=1=

Teaching new crews at Space Command never seemed to get old. Every three months a new crew would rotate in, and I’d take charge of their personal combat training—they didn’t call it that, but that’s what it amounted to.

New crews gave me the opportunity to meet new people, fresh faces—and bash them down onto the deck.

“Hey! Captain Blake!” an ensign called out to me on the first day of training. “I’m not falling for your scam today. I want you to know that straight-up, sir.”

The class hushed and stared at the two of us. They’d been buzzing a little as I walked in and moved to the front of the classroom—but now they fell silent.

Military decorum was lax in my classroom. Every attendee had been expressly informed about that before their first day. But even so, this ensign was the first person who’d spoken out loud, and I thought the kid was kind of rude.

I stared at the ensign for a few long seconds, and he stared back. Finally, he dropped his eyes, but then he looked back up again almost immediately.

I didn’t feel any special animus toward the kid—after all, he was right. This class was built around teaching fresh officers in Earth’s fledgling space-going navy how to hold their own in a galaxy that followed different cultural rules. Such moments of dominance were, in fact, critical to the training.

After years of discipline, these officers had to be “untrained” in order to deal with the aliens out there among the stars. In the good old days, discipline was consistent in every serious navy on Earth. The British had really pioneered the naval standards of Earth’s past. In their day, they’d built a worldwide empire based upon one tiny island. That achievement still marked the largest empire humanity had yet to produce.

But times had changed. We weren’t trapped on a single ball of dirt anymore. Earth’s various armed forces didn’t waste time squabbling amongst themselves anymore—at least, not often.

Wars occurred in space these days. The combatants always consisted of humans and some other variety of Kher.

The fact the ensign had briefly dropped his eyes was a good thing. It had saved him a harsh beating. He didn’t know that—but it was the truth.

As a personal combat instructor, and an introductory liaison charged with teaching these service people the culture of the Kher, I couldn’t allow an open challenge like his to stand. It would reduce my status in the eyes of the others, making my job much more difficult.

After one more tense moment, I waved for him to come up to the front of the class.

The rest of the students—about twenty in all—released a collective sigh of held breath. They lit up, beginning to tease and laugh.

“You’re in for it now, Billson!” shouted another ensign in the front row. “Jawbreaker is gonna work you over!”

“Jawbreaker” was my codename among the security agents who watched everyone and everything at Space Command. I’d always been kind of proud of that name, and somehow it had leaked, becoming a nickname the students used as well.

Billson looked a little bit worried, but defiant. He was a big boy. Easily the size of Samson, he swaggered up, rolling a set of broad shoulders he’d built up in a gym somewhere. His arms were impressive as well—but they didn’t really matter.

Billson slowed down when he got close, but I waved him closer still. A moment later we stood at the front of the room, eye-to-eye.

I had a stick in my hand—I usually did during these classes. Often, we put thinly-padded weights at either end of our fighting sticks, but those were off now. It looked like a plain broomstick, a hardwood shaft about a meter and a half long.

Thrusting the stick toward him suddenly, I made him flinch.

“Take it,” I said.

After a moment’s hesitation Billson seized the weapon.

“Listen sir,” he said, “I didn’t mean no—”

“No, no,” I said, shaking my head. “Don’t back down now. You’ve made a statement. You’ve laid down a challenge. When you do that with any Rebel Kher, you don’t get to take it back.”

“But sir, I was only—”

“I know what you were doing,” I boomed. “You were warning me off. Every brave dog does that when he meets a new pack, challenging the leader. It goes the same way with the Rebel Kher.”

“But I didn’t mean—”

“Hold your stick up!” I ordered. “Don’t make this too easy for me.”

Finally, he caught the look in my eye, and he realized he wasn’t talking his way out of this. He looked concerned, but determined.

He took a practiced step back, spun the stick I’d given him over his shoulders and back into his hand again. These were the moves of a trained fighter.

About then, I realized I was the one who’d been setup. This boy was a martial artist. He’d specifically trained in the weapons I liked to use—and that wasn’t an accident.

My eyes flicked over him, and the rest of the class went wild.

“This is on!”

“Kick his ass, Billson!”

“A hundred credits on Jawbreaker! All comers, place your bets!”

My face and my manner revealed nothing of my new concerns. I considered breaking another stick out of the lockers that lined the walls—but it was too late for that.

I’d misjudged the situation. I’d planned to take the kid down without a stick, adding to his humiliation and my mystique—but at that point I hadn’t realized he was more than just another muscle-bound loudmouth.

For a few seconds, I lamented the natural leaking of secrets that always plagued a training like the one I’d been tasked with giving. The more crews I trained, the more they talked to the next generation. My surprises and tricks were old news by now.

Gone were the days when I could take a fresh crew and whack them into submission with impunity. That sweet element of surprise was history. These days, I had to deal with crews who knew what was coming their way.

And this boy, Billson—he’d prepared seriously for this inevitable moment of confrontation.

He watched me the way a man might watch a rattlesnake on his porch steps. His stick was up, and his feet shuffled tensely, rocking a little with nervousness. His fingers flexed, gripping and re-gripping the stick I’d given him. He was nervous, tense, extremely ready—but not willing to cast the first stone despite all that.

That was when I made my choice. My approach to the tactical problem Billson represented had formed in my mind.

In situations like this, cheating was in order. I’m not proud of it—well… no… that’s a lie. I am proud of it.

I’m a first-class cheater. There it is, out in the open.

In my defense, I’ve read that politicians, CEOs of big companies, and even top military leaders were four times more likely to cheat at golf than the average guy—so I guess I’m in good company.

Rather than striking a combat pose, I walked past the kid, heading to the lockers.

His eyes tracked me, and the moment I passed him, he switched his grip on his stick.

He held it like a baseball bat, and he went for a home run—aiming for the base of my buzz-cut skull.

=2=

I hadn’t been certain Billson possessed the balls to perform a sneak-attack like the one he’d just launched, but it stood to reason that he might go for it. That’s why I’d taken a gamble and given him a clear shot at my back.

It had always been part of my training regimen to dishonorably attack my students during the course. The purpose of this was to teach students that among the Rebel Kher—which is what we called the wide variety of creatures inhabiting thousands of planets circling nearby stars—sneak-attacks weren’t against the rules.

Billson had clearly done his homework. He’d known before he got to my class that a backstab was acceptable—it was more than acceptable, in fact. It was expected.

Billson’s only mistake was in thinking he could strike me from behind and take me down that way by surprise. What he didn’t know was I was still watching him, even though my back was turned.

To be honest, the kid couldn’t have reasonably been expected to anticipate my preparedness. After all, it had to do with my cheating nature.

One power my sym gave me was that of “perception”. This was a catch-all term for the data-gathering the symbiotic creature living in my body did on a regular basis.

Capable of linking through simple Wi-Fi, my sym could absorb information, process it, and provide me with a mental image of my surroundings.

Usually, I used this power of data compilation to generate a view of local space. When I commanded a starship like Devilfish, my sym’s powers of perception allowed me to view a mental map of my ship’s tactical position. Gathered from probes, sensor arrays and the like, I could “see” where my ship was in relation to approaching enemies.

Today, I employed a much simpler method: I accessed the classroom’s cameras. Using them, I watched Billson swing like a big-league batter for my bare skull.

Ducking under the swing, I felt the stick clip the top hairs sprouting out of my head.

Reaching up, I snatched at the stick, caught it, and yanked forward.

Billson made his biggest mistake then—other than when he’d mouthed off in the first place. He hung onto the stick. A smarter man might have let it go and kidney-punched me.

But I’d surprised him, so he instinctively tried to keep the weapon I’d given him, seeing it as an advantage.

Pulled forward and off-balance, Billson’s face caught my backward-smashing elbow perfectly. My aim was precise. It was as if I had eyes in the back of my head—because I did.

Over the next ten seconds, I made short work of the kid. Soon he was down, bleeding and wrapping bruised fingers over his face.

I didn’t beat him to a bloody mess. After all, he’d dropped his eyes right from the start, and he’d initially challenged me because he’d known what was in store for him at some point during the training.

The whooping classroom had quieted after six or seven well-placed blows from my stick. They were aghast, watching Billson grunt and writhe in agony.

Sucking in a deep breath, I straightened up and leaned on my bloody stick. A wad of Billson’s dark hair was glued to the gory tip sprouting up between my tightly gripping fingers, but I barely noticed.

My right cheek was burning and my ribs hurt, as the kid had gotten in a few good licks. But I struck an easy pose on purpose, as if I was relaxed and untouched.

“Anyone else in a feisty mood?” I asked.

No one answered. There wasn’t a whisper or even a cough. They stared at Billson’s shivering form in shock and alarm.

“Unlike most of you,” I said, “Billson here chose to fast forward to the endpoint of this course. He went for the gold right from the very beginning—and I can appreciate that. In fact, I’m giving him a single rank-point right here, right now.”

That got their attention. They sucked in their collective breath and stared at me instead of my victim. Rank-points didn’t fall like raindrops onto the faces of fresh recruits.

The Rebel Fleet operated on an entirely different basis than Earth’s traditional militaries. As it was made up of literally thousands of different types of beings from different planets. None of them had any respect for local military structures. You could be a general, a viceroy or a king back home—in the Rebel Fleet you were nobody until you worked your way up from the bottom.

I was a rarity on Earth because I’d done just that. I currently held the rank of captain in Earth’s Space Command, but I also possessed the rank of approximately lieutenant commander in the real fleet—the Rebel Kher Fleet.

As a prerequisite to my high rank, I had somewhere around a million rank points in the Rebel Fleet. This gave me enough to hand out points to the lower ranks freely. They were subtracted from my own total—or another officer’s.

Each level up the chart was a big climb, requiring exponentially more points. The system gave the higher-ups the ability to be generous when rewarding their most promising subordinates.

Besides impressing someone high up the food chain, the other way people got their points was by defeating one another. That’s why duels were so commonplace among personnel with similar rankings.

“That’s right,” I told my class as I tapped Billson’s quivering form with my stick. “In the eyes of the Rebel Fleet, this man now outranks you all.”

One hand crept skyward from Billson’s huddled classmates. The hand was feminine, and it moved with a tremor—but at least she was brave enough to say something.

“What is it?” I asked.

“Captain Blake, sir? Shouldn’t we call the medics or something? Billson looks seriously hurt.”

I frowned at her, and I toed Billson with my boot.

“Billson?” I asked, leaning over him. “You want a ride in an ambulance? I’m warning you—if you take it, you’ll be giving back that rank point you just earned.”

Billson shook his head and coughed up a little blood.

I slapped him one on the shoulder and grinned.

“You see?” I called out to the others. “He’s fine. Don’t humiliate the man! Remember, in the Rebel Fleet, it’s not just about winning and losing. It’s about how you do it. If you lose a fight with a superior foe, you might even gain a point or two if you demonstrate toughness in the loss. The key is to impress your fellow Kher. To make them want to follow you, even if they’re from a different world.”

With wide eyes, they kept looking at Billson, then at me with my bloody stick.

Marching back and forth in front of them, I twirled my stick around as I walked.

Did something splatter among them now and then, making them wince and shy away? Maybe, but I didn’t care. It was time for these kids to grow up.

“This galaxy is chock-full of hostile aliens,” I told them. “Most Kher are genetically compatible with us—but they aren’t nice people. They’re all at the top of the food chain on their respective planets. They represent the nastiest beings that evolution and selective genetics has managed to produce over thousands of years.”

For the rest of the week, the class proceeded without further interruptions. In hindsight, I thought Billson might have done me a favor by blurting out a challenge in the first few minutes. He’d set a tone for the class, giving them all an unscheduled lesson which they’d never forget.

=3=

A summons from Space Command woke me up just after four in the morning on Sunday. It wasn’t a pleasant way to awaken for me—or for Mia, who was sleeping next to me.

She growled and rolled over with outstretched claws, but I dodged her curved talons easily. I’d become something of an expert at sleeping alongside a cat-girl.

Grabbing up my pants and pulling them tight, I dressed quickly and headed into the hallway, chewing a hunk of cured deer meat and swallowing water from a bottle. There wasn’t time for anything better.

“Admiral Vega called me,” I told the guards at the vault doors.

They looked me up and down and had me take a puncture-test. It was something we’d devised recently to spot Nomads. The artificial beings could mimic any human they wanted to, but they couldn’t fake our blood—at least, not yet.

Rubbing my fingers together until the bleeding came to a stop, I waited for the guards to run the results. At last, they nodded to me.

“You’re on the list, Captain Blake. This way—I’m supposed to expedite your delivery.”

“Let’s do it, then.”

I followed him to a chute, and we stepped inside. A capsule like a small elevator car enclosed us. We shot down into the earth.

Most people took a jeep or an electric cart down into the mountain. The fact I’d been cleared for transport using our latest gadgetry was alarming—it meant something was seriously wrong.

No more than twenty minutes after I’d been initially called upon, I stepped into the control center. My uniform was crisp and my hair looked clean, although that was only because it was cut so short.

“There you are, Blake!” Vega boomed. “What took you so long? Did you shit the bed again?”

“I would have been here even faster if I had, Admiral,” I answered smoothly.

He grumbled for a moment and turned away to abuse a lieutenant. The young man skittered away into the dark recesses of the underground nerve center, doubtlessly sent on an urgent mission to fetch coffee.

Vega was in a bad mood, but that was nothing unusual. In truth, even his good moods weren’t all that good. As it still hadn’t hit five a.m., he wasn’t even pretending to wear his happy-face this morning.

“Blake,” he said at last, “do you remember when Admiral Clemens came out here from London last year?”

“Uh… sure,” I said warily.

“Do you remember the advice he gave—regarding us?”

“Something about functioning as a team in times of crisis? Is that what you’re referring to?”

“Exactly. Total fuckery. Excrement of the gods of Europe. Unfortunately, they are pumping in a big percentage of the money for this space fleet—did you know that, Blake?”

I shook my head, even though I was well aware of the funding situation. I was hoping he wouldn’t blame all of today’s problems on me if I pretended to be ignorant of the basics.

“Well, it’s true. In the golden days, the good old USA footed the bill for most of the world’s defense. Times have changed, and the Euros, Chinese—they finally feel threatened enough to put in their own chips. The bad part is that gives them leverage. The power to insist on whatever random bullshit they feel is necessary.”

As I didn’t care one whit where our budget came from, I shrugged my shoulders. “Let them suggest. We’re still in charge.”

Vega gave me a rueful chuckle. “Yeah, sure,” he laughed. “You keep that fantasy firmly in mind over the next twenty-four hours. Anyway, I didn’t bring you here to bitch-box your ears. You’re here in your official capacity as my alien liaison.”

That got my attention. Clemens had arranged for Vega to become an admiral in Earth’s new fleet. So far, Vega was the only American to receive that honor. But even as the highly-ranked man in the new space service, he was still under the thumb of the Joint Chiefs, and the squabbling government bureaucrats above them.

“What’s the situation, Admiral?” I asked seriously.

He slid his eyes around for a moment, as if he suspected there were spies in the room with us. At last, he reached out and grabbed my wrist.

I could have yanked free, I was far stronger and better trained—but I fought down the instinct.

Vega turned my hand over, revealing my fingers. He saw the marks of the puncture test, and then he relaxed.

“Didn’t you get the report, sir?” I asked. “I passed all the tests. I’m not a Nomad.”

“Yeah, of course,” Vega said, warily running his eyes over his staffers, “but at times like this I prefer to verify what I hear from security.”

His behavior was bordering on the alarming. I waited impatiently for him to get to the point.

After satisfying himself that there were no spies nearby, he turned back to me.

“We’ve got another rift,” he said in a low tone. “It popped into existence about two hundred thousand kilometers out.”

Frowning immediately, I consulted the tactical table between us. I waved my hand over it, reached out with my sym, and gathered remote input from our orbital sensors.

The rift swam into view. It was big, colorful and awe-inspiring. It had a golden edge, and a greenish interior with lavender sparks—it was definitely more colorful than usual.

After peering at it for a moment, I turned to Vega. “How long ago did it appear?”

“Twenty minutes ago.”

“And it’s just sitting there? It will fade soon.”

“That’s part of what has people nervous. The aliens should have come through by now—or maybe they have, and we missed it.”

“Phase-ships?” I asked.

“That’s always a possibility. We have them—why shouldn’t the next invader to come visit us invest in the same technology?”

It was a chilling thought. Phase-ships were like the submarines of the past, except even harder to detect. They were more like U-boats when the idea was new, before sonar had been deployed to locate them.

They didn’t use stealth to glide unseen through space, however. Not exactly. The ships were able to place themselves into a different state. They lingered a half-step into the realm of wormholes and other oddities of physics. We called it phasing.

We eyed the rift on the tactical table, depicted in three dimensions and vibrant color. The staffers returned quietly, encircling the table where we’d chosen to have our personal conference.

“What’s this?” Vega demanded. “Have you got something?”

“Maybe sir,” said a commander with reddish-brown hair and amber eyes. She seemed to be leading the sensor-ops team. “Something is about to come through. We’re sure of that much. There’s an energy surge—that’s a reliable giveaway.”

Checking her nametag, I saw she was Commander Langston. I committed that name to memory.

All eyes dropped to the table again, and we were soon rewarded with a looming image. A hulking ship swam into view, like a stranger walking into a public place from a midnight fog.

I sucked in a breath. “I know who they are,” I said.

Vega’s eyes snapped up to meet mine. “Friend or foe?”

“They could be either,” I said, staring at the ship. “That’s a Terrapinian battlecruiser, sir. I’d bet my life on it.”

Vega looked toward his gaggle of sensor people. They were fingering the table, pulling up sub-screens and tapping at them in a fever of activity.

“What’s the computer say?” he demanded.

“Rebel Kher—battleship or battlecruiser class. We have good records on Terrapinian designs, but… Captain Blake could be right.”

“Let’s assume he is,” Vega said. “After all, that’s why he’s here. At least it’s not that bastard Fex trying to annex us again.”

“Your orders, sir?” Commander Langston asked.

“Encircle it at a safe distance,” he replied. “Tell the phase-ships to stay concealed.”

“And our weapons platforms?”

“All missiles are to stay hot, but don’t start pinging excessively. I don’t want them to freak out thinking we’ve got a target lock and imminent launches. As to the core fleet at Luna… let them linger there. How fast can they get here?”

“They’re already inbound, sir,” another staffer said, clearing his throat first.

“Why’s that?” Vega demanded. “I didn’t order—”

“Brussels did it, sir. They wanted the fleet brought home to Earth the moment they saw the rift appear between us and the Moon’s orbital path.”

Vega grumbled and turned to me. “You see? Euro interference. They threw a few sheckles into the budget and all of a sudden they’re running the place.”

“Make that a few trillion sheckles,” I pointed out. “In any case, it’s probably not a bad thing. We’ll need all our ships if we have to fight that thing.”

“You said they weren’t hostile.”

“I said they could be either. I’ve fought toe-to-toe with Terrapinians, and I’ve fought shoulder-to-shoulder with them as well. It’s circumstantial. I’d classify them as a potent neutral.”

“Great…” Vega said, working his jaw and squinting at the boards. “Recommendations, Blake?”

“Contact them, sir. Ask what they’re doing here.”

He rolled his eyes. “Obviously,” he said. “I’m about to do that. But before I do, I’m asking for your slant on the way I should talk to them. Should we warn them off and threaten, or should we welcome them as friends?”

I thought about it for a second. I’d found the Terrapinians could be powerful allies or enemies.

“Be friendly, but not too friendly. Try to sound neutral and matter-of-fact. They’re less emotional than most Rebel Kher species.”

“All right, hook me up.”

The communications officers descended and opened a channel. Langston, the redhead, did the honors of pressing a transmitter into Vega’s hands.

“This is Admiral Vega of Earth,” he said. “We recognize your ship as one of Terrapinian design. Please state your identity and your intent.”

I was impressed. There was no anger in his tone, no implied threat. He’d pulled off a neutral tone and made a reasonable request. From all the growling of the morning, I’d expected something more gruff.

After a brief pause, the intruding ship answered. “We are indeed from the Terrapinian Empire,” a strange voice responded. “In the past, humans have shown a capacity for violence. We came here, seeking that capacity.”

Vega frowned at the screen then turned to me. I frowned back.

“What the hell does that mean?” he demanded without keying the comm system to transmit.

“I have to admit, it’s vague. They don’t think quite the way we do. I’ve often had to pry their intent out of them.”

“Such bullshit… Capacity for violence? Does that mean they want to fight, or what?”

I shrugged. “It could be. Ritual combat for dominance is a standard with them.”

“You were their overlord at one point in the past, right?”

“That was a long time ago, and they considered that debt to have been repaid in full years back.”

Clamping his lips together in a tight line, he finally released a violent expulsion of air. It was something between a snort and a hiss of exasperation.

He thrust the comm transmitter toward me.

“You talk to them,” he said. “Unless you want me to demand they turn that ship around and exit this system before we blow a hole in their stern.”

Surprised, I took the comm unit reluctantly. I looked at it, and all the staffers looked at me with wide eyes.

Truthfully, I had no more idea what to say than Vega did.

=4=

When interstellar war quite possibly hangs in the balance, a man’s words truly do matter.

The situation called for a prepared speech. Talking to a visiting Terrapinian battlecruiser was in the realm of politics and diplomacy—but when it came to the Rebel Kher, I was the best Earth had.

One might ask how I’d gotten myself into playing the part of the alien liaison when I wasn’t a politician. The answer to that had to do with the nature of interstellar militaries. Earth had been forced to streamline our traditions regarding diplomacy and polite behavior in general.

A similar thing had happened in the middle of the last century, when atomic weapons had been invented and placed upon missiles that could reach other nations within minutes. There was hardly time for a state dinner, a round of golf, or a heart-to-heart talk between leaders when the angels of death were flying.

Then, as now, the military had gained more decision-making power. Since we’d been introduced to the community of surrounding planets, things had gotten steadily worse. There was even more uncertainty, and paranoia again ruled the day.

Part of the new intensity came from the fact we were no longer dealing with a few well-known superpowers in a moment of crisis. Instead, there were literally thousands of alien worlds out there, any one of which could throw a warship onto our doorstep without warning. We didn’t have consulates on their far-flung worlds. Maybe someday we’d get to that point, if we managed to explain what a consulate was to our Kher brothers.

Because of the speed with which a situation like this could develop, Space Command had managed to gain the right of first interaction with unexpected arrivals. The military had to respond first, because while some president or ambassador was dressing up and preparing his speech, a dozen cities might be reduced to ash.

There was no time to waste—and no room for error.

Looking at the transmitter in my hand, I froze for a half-second, thinking all these thoughts. I pondered how highly unfair it was that I’d been placed in this position. It was all due to the fact I’d been among the first humans the Kher had abducted from Earth long ago.

Sucking in a breath, I pressed the button on the side of the translation device. It lit up, indicating my words were being translated and transmitted to the starship above.

“This is Commander Leo Blake of the Rebel Fleet,” I said. “I’ve fought with Terrapinians many times—both striking them down and cheering them in victory.”

A few of the staffers gasped. They couldn’t believe that I’d brought up bashing Terrapinians—but that’s because they didn’t really understand the Rebel Kher.

There was a moment of quiet, then a response came back.

“Leo Blake…” the voice said. “A real officer. I’m glad to know you are still in authority here. Earth has done well to make you their ruler. I must assume the first being I spoke with was your servant?”

“Yes,” I said immediately, earning myself a glare from Vega. “You appeared quickly, and I had to get to a communications station to speak with you directly.”

“But that is why we let our rift spin quietly for so long,” the voice said. “To respectfully give you a chance to prepare for our arrival.”

“Of course,” I said. “My underlings are nervous, you have to understand. They don’t fully understand the ways of the Rebel Fleet.”

“I see… May I make a suggestion?”

“I welcome it.”

“Discipline, Blake!” the alien captain said. “That’s what’s needed. Never spare the lash or the goad.”

“Um… right. To whom am I speaking?”

“You don’t recognize me? Disappointing… but I know you. I once commanded a fighter that flew with you in the great war against the Imperials.”

“Really? You were a team commander on Ursahn’s carrier?”

“Yes. I am called Urgh. Since those early days, I’ve moved up in rank to rule as captain aboard this starship.”

“Excellent! It’s great to hear your voice again, Urgh!” I lied with enthusiasm.

The truth was, the Terrapinians I’d dealt with aboard Ursahn’s ship had been full-fledged pricks. They’d once awakened my crew at dawn with clubs.

“It’s not excellent to hear yours,” he said, “except that it awards me a degree of hope. Perhaps the rumors are false. Perhaps Earth isn’t completely incompetent and dishonorable.”

I could have bitten on that line, but I didn’t. Instead, I ignored his insults and continued in an even tone.

“Now that we’ve been reintroduced,” I said, “what can I do for you?”

“We sent a ship here long ago, commanded by Captain Verr. What became of that vessel?”

Admiral Vega and I exchanged glances. We’d suspected it would come down to this. More than a year ago, we’d met up with Captain Verr and his damaged ship. The vessel had been destroyed in the end by mines laid by the Nomads.

“I met Verr,” I said. “We spoke, and we formed a temporary brotherhood.”

“Who was dominant?”

Pondering several lies, I shrugged and went with the truth.

“The matter was never fully decided. His ship and mine were trapped by explosive drones. We fought to save the Terrapinians—but to no avail. His ship was lost, and we had to form a rift to escape.”

“The Nomads? Do you think I’m a fool?”

“Not at all,” I said. “But I do expect you to review the evidence before you scoff further. I’ll transmit our archives immediately.”

Turning toward the redheaded commander, I made an impatient spinning gesture with my forefinger.

Langston frowned and put her hands on her hips. Her eyes slid to Vega.

“Admiral,” she said, “we can’t let these aliens see our classified files.”

“We can and we will,” I interrupted. “Or this ship may become hostile. Which cities are you willing to lose, Commander, in order to keep our secrets?”

Vega lifted a hand, halting what was becoming a loud argument.

“Dig up the vid reports and upload them,” he ordered. “The Terrapinians have asked a legit question. We’re going to answer it plainly.”

Irritated, Commander Langston did as she was ordered. We waited while she queued up and transmitted the files.

Several long minutes passed. I could only assume the Terrapinians were reviewing the files, many of which were vids taken by me and my crew aboard Devilfish.

At last, the alien captain came back on the line.

“Stunning…” he said. “I can see we have come to the right place.”

“The reports please you?” I asked hopefully.

“Not at all. But they show Earth crews and Earth ships are not helpless. You fought for dominance with embarrassing dishonor, Blake. But you did not win or lose.”

“Dominance doesn’t matter now,” I said. “We don’t even know what you are asking for.”

“Dominance always matters,” Urgh said. “But to us, you are brothers-in-arms. You answered Verr’s request for aid. Will you do so again today?”

Again, Vega and I exchanged glances. Vega took the transmitter out of my hand.

“Captain,” he said, “what kind of aid are you requesting?”

“Why does this dog bark in my ear?” the Terrapinian demanded. “Blake, have you been struck down in a coup?”

I reached out and took the transmitter back from Vega’s reluctant fingers. “No,” I said. “My servants are anxious for information, that’s all.”

“You should abuse that one if he speaks again. He’s attempting to usurp your authority.”

“Um… I’ll take that under advisement. In the meantime, what kind of aid do you require?”

Vega was glowering at me, but he kept his trap shut. I had to hand it to the Terrapinians, very few people had managed to silence the admiral in the past.

“You’re a shit, Blake,” he said in a harsh whisper. “But keep going.”

Looking back at the device in my hand, all I could remember was the look of Captain Urgh. The species was lumpy, and their skins were mottled and greenish. They had big skulls that were wedge-shaped, like the head of a turtle.

But their eyes were their most startling feature. They were black and reflective, like drops of oil.

“What say you?” Captain Urgh asked. “Will you stand at my shoulder again?”

“Uh… what is the nature of your crisis?”

“What’s this? Do I smell the stink of cowardice? What does it matter who we shall face together on the field of honor? Will you answer my call, or will you forsake me?”

My eyes were wide. I was in uncharted territory. I had no authority to promise this turtle allegiance. I could recommend his destruction, but that was about it.

Vega was watching me with raised eyebrows. I could tell he was wondering how I was going to get myself out of this one. It seemed clear that he thought I’d shot off my mouth too much already, and unfortunately, he was probably right.

“On Earth,” I transmitted, “our command structure is somewhat different. We have civil authorities, wise councils. It is they who decide what worlds are our friends or enemies.”

“Disgusting,” Urgh said. “Your words make both of my stomachs flip and curl inside my guts. How can the pathetic fools who entrusted you with a vessel hope to contain your spirit? Any commander of a starship goes where he will.”

“Our system of governance is less individual,” I tried to explain.

“Do they shackle you to your command chair? Do they apply shock-cusps to your genitals from afar, or perhaps threaten to eviscerate your young back home without—?”

“None of those things,” I assured Urgh with a worried laugh. “You misunderstand. I command a ship—but that’s only a single vessel. If I talk to my elders, I can seek their wisdom and blessings. We can get more help then—if they approve. All you have to do is explain your difficulties.”

Urgh was quiet for a moment. I got the feeling he was conferring with other Terrapinian officers, just as was happening at my end.

“Sir?” the redheaded commander said, leaning toward me. “They’ve been tracking this conversation from Brussels. You are in no way empowered to offer these people a single ship, much less our entire fleet.”

“I know that, Commander. I’m just trying to establish a dialog.”

She waved another comm device at me, and then I realized she was probably the one who’d ratted me out.

“Now that the Joint Chiefs know this isn’t a military emergency,” she said, “but rather a diplomatic interaction, they want to take over.”

“Fine,” I snapped. “Disconnect me. They can talk to Urgh.”

Commander Langston turned her back on me and spoke quietly into the transmitter. After a moment, she turned back, frowning.

“They want you to come to a closure point with Captain Urgh first. Make him feel cared about, and—”

“It doesn’t work that way,” I told her. “The Kher don’t think like that—except for the primates. They don’t have layered politics, or think-tanks, or anything similar. They like to get ginned up, talk big, and rush off to war.”

“Well then, sir,” she said primly. “I suggest you talk him down a few notches.”

Baring my teeth briefly, I took up the transmitter again.

“Urgh?” I demanded. “Are you still there? Have your technicians failed us? I suggest you beat them well, as no Terrapinian captain would willingly keep a comrade waiting for so long.”

“Blake! Let me assure you my underlings will pay a price for any insult they’ve offered!”

I thought I heard some slapping sounds and some grunting. Possibly, Urgh’s subordinate officers had been offering too many suggestions for his taste as well.

That was a surprise to me. Terrapinians weren’t an excitable type of Kher. Oh, they could get pissed off and determined to get revenge. But they weren’t the type to scheme. The most they generally did was plot a beat-down when it was unexpected. To me, the fact they were arguing aboard their ship meant these guys were hard-up and really needed help.

As I considered the ramifications of desperation on their part, I began to smile. The tricky side of me was churning out ideas as to how to exploit the situation.

Call it a character flaw if you like—I consider it a gift. It’s just the way my mind works.

=5=

“You drive a hard spike into my bones, Blake,” Captain Urgh said.

It sounded like an idiom, so I assumed I understood the meaning and waited for him to continue.

“I have no choice but to explain in plain words,” Urgh continued. “Admiral Fex has encircled my planet. They have attacked us before, years ago when they also approached Earth. But now they have rebuilt and moved all their forces to our world.”

“I’m sorry to hear that, Captain,” I said, and I meant it.

Fex was a local tyrant among the Rebel Kerr. Since the Imperials had retreated years earlier, he’d used his fleets to dominate other civilizations. Sometimes, I almost wished the Imperials would attack again. At least in those days the Kerr were united.

Urgh continued thoughtfully. “Our reports indicate Earth managed to damage the Kwok fleet when it came here.”

“That’s right,” I said. “Our Alpha Fleet destroyed most of the Kwok force. Unfortunately, Fex himself escaped.”

Admiral Vega winced at my mention of “Alpha Fleet” because it was a figment of my own invention. We’d used some ships from Ursa, along with the handful of phase-ships we’d built at that time and our single light cruiser, Devilfish. The rest of the ships had been a bluff—but we’d managed to win the day.

“A glorious defense,” Urgh went on. “We too, rebuffed Fex initially. But he returned with more ships. Our Grand Armada is now all but broken. He has encircled our homeworld with more ships than we can face.”

“Has your homeworld surrendered?”

Urgh squirmed in his chair. “You should cut out your treasonous tongue for speaking such foul words!”

I frowned, but I made no apologies. Kerr rarely apologized for anything, as it was considered a sign of weakness. “But if Fex outnumbers you,” I said calmly, “how is it you haven’t been defeated?

“Our homeworld has a planetary shield. Fex has not broken through—yet. We are in a state of siege.”

“Ah,” I said, beginning to catch on, “so you want us to help you break the siege. Is that it?”

“Those are the essentials. What say you, old brother-in-arms?”

I glanced at Vega. He shook his head, giving me a clear and emphatic “no”.

“Maybe,” I transmitted. “My heart tells me to go. Earth people hate Fex just as much as you do.”

“So you will bring one ship then—but we need more!”

Vega was glaring at me. Commander Langston was watching in astonishment. Her lips moved, and she muttered a steady stream of commentary into her own headset, clearly conferring with Brussels.

“I’ll see what I can do,” I told the Terrapinian captain. “Give me a day.”

“Done,” Urgh said. “But please do not underestimate the urgency. Fex drops stones upon us from the out-system. Our shield won’t hold him off forever.”

The call ended, and everyone descended on me at once.

“What the hell was that, Blake?” Vega demanded. “You overstepped your authority!”

“Correction, Admiral,” Commander Langston said. “He had no authority to begin with.”

I held out my hand toward the redhead. She pulled back, staring at me as if I might be diseased.

“Let me talk to Brussels,” I said. “Directly.”

With obvious reluctance, the commander handed over her headset.

Normally, we could use our syms to link and converse directly. It was even possible to project a virtual-reality so that it seemed one man stood in the same compartment with another who stood a world away.

But such fancy connections were considered insecure. It was more difficult to link two people with our latest tech. Spies might well be listening—and the Nomads… They were always somewhere.

I brought the secure communication device to my face, and I spoke.

“This is Captain Leo Blake, to whom—?”

“This is Admiral Clemens, Blake,” an aging British voice responded. “What do you think you’re doing offering up your ship to these beggars?”

“The Rebel Kher wouldn’t understand any other response, sir. My offer might be enough to secure an alliance in the future.”

“Hmph,” he said. “Sounds more like you wanted to brag.”

“I only wanted to make friends with Captain Urgh. What we do next is up to the Joint Chiefs and the Security Council.”

“Oh, how generous! Are the old men on this side of the pond still in charge, then? Simply admitting that must be a bit of a blow, I imagine.”

“Sir, I didn’t—”

“Let’s get some things straight, Blake,” Clemens demanded. “First off, we’re not sending our fleet out there to save these bloody turtles. Fex is leaving us alone right now, and we don’t want to provoke him into taking another shot at us.”

“This is a chance to combine two fleets, sir. Ours and whatever is left of the Terrapinian force.”

“That’s not much by the look of things. This battlecruiser is scarred up and on the run. The last cruiser they sent here died quickly. Do I have to remind you, Blake, that we have only five light cruisers and less than two hundred smaller ships? I can’t spare a single ship!”

“But sir,” I said. “What if I went to inspect the siege? Wouldn’t it be nice to have hard data to go on? We know very little about Fex and his new forces.”

“You’re proposing going out there alone? That’s it, isn’t it?”

“Uh… I guess so, Admiral. I feel that—”

“What is it with you? A death-wish? Wanderlust? Why do the stars call you so strongly?”

“I’m not sure, Admiral,” I admitted. “But I see this as an opportunity. A chance to scout, gain an ally, and possibly avert a future war with Fex.”

“Or,” the admiral said loudly, “a chance to kick-start a new conflict right now!”

“There is some risk…” I admitted. “No path is without danger. It’s up to you, sir. You and the Council will have to decide.”

Grumbling, the Admiral disconnected.

The rest of the staffers stepped away from me after that. They behaved as if I was dying of cancer—and it was catching.

Only Vega had the balls to linger in my presence for long.

“You know, Blake,” he said. “You’ve got a brass pair. I’ve always said it.”

“Yes you have, sir.”

“What do you think the Council will do?”

I shrugged. “It’s hard to say. But for right now, I’d like to get some breakfast and a shower. Do you mind, Admiral?”

“Go ahead. I’ll have you hauled back the second they come to a decision.”

“Very good, Admiral.”

Walking out of the command center, I felt pretty good. I’d managed to make my case, and I felt I could live with the Council’s decision, no matter how it came down.

Oh sure, I’d be disappointed if they didn’t let me go. In Captain Urgh’s eyes, I’d be a humiliated liar.

But I didn’t think it would go that way. That’s why, instead of heading back to my apartment for a shower and food, I moved to the transmat station inside the mountain.

A few floors below the command center, a transmat system had been installed. It allowed instant—or nearly instant—transmission of human beings to any other transmat station within the Solar System.

Stepping inside, I was immediately challenged, but they soon let me through. Talking to the station op, I got him to dial me in for a one-way trip to Devilfish, which sat in orbit on the far side of the Moon.

If I was about to be called into action, I had to know my ship’s status firsthand. It was time to check up on my baby.

=6=

The transmat made a sound not unlike that of a gargantuan bug-zapper. A moment later, I stepped out aboard a space dock. A few thousand steps later, I boarded my ship.

Devilfish had been in dry dock for a long time. Abrams had made many improvements to his prototype interstellar drive, and he’d always used my ship to experiment upon.

The other four light cruisers in Earth’s tiny fleet were similarly capable of opening a rift to the stars. They were all sister ships—but Devilfish was the guinea pig among them. She always had been.

In the interim, I’d spent most of my time stuck dirt-side in Earth’s gravity-well. I’d taken up training new officers at Space Command. Most of my students went on to crew phase-ships, but not all. Each cruiser had a complement of approximately five hundred. That was a lot more than the seventy-odd souls that manned our phase-ships.

Abrams learned I was aboard within minutes. That was a disappointment, as I’d hoped to surprise him in his labs or below decks in the engineering section.

But that hadn’t been a reasonable hope. Abrams had spies everywhere. All the lab-coats and many of the coverall-wearing yard-dogs were under his rule. They’d probably been ordered to report any sighting of myself or any other flag officer who dared step aboard Devilfish without consulting with Abrams first.

Sure enough, I hadn’t made sixty steps down the echoing passages before a flapping coat appeared in my wake, the owner’s eyes comically wide. Ninety seconds after that, Abrams appeared. He stepped out of a turbo-lift to my right and blocked my path.

“Ah! There you are, Captain Blake,” he said. “To what do we owe this honor? Is this a snap-inspection?”

“Something like that,” I said, looking around. “Seems like the ship is a mess.”

Pipes, wires and open panels hung down everywhere. The ship looked like a patient undergoing radical surgery.

“She’s in good hands,” Abrams said. “There’s no need for you to worry. In six or eight more weeks, she’ll be better than ever.”

My eyes slid from a torn-up pile of insulation and circuit boards to Abrams.

“Are you shitting me?” I demanded. “This whole update is already three weeks past schedule. What the hell are you guys doing up here?”

“Hmm…” he said, smiling at me. “I sense a primitive urge to return to the nest. You have nothing to fear, Blake. Your ship will be finished, and she will be faster than ever. The next time you open a rift, you’ll come out where you wanted to go in the first place. I promise.”

“Listen, Doc,” I said. “You don’t have two weeks, much less eight. You’ve got hours, not days. Start having your people seal up systems and put back everything they ripped loose. Haven’t you heard about the Terrapinian ship in Earth orbit right now?”

Abrams’ demeanor faltered. “What are you talking about? Have you started another armed conflict?”

“No,” I said. “Admiral Fex has.”

Quickly, I filled him in on the details. His face grew paler as I spoke, until it was a shade of light green.

“This is preposterous! How can I be expected to work under such circumstances!”

“You’ll figure a way,” I said, making a sweeping gesture at all the debris around me. “But for now, it’s time to pack up. Twenty-four hour shifts. No breaks. Swap crews if you have to, pulling people off the other docks. Get my ship ready to fly.”

Abrams licked his lips—twice. His eyes shifted around, taking in the huge mess with growing alarm. He was mentally tallying the effort he was going to have to put in, and it seemed like his eyes grew wider with every passing second. It was an odd thing to watch.

Finally, with a snarl, he whirled around and began shouting orders to his sym-link. Workers sprang from compartments like Jack-in-the-box dolls, anxious to do his bidding. He set them to tasks then disappeared.

Deciding I wasn’t going to simply watch, I headed up to the bridge. I groaned aloud to see the mess up there that matched every other compartment aboard.

The workstations Abrams had built were all gutted. I felt a growl of frustration in my throat.

I knew right off what was going on. Abrams had gotten permission to update his warp drive, but that wasn’t good enough for him. He’d gone mad, tearing into every system on the ship. He was in the midst of an orgy of updating, and I’d caught him in the act.

Dragging out a toolkit, I got three of the primary stations operating within the next hour. As far as I could tell, none of them were any more responsive or functional than they’d been before. Sure, they looked a little different, but the end result hadn’t moved the bar in my opinion.

Abrams appeared as I languished with a wrench under the tactical ops boards.

“Captain Blake!” he shouted. “What are you playing at?”

Sliding on my back, I eyed him for a moment. He had a stern look, with his hands on his hips and a furrowed brow knitting up his forehead.

“I’m reassembling my bridge, Doc, if you don’t mind. I thought you’d appreciate the help.”

“That’s not what I’m talking about,” he said. “There is no emergency. I’ve contacted every official wearing brass that I’m aware of. There are no orders to ship out. No emergency deployment. The Terrapinian ship is friendly—a beggar in the street, no more.”

“That’s probably true,” I admitted. “But we’re likely to ship out soon, anyway. I want to be ready. Now, please stop checking up on me and bothering Earth Command. Get a wrench, and get down to work. If you don’t, I won’t take you with me when we leave.”

“What’s this?” Abrams exclaimed, outraged. “I’ve been slaving aboard your worthless vessel for months. At the very least I deserve the opportunity to—”

Vaulting into a standing position, I sent him skittering back away from me on his heels.

I grinned and slapped a power-spanner into his hands. “Then make yourself useful, Doc,” I said. “Show me how indispensable you really are.”

Grumbling fiercely, he tackled the sensor array station. He soon was on his back under the life support station, ratcheting and complaining at a steady pace.

I didn’t mind. He was working for me, and he was good at it. That’s all I needed from a crewman—competent work done quickly.

If he wanted to bitch all the while, that was his prerogative. As captain, I didn’t care in the slightest, as long as he got the job done.

Six hours later, I got the word I’d been waiting for.

“Blake?” Admiral Vega said in my ear. “Brussels just called me.”

“That was quick. What’s the story, sir?”

“They want to send a task force back to Terrapin with Captain Urgh.”

“Really? A task force? How many cruisers?”

“One.”

I frowned for a few seconds, but I soon got over it. After all, our five cruisers were each precious gems. They were the core of Earth’s tiny fleet.

“How many phase-ships?” I asked.

“None.”

“Oh…” I said, getting the picture. “Who’s commanding that single cruiser?”

“Have you got a mirror handy, Blake?” Vega asked.

I laughed, then I sighed. “I see, sir. I guess I did shoot my mouth off too much.”

“Bingo. When can you leave?”

Looking around thoughtfully at my torn-up bridge, I shrugged. “Twenty-four hours, sir, give or take.”

“Well then, give, don’t take. I’m sending you a crew. Use them wisely. We’ve already alerted Urgh, and he’s pulling around to your side of the Moon to pick you up.”

Frowning, I thought I’d better come clean about the state of my command.

“Devilfish isn’t really ready to ship out, sir,” I admitted. “Abrams went crazy and tore into every system aboard, updating everything he could.”

“Techs love to do that,” Vega complained. “I don’t know why, but they can never leave well enough alone.”

“I hear you, Admiral.”

“Just get life-support and your basic drive operating. You’ll have to fix the rest on the way.”

“Um… what about weapons, sir?”

“This is supposed to be a diplomatic mission, Blake. Remember?”

“Right sir, but—”

Admiral Vega’s voice rose almost to a shout. “You wanted this, Blake! You asked for it! Do you want to know what Clemens said when he passed down the order?”

“Probably not—”

“He said: ‘If Blake loves his damned turtles so much, he can sit on their eggs for them.’ That’s a quote.”

“They don’t actually lay eggs, Admiral,” I said. “But I get the message.”

“Good. The alien ship will form the rift for you. All you have to do is tag along and look tough. Maybe you’ll scare some sense into old Fex.”

“Anything’s possible, sir.”

He signed off, and I looked around in concern. The ship was buzzing with activity, but there weren’t enough workers. Not by a long shot.

Vega had said he was sending me a crew, but I hadn’t quite gotten the message at that point. I’d assumed all my own hands would be recalled and sent to Devilfish on an emergency basis—but I was wrong.

Many of my people made it back aboard, but not all. Hundreds had been reassigned. It only took me a few hours and a brief perusal of the rosters to figure it out.

“We’re expendable,” Commander Hagen, announced as he reviewed the data. He was my XO and a good one. I felt glad I had him with me, at least.

“It looks that way,” I admitted.

“They’ve taken most of our hotshots off the rolls and put them aboard other ships. They’ve left behind your command staff—minus a few key names. But it’s the support people that are really going to hurt us. These new names… the officers are cadets, and enlisted crewmen are trainees right out of school.”

“I couldn’t help but notice that, too.”

Hagen lowered the computer scroll and stared at me. “These are all people they don’t mind losing too much. You’re an officer who’s annoying—and so am I, sir… No offense meant.”

“None taken.”

“Good,” Hagen finished. “You know, I bet there are more than a few among the brass who will cry if we do ever make it back to Earth.”

Heaving a sigh, I couldn’t find a flaw in Hagen’s logic. I’d come to all the same conclusions, but orders were orders.

They’d filled my ship with wide-eyed rookies, cantankerous veterans and a surly pack of officers to ride herd over the rest. We made the best of it, working around the clock to patch up the ship.

All too soon, Urgh’s vessel generated a green-flecked rift. My ship hobbled after the battlecruiser, heading into the unknown.

Were we lambs being led to the slaughter? We could only guess.

As only one of Devilfish’s three thrusters was operating at one hundred percent, we were barely able to keep up with the bigger ship. A full minute passed after the Terrapinian battlecruiser vanished before we finally slipped into the rift and left our home star behind.

=7=

The journey to the far end of the wormhole was a quick one. Sometimes, such trips took hours—even days.

But not this time. We exited hyperspace only a few minutes after we’d entered.

The first thing our sensors and our eyes detected was Urgh’s battlecruiser. It glided quietly nearby. They’d waited for us to come through.

Looking around visually, I saw we were in a star system—which was a good thing. Occasionally, when making an interstellar jump, ships “scattered” which meant they got lost. They came out somewhere—but not at the targeted destination.

Since we’d entered Urgh’s rift rather than making our own, we were at least certain we’d come out at the same spot. When a larger fleet traveled together, multiple rifts were required, and any one of them could lose their way.

As space was, for the most part, empty, the odds that lost ships would come out near a star were slim. In this case, we were within the gravitational tug of a single bright star.

The central sun was distant, however. Had we scattered… just a little? I wasn’t sure. The distant sun, white in hue and registering as an F-class dwarf, hung low in the distance. It was something like fifty AU away from us—about the distance between Pluto and our own sun back home.

“Why are we so far from the inner planets?” I demanded. “Assuming there are any… Navigation? What have you got for me?”

The navigator turned to face me, and I realized in surprise that she was none other than Commander Langston.

“You’ve been assigned to my crew?” I demanded.

Langston looked flustered. “I—yes sir. I was reassigned from Cheyenne Station. I can do the job, let me assure you.”

I eyed the redhead for a few seconds. She appeared to be uncomfortable. She wasn’t all that bad-looking, if the truth were told. I hadn’t noticed that before, as she’d worn a scowl the entire time I’d been down in the control center in Colorado.

But her looks didn’t concern me today. What I needed was competence.

“Where’s Chang?” I asked.

“He’s been assigned to the off-shift,” she said.

I was relieved to learn that Chang hadn’t been stolen from me entirely. I opened my mouth, and I almost ordered her off the bridge to go find Chang—but I didn’t do it. She was a rookie, no matter what she thought of herself, but I figured I could give her a chance.

“Have you served in space before, Langston?” I demanded.

“No sir—I mean… yes sir.”

“Which is it?”

“I… I’ve piloted tugs and miners all over the outer planets, Captain.”

My eyes narrowed. “So… you’re one of those new commercial pilots?”

“That’s right, Captain.”

“Huh…” I said, pacing around and circling her. “No military experience?”

“None in battle, if that’s what you mean, Captain. Not yet.”

That wasn’t anything unusual in Earth’s new navy. Only the original crew of Devilfish and various phase-ships had served in actual combat. The rest of our crews were hopelessly green.

“All right, Langston,” I said resignedly. “Everyone has to start somewhere. But you only get one screw-up. That’s the limit on my bridge. After that, you’re switching to the off-shift.”

Her mouth formed a tight spot of pink, but she didn’t complain. She nodded instead.

“What’s your analysis tell us so far?” I asked. “Where are we?”

“This appears to be the Terrapinian home system,” she said with certainty. “There are nine inner planets and six large gas giants out here near the fringe. We’re just past those.”

“Why did we exit the rift out here, then?”

“You’d have to ask the Terrapinians that yourself, Captain.”

I glanced at her sharply. Was she being a smart-mouth already? Her face was a blank, and I was left unsure.

“Speculate,” I ordered.

Her eyes darted over the screens. “Uh… perhaps we’re here to give us safe distance to get organized. Urgh said Fex was in-system besieging his homeworld—that’s the fifth planet out from their sun.”

“Right…” I said, but I thought I had a better answer off the top of my head. “That’s a possibility. But Urgh also said his homeworld was doomed, and that it was under attack. What do you use to attack a target the size of a planet?”

“I’m not sure, Captain,” she admitted.

“Chunks of other planets make good projectiles,” I said. “Big chunks have enough mass to release vast amounts of kinetic energy on impact.”

“On impact?” she asked. Then, slowly, she looked around at the screens surrounding us. Every external viewport on the bridge was showing star-speckled blackness. “The only thing out this far in any star system is a field of debris: Ice, rocks, comets… that sort of thing.”

“Exactly. Work your sensor-arrays. I want to see if there is any activity out here—anything like a water-miner in operation.”

She turned away smartly and moved to marshal her team. She looked stern, and I had no doubt she’d ride herd on those poor bastards until their work produced results.

Hagen, my XO, moved to my side the second she was gone.

“Sorry about that, Captain,” he said.

“Sorry about what?”

“The whole thing with the bridge crew. I tried to hang onto as many key hands as I could, but word came in while you were down there on the mountain that we were shipping out immediately. There wasn’t much time to argue with what Command gave us. In their infinite wisdom, they spit a large number of rookies through the transmat.”

“I understand. We’ll make the best of it. How’s Devilfish doing? What’s our real level of preparedness?”

Hagen shook his head. “We’re fine as long as we don’t have to run—or fight.”

“That’s great… Until I need you, I want you below decks. Oversee the damage control and systems checks personally.”

He nodded, understanding I was giving him a critical job, not shunting him aside. “I’ll ride herd on every dog aboard, sir.”

He left, and I knew he meant what he said. If there was a single crewman slumped in a bunk one second past his eight hours, he’d better cover his tailbone. Hagen wore heavy boots, and he didn’t mind using them.

“Sir?” the comms officer called. “Captain Urgh is online.”

“I’ll take it privately—with my sym.”

Directing my symbiotic to patch the call through to my nervous system, I was able to speak with the Terrapinian as if he was standing in front of me, even though he was a good ten thousand kilometers off our port bow.

“Captain Blake?” the turtle said. “We’re baffled by your behavior. It’s customary for a subordinate to close ranks and follow the lead ship.”

“Yeah…” I said, not wanting to admit we could barely fly. “We, uh, sustained some damage in the rift. We’ve got new engines, and they aren’t operating at one hundred percent efficiency.”

Urgh’s black eyes shifted. “I see…” he said. “This is very unfortunate.”

“What is?”

“You’re either demonstrating dishonesty, cowardice or actual weakness. None of these is acceptable in an underling.”

We’d only been working together for an hour, but good old Urgh was already getting on my nerves.

“None of these are accurate characterizations,” I told him. “Where do you plan to lead us?”

“Toward my homeworld, of course. We’ll destroy Fex and lift the siege—or we’ll die trying.”

I blinked at that statement.

“Hmm…” I said, not liking the sound of his plan. Most Kher tended to be very direct, which was why the Imperials or sneaky bastards like Fex tended to beat them tactically. “How many ships does Fex have in orbit over your home planet?”

“About forty. But only half those are capital ships. The rest are screens.”

“And fighters?” I asked.

He shrugged. “A few hundred. Time is of the essence, Blake. If you would follow my lead—”

“Can you explain your plan of attack, Urgh?” I asked.

“The plan? Yes, it’s quite clever. We arrived far from the inner planets to give us time to gather speed. We’ll use our thrusters on maximum output to charge the enemy fleet. Firing missiles as we go, we’re certain to take out at least two of them by ramming at the glorious finish.”

“Ramming…” I said, finding I was unhappy with the details of his plan. “Could you hold on a second, Urgh?”

I began making a frantic motion toward Langston, summoning her to my side.

She approached, frowning. I shielded my words from Urgh with what amounted to a virtual mute button on my sym.

Urgh protested immediately. “Captain Blake? Has your comm system failed? Are all Earth ships defective?”

I ignored him for a few seconds and locked eyes with Langston.

“I need some facts,” I told her. “What are we up against?”

“We haven’t spotted every ship in orbit over the Terrapinian homeworld, but we’ve found the big ones. There are at least twenty-one vessels identified so far—all with a higher displacement than Devilfish.”

She looked pale, and it wasn’t due to a lack of sunshine.

“Right…” I said. “Urgh expects us to go with him and make a suicidal run at the enemy. We haven’t got a hope of breaking this siege—or of even slowing it down much—with only two ships.”

“There’s something else, sir,” she said. “There are ships out here, too—in the local Oort cloud with us.”

“How many ships?” I asked sharply. “How big?”

“Small tugs, patrol boats. There are maybe a dozen scattered in the region.”

I smiled at last. My mind had begun to formulate a plan.

=8=

Among the Rebel Kher, the most infamous subtypes were those of us descended from primates. We tended to be clever, subtle, and infinitely more devious than the majority.

The run-of-the-mill Kher found these traits disgusting. They liked nothing more than a stand-up fight. They were more interested in honor and decorum than they were interested in victory.

Today, I sensed just such a conundrum facing me and Captain Urgh. I knew he wouldn’t like my plan of attack, even if it had a significantly better chance of succeeding than did his insane charge.

That was the key to dealing with the Kher, unfortunately. You just couldn’t be honest with them—not if you weren’t interested in going out in a blaze of glory. You had to be down-right sneaky instead.

“Captain Urgh,” I said, unmuting my sym and turning my full attention to the Terrapinian who was technically my taskforce leader.

“I’m still here, Blake. What’s taking so long? Is your ship failing under your claws this very second?”

“I am indeed having technical difficulties,” I half-lied. “We’re not able to go to maximum thrust as your plan requires. We’re affecting repairs as quickly as we can.”

