by Ramy Vance
Shattered Lamps
Osprey Chronicles™ Book Two
Ramy Vance
Michael Anderle
The Shattered Lamps Team
Thanks to our Beta Readers
Kelly O’Donnell, Rachel Beckford, John Ashmore, Larry Omans, Kit Mitchell, Mary Morris
Thanks to the JIT Readers
Peter Manis
Jeff Goode
Deb Mader
Jackey Hankard-Brodie
Zacc Pelter
Dave Hicks
If we’ve missed anyone, please let us know!
Editor
The Skyhunter Editing Team
This book is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Sometimes both.
Copyright © 2021 by LMBPN Publishing
Cover Art by Jake @ J Caleb Design
http://jcalebdesign.com / [email protected]
Cover copyright © LMBPN Publishing
A Michael Anderle Production
LMBPN Publishing supports the right to free expression and the value of copyright. The purpose of copyright is to encourage writers and artists to produce the creative works that enrich our culture.
The distribution of this book without permission is a theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like permission to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), please contact [email protected]. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.
LMBPN Publishing
PMB 196, 2540 South Maryland Pkwy
Las Vegas, NV 89109
Version 1.00, August 2021
ISBN (ebook) 978-1-64971-979-9
ISBN (paperback) 978-1-64971-980-5
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Author Notes Ramy Vance
Author Notes Michael Anderle
Other books by Ramy Vance
Books By Michael Anderle
Connect with The Authors
Chapter One
The emergency light on the fighter console flashed red, bringing Jaeger crashing out of her nap. Damn it, she thought. I only wanted twenty minutes. Is that too much to ask?
Heart thudding with some already half-forgotten dream, she slapped the comms board and stared at the message that appeared on the screen.
Knight to E3.
She sighed and fell back into her seat, eyes closing. She counted to twenty, waiting for her heart rate to return to normal. Then she tapped the comms button. “This line is for emergencies only.” She paused. “Dick.”
“It is an emergency if you were napping on the mission,” the man at the other end of the channel grunted. He had a gravelly voice, thick and full of mucous. His name, or at least, what he thought was his name, was Seeker. At this exact moment, he was sitting in his comfortable cage aboard the Osprey, half a solar system away. “It’s your move.”
Jaeger sighed and rubbed her temples. Asteroids the size of houses dotted the star field on the cockpit display screen. Those chunks of lifeless, boring rock had been there before she fell asleep, the same way they’d been there last week and last month and every month for the previous six months.
“This place is dead.” She sighed again. “I’m starting to worry these recon missions are a waste of time.” She pulled up the chessboard display on a side screen.
“They are a waste of time,” Seeker said. “I told you that months ago.”
Jaeger shook her head. She rubbed some grit from the corners of her eyes and studied the pieces on the board in front of her. “Hang on. You didn’t move your knight. You moved the rook.”
“So you are paying attention.”
Jaeger scowled and poked the interface screen, sliding her bishop three squares. Then she minimized the chess display and studied the sensor readouts. That nap had snuck up on her quick. She’d been asleep for almost an hour. It was nearly time to return to the Osprey. Her seventh solo outing into the asteroid field was another bust.
“This isn’t a waste of time. It’s our only card. In case you haven’t noticed, our backs are up against the wall. If we don’t find a way to please the Overseers, we’ll never be able to settle here.”
She was alone in this quadrant without another human ship in sight.
The two humans she did have were a prisoner who, despite being her chess partner, she didn’t trust not to stab her in the back the first chance he got…and Toner.
Toner was loyal. An immoral, impulsive fool, but he was loyal. So she did have that going for her.
The real issue was she didn’t trust either of them to make the right decisions. She knew she should—open up, listen to them. Given who they were, she wasn’t sure how she could.
At least she had Baby.
And Occy…she could trust those two.
“It’s not our only card, Jaeger. We could hatch and fight.”
Hatch and fight. That had crossed her mind. As she played out that scenario in her head, she only saw her and her newly made hatchlings following the same path of destruction. No, she would need to do this right. Even if it did mean hanging out in space by herself.
“No sign of life at all.” She closed the sensor records. “Damn. Damn, damn, damn.”
“Stop doing the enemy’s grunt work for them,” Seeker said.
“The Overseers are not our enemy,” Jaeger reflexively said as she reached overhead to switch display screens to rear view. The asteroid belt stretching behind the little fighter was as bland as the asteroid field ahead of it.
