DEATH NEVER WINS

GUNS OF THE FEDERATION BOOK 7

ANTHONY JAMES

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

Also by Anthony James

© 2022 Anthony James

All rights reserved

The right of Anthony James to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988

The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author

This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher's prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed upon the subsequent purchaser

Illustration © Tom Edwards

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ONE

Captain Jed Grisham stared at the sensor feeds. The image on his screen was that of planet Shesa-2, a hundred thousand kilometres away. Shesa-2 was a lush world with a warm climate, a surface of mountains, lakes, rivers and oceans, and a population of almost sixty billion people. Every one of those people was in the gravest of danger.

“The first of the evacuation transports should be here in twenty hours, Captain,” said Lieutenant Dan Bishop. “It has a one-billion holding capacity.”

“Leaving only fifty-nine billion others to go,” said Lieutenant Mac Adler. “This is a catastrophe waiting to happen.”

“We already lost much of our shipbuilding capacity,” said Lieutenant Kaci Lopez. “Three of the trenches on Loxor were holding part-constructed interplanetary transports. Now we’re having to start building them again from scratch, only on a different world.”

“Enough talk,” said Grisham tiredly.

They’d gone through this dozens of times already. The Ax’Kol had been defeated at Loxor, but they’d wrecked the planet. Now, the Human Federation was faced with the urgent need to evacuate two additional planets – Shesa-2 and Earth – but without having the vessels capable of holding so many people.

Aside from that, there was nowhere for those people to go. Although there were many low-population worlds within the Human Federation, they all lacked the necessary infrastructure to cope with an influx of more than a hundred billion people.

The entire situation was a complete disaster, and, though the members of the ruling Senate were pulling in the same direction for once, this was a problem that required both time and resources to fix, and right now, the Human Federation was sorely lacking in the former. The Ax’Kol might conceivably appear out of lightspeed at any moment, and when that happened, the casualties would easily climb into the billions – unless, of course, the badly depleted human fleet could hold off the enemy until sufficient transports were constructed to enact two vast and complicated evacuations.

As the commanding officer of the immense alien warship Oblasar, Grisham was carrying a lot on his shoulders, since his was the only vessel in the fleet capable of inflicting real and significant harm on the Ax’Kol. Unfortunately, the Oblasar, advanced as it was, could not be in two different places at the same time.

Added to everything else, humanity’s new allies, the Kijol, we also under extreme pressure. Five of their worlds were in imminent danger of Ax’Kol attack, so the aliens were not able to spare any of their own fleet to assist the Human Federation. The new alliance was holding well enough, but at the moment, there weren’t many opportunities for the two species to act in concert.

Drawing his eyes away from the feeds, Grisham called up the transcript of his recent conversation with Senator Herschel Maynard. He read the words again, for what must have been the tenth time.

Less than a week ago, more than a hundred members of the HF fleet had been destroyed while helping the Kijol defend one of their planets – Jarodar - against an Ax’Kol attack. The cause of the destruction had been a massive wide-area pulse of decay energy, which had not only wrecked the hulls of the affected warships, but had also killed everyone onboard at the same time. In addition, more than twenty billion Kijol on the facing side of Jarodar had also been killed, and the aliens had also lost nearly 150 warships from their own fleet.

Despite the utter devastation wrought by the attack, there was no clear feed data of the enemy vessel – which was thought to be the Gavax’Kol. A couple of the Jarodar planetary monitors had captured a glimpse of a vast and indistinct shape, but no amount of enhancement would turn those images into anything which would provide useful intel.

Given the poor quality of the feed data, it was believed the Gavax’Kol was equipped with sensor deflection technology. Grisham had also suggested to Maynard that the artifact controlling this terrible opponent might be able to create a telepathic block that prevented it from being detected. Although his experience suggested that telepathic powers weren’t effective against non-telepaths, Grisham wondered if the Gavax’Kol was different.

“I hate not having a plan,” said Commander Lois Deneuve. She was in the seat to Grisham’s right and she bore a hard expression which, of late, was continually present on her face. “The thought of sitting here for weeks, waiting for the Ax’Kol to decide which planet they’re going to attack next, is chewing me up.”

“That goes for all of us,” said Grisham.

Of their own accord, his eyes went to the ammunition readouts for the Oblasar’s many weapons. For a warship which had existed for almost a billion years, its magazines were surprisingly close to full. When Grisham and his crew had first captured the vessel, its Kalor drive had been completely depleted – a process which had taken hundreds of millions of years – and yet it hadn’t run out of ammunition.

That meant either the Oblasar had never fired its weapons – which was unlikely, given the scarring on the vessel’s hull – or it had been resupplied at some point before its Kalor drive went offline. Grisham was keen to learn more about the species which had constructed his new spaceship, since their technology was more advanced than that of both the Human Federation and the Kijol.

He was about to ask Lopez how her search of the Oblasar’s star charts was proceeding, when Bishop spoke up with some good news.

“Captain, I’ve been told that a supply shuttle has just been launched from the Idon base. It should be in a position to dock with us in the next thirty minutes.”

Grisham smiled. The Oblasar was lacking even the most basic comforts, and it looked as if that would soon be resolved. He’d put in a request for several portable replicators, mattresses, soap, shaving equipment, and various other essentials which would make life on the warship a little more bearable. Grisham had also requested some additional weapons and ammunition for the personnel onboard, since their existing supplies were running low.

“Any news about our backup crew?” asked Deneuve.

“It’s the same situation as before, Commander,” said Bishop. “If we want a backup crew that’s fresh off a Tibor, we can have them at any time. Getting hold of officers with more experience is difficult at the moment. I’ve been told we should have our backups in a day or two.”

In truth, Grisham wasn’t eager to have new faces on his warship, and he only partly accepted the necessity. He and his crew had been together for so long, he was doubtful if the new officers would fit in quickly enough that he’d be able to rely on them if the Oblasar was caught up in a knife-edge engagement.

I’m getting stuck in my ways, Grisham chastised himself. There are thousands of skilled and experienced officers in the HF fleet.

“Would you like me to request some additional ground squads while I’m on the comms, Captain?” asked Bishop.

“Yes - they can come to the Oblasar with our backup crew,” said Grisham. “And they’ll be under Sergeant Maxwell’s command.”

He turned his gaze back to the feeds. A couple of cruisers from the local fleet travelled slowly past the Oblasar. So far, almost every vessel stationed at Shesa-2 had come by for a look, and Grisham wasn’t surprised. At fifteen kilometres in length and with an incredible mass, the Oblasar was a technological marvel, which looked both ancient, yet strikingly capable at the same time. In this case, appearances weren’t deceiving.

Grisham remembered he’d been about to speak with Lieutenant Lopez. “Commander Deneuve, you have the controls,” he said, rising from his seat.

The muscles all over Grisham’s body felt tight. The on-duty times had been long, and the padding on the Oblasar’s seats had long since decayed to nothing, leaving only the metal. Despite the thickness of his combat suit, Grisham felt like each hour sitting was a punishment. He’d requested some seat covers, along with all the other supplies, and their arrival couldn’t come soon enough.

“How’s your search of the star charts proceeding, Lieutenant Lopez?” asked Grisham, walking down the bridge’s central aisle and stopping at her console.

“It’s a slow job, Captain,” said Lopez. “There are trillions of entries in the Oblasar’s charts. Some of those entries came from our suit computers, some from the Urzox, and the rest were either in the databanks to begin with, or the Edran artifact added them just before Sergeant Maxwell destroyed it.”

“Those latest entries were also given to the Ax’Kol,” said Grisham.

“Yes, sir – and those are the ones on which I’m focusing. We already identified the HF populated worlds which the Ax’Kol know about, and you communicated details of the threatened Kijol worlds to Senator Maynard before we departed Loxor.”

“Assuming you’re hoping to find where the Oblasar was resupplied, is there any reason to believe the latest star chart entries are more significant than any of the others, Captain?” asked Lieutenant Eric Kinsey.

“Just a feeling,” said Grisham. “When the Edran knew it was going to lose to the Ax’Kol corruption, it wanted to help us – that’s why it gave us command access to the Oblasar. Maybe it tried to help in other ways too.”

“By adding something to the star charts,” said Lopez.

“Maybe,” said Grisham.

He was only guessing himself. During his last discussion with the artifact, it was on the brink of corruption. Perhaps it lacked anything resembling lucid thought, and Grisham was hoping for something which didn’t exist. And yet, at the very last, the Edran had spoken to him coherently – he could remember it well.

“What am I missing here, Captain?” asked Adler. “On the one hand, you’re saying these final star chart entries were given to the Ax’Kol, while on the other, you’re suggesting the Edran might have been trying to help us. Surely if the artifact was helping us, it was helping the Ax’Kol as well.”

“You’re forgetting one important fact, Lieutenant,” said Grisham. “The Ax’Kol are only interested in life - their primary goal is to kill as many living creatures as possible. They’ll seek out the populated worlds, and then they’ll move on to other areas of the universe.”

“Assuming the Edran tried to offer us a last moment helping hand, what exactly do you think we might find at this hypothetical resupply station?” asked Bishop.

“Tech,” said Grisham. The answer sounded lame, so he tried to pad it out with some guesswork. “The Oblasar was built to kick ass. How do we know the species which created it didn’t construct a hundred other warships like it? How do we know the Oblasar is even the best they could make?”

“We know none of those things,” said Adler. He shrugged. “I guess doing something is better than doing nothing.”

“That’s how I see it,” said Grisham. “Hunting through the star charts might turn up nothing useful, in which case we haven’t lost anything.”

“But we’re still tied here to Shesa-2,” said Bishop. “If we find something, we can’t make the journey to see what it is.”

“That’s another problem entirely, Lieutenant,” said Grisham.

He spent another couple of minutes standing at Lopez’s shoulder. She continued to search through the most recent entries – of which there were thousands – in the hope that something would stand out as being different. It was distinctly possible this was no more than a wild goose chase, but with little else to do while the Oblasar was at Shesa-2, Grisham thought it was a chase worth pursuing.

“Keep at it, Lieutenant,” he said.

“Yes, sir.”

Grisham returned to his seat, grimacing at the discomfort as he lowered himself into it. He imagined how much his life would be improved with the simple addition of some padding to his seat, and a cup of shitty coffee from one of the portable replicators. A check of the supply shuttle’s progress told him it would be docking in twenty minutes.

“I wonder if all those people down there on Shesa-2 truly know what’s happening,” said Grisham, after he’d spent another minute or two staring at the feeds. He’d made no effort to involve himself in the evacuation process and had no idea how the Senate and the military were handling the issue.

“I reckon the people needed to be told the bad truth,” said Deneuve. “Sometimes, that’s the only way.”

Grisham felt the same clenching in his guts that came whenever his mind began thinking too much about the wider realities for the Human Federation’s populace. In a way, he had it easy – he had a warship, and that gave him a degree of control over whether he lived or died. For everyone else, they could do little other than hope the military wouldn’t let them down.

Another few minutes went by and Grisham’s thoughts wandered again to the contents of the supply shuttle’s hold. A faint smile came to his lips.

The shuttle docked and the unloading was finished in only a few minutes. Sergeant Maxwell and the soldiers would deal with carrying the supplies into the habited areas of the Oblasar, and the task would keep them occupied for a couple of hours.

Long before that was done, Lieutenant Lopez announced that she’d found something.

TWO

“Captain, you might want to check this out,” said Lopez.

“On my way,” said Grisham.

He nodded at Deneuve to indicate the controls were hers and then left his seat. Standing at Lopez’s console, Grisham narrowed his eyes at the data on her screen.

“What’ve you got?” he asked.

“This,” said Lopez, pointing at a set of coordinates. “The time stamp indicates the details for this location were entered into the star charts one trillionth of a second after all the others. The filters I was running didn’t distinguish between so many decimal places, so it was mixed in with everything else.”

Grisham experienced a flicker of interest. “Are there any other entries with varying time stamps?” he asked.

“No, sir. The other entries which came from the Edran were all inserted into the databanks with the exact same time stamp. Except this one. Like it was an afterthought.” Lopez clearly had something else to say – the big reveal – but before she could say what it was, Lieutenant Adler interrupted.

“Or like the Ax’Kol forced the Edran to give up something important,” said Adler. “And the artifact showed us what it was at the same time.”

“That’s a possibility,” said Lopez. “But we were looking for anything unusual, and here’s one such entry.” She gave the thin smile of someone who was about to shut down any further argument. “Besides, there’s been some additional text implanted into the entry.”

“What does it say?” asked Grisham, leaning closer in anticipation.

Lopez pointed again, at a single word that was right at the bottom of all the other data related to this star chart entry. Grisham read it once, twice, and then a third time.

“Mordran,” he said.

“That’s got to be more than coincidence, Captain,” said Lopez.

“A sixth artifact?” said Deneuve. “Time and again we’ve been told there were only five.”

“And there might be only five,” said Grisham. “But still…Mordran…the name would drop right in with the others.”

“Before we go getting ourselves all excited, this could be anything,” said Adler. “But if it is a sixth artifact, it’s definitely information the Ax’Kol would be interested in. Those faceless bastards would prioritise the recovery of a sixth artifact above even the juiciest of planets.”

“I’m not sure I approve of you applying the term juicy to the life energy of billions, Lieutenant,” said Grisham. “But still…I agree when you say the Ax’Kol would be keen to locate the Mordran.”

“Better than keen, Captain. They’d be sniffing after it like cosmic flies chasing down the biggest turd in the universe.”

Grisham ignored the comment. “Lieutenant Lopez, is there any other data attached to this star chart entry? Does it have links to further entries that might be significant?”

“No to both, sir. It’s in isolation from everything else on our charts,” said Lopez. “Of course, the Edran might not have wanted either us or the Ax’Kol to know about linked destinations.”

“Damnit,” muttered Grisham. His curiosity had been well and truly piqued. “Can you infer anything from the position of these coordinates in relation to the surrounding star chart entries?”

“Not just by looking, Captain.” Lopez called up a zoomable model of the Oblasar’s star charts, where each entry was represented by a tiny circle, along with a label showing basic data. She pointed at one such dot. “This is Mordran. Watch what happens when I zoom out.”

The quantity of other entries on her screen increased exponentially until the dots were countless in number.

“That’s a lot of different places,” Grisham admitted.

“Yes, sir,” said Lopez. “If this was the Landol Sector we were looking at, with all of the copious data the Human Federation possesses on that area of space, I’d be able to identify strategic links between the different places.”

“But not from what you have here,” said Grisham.

“No, sir. Almost everything contained within the Oblasar’s charts is from an area of space I’m completely unfamiliar with. I’d eventually come to grips with it, but that would take time.”

“Effectively, we have the Mordran location, but no way to gauge if it’s anything important.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Transfer the coordinates to Lieutenant Adler,” said Grisham. “I’d like to know – purely out of curiosity – how long it would take the Oblasar to reach that destination.”

“I already transferred them, Captain,” said Lopez.

“I’m that obvious?”

“Yup.”

Grisham turned towards the grey-haired Adler. “Well, Lieutenant? How long?”

“Twelve days at the Oblasar’s highest lightspeed multiplier, Captain. And this vessel has a hell of multiplier.”

“Damn - so we’re looking at a twenty-four-day round journey, plus however long it takes to scout the place out,” said Grisham.

“Good luck if you were hoping to sell that one to Senator Maynard, sir,” said Lopez.

“I don’t know if I was hoping to sell him anything, Lieutenant,” said Grisham truthfully. “We can’t leave Shesa-2 – not with the Ax’Kol threatening. It’s not worth the risk.” He cursed. “But damnit, I hate that all we can do is react.”

“If you remember, sir, in the past we’ve discussed that the Oblasar can increase its lightspeed multiplier by drawing additional power from the Kalor drive,” said Adler.

“I do remember,” said Grisham. “And I also remember that we were concerned we might unwittingly increase the power draw to such a degree that we end up crippling the Oblasar.”

“Unfortunately, the interface I have with the multiplier boost is little more than a sliding scale, sir,” said Adler. “I’m sure the Oblasar’s intended crew would have known exactly what they were doing, but I’m reduced to combing through the backend software and trying to figure out how the alien coding works. I haven’t finished yet.”

“Give it your full attention, Lieutenant,” said Grisham. “Lieutenant Kinsey, help out if you can.”

“Yes, sir.”

Grisham returned to his seat, intrigued by what might admittedly be no more than extremely minor developments. Perhaps he was clutching at straws, hoping that the Edran artifact – having tried and failed to betray him – had, in its last moments, become fully committed to helping him defeat the Ax’Kol.

The big unknown was whether or not the Ax’Kol had also learned of the Mordran location. If those coordinates were significant to the enemy, they’d be swarming all over the place in the near future – depending on how rapidly their fastest vessels could travel a distance that would take the Oblasar twelve days. It was possible the Ax’Kol might already be well on their way.

An hour went by. Private Lyles entered the bridge, carrying a bundle of padded seat covers, which she deposited on the floor behind the command station, before returning to help the rest of the squad deal with the remaining cargo from the supply shuttle.

“Damn that feels good,” said Grisham, once he’d fastened the seat cover in place. Soon, he’d have a chance to try some genuine, honest-to-goodness, replicated food. After spending more than a week subsisting on nutrition shots from his combat suit, Grisham couldn’t wait.

“Captain! I have Senator Maynard on the comms!” said Bishop.

Grisham caught the note of urgency. “Put him on the bridge speakers.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Captain Grisham?” said Maynard, in his distinctive northern Shesa twang.

“Yes, Senator. What can I do for you?”

Maynard cut to the chase. “The Kijol have lost another planet – a place called Tervinol.”

“That was one of the five worlds betrayed by the Edran,” said Grisham.

“Yes. The perpetrator was the Gavax’Kol again.” Maynard was silent for a moment. “The enemy vessel fired its area decay pulse, with the same result as last time. Every warship in the Kijol local defence fleet was either disabled or destroyed, and every inhabitant on the planet’s facing side was killed instantly. Then, the Gavax’Kol repositioned and fired the pulse again and again, until everyone on Tervinol was dead. That’s another thirty-three billion souls lost to these monsters.”

Grisham’s recent life had been fully occupied with incidents of atrocities and death and yet still he was affected. “We’ve given the Gavax’Kol a need to increase the pace of its attacks,” he said. “Those assholes are going to wipe out every planet as quickly as they can, dump the bodies in their Engarvax carriers and use them to rebuild.”

“That was my conclusion as well,” said Maynard. “Everything I’ve heard suggests that the Ax’Kol derive pleasure from the killing, but given their recent losses, they cannot allow themselves the luxury of slow murder. A man with greater optimism than I might say this means the enemy have been weakened enough that they’ve been forced into new behaviour. All I see are the incomprehensible numbers of the dead.”

“Did the Tervinol defence fleet or the planetary monitors capture any new data on the Gavax’Kol?” asked Grisham.

“They did, for what it’s worth,” said Maynard. “I’ll have it sent over to you.”

“Thank you,” said Grisham. “Are we doing anything to change our approach as a result of this latest attack, Senator?”

“I don’t want to sound fatalist, but what exactly could we change, Captain Grisham? If you have any suggestions, I’ll gladly entertain them.”

“I might have something,” said Grisham. He explained to Maynard about the Mordran coordinates in the Oblasar’s star charts.

“I don’t know what to think,” said Maynard, once the telling was done. “You’re combining guesswork with supposition and coming up with—” He exhaled loudly. “I don’t know what the hell you’ve come up with.” For a time, Maynard was quiet, thinking. “If we work on the assumption that there is indeed something important at these coordinates, I could definitely spare a scout ship or a Tibor to check things out.”

Grisham turned and indicated that Lieutenant Adler should speak.

“Senator Maynard – Lieutenant Adler here – from the top of my head, a scout ship would require almost a hundred days to reach the location of the Mordran. A Tibor would require about ninety days. Hell, one of our battleships would take more than forty days. Even if we could gain agreement from the Kijol to commit a primary resource, I doubt their newest Eternus would complete the journey in less than a month.”

“In our current situation, twelve days is still too long,” said Maynard. “Given the rapidity with which the Gavax’Kol is cutting through Kijol territory we can’t—” He swore softly. “Maybe we have no choice anyway – Captain Grisham have you received the footage of the Gavax’Kol yet?”

Grisham accessed the comms system, just as a new file arrived. He opened it and watched a grainy feed of the Gavax’Kol, which had clearly been captured by a deep space monitor, rather than the Tervinol satellite ring. The enemy warship was indistinct, but not so much that its peculiar, uneven outline was completely disguised. Grisham squinted, but couldn’t quite grasp what he was looking at.

One thing he could grasp was the size estimate provided by the deep space monitor. The Gavax’Kol wasn’t just huge – it was colossal.

“Thirty-five thousand metres,” said Grisham in disbelief. “Senator, I don’t think the Oblasar can defeat the enemy vessel – not unless the Gavax’Kol is filled with construction bays and has a much lower mass than this feed would suggest.”

“Which is why I’m now asking myself if this mission to investigate the Mordran is worth sanctioning,” said Maynard. His background wasn’t in the military, and the doubts were evident in his voice. “Maybe I should take this under advisement.”

“Senator, if it’ll help sway your decision, we should be able to reduce the twelve-day journey time estimate I gave you earlier,” said Grisham.

“By how much?” asked Maynard.

“I don’t know yet,” Grisham admitted. “I should be able to give you an answer soon.”

“Let me know as quickly as you can,” said Maynard. He suddenly sounded like a beaten man. “If we can’t come up with a way to change what’s happening, we’re going to lose this war and we’re going to lose it soon.”

“Yes, sir,” said Grisham. “I’ll have my propulsion officers figure out an answer on that journey time reduction and get back to you.”

“There’s one more thing, Captain Grisham,” said Maynard. “So far, the Kijol haven’t expressed any great interest in how you came to know which of their planets were in danger, and I haven’t done anything to encourage their questions. However, if they ever learn the circumstances around your discovery of the Oblasar, and of the Edran artifact, they might be less than happy.”

“I refuse to carry the responsibility for the consequences of my last mission, Senator,” said Grisham. “My crew and I fought long and hard to recover the Oblasar. We can’t shoulder the blame for things we couldn’t have foreseen. The Ax’Kol were never going to leave anyway – not until all the Kijol were dead.”

“I’m not saying you should accept the blame, Captain Grisham,” said Maynard. “I’m just saying that the quicker this is resolved, the greater the chances our alliance will hold in the future.”

“You’re worried about a resumption of hostilities?”

“If we survive this war with the Ax’Kol, we may have to consider the possible strains between our two species, should there be any reason to point fingers,” said Maynard. “After everything it took to bring us together, I’d hate it if we defeated the Ax’Kol, only to start fighting each other again.”

“I understand,” said Grisham, his anger subsiding. He knew how much Maynard had poured into making the alliance work. “Is there anything else, Senator?”

“No,” said Maynard. “I hope to speak with you soon.”

The comms channel went dead, leaving Grisham to digest what he’d learned.

THREE

“Lieutenant Adler, is there anything I can do to assist you?” asked Grisham, hovering at Adler’s shoulder. “We need answers quickly.”

“You could fetch me a coffee, sir,” said Adler. “And a couple of cheeseburgers.”

“I’ll have one of Sergeant Maxwell’s squad bring them to the bridge,” said Grisham dryly.

Adler sat back and looked up from his screen. “Given what we just heard from Senator Maynard, it might be time to throw caution to the wind, sir.”

“And just move that multiplier booster all the way from left to right?” asked Grisham.

“Yes, sir. There’s none of us thinks the Oblasar is going to win a fight against the Gavax’Kol – not based on the contents of that last feed.”

“So we either sit here waiting for the Gavax’Kol to arrive and then lose in combat, or we deplete our Kalor drive trying to do something else,” said Grisham.

“That’s about the long and short of it, Captain.”

“There’s nothing like the promise of death to make a shit plan sound like a great one,” said Lieutenant Lopez.

“I wish there was something better,” said Grisham.

He pictured the word Mordran in his head, and he couldn’t shake the feeling it was significant – whatever it was. Unfortunately, there were billions of people relying on his instincts, even though Grisham had never solely relied on those instincts himself.

Turning his attention once more to Adler’s console, Grisham watched his propulsion officer scan through line after line of complicated code. It was possible the software for this particular function would contain hundreds of thousands of lines, so finding the relevant control routine might well take a considerable amount of time.

Grisham pursed his lips and came to a decision. “Screw it – let’s just test the multiplier booster and see what comes from it. The Oblasar’s Kalor drive lasted hundreds of millions of years on a single charge, so I’m sure we’re not going to drain it in a single journey.”

“I knew you’d say that,” said Adler, with a rare grin. “In fact, I’m surprised it’s taken you so long.”

“If I’m so predictable, maybe you’d like to take over as commanding officer,” said Grisham. “Just copy what you think I’d do and everything will be hunky dory.”

“I’m quite happy where I’m sitting, Captain,” laughed Adler.

“In that case, show me how the multiplier booster works,” said Grisham.

“Yes, sir.”

Adler deftly tapped in a couple of commands and a graphic appeared on one of his sub-screens. Sure enough, the booster was little more than a slider that could be dragged from zero all the way to the other end, which was marked with the word maximum.

“I’ve already entered the Mordran as our destination, Captain,” said Adler, pointing at a different screen which displayed the estimated journey time. “When I increase the multiplier, the time falls,” he said, demonstrating by dragging the slider along.

With the slider at halfway, the estimated time at lightspeed had fallen from twelve days to ten.

“What does it show when you drag it all the way along?” asked Grisham.

Adler obliged by moving the slider to maximum, which decreased the estimated journey time to eight days.

“I was expecting more,” said Grisham, making no effort to hide his disappointment.

“Eight days is better than twelve, Captain.”

“But it’s not nearly as fast as I was hoping for.”

“Captain, a confirmation request has appeared on the command console,” said Deneuve. “It’s asking if I want to override the maximum.”

“Hell yes, we want to override the maximum,” said Grisham.

“Confirmation entered, sir.”

As soon as Deneuve had confirmed the override, the slider jumped almost all the way back to the other end of the boost bar.

“Interesting,” said Adler. He reached out a steady forefinger and dragged the slider once more to the middle of the bar. “Two days,” he said.

“What happens when you drag the slider to the maximum?” asked Grisham.

Using the same finger, Adler slid the boost bar along. At seventy-five percent, the green colour of the graphic turned to red. “I think I’m going to like this,” he said.

With the boost bar at seventy-five percent, the journey time was reduced to twenty hours.

“Don’t stop,” said Grisham.

“Here we go,” said Adler. With a single quick swipe, he dragged the booster to maximum. “Five hours,” he said. “Damn, that’s incredible.”

“Captain, there’s another override confirmation on the command console,” said Deneuve. “Dare I accept?”

“Absolutely,” said Grisham.

“That’s done, Captain. I had to acknowledge two warnings about increased propulsion drain before it would allow me to proceed.”

Once again, the boost bar dropped back close to zero and the graphic stayed red. This time, as Adler extended his finger towards the screen, Grisham thought he saw the faintest of tremblings in the digit.

“Two hours with the booster at halfway,” said Adler.

At three-quarters, the journey time was less than one hour.

“Go for maximum,” Grisham ordered.

“Yes, sir.” Adler stabbed with his fingertip and dragged across, as if he was fearful of the outcome.

A single word appeared beneath the multiplier boost bar. “Unknown,” read Grisham. “Why does it say that?”

“Don’t ask me, Captain,” said Adler. “Let’s drag the bar back to ninety percent and see what it says.”

The word same word – unknown – stayed beneath the bar until Adler had dragged the slider back to seventy-five percent.

“I could speculate on the reason we’re seeing this output, Captain,” he said. “But I’m sure you have some guesses of your own.”

Grisham nodded. “Either species who built the Kalor drive didn’t fully understand the technology, or the outcome of the multiplier boost starts to become unpredictable at these higher levels.”

“That pretty much mirrors my own thoughts,” said Adler. He was visibly astounded by the Oblasar’s technological capabilities.

For his own part, Grisham was remembering the results of the Repulsor discharge at Loxor, and at how the Kalor drive had generated enough power to accelerate the Evoldor – the mass of which might conceivably have been as much as a trillion tons – to near lightspeed in almost zero time. He shivered with the knowledge that such technology existed in the universe.

“I guess your next step is to get on the comms to Senator Maynard, Captain,” said Adler. “But some secrets might be best kept to ourselves.”

Grisham nodded. He was in command of the Oblasar and this was his judgement to make. If Senator Maynard learned that the warship could potentially reduce a twelve-day journey to only minutes, he’d likely pressurise Grisham to make use of the facility, even if Grisham believed the risks to the Kalor drive were too great.

He stepped across to Lieutenant Lopez’s console. “The Gavax’Kol was last seen at Tervinol, and before that at Jarodar. We know the times of the attacks and we know the distances between those two planets. I’d like you to estimate how long it will take the enemy vessel to reach Shesa-2 or Earth.”

“Yes, sir,” said Lopez. “I’m sure you’re aware we’re missing plenty of the information we need in order to make this anything like accurate.”

“I know,” said Grisham. “Tell me how long.”

He waited patiently while Lopez finished her workings.

“I reckon as much as three days for the Gavax’Kol to travel from Tervinol to the closest HF planet, which is Shesa-2, rather than Earth. Unfortunately, once you include the comm travel time from Tervinol to Shesa-2 – which is how long it would take for Senator Maynard to learn about the most recent attack – then the Gavax’Kol could potentially be here within twenty-four hours.” Lopez looked up. “Maybe even twelve hours or less if the enemy ship’s propulsion is as capable as ours.”

“Or the Gavax’Kol could appear at any moment if it’s equipped with a multiplier booster,” said Adler.

Grisham cursed the uncertainty. He wanted to execute a lightning mission to find out more about the Mordran, but if he took the Oblasar away from Shesa-2 and then the Gavax’Kol attacked, it would be a disaster he’d never be able to live with.

However, even when he’d been only a Tibor pilot, Grisham had always been able to make the difficult decisions. More recently, since his recovery of the Voltran, he’d learned how to cope with the knowledge that his personal failure might have far-reaching consequences for billions of people.

Taking one more look at the star chart on Lopez’s screen, Grisham made up his mind.

“Get Senator Maynard on the comms,” he snapped.

“Yes, sir,” said Bishop. He was quiet for almost thirty seconds. “Got him. Bridge speakers?”

“Yes,” said Grisham. He spoke as soon as he heard the background hum of the connection. “Senator Maynard, the Oblasar can make it to the Mordran coordinates in five hours. I would like to make the journey.”

Even though the mission might well have been one searching for cosmic unicorns, Senator Maynard sounded as if he’d been handed a lifeline. “I think you should do so, Captain Grisham. Depart immediately and return as soon as you are able. The latest predictive models suggest the Kijol planet Rovolan will be the next target. After that, the output of the models is split between Shesa-2 and Exalare as the most likely targets.”

Grisham hated predictive models. He hated that the military poured resources into trying to know the future, based on what he saw as guesswork and numbers based on that guesswork. As far as Grisham was concerned, success was more likely to be achieved by pointing in a random direction and exclaiming we go thataway!

Nevertheless, and despite himself, Grisham felt obliged to ask what kind of figures had been shat out of the predictive models.

“Rovolan is twenty-five percent likely to be the next target,” said Maynard, who sounded like he was quoting gospel.

“What about the other seventy-five percent, Senator?” asked Grisham.

“There’s a five percent prediction for both Shesa-2 and Exalare. The other planets known to the Ax’Kol are each at one percent, while the remainder of the predictive space is blank.”

Predictive space? thought Grisham. Someone in analytics has their claws deep into the Senator.

“Assuming Rovolan is attacked, what target will be next after that?” asked Grisham, keeping his voice carefully neutral.

“After that, Shesa-2 and Exalare are both at ten percent likelihood of—” Maynard cut himself off. “You don’t believe a word of this, do you, Captain Grisham?”

“No, Senator, I don’t,” Grisham admitted. “I just thought I’d ask – in case things have moved on since last time I saw one of those reports.”

“Unfortunately, a lot of this is new to me, as much as I wish it were otherwise,” said Maynard. “And that’s why I put my faith in you, Captain Grisham. Leave Shesa-2 at once. Discover what this Mordran is, and then return. At the rate the Gavax’Kol is going from planet to planet, both ourselves and the Kijol will be extinct within a few months.”

“Hopefully we’ll find something worthwhile,” said Grisham. “I’ll speak to you the moment I return, Senator.”

Grisham cut the channel and returned to his seat. He and Senator Maynard had a long history, most of it bad, and yet here they were, working together to defeat the greatest challenge humanity had ever faced. Strangely enough, Grisham far preferred this arrangement to being under the direct command of a military officer.

Strange how life turns.

“Lieutenant Adler, our target is the Mordran – set the arrival distance at five million klicks,” said Grisham. “I want you to use the maximum boost from a single gauge override.”

“Yes, sir,” Adler confirmed. “Target set, the journey time is predicted at five hours, and our transition into lightspeed will occur in two-point-five minutes.”

Grisham didn’t know what to expect, or even if the boosted multiplier would affect the warmup. He soon found out. The usual thunder of the Kalor drive as it prepared for lightspeed developed a much harder edge, as well as an underlying guttural sound like that of a huge, wild animal. After a few seconds, Grisham was forced to lower the volume being fed through from his helmet microphone, but he could still feel the sound through the protective layers of his suit. It was stifling, like he was being slowly constricted by an invisible hand.

He looked at the warmup timer and discovered that almost a full minute remained. Grisham clenched his teeth. He swore repeatedly beneath his breath and watched as the seconds eroded.

With thirty seconds left on the timer, the Kalor drive held at a steady volume. By now the propulsion contained a dozen different elements, from a steady whining, to a resonant thunder, and many things in between. Grisham held his eyes open and told himself that he was loving it, that he was – like the Edran had told him – a creature of technology, and that this was the purest, rawest example of technology that could possibly be imagined.

At zero seconds, the Kalor drive emitted a thumping expulsion of bass energy that made Grisham’s heart miss a beat. The warship entered lightspeed, and all the sensors went offline.

Feeling as if he’d been put twice through a wringer, Grisham leaned back, glancing across at Commander Deneuve as he did do. For once, she had nothing to say.

“Is everyone…conscious?” said Grisham.

The Oblasar’s crew had suffered no lasting ill effects, nor had any of Sergeant Maxwell’s soldiers. Deep down inside, Grisham hadn’t believed it would be otherwise. He gave the instrumentation a cursory glance, and found that everything was exactly where it should be.

Now that the Oblasar was on its way, Grisham had only a few short hours to prepare for whatever he’d find at the end of this journey. With the Gavax’Kol rampaging through the Golor sector, it would have to be something game changing.

FOUR

“Lieutenant Adler – how much did our increased multiplier take out of the Kalor drive?” Grisham asked.

The news was good. “Much less than one percent, Captain. We had movement at the sixth decimal place on the charge gauge.”

“Have you learned anything that will give us an idea what’ll happen if we make the return journey using a double-override on the multiplier boost?” asked Grisham.

“I haven’t crunched the numbers yet, Captain, and I don’t think I have enough data to do so, but you know the trouble with exponents.”

“They’re ahead of you before you know it,” said Grisham.

“That’s right, Captain. I’m sure that using the double-override slider will affect our Kalor charge gauge at a level much higher than the sixth decimal place.”

“Let’s keep it for emergencies,” said Grisham. “Which may or may not be the journey back.” He rolled his shoulders, trying to get the knots out of his muscles. “Captain’s prerogative – I’m off to check out the replicators, and to see how Sergeant Maxwell is getting on with the shuttle supplies.”

“Make sure you leave time for the rest of us mere mortals to eat, sir,” said Adler.

“I will,” Grisham promised.

He exited the bridge and entered the circular pedestal room where the Edran had existed for a billion years, before Sergeant Maxwell, Private Chau, and Private Diaz had blown it to pieces with their gauss rifles.

The shards of the artifact were still on the floor and, without knowing quite why, Grisham stooped next to them. He picked up a couple of the larger pieces and tried to connect with them telepathically. Of course, the sentience that had once lived in the artifact was gone, and Grisham’s telepathic powers had been taken from him. He stared at the fragments in the palm of his hand, feeling many things.

Then, he turned over his hand and the pieces fell to the floor. Rising, Grisham entered the airlift and soon, he was heading along the passage which led to the mess room. The walls, floor and ceiling were reassuringly metal, and the scents were of technology, rather than the stale flesh of the Voltran and the Urzox.

A pile of crates had been stacked against the far wall of the mess area, ready to be carried to either the crew’s quarters, or the bunk rooms claimed by the soldiers. Two portable replicators – which resembled one-metre cubes with a screen and a pad of mechanical buttons – floated on their gravity drives near the same far wall, along with two similarly-sized tanks of biological paste, which were also equipped with gravity drives.

“Captain,” said Private Johnny Lowe in greeting, as he entered the mess through the aft corridor. He was pushing a third tank of paste along in front of him, and a smaller crate containing something else was balanced on top of it.

“Did you find your new ammo yet, Private?” asked Grisham, standing in front of the left-hand replicator.

“Yes, sir,” said Lowe. “I’ve got enough rockets to blow a hole in the side of a Kijol Excar.”

Grisham gestured towards the crates. “Have you got much more to do?”

“No, sir. This is the last trip from the shuttle,” said Lowe. “Once it’s done, the Sergeant has promised us a break, before we have to find a place for everything.” The soldier pointed over his shoulder. “The rest of the supplies are in a room back there. We should have enough paste to keep these replicators running for a few months.”

“Always thinking of your stomach, Lowe,” said Private Lyles, emerging from the same passage. She was in charge of a fourth tank of paste.

“It’s not like there’s much else to think about right now,” Lowe protested.

“True enough,” said Lyles. She looked over at Grisham and grinned. “Don’t empty that thing before we have a go at it, sir.”

“I’ll keep it down to a lean five hundred burgers,” said Grisham. He poked in his selection and the replicator gurgled. After a short time, a tray appeared, holding only three burgers and a coffee. The scent of the drink was both foul and alluring at the same time.

The seats of the mess – which had until recently been hard metal benches – were now layered with foam sheets. Grisham sat, and, for a time, he watched the activity of the soldiers as they carried in crates or guided paste tanks into position.

“We’re nearly done, Captain,” said Sergeant Maxwell, stopping by for a moment.

“Where are the mobile repeaters?” asked Grisham, taking a sip of his second coffee. It didn’t taste any better than the first.

Maxwell gave a nasty grin, as if he was imagining firing those guns into a tightly packed group of Ax’Kol. “We left two on the shuttle, and the third is in a room back there.”

“Just in case we have any unwanted visitors,” said Grisham.

“Yes, sir. For once, it feels like we have the firepower we need.”

Grisham gave Maxwell a quick rundown of the current mission. Even a slow rundown wouldn’t have taken long, since there wasn’t much to tell. When Maxwell had been brought up to speed, he nodded in acceptance.

Having drained his coffee, Grisham exited the mess area. As soon as he returned to the bridge, he indicated that Commander Deneuve, Lieutenant Kinsey and Lieutenant Lopez could take an hour. They left at speed. When they came back, Grisham told the remaining three members of his crew to take a break.

After a couple of hours, everyone was back at their station. The lightspeed countdown indicated the Oblasar would return to local space in not much over two hours. Grisham hadn’t thought too hard about what he might find there. In fact, and given the terrible things happening to the Kijol, and the threat hanging over the Human Federation, his mind was more settled than it had any right to be. Grisham hadn’t become inured to the horrors of war, rather he knew he was committed to the path of all or nothing. This wasn’t the time to dwell on events happening around him – all Grisham could do was fight to the end and hope that would be enough to influence the future.

Neither did the other crew members indulge too much in speculation, as if they too were at peace. When Grisham looked across at Deneuve, she gave him a smile.

“One way or another, we’re approaching the end,” she said. “I’ll be glad when it’s over.”

“Me too,” said Grisham.

He fumbled for something else to say, but there wasn’t anything worthwhile to add. Deneuve gave a half-shrug of understanding.

At last, Lieutenant Adler called out his ten-minute warning, and Grisham reflected that this had been a journey that had seemingly lasted an age, yet had come to an end in the blinking of an eye. It was either the best or the worst of both worlds, and he couldn’t decide which.

“Twenty seconds!” yelled Adler.

“Be ready, folks,” said Grisham.

“Ready as ever,” said Bishop.

The lightspeed timer went to zero and the Oblasar re-entered local space. Its sensor arrays came online in less than a second, and the feeds were of the expected darkness.

“Commencing local area scans,” said Bishop.

“There’s been no change in the Mordran’s coordinates, Captain,” said Lopez. “That means it’s static, rather than travelling along an orbital track.”

“A deep space platform?” asked Grisham. “Find it.”

“I’m on it, sir.” The star chart data was precise and it didn’t take Lopez more than a few seconds to locate an object, five million kilometres away. “Got it,” she said. “Check out the feeds.”

The Mordran – assuming that’s what it was – appeared to be a perfect sphere made from a dark material, and the sensors estimated its diameter at three thousand metres.

“Local scans complete and clear,” said Bishop.

“Acknowledged,” said Grisham, continuing to stare at the sphere. He got no feeling of anything about it, as if his intuition wasn’t interested.

“Should I run a scan for comms receptors, sir?” asked Bishop.

“Please.”

“Scanning…no receptors found.”

“Damnit,” muttered Grisham, wondering if his now-gone telepathic powers would have been able to contact the sphere. It was probably for the best that he didn’t have the option to try. “Lieutenant Adler, is there any detectable energy output from the target object?”

“No, sir. It’s possible we’d fail to detect anything low level from this distance. Particularly if the sphere is operating at idle.”

“Which means we have to head in for a closer look,” said Grisham.

He chewed on his lip for a moment, weighing up the likely dangers. The sphere was an unknown and its size indicated it could potentially have an enormous mass, and therefore it posed a commensurately large threat. Regardless, Grisham had come all this way to learn about the Mordran, and it was too early to turn tail and head for home.

“Let’s approach to a million klicks,” he said. “Lieutenant Adler, ready the Kalor drive.”

“Yes, sir, one million klicks it is,” Adler confirmed after a moment.

As the two-point-five-minute warmup timer descended, Grisham felt a steadily increasing tension – a tension he couldn’t decide whether to attribute to his fear of this mission failing, or to the situation as a whole. He forced a thin smile to his face, and his eyes jumped between the sensor feeds and the timer.

