Infinitys end, p.18
Infinity's End, page 18
“I don’t want to run,” she replied. “Now open it or I break your neck.”
He shook his head. “No, you don’t understand. There’s no ship out there. It’s nothing but a vacuum.”
Damn. Without a ship there was no way up to the bridge without going back through all those people. And even then, she’d be at a disadvantage, not knowing how to move about the ship. She looked down at the injured Athru. “How long can you hold your breath?”
“What?” he asked.
Now she understood, the door wouldn’t open because the “field”—whatever it was, that kept the pressure and the air in was active. She just needed to disable the field and she could go outside the ship. She’d managed a few minutes in the depths of space with Zenfor. Maybe she could stay out there longer if she needed to. Long enough to climb up to the tower. “What’s the average time we can be out in open space without dying?” she asked.
He shook his head. “No, you are a fool, you’re gonna—” she hit him hard enough to render him unconscious, then grabbed hold of one of his arms. She turned back to the control panel and made sure to close the connection to the large corridor, sealing it from the ship. She then used her newfound “authorization” to drop the main field, via the guard’s handprint. The indicator went from purple to orange. She had to assume that meant she could pass. Evie drew in a deep breath, and with the guard in tow, stepped toward the wall.
As soon as the portal that was supposed to connect to a ship opened, she and the guard were yanked forward. She barely had time to grab on to the edge of the opening before they were blown into open space, but she managed to hold on to both the side of the ship and to the unconscious guard until all the air had been expelled from the room. Once she was clear of the opening and zero gravity took over, she began a quick climb on the outside of the ship, working her way up the side with one hand and two feet working in tandem. It was surprisingly easy to ascend without gravity dragging her down, but she had to be careful and not get overzealous. One missed handhold and she and the guard would tumble off into nothingness. She could only hope she’d be able to hold her breath long enough to get to another junction point on the tower itself.
Once she reached the edge of the ship, she pulled them over, then flung herself straight forward, skimming the top of the ship until she reached the tower. She glanced up, a kind of dull pain resonating in the back of her brain either from the cold, the lack of oxygen or both. She needed to hurry.
Planting her feet at the base of the tower she pushed off with all her power, propelling them up at a tremendous speed. Without anything to slow the inertia they traveled stories in only seconds, the top of the tower fast approaching. As Evie reached out to slow them, her foot caught on an errant greeble on the side of the ship, sending them spinning out of control. She lost her grip on the guard as she tried to grab on to something—anything to keep her from hurtling into the blackness of space. Her spin was uneven, and she crashed into the side of the ship, bouncing off the sharp plating which cut into her skin and tore at her clothes. She scrambled to find a hold but missed completely. As she felt herself tumble out of control away from the ship she couldn’t help but think about what a waste it had all been, and how she’d done nothing but let everyone down. Perhaps it was for the best that her last few moments be resigned to being alone in the depths of space.
A hand reached out and grabbed her shirt, yanking her back toward the ship. Evie looked up to see the guard had grabbed on to one of the small greebles on the side of the ship and because his arms were longer, had managed to reach her just in time. He placed his hand on the side of the ship a few meters down and another portal opened, an explosive amount of air spewing from the opening. Once it was clear, he hurtled them both down and through the portal, closing it behind them. Evie felt warm all over and the gravity inside the room pulled her to the floor as the guard limped over to a nearby control board and tapped a few images. The room was flooded with oxygen again and Evie gasped in lumps of air at a time. When she’d caught her breath she looked over to the guard, also panting and still holding his middle where she’d run into him. “Why?” she asked.
“You could have let me die,” he said. “Just let me get pulled out into space. But you didn’t.”
Evie sat back, still inhaling air. Her hands were slowly regaining their color, which meant the rest of her probably was too. The bio blockers either weren’t working anymore or had been turned off. Which could have been a side-effect of the extreme cold of space.
“So,” Evie said, staring at the guard as they sat across from each other, neither one moving. “Now what?”
