Alabaster Noon Read online

  He was pretty sure it had been a couple of days since he’d last seen anyone, when the door creaked open. He didn’t bother getting up off the floor; what good would it do?

  “Oh God, Jim,” a feminine voice said.

  “I said you don’t get to call me that,” Jim said with a growl. “What the fuck do you want, Captain McKenzie?

  “I’m here to check your medical condition,” the woman he’d known as Adayn said.

  “Don’t want your prisoner dying before he spills his secrets?” he asked. “Right.”

  “Something like that,” she said and came closer.

  Jim briefly considered grabbing her and choking the traitor to death. They hadn’t replaced his nanite-bonded shackles after the first torture session. Unfortunately, he doubted that he could choke out a kitten just then. He elected to glare at her as she held a medical scanner next to him and ran it through a diagnostic.

  “You’ve lost ten kilos,” she noted.

  “The quisling torture diet. I’ll write a book and make a fortune.”

  “You’re showing evidence of malnutrition and massive deficiencies in multiple dietary categories.”

  “They stopped feeding me,” he noted.

  “Damn it,” she said and looked back at the door.

  Jim followed her gaze and saw Major Lucas standing in the doorway, silently watching. Somewhere in the back of his mind his curiosity sat up and took notice.

  “He has plenty of fat to live off of,” Lucas said.

  “He’ll still die if he doesn’t get enough vital nutrients,” McKenzie said.

  “Fine,” Lucas said and made a dismissive gesture.

  She took out an injector from the medkit, inserted a vial into it, and pressed it against Jim’s forearm. He felt the slight sting of an air-injector as it worked, then she took it away. “You’ll feel a little better in a few minutes,” she said, then she left without another word. As Jim watched her leave, he felt a couple strange twinges in his back and base of his head, then it was gone.

  “Food will come,” Lucas said. “I suggest you eat it. We’ll talk in a day.”

  “I can hardly wait,” Jim said.

  The Varangian commander sneered and slammed the door.

  Jim sat up slowly and stared at the closed door. There was more going on than he’d originally thought. Although he was sure of it, he had no clue what it might be.

  Just as Lucas had said, a meal arrived within minutes. It was soup with two slices of bread and a pitcher of iced tea. The soup was full of bits of fish and vegetables. Jim ate every single bite but did it with measured patience as his mind tried to understand what was happening.

  As he finished the soup, he felt something he hadn’t felt in a long time: a ready indicator from his pinplants. What the fuck? They’d disabled his pinplants immediately after taking him into custody. He’d tried to access them a few ways without success, but then he’d stopped trying.

  He reached for them in his mind, though tentatively, like a man dying of thirst tries to reach out to a mirage for water, and found a single function control—music. Jim activated it and the sounds of Crowded House’s song “Don’t Dream It’s Over” began to play. Tears rolled down his filthy cheeks.

  * * *

  EMS Shadowfax, New Warsaw

  Captain Elizabeth Stacy found out about her boyfriend’s medical status as her shuttle was docking. She was forced to wait as the reaction mass tanker cleared its umbilicals and an ordnance shuttle flew clear before she could land her own craft in the bay. Even if the entire crew knew of the relationship, she wouldn’t let herself show her fear. She’d already instructed her XO, Evie Miller, to get Shadowfax under power the instant her shuttle touched down. Elizabeth engaged the magnetic grapples on the shuttle’s landing legs and almost immediately felt thrust begin to build as the ancient warship accelerated.

  It took another minute before the bay was pressurized, then Elizabeth undogged the shuttle door, set her course, and jumped. It would only have taken another few seconds for the guy ropes to emerge from the deck, but she leaped anyway. It was just under ten meters to the bay exit, and she nailed it perfectly. The deck officer nodded as she shot by without acknowledging he existed. Despite her personal promise not to show her feelings, she caught herself heading for the medical deck. It was easy with her ship under increasing acceleration.

