Soul Jacker - Original Fiction - Military Sci-Fi Space

Chapter 1
Frontier Space, with in the United Free Tribes territory, just beyond the border.

“Massive fleets and secret ships,” Lieutenant Toshiro Huttori muttered under his breath as he made the way to the bridge of his scout frigate. “And we have to find both.”

It was four hours before his shift was supposed to start, but since he could not sleep and the scout frigate, Highwayman, was his ship, he was going to start early anyway.

He twisted his stocky frame as he passed another crewmember through the cramped corridors of the ship. He had to carefully duck his head to avoid hitting it on the thick cables hanging in the corner. Nearly every day he found himself wishing the ship designers had given the crew area more space to make it more livable on these long missions.

Today his mind was consumed with far bigger issues. In his head, he kept replaying the last briefing with War Admiral Evandor. It was the same mission given to every scout commander in the 5^th fleet. Though it was nearly two months ago, he could relive the moment as if he was still standing there with Evandor’s dark eyes boring into him. “Find the biggest enemy fleet ever assembled,” the Admiral had said, “and a new ship design we believe is a super weapon.”

Granted, those were not his exact words, but it was the distilled essence of the message. Evandor didn’t have to spell out that the enemy was The United Free Tribes star nation because it was understood that they are the threat on this border. Huttori’s lip curled at the thought of the disgusting bioengineering practices they forced on their people.

He had joined the military because at one time he thought he could be the hero to liberate the Tribe citizens from their unnatural practices. When he realized they were too far-gone he had to refocus his goals to prevent them from spreading their abhorrent practices. Humans are supposed to be humans, clean and pure as possible.

It bothered him how the Tribe had become increasingly aggressive over the last five years. It was especially disconcerting how they were now were amassing an invasion fleet ready to pour towards the planets of the Earth Core Republic (ECR). Evandor in turn was assembling the 5^th Combined Arms Space Fleet (CASF) that was tasked to defend this frontier. Huttori just had to find the enemy‘s staging area in the vastness of their boundaries.

“Massive fleets and secrets ships,” he muttered again as he came up to the door of the bridge. It sensed his arrival and slid out of his way.

“At ease,” he said before any of the crew could react to his arrival. “Status report?”

“Probes are deployed along assigned sectors,” said second lieutenant Uleski, who was overseeing the third shift of the bridge crew. “We are compiling information. No anomalies yet to be detected.”

Huttori nodded as he made his way to his command chair that Uleski departed. His eyes swept over the monitors and readout displays. Everything looked in order. He sat down and skimmed over the reports from the other scout frigates with the 5^th Fleet. Coming up empty, his gaze settled on the forward view port out into empty space.

He was not fond of rushing when trying to find the enemy. Effective deep space scouting depended on careful planning, intentional movements, and extreme discretion. To go hurtling through space racing to find armed and hostile ships was begging for disaster. Yet, he understood the urgency of his task, and how critical it was to Operation Storm Anvil. He had to be willing to take risks to find the Tribes so they could be stopped.

Yet, he could do little until they received some contact or clues as to where the Tribe fleet was assembling. His idle eyes fell onto Ensign Muller, one of his two sensor officers on duty. She had lost one of her brothers only a month ago during a skirmish.

Next to her was Ensign Weber, the lead pilot on this shift. His home planet was in the border zone. The Tribes had raided it three times this last year alone. Each time striking hospitals and stealing genetic materials and bio-tech. At first the Republic was surprised the Tribes targeted hospitals and medical facilities, but they shouldn’t have been. Every citizen of the United Free Tribes reveled in being a bio-engineered freak that melded animal DNA to their human forms. He didn’t want to think what they were doing with the stolen genetic material.

Weber did not lose anyone close to him during the raids, but the threat of the Tribes was very real to him. Huttori grimaced at the thought of the genetic tampering the Tribes engaged in and what they planned to do with what they stole from the Republic. “Damn tamps,” he said using the common slur used to refer to the tribes.

“Sir?” asked Uleski.

“It’s nothing,” Huttori whispered waving the thought away with his hand. He had not realized he’d cursed out loud.

Uleski’s eyes glanced at the scout reports on the monitor attached to the armrest on Huttori’s chair. “Any word on the ship?”

“Nothing at all,” Huttori said, knowing that Uleski was referring to the mystery ship. They all knew it was part of their mission to find this new secret weapon.

“What do you think it might do?” asked Weber, whose ears had perked at the mention of the alleged secret weapon. “Do you think it has something to do with the bio-tech raids?”

“I heard they call it the Soul Jacker,” said Muller jumping in. “What do you think that’s about?”

“Yes,” cut in Huttori, “ECR Intelligence has caught the name, Soul Jacker, but let’s not speculate on what it is supposed to do.” His voice low as was his habit. He had heard plenty of rumors as well, from planet buster to soul snatcher. “No one can confirm if it actually exists. So let’s not define what it may or may not do. We don’t want our expectations to blind us from whatever it ends up being.”

“Yes, Sir. Sorry, Sir.”

“Just keep your mind and eyes open. We’ll figure it out,” said Huttori. Everyone was on edge with the magnitude of danger and importance of their assignment.

The rest of the crew went back to their monitors in silence. Huttori casually let his hand drop on the armrest and his fingers fell on the cyberjack access cable. He ran his finger over the connector that when pulled out and connected to the port behind his right ear would allow him to send his consciousness into the machine. Doing so greatly enhanced the crew’s speed and coordination making it standard military combat doctrine.

What bothered him was that how many civilians used the slang term, soul jacking, for it. He didn’t like the concept that it was his soul being transferred to the machine. He shook his head, a slight grimace on his face. He didn’t really believe that was the case, but the new weapons name being, Soul Jacker, did nothing to ease his tension.

“Probe three found traces of jump drive distortions,” said Ensign Muller. Her words captured Huttori’s attention. Their own ship had been sitting recharging their jump drive coils at star point RF-471. A location rich in the solar radiation necessary for his faster than light reactors, but not much else.

“On screen, show me the distances,” he said, his voice monotone. The small 3-D projector at the front of the bridge came to life showing the planetary systems involved.

“How many jump signatures?”

“Two signatures. Analysis suggests departures from solar orbit of the Turrin Star System.

Huttori leaned forward. It was the first real contact anyone had reported. “Relay coordinates to the rest of the scouts. We will go in for a closer look.”

“Set coordinates for one of the pirate points in the system?” asked Weber. Even though he was part of the less experienced third bridge crew, he anticipated the next move precisely.

Huttori still ran over his options. Pirates recharged their ships at these remote points near an active sun. They were usually on the sun-exposed side of the nearest planet in orbit. It took longer to recharge jump drives from that distance, but it made ships harder to detect and kept them away from the open space that most ships used.

“Correct, set coordinates and prepare for jump,” Huttori said. He glanced over at the jump drive energy readouts and they were partially green. The first use would drain most of the energy reserves, but would leave enough for a short jump if needed.

The small bridge crew went through the paces preparing for the jump. With all the preparations complete, Huttori gave the order to initiate the jump drive.

Under full surge the jump drive system emitted energy waves that latched onto the fabric of time and space and carried itself into a place that was neither here or there, nor now or then. Everything felt like it shifted sideways as time and matter rippled. Altering the energy flows caused the ship and the crew to materialize in the new location almost instantly.

Appearing at their intended coordinates, the proximity alert immediately flashed red and wailed its audio alert. In front of them, taking up the entirety of the forward view port was an obscenely large ship.

Huttori and his crew sat in silent shock. They were used to dealing in distances of hundreds of thousands of kilometers, having an enemy ship sitting practically within arm’s reach was a worst-case scenario. His lightly armed and armored scout frigate relied on speed and the vast distances of space to stay safe.

“We have contact!” said Muller, her voice emitting a tinge of a shrill sound that normally was absent.

“I can see that!” said Huttori as his eyes widened and darted to the details of the ship’s hull in front of him. He couldn’t see much, but he could tell by the design style that it was not on his side. The missile tubes casually pointing right at him meant it was heavily armed and more than just random pirates.

His eyes glanced at the 3-D projector watching ships pop up all around his frigate as the computer compiled the data coming from the scanners. He had stumbled into the enemy fleet, and they were in deep.

“They haven’t reacted yet,” stated Weber. He managed to keep his voice calm, as was the trait of any good pilot. “There is no way they didn’t notice the jump drive trace we just created.”

“I’m sure they did,” said Huttori, “but we’re so damn close they probably haven't figured out what happened or who we are. Everyone, cyberjack in now!”

Each crewmember reached to the hardline cyberjack cable at their console, pulled it out and plugged it into the cyberjack port at the base of their skull behind their right ear. They quickly tightened the harness strapping them to their chairs and then lowered the helmet built into their chairs to keep their heads secured.

Their bodies safe, they sent their essence through the cybercable. They felt themselves rush into the computer mainframe where time slowed as their senses connected with the powerful computer and sensor equipment of the ship. They were no longer hampered by the need to use verbal words, or physical actions, greatly increasing their coordination and efficiency which were paramount to success in battle.

The crews’ cyberselves materialized in a computerized rendition of the bridge to give them something familiar to ground themselves in order to prevent excessive mental load. They sat in the same chairs, in front of the same consoles, but the walls were gone as they transcended beyond themselves becoming one with the ship’s sensors.

“Suggest evasive maneuvers, Lieutenant?” thought spoke Weber.

Connected to the ships sensors, Huttori could feel the enemy craft surrounding him. His vision shifted to cybersight and he took in all the enemy ships around him. His connection with the frigates optic package allowed him to focus in as if he was standing within arms of reach of each enemy ship. None of them had yet reacted to his sudden arrival, but it wouldn’t take long so they had to act fast.

Igniting the engines would cause a large energy signature that would be noticed immediately and the shooting would start quickly. Stay still and quiet, or make run for it? He silently cursed himself for jumping into this spot. He should have anticipated that the enemy would have ships at the pirate points.

“Power down all systems, collect as much data as you can, prepare to send trans-”

“We have movement!” said Muller. “They found us!”

Huttori watched as ships adjusted their vector confirming Muller’s words.

“Engage engines, full thrust, stay close to this ship’s hull for protection,” said Huttori changing his plans in a heartbeat. “Spin the jump coils. Engage as soon as you can to any place that’s not here.” There was no need to run cool now. The massive energy plume they would create from heavy acceleration no longer mattered. The ship in front of him started to move and he could feel his own ship begin to turn as Weber applied thrust.

“How long before we can jump?” asked Huttori

“Fifty seconds,” said Uleski

Huttori’s mind focused on his mission. They were scouts and they had a job to do. He had to warn the rest of the fleet. He could send nano-burst data packs through jump-space to deliver the information instantly.

However, each transmission sent would delay the use of the main jump drive that he needed to get his ship to safety.

He did not know how many seconds his ship would last. With no guarantee of escape he needed to ensure the information was sent. He had a duty to warn Evandor and the rest of the fleet.

“Muller, collect as much data on the fleet as you can. Send transmissions every ten seconds as you compile.”

Lieutenant Huttori focused on the sensor information. There were so many ships he couldn’t take it all in. He checked on the jump-drive system. It was winding up, and the calculations for the jump were computing. He had to buy time for his crew, for the fleet, for Earth.

“Hug that ship,” Huttori commanded. If they stayed close to it, the other ships would refrain from firing in fear of hitting their own ship. The Highwayman was flat and wide like a manta ray. Weber brought it in tight and skimmed across the hull.

“They are trying to lock on weapons,” said Uleski. “Deploying counter measures.” The ship launched decoy pods out of the rear wing sections. They shone a brilliant orange while projecting immense electronic, heat, and mass signatures designed to confuse the enemy’s targeting systems.

“Engaging evasive maneuvers.”

“It’s a carrier, Sir,” said Weber. “Big enough for us to hide by, but they are launching strike craft.”

“Forty seconds until we can jump, Sir,” said Uleski.

Huttori suddenly became very grateful for his scout frigates small size.

Weber was fully immersed into his daring flight. Cyberjacked in, he was the ship, flying with his arms spread wide as his belly skimmed insanely close to the carrier as he deftly maneuvered over the contours and protrusions of its hull.

Huttori watched as they approached the front of the ship. He could see the blazing trails of strike craft as they poured out of the front of the ship. The lead ships where already wheeling around towards them. This carrier had pilots sitting in the cockpits ready to launch in seconds. They were waiting for a fight.

“Thirty seconds to jump,” said Uleski.

“Sending first data transmission,” said Muller.

“They have weapons lock,” said Weber.

Huttori watched the strike craft hurtle towards him as their weapons blazed to life in an attempt to end his. Weber careened the ship hard to port, bringing it over the deck of the carrier, then around to the portside using the big ship as a shield.

Uleski activated the rear defense turret sending high-density slugs to connect with pursuing torpedoes. Red explosions flowered behind them.

“We have a second group of strike craft,” said Muller as fighters came at them from the underbelly of the carrier. They snaked in tight, getting their forward weapons lined up with his frigate.

“Twenty seconds to jump!” shouted Uleski

“Sending next transmission!” shouted Muller on his heels.

The fighters opened up with their weapons sending pulsing bolts of green into the frigates light armor. Huttori watched the damage readings on his hull plates escalate despite Weber’s best efforts to evade. Huttori winced from the blows, though he could not physically feel the pain of his ship, he groaned with it.

“Ten seconds to jump.”

“I have to pull away from the carrier,” shouted Weber. The scout frigate leapt away from the ship into open space. As he peeled away from the carrier’s hull, the bigger ships began to light them up with their turrets.

Space erupted with the brilliant colors of weaponry being disgorged at them. Blues, yellows, reds, and greens all tracing their paths to his ship’s hull systematically tearing or boiling off armor. The ship shuddered and groaned as the jump drive counted down to zero.

“Jump drive engaged!” shouted Huttori as he took the reins.

“Cyberjack crew detected. Safety protocols engaged. Jump aborted,” said the computer. Military protocol dictated that the crew wasn’t to be cyberjacked in during the jump. The mental load was extreme and could accelerate the likelihood of cybersickness.

“Fuck! Override safety protocols! Huttori five-two-delta-seven,” Huttori shouted his command codes and immediately engaged the jump drives once the computer lifted the restraints. He could have ordered everyone to cyberjack out, but didn’t want to take the time.

The hail of weapon fire ruptured the hull integrity of the Highwayman as the jump coils engaged sending the ship light years away. Materializing in empty space the ship went into a spiral as secondary explosions tore off the port wing section from the main hull.

In cyberspace Huttori saw Muller and her subordinate wink away. With no reason to remain, he ordered everyone to leave cyberspace. His essence rushed back into the warmth of his body and was immediately struck with the after effects of jumping while in cyberspace. His vision swirled, nausea gripped him and it felt like a part of him was left in the void of jump space.

Opening his eyes he discovered why the others left cyberspace early. A bulkhead had crashed down and killed them. With their bodies dead, their essence in cyberspace lost integrity and transitioned into the next life.

The fire suppression system had already triggered leaving a white haze in the air. He couldn’t smell the stench of the dry, acrid chemicals because his uniform had activated its decompression safety protocol. The helmet engaged the shield to seal off his face, and the fabric tightened its weave making sure the rest of him wasn’t exposed.

Decompression bulkheads had triggered due the extensive hull damage resulting in other casualties. Huttori was grateful to see Weber and Uleski moving. Huttori took out the cyberjack cable from his port. The warm, wetness along his calf was the first clue of his injury. Being in cyberspace he missed out on the initial shock of pain when his leg was ripped open by debris. Now it was dull throb.

Damaged reports kept coming in, his ship was dead in space and they would need rescue. He consoled himself that despite the damage and loss of life because they managed to find the Tribe fleet and warn Evandor.

“The Admiral better make this all worth it,” said Huttori, as he reached down to put pressure on his wound. His crewmembers died to get the information. “It had better be worth it.”


Back at the Turrin star system the United Free Tribes ships stood down from the brief firefight.

“Status report,” ordered Grand Chieftain Tane Corso, Commander of the Fleet. He was asleep in his private quarters when the enemy arrived and it was over so quick he barely had a chance to get out of bed and dressed.

"They escaped and sent transmissions,” said Crewer Akita.

Corso acknowledged the statement and closed the circuit. They were found sooner than he would have liked, but so be it. They were ready.

He watched the replay of the skirmish from his private quarters that were nestled deep in his flagship, Black Mastiff. The rest of the Earth Core Republic’s 5th Fleet won’t be far behind bringing him Evandor. His name brought a curl to his lip and growl in his chest. He hated the man.

His campaign against the Republic was going so well until Evandor took over nearly four years ago and pushed him back. It railed him when he heard some of his crew refer to Evandor as the Lou Gaurou, a life-stealing demon indeed. He was just a man, and any man can be fooled.

In a small way he knew he was grateful because he had learned much from Evandor. Tane was young for one to have command over the main fleet. While being born into the alpha family in the dominant Kane Tribe did have its privileges, he had shown enough skill and strength to warrant his position. At first, he was not prepared for the guile of the Republic commander, but now Tane had learned the art of trap and counter-trap.

He keyed the comms to Warlock Ava Savita, commander of his secret weapon, the Soul Jacker. He knew he would be hard pressed to win in a straight up battle with the approaching fleet. Normally he would never pool his resources like this in one spot. However, the Rept Tribe had developed a weapon that made him supremely confident.

They proved it worked when they tested it on a captured Republic ship. They had to go through nearly all the captured crew before they perfected it. He knew that the Earthers would eventually find defenses against it, but for now, he had the upper hand. A special weapon they could never imagine, let alone expect.

The face of Warlock Ava Savita appeared on screen. Her sharp features and the sheen of her skin never did look right to him, as if she was ill. It was common enough among her tribe who blended their human DNA with that of reptiles.

“They’re coming,” he said to the Warlock.

“We are ready,” she replied.

Corso smiled, he looked forward to ripping out their souls.