28
“Tell me she’s going to be alright,” Cas said, running beside Zenfor’s body as Box and two of the other nurses rushed it to sickbay on the hovering gurney.
“I can’t tell you that,” Box said. “But we’ll do everything we can.”
Cas’s comm opened again. “Captain, the incoming fleet,” Zaal said. His voice, while still deep, seemed to resonate a bit higher than normal.
“I know Zaal, I’ll be there in a minute!” he yelled, then cut the comm. He turned back to Box. “What do you need from me? Resource wise? What can I do?”
“Stay out of the way,” Box said. “Let me do my job. And you go do yours. I’ll keep you updated, but nothing I do will matter if the ship gets blown into a thousand pieces.”
His words struck Cas like ice. Box was right, he wasn’t helping by getting in the way. Cas couldn’t fall back into his old habits; he wasn’t going to be paralyzed by the possibility of loss. He stopped running, allowing them to continue on without him, and he caught one last look at Zenfor’s immobile form as they turned the corner toward sickbay. Cas ran back in the other direction to the nearest hypervator. It opened for him—one of the perks of being captain—and he tapped his comm as soon as he was on. “Zaal, I’m on my way up, how close are they?”
“Less four minutes, sir, closing fast. They were hiding on the far side of Devil’s Gate.”
Fucking Rutledge. For all his talk about wanting to help he’d been doing nothing but leading them to slaughter ever since he’d arrived. Cas doubted he was ever serious about helping them and that this had always been the eventual plan, but he was willing to bet Samiya’s talk with Rutledge sent him over the edge early. Otherwise why not wait until the entire Sil fleet was in place before springing this attack? Which brought up another point to consider: if the Sargans were advancing on them, it meant they had to be confident they had the capability to defeat the Sil—something that shouldn’t be possible given Sargans were known for notoriously unreliable tech as it was usually cobbled together from dozens of different species. Had the Athru armed the Sargans, after they’d eliminated every human from their space? Or had they just let Rutledge and others like him do their dirty work for them?
The doors opened and Cas stepped on to the bridge. Hank stood from the command chair and stepped to the side. “Captain on the bridge,” he announced.
“Give me an update,” Cas said. “What’s the status of our fleet?”
“They seem—unperturbed,” Tileah replied. “They haven’t charged any weapons or raised any defensive barriers.”
Cas made a face. “What, do they just think the Sargans are coming for us? Arrogant bastards. Open a comm to the Sil, I want to talk to them personally.”
“But sir,” Zaal said.
“Do it, Zaal, we don’t have time.”
“Aye,” he replied. The comm opened.
“Sil fleet. As you’ve no doubt noticed, we are facing an incoming Sargan armada. Contrary to what you may think, they are not here just for my ship, but for all of us. Prepare yourselves for a battle.”
“They’re responding,” Zaal said. The main view screen changed to an image of a Sil clad in her full uniform, a blue light glowing above her faceless helmet.
“You were told never to contact us in person,” she said, her voice rife with fury. “And now you—”
“Save the theatrics,” Cas interrupted. “We have a bigger problem. There’s a good chance that fleet out there is armed with Athru weapons. They may have the capability to damage or destroy your ships. We can’t stay here; we need to move forward into Coalition space now. Call the other half of the fleet still protecting Thislea. We’re attacking.”
“Preposterous,” the Sil said. “We still have no intel.”
“And we’re not going to either, the shuttle’s mission has failed. It’s unlikely the occupants are still alive,” Cas said, realizing what he was saying as the words came out of his mouth. He wasn’t sure a comm had ever gone through to Evie’s ship from Rutledge or not, but they’d have to investigate that matter later, when they weren’t facing imminent death.
“We demand to speak to our own representative,” the Sil said. “Per our agreement. This will not—”
“Listen to me,” Cas said, growing frustrated. He leaned forward, to make the Sil pay attention. “Your liaison is missing, most likely dead. Zenfor has been mortally wounded by a rogue Athru operative. Coincidentally he was the same person who attacked your people twenty-five years ago. The person who first made the incursion into your space was behind all of this. He is dead, but we have to deal with this fallout. And we’re not going to get anywhere by arguing.”
