Leviathan: Book 8 of the Legacy Fleet Series Read online

  He pulled the manual override lever and engaged the emergency hydraulics to open the doors. They slid open halfway, then got stuck. “Close enough,” he muttered, and squeezed through.

  The bridge was a graveyard of bloated corpses, some with their eyes still open, the surface capillaries burst to give them all a demonic red coloring. He made his way to the command station and gingerly pushed the captain out of the way. The body floated to the wall and bounced off, thankfully in another direction.

  “Okay, I’m in their system. Still on, and functional, thankfully. Looking through some menus . . .”

  He glanced through some files, trying to find the ones concerning the ship’s registry. “Ah. Here it is. This is the MS Harvest. The MS stands for Motherland Ship, apparently. Folksy, aren’t they?”

  “Who made it?” asked Sepulveda through his earpiece.

  “Looking . . . okay, interesting. That’s why the ship’s systems are so familiar, in spite of the exterior design and styling. It was made by Shovik-Orion. The contractor that makes the bulk of IDF’s fleet.”

  “Well I’ll be damned,” said Sepulveda. “How recently?”

  He scanned through the registration information. “Wow. Just last year. This ship is brand-spankin’ new.” He glanced up and thought. “So Shovik-Orion is outfitting a separatist militia, as well as United Earth, and the Russian Confederation. Playing all sides, I guess.”

  “Playing all sides in a war is great for business,” said Sepulveda. “Which means that someone at Shovik-Orion probably has some answers for me. If they weren’t responsible for the kidnapping attempt a few days ago, then they’ll at least know who is.”

  “Sounds reasonable. Hang on, I’m going to look at the crew manifest. We can cross-reference it with the database on the Defiance and see if anything sticks out to you.” He pulled up the files and scanned through it after sending it to his handheld device and relaying it over to the Defiance. He noticed a name halfway down the list. “Whoa.”

  “What?” said Sepulveda and Rice simultaneously.

  “Commander Rice? Is the Independence still in the system?”

  “No,” he said. “They left over an hour ago.”

  “Shit. Send a meta-space message to Admiral Proctor immediately.” He shook his head, still not believing it. “Begin message as follows. Admiral Proctor. Piotr Petrovich is not an officer of the Bellarus Defense Fleet. He’s an intelligence operative in the Sons of the Motherland.” He paused, reading through the description of the man’s rank and status. “He’s assigned to something called Special Projects. Admiral, I think you may be in danger.”

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Kiev Sector

  Bellarus, high orbit

  ISS Independence

  Bridge

  I’ll be hunting Swarm. She’d sounded so cocksure and confident. She’d wanted Sepulveda to see her swagger and maybe, just maybe, it would pull him out of his self-pitying funk and inspire him to go and do likewise.

  Instead, she felt like a blindfolded deaf person trying to find her way out of an old-fashioned escape room. She felt there were clues all about her, but couldn’t see them, couldn’t recognize them. Hunt the Swarm? Where? How?

  Do you know where they are? She reached inward to her companion. The bridge around her was a quiet hum of activity as they prepared to q-jump to their destination. The problem was she had no idea what their destination was.

  NO. THEY ARE AN ENIGMA TO US. LIKE NO SWARM WE HAVE ENCOUNTERED BEFORE.

  Explain.

  THEY COME FROM THE DISTANT FUTURE. ALMOST INCOMPREHENSIBLY DISTANT.

  And why now? Why did they come here? Out of all the possible times to come in the entire history of the universe, they chose now. Why?

  WE DON’T KNOW. ALL WE KNOW IS THAT THEY COME FROM A TIME APPROACHING THE HEAT DEATH OF OUR UNIVERSE.

  She sighed and shook her head. What is that, trillions of years? More? Why come back right now? To this specific place and time? If you can tell me where they came from, can’t you tell me where they are?

  WE ARE NOT MIRACLE WORKERS, SHELBY. WHEN THEY ENTERED OUR UNIVERSE IN THE SECONDS BEFORE BRITANNIA’S DEATH, IT WAS BUT A WHISPER. WE HARDLY NOTICED. AS THEY’VE SPENT MORE TIME HERE, WE’VE LEARNED TO FEEL THEM MORE DIRECTLY, FOR THEY, LIKE ALL SWARM, WERE AT ONE POINT TIED INTO THE GREAT LIGATURE, AND THEREFORE APPEAR TO US AS ECHOES. META-SPACE SHADOWS. DETERMINE THEIR LOCATION? NO. DIVINE GENERAL INTENT? YES. THEY ARE NOT HERE TO MAKE FRIENDS. THEY MEAN TO FINALLY ATTAIN THEIR GOAL.

