Apex (23 page)

“What? We can't use those with our shields . . .”

“Just do it!” Ella insisted as she frantically made shield adjustments that Jalia couldn't fathom.

“Fine!” she yelled, not understanding but realizing they didn't have much time left. She moved the ship in closer, bracing herself for the crash of shield on shield . . . but it never happened. The ships closed to within fifty meters and Jalia toggled the nearest mooring beams, finding no interference from the shields.

Realizing once again just how much the Cres outclassed her, she did as told and locked the two ships together with two of the energy beams, latching onto the battleship's heavy armor plating, then looked over at Ella's shield schematics in dismay. The hazy fields surrounding both ships had merged together with the current strength levels reading at 507%!

Somehow both shield controllers had used the
Resolute
's generators to extend the battleship's own shields around the freighters' hull, mimicking its shape instead of trying to super-­extend the entire ship's shield out in a large enough perimeter to cover both, which would have diffused and greatly weakened it.

What Ella and the battleship had just done should have been impossible . . . or maybe Jalia was just naïve to the ways of combat. Regardless, it was buying them the time needed for the battleship to finish off the rest of the mercs, who weren't yet retreating.

“Nice move,” Riax commented, walking up behind the pair. “Though you did take out my cannon in the process.”

“Thought you'd prefer that to getting boarded again,” Ella said sarcastically.

Riax smiled at her. “How long until we reach the jumppoint?”

“Four and a half minutes,” Jalia said in the Junta equivalent measurements. “But we'll have to make adjustments to our course in just over two minutes.”

Riax glanced at the battle hologram as another merc ship exploded. “Cutting it kind of close, but I think we'll be alright. Looks like the Vespa finally proved themselves useful,” he said, more to the galaxy in general than anyone on the bridge.

The remaining five ships, now seeing that the freighter's shields had
increased
in power, broke away from the battleship and disappeared in a matter of seconds as they used their gravity drives to get them away from the ship-­killer now that their objective was impossible to achieve. Sensors showed them moving off the jumpline and no longer in a position to interfere with their exit.

“Get us free,” Riax said in Terran, then repeated in Esset.

With a flip of three switches the
Resolute
's shields, along with the added matrix from the battleship, disappeared and the mooring beams were disengaged, allowing the freighter to drift free and position itself for deceleration a few kilometers to port from the battleship. Both vessels used their plasma engines to make the pinpoint alignment along the jumpline, then nestled together with only 500 meters separating the two and the exact navigational line passing through the gap between them.

“Here we go,” Jalia said, coordinating with the battleship's navigator. Both ships were locked into a countdown where the freighter would jump a microsecond before the battleship and at a minutely faster speed, which would put it at the head of the diverging pair that would then reform with each other in transit.

Jalia closed her eyes as her ship's computer made the jump automatically, then held her breath waiting for an impact if they'd miscalculated. After four seconds she opened one of the green orbs and glanced around . . .

Still alive.

She leaned back in her seat, opening her other eye and breathing in deeply. On her sensors the battleship was 380,000 keets behind them and losing ground at 8 keets per second. Jalia flipped her ship over and kicked in her primary plasma engines, flying ‘back' to the battleship while also correcting to the true jumpline, which her ship was veering off of since it hadn't been precisely aligned. The battleship did likewise, thrusting heavily at a right angle to their direction of flight to make the correction.

The two ships ended up side by side again en route on a twenty two day jump to the Arcad System, with the captain of the Concordat ship comming the
Resolute
as soon as they'd achieved stable drift position.

“Hey . . .” Jalia said, relaying the message. “They're inviting us over for dinner.”

“Dinner?” Riax asked, thinking through permutations. He had a lot of work to do on the
Resolute
and these were still mercs they were dealing with, possibly with shady intentions. Get them off the ship, take them prisoner and secure the cargo for themselves? Maybe, but he could handle himself.

Supposedly these mercs were loyal to the Vespa, and he was interested in finding out just what she'd been up to.

“I'm always hungry,” he finally answered.

“Big surprise,” Jalia commented. “They offered to send over a shuttle.”

“We'll use ours,” he said, slightly turning his head as another thought occurred to him. “I need to take care of a few odds and ends first. Anything more than two hours from now will do.”

Jalia nodded and relayed the message. “How many?”