“Two minutes away, sir,” Zaal said.
“What’s it going to be?” Cas asked. “Do you call the rest of your fleet, or are you going to allow the Athru to arm another potential enemy so when they finally do come after you, they’ll outnumber you a hundred to one?”
The blue light above the Sil’s head pulsed rapidly. It reminded Cas of how Box’s eyes would sometimes blink when he was processing a lot of information. They didn’t have the luxury to sit around and wait for the Sil to weigh the decision. He could just imagine this information being transmitted back to the Sil Sanctuary and the delegates there arguing over how to proceed. But in this case, they didn’t have the luxury of time.
“They’re coming out of their undercurrents,” Zaal said.
“Ignite the ship’s armor,” Cas said, “And ready our new weapons.” He didn’t take his eyes of the screen. He knew the Sil could “see” him and he wasn’t going to be the first one to blink.
“You have dragged us into your conflict, human,” the Sil said, seething. “And now we will all pay for your foolishness.”
“You want to blame me? Fine. But I’m telling you now we were drawn into a trap. If we don’t attack the source now, we won’t get another chance. We were lured here because the Sargan fleet couldn’t get to Thislea fast enough. We can outrun them to Horus, and then we’ll only be facing one enemy instead of two.”
“They’ve opened fire,” Tileah said.
“Ronde, give us some evasive maneuvers, don’t let their weapons hit this ship, even if you have to do an undercurrent jump,” Cas said.
“Aye,” he replied, exchanging a look with River, who nodded.
“Consul! They have just destroyed the Kitchtall!” A voice said on the screen. The Sil’s blue light strobed for a moment.
“Move us out of firing position,” she said, then turned back to Cas. “We are agreed, human. But once this is over, you will answer to the Sanctuary for leading us into this trap, whether it was your intention or not. And you will be judged. If you survive.”
“I’ve been judged before,” Cas replied. “And I’ll be glad to go through it again if it means we stop the Athru.” He cut the comm and the viewscreen returned to an image of space, hundreds of ships emerging from green-tinged portals in space. Some of them had already begun firing.
“I’m reading five, no, six hundred Sargan vessels still coming out of undercurrents all around us,” Tileah said.
Cas took the captain’s chair. “Plot a course to the Horus system. Get us out of here as soon as possible.”
“Sir, if we breach Coalition space without knowing the locations of their patrol ships—” Tileah began.
“We’ll run into them on the way, I know,” Cas replied. “We’ll just have to stay on guard until we can reach the Horus system. And we’ll have to expect the patrols will become more frequent the deeper we get.”
“Course plotted and laid in,” Ronde said. “We better go, it’s getting dense out here.”
Cas pulled up a tactical overlay of the system on the screen. A quick analysis showed the Sargans outnumbered their fleet almost two-to-one. And they’d already taken down three of the Sil ships. “Ronde, punch it before we lose anyone else. Maximum speed.”
Ronde nodded and in an instant they were inside the undercurrent. “Samiya reports the generators down in Engineering are working fine, Rutledge didn’t do any permanent damage,” Hank said, reading from his display.
Cas let out a breath of relief. “Drop armor and disengage weapon systems. Looks like we’ll have to wait until the main event before we get a chance to test them out.” He turned to Tileah. “But I want you running drills every four hours. We’re going to run into these bastards and my bet is it will be sooner rather than later. Let’s make sure we’re ready for them.”
“Yes, sir,” she replied.
Cas glanced over at Zaal. “Is everyone with us?”
“Two more of the Sil ships were damaged before the fleet could get away,” he replied. “I have to assume they’ll be captured and stripped for parts.”
“Maybe,” Cas said, but he wasn’t so sure. Knowing how the Sil felt about their ships led him to believe they might end up sacrificing their lives rather than risk capture. Either way, they were down five ships and based on what they were about to face, they couldn’t afford to lose anyone. Which reminded him.
“Where are you going?” Hank asked as Cas headed for the hypervator.
