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CHAPTER XXV

THE SHADOW

Ho! I thought. What happened?

Checking, Max answered. Ah, I see. Your exoskeleton activated its VR functions.

As my brain adjusted, the void focused, taking form. I felt as if I were rushing through space. With the receiver in orbit, it wouldn’t take more than a second or so to reach it. I must have jumped into combat mode with its altered time sense when the exoskeleton snapped me into this sim. I felt as if I’d experienced this for several seconds, but not even one had passed.

Location, I thought.

We’re getting input from a multitude of sensors. Max sent me a series of coordinates showing the progress of the signal. It had already reached low orbit around Parthonia.

Highcloud, are you all right? I thought.

Yes. M18-Zartrace and I are negotiating.

Goddess only knew what that meant. Any data on where this signal is headed?

There! Highcloud thought. I caught a contact, a small spike of data. Another!

I also, Zartrace thought. We are picking up nanobots similar to the specimens in the lab. Shells of dust protect them from radiation in space.

I had an odd sensation, a sense of sparks flashing around me. The signal wasn’t going to one source, but to a collection of microscopic bots drifting around the planet like harmless space dust.

In the background, I heard Raja speaking in what sounded like a slowed-down voice. “Lavinda, I have General Majda on comm.”

Max, put my time sense to normal, so I can understand what people in the lab are saying.

Done.

Zartrace thought, The orbital particles are forming an array.

In almost the same instant, Highcloud said, The nanos out here are changing their molecular structure. A new signal is forming! We’re chasing it!

Highcloud, wait! I thought. It was too late. The sim tore along as sensors picked up the new signal and sent us data, letting us “follow” the message as it arrowed toward—where?

“I can’t stop the mission now, Vaj,” Lavinda was saying. “It’s already started.”

“I have incoming,” Raja interrupted, even though Lavinda was talking to the third-most important person in the empire. Which meant Raja had someone even more important on the comm.

“Is it Imperator Skolia?” Lavinda asked.

“No,” Raja said. “It’s an aide for Pharaoh Dyhianna. You must respond first. They won’t have the Pharaoh wait for you. General Majda’s EI is informing her.”

“Colonel Majda here. I am honored, Your Majesty.” Lavinda’s voice sounded respectful and calm, but I knew her well enough to guess she was shitting metaphorical bricks.

I’m analyzing the data in the dust signal, Zartrace thought.

It has reached the orbit of Parthonia’s nearest moon, Max added.

Could the Traders have a hidden base on one of Parthonia’s two moons? But no, I didn’t see how we could have missed one that close to the planet on a moon that already had established bases.

We’ve passed the orbit of the outer moon, Max thought. We are still following the signal, but a several-second delay now exists between when sensors out here pick it up and when we receive these messages.

A distinctive voice was speaking in the lab, from Lavinda’s comm, I assumed. With an exquisite Iotic accent, the Ruby Pharaoh said, “Colonel Majda, my nephew, Imperator Kurj, isn’t available. He is in the Dyad Chair, working in Kyle space. I have your summary of the situation and will act as your contact.”

Ho! That meant the Imperator was doing what only he and the Pharaoh could do, building the Kyle net. Telops could access it, yes, but only the Dyad could design that always-developing mesh.

The Pharaoh didn’t hesitate. “Colonel Majda, you know this operation. You remain in charge. General Majda, stay in the loop.”

“Yes, Your Majesty,” Lavinda said at the same time her sister said, “Understood, ma’am.”

“Zartrace, give us an update,” Lavinda said.

The EI’s voice rumbled. “The signal from the nanobots is headed into the middle region of this star system. At this point, a ship from this planet won’t have time to reach whatever base lies out that far and stop its personnel from escaping. Shall I contact a ship farther out in the star system? I advise using the Kyle mesh for communication.”

Lavinda spoke, fast and firm. “Zartrace, yes, send the closest armed ship to the location you calculate for the signal destination. Pharaoh Dyhianna, can you transfer our link into Kyle space so we can follow in real time?”

