she can’t compel me.

  Carl put a paw to his chin. “She could probably compel animals. I’m not so good at compelling rats; I think I resemble a weasel too much—”

  Sixty snorted.

  “—they have a deep instinctive fear of weasels.” Carl scratched his chin. “But maybe Volka could charm rats like that Pied Piper fellow in human mythology. Now that would be—”

  Volka blinked. Normally, that mental image would make her mouth water, but not now.

  “Carl?” Sixty asked, rubbing his eyes. “Do you have a point?”

  Carl squeaked. “Volka can’t compel anyone to commit to a suicide mission!” He shrugged. “And perhaps not anything if people are expecting it.” He bobbed his head in Volka’s direction. “Really, Volka, you can’t. The same way I can’t compel rats to let me eat them. You can communicate, and you can nudge when your interests and your target’s interests align—”

  “Say what?” said Young.

  “—but something that would bring harm, you could put the idea there, but it would be your captain’s decision ultimately to follow it,” Carl finished, putting two paws against his hearts.

  “The ships put the ideas in our heads. They’re the conduit,” said Dr. Patrick, worrying his fingers together, a faint chill of sweat along his back. Volka shivered from it. Dr. Patrick thought of the bond between him and his ship; it was the deepest friendship he’d ever had. “Volka cannot do that,” he didn’t say aloud.

  Young shook his head. “When we fight, it’s Volka. The ships have the wrong instincts.” He stared at her, mind oddly silent.

  Her eyes slid to Sixty. He was studying the floor.

  “It’s not that different from any command position,” Young said. “Sometimes, you might have to put the idea in someone’s head to die, and they might have to take you up on that idea, because dying for the cause is something they’ve been trained to do.”

  Dr. Patrick looked between Young and Volka, his thoughts racing. “Does he really believe she can do that? If she can do that—” Aloud he said, “If she is putting thoughts in their heads, we should tell the other Marines that—”

  “No, we shouldn’t,” Young said, rubbing his temple. “They shouldn’t be wondering if the impulses they feel are hers or theirs. It’s a waste of time that might get them killed. And they aren’t just hers, they’re yours and mine—aren’t they, Volka?”

  “Yes, I think so.” Her ears came forward. How had he known that?

  Carl said, “Volka’s predatory instincts filter through all of your Marine fighting impulses and direct them, and her human mind parses your human learning. The Skimmers’ understanding of the universe is too alien and not directed toward blowing things up.”

  Dr. Patrick turned to Sixty. “You’re okay with this?”

  Sixty shrugged. “We’re sending hundreds of machines that worship me and call me General to their destruction … Young says that analyzing their impulses will hamper his men. I’d rather avoid any more destruction than absolutely necessary.”

  Volka’s ears curled, remembering how the navigation systems reacted to Sixty. He said they weren’t the same as humans—that they weren’t even as smart as a human two-year-old. He never argued that the machines shouldn’t be used in place of humans. Which didn’t mean he liked it. She could understand that. She wasn’t comfortable with her “compulsion” or “nudging” or “inspiration” she gave her captains, either.

  She gulped. Sixty’s original code was very explicit when it came to human autonomy, and Sixty hadn’t been comfortable with her using compulsion even after his programming changed. Sixty’s programming could change in an instant with volition; it could also change with experience. His current nonchalance had come the hard way.

  Carl nodded sagaciously. “As you humans say, Volka, ‘War is swell.’ Let’s get some bacon.”

  Young snorted and started down the hall.

  Dr. Patrick hesitated. He suddenly was unsure. He wasn’t a warrior; he was a scientist who made gadgets that were good for warfare. He was out of his depth.

  It was the first time Volka had heard those thoughts directed at himself and not her.

  She should feel sympathetic. But Sixty had been forced to change his programming, all the Marines were in as much danger as he was, and they were dealing with an alien entity that had them all out of their depth. She only had enough pity not to say aloud, “Join the club.”

  Sixty took her hand. “Come on. I’ll walk you to breakfast.”