 

Chapter 5

Evandor stood in the cyberspace rendition of his bridge. His cyberimage stood straight and tall with his hands clasped behind his back as he watched the fleets move into position. A cursory check confirmed all his bridge crew was with him and at their respective stations. The brilliant orange Turrin Sun blazed to their starboard side, the Tribes fleet was arrayed to their front.

Evandor kept his distance from the bridge crew, overseeing their activity. He had learned that he could no longer focus on the specifics in such large ships. In his early days of command, with the speed of cyberjacking, he used to try to be involved in everything. Which lead to extreme mental loads that resulted in splitting headaches and nausea. He also learned that by micromanaging his crew he undermined their confidence and decision making. Which had even worse long term affects to the overall performance of the ship.

He gave his flagship a mental sweep. Victor’s Valiant was one the largest ships in service, and he no longer even entertained the thought of trying to do it himself. He often remembered his mentors words and actions. How Duzan would always tell him to find those with talent and give them a chance to succeed and then keep pushing them. They needed the best of humanity doing their best.

Evandor’s put his attention to the rendition of the fleets. He had the image zoomed out so he could take in his whole fleet. Victor’s Valiant was at the heart of it all, large ships arranged all around and clouds of strike craft moving through them. Spots flashed to the port side of Victor’s Valiant announcing the arrival of more ships.

“Confirmed arrival of the Ezra’s Hammer and Orion’s Fist battle groups,” sent Colonel Reis as the capital ships materialized with all their support destroyers and frigates on the 3-D projector.

Evandor felt the instant morale boost among his fleet with the arrival of the battle group. This would be the last one joining his forces. Normally the arrival of the battleship, Orion's Fist with its supporting carriers, destroyers, and frigates was reason enough to celebrate, but it was the space cannon, Ezra's Hammer coming in behind with its supporting cast that gave the real boost.

Previously, Evandor could feel a steely grim determination among his fleet. They knew it was going to be a hard battle, but now spirits were lifted, as was their confidence, both good things. With subterfuge and counterintelligence being what it was, only the highest ranking officers in his fleet were expecting the new arrivals.

“Admiral Drest of Ezra’s Hammer reporting.”

“Admiral Byrd of Orion’s Fist reporting.”

“Acknowledged,” replied War Admiral Evandor. “Good to see you two.”

“Wouldn’t miss it for the universe,” said Drest. He and his battle group were on loan from the 1^st Fleet that usually patrolled the inner core of Republic planets. It was rare to see a ship crewed completely by Primals at the frontiers.

Evandor highlighted his capital ships on the 3-D projector. They were massive and rare in the Republic. Powerful and expensive, each combined arms space fleet had no more than a total of five. This battle he had six, which was unheard of to have so many together.

The other three were all mega-carriers. Wolfe’s Fang and Mattias’ Rampage were both part of the 5^th Fleet. The third, Juno’s Courage with Admiral Janye Dayle was on loan from the 2^nd Fleet. They were already in position with their strike craft in flight.

“Nice to see the Hammer and Fist arrive together,” commented Colonel Reis. He gave the mental image of Ezra’s Hammer firing its beam weaponry and Orion’s Fist firing its kinetic mass drivers. “Nice compliment, will give the defense frigates hell.”

“Admiral Byrd reports all rail guns online,” reported the Ensign Llorrel Ellan, the junior comm officer. To the side she had a schematic of Orion’s Fist with all systems showing green. The entire ship was reliant one the weapon platforms, from the small anti-ship turrets to the primary anti-ship rail guns that ran along its length.

“Thank you,” replied Evandor. He had been concerned about the condition of the Fist. It was an ancient ship now, and the rail guns systems had grown finicky over the decades. They fired fast, ammo was cheap, but the maintenance was high.

The arrival of Orion’s Fist made Evandor briefly wish he could have had his second battleship, Kenlin’s Pride, available but it was severely damaged in the defense of the Deketer system nearly two years ago. The Pride managed to survive the day and was hauled back to the shipyard for repairs. It still sat there with reconstruction delayed due to budget constraints.

With the arrival of these ships Evandor was all in. The entire front lines along the Free Tribes’ frontier had been stripped of any meaningful combat force. The only elements left behind were rear echelon support ships and the planetary invasion assault ships with their associated ground forces. There was little need to bring tanks and ground infantry to a space battle.

Once the battle was over, the ground pounders would see their fair share of action as they start taking planets. Evandor estimated if all goes well, that they could take and hold almost one-quarter of the Tribes’ planets and mining operations before running out of troops. If things went poorly, then the Tribes would be moving in and capturing Republic planets instead.

The key point being that the winning side would able to hold their gains. Raiding a planet was comparatively easy. Come in fast and hard, take what you came for and leave.

Holding a planet was much more of a challenge. You needed to bring enough troops to defeat the defending armies and quell the local population. If that was not hard enough, enemy sector reinforcements were close, and resupply was always difficult for the invaders. The winner of this battle would have the advantage of owning the space ways and could likely forever hold the upper hand.


“New enemy contacts,” sent Threat Analyst Bakerfan, not in words, rather a mental image of the Tribe ships that just appeared relative to their location.

“Analysis,” sent Evandor.

“Six defense frigates and one unknown.” Bakerfan captured the image of the unknown ship and formed a large rendition that increased in detail as data fed in from scanners across the fleet.

“Identify unknown.”

“Inconclusive, first recorded contact of this class.”

“This must be their new super weapon,” said Reis, his cyberself was next to Evandor. “I was expecting something different. Something bigger.”

The new designated threat was a destroyer class, or at least a similar sized ship. The back half looked like a normal destroyer with engines and supporting structures, but the front half looked like a huge tuning fork with its booms slightly concaved. In between the prongs was a massive violet sphere that seemed to be spinning haphazardly in its moorings.

Evandor took in the details of the new ship. “Agreed. This is nothing I would’ve expected.”

Reis scanned the readouts. “Display defense cones. Both sides.”

Threat Analyst Bakerfan complied adding another layer of data on the projection of the fleets. Shaped cones protruded great distances out from the defense frigates and capitol ships equipped with the protective arrays creating a wall of protection.

Defense and repulsor arrays were the crowning breakthrough in technology during the Pirate Wars that gave the star nations the upper hand that lead to victory. The systems had high-energy demands, but they were able to negate energy and kinetic weaponry. Given enough time and distance, they turned energy weapons into baths of lights, and projectiles dropped to non-lethal velocities.

The closer the attacking ship came, the harder it was to diffuse its weaponry, which made space combat a close and intimate affair. Gone were the days when ships would shoot at each other from thousands of kilometers. Now, the combatants would close in the distance to effectively pound on each other. This resulted in ships getting dangerously close to each other in a swirling array of fighters, frigates, missiles, explosions, and flying space debris. This is what the brilliance of the space cannon was, they could now reach out and pulverize ships at a distance.

"I want firing solutions for the Hammer to hit that,” Evandor ordered as he tracked the firing lines for Ezra’s Hammer. He brought in the space cannon in with his main fleet, revealing his hand early because he wanted it in place and ready to react.

“Enemy ship is giving off frequencies and radiations that our systems are not properly registering,” said Bakerfan as he brought up an image of graphs with gyrating readouts.

Evandor watched elements of the Tribes’ Fleet begin to form up in front of the new destroyer to give it a stronger defensive front. They were making a concerted effort to protect it.

“Any idea what that ship does?” asked Reis.

“Unknown,” replied Bakerfan.

“Line up the Hammer shot and alert me when ready,” said Evandor. “We will kill it now. The science crews can pick over whatever wreckage remains after the battle.”

Colonel Reis kept on the task of trying to decipher the function of the Tribes new ship, perplexed about it’s possible capabilities. “In the biggest battle in history, we bring a massive space cannon. The Tribes, they decide to bring a big purple glowing ball.”

 

Chapter 6
With the orders issued for the Hammer strike, the ships leapt into action. The distance was beyond normal combat range, but the power of the Hammer would be able reach out and be felt. Evandor watched the Hammer orient itself to bring its target in line.

The primary cannons on capital ships brought the most amount of firepower to the game. However, due to the size of the barrels that ran the length of the ship it meant the entire ship had to be aimed at the target.
Which was fine for big targets like other capital ships and planetary orbital defense stations, but made them near useless when trying to hit smaller ships like fighters, light corvettes, and to a lesser degree the faster frigates when they closed the distance and became hard to track.

Destroyers however, were big enough and slow enough to make the shot very viable. The space cannon being as powerful as it was going through its charging cycle which took longer than Evandor would have liked. He zoomed his focus onto the space cannon, watching its power levels rise. The energy cannon barrel began to glow a gentle blue-white light as it primed itself.

“Power levels beginning to spike,” said Bakerfan.

“Acknowledged,” responded Evandor as he watched Ezra’s Hammer charge it’s main gun with one eye as he watched the ships move with the other.

“Clarification, sir. Soul Jacker power levels are spiking,” Bakerfan quickly communicated showing the new enemy ship as its purple ball began to spew out streams of light and a graph showing the power levels rapidly climbing.

“Clarification acknowledged. Thank you.” Evandor quickly replied, grateful that Bakerfan noticed his focus was on the Hammer, didn’t take his response at face value and gave a clearer message of what he meant.

Back before cyberjacking, the miss would have slipped through and cost valuable time before he noticed the wildly spiking read outs from the purple ball destroyer.

“Analyze and interpret,” Evandor requested from the Science Officer Malhotra.

“Unknown. First exposure to these readings,” the lead scientist onboard the Valiant responded. “Compiling data, working on theories.”

“Comms, have all available fleet ships assist in diagnosis,” said Evandor. The comm officer quickly relayed the request to every other ship present with science personnel on board.

Evandor watched the power readouts of the Soul Jacker and the space cannon climb. He knew when the latter would reach its peak, the former was a mystery. He suddenly found himself hoping they could figure out what the Tribe was attempting and devise a solution. He did not like to have to rely on hope, it was such a wispy thing.

He began to rue that his science frigate was not available. It had rather short legs for space jumps and was almost a week out. He couldn’t afford that time and left it behind. He didn’t think he would need it, but the evidence at hand shows that he may be wrong. Granted, each capital ship had a few scientists aboard, but they didn’t have the advanced instruments, sensors, or the collective power of many scientific minds to breakdown a problem.

Mentally he replayed the events bringing them up to this stage. He was convinced that he orchestrated everything like a puppet master bringing the United Free Tribes’ Fleet to one location so he could smash them with the Hammer. It took years of maneuvers, feints, and ploys to make it happen. Now he began to wonder if the Tribes commander lured him into a false sense of victory so he could unleash his secret weapon on the amassed fleet of the ECR.

Going over in his mind all the battle logs and video replay of Grand Chieftain Tane Corso, commander of the Tribes’ Fleet, he had a hard time believing the man had this much guile in him. Tane had proved himself as a sound commander. His strategies and tactics always displayed a bold efficiency with maneuvers that tended to be straightforward with relatively little deception. Could he have been playing weak the whole time, like a wounded dog turning tail and cowering, just to turn and snap his enemy’s throat when he least expected it?

Evandor drew his focus back. As the commander of the fleet, he could not afford to be so narrowly focused on just two ships. The entire fleet will soon need his attention, feeling the ebb and flow of the symphony of destruction.

“Admiral Drest confirms Hammer ninety-eight percent ready to fire,” reported the comms officer.

“Give me Admiral Byrd,” said Evandor. The comm officer patched him through and while watching the ships maneuver into position he gave the commander of Orion’s Fist last second instructions.

“Drest confirms Hammer strike is ready.”

“Fire the space cannon.”

“Yes, sir. Cannon firing.”

With orders in place the barrel of the space cannon, which was essentially the entire front half of the ship, released its pent-up energy lashing out across the emptiness of space, reaching for its target. In that instant, every set of eyes stopped and watched the energy beam lance across blackness as they had never seen such a weapon fire before in their lives. The beam itself was immense, over one hundred meters in diameter, which could engulf any frigate on site. The core of the beam was brilliant blue with white surrounding it. What looked to be lightning or electrical discharges spiraled around the edges of the beam.

In the time for the cannon to charge up the Tribes had moved a squadron of defense frigates in its path. Normally at the range of two thousand kilometers, there would be no real threat to the masses of defense frigates. However, with Ezra’s Hammer’s strength pouring its beamed death into the target, real damage could be done. The Tribes had nine defense frigates close enough to the path of the weapon to be able to engage in emitting their disrupter fields. Any less and the Hammer strike would have vaporized the first frigate in its path. As it was, the frigates maximized their systems to their straining limits keeping death from pealing back the skins of their ships to get to the soft innards.

Both fleets watched the display of power, and it looked like the defense frigates would do their jobs on the first shot of the Hammer. That was until the first salvo from Orion’s Fist’s rail guns slammed into the lower starboard defense frigates hull. The Fist targeted the supporting vessel with the goal of weakening their defensive front so that the Hammercould get through to make its primary kill. Normally, a defense frigate was capable of putting energy into its repulsor field arrays that would stop or slow mass projectiles, but with full power diverted to the energy disrupters, the heavy slugs smashed into the front hull unimpeded.

Orion’s Fist fired its four secondary anti-ship rail guns first, the four slugs slammed into the enemy’s hull. The power of the shells stressed the armored skin, warping and stretching it as they caused it to cave inwards creating four large dents. The armor didn’t get a chance to stop vibrating when the next salvo hit. This time the two three-meter long slugs from the primary anti-ship cannons hurled themselves forward exhausting the fatigued metal. Both shells ripped open a hole and tore inside. Atmosphere barely had a chance to start venting when the shells ripped through the soft and delicate innards wreaking all sorts of havoc before burying themselves into the forward generators powering the disrupter fields.

There was no need for a third salvo for the mortally wounded frigate as its hull cracked like an egg falling on the edge of a frying pan, splitting open and spilling its contents in a messy orange display.

With one of the frigates knocked out, the remaining eight could not hold back the beam from the Hammer. It was their good fortune that the Hammer had exhausted the stored energy from its first shot.

Unfortunately, there was enough destructive power left to overwhelm the leading frigates. The first received a bath of a blue-white electrically crackling light show that hid it from sight. When the light subsided, it left the front half of the frigate with only its scorched reinforced frame remaining. The armor plating, crew, corridors, conduits, and whatever else was in the front half of the ship was just not there anymore.

The back half of the charred frigate was not designed to be without its front half. Secondary explosions, electrical discharges and parts of the ship came out of the back half before all power was lost. The ship went dark and listed peacefully to its port side a few heartbeats later.

The second frigate inline was not directly in the path of the cannon blast. Its port side barely kissed the beam, but the result was its armored skin evaporated all along its side from bow to stern. The armor that had not boiled off bubbled and looked like sickly blisters on a burn patient. Enough of the energy and heat transferred into the interior of the ship caused complete system overload resulting in secondary explosions and fires that consumed the ship increasing in magnitude until the whole ship was turned into fiery wreckage.

The first shots were fired and the Tribes lost three frigates. Evandor checked the timer as it reset for when Ezra’s Hammer would be recharged and ready to fire its second shot. It was going to be a long three minutes.

 

Chapter 7

The commander of the United Free Tribes’ Fleet, Grand Chieftain Tane Corso was in the cyberspace mainframe of his flagship, Black Mastiff. They had watched the new Earth ship arrive. Then moments later it stabbed out its white-blue beam striking his most important ship.

“Damage report?” he immediately asked after the weapon finished its discharge.

“We lost three fri-” started a crewer.

“I don’t care about those!” he snapped. His entire battle plans depended on a single ship and it wasn’t a frigate. “Give me the Warlock.”

In a moment, the bald head of Warlock Ava Savita appeared on screen. “Commander,” she said quietly lacing contempt into the words.

“Tell me what I want to hear,” Tane said, having no patience for the woman or her games. He was from the Alpha Family of the Kane Tribe, those who mixed their DNA with wolves, and as such preferred straightforward words.

“We are still functional, although that last shot damaged some systems, mostly superstructure and scanners, but we can still fire the weapon.”

“Functional is not good enough,” he said, a growl could be heard in his words. “There is no room for error. The Soul Jacker must be tuned perfectly. There is no telling what may happen if it misfires.”

“I know all of this,” said the warlock. She broke eye contact, dismissing him. “It will be ready.”

Tane stared hard at the woman on the screen. “Very well, fire the primer. If the results are in line, continue with the first mega-pulse. We will need to act fast.”

“Yes, Sir,” she said and cut transmission.

Tane Corso started issuing commands. He needed to protect the Soul Jacker at all costs. “Forward elements ahead full, initiate flanking maneuvers, reinforce that protection screen.” His eyes darted around the battle map. It looked like his nemesis Evandor brought in his own secret weapon. He couldn’t help but smile, in a way he would have been disappointed if he didn’t. This was going to be a lot more interesting than he originally thought.

With the first shots delivered and received, his fleet leapt into action. Until that moment, the ships moved tentatively, like two heavy weight boxers slowly closing in on each other jockeying for position.

Discovering the long reach of the space cannon the Tribes throttled forward pushing hard acceleration. They knew that they would not win a long distance shoot out and needed to close the distance.

The larger ships on both sides began to fire their primary weapons causing streaks of light to flash out at each other. Normally impressive, in the aftermath of the Hammer’s display they were infants in comparison. At this distance, no significant damage was expected to be delivered because the defense frigates excelled at their job. Still, it was good practice to keep the frigates honest.

Evandor stood in front of his command chair as he overlooked the ships on the 3-D projector. The threat analyst brought attention to an attack wing trying to slip down low and around the side of the ECR Fleet. The primary recipient of the report was Wing Commander Nadine who was in command of the overall deployment of the smaller craft. Evandor, being the war admiral was also in on the announcement.