“I need to check on Vrij and Zenfor,” he replied. “That man did a lot of damage, and it’s my responsibility to see that it’s all undone. I’ll be in sickbay if you need me.”
Hank nodded as Cas stepped back inside the hypervator. The short battle had told him one thing they hadn’t known before: the Athru had the capability to fight back. Which meant this was going to be a very costly battle, no matter the victor.
***
The doors to sickbay slid open, revealing two groups of people. The largest, including Box, were still hovering over Zenfor’s limp body, working furiously. Box didn’t even look up to acknowledge Cas’s presence, which was just as well. He’d promised to stay out of the way and that’s what he was going to do.
The other group, comprised of only two people—Vrij and Nurse Menkel—were over on one of the non-surgical beds. Vrij was sitting up, rubbing the side of his ribcage. Cas walked over with what he hoped was a non-threatening smile on his face. “How is he?”
“Surprisingly good,” Menkel said. “From what he described I would have thought his injuries would have been more severe.”
“Bulaq are s-sturdy,” Vrij said, wincing as he spoke. He turned to Cas. “I’m sorry. I failed in my job. You need a n-new head of security.” He slapped his left cheek with his right hand. Cas took this to mean he was upset with himself.
Cas shook his head. “No. Rutledge had capabilities we couldn’t anticipate. The Athru genetically modified him to be stronger, faster. It wasn’t your fault; it was mine for allowing him to come on board. When you’re well enough, I want you to return to your duties. That’s part of the reason I wanted to come down here.” Cas nodded to Menkel who seemed to get the point and gave them some privacy.
“I a-appreciate that, Captain,” Vrij said.
“We’ve run into a…hiccup. Rutledge had a Sargan armada waiting for us, he was working with the Athru.” It physically hurt Cas to admit he’d been so wrong about the man, but there was little time for regrets. Even though the trip to the Horus system would take some time, it felt like they barely had any at all.
“That’s a big hiccup,” Vrij said.
“But it got me thinking. For the Athru to have made a deal with him, they must have boarded Starbase Eight, rather than just fired on it from space. Which means we might be looking at the possibility of boarding parties.”
“You want us to b-be combat ready,” Vrij said.
“I hate to say it, but yes. I’d rather we be prepared than not.” He shot a glance over at the group working on Zenfor. “I don’t want to lose anyone because we were caught with our pants down.”
“Pants down?” Vrij asked.
“Unaware,” Cas said, turning his attention back to Vrij. “I want you to get started as soon as they clear you from here.”
“I understand. M-may I also make a suggestion?” Vrij’s eyes were wide, almost as if he was afraid Cas might hit him for daring to ask.
“Of course.”
“The prisoners—the pilots in the custom holding cells. Y-you may want to reconsider their long-term imprisonment. T-they aren’t the same anymore.”
Cas leaned back, considering it. The entire reason they’d been imprisoned in the first place was because they had backed Chief Rafnkell in an attempted coup against Evie and him for control of the ship. But that had been nearly a season ago and even though they’d been living in comfortable habitats constructed in one of the cargo bays, they were still in a prison. He also couldn’t ignore the fact they might need as many spacewing pilots as they could get their hands on when they reached Earth. The spacewing ships were notoriously hard to hit with conventional weapons fire and they might provide ample distraction to the Athru at a crucial moment. “I’ll take it under advisement,” he replied.
“Thank you, sir. I-I’ve gotten to know them. They aren’t all bad.”
“Most people rarely are,” he replied. Cas placed a reassuring hand on Vrij’s shoulder, then left him be as he took another look at the group surrounding Zenfor. Despite wanting to know what was happening, he managed to leave sickbay without interrupting their work. Box would comm him when there was news. For now, he had other matters to attend to.
29
Even in the dim light, Evie knew her skin had returned to its normal color. Not as if any of the Athru had been fooled before when they’d seen her paraded down on the thoroughfare, but now it was obvious she was of human heritage. She pushed herself up off the floor, struggling to stand. It seemed the exertion in the vacuum of space had really taken it out of her. She had to steady herself against the closest wall.