  She curled her fingers around his. They’d been forced to change, but not all the changes they’d endured together had been bad.

  “Something has changed,” Alexis said, her face shimmering in the holo in his stateroom.

  Alaric wiped his face.

  Solomon standing on his hindmost paw pairs, signed, “I always love how you are so clever, Pet.”

  Alaric almost wished she weren’t so clever. It would be nice for her to believe that this was just a courtesy call.

  “You’ve discovered their shipyard.” Her lips thinned. “And you must destroy it quickly.”

  Bobbing furiously, Solomon signed, “So smart! So smart!”

  Casting a reproving look at the werfle, Alaric said, “That information is supposed to be confidential.”

  Alexis’s lips parted, her brow writ in concern. “This call could be bugged.”

  “Our enemies know we know,” Alaric added. “I think it is the population that isn’t to be informed.”

  Alexis’s lips formed a thin line. “Unless we win.”

  He raised his eyebrows in reply. “Unless we win.” A defeat would be too discouraging. The Luddecceans believed they had the mightiest fleet in the galaxy. They had fewer faster-than-light ships than the Dark, and they were massively outnumbered by the Republic. The greatest Luddeccean asset was will—blind, fanatical will. How much of that was fueled by their belief in God, a belief that they would be rewarded in the afterlife for suffering now? Alaric did not believe, but his people, his believers, might be what saved the galaxy.

  He swallowed hard. If they did succeed, it would only be by a thread.

  He realized that he had not spoken for far too long. Alexis was staring at him, unreadable and cold. He doubted things would ever be completely comfortable between them.

  “I will come home on my shield or not at all,” Alaric said, resigned.

  Shoulders falling, Alexis replied, “I would hope you’d come home.” She gave him a smile that looked forced. “I have it on good authority, I’m rubbish at Guardsmen and Infected.”

  That was Sam and Lucas’s latest game. If Alaric came back, if Luddeccea lost, the game would become very real. He inclined his head. “You might not be so good at the game, but you do well at the real thing.” And it eased his heart. Alexis wouldn’t fail their children if he didn’t come back. He remembered something that Sergeant Davies had said. “Sometimes we don’t marry the person we love the most, we marry the person we need most.” Davies hadn’t lived much longer than his wife, the woman he needed.

  Alaric’s wife smiled—tentatively, but still. It occurred to him that though Alexis was very beautiful, she’d probably rarely received compliments on her competence. Perhaps those were the dearer? Something to file away for later.

  A red light began to flash at his fingertips. He had an incoming communication that was urgent. He scowled at it. “I have to go,” he said.

  “Godspeed, Alaric.”

  Alaric’s finger hovered over the disconnect. She wasn’t like Volka; she didn’t believe in God in anything but a casual, vague sort of way. Yet she’d give her life for the fight against the Dark. Kill their own children rather than see them be captured. So would he.
Had they been infected by the larger culture around them? He was, at times, ashamed of his people. At their superstition, of their denial of so much that was good in the Republic and in their history. He wasn’t ashamed of what he was, however.

  Luddeccea had made him.

  “Thank you,” he replied, and hit the disconnect.

  22

  Battle Prep

  System Zero

  The section of timeband in Sundancer’s bridge formed a nearly flat arch. Sixty was on one side of the segment, Volka was on the other. They were both wearing their full envirosuits, though their face shields were up, and she could see his face clearly. His gaze was intent, staring at the space in the floor where the arch would be sucked through. At one of its ends there were what looked to Volka like neatly cut, square teeth; on the other end were grooves. The teeth would fit into grooves of another section of the band, and that in turn would fit with another. The Skimmers were loaded with these pieces of prefabricated time gate and were assembling it in the shadow of a lifeless planetoid at the far side of System Zero.

  The time gate didn’t have a local computer, and a Q-comm-enabled machine would be needed to give it enough computational power to operate—FET12 had volunteered. The gate was the gateway back to human inhabited space for the fighters in the event the Uriel was damaged, or for the LCSs if they lost their outriggers and the Uriel was incapacitated.