“Here we go,” he said, as the Oblasar entered lightspeed.

The sensors were offline for less than a second, before they began gathering a feed. Lieutenant Bishop commenced a new area scan, while Lieutenant Lopez obtained a visual on the sphere.

Viewed from a million kilometres, the feed was much sharper than before. The sphere was utterly smooth, and with no visible markings on its exterior.

“I’m getting no output readings whatsoever, Captain,” said Adler.

“Does that mean it’s out of power?” asked Grisham.

“I wouldn’t jump to that conclusion, sir. Not yet.”

“The sphere’s exterior is made from metals alloyed with at least one other substance,” said Lopez. “I don’t fully understand the composition.”

“Run another receptor scan,” said Grisham, once Bishop had announced the local area scans were finished.

“Yes, sir. Scanning…no receptors.”

“Uh…Captain? One of our Kalor modules just shut down,” said Adler. “The output readings on the other eleven modules are showing anomalies.”

“What’s the cause?” asked Grisham sharply.

“I’m investigating, sir. I don’t know how to stop it happening yet.”

Grisham knew at once that this was a significant enough development that he’d have to act immediately. The Kalor drive had almost certainly not developed a technical fault – hardware failure like this just didn’t happen - which meant the sphere was responsible. On that basis, the two options were to run or to open fire.

“Lieutenant Adler, did the Kalor module start failing before we entered lightspeed a minute ago?” asked Grisham.

“Yes, sir, I think it did,” said Adler. “Another Kalor module is on the brink of shutting down. The outputs on the other ten are all over the place.”

“Do we have time to prepare a lightspeed jump?” asked Grisham.

“I can’t make that prediction, sir.”

Grisham swore. “If the sphere was able to detect the Oblasar at five million klicks and initiate an attack, then we aren’t going to outrun it at a sub-light velocity. Commander Deneuve, fire upon the sphere. Give it everything.”

“We’re out of range for the Repulsor and the Rodor Lance, Captain,” said Deneuve. “I don’t know the extreme range for the Avil-Tors or the Zorl missiles either, but neither will lock – the sphere is not showing as an available target.”

Grisham hauled on the Oblasar’s controls, hoping to bring the vessel into a range from which it could discharge its weapons. The warship responded sluggishly and its acceleration was laboured. Grisham took a glance at the status readouts – the Kalor drive was failing fast.

“Captain, we’ve had a shutdown code injected into our onboard systems!” said Adler.

“Can you purge it?” asked Grisham.

“Not in time. Maybe not in any case.”

Grisham didn’t give up, and he urged the Oblasar’s velocity to increase. However, he could see that it was over – the warship was so far down on power that it was struggling to reach a hundred kilometres per second. At this rate, the Rodor Lance wouldn’t be in range for nearly three hours. The Repulsor didn’t have a long range either, plus that weapon tapped into the Kalor drive. The chances of it successfully discharging were non-existent.

One-by-one, the Kalor modules shut down. Eventually, the propulsion failed entirely and the Oblasar’s backup power kicked in, allowing the sensors to remain online – albeit with a much-reduced feed resolution – along with a few other subsystems.

Having come so far, and having overcome overwhelmingly bad odds before, Grisham couldn’t help but feel he’d been well and truly blindsided.

FIVE

“There’s no indication the sphere is preparing an attack, Captain,” said Lieutenant Lopez.

“We aren’t going anywhere fast,” said Grisham. “It probably doesn’t have to rush.” He turned in his seat. “Lieutenant Adler, Lieutenant Kinsey, if you can’t figure out a way to purge the shutdown code, we’re screwed.”

“The code has installed itself in the propulsion management systems, sir,” said Adler. “The Oblasar has built-in purge routines to protect itself from this kind of attack, but they’re ignoring the malicious code.”

“Why might that be?” asked Grisham.

“The only reason I can think of is that the creators of the shutdown code had access to the Oblasar’s purge routines, so they knew exactly how to circumvent them.”

Grisham’s mind was turning. “Which makes me wonder if the sphere was constructed by the same species that build the Oblasar.”

“That would be a logical explanation, Captain,” said Adler. “Every warship in the HF fleet can be disabled by a code – in case its crew go rogue, or in case there’s a runaway hardware failure that can only be resolved by shutting down the entire vessel – so it would make sense for the Oblasar’s creators to build in a similar feature.”

“It would also explain why our weapons wouldn’t lock,” said Deneuve. “The Oblasar’s weapons systems might have been programmed so they won’t fire upon a friendly target.”

“None of which prevented the sphere from shutting us down,” said Lopez.

“Either the sphere is on a higher security tier than the Oblasar, or there’s a protocol which allowed it to inject the shutdown code in the circumstances at the time,” mused Grisham.

He felt suddenly hopeful that the destruction of the Oblasar wasn’t going to happen anytime soon. The warship was still travelling at a hundred kilometres per second, so eventually it would drift out of the sphere’s range – however colossal that might be – but there was no pressing need for this mysterious opponent to take offensive action, if indeed that was the intent.

“Lieutenant Bishop, run another receptor sweep,” Grisham ordered.

“Yes, sir. Sweep running…receptor located!”

“Request a link!” said Grisham sitting straighter in his seat.

“Link requested and accepted,” said Bishop. “The sphere is called Mordran, sir. It’s opened a voice channel. Do you want it on the bridge speakers?”

“Yes, at once!” said Grisham.

The speakers hummed with the connection and the sound of a voice came through.

“Your presence on the Oblasar was not expected. This is a breach of Security Protocol H4. The Oblasar has been shut down.”

The voice was one of the most peculiar Grisham had ever heard. It was androgynous, and dispassionate, possessed of a modulating quality that was both alien and computer rolled into one. Grisham knew straightaway that he was speaking to an AI, but he couldn’t guess if that was going to make it harder or easier to bring it on side.

“My crew and I have been given command of the Oblasar,” said Grisham. “If you have access to our online systems, you should already know that the handover was legitimate.”

“The fact of your command access is not in question,” said the Mordran. “However, the Oblasar was intended to remain the vessel of the Edran. The handover should not have taken place. Therefore, your command is not legitimate.”

Grisham was unable to read anything from the Mordran’s voice, and he knew he was walking a narrow path, with quicksand all around. He could either go for broke, by upfront telling something akin to the truth, or he could skirt around the facts in order to see if he could figure out how to convince the Mordran as the conversation progressed.

Having always been a straight down the middle kind of guy, Grisham didn’t want to risk tying himself in knots by attempting to second guess an alien AI. He took a gamble.

“The Edran become corrupted by other artifacts,” he said. “It handed command to me and my crew so that we might continue the fight against the Ax’Kol.”

“This is not possible,” said the Mordran. “The Edran should not have been corruptible.”

“It happened,” said Grisham. “The Andos and the Virdas overcame the Edran.”

“What became of the Edran?” came the voice of the sphere.

Grisham took a breath. “It asked me to destroy it,” he said. “The Ax’Kol were extracting the locations of other species within the universe. The Edran did not want it to happen.”

“You are speaking the truth,” said the Mordran. “The conceit of the Vire has led to this.”

Grisham had no idea how the sphere was so convinced as to his truthfulness. Perhaps it was telepathic as well as technological, or perhaps it could read his biological signature through the Oblasar’s controls. Whatever the reason, it was an enormous relief that the Mordran was ready to talk.

“What is the Vire?” asked Grisham, firing off the most immediate question.

“The Vire were a species which came long after the Eilas. The Vire convinced themselves their cause was righteous. They attempted to replicate the creations of the Eilas.”

“The Eilas was another species?” asked Grisham.

“Yes. They constructed the Edran – one of the Avandar - and they gave it a home in the Oblasar. There were many Avandar, though each was different. The Eilas also created the Mordran. I am a hub. A record of worlds.”

Grisham felt his head starting to spin, but he was desperate to understand what the Mordran was telling him. “So the Eilas came first and they created these artifacts – the Avandar – and sent them out into the universe? Then later came the Vire and they tried to copy what the Eilas had done?”

“Yes,” said the Mordran. “The Avandar were intended as gifts to those who would find them. They travelled far, and one-by-one became lost. The Vire, on the other hand, wished to make the universe aware of their greatness, though they would not have described their motivations as such. They created their most powerful vessels – the Endevar was the first, and it was known as the Saviour. The Exetran was next – it was known as the Light. Then came the Evoldor – Hope.”

“What about the Gavax’Kol? Did they create that?” asked Grisham.

“Gavax’Kol was the name given to the sphere on the Endevar,” said the Mordran.

“It must have changed the name of its vessel,” said Grisham. “I spoke about the Ax’Kol earlier – do you know of them?”

“Yes. I know what the artifacts of the Vire became.”

“Was there a fourth vessel?” asked Grisham. “My crew and I located a spaceship called Urzox. We believed it was intended for the Andos, but the many species which created the warship were all dead.”

“I do not know of the Urzox,” said the Mordran. “The Vire did not construct a vessel for the Andos. The Vire commenced a war against another species, and this war was their unmaking.”

Grisham had several theories about the creation of the Urzox, but it didn’t sound like the Mordran knew the answers. On the other hand, it was proving to be a goldmine of information about the origins of the Ax’Kol.

“Are you opposed to the Ax’Kol?” he asked.

“There is no reason for the Ax’Kol to exist. The Eilas wished for life to thrive in the universe. It is the reason they created the Avandar.”

“What happened to the Eilas?” asked Grisham.

“They gave themselves to the Avandar. They transcended.”

“An entire species invested themselves into the Avandar?” asked Grisham in disbelief.

“Yes.”

Grisham wasn’t sure he wanted to understand, but it put into perspective exactly what he’d done when he’d ordered the Edran destroyed. Although the artifact had become corrupted – and was therefore lost – it didn’t bear thinking about how many consciousnesses had existed within it.

Aliens are gonna alien. Don’t think too hard about it.

“We’ve defeated the Exetran and the Evoldor,” said Grisham. “The Gavax’Kol – the Endevar – is busying itself wiping out my species, and another species with which we’re allied.”

“Life must exist.”

“Will you give me back control of the Oblasar? And will you help my species?”

“The answer to both questions is yes.”

“Captain, the shutdown code has been deleted from our systems!” said Adler almost at once.

“As quick as that,” said Grisham.

He heard a distant booming sound, which he recognized as the activation of the first Kalor module. The second came online a moment later. Grisham tested the control bars, but the Oblasar wasn’t yet responding. He turned his attention once more to his conversation with the Mordran.

“I haven’t faced the Gavax’Kol, but I have seen its capabilities,” said Grisham. “The Oblasar cannot defeat it.”

“The Endevar was the greatest of the Vire warships,” said the Mordran. “But it should not be an insurmountable challenge.”

“The Endevar is not the same warship that it was,” said Grisham. “The Gavax’Kol artifact has learned how to extract life energy from the species it kills. It uses that energy to create slave minds and it uses the flesh of the dead to grow. I’d estimate the mass of the Endevar to be eight times that of the Oblasar.”

“My knowledge of the Endevar is many hundreds of millions of years old,” said the Mordran. “The vessel I knew was equivalent to the Oblasar.”

“Not anymore it isn’t,” said Grisham. “Now – what can you do to help?”

“I can tell you of places, but I cannot promise you the means to defeat your opponent.”

“Do you know of any species which might have the technology to defeat the Endevar?”

“The species I once knew are gone. My links to them are severed.”

“All of them?” asked Grisham. He had a feeling the Mordran was, in its own way, telling him about the extinction of hundreds – perhaps thousands – of different species.

“Yes. Time never stops. Old life dies and new life begins. I am alone, but I spend the aeons imagining how the universe is now. It brings me contentment.”

“Are you one of the Avandar?” asked Grisham.

“I came before the Avandar,” said the Mordran. “I am like them, but not the same.”

Grisham had many questions, but, given the circumstances, he had to keep them focused. “If everything you knew is gone, how can you help?” he asked. “Do you have weapons?”

“I am not armed,” said the Mordran. “I was not designed for war.”

“Then what—” Grisham stopped himself, since he didn’t want to come across as being critical. It sounded like the Mordran had great depths of knowledge, but perhaps it was for him to ask the right questions, rather than expect the sphere to spoon feed him solutions.

“Kalor module number eight came online,” said Lieutenant Kinsey.

“Acknowledged,” said Grisham.

His eyes went to the output readings for the propulsion, which were already above sixty percent and climbing. The controls were now responding and he increased velocity, intending to bring the Oblasar closer to the Mordran sphere.

All the while, Grisham’s mind worked as he tried to think of how to take advantage of the opportunity he’d been offered. It sounded like the Gavax’Kol had changed so much since its construction that it was now beyond anything built by the Eilas species. Since the Eilas had invested themselves entirely into creating the Avandar, they wouldn’t be able to assist, and besides, their technology wouldn’t have advanced anything beyond that of the Oblasar.

Then, Grisham remembered something else that he’d so far neglected to mention.

“It was the Edran who told us how to locate the Mordran,” he said. “It’s possible that the Ax’Kol are possessed of the same information.”

“This I had already guessed,” said the Mordran. “If the Ax’Kol know of me, they will come.”

“Can you leave this place?” asked Grisham.

“What use would I be as a hub, if I were able to depart this location?” asked the Mordran, with a note of what might have been humour in its voice. “Here I was placed and here I will stay.”

“That’s the last of the Kalor modules back online, Captain,” said Lieutenant Kinsey. “All our onboard systems, except for the Repulsor, are up and running.”

Grisham wasn’t surprised that the Repulsor was still offline, since the weapon had taken a considerable time to recover when he and his crew had first captured the Oblasar. Hopefully, it wouldn’t take so long this time, given that the Kalor drive had only been shut down briefly.

As Grisham was racking his brain for the right questions to ask the Mordran, he received a warning that he’d hoped not to hear anytime soon.

“Ax’Kol warships have appeared within my vicinity,” said the Mordran. “I have added their locations into your tactical computer.”

Cursing loudly, Grisham checked the tactical. The six Ax’Kol spaceships – three battleships and three cruisers - were almost seven hundred thousand kilometres from the Oblasar, and on the far side of the Mordran. They’d exited lightspeed within a hundred thousand kilometres of the sphere and, at the moment, they were stationary.

Realising his opportunity for measured thought was gone, Grisham requested maximum power from the Oblasar’s propulsion. The Kalor drive howled and the electronic needle on his display surged upwards, passing nine hundred kilometres per second without any change in its rate of increase.

“A thousand klicks per second,” said Grisham. “Eleven hundred.”

“The enemy vessels are not within our targeting range, Captain,” said Deneuve.

“Fire the moment they are, Commander.”

“Yes, sir.”

“I’ve detected another three enemy warships, Captain,” said Lopez. “Two of them battleships.”

Grisham’s initial expectation had been that the Ax’Kol would attempt to extract information from the Mordran, though he wasn’t sure by which means, since their battleships and cruisers had no such capability.

Then, a new warship exited lightspeed. This one was V-shaped with swept back wings, a rounded nose, and curved topsides. In appearance, it looked exactly like the Gholaxas – a warship which Grisham and his crew had already defeated – except that it was far larger. In fact, this newly arrived vessel was almost nine thousand metres in length.

“These spaceships have been sent to destroy me,” said the Mordran.

Grisham didn’t ask the sphere how it was so sure and he didn’t need to. A moment after the Mordran had made this announcement, an energy shield of intricate blue lines sprang into being all around its exterior.

As he saw it happen, Grisham snarled. The Mordran had answers – he knew it – and all he needed was to think up the right questions. On the screen in front of him, the electronic needle displaying the Oblasar’s velocity was showing twelve hundred kilometres per second, and it was climbing no higher.

With his teeth bared in anger, Grisham hoped the Mordran’s shield was strong enough to hold off the attackers until the Oblasar could blow them to pieces.

SIX

“At our current velocity, it’ll take us six minutes to reach the nearest enemy warship, Captain,” said Adler. “A lightspeed jump will be ready in two-point-five minutes.”

“I know,” said Grisham. “But I don’t want us sitting as passive observers for those two-point-five minutes. I’m bringing us into weapons range.”

“Sir, I can’t tell you what that range is,” said Deneuve. “I don’t have enough experience with the Oblasar.”

“We’re going to fix that right now, Commander,” said Grisham. He watched the targeting lights on his console. As soon as they turned green, Commander Deneuve would be able to fire.

“Four hundred thousand kilometres to the nearest enemy target,” said Lopez.

At 380,000 kilometres, the Avil-Tor targeting light went green.

“Avil-Tors set to automatic,” said Deneuve. “I’ll bias them towards that big bastard.”

“That vessel is the Gholandas,” came the voice of the Mordran.

The sound of it startled Grisham, since he’d already forgotten about the comms channel to the sphere. For a split second, he considered ordering Lopez to close the channel, but he held his tongue. The Mordran might provide some worthwhile information.

“What are the capabilities of the enemy warship?” asked Grisham.

As he spoke the question, he watched the screens in front of him. On one, he saw dozens of Avil-Tors emerge from the Oblasar’s hull and their single barrels pulsed with the rapidity of their recoil. Grisham rotated the warship’s orientation so that the repeaters on the starboard flank also had line of sight on the target vessel. Additional Avil-Tor guns erupted from beneath their protective hatches and began firing in less than a second.

So far, the Ax’Kol hadn’t directed any of their firepower towards Grisham’s warship. Either the Oblasar was out of targeting range, or the enemy were more interested in executing a quick kill of the Mordran. The sphere’s shield was now permanently activated and the intensity of its blue was increasing – something Grisham took to be a bad sign rather than a good one.

“The Gholandas is equipped with missiles and psionics,” said the Mordran. “I can sense the evil of its controlling mind. It has changed since last I knew it – all that remains is insanity.”

The targeting lights for the Zorl missile clusters turned green.

“I’m bringing us to a halt,” said Grisham. “Commander Deneuve, put the Gholandas out of its misery. Lieutenant Adler, ready us for lightspeed – drop us right into the middle of the pack.”

“Yes, sir,” said Adler. “I have the coordinates already entered. As soon as we’re at zero velocity, I’ll commence the warmup.”

“Forward and starboard Zorl clusters one to four: targeted and fired at the Gholandas,” said Deneuve. She did a quick three count. “Forward and starboard Zorl clusters five to eight: targeted and fired at the Gholandas.”

The missiles were ejected from their tubes and their propulsions ignited. With a maximum velocity of three thousand kilometres per second in vacuum conditions, the Zorls raced away from the Oblasar. The Avil-Tor slugs had a much higher velocity and they were already punching into the facing flank of the Gholandas.

“We’ve been struck by a psionic: decay, Captain,” said Lieutenant Adler. “Our energy shield has absorbed the attack.”

All of a sudden, the Oblasar was under attack from multiple sources and its energy shield lit up time and again in the same pattern as that of the Mordran’s own shield. A glance at the mind battery gauge told Grisham that his warship wasn’t in any immediate danger of being overwhelmed. Unfortunately, the enemy psionics had effectively zero travel time, and that meant their attacks were landing while the Oblasar’s Zorls were in flight.

“Two minutes twenty seconds until the first Zorl wave reaches its target,” said Lopez.

Although entering lightspeed while carrying any kind of velocity would screw with the accuracy of the arrival, there was nothing preventing Grisham from rotating the Oblasar while it remained in place. Even as the velocity gauge tumbled towards zero, he oriented the warship so that Deneuve would be able to launch from the loaded clusters.

“Portside and underside Zorl clusters one to four: targeted and fired at the Gholandas,” said Deneuve. Another three count. “Portside and underside Zorl clusters five to eight: targeted and fired at the Gholandas.”

“Our lightspeed warmup has commenced, Captain,” said Lieutenant Adler.

“Acknowledged,” said Grisham. He rotated the Oblasar again. “Commander Deneuve - it might be time to divide the wealth.”

“Yes, sir. Topside Zorl clusters one to four: targeted at enemy Indredalus #1 and fired. Topside Zorl clusters five to eight: targeted at enemy Indredalus #2 and fired. Rear Zorl clusters one to four: targeted at enemy Indredalus #3 and fired. Rear Zorl clusters five to eight: targeted at enemy Indredalus #4 and fired. Reload complete on forward and starboard Zorl clusters.”

The lightspeed timer counted down ever so slowly, while the enemy fleet bombarded the Mordran with missiles, and the Oblasar with psionics. Meanwhile, Commander Deneuve continued launching the Zorls, and soon, hundreds of them were speeding across the intervening space.

“Delayed pain,” said Adler in satisfaction. “Those enemy warships don’t know it yet, but half of them are already out of action.”

“They’ll be out of action when they stop firing,” said Grisham. He noticed something else. “Our Avil-Tors are no longer effective.”

Despite the enormous velocity of the repeater slugs, their travel time was approximately six seconds, and that was more than enough for the Ax’Kol warships to evade the impacts. Even so, Deneuve kept the Avil-Tors set to automatic, to maintain pressure on the attacking fleet.

“How’s your energy shield holding?” asked Grisham, directing his question to the Mordran.

“My reserve gauge is falling. This sphere’s energy shield was only intended to deflect impacts from space debris.”

“It’s a shame your creators didn’t foresee the possibility of a few hundred missile strikes,” said Grisham.

“Seventy percent on our mind batteries, Captain,” said Adler. “Thirty seconds and we’ll enter lightspeed.”

“How much longer before the Mordran’s shield depletes?” asked Grisham.

“Less than one minute at the current rate of draw,” said the voice of the Mordran, without any notable emotion.

“Our first Zorl waves are about to impact,” said Bishop.

With everything that was happening, Grisham had been struggling to think how the Mordran might help him defeat the Gavax’Kol. Unfortunately, if every species the sphere had ever known was now dead, and if none of those species had ever possessed more potent technology than that from which the Oblasar was created, then perhaps the Mordran didn’t have the answers Grisham was hoping for.

And yet, an idea was there, on the periphery of his consciousness, taunting him for his inability to grasp what it might be.

“Zorl impacts confirmed on the Gholandas,” said Bishop. “Eight in total.”

Grisham’s eyes skated over to the feed, where pinpoints of plasma light were burning upon the hull of the enemy warship. The Zorls carried a huge payload, but eight of them weren’t nearly enough to destroy a vessel like the Gholandas.

“Seven more impacts confirmed,” said Bishop. “The others were trapped in psionic: slow fields.”

The lightspeed timer hit zero and the Oblasar performed an in-out transit. In less than a second, the sensors were back online and Lopez and Bishop began working to obtain new sensor locks on the Ax’Kol spaceships.

Grisham didn’t delay. He pushed the control bars as far as they would go and felt the acceleration pressing him into the new padding on his seat.

“I have readded the enemy vessels to your tactical,” said the Mordran.

“Much appreciated,” said Grisham. As he’d intended, the Oblasar had exited lightspeed in the rough centre of the Ax’Kol fleet. “Commander Deneuve, don’t hold back.”

“Hell no, sir,” she replied. “Avil-Tors set to full auto.”

“We overtook most of our inbound Zorls, Captain,” said Lopez. “Those ones should start troubling the enemy over the coming seconds.”

With the Ax’Kol warships all around, nearly every one of the Oblasar’s 288 Avil-Tor guns found a target. The repeaters began hurling a torrent of high-calibre slugs at the enemy, punching out chunks of flesh with each impact.

As he banked the Oblasar, Grisham swept his gaze across the feeds. The Gholandas was his primary concern and that vessel was at a forty-thousand-kilometre distance, and accelerating along a heading that would take it to the far side of the Mordran sphere. From the behaviour of the enemy warship, Grisham suspected it knew of the Oblasar’s Rodor Lance and perhaps also knew of the weapon’s twenty-thousand-kilometre maximum range. Or perhaps the Gholandas’s control mind just didn’t want a toe to toe with the Oblasar.

Elsewhere in the combat arena, two of the Indredalus battleships had now been struck by Zorl missiles, and both were suffering an intense bombardment from the Avil-Tor guns.

As Grisham aimed the Oblasar after the Gholandas, he saw a third Indredalus erupt into flames as a result of missiles just launched by Commander Deneuve. The enemy vessel almost seemed to melt beneath the plasma heat and Grisham knew immediately that it was out of action.

“If I can bring us close enough to the Gholandas, hit it with the Rodor Lance, Commander,” he said.

The mind batteries had fallen to sixty-three percent and the Rodor shot would drain them by an additional twenty-five. He reckoned the Oblasar could handle that and still come out on top.

Unfortunately for Grisham it wasn’t just his own warship he had to worry about. The Ax’Kol continued to launch wave after wave of Death missiles at the Mordran. While the sphere’s energy shield showed no visible sign of impending failure, Grisham had already been told its reserve batteries were going to run out sooner rather than later.

He considered ordering Deneuve to divert some of the Avil-Tors onto the task of missile destruction. It was one of those judgement calls that was hard to get right. The repeaters were doing an excellent job of inflicting punishment on the Ax’Kol spaceships, and if they were instead targeted on the Death missiles, that would allow the enemy to survive longer and thereby launch yet more salvos at the Mordran.

Grisham kept his mouth shut and let Deneuve handle the repeaters, while he focused on closing the gap between the Oblasar and the Gholandas. Having detected Grisham’s pursuit, the enemy control mind had abandoned its efforts to gain cover behind the Mordran – which in any case was hardly large enough provide much of that – and was instead continuing to accelerate away, while launching huge waves of missiles at the sphere and targeting the Oblasar with psionics.

It was bad news for the Gholandas that its propulsion was not powerful enough to maintain the distance between itself and its pursuer. With each passing second, the Oblasar reduced the gap and Grisham ground his teeth as he watched for the enemy vessel to come within range.

“Forward Zorl clusters one to four: targeted at the Gholandas and fired,” said Deneuve. “Topside Zorl clusters one to four: targeted at the Gholandas and fired.”

The enemy warship trapped many of the incoming missiles in psionic slow fields. As Grisham had already learned, the Zorls were resistant to psionics and more than a twenty continued on, with their velocities unaffected. Punisher fire smashed several into pieces, but more than a dozen Zorls exploded against the Gholandas’s stern. The combined blasts were gratifyingly large and Grisham smiled thinly as Avil-Tor fire plunged into the flames.

“Forward Zorl clusters five to eight: targeted at the Gholandas and fired,” said Deneuve. “Topside Zorl clusters five to eight: targeted at the Gholandas and fired.”

“Indredalus #1 is out of action, Captain,” said Lopez. “And the nearest enemy cruiser has suffered multiple Zorl impacts.”

“A second enemy cruiser is out of the fight,” said Bishop.

Grisham spared a glance towards the rear and portside feeds. The Ax’Kol battleships and cruisers couldn’t stand up to the Oblasar – not even close – and the enemy vessels were being wrecked by a combination of the Zorl missiles launched before the Oblasar’s lightspeed jump, the more recent salvos launched by Deneuve, and the Avil-Tor guns.

Watching the destruction of his enemies filled Grisham with enormous satisfaction, but the main target – the one vessel he really wanted to see the back of – was ahead of the Oblasar and doing everything possible to escape.

As he returned his attention to the Gholandas, the next waves of Zorl missiles detonated against its stern, adding to the still-burning plasma fires of the previous waves. Although the enemy warship wasn’t nearly out of action, the damage on its hull was accumulating, and its control mind had been discharging its psionics extensively. The Gholandas was clearly a major warship in the enemy fleet, but it wasn’t carrying an artifact. Sooner or later, its mind would run out of energy.

“Twenty-one-thousand klicks to target,” Deneuve muttered. “Any moment now on the Rodor Lance.”

“Indredalus #3 is out of action, Captain,” said Bishop.

The distance to target counter was falling faster now and it dropped below twenty thousand kilometres.

“Fire the Rodor Lance, Commander,” said Grisham.

At that moment, the Gholandas vanished into lightspeed. Grisham closed his eyes and cursed. He shouldn’t have been surprised that a vessel of such a size and mass would be able to execute a psionic displacement, but nevertheless it had caught him unawares.

The Oblasar’s core utilisation climbed from forty percent to ninety percent, as the warship calculated the Gholandas’s lightspeed vector. From experience, Grisham knew it would be approximately thirty seconds before he was offered an opportunity to pursue his opponent to its destination. However, he couldn’t give chase while the remainder of the Ax’Kol fleet continued their efforts to destroy the Mordran.

Banking the Oblasar once more towards the sphere, Grisham hoped he could knock out these other enemy warships and still be able to defeat the Gholandas afterwards. With the enemy forces split, he felt that his control of the situation was slipping away, and he still wasn’t any closer to figuring out how the Mordran was going to help him.

Just when Grisham thought he had enough on his plate, the Mordran spoke once more through the bridge speakers.

“My shield reserves are almost depleted, Captain Jed Grisham. If you require my assistance, you will need to defeat these opponents soon.”

Grisham didn’t respond. All he could do was hope the Oblasar had enough firepower to finish off the last four enemy warships in time.

SEVEN

The pursuit of the Gholandas hadn’t lasted long, but it had carried the Oblasar far from the Mordran. All four of the enemy vessels had taken the opportunity to position themselves behind the sphere, from where they continued their efforts to bring about its destruction.

“The Avil-Tors will no longer target,” said Deneuve. “Luckily the Zorls don’t need line of sight. Starboard clusters one to four: targeted at Indredalus #5 and fired. Starboard clusters five to eight: targeted at enemy cruiser and fired.”

Meanwhile for Grisham, the elusive idea continued to plague him and he was unable to give his full focus to hauling it in. However, a thought came to him.

Why are the enemy so eager to destroy the Mordran?

The answer to his own question seemed obvious.

The Ax’Kol fear it holds knowledge that will help defeat the Gavax’Kol. If I’m right, it confirms the Mordran can help us.

It would also confirm that the Ax’Kol were going to pour resources into defeating the sphere, and perhaps even the Gavax’Kol itself would soon arrive. Grisham wasn’t ready to face that opponent yet and he felt a heightened sense of urgency. Plus, the Gholandas was still out there. He was sure the enemy vessel would not be passive in what was to come.

“Our mind batteries are at fifty percent, Captain,” said Adler.

Grisham only nodded in response and he brought the Oblasar into a tight curve, heading around the Mordran. The enemy vessels did their best stay in cover, but the sphere wasn’t large enough to keep them entirely hidden from a fast-moving warship like the Oblasar. A stern became visible – already alight from plasma – and the Avil-Tors began firing. The enemy warship accelerated out of sight and Grisham doubted the repeaters had inflicted any significant damage.

“My energy shield has failed,” said the Mordran. “The next salvo of enemy missiles will strike my armour.”

“Let’s do what we can to stop that,” said Grisham.

“Captain, the Oblasar has finished its pursuit calculations,” said Adler. “As soon as these enemy warships are defeated, we can go after the Gholandas.”

“And have that bastard come straight back to the sphere?” said Grisham.

He cursed that he didn’t know the limitations of the Ax’Kol warship. His encounter with the Exetran, and his short time on the Urzox, made it clear that a psionic: displacement required an enormous effort, but Grisham didn’t know how quickly the Gholandas could execute another. If he pursued the enemy warship to its destination, it might well head straight back to the Mordran, and that would allow it thirty seconds of uninterrupted time in which to destroy the sphere.

I’ve got to think of something, and soon.

While Grisham’s mind was part-occupied by the bigger picture, Commander Deneuve continued launching Zorl missiles. By now, the Oblasar was travelling fast enough, and close enough to the Mordran, that the Ax’Kol spaceships were finding it tough to stay in cover. Grisham caught glimpses of plasma flames, and the Avil-Tors fired repeatedly.

At the same time, he saw the damage being inflicted upon the Mordran. Dozens of Death missiles had already struck its armoured surface, and Grisham also saw the tell-tale signs of a psionic: decay attack. It was likely the enemy minds were exhausted, and that would explain why the sphere hadn’t suffered more extensively from the psionics.

That exhaustion also explained why the Oblasar’s mind batteries were no longer falling. In fact, they’d recovered from their previous low of forty-eight percent and were now heading in the right direction.

“I’m pretty sure Indredalus #5 is wrecked, Captain,” said Bishop. “And at least one of those cruisers is close to failure.”

Sure enough, a moment later, the debris of two Ax’Kol warships came into sight. These vessels had taken catastrophic damage, such that the battleship was breaking up, while the cruiser’s propulsion had failed. At least a dozen Zorl missiles crashed into both of these spaceships. Commander Deneuve wasn’t about to take the chance that either might have the capability to launch even a handful of Death missiles.

“Two cruisers left, Captain,” said Lopez. “From what I saw before they disappeared behind the sphere, both have suffered moderate damage.”

The Ax’Kol cruisers proved irritatingly difficult to pin down. Despite the huge advantage in velocity possessed by the Oblasar, it wasn’t manoeuvrable enough to circle a three-kilometre sphere at close range. In this, its mass was not an advantage, and the cruisers were managing to stay half a step ahead.

Neither were the Zorl missiles suitable to finish the job. Although the missiles were capable of a 180-degree turn, given sufficient space, Grisham didn’t want his own warheads accidentally impacting with the Mordran, particularly given their huge payloads.

And so, the cat-and-mouse went on. Every second or two, Grisham would catch sight of an opponent, and the Avil-Tors would fire. Commander Deneuve would launch missiles, but then be forced to disable their guidance systems once it became apparent that they might detonate against the Mordran instead of their intended target.

All the while, the Ax’Kol cruisers launched their own missiles into the Mordran, and the damage to the sphere became ever more apparent. At the same time, Grisham’s fury grew, until he could hardly contain it.

“The enemy missiles have penetrated my outer shell,” said the Mordran, in its voice that Grisham now found to be infuriatingly calm. “My internal systems have taken minor damage. On their next circuit, the enemy will target the same location.”

“I get the message,” said Grisham through gritted teeth.

Despite the best efforts of the Ax’Kol, this was never a game that would last long. Grisham guided the Oblasar through many rapid changes of both velocity and direction, and on each occasion, the enemy didn’t react quickly enough to prevent one part or another of their warships becoming exposed. When this happened, a few hundred Avil-Tor projectiles would impact with the enemy hull, and Commander Deneuve’s reactions were fast enough that she was able to land a few successful Zorl strikes.

Within a couple seconds of each other, the two Ax’Kol cruisers broke up and their debris began drifting away from the Mordran. The enemy were defeated, but the sphere had suffered greatly during the engagement – its armoured exterior was pocked with detonation craters and in places the armour had been torn away entirely, revealing the darker innards.

“Captain, if the Gholandas began warming up its lightspeed engine for a return here after its last psionic: displacement, it could be due anytime,” said Lieutenant Adler. “Assuming it doesn’t just use its psionics to come back.”

Grisham didn’t need the reminder. The Mordran still had an active comms link, and he spoke to it. “How long before your energy shield is back at one hundred percent?” he asked.

“The recharge has already commenced, but one of the batteries is no longer operational,” said the Mordran. “My energy shield’s maximum capacity is down to seventy-five percent.”

“Better than nothing, I guess,” said Grisham, his eyes on the feeds. There was no sign of the Gholandas, but it would be back, and maybe another bunch of Ax’Kol warships would arrive soon. “Once I’ve tied up the loose ends here, I could use the Oblasar to push you to a new location.”

“I cannot permit that,” said the Mordran. “If you moved me from here, I would no longer function as a hub.”

“You said everyone’s dead,” said Grisham.

“Nevertheless, this is the purpose for which I was constructed. You will not move me from here. Were you to try I would be forced to once more inject the shutdown code into the Oblasar.”

That’s it!

“This shutdown code,” said Grisham, in sudden excitement. “Would it work on other warships?”

“It would work on other Eilas vessels, when issued from a source with sufficient security clearance. The Gavax’Kol was built by the Vire. Much of its technology is similar, but its control systems are unlikely to be identical.”

Grisham was thinking fast. If the Mordran’s shutdown code wouldn’t function against the Gavax’Kol, perhaps the Vire themselves had created one.

“Can you tell us where the Gavax’Kol – the Endevar – was constructed?”

“The Vire were once part of the planetary network in which I was a hub, so that is knowledge I can impart,” said the Mordran. “However, the Oblasar would be on an equivalent security tier to the Endevar, and therefore unable to issue a shutdown code.”

“How can we get round that?” asked Grisham, his earlier elation subsiding. Obtaining a shutdown code from the computer systems on a long-dead planet was unlikely to be straightforward, but figuring out how to elevate a warship built by an entirely different species to a new security tier was something else entirely.

“The Vire borrowed heavily from the Eilas,” said the Mordran. “It is possible that some of the command protocols I am holding would be recognized by the Vire hardware.”

“Even after a few hundred million years?” asked Grisham.

“The Eilas were the more advanced species. Time would not erode the efficiency of their coding and protocols.”

“At this moment, I’ll try anything,” said Grisham. “Send the files over.”

“The files have been implanted within the Oblasar’s databanks,” said the Mordran.

Grisham looked over his shoulder, and Lieutenant Bishop raised a thumb to indicate receipt.

“We’ve got them,” said Grisham. “What now for the Mordran? The Ax’Kol will keep coming back and we can’t defeat them all.”

“The Ax’Kol wish to erase the links between species. Eventually they will succeed in my destruction.”

“Is there anything they can extract from your databanks?” asked Grisham.

“My knowledge is old,” said the Mordran. “It is that of death and extinction. The Gavax’Kol seeks new life within the universe. I am no more than a relic of the past – the smallest of risks that will, regardless, not be tolerated.”

Grisham felt a great and sudden sadness for the Mordran. Everything it had known was now so far in the past, and yet it had endured ever since. All those souls which had been invested in its creation had nothing left but memories.

“Do you fear death?” asked Grisham.

The Mordran didn’t answer for a moment. “That is a question I have asked myself many times. I believe that I have no fears, only regrets.”

Grisham couldn’t stop himself from asking – he had to know. “What regrets?”

“I regret – every soul within me regrets – that our deaths didn’t come at their natural time.”

It was confirmation of something Grisham had always suspected, but hadn’t known for sure. He remembered the words of the Edran and now he realised that the artifact was speaking from its own experience.

No living creature willingly gives its life. There is always an element of coercion.

Grisham wasn’t sure what he could say to the Mordran. The sphere had helped him, and he felt like he should say something – perhaps to tell the souls within it that they had done the right thing. Turning the words around in his head, Grisham knew they’d come out sounding like bullshit.

“Your help might well be the difference between my species living or dying, and for that I thank you,” said Grisham at last.

For a time, the Mordran didn’t answer, and Grisham thought it was gone. Then, it spoke again.

“I hope your species has learned the errors of the past.”

Grisham gave a half smile. Not a chance in hell. “Goodbye,” he said.

As soon as he said the word, the comms channel went dead.

“Time to get out of here, folks,” said Grisham.

With that, he requested power from the Oblasar’s Kalor drive and then banked the warship away from the Mordran. The velocity gauge climbed and the sphere dwindled.

“Lieutenant Adler, prepare a lightspeed jump – a journey of an hour will be enough. We’ll take stock when we’re somewhere safer than here.”

“Yes, sir. The coordinates are set. Two-point-five minutes and we’ll enter lightspeed.”

“Still no sign of the Gholandas,” said Lieutenant Bishop. “It must’ve known it was outclassed.”

“I’m sure it did,” said Grisham. “But the Ax’Kol don’t give up, even when it’s a lost cause, and that makes me think the Gholandas is waiting for reinforcements.”

“I guess we’ll soon find out if the Oblasar is a higher priority target than the Mordran,” said Lopez.

“The enemy came here to destroy the sphere,” said Grisham. “That’s what the Gholandas will target first.”

He didn’t know if he was right or not, but certainly the enemy vessel didn’t show up at an inconvenient moment, and the Oblasar entered lightspeed.

Of their own accord, Grisham’s eyes went to the timer, which was showing fifty-nine minutes and fifty-eight seconds. That gave him nigh on a whole hour to think and to speak with his crew. The encounter with the Mordran had left Grisham feeling many different emotions. He put them aside as best he could. It was time to consider the road ahead.

EIGHT

“Tell me about the files we received from the Mordran,” said Grisham.

“I haven’t had much chance to look at them, Captain,” said Adler. “Like the Mordran said, they appear to be command protocols, plus some high-level access codes.”

“So we transmit these to a Vire receiver and that receiver should recognize the Oblasar as a primary vessel?”

“Pretty much,” said Adler. “Then, once we’re accepted on whatever network we’ve managed to access, we interrogate it for anything we might find useful.”

“Such as a shutdown code for the Gavax’Kol,” said Lopez.

“That’s right,” Adler agreed. “Except we’ve come far enough together that I’m sure none of us are expecting it to be a walk in the park. We’re hoping the Vire security systems will recognize the authority of warship built by a different species that existed maybe hundreds of millions of years before those security systems were created.”

“Is there any use in you accessing the code for those command protocols and checking out how they operate?” asked Grisham.

Adler gave a short laugh. “I’ll take a look, Captain, but there’s no way in hell I’ll be able to learn the structure of a sophisticated alien programming language in a few hours, days, weeks or maybe even months. And if you were about to ask me if I can modify that code to ensure that it—” Adler exhaled noisily and finished his sentence with a shrug.

“Check it out and see what you can do,” said Grisham. “And what about the location of the Gavax’Kol’s home world? What do the files say about that?”

“It’s a place called Denivir,” said Lopez. “According to the associated text, it means Light of the Universe.”

“That kinda says a lot about the Vire, doesn’t it?” said Deneuve.

“It sounds like they had a high opinion of themselves,” Grisham agreed. “And the Mordran wasn’t shy in telling us the same thing.”

“Yeah,” said Kinsey. “The Vire thought they were the saviours of the universe or something. It’s no wonder their artifacts became corrupted so easily.”

“Pride comes before a fall,” said Grisham. “Except it’s not the Gavax’Kol that’s done the falling – it’s all the other species it’s wiped out. Is there anything else in the datafile on Denivir?”

“Nothing of any use, Captain. Just a location and data on the planet’s motion around its star.”

“What’s the star called?” asked Grisham out of curiosity.

“Reiloss, sir.”

“What does that mean?” asked Adler, his voice dripping. “The Glorious Centre of Everything? The Shining Butthole of Magnificence?”

“I’m afraid there isn’t a translation of the name,” said Lopez. “You’ll have to pick one of your guesses.”

“Enough,” said Grisham mildly. “So - it doesn’t sound like we have much to go on, except for a location.”