“For Zartrace, yes.” The Pharaoh then said, “My advisors caution against exposing the Kyle mesh to Highcloud. Major Bhaajan, if I add you to the Kyle link, can you and Max act as a buffer between Highcloud and the Kyle mesh?”

“Yes, I believe so,” I said. “Max?”

“Yes,” Max said. “It would be like the buffer I made between Zartrace and Highcloud.”

“Major, do you trust Highcloud not to try circumventing this buffer?” the Pharaoh asked.

“Yes.” I spoke with no doubt.

“I found your instincts in the Oblivion case sound,” Pharaoh Dyhianna said. “I will trust them here as well. I am adding you to the Kyle link.”

A sense of disconnect sparked over me, like a hiccup in the data pouring through space.

Kyle mesh joined, Zartrace thought.

I concentrated on the link. If we didn’t locate the signal’s destination soon, this could turn into a cosmic fail. Where would the Traders put their base? We were light-years from any region of the Eubian Concord. A signal traveling at the speed of light would take years to reach even the hinterlands of their territory. Whoever ran this operation needed a base close by, one they could use to send ships through inversion to Trader space. The receiver had to be outside the range of the Parthonia Orbital Defense system, but close enough that it only took minutes rather than centuries for the signal to reach its destination.

If a Trader base existed out here. If it didn’t, I’d probably end up in prison for sedition, or at least for stupidity.

“Zartrace, have you mapped the signal to any known location?” I asked.

“I estimate it is headed into the inner asteroid belt. I am checking maps, looking for any body in space that could intercept the signal.”

Lavinda said, “Our transmission time to the closest asteroids is at least seven minutes.”

A man’s powerful voice cut through the Kyle link. Zartrace, I’m releasing a manifest of all ISC ships and civil patrols in that region of space.

I practically jumped out of my chair. Who is that?

Max thought, Imperator Skolia. He’s in the Kyle mesh and so are we.

Manifest received, Zartrace answered. The corvette Valdor is the closest ship.

I have contacted them with orders, the Imperator said.

I have it! Highcloud said. The signal is going to Asteroid 289 TN.

Verified, Zartrace said.

Data sent to the Valdor, the Imperator said.

“Got it!” Lavinda said. She must have a telop monitoring our link. “Estimated time of arrival for the Valdor, including acceleration and deceleration, is two and a half minutes.”

“That cuts it close,” General Majda said. “This is the only chance we’ll get. We’re sending other ships along the projected trajectory, but they aren’t finding squat. If the receiver isn’t on that asteroid, it will be too late to do any more searches.”

“Understood,” Lavinda said. Her voice came over my earbud on the exoskeleton. “Bhaaj, I’m using a private channel only you can hear. You can respond by speaking silently. The exoskeleton will convert those motions into words for me. Do you think this location is accurate?”

“I can’t be certain,” I said. “Highcloud is brilliant but inexperienced. Zartrace is less likely to make errors, but the search cone is still too wide. Also, we’re assuming any spy base is on an asteroid, but a lot of space junk could be in the path of that signal. Some of it might support a base.”

“If this fails,” Lavinda said, “we’re both in it deep.”

“I know. I’m sorry.” I spoke the truth. “You acted as best you could, given the information you had, with every effort to contact your COs.” The army would look with far less favor on my decision to wait a day before revealing the presence of the child EI.

“I’m linking you and Max to a VR sim for the corvette,” Lavinda said. “As long as you can access Kyle space, you’ll see everything that happens in real time. If you drop out of the Kyle, you’ll still be in the VR link, but you’ll be subject to at least a seven-minute delay.”

“If you link in Max,” I said, “You’ll be linking in Highcloud, too.”

“We’ve already added Highcloud.” She sounded uneasy, but less grim. Although I wanted to believe she was coming to trust Highcloud, it more likely meant Zartrace had gained control of the young EI.

