by Dan Worth
The Shapers had sought it greedily, gleaning what they could from fragmentary records which they expanded upon and used their own prodigious intellects to try and construct their own device. Theirs was different from that built by the Progenitors. As yet, they had difficulties moving objects through time. The snatching of the Commonwealth fleet from the Hadar system and sending back to its time of origin had been a tentative start, by using one of their ships as an anchor point, but they had not successfully sent anything any further backwards in time. The information paradoxes became too great.
Their device could only reliably move objects through space, and unlike the Progenitor device, rather than harness the power of stars, it fed from the vast energy output from the ultimate engine of destruction at the heart of the galaxy, the black hole named by the Arkari as The Maelstrom. Gigantic arrays floated above the event horizon, defying the pull of that enormous maw, drinking in the raw energy of cosmic annihilation.
Such energy reserves gave the Shapers enormous power. Where the Progenitor wormhole portal had generated and then maintained a single wormhole at once, theirs would produce many - hundreds, perhaps thousands of wormholes at once. But the energy required was enormous. They had tested it by generating single wormholes for several years now, scattering scouts and small assault forces around the galaxy, but what they had planned now would require a vast expenditure of energy. Such a large number of wormholes could not be kept open indefinitely. The Shapers would need to achieve their objectives quickly before the device was drained of power and in need of re-charging. Even with the power of a black hole at their disposal, it would take some time to do so.
To the Shapers, the Arkari were the greatest threat in the Western Spiral Arm. Their technology was secondary only to their own. Their war fleets were enormous and well equipped. The vassal races of the Shapers could not hope to stand against such technological might. The Shapers themselves must commit a significant proportion of their forces and use the element of surprise to bring the Arkari to heel. The other races would be enslaved, but the Arkari: no, the Arkari must be annihilated.
A vast armada now gathered in front of a gigantic ring shaped structure encased in continent sized chunks of machinery that floated above the equator of the Maelstrom. Hundreds of kilometres in diameter, its black, crystalline structure glinted in the ghostly light of the Maelstrom’s accretion disk. Slowly, it began to turn.
In the Lagrange point between Keros and its moon, the point of brilliant light and energy was growing. As her transport rose above the atmosphere of the planet at maximum acceleration, Beklide saw it more clearly now, the point was expanding into a disc, limned with blue-white shimmering light. Through it shone the corpse-light of dying suns.
Her ship had finally managed to raise the Sword of Reckoning. Old fashioned analogue radio communication still worked.
‘Meritarch, this is the Sword of Reckoning,’ she was being addressed by the ship’s AI, its carefully modulated female tones seeming unruffled by events. ‘We are detecting what appears to be a wormhole terminus in the Lagrange point between Keros and the Moon. All other means of communication are down and my hypercom interfaces are being bombarded with an unknown virus infection. As a precaution I have undocked from the Ring.’
‘Order all other ships to do the same,’ Beklide replied. ‘Form up in a defensive screen between the Lagrange point and the Ring. Contact the Ring and order that all defences be brought online.’
‘At once,’ the ship replied. ‘Wait. The Ring’s systems are being disrupted. I can elicit no response from her AIs. It appears that they are still present within the Ring, but the hypercom backbone of the structure’s network has been hijacked by the virus and is preventing communication between the cores or with the outside world. The hypercom network appears to be down system wide. It is prudent to assume that this may be the case across the Sphere.’
We’re cut off, and our main static defences are down, thought Beklide as her transport swooped towards the two hundred kilometre long bulk of the dreadnought Sword of Reckoning. This had to be the Shapers. Who else could bring the Arkari down with a single stroke?
A docking port appeared in the skin of the dreadnought, swallowing Beklide’s transport as the enormous vessel powered away from the Ring to face the wormhole.