“The same old near-empty intel file that we always have to deal with,” added Deneuve. “I think it’s got to the stage where I’d be disappointed if I was ever handed a comprehensive mission dossier.”

Grisham laughed. “Me too. Anyway, we know where we’re going, and we kind of know what we’re looking for when we get there, so we’re off to a good start.”

“I’ve had a thought, Captain,” said Lopez. “The Ax’Kol know we were at the Mordran – what if they start asking themselves why?”

“I can’t imagine the enemy will be able to guess what we’re up to,” said Grisham.

“Maybe not, Captain, but it doesn’t take a great leap of logic to realise that the Edran gave us the location of the Mordran,” Lopez persisted. “What if the Ax’Kol—”

“I understand what you’re saying, Lieutenant,” Grisham interrupted. “But I don’t know if it changes anything.”

“Just so long as we stay on our toes, sir.”

“It feels like I’m never off them,” said Grisham. “Lieutenant Adler, is it a long journey to Denivir?”

“Yes, Captain. I can’t get you the precise travel time while we’re at lightspeed, but it looks, in technical parlance, like it’ll be a hell of a long journey.”

Grisham checked the timer for the current transit. Only ten minutes had gone by, and that was more than enough to put a vast distance between the Oblasar and the Mordran. Given the current situation with the Gavax’Kol, he couldn’t justify allowing the transit to complete.

“Lieutenant Adler, bring us out of lightspeed,” he said.

“Yes, sir.”

The Oblasar rode the transitions well, but Grisham sensed a faint shuddering through the controls. A moment later, the sensors were back up and gathering a feed.

“Running local area scans,” said Bishop. “First impressions – there’s nothing to see here.”

Grisham didn’t wait for the scans to finish. “Lieutenant Adler, enter the coordinates for Denivir and tell me how long it’ll take to get there.”

“Eighty-three days, Captain.”

“Damnit,” said Grisham. He said it again when he realised that the Ax’Kol had travelled all that distance, killing every living species in between. “I don’t need to remind anyone that we’re up against the clock here, so we’ll need to reduce our journey time significantly.”

“The override for the multiplier booster which Commander Deneuve accepted on our journey from Loxor is still active, Captain,” said Adler. “If I drag the boost slider all the way along on a single override, the transit time falls to three days.”

“Still too much,” said Grisham. “Go for the double override.”

“Yes, sir,” said Adler. “On the double override, with the slider at fifty percent, the journey time is down to eight hours.”

“That’s more like it,” said Grisham. “Does the prediction still change to unknown above seventy-five percent on the booster?”

“Yes, sir.”

“What’s the journey time at seventy-five percent?”

“Three hours, Captain.”

Although the urgency of the situation hadn’t changed, neither had it become any less important for the Oblasar to arrive at its destination with something left in the Kalor drive reserves.

“We still have to make the return journey, so let’s not take the risk,” said Grisham. “Three hours from here to Denivir is short enough, and it’ll also allow us to gather some additional data about the increased drain from using the booster.”

“Captain, you need to look at this!” said Lopez.

Grisham nodded to Deneuve that she should take the controls and then he hurried over to see what Lopez had found.

“Sir, I didn’t notice this before, but it looks as if the multiplier boost is also affecting the comms.” Lopez pointed at some digits on her screen that Grisham could only partially understand.

“Does this mean we can fire off a comm to Shesa-2 and it’ll get there much sooner than normal?”

“Yes, sir – I believe so. A comm usually takes about half the time to get from A to B as the transmitting warship would take to travel it at lightspeed. This is because the—”

“I know the reasons, Lieutenant,” said Grisham. “However, we don’t know if that same rule applies for the comms hardware on the Oblasar.”

“No, sir, we don’t,” said Lopez. “But this booster is still going to reduce the time it takes for one of our transmissions to arrive at its destination, and that’s a good thing, even if we don’t know what the reduction will be.”

Grisham turned his head. “Lieutenant Adler, is the booster still at seventy-five percent?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Lieutenant Lopez, send a comm to Shesa-2, updating Senator Maynard on our progress and our current plans. Do it quickly.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Lieutenant Adler, when the comm is sent, I’d like to know if it created any appreciable draw on our Kalor drive.”

“Yes, sir, I’ll watch out for it.”

“Transmission sent,” said Lopez after a few seconds.

“There was no movement on our Kalor drive reserves all the way down to the twentieth decimal place,” said Adler.

“Experiment over for the time being,” said Grisham. Being able to reduce comms travel time was big news, but he didn’t have much use for it right now. “Lieutenant Adler, enter Denivir as our destination and leave the booster on seventy-five percent.”

“That’s done, Captain,” said Adler. “The lightspeed warmup has commenced.”

Grisham returned to his seat and kept his eyes on the instrumentation. The gauge readings were significantly elevated as a result of the booster and the propulsion volume climbed like it had before, until he could hardly hear himself think. Shutting off his helmet’s external microphone helped, but the noise was still almost painful to hear.

Sitting with his fingers wrapped tightly around the controls, Grisham watched the timer and waited for it all to be over. The same thunderous resonance as he remembered from the first boosted transit struck him harder than last time and it took his breath away.

Then, the sound fell away to the usual background hum and Grisham breathed out in relief. “Damn,” he said. He looked over at Deneuve. “We’re on our way again, Commander. How do you feel about what we’re doing?”

“I’m not sure if I dare to hope, Captain. At least if it turns out to be a dead end, we’ll be able to return home in plenty of time to lose against the Gavax’Kol.”

“At least we’re no longer just waiting for the inevitable,” said Grisham.

“I’m worried that even if we defeat the Gavax’Kol, the outcome will be the same,” said Deneuve, her expression pained. “The appearance of the Gholandas tells me that the enemy have other warships in their fleet that are beyond anything possessed by either the Human Federation or the Kijol. Maybe all we’ll end up doing is delaying the inevitable.”

“I only fear the Gavax’Kol, Commander. Once it’s gone, we’ll have a chance. Maybe it means that humanity and the Kijol will have to work hard together to pull through, but where’s the bad in that?” Grisham attempted a smile. “Or maybe once the Gavax’Kol is gone, the enemy will just—” he shrugged.

“Just stop what they’re doing?” asked Deneuve.

“I don’t know,” Grisham admitted. “One thing I’m sure of – once the Gavax’Kol is out of the equation, the Oblasar will be able to defeat any singular warship in the Ax’Kol fleet. That’ll be a huge turnaround.”

“Something for us to look forward to,” said Deneuve, her resolve strengthening. “After so many years in a Tibor, I’ve grown to enjoy blowing the crap out of inferior opponents.” She looked suddenly guilty. “I don’t even feel bad about it.”

Grisham laughed. “Nor do I, Commander. Best of all, when we blow the Ax’Kol to pieces, we’re doing everyone a favour.”

The conversation died off and Grisham sat for a short time, before heading off to the replicator. Maxwell and the soldiers were in the mess area, and clearly eager to hear what was going on. Grisham stayed for a few minutes to fill them in.

When he was done in the mess, Grisham returned to the bridge. It was going to be a long shift, but fortunately he wasn’t feeling tired yet. Maybe he’d come to regret not ordering a longer journey to Denivir – a few additional hours on the transit would at least have allowed for some short sleep breaks – but Grisham didn’t want to return home and find that a planet had been lost because he’d allocated time for his crew to catch some shuteye.

The journey timer fell steadily and the mood on the bridge was pensive. Nobody knew what they’d find at Denivir – perhaps the metaphorical pot of gold would be there for the taking, or maybe the planet would be no more than ruins. Grisham fervently hoped to find something of use – humanity was running out of chances and this might well be the last one.

“Ten minutes!” shouted Adler.

Everyone was at their station, waiting for the moment when the warship would exit lightspeed, half a billion kilometres from Denivir’s expected position on its orbital track.

The Oblasar would soon arrive at the home of the Gavax’Kol, and Grisham was desperate for this mission to turn up something that would save humanity.

NINE

“Commencing local area scans,” said Bishop.

“Searching for Denivir,” said Lopez. “Got it! Captain, it’s on your screen.”

The feed was grainy, and Grisham narrowed his eyes as he stared at it. Denivir was predominantly green, with some large patches of blue, and some much smaller areas of yellow.

“Forests, oceans, deserts,” he said. “Will the feed enhance?”

“Yes, Captain, I’m working on it,” said Lopez.

Before the enhancement was complete, Bishop discovered something on the local area scan.

“Sir, there’s an object approximately thirty thousand kilometres from our position,” he said. “First impression is that it was a satellite.”

“Was?” said Grisham. As soon as he saw the feed, he knew what Bishop meant. The object was roughly cylindrical, about three hundred metres in length, and with dozens of stubby protrusions covering its dull grey alloy surface. The cylinder was travelling at a matched velocity to the planet and on a heading that indicated it was designed to follow Denivir along its orbital track.

One end of the satellite was splayed wide open and the metals there were twisted and jagged, and Grisham saw the darkness of heat scarring.

“A missile strike right on the end of the satellite?” he guessed.

“That’s what it looks, sir,” said Bishop. “Something with a modest payload, that didn’t completely knock out the monitor’s propulsion.”

“If its propulsion is still working, is that satellite gathering a feed?” asked Grisham. As far as he knew, there was nobody left to receive an alarm from the Denivir monitoring ring, but he nevertheless felt a slight unease.

“There’s no way to tell, Captain,” said Bishop. “A single Zorl, or the discharge from a couple of Avil-Tors should knock that satellite out, but if it’s operational, we’re already detected whatever action we take.”

“Commander Deneuve, blow that satellite to pieces,” said Grisham.

“Yes, sir.”

One Zorl missile did the job, and the lightly armoured cylinder was torn into pieces. The debris immediately began to diverge from its previous course.

“I’m taking us away from here,” said Grisham. “And I’d rather that satellite wasn’t watching us on the way.”

“If the planetary monitoring ring is active, all the other satellites will have their arrays pointed in this direction by now, Captain,” said Bishop.

Grisham cursed under his breath as he piloted the Oblasar away from the wreckage of the satellite. While he wasn’t excessively concerned that his warship was in danger, exiting lightspeed next to a planetary monitor was certainly bad luck. He could only hope that he hadn’t unintentionally triggered some ancient defence mechanisms that would cause him a headache as the mission progressed.

“Where’s that feed enhancement of Denivir, Lieutenant Lopez?” he asked.

“It’s coming up on your screen, Captain.”

The feed enhancement had sharpened the image, but without revealing anything new. Grisham’s first impression – that the planet was blanketed in foliage – remained unchanged.

“The Mordran told us the Vire were wiped out in a war,” said Grisham. “Either they abandoned this planet first, or that greenery is hiding an awful lot of craters.”

“At this distance, we’ll need to be stationary for the sensors to have any hope of completing a meaningful surface scan, Captain,” said Bishop.

“We’re going in closer,” said Grisham. He drew back on the controls, bringing the Oblasar to a halt. “Lieutenant Lopez, watch out for anything unexpected. Lieutenant Adler, prepare a lightspeed jump – our target is five million kilometres from Denivir.”

“Yes, sir. The destination is set. Two-point-five minutes.”

The Oblasar launched into an in-out transit and emerged five million kilometres from the planet. Lopez and Bishop began scanning.

“I have a sensor lock on Denivir,” said Lopez.

“Local area scans complete,” said Bishop. “I’m extending the scan volume, in case there are any more satellites nearby.”

“Acknowledged,” said Grisham. His unease hadn’t gone away, though he admitted it was possibly caused by the situation as a whole, rather than any particular danger. “Keep an eye out.”

“Yes, sir.”

From five million kilometres, the sensor feeds were far more revealing. Grisham estimated that perhaps fifty percent of the planet’s visible side was covered in foliage, with forty percent being water. The remaining ten percent was a mountainous and parched area near the planet’s north pole. Thick clouds spoke of heavy rainfall.

Grisham’s gaze was concentrated on the forests. Now, he could see numerous patches of grey amongst the trees. Lopez had been working on the enhancement, and the area Grisham was looking at became much more detailed.

“A city,” he said.

The position of the warship meant that the view was top down, so Grisham wasn’t able to determine the heights of the structures, but it was clear that the city covered a vast area.

“Those structures were built from a mixture of alloys and stone,” said Lopez. “Time hasn’t been kind to them, but it looks like this place was wrecked long before the trees moved in.”

“Keep scanning, and see what else you can find,” said Grisham.

“Should I run a receptor sweep, Captain?” asked Bishop.

A receptor sweep was usually undetectable, but Grisham was on edge. “Hold the sweep for the moment, Lieutenant.”

“Yes, sir.”

“I’m going to pilot the Oblasar east around the planet, since I’d rather we weren’t motionless out here,” said Grisham. “Maybe we’ll find something.”

He increased the Oblasar’s velocity to half of its maximum and held it at a static distance from Denivir. As he’d thought, the warship’s progress revealed nothing other than more trees and more water.

The minutes went by and Grisham found himself trapped between the pressures of time and his instincts, which were telling him to be careful. The conflict produced anger and irritation and he breathed in steadily to help himself stay calm.

“The planet was once heavily populated, Captain,” said Lopez after a few minutes. “I’ve detected numerous cities and they’re all in ruins.”

“Have you located anything that might have once been a military base?”

“No, Captain, though it’s possible the Vire facilities were integrated with their cities – in which case I’d probably be none the wiser from this distance.”

“What’s your judgement of the risk, Commander?” asked Grisham.

“There’s nothing shooting at us, sir. A species capable of building the Gavax’Kol would easily have the capability to build long-range missiles that could reach us at five million klicks.”

“Unless all of the surface defences were out of action,” said Grisham.

“Even if a few batteries are somehow still operational after all this time, the Oblasar isn’t going to be knocked out in a single hit,” said Deneuve.

“You’re right,” said Grisham. “I’m being too cautious – we’ll approach the planet.”

“It’s a seventy-minute journey at our maximum sub-light velocity, Captain,” said Adler. “Should I ready us for another lightspeed jump?”

“Soon,” said Grisham. “Lieutenant Bishop – run a receptor sweep.”

“Yes, sir,” said Bishop. “Sweep running…no receptors detected.”

“So the receptors are either hidden or the planet’s comms systems have all failed,” mused Grisham.

“If this place wasn’t so old, it would be an easy guess to make, Captain,” said Lopez.

Grisham stared at the feeds for a short time longer. As far as he knew, the Vire had been made extinct hundreds of millions of years ago, and yet he couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong.

“There’s something you don’t like, sir,” said Deneuve.

“I don’t know what it is,” said Grisham. “There shouldn’t be anything here to worry about – except that a place like this would have once been well-guarded. I’m worried about unknown tech, Commander, and what it might do to the Oblasar.”

“The Vire started a war and they lost it, sir. I look at Denivir and I see a place that was once reduced to rubble, before new life reclaimed it. But if you’re not convinced, we should continue the circuit of the planet.”

“We’re at five million klicks, Commander – it’ll take us nearly four hours to go around just once.” Grisham didn’t usually struggle with decisions, and he forced himself to make this one. “Lieutenant Adler - ready that lightspeed jump. We’re going to half a million kilometres.”

“Yes, sir. Half a million klicks it is.”

While the lightspeed counter ticked down, Lieutenant Bishop continued his scans of the surrounding space. He found no additional satellites.

Meanwhile, Lieutenant Lopez concentrated on the surface scans. Grisham could tell she was just going through the motions, until she could begin anew at half a million kilometres. At that range, few of the planet’s secrets would escape notice.

The Oblasar entered lightspeed, and emerged at the intended distance from Denivir. Straightaway, Grisham piloted the warship east, meaning to complete the circuit he’d begun at five million kilometres from the planet. Directly below was an area of dense forest, the trees of which were much larger than those from Xaros, and no less hospitable in appearance. The clouds he’d noticed earlier hung low, like sodden blankets, though the Oblasar’s sensors were able to pierce their mists with ease.

“This whole area directly below is one big mess of craters, Captain,” said Lopez. “You can’t see them very clearly with all the trees, so I’ll add some overlays.”

Hundreds of red circles appeared on the feed, each one outlining what Lopez believed to be a crater. When Grisham toggled the overlay off, all he could see was undulating terrain, covered in millions of trees. Time truly was a healer.

“As you can see, some of these craters have diameters greater than thirty klicks,” said Lopez. “Whatever species came here, they weren’t holding back.”

“Is there any indication what the attackers destroyed in this area beneath us?” asked Grisham.

“No, sir,” said Lopez. “I could run an in-depth scan, but that would take time and the Oblasar would have to be motionless.”

“I’m just curious,” said Grisham. “Then again, I always am, and there’s never time to stop for answers.”

He held the Oblasar on course and kept his eyes on the feeds. The trees went all the way to the coastline of the southern ocean, and one part of the shore was shaped like a semicircle, more than eighty kilometres across. Grisham couldn’t decide if it was a natural formation, or the result of a monumental explosion when the planet was attacked by the Vire’s unknown opponents. He opened his mouth to ask, but Lopez spoke first.

“I’m about to scan that city to the north, Captain,” said Lopez. “It’s the biggest one so far. If you reduce our velocity by a third, I should be able to capture all the data I need in a single pass.”

“Fine,” said Grisham, pulling the control bars gently towards him.

He accessed the same feed as Lopez and watched her zoom in and out on different areas of the city. The structures had once likely reached into the sky. Now, they were little more than piles of timeworn rubble and metal, and the visible debris was likely too unstable, or too barren to support the growth of the predominant huge trees. Grisham did, however, see the green of much smaller plants, which had gained footing in the wreckage.

“I’d guess this city once supported a half a billion people,” said Lopez. “The area it covered is vast.”

“How was it destroyed?” asked Grisham.

“Judging from the scarring of the stone, and the way the metals have warped, I’d say that incendiaries were used here, sir,” said Lopez.

“This was savage,” said Adler, making no effort to keep the anger from his voice. “Humanity is nothing like this. Hell, the Kijol aren’t either.”

“Peace and love seem to be what this universe is lacking,” said Grisham. He felt Adler’s anger, but a sadness also. “We’ve got the Ax’Kol now, but we can’t forget that this crap has been going on forever.”

Grisham tore his eyes away from the ruined city and held the Oblasar to his chosen course. So far, Denivir had shown itself to be a place of death, which was something he’d been prepared for. What Grisham wanted to find now was something he could use against the Gavax’Kol.

His unease hadn’t gone away. Holding it at bay, Grisham waited to find out what his sensor officers would discover next.

TEN

A half circuit around the planet, Lieutenant Lopez discovered what she believed had once been a shipyard, along with an adjacent area of buildings which – by their position – might have been the associated military facility.

Grisham brought the Oblasar to a halt, half a million kilometres directly overhead. On the zoomed feed were trees, with ruins protruding through the canopy. North, were high hills, again covered in forest, and with yet more visible ruins. It was raining and the droplets of water degraded the sharpness of the feeds, like steam on a lens.

“The scans shouldn’t take long, Captain,” said Lopez.

Grisham watched the feed. He’d already come to his own conclusion, but he waited to see what Lopez would say.

“This was definitely military,” said Lopez after a couple of minutes. “This area I’ve highlighted on the feed was about forty klicks by fifty. It was bombed extensively and hit by incendiaries for good measure. The construction trenches – I estimate there were thirty in total - likely all collapsed, but you can see the upper sections of the part-built warships that were in them.”

“I see them,” said Grisham. He’d already counted eight hulls in total, the largest of which loomed high above the trees. Had this particular vessel ever been completed, he thought it might have been ten or twelve thousand metres in length. “This could have been where the Endevar, the Exetran and the Evoldor were constructed.”

“Yes, sir,” said Lopez. “There’s an even larger trench, but it’s completely buried.”

Grisham felt a shiver as he realised exactly what he was looking at. “The birthplace of the Ax’Kol.”

“Yes, sir,” said Lopez. “We’re at the right planet, and this facility below could definitely have handled the construction of the Exetran or the Evoldor, and presumably the Endevar as well - before the Gavax’Kol turned its vessel into something different.”

Grisham took a deep breath and quelled his emotions. “Tell me about the other areas of the facility, Lieutenant Lopez.”

“Yes, sir. East of the shipyard are other structures that were originally different in form to those I’ve scanned in the other cities,” said Lopez. “I’ve detected the presence of rare metals and minerals in amongst the rubble. It’s possible these materials had a civilian use here on Denivir, but probably not.”

“What about the hills to the north?” asked Grisham. “I can see a few structures there as well.”

“I don’t know what those would be for, sir,” said Lopez. “Comms was my first thought - it’s possible the Vire built their comms transmitters up high, but I don’t know why they’d need to do that. Human Federation comms tech hasn’t been affected by atmospheric conditions for centuries.”

“Lieutenant Bishop, run a receptor sweep,” said Grisham.

“Yes, sir…sweep running. No receptors found.”

“Lieutenant Adler, are there any detectable energy readings from that area below?”

“I’ve been checking the underlying feed data and no, sir. There’s nothing.”

“The Edran told us that the Gavax’Kol was fitted with a Kalor drive,” said Grisham. “And since we know that a Kalor drive depletes over time, it’s almost certain the base is out of power.”

“It’s possible the facility didn’t use Kalor technology, Captain,” said Adler. “It might have been fitted with a perpetual generator, but one that’s shielded so we can’t detect it from here.”

“Regardless of the power source and whether or not it’s shielded, we’ve located a significant military facility on this planet,” said Grisham. “If the Endevar and the others were constructed here, it’s certain the base security systems would be on the highest possible tier.”

“But if there’s no power, we won’t be able to communicate with the facility,” said Bishop.

“Maybe the backup generators were set to run at their lowest output levels,” said Kinsey. “It’s possible they’re keeping the critical systems online, but with nothing spare for secondary functions like comms.”

Grisham drummed his fingers in thought. If the facility was out of power, then the Oblasar wouldn’t be able to speak to the security controller.

“When we first discovered the Oblasar, its Kalor drive was dead,” he said. “But the backup power was still functioning. The Vire existed a long time after the Oblasar was built, so I can’t imagine why their power supplies would be depleted.”

“Maybe we should send Sergeant Maxwell down there to take a look,” said Deneuve.

“That’s on the cards,” said Grisham. “But before I give the order, I’d like to know that he has a purpose beyond taking a look. The facility is massive.”

“If you bring the Oblasar in closer, I might be able to identify a target area for investigation, sir,” said Lopez.

“Let’s do that,” said Grisham after a moment’s thought. “Lieutenant Lopez, please order Sergeant Maxwell to one of our shuttles. I’d like him ready to go once I’ve had a chance to identify his mission targets.”

“Yes, sir, I’ll let him know.”

Grisham piloted the Oblasar vertically towards the planet. He took it steadily, in case any of the Denivir surface launchers remained operational. No missiles burst away from the surface, and nothing else threatened the warship.

At twenty thousand metres, Grisham brought the Oblasar to a halt, with its hull oriented north and its nose partly over the hilly area of the facility. The rainclouds were still far below, depositing their cargo upon the trees and the ruins.

“Tell me what you see, Lieutenant.”

“I’m checking it out, sir,” said Lopez.

Grisham looked too. The sensors filtered out the clouds and he saw just how badly the facility had suffered. It made sense that the planet’s main shipyard would be a primary target, and that made him wonder if anything whatsoever had survived the bombardment.

“Captain, I’ve been thinking,” said Lieutenant Adler. “I remember not long after we captured the Oblasar, you mentioned that the power reserves on our shuttles were all at one hundred percent.”

“Yes,” said Grisham. “I thought maybe the Kalor drive had recharged them once we brought it online.”

“Since none of our transports have a physical link to the Oblasar, the only way that could have happened was by a remote transfer of energy,” said Adler.

“And now you’re asking yourself if our Kalor drive would recharge the hardware on the surface facility.”

“Yes, sir. That’s exactly what I’m asking myself.”

“Let’s say I brought the Oblasar even lower – to an altitude where the energy transfer might take place – what would happen?” said Grisham. “Would we be in control? Or would the intact hardware draw on our Kalor drive until there’s nothing left for us? It’s a huge facility – the gravity field generators for the construction trenches alone would be massive.”

“You’re assuming all the hardware on the base would be capable of accepting a remote energy transfer, Captain,” said Adler. “Equally, you’re looking at the worst-case scenario, in which every power supply is intact. Besides – I reckon the Oblasar’s Kalor drive could recharge every single item of hardware on that entire facility a dozen times over, without taking more than a couple of percent from our reserve gauge.”

“What about our control over the process?” Grisham repeated.

“The Oblasar’s own shuttles were trusted resources, Captain, so it’s no wonder they were recharged without bridge approval,” said Adler. “I’d one hundred percent expect to see a confirmation request for any untrusted access to our power supply. Think of the potential exploits if that wasn’t the case.”

Grisham found himself persuaded, though in this instance he was an easy target - since he was otherwise out of ideas, he was keen to see the best in anything that was offered.

“We must be well inside the range of the planet’s surface launchers,” said Grisham. “And since we’re not under attack, I’m happy to accept that none of those launchers are operational.”

“It won’t take longer than a couple of minutes to head down there and find out if we receive any requests to access our Kalor drive,” said Deneuve.

“Let’s do it,” said Grisham. “What do we have to lose?”

He piloted the Oblasar towards the surface, through the highest clouds, and then down into the darker rainclouds, the lowest of which were hardly more than five or six hundred metres above the hilltops. The base was one of the strangest sights he could remember – a mix of ancient ruins and plant life. Much of the wreckage was now covered in soil, and thick roots grew over the burned alloys and stone.

“We’re at five hundred metres,” said Grisham. The Oblasar’s nose was almost touching the northern hilltops and he couldn’t go much lower without grounding the spaceship. “I don’t have a lot of room to play with.”

“There’s no link request, Captain,” said Adler. “It’s possible the range is really short.”

“Let’s see what I can do.”

Grisham piloted the Oblasar stern first, a few hundred metres south, which allowed him to reduce altitude by another two hundred metres. He scanned the feeds, but it was clear this was about as low as he could go, unless he used the warship’s mass to crush the highest ruins and the trees growing from them.

“Captain, it looks like some of the structures on the northern hillside survived the worst of the destruction,” said Lopez. “And I’m sure they were comms facilities.”

“It’s the security stations we’re looking for, Lieutenant,” said Grisham.

“All security commands are routed through the comms, sir. It’s likely that the access codes the Mordran provided would allow us to access the security hardware via the facility’s comms systems.”

“Once we’ve brought everything back online,” said Grisham.

“There’s still no request for access to our Kalor drive,” said Adler. “Can you reduce our altitude a little further, Captain?”

“It’s a good job the Oblasar doesn’t have fresh paintwork,” said Grisham.

With careful movements of the controls, he brought the warship another fifty metres closer to the ground. On the underside feeds, he could see the highest-growing trees splinter beneath the Oblasar’s monumental mass. The uppermost levels of the ruins were also crushed. Stones and twisted alloy slabs went tumbling to the ground.

Through a newly formed gap, Grisham saw what he thought was a road. One or two sleekly curved gravity vehicles were undamaged, while others had been flattened by the rubble.

“Captain! I’ve received a request for access to our Kalor drive!” said Adler.

“Are you sure that’s what the request is for?” said Grisham.

“It’s in our language. I guess the Oblasar must be interpreting.”

“Is there any indication which of the base hardware is making the request?”

“No, sir – there’s a list of codes, which I’m sure relate to the different systems.”

“How many codes?”

“Twenty-five in all,” said Adler. “Some of the codes contain as many as ten characters – these ones could be for minor hardware units. A couple of the codes are made up from only four characters.”

“The major stuff,” said Grisham.

“Yes, sir.”

“Are we able to pick and choose which ones we recharge?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Start with one of the minor units and see what happens.”

“Accepting request from hardware unit DS239-LN-165,” said Adler. He was quiet for a moment. “We’ve received a confirmation notice saying the recharge is complete.”

“What kind of draw was there on the Kalor drive?”

“None at the twentieth decimal place.”

“Accept a couple of the other recharge requests,” said Grisham. “Stick to the smaller units.”

“Yes, sir,” said Adler. “Two more units are now recharged, with no indication as to what they were.”

“Lieutenant Bishop, run a receptor sweep,” said Grisham.

“Yes, sir. Sweep running…no receptors found.”

“Lieutenant Adler, accept the recharge requests for all except the four-character codes.”

“Requests accepted. Recharges complete,” said Adler. “Again, no indication as to the function of the hardware units. The drain on our Kalor drive remains insignificant.”

“Run another receptor sweep,” said Grisham.

“Sweep running…no receptors found.”

“We’re running out of chances,” said Grisham. He cursed under his breath. If the base security systems had been wrecked in the attack, there’d be no way to obtain the shutdown codes for the Gavax’Kol – if indeed those codes existed at all.

“Pick one of the other hardware units and accept its recharge request,” said Grisham.

“Yes, sir,” said Adler. “This recharge is taking longer than the others. There’s drain on our Kalor drive at the fifteenth decimal place. And…done.”

“Run that receptor sweep, Lieutenant Bishop.”

“Yes, sir. Sweep running…no receptors found.”

“We’re down to one last code,” said Grisham. “Accept its recharge request.”

“Recharge request accepted,” said Adler. “Again, it’s taking longer than the others.” He fell silent for five seconds. “Much longer. There’s movement on our Kalor drive reserves at the ninth decimal place.”

“Come on,” muttered Grisham. “We need this.”

“Recharge complete,” said Adler.

“Lieutenant Bishop, you know what to do,” said Grisham.

“Yes, sir. Sweep running…receptor found!” said Bishop in excitement.

Grisham exhaled and sat back in his seat. It sounded like part or all of the facility comms had been brought back online. The next step was to interrogate the Vire hardware and see if it would give up the shutdown codes for the Gavax’Kol.

“Uh, Captain, we have activity on Kalor module one,” said Lieutenant Kinsey.

“What do you mean?” asked Grisham snapping his head around.

“I’m just checking, Captain,” said Kinsey. He swore. “The same activity is now on Kalor module two.”

Grisham’s eyes dropped to his instrumentation, where the readings for those two modules were all over the place. Then, the electronic needles for modules three and four started jumping.

The sickening realisation about what was happening came to Grisham. “We’ve been injected with a shutdown code,” he said in disbelief. “We recharged the base security, it identified us as an unknown vessel and it fed us with a Vire shutdown command.”

“You’re right, Captain,” said Adler. “That’s exactly what’s happened. We’ve lost modules one and two, and the code has now spread into all the other modules.”

“Can you purge it?” asked Grisham, already knowing the answer.

“No, sir. Like the Mordran told us – the Vire borrowed much of the Eilas control system software. The shutdown command we’ve received is immune to our purge routines.”

“But the Mordran told us the Eilas shutdown codes won’t work against the Gavax’Kol!” said Grisham. “Why are the Vire codes working against an Eilas vessel?”

“The Vire must have modified the original shutdown routines, sir,” said Adler.

Grisham didn’t bother attempting a getaway. It didn’t matter how far away he took the Oblasar, its propulsion was going to shut down.

After a couple of minutes, the last of the Kalor modules went offline. The sensor arrays switched over to the backup supply, though the feed resolution dropped markedly.

Without power, the Oblasar was only going in one direction. Gripped by fury, all Grisham could do was watch as his spaceship crashed down upon the Vire base.

ELEVEN

Sergeant Tyrus Maxwell was approaching Shuttle Bay 2, when his earpiece crackled and his HUD informed him that Lieutenant Lopez had opened a comms channel. Slowing, so that the pounding of his feet wouldn’t prevent him from hearing his new orders, Maxwell listened. The Oblasar’s propulsion was offline, so he already knew that something was badly wrong.

Lopez spoke briefly and then closed out of the channel. Maxwell straightaway increased his pace, turning only once to check that nobody from his squad had fallen behind. The soldiers knew something was wrong too.

The shuttle in Bay 1 was utilitarian in appearance, and nearly eighty metres in length. Maxwell didn’t stand and stare. He sprinted through the airlock and ascended quickly to the cockpit. Corporal Ralf Barkley wasn’t far behind, and Private Danny Chau was to be the last member of the transport’s crew.

“What’s up, Sergeant?” asked Barkley, who had so far refrained from asking questions.

“We’re in the shit, Corporal.”

“I thought you were going to tell me it was something important, sir. And what’re these files that’ve been added to my suit computer?”

“One moment,” said Maxwell. He sat in the pilot’s seat, grabbed the control joysticks, and then spoke quickly on the squad channel. “Listen up, everyone. The Oblasar’s been shut down – again – and we’ve been ordered to deploy. You’ve all had some access codes added to your suit databanks. We’re going to use those to break into whatever alien computers we find, and we’ll have to convince those computers to remove the shutdown code from the Oblasar.”

Maxwell stabbed his fingertip on the launch button and a green light appeared on his console. He breathed a sigh of relief – almost nothing would function on a Human Federation warship once its engines were shut down. At least the creators of the Oblasar had seen fit to include some useful redundancy.

At the end of the bay, an armoured door slid aside, revealing a tunnel leading through the warship’s armour. The shuttle was pointing nose-first towards the exit, and Maxwell fed in the power.

“Do we have a target?” asked Barkley.

“There’re some structures in the hills to the north. We’ve been ordered to check those ones out first.”

“And this is a dead world, right?” said Barkley.

“That’s the belief,” said Maxwell.

“Great,” said Chau. “So this is going to be an easy mission.”

“Just don’t lose sight of your rifle, soldier,” said Maxwell. “The Oblasar’s crew don’t know what hardware is active on the base – it’s possible we’ll find miniguns around every corner.”

“Good job we’ve got those two repeater turrets in the cargo bay,” said Barkley.

“They’re definitely coming with us,” Maxwell agreed. “And if it turns out we don’t need them, it’s all the better.”

A total of four doors protected the exit tunnel, and each opened as the transport approached. When the final door slid aside, the shuttle emerged from the Oblasar’s flank, where the warship’s flat portside midsection flank began narrowing towards the nose.

“Whoa, this place is a mess,” said Chau.

“That’s what I was told to expect,” said Maxwell.

His eyes jumped between the feeds. Off the transport’s stern, the Oblasar was an impossibly vast construction of metal that seemed to go on forever. At some point during the run to the shuttle, the warship had impacted with the ruins of the facility, though at a low enough velocity that the visible shockwave damage didn’t extend more than a few hundred metres.

Maxwell thought he’d seen everything, but here was another example of the devastation which technology could bring. The trees were everywhere, tall and majestic, with huge leaves. Many had been flattened by the shock of the Oblasar crashing down, but the canopy went on to every horizon. The trees – and countless smaller plants - had grown on the ruins of the Vire base.

On the underside feed, Maxwell could see only destruction, much of it part-hidden beneath layers of green. The buildings had been turned into piles of rubble, and the aeons had allowed the plants to gain a foothold, life merging with death in a way that was both terrible to view and yet also, Maxwell thought, an affirmation that the Ax’Kol would never win. Life always came back.

Aside from the forests and the ruins, there was the rain. It came down in torrents, and Barkley was having to work hard to keep the sensor feeds in focus.

“Our comms link to the Oblasar is active,” said Barkley.

“Let’s hope it stays that way,” said Maxwell. While he was confident he could figure out how to plug his suit into a Vire console, he wasn’t so sure about how to order the alien hardware to remove a shutdown code.

In addition, Maxwell was aware that the entire purpose of this mission was to extract some different shutdown codes – ones that would disable the Gavax’Kol - and also to figure out how to elevate the Oblasar onto a new security tier, so that it would have the authority to inject those codes into the enemy warship.

All things considered, Maxwell would have preferred it if one of the Oblasar’s crew had accompanied his squad on this mission, but he was happy enough to settle for a working comms link.

“Lieutenant Lopez has added the coordinates of four target buildings to our navigation system, Sergeant,” said Barkley. “She hasn’t assigned them different priorities, so I guess that means we get to choose.”

Maxwell checked the shuttle’s tactical, at the same time as he banked north and increased the transport’s velocity. The four targets were close together – at least in comparison to the overall size of the facility – and they were situated between ten and twelve kilometres north.

Keeping his eyes on the forward feed, Maxwell waited to see if he could obtain a visual. Rising above the trees on one hilltop were the lopsided walls of a metal structure. Beyond that, was a valley, and in there was the second target. From the shuttle’s low altitude, Maxwell couldn’t see anything of the building.

West of the first hill, was another rise, this one slightly lower than the first. Here, the jagged edges of a stone building were visible. Maxwell saw rebar protruding through the edges of the stone. Somehow the metal had lasted all this time.

Of the fourth target, there was no sign. The tactical indicated it was near the third building, and since he couldn’t see it, that meant it was below the trees.

“Which one first, Sergeant?” asked Chau.

“Damnit,” muttered Maxwell. None of the targets looked any more significant than the others. “Do we have any guidance from the Oblasar?”

“I’ll check,” said Barkley.

While the soldier talked on the comms, Maxwell instructed the shuttle to accelerate towards the first building he’d spotted. The closer the transport came, the more lopsided the walls of the structure appeared. He guessed this building had been maybe fifty metres square at its base, though he had no idea of its original height.

“We’re being offered no guidance, Sergeant,” said Barkley. “Lieutenant Lopez has chosen these targets based on how little damage they’ve suffered in comparison to all the others. She reckons that gives the greatest chance their hardware will be operational.”

Maxwell didn’t argue, and he didn’t waste time on the decision. The lopsided building was closest and he piloted the shuttle closer. If it looked easy to gain access, he and his squad would explore this one first.

Holding the transport above and to one side of the building, Maxwell studied the sensor feeds. He could see, on the southern side, a couple of doors, both of which were closed. The lower walls were intact, though starting from a height of about ninety metres, the upper levels had been sheared diagonally away. Not much of the building’s interior was visible, since plants were growing over everything.

Piloting the shuttle all the way around, Maxwell looked for other entrances. He spotted several, and again the doors were closed. From this vantage, he had a view down into the valley, where he could now see the second target. The building was almost completely obscured by foliage, though Maxwell saw its grey walls peeking through the green.

“Where are you planning to set down, Sergeant?” asked Chau. “I’ve seen one place that’s about three hundred metres south of this first target, but you’d still have to smash through a bunch of trees.”

Maxwell pursed his lips. There were plenty of gaps in the canopy, but the shuttle was so big that it wouldn’t fit through most of them. In itself, that wasn’t a problem, since the transport was tough and heavy enough that a few branches weren’t going to halt its progress. Unfortunately, while the shuttle didn’t need to set down, the ground itself was so rough and uneven that exiting the shuttle would be difficult to execute safely.

“I’ve spotted another place,” said Chau suddenly. “About two hundred metres north.”

Maxwell guided the shuttle that way until he saw the area which Chau had identified. The ground at the base of the trees here wasn’t too rough and, although it was on a hillside sloping into the valley, Maxwell reckoned that if he oriented the shuttle east-to-west, he and his squad could jump out of the flank door without risk of injury.

“This looks like as good a place as any,” said Maxwell. “Plus we’ll be more or less equal distance from targets one and two.”

“That’s what I thought, Sergeant,” said Chau.

Maxwell was fully aware of the urgency and he rotated the shuttle rapidly so that its nose was pointed to the west, while also positioning the vessel directly over the landing area. The tree branches – even near the top – were thick and strong looking. Maxwell didn’t pay them much heed. He reduced the shuttle’s altitude steadily. At eighty metres, it broke through the canopy, cracking branches and sending them to the ground. In the cockpit, Maxwell felt nothing at all.

As the transport neared the ground, he made a couple of small adjustments to its orientation, before bringing it to a standstill, with its portside flank almost touching the hillside.

A check of the starboard feeds informed Maxwell that the slope was a little steeper than he’d first thought, but climbing it shouldn’t present too much of a challenge. One of the shuttle’s two massive six-barrel repeaters also intruded onto the feed, reminding him that the vessel wasn’t defenceless. Maxwell fervently hoped he wouldn’t be required to discharge a single round on this mission.

“Let’s move,” he said, rising and heading for the cockpit exit.

Descending into the passenger bay, Maxwell found the soldiers already waiting at the airlock. Corporal Fine and Private Diaz were absent, having gone into the cargo bay, from where they could move the two mobile repeaters off the transport.

Maxwell headed straight for the airlock. Since every soldier was fully suited, he didn’t need to worry about external toxins, and he entered an override command that opened both doors at once. As soon as the inner door slid aside, Maxwell strode into the compact space beyond.

Through the open flank door, he could see up the hillside. It was gloomier than the sensors had let on – almost oppressively so – and the sound of the rain was like that of river rapids. Pausing at the exit, Maxwell leaned out and looked both east and west. Then, he jumped the short distance to the ground and advanced a few metres up the hill to make room.

The ground was covered in a mixture of tightly knotted roots and patches of thick moss. It was soaking and with a spongey bounce. Maxwell knew he’d have to take care with his feet, but he’d walked on surfaces far more treacherous than this one.

Turning to watch the rest of his soldiers exit the shuttle, Maxwell breathed in through his helmet filter. The air was cold and dense, and it carried odours that could have come from any drenched forest on Earth. A check of his HUD informed Maxwell that the atmosphere was also breathable, though his environmental sensor was reading levels of radiation from the ground that were too high for extended exposure.

The ramp door of the shuttle’s rear cargo bay opened outwards and came to a gentle stop against the ground. When he took a few steps west, Maxwell could see Fine and Diaz in the bay. They advanced down the ramp, and the two mobile repeaters – tethered to the soldiers’ suit computers – followed obediently, floating a half-metre above the surface.

Maxwell eyed the guns, which were cuboid in shape, with a width that was purposely meant to be slightly narrower than a human or Kijol doorway, a height of five feet, and a depth of three feet. From the front surface, a six-barrel repeater protruded, which was capable of ejecting gauss slugs at a rate that could empty a long corridor of living Kijol in less than five seconds, and could punch a hole through several inches of warship-grade alloy in a slightly longer time.

To add to the fun and games, the repeaters were also fitted with metal shields. These shields could be ordered to extend up to a metre-and-a-half from each flank of the main housing, and allowed the accompanying soldiers to advance along with the weapon, while being protected from small arms fire.

Against shoulder rockets, tanks, orbit-launched plasma missiles, and so on, the shielding wasn’t much use, but, as a foot soldier, Maxwell was grateful for anything which would tip the odds in his favour.

