Tethered Worlds: Blue Star Setting Read online

  The fireship glowed brightly on the displays. Wrenching arms of spatial distortion grew from it. The starscape appeared to twist within them, and shards of iridescent light generated at their fringes.

  "Smelting hell..." Mason stared perplexed for only a second. "All ships—"

  The sudden appearance of a purple-bordered comm VAD interrupted him. Its position indicated top priority. Mason stopped mid-sentence out of habit. The purple border indicated an ancient Vallum Corps communication protocol. A legacy left over out of respect, and perhaps by a few who hoped it would be used again one day, for it was reserved exclusively for Sojourners.

  "Avere." It was all Mason could remember to say under the circumstances.

  The untraceable VAD showed only a nondescript silhouette. "Continue forward, Captain Steede." The gender of the voice was lost in anonymity-insuring modulation. "This fireship shall discriminate between friend and foe."

  The voice was sure, as it should be. "Yes, Sojourner." Mason couldn't resist the urge to ask one more thing. "Will we meet again?"

  "You might be surprised by whom you have already met."

  The VAD winked out.

  Mason felt new wind in his sails. "All ships," he began, this time with a different order.

  Pheron's six frigates and three colliers, what he had begun to think of as his "freedom flotilla," continued back toward hilltop at a hopefully inconspicuous pace. His displays showed the fierce battle raging behind, and the fierce countenance of Commander Decard, who bordered on apoplexy.

  The man continued to shout orders, but try as he may, there was no way to alter the course of his command cruiser and linked collier. They continued blasting straight for the fireship, which had gone from iridescent to a glow brighter than the unaided eye could stand.

  "The time for subtlety's passed," Pheron said. "Increase speed, Aetaire."

  A flash preceded the fireship exploding into an expanding sphere of energy racing outward past the distorting arms. It grew quickly, slowly losing brightness and becoming translucent. Through it, where the fireship had once been, was a molten core of iridescent energy. It filled the distortions, taking on a humanoid shape.

  The initial sphere continued outward, filling a volume of space for which both sides were prepared. Only two ships were caught within its destruction—Wing Commander Decard's command cruiser and linked collier. In the end, Decard had stopped sputtering and became frozen in fear. Pheron believed the man's heart stopped at that moment.

  The expanding sphere smashed into both ships, caving in the front of the command cruiser. The collier exploded, breaking the cruiser in half before it, too, became a roiling ball of heat and debris.

  As the sphere faded, the humanoid shape grew brighter with contained energy. A flickering bright distortion was lodged at its center. The readings showed space was broken. Massive energies were impossibly wrangled. Details formed. The humanoid shape grew six wings. It mimicked human motion, swinging one arm and then the other to launch one pair of wings. Iridescent and spatially distorting, they flew off in different directions.

  "What the hell's happening?" Pheron said. Such a reaction was rare, but so was the phenomena.

  The wings rotated like crescents. They traveled beyond the conventional range of a fireship. The first angled into the three closest Perigeum destroyers. The wing expended its energy shearing all three in half. The ships exploded almost simultaneously. The other wing similarly cut two Perigeum cruisers vertically down the middle. The once graceful curved hulls pulled apart with macabre beauty before exploding. The outrigger nacelles of both ships tumbled away whole.

  The humanoid shape's core blazed with energy expenditure, briefly rivaling Windermere's brilliant blue sun. The ships of both fleets were illuminated like beacons. The humanoid shape had four wings left. It swung its arms again, and two more crescents of destruction, for that was what they were, rotated away.

  The Perigeum fleet reacted without orders to the imminent danger. Thrust rings flared as ships attempted to maneuver away from the angel of death. But the wings bent space around them, changing their course and making dodging difficult.

  Two Perigeum javelins, which had, remarkably, avoided taking damage the entire battle, were both impacted broadside by a crescent wing. The energetic crescents appeared to lose cohesion over time or distance and didn't carry the same energy as the previous impacts. The two javelins were not split, but both caved in across their length. They spurted atmosphere and plasma before exploding.

