The Genesis Fleet E-Book

Jack Campbell

• Herausgeber: Titan Books
• Kategorie: Fantasy und Science-Fiction
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2019

Beschreibung

A young fleet officer and a Marine must stand together to defend their neighbors and their colony in this thrilling finale to the powerful and action-packed Genesis Fleet saga from New York Times bestselling author Jack Campbell.The recently colonized world of Glenlyon has learned that they're stronger when they stand with other star systems than they are on their own. But after helping their neighbor Kosatka against an invasion, Glenlyon has become a target. The aggressive star systems plan to neutralize Glenlyon before striking again.An attack is launched against Glenlyon's orbital facility with forces too powerful for fleet officer Rob Geary to counter using their sole remaining destroyer, Saber. Mele Darcy's Marines must repel repeated assaults while their hacker tries to get into the enemy systems to give Saber a fighting chance.To survive, Glenlyon needs more firepower, and the only source for that is their neighbor Kosatka or other star systems that have so far remained neutral. But Kosatka is still battling the remnants of the invasion forces on its own world, and if it sends its only remaining warship to help will be left undefended against another invasion. While Carmen Ochoa fights for the freedom of Kosatka, Lochan Nakamura must survive assassins as he tries to convince other worlds to join a seemingly hopeless struggle.As star systems founded by people seeking freedom and autonomy, will Kosatka, Glenlyon and others be able to overcome deep suspicions of surrendering any authority to others? Will the free star systems stand together in a new Alliance, or fall alone?

Leseprobe

CONTENTS

Cover

Also By Jack Campbell and Available from Titan Books

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

Epilogue

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Available Now From Titan Books

ALSO BY JACK CAMPBELL

AND AVAILABLE FROM TITAN BOOKS

THE GENESIS FLEET

VANGUARD

ASCENDANT

TRIUMPHANT

THE LOST FLEET SERIES:

THE LOST FLEET: DAUNTLESS

THE LOST FLEET: FEARLESS

THE LOST FLEET: COURAGEOUS

THE LOST FLEET: VALIANT

THE LOST FLEET: RELENTLESS

THE LOST FLEET: VICTORIOUS

BEYOND THE FRONTIER: DREADNAUGHT

BEYOND THE FRONTIER: INVINCIBLE

BEYOND THE FRONTIER: GUARDIAN

BEYOND THE FRONTIER: STEADFAST

BEYOND THE FRONTIER: LEVIATHAN

THE LOST STARS SERIES:

THE LOST STARS: TARNISHED KNIGHT

THE LOST STARS: PERILOUS SHIELD

THE LOST STARS: IMPERFECT SWORD

THE LOST STARS: SHATTERED SPEAR

STARK’S WAR SERIES (AS JOHN G. HEMRY):

STARK’S WAR

STARK’S COMMAND

STARK’S CRUSADE

THE JAG IN SPACE SERIES (AS JOHN G. HEMRY):

A JUST DETERMINATION

BURDEN OF PROOF

RULE OF EVIDENCE

AGAINST ALL ENEMIES

JACK CAMPBELL

TITAN BOOKS

The Genesis Fleet: Triumphant

Print edition ISBN: 9781785650444

E-book edition ISBN: 9781785650451

Published by Titan Books

A division of Titan Publishing Group Ltd

144 Southwark Street, London SE1 0UP

First edition: May 2019

2 4 6 8 10 9 7 5 3 1

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

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

Copyright © 2019 by John G. Hemry writing as Jack Campbell.

Cover images © Shutterstock.

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To Robert R. “Bob” Chase, a gentleman of boundless goodwill and a writer of limitless imagination.

For S., as always.

1

The city of Ani, dead before it had been officially born, felt ghostlier than usual this night under the slowly shifting light of Kosatka’s primary moon. Carmen Ochoa eased carefully among the deserted buildings constructed to house families and businesses that hadn’t appeared before the foreign invaders who called themselves “rebels” infested the area.

She paused before entering an area scarred by war, the wide street half-blocked by the front portion of a tall structure that had collapsed when artillery fire tore into it. The rubble provided perfect cover for ambushers, while also forcing anyone traveling this way to divert their path into the open for a short space. Carmen knelt down in the shadow of an intact building, using the scope of her high-powered rifle to study the path ahead. Given time, the multispectral sensors in that scope could identify just about any threat.

The silent, empty city where unseen dangers lurked in the night reminded Carmen of a book she’d once read, a story set on a world called Barsoom that held many ancient, abandoned cities. It’d been a shock to realize that Barsoom was supposed to be Mars, Carmen’s childhood home. The romantic, crumbling glory of Barsoom’s lost cities had nothing in common with the squalid and ugly slums of Mars that Carmen had known, except perhaps for the fact that both contained endless threats to the life and freedom of anyone who lived there, and perhaps also that both were places where dreams of a brighter future had long since died.

Someone was trying to turn the recently settled world of Kosatka into such a place. Carmen wasn’t going to allow that.

The invaders had been pushed out of the other two cities that Kosatka boasted, though both Lodz and Drava had taken a lot of damage as the price of that victory. The human cost had also been painful. But as long as the invaders continued to maintain a toehold on this world around and in Ani, the risk of the next attack succeeding remained too high, and no one knew if the star systems that had attacked Kosatka would return anytime soon with another invasion fleet. The more that could be learned about the military resources of Scatha, Apulu, and Turan Star Systems, and the more the area controlled by the remaining invaders could be shrunk and their numbers reduced, the better chance Kosatka would have.

