Inheritance (Rise of the Empire Book 5) (12 page)

Chapter Eighteen

Seven days later - Sowir homeworld

Lurker of the Depths stood with eleven others of his kind in a circle inside the oldest building on their homeworld. The Sowir race didn’t really have a ruler or a ruling body; all of their people were part of the whole. Their ability to communicate mind to mind had resulted in all of them having a singular voice. And their ability to see/hear/sense the Spirit of the Universe allowed them to always feel the collective of their race, even if they couldn’t speak with each other across vast distances. But while they were united, their beliefs and will singular, they were still individuals, and some parts of the voice held more weight than others.

The twelve gathered here were those whose knowledge, experience, and will pulled ahead of the others of their kind. The purpose of their meeting was simple: their entire race was about to end.

The ungifted who were even now dismantling their system had used their superior void travel technology to strike fast and hard before his people could respond. The Sowir Dominion had known that they were coming from the moment they appeared in Sowir border systems, thanks to the FTL communication systems that his people had developed. But it mattered little when their enemy could move faster than they could respond.

At the start of their conflict, the Sowir had decided to sacrifice a lot of territory, keeping the enemy busy in order to reinforce systems that were far away from the front, leaving the border systems to fall and buy them time. Over four cycles after they had taken those systems, the enemy had solidified their hold on the greater part of the former Consortium territory, including the shipbuilding facilities that the Sowir had repurposed for their use.

The loss of those facilities had been a blow to the Sowir, but Lurker of the Depths knew that it mattered little to the war effort. The Empire had even allowed them three full cycles during which they had not tried to push further into the Sowir systems; rather, they had ignored their advantage and only solidified the systems they had taken, which at the time had baffled the Sowir. The Enemy gave them time to rebuild, to fortify their systems.

And then the calm ended. The Enemy attacked their systems, and effortlessly blew through them. The Sowir decided to fall back to the system that had birthed them. Here they had spent hundreds of years building defenses; there they thought to make the Enemy pay. And now, they watched from the depths of their world as the Enemy systematically destroyed every piece of military technology or facilities in their system. Although, strangely, they chose to keep the facilities that had no military use intact.

The twelve of the greatest Sowir were connected through their telepathy, speaking and discussing in moments what would take an ungifted much longer.

“The last of our war vessels have been destroyed. Our cargo and transport vessels have been disabled and left floating in the void. The enemy vessels are moving in orbit around home. Their actions make little sense,”
Sand Shard sent.

“I concur. They could have wiped the home clear of life with their weapons,”
Shallow Water agreed.

“Ever since our battle station was destroyed, they have been sending surrender requests over all channels we use, in all the languages of the Consortium, even ours. They say that we will be spared, and treated fairly if we do,”
Sand Shard added.

“They  captured some of our translating equipment early on, along with some of our people. But their requests for surrender are illogical. Why should we stop fighting and let them kill us?”
Dark Stream sent.

“The last of the Consortium are a part of their community; they must want to hold a trial before they finish us. Under their laws, the only sentence for our acts is death. We would be spared until then,”
Lurker of the Depths sent.

“Idiocy. If they could use the Spirit, they would have no need for those trials,”
Last Wave added.

“It is the way of the ungifted,”
Lurker of the Depths added.

“We have failed. There is nothing more that we can do. We will die,”
Last Wave sent, and all agreed.

***

Harbinger – High orbit over Sowir homeworld

Adrian waited in the Harbinger’s landing bay for the shuttle from the prison ship. Beside him stood Akash, Sora, and Paul.

“You shouldn’t do this. I know that you are hurting, but this insanity will only get you killed,” Paul said for the hundredth time.

“This has nothing to do with Bethany’s death,” Adrian said more harshly than he’d intended. Then, after a beat, he continued calmly. “This was always the plan. It’s why I brought the prisoners here. By now, the Sowir on the planet will be wondering why we haven’t attacked the planet yet. Why we are still transmitting surrender offers. It does not fit into what they believe about us, and that will make them curious.”

“I still think that you should still take people down with you,” Paul added.

“No,” Adrian said. “They need to see me vulnerable; they need to know that I am in their power if they are to talk with me.”

Paul sulked silently. Adrian knew that his friend worried, that he believed that Bethany’s death was making Adrian careless, reckless. But it wasn’t so; he would end this war because of her. Because he wouldn’t let another die to the lunacy of Sowir beliefs.