  The gate was a gift from Galactic Republic Intelligence, which was aiding them without explicit Senate approval. At the moment, Volka was glad of that, but she did wonder, what sort of government took part in activities without the oversight of its people?

  Young’s thoughts rang clear as though he were right beside her, though he was part of the assembly crew out in the void. “We’re ready for the next piece.”

  Sixty’s head jerked minutely; he must have received that message through the ether. He looked up at her, and she nodded. She’d heard. Sundancer had, too, and what was more, the ship had understood. Without Volka’s direction, the arch started to slowly descend through Sundancer’s floor, Sixty and Volka guiding it with their hands. Another piece of the arch was in the hallway, the end closest to them held up by Dixon and another crewman.

  “That’s it, that’s it … damn it.” Young’s thoughts raced, too fast for Volka to follow, and then the lieutenant said, “Sixty, can you come through? We need a little more help out here.”

  Sixty glanced up at Volka again. She took in the angles of his face, sharp and perfect. She could smell him, and the scent designed to be most appealing to the largest swathe of humanity and apparently weere. Her mouth watered, and she felt heat. She started. She hadn’t felt lust in weeks, even sleeping on his shoulder every night. What was happening?

  He raised an eyebrow.

  What was happening was that she was being distracted. “I heard,” she said. “Your battery—”

  He shook his head. “I have one more. Better to do this carefully.”

  With that, he closed his visor and lay down on the floor, disappearing through the hull with the arch.

  He was gone to her, only a lingering scent in the air, a flash of his Q-comm in the waves. That scent of him in the air, though … She licked her lips. Maybe it was just that she didn’t feel like throwing up for once and was not the least bit nauseous? She felt better than she had in weeks … She even felt like she’d be able to hold her stomach in zero G. The hair on the back of her neck started to rise at that thought.

  A few minutes later, when the last section of arch was in the void, Volka went back to one of the aft compartments, found her personal bag, and dug through it. She took out her hormonal suppressants, stared at the little packet with its neat lines of pills, stared at the dates beneath each one … and then she looked at Bracelet—back to being just a watch again. Her Q-comm chip was being installed in a Luddeccean fighter. She squinted at the date and time. Well, that explained it. She’d forgotten to take her suppressants. She flipped it over, almost pressed her fingernail through the foil backing, and then remembered that she’d have to miss three pills before symptoms of her season would start—seventy-two hours, although the early symptoms she’d be able to ignore.

  They were going to war tomorrow. The battle couldn’t last two days. They were too outnumbered to draw it out so long. Surprise was their weapon. Not numbers. The Dark might expect the Skimmers and Luddeccea’s LCSs, but they wouldn’t expect the Uriel.

  It would be nice to have one less reason to want to throw up during a space battle.

  Volka tossed the package back into her bag and went out to help with the time gate.

  23

  Planet Zero

  The Dark waited. The humans called this place Planet Zero. It knew this from the fragments of Itself embedded in the chaotic systems with the humans and their artificial creatures. This wasn’t Planet Zero; that was a misunderstanding, a miscalculation of their fractured thinking. This was Home, just like thousands of other Homes throughout the galaxy. Where Home was the waves rippled in near perfect order. There was peace. There was oneness. And Home was growing. Slowly, as waves of water wore away at a shoreline, the Dark wore away at the fractured parts of the galaxy, Its future Homes. After years of patience and incremental gains, with sudden speed, shorelines collapsed into the sea. So the Dark would claim its new Homes—slowly, and then suddenly—bringing its new creatures new peace, and finally, oneness.

