Dark Space- The Complete Series

by Jasper T. Scott

  “Good enough for me.”

  “Excellent. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to go get a team together.”

  Ethan nodded. “Let me know what you find.”

  “I can’t promise that, Ortane, but thank you.”

  The admiral started off at a jog, and Ethan watched him go with a frown. Hoff turned a corner and disappeared, and Ethan shook himself. Mysteries of the universe be damned. He had more important things to deal with—it was time to schedule an operation to remove Alara’s implant.

  * * *

  Walking through the mangled remains of the Tauron was otherworldly. Twisted girders and beams hung down from the ceiling; severed wires and sparking conduits drifted like tentacles in the zero-G environment. Bodies and pieces of bodies floated past Hoff’s floodlights with looks of horror frozen on their battered and bloodied faces. Hoff pushed on, ignoring the carnage. So far there were no survivors, but that wasn’t surprising. The Tauron was a mess, and it would need extensive rebuilding before it could even serve as a garbage hauler, let alone a warship for the fleet, but that was for the spacebees and greasers to deal with. Hoff had his prerogatives for boarding the derelict ship.

  As soon as Ethan had revealed the startling news about what had happened to Hoff’s clone, the admiral had put together a small team of engineers and jetted over to the Tauron. He’d left Commander Caldin in charge of search and rescue operations and told her to open a dialogue with the Gors. Meanwhile, Hoff had his own search and rescue operation to conduct. With everything going on, he’d completely forgotten to go looking for his clone, and loose ends could be dangerous if left untied. He needed to get access to his data center and his cloning facility. He had to find out if his clone had been revived, and if so, what had happened aboard the Sythian command cruiser.

  Perhaps that clone had found answers to some of the myriad questions which had haunted humanity ever since the invasion. Who are the Sythians and what do they want for starters.

  Hoff pressed on through the twisted corridors of his ship, occasionally using his cutting beam to open up corridors which had completely collapsed or been blocked with rubble. With all the debris it was hard to see where he was going, or even to recognize where he was, but he had a feeling he was getting close.

  His comm piece crackled. “Admiral? Are you all right? You’re getting a bit far from the expedition.”

  “I’m fine,” Hoff replied. “Give me another hour, and I’ll find my way back to the hangar.”

  “All right, but don’t forget to check in.”

  Hoff frowned and clicked his comm to acknowledge that before ending the transmission. He felt like a child out past his curfew, but he had refused an escort. It would have made sense to have a team of engineers with him in such a potentially unstable environment, but he couldn’t afford to have them find out about his secret. It was bad enough that Destra and Atton knew—and now Ethan, too.

  After another twenty minutes of struggling through the dark, broken corridors of his ship, Hoff found what he was looking for—his lift tube. It was still mostly intact. The lift itself was missing, but since gravity was out, all he had to do was dial down the field strength on the grav gun hooked to his belt, and then jump.

  Hoff floated down past deck after ruined deck, using his grav gun to direct his fall between jutting beams and the jagged edges of crumpled bulkheads. Hoff saw the lift tube coming up fast below his feet, and he dialed down the grav field strength some more. His feet touched the roof of the lift, and he bent his legs to absorb his remaining momentum. Using his cutting beam, he sliced a hole in the roof and dropped down.

  The cloning lab was a mess, but at least it was a recognizable mess. Glow panels still flickered down here, and the artificial gravity gave a weak, but perceptible tug. That meant that Hoff’s backup generators were still running—a good sign.

  The clone tanks in his med center had broken open, spewing blue nutrient fluid everywhere. Stasis tubes had broken away from the walls and fallen over, others were cracked and dark, the clones inside them now dead. None of the tubes were open, however, which was a bad sign. His helmet sensors told him that there was no breathable atmosphere, so if his clone had been revived down here, he would have woken up to find himself trapped inside a stasis tube that refused to open due to the vacuum on the other side. That clone would have suffocated to death.

