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“I can’t believe he finally pulled it off,” I said. “I have to blame myself.”

“No Kyle,” she said, snaking out her hand to touch mine. “Don’t do that.”

“I could have stopped him. A dozen times, I could have killed him. But I didn’t. Then
I flew out here and saved a pack of aliens while my own world suffered. Sometimes,
I just get caught up in the moment, you see? I always seem to believe I can do more
than I really can.”

Jasmine shook her head. She opened her mouth to say more, but at that moment, the
door dissolved open. Sandra stood at the entrance with her hands on her hips. Her
hands were wrapped into fists.

Jasmine’s hand quickly retreated from mine. She studied the table for a few long,
awkward seconds.

I felt a surge of guilt, but twisted it into a frown.

“Come on in, Sandra,” I said. “Jasmine has brought us grim news.

-20-

Sandra had been my girlfriend for years, and Jasmine had been a flirtation along the
way. Diffusing encounters between these two had become something of a hobby of mine.
The women had come to blows more than once, and Jasmine had always lost those encounters.
She was nanotized, but the Microbes had really done a number on Sandra. My girl was
so fast and so feral that she barely qualified as human when she lost her temper—which
was fairly often.

“I hate to make you explain it again but…could you?” I asked Jasmine.

Jasmine repeated the story of Crow’s conquest of Earth. Sandra stalked in and sat
with me. She listened to Jasmine, glaring at the woman she considered a rival. But
by the end of Jasmine’s quiet speech Sandra’s expression had changed to one of horror.
The detailed tale of extermination and lost freedom on Earth had transformed her mood.

“Kyle!” she said, turning on me. “We have to
do
something. We can’t let Crow rule Earth like some kind of god-king.”

I shrugged and sighed. “I don’t think we can beat him,” I said. “At least not right
now. Not with what we’ve got.”

Sandra shook her head. “I can’t believe I’m hearing this defeatist talk. You can do
anything
. I’ve seen it.”

I smiled faintly. “We’ve got about sixty fighting ships and a few hundred active duty
fliers. We can build up, but he’ll be doing the same. But that’s not the worst thing.
Take a look at this, ladies. We’re in trouble in a strategic sense.”

They frowned at me while I brought up a display on the conference table showing the
six known star systems and their interlinking rings. “Earth is here, at the end of
the chain. According to Jasmine, Crow managed to destroy everything the Macros had
in the Bellatrix system, and now controls it. That’s a lot of raw materials to draw
upon, but taking Bellatrix was critical for another reason: that system was the end
of the line. There is only one ring we’ve found that connects to it, and that connection
leads to Venus.”

She nodded slowly, looking at the layout of the systems. “So Crow has his back covered.
He’s got a system behind him full of resources, while we have to defend multiple systems
with two rings each.”

“Worse,” I said, “we’re surrounded. We control Helios and Eden. Alpha Centauri is
no-mans-land. Thor, the last known system in the chain, is full of enemies. We’ve
got Crow’s Imperial fleet at one end of our chain of systems and the Macros with their
new Crustacean allies on the other.”

The two women studied the tabletop.

“We’ve got half the map,” Jasmine pointed out. “That’s a lot of resources, along with
two friendly races to help us. But we’re surrounded, I can see that. If both sides
attack at once—we can’t win.”

Sandra smiled. “We
might
win.” She proceeded to tell Jasmine about the battle station. Jasmine was impressed
by the specs and its record against the Macros in combat, but she was still worried
about being hit on two sides at once, and I had to agree with her.

“Crow can mass up at each ring, press forward with everything he has, then mass up
again. We’ll be slowly driven back when he comes after us.”

“Maybe we should build another battle station,” Sandra said. “With Jasmine’s reinforcements
and a steady output from the factories, we could hold both ends of Eden.”