The shuttle landed and Adrian entered it alone, leaving Paul and his two wolions behind. Inside, he was met with the pilot and the two soldiers who were guarding the Sowir prisoner—Clear Waters—. Adrian nodded at them, and the three exited the shuttle, the doors closing behind them, leaving him alone with the prisoner. He looked at her, for the first time seeing an unrestrained Sowir.

“I trust that you realize this is your people’s last chance. If they kill me, all of you will die,”
Adrian sent to her.

“Yes. The island is the one place where there is a chance that they will meet with you,”
Clear Waters responded.

Adrian didn’t respond to her thoughts; instead, he closed the telepathic link and sent out orders through his implant. The shuttle shuddered and took off, piloted remotely from Harbinger. It dropped down to the planet and towards one of the islands. Adrian took the time to look at the feeds from the outside as they dropped through the atmosphere. The vast Ocean covered the surface, its gray and muted water giving the planet a kind of bland look. Eventually he noticed land, a small island that was their destination. The shuttle lowered itself in the middle of the island. Adrian and Clear Waters exited the shuttle and walked a bit away and towards the beach as the shuttle doors closed and it flew away and back to its ship.

“How long do you think we will need to wait?”
Adrian sent.

“They will send some of our tools first to investigate. Then they will come themselves not long after if they decide to talk,”
Clear Waters responded.

“And if they decide to use the tools to attack us?”
Adrian asked curiously. He wasn’t really worried; he might have been taking a risk, but he didn’t plan on dying. He was wearing a light assault suit with only a mask for air over his mouth, as the Sowir world’s air was thin. He had no weapons other than the mono-blades on his arms. But he himself was a weapon. He could hold out until rescue came, provided that the Sowir don’t bring any heavy weapons.

“The tools will not be a problem. I can take control of them once they are close. They have been made so that orders from the closest Sowir take priority,”
Clear Waters sent.

Adrian turned back and studied the grayish water and bleak sky of the Sowir homeworld.

***

Lurker of the Depths and the rest of the twelve watched through the eyes of their tools as they surfaced onto the island. They saw one of their kind with one of the alien ungifted, standing there alone.

“It is a trap,”
Dark Stream sent, just as they lost control of their tools. They could still see through their eyes, but no longer could they control their movements.

Lurker of the Depths felt disbelief and anger through the link coming from some of the others.

“They turned one of our own against us!”
Sand Shard sent angrily, and others pulled by his emotions joined in his anger.

Lurker of the Depths watched through the eyes of his tools, studying the strange alien. It looked strangely like a Nel, only without their tails.
“It is impossible for one of us to be turned; the Spirit binds us,”
Lurker of the Depths added.

“Then they have found a way to force us to do their bidding. We should kill them now, before they shackle the rest of us!”
Sand Shard sent.

“No.”
For the first time in a long time, Lurker of the Depths used the full power of his abilities, drowning out the emotions of others.
“Too much is wrong; their actions do not make sense. I want to know why they have done as they did. I will go and look into their minds myself.”

“And if you get turned as well?”
Last Wave asked.

“Then there is no hope for any of you,”
Lurker of the Depths said, and left the room.

***

Adrian watched as a small shuttle rose from the water some way off the coast, then flew straight at them, landing on the beach close to Adrian and Clear Waters. After its doors opened, a Sowir walked out, dressed in an ornate, tight suit. The Sowir crossed the distance and stopped in front of them, his attention on Clear Waters.

“What is this? How does this ungifted appear connected to the Spirit of the Universe?”
the Sowir sent at Clear Waters.

Adrian grimaced at the power of the voice in his head; this Sowir was strong, much stronger than Clear Waters. Before Clear Waters could respond, Adrian used his own telepathy to speak.

“This ‘ungifted’ can speak for himself,”
Adrian sent forcefully in the way he’d learned from Clear Waters.

The Sowir’s attention on Adrian intensified, and a massive force slammed against Adrian’s mind, trying to get in. Adrian staggered a step back, but managed to fight the attempt off, just barely. The power was so much greater than that of Clear Waters that he doubted he would be able to fight off another such attack. Then Clear Waters interfered. Adrian felt the two Sowir make a link and start exchanging thoughts far faster than what Adrian was able to comprehend.

Once they were done, Adrian could feel an emotional wave coming from the new Sowir—disbelief and horror.

“We were wrong?”
Adrian heard it send in despair, painfully, and he knew that the war with the Sowir was over.