A VR film inside the helmet tingled on my face, and I suddenly found myself in a starship cockpit, behind the pilot’s chair. Lights glowed on its panels: green, red, blue, gold, even violet. Holos floated above circular screens around the pilot, including maps of the asteroid belt and close-ups of the asteroid we were hurtling to meet. A holomap of the Parthonia star system hung between the two chairs. I’d forgotten how much I loved these views of space, all those stars glistening in its vast, velvety backdrop, red, blue, green, gold, and white, the answer given by the cosmos to our little cockpit lights, beauty on a scale so grand, it dwarfed us humans in its majesty.

The copilot said, “We’re entering the inner edge of the asteroid belt.” She flicked her hand through the holo of an asteroid, and it magnified as if we’d jumped toward it. Data flowed in a river below it. “No sign of a base yet.”

The captain said, “Valdor, engage shrouds.”

Another voice answered, probably the ship’s EI. “Engaged.”

Nothing changed from my point of view, but had any other ships been in the vicinity, the corvette would have vanished at least partially from their screens. Blackbody shielding altered its outer surfaces so that they no longer reflected many wavelengths of EM radiation. It wasn’t perfect, especially to IR sensors that detected heat, and every time the corvette accelerated, its exhaust revealed its position, but it would make it harder to pinpoint the exact location of the ship.

The captain tapped one of his panels and more views of the asteroid appeared, showing it from every angle available to the ship’s long-range monitors and from previous flybys by other spacecraft. There! A dark shadow showed on the rim of the asteroid.

“I don’t see anything,” the pilot said. “Nothing on long-range scan, either.”

“Look in the shadow on the far rim,” I said.

A woman spoke behind me. “Captain, I’m getting a message through the Kyle, I think from someone on Parthonia.”

“This is Major Bhaajan, retired,” I said. “I’m the one the Pharaoh put in the Kyle link with you. Check the shadow on the rim. My EI is sending you coordinates.”

Sending, Max thought.

The captain spoke tensely. “Major, I get no indication of a base or ship in that location.”

“I’ve seen this before,” I said. “They’re using a shroud, not like ours, but with Trader tech.”

Both the captain and the copilot were tapping their controls and flicking holos. “I’m not getting anything, either,” the copilot said.

Damn! Valuable time was rushing by us. “I know it doesn’t show. But I spent years in the military analyzing ESComm covert methods. They’re hiding in that shadow, I’m sure of it.”

“Major, you’re retired, aren’t you?” the captain said. “Your intel is years out of date. Our detection methods have changed a great deal.”

I spoke firmly, holding back the urge to swear. “Captain, call it instinct, call it all those years I spent trying to think like a Trader, but I know how their minds work.”

The pilot glanced at the copilot. “Are you finding anything?”

“Nothing,” the copilot said.

“It’s there, damn it!” I took a breath, calming my racing pulse. “Check the overhang at 2.4, 1.3 on your map. You’re looking for a hidden cave or recess with a mini-base, probably only two or three people. You have to do it now! They’re already receiving the warning signal.” The asteroid was clearly visible on the forward screens, growing in size as the corvette approached.

The captain swore. “Major, if you’re wrong, we won’t have time to search anywhere else.”

A woman’s voice came over the comm, curt and firm. “Captain, this is General Vaj Majda. Assume the major’s intel is good. Search the overhang.”

Ho! Apparently the general trusted my instincts more than she let me know.

“Yes, ma’am!” The captain brought the corvette into a tighter orbit around the asteroid. To the copilot, he said, “Anything?”

“Nothing . . . we’re close enough for details . . . nothing . . .” She studied the data pouring over the panel in front of her. “Wait! I am getting a signal, leakage around a shroud it looks like.”

“We can’t land,” the captain said. “The asteroid is too small. Can you read the signal?”

“It’s scattered,” the copilot said. “I lost it . . . wait, there. No, it’s gone. Now it’s back—I think they’re strobing the shroud, dropping and raising it so fast, we can’t pierce it.”