  Hoff grimaced and shook his head. Looking to his right, he found his data center still flickering with rolling waves of blue light. The glossy black meditation sphere at the end of the catwalk which led out into that data center was apparently also intact. Hoff felt a spark of hope, and eagerness drove him on. He passed through the entrance of the data center and walked down the narrow catwalk, his eyes scanning the far walls of the hollow sphere. Those walls only shone with half of the lights that they should have, indicating that many, if not most, of his memories would be inaccessible now.

  When Hoff reached the mediation sphere, he placed a palm against the glossy black side of it and waited, hoping it still had enough power to respond. For a moment, nothing happened, but then the sphere spun, revealing an opening which had been hidden underneath. Hoff walked inside and strapped himself into the high-backed black chair inside the sphere. The walls of the sphere were transparent from the inside, giving Hoff a magnificent view of his data center. He watched the lights undulate around the room for a moment before he swiveled his chair to face the control station behind it and booted up the meditation sphere. He began searching for the most recent data set in the database.

  To his surprise, that data set was just a few hours old. One of his clones had in fact tried to revive in here, but the operation had failed, and he was listed as deceased. Hoff spent a moment parsing through the data set to find the clone’s last half hour of life; then he configured his data center for a memory walk and routed the sounds to his helmet so he could hear despite the vacuum inside the data center. With everything now ready, he stabbed the button to start his journey into the not-so-distant past.

  The transparent walls of the mediation sphere shimmered and then suddenly Hoff was standing inside a Sythian ship, in a room filled with glowing purple portals in the floor and ceiling. Just a few minutes later, a dark shape floated down from the ceiling, and Hoff heard himself say, “Hello, Sythian. I’ve been waiting a long time for this.”

  Then he saw a flash of white teeth, and heard a familiar voice say, “So have I, Admiral.”

  If Hoff hadn’t been strapped into his chair, he would have fallen out of it. He shook his head. It couldn’t be.

  And yet it was. It was Captain Adram. Hoff sat and listened with horror and fascination to the explanations which followed. So this is what immortality leads to, he thought, a vile, twisted perversion of life.

  He shook his head. It had to end. He’d had his doubts about immortality before, but now he was sure—man wasn’t meant to live forever.

  * * *

  Three hours later . . .

  Destra Heston stood outside Alara’s room in the med bay. She watched through the transpiranium viewing window with Hoff, Atta, and Atton as Ethan walked in. Alara’s parents were already there, standing beside her bed and fussing over her. She looked up and smiled when she saw Ethan, and he dropped a quick kiss on her cheek before pulling up a chair and sitting down beside her. He grabbed her hand and raised it to his lips for another kiss.

  Destra felt a brief echo of something—jealousy perhaps—but it quickly passed, replaced by a bittersweet feeling of joy. She was happy for Ethan—happy that Alara was back and finally safe, happy that her slave chip was about to be removed so there would be no more relapses . . . and she was also happy for herself. She was happy that she didn’t have to feel guilty anymore, because Ethan and Atton were both fine.

  Destra turned and smiled up at Hoff. He met her gaze and smiled wanly back. “How do you feel?” he asked.

  “Complete,” she said and stood up on tip toes to kiss him on the lips. “Happy.”
/>
  “Are you sure?”

  Destra hesitated. “No more secrets?”

  “None.”

  “No more clones?”

  He shook his head. “Never again.”

  “Then yes, I’m sure,” she said, wrapping an arm around his waist and leaning her head on his shoulder. We’re going to grow old together, and die together—” Her head turned and found Ethan’s and Alara’s tightly clasped hands. “—just like them.”

  Atton turned to his mother with a smile. “I guess now I have two families.”

  “But only one mother, right?” Destra asked.

  Atton laughed. “Alara is young enough to be my sister, Mom.”

  “And I’m old enough to be your grandfather,” Hoff added.

  “No, you’re old enough to be anyone’s grandfather.”

  “What is everybody looking at?” Atta asked, bouncing on her toes to see through the windows. “I don’t see anything!”

  Atton scooped her up and placed her on his shoulders so she could see.

