Serpents and Vipers

by Donald Nicklas

  One and a half human months after the end of the civil war, Consul Lorenzo was on the surface going over Senate procedures with Sly. The Slones were in their cabin on the bridge deck of the Invicta. As they were sitting on the living room floor, playing with Olivia and laughing at her antics, the intercom activated and the officer of the deck said, “Captain to the bridge.”

  The Slones looked at each other, wondering what this could be. Being in orbit around the serpent home world has been nothing short of monotonous. Slone walked on to the bridge and asked for a report. The officer of the deck for the off-time watch was Ensign Simpson, who now reported, “Captain, we have detected three ships leaving the surface.”

  “Why is that important? We have ships going back and forth constantly.”

  “These took off from the mountains and went invisible as soon as they breached the outer atmosphere.”

  Simpson’s report was interrupted by the sensor tech turning towards Slone and saying, “Five more ships have left the surface from just outside the capital and also went invisible when they breached the atmosphere.”

  “Sparks, get me ground control,” Slone ordered.

  After a few seconds the communications tech stated the line was open. “Ground control, any idea why we had ship launches?” Slone asked.

  The ground troops had remained on the planet and set up a combined cohort camp in the plaza outside the volcano. They had been helping rebuild the damage to the old Sea Clan city. Centurion Claudius Pulcher of the eighth cohort came on and reported, “The serpents are telling us that the first three ships were carrying about 20 members of the old Mountain Clan who have been refusing to surrender. They were the last holdouts. They apparently stole three ships and decided to head off world. The five ships were sent to bring them back if possible.”

  “Where do they think they are going?”

  “The serpent techs down here think they are heading to a very remote outpost, at least the slipstream they are heading for leads in that direction.”

  Slone thought a moment if there was anything they could do. They could keep up with serpent ships in system, but not in the slipstream. “We will have to leave it up to the serpents; we can’t catch them in the slipstream.”

  The chase would last through many systems and many months, but in the end, the three ships stolen by the old Mountain Clan members were not seen again and the five ships chasing them returned long after the Romani fleet went home.

  Another month went by and Olivia was now running circles around her parents. Sly was undisputed mistress of all serpent space and the terraforming fleet had finally arrived. The terraformers were true pioneers and members of terraforming families that spanned generations. They moved onto the planets that needed forming and lived there for decades. During that time, they changed the climate of a planet by changing the flora. Once the proper flora was present, they could change the makeup of the planet and then introduce the fauna. In the end, they made the planet into whatever image was needed. To reach conclusion could take centuries, generations of terraformers, but each group had their specialty, and the same families and their descendents did not always stay to the end. The Romani terraformers picked the best location to set up their camp and start the process. The serpent scientists were impressed, since terraforming was not part of the serpent’s sphere of knowledge. They had converted their temperate areas into jungle simply by cutting down the deciduous forests and filling the atmosphere with greenhouse gasses. They did not know how to reverse the process. They were about to learn. Over the decades, the humans and serpents would work as one unit to change the planet and sometime in the future, the serpents would no longer be a dying species on their own world.

  The terraformers arrived on three dreadnoughts that were presented as a gift to the serpents. After the success of Centurion Marshal’s training of the serpents, Lorenzo and the Centurion sent a request to the Senate to consider authorizing a crack, rapid deployment force made up entirely of serpents. The Senate had all seen the videos of the fight in the mountain and had nothing but praise for the serpent fighters of Centurion Marshal. They jumped at the chance, especially with rumors of a major war looming in corporate space. The dreadnoughts were part of the 13 Petrovian dreadnoughts captured during the liberation of New Wales. The serpents were more than happy to become part of the Nova Romae military in a function other than making ships invisible. The only stipulation was that Centurion Marshal trains them. It was agreed that the training would take place in the training facility on Nova Romae and, if the arrangement worked out, a second facility would be set up on the home world. Given the serpent tendencies, it was decided that each dreadnought would house a reinforced cohort of one thousand serpent troops. Naval officers would stay behind and train the serpents on how to control human ships, after serpent techs modified them to work with serpent technology. The first dreadnought captain to finish training was Captain Artok, who gravitated to the task with gusto. Her injuries healed well and Tavia helped take care of her after she left the hospital. The serpent’s love and admiration for Tavia continued to grow. Captain Artok was back on her feet in weeks, but would always walk with a pronounced limp from her leg injury. It took some time for the serpents to get used to the large human ships. There would be over 1300 crew and troops aboard. Because of serpent physiology, they would only need two shifts, which saved several hundred crew and allowed more room for troops and military cargo.