  Which is?

  WE DON’T KNOW.

  “Ma’am? Engineering reports the q-drive is ready.” Ensign Destachio had turned toward her. “The trans-q-jump engines are basically down permanently until we can take her in for a thorough repair at Wellington Shipyards, but we’ve got q-jump ability again. For now,” he added.

  “Thank you, Mr. Destachio. I’ll inform you shortly as to our destination.”

  He nodded and started to turn back to his console, then paused. Before he could even say anything, she added, “And no, I don’t believe there’s anything you can do in engineering to help things along. Just do your job, please.”

  He blinked a few times. “Oh. Understood, ma’am.” His slightly redder-than-usual face indicated that maybe she’d pushed back too hard this time. But an embarrassed ensign was the least of her worries right now.

  “Right. Well if the Swarm have come here, now, at this time and place out of all possible times and places, let’s start with what we know. Would they go to Earth? Why? What’s there that could help them that they could only get right now? The Findiri are there and they’ve got some fairly advanced tech, but then why not go back to when Tim gave them that tech? What are we missing?”

  She’d murmured the words, but several bridge officers were nervously glancing at her out of the corners of their eyes.

  THEY FEEL LIKE SOMETHING IS ABOUT TO HAPPEN. SOMETHING NEW. SOMETHING THEY’VE NEVER SEEN BEFORE, AND THINK WILL HELP THEM IN THEIR GOAL.

  But you don’t know what it is. Got it.

  NEITHER DO THEY.

  That makes no sense.

  NEITHER DOES THE UNIVERSE.

  “Touché.”

  YOU RUSH TO FACE THEM, SHELBY. BUT WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU WILL DO TO THEM WHEN YOU FIND THEM? YOUR SMALL, DAMAGED SHIP AGAINST THEIRS?

  Anything is better than twiddling our thumbs, waiting for them to strike. Come on. Give me something, anything, to work with. What’s your best guess?

  She was putting a hell of a lot of trust in the Valarisi. Half of IDF was out looking for the Independence, and she was letting a race of liquid meta-space beings that she’d nearly annihilated thirty years ago determine her next moves.

  PENUMBRA.

  The black hole that Granger fell into?

  Why?

  IT’S HOW THEY ORIGINALLY ENTERED OUR UNIVERSE. IT’S WHERE MOST OF THEIR RACE DIED. IT’S WHERE GRANGER EMBARKED UPON HIS HISTORIC DESTINY. IT IS A POINT OF MANY INTERSECTING THREADS. NO LOCATION IN THE HISTORY OF THE UNIVERSE HAS HAD MORE OF AN IMPACT UPON ITS FUTURE.

  Good enough for her.

  “Ensign Destachio. Calculate a course to the Penumbra system.”

  Every eyeball on the bridge focused on her.

  Commander Urda, her XO, was coming as close to scowling as she’d ever seen. “Ma’am? Did we hear you correctly? Penumbra?”

  “You heard correctly, Commander. Ensign?”

  Destachio returned his gaze to his console and, after a few seconds of momentary confusion, started entering in commands. A few moments later, “Sixteen q-jumps, ma’am. About four hours.”

  “Thank you, Ensign. Engage when you’re ready.” She stood up and retreated to the exit. “I’ll be in sickbay interviewing our guest. Urda, you have the bridge.”

  When she arrived at sickbay a few minutes later, she walked in on a room that was still half-full of wounded from the devastating battles they’d recently waged at Paradiso and Earth. By now, most were on the mend. She scanned the r
ows of beds for her target.

  He was gone.

  “Nurse Suzuki,” she said to the woman at the bedside of the nearest patient, removing some dry bloody gauze from the man’s back. “Where did he go?”

  “Who?”

  “Goddammit, you know who. Petrovich.”

