Logos (Link Book Three), page 26
“I’ll be there in thirty seconds!” Val called.
Calvin stood by the ramp, between the tall Automatons, and wondered what he’d done in a past life to be in this position.
Before he left, he sent a private message to Captain Sanya Levine on the Hiphol cruiser.
Don’t let anything happen to Ethos. It’s up to you now.
The ramp opened, and Calvin jumped the last three meters. The Automatons fired at the enemy before the robots landed.
____________
Sanya watched as ship after ship exited the wormhole. Eventually, the steady flow stopped, and she tallied sixty Zen-Class cruisers. “I thought six Cadres were coming,” she told Tellan. That would have made it an even seventy-two.
“Perhaps one was diverted,” he answered.
Dread trickled through her veins, increasing with every rushed beat of her heart. The bridge was filled with clones resembling Primum and the Preserver he was based on. She hoped they couldn’t read her communications with the fleet.
“They’re reaching out,” Tellan said.
Sanya drifted from sight, keeping in the shadows as the Hiphol fleet contacted the lone vessel. She assumed they were surprised to find one of their own waiting for their exit.
The viewscreen shimmered and an image of a Locus appeared.
Sanya adjusted the volume of her earpiece translator. “Rallin, please report.”
Tellan stayed put, arms behind him. “The defenses are weak. I’ve managed to remain off radar in anticipation of your arrival. They have a base on the fourth planet, albeit a measly one. Once we extinguish that, the line is smooth to the world beyond.”
“How many are planetside?” the Hiphol captain asked.
“Fifty thousand colonists.” Calvin had said to tell him the truth, making it more enticing to the fleet. They’d be less cautious with the notion of adding that many into the Hiphol ranks.
“Why is your camera glitching?”
“We took a hit during our escape. The rest of the Cadre was destroyed at Pathos,” he said. “We’ve diverted ancillary power to the weapon system for the battle.”
“Very smart.”
“I am surprised you came yourself, Cadre Paramount Tanzax,” Tellan said.
Sanya stiffened. This was their leader? If they could destroy the head of the snake, perhaps the rest of the fleet would crumble.
“The Hiphol numbers have dwindled in the last centuries. You’ve done well to deliver the humans. Cadre Chief Khar is securing Earth and the Sun Colonies,” he said.
Sanya blinked in surprise. Earth was already being invaded? Coupled with Calvin’s cryptic message minutes earlier, she really had no choice but to succeed.
“Excellent. Praise be to the Stars, and to the Creator,” Tellan said, using the old Hiphol saying. Then, for good measure, he and the clones chorused, “We are Hiphol.”
Tanzax squinted, then barked orders to the fleet. “Cadre Blade, to the human base. The rest to Ethos.”
“Sir…”
Tanzax leaned off camera. “We’ve detected an incoming vessel.”
“Yes, that is Excursion,” Tellan said. “It’s been floating in the middle of the system since we arrived.”
Sanya held her breath, waiting to learn if Tanzax would take the bait. “Cadre Axe will investigate. It could be my contact.”
Who is his contact? Why would anyone on Ethos know who Tanzax was? A dozen more worrisome questions filled her thoughts, but Sanya quickly dismissed them, vowing to deal with only that which she could control.
It was Sanya’s job to destroy as many enemy ships as possible before they reached Ethos, and damn it, she’d succeed.
Cadre Axe separated from the sixty ships, taking all twelve vessels. Cadre Dagger did the same, aimed for the fourth planet where Sanya had personally laid a trap.
“I would like to join the attack on the human base,” Tellan said.
Tanzax paused, and the appendages drooping off the back of his head wriggled. “Fine. Then you will go to Excursion and retrieve Fred Wallace. He assured me he’d send the signal off Ethos, and I am yet to see it.”
The viewscreen went dark, and Tellan let out a long exhale.
“You did well,” she assured him.
He returned to speaking her language. “Did he seem skeptical to you?”
“Nope.” Sanya wished Calvin was there to make the high-level decisions rather than her. “Tell Black what happened.”