  The fleet finally left the serpent home world just under six months after the end of the serpent civil war. Three fully crewed serpent dreadnoughts were included, as they transported their reinforce cohorts to Nova Romae for training. Olivia was almost two and the Slones doted on their daughter, as did the Gardners along with their now two and a half year old son, Allen. The toddlers were growing much too fast. Slone enjoyed the evenings with his wife and friends. Often present were Tavia and Centurion Marshal, both working together to train the serpents and teach languages to humans and serpents. Alaya mentioned to Christopher that she thought she saw a spark between the centurion and Tavia. She wondered if they even knew it was there. Tavia was now eighteen and old enough to serve in the legions, but she preferred teaching them and scouting. However, she was thrust into working with the serpents along with Centurion Marshal. Slowly, she was becoming more legionary than scout, a circumstance that suited William Marshal just fine. Sly was also spending a lot of time with the Slones and the humans who meant a lot to her. The humans still had trouble believing they were friends with the leader of an entire species. Sly was on her way to consolidate her power on Nova Romae. She planned to split her time between the two major locations of the serpent population. The serpents on the home world were learning a lot about terraforming and were throwing themselves into the project to save their planet.

  As the fleet passed through the Rubicon system, it was obvious that trade was again flourishing. However, it was different this time. Rubicon was now only a resupply station and human ships could enter serpent space and make deliveries and bargain for contracts with the serpents and vice versa. Some traders yearned for the old way to come back, since the humans soon found out that the serpents were very shrewd merchants and drove a hard bargain. Seven months after the end of the civil war and nine months since the Slones left Nova Romae, they entered the final slipstream. The Slones looked forward to some family time at their lake house, but were not sure how long that would last. Messages had arrived from the Senate keeping the Consul Lorenzo informed of disturbing news from corporate space. Something was brewing . . .

  Epilogue

  Yet another rock in space, like the countless ones they had seen before. Some trader had passed through this system and thought they saw a ship in orbit around the rock. Normally that would not cause any raised eyebrows, but this was a restricted system. The merchant was carrying a sanctioned military delivery to the border base one system over. The base housed the Highline Corporation’s munitions experimental laboratories in this sect
or of Highline space. Things had been peaceful, until a few years ago. Sinclair Corp performed a hostile takeover of Petrov Corp. A lot of rumor had come out of that event, especially the rumors concerning a previously unknown civilization that defeated the Petrovians’ military forces, both ground and space. The Highline bosses felt that was all a smoke screen to cover Sinclair’s invasion. Now all of the corporations were on edge. Sinclair was the most powerful and had doubled its size with the absorption of Petrov Corp. The other corporations were nervous, and their militaries were on alert. If the corporations could act as one, then Sinclair Corp stood no chance. However, none trusted the other and a union was not likely.

  Nothing had happened in Highline space, but unusual activity needed to be investigated, especially when it was a system with travel restrictions due to their slipstream to the base. The base sent out one of their military scouts to check on what the freighter captain reported. The scout ship was small and crewed by three people, a pilot, a sniper and a scanning tech. Highline streamlined their military by keeping ships small and crews small. This saved money and had the side benefit of agility when it came to fleet operations. The Corporation had sat out the last corporate war, so its military philosophy had yet to be tested. Lieutenant Commander Brommel was the captain of the scout ship, HC Scout-37. His crew consisted of Lieutenant Roshe, his sniper and weapons tech and Ensign Schwarz, sensor tech and engineer. They had been a team in the scout service for two and a half years and worked well together. The Scout ship moved exclusively with sails and had no electronic emissions. This allowed it to remain electronically invisible. Its size and black, dull color made it visually invisible unless it was very close. The drawback of the Highline scout was its total lack of ship weapons. It was built as a pure scout with no chance to join in battle. They had been underway for the last day and a half after leaving the base. Finally, they were approaching the dead rock that formed the eighth planet of a no-name system. There was not even anything worth mining here, so why anyone would be snooping around is a mystery. They went into a high obit over the planet and started scanning. Its surface was pockmarked with craters and lava flows from ancient impacts.

  “There are a lot of places to hide down there,” Schwarz said.