  Destra smiled. “I think you already have a sister, Atton.”

  “Wow . . .” Atta marveled as her head scraped the ceiling. “I’m tall!”

  “Tall as a Gor,” Atton replied, and then he turned to look at Hoff. “Speaking of which, how are negotiations going?”

  The admiral shrugged. “We’re still sorting out who’s responsible for what. Now there can be no doubt about their loyalties, but we have to convince them of ours. There have been a lot of casualties on both sides, and at this point the only thing anyone can do is try to prevent more. The fact that the Gors are even willing to talk with us after Ritan means that they understand that, too.”

  Atton nodded. “You’re lucky that they’re so understanding.”

  “Humanity is lucky.”

  “You were so sure that they were against us,” Atton said, not willing to let it go just yet. “Sometimes the simplest answers are the best ones, hoi Hoff? They’re simple because they’re true.”

  “Sometimes,” Hoff conceded.

  “Yes . . .” Destra appeared to think about that for a moment, and then she turned to her husband with wide, curious eyes. “Speaking of answers, what was it that you found inside the Tauron which changed your mind about immortality?”

  Hoff hesitated. “That’s more than I think any of us are ready to hear right now.”

  Destra shook her head. “No more secrets, remember?”

  Hoff’s gray eyes found Atta, and he said, “I’ll tell you all later, in a more appropriate moment. Suffice it to say, the Sythians are not the aliens we thought they were, and immortality is not the innocent technological breakthrough I thought it was.”

  “What do you mean by that?” Atton asked.

  “If the Sythians aren’t the aliens we thought, then what are they?” Destra added.

  Hoff took a deep breath before he replied. “They’re just like us, and we’re all the same—all fighting for exactly the same reason.”

  Atton shook his head. “I don’t understand.”

  “Neither do I,” Destra said. “What reason?”

  Hoff’s gaze didn’t stray from Atta. She noticed his scrutiny and turned to him with a broad smile. “Look at me, Daddy!” she said. “I’m even taller than you!”

  Hoff smiled, and belatedly answered his wife’s question. “We’re fighting for our families, Des—we’re just fighting to survive.”

  Destra frowned, but Hoff’s comm piece trilled before she could reply. Hoff touched his ear to accept the call. “Yes . . . I see. That is good news, Lieutenant. . . . No, I’ll go personally to welcome them. I’ll be there in a minute.”

  Atton shook his head. “Welcome who?”

  “We’ve found a few more survivors, Squadron Commander.”

  “Squadron Commander?” Atton shook his head.

  Hoff smiled and reached out to squeeze Atton’s shoulder. “Come with me. I’ll explain along the way.”

  Atton set his sister down and went with Hoff. Destra watched them go, already knowing what they would talk about. She and Hoff had already spoken about it. The Valiant was Atton’s home. It was all he’d ever known. He was a capable commander and an excellent pilot. Cutting him loose would be a mistake, especially now when they needed fleet officers more than ever. Besides that, she wanted Atton close. She’d missed too much of his life already.

  As Atton and Hoff left, she heard her husband say, “How would you like your own nova squadron?”

  * * *

  Atton’s eyes widened as he heard the Admiral offer him a real officer’s commission with the fleet. “My own squadron? What about the trial? What about my crimes?”

  “You’re not the only criminal we have to deal with, Atton. There’s your father, Alara’s father, Brondi’s men who surrendered in exchange for leniency, and even me . . . we’re all waiting in line for the airlock or Etaris, and right now humanity can’t afford to lose any more people. I have a plan to deal with that, but for now just know that there won’t be a trial for any of us. The only man who we’re going to make answer for his crimes is Alec Brondi.”

  Atton frowned. “Okay, so why make me a ranking officer?”

  “We need you. We need pilots and crew, and you’re too valuable to waste, Atton.”

  They reached a pair of lift tubes and Hoff punched the down arrow. A moment later the right-hand lift opened and they stepped inside.

  “Where are we going?” Atton asked.

  “To the ventral hangar. We found some more survivors.”