  Suzuki nodded. “Ah, yes. He improved remarkably fast. I just released him half an hour ago. Assigned him some quarters nearby where I can still check in on him every few hours for the next day or so. Was about to call up to the bridge to let you know, but, you know,” she swept a hand across sickbay indicating the mass of patients she still had. “Battles are a bitch.”

  Proctor breathed deep and wanted to berate her, but it would be pointless. “Thank you, Nurse Suzuki. Please be . . . more timely in the future with critical updates.”

  “Aye, ma’am,” she said, still gingerly removing the gauze. “Room sixteen eleven, just around the corner, ma’am.”

  Proctor left sickbay and made for Petrovich’s temporary quarters. She pressed the chime on the door panel and waited.

  After a few moments she pressed it again.

  The third time, the door opened just as she pressed the button. “Ah, Mr. Petrovich. I see you’re well enough to talk. Do you have a moment?”

  He waved her in. “Of course, Admiral Proctor. Please come.”

  The quarters were small, as most guest rooms were, consisting of just a bed, a wardrobe, a sink, a rectangular desk built into the wall with two chairs on either side, and a small bathroom. She sat down in one of the seats and indicated that he take the other.

  “First of all, may I just say what an honor it is to have the Companion to the H—”

  She cut him off abruptly. There was just no patience today for hero worship. “Save the pleasantries, please, I’m quite busy.”

  “My deepest apologies, Admiral.”

  “First of all, tell me about the Sons of the Motherland. That group is new to me.”

  He nodded. “New to most, Admiral. They formed last year out of the wreckage of a few other separatist groups that were far less organized. Better funding, too. When the Swarm returned a few months ago and began their attacks, they were poised to step in and take advantage of the chaos. It wasn’t heavily advertised, but the RC sustained some heavy damage on several worlds. And with the arrival of the Findiri and the loss of Earth, it was the perfect time for them to make their move. They’d been planning for months. They’d discreetly evacuated the capital of all their people, so that when the time came they could make their strike and decapitate the entire Bellarus government in one stroke.”

  She absorbed the information, examining it from every angle she could think of, in the context of the Findiri controlling Earth and the Swarm having returned, again. “Interesting. You say they’re well funded. By whom?”

  He stood up and took a step toward the sink, pressing a button on the panel next to it. “Tea?”

  She nodded.

  The beverage dispenser whirred to life with a few taps on the panel. “Honestly, no idea. I’m not exactly highly placed in the Bellarus Defense Force, just a measly Lieutenant Commander pilot. But if you ask me?” He took the two cups that the unit had deposited on the tray and placed one before Proctor. “Shovik-Orion.”

  “Why?” She took a sip of the steaming tea. “What possible motivation could Shovik-Orion have? Multi-national galactic corporations value stability above almost all else.”

  “Except for profits, right?” He smirked, and took a sip of his own.

  “Fine. But nuking the capital city of Bellarus? Don’t they have a research lab in orbit?”

  “They do. One of their most important, if I follow the news closely enough.”

  “So why endanger such a critical lab?”

  He shrugged again. “Beats me, I’m just a pilot, remember?”

  Half the tea remained, and she was already thinking about getting another cup. This one with a double shot of whatever artificial caffeine the unit dispensed. “So what makes you say Shovik-Orion then?”

  “Oh, several reasons, in no particular order. First, a divided, weakened Bellarus that is cut off from the Russian Confederation means that Shovik-Orion has free reign to do whatever the hell they want here, just like they do on Bolivar. If the RC keeps control, or if Bellarus throws in with United Earth, then Shovik-Orion loses what freedom they have here. It’s no coincidence that it’s a research lab here and not just a regular old production facility. Lax laws mean far greater freedom in . . . less savory types of research, if you follow.”

  Proctor coughed—it felt like a few drops of the tea had gone down the wrong way. “Okay, so they get to do freaky science experiments. Is that all? Is that worth nuking a city?”

  He smiled. “Depends on the research.”

  “Fine. What else?” She finished off her tea, and coughed again—the itch in her throat was persistent.

  “Second, uh . . .” He trailed off, as if he’d forgotten, or was searching for something to say. “Ah yes. Regardless of how this insurrection plays out, it’s a win-win for them. If the RC reasserts control, Shovik-Orion is their main military contractor and will undoubtedly also step in and help out with relief efforts, ingratiating them with the local government, the RC, yada. And if UE gets to step in, the same. They’re the main contractor, and will likely write some pretty big checks to help out with relief, and get massive UE tax breaks as a result, along with good will in the Senate. God knows they could use it after that disaster with Admiral Mullins as the CEO of Shovik-Orion essentially declaring himself king of Bolivar. Look how that turned out.”