“Where are you going?” Secundo called from his pilot’s position.
“To do what I do best.” She ran down the hall, heading for the hangar where her J-1E fighter waited.
SIX
Jane ceased to be.
The platform was gone, the sphere a distant memory. Jane couldn’t recall how she’d gotten there, only that it was her destiny to be part of the Band.
Stars were born, others dwindled until their light faded into obscurity, and Jane watched from a perch high above.
Before it all, the Band existed, floating in nothing.
She witnessed dozens of alien visitors, most not understanding the power contained within the material. Many entered the sphere, each dying in turn. A race, the seventh to attempt contact, marked the symbols down, then etched them on their skin in hopes the sphere wouldn’t sacrifice their bodies to whatever god had created the Band. They survived longer, but eventually died like the rest.
It wasn’t until the Locus arrived in a ship that somehow looked familiar that the nature of the Oniri was uncovered. Ten of the aliens faced the sphere, all with tattoos on their arms. They spoke, but Jane couldn’t hear within the bubble. Rather than trying to access the energy shield, they began to harvest Oniri from the vast resources of the asteroid belt. Freighters hauled the collections that would eventually be carved into Link Controllers and Starlines. Instead of aiming to control the Band, the Locus repurposed the technology, like Henry had with the Tube.
Henry Abimbola.
The name was fleeting to Jane… Jane? Who was Jane?
She had a brief notion of trying to alter the Oniri, but it wasn’t possible to close the Link…
Jane stayed within the sphere, watching centuries pass. Time wasn’t linear within the Band. Eventually, a world came into sight. The planet filled her view, rotating on its invisible axis in space. Beyond it was a perfect star, glowing yellow and warming the surface of the world.
In the distance, the Oniri Band loomed almost in warning to the occupants, but they weren’t at a stage to see beyond their atmosphere. The aliens used rudimentary weapons, hunting food with two-stringed bows and clubbing four-legged fish as they scurried from lakes. Fire blazed and forests burned, nearly killing their population.
Time sped by. Innovation was rapid. An agricultural revolution changed them from nomads to a community-minded culture. Thinking replaced working, and within generations the aliens had an industrial revolution. In centuries they tested space travel.
Jane saw the first starship: a round can burning rocket fuel exploded. Advances occurred, and they tried again in a generation, reaching the Band.
The wormholes were intentional. They wanted to be used. The Oniri Band wasn’t built to be controlled; it was there to stimulate the universe.
She could open the wormholes. The Link Controllers would become useless and unnecessary.
The trade-off was simple.
Her life.
The sphere hadn’t been fueled in ages.
And it demanded a hefty price.
____________
Luke Dalton ducked when the Automatons fired, avoiding a deflected round. It pinged off Callie’s armor, and she glared behind her mask. It took him a moment to recognize Calvin Brooks was the man who’d jumped out of a moving starship. The newly assigned admiral rolled to his feet, shooting at Fred Wallace and his group of robots.
Luke had always thrived in chaos. In these situations, he could release all the frustrations of life and be his true self. He uppercut a Hiphol and pushed the alien into one of its allies, then stole the T-51N that tumbled to the ground. He quickly connected to it with his HUD, and joined Calvin as Fred jogged behind the cover of his army of robots.
“Good timing!” Luke called.
“I didn’t want to lose the war before it started,” Cal replied.
The building shook as the weapon on top fired up. Light crackled at the base of the extended tower. Luke wasn’t sure what it did, but clearly, it was important to Fred.
With a glance at the battlefield, he saw his team putting up a solid fight, especially as Henry’s Automatons killed the Hiphol without a trace of remorse.
“Let’s shut this down!” Luke shouted over the racket. An errant bullet hit his armor, denting the plate on his right shoulder.
Fred retreated into the stone structure, and the door slammed closed. Four robots were outside, blocking the passage. The old Excursion assistant bots were programmed to do what their owners required, and it had been shortsighted not to check if anyone had altered that coding.