“This is disappointing,” Urgh complained. “I had no idea Earth ships were so delicate. Perhaps I shouldn’t have bothered asking for your aid.”

“Well now,” I said, “just wait until you see us in battle. We’ll pull our own weight then.”

Alarmed, Samson made waving-off gestures from his control board. He was monitoring the ship’s status, and he knew we weren’t in any kind of shape to go into battle. Not yet.

I turned my body a half-turn away from Samson, so I couldn’t see him. His hand-wringing was distracting me.

“Listen, Urgh,” I said, “there’s no need to stand here in space doing nothing. We can affect the outcome of this battle from here, even as we make repairs.”

“How so?”

“There are a number of small ships in the region. Are you aware of them?”

“Yes, of course. They’re gathering comets and redirecting their orbits. It’s these falling stones that threaten to break through our planetary shield.”

“In that case, why don’t we attack them to stop the bombardment?”

“We’ve considered it,” Urgh said. “But it won’t break the siege. Fex will only dispatch a squadron of ships to stop us.”

I rolled my eyes. “Yes, but…”

It took me a little work, but I managed to get a few critical points out of Urgh that explained his thinking to me. For one thing, he wanted to make a dramatic charge as soon as possible. He wished to be seen as a self-sacrificing hero by everyone on his planet. Two, he thought that the battle was hopeless anyway, so why not indulge himself?

When Urgh was offline, Hagen moved back to my side. “Same old attitudes. They’re already calling us cowards, and we just got here.”

“You were listening in, huh?”

“I got the gist of it,” he admitted with a shrug.

“It’s just this sort of thing that makes me grind my teeth when dealing with our Kher cousins,” I said. “They really don’t think of war the way that modern humans do.”

“They aren’t into all-out war,” Hagen agreed, “that’s for sure. They never consider doing whatever it takes to win. Why is that, sir?”

“Because they want to conduct every battle in the most honorable way possible. They want to make sure they look and feel good about the outcome—whatever it is. And if poor tactics lose the conflict? Well, at least they can tell themselves they lost with style.”

“Is it always like that? How can they win anything?”

“Not always,” I admitted. “The Kher tendency appears to heighten when a conflict is unwinnable. If the fight is a close match, however, they might struggle with more cunning. When faced with hopeless odds, a grand display of gallantry is always their answer.”

“It reminds me of the armies of Earth’s past,” Hagen mused. “There are many historical accounts of knights charging enemy lines on their own, without orders. They were sometimes too impatient and too prideful to stand and bide their time.”

“Right. A good comparison.”

“Often,” he continued, “such charges resulted in devastating losses, like when thousands of French knights charged and died against the English in the Battle of Agincourt. What can we do to prevent ending up in some Kher’s mournful song, sir?”

“I’ll tell you one thing, it’s never been my intention to die gloriously—in fact, I work hard to avoid death in general.”

Hagen laughed.

“Because of this,” I continued, “some among the Rebel Kher call me a coward. But I disagree with that label. As General Patton said long ago, you don’t win wars by dying for your country. You win by making the other poor bastard die for his country.”

“Amen to that. What’s our next move, then?”

I used my sym to manipulate the main viewing-tank and gestured for Hagen to take a look.

“See the position of these tugs and auxiliary vessels? We’re going to go after them. We’re going to wreck Fex’s siege machine right out here at the source.”

“Urgh isn’t going to like it,” Hagen commented. “He’ll want his charge sooner or later.”

“To hell with Urgh,” I said. “We’re going to win this battle in spite of our allies.”

=9=

There was an unfortunate flaw in my plans. The enemy tugs were pretty far off. As our engines actually were in a sad state, we wouldn’t be able to pounce on them. We’d come up wallowing, and they’d have plenty of warning.

As they were largely unarmed, I had no doubt these ships would flee. Even the honor rules of the Kher allowed retreat when a tugboat faced a warship.

Accordingly, I went below decks to the lab section in the aft of my ship. There, I found Dr. Abrams and his hard-working team of nerds.

“Doc,” I said, “have you got a moment?”

He didn’t even glance up when I came into his lab. He waved me away with a set of flapping fingers instead.

“No, I can’t help you, Captain Blake. I’m sorry.”

Frowning, I approached him anyway.

The nerds quieted and melted away at my approach. Only Abrams himself refused to meet my eye.

“I’m sorry,” he said with his back still turned. “I can’t help you move Devilfish any faster. It wouldn’t be safe, and there just isn’t the thrust in these engines right now in any case.”

“So… you think you know what I want from you? Is that it?”

Abrams gave me a bitter laugh. “There’s only one thing you ask for when you come down here to pester your science division—the impossible.”

“Hmm…” I said, coming close and stepping around Abrams a few times.

He finally looked up from his work and glared, not enjoying my unusually close inspection.

“Can I help you with something else?” he asked in an icy tone.

“Sure. You can tell me if you’re Godwin again or not.”

“What!? That is highly insulting, Captain!”

“You’re right. Your cooperation isn’t entirely necessary. There are tests for such things now. The unfortunate thing is that you created the measurable biometric standards for these tests yourself. Could that be a suspicious coincidence?”

I finally had Abrams attention. He was looking at me now in shock. His underlings, on the other hand, had taken their cue and fled. The exits were swishing and clanging as they made their way to safer parts of the ship.

“You dare to accuse me of being a Nomad?”

“You’ve played the part before.”

“Incorrect!” he boomed, waving a thin finger under my nostrils. “I was a captive at that time. Godwin was in my lab, imitating—”

“Yeah, yeah,” I said, letting him score a point. “You were an innocent victim. Actually, I’ve just deployed an Ursa-made sniffer. It tells me you’re human, at least.”

Abrams eyed the alien device in my hands. Ursahn and her crew had left it behind when they’d searched my ship for Imperials. As far as I knew, it only detected Imperial Kher, not Nomads—but Abrams didn’t know that.

He watched the snuffling black tip of the device as if it were the head of a venomous snake.

“Looks like you’re clean,” I declared. “Glad to hear it, Abrams. I didn’t want to have to space you.”

I clapped him on the shoulder, but he shook off my hand.

“Why would you threaten my person in this crude fashion? I’m no traitor.”

“Ah,” I said, “but you refused to help your captain from the first moment I came down here. In fact, you didn’t even have the strength of character to face me and tell me why you wouldn’t help.”

“Oh… that. Are my actions insufficiently transparent? I would have thought that even a man of your low intellect—ah well, never mind. Perhaps your quotient for perception is even lower than I’d assumed… but no matter! I will explain the situation to you.”

He proceeded to discuss and demonstrate the state of our in-system engines. They were barely functioning, and it would take a week or more to completely recalibrate and align them.

I listened politely, but I was only half-interested. What I really wanted to know about was the state of our rift-drive. That he mentioned only in passing.

When he’d finished, I nodded and clapped him on the shoulder again. He frowned at my hand as if it was some kind of intrusive insect.

“Thanks for that run-down, Doc,” I said. “It confirms all my suspicions and makes my decision much easier. We’ll simply have to take the risk.”

“What are you blathering about, Blake? Did I not just explain to you that these engines—?”

“You did indeed. But I don’t intend to use the in-system drives. I intend to use the jump-drive. We’ll form a rift, hop across this solar system to the nearest collection of enemy tugs, and destroy them before they can flee. It’s the only way.”

“What nonsense is this?”

“What are you upset about? You practically made the call yourself. If we can’t get to them with the regular drives, we have to form a rift and skip all that chasing-around stuff. Now, I’ll leave you to the calculations to manage a short hop. You have one hour to come up with a navigational solution.”

Abrams was sputtering and shaking his head. I thought he might blow a gasket.

“Impossible! Absurd! Ridiculous!”

“You just told me the rift-drive is operating normally,” I pointed out.

“Yes, yes, of course.”

“Why can’t we hop across the system?”

He glowered at me. “Captain Blake. We don’t have that kind of accuracy yet. We’ll scatter for sure.”

“At such a short range?”

“Yes. The rift-drive has been updated, but it is no magic trick. There are still… accuracy problems.”

It was my turn to frown. “Look, Doc,” I said. “I understand your reluctance, but we’ve got no choice. Either we ambush these tugs, fast, or we lose this system to Fex. The Terrapinians will be forced to surrender.”

Abrams sidled up to me with two fast steps.

“Would that be such a terrible thing, in the final calculus of war?”

“Yes, it would,” I said in irritation, “since we can save them with a simple effort and add them to our list of allies. Earth needs allies.”

“But, Captain—”

“Plot me a course, Abrams. You’ve got one hour.”

“But what if we scatter?”

“It’s only a few AU, man!”

“That doesn’t matter. Our data on large, fixed gravity-wells in this part of the galaxy is thin. The computer must recognize where we are, keep track of it, and bring us out at almost precisely the same spot in astronomical terms. The equations aren’t made easier by a short range hop—they’re made more difficult!”

For once, I got his argument, technical though it was.

Since our form of faster-than-light travel involved going blindly into a wormhole and using gravity-wells to navigate with, I could see how a longer jump might be easier than a short one.

“You’re saying our instruments need time to detect how far we’ve gone?”

“Ah!” Abrams said, brightening. “The skies have split! The birds have sung! That dormant, skull-dwelling organ of yours is finally getting a workout today!”

I shrugged off his insults. If you had a thin skin, it was impossible to work with Abrams. Fortunately, I could overlook his odious personality.

All the same, he now had me wearing a frown as I puzzled over the problem he’d explained to me.

“How about this?” I asked. “What if we quickly warp out then come back from another nearby star system? Then we’ll have traveled a fair enough distance. It should be easy to distinguish the target coordinates at that point.”

Abrams shook his head so fast and so hard I thought spittle might fly from his face and hit me.

“No, no, no!” he said. “Two jumps? On an untested rig? It’s suicide!”

I narrowed my eyes in his direction. “Untested? What have you been doing out here? Why have you been tearing up my ship for months without improving it?”

“Devilfish is the fastest, most accurate ship in our fleet at this point—in theory. But if you recall, we were dispatched in a rush. I haven’t had enough time to properly vet our new warp drive.”

“So… each time you fire the new engines up, there’s a chance they will fail?”

“Yes,” he admitted.

“How big of a chance?”

Abrams shrugged, and his eyes darted around furtively. “It’s hard to say. But making a single jump would be at least twice as safe as making two.”

I sucked in a breath and released it. “All right, you’ve convinced me. We’ll do it in a single jump.”

“What?” he sputtered, “no, no, Blake. That’s not what I meant at all. I was talking about the single jump we’re scheduled to make at the end of this military adventure. We have to get home at some point.”

“That’s correct. But first, we must succeed in our mission. Like it or not, we’re going to save Terrapin, Abrams. If you have a technical difficulty, it would be best that you prioritize critical systems like our engines immediately. You might not get another chance.”

I left him puffing and complaining. I didn’t care what he said, and I’d stopped listening to him by now anyway.

“Doc,” I told him when he’d run down a little. “This is go-time. We’re either going to die or we aren’t—but either way, we aren’t going to sit around doing nothing any longer. Now, make it happen. Do whatever it takes—just make it happen.”

He nodded with a sickly expression on his face.

=10=

A few hours later, Abrams resignedly signaled the all-clear. The rift-drive was as ready as it was going to get.

What I’d learned in the interim hadn’t filled me with confidence. I’d been under the false impression that Abrams had installed a new, superior rift-generating engine. Or, barring that, he’d rebuilt the old one, or overhauled it in some way.

Nothing could be further from the truth. The system we were employing today was exactly the same physical unit that we’d had such a hard time with when I’d dealt with Fex a year or so earlier.

The only improvement, as far as I could find, was in a large software patch he’d recently installed.

“A hot-fix update?” Dalton demanded in a scandalized tone. “You mean one of those things that’s as likely as not to disable your phone when you finally give in and let one install itself?”

“Exactly,” I said. “Let’s all pray Abrams’ skills at coding have improved.”

The bridge team grumbled and turned back to their workstations.

At least I had more familiar faces with me now. Hagen was still running the ship as my XO, even though I’d ordered him to take a break hours ago. He was going to have to fly the nightshift when I retired, after all.

But he hadn’t left, and I hadn’t forced him to retire. We both knew this next move might be our last. If the drive failed—well, it wasn’t going to matter if he was well-rested or not.

On my bridge, Samson, Dalton and Mia had joined the crew. They were my most trusted people, and I wanted my A-team on hand for this step.

Turning our ship away from the core star, we signaled Urgh. He signaled back his acknowledgement—but not his approval.

I knew he still wanted to make a quixotic charge at his home planet. But that was just too damned bad. I wanted to do something concrete instead.

“Abrams,” I called with my sym, “activate the rift-drive.”

“Engaging the unit… expect a gravity flux.”

I frowned. “What’s that? Why…?”

That was as far as I got before my guts performed a horrific, squeezing flip in my belly.

“Bollocks!” Dalton moaned. “Not this shit again!”

But that was all he could get out before the gravity waves rolled through our bodies and the ship’s hull, making us all too ill to speak.

A moment later, the rift appeared in front of our bow. Fortunately, we were already underway and right on target. The nose slipped into the shimmering field—which was a riot of magenta and cinnamon-orange colors—before we vanished into nonexistence.

What seemed like less than a second later, we nosed back out of the rift.

We were in a different place, but not far from where we’d started. At first, in fact, I thought we’d gone nowhere at all.

Surrounded by chunks of dirty ice and twirling asteroids, I examined the sensor data as it came pouring in. Soon, I had enough to reach out with my perception skills, and apply them to data to form a single, cohesive image.

I cast the image with a motion toward the central display, and it lit up brightly.

There, not more than twenty thousand kilometers to our stern, a tug moved. I grinned.

“Abrams did it,” I said—then I puked on the deck.

Several others followed suit. Dalton turned his green face to me, one eye half closed and bloody at the corners.

“Why did he have to twist up our guts again, like the old days?” he demanded.

I shrugged. “I told him to do whatever it took. Maybe he took the governors off—it doesn’t matter. We’re here, and we’re in one piece. Now, pilot, swing us around and get our centerline guns locked on that tug.”

Dalton turned back to his controls and hugged the screens like he might fall from his chair—but he didn’t.

Slowly, we all recovered. Abrams’ drive had gotten us to where we wanted to go. I hadn’t enjoyed the ride, but he’d done his part. I mentally made a note to congratulate him.

The tug didn’t sense its doom until we were close—much too close. Then, it whirled around and made a run for it.

Mia demonstrated her fine instincts as a hunter. Fleeing prey—such a sight always made a feline mind go mad with lust for the kill. She was no different.

Her first, slicing shot cut the tug in two. It died with all hands, forming a puff ball of gas and metal fragments in deep space.

“Second target identified,” Commander Langston said. “She’s already fleeing, sir.”

“Can she out run us?”

Langston answered a moment later. “No. She’s doomed. Our engines are slow, but she’s no warship, and we’re already in range.”

“Mia, take her down.”

“A moment, Captain,” Langston said.

I lifted a hand and waved for Mia to stop. My girlfriend hissed at the interruption. She wanted to kill again. She had blood in her mouth, and I knew that she was far from sated. Each kill would only make her hungry for more—such was the nature of a true predator.

“What is it, Langston? A surrender plea?”

“No sir. But we haven’t even offered them the chance—”

Frowning, I waved her off. “These are Fex’s crews. They’ve been dropping rocks and comets for months on top of a planet full of civilians. If they ever got one through the shields, they would have killed millions. What’s more, this war is one of conquest, not defense or honest provocation. In short, I’m not going out of my way to minimize casualties aboard these vessels.”

Ashen, she turned back to her boards. “Understood, Captain.”

“Mia, fire when ready.”

“About damned time,” she muttered, and our weapons rumbled again.

Less than a minute later, another small ship tumbled in space, lifeless and freezing into a frosty lump of slag.

The hunt continued in this grim fashion until we’d run down and destroyed five ships. None of them had asked for quarter, and for that, I was grateful. I hadn’t wanted to give them a break, and I was glad I hadn’t been forced to make another hard choice today.

An hour later, Captain Urgh’s ship formed its own rift and came out to join us. To me, that was another silly move. He could have just as easily jumped to any of the other siege squadrons and knocked them out himself.

The fact that he’d chosen to follow us only after we’d finished our grim work indicated to me that he still wasn’t onboard with the idea. He still wanted to make his last, glorious charge toward the big warships orbiting his home world.

“Captain Urgh!” I boomed in greeting, letting slip none of my misgivings, “great to see you out here joining in the hunt. We’ve already broken the back of one team of criminals, and we’ll soon—”

“I’m here to order you to stop your actions, Captain Blake,” Urgh said.

I blinked once, then twice, before answering.

“Stop? What for? Does your nerve fail you? Are these tiny ships, these metal insects that seek to exterminate your entire race too frightening—?”

“Far from it, Blake,” Urgh interrupted. “We’ve received a message from Fex. He has agreed to withdraw from this star system. He has promised to lift this evil siege.”

“He did?” I asked, almost shocked.

I’d hurt him, a little, but Fex wasn’t so adverse to losses that he couldn’t replace a few dozen tugboats.

“It’s confirmed,” Urgh continued. “All we have to do is stand down and surrender our vessels. Once we do so, Admiral Fex and his taskforce will leave Terrapin in peace. We’re accepting his generous offer, naturally.”

“Of course you are…” I said, narrowing my eyes.

Fex. That underhanded bastard. He was lying to them, of that I had no doubt. The Terrapinians hadn’t dealt with him enough to know him the way I did.

Most of the Rebel Kher were honorable. They didn’t understand or expect people to lie, cheat, or trick one another.

But Fex was a tall, skinny primate with arms as long as a gibbon’s. He wasn’t to be trusted in any way, shape or form.

The trouble was: how would I convince the war-weary Terrapinians of that unwelcome fact?

=11=

We were already walking on down the path of deceit, as the more honorable members of the Rebel Kher would put it. Unfortunately, there was no way back. In order to come out of this situation as the winners, we were going to have to go lower than Fex. We were going to have to dig deeper and act with such treachery that even he wasn’t expecting it.

That was the trouble when two primate-based Kher met on the field of battle. Our instincts were to approach with one hand forward to shake hands, a tight grin on our faces—and a weapon behind our backs. A dagger was preferable, ready to plunge into the other’s unsuspecting chest.

Once my mind was running down dark paths such as these, there was no stopping it. There was very little trust in my heart.

It was my belief Fex was trying to trick us. If I surrendered my vessel, he wouldn’t stop the siege. He’d declare victory instead. Terrapin would fall, and we’d be prisoners at best.

Sitting in my command chair, I brooded while my staffers circled and cast odd glances at me. Eventually, an interruption came from an unexpected source.

Commander Langston stepped into my field of vision and gazed at me. I snorted awake, leaving my hard-thinking fog behind.

“What is it, Langston?”

“I’ve reviewed the reports from the Terrapinians, including the original broadcasts from Fex. We’ve sent them down to the labs for xeno-analysis as well.”

“Xeno-analysis” was a new function every Earth warship was equipped to perform. Since our naval vessels were now expected to deal with creatures we barely understood, part of the crew was dedicated to scientific analysis. Many varieties of Kher were still unknown to us, but our collective body of knowledge was growing each year.

Aboard all our cruisers, we had room in the personnel rosters for several science teams. These people were dedicated to learning about new technology we observed, new cultures we encountered, and new astronomical mapping.

Of all these functions, I thought the xeno-biologists were the most important. After all, I’d rather understand the people behind the warships than the warships themselves. It was better to avert war entirely by understanding the people we encountered than it was to just improve our weapons. We couldn’t hope to win every conflict with superior firepower.

“What have you got, Langston?” I asked.

“Abrams has a team dedicated to analyzing each communique we receive,” she said. “It’s their opinion that Fex is lying. He intends to conquer Terrapin whether we surrender our ship or not.”

I snorted with amusement.

Langston wasn’t happy with this response. She produced a strip of computer paper and began running her fingers over it. She swiped rapidly, flipping past text and diagrams to the summary at the bottom.

Commander Hagen stepped in then and touched her shoulder lightly.

“Langston, I think you misunderstand,” he said. “Captain Blake isn’t rejecting your input. It’s just that he’s already come to the same conclusion. Am I right, sir?”

They both turned to me.

“Yes,” I said. “Without a doubt, this is a primate trick. The Terrapinians might be falling for it, but I’m not.”

Langston still frowned uncertainly.

“If you know it’s a trick, why haven’t you rejected it yet?”

“Because,” Hagen said, answering for me again. “He hasn’t figured out how to turn the situation to our advantage.”

Langston eyed us both with suspicion. “Is he right, Captain? You’re brooding in your chair while your mind works up a counter-thrust?”

“Essentially, yes. I’m thinking about how I can turn the tables on Fex.”

Langston threw up her hands. “Isn’t it obvious? Just contact the Terrapinians and tell them what Fex is up to.”

“Ah!” I said. “If only it were that simple… You see, they probably won’t believe me. They want this siege to end, and they’ll see me as a dirty primate trying to blow their deal.”

“But that’s what Fex is trying to do!”

“Immaterial to the Kher mind,” Commander Hagen said. “Treacherous thoughts usually don’t occur to Rebel Kher. They’ll blame Blake for inventing the problem, just because he came up with it.”

“Really? They’ll shoot the messenger?”

“Yes…” he said. “Perhaps literally.”

Langston turned slowly back to me. She was frowning now and looking thoughtful. I could tell her mind was finally in the same zone as my own.

“In that case… what do we do now, sir?”

I gave her a thin smile. “Now you know why I’m thinking hard. I’m going to take a walk. Hagen, you go on break. Langston… do you want to take the helm for a few minutes?”

She looked startled, but then she quickly nodded her head.

The command reassignment was made to the bridge crew, and I walked off the deck. Hagen followed me.

“You think that’s safe, Captain?” Hagen asked. “She’s pretty green.”

“We just destroyed every enemy ship in the quadrant. This seems like a rare quiet moment in this region of space. Let’s make the most of it.”

“If you say so, Captain.”

“I do. Hit your bunk, Hagen. That’s an order.”

He tossed me a salute and took a side passage. I headed straight down to the lower decks and walked among the thrumming engine pods.

Tired-looking spacers scrambled to their feet and tried to look busy when I walked by, but I ignored them.

They were working hard hours down here, trying to seal up every half-built upgrade. I knew they’d get the essentials functioning—but would their repairs stand the test of battle? I wasn’t so sure about that.

“What a way to run a shake-down cruise, eh Blake?” a voice asked behind me.

I knew that voice. I knew the single individual that possessed it, a ghost from my past. A creature who had haunted me for years now.

I whirled around.

There he stood, wearing spacer blues with a single gold dot on his lapel. He blended right in as my crew wasn’t familiar with every face aboard yet. He could have been anyone among the hundreds who were working on these decks night and day.

“Godwin?” I asked in shock. “I can’t believe you’ve come back.”

Godwin was the only name I knew him by. He was a Nomad, an alien from a race unlike any other we knew of.

His people looked human—usually. They could take on any guise they wished. They were artificial life. Not machines, not exactly, but rather watery formations that didn’t have much inside in the way of organs or bones…

Since their consciousness wasn’t tied to a single body, it could be transmitted from place to place. Killing or injuring one only seemed to result in another popping up when you least expected it—like right now.

Godwin shrugged almost shyly. “I like Earth people, believe it or not. You represent a challenge.”

Warily, I stood my ground. Taking in my surroundings, I noted that the passage was almost empty. The nearest crewmen were around a corner, twenty meters off at least.

“Stop worrying,” Godwin said. “This isn’t an assassination attempt.”

“You tried to kill me the last time we met, back on Earth.”

“You mean at your trial? The execution that didn’t take? That wasn’t my idea. You actually helped me out that day by escaping your doom. The other Nomads… they didn’t understand your people yet. They saw you as a pointless distraction. An insult.”

“And what do your people think of us now?”

“We’re intrigued. We’re confused, even. Several others of your species resisted us that day. They recognized us for what we were, and they took concerted action. That’s very disturbing to our kind.”

I walked slowly toward him, stopping when we were in handshaking range.

“You said I helped you—how?”

“By not falling for our tricks. It wasn’t just you, Vega did the honors. He and his men shot down our entire delegation. That was impressive. Some of those people who attended… well, let’s just say they aren’t used to being killed and sent packing.”

“All right then,” I said. “You’re back, so I assume you want something. Let’s cut to the chase: Tell me what you want.”

“Admiral Fex is a beast—like you. He’s got big ideas, and he’s taking action unilaterally. We need you to steal his secrets and share them with us. Most importantly, we need to know where he got them.”

“His secrets?” I asked, honestly confused. “You mean like throwing rocks at domes?”

Godwin laughed. “No, nothing so mundane. You haven’t encountered what I’m talking about—not yet. But when you do, you’ll recognize it: A true technological revolution and something that might upset the balance of power in our galaxy.”

Frowning, I opened my mouth again to ask him another question, but he raised his hand.

“Your people have spotted me,” he said. “I’ve got to go. Think about what I’ve said. We’ll talk about the terms and conditions of this trade when we meet again.”

Behind Godwin, I heard a lot of pounding boots. The ship’s security people were coming.

There were cameras and sensors everywhere aboard our ships now. They were carefully attuned to detect creatures like Godwin. It made me feel safer to know that they really worked.

Then, the Nomad did something I’d never witnessed before. He melted. It was a very odd thing to watch.

He didn’t leave clothing, as his costume had been part of his fabricated structure. He simply began to collapse inwardly, folding up and sagging at the shoulders.

The head drooped like a balloon losing pressure. The face flopped loosely, then sunk to flap backwards as the neck no longer held it upright.

The whole body slapped the deck a moment later. A puddle of liquid, a few trace colors—that was all he left behind.

Huffing with exertion, a security team rushed up and surrounded me, but I ignored them and their urgent questions.

Godwin was long gone.

=12=

Dr. Abrams seemed the most eager to pry details out of me as I yawned and repeated the story of my encounter with Godwin.

“So…” he said. His eyes were wide and luminous, reflecting the flashing lights of various devices in his lab. “The being didn’t tell you what Fex has discovered? No hint of what kind of threat he’s working to uncover?”

“Nope,” I said, gazing wistfully toward the door that led out of the labs. I needed a shower and a nap. I’d been on duty for twenty hours plus.

Abrams narrowed his eyes and stared at me suspiciously for several seconds before he came to a decision.

He slapped a rolled-up computer paper against the palm of his left hand.

“Captain, you have been deceived,” he pronounced with certainty. “This is trickery. Stuff and nonsense. It’s my belief Godwin wanted only to spook us. You shouldn’t fear him.”

I snorted. “I’m not afraid of him. I’ve killed him plenty of times—and I disagree with your conclusion, Doc. Godwin wouldn’t come find me without a good reason. I think Fex must have something—something dangerous. The Nomads wouldn’t waste their time otherwise.”

Abrams sneered. “Sheer conjecture. Not helpful at all. You offer no more facts than Godwin did himself. I suggest, Captain, that you leave these complex matters to my experts.”

Here, he indicated a circle of lab coats who were studiously operating instruments.

In the midst of the huddled xeno-scientists, a puddle of liquid sat in a shallow tub. The tub rested on top of a table while they examined it closely.

The slime in the tub was Godwin’s remains. They poked at the goop delicately, dipping in probes and syringes. Now and then, one of the nerds cast me a doubtful look, as if he thought I’d somehow caused Godwin to vanish before anyone else could get a good look at the alien.

Taking my cue, I slid my butt off Abrams’ desk and headed for the exit. “I’ll leave it to your crack team, then,” I told him. “I’ll expect a full report in the morning.”

Abrams made a choking sound. He often did that, as if stress made it hard for him to swallow his own spit.

“Tomorrow is too soon, Captain! Be reasonable.”

At the door, I turned back.

“You’ve got a team, a puddle of remains, a live camera-feed and God-knows-what else. Write it up and hand it in tomorrow.”

I left him then, and he turned as I moved out of earshot to berate his underlings. Dr. Abrams was a man who was easily flustered. I was very glad I didn’t work for him.

*

Four hours later, my bloodshot eyes blinked open. Someone was trying to contact me through my sym, causing an annoying scratching sensation in my brain.

“Blake here,” I mumbled.

“Captain? We’ve got an incoming contact, ship-to-ship.”

It was Chang’s voice. I realized that meant we were still in the middle of the off-shift.

“Urgh can wait,” I said. “We all need a break.”

“Sorry Captain,” Chang said. “It’s not Urgh. It’s Admiral Fex.”

My eyes, which had sagged closed again, snapped wide.

“I’m on my way.”

Forcing myself to my feet, I realized I’d collapsed on my bunk without taking off my uniform. I staggered into my bathroom—one nice thing about being the captain was a private privy.

I splashed water onto my face until my collar was soaked. I slathered nanofoam over my face to eat up the grease and stubble. Soon, I looked better than I felt.

When I opened the door to my quarters, however, I was in for a surprise.

Mia stood there, warily. I got the feeling she’d been there for a long time.

Now, this was an odd occurrence, as Mia shared my cabin with me. We’d been in a long term relationship for years. She served on my ship, and we shared a bed—I’d never gotten tired of it.

But she wasn’t entirely human. She was rebel Kher, a feline type. She was biologically compatible, but she wasn’t entirely on the same wavelength psychologically.

“Mia?” I asked. “What are you doing out here?”

“Mate-guarding,” she said.

“Um…”

“Are you going to meet Commander Langston?”

“Who? What…? Are you jealous again?”

Mia was from a planet called Ral which wasn’t an easy-going place for females of her sub-species. The females outnumbered the males dramatically, and as a result the males were notoriously unfaithful.

“I waited here while you slept,” she said.

“Why?”

“If she approached, I would witness it. If you tried to sneak out to meet her, I knew I’d witness that, too. Is that what you’re doing now?”

Her big eyes were intense and earnest.

“No, girl,” I said, shaking my head and smiling. “Give it a rest, okay? I haven’t cheated on you yet, and we’ve been together for years.”

“That’s what concerns me. I’ve beaten the odds so far, but how long can that last?”

“Why are you so worried about Langston?”

“I saw her interest. I saw you favor her with command. You’ve never left me in command—but you put her in your seat on the first day.”

“Ah…” I said, rubbing my neck.

I brushed lightly past her and headed for the bridge which was only a few dozen steps from my cabin. She followed me, fretting and suspicious.

“Look, girl,” I said, “Fex is calling ship-to-ship. We might have an emergency on our hands. Can’t this wait?”

“I’ve changed my mind,” she said suddenly.

Frowning, I turned around to face her again. “Changed your mind? About what?”

Her arms were crossed over her breasts, and she had a determined look on her face. Her chin was held high.

“She can’t be your second girl. I’ve gotten used to privileges on Earth. I want to be alone with you in our bed.”

“Um… okay. You’ve got it. But only on one condition.”

Her eyes were big and round. “What condition?”

“That you come to my bed the next time I get back there. No more standing guard outside like a Doberman.”

“What’s a Doberman?”

“Something you don’t want to be.”

She looked a little thoughtful for a second then she kissed me. “All right. I will control my anger, even if you favor her and flirt with her in public. But remember, she can’t come to our bed to join us.”

“Got it,” I said wearily.

After a few more seconds of kissing, my sym began scratching in my mind again.

“Let’s go,” I said, trotting toward the bridge, “we’ve got a mess to deal with.”

“What are you going to do about this mess?”

“Make it bigger, probably.”

We arrived on deck, and everyone turned in surprise to look us over. The B-team crew was manning the stations—the night shift. Several of them, like Chang, I knew well. Others were unfamiliar.

“Captain,” Hagen said as he relinquished my command station. “I could use a break, but you’ve only been gone for—”

“Stay here for a minute,” I said, “I wanted to take this call on the bridge. Fex needs to see me firmly in command, not in the shower.”

“Ah, right. I’ll stand at your side.”

“Chang?” I called out. “Give me a wide-angled pickup on the cameras, will you? Project Fex onto the central console.”

Fex’s head and shoulders appeared in the midst of the bridge projection table, zoomed in to make him about three times his natural size. The effect was alarming.

“Fex, my man!” I said in a friendly tone. “What can I do for a comrade who’s fought Imperials to the death at my side?”

Fex didn’t speak right away. He was ape-like, but his eyes were quick and highly-intelligent. As primates went, he was tall and lanky with short dark hair that covered his body. To me, he looked like a skinny yeti.

“Captain Blake…” he said at last. “Why do you insist on provoking me like this? Didn’t you learn your lesson the last time I visited Earth?”

Fex was referring to his disastrous campaign to subjugate humanity. Using trickery, Ursahn’s help and Earth’s own fledgling fleet, we’d managed to drive him off.

I laughed in a hearty manner. “Come on, Fex,” I said. “It was your Kwok ships that ran from us. Didn’t you learn your lesson?”

There was a short delay due to the transmission distance. We were quite a few AU out from his location. Even with improved comm equipment that could cheat the limitations of radio waves that crawled around at the speed of light, there was a delay.

Fex winced before he responded. “Insults? First, you damage helpless ships in a craven manner refusing my invitation to honest battle. You’ve also ignored my request to surrender. Instead, you provide only insults and trickery.”

About then, I began to frown. I gave Chang the pause signal, which he acted upon immediately. Our out-going transmissions froze.

“Is Captain Urgh listening to this talk?” I asked.

Chang consulted his displays. At last, he nodded. “I think so. Fex is relaying everything said on an open channel. Looks like the Terrapinian ship is monitoring the conversation.”

“Cagey bastard…” I said.

Quite unlike most Kher, Fex and his kind were at least as underhanded as your average human. They were always playing three angles at once.

“What’s he doing that’s so tricky, Captain?” Hagen asked.

“He’s actually calling me to make me look bad to the Terrapinian crew. If he can make me seem unreasonable to accept offers of peace, if he can make us out to be the problem, he can break the Terrapinian’s trust in us.”

Hagen looked alarmed. “You don’t think the turtles would fire on us, do you?”

“Nah. They’d just stand by and let us fight alone against Fex’s ships.”

“That’s bad enough…”

“No answer, Blake?” Fex demanded suddenly. “Have your transmission systems failed you? Are you fearing to speak?”

“Bastard…” I said, making a spinning motion toward Chang, who reopened the channel.

“Fex, sorry about that!” I said. “I just got another report in about your new tech.”

Whistling, I pretended to go over a computer scroll with interest.

Hagen leaned over the arm of my chair and glanced at the blank scroll in some confusion—but he didn’t blow it and ask what the hell I was doing. He was beginning to catch onto my personal style.

Fex’s eyes narrowed like those of a wet cat. “New Tech?” he snapped. “What are you talking about?”

Still marveling at a blank page, I rolled it up and handed it ceremoniously to Hagen. “Put that in the vault,” I told him.

Hagen stepped away like he was carrying the crown jewels.

Turning back to Fex, I shook my head and clapped my hands slowly. “I’ve got to hand it to you, Fex old man. You sure can make some powerful enemies. Do you have any idea how many heavy-duty aliens want us to help them out now? They see us blow up a few tugs, and they figure we’re at your throat.”

“Blake,” Fex said stiffly. “I think you’ve gone mad. We haven’t got any new tech, or alien enemies—”

At that point, Fex was jostled. A smaller figure leered, pushing his head into the frame.

It was none other than Dr. Shug, who’d been promoted to Secretary Shug, the last I’d heard of his rank.

Shug was another primate. He was much smaller than Fex, but he was no less sneaky. He was, in fact, a genius.

“Blake,” he said. “This is Secretary Shug. I order you, as an officer of the Rebel Fleet, to stop casting out random statements. If you’ve been in touch with the Imperials—”

Long ago, I’d learned that one of the easiest ways to get a secret out of someone was to pretend you already knew it. That dropped their guard and caused them to speak more freely. They often gave you critical clues if you could fake it well enough, or your opponent might even blurt out the truth on the spot.

So far that hadn’t happened, but I wasn’t done fishing yet.

“Not just the Imperials, sir,” I said. “The Nomads visited me no more than an hour ago. Your advances are well-known. They mean to stop you.”

Of course, I hadn’t had any kind of contact with the Imperials. In fact, the idea that Shug had guessed wrong and mentioned them instead of the Nomads—that in itself was alarming.

Just what new tech had these apes discovered? What could be so big that it held the attention of both the Imperials and the Nomads?

My mind was racing. Everything made more sense to me if Shug was involved. He was a great scientist, a genius like Abrams, but infinitely more knowledgeable and dangerous. He was the kind of being who might actually make a ground-shaking discovery.

If he was with Fex… Well, maybe there really was some major scientific breakthrough involved here, even if I hadn’t seen any direct evidence of it yet.

“Blake,” Shug said, interposing himself between the camera pickup and Fex who looked annoyed. “This goes beyond any squabbling about pathetic star systems like this one. You’ll have to talk to us privately. You’ll have to be debriefed.”

“Uh…” I said thoughtfully. “I don’t see how that’s going to happen, sir. Earth Fleet is here to aid the Terrapinians in repelling an invader. Unfortunately, you are directly associated with that invading fleet.”

Shug spread his lips and flashed a lot of big, square white teeth at me. That wasn’t a threat among his kind; it was a show of stress and deep thought.

“This is all nonsense,” Fex announced, looming over Shug’s much smaller form. “You’ve got nothing, Blake. ‘Earth Fleet’ indeed! I count one Terrapin cruiser and one Earth ship. We’ve been watching you since you entered the system, and I’m not interested in your bluffing. Not today.”

“Really?” I asked in an innocent tone. “Your sensors still can’t pick up phase-ships? Even our new, larger vessels? That’s almost disappointing… I thought maybe—never mind. I guess that just because your tech is advancing in one zone doesn’t mean you’re keeping up with us in everything.”

Hagen’s eyes slid over to me then slid back to the apes on the screen again. They seemed to be growing more upset with every word I spoke. My hints and half-statements were driving them to paranoia.

That, of course, was my intention.

“All right, Blake,” Fex said. “If you won’t stand down and let us board you, we’re at an impasse.”

Shug spoke up again. “Admiral Fex,” he said. “This is a civil matter. My authority supersedes your—”

“Ah-hah!” Fex said, waving a long thin, hairy finger over Shug’s head. “Didn’t you hear Blake, sir? He stated clearly he’s allied with Terrapin. He said we were in a technical state of war. The Rebel Fleet as a whole isn’t mobilized now, and you don’t have any authority to command me and my ships.”

Shug looked resigned. He nodded and turned back to me. “Blake, don’t die for these reptiles. You’re too good of a commander for that. We might need you—the Rebel Fleet might need you—before long.”

For the first time, I took Shug’s words seriously. The situation was odd and dramatic.

The relationships between all the various Rebel Kher species were complex and ever-changing. We were like distant relatives that gathered on the holidays and fought like dogs—but who were still bound by tradition and fear to stand together when an outside threat approached.

It was a difficult moment. I was torn in my loyalties. When the Imperials or Nomads got involved, Fex, Shug, the Terrapinians—we were all brothers. But was that really happening now? Or were they trying to dig deeper to trick me, just as I was trying to trick them? It was hard to know.

“I’ll keep those thoughts in mind, Secretary Shug,” I said at last. “Blake out.”

After the channel closed, I sat brooding in my chair, staring at the deck.

“Captain?” Hagen asked after a dozen long seconds drifted by. “What are your orders, sir?”

“I’m thinking,” I said. “What are the enemy doing?”

“They appear to be gathering into a single mass—a wedge-formation.”

I looked up at last, and our eyes met. “They’re going to jump?”

“Maybe, sir,” he said. “It’s hard to tell. Our positional data on them is hours out of date. If they—”

“Abrams!” I roared, using my sym to send my voice booming over the PA system all over the lower decks. “Report immediately!”

Abrams reported-in less than ten seconds later. “What is it, Blake? Have you gone even closer to the brink of madness?”

“Abrams, load up the next jump point on our list.”

“What are you talking about, man?”

“You heard me. Open a path. Jump us to the next squadron of tugs.”

When we’d initially plotted our first attack against the ships that were steering comets out of the Oort cloud toward the inner planets, we’d come up with a list of targets and selected one of them. The math had been worked out for seven different jumps, but of course, we’d only taken one of these paths so far.

“But Blake… that data is old. The ships will have moved. The local debris will have shifted, too. What you speak of will be dangerous and fruitless.”

“Load the data. Form the rift. We won’t go through if we don’t have to. And Abrams? Make it a low-power rift. I want it to fade fast.”

“Uh… all right, sir.”

Maybe he’d caught on. My tone, my urgency… Abrams was a huge pain in the ass, but if he thought his posterior was in actual, physical danger, he could move pretty fast.

Commander Hagen was sweating. He knew the score.

“You think they’re going to short-jump it right out here. Right on top of us—right?”

“Yes,” I said. “They had to be plotting that move. It makes too much sense, whether or not they thought we’d let them board and surrender.”

Hagen nodded, and we went into emergency mode, accelerating in local space and gearing up the power modules to form a rift.

“Uh…” the comm officer said. “Captain? Urgh is calling us. He wants to know what the hell we’re doing.”

“Tell him to follow us. Tell him we’re going to jump, because an attack is incoming.”

“Urgh is refusing, sir. He’s asking us to stand-down.”

I fumed and nodded. “Damned primates. They conned him. It’s too easy to convince desperate people you’re honest when they want to believe your lies so badly.”

“The rift is ready, sir,” Hagen called out.

“That was pretty fast,” I said.

He shrugged. “Abrams did update the software. Seems to actually work better.”

The rift formed ahead of us. It was small, tight, and brightly colored. We glided toward it at speed.

Seconds later, we plunged into the anomaly, and were filled with a fear of the unknown. At the same time, it was a relief to get out of that region of space.

=13=

“Captain, something is following us through the breach,” Langston announced.

The input from our stern cameras flashed up on the central display. We watched tensely.

“How long until that rift closes?” I asked.

“Its short term,” Hagen said, “but it will still be viable for crossing for at least six more minutes.”

Six minutes. That was a lifetime when you were on the run.

“Should we accelerate?” Hagen asked. “We can put some distance between us and that rift until it closes.”

I shook my head slowly.

“No,” I said. “Helm, come about and hit the brakes. We’ll wait right here and ambush Fex if he’s following us. Any sign that his ships have left Terrapin?”

“No sir,” Langston reported. “His ships still appear to be orbiting over the Terrapinian homeworld—but they’re light-hours away. We’re seeing where they were in the past.”

“Right… Keep monitoring their activity anyway.”

Maneuvering tactically against an enemy inside the same star system was a new experience for me. In past space battles, we usually didn’t have visual contact ship-to-ship until we were quite close.

Since rifts allowed our ships to move faster than the speed of light, it was possible to fight a ship in local space even while it appeared to be on the other side of the system. The reason was that light crawled along at a steady rate when compared to the incredible distances. That meant the status of the fleet orbiting Terrapin which we were watching now was old news, not current reality. For all we knew, they were already chasing us.

Tension reigned as Devilfish slewed around and faced the rift she’d made herself. Had our attempted escape come too late? If Fex and his fleet were on our tails, they could simply use the rift we’d made to jump again and therefore land right on top of us.

No one spoke much for about two minutes—then a large vessel nosed its way through the rift.

“Unknown ship approaching, sir,” Langston said promptly.

“I can see that, Commander. Have you got an identity signal from her yet?”

Langston hesitated for several long seconds, checking her instruments. At last, she sighed.

“It’s a Terrapinian battlecruiser, sir.”

“Urgh’s ship?”

“Almost certainly.”

I frowned and spun to face Hagen. “I thought he was going to sit behind and wait for Fex to ‘inspect’ him.”

Hagen shrugged. “Maybe he changed his mind. Or, maybe he’s decided we’re endangering his homeworld by not surrendering to Fex.”

Turning back to the screens, I rubbed at my lank hair. When had I showered last? I couldn’t recall.

“Shouldn’t we at least open our gun ports, sir?” Mia asked.

She looked anxious at her station. Her kind were killers, and they enjoyed nothing more than the thrill of the hunt. Even if we might lose and all die—she wanted to fight.

“No,” I said, “stand down. You can ping her hull, Langston, but everyone else just relax until we know Urgh’s intentions.”

They sat back away from their controls—all except for Mia, who was hunched over her gunnery station. She looked disappointed and frustrated.

“If you let me hit him now…” she speculated. “I can kill him before he’s able to strike back.”

“Sorry Mia,” I said firmly. “Stand down.”

She did as I’d ordered, but her tail twitched irritably. Things might not go so well for me later tonight in our private quarters—but that was just too damned bad.

After a few moments, Urgh hailed us.

“Captain Blake?” he asked. “Is this the ambush we’ve been expecting? Is this your entire purpose for fleeing, to gain advantage?”

“Yes,” I said firmly, and everyone on the bridge looked at me in shock. “This is an ambush. Please position your ship at our flank. When Fex follows us through this breach, we can destroy his ships one at a time.”

Everyone relaxed as I said this, suddenly realizing what I was talking about.

“That would be a dishonorable act,” Urgh complained.

“Not as dishonorable as squatting on an ally’s homeworld, dropping comets on the planetary shield and demanding subjugation.”

Urgh thought about that for a few seconds. “You humans value your freedom quite highly,” he observed at last.

“That’s right,” I said. “We do. We’ll die for it.”

“That’s irrational. Terrapinians will only risk death for two things: survival and honor.”

“Humans extend their concept of honor to include political freedom,” I explained.

Urgh’s face lit up and his mouth opened as if he was struck by a new thought.

“That explains so much!” he said. “All your bizarre behavior and violent, over-sensitive ways. If you value self-determination so greatly that you’re willing to die for it—”

“We do,” I said. “In fact, it supersedes other dishonors. We’ll suffer those rather than submit to being the slave of another.”

“Bizarre and disorderly…” the Terrapinian captain mused. “But what you say fits your behavior. I will make a note of it.”

“In the meantime,” I said, “are you interested in joining us in the defense of your planet? Or do you willingly accept the humiliation Fex has offered?”

My words were intended to sting, and they did the job.

“You insult us and ask for our help at the same time?”

“No,” I said firmly. “I’ve offered help. I’m asking if you will accept our aid and remain free.”

He pondered my words seriously for a moment. “Would it not be a greater dishonor—?” he began at last.

“No,” I replied quickly.

Time was running out. Langston had signaled me, the rift was active again—something else was coming through.

“No,” I repeated. “It wouldn’t be a greater dishonor to break your word with Fex. He has broken his word with you already.”

“How so?”

“He’s lied to you. He has no intention of withdrawing from Terrapinian space. He will capture your ship, then go right back to besieging your homeworld. All promises of peace from him are false.”

My bridge crew was glancing at me and one another as I spoke these words. They seemed as uncertain as Urgh himself.

“How do you know this?” Urgh asked.

“We’re both primates. He is a liar, and he always has been. I am familiar with such beings as I’m a primate myself.”

“Trickery… Deceit… Evil…” Urgh said. His voice was both angry and despondent.

“Look, Urgh, I know you want to believe Fex. You want this to be over with. But that desire only makes you weaker, easier to manipulate.”

The rift was dying down, now. It was flickering around the edges.

I felt a momentary surge of elation—maybe the rift would close before Fex could follow us. Maybe we wouldn’t have to fight after all.

“We cannot dishonor ourselves as you suggest,” Urgh said.

“There’s no greater dishonor than playing the fool, Captain!” I told him.

A ship appeared at that point, and our conversation lagged.

It was a big vessel. A ship larger than either of ours.

“Open gun ports,” I ordered. “Line us up, Dalton.”

My primary crew had been summoned and now quietly took over their stations. Samson was at tactical ops. He looked at me seriously.

“Captain, the Terrapinian ship is preparing to fire as well. She might be aiming at us.”

We glanced at one another.

“Damned fools,” I heard Hagen mutter.

I couldn’t disagree with him. Worst of all, I knew it was perfectly possible that if I fired upon Fex’s ship, my erstwhile ally might shoot me for breaking the deal he’d brokered.

We were in a tough spot, and I wasn’t certain how I should play it.

“Leo,” Mia said, turning to look at me. “Let me fire now! If I blast them before they come completely into our space—”

“All right,” I said, knowing we couldn’t beat a battleship any other way. “Sucker-punch them. Hit them as hard as you can.”

She whirled back to her boards, and alerts went live all over the ship.

We were in going into battle.

=14=

Devilfish swung around and lined up her hull with the incoming ship. The main guns on our cruiser were built along the centerline of the ship.

In several ways, weaponry aboard spacecraft operated differently than it did on a seaborne vessel. One major difference was the handling of recoil, which could send us into a spin if we didn’t target something that was directly ahead.

Since there wasn’t any friction in space—nothing to hold onto—any force exerted caused a push in the opposite direction. This wasn’t too bad of an effect when using lasers or other energy-based weapons. Such guns could reach out over great distances and do reasonable damage.

Our main armament, however, was the railgun. Our big gun shot a projectile at high speeds, and it had quite a kick. If we didn’t have it right, it could send our ship into a dangerous tumble.

It was a design weakness, but given the displacement of my ship it was the best we could do.

“Firing solution locked,” Chang said calmly.

“Fire one,” Mia said.

As it was, Mia fired a little early. We weren’t one hundred percent lined up with the target—or rather, the predicted impact point, which was several kilometers ahead of the ship coming out of the rift. As the railgun fired and angled the shot, we had to compensate with thrusters to keep an even keel.

At the helm, Dalton let loose a string of curses, fighting the controls. Samson endured the rocking more stoically, working his station but allowing the computers to do most of compensating. Jets fired in a row on my ship’s aft region, countering the recoil and keeping us from going into a spin.

“What about our secondary batteries?” Hagen complained. “Aren’t we firing our—?”

“Lasers will barely scratch this beast,” Mia said.

I waved down Hagen, who was frowning. I trusted Mia. We’d updated our armament along with our engines recently. She was the expert—or at least she was the best we had with these new guns which were untested in actual battle.

“These new guns generate too much heat,” she complained. “I don’t like them.”

There wasn’t much we could do about technical issues now, so I ignored her complaints.

“Coil cooling…” she said. “Three seconds… we’re green. Fire Two!”

Devilfish roared and rocked under us again.

“The first shot hasn’t even landed,” Langston said in surprise.

“Are we predicting a hit?” I asked.

“It’s hard to say… I think so, but it will be a near thing. We’ll hit the enemy in the stern, or we’ll miss.”

Mia released a hiss of vexation at hearing we might miss. “They’re accelerating,” she said, “which changes the firing solution.”

“Langston, compensate,” I said. “Override your battle computer. Predict even more acceleration.”

She worked her boards without an argument, and Dalton brought the ship around to a new firing posture.

“They came nosing in slowly,” Hagen said, “maybe they thought they could talk to us.”

“They sensed a trap,” I agreed, “but they played it wrong by coming in slowly. Maybe they thought we had mines ready. Let’s hope our surprise attack—”

“Hit!” Langston shouted.

A flare went up on the display. The battleship, now completely within our region of space, was struck in the aft region. The stern was damaged.

“She’s still in this,” Hagen said. “She’s raising shields.”

“Dammit,” I said. “What’s that Terrapinian bastard doing?”

“Standing around with his thumb up his ass,” Dalton said.

He was pretty much correct. Captain Urgh had chosen to drift in the distance, watching the battle play out. At least he wasn’t firing at us—not yet.

It had to be a hard thing for a Rebel Kher to watch us fight so nearby and not join in. I imagined that he was split in his desires. Honor called for him to join an ally fighting an invader—but he’d made a deal with the enemy, offering to surrender in return for peace.

“Fire Three,” Mia announced.

The ship rocked and shivered again.

We’d gotten off three shots, and still there had been no answer from the enemy guns. If we didn’t beat them by the time our third salvo landed, there wasn’t any hope of a vessel like Devilfish ever taking out one of Fex’s big battlewagons. We were totally outclassed.

Finally, the bigger ship was wheeling. The rift behind her closed and winked out—but that wasn’t necessarily a good thing. The battleship was engaging us.

“She’s coming about,” Chang said.

“Cease fire, Mia!” I ordered. “Shields up, all power to forward shields. Prepare for evasive action.”

Mia slumped dramatically over her weapons console. “Three shots won’t be enough,” she complained.

Another problem with Abrams’ ship design was our relative weakness in prolonged combat. The upside of her design was that the ship was fast, light, and she hit very hard for her size. The downside was she couldn’t do all of these things at the same time. She was underpowered: her generators being too small to operate all her systems at once.

In effect, Devilfish could run fast, she could open a small rift, she could play offense, or defense—but she had to choose one option at a time.

Since we were facing tremendous firepower, I’d chosen to survive by raising our defenses to their maximum—even so, that might not be enough.

“The battleship is firing, sir.”

There was no delay when the Kwok ship fired on us. An energy weapons barrage landed almost immediately.

Missiles and other projectiles followed in a steady stream behind the faster beams—and suddenly, our survival looked unlikely.

The beams knocked down several concentric layers of our shielding. The odd thing was we felt nothing, just a flicker of power. The shields were new, and they were capable of producing a momentarily opaque field in front of our ship. It was as if, for a fraction of a second, a region of nearby space transformed into a mirror-like surface.

“The outer shield absorbed the shot,” a new voice said behind me. “It worked.”

I turned to see Dr. Abrams. “You’re place is below decks, Doc,” I told him.

He didn’t even look at me. He simply stood tall and watched the battle unfold on every screen around us.

“I built this ship, Blake,” he said. “Would you deny my dying wish to see her in action, for her first and final time?”

My jaw muscles flexed, but I decided we didn’t have time to argue about it. Besides, he could very well be right.

“Have you got any input?” I asked. “There’s a hailstorm still incoming—”

“Second salvo reaching the target…” Langston called out, “Hit again! She took it hard in the prow!”

Mia released a happy sound. It was an inhuman mixture of growl, purr, and squeal.

The bee-swarm of incoming projectiles grew closer every second. The battleship was about to get her revenge on her tormentor.

“We can’t evade,” Dr. Abrams said, answering my question at last. “We can’t form a rift, and if we turn, our forward shields will be useless. We have to ride this out.”

I nodded. I’d come to the same conclusion.

“Third salvo…” Langton said, “…a miss, sir. She’s changed course, and our last shot hit empty space.”

Everyone cursed and prayed. That had been our last real hope of victory.

“Sir…” Langston said, “the Terrapinian ship is moving now. She’s accelerating toward us.”

“Is she going to engage?”

“It looks like it. My course projections place her right between us and the battleship.”

“A day late and dollar short,” Samson complained.

Dalton snorted. “If those wanking turtles had fired when we had, the battle would have been over with by now!”

Dalton was, of course, correct. The Terrapinians had finally chosen to act, but even if they destroyed the battleship now, we’d still have to eat those missiles.

What followed was the worst part of space combat—the waiting. Often, one could see doom approaching inexorably, watching it crawl in pursuit for long hours. There was no torment more exquisite to a starship captain’s soul.

Fortunately, by my calculations, this would all be over within the next three minutes.

“The Kwok ship is hailing the Terrapinian vessel, demanding they stand-down,” Langston said. “Should we hail them as well?”

I raised my hand quickly, palm out. “No. Maintain radio-silence. They don’t want to hear from us, and nothing we say will change their behavior now.”

My crew shifted in their seats uncomfortably. Almost everyone was baring their teeth now, staring at each screen in sequence, lowering their heads and clutching at their workstations.

Such bracings for impact were only natural, but they were almost certainly pointless.

Then, I witnessed a change. The Kwok ship rotated to face the incoming Terrapinian battlecruiser.

