by Nick Webb
“Miguel, it’s done. I don’t—”
Tigre held up a hand. “Shut up and listen, Shelby. My people have analyzed the video. Lots to tell you. In fact, you’ll want to hear it, since Danny left you a heartfelt message right before he hit atmosphere. But the important part is what came before. Shelby, you remember the video feed from the satellite over Sangre de Cristo? The one Curiel broadcast? It’s faked. Or doctored, at least.”
She leaned forward. “How so?”
“The ship that intercepted the Magdalena Issachar. On the satellite imagery, it looked clean, with no hull markings. But on Danny’s video feed, the markings are quite clear. In fact, on his feed, it’s an entirely different ship. Whoever edited the satellite’s video was very, very good.”
“Which ship?” she whispered, fearing the answer, fearing the truth, fearing what it might do to her, what it would make her do. She’d been done. She thought it was over. But depending on Tigre’s answer, it may only have just begun.
“The ISS Vanguard,” said Tigre. “Mullins’s ship.”
It’s only begun, she thought, her fists clenched.
“Do you have any idea what his end game is, Shelby?” said Admiral Tigre. “If he was responsible for the bomb at Sangre, and responsible for smuggling that other nuke onto your ship … the consequences are … terrifying.”
“There’s more. I don’t have all the proof I need yet, but I think Shovik-Orion has developed a device—something we call a meta-space shunt. It was on both bombs, though the one over Earth was underpowered.”
“What does it do?”
“So far? Our best guess is that it summons the alien ship. At least, that’s what happened both times it was used.”
Tigre shook his head. “Why in the world would Shovik-Orion, or Admiral Mullins for that matter, want to summon an alien force to invade our space?”
“That,” said Proctor, “is an excellent question. I think we should ask him.”
“Admiral,” said Lieutenant Qwerty from behind her. “Just received a meta-space message from San Martin. El Amin has … exploded.”
Chapter Fifty-Eight
Terran Sector, Saturn System, Titan
Bridge, ISS Independence
“Exploded? What do you mean, exploded?” Proctor couldn’t believe her ears.
Qwerty stared at his screen. “That’s what they’re saying, Admiral. First some gravitational instabilities, then a catastrophic pressure buildup in the mantle, then an explosion. The planet is mainly in several large fragments drifting away from each other, but they’re projected to fall back down to the barycenter, crash, and basically throw out a huge rubble cloud over the coming weeks.”
Proctor turned back to Tigre on her screen. “Did you hear?”
He nodded grimly. “We’d been watching it, keeping an eye on those instabilities. But this … this changes everything.”
“Is San Martin at risk?” she said, thinking of the billions of people back on the main populated planet of that system.
“No. Not for decades. El Amin is about as far away from San Martin as Pluto is from Earth. But still, Shelby, if that happens to Titan—”
She stood up, still looking down at him on her console. “I know. Millions of people here in the Saturn moon system alone. If Titan goes, they all die within weeks. And if Earth is next? Just think what an exploding moon could do to it.”
“Seven horsemen of the apocalypse type stuff, no doubt,” said Tigre. “End of times.”
She bent over and leaned into the console, gripping both sides of it. “Miguel, are you with me? I need to know. The Mullins issue will have to wait. But this ship? We need to stop it. Now.”
He nodded. “To the end, Shelby. I was a young man back during the Swarm War, but to me you were a hero. Still are. You weren’t a step behind Granger—he just got all the glory. And the bullshit celebrity religion. Yeah, I’m with you—let’s go save Earth again.”
“Good. I’m about to make a fleet-wide announcement. Might be helpful for you to chime in afterward. That’d give the ship captains some cover to disobey Mullins and follow us in. And once we go in, target the weakened areas of the ship we’ve already hit. If we all bombard those spots together, we might just save our asses. And Earth’s.”
“Acknowledged. Tigre out.”
His face disappeared and Proctor turned around to the comm. “Lieutenant Qwerty, open a broad channel to the whole fleet. Mullins’s and Tigre’s both.”