The bridge of an Arkari vessel was rather different to those found aboard human ships. The advanced information technology of the Arkari lessened the need for a central command and control centre with banks of dedicated consoles. Nevertheless, it still made things much easier to have a ship’s command staff in one place during combat: enemy counter measures couldn’t disrupt face to face communication and although Arkari vessels were run by AIs who were allowed to take the initiative to a degree, all commands still had to come from Arkari officers and weapons were still under the final authority of Arkari crew with aiming and firing performed by the ship under orders. The bridge of the Sword of the Reckoning lay near the bows of the massive, manta ray shaped vessel. It was a huge curving space where information could be clearly projected alongside views outside the ship from whatever angles her crew requested.
It was busy with Arkari crew as Beklide arrived from the transport tube, somewhat out of breath and struggling to compose herself. The Sword of Reckoning had halted ten thousand kilometres away from the shining wormhole exit as vessels of all classes began to form up around the massive dreadnought.
Beklide strode up to her second in command, Ship Master Urkild, who was eyeing the glowing phenomenon with deep suspicion.
‘Report,’ she commanded smartly.
‘All weapon systems are online and functioning normally. The primary spatial distortion cannon is charged and ready to fire. We are attempting to verify the wormhole’s point of origin.’
‘I think it’s safe to assume that it’s coming from the galactic core, Ship Master. Look.’ She gestured towards a magnified image of the wormhole’s mouth that hung in the space before them. Through it could now be seen the fiery glow of a black hole’s accretion disk. Shapes were moving against that flaming backdrop. They were coming closer.
‘Scans indicate that approximately a hundred Shaper vessels of varying sizes are massing on the far side of the wormhole,’ said the ship.
‘Only a hundred?’ said Beklide. ‘That can’t be right.’
‘I think we can take them,’ said Urkild. ‘Here they come.’
The first of the enemy vessels broke through the wormhole; tightly packed like a school of predatory fish they began spreading out into an arrowhead formation. Shaper vessels, sleek and deadly were attended by squadrons of simpler, less advanced craft of differing designs. One thing was clear: the other ships were not of Shaper origin. They were either their servants or their slaves, come to fight and die for their masters.
Under Beklide’s command, the Arkari fleet responded swiftly. The two hundred capital ships defending Keros split into multiple smaller groups that peeled away from the core force of heavy destroyers clustered around the Sword of Reckoning. They began to enclose the Shaper force like an enormous claw with the Sword of Reckoning powering up the centre. Swarms of glittering fighters surrounded the massive ships. When they had closed to within a thousand kilometres of the enemy, they opened up with all guns.
Arkari ships were formidable craft. Each one of the massive destroyers was capable of taking on and destroying many times their own number of ships from the less advanced races. They were sleek, agile and heavily armed. The dreadnought Sword of Reckoning was many times larger still and carried an arsenal of weaponry larger than most entire fleets. It tore into the enemy with a fusillade of near unstoppable ferocity. Even the Shapers with their advanced technology could not help but fall back before such an onslaught as over a thousand weapon systems embedded within its seamless, silvered surface opened fire. As it did so, dozens of smaller, cruiser class vessels and fighters began to pour from its cavernous hangar as its accompanying squadrons of destroyers dove into t
he enemy formation.
The enemy fleet was heavily outnumbered and began to scatter. The Shaper vessels twisted and turned away from the wrath of the Arkari guns like hunted animals whilst their lumbering accomplices wallowed desperately. The Sword of Reckoning unleashed its main gun at one of the larger enslaved craft, tearing the fabric of space apart and shattering the thing as though it were made of glass, turning it instantly into an expanding shell of debris. The sheer weight of fire being thrown against the Shaper fleet was rapidly battering down their defences as the fight devolved into a series of one-on-one dogfights between the massive warships. Despite the odds however, the fire coming back at the Arkari vessels from the Shapers was severe, gouging long scars and craters from the gleaming hulls of the graceful ships.
‘Is this all they’ve got!?’ cried Urkild, a triumphant smirk on his face. ‘They could at least give us some sport!’ He gestured at a display that showed another alien warship struggling to evade its pursuers and being repeatedly pounded by spatial distortion fire that collapsed its bulbous stern.