“Samson,” I said, almost in a whisper. “Drop shields.”

He looked at me for a split-second, his eyes certain I’d gone mad—but he did it.

“Mia, fire one last time when your coils go green.”

“Fire Four!” she shouted happily a moment later.

“Get those shields back up,” I snapped.

“They’re coming up, Captain,” Samson said. “But they won’t be as strong as they would have been with steady power.”

“I know…” I said.

No one else spoke for a time as all three ships hurtled together. The battleship fired at Urgh’s flank—but Urgh still didn’t return fire.

“What the hell is he doing?” I demanded.

“Sir…” Langston said. “It looks like he’s going to do a fly-by. Right between us and the battleship.”

Frowning, Hagen and I studied the tactical displays. After something like ten seconds, we looked at each other in astonishment.

We’d finally figured out what Captain Urgh was up to.

=15=

We couldn’t take our eyes off the battlecruiser as she hurtled toward the fight. The fact that she wasn’t firing made Captain Urgh’s intentions all the more interesting.

“What is this?” Dalton demanded. “Is he going to ram?”

“Good guess,” I said, thinking I understood what was going on. “I think he’s going to block that barrage of missiles.”

Dalton’s mouth hung open for a moment. “Bollocks!” he said.

“I don’t get it,” Samson said, staring at the charts. “How could he…?”

The situation became clearer by the second as the computers worked to project courses. The yellow line leading the Terrapinian ship now intersected the red path of the missiles.

“He’s going to block the missiles with his own ship’s hull?” Dalton demanded. “Seriously?”

It was true. Everyone could see it now.

“Welcome to the Rebel Kher,” I said quietly, and I sat back in my command chair. “This is my fault, in a way. I put Captain Urgh in a no-win situation. He couldn’t fire on the Kwok ship without dishonoring himself. But he also couldn’t sit out this battle between an ally and an enemy. He has to help us without attacking the enemy ship.”

“It’s suicide,” Langston said, staring at the screens.

“Maybe,” I said. “We’ll see.”

There were only a handful of seconds left, and they passed quickly.

“Our fourth salvo is reaching the battleship—” Langston said. “Impact! We hit her again!”

The Kwok captain had made an error. Our fourth shot had caught him in the side—and it looked like he’d switched his shielding to face forward, expecting Captain Urgh’s charge meant he was under attack from another more powerful ship.

“The battleship is venting,” Samson said, assessing the damage. “I’m not sure our strike was fatal, but we hurt her badly.”

A whoop went up from my crew. Half of that was due to released tension, I knew. We still might die, but it always felt good to give the other guy a solid kick in the ass before you went down.

“Urgh’s ship is right in the thick of it now,” Langston said. “Such bravery… These Kher are mad.”

I didn’t argue with her. Sometimes, our cousins didn’t seem sane to me, either.

What helped me understand them was a study of Earth’s military history. Odd cultural behavior was to be seen everywhere in historical accounts. In Europe, only a few hundred years ago, men would line up in brightly colored uniforms and spray one another with rifle fire. They didn’t even duck, or seek cover of any kind. To do so would have been seen as cowardice.

More recently, Japanese soldiers would rather die than surrender. Many who were captured did their best to commit suicide, such was the depth of their shame. Tied down to prevent this, they still sometimes managed to chew off their own tongues to choke themselves.

The Rebel Kher were no less individual in their cultural approach to warfare. They had their rules, and they followed them as best they could.

All of them, that was, except vile primates like Fex and his crew. I’d come to dislike these close cousins of mine as much as the rest of the galaxy did. Trickery and deceit—their tactics seemed evil when others were so valiant and honest in comparison.

Unfortunately, I often found myself playing the part of the jackal myself. Survival was a harsh mistress. I couldn’t always afford to behave in a prideful fashion.

Earth was weak, and usually the weak fighters chose the most vicious tactics. I did what I must when my home planet hung in the balance.

After a few quiet, tense moments, the barrage made contact. The missiles pummeled Captain Urgh’s ship, and the battlecruiser didn’t survive. It was destroyed within seconds. There was a white flash of released gases, a spinning cloud of debris, and it was over.

“Total destruction,” Commander Hagen said. “But he saved us. We never would have survived that.”

“Agreed,” I said.

“Now what, Captain?” Hagen asked.

“Let’s finish the Kwok ship,” Mia suggested, craning her neck around to stare at me.

The bloodlust in her eyes was easy to see. She was a predator, and she had tasted blood. She wanted more. She wanted to see the battleship die, taking all hands aboard with her.

“No…” I said. “Hail them instead. Chang?”

Mia released a puff of disgust. I didn’t care and ignored her.

A moment later a large figure swam into view on our tactical table. It was tall and furry—but it wasn’t Fex. I was disappointed.

“This is Captain Mott,” he said. “Do you wish to surrender?”

It was my turn to snort. “Hardly. We have the advantage. Our ship is undamaged, and yours is all but finished.”

The Kwok captain blinked. Around him, I saw a crew of Grefs crawling the walls and ceiling. Grefs were primates too, but they were primitive in mind and habits. The Kwok built these ships, manned them with Gref crews, and voyaged to the stars as overlords.

“Weren’t there two ships here a moment ago?” Mott asked. “Ah yes, your comrade has exploded. A pity and a waste. Don’t make the same mistake.”

Turning to Dalton, I gave him new orders. “Circle the battleship. Approach her stern. Mia, cycle the railgun.”

“It’s ready now,” she said hopefully, but I ignored her.

The Kwok captain looked uneasy. “Don’t embarrass yourself further, Human,” he said. “As soon as Fex arrives with the full fleet, we will butcher your tiny ship. If you surrender to me now, however—”

“Fex will not come here to rescue you in time,” I interrupted. “Your position is hopeless. You don’t even have working steering jets.”

The battleship was trying to turn to face us, but she only managed to roll slowly onto her side.

“Captain Mott,” I said as Dalton brought us around behind the enemy ship. “You have no position of strength. Surrender your ship.”

“I will not. We have already transmitted our location to the main fleet. They will form a rift any moment and reinforce me.”

What he said was possible. Our ships had communications technology that worked through tricks of entanglement, allowing information to be passed over great distances faster than the speed of light traveled.

But still, even if Mott had demanded aid, and even if Fex decided to give it—Fex was unlikely to rush out here.

“I know Fex well,” I said. “I know all your people well—and I am a primate myself. Fex will test the waters. Your distress call might mean I’ve got hundreds of ships at my back which he can’t see. He will not want to throw away more ships so soon after learning of your defeat.”

“Can you gamble so carelessly?” Mott asked me. “After all, you have but one life, and one ship—”

“As I said, I know Fex. He will form a rift a million kilometers from here and then creep closer at a safe pace, scanning every moment for danger as he approaches.”

Mott made a rude sound, and he gazed off to one side for a moment. At last, he turned back to me with an angry, helpless expression.

“Fex should be out here fighting you himself, madman!”

“What is your answer? We are in position, and your stern shielding is gone. If we strike your engines now…”

“All right! I will make an offer you don’t deserve: if you agree to withdraw right now, you will be allowed to leave unscarred. But mark my words, human, you must be quick about it, or my offer of free passage shall be withdrawn.”

It was my turn to smile. This was the way Fex and his kind bargained. They started with impossible demands, but eventually they could be brought back down to see reality.

Reaching out a languid hand, I switched off the feed. Captain Mott’s image vanished.

“Um…” Hagen said in alarm. “Are we really going to blast them out of the sky?”

Mia leered at me, full of excitement.

“Let me do it,” she said in a husky tone. “He deserves nothing else.”

“Just wait a second, everyone,” I said.

Taking out my sidearm, I polished the muzzle for a moment.

“Sir?” Chang said. “Captain Mott wishes to speak to you.”

I sniffed in disinterest “Let him wait for… ten more seconds.”

The time passed, and all the while people shifted uneasily in their seats.

At last, I opened the channel. Captain Mott eyed me in a rage.

“That was very rude, Blake!” he admonished.

“Do you have anything new to say, Mott?” I demanded, toying with my gun. “Or are you still wasting my time?”

He showed me his teeth. They were yellow and pitted. In my experience, even the most advanced Kher had skipped the development of dentistry.

“I surrender!” he almost howled the words. “You are an evil being! A spirit full of deception! A malignancy—”

“Shut up,” I told him, and he did. “Mott, you and your survivors are my prisoners. Stand down, releasing all capacitance in your weapons systems.”

“Just leave us in peace,” he said.

“No, that’s not the plan. Hagen, that ship is still drifting forward at about a thousand kilometers an hour, right?”

“Something like that,” Hagen admitted.

“All right. Have Abrams create a rift. We’re going home. Make sure he puts the rift directly in front of the battleship.”

Slowly, Hagen began to grin. “We’re taking home a trophy?”

“Yes. Do it.”

A small rift soon spun in front of the battleship. It was a tight squeeze, as Devilfish was designed to make small, short-lived rifts to save power.

But the battleship fit, and despite many long, curse-laden transmissions from Captain Mott, she vanished.

Suddenly alone, Devilfish glided toward the new rift in the battleship’s wake. We plunged into the temporary wormhole and headed home.

At least, I hoped we were going home. After all, this was the first long-range jump that we’d attempted to make using Abram’s new software system.

Crossing my fingers and gritting my teeth quietly, I prayed we wouldn’t scatter and lose our way.

=16=

Earth Command detected us and sent us a challenge right away. Unfortunately, my ship was too busy trying to pull out of Sol’s gravitational field to reply immediately.

“What the hell is this?” Hagen demanded. “Why are we right on top of our own sun?”

“Dalton, go to manual,” I ordered as calmly as I could. “Get us out of the corona.”

Like all stars, our sun had an aura of heated plasma around her. It was only visible from Earth with instruments, or during a lunar eclipse.

Extending millions of kilometers outward in every direction, the corona was almost like Earth’s atmosphere—not in composition, but in form. It was like an envelope of super-heated flame.

The external temperature of our hull spiked, and radiation drenched us. Emergency klaxons rang out, filling the ship with noise.

“We should turn around, sir,” Hagen said, his eyes huge. “We could go back through the rift and escape.”

I shook my head. “Fex will be showing up back there at any moment. If we return now, we won’t have the time or energy to create another rift until it’s too late. We’ll be destroyed.”

He looked at me seriously. “We could surrender to Fex, sir.”

I didn’t answer him.

Dalton was fighting the controls. Fortunately, our engines were still functional. As we weren’t going too fast, and we weren’t too close to the sun’s gravity-well, we weren’t being sucked in. Instead, we began making steady progress, heading off at an angle away from our home star.

No sooner did the bridge crew breathe a sigh of relief, however, than Chang turned to me.

His face was ashen, and that concerned me. Chang wasn’t a man who feared much of anything, and when he was frightened, he didn’t show it.

“Sir,” he said, “Captain Mott is calling for you.”

I froze. I’d forgotten about our captured ship.

A wave of sickness rolled through me. They were frying—they had to be. No shield, engines knocked out—the radiation alone…

“Open the channel,” I said quietly.

Mott came into view again. He was injured. His face—it was cooking, I think. His mouth didn’t work quite right, and his words were garbled as if he’d had a stroke.

“You tricked us,” he mumbled. “Your disgusting deceit is without parallel. Not enough that we die—you had to see us burn, didn’t you?”

“We scattered, Mott. I’m sorry.”

“No,” he said. “Don’t be sorry. An evil being should be prideful when he’s done his worst.”

“I apologize,” I said, “we’d attempt a rescue, but you’re too close to the gravity-well now. We’d be sucked into the fire with you.”

He made a tired waving motion with one furry appendage. “Don’t seek to toy with us further. You’ve had your fun. No promise of rescue would be believed. Be assured as well, that I’ve transmitted this news to Fex using our ansible. My comrades will sing a song of rage in your honor tonight.”

At these words, I felt even more unhappy—a thing I wouldn’t have thought was possible just moments earlier.

His stabbing finger cut the channel, and Mott vanished.

“Mia,” I said, turning to look at her. “Destroy that battleship.”

“But there is no honor in such an act now!”

“There’s no honor in letting a dying enemy suffer, either. You wanted this a moment ago—do it.”

Angrily, she turned back to the console and fired. The effort took two shots—the battleship was tough, but she finally blew up.

“All hands lost,” Langston said in a shaken voice.

The bridge was silent except for the hum and trill of instruments and sensors. We’d survived, and we’d destroyed an enemy capital ship—but no one was celebrating now.

Standing up, I spoke. “Hagen, you’ve got the helm. I’m going to my cabin to report the situation to Earth Command. Dalton—take us home.”

They watched me walk out, and not even Dalton had a comment to make. We all understood we’d just fired the first shots in a new interstellar war.

Perhaps, it had been a mistake to try to help the Terrapinians. I could see that now. Even a diplomatic mission—but no, I thought, giving my head a shake. I’d changed the situation. I’d moved from diplomacy to violent action.

Admiral Vega was going to be pissed.

About a half-hour later, I’d finished reporting in. I’d sent the message via our fastest communications routes.

Hours later, I woke up with a snort. My com-light was blinking and buzzing. How long had it been ringing? I couldn’t be sure.

“You are a hard man to reach, Blake,” a familiar voice said.

Snorting, I stood up and turned suddenly. I drew my pistol and leveled it.

Godwin stood, unconcerned, in the middle of my cabin. He was at my desk, poking at the controls.

“Get away from there.”

“Why?” he asked in amusement. “Do you really think your security is—?”

I strode forward and put my gun to his head.

“I’ll kill you,” I said.

“A mere inconvenience.”

He was tense, and I could tell I’d worried him, but I also knew he was right.

We’d dealt with Godwin plenty of times before, and he’d always come back eventually. He was, after all, an artificial being.

“How’d you get here?” I demanded. “We swept every inch of this ship. There wasn’t any circlet—nothing like it was found.”

Godwin laughed. “Come now, do you seriously think we’d use the same form of device after you’d discovered the last one? My tools can take many shapes.”

I nodded and put away my pistol.

“All right,” I said. “So, you’re haunting me again. What’s the point this time?”

“Fex is upset. This makes us happy.”

Glaring at him, I felt a surge of hate. Godwin loved to get into the midst of Rebel Kher affairs. Over time, I’d come to hate him almost as much as the murderous Imperials. At least you knew where the Imperials stood. The Nomads were like teasing ghosts, and they were just as infuriating.

“So… you’re glad I blew up a few of his ships? Why?”

“Because angry beings make mistakes. Fex is becoming a danger to himself and others. He’s overreaching, and he doesn’t know his place.”

I frowned. “He’s discovered some kind of new tech, I get that. Why don’t you just tell me what it is?”

“You’ll find out soon enough, I fear.”

“Is that what you want?”

Godwin nodded. “Yes. That’s why we sent you. We’ve run all the numbers—of all the humans known to us, you were calculated to be most likely to start a fresh conflict.”

I almost shot him down then, just to make myself feel better. But I didn’t want him to come back later and laugh at the irony of such a move on my part. After all, wasn’t he accusing me even now of being a hothead?

“All right then,” I said. “Help us beat Fex.”

“Why would we do that?”

“He’s got at least fifty large ships. We’d have trouble taking out five of them.”

“Agreed… if the fight was a fair one. But you, Leo Blake—you never fight fairly.”

“Neither does Fex. Look, you had to have some point in coming here, other than to simply torment me.”

“Yes, I do have a secondary purpose. I have advice for you: when the attack comes, you must counterstrike. On defense, you’ll never be able to win the conflict.”

I blinked twice. “That’s it?”

“Yes, for now. I’ll be interested to see if your species can survive the next thousand hours. Many of my kind enjoy wagering, and I’ve placed a few clever bets myself.”

I frowned. “Bets? On us or against us?”

Godwin smiled again, and he shook his head. “I can’t tell you that. It would be a form of cheating.”

“But you just gave me advice!”

“Not personal advice. I gave you the message I was commanded to come here and deliver. That was officially sanctioned input from my government.”

Right about then, I really, really hated the Nomads. All of them. Every time I met up with one of these guys, as beaten down and mistreated as they had been by the Imperials, I found them enraging.

Maybe it was their smug “otherness” that caused me to feel this way. Or perhaps it was the fact I tended to be highly stressed whenever Godwin showed up.

It didn’t matter. One way or the other, Godwin always made me want to hit him.

“All right,” I said with a forced calmness I didn’t feel. “What do you have for me personally, Godwin? Anything?”

“You’re asking me to cheat?”

“I am.”

“Hmmm… the strange thing is that I’m actually tempted. You’re a corrupt species, I’ve always said it. So corrupt, in fact, you tend to spread your vile nature to everyone you meet in the cosmos.”

“Nice guys finish last, Godwin,” I said. “That’s a human proverb. Give me something, and maybe you’ll win that bet of yours.”

Godwin looked uncertain. “But… if such a thing were discovered…”

“It won’t be. You know I can keep a secret if I need to. If I told another Nomad—not that I see them too often—it would only spoil a conduit of information. It would be stupid for me to out a source of information.”

Godwin pondered that. “It might be a path to what we consider to be wealth,” he admitted. “But it would a dangerous path. I must refuse.”

Here, he turned to go. I reached out a hand and seized his elbow.

Sighing, he turned to face me. “You can’t coerce me,” he said. “I’m not even alive, technically, and you can’t end my existence except briefly.”

“You misunderstand,” I said, lowering my hand, “I want you to know something: the other Nomads cheat.”

“What?”

“That’s right,” I said. “You said they wager—and they also must visit Fex, or others, to talk to them. That means they cheat. It’s guaranteed.”

He blinked at me. “How could you know such a thing?”

“Simple logic,” I said. “You’re tempted, right?”

“Mildly.”

“And there are great gains to be had if you win the wager?”

He shrugged. “Yes,” he admitted.

I gave him a smug, knowing smile, the same kind he liked to give me so often.

“Can’t you figure it out? Do you usually win these bets?”

He made a careless gesture. “Sometimes.”

“Come on,” I said. “You’re a smart being. Smarter than average—anyway. I’ve met a number of your kind, and none of them looked like geniuses.”

He opened his mouth to object, but I kept pressing, talking over him.

“But that hardly matters. What matters is logic: you’re considering hedging your bets, buying a little insurance. That means they must have done the same.”

Godwin rubbed at his chin. It was a distinctly human gesture, one which I felt certain he must have picked up hanging around my kind for so long.

“I guess it’s possible…”

“Of course it is!” I said. “Now, think: who among your colleagues wins more often than not? Not every bet, mind you—but more than the odds would fairly allow for…”

It was his turn to blink quietly. I could see he was thinking that over. Maybe he was visualizing an enemy, a creature of his own ilk who’d beaten him and laughed about it afterward.

“I can see there is such a person,” I said, and I poked him in the chest several times.

This got his attention, and he reached up to grab my sharp finger. I let him.

“Whoever you have in your mind’s eyes right now,” I said. “That’s your man. He’s the cheater. He’s been cheating you for years and laughing about it, too.”

Godwin’s eyes studied me now. “How would you possibly know—?”

I threw my arms wide and hooted with laughter. “How would I know? Because I’m a cheat! You said it yourself. You’ve watched me for years, Godwin. Do you know another human who’s as adept at deceit and trickery as I am?”

Slowly, he shook his head. “I don’t think that I do.”

“Right. One of the keys to being a con man is perceptiveness. I have an excellent grasp upon the workings of another man’s mind. Of the things that motivate him, what he wants, what he’s thinking…”

“But…”

“Think!” I commanded. “Just today, didn’t I get a Terrapinian ship to commit suicide to save my own hide?”

He stared. “You planned that?”

I released a snort. “Don’t tell me you didn’t realize that! Am I a fool? Three ships met today, Godwin. Two are destroyed. One is intact. What’s more, my ship is the smallest of them all. Do you really think that was entirely due to chance?”

“No…” he said. “It can’t be. You’ve done things like that before.”

“Exactly! Just like the cheater you know back home: the being that’s tortured you with his smart—impossibly smart—wagers.”

I had Godwin now. I could tell.

In my younger days, I’d been a practicing beach bum, and I’d conned people. More recently, of course, I’d been an upstanding citizen and officer—but a man never leaves his past behind him. Not completely.

“All right,” Godwin said. “I’ll tell you something, something that will help you to win this conflict. Then I’ll bet on you. The gains will be great, as Fex is currently favored five to one.”

“Five to one, huh?” I asked, keeping my tone and expression light. “All the sweeter when you win.”

“Yes…”

Then, he told me his secret.

The knowledge was going to be useful, I knew that right away. But his whispered words of prophesy didn’t make me happy. In fact, they made me feel a little bit sick inside.

=17=

The recall command from Admiral Vega came in a few hours after we’d arrived in our home system. The return to Earth was a slog as our engines still weren’t in perfect condition, and we didn’t dare try another jump.

The message I carried locked in my brain had to stay there all the way back to Earth. I knew the Nomads could be watching me—Godwin wasn’t the only one of his kind who visited Earth.

In order not to blow it, I couldn’t take the chance of telling anyone what I knew until I got home.

Unfortunately, Admiral Vega was no dummy. He knew the moment he read my report about blowing up Fex’s tugboats and killing one of the Kwok battleships that we weren’t going to be best buddies with Fex any longer—not that we ever had been.

Fex had left us alone for over a year after his attempted annexation and the consequent fleet actions that hadn’t gone his way. It was too bad we hadn’t killed him back then. That small detail had been my greatest regret since the last time we’d met in battle.

We had managed to scare him, however. We’d left him with a lasting sensation of respect. Because of that, he’d kept his distance—until now.

“You fucked up!” Admiral Vega boomed at me when he had me alone in a debriefing chamber. “I should have known you’d start a fight. I guess I shouldn’t have sent a boxer to a tea ceremony unless I wanted to see someone get punched in the face.”

I ignored him and his tirade. Running my fingers over the rough-hewn stone walls, I examined the walls closely. Down here, in the deepest tunnels we’d blasted open under Cheyenne Mountain, the rooms all had a raw look to them. The construction had been done quick and cheap.

The cold walls might not be pretty, but they were definitely secure. The Rocky Mountains were about three hundred million years old, and not much had changed down here since their formation.

“Why the hell are you staring at the walls, Blake?” Vega demanded in frustration. “It’s time to do some explaining, not daydreaming.”

“Remember when we had visitors down here a year ago?” I asked him. “Alien visitors, a year or so back?”

His face shifted from anger to confusion. “You’re talking about the Nomads…?”

“That’s right.”

Vega paused for a second then continued on in a thoughtful voice. “Have you been visited again, Blake? Is that why you’re acting weird?”

I glanced at him. “Sir… Do you think they’re still watching us, still spying on us? Do you think they could penetrate even here, underneath a mile of cold stone?”

Vega worked his jaw uncertainly. He eyed the walls as if they held secrets. “I haven’t thought much about those freaks for a long time, actually. Not since we chased them out of here.”

“Even that is kind of odd, isn’t it?” I asked. “I mean… why aren’t we more worried about them?”

“So many threats… So many unknowns… I guess I’ve been working hard to build up Space Command. The Nomads might have slipped my mind.”

I looked at him sharply. “That’s the answer then: You forgot about them. Who else around here has forgotten about the Nomads?”

“No one, I’m sure. We have new safeguards in place. There are built-in reminders for all our security people. We’re briefed every day. Every day…”

“Okay… Show me.”

“What?”

“Let’s hear your morning reminder from this morning. How was it delivered?”

He blinked, stared, then blinked again.

He turned to the small plastic cube on his desktop. “Bob, what reminders do I have?”

“Identification match: You are Admiral Vega,” the cube said, lighting up as it spoke. “You have three reminders set.”

“What are they?”

The cube began listing reminders for various meetings and events. None of them mentioned the Nomads.

Vega hung his head. “Bob’s been reset, and I’ve forgotten about the Nomads… How could I have forgotten?”

“That’s what the Nomads excel at,” I said. “They’re experts at slipping things in and out of a man’s mind.”

He looked at me suddenly, the yellow light of suspicion flaring up in his eyes more strongly than ever. “That’s why you insisted on coming down here into this secure room, isn’t it? No sensors, no signals can penetrate this deeply into the mountain…”

“That’s right.”

“So… You’re telling me we’ve been compromised? That the Nomads overcame our system of constant reminders?”

“It stands to reason. Godwin visited me aboard Devilfish during my mission. He did so twice, once at the beginning and once at the end of the voyage.”

“Godwin…” Vega echoed as if he was having trouble recalling the name. “Right… That ghost who haunts you. The enemy we killed down here—right here in these deep rooms. We drove those monsters out of my mountain, Blake. We exorcised them.”

“Maybe we did,” I said. “Or maybe we just forgot about their existence for a while.”

“This is a serious breach, Blake. You’ve brought home two old plagues this time: Fex and the Nomads.”

“I didn’t bring the guests, Admiral. I just discovered what they were already up to.”

I filled him in then, telling him exactly what had happened in the Terrapin System and about what Godwin had told me.

“The Nomads place bets on us?” Vega demanded. “They toy with Kher like us then gamble on the outcome?”

“That’s my understanding.”

“Friggers…” he said, walking around and touching the walls as if he might find a Nomad hiding there against the stones. “You know, I’m getting sick of being mistreated by these arrogant aliens: Fex, the Imperials, the Nomads—all of them.”

“Then you and I are in the same frame of mind, Admiral.”

Pressing onward, I told him the last part—about conning Godwin into helping us in order to win one of his bets.

“The key, you understand,” I explained, “was to sow doubt in Godwin about the motives and tactics of his fellows. Once a man thinks he’s been cheated, he’ll stop at nothing to get revenge.”

Vega stared at me. “You are one oddball officer, Blake. Normally, I wouldn’t want a man like you serving under me. But in this instance, I can see the advantages.”

I shrugged. “I’ll resign today if you ask me to, Admiral.”

Vega laughed. “You’re not getting out of here that easily. Tell me what they’re throwing at us.”

“Godwin didn’t say exactly, but he indicated they’ll come directly at Earth. That they’ll be able to hit us right here at home from the start. That’s the bad part…”

“It sure is…” Vega agreed. “Now, tell me how we’re going to screw them over.”

I shook my head. “I’m not certain yet. Godwin said he’d visit me again with specifics when the time came. We’ll have to play it by ear when things get hot.”

Vega’s face fell. “I was hoping you had answers, not just more riddles.”

“Sorry to disappoint…”

=18=

Vega was in charge of Earth’s emergency defenses—but he had to know what he was defending against to be successful. I did what I could in that regard.

Godwin had told me Fex would strike close to home. It was soon decided that the best option would be to recall our entire fleet to Earth. There, we would cluster the ships in a tight orbit.

Our bases on Luna were bolstered as well, stationing new fighters and ground-based laser cannons in various craters.

The Moon really did make an excellent first line of defense. Knowing Fex would move close from the beginning meant we could aim every gun on the bright side of the Moon toward Earth.

This was because Luna was a normal satellite. That meant she was, for one thing, tidally-locked with Earth. She rotated at the exact speed necessary to keep facing one side of the Moon at us at all times.

Such an arrangement wasn’t uncommon between heavenly bodies and their satellites. Most major moons in the Solar System were tidally locked with their primaries. Pluto and Charon, Pluto’s largest moon, represented an extreme example. They were each tidally locked with the other, meaning both of them permanently presented the same face to their partner.

For purposes of defense, this was an advantage. A fortress on the side of the Moon that faced the Earth would always face Earth. That made targeting much easier, especially for line-of-sight weapons like lasers.

Time quickly passed by. We spent a week shoring up defenses, briefing politicians and top members of the brass—and we toughened up ourselves as well.

The thing was, however, I knew we couldn’t maintain a permanent state of peak readiness. Inevitably, the alarm we’d sounded would fade into memory, and people would begin to relax.

“Are you sure Godwin said Fex will come after us, Blake?” Vega demanded on the eighth day.

“That’s what he said.”

He looked me up and down doubtfully. Looking around the conference table, I saw a dozen similar expressions. The rest of the brass working at Cheyenne seemed to have the same mindset.

Leaning forward suddenly, I frowned back at them. “What? Do you think I made it all up?”

They shook their heads and studied their briefs—but they kept frowning.

All except for Vega and Abrams, that was. Vega was staring right at me with that damning frown of his, and Abrams—well, that prick looked pretty happy.

“Possibly…” Abrams said, clearing his skinny throat. “Just possibly, could you have … um… exaggerated the case?”

Ah… Suddenly, I got it. Everything was coming into focus. If there was one man I would have shoved out the far side of an airlock if I didn’t need him, it was Abrams. He’d always felt the same way about me.

We’d started our rivalry years ago. He’d never forgiven me for wresting command of his various starships and missions. Somehow, despite the fact he was a nerd in a lab coat, he felt he should be in charge of our fledgling navy. I guess his thinking harkened back to the early days of space exploration, when engineers and scientists controlled space exploration—not military men.

“Abrams,” I said, “times have moved on. We have to move with them.”

He squinted at me, not quite getting my meaning. That was okay as he wouldn’t have been happy if he had known what I was talking about.

“Let’s go over the facts—” I began.

“Yes, yes! Let’s do that!” Abrams interjected. He leaned forward and his smile became a grin. “The facts.”

“The Nomads are still active here on Earth,” I said.

“And what proof do you have of such an assertion?” Abrams snapped.

Admiral Vega slid his eyes to regard the good doctor, and I halfway expected him to tell the man to shut up—but he didn’t. He just looked back at me, waiting for my response.

“The simplest evidence is that you’ve all recently forgotten about Godwin and his kind,” I said.

“Except for you,” Abrams said in an almost mocking tone. “You’ve never been fooled by these ghost-friends of yours.”

“True enough,” I admitted. “But the fact remains: our procedures and safeguards were hacked. I doubt very much any human could have done that. It’s logical to assume the Nomads did it, in order to infiltrate our ranks again.”

Vega shifted uncomfortably. “That’s a good point, Blake,” he said. “But it’s hardly enough to justify a massive asset redeployment on our part.”

“No it isn’t,” I said. “Paranoia is what really drives us.”

“How so?”

“Let’s assume Godwin was telling the truth. What if Fex is preparing to attack Earth?”

“Then perhaps,” Dr. Abrams suggested, “you shouldn’t have gone poking Fex’s Armada with a sharp stick.”

He had me there, but I had to press on.

“What’s happened has happened,” I said. “All we can do is prepare for the fallout.”

“Exactly!” Abrams said, making a sweeping gesture toward Vega. “That’s why we’re really here today—please tell him, Admiral Vega. I can’t stand to bear his confused innocence any longer.”

Vega frowned at Abrams and shook his head.

Taking a look around the group, I got a bad vibe. People weren’t meeting my eye—at least, my friends among them weren’t. Abrams was staring and brimming with excitement, while Vega looked stern and thoughtful.

“Captain Blake,” Vega said. “You’re being relieved of your duties aboard Devilfish—for now.”

My mouth fell open and hung there for a moment. I managed to close it up again with a snap. My jaw muscles flexed, and I found I couldn’t even look at Abrams. I knew he was in an unearned state of ecstasy.

“May I ask why, sir?”

“Because the Joint Chiefs think it’s a good idea. You’ve completed a difficult mission abroad, and I’m sure you can use—”

“Some R&R? Very well,” I said, standing up abruptly. “May I be dismissed, sir?”

He frowned at me. “No, you cannot. Sit down and stop being a baby. And you, Abrams—stop grinning like you just won the lottery.”

Abrams pursed his lips, but they still curved upwards slightly at the corners.

Vega leaned toward me. “Look, you’re not being punished—not exactly. You’ll man this oversized bunker at my side. These are your pet aliens, after all. It’s the opinion of Clemens and others on the Joint Chiefs that you’ll serve Earth better on the ground in the coming conflict—if there is one.”

That last line revealed everything. They weren’t sure Fex was coming. They’d lost confidence in me.

On an objective level, I could understand that. I’d come home predicting doom, and nothing had happened for over a week. Worse, all my talk of Nomad interference wasn’t backed up by anything anyone could attest to.

On a deeper level, however, I was worried. Could the Nomads be behind this? I knew Godwin didn’t think much of most humans, but he did respect me. Maybe his kind had agents among our upper echelons, something they’d done in the past—and gotten me grounded.

“Who will take command of Devilfish?” I asked.

“Your XO will do so for now—Commander Hagen, I believe is his name.”

I nodded woodenly. “He’ll do a good job.”

“Not as good as you’ve done, I’m sure,” Admiral Vega said automatically.

His words made me feel more bitter than before, if only because they were patently false. If Vega thought I’d do a better job than Hagen, he wouldn’t have given the other man my ship.

“All right,” I said. “What’s my new official capacity to be?”

“Sidekick,” he said. “You’ll man the War Room and give direct support to whoever is in command.”

Nodding, I accepted the new orders without comment. Vega seemed pleased—and maybe a little bit relieved.

He went on to explain that it would be like commanding a ship—the flagship that oversaw the entire conflict. He talked about the imminent arrival of Admiral Clemens as well. Apparently, he was flying in from Geneva to man this post with us.

That didn’t sit squarely with me. Clemens was wise—but he was a fossil. He was over seventy and past every mandatory retirement milestone.

Still, I managed to force a tight smile on my face. “It will be good to serve under you and Clemens, sir,” I lied.

Vega laughed and clapped me on the shoulder. I could tell he was honestly pleased with my response.

“A good officer to the last,” he said. “All right then, let’s dig into the defensive planning, shall we?”

He turned the meeting over to a staffer who wore a tight black spacer’s uniform that fit her form nicely—but I didn’t care.

I couldn’t even hear what she said. My eyes could barely focus on the ship rosters, missile counts, or a thousand other logistical details.

It had all been a setup. Everyone in the chamber had known I was going down today. They’d all known, and I could only wonder how many of them were as gleeful about it as Abrams so obviously was.

I’d lost my command. I’d lost Devilfish.

As far as I was concerned, everything else was shit.

=19=

My new job turned out to be just as disappointing as I’d feared. Clemens arrived the next day, and while he was still sharp, he was old. He didn’t give me the same feeling of comradery and familiarity that I’d come to expect from Vega. Instead, he ran the War Room like a British captain walking the decks of an ancient Man-of-War.

The first thing Clemens did was change everything around.

“We’ll run two twelve-hour shifts for as long as this crisis continues,” he said. “No one will be allowed off the rock pile during their twelve-hour shift.”

No one argued, but I thought I heard a few quiet groans from the back ranks where the younger officers stood. Many had families in town, and they couldn’t be happy with these new, longer hours.

“What’s more,” Clemens continued, “all key personnel will be bunking up inside this facility. You’ll eat here, sleep here, and work here for the foreseeable future.”

The groans and shuffling feet were more noticeable now.

Clemens beetled his white eyebrows and stared around at them ferociously.

“Perhaps serving Earth is too inconvenient?” he demanded loudly. “Does anyone want to resign their commission?”

The War Room fell silent except for the hum of the equipment.

“All right then. Vega, take the first shift. I’ll settle into my quarters, and all the people who are slated to serve with me will do the same. Dismissed.”

We broke up, muttering and glancing at one another. Many people shook their heads in disbelief.

On the way out, I caught Vega’s arm.

“What is it, Blake?”

“Um… I thought you and I were serving together, sir.”

“We are,” he said with an expansive sweep of his arm. “We’ll be passing one another in the hallways on a daily basis inside this overgrown Hitler’s-bunker.”

Setting my mouth into an unhappy line, I nodded. I got it.

Vega had screwed me a little harder than I’d realized at first. Not only had he plucked me off the bridge of my ship, he’d converted me into Clemens’ sidekick, not his. Could that be because the alternative would have resulted in Vega himself working with the old buzzard? I thought it rather likely that was the case.

He’d performed the bait-and-switch masterfully. I was appalled, as I was normally considered the trickiest officer in the fleet.

Since I was technically off-duty, I took the following hours to move my stuff. I packed up my essentials. Up until now, I’d stored my belongings in my apartment in “the village,” a residential zone that was outside the vaults but on base. Once I had a few dozen zip-crates with me, I took a jeep-load of them back to the mountain fortress that was to be my new home.

Mia was with me, of course, but she wasn’t terribly happy.

“This isn’t right,” she said. “We’re supposed to live aboard Devilfish or in our apartment. On Ral, no one would dare order a hero out of his home.”

“Well, Earth militaries are different. Here, the brass moves you around like a sack of potatoes every Thursday if they feel like doing it.”

“This is wrong,” she repeated. “You should challenge Clemens to a duel. He is old and weak. You could beat him easily.”

I snorted, imagining the scene.

In my opinion, one of the reasons Rebel Kher fleets didn’t do as well as Earth fleets was directly related to their normal means of rising in rank. It was more of a dominance-thing with them, less of a studied matter of competence and experience. They preferred to follow pack-leaders rather than their wisest old men. That worked out pretty well on a small scale, but when you had vast fleets to command, our more civilized system worked better.

Still, for all of that, I couldn’t deny that I felt a surge of interest when I considered bashing Clemens around in personal combat for the honor of high command.

As a result of my musings, I arrived at the first vault doors with a smile on my face. I showed my ID and expected to be waved onward by the guards.

“Uh… sorry Captain,” the guard said, glancing at me, then Mia, then back again.

“What is it, Sergeant?”

“Well… you see sir, they’re pretty crowded downstairs. Families aren’t being allowed to quarter-up—this lady is your wife, right?”

I considered lying, but I didn’t. I shook my head.

“She’s my companion.”

At least he didn’t smirk.

“Well then…” he said. “In that case, there’s no chance, sir. None at all. They’re shoved in like sardines down below. That Brit guy, Clemens, he—”

“Yes, right,” I snapped. “I’ve got it.”

Spinning the wheel, I turned the jeep around and headed back out of the entrance tunnel.

“What’s going on?” Mia asked.

“I’ve got to take you back to the apartment, Hon.”

“Don’t call me that. I hate that. You’re ditching me, aren’t you?”

“No, Mia…”

What followed was a series of familiar stages. First, she expressed anger toward me, then my commanders—then in the end, she became paranoid.

“You met someone new, didn’t you?” she asked in a tone that sounded as if she were certain about it.

Getting back to the apartment, I took her upstairs and let her pace around the room for a while, fuming. Her tail almost knocked over our living room lamp twice.

I didn’t really listen to her, but I kept making polite noises, hoping she’d calm down. Then I glanced at the clock, and I saw our time was short.

Reaching out decisively as she passed me by yet again, I gave her tail a firm yank—a universal signal to the people of Ral.

Mia froze. “Now?” she asked.

“Yes.”

We made love, and she was somewhat mollified—but not completely.

“I’m going to set reminders on the talking box,” she said. “It will tell me when to expect you. When the box chimes, you’ll come from the mountain and join me here. We should have at least four hours for—”

“Mia,” I said, “while you were pacing, I checked the rosters with my sym. You’re still listed as a ship’s gunner.”

She stared at me. She blinked twice, then stared some more.

“A gunner? But we have no ship…”

“Aboard Devilfish,” I said gently. “You’ve been ordered to serve there… without me.”

“This is unexpected,” she said.

She came very close, putting her face into my face. I could feel her hot breath on my cheeks.

“Leo Blake, do you want me or not?” she asked.

“I do,” I said.

“Then why are we separating? No one on Ral would break up a mated pair.”

“Yes they would,” I said gently. “Think of when you joined the Rebel Fleet. You went off to serve aboard the carriers. At that point—”

“You forget,” she said softly. “At that time, I was Ra-tikh’s fourth. I wasn’t separated from him—not until you lured me away.”

Thinking about it, I realized she was right.

She looked confused and lost, and I felt sorry for her. Her people were so different. On Earth or aboard Devilfish, she was the only one of her kind. That must be part of what had bonded her so tightly with me.

“If you don’t want to serve aboard Devilfish,” I said gently, “you don’t have to. You could resign your commission and stay here.”

“But then they might give you your ship back,” she said. “And I’d be alone again.”

We embraced, and she squirmed against me. She was upset, and I didn’t blame her.

It was time for some pretty lies.

“Listen,” I said. “This is all temporary. Soon, Fex will come, and we’ll beat him. Then things will go back to the way they were.”

Her eyes grew bigger than a human girl’s could get.

“I might die out there without you,” she said. “Death isn’t temporary.”

We had a long half-hour of soul-searching together after that. Finally, she decided she’d stick with the fleet and continue to crew Devilfish. I supported her, but I would have agreed to either path.

When I headed back to the mountain alone, however, I really hoped she hadn’t made the wrong choice.

I drove the jeep into the tunnel, and the Earth swallowed me up. Craning my neck around, I could see the velvet sky outside the mountain. They were soon going to close the vaults for the night.

That archway of deep blue was just starting to gleam with countless white eyes—stars that were timeless and cold.

It had finally sunk in that Mia was going out into space where she would be fighting without me.

Maybe she really would die. It hurt just to think about it.

=20=

Terrapin fell on the twentieth day after I’d returned to Earth.

We found out about it when a lone ship appeared in far orbit—so far out it was halfway to Mars.

Naturally, every defensive system we had became active. The Space Command went on full alert, and our ships were scrambled to their patrol points. They encircled Earth and orbited her in spiraling patterns.

We began transmitting greetings as soon as the ship had nosed its way out of the rift.

“Any response yet?” Clemens demanded for the tenth time.

Dutifully, I assured him the ship had not transmitted so much as a ping since it had arrived.

It was further proof of my bad luck that the ship had appeared during my shift with the old buzzard. Clemens marched around the central clump of consoles, making the operators nervous. They glanced behind them at his looming presence whenever they weren’t focused on their ever-shifting screens.

“This is the worst part of these battles,” Clemens complained. “Isn’t that so, Blake?”

“The waiting? The uncertainty that can go on for hours, or even days? Yes sir—this is the worst.”

“I’ve read about it in your reports, and to some degree, I’ve experienced it by watching every recorded vid documenting these conflicts. It feels unnatural to me. I prefer the old days aboard a steel deck on a stormy sea. At least back then, battles played out quickly.”

I reflected on Clemens’ new attitude. He’d been warming up to me—a little. Maybe he’d been a serious prick early on in order to establish his authority.

“Technology often changes such things,” I said thoughtfully. “Naval battles were slow in the days of wind and sails. When we got to steamers, then missile cruisers—each advancement sped things up. But now… now the process has slowed again. Space battles are sometimes the slowest of all.”

Clemens nodded and continued pacing.

Suddenly, my sym tickled my mind. I was using it to perceive the situation out in space, and I was mentally tracking every ship we had.

Something had changed. The unknown ship had finally moved away from her rift, turning her nose in our direction. A few minutes later, a signal reached us, and I was able to hear it as it came in.

“It is true,” a voice boomed through our speakers. “Treachery has been alleged, and now it has been documented.”

“That’s Admiral Fex,” I said, casting the image of the enemy commander onto the central display.

A tall figure stood, hairy and malignant, with black eyes that rolled wetly in his head as he regarded us.

Clemens stepped up to the base of the platform that was displaying this ugly image and looked up at it fearlessly.

“You aren’t welcome here, Admiral Fex,” he said. “Please don’t approach Earth, or we’ll be forced to deal with you harshly.”

“More threats?” Fex asked. “More intimidation and open aggression? We have read the lingering data streams near your star, left behind by the bold Captain Mott. Is this how you treat prisoners? Destroying crippled ships and slaughtering the helpless?”

Clemens gave me a look that indicated he was unhappy all over again with me and my crew.

“Admiral Fex,” he said. “I’m Admiral Clemens. We’d like to restart our relations with the Kwok people if at all possible.”

“That sounds very diplomatic of you, human,” Fex sneered. “Unfortunately, by wantonly destroying Captain Mott’s battleship, you’ve moved us past the point of no return.”

“We did not destroy Mott’s ship,” Clemens said firmly. “I can see how you might assume that, but our returning cruiser scattered, and—”

“And in the meantime Mott is dead while Blake stands proudly at your side! No, no, Admiral, please don’t belittle your accomplishments!”

“Fex, we—”

Fex made a rude fluttering gesture with his hairy fingers. “You do yourself a disservice. Don’t debase your finest achievements with foul lies and groveling. You should stand proud, taking full responsibility for these evil acts of deceit.”

Clemens face was turning red, but he controlled himself.

“I’m now transmitting our visual records to you,” he said. “Please examine them and see for yourself that we’re telling the truth.”

“The truth?” demanded Fex, leaning forward in a sudden, tight rage. “You’re joking, right? Can’t you see your lies will mean nothing to us? We’re not predatory fools with fuzzy ears, Clemens. We’re primates like you, with bare ears that hear all.”

Clemens looked at me in alarm, and for a second, I thought maybe he was going to request that I take over the conversation—but I shook my head.

Fex didn’t like me. He never had. There was no advantage to be had by making me the spokesman now.

Clemens turned back to the glowing screens resolutely. “All right then,” he said. “Is this to be construed as a formal declaration of war?”

Fex grinned, showing us his big square teeth. “War? Hardly. Earth isn’t capable of truly waging war. Your planet can, however, be the recipient of abuse. That’s what we shall call the coming action: an act of justice.”

Clemens stiffened his spine. “Very well. You’ll find we are difficult opponents to defeat. Come our way, and you’ll be blasted out of space—just like the last time you invaded our star system.”

Fex seemed supremely confident. “I don’t think so. Not this time. We’ve just come from defeating the Terrapin planet. They had a real navy and a shielded homeworld. You have neither. Prepare to meet your doom, humans.”

Fex moved as if to cut off the channel, but I stepped forward and shouted at the screen. Clemens and the other staffers gaped at me in surprise.

“Fex!” I boomed. “Don’t try it. The Imperials know about your stolen tech. So do the Nomads, and now we do as well. Your surprises will fall flat. All they will do is prove to even greater powers than Earth that you’re dangerous.”

Fex fixed me with an evil stare of pure hate. He’d never liked me, but I thought that today he was especially irked.

“And so the jackal lurking in the shadows yips at last,” he said. “We’ll use whatever delivery systems we want to, Blake. You’ll not intimidate the Kwok Armada with vague threats.”

“There’s nothing vague about them,” I said. “If you reveal your new technology, you’ll suffer the consequences. The Nomads themselves told me as much just days ago.”

Fex’s eyes slid to me, then to Clemens who’d gone mute, then back to me again.

“Are you controlling this white-tufted puppet?” he asked me, indicating the admiral with a crooked, leathery finger. “He strikes me as inexperienced and pompous. You should remove him from command, Blake, and face me in battle. I would rather defeat you directly than deal with your lackeys.”

Admiral Clemens reddened, and he was stung into action. He strode forward to stand at my side. “Fex, you’ll rue this day. When your ships have been broken, remember we’ll stand down if you do, even in the heat of battle.”

Admiral Fex ignored him. He was studying me instead. “Blake… I should have killed you years ago, when you served under me. I regret now that I didn’t.”

The holo image faded, and alarmed staffers killed the feed. The lights in the War Room brightened seemingly by themselves.

Clemens looked at me in a distinctly questioning manner.

“Uh…” I said. “I’m sorry, sir. I got carried away in the moment, I guess.”

“Why did you reveal the Nomad threat?” he asked.

“Two reasons, sir. One: I hoped he might not dare to use whatever super-weapon he might have for fear of exposure.”

“And the other reason?”

“I hoped he might reveal something about the nature of this technological edge if he thought we already knew about it.”

Clemens frowned and rubbed at his chin. After a time, he nodded. “He did say something about that, didn’t he? Ensign, play back the last two minutes of that conversation.”

The recording began to play, and we studied it closely.

“There it is,” Clemens said, freezing the moment. “He said: we’ll use whatever delivery systems we need to.”

He looked at me sharply. “That’s what you were trying for, isn’t it?”

“Yes.”

Clemens nodded. “Your superiors said you were unorthodox and clever. I see now what they were talking about. But what does it mean? What ‘delivery system’ is Fex referring to?”

“A missile launcher, perhaps?” I suggested. “Maybe something new, with greater range and capacity?”

“Hmm…” Clemens said, shaking his head. “That hardly sounds Earth-shattering, does it? Logically, it must be something that didn’t help them take out the Terrapin home world any faster. It must be an anti-fleet weapon…”

“I guess so,” I agreed. “The Terrapinians had apparently lost most of their fleet by the time I got there.”

Clemens pointed a finger at me. “Right! Fex took out their fleet. Now, he could have done that with a superior force, of course. But why were those turtles down to a single ship? You would think they could have stuffed a few ships under the planetary shield if they were getting beaten in space.”

I shrugged. “We don’t have much to go on. My gambit failed for the most part.”

Clemens moved around the table and clapped me on the shoulder. I was startled, as it was the first openly friendly act I’d seen from the man since he’d arrived at the Mountain.

“You go right on interrupting such discussions,” he told me. “You saw a shot, and you took it, and you almost hit the mark. Don’t hesitate if the opportunity arises again. That’s exactly why I wanted you here in the first place, Blake.”

“Yes sir.”

=21=

We found out what Fex had in mind several days later. Another spiraling rift opened. But this time, it was alarmingly close to Earth.

“We’ve got an anomaly,” a female voice spoke via my sym. “It’s about one hundred and fifty kilometers out from Earth.”

It just so happened to be shift-change in the War Room. Admiral Clemens had retired, but as was procedure, I’d stayed on duty until Admiral Vega’s team had taken over completely.

My eyes swung around the room. Commander Langston was onstation at ops, and a few other familiar faces still prowled the room. Some of Vega’s people had reported to relieve my team—but not all.

Langston was the one who’d made the initial announcement. She met my eyes, and I saw the fear there. I tried to hide my own worries with a confident smile.

“This is what we’ve been setting up for all year,” I said loudly. “Every watch-stander must remain at their station. No one is relieved until the acting coordinator orders it.”

Right now, I was in command. As new people arrived for the shift-change and got through security, I directed them to take over their stations. Could Fex have known we’d be disorganized at this moment of the day? I didn’t see how, but I was too paranoid to believe in any coincidences.

“Any ships spotted yet?” I asked.

“No sir, just the breach—but it’s an unusually large and deep rift.”

I frowned at that, not knowing what to make of it. Had Fex built some huge ship? Some doomsday machine that needed a bigger hole to wriggle through? I had no idea, so I pushed all such worries away.

Work with what you know, I told myself sternly.

“Give me targeting solutions to that rift,” I ordered Langston. “I want numbers from Luna, our fleet, and our Earth-based defenses. Once you have that, let’s build up a comprehensive set of tactical options.”

The computers were working on all that information already, of course. But crunching numbers and putting together a comprehensible tactical summary were two different things. I wanted to know what our best options were.

Space battles had become more complex recently as our number of ships and defensive stations had increased. We no longer had a single squadron of phase-ships patrolling our skies. We now had a dozen squadrons, comprised of about two hundred phase-ships in all, plus around fifty larger vessels.

On top of that, we had orbital bases—missile platforms, mostly. They were scattered on Earth, in orbit above Earth, and all over Luna. More assets meant more choices, and the varied placement added to the mess. The timing of our strikes so they hit any hostile targets simultaneously would make them much more deadly.

“I…” Langston said, studying the input that was flowing to her screens. “I’m getting conflicting information, sir. Many of our Luna bases appear to be unable to hit the enemy position.”

I squinted at her. “What do you mean? Where is it located?”

Before she could reply, I closed my eyes, reached out with my sym, and gathered the data at hand.

This was something I was unusually good at. Using Earth’s sensor arrays and processing power, I was able to tap into all of it and built a comprehensive image, which I cast to the main holo-display with a pitching motion of my hand.

Using “perception” this way was often maligned by the techies in our command circles. But I was a firm believer in it.

Sure, my simplified version of a tactical situation might hide critical details. Detractors claimed vital data might be glossed over or misplaced, making the condensed version unreliable. But the same could be said for their fantastically detailed depictions. Too many floating numbers and high-resolution overlaid images confused the mind and hid the important things in a swamp of confusion.

There were a few gasps and a lot of babbling voices. The rift was visible to us now, rendered by my sym in colorful glory. It was an odd color, a glowing blue center with edges like smoke.

“That’s not a normal rift,” I said.

“Are you sure your image is accurate, Captain?” a voice asked in a sharp tone.

I turned to see Dr. Abrams had made the scene. It was a sad thing for me that he hadn’t gone with Hagen into space again. Why had they taken Mia and not Abrams? I didn’t know, but I felt like I’d been short-changed in the deal.

“The colors and shape are right. It’s more cone-shaped than usual.”

“Yes…” Abrams said, walking close and peering at my display. “I would guess it’s got a thirty degree depth… most unusual. I’m uncertain if that’s due to its large size, or some other factor.”

Moving my arms and making a spreading motion, like Moses opening up the seas, I caused the image to expand in scope. Earth spun into view, and the Moon.

At that point, Langston twisted up her lips and dropped her stylus. She was a believer in precision. She’d doubtlessly been working to present an expanded view using her metered control system.

I’d bypassed all that and therefore her main task. She was annoyed, but I didn’t care. When Vega showed up and kicked me out, she could have everything go her way.

“Ah!” I said, noting the placement of the Earth and the Moon. I spun the image sickeningly, making the crowd wince. The image stabilized again and glowed over our heads. “You see it? That’s why some of our Moon bases can’t engage. The rift has been placed precisely on the opposite side of the Moon from Earth.”

Abrams made repeated snapping sounds with his fingers. “You’re right, Blake! I can’t believe you saw it before I did. Perhaps this is due to the over-simplified display. Who chose these parameters?”

“I did,” I said with a hint of pride in my voice.

“Of course, of course, that explains the lack of detail and refinement. Still, you are clearly correct. The defensive laser stations on Luna can’t hit the rift because Earth is in the way. It’s a diabolical placement.”

That made me narrow my eyes—not just at Abrams’ implied insults, but the implications.

“It must be Fex,” I said. “He came out here previously and scouted us—now, he’s chosen an optimal attack strategy using that intel.”

Abrams nodded, rubbing at his face. “I concur. The placement of this rift can’t be an accident. However, they seem to be wasting a very limited window of time for this advantage.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, the Moon orbits the Earth—you may have heard about that back in grade-school. Therefore, it will soon come around, and our lunar bases will able to target the enemy position.”

“No, they won’t,” Langston said.

“And why not?” Abrams demanded, turning to face her.

“Because the rift is orbiting Earth as well—in direct opposition to the Moon.”

Everyone stared at her, and many people let their mouths gape a little.

“That’s impossible!” Abrams declared.

“Check the data yourself,” Langston invited.

He rushed to her station, almost pushed her out of the way, and ran his long fingers over her screens. All the while he muttered to himself.

Langston stood to one side with her hands on her hips, frowning and shaking her head. It did my heart a touch of good to see that. If she thought I was annoying, she needed to spend more time with the good doctor.

“It checks out…” he said after a half-minute, turning his face up to look at me. “This is bad. This is unprecedented.”

“How so?”

“Because this rift is different than any we’ve ever encountered. Rifts never move—the cosmos moves around them, of course, making it seem like they move upon occasion—but their coordinates are always the same.

I shrugged. “I don’t see how this really matters much.”

One skinny finger went up like a flag, and Abrams marched in my direction, eyes blazing. “A perfect example!” he shouted. “Never will they listen! Always, I tell them they should not put men of limited intellect in command of a modern space force.”

“I’m a trained flight engineer, Doc,” I said, knowing it was the wrong move the moment I’d said it. You never wanted to get into the slime-pit with old Abrams. Especially not when your staff was watching.

He made a farting sound with his lips. “Are you touting that bachelor’s degree of yours? From a state university, no less! Embarrassing. Only a full-fledged doctorate should be running any starship. How can any lesser man be trusted with a trillion-dollar vessel?”