“Me, you, and Ella. The rest I want onboard the ship. Assuming you want to come?”

“Of course,” Jalia answered. “But what about her?” she teased. “You just assuming she wants to tag along too? I thought a Human would have better manners . . .”

“Says who?” Riax said smiling as he left the bridge.

“He's in command,” Ella clarified after he left. “We're his bodyguards. We go where he goes.”

“Oh . . .” Jalia said, taken aback. “Sorry. Guess I should have known that.”

“And he did ask, by the way,” the Cres added with a smirk.

“When . . .” Jalia asked, stopping herself as she realized the answer. “You know, that whole telepathy thing gets kind of annoying for those of us who don't have it.”

“Tough, kid. Get used to it.”

“
Kid?
I'm 36 cycles old!”

“Like I said,” Ella reiterated as she stood and followed Riax off the bridge. She stopped halfway and looked back over her shoulder. “I'm 649.”

Jalia's face blanched and Ella walked away with a satisfied smirk.

The Junta held her red hands up in front of her, turning them over and looking at them as if seeing herself for the first time.

“Kitja,” she swore in a whisper. “I am a kid.”

 

Chapter 25

J
ALIA
MET
UP
with Riax five hours later in the main bay next to one of the shuttles wearing a long black gown with an equally long slit down the left side that showed virtually the entire length of her leg while her tail flipped back and forth lazily through a tiny hole behind her. The upper half of the one-­piece garment was formfitting, with a high collar and extending down to her wrists, ending with a triangle of material pointing to, and looping around, her second finger. Her headtails were pulled back and held in place by an equally black band that had reflective studs built in, and her feet, when visible, were bare.

The Human looked her over twice as she approached.

“Too much?” she asked, seeing him dressed in another bodysuit, this one black with almost glowing white trim lines.

“No. I just liked the gun belt.”

“Don't worry,” she said, pulling aside the slit in her dress and exposing more than just the minuscule lachar strapped to the inside of her leg, “I'm armed.”

“Good,” Riax said, unfazed. “I don't expect you'll need it, but it's always prudent to carry a weapon just in case.”

“Where's yours?” she asked, not seeing any obvious pockets in his equally formfitting garb.

“I am a weapon,” he told her as Ella arrived, wearing full body armor.

“Really?” Jalia complained. “I feel so overdressed.”

“More like underdressed,” Ella corrected. “I doubt that fabric would stop more than a thorough gaze . . . if that.”

Riax suppressed a smile as he picked up on their controversial mindsets. “If these mercs do turn out to be hostile, we've got a lot more to worry about than hand to hand combat. Their battleship can blast us to pieces on a whim. Well, maybe two whims, but you get the point. I don't think there's going to be trouble.”

“I hope not,” Ella commented, glancing at Jalia's figure once more before walking up the short ramp into the shuttle.

“Come on,” Riax told the Junta, motioning for her to follow him up.

Jalia stepped off the warm bay floor onto the slightly cool boarding ramp with her toes occasionally poking out from underneath the edge of her gown. She walked into the shuttle and the hatch pulled up, sealing them inside the Human craft. There was a tall central area, with a slightly lower forward section that served as the cockpit, she guessed. Behind it were four seats bracketed by two long benches extending back around an open area where she now stood.

Riax slipped into one of two pilots' seats while Ella already occupied the other one. Jalia walked up behind them and sat down gently on one of the well-­padded auxiliary chairs. She watched Riax manipulate the flight controls, seeing if she could make out what was what, which was difficult given the fact that he was also issuing telepathic commands simultaneously.

The angular shuttle lifted off smoothly and floated out the atmospheric containment field with its shields already active, but transparent. No stars or light of any kind was visible outside the bay, as the
Resolute
's shields were also active to absorb the intense radiation created when dim starlight met multiple lightspeeds.

Jalia half coughed in surprise when the shuttle passed through the
Resolute
's shields and bright neon dots appeared to her right, along with lesser ones directly ahead. To her left, the ship's aft direction, there was nothing but complete blackness as the light of stars behind them couldn't travel fast enough to catch up and be seen.

“How are we seeing this?” she asked in wonder.

