The Terminal War: A Space Opera Novel (A Carson Mach Adventure) (19 page)

“Peachy,” Mach said. “Just peachy.”

During this conversation, he realized that Beringer’s screams had stopped. He couldn’t sit up yet, his back and shoulders were locked, demanding their time to recover for they had made the bargain and had given Mach everything. Now he needed to play the game, give the time, but time wasn’t something he had in abundance. He willed himself to sit up, groaning with the effort.
 

His HUD had stopped working. Beringer’s position was no longer available to him.
 

“Kortas,” Mach said, talking into his manacle, “you read me? You seeing any of this?”
 

The static buzzed, crackled, then the unmistakable voice of Kortas broke through.
 

“Carson Mach, we see… we’re seeing…” He broke off; the sound of panicked other voices echoed in the background. A guttural scream, an explosion, the sound of stone falling and collapsing.
 

“What the hell’s happening there?” Mach asked, his body now cooperating with him, a fresh dose of adrenaline helping to combat the sloth-like indignant attitude of his tired muscles.
 

“We’re under attack,” Kortas said. “They’re swarming the Garden of Remembrance… this is… impossible, it can’t be… shouldn’t be.”

“Okay,” Mach said. “Just breathe, concentrate, and tell me what’s happening. Does it relate to what’s going on here? The ice cap is fracturing.”

“They’ve reversed the polarity,” Kortas said with an increased incredulous tone. “The fissure under the Garden is melting. You have to get back here, Carson Mach, as a matter of urgency. We need your help.”

“The polarity of what?” he demanded. As he talked, Adira had taken his laser pistol and clambered up the rock, presumably in search of Beringer. Above them, chunks of ice kept falling from the compromised ceiling.
 

“The generator rods,” Kortas said breathlessly. It sounded like he was running. “They keep the fissure that the Garden is built upon frozen while keeping the atmosphere above it warm so that we can keep the Saviors safe.”

“So you’re saying the fissure is melting, and the atmosphere is freezing now?”

“Only in the confines of the Garden, yes. The proto-vestans are more cunning than any of us could have imagined.”

So there it was, finally, an admission of what they were facing. Mach was about to launch into a castigation of how the Guardians had sent them on a fool’s mission with a lack of information, but time wasn’t available for that now. “Just tell me what you know, as quick as you can, about the situation, about these proto-vestans.”

Adira interrupted the conversation by telling him she had found Beringer.
 

While Kortas continued to run and pant, Mach dragged his tired body up to the top of the pile of rocks and joined Adira. She pointed over a half-crumbled wall to an exposed lab of some kind.
 

“That’s him,” Adira said.
 

Beringer, stripped of his helmet, was strapped to a chair, his legs and arms encased in electrical wires. From a dozen points over his body, translucent tubes looped from him to a vat half-obscured by shadow. The vat was a tall cylinder that held reddish-brown mulch.
 

“Kortas!” Mach yelled, holding up the manacle. “What the hell is this?”
 

More panicked shouting came from the manacle’s comm-link. Kortas was shouting orders to evacuate and get to the ‘temple.’ “There’s no time,” the vestan said. “You have to get to the temple, get the Saviors off the planet’s surface. It’s too late for us now. We underestimated them… their capabilities, their numbers. We see now why the Saviors buried them so long ago. We should have known not to leave them there, in the ice. We should have destroyed them.”

“Destroyed what?” Mach said. “You’re not making any sense.”

“The proto-vestans, Carson Mach, one of the Saviors’ grand experiments. A huge failure, and our forebears. The pits… the icy burial grounds, they’re rupturing, melting… they’re coming, Carson Mach, coming for all of us, for their makers, the Saviors, you have to get to the temple before all is lost.”

The feed cut. The manacle clunked and fell to the ground—as did Adira’s and, beyond them, Beringer’s. They were free… in a sense.
 