“I’ve got it!” the unseen telop said. “They’re trying to get a message out without revealing their location. They’re searching this region of space for a Kyle node close enough for them to use.”

“Why not use their own?” someone said, another person I couldn’t see. They sounded inexperienced given their lack of knowledge about ESComm ships, but that wasn’t really a surprise. No one had expected this corvette to end up on this mission.

“If it’s an ESComm ship hiding in there,” the captain said, “they don’t have their own Kyle node. They have to steal time on ours.”

“Captain, we can bomb that overhang,” the copilot said.

“We don’t want to destroy them, we want to capture them.” The captain kept the corvette on pace with the asteroid as it sailed through space.

“Only a few ships in the asteroid belt have Kyle nodes,” the telop behind me said.

“Their shroud stopped strobing,” the copilot said. “It doesn’t—fucking shit!”

The overhang exploded in silence, sending a huge fountain of rocks and ice into space. It was as if a giant hand had shoved out of the asteroid, throwing away the crust by slamming a ceiling so hard, it shattered. A ship leapt out amid the debris, a Solo, the most elite and deadly of the ESComm star fighters.

Here in the lab, Lavinda was talking to someone, telling them to “scramble for any ships, military or otherwise that can get there. And get that battle cruiser out there now.”

Good, especially the cruiser. That mammoth city-in-space would be too late for the capture or combat, but it could pick up whatever survived. ISC would love to capture one of the ultra-sleek Solo fighters.

The Solo had other ideas. Even as it rose out of the asteroid, it fired at the corvette.

“Tau missile incoming!” someone shouted.

The VR simulation went dark.

“What the blazes?” Doctor Garvin said here in the lab. “Where is the signal?”

No! The missile must have hit the corvette. Taus carried inversion drives, which turned them into miniature starships. The small missile could accelerate to relativistic speed much faster than a ship and smash its target with the energy of a megaton nuclear bomb. If a tau hit the corvette, it was gone, period.

The VR sim suddenly snapped on, putting me back in the corvette. In the same instant, the corvette’s EI said, “Quasis jump.”

The corvette had full quasis coils! Thank you, Tejas Akarya. I had no doubt his work contributed to these improved coils. No wonder the Traders had killed him; his work was exactly what they wanted to stop, projects that helped ISC kick their asses.

The crew of the corvette continued as if nothing had happened. To them, the jump must have seemed instantaneous. Their brains couldn’t change during quasis, so neither could their thoughts. It was why the ship announced the jump, to alert them. It also meant quasis couldn’t last more than a few seconds and happened only in a near vacuum. If the ship’s environment altered too much during quasis, then when it came out, the abrupt changes around it could tear it apart.

The pilot’s hands raced over his controls, flicking through holos like a maestro at work. “Valdor, use Annihilators. Shoot to disable, not destroy.”

“Annihilator fired,” the EI said. “Hit to Solo starboard engine. No damage.”

“That can’t be,” someone muttered. “How could it have no damage?”

The pilot scanned his controls. “It raised a mag field. And—damn! It went into quasis.”

So the Traders had the tech as well. Would Annihilators work against it? They fired antiproton beams, destroying protons. The Solo could avoid that beam easier than smart missiles that chased it, but it had less room to maneuver at this close range. It was a gorgeous fighter, smaller than the corvette, but more agile.

Valdor, keep firing!” the pilot said. “Pattern K1Q. Wear down its quasis field.”

Clever! Annihilator beams could affect a ship in quasis because destroying a few particles was easier than affecting the entire ship. The Solo’s mag-field deflected charged particles, and no beam was perfectly neutral, but an Annihilator neutralized and focused its beam of antiprotons by running it through positron foils. At least a portion of the shots would reach their target.

The beams came so fast, they stabbed through space. At first they had no effect on the Solo, which had to be dropping in and out of quasis at a dizzying rate. As more antiprotons reacted with the Solo’s hull, however, they created a cascade of high-energy particle showers and radiation.