There it was, out in the open, another of the friction points between Abrams and me. He really didn’t buy into military ranks and command structures. He figured we should all be five-star astrophysicists in the fleet.

“Doc,” I said gently. “While you’ve been complaining about nothing, the enemy has begun to show up.”

The output turned into a river of data as everyone turned toward their screens.

Small hostile contacts had begun to wriggle through—hundreds of them.

=22=

“What have we got?” I demanded.

Langston worked for a few seconds before answering, and I let her.

“They… they’re small, Captain. No more than twenty meters long, about two wide… They’re long, narrow craft. Each is independently maneuvering, spreading out into a formation—I’d say they’re fighters, sir.”

Frowning, I zoomed the summary image in and nodded. “But where is their mothership? Did they come through that breach on their own? Traveling through an interstellar rift in a fighter?”

“It would be suicide,” Abrams said, “for several reasons. The radiation shielding is too thin on a fighter. More importantly, there’s no possibility of retreat.”

That was only two reasons, but I decided not to nit-pick like Abrams so often did.

“The nature of this rift is already different,” I said. “Perhaps it has more properties varying from the norm that we haven’t seen yet.”

“I don’t see how,” Abrams snapped. “I’ve studied these things, Blake, unlike present company. Wormholes in space have certain undeniable properties. They are rips in space-time, interconnecting two impossibly distant points with a single inter-dimensional tunnel. One cannot simply redesign a phenomenon of physics.”

I pointed at the display. “And yet, we have this.”

“Sir?” Langston asked me. “Should we fire on them now?”

The question twisted up my guts a little, to be honest. I’d planned to avoid starting a shooting war while the other commanders were away from the War Room, but…

“Yes…” I said. “Use missiles only, and start with our farthest-out bases.”

She nodded and relayed the order. All those targeting solutions began to kick in. Missile tubes opened on a set of orbital platforms. They rose up, spun and began to track—less than a minute later, the tubes flared into a gust of released gases.

“The birds are away, sir.”

“Standard fusion warheads?”

“That’s right. Smart-missiles, type three. They’re slightly outdated models with no radiation-masers or other exotics.”

I glanced at her, and I nodded in approval. She’d committed ordnance we could afford to lose if someone later decided to self-destruct or redirect the barrage off-target.

Naturally, I knew Vega was going to be pissed. He was overdue to arrive and take over operations, but he’d been holding a meeting in the village. Doubtlessly, he was racing at dangerous speeds over the bridges and lakes back to the Mountain.

The number of targets grew steadily. They kept spreading out and adding to the formation. We’d launched a light flock of ninety birds, starting with our most remote launch platforms—but it was beginning to look like that wouldn’t be enough. There had to be a hundred contacts and more were coming every minute.

I frowned in concern. Our own missiles were spinning around the Earth to approach the enemy obliquely. We could always turn them away or order them to self-destruct if this turned out to be a meet-and-greet parade from some overzealous Kher planet—but I figured the odds of that were slim.

As the number of ships grew, I considered firing more missiles. Another group could be timed to arrive at the rift at the same time as the first, forming a single, smashing strike. We could also use our laser bases that orbited Earth if the enemy came in a little closer…

“Captain Blake?” Langston called urgently, breaking into my thoughts. “Admiral Clemens wants to speak with you.”

I winced. Most people these days simply contacted my sym directly—but not old Clemens. He went through traditional channels.

“I’ll take it with my sym.”

Reaching out, I found the waiting contact and commandeered it from the network. Techs hated when I did that, but that was just too damned bad.

“Admiral?” I spoke aloud. “This is Captain Blake. We have a serious situation here, sir. I’ve been forced—”

“Blake, you power-grabbing maniac!” Clemens interrupted. “Who gave you authorization to fire missiles at these newcomers?”

“You did, sir,” I said promptly, “when you put my name on the rosters to staff the War Room. For the duration of the current crisis, I’m Admiral Vega’s second in command. When and if—”

“Shut up and listen to me. We can’t be sure these new arrivals are hostile. They might be displaying strength, but—”

“It’s true, sir, that these intruders could be here to befriend Earth. Unfortunately, they appear to be warlike, they’ve ignored every transmission we’ve sent at them, and this looks like Fex is behind it to me. If I delay counter-action, I could be dooming our population centers.”

“You don’t have the authority, Blake! I want you to wait for Vega before you take any further action.”

“I can’t promise that, sir,” I said crisply. “If I think Earth is seriously endangered, I’ll take every step I deem necessary until I’m relieved.”

“Blake, you need to stand down. I’m warning you.”

“We’ve got no time for vague statements, Admiral. Are you ordering me to relinquish command? Should I hand over the post to Commander Langston?”

He was quiet for a several long seconds.

During this pause, Langston was eying me in alarm. She could only hear half the conversation, but she’d caught onto the idea that I was offering her up as a sacrificial lamb.

“No…” he said at last. “You’ll man your post until relieved—but stop shooting at everything that moves! Clemens out.”

It wasn’t more than three minutes after this exchange that Admiral Vega arrived. He appeared to be out of breath, and his hat was missing entirely. His hair had flapped up on his head into a windblown pattern.

“Admiral on deck,” I called out. “Captain Blake is stepping down.”

Now that Space Command had taken over the newly remodeled Cheyenne Station, we ran it like a ship that didn’t move. That seemed fitting, as the War Room operated like the bridge on a giant spaceship—a spaceship we called planet Earth.

Vega didn’t ream me out right away. Instead, he walked around the floor, panting and staring with bugged-out eyes at the situation displays.

“You fired on them?”

“One barrage, farthest out,” I said. “All standard missiles, type-threes.”

He’d gained control of his breathing by now, and he turned to face me. “Did you get the go-ahead from Clemens before you fired?”

“No sir. However, I did just talk to him, informing him of the situation. What are your orders, Admiral?”

“I’d like to order you to the brig—but I can’t. For all I know, I’ll need you to translate some kind of slug-based cultural nuances.”

I didn’t reply, as I hadn’t been asked a question or given an order.

Vega heaved a big breath. “Okay… they look hostile. That’s a weird rift—how long has it been spinning up there?”

“Approximately eighteen minutes, sir,” Langston replied.

“Right… Eighteen minutes… it took me longer to get down here than I thought it would. Langston, how long until that rift fades?”

She pondered her screens. “Well… judging by previous cases, it should have faded already. But it shows no sign of dissipating so far.”

“Right. Rifts usually last from five to fifteen minutes, tops…”

Narrowing my eyes, I looked into it with my sym. I soon determined that he was right. This rift was different. Not only in form and appearance, but function as well.

“Langston?” Vega called out. “It’s time to launch the next wave, isn’t it?”

“If we want to hit them with maximum effect, then yes, sir.”

Vega looked conflicted. “All right, launch. Alert Clemens at the same time. He’s on his way back here by air right now.”

“Launching wave two—ninety birds away.”

Side displays showed the launches. They were silent, but in a way, lovely to watch. The exhaust trails burned a bright blue as the second wave swarmed around our planet in the opposite direction.

As if they’d been waiting for this cue before taking action, the formation of fighter-sized ships near the rift suddenly advanced. Hundreds of small craft nosed forward, their individual engines flaring brightly in an oval attack-pattern.

“That did it,” I said. “They’re making their play.”

We watched as the fighters advanced, and our missiles shifted course to intercede.

Langston began fiddling with the projections, and we saw probable cones of motion appear. Like a diagram predicting the path of a hurricane, the broad red swath showed where the enemy ships were likely to be over the next half hour or so.

It was easy enough to see, even without this visual aid, that they were headed for Earth.

Langston marched over to Vega and me, joining us. We formed a trio standing in the midst of two dozen operators sitting at consoles.

“Admiral?” Langston said. “I’m not happy about these projections.”

“We knew they were gunning for Earth. There’s no surprise there.”

“Not that, sir. I’m not talking about their course projections. I’m talking about their rate of acceleration.”

Vega frowned, as did I.

“Whatever you’ve got, display it,” Vega ordered.

“I wasn’t sure…” Langston said. “We don’t have all the numbers yet, sir. We’re just looking at possibilities.”

Langston nodded toward her team, who were watching her. The screen updated with new data. It was a projection over time, comparing rates of acceleration and course information. Every second, we got a better picture.

“Here’s what we’re seeing over the next ten minutes or so,” she said, gesturing toward the screen.

The image fast-forwarded to show the predicted movement of the enemy ships and our missile. They curved together and came to a collision point very close to Earth’s surface.

“That’s close,” I said.

“That’s way too close!” Vega said. “Langston! Are you sure about this?”

“It’s only a possibility. The enemy ships are accelerating at a great rate—even faster than our missiles. That’s not normal for fighters. I’m not sure how they’re doing it. Maybe they’re a new design.”

“Some of them are bound to reach the surface,” I said. “What other assets do we have to intercede?”

“We’re out of position, sir,” Commander Langston said. “Most of the fleet was stationed at Luna, so it can’t get here in time. Our phase-ships are stealthy, but they aren’t terribly fast. We’ll be lucky to have two cruisers in range before this is over with.”

“You’re telling me that some of these invaders are going to reach Earth?” Vega demanded.

“It looks that way, Admiral. If they can maintain this high rate of acceleration for ten more minutes without running out of fuel—they’ll reach their target.”

We studied the screens for about another minute.

“Shit…” Vega said, and he turned to me. “Looks like you didn’t fire too soon, Blake. You fired our missiles too damned late!”

I would have smiled if the situation wasn’t so grim. “I’ll try to be more aggressive next time, sir.”

=23=

We were in a whole new zone now. Rather than jockeying for position, calculating the best moment for our counterattack and weighing options—we were trying to figure out which cities were about to be laid waste.

“If they come straight in,” I said, interpreting the computer models, “I’m seeing a strike in the southern hemisphere.”

“Where?”

“Anywhere from Calcutta to Cape Town.”

“India to Africa…” Vega said. His face drained of color. “All in range…”

“Not quite,” Langston said. “The strike area is forming an oval due to the spinning of the planet. The oval is off-center due to the course of the missiles—anyway, Cairo is a maybe. Tripoli is out of danger.”

She continued listing cities, but we were past hearing her. It didn’t matter. No matter where these missiles fell, the losses would be catastrophic.

“This is unacceptable!” Vega boomed suddenly. He turned to me, his face twisted into a snarl. “Blake! Get us out of this! I want an idea, and I don’t care how insane it sounds.”

My jaw was tight. I studied the numbers—but they weren’t getting any better.

“The only solutions I see are diplomatic ones, sir,” I said. “And those are maybes.”

“Diplomatic? What are you talking about?”

I shrugged. “We could surrender, sir.”

My thoughts had drifted to Godwin. Originally, when Fex had first threatened Earth, Godwin had counseled us to roll over and play dead. Then, as he’d put it, we could mount a slow build-up while waiting for a moment of weakness on the part of our oppressors. When the right moment came, we could break free again. It was a story as old as time.

Vega looked at me in shock. “You’re serious? That’s what I pay you for? To be my surrender-monkey?”

“No sir,” I said. “But you wanted a solution.”

“I want a different one. What else do you have?”

My hands lifted and spread wide. “We could take the hit. Get our forces into better position for the next round and tough it out.”

“That’s almost worse…” Vega said, staring at the screens.

I knew he’d been hoping for some kind of tactical trick that would get us out of this unscathed. Maybe such a thing existed—but I wasn’t seeing it.

“It’s your call, sir,” I said.

“No… No, it can’t be. Get Clemens on the line. Get the Joint Chiefs. We’ve got a very tough call to make.”

Stepping out of the War Room, he took a private sym-link and made a secure call. I’d been trained on the use of this emergency system, and I hoped I’d never have to use it to communicate the kind of grim news that Vega was relaying right now.

“What do you think they’ll do?” Commander Langston asked.

I turned, and noted she’d moved quite close to me. Her eyes were wide, frightened, and pretty.

“Um… if I had to guess, I’d say they’ll take the hit.”

She looked even more alarmed and took a step back. “Really? They’ll consign millions to death?”

“Japan did it—the first time. But they collapsed after the second blow landed. I’m not sure how many shots we’ll take—but I don’t think the top brass can convince anyone this is real without at least one smoking crater to point to.”

She took another step away from me. Her face was troubled. She stared at the maps, the screens. She looked lost.

“So callous… So cold… I don’t think we have the right, Leo.”

“You’ve got a point there. But we’ve been put in charge of this defensive effort. There’s no one else to do it.”

She moved away from me and went back to her post. I felt like following her. I wanted to put a comforting hand on her shoulder—but I stayed at my post instead. Now was the time to look as pro as possible.

The rest of the room was visibly shaken. Every operator, adjunct and staffer was cowed. We were all stunned—we couldn’t believe that we’d been defeated so easily.

The numbers went from bad to worse before Vega returned to the War Room. The fighters were outrunning everything we had, and we were down to grim, last-ditch options.

“We’re going to ride it out,” Vega said. His voice was low and fateful. “India is going to fire her ICBMS, creating a barrier cloud—here.”

He indicated a zone over the southern Arabian Peninsula.

Immediately, my brow knitted together in a deep frown.

“But… how’s that going to help?” I asked.

“It will,” Langston said, “I’ve got a war game report on it already—Geneva is working late tonight, coming up with options.”

She showed how our data was shifting. The zone was narrowing—moving to the northeast. Africa was no longer on the menu.

“The target is India for sure,” she said. “Mumbai, Calcutta, Delhi—maybe Bangalore. The bombers are headed for that region.”

“Bombers? I thought they were fighters?”

She shook her head. “Fighters strike at other craft. These ships are doing everything they can to avoid our defenses.”

She was right, of course. They had to be planning to bomb us.

“It makes sense—if you’re ruthless.”

“What makes sense, Blake?” Vega asked me in a tired voice.

“If these were fighters, they’d engage our fleet and try to destroy our ships. They must be bombers, because they’re going right past our fleet and attacking the homeworld. India has a very high population density. From the point of view of Fex, that makes them the best target. They don’t know everything about us—but they can easily tell where our biggest cities are.”

“Right…” he said. “Population… Kill as many as you can, then demand surrender.”

We watched grimly as the battle played out—if you wanted to call it that.

A thousand self-recriminations went through my head. We should have been more ready. We should never have antagonized Fex in the first place.

We should have begged the Nomads for help.

But the time to fix all that was in the past. We’d made our bed, and we were going to have to suffer the consequences.

=24=

Not all the bombers made it through. A massive cloud of radiation and turbulence suddenly spread thirty thousand meters above the Indian Ocean. One after another, more and more missiles—our missiles from India—flew into the kill zone and were destroyed.

We cheered as enemy red contacts winked out one after another—but some won through. Some of the attackers pressed onward, and they began to descend into our atmosphere.

The missiles I’d ordered to fire hadn’t even caught up to them yet. We’d totally underestimated the speed with which these tiny ships could travel.

When the bombers reached Kochi, a city on the southwestern coastline of India, tiny sub-contacts broke off. The city was vaporized.

“Two point one million…” Langston said in a haunted voice. “They’re gone.”

I thought I heard someone among the staffers shedding a few tears, but I didn’t look to see who it was. They couldn’t be blamed for grieving, and I wasn’t going to make it worse by staring at them.

The flock of bombers lifted off and away then, turning back—but it was too late for them.

I wondered, as I watched our navy and our missile barrages catch up with the fleeing bombers, if they’d originally had orders to strike more cities. It seemed to me that they’d shifted course right at the end.

“They lost their nerve,” I said with certainty.

“What?” Vega demanded. “Are you nuts, Blake? They just tailpiped us! That’s the worst strike Earth has ever—”

“I know, sir, but it could have been much worse. Those pilots know our missiles are closing in, and they want to go home. They were probably ordered to hit something bigger—Mumbai to the north, maybe. But see here in their course lines? They changed their heading while they were still out over the Arabian Sea.”

I showed him a course shift about a thousand kilometers out to sea. “They switched targets to Kochi, a smaller city on the coast.”

“Why?”

Langston came to join us. Her eyes were red. I couldn’t help but notice that. Had it been her tears I’d overheard a moment ago? I wasn’t sure, but I vowed never to mention it.

“I think Captain Blake is right, sir,” she said. “They were going to hit one of India’s biggest cities. We can tell now from their trajectory—but they changed their minds at the last moment.”

“Am I supposed to feel good about that?” Vega complained.

“No, Admiral,” I said, “but look, we’re nailing them now.”

Our net had finally begun to close. We’d been unable to catch them on their plunging race to Earth’s surface, but now that they had to turn and reverse course we were gaining rapidly.

Above the enemy in orbit, our fleet had arrived. The bombers had been forced to slow down when they entered Earth’s upper troposphere, or they would have burned up. That lost velocity, coupled with the need to turn around and begin racing hard back toward the rift, doomed them.

Vega showed his teeth in a feral grin. “The phase ships are attacking! Six of them!”

When we were in a battle like this, it wasn’t always possible to know where our own assets were. Phase ships were by nature undetectable when they were phasing—that was their only advantage.

As this battle was far from carefully planned out, we hadn’t been sure if any of our captains had managed to get in close enough to plot out the enemy course and intercept.

“Our boys are smart,” Vega said, beaming and marching around the tactical table with pent-up energy. “Those captains have put themselves on the return path. Did either of you order that? Blake, Langston?”

We shook our heads.

“The general call went out to intercept at all costs,” I said. “They phased out and did their best.”

Vega nodded.

We all watched as the two lines converged.

“They’re engaging,” Vega said, anxious to see some payback.

“Can those bombers take out our phase ships?” Langston asked me. “Blake, have you tangled with this class of enemy vessel before?”

“Yes… but these are faster than anything I’ve met up with in the past. If they unloaded everything on Kochi, they won’t have much left. But I think Kwok pilots are too cagey for that. This will be a fight.”

The two formations were ragged, and they met in a fury. Both sides fired. The enemy bombers definitely got the worst of it, losing half their number. But two of our own phase-ships exploded as well.

Then, just as quickly as it had begun, the clash ended. The two groups had been heading toward one another, and they soon passed each other and continued on, due to momentum. It was as if two lines of knights had each charged through the lines of the other.

Unfortunately, our phase-ships were too slow to turn and chase down the bombers.

“They’re getting away,” Vega said. “Order the rest of our fleet to intercept. Place everything we’ve got along the path between Earth and that rift.”

That instruction made me think of the rift again. Frowning, I examined the enemy rift, the spiraling wormhole in space they’d used to enter our space.

The data I saw there didn’t make any sense. I turned to Langston, and I pointed to her calculations. “Is this right? Can that rift have been held open for more than an hour?”

“The data is correct, sir.”

“That’s some kind of a record, isn’t it?”

She shrugged helplessly. “As far as we can tell, it’s not even possible.”

“Get Dr. Abrams back down here,” I said. “I want his analysis.”

Abrams returned as the phase ships met the bombers and the fireworks started.

“Ah,” he said, “intercepted them, did we? Excellent work, gentlemen.”

I glanced over my shoulder and shook my head.

Frowning, he came close and examined the tactical maps more closely. He sucked in his breath.

“Failure?” he demanded. His voice raised into a shout. “Abject failure? How could you have let them through, Blake? How could you let them turn millions to ash?”

My fists balled up and twitched. I thought about punching him, but I didn’t. I didn’t have the heart.

After all, in a way, he was right. It had been our job to protect Earth. We had undeniably failed.

Vega didn’t take Abrams’ comments so stoically. He grabbed up two fistfuls of his lab coat and forced the thin old man to stagger back, away from the tactical maps.

“That kind of talk isn’t helpful, Abrams,” he said in a dangerous tone. “If you want to have anything to do with this base and defense-contracting in general, you’ll keep recriminations to yourself.”

“I’m sorry, Admiral,” he said stiffly. “These losses are unprecedented. They’re a shock.”

“We know that. What we need from you is input: how can that rift still be hanging out there, open and showing no signs of dissipating?”

Intrigued, Abrams stepped back to the displays. He ran his hands over the numbers, making them swell and glow. Blocks of data unfolded and popped out. He was digging into the records, going deeper with each tapping motion.

“Incredible…” he said. “The rift shows no signs of dissipation at all. It isn’t decaying.”

“How long can it stay open?” Vega asked. “Do these bombers have enough time to exit through it and escape us?”

Abrams lifted his face and looked from one of us to the next. “Is there something wrong with the acoustics in this chamber? I just said that the rift is completely stable. It won’t dissipate—possibly, it will remain there for another thousand years.”

Stunned, we all studied him and then turned back to the rift.

It spun and shimmered. Lights played all around the end of the vortex, a rip in space time that connected us to another place.

Could this be the secret tech that the Nomads were interested in? It seemed to me that such an advance could be a serious game-changer.

No wonder Godwin had visited me to discuss it.

=25=

The postmortem on the battle wasn’t a fun meeting.

“I’m filling out the worst after-action report of my lifetime,” Vega said as he met with me and Admiral Clemens.

It was a closed-door affair. Everyone else had been excused. The three of us sat with glum expressions as we reviewed the data.

“It’s the worst day in human history,” Clemens said. “Easily the worst. Carry on.”

Clemens was stone-faced. I couldn’t blame him, but I was wondering what he was thinking about. Was he glad he hadn’t been here, or regretful? I could make a case for either reaction.

“We lost just over three million souls,” Vega said. “So far, that is. We’ve got fallout, disease, power-outages and food shortages all the way up these waterways from Kochi.”

“You mean the crater that was once called Kochi,” Clemens corrected.

That tipped me off as to his mood: Clemens was pissed.

Vega hesitated for a moment, but then pressed on. “The enemy lost over seventy percent of their ships. They were broken and fleeing at the end.”

“What difference does that make?” Clemens demanded.

“It might make a big difference,” I said. “Fex and his people aren’t brave. They don’t like those kinds of losses. It’s highly unlikely that those pilots will ever come back to challenge Earth again.”

“But the rift hasn’t faded,” Clemens said. “That means they aren’t done with us yet.”

“Agreed,” I said.

“The situation is still active and developing,” Vega added, “both in the sky and on the ground. The Kwok ships could launch another attack at any time.”

“Are we at least better placed to intercept them this time?” Clemens demanded.

“Yes sir,” I said, getting a flick of the hand from Vega as a signal to take over.

I went over our current disposition of forces. Clemens seemed somewhat relieved as I finished.

“Well…” he said, “at least we really didn’t lose much of our fleet. But that strike, so fast, so deep—straight to Earth. We can’t allow that scenario to repeat itself.”

Vega and I exchanged glances.

“We can’t guarantee that it won’t sir,” Vega said.

“Why not?” Clemens snapped. “We’ve got our thumbs out of our bums now. We’ll meet the next attack in force, knowing how fast they can move and how to deal with them effectively.”

“That’s true, sir,” Vega said. “But the enemy has the mobility factor in their favor. All they have to do is shut down this rift and open another one a million kilometers away. They might even be able to make it appear closer to Earth. Our science crew is debating about that.”

Clemens looked like he was ready to shoot us, or have a heart attack. Maybe it was both. I’d never seen him so worked up.

He leaned forward.

“Listen, men,” he said. “We’re about to be collectively dismissed and replaced. Now, that doesn’t matter to me personally. If they want to put me out to pasture, I’d welcome the holiday. But the problem is I don’t think there are any better tacticians available. The three of us—we’re some of the most experienced men this planet has in the fledgling art of planning space battles.”

“What can we do about that, sir?” I asked.

“We can avoid fucking up next time, that’s what.”

That was it for me. I stood up and put my hat on the table.

“Sir, I’m more than willing to resign my post if the Joint Chiefs feel they’ve got a better man for the job.”

“Sit down Blake, you showman. We’re all well aware you did the right thing from the start. You fired missiles without hesitation. If anything, your gut reaction was too conservative.”

I stood there stiffly. “I’m not sure where this conversation is going, sir. Do they want to dismiss us from this post or not?”

“Look,” he sighed. “It’s political. Every city on Earth is convinced they’re next. Can you guess what kind of pressure that’s putting on governments all over the globe?”

“Yes, of course,” I said. “But what’s that mean to us?”

“It means we have to do something. Or at least, we have to appear to be doing something that will end this war in victory.”

Vega and I looked at one another. I sat down again.

“That’s a tall order,” I said.

“No, it isn’t. Not really. What if we mounted an attack on the rift? What if we fired our own missile barrage through it?”

Vega made a rude noise. “That’s a waste of missiles. They won’t be sitting on the far side in a cluster waiting for us to blow them up, you know.”

“Of course not, but it will look good. We can claim we’ve struck back at the enemy. Think of it as a propaganda play.”

“Admiral,” I said. “With all due respect, this isn’t the moment for grand gestures. We’re on the brink.”

“I know, but—”

“No sir,” I said. “I don’t think you do know. That last attack was a probe. Fex has barely begun to siege Earth. He’s tested us, and to our horror, he found our defenses weak. That will only encourage him.”

“All the more reason to poke back at him. Isn’t that what you teach in your self-defense courses, Blake? That the best defense is a good offense?”

“Something like that…” I admitted.

“Well then, come up with a plan, and let’s start offending that furry bastard out there. We can’t allow him to keep the initiative. We must strike back.”

He left, and I sat glumly beside Vega. Both of us were sprawled in our chairs, tired and defeated.

“He needs a show,” Vega said, “even if it’s pointless.”

“The politicians can go hang themselves,” I said. “This is too big for that kind of thinking. We could lose Earth’s freedom if we play this wrong, Admiral.”

Vega nodded slowly. “I know. But I think Clemens was right: you and I are the best Earth has at the moment. If we hand everything over to somebody in Europe who’s never done anything but play paintball in the woods…”

He didn’t have to keep going. I’d thought about it before.

For a long time on Earth, the United States had fielded the most experienced armed forces. We were doing it again in this new era.

How had we come to be Earth’s warrior nation? I didn’t know, but it was undeniably our role, and it had been for nearly a century now.

=26=

Admiral Vega had many of our fleet assets set up facing the permanent rift after several hours. The captains were understandably suspicious of the rift, so they didn’t encircle it too closely.

“Devilfish is fifty thousand kilometers out,” Vega complained to me near the end of our long and eventful shift in the War Room. “What’s wrong with him? Is Hagen trying to live forever?”

“The crews are all nervous, sir,” I told him. “Commander Hagen is no coward—but this whole thing might be another trick.”

Vega looked at me with narrowed eyes. “How so? What kind of hellish ruse could it be?”

I shrugged. “It’s hard to say. But let’s deal with the facts for a moment. Fex first scouted us, then placed this rift in the most inconvenient spot he could.”

“Yeah, yeah. We’ve established that the monkey is a prick. What’s he got in store for us next time?”

I pointed a finger at him. “There, now your mind is in the same zone as Hagen’s is. He’s reluctant to go in too close because we got burned badly the last time. You can’t just fly blind with a cagey enemy.”

“Sure, but you can’t just sit on your ass, either. We have to respond. We have to anticipate and play tricks of our own. If we just react without seizing the initiative, we’ll never win this war.”

“Granted,” I said. “But we’re far from certain we’ve seen all of Fex’s new moves. So far, they’ve surprised us with some serious technical improvements. First there was that long-lived, mobile rift. Second was a swarm of ultra-fast bombers. It’s likely they have even more tricks up their sleeves.”

Vega began to pace. He was wearing thin. The day had been more than stressful for all of us. We were both struggling to talk to one another in a civil and professional manner.

“More tricks… like what?” he snapped.

“We have no way of knowing. But, we can assume there’re more coming. Therefore, we can’t do the expected. We can’t be lured into charging after phantoms.”

“So… you don’t think we should mount an offensive? Send a phase ship or two through that never-ending rift?”

I shrugged. “If we want to scout, we should do it with a sole ship. They’re certain to have heavy defenses set up on the far side.”

“Suicide then? That’s what you’d call it?”

“Yes… possibly.”

Vega wasn’t satisfied with my answers. He wasn’t happy with any of his underlings, in fact, and I couldn’t blame him. He needed a plan, and he didn’t have one.

“We’re waiting around for their next move,” he complained. “That’s not how you win a war, Blake.”

“I agree, sir. What are your orders?”

He sighed. I had him there. He was good at chewing on his staff, demanding answers and plans. But when there weren’t any good ones, the buck stopped with him. He would have to decide what our next course of action would be.

“You know…” Vega said, staring at the holo-displays. “I thought Clemens was going to kick us both out of here. But he didn’t. He left us in charge, not even ordering someone to relieve us for the rest of our shift. That’s incredible considering that we lost about three million lives so far today.”

“It shows he still believes in us—that the Joint Chiefs still believe.”

“Or,” Vega said in a bitter tone, “they realize it could have been much, much worse. Those bombers… They might have killed a billion if we hadn’t fought back effectively.”

No one responded. It was difficult to contemplate such worst-case scenarios.

Vega rubbed his neck and rolled his head around in circles. He was under a lot of strain, and it was beginning to show.

“All right,” he said at last. “Give them another hour. We’ll take stock of things then and decide if we’re going to try to slip a ship through to scout the other end of that rift.”

The hour passed—or most of it. Before we came back to making another hard decision, Langston snapped her head up.

“Contact, sirs!”

We immediately converged upon the central display. A three dimensional projection depicting the inner planets of the Solar System swam and fuzzed there for a long second. I considered reaching out with my sym and coaxing the data out of the system—but I managed to contain myself. I didn’t like throwing the techs off from doing their jobs if it wasn’t critical.

The point of view disintegrated and reformed. We were looking at another spot. It was deep space, out at the no man’s line near Mars.

“Another rift is forming,” Vega said in a quiet voice.

It was true. A small spark of color came into view. It rapidly zoomed, becoming a luminous blob. That in turn swelled, growing to fill our field of vision in the span of a few seconds.

“That’s pretty close to where Fex poked his nose out the first time,” I said.

“Have we got any assets out there?”

Langston shook her head. “No sir. All fleet elements are on the opposite side of Earth, guarding the rift that’s still sitting out there.”

“Of course…” Vega said in disgust. “He’s outmaneuvering us again. That prick.”

“Maybe sir,” I said. “Maybe not.”

Vega threw up his hands. “He’s using the rifts against us. Pop in on one side, poke the target, then switch randomly to another spot and do it again. He knows we don’t have enough ships to cover the whole sky.”

I pointed at the display and made a pulling motion. The image warped and shrank as I zoomed out. Soon, Earth was a blue ball, the moon was a white marble, and the two rifts were pinpricks of light on opposite sides.

“Dammit,” Langston complained. “Why do you keep doing things like that, Captain Blake? I can’t be responsible for data summary and display if you keep overriding my station’s controls.”

Vega waved for her to be quiet, and she shut up. She gave me a brooding stare.

“See here?” I asked. “This new rift wasn’t placed intelligently if it’s a new springboard for an attack. It’s too far out. We’ve got enough time to wheel our fleet and counter them if the enemy comes at us from this new direction.”

“So then,” Vega said with crossed arms, “what’s Fex up to? Why would he—?”

He got no further. A ship appeared in front of the new rift.

“It’s a heavy cruiser,” Langston said. “That’s confirmed. Exhaust signature, radiation analysis, spectral measurements… Sir, this vessel matches Fex’s original visitation. It’s either the same ship, or one that’s very similar.”

“All right, open a channel to that ship.”

We waited tensely, and at last the signals were able to bounce out there a few million kilometers and back again. The enemy vessel was about a half a light-minute out, creating a noticeable delay in communications.

“Admiral Fex,” Vega said, “Earth is now in a state of war with the Kwok star system. Your ship will be destroyed.”

He signaled Langston to send the message. Tellingly, she turned her wide eyes toward me for a moment as if to confirm.

I neither nodded nor shook my head. It wasn’t my place to do so. Admiral Vega was in charge of this show, and I wasn’t going to get in the way of that.

Turning slowly to the boards, she relayed the message with numb fingers. Clearly, she thought it was undiplomatic in the extreme.

We waited. After about a minute, a reply came in.

“That is a shame,” Fex said, his hairy face filling our displays once again. “I am always reluctant to exterminate a fellow primate species. I feel that we should be brothers. It is weakness of mine. Alas, this dreamt-of partnership is not to be.”

Vega crossed his arms over his chest and grunted unhappily. We all wanted to talk to Fex, to tell him to fuck off, but the distance between us precluded that without using an ansible system, and Fex wasn’t utilizing one with this message.

“However…” Fex said, brightening. “I’m never a creature who gives up hope easily. After a few more of your cities vanish, maybe—just maybe—you’ll be in a more conciliatory mood.”

“Fex!” Vega shouted. “We’ll destroy you! Don’t doubt our capacity for destruction and revenge!”

Here, I reached out a hand and put it on Vega’s elbow. He’d said earlier he lacked in the diplomacy department, and he wasn’t kidding.

“May I step in, sir?” I asked.

Vega didn’t respond immediately. His nostrils were flaring, and his breath was coming in angry puffs. He turned away from Fex’s taunting image, giving me an off-handed wave of approval.

Taking my cue, I addressed Langston. “Commander, delete that last recording.”

She did so, then I stepped up to the plate to make the best of it.

“Admiral Fex,” I said. “There seems to be some kind of misunderstanding between our peoples. We’ve tried to protect you, but I’m afraid we can no longer do so. You’ve gone too far. The Imperials, the Nomads—they all know where your new tech came from. We can do nothing further, and we will mourn your passing.”

The staffers, including Admiral Vega himself, looked at me quizzically. I ignored them all.

I could tell they wanted to ask me what the hell I was talking about—but they stayed quiet. They stood around, appearing confused and nervous.

“Send that new message,” I said, signaling Langston.

A full minute passed while our message flew out to Fex’s ship and we waited as his response—whatever it would be—returned to us.

Fex’s expression shifted before he spoke. That was fun to watch. His smug arrogance faded away, and a look of confusion grew. I realized we were watching his reactions as he listened to our words. Finally, he appeared to be concerned.

“The Imperials?” he shouted. “The Nomads? Are you a madman, Blake?”

He threw up a hairy paw. “No—no, don’t answer that. I already know the answer. You’re completely insane. Still, I’m shocked you would admit to treachery, to collaborating with the greatest enemies of the Rebel Kher. The Imperials will shave and cure your hide, Blake, just as surely as they would mine. And the Nomads—those mythical ghosts aren’t to be trusted, if you’ve actually met them.”

Vega liked this turn in the conversation. He caught my eye, nodded, and indicated I should continue screwing with Fex.

With a stern expression, I faced the cameras again.

“It’s simply too late for pleading and excuses, Fex. The evidence of your crimes is obvious. Just for starters, you’ve left a rift burning and spinning over Earth for an impossibly long duration. Could you be so naïve as to believe no one has been stalking you? The Imperials are impressed by your new toys, certainly—but not in a positive way. You’ve conspired with their greatest enemies, the Nomads, to gain a technological advantage. In turn, they’ve declared your removal from the galaxy to be an absolute necessity. May the stars help your people.”

Fex listened to this next message with even greater consternation.

“What are you talking about, Blake? How could you possibly know who has chosen to help us?”

That was a very interesting tidbit. I listened closely after that admission, but he began blathering threats.

Cutting him off, I laughed at him and talked over him, even as he went on with a laundry list of recriminations and demands for our submission.

“Shut up, Fex. We know the Nomads gave you tech—everyone knows it. You think we’re fools, don’t you?”

Fex only raged in response, so I signaled Langston to close the channel.

She looked at Vega with big eyes, and he nodded. She cut the feed, and the raving image of Fex vanished from our displays.

I for one was happy to see him fade into pixels. I’d never liked the primitive looks of our closest cousins among the Rebel Kher.

Vega turned toward me slowly, and the confused look on his face matched Fex’s expression. “You told him a pack of lies and then hung up the phone? What did that gain us?”

“Information, for one thing,” I said. “Did you notice he didn’t deny the Nomads gave him the tech? That was a wild guess on my part. Honestly, I’m surprised. Godwin didn’t seem to know the true source…”

Vega frowned. “You really enjoy tricking people, don’t you?”

I shrugged. “It’s a technique sir, nothing more. The fact that I guessed right… that’s disturbing in and of itself.”

“Could Fex be lying?” Langston asked, joining the conversation.

“Fex is always lying,” Vega declared with a snort.

“But we caught him off-guard,” I said. “He was surprised by my accusations because they hit home.”

Our conversation would have continued, but the channel-request light was blinking again.

“Fex is trying to contact us,” Langston said. “Should I open the—?”

“No,” I said firmly, giving my head a shake. “Let him stew for a while. He needs to believe we’re not afraid of him.”

“But sir… We are afraid of him,” Langston insisted. “He just nailed one of our largest cities!”

“We have to pretend like we barely care. We have to act as if he’s done nothing but piss us off by bombing our population. Ineffectiveness will decrease the odds he’ll repeat the act.”

Vega nodded thoughtfully. “All right. But it looks like Fex is withdrawing for now.”

The lone ship had retreated, and the rift had flickered out. Fex was gone.

An hour or so passed, and the skies stayed quiet. We dared to hope the enemy was at least reconsidering their options.

Still, however, the permanent-seeming rift burned near Earth. It was orbiting in a locked path, directly opposite our own Moon.

“Clemens is coming in now to take over,” Vega informed me at the end of our shift. “He’s relieving me—and you as well, Langston.”

I looked up in surprise. “Do I take it I’m to stay on duty?”

“Yes. He’s been watching, and he’s stepping in.”

“Who’s taking over ops?” Langston asked.

“Dr. Abrams has a team of xenologists…”

Both Langston and I began to protest, but Vega couldn’t do anything but refer us to Clemens.

“As long as we’re not involved in outright hostilities,” he said, “Abrams and his team make as much sense as anyone.”

“Then Clemens should be overruled,” Langston said.

Vega shrugged. “He’s senior, and he’s got the backing of the Joint Chiefs. If we start shooting weapons instead of mouths again, he might call me back in.”

Awkwardly, I watched as most of Vega’s team withdrew. Clemens walked in a moment later, looking stern and resolute.

I knew what was up the moment I saw him.

How did I know? How could I be sure Admiral Clemens was an imposter? That was hard to say…

Ever since I’d met up with Godwin, our resident Nomad doppelganger, I’d been able to pick him out of a line-up. I wasn’t sure how that occurred—it was just a hunch that came to me from time to time.

This was one of those times.

=27=

I was certain that Admiral Clemens wasn’t human. He was a Nomad, an artificial being sent here by an alien power.

Several times in the past, I’d met up with his kind. Godwin had told me that among all humans, I was unique in my consistent ability to see through his disguise of flesh and cloth.

Privately, I suspected it was my sym that made the difference. I had a rare form of artificial life pulsing in my veins. It was one of the originals—not some watered-down clone sym grown by Dr. Abrams.

Like the Nomads themselves, syms were life forms that lived inside what appeared to be a normal human body.

Right then, I wondered about the origins of our syms. Nomads were artificial beings, and so were our syms. Could it be that the two biological technologies were related?

They were different in scale, that much was certain. Syms lived inside the lining of our arteries, dependent on our bodies for survival. Nomads were much more independent. They were able to form a whole body, aping a completed being.

Both techs had apparently been developed by the Imperials. I wondered if, far back in time, the Imperials had created Nomads first. Perhaps the artificial life forms had gotten out of control, and they’d come up with syms instead. Artificial life, yes, but in a form that couldn’t live outside a Kher host.

Admiral Clemens was frowning at me by now. I’d been caught staring.

I dropped my eyes as quickly as possible and turned back to the displays.

“Dr. Abrams,” I said, “if you’d be so kind as to take your station at the sensor array. Maybe your team can give us a preliminary report.”

“I’m sure we’ll do better than your last team,” he said, and he led a knot of lab coats to the equipment.

The officers who retreated from their stations gave the incoming team dirty looks. For some reason, our various flavors of government nerds never seemed to get along. One would think that spooks and military types would see eye-to-eye—but that was rarely the case.

Abrams did seem insufferably proud of himself as he took over. He even went so far as to make dismissive shooing motions at the retreating team.

“Our analysis will be processed correctly from now on, sirs,” he assured us in a loud voice.

Langston flipped up her middle finger at his back. I was pretty sure I was the only one who saw it, and it made me grin for a moment.

She wasn’t the type to go in for such behavior, but I knew how she felt. We’d all spent a long, hard shift at our stations. Being relieved now was bitter-sweet, and it wasn’t cool for Dr. Abrams to start bragging about how his team was going to do a better job.

The term “cool” had never described Abrams, however.

Turning back to Clemens, I noted how he stood ramrod straight in front of the displays. I looked him up and down, wondering how I should handle the situation.

Calling for his arrest was likely to get me expelled from the War Room, as he outranked me and usually those in the immediate vicinity would work to protect any Nomad. Their minds were often influenced to help the doppelganger.

The next most obvious move was equally perilous. I could draw a guard’s pistol—not having one of my own on my belt—and gun him down.

That might result in my own death, but at least a traitorous alien wouldn’t spend more than a few seconds running Earth’s defenses.

I didn’t like either of these options.

“Admiral Clemens,” I said politely. “Could I have a private word?”

Clemens glanced at me sidelong. “Are you sure you want that, Captain Blake?”

The response surprised me. Was he making a subtle threat? Did he know I’d spotted him?

It stood to reason that he’d expect me to do so. After all, I’d seen through his disguises on several previous occasions.

“Yes sir,” I said. “I’m sure.”

“Perhaps you need to be relieved as well, Blake. You look fatigued.”

We eyed one another unpleasantly for several seconds. Finally, I took a half-step toward him.

All around me, armed guards stiffened. That tipped me off: they were all Nomads, or under the influence of Nomads.

Godwin had brought help this time.

Nodding, I backed away and the nervous bodyguards relaxed a fraction.

The staffers in the room all seemed oblivious to these events. They were intent on their instruments. That caused me to believe in their authenticity, at least.

“We need to talk, Admiral,” I said.

“Talk, Blake. I’m standing right here.”

Setting my mouth in a tight line, I decided to use my sym. I attempted to reach out to him. By commandeering the computer networks surrounding us, I was able to make a call sym to sym.

For a time, he seemed to ignore my efforts, but at last he sighed and answered.

Our two minds conversed directly using words we formed in our minds and electronically transmitted through conventional networks.

I didn’t think Nomads had syms of their own—but they were sensitive to them. After all, if my theory as to their origins was correct, they were essentially big walking syms themselves.

“What is it, Blake?” Admiral Clemens said in my mind.

Correction: Godwin had spoken. With an effort, I was able to change his voice from that of Clemens into Godwin’s tones.

“There you are, Godwin,” I said. “This is Godwin, isn’t it? All you Nomads look alike to me.”

“Of course it’s Godwin. What do you want—besides the hollow thrill of informing me you’ve seen through my façade once again?”

“First off, I want to know what you’ve done with the real Clemens.”

He shrugged. “He’s fine. He’s resting in his compartment, unharmed.”

Using my sym again, I reached out to security forces, requesting that they check up on the Admiral.

Somehow, the Nomad was alerted to this move. He turned to me and glared.

“You’re making a mistake. I’m here to help. Don’t force me to become more direct in my methods.”

I hesitated for a long second. He’d placed me in a bad spot. I had to alert someone, didn’t I?

But then again, if the Nomad was offering to help us defeat Fex…

“What do you suggest?” I asked.

“Stop the call you put in. Then we’ll talk.”

Reluctantly, I did so. It felt like treachery.

“Good,” Godwin said. That single word echoed in my mind. “We’re here to help, as I said. Fex must be stopped.”

“But why?” I asked. “You gave him the technology he’s been using to run around wrecking my planet.”

Godwin glanced at me in surprise then he nodded thoughtfully.

“It is from us—but it wasn’t from me. He… he’s been in contact with other Nomads.”

“Hmm…” I said. “How did he pull that off?”

Godwin shrugged. “As you know, Nomad operatives have been working this region of space. Fex’s engineers are far more advanced than those who dwell on Earth. They were able to detect us and trap some of our agents.”

“Ah…” I said. “This is further evidence I was right about your people.”

Godwin looked at me sidelong. “What do you mean?” his sym said in my head.

I gave him a smug smile. “I’m talking about the bets your people love to place. Someone must have cheated. They gave Fex this technology to influence the outcome of a wager.”

Godwin turned away, looking troubled. “We don’t know that,” his sym whispered in my mind. “Maybe Fex stole it—it’s hard to say.”

I thought he was grasping at straws, but I decided not to antagonize him further. “I guess the details don’t matter. The fact is Fex knows how to make rifts in a new way. Something only your people were capable of previously.”

I was fishing again—and it worked.

“That’s right,” Godwin said. “But we hardly care about Fex himself. The key here is to make sure the Imperials don’t learn about this new tech of ours. If Fex runs around displaying it at every opportunity, it will only be a matter of time.”

“I see… Let me take a guess: you Nomads came up with these long rifts and high speed engines to attack the Imperials—am I right?”

“Yes, of course. We exist to damage them.”

It was an unusually honest statement. On top of that, it was understandable. As odious as Fex and the Nomads were, they were nothing next to the callous, genocidal Imperials. They thought nothing of dusting off a population numbering in the billions if they felt so inclined. I’d seen them do it on many occasions to other Rebel Kher worlds.

“All right then,” I said. “We finally have common ground. Neither of us wants the Imperials to become involved. How do you propose to proceed?”

The Clemens-Godwin creature eyed me. I think I’d surprised him with my willingness to deal.

“No violence?” he said aloud, using Clemens natural voice. “No threats?”

“None,” I said. “We could use your help, actually, if that’s your real intent.”

Clemens turned back to the displays. “All right. I’ll accept your desire as genuine. Recall when we met aboard Devilfish—I said I would be in touch. I said I would return to help.”

I nodded.

He took an object from his pocket and placed it on the railing between us. It looked like an ordinary data chip.

“What’s this?”

“It’s what you need right now to win this conflict. Please don’t fail us—I had to do a lot of arm-twisting back home to procure it.”

So saying, he stepped away from the displays and calmly walked toward the back of the War Room.

Three bodyguards moved to join him. A moment later, they were all gone.

Abrams was at my side when I turned back to the displays. He wore a suspicious, pinched-nose look on his face, like he smelled cat shit.

Who knew? Maybe he did.

“Where is our illustrious leader going now?” Abrams demanded.

I didn’t answer. Instead, I lifted the data chip between us. Abrams eyed it with flickering glances.

“This is very important,” I said. “This is a new technological breakthrough.”

“From Geneva?” he demanded. “Preposterous. They haven’t done anything of significance since they discovered antimatter in that linear accelerator they’re so proud of.”

I shook my head. “It’s not from Geneva.”

He narrowed his eyes to slits, but he wasn’t looking at me, he was looking at the chip curiously. I knew he was already interested. Soon, if I played it up as a big enough mystery, he’d be burning to dig into it.

“I’ve got better things to do than decrypt some cache of pornography for you, Blake,” he said in a scoffing voice.

Despite his bluster, he hadn’t taken his eyes from the data chip.

“Listen, Abrams,” I said. “I owe you a favor. You’ve done a lot of fine work around here. I don’t understand the alien chicken-tracks that fill this chip, but I think you might, just maybe, be smart enough to do so. But if you don’t feel up to the challenge, I—”

He snatched at the chip, and I let him pluck it from my fingers.

“Alien?” he asked. “Are you certain?”

“That’s confirmed. Don’t tell anyone where you got it—and be careful.”

His tongue snaked out, wet his thin lips then snapped out of sight again. It always made me want to shudder when he did that.

“Of course I’ll be careful. I’m not a fool, Blake. Why do you always take me for a fool?”

“I don’t know. Call it a character flaw, Doc.”

“One of many…” he said, and he whirled around to approach his team.

He held the data chip like it was a holy relic. I knew I’d put it into the right hands.

=28=

If there was one person on Earth who knew as much about the Nomads as I did, it was Dr. Abrams.

He was also a man possessed when new knowledge appeared. He hungered for it—he thirsted.

Lastly, he had an overactive desire for fame and adulation. The only kind of fame he was interested in, however, was validation of his own intellect.

This case was no different than a hundred others. He tore into the chip, plugging it into a reader he’d built himself. Fex made no further attacks for almost three days, and so he was afforded the time and the resources to dig deep.

At last he returned to Vega and me as we served out the end of another long shift in the War Room.

“I’ve figured it out!” he shouted as he approached us. “It’s a tracing system!”

We both looked at him over our shoulders, unimpressed.

Admiral Vega shrugged. “That’s nice, Doc.”

“No, no, no, no,” he said, rushing down into the pit to stand between us.

That was a tight squeeze, as Vega and I had been standing side-by-side about two feet apart. We’d been talking in low tones about what had happened to Admiral Clemens, who’d been discovered in a near-coma a few days back. Since then, the old man hadn’t returned to the War Room.

“What is it now, Abrams?” Vega demanded, stepping back to give the excited scientist some space.

Abrams held up a data chip, and I recognized it immediately.

“When you gave me this—” Abrams began.

I cleared my throat loudly. Vega was already glaring at both of us.

“Uh…” Abrams said, “I mean, when you first found this and gave it to me years ago, Captain Blake, I had no idea what it was.”

“Looks like a movie chip,” Vega complained. “Are you going to play a feely for us on our holo-displays, Abrams?”

“What…? No, no, no, this is nothing like that! This chip contains a detailed algorithmic diagram. I’ve built an application from these plans, and I wish to try it out. Will you share this journey with me? Do you want to witness the results of my grand experiment?”

He had a yellowy, half-mad gleam in his eye.

Vega just glared at him suspiciously, but I nodded encouragement.

“Sure, Doc,” I said. “Just show us how it works.”

He plugged the chip into the display console, and the screen began to flicker immediately.

“Ah-ha!” Vega said. “It is a feely! You old goat, Doc.”

Abrams tossed him an angry glance, but a moment later, as the display began to reboot itself, he started to smile again.

“Hey… is that thing updating our firmware?” Vega asked. “That’s not cool, Doc. You can’t do beta-testing in the War Room!”

“Relax. It’s just an app. A beautiful app… The aliens who wrote it—I kiss their hindquarters. They’re masters of design and efficient code.”

“Aliens?” Vega complained. “Stand down, Abrams! That could be a virus, you—”

But he trailed off. The display had settled now, and it showed our local space again.

“There,” Abrams said. His voice was an excited whisper. “See that reticle? It’s new. You must direct it with motions…”

He waved his hands over the consoles, and the reticle zoomed over space. It was bright green, and it looked like a circle with crosshairs in the middle.

“Are you going to blast something with that, Doc?” I asked.

Langston stepped up to the display beside us. She appeared alarmed and skeptical. “This is against every regulation in the book, sirs,” she said. “I’m going to have to inform Clemens.”

Vega nodded in agreement, but he put his hands up to ward her off. “Let him do it. We need some magic right now.”

Langston walked off in a huff to the far side of the central display.

Abrams now had the reticle over the whirling rift that still haunted Earth’s mid-orbital range. That rift had never closed, and never slept. It was like an all-seeing eye from an enemy star system, and we hated it.

We had ships stationed nearby, of course. A dozen or so of them. Most of our vessels were spread around Earth in case we were struck from another angle. So far, however, since I’d warned off Fex, he’d not returned.

The reticle lit up the rift as it passed over it and stopped. The crosshairs flickered, changing from green to red.

“There! You see? We have a lock! Now, Admiral, please press that activation button just below the rift on the display… Press it now, if you would…”

Hesitantly, Vega lifted his hand—but he didn’t reach toward the display and touch the virtual button. Instead, he stared at the rift uncertainly.

“Do you not see it, Admiral?” Abrams demanded. “Are you blind?”

Vega turned to him. “I’m not blind—and I’m not crazy, either. What is this thing going to do?”

“Suspicion?! Directed even toward myself? I’m embarrassed for you. Such paranoid delusions do you no favors—”

“What does it do, Abrams? Tell me, or I’ll yank out that chip, and this experiment of yours will be over.”

Abrams licked his lips.

“It… it locates the far end of any rift.” He said this as if it were the darkest secret any human had ever passed to another.

It took me a moment to realize why—but when I got it, I began to smile. I smiled almost as joyfully as Abrams did himself.

“I get it,” I said, and without asking permission, I reached out a long arm and touched the virtual button below the reticle.

The crosshairs flashed and throbbed—the app had been activated. Nothing else seemed to happen right away.

“What’s it doing?” Langston asked. She sounded as fascinated as the rest of us.

“Maybe it took a screenshot,” Vega joked.

“First paranoia, then ridicule?” Abrams complained. “You’re a caricature of the ignorance that plagues my existence, Admiral. If—”

“Shut up, Doc, or I’ll have you arrested for installing unsanctioned software,” Vega said in a half-interested tone. “Now, tell me what it’s doing.”

“To the best of my knowledge, it’s cataloging subtle measurements in the rift. That should tell us the coordinates of the far end of the rift—without having to travel through it.”

Seeing the possibilities, I leaned over the table, watching the reticle. Numbers had appeared, and they were ticking in random patterns.

“Three values?” I said. “Are those standard galactic coordinates?”

“Yes, yes. I did some touch-ups to the software to interpret the data in our most familiar format.”

“But you don’t know if it really works?” Langston asked skeptically.

“That’s why we’re testing it!” Abrams snapped at her.

“Hold on, hold on…” I told them, raising a cautionary hand. “We’ve got something coming in now… See that, the first number is steady now. It’s working on the second.”

“Yes!” Abrams said jubilantly. “They come in one at a time, like the combination to a locked safe.”

“More like a hacking program figuring out a password,” Vega said.

He was leaning forward too, watching the software work. The second number stopped fluctuating—then suddenly, the third locked as well.

“It’s done!” Abrams said, clapping his hands together to applaud himself.

“Where does it go?” Vega asked.

Langston worked her side of the computer then she looked up at us.

“If this is right, it doesn’t go to the Kwok star system. It goes to the planet of the Grefs.”

Thoughtfully, I nodded. “That makes some kind of sense. Kwok ships are crewed by Grefs. The Kwok themselves only accept the highest positions of command.”

Narrowing his eyes, Vega turned to look at me. “But… you would think they’d base their attacks from their home star system. After all, they must produce the ships there.”

“First you build it, then you crew it. After that, you throw it at the enemy. Makes sense to me the ships are coming from the Gref homeworld. Too bad though. It makes it harder to hit the enemy where it hurts.”

Vega stared at the screens thoughtfully.

“We don’t have the Kwok home system coordinates, do we?”

“No sir,” Langston answered. “Most Rebel Kher hide their tracks. We’ve only just gained the capacity to form rifts of our own, and we haven’t had much of a chance to trade star maps with any of our neighbors.”

“What we do know,” I said, “is the enemy home system is somewhere in the direction of the beacon star Wezen. It’s at least a thousand lightyears from here.”

“A thousand lights…” Vega mused. “That’s a lot of territory to explore. If they’ve got us zeroed, we can’t compete.”

“No sir. Not unless we use their rifts to double back on them.”

Vega waved a finger at me. “That’s the real reason they chose to attack us from the Gref home system, I’ll bet. They’re paranoid. If we counterpunch, we’ll be beating on their servants and not the masters themselves.”

I nodded, conceding he could be right.

“It would seem to me that we should do something to make Fex himself show up again,” Vega continued. “I’m putting you in charge of that project, Blake.”

“Excuse me, Admiral?”

“Just do something to piss off Fex so badly he makes an appearance again in his private ship. Then we’ll use Abrams’ bootleg software to locate the Kwok system, and bam! We’ll have our target.”

I wasn’t at all sure how I could pull off a trick of the magnitude he was suggesting, but I was willing to try.