  The fourth wing caused similar destruction to three frigates foolishly clumped together. Their combined explosions were still dwarfed by the massive humanoid shape. It hurled its final two wings. The burning crescents distorted space as they plowed toward the heart of the Perigeum fleet.

  A protective formation of frigates, destroyers, and four cruisers guarded the corridor to the Prime Orator's Artemis. The remaining wings slammed simultaneously into that formation. The frigates were tossed fatally by the impacts. They went dark, peppered by small explosions. The boxy hulls of the destroyers were irreparably bent. Plasma gushed from one, sending it spiraling out of control. The other rolled amidst a cloud of debris and went dark.

  The last of the wing's energy hit the cruisers. One was caught in the stern mid-turn. The wing ripped through its thruster assemblies. Both nacelles exploded, sending the central fuselage tumbling. The other was jolted mightily. Its thrust rings began to flare randomly, and its main thrusters blasted sporadically. Its lights flashed in staccato malfunction.

  "The Prime Orator is a lucky man," Pheron said. "Luckier than he deserves. This is the second time he's dodged a mystic ammo nut."

  "Field commander!" Aetaire said. "The, uh, thing."

  The giant humanoid shape stood straight, its core flickered as space twisted around its edges. It appeared to stare directly at the First Cruiser.

  The moment Janus saw the readings, even before the strange, atypical distortion, he knew he was dealing with a high-level mystic threat. He shook his head, dumbfounded how one stupid ship could change the course of the battle.

  "Damn the Sojourners!"

  Why must they continuously hound him? Why must they thwart his plans? He didn't wait for answers to rhetorical thoughts, instead ordering the First Cruiser full astern. He also commanded the last aegis cruiser to remain between him and that crazy humanoid thing.

  "Continue firing sequence and fire on that mystic yard!"

  "Our aegis cruiser will be caught in the line of fire," Sybaris said.

  Her tone was matter of fact, as if the aegis was filled with bricks rather than men.

  "You heard me."

  "Firing in thirty seconds, Prime Orator."

  Janus stood, fascinated by the destruction. They had dished out their share, but this return blow happened all at once. The AIs were busy crunching numbers to see if the battle was still winnable. At least the bizarre apparition looked to have depleted its strange energies. It turned, as if looking directly at him, and a shiver ran down his spine.

  Jordahk felt stretched between two worlds. Thank the Creator releasing crescents of force was easier than holding onto them. He didn't know how it worked, except that he swung intuitively at specific targets, and the wings obeyed.

  His mind was lucid enough to know that he was straddling... places? Dimensions? Something. There was an urgency back at his anchor point, but no room remained for details.

  Explosions, debris, and chaotic formations spread across the vista of his sight as he stood tall in space. He turned, focusing on the largest ship. It truly needed to be beaten back, but his arms were empty. There was nothing left to hurl. Yet he could feel the energy in his form—enough to crush a ship if it was within reach.

  He didn't feel like himself. He could see his humanity, his emotions, almost objectively. Within that giant ship, someone was staring back, daring him, challenging him. Jordahk could sense energy building within its mighty cannon, power to rival his standing form.


  Time was running out. If only he could move across space, but his bridge between worlds was too rigid. He remembered vaguely fighting with a girl at his side. She had projected power by throwing something. Some sort of blade...

  Janus glanced at the nav VAD. The little mystic corvette that had caused him such trouble was flitting back to the Vallum Corps line. Yet he sensed a presence. Someone within that giant humanoid form, boring into his very soul.

  He stood in front of his command chair overlooking the cavernous, two-deck bridge. "Fire the ship cannon at my command."

  "It is not fully charged," Sybaris said.

  "Stow the babble, slag."

  Could machines feel insults? Could their feelings be hurt? He didn't care.

  Across space, the scintillating heart of the energetic shape rose within its body. The humanoid appeared to set its feet and began fading from the bottom up. At the same time, it raised its arms above its head, and a shape extended from hands of energy. Space twisted and shed iridescent shards around the growing form of a sword. All of the energy of the humanoid silhouette was emptying into it. The drained portions were ghostlike, allowing twisting stars to shine through.