Which was why she was here tonight, slinking through the shadows of an empty city, rather than back in Lodz with her new husband Dominic.

Satisfied that no dangers awaited, Carmen moved cautiously forward once more. The remaining invaders had lost a lot of equipment, especially the sort of sensors that could have spotted infiltrators such as her, and the sort of mines and automated defenses that could have threatened her. But Carmen kept her progress slow and careful as she flitted through empty buildings whose ground-floor doors and windows had been blown out or forced open during past fighting. She passed like a ghost through what would have been the large lobby of an apartment building, around the edges of what could have become a corner office or small shop, stepping over drifts of dirt on the floors in which weeds were striving to take root, past the empty maws of inner doorways and unfinished ventilation ducts. In the darkness those openings gaped with a deeper gloom that seemed somehow sinister, as if enemies lurked within, watching and waiting. But her sensors detected nothing, so Carmen kept moving.

Her first warning that she’d finally reached an enemy perimeter came when her scope alerted her to energy use and body heat ahead. Sentries, their gear battered enough that it could no longer offer the concealment it once had. The concealment that Carmen’s outfit still had and kept them from detecting her.

Carmen waited, watching through her scope, long enough to spot the nearest sentries when they moved. Their camo clothing matched itself to the buildings and wreckage, but movement still showed against the otherwise deserted surroundings.

Finally, she slid warily through the nearest buildings and into a small park, the trees and bushes planted there nearly four years ago grown into a stunted and tangled mass. As Carmen had expected, the invaders had counted on anyone entering that to make enough noise to be heard, but she’d learned how to move slowly and cautiously enough to pass through such obstacles. She kept her eyes open and her scope active, spotting a single trip wire in time to avoid stumbling into it, and stepping carefully past it.

Finally, Carmen reached a position where she could lie next to a tree, gazing toward a building where several individuals were visible as shadows through the shattered windows. She focused on them, zooming in, but the features remained vague and the lips too ill defined for the scope to be able to read the words they spoke. There were enough other invaders present to make any attempt to get closer far too dangerous. The signal pickup on her scope remained quiet, showing that these invaders weren’t using any electronic communications that didn’t depend on fiber-optic landlines.

That left little chance of any intelligence collection. But she’d already pinpointed this enemy-held area. One more task and she could call in a strike. Carmen watched, patient and remorseless, until she could be sure which of the figures was in charge by the way the others acted.

Finally, she aimed her rifle up toward the satellites orbiting the planet, all controlled by Kosatka’s own government, and used the high-gain transmitter in her scope to send a tight burst signal that identified the invaders’ location, as well as a requested time for the strike.

Then she had to wait a little longer, the night quiet about her, occasional movements of enemy soldiers visible, the group inside the building still talking, the timer on her scope counting down. As the numbers dwindled to less than a minute, Carmen zoomed in on the leader she’d identified, aimed with infinite care, and then fired, the noise of the shot shattering the calm of the night.

Her target jolted away and fell as the high-powered bullet slammed into them, the others around their leader scattering and diving for cover.

Carmen was already moving, no longer trying to remain silent, moving fast to put distance between herself and the invaders, hearing alerts sounding behind her, a few shots tearing through the bushes around her. As she had wanted, the invaders had all taken cover, lying low, their attention fixed on the buildings around them.

The strike came down.

It had been dropped by Shark, Kosatka’s remaining destroyer. Streamlined, solid metal projectiles, released from low orbit on precise trajectories, falling for hundreds of kilometers, gaining energy as they fell. Carmen saw multiple sudden shadows spring to life in front of her as the projectiles drew bright lines of light through the night sky behind her, a display beautiful to anyone far enough away but terrifying to those at the aim points. The invaders, belatedly realizing the strike was inbound, might be springing to their feet to flee, or might be cowering helplessly on the ground.

It didn’t matter what they were doing, because anything they did was too late now. Carmen felt her lips pulling back in a snarl of anticipation as she ran, her breath rushing between her teeth.

The ground beneath Carmen shook as the projectiles slammed to the surface, releasing their accumulated energy, tearing apart anything they struck, cratering the soil, blowing apart buildings. In a moment of insane fury, a small portion of the dead city of Ani ceased to exist.

Carmen dropped to the ground as pieces of debris whipped past above her. A large piece of wreckage rocked the ground as it plummeted down a few meters to one side. She stared at it, feeling her heart pound in belated reaction to how close death had come that time. The roar of destruction blanketed all other sounds, momentarily deafening Carmen as she scrambled back to her feet and ran once more.

As the multiple roars of the impacting projectiles faded, Carmen heard the rumble of buildings collapsing and felt the rush of air and dust at her back.

Part of Ani was gone, but so were the invaders who’d sheltered there. A little more of Kosatka was free.

* * *

Carmen didn’t linger near the site of the strike, moving a few kilometers through the dark and once-more-silent city before risking sending out a full report, her scope relaying the data and video it had recorded.

Eventually, she reached the building where the unit she was with had holed up. Outwardly, it looked as deserted and dead as the rest of the city. But sentries with weapons at the ready greeted Carmen in the outer rooms. A large inner room, shielded from the outside, held twenty men and women as well as their equipment. Inside, most wore only T-shirts and trousers, their camo, personal weapons, and body armor (if they had any) placed on the floor beside where they sat or lay. Officially, those twenty and the five sentries on watch outside made up the Third Company of the Second Regiment of the First Brigade of Kosatka’s planetary militia. The unit had been one hundred strong before the invaders landed, made up mostly of people who’d come to Kosatka to start new lives in a wide variety of occupations but had found themselves forced to defend their new homes. Some of those hundred had been called back for critical jobs, others for family emergencies, others wounded. The rest had died. Those remaining wore the weary, fatalistic expressions of men and women who were going to see their job through but didn’t expect to be there when victory finally came. If it ever did.