In only a few seconds, the squad was ready to go. Maxwell got his bearings and peered south up the slope. Amongst the trees here on Denivir – which were far larger than those he remembered from Xaros, and with broader trunks than any he’d seen before – he felt tiny, like an insect.

However, the trees weren’t densely clustered, and that allowed him to see a couple of hundred metres in every direction. When he stared north – downhill - Maxwell thought he could make out the grey walls of target building number two.

The Oblasar was completely hidden from view. Despite the warship’s monumental size it was gone, as if the forest had swallowed it up.

Suppressing an unexpected shiver, Maxwell gave the order to move. He set off up the slope, with the rain pelting against his combat suit, the air cold in his nostrils, and his feet sinking into the mossy surface like he was once more walking through the desert sands of Ovintus.

TWELVE

The going was tough, but no more so than Maxwell was used to. He made no effort to use the trees as cover, though he kept a wary eye on his surroundings. It was possible the planet was now home to other species, even if the Vire were no more. The sound of the rain hid everything.

Part of Maxwell was glad of this opportunity to stretch his legs, though he wished it were in other circumstances. After a hundred metres, he halted briefly, to make sure the soldiers were in good order, and to scan more closely ahead. Maxwell wasn’t breathing especially hard, and he judged the gravity on Denivir to be little different to that on Loxor or Earth.

The soldiers watched and waited, while Maxwell stared at the target building. High walls were visible through the trees, and he judged this had once been a plain and simple tower. Maxwell could also see the jagged edge of where the upper levels had sheared off, though he couldn’t make out where the top of the tower had fallen. The other details were made indistinct by the rain.

“Come on,” said Maxwell, just to hear the sound of his own voice.

He resumed the climb and was soon at the base of the tower, which had been built into the hillside, rather than on an area of levelled ground. The damage inflicted upon the structure was far more apparent here – the surface of the metals were uneven and they were bowed inwards.

“Incendiaries,” said Maxwell.

With a shrug – this war was a long time past – he headed for the nearest door in the structure’s northern wall. This door was unremarkable in size, being only two metres wide by two-point-five high and Maxwell’s eyes hunted for an access panel. The dark alloys were scarred and it took him a moment to spot an area of even darker material to the left of the door.

Stepping up to what he hoped was an access panel, Maxwell’s first thought was that it had suffered too much damage to be operational. Neither was there any kind of light to indicate the building’s security system was online. He thumped the side of his fist on the door. It was solid, and Maxwell wondered if Private Chau was carrying enough pack charges to blow a hole not just through this one, but potentially through several other doors afterwards.

“No lights,” said Maxwell.

“Time to try those access codes, Sergeant,” said Corporal Barkley.

Maxwell nodded once. “I’ll give it a go.”

He instructed his suit computer to search for a receptor. A moment later, several green lights appeared on his HUD, along with their approximate distances. Maxwell ordered his suit to offer the Mordran’s access codes to the nearest one.

By the magic of technology, his Human Federation combat suit spoke to the building’s security system. For a couple of long seconds, nothing happened, and then the door slid judderingly aside, its motors whirring in obvious distress.

Maxwell glanced towards his soldiers and then poked his head into the door opening.

“No lights,” he said.

For a few moments, Maxwell listened intently. Despite the interference of the rain, he was sure it was quiet within the building.

Standing directly in the door opening, Maxwell switched on his helmet light. The yellow beam seemed harsher than usual, and he squinted for a moment. As if he was being drawn deeper into the building, Maxwell took another step. His eyes were adjusting. He was in a short passage, which led to a room. Jumbled shapes lay ahead, though his brain hadn’t yet figured out what they were.

“Should we send in one of the repeaters, Sergeant?” asked Corporal Fine. She was usually one of the most stoic members of the squad, but she sounded unexpectedly nervous now.

“Not yet,” said Maxwell.

He took another careful step towards the end of the passage. Breathing through his nostrils, he still caught the scents of the forest, but now they were joined by other smells – metal, char, and something else that was stale, musty, and not at all pleasant.

Maxwell halted at the threshold to the room. The thunder of the rain had already faded into a background susurration, leaving him with a peculiar feeling of isolation. Maxwell cursed inwardly, unwilling to let this place get to him.

He shone his flashlight around. The space here was a ten-metre square. A thick layer of furry mould covered nearly every surface, hiding the original tech so that all Maxwell could see of it were lumps in the grey carpet. The opposite wall had been torn open near the ceiling, and his suit computer informed him there was a faint breeze blowing through – possibly as a result of the changing pressure when he opened the outer door.

“Found anything, Sergeant?” asked Corporal Fine.

“Mould,” said Maxwell in disgust. Scraping it away from the tech would be a filthy job. “Corporal Fine, bring that repeater inside. Private Lyles, Private Vaughan, move up. Everyone else, stay outside for the moment, and keep watch.”

Maxwell didn’t much want to touch the mould, in case its spores stuck to his suit and posed a threat to everyone’s health later on. He guessed it was already too late for that, and he walked carefully towards the nearest waist-high lump. His foot caught on a loose, mould-covered object and he kicked it aside.

“You could just run another receptor sweep, Sergeant,” said Lyles, entering the room behind the mobile repeater.

“The first sweep told me there aren’t any receptors in this room,” said Maxwell. He made an all-encompassing gesture with one hand. “I reckon the open ones are for the other perimeter doors.”

“Then what are we doing in here, Sergeant?”

“At some point – if everything goes to plan – we’ll have to interact with the hardware, Private,” said Maxwell. “And you know as well as I know that not every console permits a remote interface.”

He stared in distaste at a grey lump he hoped was a Vire console, and then leaned towards it. Using his forearm, Maxwell scraped the mould clear. Tiny spores leapt into the air, while the mould felt thick and greasy. The musty smell intensified and Maxwell curled his lip at the stench.

A couple more scrubbing motions were enough to reveal the top panel of what was indeed a Vire console. Maxwell didn’t pretend to be an expert on alien tech, but he knew enough to guess that this had once been a sophisticated piece of kit. Now, the keypads and touch panels were blackened and warped by the heat of ancient incendiaries, while the viewscreen he’d revealed was bubbled and split across the middle.

“Any chance that’ll come online, Sergeant?” asked Corporal Fine. She was standing nearby, the mobile repeater floating incongruously behind her left shoulder.

Maxwell didn’t answer. He stabbed his finger at a couple of buttons. The console stayed dead.

“The power switches are sometimes on the front panel, Sergeant,” said Lyles.

“Thanks for the reminder,” growled Maxwell.

He crouched in front of the console and wiped away the mould. The air was thick with spores and they glimmered in the beam of his flashlight. In a few moments, Maxwell had cleared away enough of the fungus that he could see the lower panel on the console.

“A switch,” he said.

Without hesitation, Maxwell flicked the metal switch upwards. The action of the switch felt mushy rather than clean, and he wondered if it had degraded into a state of inoperability. Certainly, the console remained offline, and when Maxwell listened carefully, he heard no sound coming from within. He flicked the switch a couple more times with the same lack of success.

“Dead,” he said. It was tempting to give the console a kick, but Maxwell restrained himself. “Let’s try some others. Private Vaughan, Private Lyles, you clean up those ones over there.”

The second console was just as dead as the first. Lyles and Vaughan had no better luck.

“There’s power to the building,” said Maxwell. “I wonder if this hardware has failed, or if it’s on a different circuit to the door security.”

“We should check out some of the other rooms, Sergeant,” said Lyles.

Maxwell was already ninety-five percent sure nothing in this particular building was operational, but he had to make sure before he ordered a move to the second target building. He approached one of the two doors in the wall opposite the entrance. The access panel was free of mould and it looked almost undamaged. However, it was unlit.

As Maxwell approached, the door opened automatically. He wasn’t sure why – perhaps his initial entrance to the building had placed him on a list of authorised personnel. The thought made him glance up – in order for the internal security to know him, there needed to be monitors, and that also meant the security systems were aware.

Wherever the monitors had been installed, Maxwell couldn’t see them, though he didn’t spend more than a few seconds looking. A sense of disquiet was creeping up on him.

The door opened onto a passage, and that passage led to another room, with more tech coated in mould. Before Maxwell could advance, his earpiece crackled.

“Sergeant, Private Lowe reckons he saw something in the trees to the west,” said Corporal Barkley. “If it was anything, it’s either moved on or gone to ground.”

“Are the heat or motion detectors picking anything up?”

“Negative, Sergeant.”

“What’s your feeling about what Private Lowe saw, Corporal?”

“It was probably nothing, but I still don’t like it, sir. Do you remember on Xaros, when Private Lyles thought she spotted something come over that wall?”

“I remember,” said Maxwell. “We convinced ourselves it was nothing, but it wasn’t nothing.” He cursed inwardly – the search had to continue. “The Oblasar came here by some kind of super-accelerated lightspeed jump, that should have put it weeks ahead of any other warship. If there’s anything out there, it’s most likely an animal.”

“Yes, sir,” said Barkley. “We’ll keep a close watch for it coming back. This mobile repeater will turn anything to paste in double-quick time.”

Maxwell swore again. The Ax’Kol were such tough and cunning opponents that it was easy to start jumping at shadows, with or without the additional protection offered by the repeaters. Reminding himself that the population of Denivir had been wiped out half a billion years ago, and that there was no reason for the Ax’Kol to be here, Maxwell turned his attention to the contents of the new room.

Beckoning Vaughan and Lyles to follow, he approached one of the mould-covered consoles. A few quick sweeping motions cleared the top and front panels enough that he could see what he needed to see. The power switch on this console operated with a sharp click, but still the power didn’t come on.

“No luck over here either, Sergeant,” said Lyles.

“Same here, sir,” added Vaughan.

Maxwell pushed himself upright. The decision was upon him. He could either order a thorough search of this building, which, given the size of it, might take twenty or thirty minutes, or he could abandon this place and head for target two back down the hill.

“I don’t think we’re going to find anything here, Sergeant,” said Lyles. “Everything’s offline.”

“I agree,” said Maxwell. “Let’s go for target two.”

He turned away from the console, only now noticing the scuffed footprints in the mould. Exiting this second room, he entered the first. At that moment, he heard the roar of the mobile repeater. The gun fired for two seconds and then cut out.

Maxwell dashed for the outside. When he arrived, the soldiers were looking agitated, but not unduly so.

“What happened?” Maxwell demanded.

“Local fauna, Sergeant,” said Private Chau, pointing east.

Squinting into the rain, Maxwell saw a red-soaked shape about 150 metres away. It was hard to be sure, but he estimated the mangled heap had originally been a medium-sized creature. Whether a spooked herbivore or a hunting predator, the mobile repeater had turned it into a sorry mound of chewed flesh and entrails.

“It was behind that tree, Sergeant,” said Barkley. “The repeater was set to automatic and—” He shrugged. The tale didn’t need telling.

Maxwell should have been relieved at this confirmation that his squad was not being stalked by Ax’Kol, or indeed by anything that offered a visible threat. And yet, those claws of unease were buried in his flesh and he couldn’t shake them free.

Cursing the rain, cursing the planet, and most of all, cursing the Ax’Kol, Maxwell set off down the hill towards the second target structure.

THIRTEEN

The descent was slower than Maxwell would have liked, owing to the real risk of injury, and his frustration grew. Understandably, Captain Grisham was feeling the pressure too, and it was clear from his comms that he wanted the squad to push on as quickly as possible.

Here on the ground, Maxwell was in the best place to make the judgement calls, and he refused to be rushed. Soon after departing the first building, the squads passed the shuttle which had brought them here from the Oblasar. Its doors were still closed and the vessel had suffered no visible interference.

“Two hundred and fifty metres to the next target,” said Corporal Fine. “And there’s something sticking out of the hillside ahead.”

That something turned out to be a huge slab of alloy, which jutted from beneath the roots and the moss. Maxwell didn’t know why the foliage had been unable to gain a footing here, but it allowed him this glimpse of what lay beneath the greenery. The slab was more or less level, and its surface was pitted and uneven. Perhaps, Maxwell thought, it had been thrown here by the force of an explosion elsewhere.

He didn’t dwell on it too long. Skirting around the slab – which must have weighed several thousand tons – Maxwell led the soldiers onwards. He doubted this piece of debris was going to suddenly become dislodged, but he kept a careful eye on it all the same.

“There’s target two,” said Corporal Fine.

A quirk of how the trees had grown allowed Maxwell a clear view of the structure. Its walls were approximately ten metres high and sixty long, and they looked near-enough intact from his current viewing angle. The driving rain concealed the entrances, though Maxwell was sure they’d soon be visible.

Fifty metres further down the slope, Maxwell spotted what he first took to be a ten-metre cube of a material that was so dark as to be almost black. This cube was east of the target building, and when he focused on it, Maxwell realised that it had once been much taller. The uppermost edges were ragged, as if something had snapped off the top.

“Let’s check this out,” said Maxwell diverting slightly from his course. He had a feeling this was something important, and he was only adding a minute or so to the journey.

Soon after, Maxwell stopped at the base of the cube. The target building was about thirty metres west, and he’d already identified three entrances. They could wait a moment.

“What’s this, Sergeant?” asked Private Lowe.

“I think it might have been a comms transmitter,” said Maxwell.

“It looks like it’s made of the same stuff as the Voltran,” said Lyles.

“That it does, Private.”

Maxwell placed a hand on the cube’s surface. It felt solid, though with the faintest hint of yielding. He rapped it with his knuckles, and the action produced a dull sound.

“It feels the same as the Voltran as well,” he said.

“Do you think it was made from dead people?” asked Private Diaz.

“Who knows?” said Maxwell. He headed east, along the base of the cube. “I guess the Gavax’Kol must have learned how to convert flesh into a usable material somewhere.”

At the edge of the cube, he looked north-east. An unnaturally straight lump, covered in moss and ferns, went that way, disappearing into the rain and the trees. Maxwell reasoned that if he were to dig up some of those plants, he’d find the top section of this transmitter underneath. He returned to his squad.

“Is this significant, sir?” asked the squad medic, Private Hank Logan.

“Possibly,” said Maxwell. “I reckon this transmitter stump could easily inject a shutdown code into the Oblasar’s onboard systems.”

“The injection could have originated from anywhere on the base, Sergeant,” said Barkley.

“I’m sure you’re right, Corporal. However, this is the area identified by the Oblasar’s crew as being the most likely to bear fruit.” Maxwell gestured towards the cube. “And here’s the watermelon.”

“If the transmission came from this stump, then it must be linked to a power supply,” said Barkley. He pointed towards the nearby building, but didn’t say anything.

“Report this to Lieutenant Lopez,” said Maxwell. “We’re about to commence our investigation of target two.”

“Yes, sir,” said Barkley.

Maxwell jogged away from the cube and stopped at the eastern entrance to the target building. The alloy walls weren’t entirely smooth, but they’d definitely escaped the worst of the incendiaries. When he saw the green light on the access panel, Maxwell felt his heart beating faster.

“Let’s see if the security is active,” he said, placing his hand on the panel.

The green light went red and the door didn’t open.

“No dice?” said Corporal Fine.

“No dice,” Maxwell confirmed. “I’ll feed in the access codes.”

First, he set his suit hunting for open receptors. Several showed up as a list on his HUD, and, from their distances, Maxwell was once again sure these were for the external doors only. He gritted his teeth, and hoped the hardware inside would power up.

A couple of seconds after he’d injected the access codes into the building’s security system, the door opened. A passage led to a room, and the lights were off, just like they had been in the other building.

Telling himself that this was neither a good sign, nor a bad one, Maxwell turned on his helmet light and shone it into the space. He saw more shapes, covered in more of the grey mould.

“Corporal Fine, Private Vaughan, Private Lyles, come with me,” said Maxwell.

“I was on mould duty last time, Sergeant,” Lyles protested.

“And you did such a good job, you were top of my list this time, Private.”

Maxwell entered the room and shone his flashlight around. The space was approximately ten metres square, reinforcing his long-held belief that species the universe over would invariably gravitate towards the same basic designs. Here, the mould-covered lumps were smaller, though Maxwell couldn’t see what was hidden beneath the fungus.

“One exit through each of the north, south, and west walls,” he said, having already concluded that this was only an entrance space, and that he’d discover nothing beneath the mould. “Private Lyles, you check those out, Private Vaughan, over there.”

Maxwell headed straight across the room, his nose wrinkled against the stench of the mould. Soon, his footsteps had kicked up millions of spores and he was enormously glad the filters in his helmet were keeping them out of his lungs.

When he swept away the mould covering the first object he came to, Maxwell discovered that a double-seated metal chair lay beneath. He stepped across to the next object and again brushed at the mould.

“A damned table,” he muttered. Maxwell raised his voice. “Is there anything more interesting than furniture in this room?”

“Not over here there isn’t, Sergeant,” said Lyles.

“Not here either,” said Vaughan. In an unusual display of petulance, the soldier kicked a metal-framed chair across the room. It clattered against the northern wall, and a cloud of spores rose into the air.

Maxwell went for the exit in the western wall. Like in the previous building, the internal security evidently recognized him now, and the door opened automatically. Stepping through into a room of similar dimensions, Maxwell headed over to the nearest of the fifteen or twenty console-sized lumps in the room.

Having brushed away a quantity of mould, he flicked the power switch. Immediately, he heard a low humming sound coming from within the console. A few seconds later, lights appeared on the console’s top panel.

“Bingo,” said Maxwell.

He used his glove to wipe at the mould until he could see all the different buttons on the panel, as well as the three screens mounted on top. Text was visible on the left-hand screen.

Input?

“Corporal Barkley, get your ass in here,” said Maxwell on the squad channel.

“On my way, Sergeant.”

Twenty seconds later, Barkley was in the room, looking at the same console.

“The power’s on, and I guess we need to inject the access codes,” said Maxwell. He’d already extended the universal link cable from the shoulder of his combat suit. “Should I just plug this in and send over the files?”

“That’s how it would work on a Human Federation console, sir.”

“I think what I’m asking, is what’s the likelihood of me breaking something such that this building goes into lockdown?”

“Whatever answer I give, you’ll still have to plug in that cable, Sergeant.”

Maxwell sighed. “True enough.”

On the right-hand side of the console’s top panel was a socket where something could be plugged in. The socket didn’t physically match that of the plug on the end of Maxwell’s cable, but they didn’t call it a universal connector for nothing. When he inserted the plug into the hole, extendible pins locked it in place, while other pins created a datalink to the socket. After a couple of seconds, a green light appeared on Maxwell’s HUD.

“Link ready,” he said.

“Do it, Sergeant,” said Barkley.

“Sending access codes.”

A moment after he’d sent the file into the console, the input text on the screen vanished, to be replaced by a top-level menu.

“We’re in,” said Maxwell.

He read through the options. The words were understandable, but the functions they represented were not so readily comprehended. For a minute or two, Maxwell went through the different menu sections.

“I think this might only be a routing station, Sergeant,” said Barkley.

“What does that mean?”

“It means data is sent to this station from other locations, compressed and encrypted here, and then sent out through that transmitter we saw outside.”

Maxwell considered this for a moment. “So we’re not going to be able to rescind the shutdown code from here?”

“That would be my guess, Sergeant. I reckon the issuing security systems are located elsewhere.”

Taking a step back, Maxwell gestured towards the console. “This is where you earn your keep, Corporal. There must be an audit trail accessible from this console. Find out where the shutdown code was issued.”

Barkley took Maxwell’s place at the console and got on with it. “You might have to get someone else to handle the updates to Lieutenant Lopez, Sergeant.”

“I’ll take over for the moment.”

As he watched Barkley switch between menus, Maxwell spoke on the comms to the Oblasar. Lieutenant Lopez was only pushy when she needed to be. Right now, she knew the soldiers were doing the best they could, and she didn’t make any demands.

“If Corporal Barkley needs advice on the comms console, tell him to get straight in touch,” said Lopez.

“Yes, ma’am.”

Maxwell closed out of the channel. While Barkley wasn’t warship trained, he had a knack with comms that could have eventually seen him promoted to bridge duty if he’d ever shown the interest. Already, the soldier was scrolling through a list of text which Maxwell hadn’t figured out how to call up in his couple of minutes at the console.

“Is this the audit list?” asked Maxwell.

“Yes, sir,” said Barkley. “I’m just getting to the—” He touched a fingertip against the screen. “Here!”

“What is it?” Maxwell leaned closer, but he couldn’t make any sense of the text which had got Barkley interested.

“This,” Barkley tapped the screen again, “Is the record of the shutdown code being sent to unknown warship.”

“The Oblasar.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Does it tell us where the order to send the code originated from?”

Barkley nodded. “Security Station 9. Wherever that is.”

“Is there a way to find out?”

“Maybe. It’s likely this console has access to a base map.” Barkley leaned over the console again. “Give me a minute, sir. I’ll find out.”

Maxwell paced the room. Lyles, Vaughan and Fine didn’t move, and their eyes were all on Barkley. The other soldiers outside talked nervously on the squad channel. It was clear the incident with the repeater and the wild animal had put them on edge.

“Steady,” said Maxwell. “Once Corporal Barkley calls up a facility map, we’ll be on our way again.”

“What if Security Station 9 is fifty klicks from here, Sergeant?” asked Chau. He quickly figured out the answer to his own question. “Ah. We’ll fly there in the shuttle.”

“Good to see your brain is working properly today, Private,” said Maxwell. “I appreciate that nobody wants to be here, but we’re making progress. We’ll get the Oblasar online again.”

“Yes, sir.”

As he finished speaking, Maxwell saw Corporal Barkley call up a graphic on his screen that was unmistakeably a map.

“Yes!” said Barkley.

Maxwell stepped closer. The map showed hundreds of squares in varying sizes and colours, linked to each other by lines, again in many colours. Some of the larger squares were linked to numerous other places.

“Looking for Security Station 9,” said Barkley, zooming in and out on different areas of the map.

Maxwell also peered at the map. The buildings and links were labelled with strings of numbers, and a corner menu would doubtless allow access to a database with more information on what the numbers represented.

“Got it!” said Barkley in triumph.

The soldier stopped his constant zooming and let Maxwell see what he’d found.

“Four buildings of similar size or importance, all of them linked together,” said Maxwell. “Our four target buildings?”

“Yes, Sergeant,” said Barkley. “There are other links which I’ve filtered out, but this here—” He tapped the screen once again. “—is where we are now. This building here to the west—” Another tap. “—is Security Station 9.”

Maxwell clapped Barkley on the back. “Good work Corporal.” He thought for a moment. “Can we obtain any more useful information from this console?”

“I saw a couple of other entries in the audit file that came after the transmission of the shutdown code, Sergeant. I’d like to check them out.”

“Maybe just handshake requests from other parts of the facility?”

“Maybe.”

Barkley accessed the audit list again and stared closely at one of the entries. Then, he called up another screen of text, and read through it, his lips moving slightly.

“Oh shit.”

“I didn’t want oh shit, Corporal,” said Maxwell. “What is it?”

“This entry here, sir. Read it.”

Maxwell leaned in. “Comms amplification request received. Comms amplification request approved. Signal boost: maximum.”

“That means the appearance of the Oblasar triggered a top-level security response, sir,” said Barkley. “This comms building sent out a boosted transmission.”

“Where to? And to what?”

“I don’t have the answer to either, sir. That data is presented as a bunch of code numbers, the meanings of which are probably held in the security station.”

“The antenna outside is broken,” said Maxwell.

“Yes, sir. That’ll certainly affect the strength of the transmission, but I couldn’t tell you by how much.”

“We need to get moving.”

Barkley nodded, his eyes wider than usual. “The shutdown code came from Security Station 9, and that’s where we should go.”

“Then let’s do that,” said Maxwell.

Motioning for the other soldiers to follow, he headed outside. While he and his squad were making progress, the Oblasar was still on the ground. The final transmission from the comms building had him worried, and all he could do was hope there was nothing and nobody out there to hear it.

Maxwell didn’t think he’d be so lucky.

FOURTEEN

Stepping outside again, Maxwell briefly watched the rain leave channels through the clinging grey spores on his combat suit. He raised his head and looked west.

“Our destination is approximately five hundred metres in that direction,” he said.

“Are we taking the shuttle, Sergeant?” asked Private Diaz.

Maxwell couldn’t decide whether it would be quicker to fly or to just get on with it and go on foot. Something about the loneliness of the forest, the endless rain, and the memories of this place made him decide in favour of walking.

Setting off, Maxwell watched the ground carefully. Already he was becoming accustomed to the conditions. While the plants and roots were springy, they were so tightly knotted that they weren’t especially treacherous, as long as he lifted his feet high with each stride. In addition, the ground seemed to have an endless appetite for water, and the rain drained away as quickly as it fell, so the surface wasn’t especially slippery.

The route to Security Station 9 followed the hillside, which meant the soldiers were neither climbing nor descending, though they were still walking along a slope.

“If it wasn’t for all the crap that’s happening, I think I might like this place,” said Lowe.

“I think that’s the closest thing to a compliment I’ve heard coming from your mouth,” said Diaz.

“I have lots of good things to say, Diaz – you just don’t listen.”

“You keep shooting those rockets straight, and I’ll keep on not listening,” said Diaz.

Both Lowe and Diaz laughed. The sound was a reminder of the camaraderie which had kept the soldiers going through all the crap the Kijol could throw at them, and after that, the Ax’Kol. Maxwell smiled to himself. Moments like these didn’t quite make up for all the time he had to spend away from his wife and daughter, but they certainly reminded him that he had other family too – a family out here that would fight and die for each other without question or hesitation.

“We’re going to pull this off, Sergeant,” said Corporal Fine. She was a couple of metres higher up the slope, with her pet repeater still tagging along behind her left shoulder. “What do you reckon?”

“You know I don’t like making predictions, Corporal.”

Fine smiled and didn’t mention it again. “Like Lowe said – this would be a nice place if it wasn’t for the circumstances.”

“At first, I hated the rain, but now I’m telling myself I’m back on Earth and enjoying a nice walk in a place far from anywhere,” said Maxwell.

“You can’t convince me you’re the solitary type, Sergeant.”

“Once in a while, Corporal. Once in a while.”

“I think I can see something!” said Diaz. “About two hundred metres straight west.”

Maxwell didn’t slow, but he stared into the trees. A patch of grey could be seen between the trunks, though he couldn’t make out any other details. He hadn’t yet set eyes on target four, since it had been hidden beneath the canopy when he’d scanned the area from the shuttle. It seemed unlikely the building would offer any visual surprises.

And so it turned out. Security Station 9 was a squat building, only five metres high and built on an area of levelled ground, which had been partly dug out of the hillside. The facing wall was forty metres in length, though Maxwell was unable to ascertain the depth of the place from his current vantage. In addition, he suspected that the station continued into the hill, in which case it might conceivably be far more extensive than he wished it to be.

A short time later, Maxwell and his squad arrived at the security station. The levelled ground extended five or six metres from the three sides of the building which protruded from the hill, allowing him to walk around from the east side, past the northern wall, and all the way to the west.

Maxwell guessed there was a slab of alloy beneath the greenery at his feet, and much of that greenery had grown to envelop the security station. Tough-looking roots and tendrils stretched like gnarled fingers over the walls of the building, and across onto its roof. The other structures hadn’t become so overgrown, and the fact of it here lent an air of much greater age to the security station.

“Three entrances, one on each side,” said Maxwell. “We’ve come all the way to the west wall, so this is the entrance we’ll use.”

He advanced upon the door, which was no different to those in the other buildings. A green light glowed like a pinprick on the access panel to one side. Maxwell instructed his suit to hunt for receptors. The same as previously, the scan located a receptor for each of the external doors, but nothing from inside the building.

“Open up,” said Maxwell, as he sent in his access code.

The door obliged and he stared through into a five-metre room. Like everywhere else, the lights were out, but Maxwell knew there was power.

“More mould,” he said with distaste.

“Looks like another entrance room,” said Corporal Fine, shining her flashlight into the darkness.

“Let’s get inside,” said Maxwell. “Corporal Fine, you stay outside this time. Private Diaz, bring that mobile repeater.” He then pointed at Corporal Barkley, Private Vaughan, and Private Lyles. “You’re coming too. The rest of you keep watch – if this ends up looking like a big search, I’ll call you in.”

“Yes, sir,” said Fine, backing away from the entrance. Her mobile repeater followed silently on its gravity drive.

Maxwell stepped carefully into the building. The carpet of mould was far more slippery than the roots and moss outside, and, though he knew it was foolish, Maxwell was beginning to see the fungus as an adversary which intended him harm.

Aiming his beam into the corners, he saw lumps which reminded him of the chairs and table he’d seen in the last building. A single closed door in the opposite wall was the only other exit. Going through the motions, Maxwell gouged chunks of mould away, revealing chairs and a table. The other members of his squad unearthed similar treasures.

“East it is,” said Maxwell after less than a minute.

He approached the door and it opened for him. A much larger room was revealed, and it appeared to occupy the majority of this level. Maxwell stood warily on the threshold for a moment – his light beam wasn’t powerful enough to illuminate the entire space.

The mould was everywhere, and in places it dangled from the ceiling like thick spiderwebs. Shapes large and small were hidden beneath the fungus. Shadows jumped everywhere as Maxwell turned his head, and even when Lyles joined him at the entrance, their flashlights were far from sufficient.

Near the entrance, Maxwell spotted what might be consoles, while closer to the walls were much taller shapes that he guessed could be data arrays or processing units. About ten metres from the door, between two of the possible consoles, was a three-metre lump of indeterminate shape, that could have been anything. On his second scan of the room, Maxwell spotted another like it in the far corner.

Private Diaz knew more about security systems than the others in the squad, and Maxwell beckoned her forward. The soldiers entered the room, and Diaz ordered the repeater to park itself near the entrance, so it wouldn’t get in the way.

“Private Diaz, check out these consoles, and try to power them up. Corporal Barkley, you do the same,” said Maxwell. “Lyles, Vaughan, see if those are data arrays over there. They might be where the override codes for the Gavax’Kol are stored.”

“Yes, sir,” said Lyles, heading north along the wall. Vaughan followed.

Maxwell wished he could take a flamethrower to the mould, but it was not to be. He was tempted to check out one of the consoles, but instead he went north-east towards the three-metre lump. The shape of it was lumpy and uneven, and he was intrigued by what it might be.

“Got power on this console, Sergeant!” said Diaz.

Maxwell turned his head. “Inject your access codes, Private. I’ll be over in a moment.”

“This console is powering up as well,” said Barkley.

Stopping in front of the mouldy lump, Maxwell swept at it with his hand, leaving a thick smear in the grey. The surface beneath was dark, near enough to black. Reaching higher, Maxwell used the side of his hand to drag the mould away. Here, the object was rounded.

What the hell?

With a shock that caused Maxwell’s heart to beat painfully, and his body to start pumping adrenaline, he knew what he’d found. Before he could utter the warning, a wide mouth, half-hidden by the mould, opened and Maxwell saw what seemed like dozens of razor-sharp teeth.

“Ax’Kol!” he yelled, throwing himself backwards.

Part of the mould-lump detached itself and rose high into the air. Maxwell saw the yellow of filthy talons, as they prepared to plunge into his stomach.

The mobile repeater roared and the Ax’Kol’s head vanished under the onslaught of high-velocity gauss slugs. Mould, spores, and dark flesh was thrown across the room. The Ax’Kol wasn’t yet dead, and its claws swept down, while Maxwell scrambled backwards. He evaded the attack by inches and fired a couple of shots from his rifle.

The repeater continued firing, and its projectiles tore into the alien’s upper torso. Even an Ax’Kol was unable to withstand such punishment, and the creature toppled. Maxwell jumped away and the corpse crashed down, right next to him.

“Sir! Another!” shouted Vaughan.

Maxwell whirled towards the second three-metre shape he’d seen in the far corner. The Ax’Kol was out of sight, and he guessed it had vanished behind one of the data arrays.

“Where is it?” he yelled, his eyes jumping from place to place as he tried to work out the alien’s likely approach path across the room. Then, Maxwell’s flashlight illuminated a billowing cloud of spores behind the far data array near the eastern wall. “It’s over there!” he said.

“Permission to break the equipment, Sergeant?” asked Diaz.

“Not granted,” said Maxwell. “We can’t risk hitting the main controller and shutting everything down.”

He watched and waited. Against a squad armed only with gauss rifles, the Ax’Kol would have been able to dart from place to place, with little fear of incoming fire. Here, the presence of the mobile repeater changed the game significantly.

“Come on,” said Maxwell. “Show yourself.”

The Ax’Kol didn’t oblige. For upwards of thirty seconds, Maxwell stared towards the eastern wall. The spores were no longer agitated, and now they floated gently in the faint currents of air.

“Corporal Fine, bring in that other repeater,” said Maxwell. “The rest of you stay alert.”

Soon, the second mobile repeater floated into the room and Fine parked it next to the first.

“Private Diaz, send your gun into the south-east corner,” Maxwell ordered.

“Yes, sir.”

Under Diaz’s remote guidance, one of the repeaters floated to the south wall and then went east. When it reached the corner, it would be able to target the Ax’Kol. If the creature made a run for it, Fine’s repeater would rip the alien bastard into pieces.

“Are you linked to the gun’s sensor feed, Private?” asked Maxwell.

“Yes, Sergeant. Whatever it sees, I’ll see.”

“Any moment,” said Barkley anxiously. He was standing behind one of the consoles, his rifled aimed east.

The repeater came to the south-eastern corner. At that moment, the Ax’Kol sprang with incredible speed over the top of the data array. Fine’s repeater fired a burst, while the second gun turned onto target.

As soon as it hit the ground from its leap, the Ax’Kol dropped low behind one of the consoles. Spores and mould were hurled into the air and Maxwell saw a fast-moving shape among the shadows. Fine’s repeater fired a half-second burst.

“Repositioning,” said Diaz, guiding the other repeater back west.

“Kill it,” said Maxwell, his voice tight.

The Ax’Kol was clearly on the charge. It swarmed along the floor and Maxwell could hear its claws scraping and clacking. Another short burst from Fine’s repeater smashed pieces out of a Vire console. Now the shit was hitting the fan, Maxwell’s primary concern was for the safety of his squad. If some of the tech became damaged, then so be it.

It was easy to follow the Ax’Kol’s progress by watching the spores and the clumps of mould it threw up as it approached. Soon, the creature was halfway across the room.

Maxwell had seen enough. “Back outside,” he ordered. “The repeaters can finish the job.”

As though the Ax’Kol sensed the pending escape of its prey, it leapt again, this time high over one of the consoles. The creature used its long arms to propel itself to an even greater speed.

Both repeaters fired at once, and Private Vaughan discharged his own XR gun at the same time. Huge chunks were ripped out of the Ax’Kol and it went down, its arms thrashing wildly. Having landed in the space between two consoles, the creature remained exposed to Fine’s repeater. The gun fired an extended burst and the thrashing stopped.

“Down you go,” said Lyles, offering up her middle finger to the alien corpse for good measure.

Having been caught utterly unawares by these two Ax’Kol, Maxwell wasn’t about to be caught napping again. He ordered Diaz to guide her repeater to the parts of the room which weren’t visible from here by the entrance. The scouting didn’t take long, and no more Ax’Kol were hiding here.

With his heart still beating fast, Maxwell ordered Corporal Fine back outside with one of the repeaters. There were other doors into this central area of Security Station 9, so he told Private Diaz to keep the second gun inside.

Then, Maxwell turned his attention once again to the Vire consoles.

FIFTEEN

“I’m in, Sergeant,” said Diaz. “The access codes worked.”

“Do you know what you’re looking for?” asked Maxwell.

“Yes, sir,” said Diaz. “And hopefully I’ll be able to find it.”

“Sergeant, I’m going to see what I can find out about that amplified transmission,” said Barkley from a second console nearby.

“I’ll stand here and look pretty,” said Maxwell. “Holler if you find anything.”

He stood nearby, his gaze jumping between the two consoles and the rest of the room. It was far darker than Maxwell wanted it, and he hated the thought of being surprised again. Had he been facing Kijol, he’d have placed his squad members in ambush positions at the other entrances. Regrettably, the Ax’Kol were far too tough to ambush with light arms, so Maxwell was forced to rely on the mobile repeater.

Those Ax’Kol must have been here for millions of years, he thought. Just standing in the darkness. All that time, and then we blew them to pieces in a couple of minutes. He shook his head at the strangeness of the universe.

“Check this out, sir,” said Barkley, beckoning without shifting his gaze from the console.

“What’ve you got?” asked Maxwell, detecting the urgency in the other man’s voice.

“Bad news, that’s what I’ve got,” said Barkley, tracing a line of text with his finger as he read it. “That amplified transmission was sent to the Exetran, the Evoldor and the Endevar, as well as the entirety of the Vire fleet.”

“Well shit,” said Maxwell. “The Exetran and the Evoldor won’t be responding anytime soon, but the Gavax’Kol is alive and kicking. Have there been any return transmissions? And what’s the travel time of an amplified comm to wherever the hell the Gavax’Kol is currently located?”

“There were no return transmissions received at the comms station when we left it, sir. It’s possible something has arrived since, but I don’t know if it would be automatically forwarded on to here.”

“Can you access the comms station hardware from this console?” asked Maxwell.

“Maybe. I’ll check if that’s possible.”

“And what about the travel time of the comm?”

“I spoke to Lieutenant Lopez before I called you over, and the simple answer is that we don’t know. The Oblasar has comms boosters as well, but the warship’s crew haven’t tested them extensively. One thing we can be sure of - the distress signal sent from here went out at maximum amplification.”

“So what are we talking?” Maxwell pressed. “Days or hours?”

“Hours, possibly minutes, sir. However, we don’t even know if the Gavax’Kol will respond to a distress call from its home planet – it left millions of years ago, so why would it want to come back?”

“It’ll come,” said Maxwell. “Particularly if that distress transmission contained information that made it obvious the unknown warship is the Oblasar.”

“Good point, Sergeant, I hadn’t thought of that,” said Barkley. “And since the Oblasar is equipped with technology that boosts its lightspeed multiplier, I guess there’s a good chance the Gavax’Kol has the same capabilities.”

“And if the artifact on that enemy warship starts asking itself what the Oblasar would be doing out here at its home planet, maybe it’ll add two and two together.”

“Leading the Gavax’Kol to head this way as quickly as possible,” said Barkley.

“Exactly. We need to finish here, and quickly,” said Maxwell. “Keep at what you’re doing, Corporal. See what else you can find.” He walked across to the adjacent console, where Diaz was switching quickly between different menus. “We need to step it up, Private.”

“Yes, sir. I realise that,” said Diaz. “I’m making progress.”

“Show me.”

“I’ve located the instruction to disable the Oblasar, Sergeant. Unfortunately, I’m not able to withdraw the shutdown code. Because the priority of it was so high, it requires a command to be issued from another location – Security Station 1.”

“The base is wrecked,” said Maxwell. “Is Security Station 1 even online?”

“No, sir. I’ve tried communicating with it, but the link is dead.”

Maxwell’s brain turned. “On a Human Federation base, there’d be a protocol to cover situations like this, to prevent an entire facility from being shut down just because a single cog in the wheel was destroyed.”

“Yes, sir, that’s right,” said Diaz. “I’m working on the assumption there’s an emergency override available within Security Station 9, which, when triggered, will allow this station to operate independently of everywhere else on this facility.”

“Thereby allowing us to remove the shutdown code from the Oblasar.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Think you can locate that override?”

“If it’s there, I’ll find it,” said Diaz.

“Is this something the crew on the Oblasar can help with?”

“Maybe. I’m not shy about asking, Sergeant.”

Maxwell nodded. “You heard my conversation with Sergeant Barkley?”

“Yes, Sergeant - it was on the squad channel. I know how urgent this is.”

“Good. Just shout if you need me.” Maxwell returned to stand next to Barkley. “Any progress, Corporal?”

“I’m just about to check something, Sergeant,” said Barkley. “I’ve figured out how to link to the comms station, and I’ve been able to access some information that was available on the console I was logged into over there.”

“What kind of information?” asked Maxwell.

“I’m calling it up now, sir.”

One of the console screens changed to show a star chart. The chart was zoomed right out, and the different entries were so numerous they made the centre of the screen solid with colour.

“These are the locations known to the Vire,” said Barkley. “Four-point-two quintillion entries.”

“Damn,” said Maxwell.

“And this dark area beyond those entries represents the area unknown to the Vire,” said Barkley, pointing outside the central, coloured area. “And if I zoom in on these coordinates here…”

He zoomed onto an area outside the central cluster of stars and planets. A tiny green dot appeared.

Maxwell’s eyes widened. “The Gavax’Kol.”

“Yes, sir. When the Vire built the warship, they made it trackable, just like the Human Federation does with its own fleet warships.”

“But the distances…,” said Maxwell. “How old is this positional data?”

“I don’t know, sir. I guess that in priority 1 emergency situations, every Vire warship and ground facility equipped with this boosting technology is designed to use it at maximum.”

Maxwell’s mind was racing. “If the Gavax’Kol is at lightspeed, it won’t be able to transmit a positional update, will it?”

“No, sir. As far as the crew on the Oblasar are aware, the enemy hardware lacks that capability. However, it looks as if the tracker has been designed to make predictions.” Barkley held his fingertip against a number at the bottom of the screen and Maxwell looked closely.

“Forty minutes.”

“Yes, sir.”

Maxwell had to ask, just to be sure he was fully understanding. “So the tracker is predicting the Gavax’Kol will be here in forty minutes?”

“Yes, sir. I’m sure there’s an element of uncertainty in that figure.”

Maxwell cursed and then cursed again. “We’ve got to finish up and get out of here.”

“Absolutely, sir.”

Halfway across to where Diaz was standing, Maxwell brought himself to a stop. He turned. “Is there any way we can lift the tracking facility out of the Vire hardware and install it onto the Oblasar, so Captain Grisham can follow the Gavax’Kol?”

“I can only offer you a maybe on that one, sir.”

“You’ll need to turn that maybe into a definitely, Corporal,” said Maxwell. “If we can track the Gavax’Kol, it’ll—” He stopped himself. Barkley didn’t need it spelling out.

“I understand, Sergeant,” said Barkley. “I’ll get on with what I’m doing.”

“Private Diaz, give me some good news,” said Maxwell.

“I haven’t figured it out yet, sir,” said Diaz, shaking her head. “I’m starting to wonder if there’s a command console somewhere in this building – a console which controls shit like this.”