  Energy was withdrawn from the legs, and then the torso, until finally only the head and arms shone below a sword that glowed brighter each second. The blinding core had moved to the top, wrenching space from within the hands as the form wound up, pulling the sword back. Great distortions branched off it like cracking ice. The form hurled the sword as the last of its brightness transferred to the blade. The left-behind core shattered into corkscrewing flares.

  The fading ghost watched it fly through space on the course Janus expected. He wasn't scared, but frustrated.

  "Draxy drakkin' Sojourners!"

  Sybaris raised an eyebrow. "Articulate."

  The First Cruiser lurched, thrust rings flaring for a dodge.

  "Keep our orientation, smelt it," Janus said to the ship captain. "Fire the cannon!"

  "Were off target for the staryard," he answered.

  "It's coming right at us. Fire the radiated cannon!"

  After Windermere's bright blue sun, the two brightest objects in-system were about to collide. The front of the First Cruiser exuded glare lines into space. The heat dispersion panels along its hull blazed almost as brightly. The radiant sword curved directly for it. The aegis reared up between them, the hexagonal plates of its defense system deployed.

  It had time to stack them for the relatively slow incoming attack. Distortion at the leading edge of the sword shattered granix plates. The first layer, then the second. Two more were in place by the time the sword arrived to smash into them. Fragments of superheated granix flew as the dimming sword impaled the aegis.

  Already bright, Windermere flashed to shadowless day as the First Cruiser's ship cannon let loose. The aegis was the nexus for incredible energies. It glowed brightly at the seams before bursting apart like a much smaller ship. The explosion revealed contorting space around the sword, fractionating the powerful beam. A thick line of split-off energy moved across the stern of a frigate, causing its thrusters to explode. Other lines blazed off in random directions.

  The mighty Artemis beam slowed the sword's inexorable approach, but was unable to halt it before exhausting. The blade of energy, now a barely opaque silhouette, was stripped of its dimensional warping outline. It had just enough momentum to catch the First Cruiser as it backed away.

  It nosed straight into the muzzle of the ship cannon. The narrowest portion blew apart, and soon the entire internal barrel was split asunder. But as the sword penetrated into the thicker parts of the main fuselage, the damage was less obvious externally.

  Janus watched with morbid curiosity as the front of his ship blew apart. He followed the damage on the giant ship schematic VAD as it penetrated deeper. Deck and bulkheads blew out as the sword pushed itself, ever more slowly, toward the bridge buried in the heart of the cruiser. He surmised it wouldn't make it, and chose to stare at the armored chamber's front bulkhead as if waiting for lightning to strike, daring the universe to prove him wrong.

  The ship schematic showed more sections turning red, an arrow of blood reaching for the bridge. When he realized he was wrong, he could only shake his head in disbelief, having passed anger. The deck trembled as another section blew apart, then it shook mightily as the neighboring section exploded from the vaporizing effect of the sword's touch.

  Sybaris stood abruptly and peeled open as she raced toward him. It was alien. Revolting. "Emergency protocols engaged." Her body conformed to his silhouette as she slammed into him, pushing them both back onto his command chair. Only her head remained unchanged. "Please remain still, Janus."

  He had never stopped thinking of her as a machine, but had unwittingly allowed himself to buy into her human form.

  He felt the locks disengage, and the chair began lowering into his armored quarters. The front of the bridge exploded, sending shrapnel everywhere. It bounced off the walls, shredding equipment and flesh alike. Janus felt impacts on his extremities where Sybaris's form didn't shield him. The screams of the dying were cut off by the rush of evacuating air.

  He sank away from that hellish maelstrom. It sucked upward until the deck irised closed above him. The soft emergency lights of his flag quarters came on. The face of Sybaris, literally right before his eyes, startled him. She was staring at him, the coldness of her countenance gone. A piece of shrapnel had ripped through the back of her head, penetrating to the front from between her eyes up through the forehead.

  He refused to look down at the rest of her wrecked, inhuman body. It fell to the floor with a clank as he stood and stepped over it.

  "Bridge, status?" There was no response. "Captain?"

