Dark Space: Origin Read online

  “I remember Ethan’s was just a simple silver band. I don’t think it could have cost much, but one time, when he thought he’d lost it . . .” Alara shook her head and gave a small, bitter smile. “He turned the whole ship upside down until he found it again. He treated that ring like it was his prized possession.”

  “You see? There you go. A man like that isn’t going to forget about his wife for you. The only reason he says he can now is because he realizes that his wife moved on and he’s about to die. Maybe he wants to feel like someone still loves him before he goes into the light. That still makes you sloppy seconds, girlie, so don’t you believe his krak.”

  Alara felt those words hit her like a slap in the face. Gina was right. The cockpit fell into silence, and Alara lost herself in the stars as she thought about everything Gina had said. A horrible, hollow ache began in her chest and spread through her veins until she felt numb and leaden with sorrow. Without Ethan she didn’t have anyone. The only other person she felt any kind of connection to was Brondi, and she couldn’t trust those memories. If she couldn’t trust Ethan either . . . where did that leave her?

  “There she is,” Gina said.

  Alara blinked and suddenly the starry backdrop of space came into better focus. In the distance she saw a large, gunmetal gray ship bracketed against the stars. The ship looked like it was glowing, but Alara realized that Gina had snapped on a light amplification overlay to make the Valiant visible despite the near perfect darkness around Ritan.

  “We’re a few minutes to target,” Gina said. “Thanks to you, we’ll be the first ones there.”

  Alara smiled. “You know, piloting a transport for the vanguards is going to look a lot better on your record, anyway.”

  Gina snorted. “Yea, except it’s gonna say commandeered not piloted, and it’ll be on a criminal record.”

  Alara laughed and watched the Valiant growing steadily nearer and larger in the forward viewport. When they’d closed to within just two klicks of the massive carrier, and their speed was down to 542 m/s, Alara saw the super carrier’s icon abruptly brighten on the grid, and she frowned. “You see that?” She looked up to see Gina’s hands flying over the controls. “I see it.”

  Abruptly the carrier’s hundred and fifty plus decks lit up, and the ship began shining like a whole galaxy of stars. A second later the comms crackled with, “Approaching vessels, this is the Valiant, please state your intentions.”

  “Looks like Brondi’s planning to make a run for it,” Gina said. “You’d better hold on tight. This is gonna be close.”

  The Valiant now filled their view of space. Gina used the rudder to slew their transport’s nose into line over the carrier’s ventral hangar bay, while Alara studied the blue fuzz of static shields at the opening, trying to determine if there were any heavier shields already powering over top of that thin blue membrane.

  “Transports One and Two, this is mission command, it looks like they’re on to you. See if you can get the vanguards on board before their shields are fully powered.”

  “Roger that, command,” Gina said, and pushed the throttle forward.

  Alara’s eyes goggled. “You’re accelerating?”

  “Either that or we make their shields fizz as we’re turned into liquid plasma. What do you prefer?”

  “You’ll crash on the deck.”

  Gina shrugged. “Maybe.”

  The Valiant’s hangar swelled until it was all they could see. It was an enormous, yawning space, empty but for a few novas lined up along the far wall. Alara watched the pale blue fuzz of static shields carefully, in case it suddenly brightened and became more opaque, signifying the presence of the ship’s more powerful beam and pulse shields.

  Then a flicker of movement caught her eye and she saw a transport go rocketing past theirs with a simulated roar of engines. The blue glow of its thrusters was bright enough to make their viewports polarize, and Alara read the white numerals on the side of that ship—02. Then the comms crackled with, “Ruh-kah! What’s the matter, AT One? Can’t find the afterburners?”

  Gina smirked and keyed the comms for a reply, but she never got the chance. The hangar shields abruptly flared a brighter blue, and Shuttle Two ran straight into them. Their eyes were dazzled by the explosion. The simulated roar which boomed and rattled through their sound system was deafening.

  “Frek!” Gina yelled, pulling up hard to clear the hangar.

