Books One to Three Omnibus (Armada Wars) Read online

  “I’m not sure I understand what you mean.”

  “You didn’t notice? She’s vacated the premises. Very little evidence of thought or personality going on in there. I thought you people were supposed to be keen observers.”

  “She’s called Amarist Naeb.” Brant read from the holo that Tirrano had delivered. “She was part of a geological survey team that went into the Deep a couple of years ago.”

  Tirrano interjected with what she had already learned. “The survey was part of the search for colonisation candidates along the fringes of Imperial space. Her team followed up on a probe that pinged exotic minerals; it was a planet not far into the Deep Shadows. It’s never been flagged for colonisation, but they carried on with their survey nonetheless. Been there ever since.”

  “So what was she doing on a deserted research base?” Caden said. “Something is very wrong with this picture.”

  “Charlie-Charlie Sixty-Twelve-Five Echo.” Brant read aloud the colonisation catalogue number from Tirrano’s holo. “I have a horrible feeling I’ve seen that before.”

  He swiped his own desk-mounted holo and brought up the Eyes and Ears intelligence report database, tapping and prodding until he found what he was looking for.

  “It’s on the list,” he said quietly. “No databursts or other contact for a few months.”

  “How has this not been investigated?”

  “Flagged as lowest priority,” Brant said. “Looking at this entry, it seems it’s actually not that unusual for them. After they arrived quite a lot of raw data was sent back, followed by scientific papers which were only of interest to very specific groups. Since then there’s been a significant drop-off, with family messages and service requests arriving every few weeks, plus the occasional new finding.”

  “So it wouldn’t look particularly odd then?”

  “No, not at all.”

  “What does it matter? It’s a geo-survey team on a barren planet nobody wants,” Tirrano said.

  “It matters because they’re all on their own out there,” said Caden.

  “Yes, where they chose to put themselves.”

  “Also, it matters because whatever happened out there was probably a prelude to Gemen Station. Herros is right on the fringes of the Deep Shadows, a couple of good jumps away from the Viskr border. So is the location you just described.”

  Tirrano snorted. “We don’t even know if this Naeb woman was taken from there, or if she left on her own.”

  “I think we can all take a good guess at that,” said Brant.

  “The fact is, it’s currently the only lead,” said Caden. “I’ll head there and get eyes on the place. Then we’ll know for certain.”

  “Not yet,” said Brant.

  “Why not?”

  “Because we’ve not found out what she knows.”

  • • •

  “There you are.”

  Throam looked up at Eilentes and seemed to take a second to recognise her. She knew that expression; he had been lost in thought. It was not like him to think about things too deeply or for too long, but when he did it was to the exclusion of all else.

  “Hey,” he said. “Where have you been?”

  “Where have I been? Where have you been? I’ve been looking all over for you.”

  “I was right here the whole time.”

  Throam smiled, and she knew immediately that even if he had been somewhere else, he would now stick to his story.

  “I went to check out the facilities,” she said. “You know they have a sharp-shooting range here that’s a klick long? A klick!”

  “Impressive.”

  “Impressive is the word. This place is huge.”

  “Did you shoot?”

  “No, the loaners they have down on the range aren’t worth squat. I left all my kit on the shuttle, just like you did. We’ll have to recover it from Hammer before she leaves.”

  “We’ll have time.”

  “So.” Eilentes sat down on the seat next to his. “What have you been doing?”

  “Nothing much. Just came here for a bit of quiet.”

  He waved casually at the panoramic window of the observation lounge, shielded glass that curved across most of the outer wall. She followed his gesture and saw the local star field, the distant planet crawling lazily across the darkness, the great ships moving at port speed between the fortress and the Kosling system’s gate. She had to admit, as awe-inspiring as she found the scale of it all, it was certainly a relaxing view.

  “I actually meant generally, in your life. I’ve not seen you since Brankfall. That was ten Solars ago, right? Ten Solars!”

  “Same old shit,” he said. “Running around the galaxy, trying to stop people blowing Caden’s head off. It’s a full time job. You?”

  “Same old shit. Just different places.”

  “You any closer to a command?”

  “Not been my priority for a long time. Did you ever listen to a word I said?”

  “Yes of course, you said you wanted to command a battleship.”

  “I never said any such thing! You know how long it took me to get my emancipation card approved.”

  He smirked, and she realised that once again she had fallen for it. She slapped his arm. “Wind-up merchant.”

  Throam laughed and pretended to recoil from the blow. She crossed her arms and leaned away from him, giving him the same disapproving look Mama used to give Papa whenever he brought some new piece of junk to the dinner table.

  He beamed back at her until she melted.

  “You were mulling over something when I came in,” she said at last. “Want to share?”

  “It’s nothing really. Just something is up with Caden.”

  “I thought you were watching him when you came back from Gemen Station. What happened?”

  “I’m not really sure. He’s changing, but I can’t exactly say how. He won’t talk about it.”

  “How do you mean, ‘changing’?”