  The ship’s chief surgeon looked up from his slate as Elizabeth entered. “I’ve been expecting you.”

  “I just wanted to check on your patient,” she said, and looked away. “He was injured on my ship, after all.”

  “Sure, Captain.” The surgeon gestured for her to follow him. Patrick was in a medical hammock which would keep the patient contained regardless of whether there was thrust or zero gravity. Even though it was obviously Patrick, she couldn’t quite believe what she was seeing.

  “What’s his condition?” she asked in a hushed voice.

  “Physically fine; there’s no sign of trauma.” The surgeon used his slate to display a Tri-V image of a brain scan. “His brain is showing highly unusual signs of activity.”

  “Do you know what he was doing in the auxiliary computer core?”

  “I don’t, sorry.” He pointed at a doorway. “The body I mentioned is in there.”

  She nodded and moved into the adjacent room. This one wasn’t full of stowed hammocks; it was lined with slide-out lockers, all with dim status indicators, save one. The surgeon went to that one and pressed a control. It slid out like a filing cabinet drawer. In the morgue drawer was what she could only describe as a specter, or a ghost.

  Her recollection of that fateful day on Whirlaway when the Cromwell sisters had their falling out was as clear as the day it happened. She’d been siting watch and saw the aftermath. The body lying before her was unmistakably Katrina Cromwell, who’d died twelve years ago. Her looks matched her sister in every way possible, with the exception of her general appearance. This woman looked like she was the survivor of a concentration camp, gaunt and undernourished. Her hair was ratty and unkempt, and her fingers bent like a raptor’s talons.

  “What the fuck happened?” she wondered aloud. She turned to the physician. “You’ve compared the DNA?”

  “A one hundred percent match,” he confirmed. “That is Katrina Cromwell. However, I need your authorization to conduct an autopsy.”

  “Do it,” Elizabeth ordered. He nodded his head.

  Her XO’s voice came over her pinplants. “Captain?”

  “Go ahead, Evie,” she replied.

  “We are ready to begin high-G maneuvering on your orders.”

  Elizabeth walked out of the morgue into the sickbay, stopping to look at Patrick one more time. He lay in the hammock, eyes open and staring. Other than the regular rise and fall of his chest, there was no sign he was alive. What did you stumble upon? She thought. When her love didn’t respond, as she knew he wouldn’t, she hurried toward her CIC, and her duty.

  * * *

  EMS Alicorn, Winged Hussars Flagship, New Warsaw

  “Commander Kowalczy, we are getting indications of ships entering the system.”

  Lech looked up from his personal Tri-V on the CIC and to his sensor tech. He pointed at the central Tri-V and an image of New Warsaw appeared on the screen. In the center was the system’s emergence point. The stargate was on one extreme side, Prime Base and Home on the other. His fleet assets were highlighted as green points, each with their own indicator for class, name, and status.

  “It’s hours early,” he said and searched the emergence point in vain. “Where are they?” A section of the map flashed deep in the asteroid field, almost a light minute from the emergence point. “Confidence?”

  “Neutrino sensors in that region received between five and twenty pulses. Confidence is high.”

  Lech chewed his lower lip and considered the development before speaking. “Any of our assets in the area?”

  “One non-Hussars asset,” his SitCon said. “Upsilon.”


  “Cartwright’s pet asteroid,” Lech said and shook his head.

  “Should I order a fleet element to investigate?” TacCom asked. On the Tri-V, sensors in the region of the new target began to build on the readings, but only slightly. Hazy, indistinct traces showed the vessels’ general delta-V and course. No estimates were available on their type or tonnage.

  “No,” Lech replied. “They’re not enemy.”

  “Are you sure, sir?” his XO, Lieutenant Commander Akers asked, casting a worried look at the new arrivals.

  “Yes,” he said. “Those aren’t enemy ships.”

  “With all due respect, sir,” Akers said. “How can you be sure?”