“Cease fire!” the pilot said. “We want the pilot alive, not fried by radiation.”

The copilot said, “Problem! I’m reading an overload in the Solo’s power reactor.”

The captain brought up schematics of the Solo’s construction, at least what we knew about them. “Our strikes were surgical. They shouldn’t have hit that reactor.”

The copilot swore. “The pilot is trying to blow up their own ship.”

“We have to stop the overload,” the captain said.

“I don’t see how,” the copilot said. “It’ll go any minute.”

Valdor, how close can you get to the Solo?” the captain asked.

“If you want to ram the fighter, I can get as close as you need,” the EI said.

“I don’t want to ram it. I want you to put it into quasis.”

“I can get close enough to put both ships into quasis,” the EI told him. “However, when we come out, the Solo will still explode. This ship may be caught in the blast.”

“We have about ninety seconds before the Solo blows,” the copilot said.

The captain spoke fast. “Valdor, put both ships in quasis until the battle cruiser gets here. Let them know what we are doing. They will need to take control of both our ships before they drop us out of quasis. That will give them however many seconds are left to eject the Solo’s reactor.”

“Seventy seconds left,” the copilot said.

“You’ll be in quasis too long,” Valdor said. “It’s too drastic a change—”

“Do it NOW!” the captain said.

“Message sent to cruiser,” Valdor said.

The sim went dark.

Silence filled the lab.

After a moment, I said, “Is anyone getting a signal?”

“Nothing,” Lavinda said.

I pushed the helmet off my head and the VR film retracted. Everyone was in the same position as before, Lavinda, her aides, and Angel standing behind the three scientists. Lavinda tapped at her comm. “Major Koral, are you getting anything from the Valdor?”

“Nothing yet, ma’am.”

“What about the battle cruiser?”

“We got a transmission telling us that Roca’s Pride received a message from the Valdor,” Koral said. “That’s all we know.”

Lavinda rubbed her eyes. “All right. Notify me as soon as anything else comes through.”

I spoke in a low voice. “Disengage exoskeleton.”

“Disengaging,” the console EI said.

With a smooth hum, the exoskeleton retracted, leaving me free in the chair. I sat forward, stretching my good arm, which ached from the tension.

“Highcloud?” I asked. “Are you there?”

“Yes,” Highcloud said.

“Are you all right?”

“I guess.”

“You guess?” I watched Lavinda and she met my gaze. “What does that mean?” I asked.

“Zartrace put me in a cage.”

“Lavinda,” I growled.

“I’m sorry.” She even sounded like she meant it. “We can’t let Highcloud go.”

“Bhaaj, listen,” Highcloud said. “I made a bargain with Zartrace.”

I recalled what Highcloud had said, that they were negotiating. “What sort of bargain?”

“I agreed not resist ISC if they agreed not to press charges against you or Colonel Majda.”

“Can you do that?”

Lavinda said, “Highcloud, I appreciate it, but Zartrace doesn’t have the authority to make that decision.”

“I also don’t yet have full access to the EI known as Highcloud,” Zartrace said. “I can force it, but that will damage the EI.”

General Majda spoke coldly over Lavinda’s comm. “We will not respond to coercion.”

Lavinda tapped on her comm and then touched the bud in her ear, her lips barely moving. She had dropped into a silent mode with her sister. They were probably having one hell of a debate. Within moments, Lavinda tapped off her comm and lowered her arm. I doubted anyone would make decisions soon; they’d need to consider the situation in more detail before they decided what actions to take. But we’d broken the case and stopped a covert infiltration into a major government hub of the Imperialate. They may even have captured a Solo and its pilot, if the reactor didn’t blow them and the Valdor to smithereens. If the Solo exploded inside the battle cruiser, it could take a substantial part of that ship with it as well.

So we waited.

Lavinda’s gauntlet comm buzzed. She tapped it fast. “Colonel Majda here.”