Carmen received nods of recognition as she entered, feeling a small rush of pleasure at being accepted as one of them. She’d spent a long time feeling alone. Carmen felt herself finally relaxing, exchanging greetings with her comrades, peeling off her camo, and gratefully accepting a cup of coffee.

“Kosatka is short on a lot of things, but they make sure we always have coffee,” Captain Devish said as he crouched down beside her. “It’s lousy coffee, but it’s here.”

“There’s no more coffee in Drava or Lodz,” Carmen told him. “What’s left on the planet is being sent to the fighters here around Ani.”

“I hope the planet gets more shipments in before it all runs out. You did a good job, Carmen.”

“Thanks,” she said. “What’s the assessment?”

“No signs of life. The strike wiped out that invader strongpoint.” Captain Devish, among the few professional soldiers in the unit, had come to Kosatka from Brahma, one of the Old Colonies. When asked, he always gave his reason for emigrating as “I was bored.” He certainly wasn’t bored now.

“Good.” Carmen took a drink of the hot and bitter coffee, feeling exhausted. “Did my report make it through?”

“Yeah. Clean upload.” Devish gave her a searching glance. “I heard you worked for Earth government once.”

“Yeah. After I got off Mars.” She didn’t try to hide her origins anymore. People could accept her or reject her. Carmen no longer cared. “I worked in Albuquerque.”

“Albuquerque? What was that like?”

“Better than Mars.”

Devish grinned. “What’d you do?”

“I was in the Conflict Resolution Office,” Carmen said. “Working to find legal and peaceful resolutions for conflicts and disputes on Earth and all settled worlds.”

“You’re kidding.” Devish shook his head. “How effective was that?”

“It worked when people believed in it. When they stopped believing, stopped caring, it didn’t work. I came out here to try to make people believe in that kind of thing again. Because what’s happening to Kosatka shouldn’t be happening anywhere.” Carmen touched her rifle. “That’s why I’m using this now. But someday we need to get back to depending on laws for our protection.”

“That’d be nice,” Devish said, not quite hiding his skepticism that such a day would ever come. “Anyway, you can relax. We’ve been ordered to stay under cover through daylight today, so there won’t be any more action until nightfall.”

Finishing the coffee, Carmen went into a side room for some privacy and uplinked to Kosatka’s planetary net using landline relays to keep anyone from being able to tell where her signal was coming from. Fiber cables run to the roofs of other buildings linked them to antennas communicating to the satellites above.

This room, like most rooms in Ani, lacked furniture, so she sat on the floor, settling down with her back against the wall behind her. Carmen set her comm pad down long enough to comb her hands through her hair and rub her face so she wouldn’t look like someone who’d just spent the night crawling through a dead city. Fixing a smile on her face, Carmen tapped a link.

After a long moment, the image of Dominic Desjani appeared. His face still bore signs of the strain of the injuries that kept him mostly confined to bed. “Hey, Red,” he said, smiling. Red, the common slur aimed at those from Mars, had somehow become an affectionate nickname by Dominic for her, one she loved hearing from him. “How are you?”

“Working late,” Carmen said. “Sorry.”

“I never knew collecting intelligence was so stressful.”

“Yeah, well, fieldwork. You know.” She didn’t want to lie to him, but she also didn’t want to admit to all of the risks she was running. “How’s the leg?”

“The one that’s missing? Still gone.” Dominic gestured vaguely. “I’m told maybe another month before I get a prosthetic. There’s a big backup manufacturing them for all the wounded, and I’m sort of low on the priority scale.”

“What about regeneration? Weren’t they looking at a regrow for you?” Carmen asked.

“Still looking.” Dominic smiled. “I can wait. There are others who need stuff grown back worse than I do.”

“As long as you’re okay,” Carmen said.

“What have you actually been doing, Red?”

She sighed. “Collecting intelligence.”

“That covers a lot of different ground. You look pretty worn-out.”

“I’m doing my part, Domi.”

He stayed silent, unhappy, his eyes on her.

“I’m going to be back in Lodz in a few days,” Carmen added, trying to change the subject. “What do you want to do?”

Dominic shook his head, still gloomy. “Maybe have some more honeymoon.”

“That’d be nice. Domi, I’m sorry. You know who I am. You knew what you were getting when you asked me to marry you. I’m a Red.”

“You came from Mars. But you’re not like those gangsters fighting for the invaders.” Dominic looked away. “You are a fighter. I knew that, yeah. Maybe someday you’ll tell me everything you did on Mars. Everything you did to get off that hellhole of a planet.”

“You don’t want to know, Domi.” Carmen forced another smile. “What matters is that I made it here and found you. Hey, estimates are that the invaders are down to a couple of thousand in the areas of Ani they still occupy and the land just outside the city. They’re short on everything, and they lost another senior leader tonight. They could crack at any time.”

He nodded, not seeming happy at the news. “How’d you hear about them losing a leader?”

Stupid. Why had she said that? “Uh …”

“That’s what I thought. Red—”

“Don’t. Or I’ll bring up the subject of you leaving your police job to become an officer in the militia.”

Dominic eyed her, then smiled. “We’re two of a kind, huh? Well motivated. Not too smart.”