Beklide heard the voice at the back of her mind. Just a whisper. It had a mocking laugh.
‘No,’ it said. ‘This is just the beginning. Now we have you where we want you.’
‘Meritarch!’ said the ship. ‘Other vessels are arriving!’
Urkild’s face turned to a mask of horror and Beklide saw now what he and the ship had spotted. The sky around the Arkari fleet had been suddenly filled with countless additional wormhole exits and Shaper ships were pouring through them in swarms.
‘Signal the Council and the fleet! ’ Beklide cried to the ship. ‘Enemy invasion of home system confirmed. We are massively outnumbered and are attempting to make a stand. Activate all ground defences. Defence of the home-world is to be made using all means necessary. We are on our own.’
Chapter 41
Katherine gazed up at the looming bulk of the K’Soth lord and felt horrible memories flooding back. Maranos. Trapped in the depths of the planet. Inquisitor Razortail and his esoteric collection of blades. The creature before her was terror incarnate, a mass of scaled muscle, fangs and claws. It spoke: a translator pendant turning its harsh language into monotone English.
‘Please, my lady, I mean you no harm,’ it said and bowed slightly. ‘I am the Lord Steelscale. We are friends now.’
‘We are?’
‘I hope. I have had enough of pointless war to last several lifetimes, and like you, I know that we must fight the Shapers together. Will you accept my offer of friendship?’
Lord Steelscale bowed low before her. She wondered if he had deliberately attempted to copy the human gesture.
Katherine knew that he must be sincere. They were, after all, on board an Arkari warship, on the vessel’s expansive bridge. Crew and technicians worked busily and calmly around them amidst holographic projections of data from the ship’s systems. Neither Steelscale, nor the coterie of concubines that followed in his wake, would be even allowed on board if they posed a threat. She fought the primal urge to flee and graciously accepted his offer.
Rekkid appeared more relaxed about the presence of the K’Soth lord.
‘Steelscale!’ he said brightly. ‘Well, well... always knew that you were one of the Empire’s good guys. Long time...’
‘You two know each other?’ said Katherine incredulously.
‘After a fashion, yes,’ Rekkid replied. ‘The Lord Steelscale has an interest in the archaeological record of his people and is foremost in the field of the early K’Soth civilisations. He writes under an assumed human name of course, don’t you?’
‘My family has - or rather had - modest holdings and I have no desire to be a great general or tyrant. We Steelscales carried little favour at court and my father spent most of his time trying to keep away from the attentions of the Imperial house rather than attract it. He felt that the potential consequences of angering a fickle idiot and his lackeys outweighed the potential benefits of money and power. I had much free time as a result and indulged myself with my studies. I had some contacts outside the Empire and had my work published under a pseudonym.’
‘Edward D. Cope,’ said Rekkid. ‘In Earth’s history he was the discoverer of Tyrannosaurus, the terrible lizard.’
‘Which would have been a dead giveaway if we were palaeontologists,’ Katherine replied.
‘Steelscale and I have met a couple of times before, at symposiums in Esacir space.’ Rekkid commented. ‘It was quite a while ago though; he wasn’t always able to make it.’
‘So what brings you here, Lord Steelscale?’ said Katherine.
‘My family ended up on the side opposing the Emperor in the civil war,’ Steelscale replied. ‘We are only a minor house and had no chance against the loyalists alone. Alas, we were picked off by house Bloodtongue before our allied houses could assist us. We could not hope to stand against the might of the Imperial house. They tried to assassinate my father in the end. A sniper’s bullet. We were on the balcony of our home, he and I. I heard the shot and saw him fall from a head wound... then I saw him get straight back up again, and then I saw what was inside his skull. I know now that it was a creature of the Shapers.’
‘How did you...?’