  Alara watched the carrier’s hull blur by underneath them in a terrifying rush. Illuminated viewports turned to blurry streaks as they jetted past dozens of decks in an instant. Alara clutched her armrests and gritted her teeth in anticipation of the inevitable collision. Instead, Gina fired the grav lifts and bounced them off the hull. Alara felt her stomach drop with the sudden change of direction, and all the blood rushed to her toes, leaving her blinking spots and listening to the ringing in her ears. Her head lolled and she felt like she was about to faint.

  “The Valiant’s shields are up!” Gina yelled into the comms. “No sign of weapons powering yet.”

  “Roger that, AT One.” Alara saw that the speaker was Inferno One, the squadron leader of their nova escort. “We’re reading their SLS spooling.”

  “This is mission command, do not let the Valiant make a run for it.”

  “Affirmative, command,” Inferno One replied. “AT One, we’re gonna try to overload the shields on one of those hangars. They’re not at full strength yet, so we still have a chance to get you in.”

  “Ready when you are. Which hangar . . . ?”

  “Port ventral. Looks like it’s seen some damage, and shields are weaker there.”

  Gina clicked the comm to acknowledge and then looped over the top of the carrier to the hangar on the other side.

  Alara felt her stomach lurch again, but this time upward as they dove back down the other side of the ship. She saw red and her head began to throb. She groaned and squeezed her eyes shut.

  “Sorry about that,” Gina said, looking over at Alara. “I guess you’re not used to the G’s yet. It takes a trained nova pilot to appreciate the thrill. I’ll dial up the IMS.”

  “Thanks,” Alara managed weakly. “Why aren’t they firing on us?”

  “Hoi, don’t jinx us, Kiddie. Maybe they can’t find the triggers. Whatever the case, it’s a good thing.”

  Alara watched the blue glow of hangar shields appear below them, growing rapidly closer. She saw fresh, unpainted hull plates where the hull had been patched.

  Gina hauled back on the throttle. “Any time now, Infernos . . .”

  “Torpedoes away!”

  Alara looked up to see a dozen bright silver streaks go jetting out toward the Valiant—and them.

  “Frek,” Gina muttered and hauled back more on the throttle. “They may as well be shooting at us!”

  A second later, the torpedoes slammed into the hangar shields with a blinding starburst of light, eliciting another roar from the transport’s sound simulator.

  “Ruh-kah! She’s wide open for you!” one of the Infernos screamed.

  A big chunk of debris flew at them and bounced off their forward shields with a noisy hiss, adding some downward drift to their momentum. After that, their shields were in the yellow, at 48%.

  Gina grumbled, “Skriffin’ nova jocks. . . . You hit me with a piece of shrapnel!” she yelled into the comm.

  “You’re welcome, princess,” Inferno One replied. “Next time you can kiss my ass.”

  Alara saw a half a dozen novas go roaring toward the Valiant at an unsafe speed only to pull up at the last second and bounce off its hull with grav lifts.

  “What are you waiting for?” Inferno One said. “You’ve only got a few seconds! Get in there!”

  Gina pushed the throttle forward and thumbed the afterburners for good measure. “I hope I’m not that annoying when I’m flying a nova,” she muttered.

  The tail end of Inferno Squadron flew in and bounced off the Valiant’s hull, and then Alara heard a famili
ar stuttering roar, and gold streaks of ripper fire began streaming out the side of the carrier. Two of the Infernos exploded almost instantly, and a third was clipped in the thrusters, sending it spiraling into the side of the carrier. The Valiant’s shields flashed brightly with the impact and the resultant explosion seemed to fizz—as Gina had put it—along the carrier’s shields in a rippling wave of fire.

  “Frek!” Gina said as she yanked the stick from side to side, weaving toward the open hangar in an evasive pattern. A few rounds hissed against their shields and Alara watched the shields drop another 10%.

  “She was playin’ dead!” someone yelled.

  “Let’s give her another face full of fire, boys!” Inferno One replied.

  “Negative, Infernos!” command replied. “All units abort and get back to the Tauron. You’ve got less than thirty seconds till the Valiant jumps away.”