A dark shadow crept out from behind the cylinder and loomed over Beringer. Mach raised the laser pistol, brought the green reticule over the proto-vestan’s dark, almost featureless face. Mach felt the blood in his veins chill at the sight of this thing; this… proto-vestan was the only accurate description. It was glossy black, smooth skinned, but lanky, long, odd-proportioned with the merest slit for a mouth and eyes that shone like black orbs through semitranslucent lids that reminded him of an early reptile.

Mach pulled the trigger. The pistol fizzed and hummed, a laser bolt blasting out of the barrel. Mach blinked and looked back through the scope to see the shadow slither off beyond the cylinder that obscured his view into the room.
 

He’d missed—this time.
 

The tubes running from Beringer transformed from clear to red.
 

“Fuck, they’re draining him,” Adira said, already clambering down the pile of debris and racing across the ground toward the half-crumbled wall, her right sprained ankle giving her an awkward gait.
 

Mach holstered the pistol and made to chase after her, but the movement above him stopped him in his tracks.
 

He peered up and saw hundreds of dark shadows shifting across the outside of the ice dome. He followed their trajectory and realized the proto-vestans had escaped their frozen prison and were heading back toward the Garden of Remembrance, the Saviors’ temple.
 

The numbers were overwhelming. They’d never be able to fight that many… which left but one option: do as Kortas said. Get the Saviors’ off the planet’s surface. But not before he and Adira saved Beringer—they owed the poor bastard that much at least.
 

Morgan’s two-seater transport pod powered along the side of Fides Prime’s main spaceport. To his left, crews ran for the twenty open hangars to board the stationary destroyers. He had put the planet on red alert and was heading to the Admiralty to explain the dire situation they faced if they didn’t act decisively.
 

Five fighter drones lifted from the concrete and headed in different directions toward the atmosphere. A group of eight members of the Fides Prime defense force, in their pale blue coveralls, marched in the direction of a tall white orbital cannon.
 

Meeting with senior officers at short notice was always better face-to-face and the best way of guaranteeing a result. Morgan remembered when he was an admiral. Officers always complained when the president demanded they attend an immediate meeting in the government building. Visiting them in their environment started things off on the right footing. He also enjoyed being back in his old haunt.
 

The transport pod pulled to a gentle halt outside the two-story solid granite structure. Images of early Commonwealth ships were carved into the walls. A green and white striped CW banner fluttered at the top of a roof-mounted flagpole.

Morgan hit the exit pad, and the door rose open.
 

Two marines, either side of the open glass doors, braced to attention and slapped their palms across their rifles.
 

“Carry on,” Morgan said and headed straight inside.
 

A young fidian, in dark blue officer’s dress, met him in the lobby. She smiled, flashing her light green teeth. “Welcome, sir. The space marshal and his staff have already assembled in his office. This way, please.”

Morgan followed her across the cream marble floor. He didn’t need an escort to find his way around the building that doubled as his second home for over a decade, but followed protocol. CWDF rules were never formed on democratic principles, but that was the best way to manage a fighting force.
 

Paintings of previous admirals hung on the walls of the corridor leading to the space marshal’s office. Morgan grimaced as he passed his own. The old human painter had given him an expression he only recognized in himself when he was on the toilet. Typically, Mach pointed the same thing out during the only time Morgan had given him a tour of the place.
 

The female officer extended her arm, gesturing Morgan through an open door, and he entered the room. The buzz of chatter instantly stopped.
 

All five officers stood to attention.
 

Space Marshal Brindley, at the head of a rectangular wooden table, gave a nod of acknowledgment. Morgan wondered why he still bothered to dye his hair black. It was fairly obvious from his thin frame and deep wrinkles around his forehead and eyes that he was close to retirement.
 

“Thank you for accepting my meeting request, gentlemen,” Morgan said. “Please, be seated.”

The officers collectively murmured a response.
 

Morgan sat opposite Brindley. The four commanders between them, on either side of the table, were the space marshal’s form of window dressing. He liked to have the final say on everything but primed them with questions to play devil’s advocate against any of Morgan’s plans. It wasn’t as tedious as it sounded. Brindley was excellent at his job, and everything deserved scrutiny when it came to issues relating to CW security.

