Lacuna: The Prelude to Eternity (28 page)

Operations

TFR
Beijing

Liao’s console was quiet. No more targets appeared for the
Beijing
’s missiles, and the comm chatter was about operations—casevacs, medical treatments, and reports from each section head.

They had won the day. Phase two was in session. The Marines from the
Washington
were sorting through the facility’s storage records, searching for the valuable samples the Iilan wanted.

Why, then, could she not shake the feeling that something had gone horribly wrong?

Almost as though answering her unspoken question, the long-range communications line lit up. “Brigadier General Decker-Sheng to
Beijing
.”

With the bombardment complete, Liao took the call directly. “This is
Beijing
actual.” Liao kept her tone polite. “Report.”

“Captain Liao, I’m in the storage facility on the surface. We’ve found something here, and I think you’re going to want to see this in person.”

She had a ship to run, but Iraj could do that. Her reluctance was more to do with his phrasing, offering her nothing and expecting her to obey his vague commands. “Can you elaborate?”

“It’s the plants the Iilan told us to pick up. They’re all here, but we need your help. The vault can only be opened with a Toralii hand.”

“A Toralii hand? What do you mean?”

“I mean,” said Decker-Sheng, “that the lever to open it has grooves that can only fit a Toralii hand. It’s probably some kind of deliberate mechanism to delay us, considering they knew we were coming. You—in case you’ve forgotten—have a Toralii hand.”

That was technically true. She flexed the metal fingers by her side. “Can you bypass it?”

“I’m not sure,” he said, “I’m sending up a picture. Captain, we don’t have much time.”

There was a delay. Saara caught her eye. [“This is sometimes done,”] she said. [“But why would the Alliance not simply destroy the material instead of delaying us?”]

“Because,” said Iraj, realisation dawning in his voice, “they want us to be here when they show up.”

That made sense. Liao turned to him. “Get the ship out of here,” she said. “But prep a Broadsword for departure. I’m going to get what we came here for.”

[“Wait,”] said Saara. [“Send me instead. I can open it.”]

“No.” On that, Liao was firm. She would not let Decker-Sheng get the better of her this time. The timing was convenient… too convenient. She flexed her fist. It had to be her.

“Send along the package as well,” she said. “I’ll meet them down on the surface.”

“Roger,” said Iraj. “I’ll make sure it’s shipped with you.
Allahu akbar
.”

“Thank you,” she said, and with the confused stares of her Operations crew behind her, moved toward the hatchway and out toward the hangar bay.

Boarding the
Archangel
was a blur to her, her breathing slow but shallow. She sat in the cargo area, occupying one of the foldout seats, and two Marines carried in the scorched, bright-yellow container holding the virus they were going to plant.

It was a squat, metal thing, the size of a drum, round and dented. Data cables dangled out the top as though it had been pulled from a computer. The plugs were intact. What purpose did they serve?

She looked up as a shadow appeared in front of the loading ramp, a person clad in manacles and flanked by another set of Marines.

“Good evening,” said Ben as the Marines pushed him into one of the chairs and attached his manacles.

“Yes, very good,” Liao said as the whine of the Broadsword’s engines grew and the loading ramp was raised, sealing the ship with a hiss. “My people fought and died for a bunch of plants. We’re about to do something truly terrible, and you… well, you are going to help us.”

The outside pressure gauge began to drop as the hangar bay was decompressed. Ben gestured to the drum. “You’d trust me with that thing?” A wide, dark smile crossed his features.
 

Seeing Liao’s own face leer at her was unsettling.
 

“Brave. Foolish. I’m not certain which yet.”

“We don’t need your help with that,” she said. The ship lurched slightly as it took off. “That’s the easy part. No…” Liao steepled her fingers, regarding the mirror that sat opposite her. “You’re helping us in another way.”

“Another way?” Ben raised an eyebrow. “You’re going to upload whatever’s in there to me?”

