As Estelle, Kelly and Enrique wandered off to join Chaz, Dodds made one last-ditch attempt at persuading the security detail to let them leave the hold. “Okay, seriously, I need to take a leak,” he threatened.
“Then I guess you’ll just have to go in your suit,” Wyatt shrugged.
*
“Open a jump point to Spirit,” Parks instructed Liu.
The conduit formed and Griffin started forward, followed at some distance by Ifrit and Leviathan; a cautious move, given Griffin’s current state.
Parks sat in the captain’s chair, going over the events of the day and considering the implications. In his mind’s eye, he envisioned the stack of paperwork that now awaited him. The meetings, the reports, the investigations. Likely there would be a few tribunals, too. People often thought that a job in the navy meant accepting death as a part of that duty. But when the coffins began to stack up, questions would be asked and explanations demanded. Fifty thousand-odd gone back in December, when Dragon had been taken. Well over another ten thousand here, today.
Damn it to hell. Perhaps he should’ve just left Dragon to them. They could get Zackaria another day.
He was drawn from his deep thoughts by a flicker beyond the frontal viewport. Had something happened around the jump point? Something that wasn’t normal? Just as he thought he had imagined it, it happened again.
A bright white streak coursed its way right around the portal, closely following its rotation. In its wake it left a jagged tear, which seemed to rip open and reveal the colourful space behind. The tear quickly resealed, leaving behind no evidence of the abnormality that had grabbed his attention.
That didn’t look right.
He rose from his chair and wandered to the front of the bridge. “What was that?” he said.
“Captain?” Liu asked.
“That … thing around the jump point? It looked like lightning.”
“I’m sorry, sir, I must’ve missed it.” Liu tapped at his console. “Systems aren’t reporting any issues.”
Parks began to wonder if the injury to his head was preventing him from thinking and seeing straight. The stars were usually never that big, though. He had just started back to his seat when he heard Liu’s console begin to whine. He rounded in time to see several new streaks ripping through the portal, rupturing it in a similar fashion. Yet another and another appeared, tearing the pool like a knife slashing a canvas. The tears gave way to normal space, the hues of the nebulas and distant stars visible beyond.
“Lieutenant—” he started.
“Sir, the jump point appears to be destabilising!” Liu said, his hands darting across his console. “The engines aren’t able to maintain the transit! If we get any closer, then we might be crushed in the collapse. I would strongly suggest we pull back!”
Parks realised what he was seeing – space-time was forcing the wormhole back to normal, the natural order of things attempting to regain control of the artificial passageway.
Nature was fighting back. And it was winning.
“Bring us to a halt, Mr Liu!” Parks ordered, as Griffin approached the threshold of the point. “Cancel the jump request!”
Too late. Griffin crossed the event horizon. Parks saw the bow go first as the ship was forcefully yanked forward, before the rest of it followed.
They began to tumble. Slowly at first, before picking up speed. As the carrier began to shudder, Parks ordered his crew to brace themselves. He found his own seat, setting himself down hard, holding on tight to the armrests and staring out at the unusual sight before him.
While what they now travelled through bore many of the hallmarks of a cross-dimensional transit, the familiar blue haze of the suspension field was nowhere to be seen. Instead, Griffin appeared to be surrounded by what looked like thick, blood-red clouds. More of the unsettling angry white bleeds danced and swelled within them, presenting snatches of distorted imagery where they briefly settled, before immediately dissipating.
The intensity of the shuddering steadily increased as they plunged further into the unknown. Time appeared to slow. Parks turned his head to look around the bridge, his surroundings blurred and leaking into one another. Everything appeared to be leaving translucent, multicoloured trails behind it, though nothing seemed to be moving. People, computer arrays and screens were all frozen like statues. It was like he was drunk, stumbling down the neon jungle of some inner-city tourist-trap; the bright lights of flashing signs and holographic advertising screens blinding and confusing him.
