The Epherium Chronicles: Echoes (9 page)

Tramp plugged his data pad into a port on the edge of the table. Moments later, a large vid screen descended from the ceiling and displayed a tactical grid of the
EDF
’s fleet and outpost positions. He zoomed in on one of them and pointed to the screen. “Deep space monitoring at Proxima picked up two signatures within two jumps of the base. Both were Cilik’ti frigates.”

The wrinkles of concern increased on Admiral Grant’s forehead. “Advanced reconnaissance?”

Tramp shook his head. “Intelligence doesn’t believe so, and I don’t either. The two ships appeared within forty kilometers of each other. We didn’t detect any change in position or signals for over ten minutes, but that’s when everything went crazy.”

“What do you mean?”

“There were massive energy spikes, followed by a jump event from one of the ships. The second one jumped out five minutes later, but the field it generated was distorted. She couldn’t have gone far if she made it through the jump at all.” Partially melted pieces of smooth metal plates appeared on the screen now. “I sent a reinforced reconnaissance fleet to check it out. They picked up debris from both vessels. Analysis confirms they were shooting at each other.”

Admiral Grant lowered his head. “So it’s started, and Hood is out there in the middle of it.”

“He’s got the best people with him.” Tramp’s concern for those with Hood made his left hand start to shake. “He knows if we rush out there now to reinforce him, we could run right into one of these Cilik’ti firefights. Who knows how that’ll turn out? It’s not like Cygni, Admiral. He’s got help this time.”

The concerned look on Admiral Grant’s face didn’t relax. It deepened. Tramp changed the images on the screen to Tau Ceti. There had been no further reports from Hood since the destruction of the Qu’tan mother ship. Tramp had reached out to Hood’s uncle Jonathan on Cygni. The new N’lan emissary was an Ota elder, but wasn’t as chatty as Kree had been. When he’d explained the situation with the Qu’tan, the N’lan’s response had been brief. “The N’lan are aware of the incident. Proper steps to ensure the stability of Tau Ceti are underway.”

“Yeah, but what steps? How about ‘We know your people weren’t responsible, so we’re not going to shoot you?’ This situation could escalate fast,” Admiral Grant responded.

“I know it’s not a good scenario, but if they can keep the Chi’tan and their friends at bay, it buys all of us time. Time to sort this crap out here at home and find a way to get Hood help.”

Admiral Grant landed his head in his hands and slid them back through his hair. “Maybe it would be better if we pulled him back home. Hell, pull all of them back and hunker down.”

Tramp leaned toward his friend and pointed his finger into his chest. “Dammit, sir, you and I have been through hell and back in one Cilik’ti war already. We’ve made the right call here. Don’t second-guess it now.”

The look of confidence returned in Admiral Grant’s eyes, and it made Tramp smile. The man hadn’t lost faith, and neither would he.

“I know we’ve been so focused on Cygni and Tau Ceti, Russell. Have we heard anything from
Epsilon Eridani
yet?”

“Glad you asked.” Tramp changed the visual on the screen to the destination planet of the third Epherium colony ship, Epsilon Eridani. After the event at Cygni, Tramp had dispatched a reconnaissance frigate to follow the beacons and search for any signs of the
Drake
. The ship had gone radio silent until an hour ago.

Tramp heard the door to the briefing room open, and a tall, blond
EDF
officer walked inside carrying a small satchel with a data pad sticking out of it. Commander Tom Jenkins had been his aide for almost two years and he still wore those crazy black-rimmed sunglasses even indoors. Jenkins had told him once he’d wanted to be a member of
The
Blues Brothers
when he was a kid and had finally found a pair that fit the style.

“Admiral, Commander Jenkins has been my lead on the Epherium colony ship project since we first detected the two arrival signals of the
Magellan
and the
Cabot.
” Tramp pulled back a seat to his left.

Jenkins produced his everyday smirk that counted for his smile and walked down the side of the table. He reached into the satchel, but when he removed it, Jenkins wasn’t holding the data pad. Instead, he had a security forces sidearm and aimed it right at Admiral Grant’s chest.

“Gun!” Tramp yelled, trying to alert the guards outside, and dove to his right.

Admiral Grant turned at his shout, but didn’t get out of the way until Tramp’s diving form tackled him from his chair.

The first round entered Tramp’s left shoulder just under the shoulder blade. Agonizing pain spread outward into his arm. He felt a second twinge in the center of his back, but nothing else. The two admirals crashed to the floor. Tramp landed on top of Admiral Grant, facing his friend. Grant’s eyes were closed and he wasn’t moving.