“Maybe too smart for our own good,” Carmen admitted.

“Somebody has to do it. Any estimates on when the next invasion force will show up?”

“No. We have no idea what Scatha, Apulu, and Turan might have left.”

“We know what we have left.” Dominic pointed outward. “One warship, Shark. And a planetary militia that’s low on supplies, weapons, and people.”

Carmen nodded. “Lochan went for help, remember? And we’re formally allied with Glenlyon now. Kosatka’s not alone anymore.”

“It still feels pretty alone,” Dominic said. He laughed, the sound more bitter than humorous. “I was told that if another invasion fleet jumps into the star system, I’ll be jumped up the priority list for a smart prosthetic so I’ll be combat capable again. Nice of them, huh?”

“Yeah. Nice.” Carmen had to look away this time, remembering seeing Dominic wounded, his lower leg gone, awaiting evacuation. For a moment her sight of the empty room about her was overlaid by her memories of the dimly lit basement where she’d found Dominic during the battle for Lodz, the stench of blood in the air, tired medics doing all they could, Domi himself sedated, her guts churning with fear that he might not make it. It took a major effort to wrench her thoughts away from that, to compose herself enough to smile at him once more. “I’ll see you in a couple of days.”

After the call ended she sat on the floor, gazing out at the vacant room, wondering what would happen and how long she and Dominic might have left together. Please don’t let us down, Lochan.

* * *

Lochan Nakamura, who’d already escaped a few attempts to ensure he never reached Eire Star System, tried not to look nervous as the group he was with approached the security and customs screening at Eire’s orbital facility. His attention on the people around them, Lochan twitched in nervous surprise when the security scanner chirped as Freya Morgan walked through it.

“Hold on.” The security detail displayed a level of cautious wariness that had become normal in recent years. The days of casual security theater done as a matter of form had disappeared as threats multiplied on the frontiers of human expansion among the stars. One officer studied a display, frowning, as two others stood back, their weapons not drawn but their postures those of someone ready to react. “Freya Morgan?”

“That’s the name,” Freya confirmed.

“You’re traveling alone?”

Lochan spoke before taking the time to think. “I’m with her. On business.”

“So am I,” Leigh Camagan said.

The officer gazed at them, his eyes flicking to the display and back again to focus on Lochan and Leigh. “Lochan Nakamura. From Kosatka. And Alice Mary Norton from Glenlyon.”

Leigh shook her head, tapping her personal pad. “That’s a false name to ensure I made it this far. Here’s my real identification. Leigh Camagan, minister of the government of Glenlyon.”

“I see,” the officer replied in the tone of someone wishing that such a thing had happened on someone else’s shift. “I’ll have to ask you three to step aside,” the security officer added in a voice whose politeness now held steel under the surface.

A fresh pair of security officers appeared to escort Lochan, Freya, and Leigh into a side room. The door locked behind them as the officers left them alone.

“Do they really think we’re going to start talking freely just because we’re the only ones in this room?” Leigh Camagan asked, sounding annoyed. Small, sharp, and fiery, she was identified by her false travel documents as a librarian on her way to Earth. Her ultimate destination was indeed Earth, but once there she’d be shopping not for novels but for surplus warships.

“You’d be surprised how stupid some folks can be,” Freya replied. She appeared relaxed and calm, which reassured Lochan a great deal. Supposedly a straightforward trade representative from the world of Catalan, Freya Morgan had the outward appearance of an unconcerned traveler. Only someone who looked closely would notice the way her eyes kept constant watch on everyone else, and the way her every step kept her balanced and ready to react. Lochan hadn’t learned everything that Freya was capable of, but she certainly knew a lot more about such things as improvised explosives and hacking into systems than the average trade representative.

Lochan looked around, seeing two displays on one wall, probably placed to encourage careless conversation among those waiting here. One showed an outside view of Eire’s orbital station, including both the boxy shape of the freighter Bruce Monroe that Lochan and the others had arrived in, and farther off, the menacing barracuda-like shape of the destroyer Caladbolg. Like the other warships in the new colonies, Caladbolg had begun life in Earth Fleet, where she’d been the Emperor Menelik. But Earth, finally weary of war and tired of trying to police her unruly children on planets circling other stars, had been shutting down her legendary fleet and selling her former warships.

There had been similar destroyers among the forces of those attacking Kosatka.

“You’d think Earth would care who they were selling weapons to,” he muttered.

“How can they tell?” Leigh asked. “From the distance of a few hundred light years and months of travel time, we all look the same.”

Freya nodded. “All the authorities on Earth care about is whether buyers have enough cash or good credit.”

Lochan shook his head, not sure what else to say, his eyes going to the other display, which showed a star chart of the local region. Humanity, exploding into this arm of the galaxy after the introduction of the jump drives that allowed travel between stars in a matter of weeks, had in the last few decades settled on Eire, as well as farther out on Kosatka, Glenlyon, and Catalan. Other stars, like Tantalus and Jatayu, lacked worlds suitable for humans, and remained simply waypoints to other places.

His eyes settled on a cluster of other stars. Scatha, Turan, and Apulu. Most people coming out here were seeking freedom of one kind or another. But the rulers of those star systems had wanted most of all the freedom to impose their will on others. With Earth far distant and uninterested in what happened on the borders of humanity’s expansion, that freedom had meant war and other aggressions.

Lochan Nakamura’s last sight of Kosatka had been of an invasion fleet closing in on a world with too few defenders. The end of Carmen Ochoa’s last message to him echoed in his mind. Get out of Kosatka. Go where you can find help for us. We’ll hold out until you get back.