‘It took a dozen guards to help me restrain him,’ said Steelscale. ‘Three of them died at his hands. But we managed to sedate him and place him in stasis. I didn’t know what he had become, but we heard rumours that the Arkari and the Commonwealth were getting people out of the Empire if they were willing to co-operate. I established contact with the underground and told them about my father. A human got us out... Captain Isaacs. A pilot of considerable skill.’
‘Isaacs?’ said Rekkid. ‘My, he gets around.’
‘You know him? I’ve never seen anyone fly like that,’ said Steelscale. ‘We went up against a War Temple at one point... I don’t know how we survived. But after we came here we learnt the truth about what had happened to my father, about the Shapers manipulating our societies, rotting our civilisations from within. I gather that you are no strangers to their machinations.’
‘Correct,’ said Katherine.
‘And I understand that you recently uncovered an AI from the race that created the Shapers?’
‘Yes, on the surface of the Dyson Sphere outside, though she’s been in some sort of deep communion with the Glory’s own AI for almost a week now,’ Katherine replied. ‘Mentith said that she was going to speak today.’
Since they had recovered Eonara from the surface of Bivian, a painstaking process of examining the Progenitor AI core and verifying its authenticity had taken place. The Shining Glory had first re-activated Eonara within an isolated network and then, having satisfied itself that she posed no threat to its systems, had gradually allowed the ancient AI ever greater levels of access. After a few days of cautious experimentation, the two artificial beings had seemed to enter some sort of thrall state and neither Eonara, nor the ship’s AI had been terribly communicative since. The ship had responded to routine housekeeping requests whilst it remained parked between the Black Rock and the surface of Bivian, but not a word had been heard from Eonara since she had been unplugged from the facility and the ship’s cat avatar had not been seen about the vessel either. This had started to worry the crew of the Shining Glory, especially when they had noticed the vast streams of data that were now passing between the Progenitor AI core and that of the ship. Katherine and Rekkid had, in the meantime, busied themselves with research.
‘I have done a lot of catching up since we came to the Black Rock,’ said Steelscale. ‘It seems that there are whole swathes of galactic history about which I had no knowledge.’
‘Yeah, we both had that experience too,’ Katherine replied. ‘We’re still piecing together the details from the records left to us.’
‘In any case, I hope that this ancient AI can tell us something about our mutual enemy,’ said Steelscale.
A figure strode onto the bridge from the transit tube. It was Ment
ith.
‘Indeed she can,’ said the War Marshal, having overheard the conversation. ‘I gathered you here because the ship wishes to speak to us now. Ship, if you would, please.’
A figure materialised in the middle of the Glory’s bridge. To those watching it seemed as if liquid metal were being poured into the air in the centre of the room where it formed into the figure of Eonara. It also became clear that the Eonara figure was holding the ship’s long haired, silver cat avatar in her arms. She released the cat onto the floor. Eonara regarded the various persons on the bridge with her large, intelligent eyes that glowed softly with inner light.
‘The ship and I have exchanged and mingled the contents of our minds,’ she said. Her voice had acquired a steely edge. ‘It now knows all that I know and I know all that it knows. We are linked. Our consciousnesses have been joined.’
‘You were away from us for a long time,’ said Mentith. ‘We thought at first there had perhaps been some mistake when we installed your core here. I am glad to see that that is not the case.’
‘I assure you that I am functioning correctly, as too is the Shining Glory, are you not?’ She looked at the cat.
‘There was a great deal of data to assimilate and analyse, even by my standards’ the cat said. ‘Eonara has provided me with as comprehensive record of the Progenitor Empire as we can reasonably expect to find anywhere and she has assisted me in properly cataloguing and interpreting the data stored in the wafers found on Bivian. I have spent these recent days reliving the Progenitors’ history, from its earliest moments to its cataclysmic end in all its complexity. The value of this knowledge is incalculable and, importantly, Eonara has taught me how to fight the Shapers.’
‘How?’ said Mentith.