More gunshots rang out. He tried to roll over to see what was happening, but he couldn’t move his legs. With his right arm, he pushed up and swung his head to the right, just in time to see Jenkins’s lifeless body land beside him. The dark sunglasses he’d worn when he’d entered the room were shattered now, their veil no longer concealing what was behind them. Jenkins’s eyes moved rapidly in a wild random dance then finally rolled up.

Tramp’s breathing came in gasps now and he could hear a person yelling. A voice was shouting his name, but it was like a strange echo in the distance. He fought through the pain in his left arm and turned his head back to Admiral Grant. His friend was awake. He was the one calling for him.

Chills climbed up from his throat and his lips were like ice. He lost all feeling in his right arm. Dizziness set in and he started to lose focus. But then something strange happened. The face of his friend changed to that of his wife, Victoria. Her lovely blond hair hung at her shoulders and her blue eyes were warm and inviting. In his eyes, she was still as beautiful as the first day he’d met her at the academy. He could taste the blood in his smile, but it didn’t taint the serenity of the moment. His love was here with him; that was all that mattered. He gasped for breath, but couldn’t find relief. His vision swirled and fear gripped his heart. Everything went quiet now and darkness consumed him.

Chapter Ten

High
Orbit
EDF
Armstrong
Tau Ceti 3
Wednesday, March 5
Earth Year 2155

Surrounded by her gunships and fighters, the
Armstrong
settled into a synchronous orbit over the
Cabot’s
location on the surface. It had been almost eighteen hours since the fragment of the Qu’tan mother ship had plummeted out of orbit and slammed into the ocean far to the northeast of the colony ship’s location. The large section of the ship had broken apart when it first struck the atmosphere, allowing more of its original mass to burn away. The impact had still been spectacular, and a massive tsunami had swarmed the coasts of the closest landmasses. An entire set of islands in the southern hemisphere had been consumed by the waves. Despite the destruction wrought by the broken alien ship, the waves hadn’t reached far inland near the
Cabot
and the waters were already beginning to recede.

Communications to the colony were still down, but with the new planetary satellite grid in place, Hood was ready to try again. And he wasn’t the only one. Standing next to him at the Communications Station was Henry McCraken. The Epherium Corporation representative was the chief liaison to the
EDF
concerning the colony ships, but he had a greater invested interest. The Embrace technology used on the colonists had done more than just let them sleep for the long journey. It had also been used to reprogram personalities of those locked inside its icy cocoon. While that practice had seemed horrific when first revealed, the fact that many of the colonists’ personalities before alteration were that of convicted criminals had made him a lot of friends. Epherium was short professionals to man the three colony ships, so they’d used criminals to fill their numbers. Most of the criminals were the worst kind and where they’d been locked up, few would ever see them again. Hood understood why Epherium used criminals. He just didn’t like it.

“The grid is up and functioning, sir,” Wells said. “I’ve a got a link to the
Cabot’s
communications array.” Hood gave the order to open the channel, but before Wells could initiate it, her terminal beeped. She panned back to Hood and McCraken, her eyes wide with surprise. “They’re calling us, sir.”

Hood chuckled. “Well, don’t keep them waiting.”

Wells opened the channel, and a visual appeared on the screen above her station. Static clouded the image, but in the center of the screen appeared the face of a man, whom Hood recognized easily. It was Arthur Grange, the commander of the
Cabot.
He looked exactly as Hood had expected for a man in his sixties—that was the problem.

Grange’s gray hair outlined his baldness, and deep wrinkles that used to be dimples accentuated his smiling face. “Welcome! I’m Arthur Grange.” His voice was deeper than Hood remembered and a little gravelly. “It’s so good to finally see another human being. Who are you? Did you get our signal?”

Hood glanced at McCraken. Hood was the one surprised when they’d reached the
Magellan
and found the Embrace had slowed the colonists aging process. After witnessing Grange’s current condition, McCraken stood dumbfounded. He couldn’t look away from the screen.

“Thanks for the welcome, Commander Grange. I’m Captain James Hood of the
EDF
Armstrong.
We got your signal. Thanks for raising the flare.”

“Oh my God! Jimmy, is that you?” The elation in Grange’s voice erupted into a deep rolling laugh.

Hood laughed with him. “That’s right, Arthur, it’s me.”

“We saw that huge explosion in orbit and the crash. We knew it couldn’t have been a simple meteor collision. I had everyone take cover in the ship just in case, but nothing came our way except for a few tremors. What caused it?”