A moment later, he nodded. “Open, Admiral.”
Here goes nothing. Speeches. The part Granger always hated. Why couldn’t everyone just know what the hell they should be doing without having a damn motivational speech thrown at them?
“This is Admiral Shelby Proctor, former fleet admiral of IDF. As you all know I’ve been called back into service by Fleet Admiral Oppenheimer to face this new alien threat. We’ve just received word from San Martin that the planet the alien ship already assaulted, El Amin, has exploded. If we don’t act now, every inhabited moon in the Saturn system is at risk. And it won’t end here. The alien ship could very well move on to Earth.
“I understand you’ve seen a lot of confusing things today, and heard possibly contradictory orders. You saw a nuclear weapon launch from my ship and nearly destroy Europe. You’ve seen my ship try to disable the weapon rather than immediately destroy it, and moved to block the Vanguard from destroying it as well. I assure you all there were very good reasons for these actions, and that I’ve acted for the survival of Earth and all of humanity in everything I’ve done. The Independence has even faced this alien ship three times now, and … failed … every time.”
“I … I can’t do this alone. That ship must be destroyed. Our survival depends on it. But I need your help. I’m going back in—all fleet captains, you’re more than welcome to join me. It’s now or never. Proctor out.”
Volz grunted behind her. “Not bad.”
She shot him a look.
“Not great. But … better than Granger ever did.” He was almost smiling. But only in his eyes. The circumstances were too dire for anything more.
“Ma’am,” Qwerty began, “Admiral Tigre is announcing his support to the fleet, and ordering his captains to follow us in … and from the sounds of it, several of the captains under Mullins are pledging their support.”
Proctor sat back down and secured her restraints. “Battle stations. Lieutenant Qwerty, please pass along the instructions for generating the virtual meta-material hull shroud so the rest of the fleet can block the Golgothic’s broadcast. Ensign Riisa, half thrusters back towards the Golgothic ship. Let’s see who follows us.”
A tense minute passed. They watched on the viewscreen as a handful of ships broke off from the main body of the fleet. Admiral Tigre’s ships, followed by others that had come with General Mullins. But only a few. Lieutenant Whitehorse caught her attention. “We’ve got a total of fifteen, Admiral. Two heavy cruisers, a handful of light cruisers, and the rest missile frigates.”
“It’ll have to be enough. We ready, Ballsy?”
“All systems besides thrusters still on batteries. But weapons crews are ready. Ready as we’ll ever be, under the circumstances.”
On the viewscreen a battle schematic on one half showed the other ships flanking the Independence on either side. On the other half, the tiny dot of the alien ship was just becoming visible against the line of the horizon, the sparkling purple drilling beam a striking shaft of light against the drab brown-orange of the atmosphere.
“Proctor to fleet,” she began, inclining her head toward her console to help the battle software understand who she was talking to. With a glance at the battle schematic she started rattling off names and instructions. “Justice, Missouri, Paris, Dakota, Amsterdam, Janeiro, Sweigart, form up into support and cover configuration Vickers Beta. Break off and come in from the north. Jakarta, Weibo, Budapest, Orlando, San Diego, Manitos, Formidable, and Mumbai, you’re with the Independence. We’ll descend ten ki
lometers and come at it from below. Support and cover formation Vickers Delta.”
The attack wings sorted themselves into formation, and within two minutes they were in weapons range. The Golgothic ship loomed ahead of them and at a higher elevation, the drilling beam plunging down past them into the crust.
“Open fire.”
Chapter Fifty-Nine
Terran Sector, Saturn System, Titan
Bridge, ISS Independence
It had been thirty years since the last time Proctor had seen so many ships in a live fire situation, and while the rail gun slugs sailing past were undetectable to the eye, their effect on the alien ship was not. It sparked with dozens, then hundreds of explosions per second. She wondered what the hell was holding it together—even a Swarm carrier would never have withstood such a withering assault.
“Massive power fluctuations, Admiral,” said Mumford. “The more the sensors read on this thing, the more I’m seeing that it’s not only technologically advanced, ma’am, it’s … lightyears past our capabilities. It seems to have almost an organically distributed power system, with modest self-repair capabilities at the molecular level.”