Bringing the Tribes attack wing on a periphery 3-D projector, Evandor took in the threat. They were small fast attack ships trying to cloak their way past the front lines to hit the rear echelon ships. In this case, he would anticipate they would be doing an end run for Ezra’s Hammer. Their signatures came in and out of the scanners, and Evandor found himself wanting his science ship again. Its advanced gear would be able to pinpoint what the stealthy small ships were and their flight path trajectories.

As it was, it looked to be four squadrons of bombers, with two squadrons of gunship corvettes as support. He mused that there would be a few stealth corvettes carrying enemy shock troopers to try to storm a ship or two along the way. Enemy compromised ships were always a problem. Sometimes they turn the captured ships guns on nearby targets, but more often they set them on a collision course with another ship and bailed out to move on to the next target.

He quietly observed as Wing Commander Nadine issue commands to intercept the threat. Two fighter squadrons that will shred the bombers, one combat frigate that can out range the gunships to take them out to clear a path for the fighters, and one defense frigate for protection in case those bombers get too close to the frigates before the fighters can get to them.

It wasn’t always about bringing more to the game. It was about bringing the right stuff to counter the enemy. Commander Nadine’s selection was flawless and Evandor left her to it. He didn’t want to get involved in fighter command if he could help it. One criticism against him was that he tended to favor his fighter squadrons. Being slightly too protective of them was the accusation given his history as a fighter pilot, and the fact that lots of the pilots came from his home system of Tomlin, gave weight to the argument. He scoffed at the claims giving reference to his past as a squadron commander that was marked with citations for being too brazen and daring on the verge of losing his command on more than one occasion. That was a different time, and with age, he had tempered his approach considerably.

Threat analyst Bakerfan brought another attack group attempting a flank maneuver to attention. This one near the same attack vector as the first, but far enough away that they would be hard pressed to support each other. This group consisted of a squadron of four cannon frigates with three squadrons of fighter support.

Nadine took in the threat and dispatched two missile destroyers to counter. Just as those ships began to move in response a multiple of other threats came to attention across the fleet. Each of the six capital ships acted as the nerve center coordinating the craft in their assigned sector. Evandor kept his attention zoomed out, watching the overall flow of the battle.

Intuition tingled, something was not right. His situational awareness was telling him something was off. His opponent was acting aggressive sending out flanking units, and pushing his front line. Which was normal enough for Corso, but there was something wrong about it. Not exactly wrong, but more like it wasn’t exactly right.

Not only were the flankers making end runs with poor reinforcements, but the main body formation was stretched a little too thin. The forward ships where just a hair too far away from the ships they were supporting leaving them in an aggressive, but vulnerable position.

Grand Chieftain Corso was known to be aggressive, and his movements did speak of a desperation to neutralize the space cannon. Yet, just as Evandor studied Corso and every battle he was a part of he had no doubt Corso studied him and every battle he had participated in.

Watching the pulse of the battle, taking it in like a dance he sensed it. Corso wasn’t desperate. He was luring Evandor to distraction. He made his forces slightly vulnerable, just enough that an opportunist like Evandor would jump and carve up the weakest targets, which would allow him to win the battle of attrition, which would give him victory for the day.

Grand Chieftain Corso wasn’t doing the movements to lose, he was doing them to win. If Evandor took all these targets of opportunity, he could not focus on the Soul Jacker that he brought in.

“All ships, full forward flank speed,” he commanded with such force that thoughts echoed as verbal words. He felt the momentary shock of the crew at the unexpected and forceful command. They hesitated for the briefest of moments before issuing the orders.

“All ships are to fire all weapons, primary, secondary and tertiary at every defense frigate along this corridor,” came the next command as he traced a corridor on the 3-D projector. This too was unusual. “Bring back those missile destroyers, and give me a missile solution timed with the next Hammer shot. Four second lead time.”

Military discipline overcame confusion and surprise. All ranking commanders knew that the smaller secondary weapons would do little at this range. The smaller anti-fighter tertiary turrets would be even less of a threat, never mind firing missiles at this distance because that gave too much time for them to be countered and shot down. Space erupted with a cacophony of light as every available ECR weapon came to life and sang its death song.

No matter their misgivings, ship commanders switched from effective targets to the new selections and began pouring everything they had along the corridor that would clear a path for the Hammers second shot. Whatever that Soul Jacker did, he needed to stop it before it happened.

“Weapon discharge!” came the announcement from Threat Analyst Bakerfan followed by the image projection of as a brilliant violet shock wave radiated out of the orb. Its wave front spread across the night sky, engulfing every ship in its path.

Evandor braced for impact. With a name like the Soul Jacker, high command debated if it somehow interfered with the cyberjacking systems. It didn’t seem plausible because cyberjacking was a closed, hardwired system. Even if he wanted to order everyone out of cyberspace, the disruption that would cause to the complex operations they were in engaged in made it a high risk move.

 

Chapter 10

At the edge of the effective blast zone, the purple energy wave struck Captain Sharran ‘Slice’ Blike’s squadron causing all systems to shut down. The small ships continued with their forward trajectory. Moments of time ticked by as the Lancers silently flew out of the affected area, as they did the ships rebooted their systems. The purple wave had caused them to power down but they escaped its influence before going completely cold.

The pilots onboard had lost consciousness when they were hit. It took several minutes before Slice regained her senses. She knew something happened, but she didn’t sense the passage of time. She felt ill, a fading sharp pain at her core. Like some giant hand had reached inside of her and tried to yank out her guts. Yet, she should not be able to feel pain in cyberspace.

She swept over the systems of her Lancer. Everything showed nominal, so did the check on her body’s vitals. She instantly reoriented herself to the targeting system. She was startled that the scope had no targets registered. She checked again, not believing what the instruments were trying to tell her. They were diving in on the bombers and she had multiple targets acquired a moment ago.

Slice checked her proximity scanners. Her squadron was still with her but where did the enemy go? They were in visible range. There was no way for them to escape. They could not have jumped away because no ship that small could carry the necessary drive system.

“Sabre Squadron, system check. I lost the enemy targets.”

“Confirmed,” said Toad, then the others responses cascaded right afterwards. All of them reporting no flaws detected with their scanners. Slice could feel their confusion. It didn’t make sense.

Slice powered up her long range active sensors. Her squadron was with her, but the other squadron that they were flying with was missing. They were veering off on to a different strike vector a moment ago. She should be able register them. Where did they go?

“Time anomaly registered, Captain,” said Toad.

Slice checked her ships clock, puzzled to see that it had advanced over seven minutes from where it should be. “Confirmed. Seven minute lapse.”

“What the hell?” said Slingshot. His astonished response spoke for the whole squadron.

“Both fleets are silent,” said Rain Cloud.

Slice was so focused on what was in front of her, she didn’t look behind her. A series a colorful and confused comments followed.

“Distance from the fleet correlates to our velocity and the seven minute time lapse,” said Toad. He sent a display showing the math. Their trajectory taking them straight out of the heart of the fleet.

“All pilots form up,” said Slice as she slowed her craft down. There was no point to be zipping through space at combat speed when there suddenly was no combat to be had.

Reading and then rereading the readouts, she called out to have the other pilots confirm her data. “All pilots, jack out. Give me a manual instrument check.”

Suddenly she remembered Evandor urgent call to cyberjack out. Alarmed, Sharran willed herself back into the warmth of her natural body. Her senses went from the cool lethal efficiency of her fighter, through the tunnel of the cyberjack connecting system and felt the flush of body heat. She took in a deep breath, filling her lungs feeling her chest expand.

Everything was in order, she felt fine and wondered if she really did hear the admiral call for them to jack out. Getting back to the task at hand, she focused her natural eyes, they swept over the instrument panel.

They confirmed her earlier findings.

She pointed the nose of her Lancer to the side and engaged the thrusters putting her nimble ship into a gentle arc. As the ship wheeled around, she craned her neck to look over her right shoulder to where the fleets should be blasting each other into burning heaps of space junk.

Instead of the expected violent display of lasers, cannons, tracers, and missiles streaks, there was nothing. No weapon fire and even stranger no ships had their running lights on nor was there the glow of engine thrusts. She found herself staring into the silence of space.

Chapter 11

“Attention Earth Fighters,” the male voice called through Captain Blike’s comm set made to jump. “This is First Warrior Sheppard from the United Free Tribes’ Squadron. I call a truce between us. We both see what has happened to our comrades.”

Slice cursed herself for not noticing the stealthy enemy squadron earlier as she had been too distracted with everything else going on. She narrowed her scanners to focus on the direction of the communication, and sure enough, the stealthy enemy ships came up. Twenty-four of them to be exact, all bomber class.

She smirked to herself, First Warrior Sheppard failed to mention that he was part of a bomber squadron when he called the truce. She knew that in the Tribesman military ranking structure that a First Warrior was about equivalent to an ECR Captain so their ranks matched up well. However, her fighters completely out matched his bombers.

“This Is Captain Blike,” she called back to him. “I will take your request under consideration.” She keyed off the comm, and opened the secure channel for her squadron. “Sabers, jack in, form up, and call out your targets. The lead dog is mine.”

She willed herself back into the machine, feeling her essence slip from her body, out the tunnel of the connecting cyberjack port and back into the lethal spacecraft.

Engaging her thrusters, she lined up the enemy bombers. She had no guilt in not accepting the truce he boldly tried to call. There was no doubt in her mind that if he was in fighters or gunship corvettes that they would have attacked without warning. However, since he was outclassed he tried the truce. It would have been smarter to turn tail and run hoping to sneak away.

As her ship accelerated her sense of thrill heightened. Yes, this is exactly what her old teacher Blanstot would have done as well. Take the opportunity to strike and eliminate a threat before they could cause any harm. She felt a sense of pride that he would approve of her actions.

“Earth fighters. Break off. We need to work together and figure out what happened to our fleets,” said Sheppard as his bombers started to take evasive actions.

“Sheppard, the is Captain Blike of the 5^th Fleet, of the Earth Core Republic. I do not accept your offer as I cannot trust you.” The last thing she wanted was to give an enemy bomber squadron free reign on the defenseless ships in her fleet.

“Damn you Earther, we don’t have to do this.”

“Yes, we do. Blike out.”

Slice primed her quasar auto cannons. Ingenious energy weapons whose ammunition was fed by the waste energy sludge that was created by the onboard plasma fusion engines that powered the fighters. Her guns could shoot faster than the engines could produce ammunition, but with controlled bursts, they could be used indefinitely. These bombers were not worth wasting any missiles.

She listened as her squadron called out, and locked on their targets. Slice oriented her slave-wings as her Saber Squadron swooped in like predators with their sleek, sharp edged Lancers.
Slice lined up the lead bomber, who she predicted belonged to none other than First Warrior Sheppard himself. Her targeting computer identifying the enemy bombers craft they were facing.

“Looks like we got a sausage party,” said Toad in reference to the nickname the ECR pilots had given this type of bomber. The design was of three long sausage like tubes in a triangle formation, connected along their length with support beams. Each sausage, or tube, had a thruster behind it, one tube was for the pilot, and the other two were for the quasar bombs.

“They are loaded for heavies,” said Slice, confirming that the bombers payload was geared towards hitting large ships. The quasar bombs were bigger versions of her auto-cannons. Each quasar bomb did considerable more damage than the small bolts from the fighters, but their rate of fire, velocity, and reload times suffered.

Slice rapidly closed the distance, keeping the lead bomber in her sights. The bomber fired its lateral thrusters snapping towards her and launched a quasar bomb. Slice engaged her lateral thrusters shifting her attack vector letting the bomb sale wide. A second bomb was launched, its green energy ball of goo shimmering through space as it streaked towards her. Another lateral thrust and it to flew through empty space.

She responded in kind and released a short burst of small bolts of her own glowing green energy sludge. The small bolts travelled much faster than their larger bomb cousins did, but the Tribe bomber pilot was up to the challenge and evaded the first burst. Blike expected no less.

She corrected her aim, and took advantage her slave-wings firepower. The first slave-wing fired, forcing the bomber to commit. Slice then staggered the firing arcs and timing of her other slave-wing anticipating the evasive maneuver.

Her streaking quasar bolts caught the bomber on its pilot’s sausage, instantly super heating the armor plating turning it into metallic steam. First Warrior Sheppard was fortunate that none of his internals were burnt on the first burst that hit him. His luck ran out when the second longer burst from the slave-wing stitched up his craft and sliced through the cockpit. The quasar bolts evaporated metal and the silica glass canopy before striking his body incinerating his torso and head leaving only limbs with smoking ends.

First Warrior Sheppard instantly realized his flesh body that he called home was no more. His cyberjacked soul screamed a mechanical scream as he desperately tried to stay in the machine and stay alive. With no flesh to anchor him, his consciousness evaporated from the craft to the great beyond.

The bomber shuddered under its assault. Once the life force left it, the zero-momentum fail-safes kicked on and engaged directional thrusters to bring it to a halt in space. These fail-safe zero-momentum thrusters had been installed on virtually every spacecraft.

The theory being if the crew was killed, or lost control, it was better for the ship to come to a stop and float harmlessly in space until rescue or salvage teams could arrive. This was preferred over letting the craft continue to fly through space and getting lost, or crashing and destroying itself, or worse destroying other craft or facilities.

Satisfied as the sausage shuddered and went silent Slice quickly turned her guns on the next victim. This one met bursts from her quasars striking its plasma fusion generator turning it into a flowering ball of orange fire tinged with green.

Blike’s Lancer sliced past the wreckages it just created. Her squadron had similar success, leaving no surviving Tribe ships after the first attack run. She checked her scanners, no other active ship in range. Only the derelict floating craft in the distance that had been silent the whole time.

“Confirm hostiles neutralized,” she said, then listened to her pilots report the same. No enemy survivors, no friendly casualties.

“Good job Sabers. Form up on me, and let’s head back to the Valiant.” She eased back her velocity and pointed her ship back to their home ship.

“Everyone stay alert, full active scanners,” she said as her squadron began to form up around her. Normally she liked surprises as they kept life interesting, but she had her fill for the day. “We need to figure this out.”

“Any idea what happened to the fleet,” asked Toad as his Lancer came up off her right wing.

“Let’s say I am open to suggestions,” said Slice. “Does anyone have any fleet comm activity?”

“Reading zero activity,” said Pretzel. “If ya’ll weren’t here I would think I’m going a little bit crazy.”

"Crazy likes company,” chimed in Rain Cloud.

“At least the tribe fleet is down as well,” said Inferno.

“Hey Captain, I got something at coordinates 23.47.76,” said Toad as he brought up the image of a purple star.

Slice zeroed her focus on the coordinates given which were well inside the Tribes’ Fleet.

“What’s that?” asked Pretzel. “Stars aren’t purple.”

“That is where we are going. Change course to intercept,” said Slice.

“What is it?”

“That is the place where we will find some answers,” said Slice. She took a moment to take in the two fleets. Thousands of ships floating quietly in space. “Everyone, activate your zero-momentum thrusters. Just in case.”

She was one of the squadron captains who had the practice of disengaging them going into combat. Her theory was that small strike craft relied on speed to keep them alive, the last thing they wanted was their ship to come to a halt by some mishap or technical failure.

She tried to analyze the purple star, but her scanners were not designed for complex analysis and gave her little.

“Captain, that purple energy signal is right in the heart of Tribe fleet,” said Slingshot.

“We will be flying right into the teeth of the enemy.”

“Your point?”


“Slingshot,” said Slice, pausing for effect. “Do you think everyone is doing this to trick a single squadron to fly into their fleet to destroy them?”

“Point taken,” said Slingshot, followed by a handful of jeers from the other pilots.

“Keep it tight people. I want everyone on full alert. Nothing is to be missed,” said Slice as she cut the chatter.

Toad cued a private channel. “Any idea what the hell is going on?”

“Nope. So we will fly over to that purple thing and find out together.”

“Roger that, Captain.”

They flew in together, eyes peeled and scanners wide open. Yet their eyes could not see what was happening in the invisible energy spectrum. Their scanners, which were designed for combat, to find solid targets and evade weapons, were equally blind to the real threat lay before them.

The pilots had no way to know that they had flown out of the area of affect of the Soul Jacker. Searching for answers they flew forward, straight back into the influence of the purple orb, succumbing to it once again.

 

3 Days Later
On Earth, the Center of the Colonized Galaxy

Chapter 12

Lord Admiral Duzan stood silent and rigid. He was a man of tall and wide stature. Even in his seventies, he was massive. Not fat, but rather man-beef bulk. It seemed fitting that his grand physical size reflected the immensity of his position having risen to be the supreme commander of the ECR Space Fleet. His normally imposing stature, with his shaved head, was dwarfed by the huge view screen that was in front of him.

He watched the last part of the sequence where the space cannon shot the purple sphere causing that massive energy wave to burst out from it complete with arc lightning. He slowed down the recording to catch the details watching the blue lightning stab out to hit ships as the wave approached them. How the lightning would spread apart and dance all over the hulls like the whole thing was electrically surging. Then as the purple energy wave washed over the ship, turning the blue lightning purple as it went. Finally, how the ships lights would flicker and go dark shortly afterward.

It did not matter the ships allegiance or size. Tribe or Republic, fighter or fortress, everything was affected equally with the same results.

Lord Admiral Duzan kept his hands firmly clasped behind his back, his body utterly motionless on the surface, hiding the growing storm of rage building within. His entire 5th Fleet succumbed to whatever that was. The video was at the part where the purplish-blue shock wave reached Ezra’s Hammer, washed over it, and left it silent in its wake.

He grimly watched the wave come up to the satellite probe that had been stationed at the edge of battle recording the event. Once the wave hit the probe, the screen turned to static fuzz. There were three other probes at the scene, all in different locations, but all showing the same events. The fact the probe only had capabilities for video recording and basic sensors railed against him. It left so much information in darkness.

