Warrior: Book 2 of The Legacy Fleet Trilogy Page 9

  Isaacson scowled. “You think?”

  “Someone just tried to kill you. And this was a far more sophisticated attack than the one on Avery last week. You only survived by chance.”

  Isaacson closed his eyes and rubbed his head, running through his ancient first aid training. What do you do for shock victims? Blankets? Feet? Something about feet. He propped his feet up on the sofa. “The question is, who would have the audacity to do this? And so publicly?”

  Volodin shot him a look. “Do you really have to ask? There’s only one person both capable and willing to do this.”

  It couldn’t be. Why would she do it now? Here? Why not just stab him in the back in her mid-Atlantic bunker? “I don’t know, Yuri.” He opened his eyes and tried to stand up. “But I’m going to find out. I’m heading back to Washington. Right now.”

  The room spun around him, picking up speed; he fell back onto the sofa holding his head.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  New Dublin, Eyre Sector

  Bridge, ISS Warrior

  Ballsy grunted against the weights. He pushed the bar away, then let it fall down to his chest, stopping just short of his pectoral muscles. The IDF fleet training program emphasized core and leg strength over arms and shoulders given their frequent use in space flight, but his ego emphasized all of it.

  “One more, Ballsy, give me one more,” said Lieutenant Yamato. Spacechamp, Volz mentally reminded himself. It was just simpler to think of them in terms of their callsign—helped dull the pain when they died if any actual names were tucked safely away.

  He yelled out, pushing against the bar until it reached the top, and she pulled the weights away and onto the supports.

  They swapped positions after adjusting the weights for Spacechamp.

  “How’s Dogtown?” she asked.

  Ballsy shook his head. “They’re in quarantine. All of them—Dogtown, Clownface, and Hotshot. But they’re fine. Dogtown broke his ankle, old bastard. But Clownface and Hotshot just got bruised up. And of course the Swarm shit all over them.”

  She pressed the bar up a few times. “And that Hanrahan—lucky bastard. Managed to not get a fleck on him. Jumped away at the last second. Pretty spry for an old soldier.”

  Ballsy nodded. Colonel Hanrahan was something of a Constitution—and now a Warrior—institution. He was like old Commander Haws, but sober, gruffer, fitter, and of course, more alive. And the old soldier held court off-duty down at New Afterburner’s—the reincarnation of the old make-shift bar they’d had on the Old Bird—where he drank ice water instead of alcohol, regaling the crew members who sat nearby with old stories from the last Swarm war. He hadn’t even been born yet, of course, but he talked about it like he was there, and made up for the lack of direct experience with creative vulgarity.

  “How long will they be in quarantine?”

  He shook his head. “Until Doc Wyatt is sure the Swarm matter didn’t get into them somehow. I suppose they think contact with the stuff can infect you or kill you or something. Probably aren’t sure if it can spread, hence the quarantine. They’re just being careful.”

  “Can’t be too careful these days,” she said, pushing the bar up a final time and resting it against the supports. She stood up. “What about you, Ballsy? You ok?”

  He glowered at her. “And why wouldn’t I be?”

  She shrugged, and led the way to the squat bench. “I dunno. You’ve just seemed really distracted the past few weeks.”

  “It’s war, Spacechamp. We signed up for it, but we never imagined it would actually happen.” He bent over to lift the bar onto his shoulders. “Besides. I’m not distracted. Just … I worry about you guys, is all.”

  “What, me and Fodder and Pew Pew? Aw, you old softie.”

  “I mean it. You’re my squad. The longest I’ve ever had a squad together in two and a half months. Before you guys came along I was losing squadmates at least once or twice per week. I hate to say it, but I’m getting a little attached to you all, ya’ know?”

  She steadied him as he bent forward to set the bar back down. “I’m touched.” They switched places. “Dogtown was on your squad before, right?”

  “Yeah.”

  “What happened? Why’d Pierce split you up?”

  He didn’t want to tell her the truth. That Dogtown reminded him of her. Hell, he’d lost nearly half a dozen squadmates since then.