He shook his head. “No, you don’t understand. There’s no ship out there. It’s nothing but a vacuum.”
Damn. Without a ship there was no way up to the bridge without going back through all those people. And even then, she’d be at a disadvantage, not knowing how to move about the ship. She looked down at the injured Athru. “How long can you hold your breath?”
“What?” he asked.
Now she understood, the door wouldn’t open because the “field”—whatever it was, that kept the pressure and the air in was active. She just needed to disable the field and she could go outside the ship. She’d managed a few minutes in the depths of space with Zenfor. Maybe she could stay out there longer if she needed to. Long enough to climb up to the tower. “What’s the average time we can be out in open space without dying?” she asked.
He shook his head. “No, you are a fool, you’re gonna—” she hit him hard enough to render him unconscious, then grabbed hold of one of his arms. She turned back to the control panel and made sure to close the connection to the large corridor, sealing it from the ship. She then used her newfound “authorization” to drop the main field, via the guard’s handprint. The indicator went from purple to orange. She had to assume that meant she could pass. Evie drew in a deep breath, and with the guard in tow, stepped toward the wall.
As soon as the portal that was supposed to connect to a ship opened, she and the guard were yanked forward. She barely had time to grab on to the edge of the opening before they were blown into open space, but she managed to hold on to both the side of the ship and to the unconscious guard until all the air had been expelled from the room. Once she was clear of the opening and zero gravity took over, she began a quick climb on the outside of the ship, working her way up the side with one hand and two feet working in tandem. It was surprisingly easy to ascend without gravity dragging her down, but she had to be careful and not get overzealous. One missed handhold and she and the guard would tumble off into nothingness. She could only hope she’d be able to hold her breath long enough to get to another junction point on the tower itself.
Once she reached the edge of the ship, she pulled them over, then flung herself straight forward, skimming the top of the ship until she reached the tower. She glanced up, a kind of dull pain resonating in the back of her brain either from the cold, the lack of oxygen or both. She needed to hurry.
Planting her feet at the base of the tower she pushed off with all her power, propelling them up at a tremendous speed. Without anything to slow the inertia they traveled stories in only seconds, the top of the tower fast approaching. As Evie reached out to slow them, her foot caught on an errant greeble on the side of the ship, sending them spinning out of control. She lost her grip on the guard as she tried to grab on to something—anything to keep her from hurtling into the blackness of space. Her spin was uneven, and she crashed into the side of the ship, bouncing off the sharp plating which cut into her skin and tore at her clothes. She scrambled to find a hold but missed completely. As she felt herself tumble out of control away from the ship she couldn’t help but think about what a waste it had all been, and how she’d done nothing but let everyone down. Perhaps it was for the best that her last few moments be resigned to being alone in the depths of space.
A hand reached out and grabbed her shirt, yanking her back toward the ship. Evie looked up to see the guard had grabbed on to one of the small greebles on the side of the ship and because his arms were longer, had managed to reach her just in time. He placed his hand on the side of the ship a few meters down and another portal opened, an explosive amount of air spewing from the opening. Once it was clear, he hurtled them both down and through the portal, closing it behind them. Evie felt warm all over and the gravity inside the room pulled her to the floor as the guard limped over to a nearby control board and tapped a few images. The room was flooded with oxygen again and Evie gasped in lumps of air at a time. When she’d caught her breath she looked over to the guard, also panting and still holding his middle where she’d run into him. “Why?” she asked.
“You could have let me die,” he said. “Just let me get pulled out into space. But you didn’t.”
Evie sat back, still inhaling air. Her hands were slowly regaining their color, which meant the rest of her probably was too. The bio blockers either weren’t working anymore or had been turned off. Which could have been a side-effect of the extreme cold of space.
“So,” Evie said, staring at the guard as they sat across from each other, neither one moving. “Now what?”
28
“Tell me she’s going to be alright,” Cas said, running beside Zenfor’s body as Box and two of the other nurses rushed it to sickbay on the hovering gurney.