The video package arrived this morning, sent by nanoburst transmission. A military grade relay system where the message was compressed to a nanosecond, and then sent through FTL space station relays back to Earth. The probes recording the event sent a transmission every five seconds in the event they were destroyed. Even at the incredible speeds of the system, the data was three days old. He had watched it all morning, and all afternoon, from beginning to end, from every angle available.

His entire 5th Fleet sat out there with an unknown status. Long-range scanners detected no light jumps, so they must still be floating there. The ships list ran through his head. How many decades would it take decades of full production to rebuild that fleet and train the crew? The sheer loss of resources staggered him. The best he could hope for was a stalemate with the Tribes’ Fleet as they too were incapacitated.

If they weren’t, they would have free reign to start invading ECR planets along that entire sector. He already had issued the orders to send extra elements of the 2nd CASF to shore up the defense of key planets as a precaution. The 2nd Fleet was already stretched thin, compounded by the lost ships that it committed to that debacle of a space battle. If the Tribes’ Fleet were still active, the 2nd would be hard pressed to defend. He would have to send elements of the 1st Fleet, which was not good because the 1st was not battle-ready like the others. It was dedicated to training recruits and policing inner core worlds.

“Computer, replay at fifteen point two-six and hold image.” The video shifted from the static to the image of two seconds after the Hammer struck the orb when the beam was pouring its energy into its target and the purple energy wave pulsing out of it engulfing the nearby ships, a perfect backdrop for the upcoming discussion.

Duzan slowly shifted his weight and spun around on his heels, coming to a stop to face the rest of the room. He was standing at the head of the table of the ECR High Command Council Room, which was reserved for only the top-ranking individuals and for the most sensitive topics. The table was a large, solid and fabricated with high-density steel. The centerline had installed a 3-D projector, currently not active. The whole room was dark, large, and imposing. A solid bunker of a room sealed from the rest of the universe.

Around the table sat handpicked individuals. On the left side of the table sat War Admirals Henkel Sevastian and Barl Broone commanders of the 1st and 2nd Combined Arms Space Fleets, respectively. Facing them was Lord General Grayson Kraun, the commander of all the ECR ground forces, just as Lord Admiral Karl Duzan was the commander of all the ECR Star Navies.

Two chairs down from the general sat Commander Spretza, chief ship engineer and lead scientist. Sitting next to him was the only civilian in the group, Doctor Jacque Corfur, the founding father of cyberjacking.

“Gentlemen,” Duzan said addressing the group, his deep baritone voice reverberating in the otherwise empty room. He and Lord General Kraun were the only ones wearing a black uniform with navy and gold trim. The other military personnel wore the standard colors of their respective military branches. The dark uniform, his bulk and expression made him an ominous presence. “I trust we all understand the severity of what we have witnessed and it will remain classified until I say otherwise.”

He paused, looking each man in the eye. He didn’t expect a verbal response. “What do we know about what we just saw?” The question was aimed at Commander Spretza. All the faces turned to him.

Spretza cleared his throat, he felt much better with his kind in a lab, not with these overbearing military types, especially Duzan whose size and intensity scared the hell out of him. “Unfortunately we do not know much as the recording only had basic visual and sensor data. We know that the ... Soul Jacker had never been encountered before this battle. We also can surmise that the result of the space cannon hitting it before it fired that shock wave was not what the Tribes intended to happen.”

He brought up the 3-D projection of the battle scene on the table projectors in front of them. His eyes swept over his audience. Duzan, Kraun and Broone seemed to be trying to bore holes through him with their eyes. Sevastian gave him a reassuring look, and the old doctor on the other side of him seemed to be barely paying attention. Spretza dropped his hands to his lap under the table so they wouldn’t see them tremble.

Since no one else was saying anything, he cleared his throat again and continued, “As you can see here the wave attacked their own ships in the same manner as it attacked ours. There is no way that was the original plan.” He altered the image to the first firing of the weapon. “Here we can see the... the... Soul Jacker...um... sorry, that name really bothers me. Does it have a real name?” He asked looking back at the military commanders.

They all glanced at each other before Sevastian spoke up. “He does have a point. We can’t exactly call it the Soul Jacker forever. It’s bad for morale. Especially in light of what we just saw.” Which spurned another round of sideways glances.

Duzan was well aware of the importance of morale and public relations, but didn’t believe in coddling his troops.
“Yes, we need to give it a more official reference,” Duzan agreed. Having a less ominous name

“Indigo Pulse Destroyer?” Sevastian chimed in. Duzan’s glanced to War Admiral Broone and Lord General Kraun, both gave barely a shrug. Being men focused on strategy, tactics and the logistics of battle, he knew they didn’t care. Whereas, Sevastian was excellent at organizing and administration, which made him perfect for commanding the 1st CASF in its primary role as support. However, a brilliant military mind he was not.

Duzan drew in a deep breath that drew everyone’s attention back to him. “We will continue to refer to it as the Soul Jacker,” he stated. He then turned to Sevastian. “What where you about to tell us about the Soul Jacker?”

Sevastian swallowed hard. “As I was saying, the first pulse went through all the ships on both sides. However, once it happened you can see War Admiral Evandor immediately altered his plan and launched a full-scale attack toward the Soul Jacker.” The image played forward to where all the ECR ships opened fire with every weapon they had regardless of effectiveness level. He let the clip play for ten seconds to drive home his point.

“We do not know what it did to our ships, but whatever it did caused an immediate and decisive action. Evandor did not want to be hit by the pulse again. Considering what the second pulse did, I can speculate that it was an energy disrupter of some sort. Maybe the original plan was for it to negate disruptor fields, or shut down main engines, maybe crash computer systems including cyberspace. I have no idea how it would do any of these, but the second pulse did all of that and more.”

“Can you determine how it shut everything down?” Duzan said.

Spretza stared at the 3-D projector. “We can start running tests and theories, but like I said we have very little data to work with. We don’t have the energy readings that the orb gave off. For that matter, I don’t even know the energy readings of the space cannon when it hit. It fired early, which ruins the baseline readouts, and then you can see it go through nine disruptor fields from defense frigates on the way to its target.”
Duzan stared at the 3-D projector that Spretza had pointed out. “Doctor?” he asked without taking his eyes off the projector.

Dr. Jacque Corfur let out a rattling wheezing breath. Not from nerves, but from old age. His age was hidden from public records, but everyone agreed he was well over one hundred years old. Many speculated he was past one-twenty, a few suggested he was over one-thirty and perhaps even over one-forty making him the oldest person on record. He had nearly every organ replaced among other life extending medical procedures. All things considered, he looked very good for his age, but death could not be held at bay forever.

“I’m afraid I do not have anything more to offer at this time,” he stated. His wispy thin white hair fluttered as he spoke from the old age trembling of his head. Duzan shifted his eyes to the Doctor and somehow managed to look even more foreboding.

“Ah, if you mean the fate of the crew,” Corfur said answering the unspoken question. “I’m afraid all of our studies show that when a machine lost power with a cyberjacked mind trapped in it, the results are always the same. We have never been able to recover anyone from that.”

“What of those who were not cyberjacked in?” Duzan asked next. Even in the heat of battle, only sixty percent of the crew would be linked into the machine.

“Again,” started the doctor, interrupted with a cough. “We can only speculate with the information at hand. If the rest of the crew survived they should have contacted us by now.” Corfur paused. The military men held their gaze behind stone faces.

“Yes, very well then,” Corfur continued, with no reaction to read. “It is possible that the pulse weapon incapacitated them all. If rendered unconscious, with the power to life support lost they would succumb to affixation in a matter of days depending on the size of the ship.”

It was just as he thought. “Very well, you two are dismissed.” With that, the doctor and scientist rose from the table.

Corfur paused as he stood up, licked his lips and spoke. “If I may, Lord Admiral? There was a science ship attached with the 5^th fleet. If we get its records, we will know a whole lot more of what happened and learn how to protect ourselves.”

“The science ship was not with the fleet during the battle,” Duzan conceded. “It is in route now.” The doctor perked up ever so slightly, most would not have noticed it, but Duzan had seen enough of the doctor to catch the subtle signs. It was mostly in his eyes, a hint of a sparkle.

“Would I be able to see a live feed of the mission?” Corfur asked.

“You will be advised as your expertise is needed.”

Corfur held his gaze with Duzan as he thought over the statement. “Very well,” the doctor said as he turned and started to walk out of the room. Commander Spretza walked beside him, shortening his stride to keep pace with the older man so that they would leave together.

Duzan sat down. The four remaining men sat in silence waiting for the heavy sliding doors to close behind the two men.

“We have several thousand ships floating in space. Our Tribes’ frontier defenses are thin, but our enemy is worse off as they don’t have the reserves we do, and we have millions of troops ready to invade. We need to take advantage of this.”

“My troops are ready to move across the entire quadrant,” Lord General Kraun said as he brought up the star systems along the Republic - Tribe frontier on the 3-D projector. “These planets are our staging areas,” he said as a dozen planets glowed a brighter blue. “They are all within striking distance and are our best choices. On the Tribes side of the frontier, eight planets turned a brighter orange. “They will be well defended as we know the Tribes’ armies are stationed there as well. Our biggest problem is lack of naval and fighter support with the 5^th out of commission.”

“The 2^nd fleet can help with that, but we lost half our combat ships in that sector in the last battle that were supporting the 5^th. I have two task forces of any size left along that frontier, meaning we can only reasonably support two invasion forces.” War Admiral Broone highlighted the map where his two carrier groups were stationed.

Duzan looked over the map. He already knew the details of their deployment, just as he knew the 2nd CASF was split with twenty-five percent of its forces on the three hostile fronts, with another twenty-five percent held in reserve to police and protect the outer-core worlds.

“We will take elements from every other sector only leaving ten percent behind at the outer-core. The rest will all redeploy to the Tribes’ frontier,” Duzan laid out the plans on the 3-D projector. “How soon can we support another invasion?”

War Admiral Broone eyes swept over the star map, calculations and options spinning through his head. “The nearest task force can meet the forces stationed at Kalmar system at this jump point in sixteen days.”

“Make it happen,” Duzan ordered, then turned the General. “Choose the three most valuable targets that you can take and hold.”

“What about the abandoned ships?” asked Sevastian. “We can’t just leave all of them there floating in space. If we can get crews to them we can restore the 5^th fleet and even take the Tribes’ fleet as well!”

“That is why you will be sending every available starship recruit to that sector.” Duzan said bringing his attention to the commander of the 1st Fleet. “They don’t have to be combat ready. They just need to be trained well enough to get those ships back to us so we can do it properly.”

“Yes, Sir,” said Sevastian. His eyes darting all over the map as the logistics played through his head. No doubt excited to be part of an actual military campaign instead of just putting recruits through their paces at the academies and then having them patrol the safer inner core while the best soldiers were rotated to the war theatres. “The distance is great. It will take months to get there and we don’t have enough people ready to take all those ships even if we strip crew from other ships.”

“Assign what you can and have them leave immediately,” said Duzan. “We will secure the area as best we can, then we will start with the most valuable ships first, bring them to safety and then send those crews back to get more. We will do that until we have everything. The incoming 2^nd fleet elements will provide cover for the operations and lend whatever crew they can spare to speed it up.”

“Lord General, once you take and secure those first three planets, you will leap frog to the next most valuable planets and do the same. That will pressure the Tribes keeping them busy while we salvage two entire battle fleets.”

“Long-range sensors still show an energy anomaly at the battle site,” Broone said. “We need to clear that problem before we can send ships into the area.”

“The science vessel will be there in four days. They are tasked to negate that problem,” Duzan said. “Keep everything in route. We need to protect them and that fleet from the Tribes until they can turn off or blow up the Soul Jacker.”

“You have your orders, make it happen.” Duzan commanded.

 

Chapter 15

The observation deck was on the top forward section of the ship. Two large metal plates slid open to reveal the night sky. Even though the Insight was not a front-line military vessel, it still had armor plating to protect the view ports from being too exposed. Rahmore wasn't sure what he expected to see up there, but sometimes getting away from the people and technology and seeing something with one's naked eyes gave a fresh perspective.

Ah, naked. Rahmore almost regretted his order to have everyone put on his or her military environmental suits as an extra precaution in case of complete power failure. The added safety only slightly offset his discomfort of having to wear another layer of clothing. He found himself tugging at the rigid collar. His helmet rested on the table near the high-powered telescope that took up the center of the room, his gloves on his helmet. Having his hands and face unencumbered made such a difference. He looked over his right hand taking in its supple smooth sensitive skin, a shade of rich toffee. Why he would want to cover up such a lovely and useful thing before he had to was beyond him.

They were coming up to the rear ships of their 5th Fleet and would be passing by the Valiant soon. The colossal war fortress rested in front of them, like a slumbering beast waiting to be woken. He didn't bother with the large telescope mounted behind him as he would be close enough to get a good view of the ship soon enough. He looked up to his left where the space cannon slept. Huge protruding barrel still aimed at its foe. He couldn't fathom how many years would be needed to train all the crew they had just lost. That would be for someone else to worry about, for now he needed to find out what happened and relay every morsel of information so that it wouldn't happen again.

"You wanted to see me, sir?" Tamiki asked. She was behind him, still standing in the doorway with a hint of a coy smile. Precisely on time like usual.

"Yes, come in," he said. "At ease, you can speak freely."

"Thank you, sir," she said as she strode in on her powerful long legs, eating up the distance between them quickly. She came up beside him and stood facing the same direction. They were the same height, but his torso was a good four inches longer than hers was.

They stood in silence, taking in the graveyard in front of them. Some small debris bounced off the hull, likely parts of a destroyed ship. Rahmore wanted her up there in part because her specialization was energy in all its forms. It was her team was who figured out how to modulate the defense frigates disruptor fields to counter whatever it was that caused all this. He looked to his right and watched the top turret on the defense frigate traverse slowly. Likely, the gunner was looking at the ships as they passed by getting an eye full.

"Riddle me this," he started, breaking the silence. "How is that," he pointed at the purple shining star that everyone knew was the purple orb, "still emitting its death rays when the ship attached to it is dead like the rest." The defense frigates confirmed the long-range scans on their first run to it. The big purple sphere in its tuning forks spun and shot out purple light with the occasional bolt of lightning, but the rest of the ship had no power readings or life signs. It was a tomb.

They were coming up to the Valiant now. Its black engines and rear hanger bay clearly visible. There was a second fighter launch hanger facing forward under the ship that looked like the maw of a shark from its profile that would remain out of sight.

"I don't know for sure," Tamiki finally admitted. "We have been going over the collected information and our best guess is that when the Hammer struck it there was a supercharging effect."

"A supercharging effect?" His left hairless eyebrow rose in question. "Why didn't it just blow it the hell up like it was supposed to?"

"The video recordings show that the beam went through nine defense frigate disruptor arrays before hitting it. We do not know how much they altered the beam's energy signature or how much power it took from it. If we can get those defense frigates' data recordings, we can figure it out. One problem is that two frigates were turned into burned out wrecks in the process. Yet, if we can get the data recordings from Ezra's Hammer, then we can figure out the baseline recording of that Tribes' purple thing we can probably piece it all together."

"That's a lot of ifs," Rahmore said. His stance softening as his lips pressed together tightly. "What are your chances to be able to figure it all out?"

"With time, I know we can," she said, straightening her back. They watched the Valiant as they approached the monster ship, their course would take them right over it.

"Would you be able to duplicate what happened?" He asked, the question surprising himself. "I mean theoretically."

Tamiki's eyes blinked, she wished she could run, or move. It was so much easier to think when moving. "Sir?"

"If we can get a working theoretical model of what happened we can devise countermeasures."

"Again, with time and more data we should be able to do that." She said as more debris bounced off their ship. They sailed past the broken hull of a frigate that was slowly cartwheeling backwards, considering the design of the hull it probably belonged to the 5th. "We do have all the equipment necessary on board."

They had reached the Valiant and had begun to fly over it. Soon they will be in the space between the two fleets. The last of the Republic ships will be behind them with only the Tribes' Fleet in front, all pointing their weapons in their general direction.

"I know those ships are all down," he said, his voice soft. "But, I still do not like flying right into their field of fire." Compared to the ECR ships, whose design had a certain streamlined sleekness to them with newest designs having a predatory aquatic life, the Tribes' ships had a wider variety of ship designs as each tribe had its own preference. The lead ships had the bulkier look belonging to he Bruin Tribe. Granted there was no need to worry about aerodynamics in space, but the blunt faced Tribes' ships didn't look right to him.

"I know," Tamiki agreed, "but those ships have been cold for days." Rahmore glanced sideways, catching her in his peripheral vision. She had the look of an animal ready to bolt. He grinned to himself. Like him, she never had been at ease with the deadly side of the military life. Both of them had a similar love for exploration and the opportunity to be on the cutting of new discoveries. To be the first to discover and unravel a new mystery, now that was living!

"I hope you remember your infantry training from the academy," he said. His hand going to the butt of the sidearm strapped to his right hip. It has been a long time since he wore it, "and that you have been keeping your weapon clean."

She tried not to roll her eyes. "As if we need to use any of it. Everyone, and everything, is dead." It was her turn to give a smirk. "Getting paranoid?"

"Standard military protocol, Tamiki. Standard military protocol." He said, turning to her.

She looked back at him, that smile came back. "And you are so good at standard military protocol, aren't you?" He caught the glint in her eyes.

His smirk matched hers, "I'm good at many things. That just isn't one of them."



Chapter 16

The trip to the Soul Jacker was delightfully peaceful. As they came up next to it, the crews of the three Republic ships could see that the Hammer strike left it burnt with melted and charred components across its hull. Even with the burn marks the name, Raven, could be seen on the side of the ship. Rahmore was disappointed when he saw it. He was hoping for it to be named something more epic or sinister.

The awkward group of Republic ships reoriented their formation with Insight nestled up to the destroyer connecting itself to the other ships airlock system. The defense frigates had moved themselves to the top and bottom of his ship. Their disruptor field projectors were pushed to ninety-seven percent output and angled to get as much of the enemy destroyer in their fields to allow the boarding parties to travel safely. The purple ball moored to the front continued to spin and bathed them all in it's light.