“You’re saying it will regenerate?”
“If we let it, yes, it appears so.”
“Well let’s not let it. All ships, add in laser fire to the mix. Torpedoes if you got ‘em.”
The comm chattered with affirmatives. “The regeneration rate is far too slow to catch up, Admiral. And the other good news—I’m reading that the launch mechanism for those spheres is hopelessly damaged. Destroyed. That thing won’t be launching anything down into that hole it’s drilling.”
Proctor nervously tapped her temple. “Then why is it drilling?” That didn’t make any sense. The vessel was under attack, and destruction was imminent. Why was it still drilling when it could bring that weapon to bear on the ships attacking it?
“Admiral, the rest of the fleet is here. General Mullins is signaling for your surrender, quote, as soon as the threat is neutralized,” said Qwerty.
“Like hell,” Proctor mumbled under her breath. “Mumford, are you still not detecting any life signs on that thing?”
“None that I can recognize, Admiral. We still can’t penetrate up into every single area of the ship, though. But at the moment it looks like the ship is AI-based. I’m not seeing any organic matter in there.”
“No Golgothics, huh? Maybe we were a little premature to latch onto a name for them,” she said, absentmindedly. She wanted to wait, to tell the ships to hold fire, to give her time to study this thing. To figure it out. Communicate with it. Try, one last time, to understand it before she was forced to kill it. Like she was ordered to kill the last dormant Swarm vessels. Like the Matriarch. Mother-killer. The epithet rang in her ears.
“Well this is odd—” began Mumford.
But before he could say any more, it exploded. The beam fluttered, pulsed in a seemingly random pattern, and disappeared. The ship cracked into several pieces. Several cheers rang across the bridge from the members of the crew watching the viewscreen.
The feeling was bittersweet, watching the broken pieces of the ship begin to fall from the spot where it had exploded, realizing she’d saved the day, but she’d killed without understanding. Humanity was safe, but another race was not. Was this an entire ship of AI beings? Had she killed an entire race? Was it a scout ship from another species that was looking for a new home? So many unanswered questions. She started to turn to Mumford to ask him what he’d found odd, but Lieutenant Whitehorse caught her attention.
“Admiral, the Vanguard is coming about,” she said. “They’re targeting us with rail-guns!”
“Bastard,” she muttered. “All weapons crews, retarget. Set your sights on their guns only. We’re going for neutralization of their weapons systems, nothing more—”
“Shelby! There’s a shuttle leaving our shuttle bay,” yelled Volz from across the bridge.
“Who?”
Before he could answer, Lieutenant Qwerty pointed up at the comm speakers. “They’re transmitting, Admiral.”
The comm speakers crackled on. “General Mullins, this is Lieutenant Ethan Zivic. I’ve got Admiral Proctor on board the shuttle. We’re both turning ourselves in. Please send an approach vector and docking instructions. Zivic out.”
Proctor stood up and paced toward the screen, watching the shuttle arc wide around the Independence, against the backdrop of the huge chunks of Golgothic ship that were falling down through Titan’s atmosphere. “What the hell is he playing at?” She turned to Volz, who’s jaw was set tight. “Ballsy?”
“He’s going to kill Mullins,” he muttered. “Probably the whole ship. He’s going to overload the reactor on the shuttle, and he’s going to kill Mullins, along with the rest of the Vanguard. There’s no other explanation.”
“Is he out of his mind?”
Volz nodded slowly. “Mullins killed Batak. Ethan and her were getting to be good … friends. And he’s been on the edge anyway. Seeing her die in the blast when we were so close to getting her out of there….” He sighed. “Yeah, this is classic Ethan. When something doesn’t go your way, you torpedo the whole thing.”
“Open a channel,” she said. “Ethan Zivic, this is Admiral Proctor. Get your ass back in our shuttle bay. Now. That’s an order.”
After a moment, Zivic answered. “Uh, ma’am, I was trying to give you a chance to get away.”