“I can’t tell you that,” Box said. “But we’ll do everything we can.”
Cas’s comm opened again. “Captain, the incoming fleet,” Zaal said. His voice, while still deep, seemed to resonate a bit higher than normal.
“I know Zaal, I’ll be there in a minute!” he yelled, then cut the comm. He turned back to Box. “What do you need from me? Resource wise? What can I do?”
“Stay out of the way,” Box said. “Let me do my job. And you go do yours. I’ll keep you updated, but nothing I do will matter if the ship gets blown into a thousand pieces.”
His words struck Cas like ice. Box was right, he wasn’t helping by getting in the way. Cas couldn’t fall back into his old habits; he wasn’t going to be paralyzed by the possibility of loss. He stopped running, allowing them to continue on without him, and he caught one last look at Zenfor’s immobile form as they turned the corner toward sickbay. Cas ran back in the other direction to the nearest hypervator. It opened for him—one of the perks of being captain—and he tapped his comm as soon as he was on. “Zaal, I’m on my way up, how close are they?”
“Less four minutes, sir, closing fast. They were hiding on the far side of Devil’s Gate.”
Fucking Rutledge. For all his talk about wanting to help he’d been doing nothing but leading them to slaughter ever since he’d arrived. Cas doubted he was ever serious about helping them and that this had always been the eventual plan, but he was willing to bet Samiya’s talk with Rutledge sent him over the edge early. Otherwise why not wait until the entire Sil fleet was in place before springing this attack? Which brought up another point to consider: if the Sargans were advancing on them, it meant they had to be confident they had the capability to defeat the Sil—something that shouldn’t be possible given Sargans were known for notoriously unreliable tech as it was usually cobbled together from dozens of different species. Had the Athru armed the Sargans, after they’d eliminated every human from their space? Or had they just let Rutledge and others like him do their dirty work for them?
The doors opened and Cas stepped on to the bridge. Hank stood from the command chair and stepped to the side. “Captain on the bridge,” he announced.
“Give me an update,” Cas said. “What’s the status of our fleet?”
“They seem—unperturbed,” Tileah replied. “They haven’t charged any weapons or raised any defensive barriers.”
Cas made a face. “What, do they just think the Sargans are coming for us? Arrogant bastards. Open a comm to the Sil, I want to talk to them personally.”
“But sir,” Zaal said.
“Do it, Zaal, we don’t have time.”
“Aye,” he replied. The comm opened.
“Sil fleet. As you’ve no doubt noticed, we are facing an incoming Sargan armada. Contrary to what you may think, they are not here just for my ship, but for all of us. Prepare yourselves for a battle.”
“They’re responding,” Zaal said. The main view screen changed to an image of a Sil clad in her full uniform, a blue light glowing above her faceless helmet.
“You were told never to contact us in person,” she said, her voice rife with fury. “And now you—”
“Save the theatrics,” Cas interrupted. “We have a bigger problem. There’s a good chance that fleet out there is armed with Athru weapons. They may have the capability to damage or destroy your ships. We can’t stay here; we need to move forward into Coalition space now. Call the other half of the fleet still protecting Thislea. We’re attacking.”
“Preposterous,” the Sil said. “We still have no intel.”
“And we’re not going to either, the shuttle’s mission has failed. It’s unlikely the occupants are still alive,” Cas said, realizing what he was saying as the words came out of his mouth. He wasn’t sure a comm had ever gone through to Evie’s ship from Rutledge or not, but they’d have to investigate that matter later, when they weren’t facing imminent death.
“We demand to speak to our own representative,” the Sil said. “Per our agreement. This will not—”
“Listen to me,” Cas said, growing frustrated. He leaned forward, to make the Sil pay attention. “Your liaison is missing, most likely dead. Zenfor has been mortally wounded by a rogue Athru operative. Coincidentally he was the same person who attacked your people twenty-five years ago. The person who first made the incursion into your space was behind all of this. He is dead, but we have to deal with this fallout. And we’re not going to get anywhere by arguing.”