“Long story. I’m going to cover that when I brief your people.” Hood peered up at one of the other monitors above the station. This one displayed the
Cabot
and all the colonist locators. A large group of the colonists was concentrated around the ship, but he didn’t see the others. “Listen, I’ve got to send my Marines down to do a quick sweep of the area before I allow anyone else to venture to the surface. Do you have a remote camp somewhere? We can only detect about half of your people in the vicinity.”

The smile on Grange’s face faded and he looked away from the screen. “Yeah, about that, Jimmy. It hasn’t been easy down here. The gravity was hard to deal with at first, but this place is teeming with life. While on a scouting mission, several of my people were attacked and killed by the dangerous wildlife that live in the forests. Others died from a sickness we haven’t been able to identify. Many of us started to age rapidly a few days after we left our cryo units.” He raised his head. Pain and sadness filled his eyes. “I lost over five hundred of us in a week. We’re all that’s left.”

“My God,” McCraken breathed.

Hood’s gut clenched. There had been too much death involved with these colony ships, Cilik’ti included. “Hang tight, Arthur. Transmit us coordinates for a landing site, and I’ll send down the cavalry.”

Grange forced a smile. “I’m uploading them now. We’ll be waiting.”

Hood had Wells close the channel and open a new one to Major McGregor. After updating him on the situation, McGregor recommended a scaled-down force with full environmental suit armor. The situation wasn’t as spread out as Cygni, and until they understood the idiosyncrasies of the planet’s surface, it reduced their exposure.

Once he completed his discussion with McGregor, he wheeled on the squirming McCraken. “You saw Commander Grange. I thought you said there weren’t any age deterioration effects from the Embrace units.”

McCraken backpedaled. “Captain, I’m as surprised as you are. We conducted extensive testing and extended encapsulation trials to be certain there weren’t any side effects to the cryo-stasis.” He gazed up at the atmospheric data on the planet still flashing on the screen next to the satellite view of the
Cabot.
“So many variables could be affecting them. It could be the higher gravity or the ionized atmosphere. I just don’t know.” He pointed at the image of the
Cabot.
“Once we get down there, we can analyze the ship’s data core and take blood and tissue samples from the crew.”

“Yeah, you do that. Meanwhile, we lost several of the colonists to this little anomaly of yours, and the ones still alive have seen twenty-five years or more erased from their life span.” Even in his anger, Hood was still careful. The rapid aging was part of his concern. If the Embrace units had complications and rapid aging or cell degeneration had really set in, what about the personality programming? Would that revert? The view of a promising world was becoming a howling nightmare, and at every turn there was another dragon to slay.

Hood’s scowl sent McCraken into motion toward the exit. “I’ll go and speak with Dr. Patton. We’ll set up a test protocol to isolate the problem and find a solution.”

Hood continued to glare at the red-haired man until he was finally out of sight. Dr. Patton was the best person to analyze the crew for any aging or personality changes. He doubted the good doctor could find a way to reverse any of the accelerated aging, but putting McCraken on the task and out of his hair made him feel a little better.

He needed time to think, and standing still wasn’t doing the trick. Instead, he paced around the Command Deck twice then headed back to the Command Station. There had been no word from Earth since their transmission about the destruction of the Qu’tan vessel. He was sure support would come soon, but it wasn’t happening fast enough.

With Kree still in a state of unconsciousness, he was without an interpreter should another Qu’tan ship come to investigate. The true capabilities of Cilik’ti telepathy were still an unknown for him, but with one of the Qu’tan Hal’ta on board that mother ship, the chances of long-range distress calls were pretty high.

He took his seat just in time to watch McGregor’s three assault shuttles leave the docking bay and descend toward the planet. More lightning arched through the thick clouds blanketing the planet surface. He didn’t envy McGregor. He was in for a bumpy ride.

* * *

The lead Marine shuttle shuttered violently again, and McGregor was certain he heard the sound of vomiting in the back of the troop compartment. He knew who it was and laughed. It may have been weird to others, but nothing sounded better on a fast atmosphere drop than to hear a first-timer lose his breakfast. The moans from his teammates around him confirmed his suspicion. He ducked his head into the open hatch to the compartment and yelled, “Hey, Kerrigan! Ya know ya just signed up for decontamination detail once we’re done with our sweep!”

The young Marine with a pale green complexion gave a shaky thumbs-up in response.

“Ha!” McGregor bellowed. “Good on ya, laddie.” He spun back toward the pilots and caught his first sight of the
Cabot
below. The humungous colony ship sat in a clearing barely able to hold her, but the large trees surrounding it dwarfed its height.