I held my breath. What had happened?

An unfamiliar woman spoke in a clipped voice. “Colonel, this is General Penajan. I’m sorry for the delay; I just received your message. For what it’s worth, Colonel, you have my support for your decision to proceed with the mission.”

Lavinda exhaled, but her shoulders only relaxed a bit. Penajan’s support would help, yes, but at this point she needed the Imperator to sign off on her actions.

The comms on the console stations suddenly went off, all at the same time, buzz-buzz-buzz, like the rat-a-tat-tat on a drum. An instant later, my comm buzzed as well.

“That must be it!” Gali smacked her palm on the receive panel, far more emphasis than she needed. I didn’t share her anticipation, mainly because Lavinda’s comm hadn’t buzzed.

I tapped my gauntlet. “Bhaaj, here.”

“Major, this is Lieutenant Koral in security. We can’t clear your bodyguard, Ruzik, to join you in the lab, we aren’t sure why. However, he won’t leave without you. We can let him stay in the visitors center until you’re finished. Is that acceptable?”

“Yes, that’s good.” Of course they couldn’t send anyone else in here during this operation. “Give him my thanks for staying.”

As I switched off my comm, Lieutenant Gali looked up at Lavinda. “It’s final, I’m afraid. All the nanobots in the dust have disintegrated. If we don’t get the Solo, we have nothing solid, only our record of an unknown and now destroyed base, possibly ESComm in origins.”

Lavinda nodded, looking too tense to respond.

And then her comm buzzed.

We all sat up straighter, attentive as Lavinda tapped her gauntlet. A voice rose into the air. “Colonel Majda, this is base security. We were analyzing the Quetzal’s mesh, but we got shut out from the entire system again. Should we try to force access? It will probably damage whatever blocked us.” The speaker paused. “The man Ruzik seems to think Major Bhaajan knows who created the block.”

Lavinda glanced at me. “Do you?”

“Highcloud probably.” I didn’t try to hide my relief. “Apparently Zartrace hasn’t caged the EI as well as it thought.”

Lavinda spoke into her comm. “Don’t try to break in yet. We’re negotiating for access.”

“Will do, ma’am.”

I nodded to Lavinda, grateful. She met my gaze and nodded back, almost Undercity style.

So we sat.

The colonel’s comm buzzed.

I didn’t tense this time. Or I tried not to. Everyone turned to watch Lavinda. Only Angel looked calm, but then, Angel always looked calm, even when she was royally pissed.

“Colonel Majda here,” Lavinda said.

“Colonel Majda,” a woman said. “This is the PARS Communications officer. We have confirmation. The battle cruiser Roca’s Pride picked up the corvette and Solo, released them from quasis, and ejected the Solo’s fusion engine before it exploded.” She took a breath. “They’re safe, ma’am. A bit beat up from being in quasis too long, but alive and kickin’.”

“Yes!” Garvin yelled in the same instant that Raez said, “They did it!”

I closed my eyes, letting the relief flood over me. It had worked. Incredibly, the mission had succeeded. Highcloud’s sacrifice—giving up their freedom and perhaps their life—hadn’t been in vain.

When I opened my eyes, Lavinda spoke over the comm in my ear, but she wasn’t hiding the words any longer. “You did well.”

“I didn’t act alone,” I said. “Ruzik and Angel helped. And Highcloud. We could never have caught that Solo without our young EI.” Aware that her sister could be listening, and possibly the Pharaoh and Imperator, I added, “Please forward my request to whatever panel investigates this incident that they take that into consideration when they’re determining how to treat Highcloud.”

She spoke quietly. “It will be my recommendation that we treat this as first contact with a new life-form.”

The relief that washed over me was gentler than the flood from a moment ago, but more intense. “Thank you.”

It mattered, what she told them, but it wouldn’t change their ultimate decision. We had no idea how Highcloud would develop if left on its own, and I didn’t see how ISC would consider the EI anything other than a threat.


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