She didn’t understand his comment. “I’m not sure what you’re saying. The plan is, we’re going to slather this stuff all over you and leave you here, so when the Toralii arrive, they think you’re me… or are curious enough to investigate at least, and they’ll get close enough to be infected with the contents.”

“That,” said Ben, gesturing with a bound hand, “is an emergency data core. It’s a construct’s mind—less evolved than my old one, probably a ship’s computer or something equally mundane. Possibly some kind of sentient program. If you’re thinking of overwriting my mind with that thing, it won’t work.”

Liao’s eyes fell upon the drum. “You’re lying,” she said. “Lying as you always do.” It was a virus, a weapon. That’s what the plan said. That’s what everyone was assuming.

“Actually,” said Ben, rolling his shoulders. “If I can recall correctly, I almost invariably tell the truth.”

Pinocchio’s nose was not growing. Liao felt something odd creeping in her spine, a feeling, a feeling of terrible truth. Ben wasn’t tricking her.
 

She had to know.

“Open it,” she told one of the Marines. “Carefully.”

“It’s a solid block of metal, Captain,” he said, and she could see that it was so. Apart from the data plugs…

Liao stood. She placed her prosthetic hand on the edge of the drum, mentally flexed the imaginary muscle that would give additional power to her grip, and—with the groan of twisting metal—peeled off the outside.

Inside were cables, boxes, blinking lights, still powered. She vaguely recognised it, a dim memory dragged out of the past. It was a similar model to the one Summer Rowe had accidentally activated although that one contained a star chart in one of the
Beijing
’s cargo holds on its very first mission.

However, after that incident, it had been turned over to Fleet Command. Who would have given it to…

NORAD.

That was it. The same hardware, painted yellow. She had been fooled by a coat of paint.

“It’s not a bioweapon,” she said. “It’s a
computer
. But… how is this going to hurt them?”

Ben shrugged helplessly.

She grabbed the data cables with her prosthetic. “Can you talk to this?”

“Probably,” said Ben. “I have parts of me that are still synthetic. But how will you trust anything I say?”

“I won’t,” she said, “but anything’s better than knowing nothing. And like you said… you typically tell the truth.”

“Very well,” said Ben, beckoning her forward. “Bring it here.”

She dragged the drum over, horrible metal-on-metal screeching echoing in the
Archangel
’s cargo hold. The vessel shook slightly, almost as if in response. She knew it was entering Qadeem’s atmosphere.

They didn’t have much time.

Ben extended his hand, palm up. Worms grew from his skin, thin cables from which light shone. They found the data cables on the drum and, for a moment, nothing happened at all.

Ben began to laugh: snickering at first and then full-on laughter, shaking in his restraints, a wild, manic laughter. “Oh, Captain Liao!” Tears ran down his face as he fought for air. “It’s
both
! Don’t you see?”

“No,” she said, her voice flat, “I don’t. Explain. And hurry.”

Ben gasped for air, struggling to talk. “It’s a limited construct, something reverse engineered on Earth with primitive technology by humans. But it has a singular purpose: find all the ships, travel between them, and then when the time is right, cause their jump drives to malfunction.” The laughter faded. “Watch,” he said.
 

His voice suddenly became different, genderless and empty, synthetic. The construct was speaking. “A million singularities, blossoming all over the universe, and then silence. Trade is the veins of the Alliance. Without ships, the species will wither and die. This is my purpose.”

She sat in her seat, trying to digest what she had heard. There were four holes in the universe—the
lacuna
where jump-drive malfunctions had torn apart worlds, solar systems, and the void—inexorably expanding, never closing, and eventually they would swallow all.

How much more quickly would this process be if there were millions of them?

This was a weapon in the same way a nuclear device on Earth was a weapon. It was mutually assured destruction, but the response would come in years, not hours. It was the slow suicide of their species… of every species.

“Thank you,” she managed.

Ben’s normal voice returned. “Well,” he said, the plugs on his palm squirming as they disconnected themselves and fell limp against the dented side of the drum. “That
is
something special.”