“We’ll bring back help,” Freya said in a low voice, as if reading his thoughts.

“I haven’t exactly been a success in life up to this point,” Lochan said, trying to sound cynical rather than depressed. “I’ve failed at everything important.”

“Not since you came out here, if half of what I’ve heard is true,” she reassured him.

Leigh Camagan shook her head. “We’ve all come hundreds of light years from Earth or from the Old Colonies on stars near it, but our minds are still stuck there. All of us are still nursing grudges and fears born on the worlds of our ancestors instead of seeing clearly what’s out here. If we’re going to convince other star systems to help our worlds, we have to get their hearts and minds here and now, not mired in the past.”

Lochan felt himself smiling, surprised that her words had gone home so well. “I’m going to steal that idea for my own speeches.”

“You’re supposed to call it ‘research,’ not ‘stealing.’ Instead, consider it a gift freely given,” Leigh replied, smiling as well.

The door opened again to reveal another security officer, one whose looks were so unthreatening she resembled a generic loving grandmother.

But before the grandmother could begin lulling them into complacency and revealing statements, Freya spoke up. “About time you got here. Call Colonel Ryan. Tell him I’m here.”

The grandmother blinked at Freya. “Colonel Ryan?”

“Your boss. Patrick Ryan. Tell him I said he’s a gombeen and a bollix.”

It took about ten minutes more of waiting before one of the display screens in the room changed to show an irritated but wary man in an Eire security uniform. “It is you, Freya,” he said in a far-from-welcoming tone of voice.

Lochan was surprised to see Freya smile in response.

“Even a top criminal like me can’t fool the likes of you, eh, Pat?”

The colonel didn’t return the pleasantry. “Why are you trying to sneak into this star system?”

“It’s nice seeing you again as well,” Freya said. “I’m sneaking, am I? Traveling under my own name? As for why, I’m on official business for the government of Catalan. My companions are also on official business for their governments.”

Colonel Ryan’s gaze ran over Lochan and Leigh. “Two refugees from star systems at war.”

“Diplomats,” Leigh Camagan corrected him. “Two representatives of the governments of their star systems who are seeking allies against unprovoked aggression that has already endangered our worlds and if unchecked will reach your star system as well.”

“Two diplomats from star systems at war,” Colonel Ryan corrected himself. “One of them traveling under a false name.”

“You know that Glenlyon is under blockade,” Freya said. “How else was a representative of their government supposed to get through that?”

Ryan frowned, but nodded. “Fair enough. But what does Catalan have to do with Kosatka and Glenlyon?”

“Catalan’s also under attack,” Freya said. “Not military action, yet. Economic. The choke hold is being applied.”

Ryan eyed her. “Anyone trying a choke hold on Eire will regret it.”

“You with your two destroyers? Kosatka and Glenlyon both had two as well.”

Freya’s casual put-down of Eire’s small fleet hung in the air for a moment. Colonel Ryan gave her a flat gaze before apparently deciding to avoid directly challenging the statement. “You’re on a watch list, Freya.”

She shook her head, apparently unfazed by the statement. “Official business. Government to government. Do you think I don’t know the rules here?”

Ryan grimaced. “If you’re here on official business for Catalan, I can’t turn you back. But we’ve already received a warning regarding Nakamura.”

“Anonymous, I’m guessing.”

“That’s right. You know me, Freya. I don’t like anyone trying to pull my strings.”

“I’m being open with you. Pat, this is something the government needs to deal with at a high level. There’s a time to choose sides, and that time is now.”

Colonel Ryan nodded. “I’m not going to stop any of you. Hold on and I’ll have a couple of officers escort the three of you down.”

“Make sure they’re ready for trouble, Pat. There’ve already been a few tries to keep us from reaching Eire and talking to the government. If not for Lochan there, one of those attempts would’ve succeeded.”

Lochan tried not to appear uncomfortable as Ryan’s gaze bored into him once more. “So he’s a dangerous one, is he?”

“Only to enemies of Kosatka,” Freya said. “I can swear to that.”

“That’s good enough, then. I’ll get you all down to the planet safely and let the government figure out what to do with you. That means notifying your father, Freya.”

“Then do it. Thanks, Pat.”

Colonel Ryan ended the call, leaving Lochan feeling embarrassed at being mistaken for “a dangerous one.” “What was that about your father?”

Freya shrugged. “He’s in the government.”

Leigh Camagan’s gaze on Freya sharpened. “In the government? And your father’s last name is also Morgan?”

Lochan stared at Freya. “Your father is the prime minister of Eire?”

Another shrug. “His proper title is Taoiseach. But don’t go thinking that means we’ve got an inside deal with Eire. I was disowned even before my brother. Mind you, my brother deserved it.”

The two women who showed up to escort them down to the surface were both polite. But Lochan thought they acted more like guards for prisoners than escorts for guests as the small group headed for the shuttle loading area. Each shuttle dock had its own air lock, but the room facing the docks was long and fairly wide to accommodate both crowds and cargo. Lochan guessed there were about forty other people waiting there singly and in small groups as the guards escorted him, Leigh, and Freya into the room. Like most such waiting areas, it had only a few pieces of furniture near the walls, which featured large displays revealing either external views of space or status updates on shuttle flights.

The guards did such a smooth and expert job of herding Lochan and the others through those already in the room that Lochan half wondered if they’d been trained by watching corgis at work.