I nodded slowly, considering the idea. But I really didn’t like the thought of putting
all my resources into more static defensive structures. The problem with fortresses
had always been that they couldn’t advance. They held territory at best, if you were
lucky. But I’d always done better maneuvering on an open battlefield. If I built another
battle station, I’d have very little fleet when my enemies came knocking once again.

“We’ve got another ace in the hole, Jasmine,” Sandra said excitedly. “When we took
the Eden system from the Macros, we captured their—”

I cleared my throat suddenly. Sandra stopped talking and both of them looked at me.
“I’m sorry,” I said, “but before we can release classified information to you, Jasmine,
we have to have certain arrangements made very clear.”

“I completely understand,” Jasmine said. She stood up then and walked around the table.
She suddenly went to one knee and bowed her head before me.

I frowned at this, instantly recognizing that Crow must have required just such an
outdated, embarrassing ceremony of fealty. I stood up and roared. Jasmine looked up
at me, her big brown eyes uncertain.

“No, no!” I shouted. “Get up, woman. I’m no Emperor. I’m a Colonel, nothing more.
Give me nothing more than a salute. Your sworn word goes to Star Force. That’s what
I want: Loyalty to the
service
, not to me.”

After we’d sorted that out, Jasmine returned to her seat and the two women smiled
at one another uncertainly. I was frowning and irritated. How quickly people took
to new customs. I guess they were very old customs, deeply ingrained in all of us.
When times became uncertain and life became cheap, we returned to the tribal roots
that lurked in the back of everyone’s mind.

“I have no doubt making people bow and swear loyalty to him gives Crow an intense
thrill,” I said. “But I find the whole idea upsetting. I wanted citizen-warriors,
not vassals.”

“Good,” Sandra said.

“Sorry,” Jasmine said. “I made a mistake.”

I waved away her words. “Do you solemnly swear to serve Star Force on the Fleet side,
to return to your former rank of Captain, and to defend Earth at all costs?”

“I do, sir.”

“Very good. You’re back in. But Crow is no longer part of Star Force, by his own admission.
Don’t return to Crow’s side, not even if he offers you a battleship of your own. Further
disloyalty will result in permanent banishment from the ranks of Star Force. Are we
clear?”

She licked her lips and eyed me. I could tell my words had hurt her. “I didn’t abandon
Star Force the first time,” she said. “Please take a moment to recall the situation
clearly. You and Crow were equally in charge. When you two split apart and gave me
diverging orders, I went with him, but I never saw that as a treacherous act.”

“Yeah, okay. But he got rid of Star Force on Earth. I’m now the last and only commander
of that organization. According to your report, Crow chased loyal members of Star
Force out into space. Want to tell me how that went down?”

“There wasn’t much to tell. I think he really wanted to kill us all, but didn’t dare.
He was afraid his own pilots wouldn’t fire. So, he offered us amnesty. He let us build
transports, and offered anyone on Andros Island free passage out to the frontier planets.
He specifically used your name, saying you were out here fighting on the edge of civilization,
killing vicious aliens on a regular basis.”

I nodded. He hadn’t lied about that part, at least.

“The most loyal among us left Earth. We knew it was banishment, but we built the ships
and flew out anyway. We hadn’t signed up to rule the world, we’d only wanted to kill
the machines. But there was another reason. More and more new recruits had been coming
in to join Crow on Andros Island during the months following the coup. These people
were different, and they swore to follow only Crow. I didn’t like them, Kyle. They
were Easterners, mostly. From eastern Europe, China and my own India. These were people
who wanted power. They weren’t volunteers ready to die for Earth’s cause.”

“You were the highest ranking defector?” I asked.

“I came to be one of the leaders of the exodus. We boarded our ships without weapons
or factories—”

“Of course he wouldn’t let you go armed,” I scoffed. “Why would he give you enough
equipment to challenge him from space—or even to survive out here for long?”