A rusted yellow robot’s head exploded, and Luke jumped when Thodoros arrived holding a gun. Instead of commenting, the protector from Pathos switched to a pulse arrangement and shot the remaining three, covering them with a wide scramble. They started on fire as their circuits fried.
“I guess you’re coming with us,” Cal told Thodoros.
“Rallin’s crew came with a Starline on their ship.” Luke searched for a handle, and when he didn’t find one, he removed the explosives he’d intended to use before. “We’d better move.” He slammed them to the frame and ran around the corner while the battle continued behind them.
The explosion rocked Luke off his feet, but Calvin managed to stay upright. Instead of a modest opening, the bomb tore a ten-foot section clean off.
“If their fleet gets within range, they’ll send ground troops to Ethos,” Cal said.
Luke strode in, using the gun’s beam to illuminate the dark space. He pointed up. “We need to access the roof.”
They were greeted by stairs along the wall, and Luke noted how everything appeared to be hand-carved, the steps included. They varied in size, and dozens of footprints had recently disrupted the layer of dust.
Thodoros went ahead and shot something when they reached the second story. Another robot fell, bouncing down the stairs to land in a heap on the main floor.
“Do you hear that?” Cal asked.
“No.”
“The fight is over.” Calvin entered the room before Luke. “Valentina, what do you see?”
“The Automatons and Luke’s army finished the Hiphol. Do you want me to blast the base?”
Luke nervously shook his head.
“Don’t destroy it until I give the order,” Cal ordered.
The base shook as Valentina’s ship roared by. “Okay. Whatever they’re planning, it’ll happen soon.”
Luke jogged to the next set of stairs and encountered a space filled with electronics. Screens were mounted on the walls, most of them powered off. “Stop where you are, Wallace!”
The man almost tripped on the steps. He turned slowly, hand on a round device. Even from twenty meters away, it was obvious he had his finger depressed on a button. “If you shoot me, Ethos’ base is gone.”
“You’d do that to your own people?” Calvin asked.
“I am Hiphol. The only way to survive is for us to give in. We must sacrifice Ethos. I was going to return to the Sun Colonies and explain the situation to Ambassador Gaines.”
Luke viewed Fred through his crosshairs. “You’re a traitor.”
“No.” Fred’s hair was wild, and his eyes grew larger. “I’m the only person that understands the truth. Darius fled to Earth. Linus went into freezing. I was abandoned! When Cadre Paramount threatened our home, I had no choice. And they were true to their end of the bargain. The Hiphol left Pathos alone, didn’t they?”
Calvin slowly walked closer to Fred. “You told them about Pathos?”
“I had to!” Fred’s voice rose an octave.
“I’ve heard of the long game, but this is next level,” Luke muttered.
“Where humanity is anything but. The Hiphol practice restraint,” Fred said.
“Like you, I suppose.” Calvin was a few feet from Fred, with Luke staying in position, not letting the man out of his sight.
“Do you think this is any different than what you did in the war, Calvin? I’ve read the reports. You sacrificed soldiers without a second thought,” Fred said.
“That’s where we differ. I’m haunted by what I did under the banner of the Diplomats.”
“Me too,” Luke added. He joined Calvin, and the floor vibrated with greater intensity. “You can’t destroy our colony. What would the Fred Wallace who first heard about the Link say to that? The man who drew up the original blueprints for Ethos?”
“He’s dead.” Fred started to let his finger relax, then ran up the stairs to the roof.
They followed, and Luke noticed robots working on the base of the contraption. The energy was palpable, and his HUD flashed on and off in its proximity. The four points shone brightly and added their beams to the central stack. Bits of unharnessed energy crackled randomly, until the beam appeared solid.
“Turn it off. Don’t do this. We can win the war, Fred,” Calvin pleaded.
Fred looked at peace with his decision. His frostbitten nose and cheeks gleamed with the blue light. “None of this will matter. We are Hiphol.”
Luke understood what came next.