  “Roger that.”

  “What?” Gina blurted just as their momentum carried them through the hangar shields. The recovering shields roared against theirs in protest, and for a moment all they could see was dazzling blue brilliance. . . .

  “Shields critical,” the computer warned.

  Then they were through and rocketing for the back of the hangar. The ship’s gravity yanked them toward the deck, but Gina’s hand had been ready on the grav lifts, and she was fast enough to prevent an instant crash.

  “Hold on!” Gina yanked back on the throttle until it was in full reverse and deployed the air brakes for good measure. The roar of their engines became deafening. “Still not going to cut it!” Gina said. “Extend the landing skids! We need some friction to slow us down.”

  Alara dropped the skids with a krrr-thu-thunk, and Gina brought them down close to the deck until they heard the skids make contact. Sparks flew out below them. Friction with the deck slowed them quickly. Then one of the skids abruptly snapped off, and the shuttle’s nose hit the deck. The hiss of duranium scraping against their shields was deafening. A split second later, their shields gave out with a bang, and that hiss became a thunderous screech as their transport scraped all its paint off on the deck. Alara began to feel vibrations bleeding through the IMS to rattle her teeth. Gina tried to balance their landing with the grav lifts, but she must have overcorrected, because the back end of the shuttle abruptly lifted up, and in the next instant they were screaming as they flipped over and landed on their roof. Now they were hanging upside down, watching sparks fly between the roof of the shuttle and the deck as they skidded backward. The vibrations grew stronger and stronger until Alara could feel herself being pressed into her flight chair.

  “IMS is failing!” Gina gritted out.

  And then they slammed into the back wall of the hangar, and both of them were thrown hard against their flight chairs. Something inside the cockpit exploded, and a piece of shrapnel clipped Alara in the head.

  Darkness swallowed her whole.

  * * *

  Admiral Heston slammed the captain’s table with his fist as the Valiant jumped to SLS and her icon winked off the grid. “We were that close!” he made a small gap between his fingers.

  Commander Donali nodded. “Almost, sir.”

  “We lost three novas and a transport for that.”

  “Sloppy piloting, sir. They knew the Valiant’s guns could have been live. Just because they didn’t detect weapons powering doesn’t mean they should have let their guards down.”

  Heston glared at the three dimensional star map rising out of the holo table, watching as his units fled like disorganized rabble. “How does one scruffy band of outlaws cause so much trouble?”

  “Perhaps we’re underestimating them, sir.”

  “Perhaps.”

  “Sir,” a new voice reached Hoff’s ears, and he looked up to see his recently-appointed tactical adviser, Deck Commander Loba Caldin staring at him.

  “What is it, Commander Caldin?”

  “We’re missing a transport.”

  “Another one? That makes three novas and two transports. Do you have any more bad news for me, Commander?”

  “The battle logs show no record of the missing transport being destroyed, sir, and it appears that Inferno Squadron was helping them get inside one of the hangars before the Valiant opened fire.”

  “Are you saying they might have made it aboard?”

  “That’s the only conclusion I can draw from the data, sir.”

  Heston’s grizzled eyebrows floated up. “Which transport?”

  “AT One, sir.”

  Hoff smiled. “Vanguards—the first ones in and the last ones out.”

  “The only ones in,” Caldin added.

  “Well, these ones have certainly earned their badge. Ethan Ortane is on that shuttle,” Hoff mused, rubbing his chin.

  Caldin frowned. “The holoskinner? That’s not very encouraging, sir.”

  “On the contrary, it’s an unusual boon.”

  “A boon, sir?”

  “Yes, a helpful thing. . . . anyway,” Hoff shook his head, annoyed with himself for using such an antiquated word, and with her for interrupting him. “I had Ethan implanted with a tracker to keep an eye on him. If Brondi thinks he’s getting away from us, he’s badly mistaken.”

  Commander Donali shook his head. “The tracker won’t be useful as long as they’re in SLS, and without the commnet to send faster than light communications, it’ll be useless when they drop out of SLS, too. We’d have to know where Brondi is headed and meet him there in order to receive any signals from the tracker. In other words, we’d have to be able to find them before we can find them. That’s a painful irony, sir.”