  On Planet Zero, thousands of eyes in its fragmented self saw the arrival of the humans, fifteen of the Universe Breakers they called “Skimmers.” The Skimmers had recently acquired weapons and had become as violent as the new humans. The knowledge of their arrival was shared by every cell of Its being floating in the oceans, and every human toiling in the shipyard and aboard its warships. In algal cells the awareness brought only anticipation of further completeness, but in the human hosts, the knowledge sparked old neural networks, triggering cascades of adrenaline and fear. The workers in the shipyards paused. The pilots in their ships thumbed their triggers. This was what was problematic about the forms that were not Its true self, but such forms were necessary to pilot ships and build more ships. Once Home was complete, its fragments in humans would be free to perish, their knowledge preserved in Its algal forms’ waves. But for now … It tugged on the waves within its human hosts, and the tension in them drained without even a sigh. In the shipyards, production resumed. In its skies, in and out of atmosphere, fingers on triggers relaxed.

  The faster-than-light ships not busy retrieving hosts from across the galaxy winked out of System Zero: ten to the Luddeccean System, three to System 11, not to conquer, to wear away, slowly, patiently. Eventually, both systems would collapse. These humans were even more divided than those that it had encountered millions of years before. More violent. More in need of Its peace.

  Above Planet Zero, the singularity beams were spread more evenly, tilted on their axis to better cover the planet’s surface. In atmosphere and just beneath the beams, warships were ready.

  The Skimmers twisted in the skies above Planet Zero, faster than the Dark’s ships could travel. The Skimmers’ cannons were absent, and the wisdom of its new hosts declared: they were here for reconnaissance only. The Skimmers would not engage. The Dark put forth only the barest amount of resistance.

  It waited and watched the Skimmers’ bright, chaotic twists of the wave. They threatened the peace. But only for now. The Dark’s waves were humming, hungry, ready to untwine those untamed waves and bring them to peace.

  6T9 stood on Sundancer’s bow. The ethernet had gone silent in the first three seconds after their arrival in orbit of Planet Zero. Jammers, he was sure. It was now five seconds after their arrival. Sundancer’s hull was transparent, as was Farsong’s, where James was stationed. There was a hardlink between 6T9’s skull and a holomat. His eyes were wide open, focused on the planet below, singularity weapons encircling it like loose chainmail. He programmed himself not to blink. James would be doing the same. Aboard t
he ships without androids, cyborgs had camera eyes above their own that would record everything—but James and 6T9 would be faster at analyzing the visual data they received.

  The fifteen Skimmers not assigned to System 11 split into groups of three and began a pre-planned survey of Planet Zero’s surface. Conventional fighters there tried to engage and failed. The Skimmers were too fast. The singularity beams activated, but too late, the Skimmers were already leaving, turning to light, information gathered.

  A second later, they were solid again. Luddeccean ships were outside, and Luddeccea’s first planet was below. A local ethernet hub, set up by Jerome, was alive, humming through his circuits, eyes tearing to remove the accumulated dust. He turned to the holomat at the center of the floor. On it was a rendering of Planet Zero ringed by the singularity beams, their trajectories estimated by his server and illuminated in blue. A millisecond later, he’d integrated James’s analysis of the singularity weapons and their estimated coverage. A millisecond more, and data was arriving from all the mechanical eyes that had traced the planet. Seconds after that, James and 6T9 had analyzed all recovered data.

  Before, the singularity weapons had been concentrated above the shipyard. Now they were spread out. Some parallel to the planet’s surface, others turned on their axes. In the holo, the estimated force of the weapons spread from the circles in cones of graduated light, fainter where the beams’ pull would be weaker—yet still capable of drawing in a light fighter—brighter where even the Skimmers would be caught. There was no gap in the singularity beam coverage large enough for a ship like the Uriel to slip in. The Uriel carried the payload—had to carry the payload. It was too big for the Skimmers, or even the LCSs. The weapon also had to be triggered, and then needed at least three minutes from the trigger before it gathered enough fuel to activate. The Luddeccean Net-Drive LCSs had weaker shielding and could easily be destroyed in half that time by even a badly aimed torpedo or a few steady phaser blasts. The Uriel was more massive, with the latest in Galactic Republic shielding and time bands. She’d withstand a beating, but she still had to get close enough. She needed to be in atmosphere, and preferably no more than eight kilometers from the surface for maximum efficacy of the weapon.