Command Decisions (Book 3 of The Empire of Bones Saga)

Command Decisions

Book Three of The Empire of Bones Saga

by

Terry Mixon

Command Decisions

After winning a hard-fought victory, Commander Jared Mertz and Princess Kelsey discover another insidious foe blocking their way home. A remnant of the Old Empire still exists and seems allied with the savage, AI-dominated Pale Ones.

With the existence of the Terran Empire at stake, another enemy, this one from Jared’s past, threatens everything they’ve worked so hard to achieve. Jared and Kelsey must fight for survival while the fate of humanity hangs in the balance.

Works by Terry Mixon

The Empire of Bones Saga

Empire of Bones

Veil of Shadows

Command Decisions

The Mankind Unchained Series

Liberty Station
(forthcoming)

Anthologies Terry Has Work In

Dirty Magick: Los Angeles

Dirty Magick: New Orleans
(forthcoming)

Do you want Terry to email you when he publishes a new book or when one goes on sale? Go to
TerryMixon.com
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Command Decisions

Copyright 2015 by Terry Mixon

Published by Yowling Cat Press

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including information storage and/or retrieval systems, or dissemination of any electronic version, without the prior written consent of the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review, and except where permitted by law.

This is a work of fiction. All names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination, or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Cover design and composition by Donna Mixon

Cover Image copyrights:

Big Stock Photo / 1971yes

Deposit Photos / kevron2002 (Kevin Carden)

Deposit Photos / innovari (Luca Oleastri)

Print edition design and composition by John McCarthy

Follow him on Twitter: @SurfsideJack

He may be reached at: [email protected]

Logo Design by Emily Karnes

She may be reached at: [email protected]

Dedication

To my wife Donna. I love you more than life itself.

Acknowledgements

Thanks to all of you reading this book. Your support has made this series possible. Hell, it’s made my writing career possible. I deeply appreciate your patronage. And for those of you who left kind words in a review and/or recommended me to a friend, I’m doubly indebted.

Next, to all of you who’ve interacted with me via email or Facebook. It’s great to meet people who get as much of a kick reading my stories as I get from writing them. Your encouragement has helped me more than you can possibly know. Writing is a lonely business. Thanks for pulling me into the light every once in a while.

To my podcasting co-hosts: Justin Macumber, Paul E. Cooley, and Scott Roche. Thanks for everything you do. Now go write.

Finally, thanks to those who beta read this novel: Tracy Bodine, Michael Falkner, Cain Hopwood, Kristopher Neidecker, Bob Noble, Jon Paul Olivier, and Jason Young. I would look like such an amateur without your keen eyes and incisive commentary. Thank you so much.

Special thanks go to John McCarthy for formatting the print version of this book. And for putting up with me. Seriously.

Numerous others have participated through comments in one way or another. Thank you.

Chapter One

“Behold. Imperial City, the capital of the Terran Empire.”

Jared Mertz stepped up to the railing and looked out over the vast city. Monolithic buildings stretched as far as the eye could see in every direction. Sleek grav cars in every imaginable color flitted past at breakneck speeds.

The city wasn’t sterile, though. Gardens bloomed in planters on the steep walls where the sun could get to them and wide green spaces lined the ground far, far below. The scents in the air held a hint of nature.

Pedestrians dominated the ground between the buildings like a swarm of insects. They also filled wide walkways that crossed from one building to another in an endless stream. He’d never seen so many people at one time.

The implant recording fooled his senses. It felt as though he’d gone back in time to stand in the Old Empire at its heyday.

Reginald Bell gazed down with a serene expression. “New York City. The most populous metroplex in the old United States. Two hundred and fifty million people. The first Terran emperor changed its name to Imperial City, but the residents here never accepted it. Even though United States of America no longer existed as a political entity, New Yorkers never forgot their heritage. Their attitude was legendary.”

Jared tilted his head back and looked up. Even though they were on the three hundredth floor, the building still towered over them. “Just how tall is this building?”

“Four hundred and fifty-two floors, counting the penthouse level. It provided homes and businesses for a quarter of a million people. I suspect many of them never left it during their lives. Not even in the end.”

A bird landed on the railing about ten meters away. It was a smooth gray and very fat. It stared at them as though it was waiting for them to feed it.

Jared shook his head. “I can’t believe how real this looks. I can hear the birds, I can smell the ocean, and I can see everything down to the smallest detail. How is that possible?”

“They brought in special equipment capable of recording in far more detail than any human being can actually sense, even with Princess Kelsey’s commando implants. They wanted every Fleet service member to be able to see Imperial City as it was. There are a number of other recordings just like this from across the Empire in
Courageous
’ data banks. Unfortunately, they’re made for implant viewing only.”

Jared sent a mental command to his implants to terminate the vid. Honestly, the word vid felt like the greatest understatement he’d ever made. The incredible view disappeared, leaving him sitting in his quarters aboard the Imperial Fleet battlecruiser
Courageous
. Across the coffee table from him, Bell opened his eyes.

