The Lazarus Particle (28 page)

“Ferrero, you’ll head in first,” Hondo said. “Riggs will be right behind you. You only need to be exposed for about thirty seconds. By then the sensors should have all the readings we need. Bug out as soon as they sound off. Clear?”

“Crystal, sir,” Ferrero said. Riggs simply nodded.

“Good hunting.” Not that they would be hunting in the conventional sense. It’s just what was said.

“Hell of a butcher’s bill for a couple Peeping Toms,” Hondo said as they made their way back to the command deck.

“Feel free to speak your mind, Captain.”

“I know what you did there. Send Ferrero in first as a decoy so Riggs has a shot of bringing back the intelligence we need. Tactically it makes sense, but I don’t have to like it.”

“We all have to make sacrifices, Captain. This method doubles the potential for success against an acceptable loss ratio.”

Back on the command deck, Captain Hondo gave the order to launch. Two minutes passed as both shuttles put an acceptable amount of distance between themselves and the ragtag fleet. Ferrero radioed in first, then jumped. Her blip left the radar, followed almost immediately by Riggs’.

Only slightly more than thirty seconds later, sensors picked up two jumps within their immediate vicinity. Another moment and both blips reappeared on radar.

“Have a look at that, Captain.” Orth smiled, raising his eyes from the screen. “It would appear you don’t give your decoys near as much credit as they deserve.”

“Captain Hondo was right,” Riggs reported once they were back onboard.

“One of the Tyroshi vessels definitely sustained engine damage during the escape.”

“Sensors were unable to determine the extent of the damage,” Ferrero added, “but the other vessels have clearly adopted a defensive posture around it.”

Commander Orth nodded. The four of them had retired to Hondo’s office, temporarily requisitioned by Orth. The room was dimly lit, bathed in the neon orange glow of a three-dimensional wireframe reconstruction of Riggs’ and Ferrero’s combined sensor data. As Ferrero said, the Tyroshi vessels had pulled into a tight, defensive knot. They had expected to jump in and strike quick, then jump back out before any serious response could be mounted. Clearly they hadn’t counted on Captain Dorsey Hondo. The man was sometimes a bit too garrulous, too flippant for Orth’s taste, but he had to admit Hondo’s combat instincts were second to a very select few indeed. As a result, the Tyroshi fleet had no choice but to circle the wagons or abandon its wounded; assuming they were safe from immediate reprisal, they had chosen the former.

Privately, Orth vowed to make them pay for that choice with their lives.

“If I understand your plan correctly, sir, it’s going to require an extraordinarily precise jump on the part of all three ships.”

“But it is doable?”

“Theoretically. But then so is time travel."

“But if even one of the jumps is miscalculated, it could cause a cascading failure at such close proximity,” Ferrero clarified. “One ship manifests too close to the others, boom, they all go up. Ours and theirs.”

“Understood.”

“Thank you, Lieutenants,” Hondo said. “Dismissed.”

“So,” Hondo said after Riggs and Ferrero had departed, “we still going through with this insanity?”

“Absolutely. We’ll need to bring the other captains up to speed. Have your XO arrange a holopresence conference in ten minutes. We don’t have long before Commander Trufant arrives in system. I would prefer to be well underway by then.”

“Not exactly a friend of yours, I take it?”

“Let’s just say that if you think I play it by the book, you’ll think he plays it by the library.”

“Ah. Say no more. On it.”

The holopresence suite was a spare, unadorned room centered around a circular conference table. As the conference began, the sharply outlined forms of Captains Itzin and Stannick resolved instantaneously across the table from Knolan and Hondo. In each of the other suites, their own avatars would have resolved with similar swiftness and arresting clarity.

Irina Itzin was a stately, almost regal woman in her mid forties. She had dark auburn hair she wore in a tightly wound bun and a high brow set above a lean, handsome face. Her beryl green eyes were sharp and alert, her mouth a firmly set line beneath the steep slope of her aquiline nose. Perfectly unreadable, as always.

By contrast, Rutger Stannick scowled visibly. He was in his early fifties, dark skinned and bald to the pate. A dour, severe man by nature, he had taken the loss of Orbital Station
Tau
particularly hard. It was writ all over his face, from his stormy gray gaze to the frown contorting his lips.