  “Because they can arrive anywhere they want, just like Pegasus. If those were enemy units, they would have appeared next to Prime Base, where we have exactly dick.” He looked at her. “If you could appear anywhere in a star system, would you show up in an asteroid field, or right next to your objective?” She pointed at Prime Base. “Right, exactly. Also, they have almost no delta-V.” He shook his head again. “No, those are our friends, the Dusman.”

  All around the CIC, Alicorn’s command staff exchanged looks. Lech saw everything from concern to hopelessness.

  “They made the Egleesius,” his TacCom said. “I mean, didn’t the Dusman build those ships?”

  “Maybe,” Lech said, then shrugged. “I know we’re hoping for a big fleet to come and rescue us—I certainly am. But we have to be realistic and hope our little allies have some sort of ace up their sleeves.” He didn’t say it, but he didn’t think it was the case. The Dusman had been hiding for 20,000 years and had done it so thoroughly everyone thought they were extinct. The idea they’d also have some super-secret fleet of badass warships didn’t strike him as all that probable. For that matter, why had they decided to come out of hiding now?

  Maybe they aren’t really the Dusman, he thought. Before the thought was even fully formed, he knew they were. Who would claim to be what they weren’t? After all, they’d apparently come to New Warsaw in a number of different ways, both on Cartwright’s Upsilon asteroid and various merc ships. They could just as easily have run after the battle on Earth was lost. Instead, it appeared they were bringing reinforcements of some kind.

  “We have no choice but trust them,” Lech said. He remembered the leader of the Dusman saying to “Follow our lead, or all will be lost.” They’d sounded so arrogant. He sighed. “Continue acceleration and give me an update on the status of indicators.”

  As Lech listened to his TacCom recite data, he watched the vicinity of Upsilon. The sensor data on the new arrivals slowly fell off the scale of improbability until there was nothing left to report. Either the Dusman ships had stealth—something which was all but impossible in space—or they’d concealed themselves in the thousands of asteroids in the vicinity of Upsilon. Whatever the case, he didn’t have more time to waste on the mystery.

  * * *

  EMS Pegasus, New Warsaw System

  Captain Akoo, currently in command of Pegasus, sat in his position uncomfortably. He’d had more than a week to get used to it, but it wasn’t nearly enough. Pegasus had been under command of a Cromwell from the early days of the Winged Hussars. Alexis Cromwell’s presence was profoundly missed by Pegasus’ new master.

  After this battle I’m going home, Akoo thought. He’d been with the Hussars for a decade and had loved every minute of it, until now. He was coming to realize he didn’t like being in command. At all. He fully intended to see this battle through to a win, at which point he would probably be offered command of another ship. He didn’t want it.

  Akoo liked comms and had maintained his old post in addition to being in command without an XO. It was a nest full of dung, but he felt he deserved it after watching his beloved commander be murdered.

  “Squadron is in formation,” Abby Smith, the SitCon, reported. As situational controller, she monitored the ship’s position and those of the ships around them to coordinate their actions. It took an open mind with an eye toward details many would miss.

  “Enemy emergence expected in twenty minutes,” Xander, the ship’s TacCom, said. The tactical commander handled the ship’s offensive and defensive systems. “Commander Kowalczy says to prepare to launch drones in five minutes.”

  “Understood,” said Akoo. He looked down at the seat he sat in—the commander’s seat—and ground his beak. He wished with all his being to not be in the hot seat. He used his pinplants and sent a message to the dedicated channel he’d always known existed, but never used.

  “Drone control, are you there?” Silence answered. “Ghost?” More silence. He sighed and spoke aloud. “Xander, order drone operations to prepare for launch.”

  “Standing by,” she replied. Xander looked at the closed door to the captain’s ready room then back at her controls. How drones were controlled, or even who did it was one of the mysteries of Pegasus. Now, without much explanation, crew were assigned to the task in the same manner as the other Egleesius ships. The entire command crew felt a profound difference in how the ship was about to fight. Even more than the absence of Alexis, it felt like a bit of their soul was now gone as well.