“They shot first, Jaeger.”
“I might, too, if I saw what the Osprey was carrying at the time. At any rate, that was over six months ago. We’re trying to build better relations.”
“I see. How is that going for you? Your move.”
Jaeger glanced back at the virtual chessboard and scowled. She was a few moves away from being checkmated. She could see that now. She needed time to think about her next move.
“We're going to find the Creeper base.” She activated the fighter thrusters. “I know they’re out here somewhere. Just not in this quadrant. Apparently.”
The thruster controls lit up in front of her, and she nibbled her lip, resisting the temptation to put her hands on the sticks. If she was going to be out here, she might as well get in some practice so the mission wasn’t a total bust.
She shut her eyes and visualized the thruster controls. The diode adapter attached to the base of her skull tingled faintly, activating in response to her focused will. The Alpha-Seeker fighter wa
s a devastatingly advanced and strange machine, chock full of bio-electric cerebral responsive devices that Jaeger hadn’t even conceptualized as possible before she first slid into the cockpit.
Balling her hands into fists to resist the temptation to touch the controls, she opened her eyes and focused on the field of drifting monoliths around her fighter.
Slowly, so slowly that she didn’t realize it at first, the thrusters engaged and wove her through the maze.
“It’s your move,” Seeker said patiently.
“Quiet,” Jaeger murmured, squinting as she willed the aft thruster down to half-power, swinging the fighter in a slow, tight arc around a floating mountain of craggy, shadowed rock. “I’m flying.”
“It shouldn’t take that much effort to fly.”
“Quiet,” she said again. “I haven’t had as much practice as you.”
“Let me give you a piece of advice. Breathe out when you turn. It helps keep you focused with everything going to shit around you.”
Jaeger nodded. That would be a piece of advice she’d remember. “Thank you.”
Despite his help, it was still exhausting. Jaeger managed to navigate the fighter through sheer force of will for four minutes and thirty-eight seconds before she gave up and switched to manual controls. As always, the fighter’s neural interface network left her with a raging headache, but otherwise, she was pleased with her progress.
Less so with the chessboard waiting for her when she paused to rest.
“It’s very simple.” She finally selected a piece to play. “These assholes have been hazing and raiding Overseer ships in this quadrant for decades. We locate their base and hand the information over to the Overseers as a goodwill gesture.” She placed the piece on a square across the board and hesitated, not removing her finger from the touchscreen. Not committing quite yet.
“Last I heard, you weren’t on active speaking terms with these Overseers. I mean, they were nice enough after we saved them. Even got to meet one of them in person. Kwin, right? That was the alien’s name. Then what happened? They’ve been ignoring you, at best. So what makes you think this sucking up will mean anything to them?”
Jaeger froze, her finger still on the piece. Seeker’s view wasn’t quite right. It hadn’t been no contact between them, exactly…but that wasn’t for him to know. At least, not now.
She looked at the board and saw it was another path to being checkmated if she made that move.
She returned the piece to its original position. “We don’t tell you everything that goes on in comms,” she said brusquely. “At any rate, the situation is obvious to anyone paying attention.
“These Creepers are everybody’s least favorite pain in the ass. I’ve seen their energy lance scars on Overseer ships. They’re showing more and more often. Now and then we catch the ghost of their ships on the edge of our sensor ranges. Atmospheric readings from Locaur indicate they’ve been visiting the planet, too.”
She only wished she knew why. She didn't like the thought of that enigmatic, silent menace swooping down on her little locust-centaur buddies. A few months ago, a distraught Art had drawn her a picture of a nine-legged spider monster shoveling Locari into its nasty maw—and pointed at the sky. The Overseers might have been an awkward, self-important bunch, but at least they left the Locari in peace.
“You need to get a foothold colony established on that planet before it’s too late.” Seeker grunted. “I don’t think these hostiles are going to respect the natives as much as you do. If you let them get established first, you’ll lose your only chance. An enemy with a base of operations will outmatch you.”
“No.” Jaeger shook her head. “Not until we have a good plan. And everyone’s blessing. I’m not going to stumble into becoming an occupying force. It’s a human habit I mean to break.”
“Those human habits are what kept us alive this long. Hatch and fight.” On the other end of the line, Seeker coughed.
She knew he was right. She also knew there had to be a better way. There was no doubt about it. Their situation was grim. It was an almost unwinnable predicament, and every passing day Jaeger tightened up more and more. She hated who she was becoming, but at this moment, she also believed that who she was becoming was everyone’s best chance at survival.