“We knew he wasn’t allowing us much. But we took it, rather than bow before him, or
start a civil war against the whole world. We left, hoping he’d let us go for propaganda
reasons if nothing else. But as soon as we left the system, our escort ships, commanded
by Commodore Decker, turned on us.”

“Sounds like we came along at an opportune moment.”

“Indeed you did. Decker was just looking for an excuse to blast us out of space. I’m
not sure what orders Crow had given him, but I was sure he wanted us dead.”

“You won’t have to worry about that particular bastard any longer,” I said.

“Whatever happened to Decker, Colonel?”

I smiled grimly. “He will no longer trouble us. I made sure his cruiser would never
return to Earth. I figured that I had one good shot, and I took it. Like any snake,
its best to start by removing the head.”

She gave me a cold smile of her own, and nodded thoughtfully. “Crow won’t forget that.
Decker was his wingman. They saw eye-to-eye. In fact, I think he’ll come after us,
if only because you killed Decker.”

“Then there isn’t any time to lose. I need every one of your Star Force refugees to
reaffirm their allegiance to Star Force, not Crow’s empire. We’ll arm them as soon
as we’re able and put them onto my ships. What’s your current troop strength, minus
the wounded and civilians?”

Captain Sarin smiled. “Over nine thousand, effectives sir.”

I grinned. “That, Commander, is the best damned news I’ve heard in a month. They might
even be enough, in the end.”

Sandra frowned and cocked her head. “Enough for what, Kyle?”

“Enough to retake Earth. What else?”

-21-

We returned to the Helios system, taking the time to beam graphic symbols of respect
and gratitude to the Worms. They were suckers for that, and sent us a few prideful
images of raging Worm warriors in return. I told them to rebuild, as more conflict
was coming. They signaled that they agreed with my assessment of the situation. They
assured me that any and all of our enemies would fall in time.

When we finally crossed the Helios system and slid through the last ring, I had to
field a dozen calls from the transport captains. They were overwhelmed by the beauty
and lush nature of the Eden system, which was so full of life and hope it was like
nowhere else we’d yet found in the universe. I beamed with pride as I explained that
the warmest three of the six life-supporting worlds were ours to colonize. I told
them of the outposts I had there on the ground—even though they were very thinly manned
and amounted to little more than bunkers in strategic locations.

I ordered the fleet to fly to Eden-8, the coolest of the three worlds we had laid
claim to. I liked this planet—hell, I liked them all. Eden-8 was covered by dense
forests of towering trees. The planet was physically smaller than Earth, being no
more than two-thirds the mass. There were oceans, but they were small and encircled
entirely by densely tree-carpeted land. The xenologists among my staff assured me
the trees grew to nearly a thousand feet high here because the gravity was less of
a problem, and the atmosphere had a slightly higher content of carbon dioxide. It
was a plant’s paradise.

Less than a minute after I’d given the order to fly to Eden-8, Marvin paid me a visit.
He was craning his cameras in every direction, taking in all of our expressions and
attitudes. His black, segmented tentacles of metal were whipping and slapping the
deck, a sure sign he was feeling agitated.

“Colonel Riggs? May I have a moment of your time, sir?”

“Sure Marvin,” I said, “please follow along, I’m busy.”

I walked past him and headed down a slanted passageway into the ship’s central belly
region. There, I was scheduled to meet up with yet another contingent of personnel
from Jasmine’s fleet. They were officially rejoining Star Force. I liked to personally
witness the swearing-in process whenever I could.

“What’s on your mind?” I asked Marvin when we reached the launch deck.

Marvin dragged himself after me urgently. His tentacles clattered on the metal deck,
leaving long silver scratches behind him. I glanced back that way, and saw the nanites
were healing the ship’s wounds as fast as Marvin’s strange body could make them.

“I would find it infinitely preferable to go to Eden-6, sir,” he said.

I looked at him with upraised eyebrows. “Is that right? Am I safe in assuming this
is because you left biotic pools of slime on that planet?”