They were near the air lock for their intended shuttle when one of the guards jerked and fell against him. Lochan grabbed as she slumped, holding her up without thinking, ducking a little to catch her. The instinctive action saved his life as a second shot aimed at him also hit the woman, who was serving as an inadvertent shield.

A moment later, Lochan’s feet were swept out from under him by Freya’s leg as she dropped to the floor, Freya’s hands also pulling down Leigh Camagan so all three fell to momentary safety out of the line of fire. Lochan kept his grip on the wounded guard, hearing her gasp with pain as they dropped. His thoughts and feelings were frozen, even fear not yet present as he tried to shake off the shock of the sudden attack. If not for Freya knocking him down, he’d still be standing there, paralyzed.

Some “dangerous one” he was.

The shots hadn’t made any noise. Everyone else in the area either hadn’t noticed the furor or were staring at Lochan’s group, trying to understand why they were acting so oddly. He stared back at anyone facing them, trying to figure out who had fired those shots. Blood was spreading over part of the guard’s abdomen, so Lochan pressed his hand hard on that spot to control the bleeding.

“Shooter!” the unhurt guard shouted, her voice cutting through the low buzz of conversation. “Everyone down!” Silence fell, people staring at the guard. “EVERYONE DOWN!” the guard repeated loudly enough for the command to echo.

The others in the room dropped to the floor in a flurry of movement.

“It’s probably a rail pistol, completely silent,” Freya snapped at the unhurt guard, who was crouching beside them and using her body to screen the others while she used one hand to call for help. The other hand held a weapon that swung back and forth in a futile hunt for a target. “Where’s the shooter?”

“No idea,” the guard said. “I’ve got nothing showing. All surveillance systems in here blanked. Looks like a worm in the network. Help’s coming!”

A dozen guards ran into the room, their weapons out. With every exit sealed, they began searching everyone. Emergency medical personnel also arrived, kneeling beside the fallen guard, Lochan relinquishing his attempts to control her bleeding. He stood up, staring at the blood on his palm for a moment before a med tech used a wipe to swab it clean and disinfect his skin. “Is any of this yours?” the tech asked.

It took Lochan a moment to realize that the med tech meant the blood. “No.”

The tech ran a scanner over Lochan, searching for any more blood on him or his clothing, before kneeling to clean up a few spots of blood on the floor.

“Whoever did it probably left right after their second shot,” Freya was saying to the head of the guard force. “If any of your sensors can identify anyone who left here, that’s probably our would-be assassin.”

“The entire section went down,” the supervisor muttered angrily, his eyes sweeping the room. “This was an inside job. The shooter must work up here.” That hard gaze settled on Lochan. “Both shots were aimed at you. You’re from Kosatka?”

“That’s right,” Lochan said, trying to sound calm, acutely aware of the blood that had been on his hand. He imagined that he could still feel it, wet and warm, someone else’s life spilled onto him. “How is she?”

“The guard? I’m told she’ll recover. The shots were aimed to kill you so they hit nonlethal spots on her when she blocked them.”

“I’m sorry,” Lochan mumbled, thinking of his friends Carmen and Mele, who might both at this instant be running the same risks under distant stars, perhaps suffering similar wounds. And counting on him to ensure their sacrifices weren’t in vain.

“She was doing her job,” the supervisor assured him. “Don’t let it rattle you. You’re safe now.”

“It’s not about me being safe,” Lochan protested, stung by the idea that he was being protected while his friends faced danger. “I’ve got a job to do.”

“I warned Colonel Ryan that there are people who do not want us to speak to Eire’s government,” Freya said. “The people who’ve attacked Kosatka and Glenlyon, and isolated Catalan, have been laying the groundwork to ensure no help comes to any of us.”

“I don’t care what their motives are,” the supervisor said. “I do care about doing my job. Which shuttle were they going to take down?” he demanded of another guard.

“Drop Eleven Oh Six. Departing one hour from now.”

“Anyone who could subvert our sensors would also know these passengers were scheduled for that drop and might have some backup plan for destroying that shuttle. Instead, these people are going on this drop. Right now. And I want Eleven Oh Six gone over with tech, fingertips, and eyeballs to ensure no one’s planted any bombs on it or viruses in its systems.”

“Bombs? Yes, sir!”

As the guard hastened off, Freya gave the supervisor an approving look. “You know your business.”

He shrugged. “I learned it on Rhiannon Station, screening out the crazy Reds trying to come up from Mars. I thought I’d left that kind of thing behind when I came out here.”

“We left nothing behind,” Lochan said, thinking of what Leigh had said earlier. “We brought it all with us.”

* * *

Anyone traveling by jump drive from Eire to the star that humans had named Glenlyon had to follow a crooked path. The jump drives could only enter and leave jump space at points where space-time itself had been stretched thin by objects as massive as stars, and the star jumped from and the star jumped to had to be within several light years of each other, forcing ships to jump from star to star on the way to their destination. From Eire a ship would jump across the five light years to Tantalus, where there were no good planets for humans, and then on to Kosatka, home to a nice enough world that it had already attracted the attentions of would-be conquerors. From Kosatka the ship would have to jump to Jatayu, another inhospitable star, before making a final jump to Glenlyon and proceeding onward to the planet of the same name as its star.

If, instead of going to Jatayu, the ship had jumped to Kappa, yet another star lacking suitable planets for humans, it would have then faced a choice of jumping either to Catalan or to a star named Hesta. Catalan, hemmed in by stars controlled by Apulu, Scatha, and Turan, had yet to be attacked, but had already found itself isolated. Hesta, supposedly still independent, had been the first target for aggression. Its puppet government had been under the control of foreign stars for two years.