  As the minutes ticked down, dread hovered over the crew of the Pegasus like the Grim Reaper. With fifteen minutes remaining, the five Egleesius ships released their complement of drones into the black, and they raced ahead on tiny tongues of fusion fire.

  * * *

  CIC, New Warsaw Defense Command, New Warsaw System

  “The Egleesius ships are launching their drones,” one of the comms techs said as Sansar sat in the command chair. It seemed like everyone needed her for something—a last-minute decision, a question on positioning, or a missing detail about the plan—and she had been delayed to the point that she almost hadn’t made it back to the command asteroid in time.

  One of a plethora of asteroids near the emergence zone, the command asteroid was a little further back and didn’t have any offensive weapons. It did, however, have an excellent communications suite and a bevy of defensive measures so it could stay alive while it coordinated the defense of the system.

  Although the Golden Horde had been working to upgrade and integrate the system’s defenses for years, the asteroid hadn’t been completed when Walker had been given the word that the Merc Guild was coming, but he’d at least been able to get it up to initial operating capability in the time he’d had. Many of the redundant backups weren’t in place yet, but she had full control of the operational defenses.

  The command center sported one of the biggest Tri-Vs she’d ever seen in the center of the space, with three levels of technicians ringing it. One group controlled the fixed defensive positions, the second operated the mobile defenses, and the third group was responsible for the command and control of any ships in the system. Not all of the stations were manned, though, as many hadn’t been brought online yet. They would make do with what they had, and a number of extra technicians stood nearby to fill in or assist where necessary. One display screen was blank at the moment—the one directly in front of her that showed unidentified and enemy ships.

  “Very well,” Sansar replied. “Give the order to launch all available drones and asteroids into the emergence area. Tell the tugs to cut and run.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” the comms tech replied.

  Sansar watched the massive Tri-V in the center of the CIC as little points of light—the drones—streamed from the ships surrounding the emergence area as well as the defensive asteroids. Larger points of light joined them—asteroids that had been towed to the edge of the emergence zone. Some were armed; others were no more than giant rocks designed to make targeting and maneuvering difficult for the Merc Guild ships upon emergence. Some tugs were still bringing some in; those were released and allowed to fly through the emergence zone on their own. Others had motors, limited sensors, and comms suites; those could be guided to make them deadly instead of merely annoying. Unfortunately, there hadn’
t been time to bring the overwhelming majority of them close enough—nearly all of them waited in the asteroid belt due to a lack of towing capacity. Only nine of them were in place, but their motors fired, and the massive hunks of rock began moving into the target area.

  “Arm all weapons; fusion plants to full power.”

  Sansar glanced at the status boards and watched as the lights on the various defensive platforms turned from yellow to green. Her mind raced with the power of six pinplants—what was she forgetting? What else could they do? She couldn’t come up with a thing.

  The emergence area was a spherical area with defenses everywhere along the periphery. While there were no gaps she could see, there were some concentrations that were stronger than others due to the way the ships had set up and the directions that the asteroids had been towed in from. If she’d had more time, she would have worked that out better. But she didn’t have time, so she took a deep breath and released it. It was as good as she could get it; it would have to do.

  “Ready?” Nigel asked from behind her. He’d brought her back to the asteroid on Revenge, which was now tied up on the backside of the asteroid, hopefully out of harm’s way, but near enough to use, if necessary.

  “As much as we can be,” Sansar said as the last light on the status board changed to green. She looked over her shoulder. Nigel was staring intently at the Tri-V display with the look of a predator.

  He nodded once. “Now all we need is the enemy.”

  Sansar turned to check the countdown timer on the wall. Less than a minute remained until when the Fae—the Dusman—said the Merc Guild would arrive. She hoped they were right—having to recover and rearm all the asteroids if the enemy didn’t show up would be a bitch.