Just as he thought that the already damaged carrier would be torn apart, the shuddering came to an abrupt end and the thundering red clouds parted gracefully, giving way to normal space.
Stars came rushing forward.
Time returned to normal.
The trails faded.
Following a rapid bout of tapping at his console, Liu managed to bring the carrier under control and the world stopped turning. Out of breath, he turned to Parks. “I think we’re stable now, Captain,” he said.
Parks nodded. It looked like they’d made it to Temper in one piece. “Everyone okay?” he called to the bridge. He didn’t hear the answers that came back, his eyes drawn to the featureless void that lay all around them. It was in stark contrast to the nebulas that had played host to the conflict zone they had just departed. There wasn’t a single thing he recognised – no Temper, no Spirit, no Aster, and no Ifrit or Leviathan. He looked around at the bridge crew, who were following his gaze out the front of the ship.
“Where the hell are we?” he said. Although for some unexplainable reason, he wasn’t so sure that he really wanted to know.
XVIII
— What Natalia Saw —
The Mitikas Empire hadn’t always been as dangerous a place as it was when Natalia Grace had left it. In fact, during the early years of her assignment to the nation, she’d discovered it to be exactly as she’d always believed – a vibrant, diverse and richly cultured region of the galaxy, steeped in history and filled with sprawling metropolises.
Her first few months had been easy. Networking, integrating and gaining people’s trust had always come naturally to her. As a teenager, Natalia had slung on a backpack and spent the best part of four-and-a-half years visiting a number of different worlds. She had shared hostel dormitories, train journeys and flights with complete strangers, who had shortly thereafter become travel companions and long-term friends.
In all that time, however, her adventures had never taken her as far as Mitikas. In her role as an intelligence officer, however, she’d found herself flung straight at it. She had discovered whilst going about her information gathering assignments that there was an undercurrent of danger sweeping the nation, brought about by the tensions between the Senate and the Crown Emperor. It did nothing to discourage her from exploring that part of the galaxy, however, and only made the experience all the more exhilarating.
She’d used her charms to worm her way further into the ranks of high society, attending parties, film premiers and concerts, and gained access to exclusive clubs. From there, she’d climbed the ranks of government and control, opening up new avenues of information – towards the end of her assignment meeting with some of the empire’s most important figures. Amongst them had been Fleet Admiral Jason Zackaria and Commodore Julian Rissard, who had warned her and her fellow agents that they should leave the empire. Following the death of Lorenzo’s wife, Margaret, Mitikas was becoming far too dangerous. War was coming. And it was going to be a big one. They had then headed off to battle … and had never come back.
Although people who looked like them had.
Natalia had once been one of the best. She was both a good liar and manipulator, and possessed the ability to make herself quite forgettable. But as the civil war had intensified and she’d seen death and destruction growing all around her, her professionalism and desire to continue working with the secret service had waned. After only five years, she simply couldn’t do it any more. She just wante
d out.
Though she lived a falsely glamorous lifestyle and met with excitement at everything turn, there was one major difference to her travelling days – she felt lonely. Oh, she was so very lonely. She had contacts and fellow agents, whom she saw regularly, but no one she ever grew close to. These were professional, working relationships only. As an information gatherer and intelligence officer she felt detached from those with whom she worked. Was wanting someone permanent in her life, someone to wake up next to and not have to escape from immediately too much to ask?
For as long as she stayed with the service, it would be. Clare Barber, a Confederate government agent, had told her as much. Barber took many lovers, many more than Natalia ever did, in a bid to feel close to someone, if only for a little while. It seemed to work for her. It hadn’t for Natalia, not even the brief encounter they had shared themselves.
But as much as she wanted to, the newly-formed IWC Secret Service weren’t prepared to let Natalia retire. She was too valuable. Instead, they had shifted her closer to Krasst and the Senate, whom they believed were in the midst of planning something terrible. They hadn’t been wrong; what she had witnessed during that time now burned forever into her memory.