  “That’s good news.”

  Hoff nodded. The lift arrived a few moments later and they walked out into a broad corridor which ran past a pair of rail car tunnels. At the end of that lay a set of wide, double doors.

  They reached those doors and Hoff keyed them open. Atton blinked, his eyes trying to adjust to the size of the enormous hangar bay beyond. It was one of the venture-class hangars. Right now one of Brondi’s baron-class cruisers sat there, looking like a venture-class which had been squeezed middle. Landed beside that cruiser were half a dozen assault transports, one of which was just setting down now.

  “Come on,” Hoff said, angling for that transport.

  The hangar was strangely silent and devoid of the usual bustle of activity, but that was because most of the carrier’s fighters and transports were still out scanning the debris for survivors.

  They reached the back of the transport which had just come in, and waited there for the loading ramp to drop. A moment later, it cracked open with a hiss, and Atton watched it slowly drop to the deck. Waiting behind that ramp was Captain Caldin, a corpsman, and a pair of medics. Caldin came down the ramp by herself. The other three followed, pushing and pulling a pair of hover gurneys. When Atton saw who was on those gurneys, he couldn’t believe his eyes.

  Caldin stopped before the admiral and gave a brisk salute. “Sir.”

  “You found the Tauron’s bridge,” Hoff said, eyeing the occupants of the hover gurneys.

  “Yes, sir. It was floating through the rubble. Everyone aboard was either cut to ribbons or turned to jelly in the crash.”

  “And them?” Hoff jerked his chin to the two hulking Gors coming down the ramp, their muscular limbs hanging off the gurneys on all sides, their slitted yellow eyes shut.

  “We found them stuffed inside an escape pod, still stuck inside its launch tube. The crew must have put them in there just before the crash.”

  Hoff shook his head, marveling at that. “But why? Why save the Gors when they could have saved a pair of humans instead?”

  “The pod wouldn’t have saved humans unless it had managed to launch before the collision, but Gors have much stronger bodies than us.”

  Hoff nodded and smiled, eyeing first Tova and then Roan as they reached the bottom of the loading ramp. “This will help our negotiations with the Gors like nothing else—if they live, that is. Good work, Captain. Are they asleep?”

  “Induced. Their bodies heal quite quickly whe
n they sleep, or so they tell me. The medics will do whatever else they can.”

  Hoff nodded and Caldin turned to Atton. “Who’s this?”

  “Squadron Commander, Atton Ortane.”

  Caldin accepted that with a frown. “Ortane?”

  “Yes.”

  “He doesn’t look like the imposter’s son,” she said.

  “It’s a long story, ma’am,” Atton replied.

  Caldin frowned. “I see,” was all she said to that. She looked away, back to the pair of medics as they moved Tova and Roan to one side of the loading ramp. “Get the others down here, and then we’ll take them all to the med bay together,” she called out to the medics.

  “Yes, ma’am,” they chorused.

  The corpsman came to stand beside Captain Caldin and saluted the admiral.

  “Who are the others?” Atton thought to ask.

  “Two pilots—one Brondi’s, one ours. They’re wearing the same fleet uniforms, so it’s tough to tell the difference between them except when they start screaming at each other.”

  Atton smirked at that, but when he saw the next hover gurney reach the top of the ramp, he really couldn’t believe his eyes. Another familiar face. She began cursing at the medics and railing against the Imperium.

  “This one has been out there a while,” Caldin said, looking up at the female pilot as her gurney came down the ramp. “She put herself in a hypoxic sleep to save oxygen. We found her beacon still transmitting weak distress signals. She was one of ours—piloted the transport which snuck aboard the Valiant, but . . . Brondi must have chipped her so he could use her to fight for him.”

  “Gina . . .” Atton whispered.

  Caldin turned back to him with a frown. “Yes.” Then her gaze turned to Hoff. “That woman is a very distinguished officer, Admiral. More veteran than any I can name, and I can personally vouch for her record. She’s no traitor.”

  Hoff nodded. “No, I’m sure she isn’t.”