Magnitude: A Space Opera Adventure (Blackstar Command Book 2) Page 13

  After a lap of walking around the hold, Kai held up his hand to stop them. “I’ve gotta admit it could be seriously helpful. But you said something about information. How can this thing help us with that? Also, we can’t just keep calling it the thing.“

  Senaya hopped off its back and ordered it to go into what she called standby mode, where its belly flopped to the floor to a resting position.

  “I agree about the name. Which is why I renamed it. You’ll see it on the local network.”

  Kai checked his terminal and looked at the device list for the network. There were entries for the three ships along with everyone’s personal terminals, and there, at the bottom was the newest entry in the network: Wiggs.

  He raised an eyebrow. “Wiggs? Really?”

  Senaya shrugged. “Why not? It’s short for Wiggles. It’s an accurate description given the way it moves. Besides, my project, my name.”

  Kai sighed and shook his head. “Fine, Wiggs it is, then. But the minute I suspect it’s broken its programming or poses a threat, Wiggs is going to be spaced and burned up in the Blackstar’s thrust.”

  “That’s fine by me. But before you space it, there’s one really important job it can do for us—it can help repair the gravity drive and get us fully operational again. I’ve already created a manifest of work and broken down all the tasks. If I were to do it myself, it’d take days, but Wiggs and I can do it in about six hours. And it means none of us have to tackle an impromptu EVA again.”

  “Now that’s definitely a benefit.”

  Kai considered this as he walked around the machine.

  Despite her reassurances and his faith in her, something about it still gave him the creeps from deep within his psyche. As he thought about it, he got a flash of the Navigator crystal world again, and of swarming machines, and worse: the dark abyssal thing known as Darkarahn.

  “Are you okay?” Senaya said. “You’ve gone super pale. You’re not going to chuck, are you?”

  “What? No… I’m okay, just tired and stressed. I have to be honest, I don’t trust this thing, but I trust you more, so if you think you can use it, then I’m happy for you to go ahead, but I won’t hesitate to destroy it the second it shows anything other than complete compliance with orders.”

  Senaya reached out and gripped his arm in a sign of reassurance. “It’ll be fine. It’s not a threat to us at all. You asked about information, well, Wiggs aside, I discovered a few interesting things.”

  Senaya stepped closer to him conspiratorially.

  Kai looked over her shoulder to make sure the cargo hold door was fully closed and leaned in. “Go on.”

  “Eesoh—it’s not an AI.”

  He snapped his eyes open. “What?”

  “You know something wasn’t right with it; you said yourself. I had Wiggs take a look through the network, and there is no AI module on the ship. No programming or hardware that could facilitate an artificial intelligence of any kind. Believe me or not, Kai, but that thing you’ve been communicating with—it’s a real, conscious entity. Eesoh is alive.”

  Kai reeled at this information, and a familiar buzz deep within his mind told him that what she was saying was true. This was exactly why he couldn’t quite understand his feelings towards it. It wasn’t an issue of trust. Rather, it was the unfamiliarity of a new kind of… He struggled for the word. Animal wasn’t right, nor person, and entity felt too cold now that Kai knew it was actually alive.

  Before he could consider its terminology further, and its ramifications, the hiss of the cargo hold door’s mechanism interrupted his thoughts. He stepped away from Senaya as though their close proximity would signal their conspiracy.

  “Who is it?” Kai whispered to Senaya, who was checking her terminal’s video feeds.

  “Mummy dearest.”

  “Great. Don’t speak a word of Eesoh’s status to anyone else, including my mother, okay? I want to understand it myself first.”

  “Got it.”

  The door opened, and Brenna smiled when she saw Kai. Wrinkles at the corners of her eyes and dark patches below indicated that she hadn’t been sleeping well. Her dark blue GTU clothes were tatty and damaged, and her hair—brunette currently—was wrapped up in a tight bun. Strands of silver hinted at her advancing years.