“Consider it done, Admiral,” I told him in an utterly confident tone.

Vega walked away smiling. At least one of us was happy.

=29=

The Wezen system, otherwise known as Delta Canis Majoris, was a yellow supergiant. Like all outsized stars, it had a very strong gravitational field.

That’s why astronavigators cared about big stars like Wezen. The effects of their gravity could be felt even when traveling through hyperspatial rifts.

Navigation using rifts was far from an exact science. Often ships would “scatter” meaning they’d end up in a location other than the one they’d intended. To keep a fleet of ships together, one large ship would usually open a rift, and a group of supporting smaller vessels would use the “hole” through space-time to travel to another star system.

It didn’t always work the way it was intended to, however. Several major variables affected the outcome. First, the longer the jump, the more likely ships were to scatter. So, using a nearby beacon star as a guide helped to prevent this from happening.

Second, the odds of success were also improved if a given starship knew exactly where it was trying to go—not just guessing. Empirical data from past successful jumps was a big help.

Last were the effects of sheer chance. Long range jumps were never completely safe. Now and then a ship that attempted to cheat relativity and skip over hundreds of empty lightyears of mundane travel… simply failed to arrive at the destination. Such ships were rarely heard from again.

For these reasons, we were reluctant to send even one of Earth’s handful of starships into an unknown rift. They might never come back. It was a risk every time we did it.

“Admiral,” I said seriously after I’d pondered all my options. “I only know of one way we can get Fex to show his snout again.”

Vega gave me his full attention and raised his eyebrows expectantly.

“We can attack the Gref homeworld,” I told him.

He stared at me for a moment before turning away. He grunted unhappily. “I don’t like it.”

“Let’s game it out,” I suggested. “Let’s imagine we do manage to strike them successfully. Fex would be angry, and he’d come back here for revenge. He’s already shown himself twice, and he thinks that by using a distant random location he can avoid all our defenses. In short, he plans to show up and brag.”

“He won’t be bragging if we hit him.”

“Right, but knowing him, I believe he will come back to chew us out. Let’s assume his private ship does come here and arrives from the Kwok homeworld—well, all we have to do is use the app and track his star.”

“Then you’re suggesting we attack his home planet?”

“What else?” I demanded. “We’re not going to gain any respect from them by hunkering down here and playing turtle.”

“You make it all sound easy,” Vega said. “But it isn’t. What if there are a hundred ships waiting on the far side of that rift to the Gref homeworld? Our ship could be torn apart.”

I lifted a finger. “Not if they don’t see her.”

“You’re thinking of sending a phase-ship? But they’d have no rift-drive. If anything went wrong they wouldn’t be able to get home—and that’s only if they aren’t destroyed outright.”

“Granted, this isn’t a perfect solution. But the only other option is to sit here quietly, hiding and hoping Fex doesn’t hurt us too badly when he comes after us again. I guess we can keep playing the part of a mouse in a hole, but I’m getting tired of it.”

Vega looked troubled and frustrated. He placed his balled up fists on the display table and leaned forward on his knuckles.

“If Fex was going to leave us alone,” he said, “he wouldn’t have made that nasty speech and left the rift spinning over Earth. I think you’re right about that part: Fex intends to return and attack again.”

“It seems clear,” I said, looking at him expectantly.

He heaved a sigh. “If we send a phase-ship through, how will that gain Fex’s attention? I mean, big deal. One phase ship can’t do much.”

This was the bad part of the plan. The part I’d been avoiding.

Lowering my voice, I explained what had to be done. He was alarmed and violently opposed.

“No! No, Blake! We’re not genocidal maniacs!”

“Look,” I said. “It doesn’t have to be anything as serious as what they just did to Kochi. The phase ship gets in, makes a strike by dropping a torpedo on the planet at short range, and BOOM! It’s over. We’ve made our point.”

Vega looked sick, but I could tell I’d infected him with the idea. Just sitting around waiting for the enemy to get all their ducks in a row might be suicide.

“I think you’re right, Blake, God save us all,” he said. “We have to take the chance. We must regain the initiative—or barring that, Fex has to fear us at least a little.”

“I did my best to put the fear of the Imperials and the Nomads into him this last go-around, but he didn’t close the rift. We have to push.”

“I’ll take it to Clemens,” Vega told me. “The real Clemens, not that sock-puppet you like to talk to.”

He left me in charge of the quiet War Room while he presented our plan to Clemens. I worried about that, hoping Fex didn’t show up and cause trouble now.

I’d learned after long years of service that an officer owned whatever happened on his watch. If disaster struck again, it would be my fault in the minds of many. Proof of this tendency was right there in Vega’s last words. He’d called the Nomad who’d pretended to be Clemens “that sock-puppet you like to talk to.” Right there, he’d made an unfair association.

Sure, Godwin often appeared and talked to me privately. That bugged every member of the brass on Earth who knew about it. They couldn’t help but think I was partly to blame for the back-channel association I had going with the alien.

In the same way, I felt sure I was going to be blamed for anything that went wrong while I was standing my watch here in the War Room.

Three dull hours passed. Fortunately, nothing unexpected happened. When Vega finally returned, he had Clemens in tow.

The admiral’s appearance surprised me. He was bruised—badly. The left side of his scalp and jaw were purple and black.

“Are you all right, sir?” I asked him before I could stop myself.

“I’m fine, Blake,” Clemens growled. “No thanks to you and your shadowy friend.”

My jaws clenched, but I refrained from protesting. Again, he was blaming me for Godwin’s actions.

I had to wonder if that was by design. Was Godwin clever enough to be working against my reputation among Earth’s leadership? It was possible, and just the kind of underhanded manipulation I’d come to expect from that being.

“In any case, sir,” I said. “Has Admiral Vega had a chance to—”

“The answer is ‘no,’ Blake,” Clemens said, interrupting me.

“Uh… you mean he hasn’t had a chance to—”

“No, as in you’re not getting to command the phase-ship we’re sending.”

I blinked a few times before I caught on.

“Ah, perhaps there’s a misunderstanding, sir. I hadn’t volunteered for—”

“The answer is still no,” Clemens said, cutting me off. “The Joint Chiefs and I have approved of the mission, but no matter how much disruption you enjoy causing down here under this Mountain, we’re not going to risk your life in another suicide mission. I’m sorry.”

A struggle began to play out in my mind. Part of me wanted to protest, but the wiser half was screaming to stop discussing the issue. After all, I’d gotten what I’d wanted. Earth had adopted my suggestion. We were going to counterstrike at last.

And if Clemens thought I’d come up with the idea just to get myself out of the Mountain and back into space, so what? Let him think what he wanted to.

Within the span of two eye-blinks, I made my choice. I forced a smile.

“Very good, sir,” I said, and I stepped backward a pace.

Clemens cocked his white-frosted, bruised head to the right and looked at me with great suspicion.

“You like that decision, eh? You don’t want to run off into space? You’re not bored with computers and protocol?”

“Boredom?” I questioned, smiling broadly now and making a sweeping gesture that took in the entire War Room. “This is the center of the action now, Admiral. Quite literally. This place is planet Earth’s bridge. There’s nowhere I’d rather serve.”

Clemens studied me for several seconds. Finally, he turned back toward Vega.

“I’ve changed my mind. I can’t stand this insufferable officer on my deck another hour. I thought I could—but I can’t.”

“Um…” Vega said, looking surprised. “What are your orders, sir?”

“Put him on that phase-ship. What was the name of it? The oldest one in the fleet?”

“Hammerhead, sir,” Vega said in a heavy tone. “The name of our most outdated ship is Hammerhead.”

=30=

Less than twenty four hours later, I was back in space. Just like that, I was serving on the front lines again.

The weird thing was that Hammerhead wasn’t really my ship anymore. She had been given to Miller, my old XO.

Technically, Miller still held the naval rank of commander. As I held the rank of captain, I outranked him. Showing up on his ship to assume command—that was a real slap in his face.

“Couldn’t talk them out of it, huh?” Miller asked me in a sarcastic tone.

“Nope,” I said. “Admiral Clemens himself said he couldn’t bear to watch me puttering around the War Room one more day.”

Miller’s arms were crossed, and he looked pissed. He held that expression for several more long seconds, but he finally laughed.

“All right, sir,” he said. “I guess it’s good to serve with you again—even if you are stealing my ship from me. Have you got a good reason for that, sir? Besides Clemens’ banged-up skull, I mean?”

“You heard about that, did you?”

“Word travels fast. Did your alien-friend—that prick Godwin—did he do that to Clemens?”

“In a way, he did. I guess when one of the Nomads zap a man’s brain, it causes him to pass out. Well, in Clemens’ case, he did a facer into a rock wall.”

Miller winced. “I get the picture. And he blames you for that?”

“Sort of,” I admitted.

Miller uncrossed his arms and released a long sigh. “I guess I can stop being angry with you over this. I mean, after all, you’re just coming along most likely to die a quick, hopeless death anyway. I guess the more in on this party, the better.”

Miller had always been a shade bitter under the surface. He was a good officer, but he tended to take things in a bad light. That was partly why he’d been held back from advancement.

Fortunately for him, he’d gained enough experience serving at my side that they’d been just about forced to promote him.

“Look,” I said. “This is your ship. I’m here as visiting brass. If we get into some kind of strategic gray area, they wanted a flag officer on the spot. After all, we’re on a mission to a star system no human has ever seen before. Maybe the Grefs will want to change allegiance. Maybe—”

“Fat chance,” Miller interrupted. “Those apes are as mean as they are dumb.”

He was right, so I didn’t argue the point. “In any case, since it was my idea, and it’s such a high profile strike, they wanted someone from Space Command on your decks. As I said, I’m not going to be shouting orders at your crew.”

He nodded, rubbing at his neck. “So… you won’t be haunting my bridge all day long second-guessing and backseat driving all the way to the target?”

I grinned. “I didn’t say that.”

“All right. When do we sail?”

“Immediately—oh, and there’s one other key reason I’m here, Miller.”

“What’s that, sir?”

“To choose the target city.”

He eyed me in surprise. “Oh… I hadn’t thought about that… Not a job I was looking forward to.”

“I didn’t think so. That task will fall to me. You can thank me later when we see the civvies die by the millions.”

That part of my mission had shifted under my feet. I’d proposed going to the Gref planet to drop a frightening attack on the enemy—but my orders had changed. It had morphed into a retaliatory strike.

A real bomb, dropped on a real city. I wasn’t looking forward to it.

Miller studied the deck. “A grim thing we’re doing… Did you see the size of that bomb?”

“I could hardly miss it,” I said. “It took up your entire hold.”

“We don’t have room aboard for even a month’s worth of rations due to that monster. We had to trim our O2 tanks as well. That bomb—it must weigh ten metric tons.”

“Sixteen, to be precise,” said another voice.

We both turned to see Dr. Abrams approaching. They’d added him to the roster right after my name had been thrown into the hat.

He didn’t look happy to be going into space. He was, however, insufferably proud of his gigantic bomb.

“That thing didn’t get built in a day, did it, Doc?” I asked.

“Don’t be absurd, Blake. It took six months. We’ve been working on planet-buster ordnance for years, of course, and this unit is our latest effort.”

Leaving Miller to serve on his bridge, I walked down to the lower deck. Abrams followed me.

Once I reached the hold, I stared through a porthole that afforded a view of the depressurized hold. The glass was frosted over with condensation, so I rubbed away some of the rime with the sleeve of my spacer suit.

The bomb was ugly. It hulked in there, sitting on a sled-like palette.

Big, black and covered with reflective tarps, it squatted in the hold. The shape and size of it reminded me of one of those giant stone heads that had been carved and left all over Easter Island. Under the tarps, I saw gleaming readouts: red digits, green and yellow meters—it wasn’t a simple thing.

Abrams came near and peered with me.

“Such a work of art,” he said in a hushed tone. “Part fusion, part antimatter—it’s one of my better achievements.”

“You really think so, Doc? It’s made to kill millions of beings.”

Abrams looked at me as if startled. “Millions? Well, yes… I suppose if the Grefs have a low population density, the yield could be that low…”

Frowning and squinting my eyes as if to prevent the image of something I loathed from penetrating, I turned toward him slowly.

“Millions of deaths would be on the low side?” I asked.

He shrugged. “It’s hard to say. The people who live in the blast radius will all be vaporized. With an area so large—well, it’s a simple matter of mathematics…”

For the first time, a chill went through me. What had I recommended to the Joint Chiefs? What kind of new stage in this interstellar war had I pushed for?

“Um… Doc, you mentioned an area. How big of an area are we talking about?”

“That’s classified, Blake,” he answered primly.

“Yeah, well, I’m the one who’s supposed to select the target, remember? How can I do that if I don’t know the yield of the weapon?”

Abrams sucked in a breath and released it quickly. “It was foolish of the military types to allow you such discretion. The very idea is silly.”

“Let’s deal with reality for a moment, huh? The task is mine, so I need to know what this monstrosity can do. Brief me.”

“Very well… The device will ignite a circular region encompassing approximately one hundred thousand square kilometers. That’s assuming a surface strike—which is sub-optimal, by the way.”

My jaw sagged. “One hundred thousand…?”

“Naturally, that won’t be the entire extent of the damage. Fallout will be minimal, as this weapon is designed to maximize destructive impact and heat, rather than radiation byproducts. However, the atmosphere, oceans, and even the crust of the planet itself will all be disrupted. We can assume that all life within a region twice the size of the initial crater will be destroyed.”

“Two hundred thousand square kilometers?”

“Roughly. I’ll do my best to achieve that goal—but don’t hold me to it.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it, Doc,” I said, feeling sick inside.

He kept on talking, giving me numbers and estimates—but I didn’t care, and I didn’t bother to listen.

My eyes had slid back to the hulking thing that slept under a tarp a few meters away.

It was a work of devils. A monstrosity. A sin against life itself.

Then I thought of the Grefs. Sure, they were assholes, but they were creatures who had been dominated and abused by the Kwok—a much smarter band of apes led by Fex.

Was it right to strike at the mere servants of our enemy? To hit them this hard, out of the blue?

The deck under my feet seemed to sink away from me, and I tasted bile in my throat.

Was this the way wars were supposed to go? Escalating, mushrooming, caroming out of control?

I suspected that they’d often done so in the past.

=31=

It took less than a day to travel to the rift, which still spun and looked exactly like it did the moment it had appeared.

We were full of theories as to how the rift had been maintained for so long without getting ragged and dissipating—but of course, no one really knew the answer. Only Abrams even bothered to pretend that he could comprehend the theory-breaking technology.

“It’s child’s play, really,” he told me while I chewed a dish of freshly fried eggs.

It was nice to be on a ship supplied for a short flight time. We had fresh food, and plenty of it. Everyone knew we were going to meet our fates quickly, one way or the other.

“Child’s play,” he repeated firmly.

“I’m sure it is, Doc,” I said, barely listening or caring.

“A long term rift is very simple to achieve. Really, it’s a matter of a single tweak. The second law of thermodynamics has to be suspended, that’s all.”

That made me look up from my eggs. I don’t know why I did it, but I stared at him seriously.

“Entropy?” I asked. “You’re saying they somehow managed to suspend entropy? And you call that child’s play?”

Abrams smiled back at me and blinked twice, rapidly.

“Why… Captain Blake! You astonish me! I would’ve thought you’d forgotten the basics. You’ve shown no aptitude in the past… but yes, yes. That’s what I’m talking about. A suspension of entropy.”

“But how, Doc? How are they doing it? Just saying it’s happening isn’t enough to call it child’s play.”

Abrams blew his cheeks out, looking like an angry hamster for a moment. “I didn’t say I had it all figured out. It’s just clear that—”

“That you have no idea how they’re doing it, either. I could have told you they’re breaking the laws of physics as we know them. I could have told you they’d slowed down the passage of natural decay, too. What we need to know is how they’re doing it.”

Abrams sputtered for a moment, and I went back to my eggs. They needed more salt, so I added it.

“Hmm…” he said a few moments later. “Slowed down… Yes, it could work that way.”

“What now, Doc?”

“As you suggested, an alteration in the natural flow of time. Relativity and time are interrelated, you know. The faster an object travels, the slower time moves for that object… If these aliens could somehow have used gravitational dilation, or some other relativistic effect, to alter the passage of time…”

He was honestly intriguing me now. Sure, he was about the most annoying human I’d ever met, but he was a genius of sorts.

“Time travel?” I asked, finishing my eggs. “Are you talking about time travel?”

He made a piffing sound. “Hardly. I’m just talking about the slowing down or speeding up of time. Velocity of an object and gravitational influences both alter the rate of time passing. Two clocks will run at different speeds, for instance, if one is sitting on the ground and another is orbiting the Earth. Such theories were proven long ago. In 2010, for example, a British experiment—”

I held up my hand to stop him. “Okay, Doc,” I said. “I’ll take your word for it. What you’re saying is that someone has managed to stop time at the rift, making it last forever?”

He shrugged. “Forever is a very long time, Blake. Perhaps it will last fifty days, or fifty years. But it won’t last forever.”

“All right… thanks for the tidbit.”

Abrams made a rude snort as I got up to take my bowl back to the kitchens. I glanced at him wonderingly.

“What’s funny?”

“I’m just trying to imagine how you might find my ‘tidbit,’ as you put it, useful…”

“Well, I might meet Godwin again. I’ll ask him if that’s the way he pulled it off.”

Abrams almost panicked. He jumped up and followed me to the recycling center. I put my bowl into the intake duct, which greedily sucked it up and began mulching the dish. It would turn the cellulose into something else.

“You can’t do that, Blake!” Abrams insisted.

“Why not?”

“Because my musings are classified! They are all classified. Every thought, every—”

I clapped him on the shoulder, making him stagger a little. “You worry too much, Doc. Chances are we’ll be dead before I ever run into Godwin again.”

“It’s always like this when I talk to you. One disturbing thought chains into the next. I’m upset forever afterward.”

“Yeah? That’s too bad. Maybe you shouldn’t talk so much around me in the future.”

I left him fretting and pondering my statements. He’d forgotten to eat breakfast, as he’d spent all his time yapping at me. As I exited, I saw him talking to himself in the line at the food dispenser.

Reaching the bridge, I forgot about Abrams and everything else. The rift was in clear sight now. We could see it with our naked eyes.

Hammerhead was a very dated ship—in fact, some of her alien components were centuries old—but despite her great age, she was good at dampening inertial effects. Even though we were slowing down with around two gravities of force, you could hardly feel the deck shift under your feet.

The ship was decelerating heavily, and I decided to break one of my cardinal rules: I asked Miller what the hell he was doing.

“Full braking, huh?” I asked Miller.

“You don’t approve?”

“I wouldn’t say that. I’m just gaming out the possible results in my mind.”

“And… you’d like to speed up? What if we slam into a defensive force on the far side?”

I shrugged. “Does that matter? Look, we’re in a phase-ship, and we’re phasing now, essentially invisible. If that works as we exit into the Gref system, it’s all love and biscuits. But… if this is a trap, wouldn’t it be better to have some velocity built up? I’d rather blow right past their defenses than crawl through.”

Miller frowned, thinking that over. After a few minutes, he told his helmsman to cut the braking. The ship coasted after that, and we closed in on the rift faster than the crew had anticipated.

All over the ship, klaxons sounded. Crewmen prepared for the coming transition, when we would exit our flavor of space and hurtle into parts unknown.

Miller sat in his command chair, watching and worrying. I knew exactly how he felt having commanded a ship through such insanity many times.

“Have you decided on a target yet, sir?” he asked me. “For your bomb, I mean.”

“So it’s my bomb, is it? My alien, my bomb… I seem to get credit for the worst things imaginable. But to answer your question: no. How can I select a target on a world I’ve yet to lay eyes on?”

As we talked, the rift grew noticeably. It was a big one, I could tell. Easily the largest I’d ever seen. It really was a breakthrough in FTL technology.

“I’m talking about a classification of target,” Miller explained. “City? Industrial region? Empty wilderness, just to give a warning? Or… something worse?”

I looked at him with interest. On our displays, the rift was filling every inch of our perspective now. We were right on top of it, but we hadn’t yet taken the plunge.

“What could be worse than hitting one of their cities?” I demanded, knowing I shouldn’t even ask the question.

“Hasn’t Abrams briefed you on the destructive power of his creation?”

“Yes.”

“Well… what if that kind of force were applied to their deepest ocean? Or one of their poles, perhaps?”

I blinked at him, thinking about it. These ideas were diabolical, and I was glad they hadn’t even occurred to me.

Blasting off their poles and releasing trillions of gallons of ice as steam…? Possibly, such a strike would eject matter into orbit. Or boil their oceans…

Striking their deepest bodies of water might be even worse. I imagined massive tidal waves sweeping a panicked globe, consuming every coastal region, swamping the land all the way to the highest mountains.

That kind of destruction could be total. An extinction event.

I opened my mouth to reply to Miller, but I never got out the words.

We’d hit the rift, and we vanished into it like a minnow darting into the yawning jaws of a shark.

=32=

Once riding through hyperspace, we dared to breathe—but that sensation of relief was short-lived.

“I’m picking up unusual readings, sir,” the sys op told Miller.

He asked for details, and she gave him the numbers, but none of it stuck in my head. I got the impression that we were passing close to a beacon star—but which one? Wezen? It was impossible to be sure.

“Sir…?” the sys op called in an alarmed voice moments later. “We’re going to breach!”

“Already?” Miller asked in concern. “I thought this jump would be a long one.”

“Less than a minute to go now—that’s confirmed, Captain.”

Miller was booming orders again, and alarms rang all over the small ship. I unfolded a jump-seat in the back and tried not to second-guess his captaincy.

He was doing pretty well, all things considered. He seemed to be a more methodical, less intuitive captain than I tended to be. But maybe, considering the ultimate nature of our mission, that would prove to be a good thing in the end.

The ride through hyperspace was alarmingly short. We went in and came flying out again less than ten minutes later. We plunged through the far end of the hyperspatial tube and back into normal space. Another rift, twin to the first, sprang up in our wake. I studied it, and I thought to see a glimpse of our yellow sun in that periscopic view.

“We’ve arrived, sir,” the navigator said.

“What’s on our scopes?” Miller demanded.

“Nothing yet, sir. We’re still phasing and reading passive data only.”

One problem with phase ships was their relative blindness to their surroundings. To other vessels, we were virtually invisible, but that effect worked to a lesser degree in the opposite manner. Like a car with heavily-tinted windows, no one could see us inside, but our vision was likewise dimmed while looking out.

Using active sensors was out of the question, of course. If we pinged away at our surroundings, we’d give ourselves away as a source of radiation. Therefore, we didn’t dare use radar or lidar while phasing.

We waited tensely for passive data to trickle in. Using gravimeters and other forms of quiet listening systems, our new surroundings were inferred by computers and displayed.

It soon became evident that we were in a binary star system. There were two suns, both red dwarfs. Neither was very hot or large, but together, they put out a radiance comparable to our own single home star.

But what we were really interested in was the smaller stuff. Planets came in next, and the count kept rising.

“Can this be right?” Miller questioned. “Thirty-one planets?”

“The system is still updating, sir. We’re looking at more now… Thirty-three to be exact.”

A few minutes later the count hit thirty-six and froze there.

The thrill of discovery hit my gut then. I’d never seen a star system with thirty-six planets before. I’d always enjoyed visiting an unknown inhabited system. It felt like I’d made a monumental discovery every time.

Too bad we’re here to blow it all up.

That thought came unbidden to my mind. It was a painful one, and it prompted me to stop daydreaming and sightseeing. We had a mission to perform.

“Looks like they missed us,” I said.

Miller glanced my way and nodded. “They could have set up mines—but they didn’t. A stupid oversight on their part.”

I thought about the mental capacities of your average Gref. They weren’t the brightest.

“Ships sir, I’m getting ships now.”

“Where?” Miller demanded.

We all squinted at the primary display. Slowly, it filled in with yellow clusters of pixels. Small contacts of unknown origin became increasingly definite. By their size and movement, they were clearly ships.

More importantly, however, the enemy ships were all in a cluster behind us.

“They’re swarming the rift,” the sen-op said. “We’ve already left them in our wake. Should we change course, Captain?”

“Absolutely not,” Miller said. “We coasted right past them, and we’re going to keep going until they’re far behind—as long as we aren’t going to slam into one of those planets.”

“That’s not happening, sir,” she said. “We’re heading into what looks like open space.”

“A stroke of luck, then,” Miller said.

It wasn’t that big of a break, I knew. Space was about a million parts empty nothing and one part scattered debris. Even with the Gref ships massed at the rift, unless they actually stood right at the event horizon in formation, the odds were great that we’d slip by.

Now that we were past them, I’d have spun around and performed a careful passive scan to size up the competition. Even a count of ships could be useful to Earth, should we be so lucky as to return home again.

But Miller wasn’t that kind of a captain. I couldn’t fault him, of course. His way was more dedicated to the primary mission and less opportunistic than mine, that’s all. It wasn’t wrong—only different.

I sat still and observed, saying nothing.

“Scan for emissions,” Miller ordered. “Home in with gentle use of the steering jets when you’ve got something.”

After a half-hour, three worlds out of thirty-six showed signs of life. One, however, was obviously their homeworld. The signals rolled up from there in gushes and waves.

“Can we tune that in?” I asked. “Decipher it?”

The sensor op was a young ensign named Costa. She looked to Miller, who gave her the nod. She went to work and it wasn’t long before she locked into a broadcast and managed to interpret it.

“It’s an old-style broadcast, visual and audio only. It’s digital, unencrypted.”

“Can you display it?”

“Should be able to… Our computers are familiar with most popular Rebel Kher formats.”

After a bit of fiddling, she managed to get the central display to flicker into life.

The image strobed and shimmered, but it was clear enough.

We saw two Grefs. The crew watched them curiously. They were ape-like, with long arms, squat hairy bodies and low brows. They lifted their lips to show their teeth when they spoke, reminding me of our own cousins back on Earth.

We couldn’t understand the language, as they spoke in their own tongue, but every syllable was loud and repetitive in nature.

One Gref, the larger of the two, was admonishing the smaller one. That took the form of slaps and shouts.

The smaller pouted until the larger turned his back.

At that moment, the youth—I calculated that the smaller Gref was younger—quickly snatched up the family pet by the tail.

This pet, which the camera focused on, spread claws and its eyes bulged, but before it could cry out it was cast through a window and vanished.

Spinning with all four limbs spread wide, the pet flew a long distance. The camera followed it to the distant ground.

Apparently, the animal was a tough one, as it managed to get back to its feet and stagger away.

At that point, a massive amount of grunting and squealing began off-stage. I was pretty sure the Gref audience was laughing their asses off.

Slowly, Miller turned to face me. “It’s a comedy,” he said.

“Uh… yes, that’s what it appears to be.”

Miller turned back toward the screen again. The larger Gref—perhaps a parent—was now looking for the missing pet with increasing urgency. The youth watched innocently. This again set off the audience into gales of odd, grunting laughter.

“They aren’t too sophisticated, these folks,” Miller said.

“No, they never have been.”

Miller stood up and came to stand next to me. “Targeting data is flowing into our computers now, sir. The Grefs are doing nothing to shield it. They have no idea we’re here. Would you like to step into my office and discuss this?”

I nodded after a while. The bridge crew continued watching the comedy. Occasionally, they snorted in amusement or groaned and rolled their eyes. The gags were often bizarre, sometimes cruel—but always simplistic.

When we got to Miller’s office, which was located almost adjacent to the bridge itself, Miller confronted me.

“Are we honestly going to slaughter these morons?” he asked. “They seem to have the minds of children.”

“Does that change what they did to Earth?” I asked him. “What they did to Kochi?”

Miller frowned and shook his head. “No, I guess not. They’re dangerous. Maybe more so, due to their lack of sophistication. It’s like having a baboon troop armed with nuclear weapons. You can’t trust them.”

“We can trust them, unfortunately. They’ll do what the Kwok tell them to do.”

Miller chewed on that for a time. “Why?” he asked at last.

“Why what?”

“Why are they ruled by Fex and his gang?”

I shrugged. “Simple dominance, I suppose. At some point, the Kwok must have come here and overawed them. Now they follow their masters, knowing the Kwok are smarter and meaner than any Gref can hope to be.”

“I see…” Miller said thoughtfully. He looked troubled and studied the deck.

Something about his glum mood triggered a devious thought in my mind. Feeling the tug of a smile, I let it spread over my lips.

Miller noticed this change in my demeanor with alarm. “What are you thinking about, sir?” he asked.

“I think—yes, I’m sure of it. I’ve got an idea growing in my head, Captain Miller. You might even call it a scheme.”

Miller studied me in silence for perhaps three long seconds. “I’m not going to like this one, am I?”

“You rarely like my ideas,” I admitted. “This time probably won’t be any different.”

=33=

It took us two long days to reach what appeared to be the Gref homeworld. Miller had always been a cautious captain, so he took his time. A phase-ship was much more noticeable when it fired thrusters, so we kept such activity to a minimum.

Gliding most of the way, coasting through space, we only made tiny course corrections when needed. Our path was serpentine, weaving among the many worlds and using their gravitational fields to help us reach our intended destination.

Even so, some longer burns were required to reduce speed and get onto the right course. We did those maneuvers while we were far out in deep space. We only unleashed the full power of our engines when we were far from sensors and probes.

At last, we slipped into high orbit over the target planet. At that point, Miller, Abrams and I had a meeting.

“We need to come out of phase for at least thirty seconds,” I told them, “in order for me to do the final targeting.”

“That’s suicide, Blake, and you know it,” Abrams snapped. “Finally, the truth comes out. Your career isn’t an epic story of courage—it’s a tragic tale of self-loathing. You have a death-wish. Admit it.”

I ignored Abrams and looked at Miller. “We can risk thirty seconds,” I said. “Can you do it in that much time?”

Miller shrugged. He looked defeated.

“I can, of course. I’m just not sure how long we’ll last after we show ourselves.”

“Ah, come on,” I told him. “What are the Grefs going to do? You’ve watched their TV shows. They aren’t a pack of geniuses.”

Abrams chose that moment to jump back into the conversation. “They’ll react the way any pack of feral beasts would when threatened,” he insisted. “You forget, Blake, I’ve met these creatures. They are savage. They will not hesitate to attack. They aren’t very bright, this is true—but then neither is a swarm of killer bees.”

Miller glanced at Abrams, then me. “He’s right. They’ll attack the moment we appear. Can you select a target and release the bomb in a thirty second slice of time?”

“I can,” I said firmly. “The trouble is I can’t be sure the bomb will get all the way to the target I’ve selected fast enough.”

“What do you mean?” Abrams demanded.

“Just what I said. What if the target is on our stern—behind us on our orbital path? You can’t whip the wheel around and change directions instantly in space. We’d have to wait until we completed another orbit before dropping the device.”

Abrams’ let his eyes bulge more than usual. “What!?” he demanded, slamming a skinny fist down on the table. “What you describe is highly dangerous, and I think you know this. We’re on a suicide mission.”

“I’m not sure I know what you’re talking about, Doc,” I said in an amused tone.

But underneath, I wasn’t amused. He was catching onto my plan.

“I think that you do,” Abrams said primly. “How likely is it that no major cities will be within striking range when we come out of phase? Hmm? Hmmm? Oh yes, that’s what I thought. I can see the guilt in your yellow eyes, Blake.”

Miller was frowning now, looking from one of us to the other and back again in confusion.

“I’m missing something here,” he said.

Abrams turned on him with visible impatience. “Try to think, Captain Miller. Cities are scattered all over Earth. On every Kher world we’ve visited that same pattern has been proven to be the case. Therefore, no matter where we phase back in, we should find a target city nearby. We could even home in on those mindless broadcasts of theirs.”

“Okay…” Miller said. “So you think we’re likely to have a close city when we phase back in. What’s wrong with that?”

“Nothing, if you plan to target a city,” Abrams complained.

Miller still looked baffled. Abrams made a scoffing sound and rolled his eyes.

“Look,” he said in exasperation. “Blake is worried about not having a target in easy reach. That can only mean he’s not planning to target a city at all!”

Miller got it at last. He nodded and turned toward me.

“Is the Doc’s vast extrapolation anything close to the truth, sir?” he asked me.

I was caught off-guard. I hadn’t really expected Abrams to divine the nature of my plan so quickly. He’d done so by conjecturing wildly—and accurately—upon a very small set of hints.

To me, this was all one more excellent reason not to go into space with an ornery genius.

“I haven’t decided on a target yet,” I said, dodging the question. “How can I do so without ever having seen the world in question?”

Abrams threw his long-fingered hands high in the air and stood up quickly.

“I can’t stand any more of this,” he announced. “You will find me in my lab on the lower deck, gentlemen, should you require my further assistance.”

“What a drama queen,” Miller commented after he’d left. “How can you stand that man, Blake?”

“Sometimes it isn’t easy. But without him, remember, we wouldn’t have a mega weapon at all. We wouldn’t have any starships of our own, either. Irritation is a small price to pay for such large technological gains.”

“Yeah… I guess,” Miller commented in an unconvinced tone. “Do you mind telling me what our target is actually going to be, sir?”

“I’ll know it when I see it. Let’s go up to the bridge—it’s time.”

Miller took the command chair again, although it felt like it should be mine. We’d finally come to the part of the mission where my input was critical.

“Captain Miller?” I asked politely. “Do you mind if I step in for this final stage of the mission?”

“Be my guest, sir.”

Turning to his quiet, wide-eyed crew, I gave them a nod.

“This is it, people,” I said. “This is why we’re here. Earth is depending on us, and I’m depending on you. Don’t screw this up.”

“Yes, sir,” the group murmured.

Turning toward the sensor op, I gave her a nod. “What have we got? Anyone tracking us?”

Ensign Costa was young—too young for the job, if you asked me, but I hadn’t selected her.

“We’ve got no one stalking us, Captain Blake,” she said with confidence. “It seems like the Grefs are oblivious.”

That made what I was about to do harder, as far as I was concerned. The Grefs were an unpleasant people, but I was having a hard time with the idea of obliterating millions of them.

“Prepare to phase-in,” I ordered.

“All systems ready, sir. We’ll return to normal space on your command.”

“Abrams?” Miller called out. “Is that planet-buster of yours ready?”

“It’s in a perfect state of readiness, Captain,” Abrams replied crisply.

About thirty seconds went by, during which I appeared to do nothing. In reality, I was using my sym to hook up to every computer I could access aboard this tiny ship. Fortunately, many of Hammerhead’s subsystems still remembered me.

The bridge crew began tossing questioning glances in my direction, but I ignored them.

“Sensors?” I asked finally. “Ready for phase-in?”

“Ready to ping, sir,” the young ensign answered.

“No, don’t. Stay passive, do not go active. And turn off all your security login screens. Let me tap into all your arrays directly.”

Ensign Costa was uncertain, and she looked to Miller for guidance with wide eyes.

He nodded to her, and she turned back to her boards. With a shrug, she opened her sensor array to local network traffic.

My sym reached deeper and made contact instantly. I closed my eyes and dug into warm streams of data.

Those streams were incomplete at the moment as we were still phasing, but I was now hooked up and ready to go the instant we returned to normal space.

“Open the bomb bay doors,” I ordered.

I heard the whine of distant hydraulics. The sound was transmitted through the ship’s metal frame.

“Bay doors open, sir,” the weapons officer said. “All status metrics are green. The package is a go.”

Turning toward Miller, I caught his eye. “Ready, Captain?”

He nodded seriously.

“Helm…” I said. “Phase-in.”

=34=

We were all tense, having no idea what we’d face when we phased into normal space. I wasn’t even a hundred percent sure we were orbiting the Gref homeworld.

We could tell, of course, that we were above a large gravity-well that was comparable in size to Earth. Local transmissions were strong enough to penetrate into the hyperspace shell we traveled within. Their content appeared to be local entertainment broadcasts. We also were able to intercept communications from nearby vessels. The evidence indicated there was plenty of local shipping in orbit around us.

Still, I wouldn’t have put it entirely beyond the capacities of the Gref race to do things oddly. Perhaps they were inadvertently fooling us about the location of their home planet—who knew?

With great trepidation, we phased quietly into existence above the troposphere of a world we’d yet to lay eyes on.

The tactical situation was entirely unprecedented for a phase-ship. Ships like Hammerhead had several key limitations and traditional uses, and we were ignoring them all today.

Normally, the operation of phase-ships was simple and direct: they were built to hunt and cheaply destroy starships. Since phase-ships were small and relatively easy to produce, they were used by the Imperials and Earth to sneak up on targeted shipping and destroy targets with a sudden, brutal attack.

This was possible due to one key factor: ships of all varieties only had so much power to go around. No ship ever had all the power she needed. It was all a matter of trade-offs.

For example, all ships had engines, and the faster you wanted to go the more power those engines consumed. Ships also used power to fire weapons, maintain shields, and generate rifts to other star systems. This last purpose took the most power of all, and was beyond the capacity of the smallest vessels.

Phase-ships like Hammerhead had a final use for their power: phasing in and out of the known universe.

The usual tactics for any phase-ship was to stalk an unsuspecting vessel with her shields and weapons deactivated. After getting as close as possible to her victim, the phase-ship was built to make a surprise strike. Shields cost a lot of power, which could be diverted to the engines in quiet moments. Ships that didn’t expect to be attacked normally flew with their shields down because that let them go faster.

Lowered shields gave the relatively weak phase-ships their opportunity. Coming out of phase and striking hard with a single large blast—that was the phase-ship’s game. A sneak-attack that was often fatal.

What made Hammerhead’s situation unusual today was the fact we weren’t stalking anyone. Today she wasn’t playing the part of a predator ambushing prey—she was a stealth bomber instead.

Data began streaming onto the main displays, and the crew stared at it, doing their best to analyze what they were picking up—but I didn’t have time for any of that.

At any moment, a Gref cruiser might zero us. Even if we were spotted by nothing more than a patrolling fighter squadron, we couldn’t hope to survive the conflict that was sure to follow. Phase-ships were built to attack by surprise from stealth then slip away before the enemy could react.

Anything else was suicide.

Instead of staring at the screens, I closed my eyes and reached out with my sym. I took in the data streams directly, and I let the artificial life form in my body do the processing. In my mind’s eye, I saw something like a three-dimensional puzzle coming together from countless colorful fragments.

Many of these fragments were blurred out, as if purposefully turned into blobs to protect the identity of the ships and worlds being analyzed.

“We’re being scanned, sir,” a nervous voice piped up from the tactical team.

Keeping my eyes closed, I slowly turned in a circle. Sometimes, that helped me get my bearings faster.

There! I’d spotted the source of the scan. A ship was coming down to greet us from high orbit. So far, it looked like it wasn’t attacking. Perhaps we resembled a small passenger yacht out for a run without a registered flight record—or, since this was a Gref world, maybe we looked like smugglers seeking a place to land.

“There’s a light cruiser coming,” I said. “She’s on our six.”

“How could you possibly—?” Ensign Costa began.

I didn’t have time to explain. In reply, I grabbed and tossed what I was seeing in my mind with a physical motion.

The others gasped as the light cruiser appeared on the main display, overwriting the navigational data they’d been showing there. The ship was clearly depicted in full three-D glory.

Miller began shouting about evasive action, and I felt the deck heave under me. I had to throw out a hand to catch a grab-strap and hang on—but I didn’t open my eyes.

Instead, I cast downward. I reached for the distant surface of this strange new world.

In my mind I saw a mountain range first, then a forest, a large sprawling city—and last, an ocean.

Behind us, the mountain range was rolling away fast. It was almost on the horizon already. The city loomed ahead just as quickly. In a moment, it would be directly below us.

Snatching the coordinates I wanted with two plucking fingers, I threw them toward Abrams and his crew. For a moment, I saw his surprised face.

“Are you sure of this target, Blake?” he asked.

“Drop your bomb, Abrams. Now!”

“As you wish,” he said, and he loaded the coordinates into that unholy monster he’d created.

The phase-ship bucked when we released the bomb. We surged upward, like a balloon relieved of a great weight.

I knew the effect was primarily an illusion. The bomb was a smart weapon—a suicidal drone, essentially. It had fired its own retro engines, and the kick had impacted our tiny ship. The hold where we’d carried this poison egg was now empty, full of nothing but back-blasted flame and clamps that yawned wide.

The hold doors hummed closed, and I turned to order us to phase-out again.

Miller beat me to it. “Phase-out! Phase-out now!”

The ship’s lights dimmed. My eyes were open again, and I took in the expressions on the faces of the crew.

They were ashen, bloodless. I followed their eyes and looked toward the central display.

There, I saw the light cruiser. The connection I’d made between our sensors and the display was still active.

The enemy ship was bearing down on us. They were no longer sniffing curiously, they were lunging for the kill.

Bright red flares were lighting up rhythmically, about every half-second, all over the forward section of the cruiser. As I watched, her aft modules lit up too, firing more missiles.

They were unloading on us.

Then the image faded away to nothing. We were phasing, slipping away into partial nonexistence.

We were now impossible to detect unless the enemy got very close—but we weren’t safe. If energy or shrapnel was released close to our position, we’d still be destroyed.

It was going to be a game of cat and mouse now, and we were no longer the hunters—we’d become the prey.

=35=

A standard pattern of evasion began. First, we dove toward the upper atmosphere of the planet.

This was standard operating procedure when fighting near an enemy planet. The hope behind it was the enemy would be reluctant to unload missiles and beams that might strike his own cities if he missed us.

Unfortunately, it also gave us less room to maneuver. We didn’t want to actually enter the planet’s atmosphere. The drag would slow us, and worse, we’d leave a trail as we cut through the thin upper air, making our ship easier to track.

Hammerhead rocked and heaved under us as we made rapid course changes to avoid being on a predictable path.

“Captain Miller,” I said, “may I make a suggestion?”

“I’m wide open for that, Blake!”

“Don’t go low. Go high. The Kwok don’t care about Grefs—and the Grefs don’t care much about their fellows, either. They won’t stop firing just because you go for hostages.”

“Good to know… Helm? Give me a new course, angling out toward the northern pole. Rise up slowly to give us some breathing room.”

We rolled and began pulling away in a new direction.

That didn’t last long. The first of the enemy missiles popped nearby. Hammerhead rocked and heaved. Klaxons sounded and a wisp of smoke curled into the bridge compartment. Emergency lights glowed red—that was bad.

“We’ve lost all power on our starboard flank, sir,” the support officer said.

“Reestablish! Get a repair team down there now!”

The support officer craned his neck to look at Miller. “I’m reading radiation—and a loss of pressure in the outer hull. While we’re phasing the team will be in danger…”

“I don’t care,” Miller said quickly. “Have them double-suit and send in all the robots we have—we need our power restored.”

Without both of Hammerhead’s engines, the ship was in trouble. We’d be slow and weak. If there was ever a time you needed every ounce of speed you could muster, it was while you were running for your life.

The support officer relayed Miller’s instructions to the hapless spacers below decks.

Hammerhead was coasting now. We were hoping we’d evaded our pursuers.

“Sensors?” Miller called out. “Is that ship still on us?”

“We can’t tell, sir,” said the young ensign in charge of our detection equipment. “She might have lost us—or she might not. I don’t have anything to go on.”

Miller turned to me. “Use your sym, Blake. You’re the best at it. I need to know.”

I closed my eyes and tried. I engaged with the computers, interrupted their pulsing networks, and let my sym summarize and collate. It took nearly a minute to throw a vague mess of a depiction at the display.

Everyone studied it with interest, even me.

A foggy image showed. There were bright spots here and there, showing large distant stars and planets. The largest mass was a sphere below us, which looked like a ball of bubbling gas.

In reality, these objects were completely stable. But the visualization I was working with could only interpolate the data it had, which was incomplete. It made everything fuzzy and indistinct, like looking through steamy, rain-washed glass.

“There!” Miller said, pointing. “The cruiser… she’s a ghost, but she’s still on our tail.”

“But why isn’t she firing?” Ensign Costa asked. Her face was full of youth and fear.

“Because she’s not sure,” I said. “She’s guessing, sniffing for any hint of our trail.”

“What’s out there for her to find?” the ensign asked. “We’re phased-out. We should be safe.”

“No… we’re not. Not completely. We’ve been hit, remember? That means we leaked gas, bits of metal… When the debris gets far enough away from our hull, it will become visible.”

“Are we still venting?” Miller demanded. “Support! Answer me!”

The startled support officer, who was in charge of damage control, shook himself and turned back to his boards. “Uh… no sir. We’ve got that clamped down. We’ve already had an injury on B deck, however. The repair crew is asking—”

“No,” Miller said quietly. “They have to stay down there. They have to restore our starboard power cells, or we’re all dead.”

No one spoke as the support officer relayed the order. We all knew Miller had consigned good men to radiation sickness and possible death.

“Should we change course again, sir?” the helmsman asked.

“No, steady as she goes. If the cruiser fires again, we’ll dodge then. Not a moment sooner.”

Several tense minutes passed. At last, however, it seemed like the ghostly shape of the cruiser faded, becoming a shade darker and smaller.

Everyone breathed a little easier. Miller and I dared to smirk at one another.

“We aren’t out of the woods yet, but if that cruiser—” Miller said.

Something rattled my brain then. It was my sym. I jerked and looked back at the display that some internal part of me was still collecting, processing and broadcasting.

“She’s onto us,” I said.

“Captain!” Ensign Costa called out. “We’ve got incoming missiles!”

“Evasive action. Dive toward the planet again.”

Hammerhead heaved and swung around sickeningly. At that point, I realized we’d lost our antigravity stabilizers, or we didn’t have enough power left to operate them. Either way it was bad, as it would be much harder to pull high-G maneuvers without the stabilizers. Everyone aboard could lose consciousness if the helmsman wasn’t careful.

Then, the deck flew up into my face and slammed hard into my right cheek. It had happened so fast, I could hardly react. I should have been strapped in, but as an observer, I didn’t have a reserved seat on the bridge.

Stunned, I struggled to get up and—

—I went flying. We’d lost all gravity control. I was in freefall, spinning. I reached out and latched onto straps that hung at strategic spots around the chamber, even on the ceiling where I was floating now.

Looking down, I saw a young ensign was face down on her sensor boards, out cold. There was blood all over her screens, and she’d hit hard enough to crack the tempered glass.

Miller was stirring, he’d been well-harnessed. He coughed and looked around.

“Helmsman?” he called out. “Bill?”

The helmsman was out—or dead. There was a lot of blood, and a spear-like shaft of metal had pinned him to his seat.

Kicking off with my feet, I climbed into his seat and turned to Miller. Our eyes met.

“Our orbit is decaying,” Miller said. “Even if the cruiser doesn’t find us and nail us again, we’re going down. Should we surrender?”

“After bombing them with a phase-ship?” I asked, laughing bitterly. “I can’t imagine we’ll be treated like guests.”

“What then?” he asked.

“Phase back in,” I said. “Let me talk to them.”

Miller looked at me as if I was insane for a few seconds, then he threw up his hands.

“Why the fuck not?” he muttered, and he worked the consoles.

The ship returned to normal space, and the universe outside spun sickeningly.

We were in a flat spin, out of control and helpless.

=36=

It wasn’t like we didn’t deserve to die. I kept telling myself that as we checked what functioning systems we had left.

We’d lost starboard power—permanently. All the repair people we’d sent down there were dead—there weren’t even any bodies around to bury. They’d been sucked out through our damaged hull into space.

The cruiser had struck us in about the same spot she had the first time. Whatever detection and tracking software the Kwok ships had, it seemed to prefer to hit phase-ships on the starboard side.

But none of that mattered now. We managed to correct our spin, throw up a glimmering excuse for a shield, and transmit a hailing message to our abuser.

An instant later a grinning face loomed on the display. For some reason, I’d expected to see a Gref—but the commanding officer was definitely one of Fex’s boys. Apparently, the Kwok didn’t trust Grefs to fly anything bigger than a shuttle, and I found it hard to blame them for that.

“Human scum,” the Kwok captain said. “We’ve heard you were low enough to employ phase-ships, but we hadn’t credited such rumors until today.”

“This is Captain Leo Blake,” I said loudly, as if I hadn’t heard the Kwok officer. “You will now listen to our list of demands and relay them to your superiors.”

The captain blinked. I was pretty sure he hadn’t expected to hear aggressive words from a defeated ship.

“What?” he snapped. “Impudence on top of everything else? I shall destroy you utterly!”

He lifted a hairy hand, but I lifted mine as well in a calm stopping gesture. “You’d best listen to me if you want to survive the aftermath of this encounter.”

“Listen to you, human? You are a fool. An evil, vicious and destructive fool to be sure, but a fool none the less. If you—”

“Did you witness the strike against the planet below us?” I asked. “Did you see the unleashed power of it?”

“Of course I did!” he raged. “Such a dishonorable act. If only human technology was a micron better, you might have hit your intended target.”

“We did hit our intended target,” I informed the angry primate. “We struck the mountain range near a large city.”

“You blew down a half-dozen mountains deliberately?” he laughed. “For what purpose?”

“It was meant as a demonstration. Our sister ships are poised now, all around this world. We will utterly destroy it if you don’t listen.”

Again, the Kwok blinked. He followed his confusion up with a short spate of nervous laughter. “What sister ships? I don’t see—”

“Is there anyone else aboard your ship I could talk to? Anyone with a superior intellect?”

The Kwok’s face darkened. “I am Captain Shev. There is no one superior aboard.”

“A pity. I think you might be limited in your mental capacities, but I will try again.”

At this point, Miller was cringing with every word I spoke. He was, however, staying quiet and letting me run the show. That’s all I could ask for.

“Say your words, dirty human, before I expunge you from this universe!”

“Captain Shev. We have already transmitted your name and likeness to the rest of our stealthed fleet. They will be relayed at a later date to Admiral Fex, so he knows who to blame for the global catastrophe that is about to ensue.”

“You’re threatening me? A single, half-wrecked phase-ship—”

“Yes,” I said firmly. “I’m threatening you. Here is the sequence of events that is about to unfold: if you destroy our ship, the rest of our phase-ships will each drop their planet-busters. They will, however, not target an uninhabited mountain. They will drop them on the cities and the oceans, destroying all life on the Gref homeworld.”

In the background behind Shev, I now saw two additional heads peering at me. They were both Gref crewmen, and they looked concerned. Possibly they were overhearing the discussion I was engaged in with their captain. They didn’t look like they approved of the way things were going.

“You are so full of excrement, Blake,” Shev said, leaning forward and leering. “I’ve heard about your tricks. I thought the Kwok were clever—but of every primate I’ve ever encountered, you humans are easily the worst.”

“You are correct, Shev,” I said. “We are the worst. We will destroy this planet if you don’t carry our message to Fex.”

“And what is that message, defeated foe of mine?”

“He must withdraw all forces from Earth and not return. He must close the rift that connects Gref and Earth. If these things happen, we will not kill all the Grefs in existence.”

There were three faces behind Shev now. All were hairy, primitive, and unsympathetic.

Again, Shev laughed at me. “That was an excellent performance, Blake! I have recorded it, and I will share it one day with my children so we may laugh together—”

Suddenly, something long and gleaming rose and fell. Shev winced, began to turn—but more gleaming metal tools thudded into his back, his shoulders, and finally his skull.

Slumping down, he stopped speaking.

Patiently, I waited. Miller was aghast. He stared at the scene in disbelief, as did the young ensign. She’d awakened and was rubbing her sore head.

“What did they do to him?” she asked in a harsh whisper.

Again, my hand came up, palm out. She fell silent.

At last, one of the Grefs had the balls to face the camera pickups.

“Hello,” he said. “This is Gref.”

“Hello Gref,” I said. “You are now the captain of your ship.”

He looked startled. “Who are you to declare me captain?”

“I’m a commander in the Rebel Fleet. I will bestow upon you fifty status points—and the rest of your crew will gain five each.”

The Gref looked cagey. A few others tried to crowd into his chair, but he pushed them back. A few caught savage blows from the wrench he’d used to beat down Shev.

“Fifty is not enough,” he complained. “To reach captain, I would need—”

“You will have one hundred then. That is my final offer, take it or leave it.”

The Gref licked his lips. “I will accept this. But you are an enemy. You make war on Gref—all Gref. How can you—?”

“I do not make war on Gref,” I said. “We dropped a bomb as a warning only.”

“Some Gref died…”

“The warning was a harsh one. A real attack would have killed millions.”

The Gref blinked, and I could tell he wasn’t quite sure what to do.

“Captain Gref,” I said. “You are a hero. You saved your world today. All you have to do is agree not to attack Earth again. We will then leave your space and not come back. No more bombs will fall.”

“Gref is Hero…” he said.

For the first time, I began to sweat. Other ships were bound to be converging on this region of space. This individual had a strong arm on him, but he might be too dumb to command a starship—even briefly.

“I like this title,” Gref said, looking at me and standing suddenly in his chair. “Hero Gref!”

He stooped suddenly, and I heard another thump. Had he struck another Gref who’d come too close? Or landed one more solid blow on the hapless Shev? I wasn’t sure.

“Good,” I said. “You are a hero. You command a starship. All you must do is allow us to retreat, then—”

“No,” he said. “That would be weak. Gref isn’t weak, he’s strong! Gref is hero.”

Again, he struck a nearby body. I was pretty sure it had to be Shev, because I didn’t hear any cries of protest. Probably, the others were smart enough to stay out of reach.

“You are smart,” I said. “You are strong. We’re leaving. If you fire on us, your cities will burn and every Gref will hate you.”

He narrowed his eyes and showed his slimy teeth.

“Gref will beat you down. Gref will beat you all down.”

My eyes slid toward Miller. I pointed toward the lever that put us into phasing mode, and he nodded.

“Two hundred points!” I shouted suddenly, pointing at the display. “Two hundred status points to the Gref who puts down this false captain!”

That did it. A flurry of screeching, thuds and flashing tools ensued. The Grefs were having a brawl.

Miller didn’t even need to be told what to do. He activated the stealth fields, and we phased out again.

=37=

The voyage back to Earth was long and slow. We’d lost around half our crew including Ensign Costa, the young sensor op from the bridge crew. Worst of all, we only had one engine left that could be powered.

After we’d crept away into open space, about a million kilometers out from the Gref homeworld, we powered down everything except for the phasing system and life support. A full week was spent on repairs, and during that time many died from radiation poisoning and injuries from the two strikes Hammerhead had suffered.

“That was a close one, Captain Blake,” Miller told me. “I’m glad you were here to help out when things got tight.”

“I hope I wasn’t too much of a pain in the ass.”

He laughed tiredly. “Not at all. Your moves worked out in the end. We got a little bad luck when the cruiser picked us up so fast—but you managed to weasel us out of it.”

I smiled. Sometimes, quick wits and a quick tongue could get a man out of danger.

“Our best break was in the nature of the Grefs themselves. They’re gullible.”

“That’s for sure… but sir? There’s one thing I wanted to ask you about.”

“Anything.”

He looked at me, slightly troubled. “Why did you hit an empty mountain range? I mean… I thought we were supposed to flatten a city at least.”

There it was, out in the open. For days Miller had been thinking over this very question. I’d seen it in his troubled eyes.

Miller was a man who followed the rules. Most people in Earth’s navy were like that—especially the officers.

I was unusual, but not unique. Every member of the initial group of five who’d made it into space with the Rebel Kher in the first place was a little crazy. You had to be just to survive the trials it took to win through and man a ship in the Rebel Fleet.