  That turned out with Mullins trying several times to have her killed, and siding with an insane Swarm-controlled prophet that nearly hijacked the Galactic People’s Congress and paved the way for the Swarm to eventually destroy Britannia.

  But it seemed like he was stalling. He talked slow, and he added asides and tangents, and this reason didn’t seem particularly compelling.

  She coughed again. This time the itch just got worse and worse. “Okay. Quickly, please, I’m needed on the bridge. What else?”

  He laughed. It sounded strange. “The third reason? The most important. Get you to waste enough time to let the poison do its job.” The smirk on his face was the most infuriating part. Aside from the feeling of her throat closing up and her vision blurring. She tried to stand, but couldn’t.

  “Congratulations, Companion to the Hero of Earth,” he said the words mockingly. “You’ve reached the point in the conversation where I get to take the mask off, and it won’t matter. I wasn’t lying, I’m just a lowly Lieutenant Commander in the Bellarus Defense Fleet. I also work for the intelligence arm of the Sons of the Motherland.”

  She couldn’t move, but she could still speak, in between coughs. “That’s it? Your organization sent you to kill me? What for? Ah. You weren’t lying at all. The reasons you gave.”

  He chuckled. “Well, I fudged a little on the second one.”

  She tried again to get up, but only succeeded in falling on the floor.

  “The first one, though. Sure. I assume that’s what they’re up to. I don’t care. Doesn’t affect me. I’m just here for the cash. You know how much we were paid for this? For both you and Sepulveda?” He laughed again. “It’ll fund our operations for years to come.”

  “Who,” she managed to force the word out. “Shovik-Orion?”

  He shrugged. “Yes and no. They have influence there, for sure.”

  The door opened and she heard a voice. “Step away. Now. I won’t ask again.”

  Petrovich reached around behind his back, and she heard a loud bang. From her vantage point on the floor, before her vision got too blurred she saw the wall behind him sprayed with blood. He fell to the floor and didn’t move. She struggled to keep her eyes open. She was too tired to cough anymore.

  “Sickbay! Medical emergency!” She recognized Ensign Sampono’s voice. Thank god. She felt her touch her neck and bring her face cl
ose to hers to draw in a deep breath through her nostrils. “And bring antidote for Radix Thirty-Nine. Hurry! You’ve got literal seconds here!”

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Sol Sector

  Earth

  Arlington National Cemetery

  “He should be in this section,” said Liu, studying the tombstones as they walked down the path. “Everyone that died on the Constitution is here.”

  Danny read off the names in his head as they passed by, wondering if there was any type of order to then. “Question. Did they recover all the bodies? I mean, space battles can be . . . chaotic. Some get sucked out into space. Some get kinda incinerated.”

  Liu shrugged. “I think they place a headstone here regardless of whether there’s a body or not.”

  “So this might be pointless, is what you’re saying?”

  “But they did recover Haws’s body. Both Granger and Proctor told us that.”

  “But think about it. What did we learn in school? Every kid knows the story.” Danny paused to pull out his handheld data pad, and searched through the database for the right video. “Here we go. Look. Haws was already dead by the time the battle over Earth even started. His body was in sickbay. Then? Watch.”

  He played the video, most likely captured by a nearby starship as the ISS Constitution was making its last stand over Earth during Swarm War Two. It exchanged intense volleys of weapons fire with a Swarm ship, but nearby loomed a growing artificial singularity that the enemy was about to launch at a city below. And in a desperate attempt to save the city, Granger piloted the dying Constitution toward the singularity.

  The ship disappeared in a flash, taking the singularity with it.

  “It disappeared for ten seconds. During which it stayed at the secret Russian station for nearly three days where they pumped him full of the Swarm juice which cured his cancer, and then after shenanigans involving time travel and multiple Grangers, he pilots the Constitution back into the singularity’s other end and reappears over Earth, careens through the atmosphere, and somehow my aunt boarded the thing as it fell and managed to pilot it into a crash landing in downtown Salt Lake City.”