“Captains, good of you to join us.”

“Of course, Commander,” Itzin said. “It’s good to see you, sir, if only in holopresence.”

Stannick nodded tightly. “Likewise, sir. We weren’t certain we would be able to give you enough time to clear the system.”

“Gotta hand it to these old Arbiters,” Hondo added. “They still got some fight in ‘em, that’s for sure.”

“We’ll discuss the matter of those actions at a later date. In the meantime, Captain Hondo and I have devised a strategy for confronting our attackers. During the initial confrontation, one of the Tyroshi vessels sustained crippling engine damage. The remainder of their fleet has since redeployed to protect the damaged vessel while it undergoes repairs. Having scouted and mapped the disposition of the enemy fleet, we propose to execute three simultaneous jumps placing us within their defensive perimeter.”

“Effectively compromising their firing solutions while maximizing our own,” Stannick said, discerning the nature of the plan immediately. His lips twisted into an angry smile at the thought.

“Only as a last resort. Upon completion of the jumps, each of our ships will fabricate indications of an imminent core meltdown. We do this right, we don’t have to fire a shot.”

“What’s the objective?”

“Motive, for starters.”

“Sir?”

“Speak your peace, Captain Itzin.”

“It seems like an exceptionally high risk, low reward scenario. ”

“It’s unconventional, I’ll grant you that, but I believe we have the means to carry it out successfully.”

“Has this action been sanctioned by the Admiralty?” Itzin asked pointedly.

“It has not.” Commander Orth respected his subordinates too much to lie to them. “This is an independent action for which I will accept all responsibility and fallout. But the simple fact of the matter is, someone blew up my orbital, and I intend to find out.”

Stannick nodded sharply. “My sentiments precisely. When do we make our move, Commander?”

Orth looked to Itzin. She nodded, though with considerably less verve than Stannick. “As soon as possible, Captain,” Orth answered. “Both of you should have your XO’s begin overseeing the jump calculations immediately.”

It took the combined forces of their helmsmen and engineers nearly thirty minutes to calculate what they were certain was a course that would manifest them within the Tyroshi defensive perimeter. It was a calculated gamble, one that would either pay vast dividends or prove very costly indeed.

Just as Commander Orth was about to give the order to execute, the sensors lit up with over a dozen capital-class contacts. Commander Trufant had arrived in force.

“Sir? We’re being hailed by the new arrivals.”

Orth narrowed his eyes. “Audio only.”

"This is Ship Commander Armand Trufant III of the Battle Group
Vanguard
."
Trufant's voice was every bit as pompously affected as he remembered. Apparently age and experience had done nothing for the man who had boasted as a young legacy officer that he needed neither to secure his advancement.
“Commander Orth, my sensors tell me what remains of your fleet is preparing to jump. May I ask just what you think you are doing? Were you not instructed by the Admiralty to stand down and await my arrival?”

Orth drew a line across his throat. The transmission abruptly ceased. “Have the coordinates been synchronized and verified?”

“Yes, sir.”

The time had come.

“Execute.”

29 • TRANSGRESSIONS

Zj Soliorana needed time to think, to prepare his fleet’s next move. Repairs were proceeding on schedule, but even the most optimistic projections put the engines several hours from being fully operational. Meanwhile, the rest of the fleet was tethered to the defense of its flagship. They were deep in hostile, unfamiliar territory with no telling when or even if the station’s perimeter defense fleet might return with reinforcements. It was only a matter of time before their assault was answered in kind, the Zj was certain, that each static second brought them one more closer to whatever form or fashion that retaliation might take.

Given enough time, he knew he could salvage the situation. But then that was true of any endeavor. What would ultimately matter most, the single variable upon which all else would hinge, was how he managed the time he had to prepare.

“Lj Rejvollori?”

“Yes, my Zj?”

“Continue to oversee the repairs and notify us of any developments,” he said, standing and striding across deck. “We shall be in our hovel.”

“Of course, my Zj.”

The lift aft of command engaged swiftly when he entered. Less than a minute later he was stepping into his personal hovel just one deck below. A sweeping space much different from the human conception of the word, the Zj’s hovel served a variety of functions. This was not just where he did his critical planning and confronted the administrative aspects of directing Clan Ndeeldavono, but also where he nested and meditated and performed the ritual disciplines that cleansed the body and focused the mind. It was all artificial, of course, but so utterly convincing that after years of service he was no longer certain he could tell the difference between reality and the Simulacra rendering.