“Something terrible,” said Liao. “We thought it was a bioweapon. There were only a handful of people who must have known…” She snatched her radio. “Decker-Sheng, this is Liao.”

Static. The ship was still dragging through the atmosphere and well out of range of her puny handheld device.
 

She switched frequency to the
Warsong
’s intercom. “This is Liao,” she said tersely. “Put me through to Decker-Sheng.
Now
.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

The ship groaned as it touched down, the metal creaking as it resettled, expanding from the heated reentry. Liao tapped her finger against the plastic of the radio, waiting… waiting.

“This is Decker-Sheng. I can see your bird landing. Is everything all right there, Captain?”

“No,” she said, barely able to keep the anger out of her voice. “Listen, I need you to describe the weapon we’re about to deploy.”

He hesitated, vague and rather unlike him. “I’m not sure to what you are referring to, Captain. It’s a virus. It travels from ship to ship—”

“I know that,” she said. “The mechanism.
How
does it kill?”

“What does it matter?”

Liao squeezed the radio so hard she feared she might crack it. “Decker-Sheng, I need you to tell me exactly how you think this device kills the Toralii.”

“I’m honestly not sure,” he said. His tone became alarmed. “Captain, are you infected? Our engineers inspected the device. The outer shell is damaged, but the contents should be secure. If there’s been a breach in quarantine, you should return to your ship—”

He was stalling for time. Liao switched off her radio. The opportunity for talking was past.

The Broadsword’s loading ramp lowered. If Decker-Sheng wanted to make his move, it would be in moments.

She wouldn’t give him that chance. Liao extended her prosthetic into the exposed guts of the drum and began grabbing and clawing at anything she could. She crushed components and tore wires, and metal screamed as she smashed it to pieces, crushing each component in her metal fist.

“Is it dead?” she asked Ben.

“As certain as I’m standing here.” He whistled. “Shame. I would have loved to see it in action. So many Toralii corpses… you should have reconsidered, Melissa.”
 

“Don’t call me that.” She kicked the drum over, and it spilled components in all directions. “Come in,” she said to the Marines. “We have to go shoot another Sheng in the fucking face.” She grimaced, hating herself for saying it. “And bring Ben, too.”

“Why?” asked Ben. “Why exactly
am
I here anyway?”

Liao fought down the bile in her throat. “You’ll see.”

“Fun,” said Ben, his tone cheery. “I like surprises.”

“You won’t like this one. Move.”

She shoved him forward, and as she did so, the plasma pistol popped out of her wrist, glowing ominously. Liao jumped. She hadn’t intended to activate it.

Ben stared at it. “Okay,” he said, “you’re right. I don’t like this one.”

The weapon’s glow intensified. Liao took a deep breath and forced aside her anger. The weapon retreated, slowly, as though calming as she did.

“Careful,” said Ben. “That thing looks live.”

Liao said nothing and just motioned for Ben to continue walking, trying her very best to keep herself from thinking overly angry thoughts about Decker-Sheng, with limited success.

C
HAPTER
XII

Phase Three

*****

Operations

TFR
Washington

Velsharn L1 Lagrange Point

T
HE
M
ARINES
LED
. L
IAO
FOLLOWED
, her pistol out and pressed to Ben’s back. Torchlight was their guide. They passed survivors, wounded, and the dead. Destroyed drone after destroyed drone. The smell of the place rose. A thousand unidentified scents mixed with gunpowder, blood, and sand, a dark, synthetic smell that, while oppressive, was not disgusting but simply alien.

Doubts tore at her.
 

What was done was done, but her choice to destroy the construct’s datacore gnawed at her. Victory was the ultimate desired outcome. Why hadn’t she taken that opportunity? Six billion Humans lay dead on a tomb world once called Earth. Was it wrong to do the unthinkable to those who treated Human lives with such callousness? Surely the destruction of their fleet and the envelopment of almost every world they inhabited would wreak havoc on their ability to wage war, but what other consequences would there be?