  “We have to at least give it a full day cycle to say we did our job,” Brommel said. Do we know the exact time the freighter claimed to see the ship in orbit?”

  Schwarz pressed a few buttons. “Records of the incident say it was 15:27 Earth standard.”

  “Let’s assume the phantom ship was in a stationary orbit. Calculate what face of the planet would have been visible from the position of the freighter at that time.”

  “Good call, captain.”

  “I have my moments, Ensign,” Brommel said with a smile.

  After making some calculations, Schwarz reported, “Captain, the part of the planet that would have been visible will be facing us in 6 hours.”

  “Very well. We will maintain a watch until it comes around. Keep monitoring the surface the entire time as it rotates.”

  “Aye, sir.”

  Time passes slowly, especially when concentrating on the surface of a dead world whose face never changes. More and more craters and mountain ranges came over the horizon, but they were similar to the ones passing behind the far horizon. After the longest six hours that Brommel could remember, the suspect area finally started to rotate into view. As it came under the ship, a light started blinking on the sensor console.

  “We have a contact,” Schwarz said.

  Both Brommel and Roshe perked up and went over to the sensor console. The bridge was small but they could move around a bit. As they gathered around the sensor station, the screen showed a magnified image of the surface. “See there, captain?” Schwarz pointed to the rim of one of the craters that just came over the horizon. “Near the wall of that crater is an irregularity that is not natural. Sensors indicate there is something underneath the surface where the crater wall meets the floor.”

  It was almost imperceptible but it was there. “Any sign of movement on the surface?”

  “No sir.”

  “Ok, I will land us near the irregularity.”

  They all returned to their seats and Brommel brought the ship down to the surface. He landed about 5 kilometers from the irregularity, just behind a rise of the crater made by a smaller impact. This totally hid the ship from the irregularity. Schwarz would stay aboard and monitor the surroundings. A camera and sensor mast rose from the center of the ship to give a view above the rise. What they saw was disturbing. There was a blast door in the side of the crater and a dome covered by dust in front of the door. This would have never been seen if that freighter captain had not noticed the ship. A half hour later, Brommel and Roshe were standing in front of the blast doors wearing armored space suits and carrying standard issue automatic rifles with pistols in their belts. Roshe was more than a sniper; he was also an expert at getting into doors. It only took him five minutes to bypass the door controls and open the blast doors. To their surprise, the interior was not pressurized. They went in with guns at the ready, but it soon became evident that this was an automated facility; automated for what?

  “Captain,” Schwarz’s voice came in over the communicator, “Our ship has just been scanned and the computer was accessed.”

  “By whom?”

  “Apparently by that station you’re in. The scan happened as soon as you opened the door. Any corporate markings in there?”

  “Not that we can see. Wait, a panel just came on.”

  “Captain, sensors indicate the dome is raising in front of the blast doors.”

  Brommel and Roshe looked outside and saw that the dome was actually a silo cover. As soon as the dome was fully open, a very large missile launched off the planet and into surrounding space heading towards the outbound slipstream to the base.

  “Schwarz, what is that?”

  “Sensors show it is a slipstream capable missile and its signature indicates it is high yield nuclear. Captain, it is transmitting our ship signature.”

  The crew was thunderstruck. If it was transmitting their signature, then it would not be questioned when it entered the system containing the base. “We have to stop that missile, move the ship over here and pick us up.”

  “Aye, sir.”

  The scout ship moved to the blast doors and Brommel and Roshe ran to the opened hatch. Just as they got there, a massive nuclear detonation obliterated the floor of the crater, along with the automated installation, missile silo, scout ship and crew. The crew never knew what happened, as their atoms were scatter throughout the system.

  The large, nuclear missile was fully automated and it entered the slipstream seven hours after leaving the planet and ten hours later, it entered the restricted military system. The experimental weapons facility detected the incoming missile but they read its identification code as their returning scout ship. When they tried to communicate with the ship, they received static in return. All assumed it was just a communications problem. The transit time to the base was eleven hours and no one gave the missile a thought. When the scout returned they would check its communications. After all, no one was at war. At the end of the eleven hours, the missile finally became visible to the base and the threat was revealed, but the point defenses refused to fire on the missile since it transmitted a friendly transponder code. They were still discussing what to do when the missile hit the facility and detonated. There was no mushroom cloud in space but the asteroid that housed the base broke apart and not a single person survived the blast. The third corporate war had just begun. . . .

 

 

 
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