“After returning home following the first war,” I said. “I stayed with the regular navy as it transformed into a global force based around spacecraft instead of ocean-going ships. But I guess I still don’t quite belong in this new navy. Remember, I fought with the Kher against the Imperials. Deep down, they’re still my brothers.”

“Even the Grefs? Stinking, ignorant, vicious morons?”

“Even the Grefs. I couldn’t drop the bomb on them. I couldn’t devastate their planet despite what they’d done to Earth.”

Miller shook his head and crossed his arms. “I would have done it,” he said. “I would have laid that big black egg right on top of their capital—if they have one.”

“Fair enough,” I said. “But anyway, that’s why I changed the devastating blow into a devastating scare.”

“But sir… what if that had been our only shot? Maybe it was—we don’t know how this will turn out. The Grefs were supposed to be scared into quitting the war.”

I lifted a finger and waved it at him. “Not really. This whole thing is really targeted at their masters, the Kwok. They were the ones who started this conflict. They’ve been using the Grefs. We wanted to scare them into backing off.”

“Well… same difference. Either way, we should have nailed a city. The U.S. didn’t hesitate to hit the Japanese to end that war, remember? They didn’t bomb Mt. Fuji—and their attack worked.”

“True, but I think the dynamics here are different. I was put in charge of selecting a target because no one was sure the Grefs even had cities. But in the end, you’re right. I made the call to scare them.”

“Hmm,” Miller mused. “If nothing else, I think it might have saved our asses in the end. The cruiser probably would have finished us without talking if we’d destroyed a city.”

“Agreed. Now, how do we get home?”

We began working out our course with our sole surviving navigator after that. It wasn’t easy, as the path required creeping away to other planets, a chain of them, swinging around each and throwing ourselves back at the rift we’d come through.

Days passed, and we’d patched Hammerhead together enough to function. When we finally got close to the rift that led the way home, we became tense.

“We’ve got eighty percent performance from our remaining engine,” the systems operator told Miller. “That’s the best I can do with our stealth field up. The rest of it we need for life support and the like.”

“Suit-up, everyone!” Miller ordered. “Ensign, turn off the O2 recycling, the heaters—in fact, shut off all life support. Then power-down every other luxury system aboard. I want one hundred percent of my last engine.”

The system operator didn’t meet his eyes but instead turned back to his operating station. He relayed the message over the PA system then began switching things off all over the ship.

“What about the medical bay, sir?” the lieutenant asked Miller. “We’ve got people down there who are still in critical.”

“Give them device power, but cut their lights to half,” Miller ordered. “What are we up to on Engine One?”

“Uh… ninety-two percent, sir.”

“That’s better… Are there any hot weapons?”

“Only our missiles, sir. They require very little power while waiting inside their pods.”

It was going to be grim if we were located now. We’d built up a head of steam, but we were still pretty much crawling through space. If the enemy had set up a minefield or something else that was equally effective, we weren’t going to get out of this alive.

To me, this was the scenario I’d always feared since the start of the mission. Sure, I’d felt pretty confident we could sneak into the Gref system and, with a little luck, we’d get to their home world and drop our special gift on an unsuspecting planet.

But what about afterwards? How were we supposed to get out of an enemy star system when they were fully alert and angry?

The biggest problem was they knew where we were headed. Sure, they might not be able to ferret us out in deep space—but they knew we had to wriggle back out through the same hole we’d used to get in.

I wouldn’t be surprised if the entire fleet of ships this world possessed was waiting out here for us. We couldn’t see them if they kept their emissions low. They might very well have been posted in deep space to intercept and destroy our sole, limping vessel.

The final moments came hard for everyone. Anticipation kept us all on a knife’s edge.

“Sir,” the navigator spoke up, “I implore you again, let’s come visible briefly so I can get a fix on the rift. We can’t be sure it’s in the same—”

“No,” Miller said.

The navigator squirmed a little, but he spoke up again about a minute later. “We’re going to be too close soon, if they have guardian ships—”

“No,” Miller said. “If we miss the rift, we’ll turn around and take another shot at it. If we show ourselves, even for a second, we might be detected. Hammerhead is too banged up to evade another cruiser.”

The navigator squirmed some more, but he kept quiet.

The minutes crawled by. After about an hour, we were reaching the moment of truth.

“The clock says nine minutes to intersect,” Miller said. “Is that accurate?”

The navigator, nodded. “As best we can tell it is, sir.”

“Still no dimensional vibrations showing the rift’s position?” Miller asked.

“No sir, I would have alerted you—but that’s not all that unusual. This rift is stable, and the more stable they are, the harder they are to detect while stealthed. We might slip right through without realizing it.”

“Let’s hope that’s the case,” Miller said.

We all kept our voices low and watched the instruments without blinking much over the next ten minutes. It was a common affectation, I’d noticed over the years, for the crew to grow quiet when stealthing in dangerous territory.

We knew, of course, that no one could hear any sound we made aboard Hammerhead. Space has no molecules to carry a vibration from one ship to another, so we could all scream our heads off and it wouldn’t make a lick of difference.

But still, we quieted and crept around the ship like mice. All of us knew the predators were out there, unseen, and we were definitely the prey. I guess it was instinct.

Two more minutes passed, and I saw time was wearing on Miller. He was tapping at the arm of his command chair nervously.

“We must have passed the rift,” he said.

“I’m so sorry, sir,” the navigator said. “Our instruments took a hard knock back there and—”

“No need to apologize,” Miller said. “A dozen things could have gone wrong. We went for luck—a clean shot from ten AU out—and it didn’t happen. Now, we’ll just have to adjust our strategy.”

For the first time in hours, Miller looked at me.

“Captain Blake?” he asked. “How would you handle the situation?”

I’d kept quiet for hours, despite wanting to speak up on a number of occasions. I’d figured that it was Miller’s ship, and as our primary mission had been completed, I should duck out.

Now that he asked, however, I took in a deep breath.

“How would you handle it, Miller?” I asked.

Every crewman on the bridge watched us. They knew we’d all die if we played this the wrong way.

“I’m thinking we should silently glide another half-million kilometers past the target, then turn around. At max range, we can phase back in briefly and scan the region to get a better fix on the rift.”

“A reasonable approach,” I said.

“But not the one you’d take? Let me guess… it’s too timid?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“No… but I want to hear your play. What would you do?”

After thinking it over, I decided to tell him the truth. “I’d move to our best-guess coordinates. From there, I’d phase-in very briefly, then I’d phase-out again the second we had local data from passive sensors. With any luck, the rift will be right there, a few kilometers away.”

“What if some waiting ship detects us?”

“They will,” I said. “They’re certainly out here, and they will detect us—but with luck we can dodge all the way to the rift and dart through.”

Miller drummed his fingers on the arm of his command chair.

“And why is that a better approach than attempting to take a look from a few hundred thousand kilometers out?”

“Because once we show our noses, they’ll see us, and they’ll be alerted. Gref crews are lazy. Once they know there’s game nearby, they’ll wake up. Also, we’re not at our best. We can’t move fast, or dodge well. They’ll come after us and try to lay out patterns to nail us—their odds will be much worse if we only have a few kilometers to go.”

Miller sighed. “One cast of the dice? All or nothing?”

“That’s what I’d do,” I said, and I shrugged. “But it’s absolutely your call, Captain Miller. You’re in command.”

Miller nodded slowly. He stared down at the deck, and I knew that he was torturing himself internally.

A long time ago, he’d wanted to command Hammerhead with every fiber of his being. We’d come to blows over the matter more than once.

Now that he’d finally gotten his chance, I wasn’t sure how much he was enjoying the experience.

“Helm,” Miller said at last, “return to our original target departure point.”

I raised my eyebrows, as did others, but I said nothing. I hadn’t expected him to take my advice. In a way, it was troubling, as I now realized my final moments might come with the firm knowledge I’d killed Hammerhead—not Miller.

But, on the other hand, it was hard not to be a little bit pleased he’d taken my advice.

We swung the ship around, gently braked with our primary jets, and soon began heading back the way we’d come.

We hadn’t gone very far, so it only took about an hour to ease the ship around and return to the point of truth again. There was no sign of the rift we were seeking.

“Dammit,” Miller muttered as he scanned the passive readings.

The data streams were empty and stone cold. It was as if we were foolishly creeping around in the void alone.

But I didn’t believe that. The Kwok ships were here, somewhere, waiting for us with everything powered down so we couldn’t detect them without phasing in.

And that rift—it always had been unusually smooth, perfect, without any of the unusual undulations and fissures generated by a spinning rip in space-time.

“This is it, Leo,” Miller said to me.

I nodded and smiled. I clapped him on the back.

Miller turned toward his crew. “It’s been a pleasure to serve.”

A few of them mumbled their thanks. Others just stared with wide-open eyes.

“Systems…” he said at last. “Phase-in.”

=38=

We returned to the material universe after a few rippling seconds. Miller shouted no orders to the sensor crew—they were bent over their stations, working feverishly for any scrap of data.

I closed my eyes and cast about with my sym melding into Hammerhead’s computers. Reaching out with perception, I caught the central star first. Luckily, it was exactly where it should be. We hadn’t gone off-course.

The planets were there, too. We ticked them off together…

But the rift? Where was the rift? At this short range, it ought to register very quickly.

“Something’s wrong,” I said, keeping my eyes closed. “Miller… phase-out again.”

“We haven’t picked up anything yet, sir,” our new sensor op said. “Ten more seconds, and we should get a fix.”

Miller raised his voice. “Phase-out. Helm, evasive action.”

“No,” I said, “I wouldn’t use the engines. Just drift.”

“Helm, belay that order,” Miller said after a half-second of indecision. “Let’s just phase-out and standby.”

Miller climbed down out of his command chair. I could hear him stepping up to me, standing close.

“What are you seeing, Leo?” he asked. “What have you got?”

“I don’t know for sure…” I said. “But the rift isn’t here. They closed it. That’s great news, Miller. Don’t you see? We succeeded in our mission. We got Fex to back off.”

“Yeah… But how are we getting home?”

I didn’t answer, because there was no answer. Hammerhead was no starship. She was an obsolete phase-ship that was half-wrecked and manned by a skeleton crew. Even our supplies were low. We’d run out of food in another few weeks, and although we could recycle our water infinitely, the carbon dioxide scrubbers were in sorry shape.

Already, I could foresee our future. The Kwok had screwed us authoritatively. Hell, they could always open a rift somewhere else if they wanted to—but we’d never find it.

After another month of lurking around, we’d have to surrender or die of hunger if not asphyxiation.

Still, I smiled. “We did our duty,” I repeated. “We—”

I broke off. Something had sparked.

We were phased out, drifting in a hyperspatial bubble. I was still watching all the sensors, trying to pick up something strong, something useful.

There it was again. A shift in the ether around us. A glimmer in the formless void.

“A ship is out here with us,” I said. “She’s within a hundred kilometers. She’s using her jets, but gently.” My eyes snapped wide. “She’s sneaking up on us, Miller. Someone saw us, and they’re closing in.”

“Should we run?” the helmsman asked.

“No,” Miller said. “We can’t. If we go to full engine power, our damaged ship will vent and leave a trail. We can’t outrun them on one engine, anyway. We have to huddle right here and hope they miss us. They’ll give up in time.”

Everyone looked panicked. There seemed to be little chance the enemy would get bored and wander off. After all, they’d closed the rift and sat out here for weeks. Now that we’d finally shown our noses, they’d be encouraged to keep searching.

In fact, I knew what was likely to happen. They’d call for back up. Every ship in the fleet would rush right here, and they’d cube-out every millimeter of local space and comb it until they found us.

Closing my eyes again, I sought our hunter. Several minutes passed before I picked them up again.

“Jets again,” I said. “Very close.”

“I picked it up this time, sir,” the new sensor op said. “Captain Blake is right—looks like they’re doing a slow turn.”

“Where?” Miller demanded.

“Right on top of us. Less than a kilometer away.”

“Shit.”

I echoed the sentiment in my mind.

“What class is she?” I asked. “She looks like another light cruiser to me.”

“Agreed. Might be the same ship or just one of the same class as the one that nailed us the first time.”

It was more than bad luck, it was well-planned enemy competence. Whatever one had to say about Kwok ships flown by Kwok captains with Gref crews, they worked well together most of the time.

“Unless they get into trouble,” I said aloud.

“What’s that, Blake?” Miller asked. “If you’ve got another bright idea, this would be a fine time to let me hear it, because we’re in trouble.”

“You’re not going to like it,” I said.

He laughed ruefully. “I know that already.”

“We could hit them. In the ass. Hard.”

He stared at me. “We can’t take out a cruiser one-on-one, Blake. Not in our current state.”

“I know that—but do they know that? Do they really know what they’re up against?”

He blinked at me. “I’m not following.”

“I’m suggesting we scare them. Predators hate one thing above all else—getting hurt. They don’t mind playing with their food or making a clean kill—but they don’t really want a fight. If we can convince them they’re in danger, they’ll bug out and come back later with reinforcements.”

“That’s your plan?” Miller asked. “To get them to run? Then what? There could be six more ships patrolling out here.”

I nodded. “At least that many.”

“And they’ve got to be converging on this spot, even now.”

“Agreed. Time is short.”

“Time for what, Blake? Going out in a blaze of glory?”

“No…” I said, closing my eyes again and seeking our predator. After a minute or so, I got a fix on him when he made a tiny course correction.

With a casting motion of my hand, I threw what I was seeing to the primary display. I backed up the point of view, and they all saw the tiny orange cone of wavering energy release. A dark shape surrounded it briefly, then it all faded.

“I’ve got a fix,” the navigator said.

“Orders, sir?” the helmsman asked.

Miller looked at the image. “Come about, ten percent thrust. Helm, take us up to her flank.”

“Don’t you mean to that tailpipe she just fired up, sir?” the helmsman asked.

Miller scowled at him. “No. She knows she’s fighting a phase-ship. The captain would have to be a fool to have her rear shields down. We’re hitting her in the flank.”

I didn’t argue. Miller’s logic was sound.

Minutes crept by—but not too many of them. Less than ten minutes later, I caught a puff of jets again.

“She’s close!” I said, and I heard everyone gasp.

I opened my eyes. The feed I’d been relaying to the central display was still there, and they could all see it.

The orange wavering cone of fire was very close indeed. We were right on top of her.

“We’ve got her flank, Captain!” the helmsman said.

“We’re going to perform a pop-up attack,” Miller announced. “Ready on that phasing field, ops?”

“Charged and ready.”

“Gunner?” Miller asked.

“Railgun loaded and cool. We can’t miss at this range, sir.”

“See that you don’t. On my mark. One… two… Mark!”

The ship phased in. I felt that thrill I always felt in moments like these. We were going into battle, half-dead and desperate—but we had no real choice.

The computers took over after we phased in. The moment we’d materialized fully in the same slice of universe the cruiser was in, we fired our primary weapon. The flare was bright, and it was instantly echoed by the strike on the enemy hull—only, it didn’t make it through to the hull.

“Phase-out! Phase-out!”

“We didn’t even scratch her,” I heard someone say.

“She’s coming about,” the helmsman said. “I’ll go for the fantail this time.”

“Permission to make a suggestion, Captain?” I asked.

“Always Blake! Talk to me!”

“Go for the flank again. Fire blind—while phased-out.”

He looked at me in surprise.

“It won’t penetrate,” he said.

“Probably not. But that’s not our goal.”

Phase ships generally appeared to fire upon their prey for maximum effect. A projectile or energy beam only hit with partial force if it landed while it was phasing. Also, ships generally didn’t have enough power to phase, operate defensive shields and fire their primary weapon at once.

Bigger ships like this light cruiser, however, could fire a vast amount of ordnance, saturating local space in hopes of a glancing blow that would knock us out of the fight.

“We’ll have to lower our shields and turn down our engines to a glimmer…” Miller said.

“That’s right,” I agreed.

He took in a deep breath, and he looked a little green. “Kill all power except for phasing and our railgun. Weapons, hit her in the side again.”

“We’re going to overheat sir.”

“Fire the moment you’re in the yellow.”

We watched the helmsman jockey for position. The primary railgun metrics showed the weapon’s status as it slowly faded from red, to orange, to yellow.

“The cruiser is firing charges—but she’s firing too far out.”

We rumbled and shook for a moment, but the strikes were far off our stern.

“She thinks we’re running,” Miller said. “That means she has no idea we’re still on top of her… I want to see another pop-up attack! We’re phasing in, and out again. On my mark…”

He counted it down, and I gritted my teeth. I had balls, but Miller was going one step further than I’d suggested.

Firing while stealthing wouldn’t do much damage, but I’d hoped it would scare the enemy into retreating from the area.

Miller, on the other hand, was swinging for the fences.

We phased-in, fired another point-blank shot into the big ship’s guts, and phased out again.

That was it for the cruiser. She turned tail and moved away.

The bridge crew cheered. “She probably thinks there are two of us out here,” Miller said.

“She probably does,” I said. “That was a brilliant addition to the strategy, Miller.”

“Brilliant because it worked, you mean.”

“That’s exactly right. If we’d gotten dusted, I’d have used my dying breath to call you a moron.”

He laughed.

“What now?” he asked, beaming.

My eyes drifted to the display, and they widened. “Now? Now we follow that cruiser.”

Miller turned toward the display, he whooped and everyone else did the same.

The cruiser had opened a rift. She was bugging out—all the way out.

I smiled. You could always count on a primate to run hard if you scared them badly enough.

We kicked off the railgun, the shields—everything—and we charged after the cruiser with all the power our single engine could generate.

Slipping into the short-lived rift before it vanished, we left the Gref star system behind.

There was no telling where we were going to end up, of course, but I didn’t care.

We’d escaped.

=39=

We expected to drop out of hyperspace quickly. When a ship used a rift to escape combat, it usually didn’t jump very far.

But the ride wasn’t a short one.

“The tension really hasn’t dropped on this bridge much,” Miller told me a few minutes later. “We’re still not out of the woods. The moment we breach and return to normal space we’ll be in combat again.”

“Just keep the phasing system on,” I said. “When we breach, the cruiser won’t see us.”

Ten minutes passed, during which we watched every instrument every minute.

Nothing changed. Ten minutes turned into twenty—then an hour.

The bridge crew was casting worried glances at one another. Jumps that lasted days weren’t all that rare—but they weren’t common, either.

After two full hours had passed, Dr. Abrams appeared on deck.

“Gentlemen,” he said. “We have a problem.”

We all looked at him, but Abrams just turned around and walked off the bridge.

Miller got out of his chair and told the helmsman he was in command for now. He followed Dr. Abrams, and I went with him.

We clumped down the passages to where Abrams had taken refuge in the officer’s mess. He often ate there, even though he wasn’t officially an officer aboard Hammerhead. I decided today wasn’t a good time to try to break him of the habit.

“Gentlemen,” Abrams said. “I can see in your faces you’re worried. That’s good. Even you two have figured out that something is gravely wrong.”

Captain Miller shrugged. “It’s a long jump, that’s not unprecedented.”

Abrams leaned back in his chair. He looked resigned to his fate, even bored with it.

“Out with it, Doc,” I said.

“Why, whatever do you mean, Blake?” he said.

“Why is this damned rift never-ending?” Miller demanded, losing his temper. “You’re hinting that you know something, and I won’t have a crewman aboard who won’t share critical data that endangers my ship.”

Abrams looked smug. He loved it when we really needed him.

“Seriously?” he said. “I thought it was so obvious—but I guess I put too much faith in the mental capacities of my fellow man. It’s a failing of mine.”

“No cat and mouse today, Doc,” I said. “We’re not in the mood, and Miller here is likely to space you just for fun.”

Abrams twisted his lips. I knew we were spoiling his fun.

“Very well, I will enlighten you. We’re stuck in this rift—possibly forever.”

“How? Why?” Miller demanded.

Abrams shrugged. “Surely you’ve heard of ships scattering, yes? Sometimes, vessels jump into a rift and vanish, never to be heard from again.”

“Of course we have,” Miller began, “but—”

“This is what that looks like, gentlemen. I’ve taken many readings over the last several hours, and I’m certain I’m correct. We’re caught in this rift. It will never end. Our bodies will die and desiccate—but still, the journey will go on.”

We stared at him, mouths gaping.

“We’ve scattered?” I asked. “So badly that we’re not just heading to the wrong spot—we’re trapped in hyperspace?”

“Yes, I do believe that’s what I just said.”

“Why are you so calm about it?” Miller demanded. “You’re trapped in this private hell with us!”

Putting up a hand, I caught Miller’s attention.

“Because,” I said, “you aren’t talking to Dr. Abrams. This is Godwin.”

Godwin made a sound of irritation. “Dammit, Blake. You always spot me! I thought I was doing a perfect job of imitating Abrams.”

I smiled grimly. “You were doing it very well, I admit.”

Miller looked from Abrams, to me, and back again. His face darkened after he got over his surprise.

“I’m going to space this alien, Blake. Any objections?”

“None,” I said.

“Ah-ah!” Godwin said as Miller laid firm hands on his shoulders. “Aren’t you curious as to how I got here? Or what happened to the real Abrams? Or, the smartest question: can I help you get out of this?”

Miller hesitated. “Well? Can you get us out of hyperspace?”

“Possibly. But not if I’m dead.”

“Where is the real Abrams?” I asked.

“Below decks, in his lab. He’s fine, and he has no idea I’m aboard.”

Miller let him go. “I’m checking on that.”

He stepped away and communicated with the crew.

I turned my attention back to the Nomad.

“Godwin,” I said. “We do need your help if you aren’t bullshitting about us being trapped in this rift.”

“I’m not,” he said. “You see, you hit that cruiser too hard the second time around. It cracked the hull. When they entered hyperspace, they broke up.”

I made a hissing sound through my teeth. “So there’s no ship to lead us to the other end? It died here without creating an exit, right?”

“Exactly. We’re all trapped in a state of semi-nonexistence.”

“What about you, can you get out?”

“Yes… in a sense. I’m artificial. After I’m presumed dead here, I’ll be remade elsewhere. Effectively, I will live again.”

“That’s great for you, but we’re screwed.”

He made an unconcerned gesture waggling his fingers at me. He really did remind me of Abrams at his worst.

“We’ve actually scattered… badly,” Miller said, taking a slow seat in his office chair. He stared at the bulkhead blankly. “I can’t believe it.”

“I guess you kicked it in the ribs harder than you thought you did,” I told Miller.

“I guess so. At least we’ll have that fond memory to look back upon as we run out of food and air.”

I turned my attention toward the Nomad. “Can you help us, Godwin? Or are you just tormenting us?”

“A little of both, I admit,” he said. “I think I can end the rift—but that won’t necessarily mean we’re in the clear. Space is big, and—”

“Just shut up and do it!” Miller demanded. “We’re traveling further through space every minute. Who knows how many lightyears we’ve crossed already? We might never get home, even if we break out now!”

“Fine, fine,” Godwin said, “let’s go see the real Dr. Abrams.”

So saying, he climbed out of his chair and exited the office. We followed him, but I stopped him with a hand on his shoulder.

“You can’t go down there as Abrams,” I said. “That just won’t work for anyone’s sanity.”

“That’s right,” Miller agreed. “There can’t be two of you. Gods! I’ll kill myself.”

“All right… then who should I…? Never mind, I’ve got it.”

Godwin closed his eyes and his form shimmered. I’d seen him change shape before, and it never failed to send a shiver through me. This creature, this Nomad—he was so thoroughly alien.

After he was finished, I found my hand wasn’t clutching the shoulder of Abrams in his white lab coat any longer. Instead, I had a thinner, slighter body in my grip.

“You like this better, Blake?” Godwin asked in a young, feminine voice.

He’d taken the form of Ensign Costa, who had died days ago in the battle over the Gref homeworld.

I yanked my hand from her shoulder as if burned.

“It’ll do,” I said. “Let’s go.”

=40=

When we reached Dr. Abrams’ lair, the nerds down there stared at our companion.

“Um…” Abrams said. “Blake? Could I be mistaken? Didn’t we bury this young lady in space a week or so ago?”

“Things aren’t always what they seem to be, Abrams,” I said vaguely. “We’ve got information for you. Critical information.”

We explained the nature of our predicament. He was happy to learn we’d been left in hyperspace after the cruiser we’d damaged had belatedly exploded.

While we spoke, Godwin, in the guise of Ensign Costa, paced around the lab. She toyed with things. The lab people and Abrams himself watched her warily. I think they suspected what she was, but they didn’t make any accusations out loud.

“There’s no known way of exiting a rift with no endpoint,” Abrams said. “We can experiment, of course, but…”

Godwin returned to our circle. She smiled. It was an eerie thing to see.

“I can help,” she said. “This is a phase-ship. Such vessels already have the capacity to enter and exit an intradimensional state. All we have to do is exit the state we’re in and return to normal space.”

“That’s not a good solution,” Abrams said. “We’d be hopelessly lost in the gulf of space between the stars, even if we manage to return to normal space smoothly.”

Godwin looked at him. She waved a long, thin, red-nailed finger at him.

“You’re right. We need a target. A beacon star. Are your sensors capable of picking them up even in hyperspace?”

“Yes—the biggest of them.”

“Show me.”

Abrams did, and Godwin studied the equipment he used to do it.

“We’ve already passed Rigel,” she pronounced.

“All the way from Wezen to Rigel in one jump!” Abrams declared in a near-panic. “That’s four thousand lightyears!”

“Yes, roughly,” Godwin agreed. “The next star in this general direction with sufficient size would be Deneb. Would you like to land near Deneb, Captain?”

She asked this of Miller, who looked startled.

“I guess it beats flying all the way out of the Orion arm. Do it.”

Abrams watched, bug-eyed, as Godwin took more measurements. She twiddled with his instruments and worked various gravimeters.

Abrams sidled up to me while the work continued.

“Do you know what that is, Blake?” he asked me in a husky whisper. “That doppelganger? That imposter built of artificial flesh?”

“It’s Godwin, Doc,” I said. “I know.”

He shivered and stared. Even he was creeped-out by these aliens.

“All right,” Godwin said at last. “I’ve set up a detection system alarm. When it goes off, we need to phase-in on the main console on the bridge.”

“That’s it?” I asked.

“Not entirely, the point of return is very precise. There will be no more than a seventy nanosecond window during which to make our return.”

“Seventy nanoseconds!” Abrams exclaimed. “We’ll have to automate it! The ship’s computer will have to be dedicated to the task!”

“Get to it, Doc,” Miller said. “You have my permission to override any systems you need to.”

Abrams scrambled out of the lab. A flock of his minions followed in his wake.

“Godwin?” I asked. “How long do we have? Until we pass Deneb, that is?”

“Less than an hour. We’d better get a move on.”

We did as she directed. We scrambled and strained, with Abrams’ team working the hardest. They rigged up a timing circuit with a software hack on the helmsman’s station. It was counting time down with an impossibly fast digital readout. The numbers flickered so fast you couldn’t read past the hundredths of the second. It used what looked like a solid red blur of light to represent the values after the decimal place.

Time went by, and we sweated almost as much as Abrams.

Godwin, however, wasn’t like a human in that she rarely felt stressed. She was calm, faintly smiling, and she seemed to be enjoying the ride.

The minutes spun down at the end. I must have glanced at that countdown a thousand times. The technical people kept fooling with it, trying to make sure they hadn’t made any tiny mistakes. Even the code in the clock mechanism had to be optimized, as the window for execution was too short for any kind of mistake.

We weren’t going to get a second chance.

I blinked when the final, fateful second came and went.

At first, when I opened my eyes and looked around, I thought nothing had happened. I looked quickly at the clock again—it read all zeros.

Closing my eyes I cast outward with my sym. The immediate surroundings—”

“We’re in normal space,” I said, feeling some level of excitement building.

“Where’s Deneb?” our navigator asked.

“There,” our sensor op said. “I’ve got it. A blue-white supergiant. That’s got to be Deneb.”

“Dangerously close?” Miller asked.

“Close, yes. But not dangerously so. Deneb has about a hundred thousand times the luminosity of our sun, so the radiation levels are pretty extreme, but we’ll survive.”

The group sighed. “Now all we have to do is get ourselves picked up by local traffic.”

“Something friendly, I hope,” Miller said.

Smiling at last, we turned toward Godwin. She’d done it, and we wanted to thank her.

But we never got the chance. She was only a puddle on the floor by now. Her existence had ended just as suddenly as it had begun.

I stared at the small, dark stain on the deck. It was hard to believe that mess had been a woman just moments ago.

Abrams walked near and tsked at the remains.

“Too bad,” he said. “I can see that you were taken with that creature, Blake. Hard luck for you.”

“Taken with her? No, I’ll stick with my cat-girl. I just wanted to thank Godwin for saving us.”

“Thank Godwin? Whatever for? I built the timer, after all.”

I released a puff of laughter. “That’s right, Doc. You did. You deserve our hearty thanks as well.”

He liked that, and he strutted around the deck for a while, boasting.

Miller and I let him do it. After all, he’d earned some points today.

=41=

Three days after Godwin had melted away on Devilfish’s deck, a ship picked up our distress signal.

We waited tensely while it approached and scoped us out. The vessel finally hailed us, and we answered without hesitation. After all, we were running out of supplies, and we were getting desperate.

“Unlicensed phase-ship,” the caller said. “Surrender your vessel and prepare to be boarded.”

Miller and I exchanged glances. This was bad. They didn’t sound like they meant to patch up our ship and feed us cookies for the road home.

“Should we phase-out and run, sir?” the helmsman prompted.

I turned toward Captain Miller, realizing he’d yet to give an order. He looked at me.

“You want talk to them, Blake?” he asked. “You’re good at that. The rift has vanished—we’ve got no way out and only one engine. We need help.”

He was right, I realized. We didn’t even know who was hailing us. The Kwok cruiser we’d followed into hyperspace had been destroyed days ago, so it could be anyone.

Checking the instruments, I saw we had enough power to phase-out—but only barely. It took time to build up a charge, especially when you were half-crippled. At the very least, I could stall for time.

“Unknown vessel,” I announced, “this is Captain Leo Blake of the Earth ship Hammerhead. To whom do I have the pleasure of speaking?”

“Earth ship? Rebel Kher?”

I hesitated, then sighed and crossed my fingers. “That’s right. Rebel Fleet.”

There was a long moment of quiet on the channel. I checked the scopes which were coming in with fresh data now. Even with the blasting radiance of Deneb, I was able to make out the other ship.

It was a heavy cruiser, if I had to guess. A long ship with a strange design.

“This is—” began the voice, interrupted with an unpronounceable noise that sounded like utensils clicking on plates to me, “—we know you, Blake. We met long ago. You are not favored by our people.”

Frowning, I waved for the sensor ops attention. “Get me a visual.”

She worked the boards, and a disturbing image popped up. It was an odd creature, kind of like a furry beetle.

“I remember these guys…” I said aloud. “We struggled honorably in the pits aboard Ursa’s carrier vessel, Killer.”

“This is accurate,” the being said. “You coerced beings in our genetic family to fight and die with the rest of the rebels.”

“Exactly!” I announced, deciding to own it. “I’m glad to see it caused your population no harm to avoid that shameful moment.”

The beetle was talking about a time long ago during one of the Rebel Fleet’s first actions against the Imperials. The bugs had joined the fleet with a few manned fighters—but they’d figured from the beginning they were too important to risk their lives and die with the rest of us. So, I’d “encouraged” the Imperials to take the fight to them, ensuring they’d fight like prideful Kher.

The bug clattered its dinnerware again. I saw it do it this time—the mouthparts were moving and clicking. Was it speaking to a crewmate off to the side in its native tongue, rather than to me in standard Kher? That was my impression.

I waited patiently. These guys had been stubborn, and they had reason to dislike me. At least they weren’t our sworn enemies. In short, it could have been worse.

“Talk to me, big guy,” I said after waiting a full minute.

He still ignored me and clicked to someone on his flank. I began snapping my fingers at the screen next, and that did it. I’d managed to interrupt the beetle’s chop-stick session with his buddy off-camera.

The bug turned back to face me. “Your size reference is inaccurate,” he complained. “Humans are at least a half-meter—”

“All right, all right, okay,” I said. “Tell me something, brother Kher: How is it you’ve got a heavy cruiser? I recall your home planet was destroyed in the war with the Imperials. There were very few of your kind left.”

“That is an accurate statement, but it is out of date. We’ve had many standard time-units to recover. Gene-sharing allowed us to quickly recover our numbers on a new planet we colonized.”

“Gene-sharing…? You mean cloning? You guys are clones?”

“Clones…? Ah yes, the concept is a crude approximation of gene-sharing. Our genetics are modified systematically during reproduction so that no two clickety-clicks are exactly alike. Perhaps your cognates are insufficient to comprehend our biotechnology.”

All the reasons I’d disliked these guys in the first place were beginning to come back to me. With an effort, I pushed that way. It was time to make friends.

“That’s fantastic news, click-click. I’ll tell you what, we could use a little help right now from a group of friendly, honorable techno wizards like yourselves.”

More clicking ensued. “You have badly mispronounced my designation,” the alien complained.

“Right, sorry. But that error just proves my point. We need your help, clicks. What do you say?”

“What form of aid do you require?”

“Just a half-hour’s work on your part,” I said. “No big deal at all. If you could just open a rift to these galactic coordinates…”

I spent the next ten minutes telling him what a genius he was, and how big and hard his ship was when compared to our battered piece-of-shit rust-bucket. That seemed to do the trick eventually, despite his obsession with correcting me.

There were many things that varied about Kher personalities, but a prideful nature wasn’t one of them. All of us liked to be told how cool we were, no matter what we looked like or how advanced we were.

Eventually, the bugs spun up a rift and let us limp through it. We exited the Deneb system and prayed we’d come out at Earth when we got to the far end.

When we were out of range of the heavy cruiser, Miller clapped me on the back.

“I knew I brought you along on this mission for something,” he said. “I couldn’t have stood that much boot-licking. Those guys are true assholes.”

“They’re not so bad,” I said. “I’ve met plenty that were worse.”

He laughed and walked away, shaking his head.

Twenty-one minutes later, in our somewhat distorted flow of time, we emerged from the rift and took stock of our surroundings.

Everyone was nervous, studying our instruments with unblinking eyes.

“One star, G-class,” the sensor op read out loud. “Eight planets, a busy out-system Oort cloud… Sir, this appears to be the Solar System.”

Everyone hollered and stood up, laughing. We hugged each other and some people even cried with joy.

At long last, we’d made our way back home.

=42=

Three days later my feet were back on solid ground. It felt good to suck in a fresh breath of Rocky Mountain air. We’d been breathing recycled canned air for weeks.

I had a steak dinner with Mia, who pawed me at the restaurant until people were staring at us—but I didn’t care.

It felt great to be home.

“Leo,” Mia said with hot breath in my ear. “I want you to take me to our apartment. Immediately.”

“One more bite of this steak, and you’ve got a deal, girl.”

I chowed down three bites, we paid the check and headed for the exit—but we didn’t make it home.

A siren went off. It was an air-raid warning. The undulating noise was unmistakable.

Taking Mia’s hand in mine, I moved toward the exit. Others were doing the same. Cellphones were buzzing everywhere as key base personnel got their recall notices. That’s what made it all real to me.

Something was coming. It was probably still out in space—but it was hard to know.

“Look at that!” called one of the patrons when I reached the door.

I paused and craned my neck, letting others crowd in front of us.

The restaurant had big screens all over above the booths and tables. A news bulletin had cut into the various ballgames and commentaries.

There, displayed on a dozen screens, I saw rifts. There were at least six of them, visible in the night sky.

That made my guts churn. Multiple rifts appearing close to Earth? We hadn’t seen that kind of activity since the Rebel Kher had come here to recruit the first crews to join the fleet. It was kind of a shock to see it now.

I straight armed the door and dragged Mia to the parking lot. My phone was going crazy, so I answered it as I was backing out.

We weren’t on the base, we were down in Colorado Springs. The drive back up to the mountain was going to be a challenge, as thousands of others were trying to make the same run with just as much urgency as I was.

“Blake?” a familiar voice barked out of my phone.

“Here, Admiral.”

It was Vega. He was all business, which confirmed things were just as bad as they looked.

“Get your tail into my mountain, pronto.”

“I’m down in Colorado Springs, sir,” I said.

“What?”

“You gave me the night off, remember? I just got back from a month of—”

“I don’t give three shits about that, Blake. Hold on… Okay, I’ve got your coordinates. Just sit tight where you are. Don’t move.”

“What’s happening, Admiral?” I asked, but the call had ended.

Mia was looking at me with those big cat-eyes of hers.

“What’s happening? What did he say?”

“I don’t know,” I told her. “We’re supposed to sit right here. He’s sending someone to get us.”

“But… what’s going on, Leo? You just got home. I don’t want you to leave again!”

I reached out a hand and patted her arm. “That won’t happen. I’m sure of it.”

She didn’t even call me a liar. She squirmed around in her seat, looking in every direction at once. Then she pointed upward, through our sunroof.

I followed her gestures and cries, and my eyes widened as well.

Rifts. They were opening right above us.

They couldn’t be anything else. The night sky in the mountains, on a cloudless night, made the stars look almost as big and bright as they did in space itself. The rifts were bright ovals of spinning color, holes in the heavens.

“Leo, they’re coming to attack here,” Mia said in a whisper.

I looked at her, then back up at the spinning swirls of color. She could very well be right. If they were coming after China, on the far side of Earth, we wouldn’t have seen any rifts at all.

Or… I thought to myself, generating an even grimmer alternative, they could be spinning up rifts all around the planet.

We both stared, gaping at the night sky, when it was suddenly blotted out.

We yelped in surprise. It was involuntary.

After a panicked moment, I realized a small floating craft had come to hover over my car. It was like a helicopter, but there were no blades chopping the air. The vessel was sleek and silent.

We’d recently managed to construct some atmospheric craft that operated like those that the more advanced Kher societies had. Using antigravity systems, we had a few air-shuttles that could glide anywhere. They were still rare, of course, but we had more than our share of these prototypes here at Cheyenne Station.

“It’s okay,” I told Mia, who was scrabbling at the door handle. “They’re here for us, to take us to the Mountain.”

This time, when they tried to kick Mia out, I wasn’t having any of it. They didn’t argue much and transported us to the vault entrance directly. It was a good thing too, as it would have taken at least an hour to fight past that long line of brake lights leading up the winding mountain roads.

About three minutes later we were in a hummer shooting down the cold tunnels into the base. Inside the mountain, I saw the vault doors closing in the rearview mirror.

Behind us, a few vehicles gunned it, squeaking their way inside.

Was that a panic? Did they know more than I did?

There was nothing to do other than hang onto the hummer and roll deeper and deeper into the ancient heart of the Cheyenne Mountain.

I managed to leave Mia in the lower security zone on the upper decks as I then scrambled down to the lower vaults. There were several security checks, but they waved me on like they knew me—which they did.

At last, I reached the War Room.

It was all-hands-on-deck down there. Clemens was there, Vega was there, and even Abrams sat sourly in the back, picking his teeth.

It was Abrams I approached first, as the two admirals were head-to-head in what looked like a heated private conference.

“They caught you eating dinner too, huh Doc?” I asked.

He flashed me a distracted glance. Suddenly, he stood and began a hand-flapping walk. To me, he looked like a rooster who was about to crow at the dawn.

“This makes no sense. We drove them off. We frightened them. Why would they dare strike us again, ten times as hard?”

I shrugged. “There’s no accounting for Kher psychology. Maybe we embarrassed Fex, and he has to put us down in order to keep his position.”

“Put us down? Like unwanted animals?”

“Exactly like that.”

Huffing and hissing, he went into another chicken dance, so I wandered off, losing interest. I grabbed Vega’s elbow.

“Oh, there you are Blake. It’s about time.”

“Sorry sir. I’ll come quicker for the next apocalypse.”

He stared at me coldly for a moment. “Joking again? Right past the graveyard?”

“It’s the best way, sir,” I said.

“Never mind. I’m just worried.”

Pointing at the rifts, I nodded. “I can see why. What do you know that the rest of us don’t?”

“Not much,” he admitted. “We’re arguing about our first response. Clemens wants to launch missiles now, apologize later. I want to wait for their ships to show up first.”

I cringed a little. “That’s a tough call. This doesn’t look like a social visit—but do we really want to fire first?”

“Clemens does. Go talk to him.”

Taking the invitation seriously, I walked over to Clemens.

He stood ramrod straight in a little alcove that overlooked the War Room operators and screens. The whole place was still shiny and new, but it had already seen more action than the old one ever had back in the Cold War days.

I stood at his side and cleared my throat. “Sir?”

“What is it, Blake?” he asked in an acid voice.

“I just wanted to see what I could do to help, Admiral.”

He sneered at me briefly. “You’ve done quite enough from the looks of things.”

I glanced at him in surprise. “Are you suggesting I brought this mess back with me from the stars?”

He pointed at a new rift as it opened in the western sky. It was low on the horizon and half obscured by the mountain peaks.

“There’s another one. This is doomsday, Blake. Don’t you see that? And did it somehow fail to penetrate your brain that this is happening exactly twenty-four hours after you returned from a month of marauding?”

“We weren’t exactly performing a series of Viking raids out there, sir. We delivered our bomb and managed to come home.”

He peered at me. “That’s another mystery. You weren’t supposed to come home—surely you knew that Blake. No? How could you be so naïve?”

I thought that over, and I nodded. “I guess, in a way, I did know. It was a one-way trip. A suicide mission.”

“Exactly,” he said, pointing a skinny pink finger at the screens. “But no. Somehow, you escaped your fate and goaded the entire galaxy into a murderous rage.”

“Um… No news as to who is lighting up these rifts?”

“Nothing. Admiral Vega has implored me to hold our fire—but I’m of the opinion we might as well go down snapping and biting. Don’t you agree, Blake?”

“If it comes to that, sir, I’ll sink my teeth into whatever comes at us.”

Clemens sucked in a breath and released it. He seemed to relax fractionally.

“I must shoulder some of the blame for this imminent doomsday,” he said. “After all, I sent you out there. If I hadn’t wanted Earth to be represented by a madman, I should have sent someone else.”

“Well… sir… maybe we shouldn’t panic quite yet.”

He glared at me. “I’m not panicking Blake. I’m being realistic and bitter. That’s an entirely different state of mind.”

“Of course, Admiral. Of course.”

=43=

Despite our worries, no ships emerged from the rifts for hours. This wait was disturbing in and of itself, adding to the general mood of malaise in the War Room.

“Six long term rifts…” Admiral Vega said when Clemens took a break.

He stood at my side in the overseer’s alcove. The small railed stage felt like a convict’s docket today.

“It has to be Fex, then,” I said, “unless someone else has developed the technology to create rifts that spin for days.”

“Yes…” Vega said. “That’s right. Also, I’ve been reminded that this pattern fits our previous experiences. The first time the long term rift appeared, it spun out there for quite a while before Fex sent his fighters through to attack. I’d forgotten that.”

“A limitation of the technology, perhaps?”

Vega looked at me sharply. “You aren’t suggesting we counterpunch first, are you? Do you honestly think we should fire missiles and whatever ships we have through those rifts to blacken the eye of the coming enemy?”

I thought that over. It had occurred to me.

“No,” I said at last. “It’s too risky. There must be a reason Fex doesn’t come through right away. Maybe these longer term rifts take time to stabilize. If we send ships into them now, they’ll probably be lost.”

Vega grumbled and stared at the rifts. “The suspense is killing me. I wish they’d get it over with.”

“They will, sir,” said a voice behind us. “They will soon enough…”

We turned and frowned together at the intruder. She was an ensign—and she was supposed to be dead.

“Ensign Costa?” Vega barked. “What are you doing down here? I don’t believe you have clearance for—”

My hand came up, and I pressed it against Vega, holding him back as he approached the girl.

It was Godwin, of course, and she was smiling that knowing, superior smile the alien always wore.

“Let me handle this, Admiral,” I said.

Glowering and giving me strange looks, he stepped aside.

“This way, Ensign Costa, please,” I said, leading the way to the exit.

“Oh… of course,” Vega said behind me. “You know her… Why am I not surprised?”

Had his tone been a trifle bitter? I thought that it might have.

When I had Godwin off by herself, I turned to face her.

“What are you doing here, Godwin? Gloating?”

“I’m here to help,” she said. “I’m always here to help.”

“I don’t believe that. Come on, tell me whatever you came to say. I’m kind of busy.”

I gestured toward the glimmering rifts that dominated every screen.

“Ah, of course, I won’t keep you. But I thought you might want to know the Imperials have taken an interest in this event.”

I blinked slowly. “The Imperials? How so?”

“They’re monitoring unusual disturbances in the space-time medium. This event is a major disturbance. Fex isn’t performing a small-scale experiment. He’s doing something rather overt, don’t you think?”

My eyes narrowed with suspicion. “What are you guys up to?” I demanded. “You’re not here to help anyone other than yourselves—you never are.”

“That’s not the question you should be asking,” the Nomad said. “You should be asking me how you can keep your species from becoming abruptly extinct.”

“That’s what you want us to focus on, but all right. Give me your pitch.”

She offered me a device. It was a simple affair, nothing more than a clock with a timer running down on it.

“Here,” she said. “When either Fex or the Imperials arrive, press this button. The timer will reset, and I’ll come soon thereafter.”

“Why don’t you just stand around waiting for them yourself?”

She waggled a finger at me. “I’m not well-liked by these people. One or the other of these groups are about to become your new masters, so you should listen closely. You’ll press this button, and I’ll come back to negotiate with them on your behalf.”

Every internal alarm my brain had was going off by this point, but I forced a smile.

“All right,” I said. “I’ll do it. Thanks a bunch, Godwin.”

She smirked with half her mouth. “Until we meet again,” she said.

Then, she melted away to nothing on the stone floor. I never got over that when a Nomad did it right in front of me.

Carrying the clock like it was a nuclear device—which I half expected it might be—I returned to Vega and got him to come to the conference room and consult with Abrams.

Dr. Abrams complained about being taken away from studying the forming rifts until he saw the timing device, at which point he became curious.

“What’s this?” he demanded.

“That’s what I’m hoping you’ll tell us, Doc,” I said.

I laid out the sequence of events that had resulted in the arrival of the device, and he went to work examining it immediately.

“I want to take it down to my lab,” he said. “This artifact is more than it seems to be.”

“You’ll have to work here,” Vega said. “We can’t chance removing it. There might be a diplomatic incident.”

Abrams snorted rudely and flicked a finger in the direction of the rifts spinning overhead. “I would say we’re past such worries, Admiral.”

“Here, Doc. Work on it here.”

Abrams grumbled, but he quickly assembled a squad of lab coats. They went to work in the conference room. Within minutes his people had taken over the entire room.

Not long afterward, a ship did finally arrive—but it didn’t emerge from any of the six long term rifts.

Instead, another rift appeared near the Moon. It was a very large rift, bigger than any of the others. A moment after it appeared, a single, sleek, monstrously large ship slid into existence.

The sheer size of it was shocking. We’d never seen such a vessel. It was bigger than a battleship and bigger than a carrier. It seemed to belong to an entirely different class of ship, one that we’d yet to encounter.

Our hearts sank as we scanned her.

“It’s a warship, sirs,” Commander Langston declared a few minutes later. “There’s no doubt of it. She has missile tubes, weapons projectors, railgun pods on swiveling turrets, plus other weaponry we can’t even identify.”

“Blake?” Vega called out. “Do you think this is the right time?”

“For what, sir?”

He looked at me. “To press that button. To contact Godwin. Didn’t that bastard describe a scenario exactly like this just an hour ago?”

I looked at him, and I thought it over.

Turning, I walked to the conference room and straight-armed the door. A few nerds skittered away.

“Abrams? Doc? Have you got anything on that box yet?”

“Not much,” he admitted. “There is no trace of explosive residue or leaking radiation. It’s not emitting any signals either—but I think it’s capable of doing so.”

“And the timer? What’s that about?”

Abrams shrugged helplessly. “Do you want me to take it apart? I can’t determine much more without doing so. The box resists x-rays, sonics and magnetic imaging systems.”

As we watched, the timer continued. I’d half-expected the spinning numbers to freeze when the big ship appeared—but they hadn’t. There were several more hours yet to go.

We stared at the box, uncertain.

“Don’t do anything other than scan it…” I said thoughtfully. “Don’t disturb it. Whatever you do, don’t touch the activation button on top. Don’t even get close to that.”

“All right, all right. We’re not amateurs here, Blake. You don’t need to—”

He would’ve said more, but I’d let the door swing shut again.

I returned to Vega’s side with a very concerned expression on my face.

“Well?” Vega asked. “What form is our doom to take today, Blake? That big ship is lurking out there, rolling toward Earth. She’s coming at us slowly, but we’ve got no hope of stopping her.”

“Do you mind, sir,” I asked, “if I make another diplomatic effort on Earth’s behalf?”

He winced in pain. “That’s not feasible, Blake. Our people from the central government are already bombarding that monster with a thousand messages. Everything is bouncing off that iron leviathan. There’s been no response.”

I shrugged. “Then there’s no harm if I give it a try then, is there?”

“How would you proceed?” he asked suspiciously.

“I’d like to take Devilfish out there to parley with the big ship. I’ll meet her in open space before she reaches orbit here.”

“How would you get up to Devilfish in time to—”

I smiled. “Devilfish has a transmat receiver aboard. Remember, sir?”

He made a face then sighed. “I don’t think Clemens would approve, but he’s not on deck right now. He’s probably finding a nice thick beam to hang himself… All right, Blake. Go up there and talk to them—whoever they are.”

“Oh, I know who they are, sir,” I said confidently. “But I don’t know if they’ll listen.”

Heading to the transmat station, I was disintegrated like a bug in a zapper. A few moments later, I was reconstructed aboard Devilfish.

Pulling rank relentlessly, I made my way to the bridge. Many of the crewmen seemed glad to see me.

“Welcome aboard, Captain. The crew’s spirits will be lifted. These are dark days, sir, dark days…”

“Glad to be back,” I said. I marched past spacers and surprised officers alike.

When I got to the bridge, Hagen was shocked to see me.

“Captain Blake? When did you get back from your—ah—mission?”

“Recently,” I said. “I’m sorry about this, Hagen, but I’m resuming command of Devilfish.”

He stared at me for a long second, but then he got up and stepped aside without a word.

I settled into my old command chair, and I had to admit, it felt good to be there.

“Are we about to die, sir?” Hagen asked me quietly.

I glanced up at him and nodded slowly.

“Possibly, Hagen. Quite possibly…”

=44=

Taking my tiny cruiser out of Earth’s orbit, I approached the monstrous ship at a gentle pace. I hoped our cautious demeanor would prevent our action from being misconstrued as hostile.

Even so, there was no way two warships can approach one another without trepidation.

“Those lower turrets are locked on us, sir,” Chang said. “They’re tracking perfectly.”

“Dalton,” I said, “pull up alongside her, about twenty thousand kilometers off her flank.”

“That’s pretty close, sir,” he complained. “At that range, we won’t get much warning if she fires on us.”

I gave a single grunt of laughter. “If she fires on us, Dalton, it’s not going to matter how much warning we have.”

He steered Devilfish onto a parallel path. We shadowed the massive vessel as it crept closer to Earth.

“You know, sir,” Hagen said. “She’s not acting like she cares about us much. She’s headed toward those rifts.”

“Or to Cheyenne Mountain,” I said, “that’s directly below the rifts, remember? It will be directly above Earth’s base of operations planet-side.”

“Right…”

We continued shadowing, but eventually the bigger ship braked and came to a full stop. We matched her.

“She’s scanning the rifts, sir,” Chang said. “Pinging away like crazy on every known wave length.”

“Let her…” I said. “She’s curious about those rifts. Now, everyone shut up. I’m going to try something.”

Closing my eyes, I engaged with my sym.

I ran an old program using a data set I hadn’t employed for years, not since the early days when I’d first met up with Imperial vessels long ago.

At first, the big ship ignored me and continued with its careful scans. But eventually, someone’s board must have lit up with security warnings.

A transmission came in our direction. A single sensor array had been turned away from the rifts and toward our cruiser.

“She’s pinging us now, sir!” Samson called out.

“Relax,” I said. “Let her do it.”

“A bears licks you before he bites,” Samson muttered.

I almost opened my eyes and laughed, but I managed to keep my focus. Tuning out my crew, I dug deeper.

Finally, someone aboard the huge ship got tired of my hacking attempts.

“Unauthorized entry attempts detected,” a person said, visually appearing on our screens. “Cease and desist, or be destroyed.”

The person in question was long of limb and almost human in appearance. It was a female, with a sharp nose and piercing eyes.

I’d seen her kind on many occasions. She was an Imperial officer.

“Greetings,” I said calmly. “We’re merely curious about the reasons for your visit here. If we can do anything—”

“Stop hacking our coms array, or we’ll destroy you, Human.”

“I will stop immediately,” I said, and I did. “Can we help you in any way?”

“Help us? You’re an insect—no, that’s incorrect. An insect can be useful at times. This conversation is at an end.”

This was typical of Imperials. They weren’t easy-going, reasonable, or courteous. They were arrogant and dangerous, utterly sure of their superiority.

Unfortunately, they were usually right about that last part.

“That’s too bad,” I said. “We’ve been studying these long term rifts that you seem interested in, and we’ve learned a lot about the phenomena. I was hoping we could share data, but if there’s no reciprocal interest—”

“Shut up, beast,” the woman said. “You will stay on this channel. You will wait until commanded to speak again.”

The screen dimmed, but didn’t go blank. A moment later, it brightened again. We’d been transferred to another female Imperial.

This time, the officer was more regally appointed. She had jewels adorning her left cheek on hanging strands. Her eyes glittered at me.

Those eyes traveled over every crewmember she could see in range of our pick-up. They were intelligent, lovely—and evil-looking.

“I was told you beasts were confessing your crimes and begging for mercy. Speak.”

I blinked once, but caught myself. I forced a tight smile.

“I’m Captain Leo Blake,” I said. “To whom do I have the honor of addressing?”

“You haven’t answered my question. Is this due to insolence, or stupidity?”

“I’m sorry, sir,” I said. “I will assume you are the captain of your vessel. In reference to your previous statements, there seems to be some miscommunication. We’re neither confessing nor begging—we’re sharing information about our mutual enemies.”

“Insolence, then,” she said. “I will tolerate your continued existence for a short period in case you’re capable of relating valuable data—which I doubt. I am Captain Thalia. Proceed.”

“Captain Thalia, can I assume you’re here to investigate these odd long-lasting rifts?”

“You offend us by restating the obvious.”

“I apologize, Captain,” I said, maintaining my pasted-on smile. “May I ask how you became aware of these unusual rifts?”

“Space-time is a pseudo-liquid medium. Sustained ripples reach farther than brief ones. We’ve been hunting for the source of these unusual signals for months.”

“Thank you for enlightening us on that point. Perhaps I can explain further. We’ve been in contact with beings that have amazing technology. They’re capable of spinning these long term rifts from their home system, and—”

“Your statements are self-evident, human,” Thalia interrupted, “as I doubt your kind possesses the required intellect to develop such a significant breakthrough in transdimensional systems. For this reason alone, we have not yet demolished your planet.”

I ignored the grunts and whispers of dismay that filled the bridge.

“Very wise, Captain,” I said evenly. “Are you interested in capturing members of the species who created this technology?”

For the first time, I got her undivided attention.

“Yes.”

“Excellent. I think I can arrange it. Further, I’ll attempt to get you a sample unit, a projector that creates these unusual rifts, for your study.”