  But none of them had disappeared into a singularity. He hadn’t been the one to deliver the news to all those families. Just to hers.

  And none of them had a kid that would insist on sending him drawings. Drawings of fighters, or of his mom and dad. Little scrawled messages that were only gibberish but what the grandparents translated to say things like, “thank you,” or, “I’m going to be a pilot too,” or, “when can you see Zack Zack?”

  He had half a mind to tell the grandparents to put a stop to it. It was distracting. But he couldn’t let the kid down. He’d lost his parents. Hell—they’d all lost someone close. But he couldn’t do it—the kid had latched onto him. Thought of Volz as some sort of hero or some bull like that, so he let the messages come, and would occasionally send him a note too, or a picture of him in his fighter.

  “They wanted experienced pilots as squad commanders, and Dogtown is as experienced as they come.”

  She nodded. “Yeah, he’s ok, I guess. Me? I’m just glad I’m in the Untouchables.”

  He glanced sidelong at her as they switched places again and he lifted the bar onto his shoulders. “Untouchables?”

  She snorted. “Yeah, it’s what the other jocks are calling our squad. Between your death-defying stunts, and Fodder and Pew Pew’s propensity to not die even in the center of a fiery firestorm of fire, we’ve gotten quite a rep.”

  “Give yourself some credit, Spacechamp. You’re not so bad yourself. I’ve never seen better.”

  It was partially a lie. He had seen better. Fishtail had that natural talent. She was new, of course, but she would have grown into one of the best fighter pilot he’d ever seen. Had things been different, that is. Dammit.

  “Aw shucks, sir.”

  They finished up and showered. Fodder and Pew Pew were busy in the pilots’ lounge recounting their most recent death-defying stunts to some of the pilots-in-training, each talking over the other and finishing each other’s sentences.

  “Call for you, sir,” said a yeoman who caught up to him, slightly huffing from the run. “From Earth.”

  “Who is it?”

  “Lady says her little boy wanted to talk to you. Says he’s inconsolable. I told her it was against protocol but she wouldn’t—”

  He sighed and held up a hand. “For good reason, yeoman. Pilots can’t answer every single fan-comm that comes their way.”

  The yeoman’s face blanched. “Uh … I’m sorry, sir. I’ll go tell the grandma that you’ll call next time we come to Earth.”

  “You do that.”

  The yeoman scurried away and Ballsy grabbed a standard non-alcoholic beverage from the fridge—pilots weren’t allowed to drink after or before potential engagements when the ship’s status was still elevated. He glanced at the alert indicator above the door. Still orange. He grumbled and cracked open the bottle.

  The kid wanted a hero. He sighed again.

  All the real heroes are dead.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  New Dublin, Eyre Sector

  Bridge, ISS Warrior

  The body slumped to the floor with a thud as blood sprayed out onto the conference table from the rear of Sparks’s head.

  Avery spit on the body. “Looks like Ohio will be having a special election.” She thrust the gun back into her handbag and zipped it, and grabbed her coffee back from the chief of staff and took a sip before calmly sitting down.

  The rest of them, too shocked to speak, followed her lead, lowering themselves slowly back into their chairs. Two of the secret service officers dragged the body away and the other two stepped out into the corridor
to stand guard. Avery broke the silence. “There’s a contingent in the government that is trying to kill me. Also, the Russians want me dead. Also, the Swarm. Also—” She paused. “Are you boys sure you want to be sitting next to me?” A dark chuckle, and she sipped her coffee again. “The good news is my ex-husband is too much of an air-headed fool to try something like this, so at least we’re all safe on that front. Ha!”

  “You were here all along? On Interstellar One?” asked General Norton.

  “Of course.”

  Granger looked down at the body in revulsion. Sparks’s eyes were still open and a track of blood led to where the secret service officers had dragged her. “And the congresswoman? You’re sure she was the assassin?”

  Avery shot him a look. “I just put a bullet in her brain. You bet your ass I’m sure she was the assassin.” She opened up her handbag and pulled out a data pad. “I’d finally tracked down the leak to my own office, and decided to conduct a little test. At least for my aides.”