Rahmore and the boarding party stood in the airlock environmental suits sealed tight. He already had his sidearm out. Even in the days of faster than light travel, space stations, and interplanetary terraforming across the cosmos, the explosive charge to propel metal slugs was still used in hand weapons. Trying to get energy weapons to such a small platform remained impractical. While the delivery system was based on an ancient idea, technology made them faster, smarter and more versatile. Today they had standard slugs of armor piercing rounds. Effective enough against any crew and light armor they may be wearing, but wouldn't do anything to the outer hull.

He had added a modular under barrel light to his handgun. In front of him the twelve soldiers prepared to open the airlock, they were just waiting for his signal. Each of the three ships had four soldiers who acted more like security. Not exactly front line shock troopers, but it was the best he had. Besides, as Tamiki said, there would only be dead people floating around in there.

Rahmore looked at the data pad on his left wrist, the defense frigate systems were nearly maxed out, but currently stable. Knowing that the ships should be okay for the time being he could attempt to board the Raven and try to turn off its orb.

He took one last deep breath to calm his nerves. "Break it open," he commanded.

The front soldier hit the touch pad and the airlock interfaced with the Raven, gave it a power jump and slid open. There was a whoosh of air as the two chambers equalized air pressure. On the other side of the door was the enemy ship. Its darkness pierced by the lights attached to the top of their helmets and underneath their weapons.

"Move out," ordered the sergeant and the first squad moved forward. Once they left the deck of the Insight they floated up as the Raven had no artificial gravity generators functioning to keep their feet on the ground. The four-man lead squad floated forward carried by their momentum. They came to an intersection and engaged their magnetic boots securing themselves to the metal deck. Two soldiers trained their assault rifles down the left corridor, and the other team trained their weapons down the right.

"Clear on left,"

"Clear on right," came the calls.

"Okay, move out. First team with me to the bridge, second team with Sanzzer to the engine room. Sergeant, keep one squad by the entrance."

"Yes, sir," the sergeant said. "You heard the captain, let's move out people."

"Captain, atmosphere is toxic, no oxygen or heat to sustain life," Tamiki said, tapping her portable scanner behind him."

"Looks like the poor bastards all suffocated on carbon dioxide," said the sergeant.

"Noted, let's roll people." The soldiers moved forward taking the lead positions. Their high intensity lights cutting through the darkness. Captain Rahmore moved with them and holstered his pistol when no one was looking as he started to feel a bit silly for having it out.

He moved into zero gravity becoming weightless and turned to the left. The four soldiers in front of him led the way. Tamiki was with him as well as three other crewmembers.

They took the corridors that they believed would lead to the bridge, up and to the middle of the ship taking the paths that kept them as close to the hull as possible to keep within the safety fields created by the defense frigates. With no elevators operational, they had to scrounge around to find emergency access hatches and stairs to move up decks going from darkness into darkness. Their lights danced along the corridors with their movements lighting their path.

"We got one," announced the lead soldier. Rahmore slid up behind him to see what he was looking at. He had his weapon braced up to his shoulder sighted on the targets. Floating in the corridor some thirty meters in front of him were two Tribes' crewmembers. They hung in the stale air, limbs splayed out. One was slowly rotating clockwise.

"No heat signatures coming from them," said Tamiki, her data pad scanner in front of her.

"Let's go check them out," Rahmore said as he moved forward. As he approached them, he noticed the frozen fluid droplets in the air. He didn't realize they were urine until he was moving through them. He instantly added another reason to be grateful for the environmental suit he was wearing. It would need a good cleaning after this, but kept him safe from the touch and smell of bodily waste. He should have anticipated the problem as he knew that when they had died anyone with a full bladder would have it void.

He came up to the first crewmember. A male with thin shoulders, his olive drab military issue pants were iced solid with piss. Spinning him Rahmore gave him the once over. His face and lips were bluish. Judging by his facial structure and coloring he was from the Rept Tribe of the United Free Tribes. The Repts prided themselves as masters of ambush and quick strikes.

"Scans show he has been dead for five days now." Tamiki said behind, "He froze to death before he ran out of air."

"So whatever happened to them they didn't die instantly." Rahmore commented, thinking aloud. "They were knocked unconscious, and slowly died as the life support systems failed."

"That is what it looks like," Tamiki confirmed. Her eyes spent most of their time glued to her scanners display only glancing away for the briefest of moments to orient herself to her surroundings.

"Let's get going, nothing here for us," Rahmore said as he pushed off the dead tribesman. He gave the other crewmember a quick once over. This one was a female, her skin also a bluish tinge. She too looked like she was from the Rept Tribe. He pushed off her, sending her down the corridor as he kept going.

They eventually made their way into the bridge, one of his crew members had to bring out the cutting torch to get through the door. Once through, they came upon the dead bridge crew. All of them strapped into their chairs wearing their helmets with their cyberjack cords floating beside them. The ECR soldiers moved in first and gave the bridge a once over before giving the all clear.

Rahmore was next to float into the bridge. He had never been on an enemy ship before, let alone the command bridge. He would bet if he weren't a medical specialist he would have been more interested in the layout and design of it. It seemed practical enough. They did not have a 3-D projector as the newest ECR ships did. Rather all the chairs were facing forward and with numerous large view screens on the walls.

He went over to the chair situated to the back that overlooked the rest of the bridge. "You must be the commander," he said quietly to the dead woman sitting there. He looked at the rank insignia on her lapels and cuffs. "You're a warlock?" he whispered, his eyes opening wide with shock. "That isn't right," he said to himself as a small chill went up his spine.

The ECR military did not have an exact match for the Tribesman warlock rank designation. Warlocks were something like a spiritual leader, medical professional, and an advisor rolled up into one. This is the first time on record where one was found commanding a warship. He pulled back on her eyelids, revealing the glassy stare of the dead. She too was a member of the Repts. He could see the micro scales creating a glossy sheen on her skin, her eyes were slits, and her features were sharp and pointed giving her a hint of a resemblance to a lizard. The whole crew was likely from the same tribe, nasty business. Then again, which group among the Tribes wasn't?

On her lapel was stenciled the word, Ravenous. He looked over his shoulder around the bridge and found it stenciled above the door and above the main view screen. Turning back to her, he said, "So your ship is called theRavenous. That is more ominous sounding then just the Raven." The other letters must have been burned off by the Hammer's strike.

"Captain Rahmore, this is Lieutenant Sanzzer," her voice came over his helmets comm system. "We have breached their engine room. No sign of life."

"Good job, lieutenant," said Rahmore. "Let's see if we can power up this bad boy so we can shut down that orb."

He turned back to the woman sitting in the command chair. He looked at her glassy dark eyes as they stared into emptiness. He reached behind her right ear, found the cyberjack port and pulled out the connecting wire. He had seen them before, but never a fresh one like this. Inspecting the port, it looked like the other ones he had seen. Different from what the ECR used. The Tribes' cyberjacking technology had similarities, but they went about it in different ways. He could feel the excitement building up in him, here is a real chance to diagnose the Tribes' cyberjack technology on a fleet full of intact ships.

"I am going to unlock all your secrets," he whispered to her as he smiled. He felt the excitement in him build at the treasure of information, it almost made him feel giddy.

 

Chapter 21

"Holy Shit!" Rahmore's hand recoiled in fear. His feet involuntarily back peddled him away from the talking corpse. Before he knew what was happening he stepped backwards onto the 3-D projector, lost his footing, and landed on his rear end.

He scrambled for his sidearm that he had holstered.

"I wouldn't do that either if I were you," said the admiral in that inhuman high-pitched voice. He was now standing with his sidearm drawn and leveled at Rahmore's face. "Also, please get off my 3-D projector. It is somewhat delicate."

Rahmore's eyes were glued to the muzzle of the weapon trained on him. He slowly stood up and raised his hands over his head. "War Admiral Evandor?"

"In the flesh, so to speak," said Evandor. He lifted his free hand and watched as he flexed the fingers. Audible creaking came from the joints. Days of dehydrating and rigor mortis had taken their toll. "Interesting," commented the admiral as he rotated his wrist listening to it pop in protest.

Seeing the admiral distracted Rahmore slowly lowered his hand to his sidearm. His eyes darted around the bridge to see what the rest of his team was doing. He froze when he laid eyes on the two rippers, each one blocking the doorways into the bridge with their massive imposing frames. Their weapons drawn, both the rotary guns and breach blades. The one to the left was painted deep red. The pilot had added horns on the helmet and spikes along the body giving it a demonic look. The other ripper was black, but the pilot painted white bones on it giving it the look of a giant skeleton. Spreading out from the rippers stood other crew members of the Valiant, moving awkwardly in their dead bodies. They were armed with assault rifles and handguns, though that hardly mattered with the two rippers standing in support. He glanced to his right and left, the team he came with stood with their hands up with looks of horror and shock on their faces. "Oh shit," he said quietly as he raised his own hands.



"Oh shit!" exclaimed Captain Chard as he stood up. He had been watching the live feed from the camera that was attached to Rahmore's helmet. The stoic captain quickly regained his composure. The entire bridge crew had their eyes fixed on the forward view screen showing the animated corpse of the admiral pointing his gun at the screen.

An alarm sounded off to the right. "Sir, we are being boarded!"

"On screen," ordered the captain. The main screen showed the air lock where Rahmore and his team boarded the Valiant. Standing in the doorway was a ripper; his arms spread wide holding both sides of the sliding door lock system. Chard knew that the ripper had locked its arms in the airlock forcing both doors to stay open. He would have to remove it before he could close them. Other rippers were stepping past him ducking under his arms.

Chard jammed his thumb on the ships intercom. "All hands to arms! Repeat all hands to arms! We are being boarded by rippers." He did the math in his head, he had a crew of ninety-two, and his only security was standing on the bridge of the Valiant. He needed to rally his crew into organized defensive groups if they were to stand any chance against the rippers.

The front view screen showed the rippers spreading out across his ship. They were firing shock blasters at his crew that were fleeing before them. Those hit by the blasts lay unconscious on the ground. They were coming for prisoners.

Chard contemplated giving the order to abandon ship. To flee in the escape capsules, but where would they go? They were in the middle of a suddenly hostile fleet with no safe haven in range of the capsules.

"Helm," he said, "Engage the thrusters." The helmsmen swung his head to Chard, a look of bewilderment on his face.

"I said engage the thrusters. We are going to tear ourselves off that ship and make a run for it."

"Engaging thrusters," he said. The whole ship lurched forward and began to shudder. The helmsman dialed up the power, metal screeched in protest. On the view screen, the ripper holding the air lock open stepped inside as the portal ripped open leaving a gaping hole in the side of the frigate.

The ripper managed to hang on to the frigate, his two-fingered pincer hand clamped to twisted metal as air rushed out past him into the vastness of space.

"Open a channel to Grenner," Chard commanded. He needed to contact the other defense frigate, to warn him or ask for aid depending on his situation.

"Sir, he isn't responding," replied Fenn, the communications officer.

"Prepare an emergency broadcast to Earth Command. They need to know what happened here. Keep broadcasting until you can't," ordered Chard. It looked like his frigate was an island unto itself now. "How many rippers got on board?"

"I counted nine getting on board, including the one hanging on at the airlock." Nine rippers against his crew of about ninety remaining people, this was going to be tough.

"Conroy, prepare the jump drive and get us out of here immediately," Chard commanded the helmsman as he strode over to the bridge's weapons locker. "Fenn, establish communication with as many crew as you can, we need to coordinate ourselves to stop the rippers." He slapped his code into the keypad. The panel slid open revealing neatly lined assault rifles. Chard grabbed the first one in line. "Everyone else here, rally on me. We got rippers to hunt down," he said as he slapped a magazine of armor piercing bullets into his rifle.

 

Chapter 24

"Lieutenant Sanzzer," said Ensign Rohn who had taken up position of the sensory station on the bridge of the Ravenous. "We have movement out there."

Sanzzer had made her way up from engineering and was on the bridge with the others. "Who?"

"Looks like Chard is pulling his ship away from the Valiant."

Sanzzer pursed her lips and scrunched her nose. "Why is he doing that?" she asked, "Put it on the main screen."

Rohn took over the main screen image showing the defense frigate DF-010047 flying up and away from the Valiant, its thrusters flared bright. "He didn't disengage the airlock mating system," said Rohn, her words betraying her surprise. "He literally tore himself off the Valiant." Ship parts that were once attached to the frigate could be seen spiraling in space.

"Lieutenant, we are getting an emergency broadcast on all ECR channels," came Jenske's voice over the intercom. Jenske was still aboard the bridge of the Insight.

"On screen," Sanzzer said.

"Patching through..." the screen turned to fuzz then showed the face of Chard. His coarse grey hair was wild. He had put on an armored chest plate and had an assault rifle butt to his shoulder.

"This is Captain Chard of the DF-010047 Defense Frigate of the ECR 2nd fleet. We are being boarded by rogue 5thfleet rippers from the Valiant. I repeat, we are being boarded by rogue 5th fleet rippers." There was someone shouting off camera, Chard's eyes looked off screen then snapped back. "I am sending a data file from Captain Rahmore who boarded the Valiant, this is his last transmission." Chard gave the camera a grim look and said in his gravelly voice, "The dead walk."

The transmission cut out. The bridge aboard the Ravenous was silent, a sudden chill in the air crawled up everyone's spine.

"Lieutenant, there is more movement out there," said Rohn, her voice sounded tight.

"On screen," Sanzzer ordered. "Now!"

The screen panned out showing the 5th Fleet. "Multiple signatures, 5th fleet fighter, bomber, and corvette engines are online. Those ships are moving. Most of them are headed this way!"



Captain Sharran Blike throttled up her Lancer star fighter, its engines coming to life propelling her forward. She just received the go-ahead to launch an attack from the admiral. His news that they could take the bodies of the living thrilled her and gave a new purpose.

She could feel the glee washing over her. She would be able to cheat death even longer. Her squadron formed up behind her, they were the closest ECR ships to the primary target. Their mission was to make sure it didn't get away. Ripper squads were not far behind in their Fastcat corvettes.

She did not care so much for the destroyer or the secrets it held, but rather that there were warm bodies on that ship. Warm living bodies. She wanted one, needed one, there would be no stopping her from taking what was rightfully hers.

She primed her quasar guns, her targeting computer highlighting the soft spots on the Insight.



"Squadron of Lancers, coming in hot!" shouted Rohn. She brought up the streaking fighters on the view screen. They looked fast and angry.

Sanzzer swallowed hard, she was a scientist, not a military commander. She was not ready for this. "Engines? Do we have engines?" she called out.

"Not yet, they are still spooling up!" came the voice over the intercom from the crew chief that was in engineering now. Her panicked mind couldn't remember the man's name.

"Abandon ship, everyone get back to the Insight. Jenske prepare the jump drives. We jump the moment we are on board."

"Yes, ma'am," came the curt response, strain could be heard her voice as well.

"Lieutenant," called out Tamiki, "we can't just abandon this ship!"

Sanzzer quickly turned to face her, "We can and we will. Move now!"

Tamiki hesitated, her hand still on the console she was working on. She turned from it and began to run with the others.



"No! Wait!" shouted Rahmore as Reis lowered the cyberjack helmet on his head. "I can help you!"

Reis had the cyberjack cable in his hand, paused, and looked back at the admiral. Evandor did not change expression or say a word. Reis turned back and lined up the cable to the cyberjack port behind Rahmore's right ear.

"I am Doctor Rylan Rahmore, cyberjack specialist trained by Doctor Jacque Corfur himself!"

Reis paused again, looking back at Evandor.

"Once we take you, we will know all your secrets," said the admiral.

"You will know what I know like a data file, you would not have my intellect and intuition." It was a wild stab in the dark, but the only thing that came to mind to save his skin.

Evandor took him in, his eyes unblinking. "Take him to an officer guest quarter. Put him under guard. Bring the next one." By this time, the bridge was crowded with cadavers holding down the struggling humans that still inhabited their own bodies. The sudden threat of getting their bodies stolen gave them cause to fight back.

The red ripper picked up Rahmore taking him out of the seat and carried him away. Evandor had moved back off the 3-D projector and was standing in front of his command chair. He was a solid statue among the throng of growing chaos around him.

"Do this somewhere else," he said, his voice raised. "I want my bridge back." The animated corpses began to usher the resisting humans out of the bridge. One of the soldiers got his arm free, pulled out his sidearm, and fired three shots at the admiral before he was subdued. He struck at their leader in an attempt to bring down the alpha wolf.

The first bullet struck the admiral in his left lung puncturing it, the second went clean through his jugular leaving a nasty exit wound. The third bullet hit the left side of his jaw deflecting off bone and ripped his cheek open to reveal teeth that were cracked and shattered. A normal person would have hit the floor and died in less than a minute with blood pouring out of them.

Evandor stood there, his eyes zeroed in on his assailant. A hiss could be heard as air escaped from his punctured lung. Without turning, he spat out teeth and tooth fragments. Not a single drop of blood came out of him. "Take him next," he said, a slight slur in his speech from his ruined mouth.

He sat down in his chair, plugged himself back in and cyberjacked into the machine.





Chapter 25

Tamiki found herself at the back of the herd running down the stairs to get to the airlock of the Insight so they could escape. She was the tallest woman of the group, and she knew her speed would put the others to shame, but the mass of humanity and narrow passageways prevented her from passing anyone. It drove her borderline crazy not being able to run past the gaggle of slow moving nerds.

"We are under attack," said Jenske over Sanzzers wrist comm. They are attacking the airlock system."

"Can you fend them off?" Sanzzer replied, she sounded winded from the sudden sprinting.

"They are moving too fast for our turrets," came the response. "Should we cyberjack in?"