  “Ah, but we do have a working commnet, and we do know where Brondi is going.”

  “We do, sir?”

  Caldin began nodding. “Dark Space. We have a working commnet inside the sector.”

  Hoff inclined his head to her. “Correct. Brondi won’t flee deeper into Sythian Space. His safest bet is to head back to Dark Space where he can muster some kind of defense, or merely hide in whatever rat hole passes for his headquarters—and that, my dear Commander Lenon Donali, is how the tracker will help us to find the Valiant. As soon as we get to Dark Space, we’ll start receiving signals from Ethan’s tracker via the gate relays, and we’ll be able to pinpoint Brondi’s location.”

  “Shall I plot a course to Dark Space?” Donali asked.

  “Not yet.” Hoff turned to Caldin. “Do you think that Tova and Roan can be trusted, Commander?”

  Caldin hesitated. “I would personally never trust a Gor.”

  Hoff smiled. “I like you, Caldin. Keep that up and you might just make it back to Captain.”

  “That would be an honor, sir.”

  “Nevertheless, those two pet Gors of yours have already been to Dark Space, so there’s no danger in us taking them back, is there?”

  “I suppose not. . . .”

  “I’m not confident we can overwhelm the Valiant’s novas and whatever ragtag fleet Brondi will have mustered to defend himself. I’d have to bring my whole fleet to bear, and that would take weeks—not to mention it would leave the enclave undefended. The Gors can help us to shortcut that process and save a lot of lives.”

  “I’m not sure I see how Tova and Roan will make the difference in that equation,” Caldin replied.

  “I’m afraid I don’t either,” Donali said. “Two Gors will never be enough to take back the Valiant.”

  “But that’s where you’re wrong,” Heston said. He turned to stare out at space and the dark, distant specter of Fortress Station. “We’re going to use them to communicate between this ship and the Interloper while it’s cloaked. The Interloper will trace Ethan’s tracker signal to its source, sidle up close to the Valiant, and wait beside one of the venture-class hangars. Then they’ll call us in, and we’ll blow a hole in the hangar shields for them to get inside.”

  Donali’s real eye widened. “Brondi will never see it coming.”

  “Literally.”

  �
��I agree. It’s a good plan,” Caldin added.

  Hoff turned to her with a smile. “I’m glad you agree, Commander, because you’re coming with me to pitch it to the skull faces.”

  Caldin’s nose wrinkled with distaste. “Yes, sir.”

  Chapter 15

  Tova’s slitted yellow eyes flicked from Commander Caldin to the admiral. She reached up to grip the bars of her cell in two large gray hands and began warbling at them. A moment later, the portable translator which Caldin held in her palm translated Tova’s warbling language into a gender-neutral facsimile of Imperial Versal. “You ask me to help you but offer nothing in return. Why should I agree?”

  Admiral Heston spread his hands and smiled. “If you help us, it would go a long way to establishing the level of trust we need to extend the human-Gor alliance to my enclave.”

  Beside them, Captain Adram was quiet and subdued as he craned his neck to gaze up at the two-meter-high alien. For her part, Caldin glared up at Tova with undisguised suspicion.

  “The alliance no longer existsss,” Tova hissed. “I am not stupid. Your overlord is to be eaten by his crèche mates. He is no longer a lord.” Tova shook her head. “Do not lie to me, Admiral.”

  “Very well,” Heston inclined his head. “I’ll grant that you are very smart, Tova, so I’ll do you the courtesy of telling you the truth. Right now I have no reason to believe your people’s story or trust the Gors at all, and I am now in command of all the human survivors. You are right to say that the alliance no longer exists, and the reason for that is very simple—whether you were slaves or not, you pushed our race to the point of extinction, and most of my people can still remember that. Any one of my officers can close his eyes and still see Gors marching in their black armor. There is a lot for us to forget before we can fight alongside you.”

  “Then you say that we are always to be your enemy?”