  To Kai’s shame, he realized he couldn’t remember exactly how old his own mother was. He knew she was in her late fifties, but as she’d been away for so long as a GTU agent, time had conspired to obfuscate her age.

  “My boy, just the man I wanted to see. I hoped to find you here,” Brenna said, walking into the hold and looking around at the place, her focus falling briefly on the Koldax before coming back to Kai and Senaya.

  “What can I help you with, Mother?”

  “We need to talk about your father and Marella.”

  “Ooh, messy family stuff,” Senaya said. “I’m outta here. I’m gonna grab some sleep—it’s been a long cycle.”

  “It’s fine. You can stay,” Kai said, not wanting to get into all the family stuff again.

  “Nope, this is all yours.” Senaya gave him a smile and quickly slipped out the open door, leaving him alone with his mother and the Koldax machine.

  “So, Mother, what’s on your mind?”

  “Marella has been lying to you. She found some journal entries from Kendal that you need to read. I requested them from her, but after reading them, I know she’s holding some back. Oh, and I suspect her of having an affair with your father.”

  Chapter 17

  GENERAL RATIC HOMINOS yawned and groped for the alarm buzzing next to his head.

  In truth, he needed no such alarm and had been awake for at least an hour, waiting for his scheduled meeting at 2300 hours to commence. He and his intelligence expert, Officer Ukjao, were due to discuss the report from agent Miles regarding this meeting between the Host hierarchy and their mysterious allied faction.

  Miles had used one of the GTU sleeper agents on the Host world of Gaszla II to get him a position as a translation aid to the embassy.

  Over eight years of covert operations had come to this final moment.

  Hominos hoped all that time and effort wasn’t spent in vain. They had to get something useful from this, especially given the unlikely situation of Musa Miles surviving the event. The Coalition needed to know who was manipulating the Host, who was supplying them with soldiers and technology, if they were to have any chance of defeating them.

  He had pondered on it while resting in his quarters, wondering what species this new ally could be. Probably nothing from the Lasides Quadrant. These species were almost entirely known and populated both the Coalition and Host worlds. If there were something within the quadrant with advanced technology and sufficient numbers, everyone would have known about them.

  Not least Ratic Hominos.

  As a child, he’d developed a wide-eyed wonder for all the different species within the Lasides Quadrant of systems, both Host and Coalition alike. This interest led him to a doctorate in anthropological species studies, specializing in hybrid biology.

  His work in the academic circles and knowledge as a result of his interests led him down a career track that had culminated in his role as general.

  Although he did his best not to show it, he felt the pressure. A tightening of the neck and shoulders and a permanent unsettling of his digestive system the physical manifestations of that. None of that affected his resolve. Or diminished his focus.

  Quite the opposite.

  He’d ended his long-term relationship with his fiancée within a few hours of his receiving news of his promotion, knowing he couldn’t give her what she needed now that he had more serious responsibilities.

  He couldn’t afford the distraction a family would bring.

  Given his new role, he needed to be independent so he could make decisions from a higher point of view. An elevated position of ultimate perspective.

  The pain still hurt. He still missed Elisa not being next to him in bed.
He missed her smile and her brunette hair, all wild and jumbled. He missed her spirit and refusal to follow anyone’s rules—even her own at times.

  Letting her go was the hardest thing he’d had to do up until now, but also the best.

  The decisions he was now expected to make required him to be less human and more objective, calculating; some would say cold and detached. He couldn’t ruin Elisa’s life or hold it back. He’d poison her, and watching her wither within her devotion would surely kill them both.

  His ability to rise above his own emotional drives and the fact he had no family—both of his parents having died in the first war with the Host—or dependents of any kind had no doubt made him an attractive proposition for the role of general.

  The presidents had said as much, albeit in different terms, in their offer message.

  And now, over a video feed, he had to watch a good agent die for the safety of the Coalition and its citizens and somehow be okay with that.