Chapter Nineteen

Three months later – Warpath

Adrian sat at his holo table and looked at the comm message from Bethany in his queue, still unopened. The words recorded inside were her last to him, moments before she’d died because of his mistake. Because he hadn’t been good enough. Because he had grown accustomed to using the Watchtower where all the information was fed into his mind, so much so that outside of it he had forgotten to check everything. He hadn’t accounted for how much larger the fallout of the destruction of the Sowir Construct would be once the massive power generators that ran it exploded. He had failed her, and the people under his command. He feared her words. He feared that she had condemned him, cursed him for killing her.

For the first time ever, he had let his guard down, let someone inside. He had had her for one night, and even then only a handful of days before he’d lost her. His thoughts were a mess. He couldn’t focus. Couldn’t allow himself to grieve. He didn’t allow the loss he felt to show; his face was a cold, emotionless mask. It was his arrogance that had put them in that position. He wanted to make a point to the Sowir: it was he who gave the orders.

He had heard the whispers of those around him. How they called him merciless, without a heart. They questioned how he was able to not care about someone close to him dying. And yet they didn’t know, couldn’t know, that he feared breaking. His friends had tried to talk to him, Laura too. But he didn’t allow anyone close. After his mission in the Sowir home system was finished, he’d rushed to Warpath and shut himself inside his quarters. His only company was Akash, Sora, and his steward, who he only saw during meal time.

And the thing that scared him the most was that he knew in his heart that if he could turn back the time, if he could go back to the moment before Harbinger had fired its weapon and destroyed the Sowir Construct, he would have done the same thing again. They’d needed to destroy the Construct, or risk getting surrounded by Sowir warships on the one side and the Construct on the other. He would have given the order again, even if he’d known beforehand that Bethany—the woman he had loved since he was barely a man—would die. And that was what threatened to break him, the knowledge that he was willing to sacrifice anyone in order to win.

Adrian focused back on the message blinking above his holo table. Gathering all his courage, he played the message. He was met with sounds of battle, chaos in the command center of the Audacious as its crew struggled to survive. And at the center of it all was Bethany, her hair plastered to her sweating face and her lips upturned in a sad smile.

“
Adrian. I am sorry that we didn’t have much time together; that was my fault for allowing my pride to rule my decisions. But the few days we did have were the happiest I have ever felt.
” Her hand reached up and moved a strand of her red hair from where it had stuck to her forehead.
“I want you to know that I love you, Adrian. I always did, and always will.”
With that, her other hand reached and stopped the recording. The video went to black and Adrian stared at it.

His breath quickened, and he stood up, walking to the middle of the room. Images flashed through his mind—Bethany at the Academy, their fights during training, them making up, them being given positions together on the Athena, the fight against the Concordis ships, coming to Sanctuary, their long talks while they were on patrols, him finding out that she was getting married, her lashing out at him, then years later their reconciliation, and finally the last days. Their first and only night together.

Rage filled his body, and he felt himself trembling. He spun around and his hand pointed at his holo table and chair. He grabbed hold of them and ripped the table from the floor with his mind, throwing both the table and the chair across the room, smashing them against the wall as he released a gut-wrenching scream. Items on his shelves shook and trembled as his telekinesis reached around him uncontrollably.

Then everything left him as he drained his energy supplies, and Adrian dropped to the floor with tears flowing down his face.

“She didn’t blame me,” he whispered.

Iris appeared in front of him, looking at him with compassion. She tried to touch him, but her holographic hand went right through Adrian. “Of course she didn’t blame you, Adrian,” Iris said. “She was in the Fleet; she was one of the best commanders in the Empire, same as you. She knew that you needed to destroy that Construct or risk many more lives.”

“It was my mistake. I shouldn’t have charged into their system like that. I shouldn’t have ordered her ships so close. I should have known how big the fallout would be,” Adrian said softly, and Iris stayed silent.

“You are good, Adrian, one of the best. But not even you can know everything. You are not omniscient,” Iris told him gently.

He didn’t know how long he sat there crying, but eventually he gathered himself, took a deep breath, and stood.

“Adrian, are you alright?” Iris asked hesitantly.

“Yes…I think so,” Adrian responded.

He turned towards the door to his room and opened them, only to be tackled to the floor by two massive animals. Sora and Akash were nudging him with their snouts, and he petted them while making soothing sounds. He’d left them outside on purpose, not wanting to fall into temptation and have them muffle his emotions.

“It’s okay. I’m okay,” he told them. And then finally after a few more minutes, they allowed him to get up, and he entered his living room and started towards the main doors.

“Where are you going?” Iris asked.

Adrian grabbed his coat off the back of a chair and answered, “Sanctuary.”