Unlike the true stasis field capsules employed by some vessels, the hibernator of her escape pod not only put her to sleep, but also allowed her to dream. Dreams populated by things she’d seen, done and remembered.
*
In many of her dreams, she found herself wandering the desolate streets of some unidentifiable Imperial city. The sky above was black and grey, light finding it difficult to penetrate the layers of dust and smoke that stretched uninhibited towards the horizon. Gone were the many tall glass skyscrapers, spired buildings, ornate bridges, carefully engineered rivers, lakes and hanging gardens, replaced now only with splintered remains of glass, masonry and broken steel. Such crumbling, dead and lifeless cities, she knew, were all that now remained of the once glorious galactic nation.
She made her way amongst the rubble and ruins, seeing bodies and other human remains that had been left to litter and rot in the streets. Their corpses had been looted, relieved of anything that might be useful to the Pandoran army – weaponry, ammunition, consumables. Similarly, vehicles she saw had been stripped for parts, leaving some picked so clean that all that remained were their skeletal frames.
There was little life anywhere. The destruction of the empire had occurred on a variety of scales, ranging from street-level combat, involving troop regiments and tanks, to mass genocide from nuclear strikes. Extermination had always been on a planet-wide scale, with even the smallest of towns and settlements in the most remote of areas being thoroughly cleansed. She doubted there were any survivors; and even if there were, they wouldn’t have lived very long without basic necessities.
The radiation from the nuclear fallout wouldn’t have been merciful, either.
She sat down as she came to a mound of rubble, resting her weary legs and staring down an endless corridor of collapsed buildings. In the distance she could make out a fleet of airborne vessels, grouped together and travelling slowly across the horizon. She knew who they were – the Pandorans, those black-suited, ruby-eyed perpetrators of the Mission; its goal, not to conquer, but to destroy without prejudice, for the glory of the empire.
Although her own mission priorities had prevented her from approaching Kethlan, the Seat of the Emperor, she had been able to determine that the bulk of their forces were still concentrated in and around the adjoining star systems. They were now executing a mop-up operation, before moving on to their next target of Independent space. A conflict with the Enemy (as the Pandorans were so-called) was both inevitable and unavoidable, and an eventuality for which the rest of the galaxy should immediately prepare. Some would believe that they were facing an alien invader, and that humanity’s first encounter with an extraterrestrial life-form would be their last.
Natalia knew better.
She became aware of a ghostly figure standing nearby. It was a tall, nearly-bald man, dressed in a formal INF uniform. A blood-red cloak, fastened about his neck by a gold chain, hung from his shoulders, clearing the ground by about a foot. In his hand he held a dagger, a beautifully adorned ceremonial item of the Imperial Naval Forces.
Jason Zackaria, the fleet admiral of the Imperial Naval Forces, and the man that Emperor Adam III had entrusted with ending the threats posed by the Senate. At its outset, he had been seen as the key to ending the conflict. It still held true now.
“Please stop, Admiral,” she said to him. “Halt the Mission. Stop the killing. Stop the madness.” Zackaria neither answered nor acknowledged her presence in any way, and as she turned to face him his ghostly form evaporated into nothingness. The reaction didn’t surprise her. Zackaria had never spoken a word to anyone outside the Pandoran army, not since he had joined it.
She looked back to where the multi-class craft were still moving in the distance.
With the information she had gathered from studying the movements and behaviour of the Pandoran forces, she had built a fairly accurate picture of how they operated. Unlike traditional military systems, there didn’t appear to be anything in the way of a chain of command or ranking scheme, aside from the notable exceptions of Zackaria and Rissard. Command within detachment groups was assumed on an ad hoc or best-fit basis. They all cooperated and mutually agreed with this arrangement, with no challenges ever being made for leadership. Lower-ranking personnel were very ant-like, working tightly as a team for the overall benefit of the entire structure. No task was too big, too small or too demeaning for any of them. They all went about their duties in a uniform, regimented, and almost mechanical fashion, never slacking, and without so much as even a slouch or swagger to distinguish between them. There was no stepping out of line and no misbehaviour, and no one acted out of personal gain, only ever working to benefit the whole – for the Mission. They had no law, military or otherwise, but within such a well-oiled, cohesive unit, one simply wasn’t needed. Nor was there any social structure – they didn’t make friends or enemies within their own ranks, and both men and women, young and old were held equal in all circumstances.