  He briefly considered the option of standing down and finding Elisa. But what good would that do? They’d all likely die at the machinations of war shortly after. At least this way, with him in a position of power, he might just be able to save a few lives.

  And give Elisa a future she deserved—even if it meant without him.

  HOMINOS CLEARED his throat as he approached his office within the CDF HQ. A mute pair of guards stood to either side of the door. He knew their names, but couldn’t find it in him to engage in polite conversation. To know them would only make it worse if he failed to stop the Host’s new weapon.

  “Is Ukjao inside?” he asked.

  “Sir, yes, sir. We let her in two minutes before your arrival, sir,” the one on the left said.

  “We’ll be about an hour. No one comes in—even the presidents.”

  “Understood, sir,” the other guard said.

  Hominos nodded to them and entered his office, locking the door behind him.

  Officer Urahu Ukjao was standing by the large window overlooking downtown Goddenia.

  She wore a long, flowing gown the color of the evening sky. It was almost black in the low lighting of his office and matched her skin. The robe shimmered as her tall, sturdy body shifted beneath the fabric. A gold necklace contrasted brightly and brought out the inner, fiery glow of her skin that made the Axzatti people so attractive to almost every other species. Long, flowing black locks of shiny hair completed the striking look.

  During Hominos’s studies, he had focused on the Axzatti. They were a highly adaptable species, willing to use synthesis drugs to drastically alter their metabolism and bodies to thrive on a wide variety of different worlds.

  This made them exceptional diplomats, especially given the race’s philosophical leanings. Although they usually took up scholarly and political roles within the Coalition and even some within the Host, Hominos had always sought them out for strategic positions.

  Officer Ukjao was his first appointment when he was lieutenant general, having had her in his sights for some years previously when she had first signed up to the CDF.

  “General Hominos,” she said, turning to face him, “it’s a quiet night out there. I don’t think most of the population truly grasps what is happening beyond their own small sphere of existence.”

  Hominos joined her and gazed out at the slumbering city. “They can’t,” he said. “It’d crush them if they knew the full extent of what is coming.”

  “But not us,” Ukjao said, with a lilt to her voice that seemed to intone every word and phrase with implied gravitas. “We stand between the fates, do we not? Doing our jobs to prevent the worst from happening to the blind and unaware.”

  Hominos didn’t respond and repressed an urge to cut to the chase. He simply took in the moment for what it was: a quiet time to just reflect before descending into the grim reality of a war that he suspected couldn’t be won despite their best efforts. He focused on the city below them. Towers and domes dominated the skyline. There was little traffic this evening. It had been that way since the first battle with the Host.

  Vast numbers of the population had either left to go to remote worlds closer to the center of the quadrant and farther away from the fighting, or bunkered down, preparing for the worst.

  “It’s never looked so peaceful,” Ukjao said.

  “Ironic considering the motivation.”

  “And the developments of the Host’s…” She tailed off and her muscles stiffened as though she had overstepped her mark.

  “Please, Officer Ukjao, continue. What of the new Host weapon? Do we have a lock on its current location?”

  “We do, sir,” she said, brushing a slender finger across her terminal, scanning for the appropriate data.

  “Is it retreating, or threatening a front?” Hominos prompted, already knowing the answer, but gauging how this bright officer would choose to communicate the news.

  She looked up from her terminal, locked eyes with him and gave it to him straight. “It’s seven days away from engaging with Capsis Prime, sir.”

  “Good,” he said.

  She raised a golden, neatly sculpted eyebrow in silent query.

  Hominos remained silent, waiting for her to take the initiative and vocalize her confusion.

  A tense few seconds passed.

  She coughed into her fist and broke eye contact for a moment before looking back at him. “Excuse me for asking, but why would that be good, sir?”

  “It means fewer deaths to our citizens as it approaches, Officer. If we attempt to engage with this new weapon with the ragtag defense force we have out there on the boundaries, they’d be slaughtered. It’s better we keep the civilian defense fleet to engage the smaller Host ships, make a nuisance of themselves, so our more experienced and more potent ships can focus on defeating the biggest threat—if that’s even possible.”