  The president’s other aide seated at the table stiffened in his chair.

  “Don’t worry, Johnson, you check out,” she said with a wink. “Based on some other details I won’t go into here, I’d narrowed it down to one of you two. So, I told you I’d be aboard the Verso, and I told that,” she indicated the body, “that I’d travel aboard the Recto.” She sipped her coffee.

  “And you stayed here,” said Zingano.

  “And I stayed here. Poor souls on the Recto, though. Captain Newman was a good woman. Frightfully loyal. A patriot. Such a shame.”

  A brief silence. In spite of the relief that the president was very much alive, there was still death all around them. Fifty aboard the Recto. The congresswoman laying the corner. The war touched everyone.

  “So. Gentleman. We’re here for a reason.”

  “Several reasons,” said Zingano.

  “You’ve tracked another Swarm vessel, and you’re sure that it headed toward the Polaris System, and in fact have detected a world near Polaris with Swarm spectrographic signatures.” It was a statement, not a question. “And you’ve made contact with another alien species. My god, to think that I’ve lived to see days like this. Discovering whole new civilizations. Only for them to come at us with guns cocked and alliances already made with our mortal enemy.”

  She sipped her coffee again. Granger marveled at how remarkably calm she was, even after an attempt on her life. “You know, in a different life, when I was young and naive and full of optimism and happy sunny thoughts, I worked at a publishing house. Fulbright Press. Most prestigious literary organization in the world. They only published the cream of the cream of the crop. The best of the best. Most people—outside the house—thought that meant the best writers. The most brilliant minds. The most celebrated literary artists.”

  Another sip.

  “Bullshit. You know who we published? The ones who made us the most money, and the ones who paid us the most money. One day at work, when I blundered my way into a deal gone south with one of the authors—former senator, nobel prize winner, all that shit—the editor takes me aside into his office, pushes me up against his desk, threatens me with firing, and pulls my pants down, then his. His magnificent, elitist, Ivy-league manhood pressed right up against my leg.

  “You know what I did?” She tipped the mug back and downed the rest of the coffee. “I grabbed his swollen dick, knelt down, head bowed, like I was some good, obedient, submissive whore, then grabbed the pen above my ear and stabbed him in the scrotum.” She laughed. “Oh, how he howled. Swore up and down he’d have me arrested, swore he’d expose me for seducing him. That I’d be ruined. But it was all bluster. I stood up and told him: go ahead. Tell everyone that lil’ old me stabbed him in the balls. Tell everyone that you let yourself get taken down by a five foot tall, one hundred ten pound stick of a twenty-year-old girl. The southern belle he hired for her pretty face and tight ass.”

  She set the mug down and dabbed at her lips with a finger. “The next day, I got a promotion. And the month after that, another promotion. And within a year, I had his job. Sorry boys, I’m rambling, so I’ll get to the point. The names of my escort ships. Verso and Recto. Those are the right and left facing pages of a printed book. And what’s in the middle?”

  Silence around the table.

  Zingano offered, “A book?”

  “Interstellar One?” said Norton.

  “A SPINE,” she yelled, banging the table with a fist for emphasis. “A goddamned spine. Lesson number one. Show your spine, or they’ll eat you up and shit you out like the little turds you are.” She waved a hand apologetically. “Not you you, but general you. You all have spines. You’re no-nonsense badasses that take no prisoners and eat nails for breakfast, I’m sure.” She started to sip her coffee again before remembering the cup was dry. “Well? Go on. Brief me.”

  Zingano cleared his throat. “Madam President, as you know we’ve tracked the Swarm ship to the Polaris Sector. We sent several scout ships out that way and they confirm: there are various planets out there that might be likely candidates. They detected Swarm activity around several before coming back—we didn’t want to tip our hand that we know where their base is.”

  “We don’t know where it is. It may not even be in that sector,” interrupted Avery.

  “True, ma’am. But this is the first time we’ve detected Swarm activity that wasn’t in our own systems during an attack. We’ve explored all these regions of space for decades, and never found anything but ruins of old civilizations. Never any life.”