McGregor wanted to survey the site again and signaled the pilots to conduct an additional pass before they started to land. On Cygni, the
Magellan
had been cannibalized to create small dwellings and structures, but here it was different. A small compound surrounded the colony ship, and the entire perimeter was encircled with tall metal poles. He leaned closer to the nearest viewport for a better look. Crackling energy arched between the poles. The colonists had created a huge high-energy defensive grid.
Why in the world do they need that?

The copilot pointed out the port-side view port. “Major, I think we picked up an escort.”

After shifting to the right, McGregor leaned closer to the viewport. Flying below them was large winged animal. At first, he thought it was an alien bird, but once the sun’s rays poked through the clouds, he got a better view. The animal’s wings spanned almost as wide as the shuttle, but unlike a bird, they were a thin membrane, not feathers. Long tan-colored hair flowed along it skin. Its head had a short hard beak, much like that of a hawk. The flying creature’s left eye darted back and forth as if it was studying the shuttle for potential danger or weaknesses.

After a quick wind gust that buffeted the creature to the right, McGregor took note of two powerful-looking legs tucked against its underbelly, each with long, sharp talons. He was sure the gunners of the shuttle saw them too. He could hear the motors of the dorsal and ventral turrets each time the gunners moved to keep the creature in their sights.

Without incident, the creature dove to the right and followed a path to the north low over the tree line. McGregor watched it pass out of sight then leaned back to the copilot. Whatever that thing was, he didn’t think it was alone. His orders to the shuttle’s crew were clear. If anything resembling that creature on the shuttle’s scanner returned on an intercept course, don’t hesitate. Blow it out of the sky.

The pilots completed their pass over the
Cabot.
There was no sign of the flying creature again, but it didn’t lessen McGregor’s intensity or vigilance. He knew what it took to land in a potentially hostile environment and he made sure everyone under his command did, as well.

The three shuttles set down on a small hill a few hundred meters to the east of colony. Clad in his full environmental armor, McGregor exited the shuttle first and directed the deployment of his Marines and their three Armored Personnel Carriers, or APCs. He’d been used to wearing armor for most of his career, but the weight of it in this new planet’s gravity bore down on him. When he headed down the ramp, he felt as if he’d just run a full sprint uphill on the side of a mountain with a boulder strapped to his back. He took a moment to regulate his breathing. It would take time to adjust.

The cloudy sky parted for a moment, and he could see the bright blue above. Unlike Cygni, this planet was similar to Earth. The grass was tall and green. A fresh puddle of water lay nearby. He scooped up the water in his gloved hand, along with a layer of dirt. The thick, peaty mud reminded him of home in the Highlands.

His communications officer, Lieutenant Searcy, walked up beside him holding a mobile scanner. She pointed at the trees. “Sir, have you ever seen anything like these? I grew up near Yosemite, and these make those redwoods seem small.”

Fighting the glare on his armor’s helmet visor, McGregor arched his neck to gauge the tree line. Many of the treetops towered above, and their thick heart-shaped leaves provided an excellent shade canopy below. At best guess, the tallest along the tree line had to be one hundred fifty meters, and he was being conservative. “Aye, I’d bet we could cut fine cabers out of a few of ‘em.”

Searcy giggled. “You threw cabers, sir?”

“Tossed cabers, lass,” he corrected her. He arched his back. “Back home, I was regional champ before I joined the Corp.” The memories of his youth in the Highlands brought a warm sensation to his heart. “Of course, I was all skin and bones back then.” He threw her a wink. “The Corp made me the man I am today.”

She shook her head. “It’s hard to imagine you as a scrawny kid, sir.” She didn’t give him a chance to answer and scanned the landing site. “Where’s our welcoming party? Weren’t the colonists supposed to meet us here?”

McGregor frowned. He was wondering the same thing. He accessed the shuttle’s comm gear from his armor and opened a channel to the colony’s array. Static popped on the channel. He heard a voice for a brief moment, but it was drowned in the distortion. He closed the channel with an angry slap on his wrist.

An armored hand tapped his shoulder. “Sir, I’ve picking up movement to the northeast. There aren’t any strong wind gusts, but I’ve got a solid signal in the trees. It’s moving this way.”

A loud and beastlike roar boomed from the direction Searcy was pointing.

“Defensive positions now!” McGregor’s order was almost on par with whatever was closing on their position. The Marines formed wedges in line with the three APCs, and McGregor heard the whine of the vehicle’s mounted pulse cannon powering up. The cannons were excellent against infantry, but didn’t have the punch of the Marine tanks or rail gun mounted Mongoose.