“We still haven’t located the mole,” Brindley said. “Any luck your end?”

“Nothing yet. I’ve got Babcock working on it.”

A smile stretched across Brindley’s face. “Kingsley Babcock? How is the tetchy old bugger?”
 

“He’s just fired on the Axis grand fleet. I’ll send him your regards.”

“Babs? Are you serious?”

“I wish I was joking. Mach is completing a ground mission. Babcock’s standing in.”

Brindley’s smile dropped, and he rolled his eyes. “What have you got Bleach doing this time? Please don’t tell me he started all of this?”

“No, he didn’t, but he’s currently on Terminus.”

“Why doesn’t that surprise me?”

Morgan remembered Brindley had been Babcock’s junior officer in engineering over thirty years ago. They worked well together and had a healthy mutual respect. Mach constantly annoyed Brindley when he visited Babcock in the lab by playing with their test equipment and calling them geeks.
 

“Down to business,” Brindley said and flipped open a desk-pad. “I need more information before we commit eighty percent of the Commonwealth’s resources to an unchartered area of space.”

“Babcock’s report matches a witness account from Orbital Hibock. Over a hundred Axis ships are heading to attack Terminus. We need to stop them for the sake of the treaty, and our futures.”

“Terminus?” a middle-aged commander to Brindley’s right asked. “We don’t have any records of the planet. The coordinates are outside our frontier.”

“He’s right,” Brindley predictably added. “It’s not in the agreement we signed with the vestans. What’s so special about this place?”

“It’s the planet for their dead and most don’t know the location,” Morgan said and leaned forward to emphasize his point. “Their greatest technological minds are based there. If the Axis capture them and desecrate the land, we kiss goodbye to our new allies and the edge they bring.”

Brindley slowly nodded. “I see the need for us to defend the area, but we’re talking about facing down a grand fleet. Are the thousands of lives we’d lose worth it?”

Morgan counted to five in his head to compose himself. He knew the marshal had probably already calculated the risk. “We’re talking millions of lives if we don’t. The Axis will retreat if they see an equal force. You know we can beat them in battle. If they attack, we’ve got a chance of securing peace for another decade by knocking out their fleet.”

“An armchair admiral would agree,” Brindley replied, “but we’ve still got our mole to consider. An assembling force in space is open to ambush.”

The four officers nodded in agreement. Morgan maintained a calm exterior, but inside he was irritated about the armchair admiral comment. Brindley knew as well as he did that they had to scramble.
 

“Nero fiddled while Rome burned,” Morgan said and relaxed back in his chair.
 

Brindley frowned. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It’s an ancient saying from Earth. While the great city of Rome burned to the ground, its emperor Nero played a violin, revealing his lack of concern for his people and empire.”

“Are you saying we aren’t concerned?” a commander to Brindley’s left asked.
 

“No. I’m aware of the threat our mole poses, but that doesn’t mean we neglect our priorities. Can I tell the vestans we’re on our way to Terminus?”

Brindley looked around his commanders. “The Fleet always acts in the Commonwealth’s best interest. I know you’d carry out the same due diligence in my shoes. Hell, I’ve even seen you do it.”

“You’re not wrong,” Morgan said, taking a more conciliatory tone. “But we both know there aren’t many options on the table. Two things can happen. Our show of force will be enough to avert a conflict, and we continue to build our strength.”

“Or?” Brindley said.
 

“Or we create history by making our next war last a day, rather than a century.”

The commander to Brindley’s right leaned toward him and whispered. Morgan found it rude for a moment until he remembered doing the same thing in front of former President Steros. Forty years of CWDF service was hard to shake. He had to accept he moved in different circles nowadays.
 

“Have the vestans confirmed their numbers?” the whisperer asked.
 

“Forty-five frigates,” Morgan replied. “They’re in the process of deploying.”

“And the Axis strength is confirmed at a hundred?”

“That’s the latest report I’ve had from the staging area.”