“The shields filter out the higher end radiation while allowing the lower end to still pass through,” he said as he turned the ship to the right and the entire forward display lit up with oddly colored dots ranging from reds to neon blues to bright greys and, to Jalia's enhanced vision, the turkest and orival colors of the ultraviolet spectrum, but skewed somehow to make them seem twice as luminous.

“Impressive,” Ella commented as the shuttle rose up, crossing over the freighter and heading towards the bow of the battleship. Riax flew her parallel, along the length of the giant ship, then arced her up and over, coming down just in front of the starboard bow bay that they'd been instructed to use.

Overlapping onto the forward ‘viewport' a computer-­generated sheen was visible over the battleship's hull, marking the perimeter of her shields just outside the bay doors that were only now opening.

“Wait,” Jalia said, confused. “How can we see inside their shields?”

Ella turned her head and looked at Riax, equally interested in his answer.

“Our sensors work differently than yours. The shields don't stop them.”

“Handy,” Jalia commented.

Riax flew the shuttle out clear of the bay, then drifted in on a direct line. There was a small icon marking the navigational beacon that the mercs were using to designate the location of their bay in the center of the screen, but the Human didn't need it. He kept the shuttle lined up visually and slowly brought it in through the shield wall.

The medium-­sized hangar was mostly empty, with flashing guide lights indicating where on the deck the mercs wanted him to land. Riax piloted the shuttle over to that position, swung it around 180 degrees so it was facing out of the bay, then gently touched down.

“I don't know about you two, but I'm starving,” the Human said, almost jumping out of his chair and heading aft. “Let's go make some friends.”

“I
FIND
IT
hard to believe that you are Human,” the Elari captain said, his thick top set of arms crossed over his chest. “They were great warriors . . . you are diminutive.”

Riax half smiled as he was chewing, then cleared his throat. “Don't let size bias you. I could take you with one arm tied . . . with one arm,” he finished. “Or not even that.”

Captain Terrek laughed, making a soft booming sound. “That I would like to see, my young friend.”

The Human stood up as he finished one last mouthful of small white food pellets called Ekchma, which he mentally added to his future requisition list. He rather liked the crunch.

The Elari did likewise and they both walked off into a large area between the long table and the entrance.

“What are you doing?” Jalia whispered at him as he left the table.

Setting some ground rules,
his voice echoed through her mind.

She turned sideways in her high backed chair to watch, as did the other eleven ­people at the table.

“Ha,” Terrek laughed, beating his chest with his lower fists, then his uppers. “Impress me.”

Riax smiled and moved forward in a blur of motion, kicking the taller Elari in the gut and knocking him back a step, then he pulled back to his original position and looked the Captain over.

Terrek huffed and clapped both sets of hands together with a thump. “Faster than I expected, but you'll have to do better than that.”

“As you wish,” Riax said, beginning to walk a slow circle around him. When he made a full quarter orbit he ran forward a step, leaned forward, then launched himself up into the air while rolling through a somersault, bringing his feet forward.

His left foot hit the Elari in the upper chest while his right missed over his shoulder. Riax fell sideways, bouncing off the captain's arms, and landed on his knee. He caught his balance instantly and rotated about, knocking Terrek's legs out from under him. The Captain fell backwards and landed hard.

Riax stood up and looked him over again patiently.

“Alright, enough with me being nice,” the Captain said, climbing to his feet. “Missing arm or no, you're going down this time.”

“It won't be that easy,” Riax warned, standing still.

The four-­armed giant ran toward him, surprisingly fast, and swung his left arms in a staggered punch.

Riax merely ducked down, nearly sitting on his ankles, then jumped sideways as the Elari slashed down with his right arms, which also missed.

Jalia nearly choked, covering her mouth with her right hand in anticipation of the blows to fall, but somehow they never did.

Stepping forward quickly, Riax kicked into the giant's midsection again, but Terrek took it and caught his leg with his bottom left hand and held it in place long enough to grin before whipping the Human around and throwing him against the side wall.

Riax bounced off it and landed in a heap on the ground.

That's more like it.

Terrek clapped both sets of hands together again, urging him to return to the fight. Riax stood up and nodded his head in a gesture of respect, then walked towards his opponent. When he was two steps away he darted forward and kicked his him hard in the leg, knocking it out from under him.