Maxwell was about to respond, when he heard the sound of Fine’s repeater firing outside.

“Corporal Fine, please report,” snapped Maxwell.

“It was an Ax’Kol, Sergeant, coming from the west. The repeater put it down.”

“Where there’s one, there’s sure to be others,” said Maxwell.

“Our current position outside prevents us from seeing east, and it cuts out most of our viewing arc to the north and south, sir,” said Fine. “I recommend I head up to the roof along with everyone else who’s already outside with me.”

“Agreed. Do it,” said Maxwell. “Private Vaughan, join them.”

“Yes, sir.”

For a time after deployment, the mission had been in a semblance of control. Now the situation had gone rapidly south, and the soldiers were coming under extreme pressure. Maxwell couldn’t begin to guess how many Ax’Kol were scattered around the Vire facility. If they numbered in the thousands and they were near Security Station 9, the mission was likely over.

Maxwell suddenly felt as if someone had tipped a big cup of insects into the pants of his combat suit and he paced back and forth in agitation.

“Sergeant, there is definitely a command console somewhere in this building,” said Diaz after a minute.

“Any idea where?” asked Maxwell. He was close to another console and he leaned across it to sweep some of the mould clear. The hardware didn’t look any different.

“No, sir – there’re no directions. I guess the personnel working here were expected to know.”

“Private Lyles, give me some help,” said Maxwell.

He chose another lump in the floorspace and headed for it. The dead Ax’Kol was in his way and he delivered a vicious kick to the corpse on his way past. It was solid, like a tree stump.

The next console was the same as the others, and, a few metres away, Private Lyles didn’t have any more luck.

Maxwell stopped for a moment, to ask himself if there was a more logical approach. There didn’t seem to be any particular order to how the consoles had been positioned in the room, but he reasoned that the commanding officer of the security station might have been seated in the middle. Heading that way, Maxwell proceeded to clear the mould off a half-dozen consoles. They all looked the same, and by now, the spores were thick in the air and the stench was overpowering.

Soon, Maxwell and Lyles had together revealed most of the consoles, and they were identical. A quick check of the taller hardware near the walls confirmed Maxwell’s initial thought that they were either databanks or processing units.

“There’s no command console in here,” said Maxwell, facing the unpalatable truth that he’d have to explore further than this one room.

“We came in through the western door, and I reckon the doors to the north and the east lead straight back outside,” said Lyles. “That leaves the door to the south.”

“I’m taking control of the repeater, Private Diaz,” said Maxwell.

“It’s all yours, Sergeant. It likes being tickled behind its ears.”

“I’ll be sure to remember that,” said Maxwell.

He linked to the repeater’s onboard computer and assumed control. It took only a moment to issue a tether command, and then the device floated across the room towards him, avoiding all the obstacles in the way.

Without further delay, Maxwell strode for the south door. His foot skidded, and he pictured himself firing a rocket into the room and watching the blast incinerate all the fungus.

“Ready?” asked Maxwell at the door.

“If there were any other Ax’Kol in here, we’d know about it by now, right?” said Lyles.

“Let’s hope that’s the case.” Maxwell stepped closer to the door and it dutifully opened. “Shit. An airlift.”

“Are we going down?”

“Let’s do that,” said Maxwell.

He entered the lift car, which was square and large enough to accommodate ten or twelve soldiers in full combat gear. There was therefore plenty of space for two soldiers and a mobile repeater.

Positioning himself by the lift control panel, Maxwell paused to instruct the repeater to turn so that its gun barrels were pointing towards the door. When that was done, he reached towards the panel. Some text in red letters caught his eye and he frowned.

“Operation failure.” He looked across at Lyles and raised an eyebrow.

“Could be something from when this base was bombed to shit.”

“Or there’s an Ax’Kol at the bottom, which tried and failed to use the lift.”

“How would it have got down there originally, without being able to get back up, sir?”

“That’s a damned good question, Private.”

One part of Maxwell was worried that he was allowing himself to become spooked by details which likely had a perfectly reasonable – and nonthreatening – explanation. Another part firmly believed that if there was ever a good time to err on the side of exceptional caution, it was now.

To be on the safe side, Maxwell ordered the mobile repeater to extend its side shields. A thick piece of alloy slid from each of the weapon’s flanks, forming a barrier across much of the lift car.

“There’s only a single level below this one,” said Maxwell, returning his attention to the lift operation panel.

“We’d best go take a look what’s down there, Sergeant.”

Maxwell touched the electronic button on the panel to send the lift to the lower level. As soon as the door closed, he positioned himself behind the repeater shield and looked around the side of it, with his gun pointing towards the exit. On the other side of the repeater, Lyles did the same.

The feeling of acceleration didn’t last long and then came a brief period of deceleration. Breathing steadily, Maxwell waited. The lift came to a halt and he watched anxiously to find out what would be revealed when the door opened.

SIXTEEN

With a quiet whine of motors, the lift door opened. Two flashlight beams stabbed into the darkness of a corridor leading north.

“Looks clear,” said Lyles.

“All the way to that room ahead, at least,” said Maxwell.

The light didn’t reach far enough to tell him what lay in the next room, but he had a sense it might be a big space. For a time, the two soldiers listened.

“Quiet, like the grave,” said Lyles.

“Someone else’s grave.”

“And no mould,” said Lyles. “That’s a positive.”

“I’m sending the repeater on ahead,” said Maxwell. “I’m damned if I’m going to go marching in there without knowing what I’ll find.”

With its shields extended, the repeater wouldn’t fit through the lift door, so Maxwell ordered them to retract. The device accelerated into the corridor and he linked to its sensor array, which was only a little more sophisticated than the hardware installed in his suit helmet. Maxwell was also aware that the Ax’Kol didn’t show up with night sight activated, so he kept the repeater in daytime mode. Fortunately, the device was equipped with its own flashlight and the beam from that lit the way.

“A twenty-metre passage. Coming up to the room,” said Maxwell, narrating what he could see through his link to the repeater’s feed. “Half a dozen consoles, along with some more databanks. This might be the place.”

“Want me to call for Private Diaz?”

“Not yet,” said Maxwell. “Let’s finish checking it out first.”

The repeater came to the threshold of the room and he brought it to a halt. First, Maxwell instructed it to rotate right, so he could see what was on that side of the room. There were more databanks. Then, he instructed it to rotate left.

At that moment, Maxwell caught sight of a dark shape moving at tremendous speed from the room’s left-hand corner.

“Shit, Ax’Kol!”

The gun began firing, the sound of it jarring in the quiet of the underground room. With a crunching thump, the Ax’Kol collided with the repeater and Maxwell saw the creature’s long arms wrap around the device.

Knocked aside by the force of the impact, the repeater’s gravity drive fought to correct its position, while its gun spewed out bullets. Maxwell fired his rifle at the Ax’Kol. The repeater was armoured and it didn’t matter if a few of his gauss slugs missed the real target.

Having recovered from the collision, the repeater was again positioned at the end of the corridor. The Ax’Kol had its arms around the gun and, for a moment, Maxwell didn’t understand what the alien hoped to achieve. Then, he saw the creature raise one of its massively strong arms and crash it down against the front of the repeater, which was currently facing away from Maxwell.

“It’s trying to break the guns,” he said.

“Ah shit,” said Lyles, firing her rifle as fast as it would discharge the shots. “Is it strong enough?”

Maxwell had a feeling the answer to her question was a definite yes. As he watched, the Ax’Kol made several clubbing motions with the same arm and he thought he heard something snap. The repeater stopped firing.

“Sergeant, close the lift doors!”

Quick as a flash, Maxwell reached out his arm and touched his finger to the onscreen button which would send the lift back to the upper level. A red light appeared.

“Operation failure,” spat Maxwell in disgust.

At the end of the passage, the Ax’Kol was trying to force its way past the repeater. While the repeater’s guns were no longer firing, its gravity drive was fully operational and the alien wasn’t nearly strong enough to push it aside. However, once the Ax’Kol realised that brute force wasn’t going work, it would notice there was ample room over the top of the repeater, and also enough of a gap to squeeze by the sides, if only just.

“We’ll need someone to call the airlift from the upper level,” said Maxwell. He switched into the squad channel and gave the order. Diaz was likely the closest member of the squad to the upper-level operation panel, but she had to dodge plenty of furniture to get there.

As he spoke, Maxwell put another three shots into the Ax’Kol. The alien had clearly suffered from the repeater’s initial burst, and in the dim light, Maxwell could see that part of its head was missing and its torso had been chewed up by gauss slugs.

By now, Lyles had unclipped a couple of grenades, and she stood ready to arm them. “Should I throw, or should I hold, sir?”

“Hold!” said Maxwell. The repeater’s armoured shell would withstand a couple of grenade blasts no problem, but the force of the explosions might well budge it just enough for the Ax’Kol to push past.

As Maxwell was asking himself what action he could take while he was waiting for the lift to be called, the Ax’Kol looked up and gave him a wicked grin. He could see at once that it was about to surge through the right-hand gap between the repeater and the passage wall.

“Like hell,” Maxwell growled.

The moment he saw the alien move, he commanded the repeater to jam it against the corridor wall. Maxwell’s timing was good and the Ax’Kol thrashed as it tried to free itself. He spoke again on the squad channel.

“Private Vaughan, get your ass to the lift.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Do you still want me to call it up, Sergeant?” asked Diaz.

“Yes.”

“Lift called.”

It was evident that the lower lift control panel had malfunctioned, since when Diaz sent the command from the upper level, the doors closed at once. Maxwell sensed the acceleration and then the doors opened at the upper level. During those few seconds, he told his squad what was happening on the level below. At the same time, Maxwell kept his eye on the repeater’s sensor feed. The device had 360-degree vision and he could see the dark shape of the Ax’Kol stuck against the wall, still struggling to free itself.

“Where are you Private Vaughan?” asked Maxwell.

“On my way, Sergeant.”

Vaughan had to come down from the roof, so it took him a short time to arrive. Then, he dashed into sight and entered the lift. Straightaway, Maxwell sent the command and the lift doors closed. A few seconds later, the doors opened again, this time on the lower level.

Having used the short journey to set up his XR repeater on the floor of the lift car, Private Vaughan started firing at once. Bullets thumped into the Ax’Kol and the alien thrashed with renewed vigour. The creature was not able to free itself and in a short time, it was destroyed. Vaughan fired into the still corpse for a couple of additional seconds – playing it safe – and then his gun fell silent.

“Stay where you are, Private Vaughan,” said Maxwell. “Until I’m one hundred percent sure the room is clear.”

“Yes, sir.”

Maxwell commanded the mobile repeater once more into the far room. Unpinned from the wall, the Ax’Kol slumped face-first onto the floor.

For a few seconds, Maxwell used the repeater to scan the room, until he was certain there were no more nasty surprises.

“The place is empty,” he said. “And there are no other entrances.” Advancing from the lift, Maxwell headed for the far room. “Private Diaz, there’s a command console down here,” he said.

“I’ll call the lift and join you,” she said.

“Private Vaughan, you’re not needed down here any longer. Re-join Corporal Fine and the others on the roof.”

“Yes, sir.”

Maxwell entered the room. It was smaller than the one on the upper level, and with fewer consoles. Against the north and south walls, data array cabinets came almost to the ceiling, while huge screens – currently without power – were fixed to the east and west walls.

In the centre of the floorspace were four consoles, with a single, larger console near the western wall. A check of his HUD told Maxwell that more than eight minutes had gone by since Corporal Barkley had first suggested the Gavax’Kol might be here in forty minutes.

Biting down on the urge to order Private Diaz to hurry, Maxwell headed to what he felt sure was the main command console for Security Station 9. Since it wasn’t covered in mould, he located the power switch in moments and turned the console on. Lights appeared on the top panel, and all four screens illuminated. A command prompt appeared on the left-hand screen. Maxwell made no attempt to interact.

Private Diaz didn’t take long to arrive and she dashed across to the console. In moments, she’d plugged in the link cable from her combat suit and injected the access codes.

“I’m in,” she confirmed.

“Can you do what we need to do from here?” asked Maxwell.

“Maybe. I’ll tell you in a minute, Sergeant.”

Gritting his teeth, Maxwell paced.

“You’re putting me off, sir,” said Diaz.

Maxwell stopped pacing and watched the soldier. Her hands flew from place to place on the console, but it wasn’t clear if she was making any progress.

“Sergeant, the topside repeater took out another Ax’Kol,” said Corporal Fine.

“Acknowledged,” said Maxwell. “Keep me informed.” Inwardly, he swore. “We’re running out of time, Private Diaz.”

“Yes, sir, I know.”

Maxwell’s fear that a drip-drip of Ax’Kol attacks would soon turn into a flood was reinforced when Corporal Fine advised a few seconds later that the mobile repeater had destroyed a third alien.

“Sergeant, this is definitely the right place,” said Private Diaz, indicating the command console. “I’ve figured out how to activate the emergency isolation mode. Once that’s done, I’m hopeful this security station will be authorised to do whatever the hell I tell it to do.”

“Put the station into isolation mode,” said Maxwell.

“Yes, sir.” Diaz pushed three mechanical buttons in quick succession and then flicked a grey switch. She watched the left-hand screen intently. “Done!” she said.

“Can you remove the shutdown code from the Oblasar?”

“I’ll tell you shortly, Sergeant,” said Diaz. “A new menu appeared.”

Maxwell bit down on his frustration. “Don’t forget you can speak with the Oblasar’s bridge crew if you need assistance, Private.”

“I’ve been talking to Lieutenant Adler, sir.”

“Sergeant, the mobile repeater took out another two Ax’Kol,” said Corporal Fine on the squad channel.

“What direction are they coming from?” asked Maxwell.

“They’ve all been from the west, so far, Sergeant – they must be coming from the main area of the facility.”

“How did the repeater cope with two at once?”

“It had no problem, sir. I reckon if the Ax’Kol start coming five or six at a time, I’ll have a different answer for you – even with Private Vaughan up here.”

“I’m hopeful we’re making progress down here, Corporal.”

“Yes, sir. I’m sure you’re thinking what I’m thinking about these topside attacks.”

“They aren’t going to stop until we’re overrun. The Ax’Kol never give up.”

“That’s what I think too, Sergeant.”

Maxwell turned his attention once more to Private Diaz. Whatever she was doing, she seemed confident.

“Right,” said Diaz after another couple of minutes. “There’s some good news, but also some bad news.”

Wondering why there always had to be some crap stirred into the freshly baked apple tart, Maxwell readied himself for the worst.

“Tell me,” he said.

SEVENTEEN

Diaz started with the good stuff. “This security station now has the authority to remove the shutdown code from the Oblasar, sir. Doing it should only take a few seconds.”

“What about the bad news?”

“There’s more good news first - we can now elevate the Oblasar to the highest security tier. The bad news is that it’ll take time.”

“How long?”

“I don’t know, Sergeant.” Diaz raised her index finger for a moment while she listened to something on the comms. The listening took over a minute. “This is how Lieutenant Adler just explained it to me – if the Oblasar stays offline, the tier elevation will be finished much faster than if we remove the shutdown code and bring the warship straight back online.”

“I’m sure you’re about to tell me there’s a logical reason for that.”

“Yes, sir. The tier elevation makes widespread changes to the Oblasar’s onboard systems. If the warship is online, it needs to shut down one system at a time in order to remain operational. That slows the process to a crawl.”

“But if it’s already offline, the security updates can all be done in one go?”

“Yes, sir. Lieutenant Adler is busy figuring out how long it might take to complete an offline security tier elevation.” Diaz raised a finger again as she listened to a separate comms channel. “Lieutenant Adler’s best guess is twenty minutes offline, and four hours or more online.”

“Can we remove the shutdown code first and then perform the offline tier elevation?” asked Maxwell.

“Yes, sir, but once the shutdown code is deleted, the Oblasar’s Kalor drive will automatically power back up. Then, Lieutenant Adler will have to shut it down again. That’s going to add about five minutes to the process. Besides, he reckons the tier upgrade should purge the shutdown code anyway.”

Maxwell nodded. “This was never my decision.”

“No, sir. Lieutenant Adler says we’re doing the tier elevation with the Oblasar offline.”

“Don’t wait around, Private,” said Diaz.

“I won’t, sir. I initiated the process while we were talking.”

Maxwell had another thought. “What about the tracking software for the Gavax’Kol? Corporal Barkley’s still looking into that.”

“Ah, I haven’t told you yet, Sergeant. Lieutenant Adler reckons that when this ground station updates the Oblasar to the highest security tier, it’ll automatically add the tracking facility to our onboard systems.”

“Neat,” said Maxwell. “We should head back to the shuttle. I’d rather we were ready to dock with the Oblasar the moment it comes back online, than be obliged to fight our way through hundreds of Ax’Kol.”

“You’ll not hear an argument from me, Sergeant,” said Diaz.

“Before we leave, is there anything else you need to do at that console?”

“I don’t think so,” said Diaz. Her face twisted with uncertainty. “I’d best check with Lieutenant Adler.”

“Do it quickly,” said Maxwell.

Before he could start issuing orders, Corporal Fine’s latest update gave him pause.

“Sir, Private Vaughan and our mobile repeater just took out six Ax’Kol. There are others, but they’ve wised up and now they’re using the trees as cover.”

“How many others?”

“At least eight. We’re approaching the tipping point.”

Maxwell cursed. “Hold steady, Corporal. I need to make sure we’re done here in this security station.”

He looked directly at Private Diaz, who was still talking on the comms. When she finished, Maxwell knew at once he wasn’t going to like what was about to say.

“Sergeant, it seems that Lieutenant Adler isn’t quite so sure the shutdown code will be removed as part of the tier elevation process. Our orders are to stay here until it’s confirmed one way or the other.”

“Let me guess – he’ll only know once the tier elevation is completed?”

“Yes, sir.”

“That’s another eighteen minutes.”

“Yes, sir.”

Maxwell felt like punching something. “The shuttle is nearly three hundred metres uphill from our current position.” He grimaced and calmed himself down. Anger never fixed anything. “Let’s see if I can remote-link to the transport and bring it here.”

He instructed his suit comms to perform a wide-area receptor sweep. The sweep located the receptors for the doors in Security Station 9, but none further afield.

“The transport isn’t set to accept a remote connection,” said Maxwell. “I guess that has to be enabled from the Oblasar.”

“We’ve been promised air support for our return, Sergeant.”

“That’ll have to do,” said Maxwell. There wasn’t much point in getting himself agitated over something he couldn’t change. He switched into the squad channel. “Corporal Fine, we’re holing up in this security station for the next twenty minutes. Bring everyone back inside.”

“Yes, sir,” said Fine. “I hope you have an escape plan, Sergeant. Even now we’d have a hard time reaching the transport.”

“We’ll get out of here, Corporal,” said Maxwell. “Head inside - I’ll meet you on the upper level.”

“Yes, sir.”

Maxwell, Diaz and Lyles returned to the lift. Corporal Barkley was ready at the top and he commanded the lift to return.

When the doors opened on the upper level, Maxwell was greeted by the stench of the mould. He reminded himself that he only had to put up with it for less than twenty minutes, which was a minor consolation.

Corporal Fine and the others entered by the western entrance and Maxwell ordered them into defensive positions. Once that was done, he filled them in on the latest information.

“So the Gavax’Kol might be here in less than thirty minutes, and the Oblasar is going to be offline for twenty of those minutes?” said Private Logan.

“That’s right,” said Maxwell.

“And when the Oblasar is back online, we have to sprint uphill to the shuttle through a bunch of Ax’Kol, and then make it to the warship before the shooting starts?”

“I’m glad to see you’ve grasped the situation, soldier,” said Maxwell. “That means I don’t have to explain it twice.”

“We’re cutting it fine, sir. And what if—”

“Captain Grisham won’t leave us behind, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

“I know, Sergeant, it’s just that—”

“We’re going to make it out of here,” said Maxwell. “And I don’t want to hear any talk that says otherwise.”

“That’s all well and good, Sergeant,” said Private Lowe, “But we know the Ax’Kol are good at breaking through doors. And there are three ways into this security station.”

Maxwell turned towards where Private Diaz was standing at the console she’d powered up earlier. “This station is now on the highest possible security tier, right?”

“Yes, sir. If you’re about to ask if that guarantees the Ax’Kol can’t open the doors, I can’t promise you either way. The Gavax’Kol was originally created by the Vire, so the Ax’Kol themselves might have a way to override the security.”

“Does this building have external monitors?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Call them up.”

“On it.”

Maxwell stood next to Diaz. She accessed the building’s external monitors and already it was looking busy outside. Now that the mobile repeater wasn’t cutting them to pieces, the Ax’Kol had reached the external walls. Maxwell counted six, and then another two appeared, making it eight. Five of the aliens were at the western side and they were definitely interested in the door.

A sudden thought came to Maxwell.

The Vire were telepaths. What if the doors can also be controlled by telepathy?

“Private Diaz, if the Ax’Kol manage to open one of those doors, will you be able to close it again?”

Diaz pointed at one of her screens, which showed a security diagram for the building. “Yes, sir, I can order the doors to open and close from here.”

“But if the Ax’Kol open one of those doors, they’ll stop it from shutting again by lying across the threshold,” said Maxwell. “Even if it kills them.”

“I’m sure you’re right, Sergeant.”

It was a risk too far. “Everybody into the lift,” said Maxwell. “We’ll go to the lower level and use the mobile repeater to keep the lift doors from closing again. That way the Ax’Kol won’t be able to call the lift.”

“How do you plan for us to get out when the Oblasar comes online, Sergeant?” asked Corporal Fine. “You said the lift operation panel on the lower level has malfunctioned.”

“The Oblasar will have to blow a hole in the hillside for us,” said Maxwell.

He didn’t need to spell out the potential dangers of using a blunt tool like a plasma missile or an Avil-Tor gun to free a squad of soldiers trapped underground, and nobody pointed out the obvious.

The soldiers headed rapidly for the airlift. Corporal Fine positioned the single mobile repeater in the centre of the room, where it had the best view of the three entrances. Once the soldiers were in the lift, Corporal Fine called the repeater. There wasn’t much space in the lift car, and the soldiers kept themselves pressed against the side walls.

A roar of discharge indicated the Ax’Kol had already breached the door security. From his position in the lift, Maxwell couldn’t see the enemy, but the repeater didn’t stop firing until it entered the car.

As soon as he ordered the lift to descend, the doors closed and the gun fell silent, a heat haze rising from its slowly turning barrels. When Maxwell listened carefully, he could hear the clunking of its internal ammunition feed.

The short descent ended and the soldiers hurried along the passage leading to the lower room. There was just enough space for the two repeaters to pass in the corridor, so Maxwell instructed the damaged gun to hover over the lift car threshold in order that the doors wouldn’t close. Then, he positioned the operational repeater at the end of the passage, with its gun barrels aimed towards the lift.

“Are we going to need this one, Sergeant?” asked Private Chau, giving the working repeater a pat on its flank.

“I hope not,” said Maxwell. “But it’s possible those Ax’Kol will find a way into the lift shaft.” With that thought, he beckoned Vaughan across. “Set up here, Private.”

“Yes, sir.”

“The rest of you are going to keep watch on this passage,” Maxwell ordered. “No grenades unless I give the order.”

With the arrangements in place, Maxwell positioned himself with the other soldiers. Every gauss rifle was pointed towards the lift, and even Private Lowe had swapped his shoulder launcher for a gun. A rocket blast in the passage would be devastating for any Ax’Kol which showed their faces, but it would also wipe out the squad with them all being so close.

Maxwell watched along the corridor, as did everyone else. So far it was quiet, but he didn’t know how long it would remain so.

One thing was certain – it was going to be an unpleasant wait.

EIGHTEEN

Five minutes passed and Maxwell heard a thudding sound coming from the end of the lift passage.

“Shit,” said Lyles. “Did you hear that?”

“It sounded like something landing on top of the lift car,” said Lowe.

“Because that’s exactly what it was,” said Maxwell, trying and failing not to let his irritation show. “Now be quiet, so I can listen.”

Nobody spoke. A second thudding sound came, and then a third. Maxwell tried to remember if there’d been an access hatch in the roof of the lift car. He wasn’t sure, and neither was anyone else in the squad when he asked.

“Want me to check it out, Sergeant?” asked Chau.

“Stay put,” said Maxwell. “The enemy are either coming or they aren’t.”

He heard another thudding, and then again. The sound was repeated at two-second intervals and Maxwell guessed it was the Ax’Kol trying to smash their way through the lift car roof.

For several minutes, the pounding continued, and Maxwell dared to believe that the ceiling panels in the lift were too tough for the Ax’Kol to break with their fists. Then, he heard a much weightier thudding noise in between the regular pounding.

“That was something big,” said Lyles.

For a short time, the pounding stopped, and there were no audible sounds. Maxwell waited for the inevitable, and, sure enough, the striking against the lift roof resumed, this time slower, but with much greater force.

“How long until the Oblasar is back online?” asked Chau nervously.

“Between five and ten minutes, if Lieutenant Adler’s estimation was correct,” said Diaz.

“Does Commander Deneuve have our position underground?” asked Logan. “If she has to break us out of here—”

“It’s all in hand,” said Diaz. “Or as much as it can be.”

“I want no more talk about whether or not we’re getting out of here,” Maxwell warned. “You’re all becoming scared and I don’t like that – it’s never happened before now.”

“None of us want to die at what might be the last hurdle, Sergeant,” said Lowe.

“I know that, soldier, and that includes me. But we’ve come this far, and we can’t afford to fall apart right now.”

The talk dried up, leaving the squad to listen to the impacts on the lift roof. After a minute, Maxwell was again starting to think that the bigger Ax’Kol which was busy punching the alloy, was going to be no more successful than its smaller brethren.

No sooner had the thought formed, than he heard a creaking sound from along the corridor. Each of the next two impacts produced the same noise, while the third strike caused the metals of the lift roof to shriek.

“It’s coming through,” said Chau.

Maxwell briefly considered using the damaged repeater to block the hole, but then there’d be nothing stopping the Ax’Kol from calling the lift to the upper level, filling it, and then descending. The operational mobile repeater would inflict significant pain, but he doubted it would stop a half-dozen of the aliens at such a short range.

I could block the hole with the damaged repeater, and position the other one on the threshold.

There were flaws in this plan as well – most notably the fact that the damaged repeater might not be large enough to block the hole in the lift ceiling. In the end, Maxwell instructed the far gun to extend its side shielding, so that it blocked the corridor to a height of nearly two metres. That left a gap of nearly a metre over the top, which Maxwell was sure an Ax’Kol could force its way through.

For another half-minute the sound of tearing metal continued, and then, though the gap above the repeater, Maxwell saw a huge shape drop into the lift car.

“Here they come,” he said.

An Ax’Kol struck the far side of the damaged repeater with enough force to knock the device a metre along the corridor. The gun’s automatic compensation systems kicked in and it repositioned itself once more on the lift threshold.

Maxwell kept his eyes on the upper gap, and he could see the head of an Ax’Kol, along with its hunched shoulders. While his view was less than perfect, he got a sense that this enemy was a real hulking bastard. He remembered the aliens he’d encountered on the Voltran warship. Those had been big, and Maxwell reckoned this one here was just like them.

The operational repeater opened fire, and its projectiles thumped into the Ax’Kol’s head. Immediately, the creature dropped low, such that all Maxwell could see of it was its feet in the smaller gap beneath the gun.

Private Vaughan was prone behind his own repeater, and he had a good view of the alien’s feet and ankles. He fired an extended burst and the Ax’Kol started hopping around, as if it might escape the gunfire. In trying to avoid Vaughan’s shots, the alien kept exposing its head. With the near-instant reactions of a computer, the operational repeater fired short bursts whenever the Ax’Kol presented a target.

Throughout this, the enemy creature was not passive. It threw punches at the armoured side shields, and each strike created an indentation in the alloy. Still, Maxwell had a feeling that this Ax’Kol was going the same way as every first soldier into the breach. However, when he ducked low, he could see that more of the aliens had already dropped into the lift car. When the first one went down, these others would be ready to take its place. Sooner or later, their numbers would prevail.

Suddenly, the damaged repeater was forced a metre along the passage. The device attempted to reposition, but instead it was pushed another half-metre towards the soldiers.

“All those Ax’Kol must be too much for its gravity drive,” said Maxwell.

Slowly, but steadily, the repeater was pushed away from the lift. Vaughan’s XR gun cut into the feet of the Ax’Kol, while the multiple barrels of the second mobile repeater punched into the heads of the enemy whenever they came into sight.

Dropping to the ground, Maxwell looked along the passage. The lift car was crowded with Ax’Kol and he was sure plenty more were waiting in the shaft.

“Sergeant, the Oblasar’s engines are coming back online!” said Private Diaz.

“How long will that take?”

“Five minutes. No more.”

“That’s too long,” said Maxwell. “Can the warship do anything for us now?”

“No, sir.”

Maxwell watched the slowly advancing repeater for a few seconds. He doubted the soldiers had any more than two minutes – three at the outside – before the room became filled with enemy soldiers.

Unless.

“Everyone fall back!” yelled Maxwell. “I want everyone against that far wall! Corporal Fine, that repeater comes with us.”

“Yes, sir.”

The soldiers dashed across the room until they were the farthest possible distance from the corridor entrance. One of the Vire consoles was nearby - it would provide a little cover, as well as a platform to enable Maxwell’s next order.

“Private Lowe, if you stand on this console, do you think you can land a rocket shot in the middle of those alien bastards?”

Without hesitation, Lowe jumped up onto the console, his shoulder launcher back in his hands. “Hell yes, sir. There’s plenty of traffic, so I might not be able to hit the back of the lift car, but I’m sure I can burn a few.”

“Then do it.”

“Three, two, one, rocket out,” said Lowe calmly.

The missile raced into the passage, while the soldier jumped down into cover. A flash lit the room and then came the whump of detonation. Maxwell heard a dense thud, which he believed was the repeater being hurled against the passage walls. The temperature reading on his HUD peaked at four hundred Celsius and then began to fall, though not as rapidly as he would have liked.

Climbing to his feet, Maxwell stared along the passage. The repeater had been knocked onto its side and beyond it, he could see many huge burning lumps of what had once been Ax’Kol. Smoke rose thickly and Maxwell hoped that most of it would be sucked out through the lift shaft so he wouldn’t have to breathe in the stench.

He had greater things to worry about. A quick check told Maxwell that his link to the repeater had failed, and his attempts to re-establish that link came to nothing. The gun was completely out of action.

“Corporal Fine, send that other repeater into the corridor,” said Maxwell. “The same as before, we’re going to use it to block the way.”

“Yes, sir.”

The repeater sped across the room, and Maxwell watched to see if the Ax’Kol had yet recovered from Lowe’s rocket attack. With any luck, those in the lift shaft had also been incinerated. No more of the aliens appeared in time to interfere with Corporal Fine’s positioning of the repeater in the passage. In only a few seconds, the last of the squad’s two mobile repeaters was on the lift threshold.

Maxwell wasn’t expecting the Ax’Kol to give up, and sure enough, the repeater started firing again within a few seconds. Now that he was on the far side of the room, Maxwell’s view was even more obscured by the Vire hardware, and all he could do was hope that the repeater would destroy a few of the Ax’Kol before they broke its gun.

“How long?” asked Maxwell. The first of the reeking smoke came to his nostrils and his face twisted.

“Three minutes,” said Diaz.

Maxwell cursed that only two minutes had passed since last time he asked. “Have you informed Commander Deneuve of our new position within the building?”

“Yes, sir,” said Diaz.

“Can they send the shuttle this way?” said Maxwell. With everything that was happening, he’d forgotten to ask. “It’ll save us a few seconds when the Oblasar finally blows a hole in the side of this building.”

“I’ll check on that, Sergeant.” Diaz spoke quickly into the comms. “Lieutenant Bishop confirms his link to our shuttle. He’ll bring it in ready for us.”

“And if he could use its side guns to shoot a few hundred of the Ax’Kol I’m sure are having a party topside, that would be much appreciated.”

“That’s what Lieutenant Bishop is aiming to do, sir.”

Not once during this conversation had Maxwell’s eyes left the passage. He still couldn’t see much other than shapes moving, but then the repeater’s gun abruptly cut out, which told him everything he needed to know. Straightaway, the repeater was struck on its far side, and then the Ax’Kol began forcing it towards the room. However this time, there was nothing firing at the aliens over the top. Private Vaughan had found himself a place with a clear line of sight beneath, but his XR repeater wasn’t going to hold back the tide.

“This baby’s reloaded whenever you want to order another shot, Sergeant,” said Private Lowe, tapping his shoulder launcher.

“It may come to that, Private,” said Maxwell.

Bit by bit, the Ax’Kol forced the repeater along the corridor. Time was running out – Maxwell reckoned the gun would be pushed into the room in about one minute, while the estimate for the Oblasar to come back online was more than one minute.

Desperately, Maxwell tried to come up with a way to slow the enemy advance. The only option he could think of was grenades, but a few of those might well knock out the repeater. Even so, he didn’t have too much choice in the matter.

“Get ready with the grenades,” said Maxwell. “When that repeater’s two metres from the end of the corridor, I’m going to order Private Lowe to give the enemy another rocket shot. That’ll destroy our last mobile gun and leave the way clear for the next wave of Ax’Kol.”

Less than a minute later, the repeater was nearing the passage exit. Maxwell gave the order and Private Lowe fired a second rocket into the corridor.

“Shit,” said Lowe, jumping down from the console he’d used for elevation. “An Ax’Kol got in the way.”

These last words were only just audible over the sound of the blast. Hunkered behind the console, Maxwell grimaced as the air temperature rose beyond five hundred Celsius. The material of his combat suit darkened and it gave off smoke.

Once again, the temperature didn’t fall quickly, and it remained above the operating maximum of a combat suit. There wasn’t much Maxwell could do, other than hope his suit didn’t fail, and he stood once more so that he could see along the corridor.

Lowe’s rocket might well have struck an obstacle on the way to its intended destination, but it had still inflicted havoc upon the Ax’Kol. Their charred remains littered the passage and Maxwell was sure the intensified stench would soon hit him. Still, he’d gladly breathe it in all day like it was the sweetest perfume if it meant the Ax’Kol were dead.

“That’s our second mobile repeater out of action,” said Maxwell, his eyes on the blackened lump of metal near the passage entrance.

He quickly unclipped four of his grenades and laid them on the console in front of him. A fifth he kept in his hand. The room was large, but he was confident he could land a throw in the lift car from here, and Maxwell didn’t even have the best arm in the squad.

Regardless of that, grenades hadn’t proven enormously effective against the Ax’Kol in the past. The aliens seemed to shrug off the blasts, and, given how fast they could run, Maxwell had a feeling the coming engagement would be short and fatal.

An Ax’Kol dropped into the lift car. Maxwell armed his grenade and drew back his arm in preparation to throw.

Before he could release, sound and light filled his world.

NINETEEN

A column of fire jetted into the lift car, turning the Ax’Kol into carbon and illuminating the passage. At the same time, Maxwell heard a thousand overlapping sounds – sounds of huge impacts against metal and earth.

Avil-Tors.

Each strike created its own shockwave that pressurized the air, and made it seem to Maxwell as if he was curled up in a metal drum, being beaten with savage vigour from the outside. He was still holding onto his grenade and he threw it into the passage with a rapid snap of his arm. While the device was still in flight, the entire western side of the room seemed to just vanish, revealing the world outside.

Gloomy light dispersed the darkness and Maxwell saw the rain – the sweet rain - coming down in torrents. A much stronger light, so vivid it hurt his eyes, flashed outside, somewhere not nearly far enough away. Soil – thousands of tons of it - was hurled upwards and Maxwell heard stones clattering off the equipment in the room. He wanted to drop to the floor until it was over, but he couldn’t allow himself.

“Be ready for the order!” he bellowed on the squad channel. “When I say go, we go!”

Yet more movement caught Maxwell’s eye and he turned towards the passage. Incredibly, an Ax’Kol had survived the onslaught and had dropped into the lift car. Then, Maxwell noticed the creature had lost an arm and most of its left shoulder. It twisted around and grinned at him.

A split second later, the alien was pulverised by an Avil-Tor slug. The creature, the lift car and most of the passage simply disappeared, and the shock of the impact staggered Maxwell. He grabbed the edge of the console. Without the insulating properties of his combat suit, he was sure he’d have been killed.

“Who’s injured?” asked Maxwell. Miraculously, nobody was hurt, or at least nothing they saw the need to report. “Head to the opening!” he ordered, looking towards the newly made exit.

The Oblasar was still firing its weapons, but the way out seemed a hell of a lot more inviting than staying in this security station. Maxwell’s first couple of steps were shaky, but his legs steadied quickly. Trusting the judgement of the warship’s crew he dashed for the exit opening, checking once to make sure everyone was on their feet.

Standing on the edge of the wall breach, Maxwell discovered that the reason for the gloominess was the immense presence of the Oblasar. The warship was at a low altitude – maybe less than a thousand metres – and its undersides went on as far as he could see. Even from here, Maxwell could clearly make out its Avil-Tor turrets, and he fancied he could see the recoil of the guns.

A sound deeper than the ocean, and generated by the vessel’s propulsion, pervaded everything.

Wrenching his gaze away, Maxwell scanned his immediate surroundings. Much of the hillside into which the security station had been built was gone, like it had been gouged out by an enormous machine. Below where he was standing, earth had been displaced in enormous quantities, creating a bank of sodden soil that was about twenty metres to the bottom. Here and there, pieces of sharp metal protruded, and Maxwell guessed they’d once been part of the Vire facility before time sealed them away beneath the forest floor.

To Maxwell’s right – north – the gouge formed a rough curve towards the west and two of the forest’s enormous trees were leaning at crazy angles, their immense roots exposed. Elsewhere, other trees – dozens upon dozens of them - had been pulverised. Judging by the continuous, dense sounds of Avil-Tor impacts, the Oblasar’s crew were picking off the Ax’Kol further afield than the ones who were already at the security station.

A shower of soil, roots and small stones prompted Maxwell to look up again, to see if he could determine what had become of the building above, and the Ax’Kol which had been swarming over it. He couldn’t see much that way, other than an overhanging alloy beam which had suffered extensive heat damage. The Oblasar was still firing at that area, which meant the warship’s crew weren’t satisfied that the last of the enemy were gone.

“Where’s that shuttle?” asked Maxwell.

He couldn’t hear the transport’s engines above all the other sounds, and the canopy, damaged as it was by the Oblasar, still impeded his view.

“Lieutenant Bishop is bringing it in, Sergeant,” said Diaz.

Now Maxwell saw the shuttle. It raced nose-first into sight over the treetops, about three hundred metres away. The transport was so low it was almost touching the canopy and its propulsion rumble was suddenly audible above the Oblasar’s engines.

Standing at the newly formed exit to the security station, Maxwell ran his eye across the hillside around him. With the transport being oversized, he wasn’t sure if it would fit near enough to the opening that his soldiers would be able to climb onboard. Maybe if Lieutenant Bishop lowered the rear bay cargo ramp, the squad could use it as a bridge from here to the shuttle.

Certainly, Maxwell didn’t want to climb down this slope if he could avoid it. Even as that thought formed, a new fountain of thrown-up forest floor two hundred or so metres to the south carried the broken bodies of several Ax’Kol high into the air, before they began the long fall down the hillside.

“It’s too tight here for the shuttle,” said Corporal Fine, who’d moved up to stand at the opening. Then, she pointed north. “More Ax’Kol.”

Maxwell glanced that way, just in time to see new eruptions from the earth. Whatever Ax’Kol had been there a moment ago had been taken out by the Oblasar.

It appeared that Lieutenant Bishop didn’t see a problem with getting the shuttle to fit. Once the transport had cleared the treetops, he rotated it so that its nose was pointing south and brought it in at a flank-first diagonal. Then, and less than two hundred metres away, the shuttle decelerated and came to a standstill.

Maxwell waited for Private Diaz to relay the message he was expecting. In those short few seconds, while the transport was stationary, its flank almost level with the opening, he noticed something he was distinctly not expecting. The access panel light on the transport’s forward door should have been red, but instead it was green. Maxwell didn’t need to ask if his squad had left the vessel secured, because they definitely had left it secured.

“Ah shit,” he said, turning towards Private Diaz.

“Lieutenant Bishop reports he’s no longer in control of the shuttle, Sergeant,” said Diaz. Her expression was one of puzzlement – she hadn’t yet figured it out, and presumably Bishop hadn’t either.

“That’s because the Ax’Kol took it over!” yelled Maxwell. “Tell that to Lieutenant Bishop!”

As he spoke, he wheeled towards the shuttle. Suddenly, the rear cargo ramp dropped open like it had been kicked with tremendous force from the inside. The bay was dark, but not so much that Maxwell couldn’t see the huge shape inside – and it was a shape far larger than any normal Ax’Kol.

“Destroy the shuttle!” he yelled.

“Yes, sir, I’ll—”

Diaz didn’t get to finish her sentence. An Avil-Tor round struck the shuttle’s topsides with almost enough force to bend the vessel in two. The sound – a dull, solid clunk – was tremendously loud and even from this distance Maxwell felt the shock.

A moment after the first impact came a second, and the distortion of the shuttle’s hull became even more pronounced. Its propulsion stuttered. A third Avil-Tor projectile impacted and then a fourth. Maxwell noted that the strikes against the transport were designed to knock it away from the opening.

Four Avil-Tor shots were more than enough and they’d reduced the shuttle to a mangled lump of scrap. Its propulsion had failed and it was on its way down. Commander Deneuve – who was clearly aware that there might still be living Ax’Kol onboard, fired several more Avil-Tor rounds in quick succession, hastening the vessel’s fall to the ground. The wreckage thudded into the soil and then began tumbling down the hillside.

Maxwell’s day was not about to get any better.

“Shit!” said Private Chau. “Sergeant!”

Twisting to look over his shoulder, Maxwell already had a feeling he knew what was coming. Sure enough, an Ax’Kol commander was hunched over by the far wall, and just to annoy the hell out of Maxwell, it was covered in patches of mould.

The creature had obviously teleported itself off the shuttle and into the room, but for a moment, Maxwell wasn’t sure why it hadn’t yet attacked his squad. Then, he realised it had screwed up its psionic jump, and its right arm was embedded all the way to the elbow in one of the Vire consoles.