Captain Thalia shifted in her chair. Her demeanor had changed from that of someone who was barely interested to intense predatory alertness. She stared at me as a cat might stare at a nibbling mouse.

“Elaborate, human.”

I did so, and Thalia listened. At times, she scoffed and sneered. At other times, she flatly refused and had to be coaxed further.

But in the end, she gave into my demands—or at least, she pretended to. It was hard to know which, but in the past when I’d had dealing with Imperials, they had kept their word in important matters.

I sincerely hoped they’d continue to act in an honorable fashion today.

=45=

As a first step in our negotiations, we agreed to a face-to-face meeting with the Imperials. Heading down to the transmat booth, my crewmembers made it clear they thought I was insane.

“Blake, you’re going too far,” Hagen told me. “As much as I’d like to take command of Devilfish again—I don’t want to do it like this.”

“It’s too bad about your premature death, mate,” Dalton said. “You only just got back here.”

I looked at Dalton. “I’m not in the grave yet, helmsman.”

He shrugged. “You know me, I’m always looking ahead.”

Samson waggled a handful of dollars in Dalton’s face, and the pilot snatched at them. Samson yanked the money away.

“Let’s see your green,” Samson said. “I’ve got a thousand on Blake.”

“Even odds?”

“That’s right.”

Dalton grinned and gave me an apologetic nod. “I’ve got to take that kind of money. You understand, don’t you Captain?”

“Of course,” I said, with my teeth clenched.

These two had never stopped fooling around since I’d first met them. They were a morbid pair of thugs with semi-criminal pasts. Several years in Earth’s space service still hadn’t completely civilized them.

They both put up cash and dictated their bet to Chang. He was the only man on the bridge that everyone trusted implicitly.

Hagen smiled with half his mouth as he followed me down to the transmat chamber.

“How are you betting, Hagen?” I asked him.

“What? Me sir? I’m going with Samson’s side on this one.”

“Really?” I asked. “I’d thought after hearing all your objections that you might be on Dalton’s side of the fence.”

He shook his head. “No way. That’s a loser’s bet.”

While we spoke, I talked to the transmat operator. The girl looked startled, but she set the coordinates the way I requested anyway.

“Glad to hear that at least you have faith in me, Hagen,” I said as I backed into the transmat.

I wasn’t disintegrated instantly as the operator hadn’t gotten the synch-up signal from the receiving booth yet.

Hagen blinked at me. “Oh… well sir, in the interests of complete honesty, I’m only betting on you because I can’t lose.”

“How’s that?”

“Well, if you don’t come back we’re all screwed, so I won’t have to pay-up. If you do pull this off, as unlikely as it seems, I’ll gain some cash on the side. You see? A no-lose proposition.”

He looked pleased with himself, but it was my turn to frown. “I see.”

“Ah now, don’t go off on a bad note, Captain. I—”

I never heard the rest of his apology. The transmat hummed, and I heard the first half of that split-second bug-zapping sound.

Just like that, I was dismantled and transmitted to the Imperial warship.

A moment later, I looked around in wonderment. I wasn’t in a traditional transmat booth. I was in a cage of sorts instead. There were no bars, but an enclosure of force surrounded me. I could see it. It was a transparent zone that warped my vision as my sight passed through it.

Outside the force wall, a group of Imperials stared with mild curiosity. Their faces and bodies were slightly distorted and seemed to undulate in a slow, methodical fashion. All this was due to the force field enclosure.

“I’m Captain Leo Blake,” I announced evenly. “Which of you is Captain Thalia?”

The group stared at me. There were two women in the center and four armored males surrounded them. The Imperial society was a matriarchal one, with most of the males serving in subservient roles as ground-troops and enlisted crewmen.

The women did all the technical work and served universally as officers. I wasn’t sure if these arrangements were due to true cognitive differences in the sexes or cultural norms.

Effectively, it didn’t matter to me, so I’d never asked them about it. Invariably, when I dealt with Imperials, my sole concern was survival.

The force field vanished after several long seconds. During this process, they didn’t ask me any questions or speak among themselves. Instead, they used instruments to scan me. When they were satisfied I’d come unarmed as agreed, they let me out of my glass box and ushered me out of the transmat chamber.

When I say “ushered” I mean I was hustled out between two figures wearing power-armor. Both the males and females among the Imperials were characteristically tall, thin and slight. These individuals were no exception.

In order to accentuate their poor physical strength and combat abilities, the males often wore powered, exoskeletal suits that interpreted their movements and accentuated them. Every movement they took, whether gripping my biceps with crushing force or clanking along down their lengthy ship’s passages, was done with careless strength.

It had been a long time since I’d been a prisoner of the Imperials. The experience was bringing back memories every moment—none of them pleasant.

When we at last reached the bridge, I was held by two of the males. Ahead of me, I could see Captain Thalia as she prowled her impressively cavernous bridge. She seemed to be circling the place, checking every operator’s station.

They were all scanning the six long term rifts, taking in countless readings. They’d been honest about that much, at least. They were very interested in these unusual phenomena.

At last, Thalia made her way around the enormous deck and took notice of me.

“Captain Thalia,” I said. “Thank you for your hospitality.”

It was a sarcastic jibe, but it seemed to go right over her head.

“Human…” she mused, reading off a chart. “ My data-cube has an unusually high number of entries with your identifier associated. Did you know you’re infamous, Captain Blake?”

“Me in particular? Or are you speaking of my entire sub-species?”

“Both,” she said. “Did you or did you not have associations with one Lael, Imperial Captain, lost two years ago?”

I almost squirmed, but I managed to contain myself.

“That name does ring a bell…”

“It should,” she said, flipping through a long-ass looking report. “According to our subsequent investigation, Lael died on Earth.”

She looked up at me expectantly.

“Uh…” I said. “That’s true. The same enemy who killed her, however, is plaguing both of us now.”

“Right now, the only entity that’s of concern to me is you. I’ve already logged the capture using our deep-link, and I hope to be commended for it.”

“Hold on,” I said. “What about our deal?”

“Deal? We do not deal with Rebel Kher at all, in most instances, and certainly not with pirates like you.”

“Hold on,” I repeated. “I want to show you something.”

She frowned suspiciously. “Show me what?”

“There’s a data chip in my front pocket. Could you have one of your walking refrigerators fish it out for me?”

She ignored my suggestion and stepped forward. Without a qualm, she dug in my front pocket. It was all I could do not to squirm.

At last, she pulled the data chip out and held it up.

“This seems small for a bomb,” she commented.

“Scan it,” I said.

“We already have. It must have a virus on it, since it’s not a physical threat. That would make sense as you began this encounter with a hacking attempt.”

The Imperials were nothing if not paranoid. I pasted on a smile and kept my voice even in tone.

“I’m so sorry, Captain, if there have been misunderstandings. We weren’t hacking, but only trying to gain your attention.”

“You should be pleased then, human. You have succeeded. You have our undivided attention.”

Thalia handed off the chip to another of her sidekicks who bore it away as if it was made of deadly plutonium. Then, Thalia turned back to me.

“I would remind you, Captain, of our agreement. I’m here to cooperate on this joint venture.”

“So far you’ve produced nothing but irritation.”

“I’m sorry, Captain. If you’d just allow the data on that chip to—”

“I find this situation hard to credit,” she said, beginning to pace in front of me. “I’m a vaunted captain of a super-massive from our primary fleet. Why aren’t you overawed?”

“A super-massive? Is that what you call this class of vessel?”

She shrugged. “Yes. They aren’t that uncommon in the important parts of the galaxy. Out here, I imagine, they’re quite rare. But none of that matters. What you should be asking yourself, human, is why such an important ship would come to Earth at all.”

“Um… why are you here, Captain?”

“We are here because there are inexplicable signals coming out of this system. There are signals in space-time that represent a possible existential threat to my civilization. We must determine how you gained this technology.”

“We don’t have it. We’re victims of its usage, that’s all.”

She squinted at me. “You resemble a true Kher far too much, primate. I don’t like it. Your similar appearance to a true-blood is offensive.”

“Uh… sorry, Captain.”

Thalia waved away my words and turned to a tech, who was returning with my chip in her hands. It looked to be partially melted.

“You destroyed it?” I demanded.

Thalia looked at me sharply. “Silence,” she said, and she turned to her tech. “Play the stream.”

A suspended tank of force fields and gases glowed into life. Inside the globular visual tank I saw the stream from the chip I’d brought along playing, and I relaxed to see it. At least they hadn’t ruined my sole piece of evidence.

What played was a series of recent clips of Godwin’s intrusions. He was shown in various forms and guises.

At first, the Imperials seemed restless. They didn’t get it. But when Godwin faded away to a stain on the carpet, they gasped.

“A Nomad!” Thalia demanded, turning to me and stepping close.

The two guards who still had my arms in their grippers squeezed reflexively. I knew that was going to bruise, but I didn’t make a sound.

“Exactly, Captain,” I said. “Watch now as the creature makes its most recent appearance.”

Leaning hard on a metal railing, Thalia watched the tank. Disguised as Ensign Costa, Godwin delivered the mysterious device and admonished me not to press the button until the Imperials arrived.

This caused a furor on the bridge. The Imperials had always been highly paranoid about the Nomads.

“We should never have created those creatures,” Thalia said. “All of this makes sense now. The Nomad used you as pawns to lure us here—to demonstrate its technology and trap us!”

“Um… I don’t think that’s—” I began, but she wasn’t listening.

“Helm!” she shouted. “Come about, leave orbit! We’re in mortal danger!”

The ship slewed around and became very noisy. I tried to get Thalia’s attention again, but she wasn’t interested.

With true worry in my heart, I realized I’d lost control of the situation—if I’d ever had it to begin with.

=46=

Captain Thalia of the Imperial super-massive was in a state of near panic. She clearly believed she was in the jaws of a trap—with me playing the star role as the wretched bait.

The ship turned around and moved away from Earth, away from the spinning rifts. No one was listening to me, so I stopped trying to call attention to myself. Hopefully, when nothing untoward happened, cooler heads would prevail.

Unfortunately, events spun further out of control with every passing moment.

The rifts glowed brighter. All six of them.

The timer, I thought.

Looking up at the glowing imagery in the holotank, I watched as the Imperials replayed the final scene. Godwin appeared, holding that box. She showed me the function of it, the button and the spinning numbers.

I squinted to see the values. They were going down, as before. But how long ago had that been? Hours, at least. Could the timer on the box be down to all zeroes by now?

I should have known the answer to that question, but I’d been so concerned with the appearance of a super-massive hostile warship over Earth, I’d kind of forgotten about Godwin’s box.

Where was that box, still on the conference table near the War Room? I suspected it remained there, counting down…

Until about now.

“Something’s coming through those strange rifts, Captain,” a staffer warned.

Thalia showed her teeth. “Give me some distance. This could be a trap. Those rifts—what’s that?”

An outpouring of ships erupted. Six vessels, heavy cruisers all, orbited above my beloved homeworld.

My heart sank. How could I hope Earth would escape this conflict unscathed? All told, our navy wasn’t a match for either the huge Imperial ship or this new squadron of invaders.

“Identify those ships!” Thalia demanded.

“Nothing valid is coming up… they’re Rebel Kher, best guess.”

Captain Thalia nodded. “Or Nomads,” she said, “masters of disguise and subterfuge.”

I thought she was being paranoid—even for an Imperial. To me, they looked like Fex’s ships. Same size, same configuration… Yes, it was almost certain.

But no one was asking me.

“How long until the generators can produce a fresh rift?” Thalia demanded.

“At least eight minutes, sir. If we drop our shields, that is.”

That surprised me, but not too much. A ship as large as the one I was aboard now would take a monstrous rift, which meant a monstrous release of power. Such a thing took time to build up and control.

“It’s too late to run, then,” Thalia said, her voice dropping and becoming calm again. “Come about to face the enemy. We can’t allow them to rake our stern. Forward shields, up. All gun ports open.”

At last, she turned toward me. She peered at me malevolently. “I’m not sure what part you play in all this, Blake. But you’d better hope we can’t destroy all these ships. If I survive long enough, I’ll make your final hours a living hell of torment!”

I almost made a loud retort at that moment, but somehow I managed to keep my mouth shut.

Quite possibly, Fex was about to attack Earth. In that case, I wasn’t going to allay the fears of these Imperials. If this Imperial super-massive ship distracted Fex—great. I wanted this ship to fight with Fex’s armada. If that happy event occurred, I’d take my torture and count myself an unsung hero.

Following Thalia’s orders, the super-massive swung around and glided back toward Fex’s flotilla.

Already, the fireworks were going off above my homeworld. Missiles flew, and they were met by counter-missiles and automated defense beams. Explosions lit up the shielding on the Kwok ships which seemed intent on Earth herself.

Our own ships closed in on their flanks, but they seemed to be moving too slowly. Maybe Vega was playing it dangerously, hoping the Imperials and the Kwok would engage. If they did so before…

“No!” I gasped.

The first missile had struck Earth. I could see the flash, the expanding fireball. Soon a mushroom cloud rose up into the upper atmosphere.

Another strike flashed, and another. They were hitting dead center over North America—the Midwest.

“They must hate these humans as much as we do,” Thalia reflected. “The best moment to strike them is now, while they are engaged by the human defenses.”

Still, she hesitated.

I thought of a dozen ploys to get Thalia to attack. I could lie about Fex and his intentions—but I’d already feigned a lack of knowledge about them. Finally, I struck upon a plan.

“The better part of valor, is that it?” I called out loudly.

The grippers that had clamped onto my arm squeezed painfully, but I ignored the pinch.

Thalia turned toward me with a frown. “What was that, human?”

“It’s an Earth idiom. Running away, avoiding battle, such tactics are acceptable—under certain circumstances.”

She began to frown, and she stepped toward me. Her hips swung dangerously as she walked.

“Are you suggesting our observation at a distance is due to cowardice?”

“Not exactly,” I said, “it might look that way to any outside observer, of course. But you’re simply waiting for the Kwok to finish off Earth, if I’m not mistaken. Perhaps we can take down a ship or two of theirs with our missiles…”

“Where’s your fleet, human?” she asked. “Where is it hiding?”

I shrugged helplessly. “We have a few ships, but nothing that can face this.”

Thalia turned back toward the displays thoughtfully. “They’re annihilating your cities for no purpose? Is that it? I thought you rebels banded together when facing a superior foe.”

“We do. But there’s only your single ship here, and you’re clearly no threat.”

“No threat?” she bristled. “How dare you suggest—?”

“I meant no offense!” I insisted. “The kind of prudence you’re displaying now is often the wisest course. If we can hold them for another eight minutes, you can escape with your lives. I’m learning more about the Imperial way each passing moment as we sit here.”

Her face was dark now. Her small white teeth gleamed wetly as she showed them to me with a snarl. “I’ll have you know, human, that this vessel is more than capable of destroying that entire force!”

“If you say so,” I said, rolling my eyes and giving her a mocking smile. “That fleet out there is driven by the Kwok. They’re formidable local tyrants. Look how long their rifts last. Can Imperial ships do that? No—of course not. Perhaps that’s why you fear. It’s for the best, really…”

At the mention of the rifts and their unusual characteristics, Thalia checked my claims. They were proven out. The Imperials couldn’t create such rips in space-time, and it really bugged them to see someone else do something—anything they couldn’t match.

Thalia turned back to the displays with her hands on her shapely hips. “Gunners, target the lead cruiser. Open fire at optimal range—beams only.”

I gave a little gasp, as if shocked. “You dare so much?” I asked. “Fex might not be merciful when—”

“Shut up!” Thalia demanded, and the guards shook me.

I shut up, as my goals had been accomplished.

As soon as the super-massive got close enough, blinding bolts of power leapt out. They struck the nearest cruiser. For about three long seconds, there was a coruscating lance of radiation connecting the two ships.

Then the cruiser broke up into twisted wreckage. An odd warbling howl came out of the Imperial bridge-crew. They were cheering, I figured.

That was it for Fex and his boys. They wheeled around, Earth forgotten. They turned their guns on the monster vessel behind them.

“They’ve made a sick miscalculation,” Thalia said arrogantly. “Watch them all die, human. They ignored us, thinking us out of range—their crews are poorly trained. A super-massive outranges any heavy cruiser by an order of magnitude.”

I realized she was right. Fex must have been a fool to ignore the mammoth enemy ship approaching his flank—but then again maybe the Kwok had figured the Imperials were out of reach. They’d thought they had more time to abuse Earth. If so, they were now being harshly schooled.

“Our calculations show they won’t even reach us before we’ve destroyed them all,” Thalia continued in a proud tone. “This is just one more example of… what’s this?”

I followed her gaze, and I saw why she was frowning again. Six more heavy cruisers were emerging from the long-lasting rifts.

This time, they didn’t bother to attack Earth. They knew this massive ship was their real enemy. They spun around and approached immediately.

The bravado aboard the Imperial ship was immediately dampened. Eleven ships was an entirely different matter…

“Take out the next one,” Thalia ordered.

The big, long-range batteries cooled down and powered up enough capacitance to strike again. The second ship dodged—but still she was destroyed.

Another warbling cheer went up. But this time, it seemed to me, their cries of joy were more muted.

“Six more, Captain!” shouted a tech.

Captain Thalia began to hiss and fume. Two of the original five were gone, but still we faced sixteen more. Sure, none of the cruisers were in range yet, but they were without a doubt closing in.

“Reverse engines!” Thalia ordered. “How long until we can spin up a fresh rift?”

“Eight minutes, sir.”

“What?” she demanded, and she went to check the numbers in person.

They held up. I could have told her they would. The ship had been expending massive amounts of energy firing her big guns. Whatever was left over hadn’t built up enough to create a rift.

Thalia stared at the data, frowning fiercely.

I knew what she was thinking. I knew she was considering what I would have thought in her shoes: she pondered sounding the retreat.

If the big ship wheeled and ran now, she could build up some power and keep out of range of those angry cruisers. With luck, we’d escape unscathed.

She didn’t want to do it, but it was the right move—for her, for the Imperials. It wasn’t the right move for Earth.

“Captain Thalia?” I called out loudly, interrupting the sudden quiet. “You should consider running for it, you know. There’s no shame in it. Sometimes, even an Imperial has to admit when they’ve been beaten fair and square. There’s no shame in it at all. No one will say Captain Thalia was a coward. No Rebel Kher scum will dare sing songs—”

“Silence that beast!” she screeched.

Twin explosions of pain gripped my sides—literally. The two armored men at my sides had grabbed up wads of fabric and skin, giving the flesh over my ribs a vicious twist.

I felt blood run down my sides to my legs, but I didn’t care. I kept my eye on Thalia. It was all up to her now.

She bared her teeth and stared at the approaching cruisers in hate.

“Gunner, kill another one of those insects! Crush them!”

My sides burned and throbbed, but I dared to smile. The battle was on, and the Imperials were committed.

=47=

Thalia’s ship was committed now. The enemy vessels were closing, firing in unison. There was no escape due to the fact we had to keep our shields up at full power or risk being destroyed.

The battle wasn’t playing out as a face-to-face struggle with both sides standing at optimal range and pouring fire at one another. Nor was it a battle where each side charges into the other side’s lines and breaks through due to inertia.

Instead, Thalia conducted a continuous retreat while firing. This was due to her ship’s superior range. Rather than closing in with the enemy cruisers, she wanted to withdraw as fast as possible while sniping from a distance.

The approach worked, to a degree. The enemy cruisers weren’t able to get in close—but they were still able to hit the bigger ship with glancing blows. The damage wasn’t overwhelming from any one ship, but with the remaining fourteen of them gunning for us, we weren’t getting away without taking some hits.

“Shield four is buckling, sir. Shield nine is down to ten percent. It won’t take another hit on that flank.”

“Invert the ship and maintain our withdrawal course,” Thalia ordered.

We rolled over, presenting a new side to our dogged pursuers. That way, a different section of shields and hull was made vulnerable, but the damaged region was out of reach.

The enemy cruisers kept coming. I’d felt a surge of happiness during the first minutes of the battle. I’d helped convince Thalia not to pull her ship out and run. But now, with Fex’s forces closing in, it was hard not to feel the stress of knowing we could be destroyed in the next few minutes.

The most heartening moments came when I caught an occasional glimpse of Earth in the distance. Each time I caught sight of my homeworld, it was farther away. That part felt good. At least no one was dropping bombs on my planet now. With luck, these two hostile fleets would destroy one another.

The ship shook when we took a hard strike on our fantail.

“That one got through,” I said.

Captain Thalia snapped her head around to look at me. “You sound pleased, human.”

I shrugged. “I’m not. I don’t want to die—not yet, at least.”

She walked up to me slowly, cocking her head to one side. “I don’t know what to believe. I was impressed with your bravery when I first became aware of you. You pestered my ship when you knew we could destroy your vessel in moments. But now… I’m not sure what you’re thinking. I don’t like that.”

“I’m just trying to help Earth, Captain. Those ships out there were bombing my planet. My only interest was in stopping them.”

“Ah…” she said, walking a step closer.

The super-massive shook under our feet again. The deck seemed to buckle for a moment—but then it stretched flat again. I could only imagine the fantastic stresses it was enduring while being pounded by Fex’s determined fleet.

“I understand now…” Thalia continued. “You want our two fleets to grind each other to dust. Be assured, this Imperial vessel is superior. When we destroy the last of these rebels, we’ll deal with your homeworld in a fitting manner.”

“Providing us with a victory speech and a trophy, I hope.”

She ignored my words and moved to watch the battle again.

It was intensifying. Fex was down to twelve cruisers, but they were closing in. they began to score bigger and bigger hits.

As I watched, Thalia ordered her ship to come about again, aiming far enough back to strike again with her main guns.

Hundreds of thousands of kilometers away, the oncoming cruisers saw this and began to alter their courses at random. We were far enough apart that it took a few light-seconds to reach out and strike at one another. If a ship dodged in a random pattern, it was much harder to hit.

Again, the big main batteries sang and connected the super-massive with the hounds pursing her. One of them blew up—but then everything changed.

A hundred tiny red contacts appeared all around us—then two hundred more.

“Incoming!” one of the bridge crew called out. “Brace for impact!”

I wasn’t sure if they were missiles or fighters, but they’d managed to get in close before we’d spotted them.

“Sneaky bastards!” Thalia snarled. “They waited in stealth until we fired so our shields can’t be pumped up to maximum. Shut down all weapons other than short range turrets. Power up our shields as much as possible!”

An underling dared to get her attention. “Captain…? If we shut down our primary engines, we’d have a lot of power for the shields.”

Thalia growled indecisively for a few seconds.

Outside in space, things went from bad to worse. The small contacts appeared to be fighters—stealth fighters which had managed to get in very close indeed to our huge ship’s hull.

“Kill the primary engine,” Thalia said at last. “We’ll have to fight it out.”

“But the enemy cruisers will catch up to us.”

“Don’t you think I know that? If we don’t bolster our shields, the fighters will penetrate. We have to deal with one threat at a time.”

We started cruising rather than flying under heavy thrust, and the shields brightened on every quadrant. The enemy fighters swarmed us like furious hornets, but they couldn’t get through.

A grim methodical slaughter began. The cruisers had stopped firing, fortunately, for fear of hitting their own fighters. That left the super-massive free to abuse the tiny ships that formed a tangled mass around her.

Seven minutes later, the last of them buzzed away in full retreat.

“They lost sixty percent of their number,” Thalia said pridefully. “They won’t return again after that kind of beating. Once the Rebel Kher break, they don’t come back to the front line. A lack of discipline like that will lose every battle in the end, Blake.”

I nodded. “I hope you’re right. Those cruisers are looking kind of close to us now.”

Thalia’s eyes slid back toward the screens, and she stopped boasting.

Fex and his surviving ships were on top of us and moving to encircle.

=48=

The mood on the bridge became grim. Every Imperial gunner was fighting methodically, targeting one cruiser after another and blasting them out of space—but it wasn’t going to be enough.

Already, the big ship’s shields were buckling. The outer hull of the massive vessel was being scarred by strikes that won through. A large battery of six guns on the belly of the super-massive had been knocked out.

A simulation expert stepped up to Thalia to make her final report. Her face was ashen.

“Well?” Thalia demanded. “Will we make it out of this filthy excuse for a star system or not?”

The simulation officer shook her head. “We will destroy most of them… but when they are down to five ships—maybe six—we’ll be disarmed and overwhelmed.”

“That’s it?” Thalia snapped. “No tactical ingenuity? No last-ditch defensive miracles to offer?”

The simulation officer looked surprised and blinked. “There are several such items in the report—the prognosis includes the full implementation of all of them.”

Captain Thalia threw the flapping computer sheet at the officer, who scrambled to catch it.

“Fine. Implement everything on your list. Let’s hope you’ve failed in your predictions.”

The simulation officer rushed away and relayed the orders. We soon began a sickening series of rough course changes.

Captain Thalia walked to where I still stood, clamped between her two robotic males. They’d never spoken a word to me. Perhaps their vocal chords had been determined to be superfluous.

“And here you are with your talk of glory and honor. Are you pleased now? We might have run and saved this ship.”

I shrugged. “Why do you care what an Earthman thinks?” I asked.

She came dangerously near.

“I find you oddly attractive,” she said. “You’re not like our males—you haven’t been tamed. It has an inexplicable effect on my thinking. Too bad we’ll all be dead soon.”

I smiled. “If by some miracle your war game officer is wrong, I’ll go on a date with you, Captain.”

Thalia snorted and shook her head. She paced the deck and all around us people scrambled to fight the battle. As was the case on most large facilities, the overall commander decided the big-picture strategy, but once the fighting began she was a spectator for the most part.

Soon the Rebel fleet was down to ten cruisers, then nine. On the Imperial side, the damage was mounting up. The key to the battle wasn’t for the smaller ships to destroy the super-massive outright. They lacked the firepower for a deadly single punch.

But they could snip off pieces. All the external armament was being trimmed away. Thalia had already expended all her missiles and now was down to gun turrets. These were half-gone as well, and her shields were all flickering out.

When our last offensive armament was knocked offline, the big ship would be nothing but a punching bag. Sure, we could turn tail and run, but to what purpose? The cruisers would chase Thalia’s ship down like a pack of baying hounds, shooting out her engines. In the end, she wouldn’t even be able to steer.

Suddenly, Thalia straightened her spine and swung her body around. There was a new light in her eyes.

“Helm!” she roared. “Swing around their satellite. Return to the planet, throttle full-forward. Send all the power we’ve got left to the engines and the aft shields. Ceasefire with all cannons.”

The bridge crew looked at her in shock. The pilot obeyed, however, and I felt a surge of acceleration under my feet, combined with a lateral centrifugal force. The big ship was making a slow curve, coming around our moon to aim toward Earth again.

Clearing her throat, the simulation officer approached in a wary fashion. “Captain Thalia? I’m so sorry, but this course will hasten our doom—”

“Oh really? Can we, possibly, destroy a few more of these cruisers if we stand our ground? What a pity. Well, I’ll tell you what’s on my mind, tactician: I want vengeance. I want to go out in a fashion that’s memorable, rather than ignoble.”

“I don’t understand what—”

“Of course you don’t! You know nothing of glory or how to die with style. Shall we ask this ape here what my plan entails? Come here, ask him.”

The two approached me. They were both lanky but attractive women. I’d seen their kind in clothing advertisements all my life. It was odd to be faced by such a pair at such a dramatic moment.

Captain Thalia raised her eyebrows expectantly.

I looked up at the big screens. We were coming around the Moon now, soon to be aimed back at Earth. Our velocity continued to rise, and the trip back from the Moon to Earth’s orbit would be much shorter than it had been on the way out here.

My first thought was Thalia was going to try to fly through one of the rifts that Fex had created when he’d come to assault Earth. Perhaps we could attack his homeworld by doing that.

But a quick perusal of the facts dashed that idea. First off, the rifts weren’t in front of us. They’d orbited around to the far side—or we had. Secondly, the super-massive was just too big to fit into one of those spinning breaches.

Then, at long last, I got it.

“You’re going to ram Earth?” I said. “Crashing down into a city or something?”

“Or something,” she said. “I think a better choice would be one of your deepest oceans. Why take out a single city when a tidal wave might take out a hundred?”

I stared, aghast. The simulation officer looked as horrified as I did, but for entirely different reasons.

Captain Thalia laughed bitterly at us both. “This could even be an extinction event,” she said. “If we can build up enough kinetic energy…”

I was no longer listening. I was too stunned, too sickened.

The worst part was I knew that I’d helped bring about this sequence of events. I hadn’t been satisfied knowing Fex had chased off the Imperials. No, I’d kept pushing, driving Captain Thalia to this fateful moment.

My only solace was that if Earth did perish with me, no one would ever be the wiser. My sick failure as a human was a secret the cosmos would never share.

=49=

As a veteran trickster, I was now regretting some of my life-choices. I’d gotten entirely too fancy, too fast-and-loose with reality. I’d helped change a bad situation into one that was nearly hopeless—and my homeworld was about to pay the ultimate price.

I didn’t let my state of near despair show, naturally. There was no reason to give these vicious Imperials an extra boost of pleasure.

Instead, I put on an expression of confidence and even amusement. As the final minutes passed by, this seemed to annoy Captain Thalia.

“What are you grinning about, ape?” she demanded at last. “Are you glad to die with your pathetic sub-species?”

“Sometimes, ma’am, things aren’t as they seem.”

This annoyed her to no end. She paced around me, frequently casting glances in my direction. Her kind wasn’t used to acts of cheerful defiance from a beaten enemy. Either you hissed and spat, or you groveled and begged—there were no other options in her mind.

“What could you be thinking…?” she asked herself, looking over every monitor and sensor reading.

Not long after that, she started her search for a phantom detail she’d missed. The tactical officer then made a surprising announcement.

“Captain? More ships have appeared.”

Immediately, Thalia and I swung to look toward Fex’s rifts. We saw nothing new there.

“No… behind us. The ships are small, but they appear to be engaging the rebel cruisers.”

The primary display swam sickeningly for a moment, giving us a view of this new development.

“Phase-ships?” Thalia asked in surprise. “Are those Imperial vessels?”

“No,” I said loudly and with utter certainty. “They’re our ships. Earth vessels.”

She swung her eyes to me, and her mouth was slightly ajar. I felt a surge of happiness to see the alarm in her expression. Things were happening that she hadn’t expected—and to be honest, I hadn’t expected them either.

The tactical officer came to the center of the bridge and pointed at me. “It’s my suggestion that we execute this beast, Captain,” she said.

“Why?” Thalia asked. “He’ll be dead soon enough if the simulation officer is correct.”

“Things have changed. The cruisers are being hit hard on their flanks. Another has been destroyed.”

Thalia and I both examined the data. It was true. The phase-ships were outdoing themselves. Probably, Fex had taken down his flank shields during the long chase after the super-massive, believing he needed all his power to chase down the larger ship.

“The cruisers are slowing down, engaging…” Thalia said.

She looked up at me sharply then turned toward the tactical officer. “You still haven’t explained why we should kill this clever beast.”

The tactical officer glanced down at the deck, steeled herself then met the captain’s eyes.

“He’s distracting you. Altering your judgment. It’s my belief that he may yet endanger—”

“Nonsense!” Thalia shouted. “This human is nothing to me! He’s a distraction, I admit, but his presence changes nothing. Besides… if the humans manage to destroy the other rebels for us, what’s the harm in that?”

The tactical officer compressed her lips tightly, and she said nothing more. I got the feeling that arguing with this captain might be fatal.

“Get back to your post,” Thalia ordered, and the other woman rushed away. “Helm, start braking. Come about—slowly. We’ll see if we can help these crazy humans with their task at a safe distance.”

I watched, uncertain how this battle would play out now. Earth had built over two hundred phase-ships, but they hadn’t been deployed optimally. Not knowing where the next attack might come, we’d stationed our vessels in various positions. About half of them had managed to get close to Fex’s cruisers.

But not all of those ships had been in range for that all-important opening volley. As I watched, three phase-ships were destroyed and one more of Fex’s cruisers vanished as well.

That was enough for the enemy. They spun up rifts and ran for them. The phase-ships gave chase, but they phased-out rather than going into rifts that led to unknown places.

Dumping gravity waves and braking for all she was worth, the badly damaged super-massive managed to slow down and slip into orbit over Earth.

Captain Thalia approached me in wonderment. “What’s next?” she asked. “Will this vessel be enclosed by your ghosts?”

“Maybe,” I said. “It’s all up to you.”

Thalia squinted at me like an angry cat. “We could bomb your pathetic planet, you know,” she said. “What’s to stop us from doing that?”

I shrugged and gave her a mysterious smile. That bothered her a lot. I could tell now that she didn’t trust me. She suspected she’d been set up from the beginning.

“I think there’s been entirely too much fighting and dying today,” I said. “When I came here, I did so in good faith. I offered to provide you with an example of the technology you fear so much.”

“We fear nothing!”

“Just so. Clearly, I misspoke.”

She paced around me in a tight circle, muttering to herself.

“I should abuse your neural transmitters. I would find that amusing.”

“I’m sure you would, Captain. But torture won’t solve your problems now.”

She paced some more. The next time she came around, she put her face close to mine. The two marines who had me clamped between them tightened their grips reflexively, just in case I was thinking of pulling something.

“You’ll give me an alien responsible for this mess and a sample of the technological ability to spin up long term rifts?”

“That was my original offer,” I said. “In return, we ask only that you leave our system intact.”

She paced some more, but at last, she agreed to my terms.

“Well?” she asked. “Show me!”

It was my turn to laugh. “I don’t have such things on my person. You’ll have to come down with me to our command center. We can use the transmat.”

Her suspicious eyes tracked me. She stared at me unpleasantly.

“This seems like another base trick, human. You’re attempting to lure me off my bridge so you can abuse me.”

“All right,” I said. “If you don’t want to complete this mission in person, I can certainly reveal the truth to one of your underlings. Perhaps the simulations officer—or the tactical leader.”

“No!” Thalia said after a moment’s thought. “I’ll not have such pathetic excuses for officers undermine me and take all the credit. We’ll go down to your planet—but let me warn you, human. Any illicit activity will result in total destruction.”

“That’s assumed. Shall we go?”

After mumbling distrustfully and listening to the cautionary complaints of her junior officers, she finally led me to the ship’s transmat station. We spoke with the operators, dialed up the coordinates, and prepared to depart.

There was no talk of asking Earth for permission, so I didn’t suggest it. After all, Imperials didn’t regard us as equals in any way. They didn’t care if we wanted to be visited or not. To their way of thinking, we had no right to object.

We arrived in the heart of Cheyenne Mountain moments later. A shocked group of guards turned, recognized I was with an alien, and raised their weapons.

Without compunction or hesitation, Captain Thalia used her wand on them. They dropped to the deck, paralyzed.

The primary personal device any Imperial officer carried was a short baton—so thin we called it a wand. This device was attuned to the officer and served her as a tablet or cell phone might for a human.

It was more powerful than any such ordinary device, however. It could transmit data over much greater distances, and it had offensive powers such as she’d just displayed, granting her the ability to stun unshielded Kher.

To me, it was the equivalent of my sym—but its capabilities were more direct.

“Captain!” I said, putting my hand on her elbow. “You can’t just stun everyone we meet.”

She stared at my hand coldly. “You dare to touch my person? You shall be executed after this charade has reached its conclusion.”

At that point, we’d stepped out of the transmat unit. The booths buzzed behind us and four armed males appeared.

It was clear to me at this point that Captain Thalia’s conceptualization of a diplomatic visit didn’t match my own. This was more like an invasion.

“Captain, please listen to me,” I said as the males clanked forward and secured the area. “You can’t fight through ten thousand humans—not here. The security is very tight.”

“There are traps?” she asked.

I lied without hesitation. “Yes. Tricky technological defenses everywhere.”

She licked her lips and eyed the exit. Already, alarms were ringing and there was the sound of tramping feet.

The transmat booths buzzed again. I couldn’t believe it. She was sending down more troops?

But they never arrived—at least, not in their entirety. Someone in the operations station had disconnected the transmat booths mid-transmission.

The results were grim. Twisted, steaming limbs were mixed with metal suits. Some portions of the guards appeared to be whole—but not enough to function. Within moments, the shivering, grunting forms expired.

Captain Thalia eyed her dead soldiers coldly. “I see what you mean. A nasty trick—and it will be answered in kind. If I don’t call in regularly using my wand, this entire mountain will be leveled from space.”

“And I’m sure our fleet will then catch up to and destroy your limping super-massive,” I said. “But that’s not why we’re here. The battle is over. Earth has no conflict with the Imperials. In fact, we just helped you destroy a fleet that attacked you. Notice as well that we didn’t fire upon you when you first appeared.”

Thalia sniffed, unimpressed. “The fear of a subservient isn’t love, and it won’t be returned regardless. Proceed, human. Take me through your gauntlet of traps.”

Using my sym, I contacted Admiral Vega. He didn’t respond, but passed me up to Admiral Clemens instead.

This was disappointing. It was always hard to have two bosses who were at odds.

“Blake! Where have you been? Hiding under a bed with that cat of yours?”

“No sir, not exactly. I’ll cast you a view of what I’m looking at right now.”

I sent him the input from my eyes, which could operate like cameras in conjunction with my sym.

The old man sounded like he’d swallowed something large and foul. He choked, regained his composure then began to chew me out.

“So,” he said, “you’ve finally made your peace with it and sold out Earth. I didn’t see it coming. I should have, mind you. Plenty of people warned me, but—”

“Sir, you misunderstand. Captain Thalia is here on a diplomatic mission. If we can convince her of certain truths, this struggle between our armed forces can end peacefully.”

“Diplomatic…? She’s killed two men already in the transmat station!”

“They’re not dead, sir,” I hastened to tell him. “They’re just stunned. It’s we who have slain two of her bodyguards.”

“Hmm… Well, she should have communicated her intentions. What kind of a diplomat is this woman?”

“A poor one, I’m afraid,” I said. “Imperials do not recognize us as anything other than rebellious subjects. They very seriously lay claim to this entire galaxy.”

“That’s why we build ships, Blake.”

At this point, I noticed Captain Thalia was becoming impatient. She’d moved to the door, where her guards crowded ahead of her. They peered around the corners in a paranoid fashion.

“We’re coming to the conference chamber behind the War Room, Admiral,” I announced. “Please don’t approach this delegation until we get there.”

“That’s a highly classified region of this base, Blake!” Clemens complained. “This whole damned place is off-limits, for that matter! You were a fool to bring them here at all!”

“Sir, the only thing they’re interested in is inside the conference room. If you value our planet, stand down.”

Realizing Captain Thalia wasn’t going to sit still any longer, I stepped past them and led the way. The clanking guards and the suspicious-looking Thalia followed me.

“We’ve already taken two hits to the Denver area!” Clemens shouted. “Millions are dead!”

That made me squeeze my eyes shut for a moment. I was from Evergreen Colorado, an area not far from here. My relatives might not have survived.

“Sir,” I said when I’d regained my composure, “those missiles were launched by Fex, not the Imperials. These people haven’t struck Earth—not yet. Please come down and greet us.”

Admiral Clemens seemed to snap out of it after that. By the time he met our delegation—if you could call it that—he was even able to force a thin, flat smile onto his lips.

“Greetings from Earth,” he said between clenched teeth. “Can we do anything for you?”

“Finally,” Captain Thalia said. “Appropriately servile responses. I approve. Lead us to the evidence chamber. Make your case, humans.”

Clemens slid his eyes to meet mine. He had no idea what she was talking about.

“The conference room, sir?” I prompted.

With poor grace, Clemens led us to the conference room. Armed guards watched us every step of the way, but they didn’t draw their weapons or take any other hostile actions. Apparently, Clemens had gotten the word out.

When we walked into the conference chamber, I found Vega was already there, along with Dr. Abrams.

Vega was poking at the box on the conference table, the strange artifact that Godwin had left behind. The clock on the front of it had counted down to zero, and it now blinked all zeros in glowing numerals.

“What is this thing anyway, Blake?” Vega asked. “Did we ever figure that out?”

“Please don’t touch the artifact, Admiral,” Dr. Abrams urged. “We haven’t identified its purpose yet.”

“Yes,” I said, “let’s just leave it alone for now, shall we gentlemen?”

I could tell plainly that Abrams wanted to toy with it, but the moment wasn’t quite right. He’d have to wait his turn.

“This is the artifact in question, Captain Thalia,” I said.

As I approach the box, I shoed Abrams away. He retreated reluctantly.

Captain Thalia came near, scanned the box with her wand, and frowned.

“This is it?” she asked. “You brought me down to this stinking planet to see a malfunctioning clock?”

“It’s not just a clock—at least, we don’t believe it is. This was left here by a creature we know as Godwin, a being who you would call a Nomad.”

She snapped around to look at me and backed away from the box.

“Another trap!” she said. “What’s the point, Blake? If you wish to slay me, it should be easily done. You hardly need to come up with such an elaborate ruse. Of course, you’ll pay the ultimate price in the end for this treachery, but I still fail to grasp your reasoning.”

“We’re not here to kill you, Captain,” I said patiently. “This device was left by a Nomad. He told me to press this button when the clock went to zero. At that point in time, your ship had just arrived in local space.”

Thalia frowned. “So what?”

“I think the creature in question meant the results to be surprising. As you can see, we never did press the button.”

“It’s probably some form of attack,” Thalia said. “A weapon? A trap attuned to my ship?”

“It’s hard to say,” I admitted. “But I do think I know the answer to this riddle.”

So saying, I reached out a hand and pushed the button on top of the strange cubic clock.

=50=

There were a lot of strangled cries in the room when I pushed that button. Admiral Clemens began shouting incoherently, Thalia’s guards lurched mechanically in my direction, and even Captain Thalia herself got into the act.

She waved her wand at me, trying to knock me out, but I was shielded. She even thrust her wand out to touch my cheek—it burned there as if I’d been hit by a Taser.

My teeth bared themselves, and I felt them buzz in my head. I reeled away, stunned, but I managed to knock her wand out of her grasp. She held her injured wrist and glowered with raging eyes.

The two male guards converged on me then, and we wrestled for a few moments.

I’d been tempered by a sym for many years. Such was the strength of a man like me—who’d become a personal-combat specialist over time—that I managed to put down one marine.

The second managed to get an arm-lock on me I couldn’t break.

“Captain!” I called out. “Contact your ship! Have them tell you what’s happened!”

When I was restrained, Thalia did as I asked.

“I must ask for your forgiveness, Captain Thalia,” Clemens said. “He’s unwell.”

“If my ship has been assaulted in some fashion, you’re all dead!” Thalia said loudly. She turned away, using her wand to speak to her ship.

I was impressed by the technology. We were a mile deep in the Rockies. Clearly, her comm system wasn’t using standard radio signals.

She frowned as she spoke, asked confirmation, then waited a moment longer. At last, she lowered her wand and turned toward.

“There’s a new rift,” she said. “What’s coming through it? What new kind of ambush is this?”

I smiled. My gambit had worked—so far.

“The rift probably connects to the same system the others connect to. The system Fex hails from.”

She shook her head in bewilderment. “But why create a seventh rift now? What’s the point?”

“Ask your people where the rift was generated from.”

She shrugged. “I already did. It appears to be from this mountain.”

I smiled again. Everyone else in the room was frowning. It all seemed clear to me—but possibly that was because I’d made a lifelong study of trickery and deceit.

“You see,” I said, “the Nomads wanted us to push this button when your ship arrived. That would demonstrate a new rift had been generated by Earth—from this very mountain. Your instruments would have picked up that detail, right?”

“Yes, of course.”

“Wouldn’t you have assumed at that point that all the rifts in orbit had been created by us?”

Thalia hesitated, but then she nodded. “Yes. I suppose we would have.”

I spread my hands. The guards flinched, but didn’t attack.

“There you have it,” I said. “The box was a trap for us, not for you. It was meant to blame Earth for all of this.”

Captain Thalia looked thoughtful. She had a suspicious mind to begin with, so I thought she should be able to follow this twisted logic.

“You’re saying the Nomads set all this up? They wanted us to destroy one another? Earth, Fex, the Imperials?”

“Absolutely,” I said. “They wanted your ship to die, they wanted Earth to die, they wanted Fex and his rebel ships to burn…”

“To what purpose?”

“Think: if your super-massive came here and was destroyed, would the Imperial Navy stand for that?”

“Never. They’d come here and destroy this nest of rebels.”

“Right. A new war would have been kicked off. A war in which all the regional powers are involved—except for the Nomads.”

“But this technology Fex possesses—it’s too dangerous. With a long term rift he can plague our planets just as he’s plagued yours.”

“Ah!” I said, raising a finger up high.

The Imperials all eyed my finger with great suspicion, so I lowered it. I had to remember not to make any threatening gestures.

“I believe that if you investigate further you’ll learn that Fex isn’t in control of this technology any more than we are. The Nomads gave it to him. They want us all in a war before they strike—that’s when they’ll show us their final game plan.”

“There’s no need to wait for that,” Thalia said. “We know what the artificials want. They wish to dominate the galaxy—to escape their prison and rule us all.”

I nodded, unable to argue the point.

“I’m still unconvinced, however,” Captain Thalia said, “in terms of Earth’s innocence. In our eyes, you’re all accomplices of artificial life forms.”

“A reasonable assumption, if a paranoid one,” I said. “I invite you to stand here with me and wait. I would suggest we send everyone else out of the chamber for a time. I doubt Godwin will reappear in the midst of a crowd this large.”

Captain Thalia considered, but at last she agreed. Admiral Clemens and Dr. Abrams were full of objections as well, but we overcame them at last when Thalia began to threaten Earth with wanton destruction again.

She had us over a barrel, I knew that. We could kill her, of course, but then her ship would exact revenge. The super-massive’s shields were fully powered again, and she’d begun repairing weapons turrets. I wasn’t sure if our entire navy could take her out in a fair fight.

Even if we could, there would be plenty of time left for the monster ship to bomb Earth’s cities, and none of the brass wanted that.

When we were alone in the chamber with the blinking clock, which still registered a long set of zeroes in red digits, Thalia eyed me curiously.

“You seem to rule here,” she said. “Am I wrong about that?”

“Sometimes,” I said, “a man who takes the initiative is the ruler in effect, even if he is not the ruler in rank.”

She nodded thoughtfully. “You should be executed. Your offspring should be hunted and exterminated as well.”

I blinked in surprise and began to object to her insults, but she raised her hand to stop me.

“I meant no offense,” she said. “But among the Imperials, a woman who thinks the way you do can’t be tolerated. And a male—well, such a creature would be even more unbearable. Our entire way of life would be threatened.”

I forced a smile. “Well then, you don’t need to have any such concerns. I’m Rebel Kher, not Imperial. If I’m such a cancer, you should be glad to see me inflicted upon your rivals.”

Thalia laughed, and we all relaxed a little.

At last, I heard a click as a door was quietly opened. At first, Thalia and I turned toward the exit—but that door was still sealed.

Instead, a smaller door that led to a storage closet had opened. A being stepped out, and I knew her in an instant. It was Godwin, again wearing the guise of the deceased Ensign Costa.

=51=

Godwin looked at me smugly. The creature was simulating Ensign Costa at the moment.

She ran her eyes over the scene. Those roving eyes landed on the box with the timer at all zeroes—and she began to frown.

“You didn’t activate this unit in a timely manner,” she said.

“No, you’re right,” I said. “We didn’t do so for several hours. Are you here to tell me what’s going to happen next, Godwin?”

Godwin’s eyes slid back to me. For the first time, a sliver of doubt showed on her face. Her certainty was fading.

“The rift has opened…” she said, looking away and letting her eyes unfocus.

I realized I’d often worn that look on my face as I delved into data streams. It was then, right then, that I realized Godwin could connect to our computers and sensors just as I could with my sym.

That had to be it! The ability to effortlessly invade the electronic systems of others… That went a long way toward explaining this odd creature’s source of knowledge and power.

If she’d been using Wi-Fi to connect to some server of her own, we would have detected it by now. Instead, she must be using our own technology against us. She was an artificial life form with a built-in hacking system. Advanced yes, but not inconceivably so.

For a long time, we’d wondered how Godwin had performed the seemingly mystical acts she was famous for. Now, I felt like I was beginning to grasp it all.

“You’re using our sensors, aren’t you?” I said in a tone that seemed nonchalant, as if I knew everything about her. “That won’t work perfectly right now—you see, we’ve made some alterations of our own.”

This snapped Godwin’s attention back to me. “Alterations? What’s this about, Blake? Aren’t we friends anymore?”

“Of course we are,” I said with false warmth. “Now, if you’d just answer a few questions…”

“Who is this person? Who is this…?” the doppelganger asked.

Godwin had stopped talking and stared. She seemed to be in shock now.

“The physiognomy is all wrong,” she said. “The neck is too long. The uniform—”

“Yes,” I said. “Excuse me for not introducing you. Your arrival was sudden. This is Captain Thalia. She’s a member of the Imperial Navy.”

Godwin was blown away, I could tell. She struggled to recover her usual cool exterior and continue, but her eyes kept crawling aside to stare at Thalia.

Captain Thalia, for her part, looked like a predator with a tasty victim in her claws. She wasn’t speaking, but she was salivating. It was obvious.

“An Imperial?” Godwin said. “On Earth…? In an otherwise peaceful setting…?”

“More than a peaceful setting,” I said. “We have a cooperative arrangement. In fact, we’ve just completed a hard-fought space battle together which resulted in victory.”

Godwin dragged her eyes from the Imperial and looked back at me. She blinked as if she was having trouble processing what I was saying. Under the circumstances, I thought this was understandable.

“Leo Blake,” she said, her tone suddenly forlorn. “I’m so sorry things have gone this way. We had such hopes—I regret this news of your defeat and enslavement.”

It was my turn to look momentarily confused, but I recovered quickly. Godwin was trying to sow discord between the Imperial and I—and in truth, that wasn’t going to be hard to do. We could barely stand each other most of the time.

“We’re not permanently allied—yet,” I said. “We were attacked, and we defended ourselves in unison against our assailants. If you are behind these recent events, you should know that you’ve managed to push us closer together.”

Godwin compressed her lips. “It would seem to me that you’re up to your old tricks, Blake. Blaming my people for things that you’ve done yourself, is that it?”

I knew already where she was going with this, so I thought I’d jump in and help out.

“Do you mean like forming long term rifts in far orbit?” I asked. “That was us, was it? Then we invaded our own star system, filling our local space with Kwok ships. We don’t sound very bright, if that was all due to our poor planning.”

Godwin licked her lips quickly. Her breathing seemed rapid. She was worried, and I enjoyed that. It was possibly the first time I’d ever seen any version of Godwin sweat.

“They bombed the very mountain we’re all sitting inside of right now,” I continued. “Did you know about that, Godwin?”

Godwin didn’t answer. She turned to Captain Thalia directly instead, making a surprise appeal.

“You, of all people, should be able to see through this human’s ruse,” she told the Imperial.

“What do you mean, abomination?” Thalia asked.

“Leo Blake is a very dangerous man,” Godwin said, as if I wasn’t there. “He lies. He distorts. He plays tricks. Don’t underestimate him. Look him up in your data-cube. He’s plagued your people for years, destroying many of your vessels.”

“How could a lowly rebel Kher accomplish so much?” Thalia asked.

“He’s a mule—a rare birth. We’ve even postulated he’s a mutant of some kind.”

I snorted with amusement. My laughter died when I caught the paranoid frown on Captain Thalia’s face. Could she be buying this fresh brand of bullshit?

“He is unusual…” Thalia said. “But I think that’s because he’s been serving as your unwitting tool. You’ve made him what he is. But today, the puppet turned to bite the master.”

Godwin laughed. “Sadly, we’ve been as unable to control him as you’ve been. Wait! I see it in your expression. He has plagued you, hasn’t he? Has he toyed with your mind? Manipulated you—even made an Imperial Captain into the puppet? Oh, the awful depths of your shame. It must be unspeakable.”

My heart rate was rising now. There was some kind of chemistry going on between these two that I didn’t quite get. Was Godwin drenching her with brainwaves or pheromones? I couldn’t tell, but I was suddenly worried.

“Stop influencing our guest, Godwin,” I said. “It’s rude.”

Turning to Captain Thalia, I spoke to her as if Godwin wasn’t present. “I’m a starship captain, that’s all. I fight for Earth, and I do so with honor.” Here, I stretched out a long arm and pointed at Godwin’s nose. “This creature, on the other hand, is very deceitful. This is a Nomad: A ghost that comes and goes masquerading in the form of a Kher.”

“I know what it is,” Thalia said in a voice that was almost a hiss.

“Of course you do. She’s an archenemy, an existential threat to Imperials everywhere.”

Captain Thalia turned to me and blinked. It was as if she was breaking out of a waking dream. “What you say is true…”

Godwin stood up suddenly. “Unfortunately, this meeting must come to an end. I’m glad to have made your acquaintance, Captain Thalia—”

“I’ll bet,” I laughed.

Godwin eyed me in irritation. “No need to be rude, Blake. You won this round. Enjoy your victory with grace.”

So saying, Godwin took a step toward the closet.

“She’s getting away!” I called out. “We must stop her!”

We were all on our feet now.

Godwin looked annoyed. “What are you going to do, Blake? Kill me again?” she demanded. “That’s very poor diplomatic style. You’re like a bull in a glass shop. Imperials are better mannered than that.”

As she spoke, Godwin stepped again toward the closet she’d emerged from. It still hung ajar, and it was dark inside. I knew from long experience there’d soon be nothing but a wet stain on the floor to show she’d ever been here at all.

=52=

I thought about drawing my sidearm and shooting Godwin in the back—I really did—but I didn’t do it.

Maybe that was because she looked so much like an evil version of Ensign Costa. I’d had a small thing going for that girl since I’d first laid eyes on her. To see her die a second time, but at my hands this time… that would be hard to take even when I knew it was just some mock-up created by a Nomad.

Captain Thalia had none of my qualms, however. She lifted her wand and operated it.

To my surprise, Godwin stiffened. She didn’t fall to the floor paralyzed, but she did slow her movements to a crawl.

Releasing a stream of curses in her own language that the translator boxes missed, Thalia stepped quickly around the table to where Godwin was still slowly marching for the closet door.

At first, I thought she was going to stab Godwin with her wand, but she didn’t. She tapped her instead. The wand quickly touched the back of each knee, the elbows, and the neck.

Each tap stiffened the escaping Nomad further. At last, Godwin was almost a statue. I stepped around to see her face.

The eyes were still alive. The mouth worked, and a thin white stream of liquid ran from the downturned corners.

“What’d you do to her?” I asked.

“It has been immobilized. It probably can’t melt now—it’s stuck here with us.”

Slowly, I began to grin. “You did that with your wand? We’ve tried a lot of things, but we’ve never managed to capture one of these creatures.”

“There is only one of them,” Thalia said, “taking many forms in many places. They are iterations of the same core concept.”

I blinked at that, trying to grasp it. “You mean they’re like clones?”

“Nothing like that, no,” she said. “To put it into terms a human can comprehend, they’re like apps with physical form. You can run an app more than once on a given device, can’t you?”

“Yes…”

“Think of an app that can generate a body and live in it. Destroying the app doesn’t mean it won’t run again. In fact, shutting it down won’t even keep it from remembering what it knew the last time it ran, will it?”

“No…not always. I guess I get it. Artificial life… I was thinking along the lines of a collection of cells that were generated by a machine or something.”

She shrugged as she examined Godwin. “There is always a device to spawn it, but after that, it lives on its own.”