He began by inducing a meditative state, opening himself to the wisdom of the Aftermire. Normally a source of succor and solace, the Aftermire met his plight with impassive silence. It was because he had strayed, he knew. Allowing the death of Kerikeshaala and the extinction of her clan to overwhelm him, he had thrust his fleet into the sovereign corporate space of Morgenthau-Hale and quite possibly instigated a war where none existed before. Indeed, the more he considered it rationally, lucidly—free of the stresses and pressures that come with a sworn debt of vengeance—the more irrational the very notion of Morgenthau-Hale involvement came to seem.

The ritual disciplines in which he next engaged proved even less elucidating. He felt neither cleansed nor focused. Doggedly, he performed the rituals a second time. When at last he forswore them midway through a third iteration, he felt sluggish, cramped, and still no more enlightened for all the extra effort.

Without warning, a fierce spasm shook Zj Soliorana from head to toe. Clutching the wall to steady himself, he swallowed a shriek of pain, his mandibles grinding nearly as loudly and shrilly in its place. He felt as if he had just been pulsed, every nerve-ending in his body rioting at once against the invading stimuli. His tongue swelled like a sponge in his mouth; his eyes strained at the sockets, the pain blinding and white and expansive. He knew he should summon help, that it would be mere moments before it arrived were he to do so, but still his pride refused him. If he could just ride it out…

A hiss sounded from the across his hovel. The lift. As the chamber opened, Lj Rejvollori strode from within, his gaze fixed squarely upon the flexpad he carried with him. “I have received an updated assessment from engineering, my Zj. They have revised their original estimation downward by—” Gasping as he happened to glance up, Lj Rejvollori nearly dropped the flexpad. He hurried not to the aid of his Zj, but to a corner of the hovel where he knew the elixir to be.

The Zj began to breathe normally within moments of taking the elixir. The pain behind his eyes receded and his tongue deflated to its normal size and thickness. Slowly, the shakes began to subside.

“Gratitude, my Lj,” he managed to sputter after several seconds.

Lj Rejvollori brought him a goblet of
bak’ceba
, a viscous, coppery liquid he knew to bear certain ameliorative properties for those in the Zj’s condition. Ndeeldavono took it gratefully, careful not to spill a single drop as he funneled it down his gullet. He requested another, which Lj Rejvollori quickly dispensed. Only then did he feel capable of standing again, and only then with the assistance of his second.

“You fear you have led us astray. Down a bad path.”

Ndeeldavono fixed his second with a deconstructing stare.

“I fear I have come to know you, my Zj, even better than I know myself.”

“Yes,” he allowed after a slow beat, “We suppose you have.” Covertly helping one’s commander conceal his rapidly declining health for the better part of three cycles will do that, he supposed. “And yes, we fear we have.”

“I refuse to believe such a thing of you.”

A raspy chuckle escaped his lipless beak as they sat across from one another in the command area of his hovel. “And will you still refuse when our fleet is rent asunder before your very eyes?”

“I refuse to believe it will come to that.”

“We are considering ordering the rest of the fleet away,” Ndeeldavono confided after a short beat.

“But, my Zj!” Lj Rejvollori balked. “We would be completely defenseless! And besides, the rest of the fleet can be prepared to jump away at a moment’s notice.”

“Not with you aboard one of the vessels serving as Acting Fleet Commander.”

Lj Rejvollori had no answer for that.

“We can see no other way to salvage the situation. We will not abandon our flagship. Whether or not we perish here today, we are not long for the Aftermire regardless. But the fleet should not pay for our transgressions, nor should you, our Lj.”

“I see.” Lj Rejvollori considered the options, of which the Zj was convinced there were precious few. “You have meditated, I trust? Performed your disciplines?”

He scoffed, waved a taloned hand dismissively. “To no effect.”

“Have you considered, my Zj, that perhaps the lack of an answer is itself the answer?” Lj Rejvollori spread his hands openly across the table between them, as if presenting Zj Soliorana with a rare and prized gift.