  She didn’t hesitate this time. She was learning rapidly, Hominos thought, proud of her for quickly escaping the burden of morality. “You don’t think it’s possible to defeat?” she said. “If we can’t find a way to nullify it, we’ll surely lose the capital and the war.”

  “That is the most likely outlook, yes. We will almost certainly die during this conflict,” he added, maintaining his direct gaze. He leaned forward to emphasize his statement, wanting to see what she was made of.

  To his surprise and delight, she leaned forward, balled a fist, and said, “Then we better make the most of the time we have and do as much damage to the enemy as possible.”

  “Indeed, Officer.” A beep from his desk terminal sounded, signaling to Hominos that Miles’s report was ready to be streamed. “It appears my other appointment is waiting for me, so you’ll have to excuse me. While I’m dealing with this, I’d like you to talk with the analysts and see what tactics against the new weapon they’re working on and report back to me as soon as they’ve got anything useful. But don’t waste my time on anything that isn’t directly applicable.”

  Officer Ukjao stood up and snapped a salute. “I’m on it, sir.” She spun on her heel and left the office, closing the door with finesse.

  He turned his attention to the terminal screen on his desk and pressed his thumb against the pulsating green circle. It flashed once; then the screen resolved the video.

  Captain Mathieson, the new acting head of the GTU, appeared on the feed. Her tall blond hair dominated the frame, obscuring the details of her office. She leaned in, filling the frame further with her face. She appeared more drawn and tired since they had last spoken.

  “General Hominos,” she said with a curt nod, “Agent Miles is in position and broadcasting. The feed from him is currently delayed by thirty standard minutes. Our relay stations are working to their maximum.”

  “That’s good enough,” Hominos said, knowing they couldn’t save him anyway. “Patch me in.”

  Mathieson’s face tightened. Her eyes squinted. The edges of her mouth twitched as though she wanted to say something, but the pain of the situation was too muc
h.

  She and Miles were close friends, having worked together in the GTU for well over a decade. Intellectually, Hominos understood that this would be tough for her, but that wouldn’t change the outcome.

  Miles’s life had run its course and brought him to this moment.

  The ensuing scene would play out regardless of his or anyone else’s intentions.

  This was what made Musa Miles such a good agent. He had walked himself to the slaughterhouse fully cognizant of his pending termination and still remained professional.

  Like Hominos, he had sacrificed his future and his own happiness.

  Miles knew his sacrifice was for the greater good.

  “Patch me in, Agent,” Hominos prompted again, keeping his voice firm but respectful. “We’ll speak further later.”

  “Yes, sir,” Mathieson said as she leaned forward and tapped the screen.

  The feed changed to show a grainy, washed-out video sent from Miles’s iris camera. The resolution was low, but the software within the relays did a good job of balancing the exposure and stabilizing the focus.

  Ratic Hominos sat back, placed his hands together and prepared to watch a good man die for his people.

  Chapter 18

  MUSA MILES’S feed sharpened into focus as he adjusted the controls of his internal systems. Hominos could make out five other individuals within the glass-walled room. They were all wearing the two-tone gray outfits that were the current fashion for Host embassy officers.

  Sitting around a glass table with a communications pod situated in the middle, the Host members fidgeted in their seats.

  Small talk broke out between the ambassador, a short human male with close-shaved dark hair, and the Host leader, Empress Yuan Lia, identified by the glittering chain adorning her bare neck.

  Someone leaned into Musa and whispered something Hominos couldn’t make out.

  He made a note to get one of the analysts to run it for any potential intel, although he assumed it was just random chitchat.

  Musa responded in kind and played nervously with the glass of water in front of him to fit in with the overall mood. It was small things like this that had gotten him behind enemy lines and into the queen’s parlor, as it were.