  “Used to be he’d zone out sometimes, just once in a while. But now it’s different. It’s like he has some kind of anxiety attack. But I’ve never seen him panic about anything.”

  “Hasn’t he been checked out?”

  “Oh yeah, all the time. We both get the full works before every mission; it’s regulations. But they never find anything wrong.”

  “Shouldn’t you tell somebody? If he won’t talk to you about it I mean.”

  “Like who? The Empress? He technically doesn’t have a commanding officer.”

  “Ah yes, I see your problem.”

  “Maybe I’m just worrying too much. If it was serious, I’m sure he’d say.”

  “Wouldn’t make sense to put you both at risk.”

  “No, and he certainly knows it.”

  Throam went quiet again, staring at the floor. She knew she would lose him to his own thoughts if she did not give him something else to talk about.

  “Are you and Caden…?”

  He stared at her dumbly, not understanding what she was trying to ask him. Clearly he had not changed that much then.

  “Are you two an item?”

  He looked like he did not know whether to laugh or shout. “Worlds no! Only one of us would survive that.”

  She thanked the universe mentally, and grinned at him as if she had just been joking. “What’s he like? I mean they have a bit of a reputation, the Shards. People in the fleet say they’re unemotional and not worth trusting.”

  “Unemotional?” Throam smiled again. “I wouldn’t say so. I guess Fleet usually only see him when he’s on a mission, and it’s not his job to be emotional.”

  “Because that’s surplus to requirements, right?”

  “Exactly. As for not being trustworthy, well that’s a right load of shit. There’s nobody I’d trust more with my life.”

  “Not even me?”

  “Definitely not you, with your crazy-ass flying. You’ll be the one who finally kills me.”

  She slapped him on the arm ag
ain.

  — 07 —

  Fresh Meat

  Castigon vented a stream of curses into the night sky of Fengrir as he scratched his right leg furiously. Of all the times for him to pick up a small cut, it had to have been just as he arrived on one of the contaminated worlds. Perhaps the inflammation would teach him to be more careful in future.

  He had nicked his skin on a sharp metal edge while unbundling himself from a most undignified hiding place. Arriving on the planet as a stowaway, he had had little choice but to choose stealth over comfort — being caught by immigration control was not really an option by this point.

  Hours had now passed, and an infection had well and truly taken hold. The scratching did not really help, truth be told, and he had tried to avoid it for as long as he could before being driven to relieve the infuriating agony. Yes, there was definitely Blight in that tiny wound. His dear old friend, back for another game of ‘guess the scar radius’. The sensation was dry and electrical, as if a live circuit were flexing and sparking and burrowing just under the surface of the skin.

  But he had learned his lessons well on Urx, and even in his frenzied clawing he took pains to avoid tearing the actual cut itself. He tried to rake his nails only across the healthy skin surrounding it, digging in as if he could press the sensations out of his flesh by coming in from the side.

  Whoever had said it was not worth vaccinating humans against the Blight had clearly never had this experience, he decided. He made a mental note to find out precisely who he would need to talk to about that. He could be very persuasive.

  He was only half joking with himself, but even so that would have to come much, much later. Right now, he had some important business to attend to. Thanks to the Backwaters he was surprisingly far ahead of schedule. He had believed — as he languished in his cell back on Urx, in those early days of incarceration — that his mission of re-education would take him years.

  And yet here he was, just days after his release, walking on the very same soil that his first target now trod.

  • • •

  “This is seriously boring.”

  “We aren’t here to enjoy ourselves, I’m afraid.”

  Ider Firenz already found her younger counterpart irritating. She could not for the life of her see how this man could possibly have risen to the rank of company captain, much less imagine what he must have done to earn his position next to her.

  “I really don’t see why we’re needed here anyway.”

  He was perhaps right — on a purely practical level of course — but Firenz knew well that it was better to have a Shard on hand when the need arose, rather than be without and suffer the consequences. And if she had to be there, then so too did he. She started to open her mouth, to tutor him on the topic of due diligence, but immediately changed her mind.

  She had no intention of recommending to keep him on when they were done on Fengrir. Why waste effort on him? The Empress would just have to try again, and may the light of a thousand suns shine down upon Her most radiantly fat behind.

  “I’m going to stretch my legs,” he said. “Will you be okay?”

  “I survived Ottomas,” she said. “I think I will survive the ambassador.”

  “Ottomas Endures,” the counterpart said. He got to his feet.

  “Until the Last Breath,” she replied. At least he could get that right.

  Appatine strolled quietly away, heading clockwise around the perimeter of the square. She assumed — no, hoped — that he would continue to watch the people in the crowd as he went.

  The Lem Bataan visitor had been talking for almost an hour now, with the translation from his link routed through an audio system kept permanently in the public space. She was glad for the translation; the piping and fluting voices of the Lembas usually gave her a headache after just a few minutes, and hours of it would surely have finished her off. The amplified translation was just enough to ensure she could not hear the ambassador’s natural voice.