Now that it was noticed, the Ax’Kol commander rose from its crouch, seeming to grow three times bigger as it unfurled its limbs. The ceiling was far too low for the alien to stand to its full height, forcing its spine into a curve.

With a wrenching heave, the Ax’Kol tried to free itself from the console. Maxwell didn’t know if it was intending to snap its own arm off, or if it hoped to rip the console away from its fastenings.

“We have to get out of here!” he yelled. “Quickly! Down the slope!”

Corporal Fine led the way. The slope was far too steep and wet to attempt a descent entirely on foot, so the soldier began what she hoped would be a controlled slide, using her hands to prevent herself from travelling too fast.

Maxwell didn’t watch. He grabbed the arm of the next soldier – Private Chau – and hauled him towards the opening. Without a word, Chau sat on the edge of the opening and then vanished through it.

Seeing its intended prey making an escape, the Ax’Kol commander pulled violently at the console. To Maxwell’s horror, he heard the shriek of tearing metal.

“Quickly!” he yelled.

The next two soldiers exited the building using the same method employed by Fine and Chau. Meanwhile, Private Vaughan unloaded XR repeater shots into the Ax’Kol to give it something extra to think about in addition to its trapped arm. Pieces of flesh went flying, but Maxwell had no doubt the creature wouldn’t go down before it managed to free itself. The Ax’Kol were just those kinds of assholes.

Another wrench was almost enough to tear the console from the floor. By this moment, only Vaughan, Maxwell and Lowe were left to go.

“Vaughan, you next!” Maxwell ordered.

“Yes, sir,” said Vaughan.

The soldier took four steps towards the opening, deftly shrugging himself into his repeater straps as he did so. At the edge, he sat and then dropped straight out of sight.

Maxwell turned his gaze back to the Ax’Kol commander, which was still tugging at the Vire console. The hardware’s final mountings were proving stubborn and the alien pulled jerkily to break them.

“Private Lowe, your turn!”

“Sergeant, that thing is going to come straight through this hole after us. I can land a shot.”

“You’ll be too close to the blast, Private. I won’t have you killed.”

“I can do this, sir. It’ll be my magnum opus.”

Despite everything, Maxwell’s jaw dropped open. “Your what?”

“My best ever, sir. My work of art.”

“I know what it means,” snapped Maxwell. “I just didn’t expect—” He shook his head. “Never mind. You’ve got your shot, Private. Good luck.”

With that, Maxwell strode towards the exit opening. Looking down, he could see the rest of his squad had made it safely, though Private Vaughan was only halfway down. Placing his free hand on the floor, Maxwell sat on the edge. He took a final glance over his shoulder, just as the Ax’Kol commander ripped the console free. The creature raised the hardware aloft, as if it weighed nothing.

Not wishing to block Private Lowe’s escape, Maxwell pushed himself out of the opening. He dropped more than a metre before his feet contacted the rain drenched soil, and then he began to slither downwards. Fighting for control, Maxwell dug his fingers into the ground and managed to slow himself.

“Yee-hah!”

It was hard for Maxwell to look, but somehow, he managed. Straight overhead, Private Lowe had leapt backwards out of the opening, with his shoulder tube aimed into the security station. The soldier fired and a rocket sped into the room. Less than two seconds later, it detonated and plasma fire jetted out of the opening.

By now, Lowe had fallen far enough that he escaped the blast. He landed feet first, about a metre to Maxwell’s right and several metres higher, with his knees bent and his face aimed at the slope. Momentum carried Lowe down and his boots left twin grooves in the mud. Within moments, he slid past Maxwell, close enough to touch, and with his shoulder launcher tucked tightly beneath one arm.

As he approached the bottom, Lowe almost lost it, but he recovered his balance and came to a halt upright. Spinning nonchalantly on his heel, he strode towards the place where Corporal Fine had gathered the rest of the squad.

Soon after, Maxwell’s descent came to an end. He was more or less on his feet, and scrambled away from the slope. Mud caked his combat suit, but already the rain was washing it away.

“Sergeant! Run!” yelled Fine on the comms.

Maxwell was facing the soldiers and he could tell from their reaction what was about to happen. He increased his pace and his feet skidded with the acceleration. A crashing noise came from behind and Maxwell threw a glance over his shoulder. There, hunched in the opening, was the Ax’Kol commander. Plasma clung everywhere to its body, but the creature wasn’t dead.

With a surge of muscular motion, the alien launched itself from the opening, landing on its feet halfway down the slope. The Vire console was still attached to the Ax’Kol’s arm and, as it skidded downwards, the creature raised it like an enormous hammer.

At the bottom of the slope, the alien reared up unsteadily. Plasma was still burning on its torso, but the mud had extinguished most of the flames. Smoke poured away from the enemy commander, seemingly encouraged by the rain rather than dampened.

Swinging the console like a club, the Ax’Kol turned its head towards Maxwell. The creature wasn’t far away – two long strides and then a swing of its arm would see him dead.

Like hell am I going to die to that.

This encounter was not to be Maxwell’s last. As he ran, with his head turned towards this opponent, he saw a crater appear where the Ax’Kol had been standing only a split second before. Mud was ejected at tremendous velocity in all directions and the weight of it was enough to send Maxwell face down into the dirt. He got his feet under him and started running again.

“Sergeant, it’s done,” said Corporal Fine.

Maxwell knew it too, but his legs had wanted to keep running anyway. Now, he slowed and turned. An Avil-Tor shot from the Oblasar had been enough to obliterate the Ax’Kol commander, and its crushed remains were somewhere out of sight at the bottom of the crater.

“There’s another shuttle heading our way, Sergeant,” said Private Diaz. “ETA: thirty seconds. The Oblasar will keep us covered.”

Maxwell joined the rest of his squad. While the soldiers tried to convince Private Lowe that his rocket shot only scored a nine-point-five, instead of a full ten, Avil-Tor projectiles continued to thunder into the forest as far as the eye could see. All the time, the rain fell like it would never stop. Maxwell had been in some strange, unforgettable situations, but he thought maybe this one topped the lot.

Thirty-one seconds after Private Diaz had advised of the shuttle’s ETA, the replacement transport set down awkwardly nearby, its propulsion rising and falling with the corrections needed to hold it in place.

Maxwell climbed onboard, along with all the others. Nobody had died and the mission goals had been accomplished, which in combination made this visit to Denivir a complete success.

Now it was time for the Oblasar’s crew to take over.

TWENTY

With the shutdown code gone, the Oblasar had returned to a fully operational state. All the systems were back online, including the Repulsor, which had remained unavailable ever since the encounter with the Mordran. Now it was ready to fire again.

“The tracking software indicates the Gavax’Kol could be here at any moment, Captain,” said Lieutenant Adler. “The data obviously isn’t real-time because the enemy warship is at lightspeed, so we’re relying on the tracker’s prediction routines.”

“If the Gavax’Kol arrives at the time we’re expecting we’ll know the tracker is doing a good job,” said Grisham. “Will the tracker output transfer to the tactical?”

“Yes, Captain, I’ll do that now.”

Grisham checked his tactical screen. The Gavax’Kol was now shown as a target, but with its location and distance listed as unknown. Presumably when the enemy warship exited lightspeed, the tracker would begin showing more accurate data.

“I’ve run repeated scans for active Vire satellites in the planet’s orbit, and I have not located any which are operational,” said Lieutenant Lopez. “We won’t have any advance warning of the enemy vessel’s arrival or approach.”

“Acknowledged,” said Grisham. It was bad news. “Might there be any active satellites beyond the range of your receptor sweep?”

“It’s possible, Captain. There’s nothing within a million klicks – beyond that range, the sweeps need to be focused, rather than wide-area,” said Lopez. “I’ll continue the search – maybe we’ll get lucky.”

“We won’t know if we don’t try,” said Grisham.

Having completed the pickup of the soldiers, he was now holding the Oblasar steady at a one-thousand-kilometre altitude, directly over the ruined facility. From here, the planet seemed wild and untamed – like it was meant to be, Grisham thought.

His eyes dropped to his control panel. The moment the enemy warship appeared on the sensors, Lieutenant Lopez was going to transmit the shutdown code. Grisham hoped that soon, he and his crew would inflict a permanent setback on the Ax’Kol, and one from which they would never recover.

Breathing steadily through his nostrils, Grisham divided his attention between the sensor feeds and the tactical. His warship’s control systems were showing new options now that it was on a higher security tier. Most of those options were irrelevant to the current circumstances, and Grisham was really only interested in his ability to shut down the Gavax’Kol warship.

However, one major unknown existed - he had no idea if the control artifact itself would also be affected by the shutdown command. If it was not, then the Oblasar would likely suffer repeated psionic attacks until the enemy vessel succumbed to the incoming fire Grisham intended to unleash upon its disabled hull.

“Captain, there’s something happening on the southern horizon,” said Bishop. “What the hell—?”

Grisham already had the feed on his screen. Far to the south, in a line that followed the planet’s curve for two thousand kilometres or more, the green of the trees had become dark grey. At first, Grisham wasn’t exactly sure what was happening – he wondered if maybe the planet suffered from vast storms.

The grey was spreading. It raced north with incredible speed, like the planet was being coated in dust. On it came, and when Grisham looked east, he saw that the same was happening that way, and west too.

“It’s like Denivir has been hit by—” He shook his head in disbelief.

“A psionic attack,” Deneuve finished for him.

Grisham nodded. “A psionic attack with the power to wipe out life on an entire planet. The tactical still shows the Gavax’Kol as being at an unknown location and an unknown distance.”

“I’m scanning for the enemy vessel, Captain,” said Bishop. “It is not yet in our sensor arcs.”

Grisham held the Oblasar in place. The Gavax’Kol had clearly arrived in the Reiloss system, but he wasn’t about to panic. “Lieutenant Adler, there must be a delay on the tracker, even when the target is in local space. Find out how long that delay is, and do it quickly.”

“Yes, sir.”

The story unfolding on the underside feeds told Grisham that the planet was doomed. He could see how the forests weren’t just wilting, they were crumbling as if they’d been drained completely of their essence.

“The Gavax’Kol is here and now it’s got a planet full of life energy to use against us,” said Lieutenant Kinsey. “We’ll have to shut it down fast.”

“Are we going to wait here, Captain?” asked Deneuve. “Or should we go looking?”

The answer was a matter of picking between two guesses. “We’ll wait,” said Grisham. “After all, the Gavax’Kol came here on the hunt. We might as well sit back and let it find us.”

By now, the onrushing tide of grey was visible on the northern horizon too. Soon – in two or three minutes – the last part of the planet would be completely drained by whatever attack the Gavax’Kol had launched against it.

Grisham felt the same anger as always, though it was no more intense than usual. He wondered if the Ax’Kol had lost the power to shock him. Maybe there came a point where the enemy could do no worse than they’d already done.

“Come on, show yourself,” he muttered. Still the tracker hadn’t updated.

He felt his fingers tightening around the control bars and with a conscious effort he loosened his grip. The planet’s horizons were clear, and the skies likewise. Grisham was certain the Gavax’Kol hadn’t returned to lightspeed – the enemy was out there, and it was close.

The last of the planet’s forests turned to grey. Grisham looked once more at the underside feeds, where the shrivelling of the plants was steadily revealing more of the Vire surface facility. Now, he could see the overall outline of the base, and the devastation which had been inflicted upon the shipyards and the manufacturing areas was clearer than before. The trees had hidden much, and the Vire had suffered greatly.

They brought this upon themselves, if the Mordran is to be believed.

Grisham was hauled immediately from his thoughts.

“Captain! The Gavax’Kol!” yelled Lopez.

There it was on the one of the starboard feeds – the bringer of death to trillions. Slowly across the eastern horizon came the Gavax’Kol, as if it had all the time in the world. The enemy vessel wasn’t on an intercept course, and if it stayed on its current heading it would come no closer than five thousand kilometres to the Oblasar.

This was the first time Grisham had seen his opponent in the flesh and he didn’t much like the view. At thirty-five-thousand metres, the Gavax’Kol was huge beyond imagining, but he knew that already. What he hadn’t appreciated before now was what a vile construction it was. The enemy ship had no discernible overall shape – instead, its hull was covered in many protrusions, all them large, but some much bigger than the others.

Suddenly, Grisham realised what they were. The Ax’Kol built their warships from the flesh of the dead, but when the Endevar first rose from its construction trench, he was sure it had been made entirely from alloy.

Over the aeons, it had grown with each species it had made extinct, yet unlike the Exetran and the Evoldor – which Grisham believed had retained the same basic shape of their underlying alloy hulls – the Gavax’Kol had given no consideration to its original design. Instead, the enemy warship had allowed itself to become ugly like a tumour. Perhaps that was intentional, though Grisham could hardly begin to guess at the motives of a half-billion-year-old artifact.

Whatever the truth, the sight of the Gavax’Kol was enough to make Grisham feel a hatred beyond anything he’d ever known.

“Lieutenant Lopez, issue the shutdown code,” he said. As he spoke, the tracker updated, letting him know the Gavax’Kol was exactly where he knew it was.

“Uh, there’s a problem,” said Lopez. “We need to get out of here now, sir!”

These were words Grisham hadn’t wanted to hear. So far, the Gavax’Kol hadn’t launched an attack, but it had surely detected the presence of the Oblasar, and from the tone of Lopez’s voice, the problem was a big one.

Requesting maximum power from the warship’s propulsion, Grisham aimed it on a heading directly away from the Gavax’Kol. As the Oblasar gathered velocity, he reduced altitude, intending to reduce the time his vessel would remain in the enemy’s sensor sight.

A psionic: decay hit the Oblasar, causing its defensive shield to light up, and the mind batteries to fall. Less than a second later, another psionic decay activated the shield, and then a third. Each attack knocked the reserve batteries down significantly. Against such an assault, even the Oblasar couldn’t stand for long.

With its propulsion howling and a heat trail already forming in its wake, the warship escaped from the Gavax’Kol’s sensor sight. Grisham wasn’t reassured.

“Is the enemy giving chase?” he demanded.

“I think so, Captain,” said Bishop. “It changed course just before we dropped off its horizon.”

“The tracker only updates every two minutes, sir,” said Adler. “There’s no way to reduce the interval – it’s already set to the minimum available.”

“Well isn’t that just tremendous?” said Grisham angrily.

He didn’t reduce velocity and the Oblasar tore through the planet’s upper atmosphere. He needed to stay ahead of the Gavax’Kol long enough to understand exactly what the problem was with the shutdown code.

“Lieutenant Lopez, talk!” he ordered.

“Captain, I was about to send the shutdown code, but the software listed a total of ninety targets. The data packet takes several seconds to transfer, so I couldn’t hit more than one target, and I didn’t want to give away our gameplan to the enemy by guessing.”

“Why ninety?” asked Grisham. “Why not just one?”

He was already asking himself if he should have just gone for broke by ordering Commander Deneuve to fire both the Rodor Lance and the Repulsor at the Gavax’Kol. However, Lieutenant Adler had produced some calculations which suggested the Repulsor would not be nearly so effective against a vessel with an estimated nine times the mass of the Evoldor. It was this which had made Grisham hesitate in giving the order.

The opportunity of a rapid all-out attack was now gone – at least for the moment - and Grisham hoped he’d made the right call by acting on Lieutenant Lopez’s advice to run from the enemy warship.

“I don’t know why, Captain,” said Lopez. “Each target had an identifier, but there was no way to distinguish between them.”

Grisham thought fast. “Now that the Oblasar is on the highest security tier, we must be able to issue that shutdown code to whatever the hell we choose. Maybe it detected some of the systems within the Vire facility and offered those as shutdown targets as well.”

“No, Captain, the targets were clustered,” said Lopez. “They were all part of the Gavax’Kol.”

“Shit and damn,” said Grisham as another thought came to him. “What if the Gavax’Kol looks like it does because its absorbed other Ax’Kol warships into its hull over the years? Maybe doing so is a quicker way to repair damage than waiting for it to heal over time.”

“You could be right, Captain,” said Adler. “I grabbed a couple of readings from the Gavax’Kol’s hull and there are variations which would be explained by what you said.”

“So this means we’ll have to issue the shutdown code ninety times in order to guarantee we send the Gavax’Kol itself offline?” said Deneuve. “Damn – we can’t duke it out that long.”

“The control artifact isn’t going to stick around while we slowly whittle through those shutdown targets anyway. It’s existed too long and I’m sure it won’t take a risk like that,” said Lieutenant Adler. “Maybe the Gavax’Kol will allow itself to be afflicted by a handful of codes before it takes off into the nowhere.”

“That would be a positive outcome for the Human Federation,” said Bishop.

“The Ax’Kol would return and you know it,” said Adler. “Maybe not soon, but it would happen. The Gavax’Kol’s behaviour against both the Kijol and the Human Federation indicates it’s vengeful. That alien artifact bastard won’t forget.”

“We have to stop it now, but there has to be a way that doesn’t involve issuing that shutdown code ninety times. Like you say, Lieutenant Adler, the enemy won’t permit that.” said Grisham. The tracker updated, showing the Gavax’Kol to be on the far side of Denivir, directly over the ruined Vire facility. He had another thought. “But maybe the Repulsor would knock the Gavax’Kol offline temporarily, giving us the time we need to inject the shutdown code into all ninety targets.”

“We don’t even know if the Repulsor will send the enemy warship offline, temporarily or otherwise, sir,” said Deneuve. “We fired it once and we were lucky enough that it shot the Evoldor into Loxor’s moon. It’s possible that without the impact, the enemy vessel wouldn’t have been affected beyond being knocked out of position.”

Grisham bared his teeth and bit down on a stream of curses. The elation of having the shutdown code in his possession was rapidly fading. Even that last brief encounter with the Gavax’Kol was enough for him to understand that the Oblasar couldn’t stand toe-to-toe with the enemy vessel for any length of time.

“Captain, maybe it’s time we backed off,” said Deneuve softly. “If we stay at Denivir, we’re going to find ourselves in an engagement we aren’t ready for.”

“But the Gavax’Kol is here, Commander,” said Grisham. “Here and now.”

“We have the tracker, sir. Wherever the enemy vessel goes, we can be there ahead of it.”

“What if it goes to a planet?” asked Grisham. “What if it goes to a planet, and we could have stopped it here?”

“We know the Gavax’Kol is going to a planet, sir. By leaving Denivir, we’re buying the time we need to think of a better way to win this. Now the Oblasar is carrying the shutdown codes, this warship is more important than any planet. We’re holding the one and only key to victory.” Deneuve’s face fell. “Even if we fail once and another world dies, we have to keep the Oblasar intact. Maybe we can figure out a way to inject the shutdown code into all ninety targets at once.”

“That would require some additional hardware, Commander,” said Lieutenant Lopez. “I’m not even sure if the Human Federation comms modules could be modified to speak with the Oblasar’s existing security hardware. If not, we won’t be issuing any tier one shutdown codes.”

“But we might be able to make it work,” said Deneuve.

“Given the time,” said Lopez. “A resource we’re currently lacking.”

Grisham didn’t like the thought of running, but he knew there was some truth in Deneuve’s words. If he returned to Human Federation or Kijol territory with the Oblasar, he’d have backup from two militaries.

However, the Gavax’Kol could wipe out entire fleets with ease and the thought of so much additional sacrifice was a hard one for Grisham to bear. There had to be a better way than simply throwing warships at the Gavax’Kol, since that method would certainly ensure defeat.

Just because I can’t think of a way now, doesn’t mean there isn’t a way, thought Grisham. If I took the Oblasar home, I’d have access to the best strategists in the military.

Grisham was torn right down the middle and he knew it. “It only took the Gavax’Kol forty minutes to travel from either Kijol or Human Federation territory all the way to here,” he said. “Even if we leave now, we might not be earning ourselves much breathing space.”

“Judging by the drain on our own Kalor drive from boosting our lightspeed multiplier, I reckon the energy costs of that forty-minute transit were enormously significant, sir,” said Adler. “The Gavax’Kol is set on wiping out our planets, but I don’t think it’s in that much of a hurry. It needed to make the journey here at its highest possible multiplier. I’m not sure the same will apply on the way back.”

Of all the many tough decisions Grisham had been forced to make since he’d first recovered the Voltran from the fused sands of Ovintus, this was one of the hardest.

“Let’s get away from this place,” he said, trying not to sound angry about it. “Lieutenant Adler, prepare the Oblasar for a short duration lightspeed jump. I don’t care where the hell we end up, as long as it’s not here.”

“Yes, sir,” said Adler. “Two-point-five minutes and we’ll enter lightspeed. The transit time is set at five minutes.”

Grisham held tight to the controls, wondering if he’d run into the Gavax’Kol again before those two-point-five minutes were up. The tracker updated once more and still the enemy warship was over the Vire facility.

“Why is the Gavax’Kol so interested in that base?” he wondered. “I doubt the artifact is sentimental about the place it was created.”

It was a question to which Grisham thought he ought to know the answer, but nothing came to him immediately. While he considered the possibilities, he brought the Oblasar onto a new heading – one that would keep it circling Denivir at the same twenty-kilometre altitude, while also staying far from the Gavax’Kol.

“One minute and we go,” said Adler.

As the seconds counted down, Grisham found himself completely on edge about what the Gavax’Kol was up to at the facility. Then, it came to him. With only forty seconds left before the Oblasar entered lightspeed, he talked fast.

“Is there any way the enemy vessel could do something at the Vire facility that would allow it to disable the tracking system?” Grisham asked. “So that we could no longer find it?”

“No, sir. I believe the tracking is deeply integrated into the navigational systems - which makes sense, because you wouldn’t want anyone turning it off and on whenever they felt like it,” said Adler. He went quiet for a moment. “Shit, maybe that’s it – now that Security Station 9 is in isolation mode, it might be able to promote the Gavax’Kol onto the same security tier as the Oblasar.”

“Does that mean we’ll no longer be able to inject the shutdown code into the Gavax’Kol?” asked Grisham sharply.

“That’s exactly what it means, Captain,” said Adler. “Once the enemy vessel is on the same security tier as the Oblasar, we’ll be back to square one.”

“We destroyed the security station,” Bishop protested. “Damn - unless the main data arrays and processing hardware were installed underground.”

“And I didn’t target the transmitter stump outside the nearby comms building,” said Deneuve. “The security station wouldn’t have lost its comms capabilities – it could still transmit the necessary data.”

Grisham had heard enough. “Lieutenant Adler, cancel the transit!”

“Yes, sir. Transit cancelled.”

The Oblasar remained at Denivir, and Grisham reduced the warship’s velocity to little more than zero.

“We were offline twenty minutes while the tier upgrade was completed,” he said.

“Yes, Captain,” said Adler. “And if we’d been online, the upgrade would have taken hours longer.”

“I think we can assume the Gavax’Kol isn’t going to shut itself down,” said Grisham. “So that leaves us with plenty of time to think before we have to act.”

Having been on the verge of leaving Denivir far behind, Grisham found himself in a position where an engagement with his opponent, which he’d thought postponed, was once again in his immediate future.

And then, Grisham realised he’d overlooked the most obvious question of all.

TWENTY-ONE

“We’ve been talking about having to issue ninety shutdown codes into the Gavax’Kol,” said Grisham. “Why can’t we find the original identifier for the Gavax’Kol and issue the code directly to that?”

“It’s likely the identifier number was stored in the main data array on the Vire facility,” said Lopez. “In the asset database.”

Grisham drummed his fingers. “We already powered up the last of the active structures on the base. Could we interrogate those and extract the database?”

“We could,” said Adler. “It’s certain Security Station 9 will hold a local copy of the asset database, but that’s the exact place we need to destroy in order to prevent the Gavax’Kol being elevated to a higher security tier.”

“We missed our chance when Sergeant Maxwell and his squad were deployed,” said Bishop. “They could have accessed the database and pulled out the specific data we need.”

“Let’s not dwell on it,” said Grisham. “This isn’t the time to rue missed opportunities.”

He sat back and stared at the feeds of Denivir. The situation – having to destroy something which he also needed – should have angered him greatly, but it did not.

“Can we perform a remote extraction from long range?” he asked.

“That’s a possibility, Captain,” said Lopez. “However, the security tier elevation is likely to be saturating the comms bandwidth of that single ground station, so if we start drawing extra through that same pipe, the Gavax’Kol is certain to notice the reduced data flow into its systems.”

“Even if we extract the asset database over an extended period?”

“The database won’t be a small file, Captain. It’ll not just be a bunch of numbers – if it’s anything like the Human Federation asset databases, it’s likely to contain the technical documentation and construction plans down to the minutiae. If we extract the database slowly enough that we won’t be noticed, we run the risk that the Gavax’Kol’s security tier upgrade will finish first. Of course, I’m just guessing.”

“Assuming we had full use of the bandwidth, how long might it take to extract the database?” asked Grisham.

“That depends on our proximity – Human Federation comms stations have much higher close-range bandwidth, since their comms amplifiers are only capable of sending relatively small quantities of data above lightspeed.”

“How close?”

“Since we don’t know much about the Vire hardware, best guess would be right on top of the base. That’s probably why the Gavax’Kol has positioned itself at such a low altitude.”

“And how long to extract the database?” Grisham repeated.

“Pick a number out of thin air, Captain.”

“Give me a ballpark idea.”

“Based on the size of the Human Federation’s asset database, the bandwidth of one of our mid-sized comms stations and—” Lopez cursed. “Sir, you really can’t rely on any estimate I give you.”

“I know, but tell me all the same.”

“One minute, Captain. I’ll speak with Lieutenant Bishop and see what we can come up with.”

“What’s the importance of knowing, sir?” asked Deneuve. “The Gavax’Kol is parked right on top of the Vire facility. Are you planning to draw it away?”

Grisham tapped the side of his head. “I’m working on something.”

Deneuve nodded. “Is this plan of yours going to obviate our need to destroy the data arrays once we’re done with them?”

“I hope so.”

“If you’re only hoping, we should discuss how we’re going to destroy those arrays.”

“Let’s do that. What’re your thoughts, Commander?”

“Well, sir, we could launch missiles from halfway around the planet and hope enough break through the Gavax’Kol’s psionics and Punisher fire to disable the hardware beneath the security station,” said Deneuve.

“But what if the hardware is buried deep?” asked Grisham. “Like a kilometre deep?”

“That’s more than possible,” Deneuve conceded. “We could target the transmitter stump instead, which would prevent the tier upgrade data being sent to the Gavax’Kol.”

“Maybe not, Commander,” said Bishop. “It’s possible the stump goes way underground – which would also explain why the security station was able to send its accelerated comm to the Gavax’Kol.”

“And even if we completely destroy the transmitter, the enemy would be able to rig up a new one – just by wiring in the hardware from one of their shuttles and routing the data through its comms system,” said Lopez. “The transfer speed would be significantly slower – like much slower – but it would get the job done.”

“We can’t afford the tier upgrade to be only delayed,” said Grisham. “We have to stop the process entirely.”

“A Rodor Lance into the ground would do it,” said Deneuve. “And maybe at the same time, we’d be able to punch the Gavax’Kol into the surface of Denivir with the Repulsor. Perhaps it won’t be enough to score a kill this time, given the enemy vessel’s mass, but I doubt our opponent will come out of it completely unscathed.”

“I think we’ve talked this one out,” said Grisham. “Lieutenant Lopez, how are you getting on with that estimate?”

“It’s done, sir. I reckon that if we positioned the Oblasar directly above the Vire facility, it might take anywhere between twenty seconds and five minutes to extract the asset database.”

“Now you’re going to tell us exactly how you intend to draw the Gavax’Kol away from its current position, in order that we can take its place, Captain,” said Deneuve.

“You’re quite right, Commander – I am going to tell you,” said Grisham. “First, however, I need to launch one of our shuttles.”

Deneuve narrowed her eyes. “What are you planning, sir?”

“Lightspeed ping pong, Commander.”

Grisham ignored the feeling of Deneuve’s gaze boring into him, and double-checked the position of the Oblasar. The warship was approximately one-third of the way around Denivir from the Vire facility and – presumably still – the position of the enemy warship. Grisham glanced at the underside feed. The decay of the forests had continued long after the Gavax’Kol’s initial attack, and the trees below had crumbled to such a degree that they were no longer recognizable as what they’d once been.

“I’m launching one of the shuttles from Bay 2,” Grisham said.

A few seconds later, the transport – an identical model to the one which had taken Sergeant Maxwell and the soldiers to the planet’s surface – emerged from the portside of the Oblasar. Grisham brought the vessel to a standstill and instructed it to hover in place.

“Once this is set up, we’re going to act immediately. This here is Shuttle 1.”

“You need to explain, Captain,” said Deneuve. Her patience was wearing thin.

“I will,” said Grisham. “Commander Deneuve, override the targeting fail-safes and instruct the Oblasar to recognize that shuttle as a hostile target.

“Yes, sir, that’s done.”

Even though the warship’s weaponry would now fire upon the shuttle – if the command was sent – the rest of the Oblasar’s onboard systems were still able to talk with those on the transport.

Grisham stared at his tactical screen for a few seconds. “There’s an eight-minute lightspeed warmup on those shuttles, right?”

“Yes, sir,” said Adler.

“So here’s what’s going to happen,” said Grisham. “The Oblasar will enter lightspeed and its target destination is one billion klicks into space, directly over the Vire facility. Once we exit lightspeed, I’ll launch a second shuttle – Shuttle 2 - and instruct it to return to Denivir, also at lightspeed, and with a destination near where we are now.”

“Lightspeed ping pong,” repeated Deneuve in sudden understanding. “With the shuttle set as a hostile target, the Oblasar’s onboard pursuit system will calculate its destination.”

“Exactly right, Commander,” said Grisham. “I plan to start extracting the asset database when we’re out at a billion klicks. Lieutenant Lopez believes the bandwidth will be too low for us to draw out all the data we need, but hopefully the Gavax’Kol will feel obliged to investigate what we’re doing.”

“At which point, we’ll activate the Oblasar’s pursuit mode, which will return us to Denivir,” said Deneuve. She shook her head and smiled in semi-disbelief. “And then we’ll have access to the comms facility’s full bandwidth.”

“With any luck for enough time that we can both extract the entire asset database and destroy the underground arrays,” said Grisham. “Assuming we still need to take out those arrays.”

“I think we should plan on doing so, Captain,” said Bishop. “It might take some time to find the Gavax’Kol’s identifier code among all the other data.”

“In which case, we’ll definitely destroy the arrays,” said Grisham. “Just to be sure.”

“Captain, you’re overlooking something,” said Adler. “The Gavax’Kol will be able to psionically displace itself back to Denivir.”

“The maximum range on the Urzox’s displacement was only four hundred thousand klicks, Lieutenant,” said Grisham. “And when the Exetran attempted to disengage from the Oblasar, it only travelled about five million klicks. I know the Gavax’Kol is a step above, but I’m willing to bet it can’t displace anything near a billion klicks.”

“Point accepted,” said Adler. “However, there’s a good chance the enemy vessel is fitted with similar pursuit technology to that on the Oblasar.”

“I’m sure you’re right, Lieutenant. The way I see it, the Gavax’Kol’s processing technology probably isn’t any more advanced than the cores on the Oblasar, and that means we have at least thirty seconds before it returns.”

“Which is cutting it more than fine if you hope to extract the entire asset database,” said Adler. “And then we have to escape from the enemy, to buy us the time we need to locate the Gavax’Kol’s identifier in order that we can inject the shutdown code.”

“And that’s what this first shuttle is all about, isn’t it, sir?” said Deneuve.

“Yes, Commander, and this is where the plan becomes a little harder to pull off,” said Grisham. “Once we’re at a billion kilometres, Lieutenant Bishop is going to take remote control of Shuttle 1. He’s going to order it to also warm up for a lightspeed jump, but the timing has to be right. Shuttle 1 can only depart after the Oblasar has returned to Denivir, and the transport has to within sensor sight of this warship so that the pursuit technology will activate.”

“Tell me if I’m understanding this right,” said Lopez. “We draw the Gavax’Kol away from Denivir, and then use the Oblasar’s pursuit technology – targeted on Shuttle 2 - to return to the planet. When the enemy ship inevitably follows us back to the Vire facility, we should by then be able to activate the pursuit technology again to enable our escape, only this time we go after Shuttle 1.”

“That’s it in a nutshell,” said Grisham. “The plan is for Shuttle 1 to head a billion klicks away.”

“Won’t the Gavax’Kol follow us for a second time?” asked Kinsey.

“Almost certainly, but we’ll have thirty seconds in which to put some distance between the Oblasar and its pursuit arrival point,” said Grisham.

“That’s cutting it tight.”

“It is,” said Grisham. “However, I’m hoping we’ll have a lot more than thirty seconds in which to escape after we follow Shuttle 1. Even if all the timings work out, we’re unlikely to extract the entire asset database before the Gavax’Kol shows up to ruin our day. We’ll have to hold position over the Vire facility for as long as we’re able.”

“During which time we’ll give the enemy hell,” said Deneuve.

“As much as possible,” said Grisham. “We’ll hit the Gavax’Kol with everything we’ve got. Something makes me believe the enemy can’t remember what it feels like to be given a bloody nose. Perhaps we’ll give it pause for thought.”

“This plan is crazy,” said Adler. He chuckled. “If any of it appears in the mission report, they’re going to lock us up and throw away the key.”

“Only if we fail, Lieutenant,” said Grisham. “And if that’s the case, we’ll be too dead to care.”

“Let’s do this,” said Deneuve.

“Hell yeah,” said Kinsey.

The plan was an audacious one, but Grisham believed he and his crew could make it work. He smiled thinly and readied himself for what was to come.

TWENTY-TWO

“Lieutenant Adler, ready the Oblasar for lightspeed,” said Grisham. “Take us a billion klicks directly over the Vire facility.”

“Yes, sir, the target destination is set. Two-point-five minutes and we depart.”

The lightspeed timer’s descent seemed to take an age, and Grisham could only stand to look at the decaying planet for so long. It was a depressing reminder of what lay in store for the Human Federation if the Gavax’Kol wasn’t stopped.

At last, the timer hit zero and the Oblasar launched into lightspeed, before emerging a tiny fraction of a second later. The sensors came online and Lieutenant Lopez quickly obtained a sensor lock on the planet. From way out here, the grey of Denivir made it resemble any one of a thousand different rocky spheres Grisham had visited over the course of his time in the military.

“Launching Shuttle 2,” he said.

A few seconds later, the transport emerged from the Bay 2 portside exit, and Grisham brought it to a standstill.

“I’m now remotely linked to Shuttle 1, Captain,” said Lieutenant Bishop. “Awaiting your order to warm it up for lightspeed.”

“Hold until you hear that order.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Lieutenant Lopez, can you link to the Vire comms station without being detected?” said Grisham.

“Yes, Captain. I should also be able to search the contents of the security data array with a very, very low chance of detection.”

“Do it and tell me when you’ve located the asset database.”

“We’re linked, sir,” said Lopez. “Commencing search.” Thirty seconds later, she announced her success. “I’ve located the file. Like I thought, it’s huge.”

“Are you about to revise your estimation on the extraction time in the wrong direction?”

“No, sir – I based my estimation range on the file being a big one. Nothing’s changed.”

“Are you in a position to begin the extraction?”

“Upon your order, sir.”

“Hold for now.”

“Yes, sir.”

Grisham turned his attention to the next step of his plan. “Readying Shuttle 2 for lightspeed. Eight minutes.”

This was where the guesswork came into play. Grisham reckoned that without all the trickery of psionic displacements, and pursuit technology, the Gavax’Kol likely required the same two-point-five minutes as the Oblasar to ready itself for lightspeed. He also reckoned the enemy vessel would detect the extraction of the asset database within a few seconds, which meant that not much more than two-point-five minutes after he gave the order, the sensor feeds would be full of Gavax’Kol.

Grisham already had a figure in his head for when Shuttle 1 should commence its lightspeed warmup. Three-point-five minutes after Shuttle 2 began its own warmup, he gave the order.

“Lieutenant Bishop, ready Shuttle 1 for lightspeed.”

“Yes, sir,” said Bishop. “Eight minutes and it’ll be on its way. I’ve programmed its navigational system with the coordinates for the Vire facility. The moment the Gavax’Kol appears on our sensors, I’ll instruct the shuttle to pilot itself to that location.”

“If everything works out, Shuttle 1 will enter lightspeed approximately thirty seconds after the Oblasar returns to Denivir,” said Grisham. The more he thought about it, the more tenuous everything seemed. He forced a smile – this was a time he couldn’t let the doubts seep in.

Eight minutes after the commencement of its lightspeed warmup, Shuttle 2 vanished from the feeds, its intended destination being low to the surface of Denivir and less than a third of a circuit around the planet.

As soon as the shuttle entered lightspeed, the core utilisation gauge on the Oblasar climbed to forty-three percent. Thirty seconds later, a new option appeared on Grisham’s tactical screen.

Pursue?

He ignored the option for now. “Lieutenant Lopez, commence the extraction of the asset database.”

“Yes, sir. The extraction is underway. At the current rate of data transfer, the entire file will be in our arrays in approximately four hours.”

“I think we have about two-point-five minutes before the Gavax’Kol does its best to interrupt the extraction,” said Grisham. He turned to his right. “Are you ready, Commander Deneuve?”

“Yes, sir. Waiting on a target.”

The seconds went by and Grisham felt his scalp prickling with sweat. He’d been outgunned before, but he had a feeling the disparity this time was greater than ever before.

Two minutes and thirty-five seconds after the commencement of the database extraction, the Gavax’Kol appeared on the Oblasar’s starboard feeds, hardly more than five hundred kilometres away. Viewed from so close, the enemy vessel appeared even more monstrous than it had in the skies of Denivir.

“Commander Deneuve – fire,” said Grisham calmly.

“Avil-Tors set to fully automatic. Starboard and topside Zorl clusters one to eight, targeted and fired.”

Gauss slugs pummelled the enemy vessel, leaving countless indentations in its flank. At the same time, Zorl missiles burst from their launch clusters and accelerated towards their target. To Grisham’s enormous satisfaction, all 192 warheads detonated against the Gavax’Kol’s starboard side, engulfing a significant area of its midsection in plasma.

“Time to go,” he said, unwilling to chance the enemy vessel landing even a single psionic attack.

A touch of the tactical screen sent the Oblasar in pursuit of Shuttle 2 and the warship shuddered with the in-out transition. Less than a second passed before the sensors came online, and Grisham saw the surface of Denivir about four hundred kilometres below. Shuttle 2 was at a higher altitude and about five hundred kilometres away. The transport had done its part and would no longer be needed.

“I’ve put a course overlay on the tactical, sir,” said Lopez.

A red line appeared on the screen, showing Grisham the shortest path to the Vire facility. He pushed the controls as far forward as they’d go and the Oblasar surged towards the target.

With the acceleration holding him against the back of his seat, Grisham piloted the Oblasar low across the planet’s surface. The timer was counting down, and soon, the Gavax’Kol would return. Before that happened, Grisham wanted the asset database safely extracted into his warship’s arrays, and he wanted to have Shuttle 1 in his sensor sights before it vanished into lightspeed.

Soon, the Vire facility appeared on the forward feeds.

“Where’s Shuttle 1, Lieutenant Bishop?” asked Grisham.

“It’s under control, sir. I’ll have it in our sensor sight in the next few seconds, and it’ll enter lightspeed in twenty seconds.”

“I’ve re-established our link to the Vire data array, Captain,” said Lopez. “The extraction has resumed.”

“Do you have any better idea how long it’s going to take?” asked Grisham, hauling back on the controls.

The Oblasar decelerated rapidly and it came to a standstill with its midsection undersides directly over the security building which Sergeant Maxwell had so recently departed. On the feeds, Grisham saw many hundreds of Ax’Kol. With nobody left to kill, they were just standing in the mud and the rain, like they were content to wait another hundred million years if necessary.

“No, sir,” said Lopez. “Once the transfer speed has stabilised, I should be able to give you a prediction.”

“I have a sensor lock on Shuttle 1, sir,” said Bishop, the relief clear in his voice. “Bringing it to a halt. Five seconds and it goes.”

“Our ticket out of here,” said Deneuve.

The shuttle vanished into lightspeed and the Oblasar’s core utilisation climbed. In thirty seconds, the pursuit option would become available, but Grisham felt sure the Gavax’Kol would return to Denivir in about fifteen.

“Tell me about the extraction, Lieutenant Lopez,” said Grisham, his eyes roving across the feeds.

“One minute and the extraction will be finished, sir.”

“Could’ve been worse,” said Grisham, inwardly wishing it was a bit better.

As was usual in situations like this, each second seemed to last a full minute. Rarely in the past had Grisham struggled for calm, but now his heart rate was elevated, and so much adrenaline was pumping into his body that he felt light-headed.

His estimate of fifteen seconds for the Gavax’Kol’s return was an accurate one.

Just as Lopez was announcing there were forty-five seconds remaining on the extraction, the Gavax’Kol exited lightspeed. Once again, it was only five hundred kilometres away and it was directly overhead. Only the enemy warship’s underside was visible, denying Grisham a chance to gauge the extent of the earlier damage.

“Avil-Tors set to full auto,” said Deneuve. “Topside and forward Zorl clusters one to eight: targeted and fired.”

This time, the Gavax’Kol wasn’t caught napping. Overlapping psionic: slow fields trapped seventy percent of the Zorl missiles and Punisher fire raked into the others. Only fifteen warheads successfully detonated.

Grisham didn’t sit back and stare. The moment Deneuve had launched from the topside and portside clusters, he rotated the Oblasar so that she’d be able to fire from the other loaded clusters. As he pulled on the controls, Grisham’s mind was working overtime.

Despite the vast, incredible size of the Gavax’Kol, it appeared to lack a commensurate quantity of Punisher guns. Grisham thought that maybe all the other warships absorbed into the enemy vessel’s hull had blocked off many of its original external armaments. Perhaps a few of the armaments on the absorbed spaceships were still operational, but he hadn’t seen much sign of it yet.

However, even if the Gavax’Kol was comparatively lightly-armed – for its size – Grisham knew full well that its psionics were the main threat. He was given an immediate example of this fact when the Oblasar’s energy shield activated and remained so for almost five seconds. The mind batteries plummeted beneath the onslaught.

“Missile launch detected from the enemy vessel,” said Lieutenant Bishop. “Eight waves of thirty-six heading our way.”