“Bullshit. I’m not running from this situation, and neither are you. We’re done running.” She paused, mentally redirecting her attention to the rest of the fleet undoubtedly listening in. “Ethan, they found my nephew’s body. His suit was intact. We’ve got video evidence of Admiral Mullins and the ISS Vanguard docking with the Magdalena Issachar minutes before its demise. It was Mullins all along. The new president of Shovik-Orion—yes, Ted, I know you’re listening in, and yes, I have proof. You know,” she paused, leaning back in her chair, propping a foot up on her bad knee, “when this all started a few days ago, I wanted nothing more than to get in, find my nephew, maybe save humanity, maybe not, but definitely go back to my beach house when it was all over and just kick back with a martini and an unflattering bathing suit. But you’ve convinced me, Ted. You’ve convinced me to come back and root out the cancer. This is your official notice. Assholes that threaten my family, and that threaten humanity and Earth and all its planets, have me to answer to. Understood?”
The comm was silent. Zivic didn’t say a word, thankfully understanding that this wasn’t about him, for once. Mullins didn’t reply either, apparently sizing her up and wondering how much she was bluffing.
She prayed he called her bluff. She wanted nothing more than to beat the ever-living shit out of him.
To her surprise, Mullins’s ship flickered, and disappeared. “Admiral, the Vanguard q-jumped away. Along with most of the ships in his fleet.”
She sighed. “Damn. I was kind of hoping to teach him a lesson.” She stood up and smiled at Volz. “At least him high-tailing it out of here basically validated my point. PR win, right?”
He nodded. “I think the next board meeting at Shovik-Orion will definitely be … lively.”
She tapped her finger against her temple, deep in thought. “What’s your game, Ted Mullins?” She ran through the details. First he’d played the GPC to get those two missiles, then frame the GPC by making it look like the Magdalena Issachar had committed a false-flag operation and attacked its own people, ostensibly to generate sympathy and enthusiasm for the cause. Now he was playing her and IDF, or rather, trying to get her out of the way and keep his influence within IDF. He’d probably arranged for the design of the meta-space shunt. Now that she thought about it, he’d probably arranged for both attempts on her life, too. And at San Martin he was probably trying to kill two birds with one stone. Kill her, and Secretary General Curiel.
But why? Power? He already had it. Money? It just didn’t make sense yet. She needed more time to investigate. Time she
didn’t have.
Commander Mumford caught her attention. “Ma’am, I was trying to tell you earlier….”
“What is it?”
“Something I picked up on the sensors earlier. It didn’t show up before, but the more the fleet’s weapons penetrated into the ship, the deeper I was able to scan. The ship, Admiral. The ship is … well, let me just show you.” He fiddled with his console, then pointed up at the front viewscreen. “This is a reconstructed image I put together from the most recent scan. It came from a piece of interior hull plating deep up inside the ship.”
She turned back toward the screen. The image was grainy, but still easy to read. Letters.
“I … S … S … Vic….”
Her sweat went cold.
“ISS Vic?” said Volz. “That could be anything.” He shook his head, as if trying to convince himself. “Impossible.”
“No,” said Proctor. “I’d recognize that until the day I die.” She turned to Volz. “ISS Victory. That’s the nameplate from her hull.”
“What the hell is Victory’s nameplate doing inside an alien ship?” Volz waved his arms up in the air. “That’s … that’s batshit crazy!”
Mumford cleared his throat. “Just to be sure, ma’am, I brought up an old materials analysis of the ISS Victory and compared it.”
“Tungsten, right?”
“Right.” He nodded, but pointed at the screen. “That’s tungsten alright. But the isotopics are all wrong. It clearly does not have the same isotopic signature as the material used for the Victory’s hull.”
“So what the hell is it then?” She watched the other side of the screen as the broken pieces of the ship continued to fall through the atmosphere.
Mumford swallowed hard. “The interesting thing is that, if you take the old isotopic signature, and step it forward in time by about, oh, thirteen billion years, then you get what we’re reading now.”