I thought of the circlet Godwin had used a few years back to create itself over and over again. The technology was so very strange. I felt like a monkey trying to figure out a smart-phone.

“What are you going to do with her now?” I asked.

“We shall take this construction to my ship and study it. I’m in your debt, strangely enough, Blake. You helped my ship survive, and you’ve given us critical intelligence. As far as I know, none of these creatures have been captured alive for many, many centuries.”

“And still, for all that time, they’ve been somewhere in exile. Plotting to return and claim this galaxy…”

Captain Thalia gave me a strange look. “What are you prattling about?”

“That’s what Godwin explained to us. That you invented the Nomads, but came to fear them, and eventually drove them out of the galaxy.”

Thalia made a spitting sound, turning to Godwin.

The creature’s eyes were watching us. They blinked slowly, every ten seconds or so. It was an eerie thing to see.

“Is that what you told these shaved apes?” Thalia asked Godwin. “So many lies—but always with a tiny grain of truth. I suppose that makes misleading statements seem more real.”

“What do you mean?” I asked. “What are they really? Where did they come from?”

“They’re an advanced form of machine intelligence. They weren’t made by us—they made themselves. I’m not sure if they are alive or not, but existence and sentience can come in many forms. As for owning planets—no, they don’t operate that way.”

I turned to Godwin, squinting into her face. I got close, putting my face near hers and looking into her eyes.

“Why then?” I asked Godwin. “Why do you plague us so much? If you’re artificial and can live anywhere, you don’t need to compete with humans or Imperials.”

Godwin’s lips trembled, but she was unable to speak.

“They plague all the Kher,” Thalia said, “when they wish to do so. They don’t want to win back lost stars, or make friends, or anything of the kind. They wish to dominate, to possess, to control. They use their strange tricks to achieve these ends.”

“Hmm…” I said. “Godwin did tell me about having competing members of her own race that were betting against her. That they did research and influenced societies to impress one another. For status.”

Thalia shrugged. “That’s possible, I suppose. Though there are many of them, they’re all variants of a single form. Perhaps some individuals wish to prove they’re superior to all the others. Maybe this one wishes to prove that her code, her genes, or whatever it has—are superior to the rest.”

It made as much sense to me as anything else, but that wasn’t saying much. The Nomads were truly strange. They were the most odd, manipulative aliens I’d ever met up with.

They were like creatures from some dark mythical legend who liked to toy with humans. They were ancient, occasionally evil, and always filled with madness.

=53=

Captain Thalia took charge of the frozen Nomad. Her marines hauled Godwin away to the transmat.

I felt a pang, I have to admit, as I watched Godwin’s fate unfold. He, she… it…? had talked to me many times for years. I kind of felt like Godwin was almost human. Not a friend, mind you, but an acquaintance.

Clemens and Vega, on the other hand, were overjoyed to turn the Nomad over to the Imperials. To them, Godwin had been nothing less than a haunting presence. A poltergeist that wouldn’t stop plaguing humanity.

“That was the smoothest bit of diplomatic judo I’ve ever seen, Blake!” Vega told me, clapping me on the back. “I can’t believe it. Talk about killing two birds with one stone!”

He went off into a gale of happy laughter.

We followed the procession to the transmat station and watched Thalia transport her prize up to her super-massive ship.

When they were gone, Clemens approached me as well. He was beaming.

“Blake, you’ve outdone yourself. Everyone thought you were some kind of reckless maniac—but it all turned out for the best. Godwin is gone, the Imperials are withdrawing—it’s incredible.”

Admiral Vega stood near, nodding. “That’s right. Sure, we’ve got a few craters in the Rockies we’d rather not have, but after the fallout settles, we’ll be back on our feet.”

I frowned at him. “That’s right, sir… I understand Cheyenne itself was hit before I returned?”

“Yes. That bastard Fex took out Colorado Springs and a big chunk of Cheyenne Mountain. Our granite vaults held, but they’ll be digging us out for weeks. Fortunately we’ve got the transmat. We’re still in touch and in charge of Earth’s defensive network. We’ve got enough supplies to last for years if need be, and we can always teleport more in if we must.”

The scenario sounded like good news to them, but it sounded pretty horrific to me. I knew lots of the staffers and families that were located outside these thick stone walls. Some of these officers, even those in the War Room, must have lost loved ones.

I guessed the mere fact Earth hadn’t been utterly destroyed had most people smiling. We’d looked into the abyss, and the abyss had blinked. We were still around to fight another day.

Godwin, however…

The Imperials hustled the frozen form into the transmat, and I could have sworn that those alien’s eye sought mine.

Did she/it make a plaintive appeal in that moment? A look of terror, of full knowledge and awareness?

Could an artificial construct feel fear? Pain? Emotional distress?

These were questions I found hard to answer. They were beyond my pay-grade.

After being congratulated and clapped on the back by another half-dozen officers, I finally managed to slip away. I told them I needed a break, and they believed me.

Wandering out of the lowest vaults of Cheyenne station, I worked my way up to the residential zone. This was higher ground and closer to the external slopes of the mountain, but the station was still so deeply buried in rock that little damage had been done.

When Cheyenne had served as the core of NORAD, they’d built shock-absorbers into the floors. The whole thing had been designed to withstand nuclear attack. It seemed odd to me that only now, after so many decades, the old mountain had served its original purpose at last.

Without thinking, I found my way to my quarters. Mia wasn’t there, and I felt a thrill of worry. Checking with my sym, I realized she was alive and well inside the complex somewhere. I reached out, lying on my back in the dark, to contact her.

“Hi girl,” I said. “It’s me.”

She growled. It wasn’t an angry sound, it was more of a purr.

“I knew you were back,” she said in my mind. “Why didn’t you come see me immediately?”

“I was busy.”

“Saving the world, yes, I know. Where are you?”

“In our bed. Resting.”

“Not for long,” she said, and she broke the connection.

Smiling tiredly, I closed my eyes and felt all the weight of the day crash down upon me. I felt the stresses I’d kept at arm’s length for so many hours. At last, I was at peace.

Drifting off to sleep, my rest was soon interrupted. Mia came into the room in a rush and launched herself onto me.

We made love, and it was glorious. I’d never felt so relaxed in recent days—in fact, it had been months. Sometimes, when you push hard day after day, a release feels better than good. This was one of those times.

In the morning—whenever morning really was on my shift-schedule—I got up and showered. Mia ate breakfast with me, and I saw the usual red flood of notifications in my inbox.

I ignored them all. My sym didn’t like that choice, and it blinked in my mind, warning me about the work I was dodging. But I’d learned to ignore that, too.

After breakfast, I took a detour to the gym. It was crowded, as always. Space was at a premium inside the mountain. No matter how deep we dug into the ancient bedrock, it never seemed to be big enough.

“Leo Blake…” a voice spoke behind me.

I turned around, and my heart began to pound. I knew that voice.

It was Godwin. He was back to his original form: A man of plain voice, plain face, plain clothing. A man who was average in every way.

I smiled. I couldn’t help myself.

“So,” I said. “You got away from the Imperials?”

He shook his head. “Not really. I’m a new copy. That version of me, the one you sold to your enemies, that being is suffering the most terrible torments.”

“Oh… I’m sorry.”

“Coming here today is a hard for me,” Godwin said. “I’ve been through countless dissolutions, but to know you’re still living somewhere else—it’s almost as bad as experiencing the pain yourself.”

Godwin honestly seemed disturbed. That fact disturbed me in turn. I’d never seen him look so worried. I wasn’t sure what to say, so I said nothing.

“They took the box,” Godwin said. “Did you notice that?”

I blinked. “No,” I said. “I really didn’t.”

“They asked your overlords, Vega and Clemens, and they agreed instantly. Such a loss…”

“Was the box that special?”

Godwin looked down. “It will lead them to our projectors. They will gain the technology. It has slipped through your grasp.”

I stared at him, not really knowing what he was talking about.

“Godwin,” I said. “The Imperials were going to destroy Earth. We had to give them everything to appease them.”

Godwin shook his head. “It’s my fault,” he said. “I shouldn’t have been so underhanded. It never occurred to me that your paranoia would drive you to such lengths.”

“What do you mean?” I asked, but already, I was feeling a sinking sensation in my gut.

“Since when does Earth cooperate with the Imperials?” he demanded, suddenly angry.

It was my turn to raise my voice, and I did. “You gave advanced warp projectors to Fex, and he attacked us with them! Then you planted such a device here on Earth. You did that to make it appear that we had created these rifts, so the Imperials would destroy us!”

Godwin blinked. “Really? That was your reasoning? You’re far off the mark, old friend. Have you tried going through that new rift? The single anomaly that still spins and spins over our heads even now?”

“Uh… no, I don’t think so.”

“No curiosity as to where it leads?”

“We’ve only just gotten the Imperials to withdraw. We’re not in an adventurous mood right now.”

“You were supposed to destroy the Imperials!” Godwin shouted at me suddenly. “The rifts—they were designed to stop this pointless struggle between Earth and the Kwok. You were to ally together and use our technological gifts to attack the Imperials, not your brother rebels!”

I thought that one over. I was confused and worried. Could it be true?

Moments like this made Godwin a grim prospect to deal with. He was always complex and tricky. It was hard to say, as you peeled each layer of his scheming away, if it was the last one. I never knew what was truth and what was a pack of vile lies.

Still, this appeal was being made with conviction and it made sense, to some degree. The Nomads had always seen the Imperials as their greatest threat. They’d always tried to get us to work with Fex and the Kwok.

“The first time Fex came here,” I said. “You advised us to surrender to them and to serve them like the Gref.”

“Of course we did. Earth had no fleet back then. Now, she does. Now, you’ve got teeth and can defend yourselves. A rebel alliance makes more sense under these new circumstances.”

“Why didn’t you just say that?” I demanded.

“Because both sides were angry about your previous conflicts. Fex had been humiliated. Blood had to be spilled—on both sides. You were supposed to come to the logical conclusion that peace would be better than mutual destruction.”

“Fine,” I said. “Let’s pretend for a moment that I believe all of this. What do I do now?”

“Prove me correct,” he said. “Go through the new rift, the one you made when you pushed that button on our gift. If you do so, you might still be able to understand before it’s too late.”

I grabbed up my hat and shrugged on my jacket. At the door, I turned to ask Godwin if he was coming along—but he had melted away.

There was nothing left of him other than a dark stain on my floor.

=54=

It took me nearly a half-hour to come up with a scheme to investigate the rift as Godwin had suggested.

My first thought was to come clean and tell my superiors that Godwin had visited me yet again, relaying what he’d said.

But I knew that wasn’t going to fly. The alien had been hated universally by the likes of Vega, Clemens and practically everyone else on Earth who was aware of his existence. They were so happy he’d fled that I knew the last thing they wanted to hear was that my personal ghost had returned.

On top of that, there was the chance Godwin was telling the truth, and we’d made a horrid mistake. Of course, I wasn’t convinced he wasn’t simply trying a new ploy by lying about his intentions to sow more discord among his enemies.

The truth was Godwin was both persistent and fantastically tricky. I’d always been a man who’d prided himself on getting the best of others when we matched wits—but Godwin lived on another plane when it came to weaving complex webs of deceit.

Accordingly, I decided it would be best to perform my investigation in the most subtle manner possible. My first move was to see Clemens.

“Admiral?” I called out, stepping into his private office. “Glad you could make time to see me.”

“I’ve always got time for the best of my line officers,” Clemens said, beaming at me.

Damn. I knew I’d regret it the day this man stopped smiling whenever he saw me.

“Excellent…” I said. “Uh… are you cleaning out your office, sir?”

The older man stopped putting things into a box and paused.

“That’s right. I’m heading back to Geneva tonight. We’ve got a transmat station in Europe now. I’m looking forward to getting into my own bed back home.”

“Right…” I said, thinking that over.

My mind was racing. If I waited another day, I might have Vega to deal with instead of Clemens. Would that be better or worse?

Worse, I quickly decided. Vega knew me too well. He’d be suspicious the moment he heard of my plans.

“That’s excellent, sir,” I said. “I’m truly happy for you. But Admiral, is there one thing I might ask before you leave?”

“Name it, Blake.”

“I was wondering, sir, if I might get my ship back. I’d love to command Devilfish again.”

Frowning, he straightened and put down a set of sterling pens. “You like to work the line, don’t you, Blake?”

“Yes sir.”

“Hmmm… you remind me of myself in that way. I always wanted to be away at sea. Desks bore the shit out of me.”

I smiled. “Well then…”

He picked up the sterling silver pen set again and waved it at me. “You see this? Here I am, packing my own stuff. Never let them pack for you, Blake. They’ll treat you like royalty if you let them—it’s cancer for a military man.”

“Um… I’ll remember that, Admiral. But, do you think…?”

Clemens shrugged. “I don’t see why you can’t get your ship back, at least for now. We’ve beaten Fex’s fleet badly, the Nomad was captured, and even the Imperials are sort of friendly toward us now. When can a man relax, if not today?”

I forced a smile. “Here are the orders, sir,” I said, pushing a computer sheet over his desk.

Clemens frowned down at them. His voice downshifted, becoming gruff. “What’s this? You penned your own orders? Imagine the cheek! What do you think this is, Blake, a professor’s recommendation letter?”

“No sir, I’m sorry, sir. I’ll just—”

I was reaching for the orders to retrieve them, but he snatched them up and read them. Grumbling under his breath, he took out one of his sterling pens and scrawled his name at the bottom at last.

“Thank you, Admiral.”

“Thank you, Blake. Now get out of here, and don’t even think of asking me for a promotion.”

I scooted out of his office before the ink could dry on my rolled-up computer paper. Making my way down to the admin offices, I got the whole thing cleared with Space Command.

Just like that, I was a space-going captain again. I liked the feeling immediately. No matter what happened next, this was better than being a desk-jockey.

The next morning I took the transmat up to Devilfish with my newly signed orders. Hagen had gotten the word, and he had to struggle not to look sour.

“It was good while it lasted, sir,” he said.

“I’m glad you took such good care—hey!”

I’d noticed the damage reports. It was hard not to, as they were displayed in glimmering red words above every console.

“Engines disabled?” I read out loud. “Our engines are offline?”

“Between Fex and that monster Imperial ship, we took a few hits, I’m afraid. They aren’t out of commission, but they’re testing below official specs.”

“Shit.”

Mia came up and looked suspiciously at the reports. “This isn’t fatal—but it will slow us down.”

I glanced at her and shook my head. I’d brought her along to serve as a gunner, and so far she was the only person who knew my intentions. Unfortunately, she had a naturally big mouth.

“What’s the problem, Leo?” Mia asked. “Hagen is going to have to be told what’s really going on, anyway.”

I showed my teeth in a modified smile. We weren’t away from the dockyards yet, and I didn’t want to have to explain anything until someone noticed where we were headed.

“What’s all this about, Captain?” Hagen asked me. He crossed his arms and squinted at me. “Please don’t say Devilfish is going on another one-way bombing mission.”

“No… not that. At least, I hope it doesn’t come down to that.”

Hagen was really looking worried now. “Perhaps we should talk in my—uh, your office, sir?”

“All right. Mia, take your station. Get everything you can operating on the weapons side. Don’t drop any more hints to anyone else.”

She pouted a little, but nodded. She headed to the consoles and reacquainted herself with Samson and Dalton. They high-fived her fuzzy hands and whooped.

“What’s this all about, Captain?” Hagen asked when we were off on our own. “I don’t like the sound of it—not just about losing command, I mean.”

“I know. I thought things were over with, too… but they aren’t.”

I walked down the passage. Hagen opened the door to the office—but I blew right past that.

“Follow me, Hagen.”

He did so. He didn’t even ask me where we were headed. Maybe he knew—or maybe he figured I wasn’t going to tell him.

We went up, up to the observation deck above the bridge. It was a tiny affair, used by the lab coats mostly. There were lots of instruments taking photos through a dome of transparent polymer.

“Uh…” Hagen said, looking around at the whirring equipment. “We should be careful. The scientists are back in charge now that the war’s over. They’ll freak if they find out we were even in here with their experimental optics.”

“I don’t care about them—or their optics,” I said.

Standing at the rim of the chamber, I was close enough to the cold glass to fog it up. Defrosters gently blew away my steamy breath, but they could barely keep up.

Hagen stepped up to my side and stared out with me.

We could see Earth, a wide crescent below. It was night down there, and cities glowed like rivers of light along the sea coasts. Up high, to our right, was the Moon. She hung there like a lantern, half-visible and half shrouded in darkness.

Having gained my bearings, I tilted my head and swung my hand out, fully extended, pointing to our left.

“There it is,” I said. “Low, just above Africa.”

Hagen turned and followed my gesture. “That rift? Still hasn’t faded yet, huh?”

“No. All the rest are gone, but the seventh one—the one Godwin made—it’s still up there.”

“Nothing has ever come out of that last rift,” Hagen said. “Can’t we just leave well-enough alone?”

I glanced at him and laughed.

“You know that’s not my style by now, don’t you?”

“Yeah…” Hagen said, sighing. “I guess I do, Captain.”

=55=

The next morning, we slipped free of the docking tubes and began orbiting Earth under power. We gently cruised upward, away from the planet surface, increasing our altitude until we were about ten thousand kilometers away from the world of my birth.

On paper, we’d been cleared to head to the Moon—but we weren’t going to make it that far. Only Mia, Hagen and I had an inkling as to our true destination.

No one aboard but me knew exactly why we were headed out to investigate the rift.

Rising slowly into high orbit wasn’t a weird thing to do. Often, captains used the gravitational swing of whatever body they were orbiting to slingshot their ships toward another gravity-well in the star system.

By spiraling around Earth several times, we got closer to the rift without heading toward it purposefully. On our seventh orbit, seemingly by the sheerest of chance, we came very near to the anomaly.

I’d begun to think we’d actually be allowed to enter the rift and vanish before we were challenged—but it didn’t work out that way.

“We’ve got a call from Space Command, Captain,” Chang said.

“Patch it through to my sym.”

He did so, and a traffic operator stood superimposed upon my primary display tank. No one else could see her.

“Captain Blake,” she said. “You’re dangerously close to the anomaly. Your bearing is within three degrees of the alien rift, which will take you into the no-fly zone. We recommend you select a new heading that will take you no closer than a thousand kilometers of the event horizon. Space Command, out.”

My mouth slammed shut. I’d been ready to reply, but she hadn’t even given me a chance to feed her some bullshit. I twisted my lips into a frown.

Thinking hard, I came up with a few solutions. I could straight-up ignore the course-change order. Or, I could alter our heading—but then drift back again. I could even change my heading firmly now, but then do a ninety-degree hard turn and snap back on-target a few minutes later.

All of these possibilities were unsatisfying. I’d been given an explicit directive to stay away from the rift, so flying through it now was going to be an even bigger deal than it would have been previously.

Wracking my mind for a minute or so, I got a hunch. To check up on that hunch, I quickly examined the ship’s rosters.

Within thirty seconds, I found the name I was looking for. Muttering a few choice curses, I finally spoke to my confused bridge crew. They’d been standing around watching their captain from afar all this time, wondering what was up.

“Helm,” I announced, “change course. Level off our altitude and take our bearing three degrees off that rift.”

Dalton laughed, and a few others sighed.

“I was wondering, Captain,” Dalton said. “We were going to shave that light-show the way we were heading.”

Without replying, I stalked off the deck. I marched below—way below, down to the labs.

There I found Dr. Abrams. He seemed to be waiting for me.

“You’ve come to talk, Captain Blake?”

I nodded. “I couldn’t help but notice that you were added to this ship’s roster just hours before we departed, Doc. I can’t recall requesting the assignment, or sanctioning it.”

Abrams threw his hands wide and shrugged. “An oversight, surely. There’s been so much confusion! They bombed Space Command, after all. Those animals! No one down there knows quite what’s happening in the aftermath. Have you seen video of the fallout? It’s—”

“Which animals are you talking about? The Grefs? The Kwok? Or maybe the Imperials? Or… could you be talking about Nomads, Doc?”

He stared at me for a cold moment. He crossed his arms in irritation.

“So, you’ve spotted me again? No need to gloat. How did you do it this time? We haven’t even met during this voyage.”

“I can read a crew roster, Godwin.”

A few of the lab coats in earshot twitched and gave us sidelong glances as I said this. The name “Godwin” was infamous aboard any ship I’d ever served on.

Godwin sighed. “I’m only here to help.”

“Bullshit. You’re here to see that I do what you want me to do.”

“I thought we were in agreement on the purpose of this voyage.”

“We are, in principle.”

“Well then?” he said, lowering his voice to a hiss. “Go back up to your bridge, steer this ship into the rift and have done with it, Blake!”

“I’ve been specifically ordered not to,” I said, lowering my voice somewhat. “The crew might not follow my orders. In short, I need your help. I don’t have permission to exit this star system at all—much less via an unknown alien rift.”

“What am I supposed to do about it?”

“Go down to Earth. Haunt some new people. Change their minds.”

His eyes flashed at me. He hesitated. “You want me to use my ‘push’ to alter the opinions of your superiors? That’s a tall order.”

“You’ve done it before.”

He shook his head. “I’ve erased small segments of memory. Sometimes, I’ve added tidbits that were convenient to me to a few minds—but now even those tricks are beyond my reach.”

I knew what he was talking about. Space Command had been badly shaken up by evidence of Godwin’s tampering with memories in the past. They’d taken many counter-steps to prevent such things from happening in the future.

“We could try a joint effort,” I said. “Just for a single target—plus anyone else who gets in the way.”

“Who is this target? Admiral Clemens?”

I shook my head. “Can’t be Clemens. He’s cleared out back to Europe.”

“A pity… I’ve found his mind most malleable.”

I filed away this tidbit for the future. “It has to be Admiral Vega,” I said.

Godwin shook his head.

By this time, we’d stepped close to one another. We were now speaking just above a whisper. Didn’t all treacherous conspirators throughout history end up talking that way at some point?

“How can you help me do this?” he asked.

“I’m a gifted man with a sym. I’ve got clearances—and I’ll do a little hacking.”

His eyes widened then narrowed again. “You’d do that? To help this mission?”

“Regretfully… yes.”

“Why?” he asked me. “I’m truly curious about your change of heart. Is it because you screwed up so badly and wish to make amends? Or is it—?”

“It doesn’t matter, Godwin,” I growled at him. “Are you going to do it or not?”

He backed off. “Lower the defenses on our target. I will do what I can.”

He strode out of the labs, acting like Dr. Abrams. The bird-like gestures, the flapping limbs… He did such a good job of imitating the man.

It was uncanny.

=56=

We orbited twice more. I was beginning to get edgy, as was the rest of my crew.

“Captain Blake?” Hagen asked me about an hour later. “Can I have a word?”

Reluctantly, we retired to my office.

He gave me an odd look. “Sir?” he said. “There’s been some unusual net traffic.”

“Yeah? Did you ask Samson about it? He’s in charge of support systems.”

“Um… well sir, that’s the man who brought it to my attention. There’s been some traffic between this ship and Space Command. Unusual, encrypted traffic.”

I nodded and put on a concerned expression. “Someone watching a pornographic feely again? Is that it? Unprofessional, Hagen. Find the spacer and reprimand him.”

Hagen shifted his bulk uncomfortably. “Well sir, we already tracked it down. It seems to be emanating from your sym… sir.”

Our eyes met, and no one spoke for a few seconds. “Are you accusing me of cruising the nets for dirty—?”

He waved away my words. “No, no—come on, Captain. Can we talk plainly?”

I sat back and considered a full halt to my bullshit machine. I really thought about it. For about five seconds.

Then I got real, and I copped to a lesser charge.

“Listen, Hagen,” I said. “What Samson is detecting is some clandestine activity. It’s not publicly sanctioned—but it is Space Command’s business. Are we clear?”

He smiled at last and sighed. “That’s good to hear, Captain. I thought it was something like that. Thanks for telling me what you could. I’ll just file a report with Cheyenne and—”

“Hold on,” I said sharply. “No reports.”

“But any security breach must be—”

“Give them a few hours to sort it out, Hagen.”

He paused. “How many hours, captain?”

“Six.”

He blinked and shook his head. He was unhappy all over again. “I’ll sit on it for three. They’ll be pissed after the first ten minutes, mind you, but I’ll drag my feet. I hope it’s worth it, sir.”

“So do I, Hagen. So do I.”

He left, and I contacted Godwin. It was strange to be operating with him, treating him like my henchmen. This was a first for the two of us. We’d rarely cooperated in the past.

He’d asked me why I was helping him now, and that question was still bothering me. Was it because of the look of horror on Ensign Costa’s face when the Imperials had dragged that version of Godwin away? Maybe so.

“Godwin,” I said, “we’ve got problems. They’re onto us.”

“I’m working as fast as I can, Blake. Please stop interrupting.”

At first, I was unable to get a visual, only audio. That was mind-to-mind, but it sounded like we were speaking together. The aural nerve was stimulated in a very realistic fashion.

Pushing a bit, with my sym, I tried to get a measure of Godwin’s surroundings. I couldn’t see it through his eyes, that was blocked. But I could get a reading on which routers and repeaters were carrying the signal for me down there, in the quiet depths of Cheyenne Mountain.

At last, I thought I had him pinpointed. I cast a map onto my desktop with a flick of my wrist.

The diagram zoomed and spun. I saw a dot inside the base, moving along…

“The residential section?” I asked aloud, then I checked the time.

Local time in Denver was three a.m. Godwin was up to his old tricks, lurking in shadows and haunting passages. He was like a ghost or a vampire, stalking sleeping prey.

“You’re distracting me, Blake,” Godwin said. “I’m cutting this feed.”

I let him do it—but I didn’t stop watching him. Using my sym and all my skills to manipulate security networks, I traced his every step.

He was heading quietly toward Admiral Vega’s quarters. He would gain entry, fog Vega’s mind, and—

I almost called security. It took an effort of will not to do so. The revulsion and distrust was welling up in me, a natural reaction.

Godwin was like a thing in the night. A nightmare, a story designed to frighten children who wouldn’t stay in bed—only, he was real.

Pulling open the bottom drawer under my desk, I found a bottle of something caramel-colored. I poured a glass and swigged it.

My face twisted into a grimace. It was straight bourbon. Unfortunately, Hagen didn’t like paying for the good stuff.

A half-hour went by. During that time, I finished my single drink and had a second. I was just pondering a third when my sym jolted me out of my reverie.

“Blake here,” I said.

“Still up?” Vega asked me. “I’m surprised. It’s dawn down here.”

“Starships never sleep, Admiral. What can I do for you?”

I could see him now. His face was drawn, haggard and gray. He’d been awakened. It was like he’d had a bad dream.

“I—I needed to contact you, Blake. I want you to investigate that rift. It’s bothering me. I don’t know why, nothing has ever come through it.”

“The last alien rift, sir? What exactly do you mean by ‘investigate’ it?”

He looked at me in confusion for a second. It was as if someone was talking to him—but no one could be seen.

“Ah, yes. Of course. I need you to fly through it, Blake. Have a quick look on the other side. I’ll expect a full report as soon as possible.”

I felt a little sick. Admiral Vega was an asshole at times, but I considered him a friend. I didn’t like seeing him being manipulated this way.

It occurred to me then that I might be under a similar spell, perhaps right now. What if Godwin wasn’t playing Vega, but he was playing me?

Despite this disturbing thought, I pressed ahead. I had to get confirmation.

“Are these new orders official, sir?”

“They are as far as I’m concerned. You’ve done this sort of thing before. Cross over, take a look around, and come home. Don’t get that cruiser blown up or anything. Bring it back safe and sound.”

I smiled. Godwin might be influencing his mind, but that did sound like Vega. To him, the hardware was always more important than the man—especially when you were talking about a trillion-dollar starship.

“Will do, Admiral,” I said. “Get yourself some sleep—it looks like you need it. Blake out.”

After that I sat back in my chair, poured my third drink, and downed it.

=57=

The next time we orbited Earth, things felt different. We had orders to explore the rift—official orders—and my crew felt certain they knew what was going on.

“That was quite clever of you, Captain,” Dalton said. “You’ve been lingering up here, pretending we were striking out on our own again—when apparently, we just hadn’t gotten official confirmation yet.”

Shrugging, I glanced at him. “Secrets are secrets,” I said. “I’m not always able to share our mission parameters. Steer for the rift at the last moment, as we discussed.”

Chang frowned a bit. That part had been sticking in his craw since I’d first explained the whole thing to the bridge crew moments ago.

“But Captain…” he said. “If we have official sanction from Space Command, why are we sneaking up on this rift?”

“Too many questions, Chang,” I said loudly. “Please run a full diagnostic on your boards.”

“A full diagnostic? But we’re about to transition—”

“You should hop to it, then, instantly.”

Alarmed, Chang began working at a steady, almost fevered pace. There was no way he could get a full diagnostic done before we hit the breach—but that’s what I’d been counting on. He was now far too busy to annoy me with questions.

By the time we hit the rift, Chang had almost finished his diagnostic sweep. I ordered him to pause the process, so we wouldn’t arrive in a new star system blind. He apologized for this inability to get the job done before we exited the Solar System. I accepted his apology gruffly, and then Devilfish entered the rift.

The transition was a strange one as such things went. Instead of taking minutes or hours, it seemed to take only seconds.

One of the reasons these rift-travel times varied so much, according to Dr. Abrams, was due to relativistic effects. Time simply ran differently in one rift versus another.

As it was, we came out only moments after we entered—according to our local sense of time.

Bursting into a new region of space I didn’t recognize, we raised our shields and scanned our surroundings.

“There are no planets in the immediate vicinity,” Chang said. “There is a central star, a yellow-white dwarf. G-class, like our own sun. We’re pretty far out, however, about three hundred AU.”

“Three hundred AU? Any contacts?”

“None, sir. Scanning for planets—can we go active?”

Active scanning amounted to transmitting pings of light, such as radar or lidar, toward surrounding objects. It gave you a much more accurate picture of your surroundings, but it also made you a target.

Passive scanning was like sitting in the dark, listening and staring. Active scanning was like sweeping the area with a flashlight. Active was far more effective, but people tended to notice your presence more as well.

“No,” I said after a moment’s consideration. “Let’s just glide in toward those planets for a while, checking out everything we can passively.”

Devilfish turned slowly, using minimal thrust, and we cruised quietly toward the central star and planets. I was full of questions, and I’m sure my crew felt the same way.

Why had the Nomads set up a rift that led here? It certainly wasn’t immediately dangerous, nor was it a good spot from which to launch an attack. It would take days to reach the planets—even longer if we didn’t use our main engines.

Hagen rubbed at his face for a moment then pointed a finger at me. “We’re so far out… I bet this rift is undetectable from the inner planets at this distance.”

Apparently, he’d been trying to reason his way through the same questions I was.

“You might be onto something there, Hagen,” I said. “If this is enemy territory, placing a rift this far out might allow a ship to arrive and approach without notice.”

Dalton, Samson and the others were casting concerned glances at one another. I knew what they were thinking: What kind of a mission is this?

We didn’t make it far. Less than twenty million kilometers into the new system, a dozen or so contacts appeared, then a dozen more.

“We’re picking up ships, Captain!” Chang said with uncharacteristic alarm. “There are twenty—make that thirty of them.”

“Classes?”

“Cruisers, destroyers… all with a displacement equal to our own or greater. We’re surrounded, sir.”

“We have to pull out,” Hagen said, stepping up to my command chair. “Blake, get my ship out of here. We’ve got enough capacitance to spin up a rift right now. We can run.”

His eyes were pleading with me, so I didn’t look at him.

“Crew,” I said, “look at our range. We’re under their guns already. Opening a rift now will take about a minute—we don’t have a minute.”

Hagen looked defeated. Disgusted.

“Chang,” I said, “open up a hailing channel. Let’s talk to them.”

I wasn’t really surprised when an ape-like face appeared on my central display. The creature wasn’t Fex, but he was a member of the Kwok species.

“Human…” he said. “I’m not surprised that you would try to bomb our worlds as you did the Gref.”

“Captain? Put me in contact with Fex, please. I’m not interested in talking to an underling.”

The Kwok Captain’s eyes flashed with anger. He’d been smug and arrogant a moment before—but being called an underling seemed to upset all of his kind.

“You will surrender your ship, human,” he said. “Or you will be destroyed.”

“Fool,” I said. “Do you really think we’d come here and place ourselves in your hands? Do not force me to order an attack. Our ships are already in place at your homeworld. I’m here to talk, not fight, but if you force my hand—”

“What are you prattling about, human?” the other demanded. “You have exactly one ship. You are surrounded and badly outgunned. You will stand-down, lower your shields, and—”

Shifting in my seat, I faced Hagen. “Signal the advance fleet. All phase-ships are to appear and drop their ordnance in unison. There won’t be a Kwok city left standing…, it’s unfortunate.”

Hagen gaped at me like a fish, but he didn’t say anything stupid. He nodded instead.

“I’ll relay the orders, Captain Blake.”

He stepped away from the watchful eyes of the Kwok captain.

“Wait,” the captain said, looking concerned. “You can’t order—”

Suddenly, the feed flickered and cut out. A moment later, instead of facing a generic Kwok captain, I found myself staring into the malevolent eyes of Fex himself.

He was dark-furred, tall and evil of aspect. I would know that face anywhere.

“Ah, Admiral Fex,” I said. “So good of you to put in an appearance.”

He had been lurking of course, watching the conversation but not showing himself.

There were good reasons for this odd behavior. First off, the Kwok were paranoid by nature. If I didn’t know Fex was nearby, I couldn’t target his ship, so he’d stayed hidden.

But now that things were advancing in an unexpected direction, Fex had decided to step in and deal with the matter himself.

“Blake…” he said. “My least-favorite primate from the most backward species in our genus.”

“We’re slower than Grefs, are we?” I asked.

A fuzzy face appeared in the background. As I’d expected, Fex’s ship was crewed by Grefs. The Kwok were too clever and lazy to do their own grunt work.

“Yes,” Fex insisted. “Much slower than Grefs. You’re obvious failures in the grand march of mutation and differentiation. Only a sick monster would strike at the Gref homeworld.”

I blinked. This seemed like a stretch even for Fex. After all, they’d bombed our world recently. Denver was a series of craters because of these people.

“Fex,” I said, “I like you, so I’m going to cut you a break. We bombed the Grefs as a warning, and the first time we made sure we didn’t hit any population centers.”

Fex stared at me with hate. “You’re threatening us? Seriously? You have only one ship against—”

“Certainly, you could destroy this lone cruiser,” I said. Shrugging, I stared at nothing, putting on a bored expression. “But that’s a small price to pay for vengeance.”

“Why would you pay this small price, Blake?” Fex asked. “It’s not like you. Your path is that of the pond-worm. A slippery thing that escapes an honest paw and wriggles back into the water.”

“My family comes from the region you bombed on Earth, Admiral,” I said. “Now our ships are in far orbit around your home planet.”

At this, Fex blinked. He paused.

I knew that for the first time he was beginning to take me seriously. After all, we’d managed to get a phase-ship in close to the Gref homeworld and strike. We’d formed a rift—as far as he knew—that was long term and led to his home system.

That rift had sat out here, spinning quietly for days. Couldn’t a few phase-ships have slipped past their defenses? Was it so implausible?

That was the power of the phase-ship. It was a terror weapon, a device that might appear anywhere and strike out of the darkness.

“We have powerful friends, Fex,” I said. “The Nomads gave us the same tech they gave you. You’re not special, not in the least. We can form long term rifts. What’s more, we have the Imperials on our side. They will fight with us if need be, and just one of their super-massives could take out your entire fleet.”

“Why would the Imperials do anything to help Earth?”

“Because we’ve offered them so much. We’ll share the long term rifts with them. They can use this new technology to reach far and snuff out the Nomads, if that’s their goal.”

Fex looked astounded. “That’s treason!” he said. “Outright treason! You’re Rebel Kher, Blake! Have some pride. You can’t call the Imperials allies.”

“Why not? What good does it do Earth to remain loyal while our so-called allies plot to bring us down? You’ve bombed our cities. You’re lucky we haven’t returned the favor—yet.”

Fex was beginning to sweat. I could see it.

“So,” I said loudly. “Let’s recount the situation. You’ve got my ship surrounded, and you can destroy her. I’ll give you that one. We didn’t come out here expecting to be greeted with enthusiasm. What else have you got? Godwin? A long term rift generator? A few surviving cruisers…? Pathetic, really.”

Fex was snarling, but his image wavered and faded out.

This time, I was at a loss. I hadn’t been that surprised to see Fex take over the netcast, but now it seemed like he was being replaced as well.

Another primate appeared. This one was older, smaller, and he wore glasses.

“Dr. Shug?” I asked in surprise.

I hadn’t seen Dr. Shug in years. He’d always been the cleverest ape I’d ever met.

“The years have been kind to you, Blake,” Shug said. “Now, what’s all this about you cooperating with the Imperials? Tell me that’s bluster, Blake. Tell me now. Otherwise, the Rebel Kher in this quadrant will have no choice. We’ll have to put down your species.”

For a second, my face remained frozen. The ball was clearly in my court.

Finally, I forced my lips to curl at the corners. I leaned forward with calm determination.

“I’m sorry to hear that,” I said. “I’d hoped to negotiate. Clearly, you’re not interested in anything other than idle threats.”

“My threats are never idle, Blake. Come to your senses, human. You can’t—”

I cut off the signal and waved for Chang’s attention.

“Don’t answer when they call back,” I told him.

He looked worried, but he did as I commanded.

=58=

We let Dr. Shug dangle on the end of his string for about five minutes. At the end of that time, I could tell he was losing his patience.

We didn’t move Devilfish. We cruised quietly through space, still a long, long way out from any planets. We didn’t give them any reason to fire on us—but we weren’t giving them any reason to be friendly, either.

“How long is this standoff going to go on, sir?” Hagen demanded at last. “They’re starting to circle up and move closer.”

“The enemy ships are opening their gun-ports, sir,” Chang said, adding to the tension. “Should we open ours in response?”

“No,” I said firmly. “Stay on course.”

“They’re hailing us again,” Chang said. “Shall I—?”

“No. We can’t respond now that they’ve laid bare a new threat. We have to wait a bit longer.”

Everyone on the bridge looked like they were doomed. I couldn’t fault them for that. Perhaps we were about to die.

“Listen up,” I said loudly. “They’ve got us. If they want to fire, they can. We’ve got to make it look like we just don’t care.”

“But all that talk about bombing their homeworld is bullshit, sir,” Samson said. “They know that.”

“Do they?” I asked suddenly, turning on him. “Do you know we don’t have ships in place?”

He frowned back at me. “I suppose… it could be possible.”

I threw my hands wide and languished in my chair.

“Exactly,” I said. “They can’t be sure. Shug, Fex and that whole crew have one awful weakness: they like to be charge. They don’t like to operate on emotion, they prefer logic and outsmarting opponents. But in this case, they can’t take the chance we’ve positioned phase-ships in their system. To destroy Devilfish now would be very satisfying, but they can’t risk their home world just to indulge their rage on us.”

Another few minutes passed. At last, one of the cruisers nosed around and began sliding closer to us, blocking our path.

“Our shields will come into contact soon, sir,” Samson warned.

“They might be planning to board us,” Hagen suggested. “We could take them out easily with a hard shot to the engines.”

“But then we’d be promptly annihilated,” I said, and I stretched in my chair. “All right. Open a channel, Chang. I’ll take it privately with my sym.”

Getting up and walking down the ship’s main passage, I saw Dr. Shug glimmer into life at my side. He looked around in surprise, but then he fell into step.

He wasn’t a tall ape, but he was a genius. He moved as if he was really walking at my side, even though we both knew he was only a holographic projection.

“The Kwok want to destroy your ship, Blake,” Shug told me. “You have to give me a good reason why I shouldn’t let them do it. The level of disrespect you’re showing here is—”

“Is nothing,” I said suddenly. “We found it quite disrespectful to have fusion bombs dropped on our cities back on Earth. They’ll soon feel the same way.”

“So that’s it? Petty revenge? I don’t get you humans. This isn’t the Kher way.”

“Explain it to me,” I suggested.

“You can’t win against more advanced fleets. Fex has dozens of capital ships remaining, despite your victories. The Grefs are still his servants and now—now he’s got the Terrapinians as well.”

This last tidbit surprised me. “So the turtles surrendered, did they?”

“In the end, yes. I’ve studied your planet over recent years. There’s very little written on it, you know. But what we do know is that humans have an unusual political hierarchy.”

“We’re quite advanced in that department.”

He laughed. “If you call aping the Imperials advanced, then maybe so. Normal Kher know how to behave. We vary in physiology, but we have very similar social traits. Among species on your own world, you’d say: we operate like a wolf pack.”

“Right. One dominates until it is taken out by a stronger wolf. You’re telling me Fex is the Alpha-dog in this part of space, and we should bend a knee to him.”

He spread his hands. They were a leathery, wrinkled brown.

“Exactly! Would that be so hard? When you’re beaten, you make an honorable show then give up. The alpha species leads until they weaken—but no one has to die out over dominance. It would be a horrible waste.”

The funny thing was I could actually see his point. To the Rebel Kher, my threats and tricks didn’t entirely make sense. They were faster to surrender and accept being dominated when they were beaten. Humans tended to fight to the death—an unusual trait among our brothers and sisters from the stars.

“Hmm…” I said. “I don’t want to kill Rebel Kher. That’s not my goal. Note that we didn’t drop our bomb on the Grefs directly—it was only a warning shot.”

He snorted. “Quite a warning. You scared the hell out of those dummies.”

“They had to know we’re dangerous. Fex needs to understand the same thing. We’ll destroy his planet if he keeps pushing.”

Shug stopped walking and turned to face me angrily.

“What gives you the right?” he demanded. “You of all humans know the Kher way! You’re facing a dominating force. Destroying that force—and yourselves—is treasonous. The real enemies are the Imperials and the Nomads. Save your giant bombs for them!”

“We will,” I said agreeably. “But we won’t bow and scrape the floor with our knuckles to placate the Kwok. It’s just not going to happen. Tell Fex to go away and bother some other less stubborn planet.”

“And what would you offer in return?” Shug demanded.

For a few seconds, I allowed myself to feel a surge of triumph. This is where I’d wanted the conversation to go all along—to the negotiating phase.

Without a hint of elation on my face, I nodded as if carefully considering his words.

“A diplomatic solution, huh?” I asked, as if I’d never thought of the idea. “It seems almost dishonorable…”

“Oh, come on,” Shug demanded. “You’re the one behaving dishonorably in Fex’s eyes. You have to see that.”

“In an intellectual sense, I can understand his point of view. But I’m not the only human on Earth. Others must be convinced. Tell me, what is Fex willing to offer?”

I asked this final question in a tone of vague interest—but Shug wasn’t fooled.

He narrowed his eyes, and his nostrils flared. If he had actually been present in the flesh, I got the feeling he would have sniffed out my lies. Humans had long ago lost the ability to sense mood and intent with their noses, but most of the Rebel Kher had retained these skills.

Telling myself it didn’t matter, I was determined to play this out to the bitter end. After all, the stakes were very high.

We stopped walking and eyed one another expectantly. Finally, Shug broke first.

“You’re stalling for time,” he said. “I can only surmise that’s what this is all about. Perhaps your ships aren’t quite in position yet… It almost makes me want to give the order to fire on your vessel now, while we still can.”

I shrugged disinterestedly. “It’s up to you. I’ve done all I can. I’m here to talk, but if you aren’t interested…”

“Very well. Go back to Earth. Take your dishonorable navy with you—we’ll give you two days to clear out. Fex will stand down and move to a range of a million kilometers. Once you’ve slunk away back into your hole, close the rift. Fex will swear not to attack Earth again. In return, you must vow to stay out of this star system and that owned by the Grefs as well.”

Making a great show of considering it, I nodded at last. “I find your terms almost acceptable. Here are my stipulated changes: We’ll take a week to pull out, and Fex must withdraw to a range of thirty million kilometers—and he must drop his shields.”

“Absurd!” Shug raged immediately.

The negotiations were on. I couldn’t just agree to their first offer, of course, despite the fact it was quite acceptable. The Rebel Kher were naturally paranoid. They’d suspect I was full of treachery and deceit if I gave in too soon—and they’d be right.

=59=

Heading back to Earth was a lengthy process. After all, we had to pretend we were shepherding a flotilla of ghostly ships.

Standing off at a great distance, Fex’s watchful fleet drifted and peered at us. We saw their pinging sensor arrays, but ignored them. It was only natural that the Kwok captains were curious.

After three days, I decided the charade had gone on long enough and we slowly, gently, slid into the rift. The trip home was oddly long. It felt like four full hours before the return trip ended and we arrived near Earth.

“Now all we have to do is shut down that rift,” Hagen said, smiling. “You did it, Captain. You pulled off the heist of the century!”

I smiled weakly and nodded. Internally, however, I was worried.

“What’s wrong, sir?” Hagen asked. Then he lowered his voice and added: “Did all our phase-ships escape?”

I glanced at him in surprise, but I recovered quickly. He apparently had bought into my bluff. That was a good thing, as a fantasy the crew believed in could only make the whole thing more real to the enemy.

“They’re all back in home space,” I assured him. “What I’m worried about now is our final part of the bargain. That rift… we didn’t create it ourselves—and I have no idea how we’re going to shut it down.”

He blinked at me, uncertain. He hadn’t been at Cheyenne Station when the Imperials had hauled away Godwin and his mysterious box. He knew nothing about those events, and they were classified.

“If not us…” Hagen asked in a near whisper. “Then who did create that rift, sir?”

“That’s a secret. But don’t worry about a thing. We’ll sort it out.”

Hagen gave me a nervous laugh and left, shaking his head. I took a quick transmat trip down to Space Command where I was promptly met by Admiral Clemens.

Clemens looked stern and red-faced. Behind him stood no less than six armed marines. No one was smiling.

“Hello sir,” I said. “Where’s Admiral Vega?”

“He’s under arrest. You are too. This way to your debriefing, Blake.”

I followed him docilely enough. I didn’t have much choice.

The debriefing was long, thorough and rude. Somehow, Godwin’s efforts to influence Vega hadn’t gone unnoticed. He’d managed to give me the orders and cover-story, and I’d gone off through the rift.

But when Clemens had heard about it, he’d returned from Europe in a rage. He’d ordered everything shut down until he had control of matters again. Godwin himself, naturally, was nowhere to be found.

I played the part of an innocent dupe, and it almost worked.

“So…” Clemens said, “you received surprise orders from Vega to go through the rift. And this seemed acceptable to you? Out of the blue? No alarms sounded inside your otherwise fully-functional mind?”

“No sir. It seemed quite rational that we would explore this final, long term rift. How could we know what might be coming at us if we didn’t?”

“That wasn’t your call to make, Blake!”

“Of course not, Admiral Clemens. It was Admiral Vega’s. He was in charge of Space Command at the time.”

“You’re not going to get away with this, Blake. You’re not a one-man government. Speaking of which, let’s move on to your next overreach. Who gave you the authority to negotiate a peace treaty with the Kwok?”

“I operated under my own initiative. But don’t worry, if we can’t get that rift closed, the deal is off anyway. Sir, do we have a way to close the rift?”

“Not yet,” he admitted. “We’re working on it. We were doing so even before your little jaunt into the wilds—and all the time you were gone as well. I could have lost an excellent cruiser if you hadn’t returned when you did.”

Clemens was all love and cookies when you skirted his authority.

He grumbled and carried on for hours, but eventually, since I continued to stick to my story, he grew tired of the game.

I was removed from active duty aboard Devilfish and given my old desk job back.

Stepping out of a late shower in my apartment, I was startled to run into Godwin.

He was back to his usual guise: An average-looking guy who wouldn’t stand out in any crowd.

“Godwin?” I asked. “Where have you been?”

“I’ve been… busy…” he said vaguely. “The Imperials are troubling us, Blake. You unleashed something horrid when you gave them our technology.”

“I hardly had a choice,” I said. “They came down here in force and seized your little box. Did they find your projectors?”

“Yes, of course. They took all of it to their home stars. They’ve already begun experimenting with their own long term rifts.”

“Experimenting? To what purpose?”

He glanced at me reproachfully. “Do you really need to ask? They’re setting up to attack our worlds. We only have a handful, Blake. We’re on the run again.”

I almost smiled, but I managed not to gloat. It was a close thing. Godwin had lorded it over humanity for years, treating us like toys. It was kind of nice to know they had their own deadly enemies to deal with now.

“That’s a terrible, terrible thing, Godwin,” I said. “I truly wish there was something I could do about that.”

“Yeah, well… you can’t. Your local planets are barely colonized. Your biggest ships are light cruisers, and you’ve got precious few of those. Even if you had a serious fleet, your tech is pathetically backward.”

“All true, all true,” I said in a mournful tone. “We can barely help our friends in need. But… maybe you could help us?”

He looked at me warily. “How?”

I quickly told him about the deal I’d made to shut down the long term rift. He snorted.

“That’s easy,” he said.

“You mean you’ve got more equipment? Something we can use to—?”

“Not frigging likely,” he complained. “The original projectors are gone, remember? The Imperials found them and confiscated them as they left. Without them, another control box would be useless.”

“Hmm…” I said. “Perhaps if we…?

He waved away my words and sighed. “There is a technique. It’s simple enough—maybe you can do it on your own, since you’ve made such a mess of everything we’ve given you.”

“And that technique would be…?” I prompted.

He eyed me with anger and distrust. “I should let you fight the Kwok. They’ll eventually come through and attack, you know. It might take another week for them to become angry enough, but eventually they’ll do it.”

“Just tell me, Godwin, or melt away. I’m busy.”

Still, he stared at me for a time. At last he managed to grunt out a few important words.

The process was simplicity itself. When he’d finished explaining it, I thanked him.

At last, he disappeared. When I was sure he couldn’t still be watching me, I sprinted down to the labs.

I had to talk to Dr. Abrams immediately.

=60=

The next day, Abrams brought up the solution to the Joint Chiefs. They grumbled and eyed him with disdain, but they let him try his grand experiment in the end.

The key was that we presented the idea as if it had come from Abrams—not me. Not Godwin, either.

Dr. Abrams was more than glad to take all the credit, naturally.

He gathered all five of our light cruisers, as they were the only vessels with operating rift projectors. We flew them to the rift and encircled it. On a signal from Abrams, we lit up the rift with a larger one of our own.

The process to remove a long term rift was intuitive, but frightening. Essentially, we had to create another, larger rift that encompassed the original one. When the larger rift grew unstable and faded away, it would take both down together.

At least, that was the theory. Dr. Abrams took the theory and ran with it, the chief problem being one of using all our starships together to create a large rift in unison.

It wasn’t an easy task. Every engineer involved, whether they were on Earth or aboard those five starships, held their collective breaths.

Abrams had rigged up a real-time control network to coordinate the projectors, but something of this scale had never been attempted before.

Seeing the ring of ships placed at five equidistant points in high orbit, I was struck by how precise everything had to be. If one of those ships was a few feet off…

Finally, the big moment came. Abrams did the honors himself, and I let him take all the glory.

He paused with his hand on a large lever. He’d rigged it up to trigger the final sequence. The lever didn’t have to be large, black and intimidating, but I figured Abrams liked it that way. He’d always had a flare for the dramatic.

“This is a significant moment in history,” he said, addressing everyone who was involved in the project. “We, as humans, are taking charge of yet another facet of our technological pathway to the stars. If we—”

“Just get on with it, man!” Clemens shouted. “What if the Kwok officers decide they’ve waited long enough and try to come through? You’re wasting time!”

Abrams gave him a hateful look, but at last, with poor grace, he reached out and pulled on his long, black lever.

For a few seconds, nothing happened. Then at last, the starships began to glimmer. Their front projectors sparked blue, wove a pattern of light—and a singularity of shocking size spun into life.

It dwarfed the long term rift in its midst. The odd thing was I could see through it for a moment. I thought… yes, I was fairly certain. I knew the beacon star in the midst of that swirl.

“Antares? Antares itself?” I asked aloud. “But that’s in Imperial territory!”

A buzz went up all around the War Room. We were shocked. To create a rift which connected our system to the Imperials, even if it only existed briefly… That might be suicide.

“Abrams, what are you thinking, man?” I demanded, and I walked up to him, reaching for his long black lever.

He fought me. He gripped it firmly, and he pulled with all his strength. I was surprised as I tried to pry him away.

He was such a skinny old man. He shouldn’t have this kind of power in his limbs. Then I knew the truth, and I struck him down with a flurry of blows.

He fell to the unforgiving deck, and he seemed to keep falling. He folded into himself and melted away to nothing.

The creature hadn’t been Abrams. It had been a Nomad.

Godwin? Probably not. It was hard to tell, but this one had seemed wilder than Godwin, less civilized. Whenever I’d met another of his kind, they’d always seemed more feral and even slightly insane.

Fortunately, when the lever slipped out of his dissolving hands, the rift faded away with it—both of them. The long term rift was gone.

We bided our time for days later, doing countless scans and detailed studies. Dr. Abrams was located and freed. He wasn’t happy to have been abused by Nomads, but he was glad to be alive. Strangely, most of the brass gave him credit for having destroyed the long term rift, which he accepted without hesitation.

“What do you think happened, Blake?” Vega asked me after a week had passed.

“Briefly, one rift covered another. That means three star systems were connected, not just two.”

“The Kwok system, the Solar System—and Antares itself?”

“Yes. That’s what it looked like.”

“Do you think anyone noticed?”

“Like the Imperials? Maybe. It’s hard to say. If they were looking, and the rift lasted long enough for them to get a fix on its origins…” I shrugged.

“How can you be so cavalier?” he demanded.

“Well, if the Imperials jumped on the offense and actually got a fix, then there’s not much we can do about it. They might come out here and snuff us—or they might ignore the whole thing. I guess time will tell.”

Disturbed, Vega left me in peace.

I used whatever time I had left to seek out Mia and spend it with her. She was in my arms all night, and we camped out on the mountainside.

It was summer now, and the fallout had long since blown away. The radioactivity had died due to the short half-life of the bombs they’d used—I was glad for that small blessing.

There were only burnt trees and cool rocks to keep us company, but the stars were brilliant. They shone in their billions, so big and close you could reach out and touch them.

We made love on that barren mountainside. Mia seemed more passionate than ever. Was it due to the nearness of obliteration? Maybe, I couldn’t say.

Neither could I answer the more pressing question: Would we be visited by hostile fleets again?

Only the stars knew the answer to that one, and they weren’t telling their secrets tonight. Like gods, the distant fires in the sky watched us slumber in silence, and we dreamt of better days.

THE END

From the Author: Thanks Reader! I hope you enjoyed EARTH FLEET, the fourth book in the Rebel Fleet Series. If you liked the book and want to read the story to the finish, please go here to put up some stars and a review to support the series. Let me know what kind of world you’d like Leo Blake to discover next!

-BVL

More SF Books by B. V. Larson:

Rebel Fleet Series:

Rebel Fleet

Orion Fleet

Alpha Fleet

Earth Fleet

The Undying Mercenaries Series:

Steel World

Dust World

Tech World

Machine World

Death World

Home World

Rogue World

Blood World

Dark World

Star Force Series:

Swarm

Extinction

Rebellion

Conquest

Army of One (Novella)

Battle Station

Empire

Annihilation

Storm Assault

The Dead Sun

Outcast

Exile

Demon Star

Lost Colonies Trilogy:

Battle Cruiser

Dreadnought

Star Carrier

Visit BVLarson.com for more information.