The Elari dropped to a knee and as the bigger alien's torso came down Riax brought his opposite knee up and impaled him in the chest hard enough that it lifted the Terrek half a meter off the ground. Riax stepped back and waited for him to stand up again before he finally used his full strength and kicked him flying backwards into the wall where he hit it at a bad angle. Hard.

The Elari slumped to the ground and shook his head to clear it, then he looked up at Riax.

“You are far stronger than you should be for your size.”

“It's not the size of the muscles. It's the strength of the fibers,” he explained.

“Hmmn. Were all Humans this strong?”

“No, it's a genetic upgrade that I had to earn,” he said, offering his tiny hand.

The Elari's grip swallowed it up, but Riax had little trouble pulling Terrek to his feet.

“And yet I sense you were still holding back,” the Captain guessed, looking down at the much smaller Human.

Riax turned to his right and looked at the table. His glass of water was sitting next to Jalia and still half full. He reached out his hand towards it and telekinetically floated it over to him, taking a big gulp before answering the wide-­eyed Elari.

“You could say that.”

The Captain was so stunned that he couldn't say anything for a moment, then busted out laughing again, vibrating small objects in the room. “I can see now why the Elder values your survival. Should your race return to the stars you will be a formidable ally indeed.”

“That remains to be seen,” Riax cautioned. “The Vespa and I do not see eye to eye on many things. We have never been enemies in the military sense, but we have sparred in other ways.”

Terrek nodded, motioning for them to return to the table. “You were once their adversary?”

“They are an incredibly annoying race,” Riax said, resting his hand on Jalia's shoulder as he sat back down next to her, reassuring her obvious anxiety that everything was alright. “But we find common purpose on occasion.”

“I hope we can share common purpose now. The galaxy is barbaric, undisciplined, and segmented. We try to stabilize what we can, reconnecting local systems and protecting those that cannot fend for themselves. If what the Elder has said is true, this is not apart from your own goals.”

“Tell me more about the Concordat and your ‘Elder.' I want to know what she's been up to.”

“She? I didn't realize the Elder had a gender. No matter. I will tell you whatever you wish to know.”

“A brief history would be a nice start. As far back as you know, anyway.”

Terrek pointed to a Fret on his left. “My analytical Lieutenant would know more than I do.”

“Yes, well . . .” the thin, green-­skinned Fret said, talking quickly, “the Concordat originally began as three separate mercenary factions . . . small, fringe rings . . . that the Elder recruited and joined together to serve as a protectorate for the moon of Dega . . .”

Riax leaned back in his chair and listened to a long, detailed history of the creation and accomplishments of the Concordat and their Elder. The Fret, a race Riax wasn't familiar with, took extreme care in detailing the timeline, giving the Human a good idea of what the Vespa had been up to. By all accounts, she was employing their original pacifistic philosophy of force containment and dispersion by supplanting local militaries with the Concordat, thus taking away their ability to initiate conflicts.

It seemed the Concordat would work for less than other mercenary units, far less in fact, and offer extremely generous contracts that made local governments comfortable with ceding their planetary defenses to the organization. The Concordat terms offered significant monetary savings ­coupled with technologically superior defense forces, compared to what they could have fielded on their own, which made the Vespa's need for Human technology clear. The more advanced her available tech became, the more incentive and negotiating power she'd have . . . and to a Vespa, negotiation was everything.

What didn't add up, though, was how she was paying for all of this. Mercs charged high rates for a reason, and it wasn't pure greed. Fielding and maintaining a fighting unit was expensive, and if she was undercutting all the others then she must have some other resource base. While the analyst's explanation of Concordat affairs didn't fully answer his question on that account, it did convince Riax that the Vespa's dealings were more widespread and intricate than he'd thought possible. It seemed she'd learned quite a few new tricks during his ‘nap.'

Riax nodded his thanks as the Fret finished his recollection. “How many of these battleships do you have?”

“Four,” it answered in a clipped word, talking as if it was always in a hurry.

“Then you must rate fairly high in the organizational structure, Captain. Beyond the Vespa, what is your chain of command?”

“I am Captain of this ship, yes, but my duties are those of a General. I answer only to the Elder, and from time to time lead fleet operations. There are six others that I know of with similar standing, though the Elder keeps some portions of the Concordat out of public view, so I cannot say I have full knowledge of our current forces or command structure. We serve the Elder, and do not concern ourselves with the overarching details.”