Natalia looked down the lengthy street to where she could see the sun now peeking out between the clouds. Whether it was rising or setting, she couldn’t be certain, but there was a red tinge to the sky there, similar to the red eyes of the soldiers. The changing of the hour made her think of the early infiltrators the Pandorans had used throughout Mitikas. Now that she knew them, the signs of transformation were easy to spot. The physical changes were the most obvious – subtle hair loss and alteration to the skin, random bleeding from the nose, ears, eyes and mouth, increased sweating, unexplained bodily emissions. Fierce mood swings and changes to personality were also a give away, although these were a little less frequent. To those unaware of the Pandoran army, these would be explained away as the result of some recent emotional scarring. By the time the deception was uncovered, it was often too late.
Natalia became aware of a new figure, another man, standing some way off in the distance. Though he was far away, barely a silhouette against the sunlight, Natalia felt a warmth coming from him, a beckoning invitation of companionship. He stood patiently, looking towards her. She could feel him smiling. It was a long way to walk, but she knew it would be worth it, knew he would wait for her. She took him up on the offer and, rising from the mound, began walking the distance.
She watched the endless streams of craft moving above, as she went, certain that they hadn’t been constructed by the Enemy. From what she knew, they didn’t appear to retain knowledge of building spacecraft themselves. That knowledge had somehow been lost. Or maybe, it was just unwanted. They were, however, very adept at repairing and modifying them. It was actually a blessing. A large number of their forces would remain planet-bound for the foreseeable future, though the number of mobile forces was still far from insignificant. Unless a way could be found to slow the speed of their advan
ce, the Pandoran army would be ready for a full strike against neighbouring Independent systems within the next six months.
If not sooner.
And when they did, she knew that they would deal the same fate to the rest of the galaxy as they had the empire – prisoners would not be taken, lives would not be spared. They are heartless, cruel and without pity. The perfect killing machines.
*
Natalia halted as shadows fell over her, and she looked skyward to see scores of Imperial troop transports sweeping overhead. Not long after they came in to land, before starting to deploy their cargo – dozens of heavily armed black-clad soldiers, carrying with them all manner of weaponry. The Enemy.
They turned to look at her. Fingers pointed.
Natalia ran.
She ran as fast as she could, but the ground she covered was minimal, as if her legs were moving in slow motion. She looked around as she tried to escape, seeing the corridor of buildings and the city now gone, and the herd of soldiers swarming behind her like thousands of scurrying black ants. Their numbers spread out across an expansive, impossibly wide plain, one that went on forever to the horizon, leaving nowhere to hide. Amongst the sea of black shone innumerable pairs of ruby-red oval eyes, bobbing up and down as the soldiers ran. The thundering of their boots on the ground was almost deafening.
Natalia tried harder to run, but it still felt as though she was pulling herself through treacle. She fell to the ground, trying with all her might to crawl forward, but found herself as immobile as ever.
The ranks of black suits began to close in around her and she cast around for another way to escape, looking first to the sky, then the ground beneath, but seeing nothing save for the swells of black, glints of knives and glows of digital weapon counters.
Hands caught her shoulders, then her forearms, then her legs, tackling her down and pinning her to the ground. Muzzles from rifles were pushed into her face. The suffocating black enclosed her, black broken only by flashes of white from two small emblems that adorned the suits. She tried to cry out for help, pleading to the man whom she’d seen earlier.
The Battle for the Solar System (Complete Trilogy) Page 27