The Avil-Tors were set to prioritise incoming missiles, and their projectiles punched into the Gavax’Kol’s Death waves. More than 150 were pulverised by the Oblasar’s defences, but the remaining warheads detonated against the warship’s energy shield. Once again, the mind batteries fell, and Grisham willed the souls inside those batteries to hold strong.

“The pursuit systems are ready to activate, Captain,” said Lieutenant Adler. “We can go after Shuttle 1 whenever you choose.”

“Once our job here is done, Lieutenant.”

“Underside and portside Zorl clusters one to eight: targeted and fired,” said Deneuve. “I’m waiting on your order to discharge the Repulsor, Captain.”

“We’re going to hold as long as possible, Commander. That weapon is going to help our escape.”

“Yes, sir. If this goes on much longer, we won’t have the twenty-five percent we need in the mind batteries to fire the Rodor Lance.”

“This was never going to be easy, Commander.”

Grisham rotated the Oblasar again and watched as another twenty or so Zorl missiles from the previous wave struck the Gavax’Kol. The enemy vessel was taking damage, but not nearly enough to knock it out.

“Fifteen seconds until the asset database extraction is complete, Captain,” said Lopez.

To Grisham’s shock, the mind batteries were already as low as forty percent. Another psionic: decay hit the Oblasar and was closely followed by another. A Rodor Lance discharge would reduce the batteries by an additional twenty-five percent and when those batteries were fully depleted, the energy shield would no longer activate. Grisham didn’t expect his warship’s alloy hull would hold up for long beneath the Gavax’Kol’s onslaught.

“Forward Zorl clusters one to eight: targeted and fired,” said Deneuve.

As the wave of missiles raced towards their target, the Gavax’Kol’s psionics struck the Oblasar time and again. Grisham could only watch helplessly as the mind battery gauge fell.

“Five seconds and the extraction will be complete,” said Lopez.

Grisham was about to re-orient the Oblasar, to point its nose towards the security station twenty kilometres below so the Rodor Lance would fire straight into the ground, when the Gavax’Kol’s continuous psionic attacks pushed the mind batteries below twenty-five percent.

“Not enough energy left for a Rodor Lance,” said Grisham in fury.

For a moment, he was at a loss. It looked as if the extraction of the asset database was going to successfully complete, but Grisham really wanted to destroy those underground data arrays, and there was still the matter of escaping from the Gavax’Kol in order that his crew might have a chance to find the enemy warship’s identifier code.

An idea came. It would be dangerous and destructive, but it might just get the job done.

“Commander Deneuve,” said Grisham, rotating the Oblasar, so that its nose was pointing towards the Gavax’Kol and its stern was facing the planet’s surface. “Get ready to fire the Repulsor.”

TWENTY-THREE

The Gavax’Kol wasn’t holding back, and, in the short time it took Grisham to re-orient the Oblasar, the mind batteries had fallen below twenty percent.

“Lieutenant Lopez?” he growled.

“The extraction progress bar is stuck on ninety-nine percent, sir!”

Grisham cursed. “Figures.”

In terms of what he intended, a few seconds delay didn’t matter so much. He requested maximum power from the engines and the Oblasar accelerated directly towards the Gavax’Kol. Waves of Death missiles, already in flight, detonated against the warship’s nose, inflicting further drain on the mind batteries.

Seeing what was coming, the Gavax’Kol also began accelerating. As rapid as it was, the enemy ship was vast, and it was unable to escape the collision. The impact was crunching and the Oblasar’s energy shield burned brightly. A vast indentation appeared in the Gavax’Kol’s portside flank near its stern, though the vessel hardly seemed to be knocked off course. Somewhere in the background, a bone deep vibration rolled through the Oblasar, fading to nothing almost at once.

As Grisham had hoped, the Gavax’Kol’s control mind maintained its warship’s acceleration. Just like the Exetran, it wasn’t accustomed to meeting opponents who knew how to fight back, and was taking the safe option in case Grisham attempted another collision.

In fact, he had something else planned. The impact with the Gavax’Kol had brought the Oblasar almost to a standstill, and now he instructed the warship to accelerate stern-first towards Denivir. The numbers on the altimeter tumbled.

The surprise impact attack on the Gavax’Kol had – like he’d hoped – both inflicted damage on the enemy vessel, and also interrupted the nonstop psionic attacks against the Oblasar. What Grisham intended next would really test the mind batteries.

His eyes jumped to the reserve gauge. Eleven percent. It’ll have to be enough.

“Commander Deneuve, fire the Repulsor!” yelled Grisham.

“Repulsor fired!”

The Oblasar shook and the weapon discharged. A violent eruption of energy detonated against the Gavax’Kol’s stern, hurling it sideways and upwards, and inducing a rapid spin at the same time. In a split-second, it was no more than a pinprick on the feeds.

Grisham knew what was coming next and he was braced for it. The recoil from the Repulsor discharge smashed the Oblasar stern-first into the planet’s surface. Unable to entirely suppress the near-instant acceleration and the following deceleration, the warship’s life support systems struggled to cope. Grisham wasn’t wearing a harness and he was almost thrown out of his seat, before the collision with Denivir pressed him back into the meagre padding.

A red light flashed on Grisham’s screen, telling him the mind batteries were empty, and a row of ambers let him know that the Oblasar’s onboard systems hadn’t escaped unscathed.

Grisham felt dazed, but he shook his mind clear. A handful of the sensor arrays had gone offline, but not enough that he was unable to grasp the effects of his warship striking Denivir at high velocity. The Oblasar’s stern was in a crater of its own making and the warship’s hull had started the long topple towards the ground. Hardly without thinking, Grisham halted the fall, while his brain caught up with everything else.

The nose and midsection sensor arrays were above the crater’s rim, and on their feeds, Grisham saw the surrounding grey of the planet. Such had been the force of the shockwave, that it had swept aside the crumbling trees for hundreds of kilometres in every direction, and obliterated most of the Vire facility at the same time.

As fascinating as it was, in a terrible way, Grisham wasn’t able to stare.

“Is anyone injured?” he said loudly. Twisting in his seat, he could see that his crew were all awake, and Commander Deneuve was looking fully alert.

“The Repulsor is offline again, sir.”

Reassured that he hadn’t lost anyone in his gamble, Grisham fed power into the Oblasar’s propulsion and instructed it to rise from the crater. The howl of the engines was all the reassurance he needed that they hadn’t lost any of their potency from the impact.

In moments, the crater, which was almost fifteen kilometres across, was fully visible on the rear sensor feeds. The information overlay on Grisham’s screen indicated the deepest point at almost two kilometres.

“That should take care of the Vire data arrays beneath the security station,” he said. “There’s no way they buried them deeper than two klicks.”

“And even if they did, the shockwave would have wrecked anything beneath the bottom of the crater,” said Kinsey.

“Lieutenant Lopez, where’s the Gavax’Kol?” asked Grisham. A glance at his console told him that the pursuit option for Shuttle 1 was still available, and the mind batteries were already climbing, though it would be some time before the Oblasar was ready for another exchange with the enemy warship.

“I’ve added a course overlay onto your tactical, Captain. I don’t have enough information to tell you how far the Gavax’Kol was thrown by the Repulsor, but its acceleration was significantly less than we witnessed when the Evoldor was hit by the same weapon.”

“The tracker will provide us with some additional information when it next updates, Captain,” said Adler. “That’ll happen in about ninety seconds.”

“We need to find the Gavax’Kol’s identifier,” said Grisham. “Lieutenant Kinsey, Lieutenant Bishop, that’s your sole task.”

“Yes, sir.”

Grisham scanned the skies anxiously. He’d achieved his primary goals of extracting the asset database and destroying the security station hardware, but he still wanted more. While there’d never be a better time to escape the Reiloss system, the moment the Oblasar entered lightspeed, Grisham’s control would be gone. The Gavax’Kol would choose a location – a populated planet – and it would start the killing again. Even with the tracker and the shutdown code, Grisham couldn’t guarantee he’d be able to prevent it happening.

“You want to go after the Gavax’Kol,” said Commander Deneuve.

Grisham nodded. “If we inject the shutdown code now, the war is won.”

“Maybe this is the time, Captain. If we can pull it off.”

“We have to try, Commander.”

Grisham piloted the Oblasar higher into the planet’s atmosphere, and held it steady on the Gavax’Kol’s trajectory line. The mind battery reserves continued climbing, and the sensor feeds continued to show nothing.

Fighting the temptation to head off in pursuit, Grisham waited for his crew to locate the Gavax’Kol’s identifier in the asset database. His mind turned as it pondered the unknowns. Perhaps the enemy vessel had seen enough of the Oblasar and decided it was too chewy a morsel.

Grisham doubted it – he was beginning to understand something of the control artifacts. They’d existed so long that they were wary of defeat, but equally he believed they couldn’t handle losing. The artifacts were corrupted and Grisham suspected they harboured a hatred of everything. These were their weaknesses.

“Mind batteries at twenty percent,” said Lieutenant Adler.

“No sign of the enemy on the long-range scans,” said Lieutenant Lopez. “Maybe the Gavax’Kol was knocked offline.”

“I reckon it might have been,” said Grisham, “But I doubt it was for this long.” He checked the tactical overlay again. “The last recorded velocity of the enemy vessel was forty thousand klicks per second and climbing. If the Repulsor threw the Gavax’Kol far enough, it would have to return either by psionic displacement, or at lightspeed.”

“And the enemy vessel’s lightspeed warmup time is roughly equivalent to that of the Oblasar,” said Adler. “Wait! The tracker has updated – it places the Gavax’Kol approximately eight million klicks from our current position! Given the elapsed time since the Repulsor discharge, the enemy vessel achieved a velocity in the region of seventy thousand klicks per second.”

“Eight million klicks is too a great a distance for the Gavax’Kol to return by psionic displacement,” said Grisham. “Or maybe it isn’t, but I have a feeling the enemy won’t want to waste its psionic reserves – not now that it’s seen what the Oblasar is capable of.”

“The tracker doesn’t tell us if the enemy vessel is in motion, Captain,” said Adler. “Maybe it is offline, and just drifting now. We didn’t really have a chance to understand the effects of the Repulsor on the Evoldor, what with the enemy ship being fired into Loxor’s moon and everything.”

“We’re staying here until we’ve located the Gavax’Kol’s identifier,” said Grisham. “If the next tracker update shows the enemy vessel is on the same course as before and at the same velocity, we’ll give chase – but only if we’re ready to inject the shutdown code.”

“If the Gavax’Kol isn’t drifting, we can expect it back in a couple of minutes,” said Deneuve.

“And that’s how long we have to locate the identifier.”

Grisham didn’t ask Kinsey and Bishop for a progress report. They’d both be doing everything to find the required information, and asking questions would only slow them down. For a moment, Grisham thought about accessing the asset database to see if he could help, but he needed all his focus in case the Gavax’Kol returned.

“Come on, come on,” he muttered quietly under his breath. Glancing over, he saw that Deneuve was also speaking quiet encouragement to the gods of fate and luck. She gave him a tight smile.

A minute went by, and still the identifier code remained elusive. It became ever harder for Grisham to keep his mouth shut and not ask for a progress update. He gave in to a different temptation and called up the Vire asset database. Unfortunately, its contents were huge and sprawling, and Grisham knew he had absolutely no chance of finding the identifier unless he could give it his full attention. He closed the database file.

Thirty seconds later, the Oblasar entered what Grisham believed was the peak danger zone. He felt sure the Gavax’Kol was readying for a lightspeed jump, and ample time had passed for it to be nearing a launch.

“The tracker will update in ten seconds,” said Adler.

“Let’s see if the enemy vessel is still in motion,” said Grisham.

“Five seconds.”

The tracker updated and the Gavax’Kol was in the exact position as it had been two minutes ago. It was confirmation that the enemy warship was not drifting, and by far the most likely reason for it to be stationary was because it was readying a lightspeed jump. Grisham’s eyes went to the mind batteries. They were up to forty-five percent.

“Get ready folks,” he said. Now, he had to ask for a progress report. “Lieutenant Bishop, Lieutenant Kinsey, give me something.”

“Yes, sir,” said Kinsey, sounding distracted.

“That’s not an answer,” snapped Grisham.

The Gavax’Kol exited lightspeed, less than three hundred kilometres from the Oblasar’s portside and at a similar altitude. Grisham’s eyes took in the details at once – the enemy vessel’s entire facing flank and part of its underside looked as if they’d been pushed inwards by a thousand metres, turning the already misshapen vessel into something uglier, yet no less menacing. Patches of heat glowed dully from the earlier Zorl detonations, and the Avil-Tors had chewed up large areas of the Gavax’Kol’s flesh.

All-in-all, Grisham thought his opponent looked a mess, but not nearly ready to break apart.

“Portside and topside Zorl clusters one to eight: targeted and fired,” said Deneuve. “Avil-Tors set to fully automatic.”

As the gauss slugs pounded into the Gavax’Kol, and the Zorl missiles raced towards their target, the enemy psionic attacks commenced, lighting up the Oblasar’s energy shield and producing an immediate drain on the mind batteries.

“We have to get out of here folks!” said Grisham. “If we can’t inject the shutdown code, there’s no point staying to flex our muscles.” He was reaching over to activate the pursuit hardware, when an exclamation brought his hand to a halt.

“Captain! I’ve located the identifier!” yelled Kinsey. “I’m sending it across to Lieutenant Lopez!”

“Lieutenant Lopez, inject the shutdown code as soon as you’re able!” said Grisham.

Once again, he checked the mind battery reserve gauge. It was dropping like a stone, but not so fast that it would be at zero before Lopez fired off that code.

“Gavax’Kol identifier received,” said Lopez. “Injecting shutdown code.”

Although his warship was still under attack, Grisham felt a surge of elation. By this action, the war against the Ax’Kol might finally be over and trillions of lives, both now and in the future, saved.

“Mind batteries at fifteen percent,” said Adler.

Grisham didn’t know if the shield reserves gave him enough time to watch the demise of his enemy – its onboard systems would take a short while to shut down completely – but certainly he had a few seconds before he’d be obliged to activate the pursuit hardware.

“Any sign of fluctuations from the enemy warship, Lieutenant Adler?”

“Not yet, Captain, but I’m watching.”

The mind batteries dropped below ten percent, and Commander Deneuve launched another wave of Zorl missiles. Meanwhile, the Avil-Tors maintained their continuous bombardment.

“We should think about getting out of here, Captain,” said Deneuve. “The Gavax’Kol looks like it’s happy to slug this one out with us. I guess it has nothing to lose.”

Grisham knew he should take the Oblasar in pursuit of Shuttle 1, but he was fixated. The Gavax’Kol had caused so much misery that it needed someone to witness its demise. Perhaps later, he’d be able to share his vision with the souls in those mind batteries. It would bring them peace.

“Captain, I don’t think the Gavax’Kol is shutting down,” said Adler. “In fact, its hull readings are going up.”

“What does that mean?” said Grisham. He suddenly felt as if this great victory was slipping away. It meant so much to him that he didn’t want to leave, since doing so would be to admit that the shutdown code had failed.

“I don’t know, sir.”

Then, something strange happened. The visible flank of the Gavax’Kol seemed to writhe slightly, and it put Grisham in mind of an oil-covered ocean. He wondered if the shutdown code was starting to have an effect, though the psionic attacks were coming no less frequently than before.

“Two percent on the life batteries,” said Adler.

“Damnit!” said Grisham in fury.

His hand shot out and he activated the pursuit mode. The Oblasar entered lightspeed, emerging almost immediately from its transit, now a billion kilometres from Denivir.

Grisham still didn’t know if the shutdown code was working, but for the moment, he had to pilot his warship away from its lightspeed exit point, in case the Gavax’Kol activated its own pursuit systems. Even a wounded animal could inflict a fatal strike.

The Oblasar raced through the void, while Grisham asked himself how this would all end.

TWENTY-FOUR

Just to be on the safe side, Grisham ordered Lieutenant Adler to ready the Oblasar for lightspeed. If the shutdown code had failed, and the enemy warship maintained its pursuit, he wanted the option to make a double-quick getaway.

“Our lightspeed warmup has commenced, Captain,” said Adler. “The Gavax’Kol tracker is due to update in a few seconds – maybe that’ll give us an idea of what the enemy is up to.”

“The tracker will only tell us if the Gavax’Kol has changed position, Lieutenant,” said Grisham. “I want concrete answers about that shutdown code. Did it fail, or was it just slow to affect the enemy warship?”

“On the occasions when the Oblasar has been shut down, the Kalor drive output started dropping immediately,” said Adler. “With the Gavax’Kol, its hull output went up, rather than down.”

“Ten seconds and the Gavax’Kol’s pursuit calculations will be done,” said Deneuve.

Grisham’s eyes were drawn to the rear feeds, which were still only of darkness. “Lieutenant Adler, what might explain your unexpected readings from the enemy warship?”

“The first idea that jumped into my head was that the Gavax’Kol was tapping into the propulsion systems of those eighty-nine warships it’s absorbed into its hull.”

“Damnit, does that mean we really do have to inject another eighty-nine shutdown codes?” asked Grisham. “We’ve already discussed that idea – all it’ll mean is that the enemy vessel will vanish somewhere into the universe and return in the future.”

“We have the tracker, sir,” Lopez reminded him.

“Yes, but we evidently lack the firepower,” said Grisham.

“The Gavax’Kol is ten seconds overdue on its minimum pursuit time,” said Deneuve.

“Any moment on the tracker,” said Adler. “Let’s see if the updated position gives us some ideas.”

The tracker updated, showing the Gavax’Kol to be approximately three hundred kilometres away from its previous position.

“Those coordinates indicate the enemy vessel is much closer to the planet’s surface!” said Lopez. “Maybe it’s out of power and falling.”

Grisham wanted to feel hope, but now he was more than halfway convinced the shutdown code hadn’t worked.

“Lieutenant Adler, we were talking about your thoughts on the Gavax’Kol’s raised output,” he said.

“Yes, sir. I was about to say I thought it unlikely those other eighty-nine propulsions would be able to generate the output spike reading I took from the enemy hull - I just don’t think they have the combined mass. Not only that, the Gavax’Kol would need internal modifications to tap into each separate propulsion system. It’s had plenty of time to put in those modifications, but why bother? If all that extra power was needed, why not just install it properly instead of adding it slapdash around the hull?”

“You said that was the first idea that jumped into your head,” said Grisham. “What about the second?”

“There is no second idea, sir. Not yet.”

“Well keep thinking,” said Grisham.

“The Gavax’Kol is now forty seconds over its minimum pursuit time,” said Deneuve. “Are we planning a return to Denivir if the next tracker update shows the enemy impacted with the planet?”

“Damn right we are, Commander,” said Grisham.

“But you don’t think we’re going to see that impact?”

“I think either the shutdown code has failed, or the Gavax’Kol has a way to prevent itself being forced offline. I hope I’m wrong.”

“So do I, sir.”

“Twenty seconds and we enter lightspeed,” said Adler.

It was a reminder that Grisham didn’t have long left to make a decision. The tracker’s next update was due in ten seconds, and he watched the tactical screen anxiously.

“Updating in three, two, one.”

The Gavax’Kol was no longer at Denivir. Now, it was 170 thousand kilometres behind the Oblasar, right where Grisham’s warship had exited lightspeed two-and-a-half minutes ago. Lieutenant Lopez spotted it on the sensors at the same moment and shouted a warning.

“Captain, we should allow the Oblasar to enter lightspeed,” said Deneuve.

“That’s exactly what I’m planning to do, Commander.”

In the time it took Grisham to say those few words, the Gavax’Kol executed a psionic displacement that brought it to a stationary position, twenty thousand kilometres ahead of the Oblasar. Immediately, the huge warship began accelerating, clearly intending to match velocities, and the psionic attacks started anew.

Those attacks were not enough to fully deplete the Oblasar’s mind batteries, and the warship entered lightspeed.

“This transit is due to last for one hour, unless cancelled, sir,” said Adler.

Grisham put his head back and exhaled. Every muscle felt tight and his forearms were aching from his death grip around the control bars. It hadn’t yet sunk in that the Gavax’Kol was clearly still operational.

“What did we do wrong, folks?” he asked.

“We did nothing wrong, Captain,” said Deneuve. “We injected the code and it didn’t work. That’s not our fault.”

“We’re back at the beginning again,” said Grisham. He wasn’t a man who wallowed in defeat and he shook his head, as if to deny his last statement. “We didn’t defeat our enemy, but we gave better than we got.”

“And we lived to fight another day, sir.”

“That we did, Commander.” Grisham rose from his seat and rolled his shoulders, feeling the muscles stretch.

The disappointment was still there, but his mind was thinking clearly again, and it was telling him that he was overlooking something.

“So, it appears the shutdown code failed, but it wasn’t ineffective,” he said. “We know that, because the Gavax’Kol’s power output climbed. Not only that, there was a visible response from its hull – I assume you all saw that.”

“Yes, I saw it,” said Lopez. “It wasn’t exactly a shudder, but it was clear there was a physical reaction in the enemy warship.”

“Like a lump of shit squeezing through a diseased intestine,” said Adler.

“Eloquently put, Lieutenant,” said Grisham. “Any theories as to what might have caused such a reaction? Particularly since we injected the shutdown code into the Gavax’Kol’s technological systems, rather than a toxin into its biological mass.”

He felt sure the answer was important, and he paced up and down in the confines of the bridge, but he couldn’t come up with a convincing explanation.

Sitting once more, Grisham checked the tracker, which showed the Gavax’Kol as being located at Denivir, though a text label indicated that the data was no longer reliable. Presumably this was because the Oblasar was at lightspeed and therefore unable to receive further updates. The tracker relied partially on prediction, though Grisham didn’t yet fully understand the underlying mechanics of how it worked.

“What’s the plan from here, Captain?” asked Deneuve. “At the end of this transit, we’ll be in the middle of nowhere. If the tracker updates and shows the Gavax’Kol is still at Denivir, are we returning?”

“I don’t know, Commander,” said Grisham. “If we can’t figure out what happened to the enemy vessel when it was afflicted with the shutdown code, then I’ll probably order a transit to Shesa-2.”

“With a boosted lightspeed multiplier,” said Deneuve.

“Definitely - we’ll need as much time to prepare as possible. Maybe the HF and Kijol fleets can lay a trap, or maybe one of the bright minds we have working for the military will see something we’re missing.”

“We’re the ones who know the hardware, sir,” said Deneuve. “And we’re the ones who know the Ax’Kol best. If there’s a solution, it’ll be one of us who figures it out.”

“I hope so.” Grisham smiled. “I’m not in it for the glory, but we’ve come so far and we’ve accomplished so much. I want us to be the ones who finish the job.”

“Me too,” said Deneuve.

“Captain, you might want to look at this,” said Lieutenant Adler.

“What is it?” asked Grisham, pushing himself out of his seat.

He walked across to Adler’s station, where the officer had a graph filling much of his middle screen. The single line on the graph showed an almost imperceptible downward trend.

“This line represents the reserves of our Kalor drive,” said Adler. He zoomed in on the graph and then poked a thick finger here and there on the screen. “These decreases are where we used the multiplier booster.”

“Not much of a drop,” said Grisham.

“Not in numerical terms,” Adler agreed. “But obviously we want this warship to last until the Human Federation’s own technology surpasses it.”

“What exactly did you call me over for, Lieutenant?”

“Watch when I zoom in on this other area of the graph, sir. You’ll have to lean in close to see it.”

Grisham leaned. For a moment, he didn’t know what he was looking for, and then he saw it. “The Kalor drive reserves went up.”

“Yes, sir, by about a thousandth of one percent.”

“What caused it?”

“According to the timeline on the audit trail—” Adler made a sound, as if he couldn’t quite believe what he was about to say. “Do you remember when you crashed us into the Gavax’Kol?”

“I’d call it more of a tactical collision, Lieutenant.”

“Well that’s when the Kalor drive reserves went up.”

Suddenly, Grisham remembered the bass note at the time of the impact, which had seemed completely out of place to everything else. He added two and two. “The Oblasar’s underside domes began extracting the Gavax’Kol.”

“I’m certain that’s what happened, sir,” said Adler. “We were close enough, for that brief moment, for us to begin drawing energy from the enemy vessel’s biological mass.”

“If only those Ax’Kol bastards would sit still long enough for us to drain them dry,” said Lieutenant Kinsey.

“There’s enough mass in the Gavax’Kol to refill the Oblasar’s Kalor drive a dozen times over,” said Adler. “So we’d need to figure out a way to discharge the excess – perhaps it’s possible to channel it into the Repulsor and fire it out that way.”

“Like Lieutenant Kinsey said, the Gavax’Kol won’t obligingly hold in one place while we extract it,” said Grisham.

“I know that, sir – this is just the beginning of an idea. I’m sure the Repulsor knocked the Gavax’Kol offline for a short time, and that would give us an opportunity to—”

Grisham put his hand on the other man’s shoulder. “I’m glad you made this discovery, Lieutenant. It’s got me thinking about something else.”

“What something else?”

“When I first boarded the Oblasar, I spoke to the Edran artifact for a time. In the beginning, it was reluctant to extract the Urzox, but I managed to persuade it. The artifact told me there was insufficient mass to fully replenish the Kalor drive, and then it said something else. I can remember it clearly.”

“What did it say?” asked Adler. By now, the other members of the crew were all looking.

“It might turn out to be nothing, but the Edran told me that the Oblasar would become almost fully operational, even with the limited power.”

Deneuve immediately spotted what it was that had Grisham so interested. “Almost fully operational,” she said. “Not fully operational.”

“I wonder if there’s something else the Oblasar would be capable of, if it were fully operational,” said Grisham.

“Let’s extract the Gavax’Kol and find out,” said Bishop.

“We won’t need to extract the Gavax’Kol, Lieutenant,” said Grisham. “Not when there’s a perfectly viable source of biological material plastered across half of Loxor’s moon.”

“The Evoldor,” said Bishop in understanding.

“Exactly,” said Grisham. “Maybe we should check it out, and since we’re about to top up our Kalor drive to maximum, we can afford to be wasteful with our current reserves.”

Grisham returned to his seat with a tingling excitement and thoughts of a return to Denivir currently gone from his mind. The moment he was back at the command console, he gave the order for Lieutenant Adler to return the Oblasar to local space.

TWENTY-FIVE

Lieutenants Lopez and Bishop went through the motions of running the local area scans, but Grisham wasn’t paying too much attention. What had caught his eye, was the now-updated tracker, which indicated the Gavax’Kol was no longer anywhere near Denivir. The enemy warship had entered lightspeed and it had travelled a considerable distance.

“Lieutenant Lopez, as soon as you’re done with the local area scans, I want you to watch the updates on the tracker. It’s vital we discover where the Gavax’Kol is going.”

The scans were done quickly and Lopez soon had an answer for Grisham.

“The Gavax’Kol is heading towards our current location, Captain.”

“Lieutenant Adler – ready us for lightspeed again. Any destination, and set a journey time of at least one hour,” said Grisham at once. He had another thought. “Correction - set a journey time of one hour, but with the multiplier boost at seventy-five percent. Let’s see if the Gavax’Kol is willing to invest the extra energy required to come after us.”

“Yes, sir, that’s set,” Adler confirmed. “Two-point-five minutes.”

“Lieutenant Lopez, do you have enough data to predict when the Gavax’Kol will arrive here?” asked Grisham.

“For that I will need to watch the tracker updates, Captain.”

“There’ll only be one more update before we enter lightspeed.”

“That may be enough, sir.”

“I hope so - I’d really like to know if the enemy vessel will exit lightspeed before we depart,” said Grisham.

“Gut feel tells me that isn’t going to happen, sir - gut feel, along with observation of the Exetran’s behaviour and limitations when it was pursuing us.”

Grisham tried not to let his anger show at the memories. During the Exetran’s long-running pursuit of both the Voltran and the Urzox, the enemy vessel had always been many minutes behind. However, that was when the corrupted Andos artifact was manipulating Grisham into hunting for the Oblasar, and cloaking many truths in the shadows. The upshot was, the limitations of the Ax’Kol’s lightspeed pursuit methods remained unclear.

However, on this occasion, the Oblasar entered lightspeed without interference. Lieutenant Lopez used the data from the final tracker update before departure to predict that the Gavax’Kol would have arrived between five and seven minutes later.

“That doesn’t give us much leeway,” said Grisham.

“Maybe the enemy warship is using a modified version of the pursuit technology to predict our lightspeed destination,” said Lieutenant Adler.

Grisham had a different idea. “What if the Gavax’Kol has always had the tracking facility installed, but now it can use it against the Oblasar because of the security tier upgrade we just underwent?”

“That won’t—" Adler stopped himself and his face twisted in thought. “You could be right - when the security tier updates were made to our systems, it’s almost certain the tracker was installed at the same time.”

“Would a lower-tier vessel be able to track a higher tier vessel?” asked Bishop.

“Lower tier or not, the Gavax’Kol was constructed as a primary warship,” said Grisham. “I’m sure it would be permitted to use the tracking facilities.”

“So there’s our answer, then,” said Adler. “We can follow the Gavax’Kol, and the Gavax’Kol can follow us.”

“Except at the moment, we’re the ones doing the running away,” said Grisham. He pondered the matter for a few moments. “So the Gavax’Kol now appears to be in pursuit of the Oblasar, which is either a good or a bad thing, depending on how you look at it.”

“You’ve raised the question there yourself,” said Deneuve. “Why would the Gavax’Kol want to chase us down when it evidently knows the location of several populated worlds? The enemy have no need to confront us again, because they have nothing to gain by it. And since our kill switch didn’t work, we’re unlikely to come out on top in another engagement anyway.”

“I think we’ve angered the Gavax’Kol artifact,” said Grisham. “Or stirred up whatever the equivalent emotion is in a half-billion-year-old stone sphere.”

“The artifact didn’t get to be that old by endlessly pursuing every spaceship that landed a missile on it, sir,” said Adler.

“We don’t know that,” said Grisham. “Besides, this war against humanity has cost the Gavax’Kol dearly. Right now, a rational enemy would take whatever was easily available and move on, but what if the artifact isn’t rational? What if it’s never been pushed this far, and now all it wants is revenge?”

“You know the artifacts better than any of us, Captain,” said Deneuve. “It’s your head they were in.”

For a time in the past, Grisham had been pulled this way and that by the Andos and the Edran and perhaps, for all he knew, some of the other artifacts too. They’d manipulated him to do their bidding, and they’d been good at it too. However, now that his mind was clear, Grisham was left with no more than speculation about the motivations of these alien spheres.

“I didn’t learn as much as I’d like,” he said at last.

“That means we’re no closer to knowing our enemy than we were before,” said Lopez.

“I disagree, Lieutenant,” said Grisham. “The current behaviour of the Gavax’Kol is absolutely consistent with a hunt for revenge. While that lasts, we have to make it work in our favour.”

Grisham sat quietly in thought for a time. Having been himself manipulated by alien artifacts, now he had the opportunity to turn the tables and start tugging on the Gavax’Kol’s strings. His control was tenuous at best – if the enemy vessel ended its pursuit and started heading for a human or Kijol world, Grisham would be forced to confront it. Once he started reacting to his opponent, his control would be gone.

The primary destination for the moment remained the Evoldor’s wreckage. A fully replenished Kalor drive would offer much greater flexibility, allowing the Oblasar to make every lightspeed transit with its multiplier boost slider dragged all the way into the red zone. The comms, too, could be accelerated, though Grisham and his crew hadn’t yet extensively tested them.

While faster comms were always a good thing, making best use of them would require foresight and planning. After all, the human and Kijol fleets were unable to travel from place to place at anything like the Oblasar’s velocity.

As he was sitting, with his mind churning through all the possibilities, Grisham hit on a possible reason why the shutdown code hadn’t worked.

“Lieutenant Adler,” he said. “What would happen if a shutdown code was injected into our Kalor drive at the same time as we were extracting the wreckage of the Evoldor?”

“I—” Adler started. “You’re really talking about the Gavax’Kol here.”

“Yes. What would happen?”

“Well, the shutdown code invades the control systems. Those control systems – the hardware side of them at least – are what hold the atomic structure of the drive in the state required for it to generate the necessary energy to propel a trillion ton—”

“And the shutdown code reduces the power output to zero,” Grisham interrupted.

“Not zero, sir – pretty damn far from zero, in fact. On the two occasions we’ve been shut down, our Kalor drive has still been generating energy – albeit at a much-reduced level – but it’s energy in a form that the other onboard systems can’t utilise.”

“Back to the original question – what would happen in a situation where a warship was simultaneously extracting energy, while also being infected with a shutdown code?”

“You’re asking me to make a guess on technology I’m hardly familiar with, Captain, but you know that anyway,” said Adler. “I reckon the extraction would channel enough energy into the Kalor drive to keep it running, regardless of the shutdown code.”

“So, if the Gavax’Kol began extracting itself, then it would be able to function even after we injected the shutdown code?” said Grisham.

“Yes, sir,” said Adler. “And that would explain the rippling effect we saw on the enemy vessel’s hull shortly after we fed it the code. Damn, but the Gavax’Kol would need to extract itself at a monumental rate in order to keep itself operational.”

“Does this mean the enemy warship is effectively dying?” asked Lieutenant Bishop.

“I think it does,” said Adler.

Grisham couldn’t let his earlier elation return, since he’d spotted a problem - a big problem. “We saw the Gavax’Kol extract all the life from Denivir,” he said. “The enemy isn’t about to give up and let death happen – it’s going to call in its warships and extract them, but most of all, it’s going to head from planet to planet and extract those too. Only this time, there’ll be no chance to defend – the Gavax’Kol will exit lightspeed, kill everything to feed its own existence, and then head to the next location. Maybe it’ll run out of targets and be forced to shut down, or maybe it already has a list of planets a million long that it planned to visit in the future.”

“If all this is true, then the Gavax’Kol isn’t going to pursue us for long,” said Bishop. “I doubt the enemy will allow itself to die, just in order to destroy the Oblasar.”

Grisham sat back in his seat. He was sure his guess about the Gavax’Kol effectively having to consume itself was correct and, although Lieutenant Adler believed the enemy vessel would require a huge power influx to keep its propulsion systems running, it had plenty of flesh available.

Perhaps for a time, the Gavax’Kol would continue its pursuit of the Oblasar, knowing that planets were available for extraction whenever they were required. On that basis, the pursuit might conceivably go on for a long time, only being interrupted when the enemy warship needed a top up of energy, before resuming once more.

Shaking his head as he tried to make sense of it all, Grisham asked how he could take advantage. Unfortunately, he didn’t yet know enough to figure that one out. Once the Oblasar exited lightspeed, the tracker would provide another glimpse into the enemy behaviour. Then, perhaps, he’d be better placed to make plans.

Although this current transit was a welcome break from the recent conflict, Grisham knew he couldn’t sit here for another forty minutes until the journey ended.

“Lieutenant Adler, cancel this transit,” he said. “Let’s find out if the Gavax’Kol is so desperate to destroy us that it’ll drain the required extra from its Kalor drive.”

“Yes, sir, cancelling the transit.”

The background hum of the Oblasar’s engines fell momentarily quiet and the warship entered local space. As expected, the feeds showed little of interest.

“The next tracker update is due in eighty seconds, sir,” said Adler.

“More than enough time to complete the local area scans,” said Grisham.

While his sensor team got on with the scans, he called up the navigational system and experimented with the multiplier boost. With the double override in place, and the boost slider at seventy-five percent, the journey to Loxor was a little under three-point-five hours. Moving the slider to seventy-six percent or higher produced the same unknown outcome as before.

With his brief checks done, Grisham turned his attention to the tracker, to see what the next update would show. Right on time, the position of the Gavax’Kol changed and straightaway, he could see that the enemy warship was deviating from its pursuit.

“Damnit,” Grisham cursed. “Where’s it going, Lieutenant Lopez, and at what kind of multiplier?”

“I’ll need at least one more update before I can tell you, sir. As you’ve already guessed, the Gavax’Kol is not heading for our current location.”

Grisham waited in agitation for the tracker. While he didn’t yet believe his control over the situation had gone, he’d hoped the Gavax’Kol would at least pursue the Oblasar for a time, in order that he could extract the energy from the wrecked Evoldor without having to worry about humanity or the Kijol losing another populated world.

The tracker updated again, and Lopez was quiet for a moment as she studied the charts.

“I’m seventy-five percent sure the enemy is heading to Shesa-2, Captain.”

“At what kind of multiplier?”

“I’ll need one more tracker update to be sure.”

Grisham could have insisted that Lopez provide him with a guess, but he did not. He sat for another two minutes, until the tracker updated again.

“Unless the Gavax’Kol exits lightspeed and changes its heading, it’s definitely heading for Shesa-2, sir.”

Shesa-2: population, approximately seventy-one billion people.

“How long before it gets there?”

“Eleven hours, sir, give or take thirty minutes.”

“We can’t let the enemy make it to the planet, Captain,” said Deneuve. “We’ve injected the shutdown code and that means the Oblasar is now as expendable as every other warship in the fleet. Maybe we should commit to another engagement, and hope we inflict enough damage that the enemy is unable to recover.”

“It may come to that, Commander,” said Grisham. “However, having come all this way against the Ax’Kol, I’d rather have something up my sleeve to tip the odds in our favour.”

“Such as what, sir?”

“I’ll think on it,” said Grisham.

He turned in his seat. “Lieutenant Lopez, you told me the comms systems can send a boosted transmission.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Send two identical transmissions to Senator Maynard, letting him know what’s heading his way. What he does with the information is up to him. The first transmission goes with a seventy-five percent setting on the overridden booster. That should see it reach its destination in a hundred minutes or so. For the second transmission, send it with the override at maximum.”

“Yes, sir. We won’t receive any kind of response – a return comm amplified by current HF hardware will take months to reach us out here.”

“I know,” said Grisham. “We’ll have done our bit by sending the warning.”

“The first comm is sent, Captain,” said Lopez a few moment later. “And there goes the second.”

“Was there any appreciable draw on our Kalor drive, Lieutenant Adler?”

“Yes, sir – movement at the fourth decimal place.”

“That’s a big hit for a comm.”

“And a warning about what’s likely to happen if we attempt a lightspeed transit with that boost slider at maximum.”

“What’s the plan, Captain?” asked Deneuve.

“We’re heading to Loxor, Commander. A double-override seventy-five percent multiplier boost gives us a journey time of three-point-five hours. We have plenty of time to extract the energy we need from the Evoldor. After that, a multiplier-boosted journey to Shesa-2 should only take a few minutes.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Lieutenant Adler, set a course for Loxor, with the booster at seventy-five percent.”

“Yes, sir, the course is set.”

The tracker updated twice more during the Oblasar’s lightspeed warmup, and the Gavax’Kol showed no deviation. Any doubt about the enemy’s target was now gone. The Gavax’Kol was heading to Shesa-2 and when it arrived, there’d be no way to prevent it from wiping out the planet, even if the Oblasar got there first.

TWENTY-SIX

Under different circumstances, a three-point-five hour lightspeed transit would have been tolerable – an opportunity for Grisham to pay the replicator a visit, and to stretch his legs. This time, short as it was, the transit was a yawning chasm between where he was now and where he wanted to be.

Even so, he rose from his seat and headed towards the mess area. Grisham’s mouth was dry and his last meal seemed like it was days ago.

Sergeant Maxwell was in the mess, along with every member of his squad. It wasn’t as if they had much else to do. The soldiers sensed Grisham’s agitation and they waited expectantly for news. After all, they hadn’t been updated since their escape from Denivir.

Grisham wasn’t in the mood for talking, but the soldiers deserved to know what was happening. While he was drinking an over-sweetened coffee and eating his cheeseburger, he explained the current situation. Then, he took his leave and returned to the bridge, where he excused Commander Deneuve and Lieutenant Bishop for a short break.

When the journey timer fell below an hour, the crew were all back on the bridge and ready. This was going to be the longest hour ever, Grisham was sure, and when it was over, its gold medal position would surely be rapidly superseded by the subsequent journey from Loxor to Shesa-2.

“Did anyone ever find out what happened to the Loxor evacuation shuttles?” asked Lieutenant Kinsey, out of the blue.

“There isn’t a planet ready to house those people yet, so they were sent to a few different locations,” said Commander Deneuve. “Given the current circumstances, they might not find a home for a long time. Maybe not ever.”

“The Senate should probably think about sending one of those big colonisation vessels to join them,” said Adler. “At the rate things are going, it might be best if some of the evac shuttles took off into lightspeed for a few years, and looked for somewhere new to settle.”

“Those shuttles were stripped out so they could accommodate extra people,” said Deneuve gloomily. “I don’t know how long they’ll be able to support their passengers, but it won’t be anything more than a few months.”

“Four of the transports went to Gilias,” mused Grisham.

“Yes, sir. They’re carrying about five billion people between them.” Deneuve stared intently at Grisham. “You’re thinking of something.”

“If I am, I’m not ready to share it yet,” said Grisham.

He called up the star charts and zoomed in on Gilias. The planet had once been a staging post, back in the days when lightspeed multipliers were a fraction of what they were now. Spaceships would stop at the planet for resupply or repair, before resuming their journey. The facilities on Gilias were long ago made redundant by the advancement of technology, but they hadn’t been dismantled.

For a time, Grisham stared at the chart and ran a few ideas through his head. In the seat adjacent, Commander Deneuve was curious, though she didn’t ask him any more questions.

“Ten minutes and we re-enter local space!” said Adler.

“I’m sure I don’t need to spell out the plan, folks,” said Grisham. “The moment we exit lightspeed, I’ll pilot the Oblasar towards Loxor’s moon. Lieutenant Lopez, I want you to send additional transmissions to Senator Maynard, letting him know we’re intending to replenish our Kalor drive.”

“And should I tell him we’re heading straight on to Shesa-2 after that?”

“Not yet, Lieutenant. We’ll send an additional transmission before we exit the Altarn-4 system.”

“You’ve got something on your mind, sir,” said Adler. “A plan.”

“Yes,” Grisham agreed. “I don’t know if it’s viable yet, so I’m keeping my mouth closed.”

In truth, the viability of the plan relied on two things. Firstly, the words of the Edran. Almost fully operational. In Grisham’s mind, the Oblasar was currently not at one hundred percent of its fighting capability, and he had a feeling – more of a hope, perhaps – that he knew what it was missing.