Fred’s finger slipped, and Luke sprinted, moving into a dive to knock him aside. They wrestled as the beam intensified. The robots gazed up.
The device fell from Luke’s grip and bounced over the edge of the roof. He lay on his back while Fred laughed in celebration.
“Val! Now!” Calvin shouted.
The starship arrived, but it was too late.
Thodoros raced across the roof, leaping over Socrates and his reprogrammed allies. The robot from Orbitus landed in the center of the weapon and fired his T-51N into the bottom of it as he began to melt. Thodoros didn’t stop, even when Socrates and another tried removing him. He continued shooting, and a second later, the three robots exploded, along with the T-51N’s charge.
Luke was thrown off the building with the sheer force of the detonation. He watched the beam dissipate, then vanish from the dark sky, while falling. For a second, he was weightless; then reality struck, and he dropped four stories to the ground. He landed with a smash, and his HUD turned off.
“Are you okay?” The voice was familiar, but Luke couldn’t see anything. He fumbled for the release and tossed the helmet off. Lois’ face was bleeding and her hair was matted, but she was alive.
“I’ve had better days.” Luke glanced around. “Where’s Calvin?”
Valentina fired at the rooftop until the building collapsed and the weapon was completely neutralized.
“Cal!” Luke called. “Calvin!”
A figure emerged from the cloud of dust, his armored suit dented in the chest plate. Calvin’s helmet was off, and his right eye was red and bloodshot. “You don’t think I’d go down that easily, do you?” He tossed the ruined piece of his suit to the field and looked at the remnants of Luke’s army.
At quick count, they’d lost a third of his troops in the assault, but every Hiphol from their recovered Cadre cruiser lay dead in the battlefield.
Valentina landed in the center of the mess, her thrusters burning a Hiphol corpse. Luke noticed the visceral reaction from some of the green recruits.
As the sun began to rise, a dropship flew toward them for an extraction.
Luke was exhausted, but the battle had finally begun.
SEVEN
Sanya watched the feeds in the cockpit of the J-1E, nestled within the safety of the Zen-Class cruiser they’d stolen from Cadre Dagger.
All twelve ships were destined for the trap, and Sanya kept thinking they’d turn on them. But they truly believed that Tellan was Rallin, the Cadre Chief in charge of Dagger.
The planet reminded Sanya of Neptune. It was mostly ice, with dark, cold conditions. If the Hiphol knew anything about humans, they’d have questioned why they had a base in such a harsh landscape.
She checked the radar, finding three full Cadres flying deeper in-system where they’d eventually encounter the first line of defense. Calvin wasn’t so confident in their abilities, but with Colonel Baker in charge, Sanya had faith they’d do serious damage to the enemy fleet before they reached Selene.
“Where is the base?”
Sanya’s dash translated the conversation between Cadre Blade’s Chief and Tellan.
“I’ve sent the coordinates.”
“Perhaps we should send a scout,” the Hiphol said.
“There’s no need. I have confirmed the site.”
Sanya had aided Will in the creation of the forged documents. In the files were falsified videos of the domed structure, complete with thousands of humans and dozens of starships waiting for the Hiphol to arrive. In reality, there was a bomb that could fry the shields of the cruisers, thanks to Henry’s reverse-engineering. Once the shields were off, the core would erupt, blasting the rest of the Cadre.
“Lead the way.”
Sanya swallowed, knowing this could be it. The ultimate sacrifice. She’d expected to die nearly every day during the Solar War, but had spent the following fifteen years trying to resist that sensation.
Sanya gripped the controls tightly. If she was going to die at the hands of the Hiphol, Ethos would be spared first.
Two of the Hiphol cruisers stayed back while ten followed Tellan planetside.
After thirty minutes, the dome came into view. The planet was covered in sheets of ice, with the occasional gray rock protruding out. The barrier was a projection, and Sanya held her breath, praying it didn’t shimmer and show their cards.
She checked the two vessels, and knew she’d need to time this properly. Every enemy craft they destroyed greatly increased their odds of surviving the incursion.