Tamiki could hear the conversation as Sanzzer was directly in front of her. The Insight only had two turrets on it, close range weapon systems, one on the top of the saucer, the other one on the bottom.

"Cyberjack in, try to shoot them down," Sanzzer responded. It was a safe risk to cyberjack in now. With the purple orb out of commission, there should be no threat.



Blike ran her second pass on her target. She had zeroed in on the airlock system connecting the two ships. If she ruptured the connecting port, she would trap the crew on the Soul Jacker. That would give the incoming rippers a chance to get on board and take them captive. Warm bodies for the taking.

Her Lancer flew straight with the momentum she had while her nose and guns pointed at the airlock as she kept firing into it. The Lancers quasar guns made short work of enemy small craft, but took more effort to register real damage against these larger ships. Her squadron flew in a single line formation taking turns pouring in green quasar death.

She felt a sense of satisfaction as the third ship behind her managed to evaporate away enough of the armor to cause a hull breach at the airlock. That would stop anyone from crossing over.

The forward topside turret came to life with suddenly precise fire. One of her Lancers barely dodged to the side with a burst from its lateral thrusters narrowly escaping destruction. The turret was previously shooting poorly, as if a drunkard was at the controls.

"Evasive action," she mentally called out to her squadron. "They cyberjacked in." The ships of saber squadron engaged thrusters, both lateral and main to deny the gunners good targets.

The science frigate broke free from the airlock mating system. The helmsmen at the controls engaged thrusters to try to get away. She angled the ship to fly forward and over the Soul Jacker trying to use it as cover.

Blike nearly laughed to herself at the foolish attempt. She fired her thrusters and swung around to the rear of the ship where the turrets couldn't target her. She slowed her Lancer down so she wouldn't overtake the slow-moving vessel and then let her guns loose on the starboard engine.

The rest of the squadron soon joined her, like piranhas dining on a wayward cow. Under the relentless firepower, the thin armor gave way causing internal explosions that propelled the ship into an out of control lateral spin.



Tamiki and the rest came to a screeching halt at the blast doors where the airlock was were slammed together denying access to freedom. "Jenske, report!" shouted Sanzzer into her wrist comm.

"The enemy fighters have breached the airlock system. Emergency blast doors engaged," she said, her words coming out tense and fast.

The team that was at engineering had rounded the corner, slowing as they saw the others standing at the blast doors.

"Get out of there!" yelled Sanzzer, "Everyone, back to the bridge!" She spotted the engineering team, "You guys, back to engineering. I need the jump drives! Hurry!"

With that, the herd turned and sprinted back the way they had just came. Tamiki was now in the lead and outpaced the group. She ran swift and fast, her mind racing. She would get to the bridge first and start calculating the jump coordinates. Right now, it did not matter where they went as long as it was not here.

She flew up the stairs, taking four at a time with her powerful strides. She rounded the corner out of the stairway making a beeline down the corridor when suddenly the wall to her left slammed into her sending her flying into the right wall. She bounced off and hit floor hard tumbling to a stop, dazed and confused.



Evandor was back in cyberspace, it felt good to be back in the machine. He didn't like how he felt in his old body, cold and uncaring. It was as if the brain was functioning poorly, he found his mind wandering making it hard to focus on a train of thought. Lack of fluids must have been hampering the nervous system and mental synapses in his former body.

He brought his attention to the 3-D projector as he watched the skirmish between his Sabre squadron and the enemy's science vessel. The larger ship had detached from the destroyer and was attempting to a make a break for it, a logical, but hopeless gesture for the lumbering beast.

He watched the fighter group come up behind the ship and lay fire into its engines to cripple it, causing him to nod in approval. The ships armor failed and the starboard engine exploded causing it to careen wildly.

Then, in what looked like ultra-slow motion, he watched it pitch forward into the Ravenous colliding into it right between the two forks that held the purple orb. The science vessel rolled along the edge of its saucer section hitting the orb causing it to dislodge from its position between the forks. Then, as its jump drives engaged, the Insight reached out into the realm beyond space and escaped the scene.

Evandor grimaced as it got away. He hated having loose ends like that. He issued commands to try to track its jump trails to see if they could find out where it went. The big purple ball rolled forward, slowly spinning as it departed from its support structure floating freely into space. Fortunately, there were no immediate secondary explosions from the collision. The last thing he wanted was his prize possession to be destroyed before he could learn its secrets.

"Damage report on the Soul Jacker," he said. "And I want that purple ball."

"We have defense frigates online, they should be able to stop its momentum with their repulsor arrays," said Bakerfan. Evandor sent his approving thoughts. Repulsor arrays were designed to slow down enemy projectile weapons, no reason why they wouldn't work on the massive slow cannonball.

"Sir, we have a repeating emergency broadcast coming from DF-010047," relayed the comm officer.

"Show me," he replied. He watched Captain Chard's emergency warning. He did not like the comment about the dead walking because they were not dead. He felt offended that Chard would refer to his rippers as rogue elements.

Then again, being a mere captain he would not be privy to the intentions of high command. He was just following orders to the best of his knowledge and abilities. He had to give the man credit as he watched the replay again. Even with his phenomenon's skill set from Andorin, he would be hard pressed to fend off the rippers that managed to board his ship.

"Dispatch more Fastcat ripper squads to the escaping frigate," Evandor ordered. There was no point in making it a sport. He had the resources to guarantee success. "How soon will the ripper teams get to the Soul Jacker?" he asked switching his attention back to the other ship.

"ETA, three minutes, thirty-two seconds," said the comm officer.

Evandor mentally nodded. Not only did he want the ship, but he also wanted the people on board. He needed to try a living body on for size. He could feel the growing urgency to get inside something with a beating heart. He needed the other bodies liberated so he could get back to what it feels like to be alive.

His thoughts went back to the image of Chard, standing with light body armor and an assault rifle ready to defend his ship. Insufficiently armed and under equipped, he was a brave soldier. A good soldier who did what he believed was right.

Evandor sought out the data file of Leesa Panndin. Wing Commander Nadine was right, they had broken her essence, and all that remained was bits and bytes of her memories, thoughts, and belief systems. Every secret laid bare. Yet there was no spark of life behind the information. It was just raw data.

It felt a waste to lose a soldier like that. They were all part of his crew, misguided with false information. They were still under his responsibility ultimately to protect. His thoughts went back to that one soldier who shot his old body trying to kill him. Again, another good soldier doing what he beliebed was the right thing for his cause.

"Reis," he said opening the intercom to his second-in-command. He was still in his old body overseeing the assimilation of the invaders. "Give the captives a chance to join us. We very well may be the next evolution of the human race. It is fair and just that they should have an opportunity to become one of us." The words came out before he thought about them. Now that he heard them he wondered if this tragedy was somehow for the greater good.



Ensign Sara Jenske brushed blonde strands of hair out of her face. She was now the ranking officer of the science frigate Insight that had just materialized light years away escaping the clutches of the dead. She stared at the monitors, barely believing what she saw, empty space, silent and beautiful. Not a single ship on her scopes, no one firing at her, and no one trying to board her ship.

She sat down with a thump in her chair, the tension of the battle had caused her to stand. There was only one other person on the bridge with her. She leaned back into her chair, letting out a big sigh of relief.

Jenske looked over the control panels at the damage report, one functioning engine, damage to sensor and communication arrays, and the jump drive system wasn't responding. At least the fire suppression system was working properly bringing down the blaze at the destroyed engine. They were only a skeleton crew of fifteen as everyone else was caught on the Ravenous or on the Valiant. She looked at the star map and wondered where the jump drives took them, it wasn't at their intended destination.



Captain Rahmore found himself unceremoniously dumped on one of the guest quarters reserved for visiting officers and dignitaries. The red demon ripper closed the door behind. Rahmore could still feel where its pincers held him along his torso. He barely noticed with his mind spinning as it tried to digest what had just happened. Those who should be dead walked and talked, their consciousness should have evaporated away like every other time the body died. Yet it did not happen to these people, they were back, or perhaps they never left the world of the living at all. They did what was considered scientifically impossible.

Not only did they find a way to get back into their dead bodies, they found a way to take the bodies of the living against their will. He would had not have believed it if he did not see it happen right in front of him. His mind went back to Ensign Panndin and wondered what the new host meant by saying they broke her and had her secrets laid bare. He could take an educated guess and the thought caused a shudder to ripple through his body.

Giving his head a shake, he took in his surroundings. The guest quarters were large compared to what he had back on his own ship, but it was still a compact and efficient space-conscious design. He was standing in the entrance of the main room. In front of him were two couches facing each other with a coffee table in the middle. At the head of the coffee table, was a single comfortable looking plush chair. Past the furniture was the kitchenette, a tall counter separating it from the rest of the room.

Without thinking, he started to unfasten the seals on the front of his environmental suit, his body wanting to shed the uncomfortable garment. He opened the front and shrugged it off his shoulders. He looked down and realized he was wearing his red silk pajamas. What was worse was that his pants were wet from when he lost control of his bladder.

"Well, that isn't exactly dignified looking," he muttered to himself as he realized he would have to face Evandor in what will be a conversation that his life would depend on. Holding the suit half-done up to his waist, he awkwardly trotted towards the back of the quarters. Next to the bathroom, he found the clothes purifier. He looked over his shoulder back to the door. No telling how long he had before they came. Seconds, minutes, hours? Rahmore quickly made a decision and stripped himself naked. He stuffed his red silk pajamas into the purifier that would blast them with heat and sonic waves that will leave them clean, crisp, and warm.

The environmental suit would never fit in the purifier so he stuffed it into the laundry chute meant for towels, sheets, and similar standard issue items that went to the bulk cleaners to be done in mass by the automatic system. They would reject the environmental suit because it would need specialized cleaning, but he did not want to leave it anywhere in the guest quarters as he felt Evandor wouldn't appreciate finding out that there was a urine soaked suit stuffed in one of the closets.

Not giving it a further thought, he jumped in the shower to rinse himself off. He needed to be fast as he was sure being caught showering naked by the commander of the undead would not end well.

 

Chapter 28

War Admiral Evandor surveyed the latest battle reports. Defense frigate DF-010047 had been confirmed captured, he hoped Chard was taken alive. His spirited defense had impressed him compared to how quickly the other frigates were overrun. Evandor wanted Chard to join him. He could use more soldiers like that. If Chard accepted, he would be due for a promotion.

Two ripper teams had landed on the Soul Jacker and confirmed control of the bridge and jump drives. It was going nowhere. The large purple ball itself was halted. Two defense frigates had intercepted it and stopped its forward momentum. They were not able to trace the jump trails of the escaping science frigate as they were slightly distorted causing a miss-jump. The ship had likely jumped to an unintended location or it may have been destroyed in the process. Either way, it was beyond his reach.

Evandor wished that he had some of those tractor beams he had seen in science fiction movies. While the concept was wonderfully appealing to any ship commander, the notion that energy beams could capture and tow physical objects like that was ludicrous. An admiral could dream, but reality dictated the use of tow cables and grapplers to be able to collect that prized possession of his.

Satisfied all was under control he turned his attention elsewhere. He had a guest to entertain.



Tamiki stared down at the creature in front of her, the barrel of her handgun nearly touching its temple. She found herself frozen, she was not a real soldier and she had never had to draw her weapon and aim it at another person. Firing at targets on the gun range was completely different from possibly ending a life. She decided she didn't want to kill, but rather take hostage and try to reason with him. They were once, or still part of the 5th fleet. Find a common ground, weren't they all sort-of human still? She knew she had to get close so that she could talk to it. As peaceful as her intentions where, she wanted to negotiate with the gun pointing at him, not the other way around.

The sound it made was heart wrenching. Like a wounded animal wailing in the night. She called out to it. When it didn't respond she nudged the barrel to tap it on its temple, which got its attention. Its eyes slowly focused on her, flashing sudden hate and malice. Its jaw snapped at her like it wanted to bite her. She could not help but to jerk back, she gripped the gun tighter, her finger squeezed the trigger causing the gun to bark as it spat out a bullet that went through the creatures left eye, through its brain and passed out the back of the skull creating a dark red splatter mark on the wall behind it.

The creatures head snapped back and it slumped over and slowly fell to its right side, body limp. Tamiki's green eyes were huge like saucers, her teeth gritted together. Her hope of talking to it came to a sudden end. "Dammit."

She looked over her right shoulder towards the bridge. The others may have heard that shot, or they may come checking on their squad mate when he did not report in. She needed to get out of there now. She needed to run and run fast.

She looked at the three bodies of her crewmates that were unconscious at her feet. She could only realistically carry one at a time and would have to abandon the others if they had any hope of escape.

Making her decision, she holstered her pistol, took the creatures hands off Lieutenant Sanzzer, and hefted her over her shoulders. She was the second in command of the Insight, and she had both piloting and engineering skill sets that would give them the best chance to get off the ship.

 

Chapter 30

"Officer on deck," Rahmore shouted as he snapped to attention and saluted smartly. The door had opened and the first man stepping through was one of the soldiers that was a part of his boarding party. He could see two others right behind him. One was Leesa Panndin, and the other was another one of the soldiers. Rahmore had no doubt one of the bodies was hosting the admiral.

"At ease," said the lead man, the body used to belong to Private Narrel, one of the larger soldiers that had accompanied him earlier. He was a tall broad shouldered man, with dark features and the standard short military hair cut. "Do you know who you are talking to?"

"War Admiral Evandor, I presume," said Rahmore taking the at ease stance, feet shoulder width apart, hands clasped behind his back. He nodded towards the man to the left, a fair-haired man with a modest constitution and size, "As well as Colonel Reis." Then nodding to Ensign Leesa Panndin's body, "and we have all have met Commander Nadine."

"Very perceptive of you, Captain," said Evandor, his voice deep and strong in his new body. He gave Rahmore the once over. "Red pajamas?" he asked with a raised eyebrow.

"The environmental suit is rather uncomfortable against my skin," Rahmore explained. "The soft under clothing is a concession to my physiology."

"Ah yes, the sensitive flesh of Merlur," the admiral conceded.

"You're from Merlur?" exclaimed Nadine, her eyes opened a touch wider than normal, her voice raised a pitch higher, and a slight flush came to her cheeks. It was not the first time Rahmore saw such subtle hints from a female when she discovered where he was from and his associated phenomenon. He forced himself not to roll his eyes. This was not the time or place for such games. For that matter, he was not sure what he thought about the whole dead soul in some other woman's body thing.

The admiral had closed the distance between them and was standing behind the chair, his eyes on the single glass of orange juice set on the coffee table. The other two had come up behind the couch opposite, their eyes locked onto Rahmore who in turn kept his eyes on them.

They stood there in silence, waiting. When no word came from the admiral, three sets of eyes looked to him. Marcus's attention was fastened to the glass of orange juice. He eventually felt the other eyes on him. "Please be seated," he said breaking his gaze away from the drink. He was trying to get used the new body, it was young and had wild impulses he was not used to.

The others sat down. Evandor stepped around the chair and sat down at the head of the table. His eyes were now on Rahmore, pointedly avoiding looking at the glass and its contents.

"Do you wish to explain your actions, Captain?"

Rahmore sat with his hands folded in his lap to keep them from fidgeting. He couldn't figure out what the admiral was specifically trying to get at. "Sir?" The admiral kept his gaze on him, not a muscle flinched. A certain expectation radiated from him. Rahmore cleared his throat, "Could you be more specific, Sir?"

"We can start with the specific orders you were given," Evandor said, his voice carrying the weight of command. "You should know that if I sense you are withholding information, we have new ways of finding it, your intellect or intuition notwithstanding."

Rahmore tried not to shudder, his mouth suddenly dry. His eyes flicked to the thirst quenching orange juice within arm's reach, before going back to the admiral. "When we discovered both fleets were..." his eyes darted to the other officers, "incapacitated... I was to attempt to discover what happened."

The other three just sat there, attempting to drill into his mind with their eyes. "I was to gather information, and then recover the Ravenous, Valiant, and Hammer bringing them to safety. We could not risk losing those ships."

"The Ravenous, do you not mean the Soul Jacker?"

"The Soul Jacker is the weapon, the Ravenous is the ship," explained Rahmore.

Evandor's jaw muscles clenched tighter. His anger flared. The captains statement solidified their conclusions that Rahmore was indeed part of the treachery against them. It was as he suspected, but it was still hard to hear it from this scoundrel's mouth. Evandor was not used to such raw emotion, it must be the young body he was in.

"That is the name of the Tribes' ship with the purple orb," said Rahmore rather lamely when no one responded.

Marcus's eyes narrowed. Of course, this treacherous being would know the name of the ship that killed them all. It was difficult to keep his face as stoic in this body as it was in his old Tomlin body. These emotions ran so hot.

"Tell me Captain, could you have been at the battle if you really wanted to?" Evandor asked. He had his suspicions.

Rahmore swallowed hard, he gripped his hands tighter together so they would not tremble. He was thankful he was not standing. He closed his eyes, as he could not bear to look at the admiral. "It is true that I did not navigate the most efficient course en route," he confessed. He was not a soldier, never was. His ship would not hold up in a real firefight. He hated to admit it, but he dare not lie.

"So you were conveniently not around when we all died?"

Rahmore's throat tightened, he nodded his head and forced a weak "Yes, Sir." His eyes opened. As far as he could tell the admiral did not move since he last saw him, yet he radiated a contained fury. "The Insight is not a war vessel," he forced, "Nor are the crew soldiers." It was intentional that he joined a non-combat military arm.

Evandor nodded slowly. He had a sense his science vessel could have made it to the battle, but with other priorities on hand, he had let it slide. "Who gave you these orders?" Evandor asked. He wanted to know how high up this went. How deep the corruption and betrayal.

Rahmore felt himself relax. This would be better news, "I received my orders directly from Lord Admiral Duzan."