  She snorted. “But we never explored out toward Polaris. No, no. Of course not. Russian Confederation territory lies between us and Polaris. Heaven forbid they actually honor their treaties and give us passage through their space. Bastards.”

  Zingano continued. “All told, there were at least three candidate planets that we detected—mass, atmosphere, gravity, solar irradiance all similar to Earth’s. Planets most likely to support Swarm anatomy.”

  “Anatomy that we know nothing about,” Avery interjected. “But you say one of those planets has a bunch of liquid Swarm shit smeared all over it?”

  “Yes, ma’am. The scout didn’t stick around to get a good look, but telescopic spectroscopy confirms Swarm matter on the surface. Reflectivity, spectral curves—matches all the data from the tests we’ve run.”

  Avery cocked her head. “But it’s alive? Do we know that?”

  “No, ma’am. We’ve never—knowingly at least—tested a live specimen.”

  She pointed at Zingano. “Get a live specimen. Capture a fighter. Do what it takes. I can’t believe it’s taken us seventy-five years and we still have never seen a live specimen.”

  Zingano nodded. “I’ll order one of our task forces to make it their priority.”

  The President crossed her legs. “And there’s also the issue of our new friends. The Dalmatians? What the hell did they call themselves?”

  Zingano kept nodding. “The Dolmasi, yes. I’ll let Granger talk about them—he made first contact.”

  Avery turned to regard him. “You’re responsible for quite a few firsts, Captain Granger.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Well let’s hope you can give us our first total victory over these bastards. I don’t want a situation like last time where they just up and disappear for decades, building their strength and advancing their technology while we just sit with our thumbs up our asses getting basket-weaving girl scout merit badges.”

  Granger chuckled. She was starting to grow on him. In spite of the fact that she was responsible much of the basket-weaving over the past decade. “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Go on, then. Dolmasi me.”

  “Well, we were chasing down the last escaping Swarm carrier—”

  Avery interrupted. “Chasing down? What about Operation Battle-ax?”

  “Admiral Azbill was determined to not let any Swarm get away alive. I had to intervene with the Warrior.”

  Zingano chime
d in. “I’ve had Azbill reassigned, ma’am.”

  “Asshole,” she muttered. “Good. Go on.” She waved a hand.

  “And right as the Swarm carrier was about to be overwhelmed, the Dolmasi q-jumped in out of nowhere. Fifteen ships. From our sensors it looked as if they were more than a match for us. At least, just the Warrior and the New Dublin task force that was chasing down the carrier.”

  “So how did they know to come right then?” Avery asked.

  “That’s our line of thinking, ma’am,” replied Zingano. “The Swarm must have sent out a meta-space distress signal that summoned the Dolmasi. Either that or it was previously planned. But that’s too much of a coincidence.”

  “And we detected nothing?”

  Granger shook his head. “Nothing above our detection limits.”

  She nodded. “So, either the signal was below our detection limits, or it was otherwise a type of signal undetectable to us. Some new tech?”

  “Could be,” said Granger. No one spoke up so he continued. “Anyway, the Dolmasi showed up and demanded we leave.”

  He recounted the entire exchange, and they watched the recorded conversation on the view panel on the wall. “Interesting. Almost reptilian,” said Avery, watching Vishgane Kharsa with vague wonder.

  “That was my thought, ma’am. Probably evolved from some sort of species related to our reptiles. At least, the skin looks remarkably scaly, even though it’s almost a human skin tone. Proctor said she wouldn’t be surprised if they were cold blooded.”

  Zingano nodded. “This speculation is all well and good, but what do we do? How does this affect our strategic thinking? Do we move forward with Operation Battle-ax?”

  Granger scratched his stubble. “What choice do we have? We’ve got to strike at them before they just pick us apart, regardless of who their friends are.”

  General Norton shook his head. “Unless all those friends are as powerful as the Swarm. They claim there are six other separate species that are their allies? Even subject to them? If that’s true, then we’re up against not just overwhelming force, but seven overwhelming forces. There’s no way we can win this militarily.”