“Two minutes away, sir,” Zaal said.
“What’s it going to be?” Cas asked. “Do you call the rest of your fleet, or are you going to allow the Athru to arm another potential enemy so when they finally do come after you, they’ll outnumber you a hundred to one?”
The blue light above the Sil’s head pulsed rapidly. It reminded Cas of how Box’s eyes would sometimes blink when he was processing a lot of information. They didn’t have the luxury to sit around and wait for the Sil to weigh the decision. He could just imagine this information being transmitted back to the Sil Sanctuary and the delegates there arguing over how to proceed. But in this case, they didn’t have the luxury of time.
“They’re coming out of their undercurrents,” Zaal said.
“Ignite the ship’s armor,” Cas said, “And ready our new weapons.” He didn’t take his eyes of the screen. He knew the Sil could “see” him and he wasn’t going to be the first one to blink.
“You have dragged us into your conflict, human,” the Sil said, seething. “And now we will all pay for your foolishness.”
“You want to blame me? Fine. But I’m telling you now we were drawn into a trap. If we don’t attack the source now, we won’t get another chance. We were lured here because the Sargan fleet couldn’t get to Thislea fast enough. We can outrun them to Horus, and then we’ll only be facing one enemy instead of two.”
“They’ve opened fire,” Tileah said.
“Ronde, give us some evasive maneuvers, don’t let their weapons hit this ship, even if you have to do an undercurrent jump,” Cas said.
“Aye,” he replied, exchanging a look with River, who nodded.
“Consul! They have just destroyed the Kitchtall!” A voice said on the screen. The Sil’s blue light strobed for a moment.
“Move us out of firing position,” she said, then turned back to Cas. “We are agreed, human. But once this is over, you will answer to the Sanctuary for leading us into this trap, whether it was your intention or not. And you will be judged. If you survive.”
“I’ve been judged before,” Cas replied. “And I’ll be glad to go through it again if it means we stop the Athru.” He cut the comm and the viewscreen returned to an image of space, hundreds of ships emerging from green-tinged portals in space. Some of them had already begun firing.
“I’m reading five, no, six hundred Sargan vessels still coming out of undercurrents all around us,” Tileah said.
Cas took the captain’s chair. “Plot a course to the Horus system. Get us out of here as soon as possible.”
“Sir, if we breach Coalition space without knowing the locations of their patrol ships—” Tileah began.
“We’ll run into them on the way, I know,” Cas replied. “We’ll just have to stay on guard until we can reach the Horus system. And we’ll have to expect the patrols will become more frequent the deeper we get.”
“Course plotted and laid in,” Ronde said. “We better go, it’s getting dense out here.”
Cas pulled up a tactical overlay of the system on the screen. A quick analysis showed the Sargans outnumbered their fleet almost two-to-one. And they’d already taken down three of the Sil ships. “Ronde, punch it before we lose anyone else. Maximum speed.”
Ronde nodded and in an instant they were inside the undercurrent. “Samiya reports the generators down in Engineering are working fine, Rutledge didn’t do any permanent damage,” Hank said, reading from his display.
Cas let out a breath of relief. “Drop armor and disengage weapon systems. Looks like we’ll have to wait until the main event before we get a chance to test them out.” He turned to Tileah. “But I want you running drills every four hours. We’re going to run into these bastards and my bet is it will be sooner rather than later. Let’s make sure we’re ready for them.”
“Yes, sir,” she replied.
Cas glanced over at Zaal. “Is everyone with us?”
“Two more of the Sil ships were damaged before the fleet could get away,” he replied. “I have to assume they’ll be captured and stripped for parts.”
“Maybe,” Cas said, but he wasn’t so sure. Knowing how the Sil felt about their ships led him to believe they might end up sacrificing their lives rather than risk capture. Either way, they were down five ships and based on what they were about to face, they couldn’t afford to lose anyone. Which reminded him.
“Where are you going?” Hank asked as Cas headed for the hypervator.