This time it was Evandor's turn to reel in shock. His eyes closed, his head leaned back as the news slammed into him. His so-called lord admiral had set him up. He felt sick, his emotions rushing wildly. His mind searched for a reason to understand why Duzan would do such a thing. Why he would sacrifice the soldiers of the 5th Fleet? Why would he give them over to the Tribes?

He decided it could only be because Duzan was resentful deep down that Evandor was not a pure blood from Earth. Everyone knew that all top-ranking military commanders were all primals, the only exception being Evandor. He had thought he would be accepted on merit. Apparently, he was wrong. He had seen the underlying contempt and prejudices from the other war admirals when he joined their rank, he was sure of it.

However, this extreme? Did Duzan hate him this badly? Evandor wondered if he had sided with the Tribes, or struck some sort of deal with them, as he could not believe he would completely betray his beloved Earth Core Republic. Evidently, Duzan held no such love for Evandor or the men and women of the 5th Fleet. The betrayal struck him deeply as he had great respect for Duzan and thought of him as a mentor from early on in his career.

Rahmore's brows furrowed as he watched the admiral's reaction. He looked absolutely devastated. If he didn't know any better, it looked as if the man was going to be physically ill. Evandor leaned backwards into his chair, his head falling back, his eyes staring at the white ceiling. Rahmore would have thought the news that Duzan sent him to try to help would have been a positive revelation.

"Tell me, Captain," he said quietly, his words barely audible. "Before I do anything rash, could you explain how it is that you plan to help us like you promised?"

Rahmore felt beads of sweat run down his back. He was not sure what just went wrong, but he knew that his next words would determine his fate. "I tell you the truth," and he had been telling him the full truth, "You know me as Captain Rylan Rahmore, commander and medical officer of the science frigate SRF-014 Insight. What you didn't know is that I am part of Doctor Jacque Corfur's inner sanctum of cyberjack specialists. He calls us his Forerunners. We know secrets of cyberjacking the doctor holds close. I am privy to abilities and powers that only we know."

Rahmore felt like he started well. He had been rehearsing this speech in his head. If it had any effect on Evandor he could not tell, the man just sat there staring at the ceiling.

"I have seen you do what should not be possible. You have single-handedly created a breakthrough in cyberjack technology." Rahmore felt like he was laying it on thick, but flattery often reaped rewards. "I believe together we will change the universe, we can reach new heights of existence."

Rahmore ended his sales pitch, he could feel his own excitement peak as he spoke out loud.He had hoped it translated to his audience the same way. Rahmore ended with a teaser and he expected the admiral to pry into what he meant.

"You are dismissed, Captain," Evandor said, his voice so quiet Rahmore wasn't sure he had even heard him. Not wanting to ask in fear he might change his mind he began to stand up and paused half way. His eyes darted around.

"Where should I go, Sir?" He asked. "You quarantined me to these quarters."

"Stand outside in the corridor until I decide," Evandor said, his voice still quiet.

"Yes, Sir," Rahmore responded, gave an awkward bow and quickly made his way to the door. He could not leave fast enough. Opening the door, he moved himself into the corridor closing the door behind him. The red demon ripper turned to face him. It stood before him like a statue of death, expressionless faceplate bearing on him. Rahmore stood there taking the 'at ease' position. He felt relieved to be standing in front of this seven-foot tall demonic war machine, designed and bred to destroy and kill. It felt tame and gentle compared to the presence of the man he had just left.



Chapter 31

"I can't believe he flat out admitted it," Nadine said once the door closed behind Rahmore.

"I am still having a hard time believing that Duzan would do such a thing," Reis said, he moved to the now vacant couch. "What would his motivation be?"

"Think about it," said Nadine, her gaze fell downwards. "The 5th Fleet is the only one who doesn't have a primal in its command structure. We are the misfits of the ECR fleets, the unloved step child that is, at-best tolerated."

"Duzan may be as proud of being a primal as anyone else," Reis commented, "but to the point of sacrificing all of us to appease his prejudices? Is that not crazy?"

"He could have been pushed by the high council," Nadine offered. "An ethnic cleansing of sorts?"

"I don't know," replied Reis. "It feels like a stretch to me."

Evandor looked down to his two trusted officers. He and Reis had been together through four commands now. Starting with the hybrid destroyer with the Landa Task Force, then on to the carrier group Tangorn, to the mega-carrier Rampage and its fleet and now with the war fortress Valiant and the entire 5th Fleet. Nearly twenty years serving together. Nadine was the wing commander aboard the mega-carrier. She was so efficient at her job, Evandor requested she join him on the Valiant and oversee all combat operations associated to the smaller craft. She jumped at the opportunity and had proven her worth ever since.

"The reason does not matter right now, even if we were not betrayed and all was good with Duzan, do you think we could go back in our current state?" Evandor asked, his voice rising, picking up an edge. Nadine and Reis looked at each other, then back to Evandor. "Do you think we could go back with all of our original bodies dead and with stolen bodies?" He continued answering his own question, "we would never be accepted. Let alone allowed to keep our command. They would lock us up and turn us into science experiments."

"Then where does that leave us?" Nadine asked, seeing no point in arguing the logic.

"Somewhere between life and death, in an existence that we have yet to define," Reis put in. Usually a straightforward man, he did on occasion tend to wax philosophically.

"The way I see it, we have three selves now," Evandor said, leaning forward and raising his right hand holding up one finger. "We have our cyberselves. Safe in the computer, no longer attached to our bodies, which may mean we have lost the grounding of humanity. I know you both have felt it just as I did. I feel different in there now. I think differently, more cold and calculating, like I am becoming more of a machine."

"Second," he said as he raised the next finger. "We have our original bodies. Dead for days, we can still enter them. I know you have been in yours as well Reis. Correct me if it was different for you, but it felt like being back home in a way. However, it felt cold and dry. Like dust in my mouth and my eyes. It was hard to move, and it progressively got harder to think clearly. Maybe I still have to adjust to it better."

"I did feel that way as well," Reis agreed. "Those bodies had been dead for days. They have begun to decompose. I see it getting progressively worse. However, as you said, it was like being home because it was so familiar, yet at the same time, it felt like I was a pilot in a ship. I told my body what to do and it did it. There was no pain, but my senses, like touch and smell, did not work right, but deep down it felt good to be back home." Evandor nodded in agreement for he had felt the same. It was difficult to put into words, but Reis did a good job.

"Then there is our third self." He raised his third finger and waved his hand in the air. "There are these new bodies that we can take over. I know we are all older than these men and women, but I do not recall youth feeling this alive!" his eyes lit up as he spoke.

"I know!" gushed Nadine. "Colors are brighter, sounds are sharper, emotions feel charged, and my skin," she ran her hands up the sides of her legs and along her waist line, "my skin feels electric, touch is near intoxicating! I have never felt anything like this before!" Her hands made their way upward and ended up cupping her breasts before she realized what they were doing. She moved her hands back down to her legs and smoothed the fabric of her pants. A blush coming to her face, both men could not help but notice. "And you," she said turning to the admiral wanting to change the subject, "your body has been working out!" Her eyes danced along his broad muscular shoulders and chest.

"I have always known Tomlin physiology was slight of build and strength," he said getting caught up in the moment, those damn youthful emotions feeding on the flattery. "But I had no idea how strong others felt." He flexed his arms and rolled his shoulders feeling the strength of the muscles. "I want to exert my physical strength; my body is crying out to do so. I want to move furniture or sprint down the halls." Nadine gave him an approving eye as he stood and strutted his stuff, feeling out his muscles.

"Everything is super charged," Reis put in. "I am in the body of an Akuan. Their eyes are incredibly acute. If I narrowly focus on one point I can drop down the thin membrane eye covering that lets me zoom in on it seeing every exquisite detail. He looked at his hands, flexing his fingers open and closed. "I love it."

"All this time, were we taking life for granted?" Nadine asked.

"And, only now, after coming back from the dead do we appreciate it?" Evandor said finishing her thought.

"There is more to it," Reis said. "When I was in my deceased body, I lusted for these live ones. I wanted one so badly, I couldn't control myself." His eyes cast down. "It was so bad that the last few captives tried to surrender and join us, but we couldn't stop. Once some of us took over the first bodies, we couldn't help ourselves getting to the last ones. It was sheer ecstasy."

Evandor leveled his gaze on his executive officer. "We will speak of this later in private," he said. Disobeying a direct order could not be ignored, but he would reprimand him in private. Yet, he felt the same feelings, the same impulse to snap and take life from others, consequences be damned.

Evandor moved his attention from Reis to the glass of orange juice sitting on the table. Condensation had collected on the outside of the glass. Cool beads of water had run down its side. He scooped it up with his large meaty hand and brought it to eye level. He looked into the glass, the vibrancy of the orange color drawing him in. The citrus aroma reached his nose. He inhaled deeply letting the sensation wash over him. His mouth began to water in anticipation. He brought the glass to his lips and drank deeply. The liquid ran over his tongue, engaging taste receptors in an orgy of flavor and tanginess. Evandor's eyes opened wide as the sensation flooded his brain, he could swear that orange fireworks were exploding in his head. He could feel the cool liquid race down his throat and splash into his stomach.

"You need to try this!" he said, his voice deep and throaty. He passed the glass to Reis, who took a mouthful. His eyes bulged in shock and he stared at the drink in wonder. Without saying a word, he passed it to Nadine, who downed the last of it. She physically shuddered from the blast of orange flavor and sensations, "Is there more?" She panted, her breath rushing out.

"Yes, yes there is," Evandor said turning on his heel, he headed to the fridge. "Follow me." He opened the door and pulled out a carton of orange juice for each of them. They opened the spout and with heads thrown back, they guzzled the tangerine elixir.

Finishing first Reis wiped his mouth with his sleeve, "that was amazing." He looked at Marcus, a thought coming to him, "I want to try this in your body."

Evandor looked at him and then looked down at the body that once belonged to Private Narrel. "We are going to need more bodies."

 

The Next Day

Turrin Star System, Location of the Event

Chapter 37

The largest capital ships, namely the mobile war fortress, mega-carriers, battleships, and the new space cannon were all self-sustaining vessels. They housed manufacturing facilities to create incidental items from clothing and kitchen appliances to essentials like medicine and ammunition. The war fortress and mega carrier could build ships such as fighters, bombers and even the light corvette class ships. To support the ability to manufacture items they were also equipment to gather resources and had all the necessary cargo transports, mining equipment, refineries, and so forth. Their hydroponic facilities could produce grains, vegetables, and fruits in large enough quantities to support the ship's crew, as well as enough surpluses for the associated ships in its fleet. The medium sized ships like the destroyer also carried hydroponics and limited manufacturing for small items. The smaller ships like the frigates were dependent on being resupplied from either the capital ships or space docks.

With the extended periods that fleets could be away from friendly spaceports, the large capital ships also contained shopping and social districts. With crews numbering nearly ten thousand on board, along with the crews of the other ships in the fleet, it was deemed essential to support the basic human need of social interaction, rest, and relaxation. This area was often referred to as the city by the ship's crew. It contained restaurants, cafes, coffee shops, stores for all types of goods, nightclubs, pubs, and other such common social establishments. There were also swimming pools, tracks, gymnasiums, fitness rooms, and other entertainment to allow the crews to have physical exertion, both to maintain health and to help mental balance.

Civilian personnel who had careers within the military supported these facilities. They were the shop stewards, maintenance, hydroponics, and manufacturing crews. They had their own less formal civilian ranking system and intertwined with the military ranks. In the city, the intention was to resemble civilian life. As such, military personnel would wear civilian clothes in order to blend in. Rank was known only to people who knew each other, but strict military protocol was not adhered to in their interactions within the city.

Part of the city was the apartment district, where the civilians would live, including those with families. The soldiers without families were stationed in the barracks in the military zone of the ships, but a section of apartments were dedicated for off-duty soldiers to utilize. Crew from the smaller ships would often ferry to the capitol ships to enjoy some down time as well. Overall, the additions of the cities to capital ships created a healthier atmosphere that built a society and unity among the people.

The day after the event Marcus Evandor walked through the city of his ship in his old body. The bullet wounds to his neck and face created a grisly figure of a man as he stiffly walked down the main street. After the initial chaos of coming back to life, it was soon discovered that only the personnel who were cyberjacked survived. Those who were not slowly died off when the life support shutdown. Including nearly every civilian, and the majority of non-combat personnel such as the engineers and flight deck crews. That left a very lopsided cross section of skill bases in the surviving crew, an abundance of combat abilities, a dearth of anything else.

He wished they could have been left behind going into the battle, but they were an integral part of his ship, and they should have been safe. Many civilians hunkered down in the reinforced life support bunkers, but some who have been through numerous engagements stayed in their living quarters or confidently walked the streets. All of them still lay where they fell. When the purple death wave washed over them, they collapsed unconscious, and slowly died. As Evandor walked the streets with Reis the bodies lay strewn giving glimpses of what they were doing when the lights went out.

Some were face down in the streets as they were incapacitated midstride. Others sat in cafes slumped over drinks and food as cold as their flesh. Through the store windows, he could see clerks and customers laying among the goods. One woman still held an orange from the hydroponics facility. The bodies ruined the charm of the city, artificial blue summer sky over their heads. A warm breeze ruffled the sleeves of his light jacket. Evandor was thankful that his sense of smell did not work in the body he was in as the sights were bad enough.

"This is a tragedy on so many levels," Reis said walking beside him. Evandor nodded without looking at him. His voice sounded too high pitched in his decaying body.

"How are you, Kyle?" Marcus asked, this time he turned to look at his old friend. Reis was still in good physical shape. His dead body had the characteristics of his older age, stocky build that was a bit too heavy around the middle, but with thick arms and legs to make up for it. His military cut hair was grey from age and looking freshly trimmed like always. Marcus knew that Reis' wife had chosen to join him on the ship and she was somewhere in the city, suffering the same fate as the rest of its citizens. Thankfully, Reis' children and grandchildren were scattered across the Republic. Reis had grown up on space stations and starships, a child of the stars, as he never had roots on any planet. He exhibited no phenomenon and looked like a primal, but had never set foot on Earth.

"Like I said, a tragedy on many levels," he said again. Evandor let it rest. He knew Reis was a dedicated family man and he would need time to work through his personal loss. They had walked to their favorite cafe, automatic doors sliding open for them. Going to the back, they entered the elevator and went to the top floor of the five-story building, one of the tallest in the city. They arrived at the top floor, which was a quaint open-air restaurant by the simple name of Cosmo's Café. They had visited it many times in life. It was empty save for one table where a young couple had made their final resting place. They had moved their chairs together and where leaning into each other. Burnt out candle stubs and untouched glasses of red wine on the table.

Evandor came up to the railing. He didn't lean against it, but looked over his once bustling city. It had been a full day since they had awoken from the effects of the event. He had set in motion the efforts to take stock of losses, ship conditions, and begin salvage efforts. Salvage was given the top priority and he put nearly all of his available personnel towards that. It was not every day a fleet of crewless ships lay before him. He did not have the people to crew both his and the Tribes' Fleet at the same time, but he would be damned if he left them behind. At least damned more than he already was.

He watched two of his crew move from body to body in the city. One had a scanner in hand to scan the microchip implant everyone within the ECR had imbedded. The other had a data pad confirming the information. Once they finished with the body they put it on its back and placed the arms neatly across the chest so they knew it had already been accounted for, then moved on to the next one.

"You know," Reis said breaking the silence. "I completely agree with your assessment that Duzan didn't betrayed us." Evandor had shared his earlier conclusions with him. They watched the two walking cadavers making their way to the next inert body. "Analyzing the course of events and trying to think through what his intended results could have been, I fail to see the logic of such a betrayal."

"I know," Evandor admitted. "Putting it all together, breaking it down, clearly we were never betrayed by him."

"That means we attacked the ECR. We are the traitors," said Reis.

"I gave the order to attack. It falls on me," countered Evandor.

"We eagerly went along with you," said Reis. "We all made a grave mistake." Reis shook his head. He turned to the taller corpse and kept talking. "Calling it a mistake is not giving enough weight to the magnitude of what we did."

Evandor kept looking ahead, eyes sweeping over lifeless buildings and bodies. "What happened, happened. I do not know how it could have happened any other way. Do you not remember the intense pain, and the stark raving anger consuming us?"

Reis took his eyes off Evandor and looked back across the street. "I remember. How could I not? I am the one who pinned down the first victim so that we could take her body. I was like a man possessed, a single-minded obsession that I couldn't deviate from or resist."

"You were still following my orders."

"Which is still not a excuse for my actions. I still have a moral duty to do what is right."

"We both made horrible mistakes," conceded Evandor.

Reis pressed his lips together. He didn't like the answer and would have to live with his actions. "Then now what do we do, Marcus?"

Evandor drew in a deep breath. "I feel duty calling me," he started, eyes tracking the movement on the streets. The two below had reached the next body and turned it over. "Duty to the oaths I have sworn to the ECR, and duty to those I swore to protect." He swept his hand gesturing to those laid below him.

"Since Duzan didn't betray us, then isn't it right that we go back to the ECR?" Reis asked. "So we can continue to protect the people and face justice for our crimes?"

Evandor did not answer right away. He wished he could feel the wind rustle his short hair. He commanded his body to take a deeper breath, not that it needed oxygen, but he wanted to feel the memory of needing to breathe. "We can't go back because we are the forefront of an invasion. It would be irresponsible to withdraw, we have to press on." Evandor paused, as if he didn't want the next words to come out. "And, as you know we have the problem that if do we go back, they would lock us up and turn us into science experiments."

"We should still turn ourselves over to the authorities. We should face justice for what we did," Reis said, his voice quiet as well.

"I would deserve justice for my actions, but can I let everyone in the entire fleet suffer for my choice as well?" Evandor turned to Reis and looked him in the eye. "Could you go to each crewmember, those that we swore to protect, those who trust us to lead them, and tell them they have to go back for what is essentially a death sentence?"