But getting a ship to actually take you along those routes would be much more difficult than it had once been. Word was getting around that any star past Tantalus was in a war zone. If a ship didn’t get caught in combat, it would likely fall prey to the pirates popping up in star systems like Kappa and Jatayu. The pirates, using freighters modified to carry a few weapons and a little more propulsion, were widely known to be privateers working for the aggressive star systems. Of course, freighters owned by Scatha, Apulu, or Turan still made the journeys, but at monopoly prices far higher than anywhere else. And traveling on one of their ships meant placing yourself under the control of stars who were looking for servants, not new citizens. Lochan, Leigh, and Freya had come from Kosatka on the Bruce Monroe, which for all they knew had been the last free ship to make that voyage after starting out from Glenlyon.

Light itself would take more than twenty years to cover the distance between Glenlyon and Eire. Scientists were still debating whether time was really uniform across such distances, or if humans were bringing their own perceptions of time with them. But then scientists were still debating what time was. Yet, if events in separate star systems could take place “at the same time,” as Lochan Nakamura and his companions were arriving at Eire, his friend Mele Darcy was on the surface of the planet named Glenlyon orbiting the star of the same name. Wearing the uniform of Glenlyon’s still-new Marine force, Mele stood facing Colonel Menziwa, the commander of Glenlyon’s still-meager ground forces.

“What do you want, Captain Darcy?” Menziwa asked, as if she was equally annoyed and uncaring about the reason for Mele’s visit. As usual, the ground forces colonel had a severely correct uniform, not a single thread out of place, and a matching hairstyle, not one hair daring to deviate from its proper position and placement. The colonel’s desk was also as precisely laid out as a parade ground, without even a single stray paper clip to mar its order. Mele had wondered more than once if Menziwa’s primary objection to the creation of a Marine force outside of her control was really about the existence of “soldiers” occupying the wrong organizational box.

“I wanted to propose some joint exercise activity,” Mele said.

Menziwa frowned slightly before leaning back in her seat and giving Mele a closer look. “Joint exercise activity.”

“Yes, Colonel.” Mele tilted her head in the direction of the ground forces barracks. “Your people have been training by having mock engagements with each other. So have my Marines. But I think my people are falling into ruts, getting too used to each other and what they’ll do. I’d like to shake them out of any training routines and confront them with new challenges.”

Menziwa spent several long seconds gazing at Mele without speaking. “How large is your force?”

Like Glenlyon’s ground forces, the Marines had been expanding, so Mele wasn’t surprised that the colonel didn’t know that number. “We’re currently at forty Marines, Colonel. Forty-one, counting me.”

“We need to count you,” Menziwa said, her expression and voice leaving it unclear as to whether that was praise or a rebuke. The colonel fell silent again for a few seconds. “That’s not a bad idea. I’ve never made it a secret that I see no need for a separate Marine force, but in this case it does offer some benefits in giving my people different opponents to face in training. Let my staff know I approve of the concept and want them to work out the details with you.”

“Thank you, Colonel,” Mele said, saluting.

Instead of returning the salute, Menziwa fixed her gaze on Mele again. “Captain Darcy, I’ve read all of the after-action reports from Kosatka.”

Mele waited, holding herself at attention, wondering where this latest jab would lead.

“It’s clear,” Menziwa said, “that if not for your actions and those of Commodore Geary, the invasion of Kosatka would have succeeded. Our enemies know that as well as we do. What will those enemies do as a result, Captain Darcy?”

“Try to ensure that we can’t intervene again the next time they try to conquer Kosatka,” Mele said.

“Exactly. I don’t particularly like you, Captain Darcy, but you’ve got a good head on your shoulders. We need to be prepared for whatever our enemies do to try to take us out preparatory to their next assault on Kosatka.”

“I understand, Colonel.” Mele paused. “Permission to speak freely?”

“Granted.”

“I don’t particularly like you, either, Colonel.”

For the first time in Mele’s experience with her, Menziwa smiled. “Your work at Kosatka earned you the right to say that. Now get out of here.”

“Yes, Colonel.” Mele saluted again, pivoted, and left the office, once more grateful that Menziwa wasn’t in her chain of command.

The officers she needed to speak with about the training weren’t available, being themselves out in the field on training exercises. Mele left messages for them to contact her, then headed back to the spaceport earlier than she’d anticipated for a lift back up to the orbital facility where Glenlyon’s small Marine force was garrisoned.

Leaving headquarters required enduring a search of her driverless vehicle and a check of her ID by the gate sentries. Menziwa clearly was acting on her concerns, ensuring that no potential threat could easily pass in or out of her headquarters.

On the road leading away from ground forces headquarters, Mele’s vehicle passed a truck lumbering toward that facility. A sign up front indicated the truck had no driver, fully automated as usual, and was one of the routine supply deliveries to the headquarters.

She hadn’t gone more than a few kilometers when a flash of light behind her warned of the crash of an explosion that followed immediately after. Mele’s vehicle swerved as the ground jumped beneath it in response to the shock wave from the blast.

Ordering her car to an emergency stop, Mele checked the radiation detector on her personal pad. There hadn’t been a surge of radiation, so the blast hadn’t been nuclear. Knowing there wasn’t any risk of fallout, Mele got out of her vehicle and stared back toward ground forces headquarters. A mushroom-topped pillar of smoke was rising skyward, testimony to the amount of explosive in the blast, and pieces of debris were still falling back to the ground. The distant sound of emergency sirens wailing seemed faint after the noise of the blast.