  "The captain is dead, Prime Orator," the ship AI said. "The First Cruiser is still nominally controllable. What are your orders?"

  His anger returned in a rush, and he ground his teeth. "Full retreat. Get us out of here."

  He was tired. It would be easy to just close his eyes and rest, but that would be wrong. He had to journey back, not only for himself but for someone else. It was urgent. He pushed across space, which seemed to be growing thicker and more resistant by the second. He felt deeply submerged, swimming desperately to the surface for a breath.

  Panic threatened but didn't win. He pushed until the space around him changed to interior brightness. He saw it as if through water, and sounds came equally distorted. He could barely feel his body, distant and numb. He was where he should be, yet out of sync.

  Proximity made his thoughts more lucid, but knowledge of his predicament offered no comfort.

  I'm trapped in foundation space. I'm right here! Somebody pull me in.

  Who could even know where he was? Yet, out of the daylight fog a figure emerged. Judicum. He wore an aggressive expression, similar to that during the thresh. He strode within arm's reach and put a rough grip upon Jordahk's compy wrist. Current crackled at the contact. The shock, muted at first, intensified until the underwater veil dissolved amidst painful arcs. Unfiltered light rushed in, and Judicum was nowhere to be seen. The graceful, curving lines of Aurora's bridge came into clarity, along with familiar sounds his brain could now distinguish.

  "Kid! Kid, are you with me? Come on. Khai needs help."

  "Max..." His body felt sluggish from disuse, like awakening from cold coma. He needed Max to give him a dose of something, but he carried no stims. If he was going to keep doing this, it was time to look into a custom organ. "Do something. Can't move."

  "Okay. Now that you're back I'll force-release endorphins and adrenaline."

  Sensation returned, and after a spasm or two, his muscles responded to commands.

  "Stand," he croaked. The chair stood him upright onto wobbly feet. Then he saw Khai, and his heart sank. He forced himself into action. "Flatten her chair. Quick."

  He was confused by a myriad of emotions. Khai moved to a waist high lying position only by the macabre manipulations of the
command chair. All color was gone from her complexion. The strange, complex ivory of her skin was reduced to a lifeless white. From the heat ports at her temples, streaks of perspiration, pink with blood, were drying down her cheeks.

  "No respiration. No heartbeat," Aurora said. "I've drained away the heat and tried other emergency procedures, but she's not responding. Drones are here to bring her to the med station."

  "There's no interfacing with her micros. That's beyond us," Max said. "She's been this way for two minutes. I don't think the med station can do anything for her. If you've any tricks left, now's the time."

  Jordahk fought off the despair creeping along the edge of his consciousness. "Ingots, Max. I don't know what to do." He touched her hand. It was neither warm nor cool. "Open the suit." The no-suit opened down the front as scales cascaded to the side. He expected to find her exercise outfit underneath. Instead it was the feminine black bodysuit with the laced, square cut down the front. "Open the laces." They sprang away, and he placed the flat of his palm on the skin between her breasts. "I know Wixom's got the energy, shock her, Max."

  "I tried that," Aurora said.

  He was already reaching out through the contact, trying to sense anything within her. "Just do it."

  His wrist tingled as the no-suit clamped down upon it.

  "You're still gonna feel this," Max said.

  His hand spasmed with a burning sensation, but he kept it pressed into her flesh. Was there any spark within her? He tried to sense a hint of that fire he felt when they touched.

  "Again, Max!"

  He wandered deep within her, feeling the shock less this time. He was in a giant open space. Empty. Wait, after the shock, a hint of something in one corner. It felt familiar. Where had he felt that before?

  His eyes opened. Her hand fell open over the side of the command chair. Something hit the deck. The jeweled leaf pin Vittora gave her. Pale blue and brown gems were covered with black carbon.

  No!

  He had finally come to terms with Cranium's sudden death during the Egress Incident. Must the loss of this girl, who also trusted him, be borne? As if in answer, his compy bracelet sprang to life. Not the familiar thinking of Max, nor the deeper sensations of Wixom. It was something he had not felt since he floated in orbit above Adams Rush. Ohrias.