“You need to quit smoking,” Jaeger said.
“You need to shut your trap and move.”
Jaeger winced. There were so many options arrayed on the chessboard before her, and not a single one of them left her pieces safe from capture. Not a single one of them couldn’t, somehow, lead to her defeat.
“Running around begging for the approval of aliens like a whipped dog,” Seeker grumbled. “While humankind fights for its survival on the other side of those wormholes. I can’t believe it’s come to this.”
There wasn’t much anger in his voice anymore. They’d had this argument too many times. Now he sounded tired, and Jaeger was beginning to despair that she might ever talk him into defecting with her. She needed something big to gain his faith, as much as the faith of the local alien populations.
She needed something big to prove to herself she could do this—the right way.
“I’ve heard another one opened, by the way,” Seeker grumbled. “You try to keep me in the dark in here, but I hear things.”
“Damn Toner and his big mouth.”
“It was the kid, actually.”
Jaeger frowned. She couldn’t imagine Occy going to visit Seeker by himself. The two of them didn't exactly get along. Occy insisted the big fighter pilot was a bad guy—a rather ironic claim, coming from the human-octopus hybrid that had nearly ripped Seeker’s head off in a fit of childish temper a few months ago.
“Quit changing the subject,” Seeker went on. “You have wormholes opening up in the area again. Are you gonna explore them? It sounds like the kid thinks a few of them might lead back to base quadrant.”
Jaeger would have to have another talk with Occy about the meaning of the word confidential. There was no point in lying about it now, though. “They might.” She finally selected a single pawn and used it to take one of Seeker’s bishops. “Virgil isn’t sure. Even if they did, we’re not ready to go back to base quadrant.”
Instantly, Seeker’s remaining rook slid forward to capture her last knight. “Check,” he said. “Not ready to rejoin the fleet. Not ready to go home. Not ready to build a new colony. Not ready to do anything, it seems, except lick alien boots. Your move.”
Jaeger ground her teeth. With every move she made, it felt like she was delaying the inevitable. Seeker was a relentlessly aggressive player, and he was damned good.
She didn't care for what that implied about their opposing worldviews.
“I will not act for the sake of acting,” she snapped. “That’s not the way to peace or stability.”
“You know what it is, though? It’s the way to survival. It’s your move, Jaeger. Shit or get off the pot.”
Jaeger stared at the board spread before her and despaired. The game started with so many pieces. Now they’d reduced it to a smattering of lonely pawns and a few rooks protecting royalty. What made the king so important, anyway, if you needed to sacrifice all the other pieces to save it? What was the point?
It looked terribly lonely, and she saw now that there was no way out. No matter what she did, somebody was going to get hurt.
One of the sensor lights at the corner of her panel flashed yellow. A new voice joined the conversation; soft and mild, nearly genderless, and faintly accented.
“Sensors detect unusual activity in the asteroid belt,” the computer murmured.
Jaeger let out a sigh of relief and snapped the chess program closed. Her inevitable defeat would have to wait. “We’re going to have to resume this game some other time,” she told Seeker. “How far?”
“Several thousand kilometers from the Osprey,” the AI said. “I detect several energy signatures that suggest small engines discharge, but with all of the asteroid inter
ference, I cannot get a good reading on the exact number yet.”
“Thank you, Virgil.” Jaeger deactivated the diode on the base of her skull but didn’t bother peeling it off. It was a pain to attach. She slipped her hands into the thruster controls. Practice time was over. She needed skills she could count on. “That is very helpful.”
“Of course, Captain,” the speaker said. “I'm happy to be of service.”
Chapter Two
It was the first good look Jaeger had gotten at the alien ships, and she wasn’t sure if "ship" was exactly the right word.
They looked a bit like spider or crab-style droids, crawling over the face of a drifting asteroid. They were an order of magnitude bigger than any of the droids in the Osprey’s repair fleet, though.
Jaeger’s fighter drifted out of sight, hiding behind the asteroid she had used as cover and just far enough away for standard radar sensors to miss her. Especially with so much debris around. The short-range spy camera she’d planted around the corner fed her a clear view of the Creeper operation.
“It looks like they’re eating it,” Jaeger mused, watching one of the things rip chunks of asteroid free and shovel it into a compartment slung beneath its legs.