The ice in Jared’s drink had almost melted, but he took a deep sip anyway. The alcohol burned going down. “All of that historical detail and only we can see it? That’s going to make the historians revolt if we don’t capture that freighter and its implant supplies. They’ll demand we launch an expedition deeper into the Old Empire immediately.”

The old man laughed. “I imagine you’re right. Not even the prospect of the Pale Ones would deter them.
Courageous
might be able to display these vids on a monitor, but much of the fine detail is going to be lost.”

The Old Empire had designed so many things for people with implants. They hadn’t considered unenhanced human beings needing to access them. Yet, here in the post-Fall Terran Empire, only the three of them had those implants.

The cataclysmic rebellion and civil war half a millennium ago had wrecked the Old Empire and killed uncounted trillions of people. As of yet, they had no idea how many feral humans survived amid the bones of the Empire. Or how many isolated pockets of civilization like the Kingdom of Pentagar survived.

The Kingdom occupied a single planet. The resurrected Terran Empire he came from added several dozen heavily populated worlds and perhaps twice that number of frontier planets to the count. That left tens of thousands of systems that had once been part of the old Terran Empire left to explore.

And to do that, they had to deal with the artificial intelligences that had staged the revolt and the poor bastards they’d forcibly implanted.

Bell picked up his glass and sipped his whiskey. “Now that the Pentagarans have their first ships ready, when will you be returning to Erorsi? Have the recordings the AI made changed your plans?”

During the final battle to control the system next door to Pentagar, Kelsey had defeated the controlling AI and salvaged its data banks. In the process of gathering everything they could, the marines had pulled data off the communications systems the AI had used. The news had not been good.

“We’re still reviewing the oldest of the transmissions. They go back over five hundred years. I don’t think we’ll get any deeper shocks that we’ve already gotten, though. The AI’s communications records told us everything we needed to know.”

The AI controlling Erorsi received supplies each year about the same time from what certainly appeared to be a ship from the Old Empire. The most recent conversation between a man and the AI had been brief, but chilling. The human had looked like a Fleet officer. Definitely not a savage like the Pale Ones.

Unlike this man, the feral humans didn’t even seem capable of speech. Once Princess Kelsey and the marines had destroyed the AI that controlled them, the primitives had ceased to be a direct threat. They’d still need to summon them to a central area and overwrite the corrupted implant code. Then the poor bastards could live out their lives in whatever peace they could find.

The man in the recording spoke to the AI in an obsequious tone, declaring that the freighter had all the supplies the AI couldn’t build for itself. Including implant hardware. The AI told the man that it had adolescent human beings for them in trade. Children. He shuddered to think of how the others might be using those kids.

Obviously, something of the Old Empire survived. Something twisted and terrible. Jared’s problems had become several orders of magnitude more complicated with the revelation.

“Based on the rough schedule of the resupply, it’ll be along in another few weeks,” Jared said. “We go back to Erorsi tomorrow and set up an ambush. We need that freighter’s cargo and we cannot allow it to raise the alarm.

“Two thirds of Pentagaran ships will hide behind Erorsi while the rest lay in wait with
Courageous
in the asteroid belt. We’ll catch the freighter and its escort, if any, between the hammer and anvil. The marines will clear the freighter before Kelsey boards to work with its computer.”

Bell nodded. “You’re short on missiles, so will you be able to handle any escort?”

“
Courageous
says the escort is a normally a destroyer, so I think so. We’ve have three dozen missiles left. Any battle will leave us critically short, though, so I’m hoping this is one of the years where the freighter doesn’t have an escort. It comes alone more than half the time.”

Bell took a sip of his drink. “I hope that’s how it plays out. My people have enough problems. The kinetic strike might not have directly hurt us, but our facility is dependent on hidden farms for food. The impact sent a tremendous amount of debris into the atmosphere. That means a harsh winter that will last half a decade, if we’re lucky. The crops are dead.”

“Hopefully all the supplies we brought will tide you through. That won’t help the primitive humans out in the wild, though. I’m afraid they’re in for a very rough time.”

“It’s a tragedy,” Bell agreed. “One bit of good news. We found where the AI was holding this year’s tithe of children. Hundreds of boys and girls between the ages of four and six. We’re doing what we can to fit them into our community.”

The older man shook his head. “That’s a problem we can solve. What if they send someone looking for the missing ships?”

“They might not. The communications logs have several instances where the AI and the humans had discussed the lack of a freighter the previous year. It sounds as though they just shrug when a freighter fails to return and send another next year. Hopefully by then, we’ll be able to deal with them. We don’t really have a choice. Once we stop the freighter, we’ll do what we can to help your people recover Erorsi.”

“We appreciate your assistance, but that’s going to take much, much longer than either one of us has left to dedicate to it. Your people will be trying to find your way home soon. Are you taking a Pentagaran embassy with you? Perhaps Crown Princess Elise?” Bell’s lips quirked up in a smile.

Jared wished she was coming along, but that wasn’t realistic. Their relationship had grown closer over the last several months. They’d taken to dining together almost every night, and frequently took sightseeing trips around the Kingdom enjoying one another’s company. They’d become intimate in the last few weeks, but no one could possibly know about that. They’d taken elaborate precautions.