“I need to check on Vrij and Zenfor,” he replied. “That man did a lot of damage, and it’s my responsibility to see that it’s all undone. I’ll be in sickbay if you need me.”
Hank nodded as Cas stepped back inside the hypervator. The short battle had told him one thing they hadn’t known before: the Athru had the capability to fight back. Which meant this was going to be a very costly battle, no matter the victor.
***
The doors to sickbay slid open, revealing two groups of people. The largest, including Box, were still hovering over Zenfor’s limp body, working furiously. Box didn’t even look up to acknowledge Cas’s presence, which was just as well. He’d promised to stay out of the way and that’s what he was going to do.
The other group, comprised of only two people—Vrij and Nurse Menkel—were over on one of the non-surgical beds. Vrij was sitting up, rubbing the side of his ribcage. Cas walked over with what he hoped was a non-threatening smile on his face. “How is he?”
“Surprisingly good,” Menkel said. “From what he described I would have thought his injuries would have been more severe.”
“Bulaq are s-sturdy,” Vrij said, wincing as he spoke. He turned to Cas. “I’m sorry. I failed in my job. You need a n-new head of security.” He slapped his left cheek with his right hand. Cas took this to mean he was upset with himself.
Cas shook his head. “No. Rutledge had capabilities we couldn’t anticipate. The Athru genetically modified him to be stronger, faster. It wasn’t your fault; it was mine for allowing him to come on board. When you’re well enough, I want you to return to your duties. That’s part of the reason I wanted to come down here.” Cas nodded to Menkel who seemed to get the point and gave them some privacy.
“I a-appreciate that, Captain,” Vrij said.
“We’ve run into a…hiccup. Rutledge had a Sargan armada waiting for us, he was working with the Athru.” It physically hurt Cas to admit he’d been so wrong about the man, but there was little time for regrets. Even though the trip to the Horus system would take some time, it felt like they barely had any at all.
“That’s a big hiccup,” Vrij said.
“But it got me thinking. For the Athru to have made a deal with him, they must have boarded Starbase Eight, rather than just fired on it from space. Which means we might be looking at the possibility of boarding parties.”
“You want us to b-be combat ready,” Vrij said.
“I hate to say it, but yes. I’d rather we be prepared than not.” He shot a glance over at the group working on Zenfor. “I don’t want to lose anyone because we were caught with our pants down.”
“Pants down?” Vrij asked.
“Unaware,” Cas said, turning his attention back to Vrij. “I want you to get started as soon as they clear you from here.”
“I understand. M-may I also make a suggestion?” Vrij’s eyes were wide, almost as if he was afraid Cas might hit him for daring to ask.
“Of course.”
“The prisoners—the pilots in the custom holding cells. Y-you may want to reconsider their long-term imprisonment. T-they aren’t the same anymore.”
Cas leaned back, considering it. The entire reason they’d been imprisoned in the first place was because they had backed Chief Rafnkell in an attempted coup against Evie and him for control of the ship. But that had been nearly a season ago and even though they’d been living in comfortable habitats constructed in one of the cargo bays, they were still in a prison. He also couldn’t ignore the fact they might need as many spacewing pilots as they could get their hands on when they reached Earth. The spacewing ships were notoriously hard to hit with conventional weapons fire and they might provide ample distraction to the Athru at a crucial moment. “I’ll take it under advisement,” he replied.
“Thank you, sir. I-I’ve gotten to know them. They aren’t all bad.”
“Most people rarely are,” he replied. Cas placed a reassuring hand on Vrij’s shoulder, then left him be as he took another look at the group surrounding Zenfor. Despite wanting to know what was happening, he managed to leave sickbay without interrupting their work. Box would comm him when there was news. For now, he had other matters to attend to.
29
Even in the dim light, Evie knew her skin had returned to its normal color. Not as if any of the Athru had been fooled before when they’d seen her paraded down on the thoroughfare, but now it was obvious she was of human heritage. She pushed herself up off the floor, struggling to stand. It seemed the exertion in the vacuum of space had really taken it out of her. She had to steady herself against the closest wall.