  As far as she could tell the Lemba had not said anything worth hearing yet. His circuitous speech did not command her attention, for she was true to her role and watched carefully for danger, but she was fairly certain that as yet his purpose on Fengrir had not even been spoken of.

  Even with a cursory glance, she could see that none of the people gathered here were cause for any real concern. Not even the Coalition had bothered to turn up to this particular event, and they were usually so determined to cause disruption. If you could call it that: informing the citizenry they ought to feel unhappy about the things that made them unhappy was — in her view — a complete waste of time.

  Politics, she thought, is the only true constant.

  “It is vitally important that nothing upsets the delivery of the ambassador’s message.” The Empress’s Chamberlain had looked down his nose at Firenz with visible distaste, as if the distance between their holos were not great enough for his liking. “Vitally important, you see? She expects you will do your duty, Shard Firenz. Oh yes, She does indeed expect that.”

  She scanned the crowd yet again.

  Vitally important? Ha! The Lemba was still warbling out his meandering friendship greeting, in the customary way of his people. The Lem Bataan Confederation considered every citizen to be part of a huge family, and it was clear the ambassador was applying that traditional view here. He presumably had not noticed that most of the people listening had not been there when he started. They were stopping to see what was being said, then moving on to deal with the day’s business.

  Imperial citizens are not like your people, she thought. Good luck with the speech though.

  Perhaps Appatine’s laconic appraisal of the day was entirely justified. At least the man said what he thought; many in his position would not have the stones for that, knowing as he did that they were being evaluated constantly. Maybe she would wait until the end of this pointless mission before deciding whether to write off his chances of becoming a counterpart. Worlds knew, candidates with a big enough set of balls were hard to come by these days.

  • • •

  Castigon had been very, very careful. It would not do for Ider Firenz to see him just yet. He was certain that his was a face she would remember until the day she died.

  The counterpart was a different matter. He had never seen the lad before, and judging by his apparent age that was to be expected. While Castigon was being tried prior to his detention at Correctional Compound One, this knuckle-dragger would have been scratching his big ape head on the back row of some provincial classroom. He certainly didn’t look the type to make a point of following the civilian news feeds.

  Probably best not to be seen though, he thought to himself. Dear Ider might have shown him my files.

  It was doubtful, seeing as the lad was plainly a probationer, but Castigon was not in the mood for taking risks. Not any more, not the reformed and rehabilitated Maber Castigon. He had had a long, long time to think about what went wrong at Ottomas.

  Rehabilitated! Oh he made himself laugh sometimes.

  He stepped silently back into the sharp-edged shadows beneath the square’s peristyle, and made for the exit nearest to the House of Governance.

  It was not far between them; proconsuls of the Empire were fans of speaking in general, more so of being heard. The public square was often one of the first things to be built in a colonial town. Castigon walked past the grounds once, turned the corner of the next street along, and stopped to think.

  It was the standard layout, with a large set of double gates set into a high plasteel wall. The gardens in front of the receiving hall had a wide spinney of flowering trees right in the centre, surrounded by a small wall of its own. Festive, to be sure, but also a defence against vehicles driven at the building by suicidal attackers. Not that he planned anything quite so melodramatic.

  If he had not minded the risk of being identified, he would be able to waltz right in there and take a look around. He would have needed to come up with some ruse, ye
s, but that was not a problem. The security systems however might be his undoing. It would possibly be sufficient to rely instead on the utter lack of imagination behind the Empire’s policy on civic architecture.

  Anyway, it was not like there was any chance he would be able to plant anything in the building before evening came. The doors and windows would be sealed at sundown, and the entire building swept for weapons and devices. It would not be opened again until the guests began to arrive for the reception, and even then access would be policed thoroughly.

  Ah well, he thought. I’ll wing it, just like on Ottomas. I hope this one doesn’t go balls-up as well.

  • • •

  Mostrum Appatine, as it turned out, scrubbed up very well indeed. Firenz could not help but glance sideways as they made their way up the steps to the receiving hall, and found herself warming to the idea of having him as her counterpart.

  No, that would not do at all. She was here to do a job, not to slobber over fresh meat. A close shave and a dress uniform did not make someone suitably capable, in any case.

  The doors were wide open, and soft music floated out into the warm night. Lem Bataan music, if she was not mistaken. Accompanying it was the deceptively delicate scent of tchok, a Lemba delicacy. She hated tchok with a passion.

  As they passed through the entrance, Firenz cast her eye casually over the duty guards. Local civic security, and judging by their bearing not one of them had military service. Still, at least each of them carried a Moachim P16 rapid fire pistol — someone evidently believed they should have reliable side-arms. She hoped they had received adequate training.

  “You’re here, here at last. Welcome. Please come this way, quickly as you like!”

  One of the proconsul’s staff was bustling towards them, bowing halfway to the floor before seeming to recall that Firenz and Appatine were not honoured guests. He aborted the attempt and half-waved, half-flicked his hands towards a panelled door on the far side of the reception hall.