Secondly, the plan relied on the Gavax’Kol being able to track the Oblasar. If it could not, then the plan was a nonstarter.

Suddenly itching to find out, Grisham kept his eye on the lightspeed timer. When the digits hit zero, the Oblasar entered local space.

“Commencing local area scans,” said Bishop.

“Searching for Loxor and its moon,” added Lopez. “Done - I’ve got a sensor lock on both.”

Grisham had hoped never to come here again. The ruin inflicted by the Ax’Kol was terrible to see, and even from the Oblasar’s current quarter-million-kilometre distance, the wounds on the planet’s surface were vivid, and the smoke from the devastated cities hadn’t nearly dispersed. Most prominent of all were the vast craters formed by the multiple impacts of both Human Federation and Ax’Kol warships.

Hauling his attention away, Grisham stared at the feed of the planet’s moon. The satellite was fully visible and at the same approximate distance as the planet. Having been struck by a trillion-ton object travelling at almost the speed of light, the moon’s surface was extensively cracked. Scans performed by Lopez and Bishop before the Oblasar’s last departure suggested the moon was breaking up, and, from here, an immense trail of rocky debris was clearly visible.

“Let’s get this done,” said Grisham, fighting to control both his sadness and his anger.

“The wreckage of the Evoldor is on the blind side of the moon, Captain,” said Lopez. “The journey time is four minutes and twenty seconds at our maximum sub-light velocity.”

“Let’s not go to lightspeed,” said Grisham.

He pushed the control bars as far as they’d go, and the Oblasar accelerated towards the shattered moon. Lieutenant Lopez added an overlay to the tactical, which showed the most efficient course to the Evoldor.

Soon, the Oblasar was travelling at its sub-light maximum and Grisham allowed the vessel to coast. The moon grew steadily larger on the forward feeds, likewise the planet, which was most visible on the starboard feeds.

“The tracker updated,” said Lopez. “The Gavax’Kol is still heading for Shesa-2 and at the same lightspeed multiplier as before.”

Grisham didn’t want the enemy to make any unpredictable changes, so for the moment, he was content to hear there was no deviation. He kept his gaze on the forward feeds, since the slowly unfolding fate of Loxor’s moon made it hard to take his eyes away.

“That’s a lot of debris,” said Adler.

Several massive plates of stone – the largest being two hundred kilometres across - had become detached from the moon’s surface, though they continued to travel at the same velocity and on the same orbital track. In addition to these slabs were countless smaller pieces of rock which also followed the moon in a thick trail.

The Oblasar’s detection systems began to identify yet more rubble, which had drifted away, and which might present a threat if the warship impacted with some of the larger pieces and at a high enough velocity.

Although Grisham was in a hurry, he needed his spaceship to be in one piece when it came up against the Gavax’Kol. Consequently, he adjusted course, in order to avoid the worst of the debris, and reduced velocity so that he’d have more time to avoid potential impacts.

The journey took three minutes longer than predicted, but eventually, the Evoldor came up on the underside feeds. Grisham’s memories of the destruction had blurred some of its worst excesses. The remains of the Ax’Kol warship were flattened across the bottom of the huge crater formed by its impact, and the detonations of hundreds of Zorl missiles – launched to make absolutely sure the enemy vessel would be unable to heal itself – had charred the remains almost beyond recognition.

“Is there anything left to extract?” asked Bishop.

Grisham didn’t commit to an answer, though he admitted to himself he was worried.

“I’ll take us down into the crater,” he said.

Most of the rubble which had broken from the surface was following directly behind the Loxor moon, and on this side, there wasn’t much to avoid. Nevertheless, Grisham kept a close eye on the sensors and the tactical as he brought the Oblasar ever closer towards the surface.

The crater was vast, and it swallowed up the warship. Grisham couldn’t help but marvel at this example of what could happen when technology asserted itself over the universe.

“The range on the extraction domes wasn’t large,” said Commander Deneuve.

“I know - we’re going in close,” said Grisham.

In terms of its original dimensions and mass, the Evoldor hadn’t been much different to the Oblasar. Now, with the Ax’Kol warship being spread across the crater, it was hard to picture how the two vessels had once been comparable.

When the undersides of the Oblasar were only a few kilometres above the wreckage, the extraction process began automatically. Grisham felt the droning bass of it through his feet, through the metal of his chair, and through his grip on the control bars.

“What’s happening with our Kalor drive, Lieutenant Adler?”

“Nothing yet, sir. No, wait, our reserve gauge is climbing!”

“And the Repulsor came straight back online,” said Deneuve.

Grisham smiled thinly at this double success. “How long until our Kalor reserves are full?”

“It’s hard to be sure,” said Adler. “The increase isn’t happening at a steady rate. I wonder if some of the wreckage is so badly burned it’s harder to extract the energy from it.”

Casting his mind back to the extraction of the Urzox, Grisham remembered the process hadn’t taken long to finish, though he’d been otherwise distracted at the time and hadn’t taken note of the specifics.

“Take a guess,” he said.

“We’re already at forty percent and climbing, sir,” said Adler. “Another ten minutes or so and the Kalor drive reserve will be at one hundred percent, assuming there are no significant fluctuations between now and then.”

“There’s still no change in the Gavax’Kol’s heading, Captain,” said Lopez. “It’s heading die-straight for Shesa-2.”

“Acknowledged.”

Although he wasn’t expecting trouble, Grisham kept a close watch on the sensors. After the engagement at Loxor, when he and his crew had defeated the attacking fleet, other enemy warships – including the Evoldor – had continued to arrive piecemeal, offering Commander Deneuve some gratifying target practice. Grisham was wary that other Ax’Kol vessels might have subsequently entered the Altarn-4 system, though it was doubtful they’d be much of a threat to the Oblasar.

As the Kalor drive reserve gauge climbed, Grisham kept a close eye on the warship’s control menus, to see if any new options would unlock and become available. When the gauge hit seventy-five percent, what he was hoping for became reality.

“We’re done, Captain,” said Adler a short time later. “The Kalor drive is at one hundred percent.”

Grisham piloted the Oblasar out of the crater. The wreckage of the Evoldor was now even more shrivelled up, and he guessed maybe a quarter to a third of its mass had been extracted into the Kalor drive. Having terrorised worlds for hundreds of millions of years, the Ax’Kol warship was now a pathetic sight. As he stared at the remains of the warship, Grisham hardly felt much of anything.

Once he’d piloted the Oblasar far from the moon, Grisham thought it was time to tell his crew of his plans.

“We now have an override facility on the Repulsor,” he said.

“Holy crap, you’re shitting me?” said Adler. “The Repulsor is already incredible – and now you tell me we can increase its output?”

Grisham had the weapons panel up on his screen. Unlike the propulsion and comms booster, the Repulsor only had three different settings, the lowest of which had inflicted significant harm to the enemy on each discharge.

“Three levels of pain,” he said. “We’re going to set the weapon to maximum and find out how the Gavax’Kol reacts to a level 3 shot in the face.”

“Is that going to be safe?” asked Adler, his tones still full of awe. “Maybe we should try the middle setting, just in case something happens to the Oblasar.”

“Why include three output levels if one of them is going to tear the host warship apart?” asked Grisham.

“Fine, let’s go with output level three,” said Adler.

“You didn’t take much convincing,” Bishop observed.

“If I’m going to die, I might as well go out with a bang,” said Adler. “A big bang.”

“You were about to tell us the plan, Captain,” said Deneuve.

Grisham nodded, suddenly and acutely aware exactly what he was about to suggest. He took a breath and then he talked.

TWENTY-SEVEN

“When we left Denivir, the Gavax’Kol followed us through our first transit,” said Grisham. “From that, we believe the enemy vessel is able to track the Oblasar.”

“Except the artifact’s thirst for revenge didn’t extend beyond following us that single time,” said Deneuve.

“I don’t doubt the Gavax’Kol’s primary goal is to preserve its own miserable existence,” said Grisham. “However, I also believe that destroying the Oblasar is second on the enemy’s to-do list. It’s just that right now, the Gavax’Kol’s been hurt and it’s playing it safe by heading for Shesa-2. Once it’s sucked the life out of everything on the planet, I’m sure it’ll come hunting for us again.”

“There’s a lot of supposition in what you’re saying, Captain,” said Lopez.

“And I’m not done with it yet, Lieutenant. What if we offered the Gavax’Kol something it couldn’t refuse? What if we gave it a chance to both destroy the Oblasar, and to extract the life it needs, all on one place? The enemy would surely take that chance.”

“All we need to do is head for Shesa-2,” said Lieutenant Kinsey.

“If the Gavax’Kol exits lightspeed anywhere close to the planet, it’ll wipe out everything before we have a chance to stop it happening,” said Grisham. “The place we should look to engage is Gilias.”

“Using those evacuation transports as bait,” said Deneuve, nodding like everything was falling into place in her head.

“The thought of putting those people in such extreme danger…well, you’ll appreciate it sits less than easy with me,” said Grisham. “But Shesa-2 isn’t mobile like those evacuation transports. The planet is a helpless target.”

“What makes you believe the Gavax’Kol will know we’re with the transports?” asked Bishop.

“The Gavax’Kol finds life, Lieutenant. If it didn’t, its Kalor drive would have run dry a long time ago, leaving the artifact to drift for an eternity.”

“I don’t like the idea of using those transports any more than you do, but your plan might work, Captain,” said Deneuve. “Once we exit lightspeed, the Gavax’Kol’s tracker will tell it our location. Perhaps then, the artifact will perform a telepathic sweep, or whatever it does, thinking we’re at a populated world.”

“And it’ll sense the life on those transports,” said Grisham. “Five billion people doesn’t compare to the seventy-one billion on Shesa-2, but the planet isn’t going anywhere. The chance to combine an attack on the Oblasar while also draining the life out of all those people might be too much to resist.”

“What if it isn’t too much to resist, sir?” asked Lopez. “What if the Gavax’Kol heads straight past Gilias and on to Shesa-2?”

“We’ll know by watching the tracker,” said Grisham. “I’ve already worked this out – if the Gavax’Kol doesn’t take the bait, we can still beat it to Shesa-2 by cranking up our lightspeed multiplier.”

“I can see an issue with your plan, sir,” said Deneuve, “Though it’s one I’m sure you’re already aware of.”

“Tell me.”

“If we successfully lure the Gavax’Kol to Gilias and we lose the battle, then we’ve effectively led the enemy to five billion of our people who might have otherwise escaped.” Deneuve raised a hand to stop Grisham from interrupting. “I know we could say that those people would have eventually been tracked down and killed anyway, but—” She shrugged. “That doesn’t mean we should be the ones who pick and choose the moment of their deaths.”

“You’re right, Commander, this was something I’d already thought about,” said Grisham. “If we screw up and those people die, but we somehow survive, we’re going to be left with a burden none of us can handle.” He shook his head slowly. “But I think we can do this. With the right timing, those shuttles could enter lightspeed before the Gavax’Kol has a chance to target them with its psionics. Plus, we’re looking to engage with the enemy in space – those shuttles aren’t confined to a planet, in the same way as the people on Shesa-2.”

“I think we should do this,” said Lieutenant Adler.

“As it happens, so do I,” said Deneuve. “Are you planning to send advance notice to Senator Maynard, sir?”

“Yes, Commander. I’m not going to hide from this, and regardless of what the Senator thinks about the wisdom or otherwise of my decision, I don’t think he’ll try to stop us.”

“His comm wouldn’t reach us in time anyway, sir,” said Bishop.

“I’m aware of that too, Lieutenant.”

“Should I send the comm, sir?” asked Lopez.

“Do it,” said Grisham. “The same way as before – one at seventy-five percent amplification and one at maximum.”

“Yes, sir.”

“What about the spaceships at Gilias, sir?” asked Deneuve. “Are you going to tell them about the plan?”

“I don’t know, Commander. I’ll decide when we get there,” said Grisham. “Lieutenant Adler, set the propulsion multiplier boost to seventy-five percent and ready the Oblasar for lightspeed - we’re heading to Gilias. Land us right on the doorstep.”

“Yes, sir, the doorstep it is. Destination set, warmup commenced. The travel time is estimated at eleven minutes.”

“And how long before the Gavax’Kol reaches Shesa-2?” Grisham asked.

“I was about to tell you seven hours, Captain, but the latest tracker update is showing an expected arrival time of just two hours,” said Lopez.

“The enemy vessel increased its multiplier,” said Grisham.

“Yes, sir.”

“There’s still time to reach Gilias, and then transit to Shesa-2 if the Gavax’Kol doesn’t divert,” said Grisham.

“Yes, sir, but we’re running out of wiggle room.”

“I’d sooner wait ten minutes for my enemy than a hundred,” said Adler.

“I agree,” said Grisham.

Despite his bold words, he felt a creeping worry that if the Gavax’Kol had increased its lightspeed multiplier once, there was nothing stopping it doing so again. There wasn’t anything Grisham could do to influence the Gavax’Kol – at least not until the Oblasar arrived at Gilias, so he told himself to stop thinking about it.

The lightspeed warmup finished and the Oblasar exited the Altarn-4 system. An eleven-minute journey should’ve been a breeze to endure, but Grisham felt as though he was in a dentist’s waiting room, with a dozen root canal treatments ahead of him. Staring at his centre console screen, he refused to let his eyes be drawn to the journey timer.

“Two minutes and we exit lightspeed!” said Adler.

“I’d like a comm channel to the officer in charge of those evacuation shuttles as soon after our arrival as possible,” said Grisham.

“Yes, sir, I’ll get straight on it when we exit lightspeed,” said Bishop.

The journey entered its final minute. Grisham had visited Gilias once, long ago, but try as he might, he couldn’t picture the facility in his head, other than as an expanse of grey.

“Entering local space,” said Adler. “Waiting on the next tracker update.”

“Commencing local scans,” said Lopez.

“Running sensor sweep,” said Bishop. “I’ve located two open receptors – the shuttles Lander and Homeward Bound are within the sweep range. They have an escort of one – the cruiser No Way Back. I’m attempting contact.”

The irony of the Homeward Bound being used to evacuate people from their homes wasn’t lost on Grisham, nor was the name of the cruiser. It seemed like a bad omen and he tried not to think about it. Instead, he watched the sensors, while holding the Oblasar in place.

Gilias was already on the forward feeds, at a distance of almost fifty thousand kilometres. Everything was grey like Grisham remembered it. The surface was pocked stone, with few signs of upheaval. In a universe seemingly filled with grey, Gilias fitted right in.

“Local scans complete,” said Lopez. “No threats detected. I’ve located the surface facility and zoomed in the forward feeds.”

Immediately, Grisham saw the surface facility, which comprised a landing field – likely huge in its day, but now barely large enough to accommodate a single Nexus heavy – along with a few hundred square and rectangular structures, mostly clustered south of the landing area. Even from so far away, Grisham could see how outdated everything was.

“Have you made contact with the cruiser yet, Lieutenant Bishop?” As Grisham asked the question, the Gavax’Kol tracker updated. The enemy vessel hadn’t deviated from its course towards Shesa-2.

“Yes, Captain. The comms officer I was speaking to sounded jumpy, but now I have Captain Lorn Derno on the comms – he’s the commanding officer of the No Way Back. I haven’t told him why we’re here - should I put him on the bridge speakers?”

Grisham wavered between answers. If he came clean with Captain Derno, the officer might well – and understandably – order the two shuttles into lightspeed. On the other hand, keeping Derno in the dark, while a shitty thing to do, increased the chances of Grisham’s plan working.

“I don’t want to speak with anyone on the No Way Back,” said Grisham. “Not yet. Inform Captain Derno I’m the primary officer and order him to provide us with access to the local battle network.”

“What reason should I give for us being here, Captain? It won’t take a genius to guess that a fifteen-klick warship like the Oblasar isn’t at Gilias to run a resource scan of the planet’s surface.”

“Make something up,” said Grisham. “Tell him we’re awaiting orders of our own, and that coming to Gilias allows us to watch out for the shuttles at the same time.”

“Yes, sir,” said Bishop. “I’ll do what I can to convince him.”

With little else to do, Grisham waited for the outcome of Bishop’s conversation. Meanwhile, Lieutenant Lopez ran a series of scans across an increasingly large volume of the surrounding space. Soon, she located the cruiser and the two shuttles – they were approximately a hundred thousand kilometres away and at a similar altitude to the Oblasar.

“Sir, Captain Derno won’t accept your primacy, until he receives confirmatory orders. He’s requested those orders, but the comm travel time makes it certain he won’t receive a response before it’ll be clear whether or not the Gavax’Kol is coming to Gilias,” said Bishop.

“What about adding us to the local battle network?” asked Grisham. “If the Gavax’Kol shows up somewhere close to those shuttles, I’d like to have access to their sensor data.”

“We’ll receive an invitation in a few moments, sir.”

“There’s been another tracker update,” said Adler. “The Gavax’Kol has not deviated from its course.”

It was bad news, but Grisham knew he had to remain patient for a time. “The enemy needs to exit lightspeed in order for their Oblasar tracker to update,” he said.

“We’re eleven minutes from Shesa-2 if we use a seventy-five percent override, Captain,” said Adler. “Plus the lightspeed warmup time, and some extra time for leeway. I’d advise we leave Gilias when the Gavax’Kol is fifteen minutes or more from its current destination.”

“So about eighty-five minutes from now,” said Grisham.

“Yes, sir. Of course, if the Gavax’Kol increases its lightspeed multiplier again—”

“I know,” said Grisham. “We can’t control every variable.”

“We’ve been added to the local battle network, Captain,” said Bishop. “The only surprise is that there’s a new-gen Tibor class – the Fearsome – also in the escort. It’s just behind the planet’s cusp, so it wasn’t picked up in the receptor sweep.”

Grisham didn’t give the tactical any more than a glance. “I’m going to launch another one of our transports,” he said. “Commander Deneuve, you’ll set it as a hostile target, and I’ll instruct it to enter a lightspeed transit towards those evac shuttles. I’d like to hold the Oblasar here, but I’d also like the option to activate the pursuit hardware if the Gavax’Kol exits lightspeed somewhere inconvenient.”

“I’ll get on the comms again, and let Captain Derno know we’re sending over a shuttle,” said Bishop. He gave a short laugh. “I’ll have to come up with a bullshit reason to explain why we’re doing it.”

“I’m sure you’ll think of something,” said Grisham.

He ordered his chosen shuttle to exit its bay and then waited for Commander Deneuve to confirm it was set as a hostile target. When that was done, he instructed the transport to commence a lightspeed warmup, with its destination set as a few hundred kilometres from one of the evacuation shuttles.

The tracker updated four more times during the eight-minute warmup, and each one told the same story – the Gavax’Kol was on its way to Shesa-2. Grisham watched each update with the same sense of trepidation. He knew that if the enemy vessel came to Gilias and destroyed the evacuation shuttles before he could react, then he’d have royally screwed up, and would be responsible for the deaths, not just of a handful of people, but billions of the Human Federation’s citizens.

Part of Grisham wanted the Gavax’Kol to continue on its journey to Shesa-2 – that way, whatever happened, it wouldn’t be his fault. However, he’d learned that success often depended on making the hard decisions, and he was absolutely committed to his plan. If it failed, he’d deal with the consequences.

The shuttle completed its short lightspeed journey, and the Oblasar’s pursuit hardware recorded the transit. From here on, Grisham could order his warship to travel almost instantaneously to the transport’s location.

With all possible preparations completed, Grisham readied himself for a wait.

TWENTY-EIGHT

The minutes went by and the tracker updated at its scheduled intervals. By the time the Gavax’Kol was only thirty minutes from Shesa-2, Grisham was starting to think his plan had failed, and that the enemy artifact was completely focused on its current destination, such that the Oblasar, plus five billion lives, weren’t enough of a lure.

Grisham’s plan continued to hang on his hope that the Gavax’Kol would exit lightspeed fifteen minutes or longer before it arrived at Shesa-2, so that its Oblasar tracker had a chance to update.

“Captain Derno has just been on the comms, sir,” said Lieutenant Bishop. “He wanted to speak to you, but I told him you were otherwise engaged. I think he’s becoming suspicious about why we’re here.”

“He’s right to ask questions – or at least to try and ask questions,” said Grisham. “Keep fending him off, Lieutenant.”

“Yes, sir, I will,” said Bishop. “I have to say, if I was in Captain Derno’s position, I’d be ecstatic to have the Oblasar watching from close by.”

“Me too,” said Grisham. “But he’s still right to wonder what we’re doing here.”

Another five minutes passed with no deviation in the Gavax’Kol’s heading. Captain Derno made another attempt to speak with Grisham, and again Bishop was successful in deflecting him.

“Twenty-two minutes until the Gavax’Kol arrives at Shesa-2,” said Adler on the next tracker update. “We’ll have to commence our lightspeed warmup in no more than seven minutes.”

“Noted,” said Grisham.

“Captain Derno is back on the comms, sir,” said Bishop a short time later. “He’s threatening to order the shuttles into lightspeed.”

“Crap,” said Grisham. He thought fast – the Gavax’Kol was now twenty minutes from Shesa-2. “Let Captain Derno know we’ve received orders of our own and that we will imminently depart from Gilias.”

“Yes, sir,” said Bishop. “Captain Derno asked for something more specific than imminent, so I told him we’re commencing the warmup of our lightspeed drive immediately. I lied and told him the Oblasar requires six minutes to complete a transition.”

“Did he buy it?” asked Grisham.

“Yes, sir, or at least he didn’t give me an argument.”

“Good work, Lieutenant,” said Grisham, though he wasn’t feeling great about pulling the wool over the eyes of a fellow officer. “Lieutenant Adler, begin the warmup of our lightspeed drive – set the destination as Shesa-2.”

“Are we leaving?” asked Adler in surprise.

“No, Lieutenant – I just want to create an obvious change in the Oblasar’s hull readings. I’m sure Captain Derno will be scanning us for signs of an increased energy output. Cancel the warmup at two minutes and start a new one.”

“Yes, sir, though I’m not sure if that trick will fool a propulsion officer with any kind of experience.”

“Do it anyway,” said Grisham.

“Yes, sir.”

The tracker updated again, and Grisham swore inwardly at the sight of the Gavax’Kol, still on the same course to Shesa-2 as before.

“We’ll have two more tracker updates before we hit the fifteen-minute mark,” said Adler. “The third update will happen when the Gavax’Kol is fourteen minutes from Shesa-2.”

Grisham’s plan was balanced on a knife edge and there wasn’t anything he could do to affect the outcome. He held onto the control bars and watched the tactical for the next tracker update. He cursed when it happened.

“No change,” he said.

“I’m cancelling and resuming our lightspeed warmup, Captain,” said Lieutenant Adler.

Approximately two seconds later, Captain Derno was back on the comms, demanding to know why the Oblasar’s hull output had fallen and then resumed. Grisham listened to Lieutenant Bishop making up some crap about how a Kalor drive and a Charos drive didn’t work the same.

“Did Captain Derno buy it?” asked Grisham, when Bishop finished on the comms.

“Your guess is as good as mine, sir.”

“One more tracker update and then we’ll have to be out of here,” said Deneuve. She looked across at Grisham, but he didn’t say anything.

The next tracker update came, showing the same thing as all the others.

“Cancel the lightspeed warmup and start a new one,” said Grisham. “We’re letting the tracker update one more time. We’ll let this warmup complete if the fourteen-minute update shows no change.”

“Lightspeed warmup cancelled and restarted,” said Adler.

“I have Captain Derno on the comms, sir,” said Bishop a few seconds later. “He’s going to order the shuttles into lightspeed.”

“Put him on the bridge speakers,” said Grisham.

“Yes, sir.”

“Captain Derno,” said Grisham.

“Captain Grisham, I don’t know what you’re playing at, but I’ve had enough of it,” said Derno. He sounded like he was a similar age to Grisham, and he was stressed as hell and angry with it.

“Captain Derno, I’m not playing at anything,” said Grisham. “I have orders, to which you are not party. Those orders instructed me to wait here at Gilias. Now I am preparing to depart.”

As if hearing it from an officer of equivalent rank suddenly made it more believable, some of the anger disappeared from Derno’s voice. “There are five billion people on those two shuttles, Captain Grisham, and I have only this cruiser and one Tibor with which to keep them safe. If the Oblasar is not here to join the escort, then I don’t know why you’ve been ordered to bring your warship here. From what I’ve been told, the Ax’Kol are able to follow their targets through lightspeed. If you’ve encountered other enemy ships recently, your presence increases the risk to our people.”

Grisham raised a mental eyebrow. It was clear that Derno was relying on speculation about the Ax’Kol’s capabilities, and, on this occasion, that speculation was partway accurate. Another glance at the tracker told him it would update in a few more seconds.

“Captain Derno, I am unable to provide you with any details of my mission,” said Grisham, playing for time. “Suffice to say—” The tracker updated again, and the Gavax’Kol was in the same position as it had been during the previous update. “One moment,” he said, muting the channel. “The Gavax’Kol exited lightspeed. It’s coming to Gilias.”

“That’s what it looks like, sir,” said Lopez. “Now you’re about to ask how long it’ll take the enemy warship to reach Gilias at its previous multiplier.”

“I was about to ask that. Give me the answer.”

“Working on it…shit…eight minutes,” said Lopez. “However, because of the tracker interval, we don’t know how long the Gavax’Kol has been stationary. It could potentially be here in ten minutes, depending on when it commenced its lightspeed warmup – and assuming it really is coming to Gilias.”

“It’s coming,” said Grisham. He took the comms off mute. “Captain Derno, I remember those evac shuttles having an eight-minute lightspeed warmup time – the same as the new gen Tibor that’s with you.”

“That’s right,” said Derno, instantly suspicious.

“Listen carefully,” said Grisham. “We have reason to believe the enemy capital ship – the Gavax’Kol - is heading to Gilias. It will kill everyone on those shuttles and it’ll destroy your warship without you being able to do a damn thing to stop it. You need to leave your current positions under maximum acceleration, and enter lightspeed as quickly as you can – your destination doesn’t matter, but I’d recommend you stay at lightspeed for at least a day. Maybe at the end of your transit, our war with the Ax’Kol will be over.”

“Shit, have you brought this danger to—”

“Enough!” snapped Grisham. “Go! Now!”

He watched the tactical, and already the four Human Federation spaceships were accelerating away from the planet. They wouldn’t get nearly far enough in eight minutes at sub-light, and ten minutes wouldn’t give them much more of a chance. Hopefully all four would enter lightspeed before the Gavax’Kol arrived at Gilias.

Derno clearly wanted to ask more questions, but Grisham didn’t have anything useful to offer, other than reiterating the urgent requirement to get the hell away. After a few seconds, Grisham cut the comms channel.

“If Captain Derno – or anyone else from those spaceships – requests another comms link, accept it and listen to what they say, but I don’t want to hear about it unless it’s absolutely necessary,” he said.

“Yes, sir,” said Bishop.

For a few seconds, Grisham watched the fleeing spaceships. The maximum velocity of the shuttles turned out to be 220 kilometres per second, and the warships limited their own velocity to the same.

“They aren’t going to make it much farther than a hundred thousand klicks,” said Deneuve.

“This is all about them entering lightspeed, Commander.”

Once again, the tracker updated, and Grisham cursed when he saw it. The enemy vessel was unmistakeably heading for Gilias, but there was something else too.

“The Gavax’Kol increased its multiplier again,” he said.

“Yes, but not by much,” said Lopez. “It’ll be here in four-point-five minutes.”

“That’s two minutes before the shuttles are due to depart,” said Grisham angrily.

“Should I make Captain Derno aware?” asked Bishop.

“Yes. If the Gavax’Kol exits lightspeed within targeting range of either the cruiser or the Tibor, they’re to hold fire in case they hasten the enemy warship’s detection of them.”

“Yes, sir, I’ll pass on your recommendations.”

“Are we going to wait in our current position, Captain?” asked Deneuve.

“Yes, Commander – unless you have a better plan?”

“No, sir. Am I giving the enemy warship a level 3 Repulsor shot the moment it’s in our sights?”

“Yes, plus whatever else you can land on its hull – assuming the Repulsor doesn’t fire the Gavax’Kol straight out of range of our other weapons.”

The bridge was silent for a time, and Grisham divided his attention between the tracker and the sensors. Soon, the Gavax’Kol would be here, and he’d already witnessed how quickly its psionics could chew through the Oblasar’s mind battery reserves.

Privately, he was also concerned that the enemy would take greater precautions against the Repulsor this time. The weapon couldn’t fire over a long distance, and if the Gavax’Kol was determined to avoid taking another shot, it had the tools to keep out of range. It was just another battlefield problem, and one which Grisham knew he’d have to overcome.

The tracker updated again, and now it was predicting the Gavax’Kol would be at Gilias in less than one minute – somehow, the enemy vessel had increased its lightspeed multiplier in the middle of a transit, and now it was due to arrive more than three minutes before the evacuation shuttles entered lightspeed.

Fleetingly, Grisham wondered if he should have fired the Repulsor at the transports, in order to catapult them far across the solar system, and – hopefully – to safety. There were too many unknowns – not least of which being the damage the weapon might do to the target vessels. Plus, the Repulsor kept shutting down every time it was fired. Without it, the Oblasar wasn’t going to win the coming fight.

Wishing the timings had worked a little more in his favour, Grisham readied himself to face his enemy.

TWENTY-NINE

“One minute has passed, Captain,” said Lieutenant Lopez. “If the Gavax’Kol isn’t already here, it will be soon.”

Grisham scraped his teeth together and his eyes jumped between the feeds. If the enemy vessel was at Gilias, he couldn’t see it. That meant it was either blind side of the planet, or it had exited lightspeed somewhere farther away than he’d expected.

“Where is it?” he muttered.

Grisham got his answer a moment later. The Gavax’Kol exited from a psionic displacement, about two hundred kilometres directly off the Oblasar’s stern. Grisham knew it was a psionic displacement, rather than a normal lightspeed transit, because the enemy vessel accelerated without any of the usual delay.

“It’s coming straight for us!” said Lopez.

Grisham had already seen as much, and he had the control bars pushed right to the end of their travel. Unfortunately, the Gavax’Kol had the jump on him. The massive enemy warship’s acceleration was the match of the Oblasar’s, and it had started earlier. With a thud, the Gavax’Kol collided with the Oblasar’s stern, knocking it off course and activating its energy shield.

“We’re too close for a missile launch,” said Deneuve. “Avil-Tors set to fully automatic. You definitely got the artifact pissed by ramming into it at Denivir, Captain.”

“So it seems,” said Grisham, fighting to put some distance between his vessel and its pursuer.

“We’re being struck by psionics, sir,” said Lieutenant Adler.

“I can see that,” said Grisham tightly. The Oblasar’s energy shield glowed with a deep intensity, and the mind batteries fell. Combat had only just commenced and already the disparity between the two vessels was glaringly apparent.

Despite Grisham’s best efforts, the Gavax’Kol stayed right behind, though it couldn’t get close enough to force another impact. It did, however, launch Death missiles in great numbers. The Avil-Tors punched into them, but the repeaters weren’t so effective at such close range. For every two or three of the incoming missiles they knocked out, one got through.

Grisham hauled the Oblasar’s controls one way and then the other, but the enemy vessel clung onto his tail, its incredible size and equal propulsion allowing it to compensate for his attempts to shake it off.

As well as the Death missiles, the bombardment of psionics came nonstop, and the mind battery reserves continued their downward trajectory. In return, the Oblasar’s Avil-Tor slugs pounded into the Gavax’Kol’s nose, though Grisham was unable to gauge the effect. The enemy vessel was so close that it appeared only as a moving shape of darkness.

“Rear Zorl clusters one to eight: targeted and fired,” said Deneuve.

The detonations came almost at once and the rear feeds turned bright with plasma. Deneuve could only obtain a weapons lock from two of the topside clusters and she launched missiles from those too.

As the seconds went by, the Oblasar gradually began pulling away from the Gavax’Kol. Grisham aimed for the planet. He hoped to lose the enemy warship, which would perhaps allow him a chance to restart the engagement in such a way that he could discharge the Repulsor. Right now, the only option he had to fire the weapon was to execute a nose-tail swap on the Oblasar, but he wasn’t keen to fire the Repulsor at maximum boost when he was so close to the target.

The other option was to activate the pursuit hardware, which would transport the Oblasar to the shuttle Grisham had left parked fifty thousand kilometres from Gilias. Unfortunately, that would bring the Gavax’Kol closer to the fleeing evacuation shuttles than he was prepared to accept.

“Two minutes and those transports are out of here,” said Adler.

“I don’t think our energy shield is going to hold out that long,” said Grisham.

The distance between the Oblasar and the Gavax’Kol had widened to three hundred kilometres, and Grisham angled his warship so that Deneuve could launch from the portside clusters. Deneuve obliged.

Punisher shots tore into the Zorl missiles, and others were caught in the Gavax’Kol’s defensive psionic: slow fields. A few warheads detonated, but not enough to trouble the enemy vessel.

With the additional distance, Grisham now had a better view of his pursuer. Although he couldn’t stare, it seemed to him the Gavax’Kol’s overall shape was different to how it had been before – its visible flank was noticeably less lumpy, as though the once-embedded warships had now been partially digested to keep the enemy vessel’s propulsion running.

“If you swap our nose and tail, I’ll be able to get a Rodor Lance all the way from one end of the Gavax’Kol to the other,” said Deneuve.

“We don’t want to drive it away, Commander,” said Grisham. “And our mind batteries are falling too fast. We need our shields to hold, until I can figure out a way to line us up for a Repulsor shot.”

The Oblasar was fast approaching Gilias, and Grisham aimed the warship on a heading that would keep the planet between the Gavax’Kol and the evacuation shuttles. At a five-hundred-kilometre altitude, he levelled his spaceship and guided it around Gilias, without reducing velocity. The enemy vessel stayed close, and the Oblasar’s mind batteries fell below forty percent.

“Something has to change here, Captain, or we’re going to lose this,” said Deneuve.

“Those shuttles are tying our hands, Commander,” said Grisham. “The Gavax’Kol is interested in us, and I’d like to keep it that way.”

“One minute before the transports depart,” said Adler. “It’ll be touch-and-go on our shield.”

“We’ll still need some charge in those mind batteries to keep us alive until we can get the Repulsor on target,” said Grisham.

At the Oblasar’s current velocity, it would soon travel far enough around Gilias that the escaping shuttles would come into sensor line-of-sight. Grisham didn’t want the Gavax’Kol deciding the transports were worth a quick diversion, so he brought the Oblasar into a tight, banking curve, that would keep the warship circling the area of Gilias which was blind to the shuttles.

Missiles continued raining down upon the Oblasar’s hull, and hundreds of Punisher turrets directed a torrent of projectiles into the warship’s armour. Not for a moment did the energy shield deactivate, and Grisham could only curse at the Gavax’Kol’s endless depths of psionic power.

“Forty seconds until the shuttles leave,” said Adler. “And twenty-five percent on our shields.”

“We aren’t going to make it,” said Deneuve.

Grisham could only nod - the time to act was now. He’d always known he was gambling with the lives of the people on the evacuation shuttles, but the optimist in him had believed he’d not only be able to help them escape, but that he and his crew would be able to defeat the Gavax’Kol at the same time.

Now it was looking as if he’d be forced to lightspeed over to the Oblasar’s parked transport, to gain the mind batteries a chance to replenish. By doing so, he’d be exposing the evacuation shuttles to even greater danger.

Or maybe not.

A plan jumped into his head, and he quickly played through how it might unfold. As ever, there was risk involved, but it might just work.

“Commander Deneuve, be ready on the Repulsor.”

“Yes, sir.”

Grisham glanced over at the tactical. In about five seconds, the Oblasar would be on the direct opposite side of Gilias to the parked transport.

“Nose-tail switch coming up,” he said.

It was a manoeuvre Grisham was familiar with, albeit one he hadn’t practised on the Oblasar. He made a series of rapid, violent movements on the controls, at the same time as he altered the balance of thrust across the Kalor modules. The sensor feeds spun crazily. The Oblasar’s nose flipped around, while the warship lost hardly any of its velocity and stayed almost exactly on course.

In moments, Grisham had brought the warship back under control. Now, it was heading stern-first away from the Gavax’Kol, and the enemy vessel was almost within the Repulsor’s firing arc.

“Repulsor targeting,” said Deneuve.

Grisham didn’t think she’d get the shot off, and he was right. Just like he’d anticipated, the Gavax’Kol executed a psionic: displacement and it vanished from the feeds.

Hoping upon hope that he’d guessed where the enemy vessel would end up, Grisham darted out a finger towards the tactical.

“Pursuit hardware activated,” he said. The sensor feeds went blank for a moment and then the feeds resumed. “Find that spaceship!” Grisham yelled.

The searching didn’t take long – in fact, the Gavax’Kol was almost directly below the Oblasar, thirty thousand kilometres nearer to Gilias. The enemy vessel was accelerating directly northwards around the planet, evidently hoping to re-engage with the Oblasar, only this time outside the Repulsor’s firing arc.

Grisham pulled hard at the controls, and his warship’s nose turned towards the planet. He requested maximum thrust from the propulsion and the Oblasar’s velocity gauge climbed strongly. “Fire when ready, Commander.”

“Yes, sir. Firing when ready. We’re currently out of range.”

As Grisham gave chase to the Gavax’Kol, the few seconds of the pursuit seemed as though they lasted a lifetime. In his head, he imagined the Gavax’Kol activating another psionic: displacement, and emerging somewhere he least wanted it. Instead, his opponent banked one way and the other, and Grisham hoped that meant the artifact couldn’t execute another displacement so soon after the last.

“Range: fifteen thousand kilometres,” said Lopez.

The distance to target reading on the tactical tumbled, and Grisham stared at the zoomed feed of the Gavax’Kol. This was his best view of it since the beginning of the engagement and the changes indirectly wrought by the shutdown code were more apparent than before. The entire hull of the huge Ax’Kol warship seemed to ripple and flex, indicative of the vast energy drain required to keep it operational.

“Range: ten thousand kilometres,” said Lopez.

“Repulsor set to maximum boost: fired,” said Deneuve, a moment later.

The weapon discharged with such force that Grisham’s vision blurred and everything seemed to slow down, as if time itself were affected. Then, his brain registered two significant outcomes, which happened almost simultaneously.

Firstly, the entire hull of the Gavax’Kol bulged outwards, before the enemy warship was torn apart in an explosion of debris. Pieces of the wreckage were accelerated to near lightspeed and they vanished from the sensors.

Secondly, a huge indentation appeared on the surface of Gilias, like the planet had been punched by a massive fist. This indentation was roughly circular, and, at about eight thousand kilometres in diameter, it covered much of the planet’s visible surface. The crater’s depth of nearly fifteen hundred kilometres allowed Grisham to see all the way down into the glowing mantle.

Incredibly, the ruined planet began to accelerate away from the Oblasar, and huge cracks appeared across its surface as it went.

Grisham didn’t have time to watch. He saw these things happen in the space of only a moment. Then, the Repulsor recoil hit the Oblasar, and suddenly, the velocity gauge on Grisham’s control panel was reading two hundred thousand kilometres per second. The acceleration threatened to hurl him from his seat, but he was ready for it and managed to hold himself in place until the life support system – which was robust enough to protect a human during the trauma of lightspeed entry – stabilised the interior once more.

The part of Grisham’s brain which never lost its cool during periods of high pressure, operated the controls and reduced the Oblasar’s velocity all the way down to a thousand kilometres per second, while the engines howled and everything shook, as if the warship itself was trembling from the outcome of the Repulsor discharge.

“Is it over?” asked Deneuve after a few seconds.

“Lieutenant Lopez – check the sensor recording of the Repulsor shot,” said Grisham, turning to make sure everyone had come through without injury. “Confirm the kill.” He already knew the Gavax’Kol was gone, but he had to see it again – just to be absolutely sure.

“Yes, sir.”

“Lieutenant Bishop – please confirm the evacuation shuttles escaped into lightspeed.”

“We’re no longer on their battle network, Captain,” said Bishop. “So they either entered lightspeed or—”

“Find out.”

“Yes, sir. We’re a long way away.”

Although the Oblasar hadn’t travelled at its increased velocity for long, the warship had nevertheless been hurled a considerable distance and the return time was more than twenty minutes.

“Let’s go back at lightspeed,” said Grisham.

During the short time it took the Oblasar to ready for lightspeed, Lieutenant Lopez analysed the feed recording and declared the Gavax’Kol to be well and truly neutralised. Grisham could still hardly believe it, and he watched the recording himself twice more. Struck by the Repulsor, the enemy warship – which had brought murder and death to the universe for half a billion years – erupted into pieces. It was gone, of that there was no doubt.

When the Oblasar completed its in-out lightspeed transit, Bishop completed his scans and confirmed there was no wreckage to indicate the evacuation shuttles had been attacked or destroyed. Grisham tipped his head back and closed his eyes in relief when he heard the news.

Meanwhile, the planet Gilias had been thrown almost a million kilometres away from its orbital track, and it was still travelling along an enormous, shallow arc. The planet was breaking up, and, after all the destruction so far, Grisham didn’t want to think about where it would end up, or what would become of the debris.

At last, it began to sank in.

“Lieutenant Lopez, send a comm to Senator Maynard, letting him know the outcome of our engagement with the Gavax’Kol,” said Grisham.

“Yes, sir.”

Grisham exhaled. “We did it, folks.” He looked across at Deneuve, and she wore the same stunned expression he knew was on his own face.

“The Kalor drive is down to twenty-five percent, Captain,” said Adler. “That one shot took seventy-five percent out of our propulsion system.”

“I know where we can fill it up again, Lieutenant.” Grisham smiled. “Set us a course for Loxor.”

“Yes, sir.”

Despite this magnificent, hard-fought victory over the Gavax’Kol, which had started at Denivir and led all the way here to Gilias, there was work still to be done. The originator of the Ax’Kol was gone, but the enemy might yet continue their war, using whatever remained of their fleets.

This time, however, they wouldn’t be facing only human and Kijol warships – they’d be facing the Oblasar. And Grisham’s appetite for wiping out every last one of the Ax’Kol was undiminished.

He smiled again, and flexed his fingers in anticipation of the destruction he’d bring. The souls would have their revenge.

* * *

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