Their enemies had struck again, just as the colonel had predicted.

She got back into the car and directed it to return to Menziwa’s headquarters, wondering what she’d find there.

2

The image of Mele Darcy on Commander Rob Geary’s display had taken only a second traveling at the speed of light to reach the destroyer Saber where the ship rested in the repair dock at Glenlyon’s orbital facility. Rob studied Mele as she talked, marveling at the way she could act and speak so calmly and coolly even after what she’d just witnessed and experienced. He knew Mele better than anyone else on Glenlyon, but even Rob couldn’t be sure whether she was really that composed inside or if she was bottling it all up until it could be released in a night of drinking.

“The truck apparently tried to drive on through the gate when the sentries ordered it to stop for inspection,” Mele told him. “Automated barriers stopped the truck, but then it blew up. Improvised explosives, but a lot of them, and very well screened from the sensors in the gate and along the road. The ground forces lost thirty men and women, including both sentries at the gate. Their base took some damage, but nothing like what would have happened if that truck had reached the main buildings before exploding. Colonel Menziwa is all right, but mad as hell.”

“That sounds like a professional job,” Rob said. “Not the work of amateur terrorists.”

“Whoever did it was well trained. It looks like Old Earth is deporting its professional saboteurs to the stars. I guess the mother world is glad to have some distant places to dump all of its problems.” Mele paused, her eyes clouded with thought. “Why didn’t those saboteurs try to take out Saber and my Marines at the same time as they hit the ground forces base? Why warn us with one attack on one target?”

“Maybe they intended to hit Saber,” Rob said. “One of the shuttles up here was taken off-line this morning when a systems check showed something odd in the autopilot software. When the autopilot was isolated and our code monkeys started a close look, whatever was in there ran a suicide subroutine that wiped the system clean.”

“Software suicide?” Mele nodded. “What would’ve happened if that shuttle had suddenly gone to full autopilot, and then accelerated at Saber?”

“If the pilot aboard didn’t manage to disable the autopilot in time, Saber would’ve been badly damaged,” Rob said. “There’s a chance it would’ve aimed at the facility, though. The enemy might have heard about the role you and your Marines played in stopping them at Kosatka.”

Mele shrugged, as she usually did when someone tried to make a big deal out of her fight aboard Kosatka’s orbital facility. “I think it would’ve gone after Saber. My guess is they still want to take Glenlyon’s orbital facility intact, so they’re willing to kill Marines one at a time to do that. But when it comes to you and Saber, I think they’ll do all they can to blow you both to hell. Be careful, boss.”

“Understood. They might be targeting you, personally, as well. Maybe they sent in that truck because they heard you were at the ground forces headquarters.”

“I’m not that special,” Mele said. “But I’m keeping my eyes out, and acting unpredictably. You know how good I am at the unpredictable thing.”

“That’s true. Still, I’m glad they didn’t get you in that blast.” Rob heard his voice waver a bit on the last words. “You care about them too much,” his wife’s voice sounded in his memory. “You can’t afford to let it hurt you so badly when they die, because that’s the business you’re in. But you can’t change that about yourself, can you?”

Instead of showing any reaction to Rob’s inadvertent display of emotion, Mele grinned. “Heaven won’t take me and hell doesn’t want me.”

“That I can believe. How long until you’re back up here?”

“As soon as they clear shuttles to lift again.”

Rob Geary grimaced, and forwarded the message to his executive officer, Lieutenant Commander Vicki Shen. There wasn’t anything else he could do.

Rob sat in the captain’s stateroom, a grand name for a compartment about the size of a large closet in a building on the surface of a planet. In addition to being captain of Saber, he was also the Commodore in charge of all of Glenlyon’s space defenses. Since those defenses consisted solely of Saber, and the small force of Marines commanded by Mele Darcy, the Commodore title was also a grand name for something fairly small in reality.

Victory at Kosatka had come at a price for Saber. The damage was still being repaired, even though the worst of it had been fixed. Trained personnel would have been harder to replace than equipment, if not for the survivors from Saber’s sister ship Claymore. Plenty of those experienced men and women had been eager to join Saber’s crew, most of them motivated by a desire to avenge shipmates lost in the destruction of Claymore.

“We can replace the people we lost in terms of skills,” Rob had explained to his wife Lyn. He rarely called her by that name, since Lyn much preferred her professional software engineer nickname Ninja. “But it’s a lot harder to replace the people as people. Those men and women we lost are gone, and every time I see one of the replacements I remember the people they replaced.”

And Ninja, knowing that there were no words adequate to the need, would simply hold him until the darkness inside him faded.

The blare of an alarm shocked Rob out of his reverie. His desk display lit up, revealing an emergency alert. After an agonizing couple of seconds, the image of Council President Chisholm appeared. She had a grim set to her mouth, slightly tousled hair, and a red scrape along one cheekbone. “I am making this announcement in person to ensure that everyone knows the assassination attempt against me that took place a few minutes ago did not succeed thanks to the efforts of my bodyguards. The alleged attacker has been captured, and will be questioned. Rest assured that the government of Glenlyon remains strong and stable. Our enemies will not triumph. We will not fail.”

Rob smiled as Lieutenant Commander Vicki Shen ran up to the stateroom hatch. “What do you want to bet Chisholm left that scrape untended until after she made that broadcast?” he said.

Shen raised her eyebrows at him. “Do you think she faked it?”