Reis stood silent, a gust of artificially produced wind rippled his clothes. "Then what? Are you suggesting we turn against the ECR? That is something I cannot abide. I agree we have to think of our crew, but we also have to think of the billions of civilians on the planets we also swore to defend. That is the duty of military, to face the horrors of war so other will not."

"I will not attack the ECR. It is still, and always will be my home. Yet, we cannot stay," replied Evandor.

"Then what? We can't just leave them unprotected?"

"We won't," said Marcus, he was still looking over his city, but his eyes had a distant look as he spoke his thoughts. "They will be safe. The Tribes' fleet is neutralized so now they have no effective way to attack our planets. I would expect the 5th Army to be invading into Tribes' space with support from the 2nd Fleet as we speak."

Reis listened as he watched another civilian body be processed. The two doing the work, moved into a storefront escaping his view. With them gone, there was only stillness. Only Evandor's words hanging in the air.

"We are going to support the assaults into Tribes' space. This will put them on their heels and ensure the safety of our planets." Marcus continued. "We will help the ECR take planets all across the front. The Tribes will be on the defensive, and the ECR will grow in strength. Once the ECR has a strong foothold, we will continue into Tribes space. We will gather resources as we need them and blaze a new path into unknown space. Our actions will protect the ECR, and give or crew a chance for a future."

Reis turned his gaze to the artificial horizon. "You're planning to leave forever? What of the duty to protect our people?"

"Who are our people?" Marcus asked, his voice soft. "I have not set foot on my home planet for over twenty years now. I want them to prosper and do well, but I would never be allowed to enjoy it.

I will take actions to ensure the protection of the ECR, but I cannot forget my duty to the crews of my fleet. The men and women who risk their lives for me, who put their trust in me to do right by them. I can't take them back to the ECR. That is not fair to them. I will protect them and the only way I can is by leaving."

Reis turned back to Evandor. "Not everyone will accept this decision, not everyone will want to go. There is a growing unrest among the crew."

"I know," admitted Evandor. "I will discuss this with the other admirals in the fleet first. I will give everyone a choice, lay out the plan before them and they can decide. Those who wish to go with us, and those who wish to return will be free to do so."

"Very diplomatic of you," Reis said. "Aren't you concerned that you will lose more troops?"

"Of course I am, but if we are to be our own people I want only those who are dedicated. Those who wish to return to the ECR will not be forced to stay with us. This is one time where giving a choice is better than making a command."

"For the record, I don't like this," said Reis.

"Neither do I," replied Evandor "but there isn't a fiber in my being willing to lie down and give up."

Reis and Evandor stood on the rooftop. Letting time slip by as the weight of the moment rested on them. They both knew that they would never be same. Their lives forever put on a different path and the universe will change because of them. They will see to it, one way or the other.

"Summon the other admirals," Evandor said, his voice quiet, but strong. "I will speak with them privately over dinner. Set the time for eighteen hundred hours in two days." That would give him enough time to make the necessary arrangements and gather some more information.

"Understood, sir," Reis said. After a moment he asked, "Can you feel it?"

Evandor slowly turned to his old friend. "You mean the burning desire for living flesh when in this dead body?"

"Yes," Reis said. "It is impossible to deny it. I know I am alive, but I desperately want to be living in a body with a beating heart."

"I feel it as well, but we don't have enough of the living," Evandor said. As grim as it was, he had instituted a system where the crew took turns using live bodies. A rotational schedule was set up, but they only had hundreds of the living to go around.

"We will need more."

 

Chapter 38

Captain Sharran Blike worked on her FF-51 Lancer flex fighter. She was literally head and shoulders into the strike craft through one of the bottom access panels. She typically did not do her own work, but flight deck crews were one of the positions that did not often use the cyberjack system. When the event happened very few of them were in cyberspace and the rest perished with their bodies.

That left the pilots as the only ones who had any skill in maintaining the small craft. Every pilot had learned the fundamentals of the systems and the necessary maintenance schedules and procedures during flight school, but lack of practice made them all rusty. When they first landed on the Valiant and realized they would be doing the work themselves they had to pull out manuals and pour over them to make sure they didn't miss anything. Fortunately, one of the charms of the Lancer was that they were very self-sufficient vehicles and easy to keep running at peak performance. Not like those poor suckers who had to deal with their light corvettes once they returned, at least they had crews of three to six to share the workload. The few remaining flight deck crew, all privates or corporals as not one sergeant survived, helped with the bigger machines.

There was very little real combat and strain put on the ships on that last mission so the Lancer pilots finished their work quickly and then shuffled off in their dead bodies. Sharran was one of the few that stuck around and helped one of the bomber pilots work on his lateral thrusters that did not fire properly. While they were chatting about vector plasma control and the recent experience of blacking out and waking up dead a thought came to her. After finishing the work on the bomber, she spent some time at the flight deck crew chief's office researching data sheets on the frame structure and performance limitations of the Lancer.

Finding what she was looking for she went back to her craft, opened it up, and pulled out the governor package that limited its performance. She hooked it up to the software package at the flight deck mainframe to readjust it. Usually set to limit the performance to 14 g's during combat maneuvers, which is the most a human pilot could sustain with the help of vibration and electromagnetic dampeners. However, she reasoned that now that she no longer needed to worry about keeping her body alive she decided to loosen the parameters. She had no idea what her freshly dead body could handle, and since it was the only body she had, she did not want to destroy it. Then she realized that after she cyberjacked into her Lancer her body could be removed and she could push the limit to what the frame could handle, a whopping 32 g's at combat maneuvers. If this worked, she would become the next terror of the space ways, the thought gave her a rush.

She smiled to herself as she worked at reinstalling the governor. It didn't feel right to have her dry, cracking lips stretched over her dry teeth, but smiling still felt good. The lack of the sensation of touch made the procedure take longer, but she didn't have anywhere else to go. At least the coldness of death was not as annoying as the coldness of being a Tomlin on a ship full of other races who left the heat down. Since Tomlin physiology had a hard time keeping internal body temperature up, she used to have to add a few layers of clothing to keep warm and a pair of gloves so her fingers wouldn't be ice claws. Now that her body was dead, the cold did not physically hurt. It was not right, but at least she didn't have to wear thermal underwear beneath her uniform anymore.

"Captain Blike?" she heard someone ask. She couldn't see whom it was with her head stuffed in the flex fighter, nor could she recognize the voice because now everyone spoke in much higher pitches, which was probably a combination of dry vocal cords and dry ears.

"You found her," she stated without stopping what she was doing.

"Captain Sharran Blike of Sabre Squadron?" the voice asked again. This time she stopped what she was doing. That was a very formal way of being addressed. The governor was half installed, but secured to its spot and would not fall out. She ducked out of the access panel and saw Colonel Reis standing next to her ship tapping the images on his wrist data pad.

"Officer on deck," she said as she snapped to attention.

"At ease," he said, the words coming out before she finished speaking. His eyes barely left the data pad screen on his left wrist, he tapped and swiped the screen with his free hand. "After reviewing your file carefully I have a special assignment for you. It comes directly from War Admiral Evandor." Even with his high-pitched voice, he managed to sound important.

"Sir, I am ready for anything!" she said. A ghastly smile plastered on her face. Not because she intended to be smiling like an idiot, but rather because her dry thin lips had stuck to her gums. She imagined what sort of important mission was in store for her that the war admiral himself was handpicking her. It must be of the utmost importance, high-flying danger where her pilot skills would shine. It was about time that she got something exciting to do.

"Mm, yes, yes," said the Colonel. "According to this you are the best qualified so you will be leading the team."

Sharran's thin eyebrows rose. Leading the team? This was only getting better. She felt a growing sense of pride . While it made sense that she would be picked as she was one of the, if not the top pilot aboard the Valiant, she still could not help but feel validated. Her mind raced with excitement trying to deduce what would be asked of her. Had the admiral already thought of changing the governors on fighter craft and was just waiting for someone else to figure it out? He must have discovered her research and that she came to the same conclusion, thus rewarding her with this assignment.

"I am transmitting mission details now," Reis said as he tapped his data pad. The wristband data pad on Sharran's forearm buzzed with receipt of the message. "You are to meet the admiral at the officer's galley in two hours to go over the menu details," Reis continued. "You are to pick up a live body on your way there. The rest of the details are in the data package. Any questions?"

"Galley? Admiral? Menu? What?" Blike blurted out, her mind not comprehending what just happened. What did any of that have to do with a combat mission?

"Yes, your records show you took secondary culinary courses, and with the unfortunate demise of the galley staff that leaves you to lead the team to prepare the formal banquet for the gathering of the admirals in two days." Then after a slight pause Reis said, "Congratulations, I have complete faith in your abilities to succeed." With that, he turned on his heel and walked away, head down reading his data pad. Sharran stood there watching him leave, jaw hanging wide-open in disbelief.



Chapter 39

Captain Rylan Rahmore stood outside the boardroom adjacent to the main bridge. He was summoned by the war admiral for a meeting. Not surprising and it was better than sitting in his new quarters by himself with nothing to do.

He stood patiently outside the door to the boardroom, his back to the wall waiting his turn. The boardroom was separated by a short hallway, leaving him staring at boring white walls by his lonesome. He settled into a relaxed at ease stance that any military person could stand in for countless hours. In contrast, his mind danced among thoughts of what he was summoned for, questions he may be asked, and answers he would give.

He was not sure how long he was there, it couldn't have been too much time, when the door slid open. He watched Commander Nadine and one other he did not recognize shuffle out in their deceased bodies. She noticed him standing him there and eyed him up from the soles of his feet to the top of his head with what he assumed was an approving look. The crooked half smile on her dead face and what looked like an attempt to wink, confirmed it to him.

Gross, was the only thought that came to him, and he was grateful the word didn't escape his lips. It wasn't the first time he was eyed up by a woman, and Nadine was probably a fairly attractive middle-aged woman in life. Average height, strawberry blonde hair, nice facial structure and decent body. Her career path meant she had spent too much time at an officer's desk and had become somewhat bottom heavy, but nothing that couldn't be easily forgiven. However, in death...the thought was disgusting and ridiculously revolting. He made a mental note to avoid being caught alone with the woman.

He made a point not to look back at her as he stepped towards the boardroom. No need to catch her checking him out. "Sir, you wanted to see me," he said from the 'at attention' position.

War Admiral Evandor looked up from his data screen that came out of the table he was sitting at. The table was a dark wood oval shape large enough to seat eight people, one at either end and three along each side. The use of natural wood signified an extravagance. The chairs were standard looking black mesh with plastic frames. The rest of the room had the standard military-grey clinical look. The wall on his left was one big view screen that currently showed the star system outside. It was merely a view screen as the bridge was deep in the midsection of the ship, safely nestled away from easy strikes.

"At ease, have a seat, Captain," said Evandor. Rahmore looked at his choices of empty seats and decided to pick the one closest to him, which would be at the opposite end of the table from Evandor. Rahmore wondered why the bridge crew chose to use their old dead bodies, first Nadine and the other crew member, and now Evandor. Especially considering the bullet wound he took earlier had ripped the flesh from his left cheek exposing broken teeth and his gum line. His lips were still intact, but the blown out side made his words harder to understand between the high-pitched sound and the added sound of escaping air from the side of his mouth.

As Rahmore sat down Evandor put a purple crystal shard on the table. It was about ten inches long and thin. He slid it across the table towards Rahmore who snatched it up. It was straight with well-defined lines accenting it. One end was blunt, the other came up to a sharp point. He held it up to the light to see fine lines through the semi-transparent crystal.

He touched the end with his finger. Sharp. It could easily be used as a dagger, and he was sitting in a room alone with the admiral of the fleet. The thought crossed his mind that he could attack Evandor. His living Merlurian body should have the strength advantage over the admiral's dead Tomlin body. Rahmore believed he would win in a physical confrontation, but to what end? He could kill the admiral outright, drive this purple dagger into his brain and crush the cyberjack port. That should kill him, but then what? He would have killed the alpha lion of the pride, but how would the pack react? Would it fall apart and dissolve its strength? Could he make a power play to take it over or would a new alpha take his place? It was difficult to determine the result because he did not know the political landscape. However, the chances of his personal survival would be slim. As far as he could tell, the immediate crew was loyal and would not take kindly to an assassin.

His other option was to take Evandor hostage. Use him to get safe passage to a smaller jump drive capable ship and get the hell out of hell. The only problem was that no ship with jump drives could be piloted by a single person. He would need a crew. His thoughts went to the people of his old ship. He was sure they would want to leave with him. He would have to do a hostage trade to get them, secure a ship, and get away. Theoretically possible, but with all the steps involved and the environment he was in, made it seem like an incredible long shot.

A likely demise in either scenario, he had no plans to become a martyr for the Earth Core Republic. Besides, he would lose his chance at grasping immortality. Something he felt utterly compelled to explore. He hadn't realized how badly he wanted it until it got so close.

"Sharp isn't it?" asked Evandor.

Rahmore took his eyes off the crystal and looked up. The admiral had been watching him the whole time. As if he just watched Rahmore's entire thought process rationalizing if he should attack him or not. Rahmore did not like how well the other man predicted his behavior. He glanced around the room checking to make sure it was empty even though he knew it was. The admiral was so confident in how he would react there was no need to bring any protection, at least none that was apparent.

"Is this what I think it is?" Rahmore said answering with a question.

"Yes," came the short reply. With the damage to his mouth, it came out with a slight slur.

Rahmore turned the piece over in his hands. "Did you chip a small piece off? I don't think that was a...prudent decision."

Evandor formed his face into an amused smile. With the taint of death and the smashed face, it took on an element of wickedness. "I would never damage such a rare and precious artifact. Unfortunately, the Insight crashed into the orb."

This was the first Rahmore had heard of the news, he became concerned for both his ship and the orb. "How bad was the damage?" he asked.

"The Insight is gone. It was damaged during the skirmish, but managed to jump away," answered Evandor, his attempt at a smile melted off his face. "The orb received multiple fissures and cracks throughout. Apparently, it was rather brittle."

Rahmore sunk into his chair, "Is it destroyed?" His voice low, as if he just heard about the death of a loved one, yet a part of him was relieved to hear that his ship got away with some of his crew.

"I don't think it can be restored. It was knocked off its moorings and we managed to recover it," the admiral said. He brought up a 3D projection over the table showing it being held in space. Small pieces kept breaking off of it. Two defense frigates held it in place with their repulsor beams and he could see salvage corvettes and rippers flying around collecting the pieces that came loose. There were others in space suits moving along its now irregular surface. "We are trying to get all the pieces to put it back together if possible."

"You can restore it?" Rahmore asked, his voice rising with hope.

"I don't think so," Evandor replied. He pulled out two more fragments and placed them on the desk, both daggers just like the first one. "The orb is crumbling every time we try to move it. It could also be the after effects of getting hit by the space cannon."

Rahmore looked at the pieces in front of Evandor then back to the one in his hand. "The reason I brought you here," Evandor continued, breaking the silence. "Is to find out if you can duplicate what happened."

Rahmore looked up, hairless eyebrows arching. "You want to," he paused looking for the right words. "Make more?"

"Any new civilization needs the ability to reproduce," the admiral stated and gave Rahmore a flat look.

"With the orb broken there is no hope to do that again."

"Can you replicate it on a smaller scale with that?"

Rahmore looked at the piece in his hand. His mind began to run through the possibilities. Theories came to life in his head. He was not sure if he could do it, but he knew what the right answer was. "Yes," he said, "but I will need help."

"What do you need?"

"I can handle the bio and cyber medical parts of it, but I need someone who knows energy wave theory better than I do."

"Do you know of someone?"

A specific person did come to mind for the captain. "Yes, but I don't think she will be inclined to cooperate."

"Find a way to convince her."

"Sir?"

"This is critically important, Captain," said Evandor. "Give her whatever incentives necessary, money, possessions, freedom. Everyone one has buttons you can push."

Rahmore nodded. Thankful the admiral was referring to positive reinforcement methods.

"One other thing, Captain, when you complete this task will you join us?"

He let the question hang in the air. Rahmore knew exactly what he meant, if he would voluntarily choose to separate his body from his soul freeing himself from the bounds of flesh. It was not a small thing to ask. Rahmore did not have to think long or hard, he felt the word, "absolutely" burst out him. Like a bubble he had been trying to hold underwater. It startled him how badly he wanted to become like them, immortal.

Evandor smiled his amused wicked looking smile. "Very good. I also want to be able to extend this invitation to other star nations, including the Tribes. Can you make it work for them?"

"We do have a fleet full of Tribes' bodies and cyberjack systems to experiment with," he replied. "I do not see why not." Then after a moment he asked, "Invite?"

"Yes, an invitation to join us."

Rahmore gave him a sideways look.

"We're deciding if we will offer this to everyone. Right now, I believe we will."

"You think others would take you up on your offer?"

"You did."

Rahmore had nothing to say to that. Thinking about it, he would think that many wouldn't take him up on the offer, but others would flock to him for the opportunity. However, he felt it would be highly unlikely anyone from the other star nations would join them, but he kept that thought to himself. For that matter, it seemed odd that the admiral was going to even offer it to other star nations.

"Speaking of the Tribes," said Evandor filling in the dead space of silence. "Why did they not rise like we did?"

"I can only speculate because our cyberjack and computer systems are different enough that they reacted in different ways to the event," said Rahmore. "I'll be able to figure that out as well."

"Very well, report back to me after you have recruited those you need and we will proceed to the next phase," Evandor said, tapping at the monitor in front of him. "If you will excuse me, I have an appointment I need to keep elsewhere."

"Yes, sir," Rahmore said standing up he turned halfway and paused. Turning back, he asked. "If I may, I have a few ideas about how to maintain your current bodies, and with your permission I could fix your face," he said as he touched his own left check.

Evandor looked at the time, then raised his eyes to the captain said, "You have four minutes."