War on a Thousand Fronts Read online

  Tanis shrugged. “I’m not convinced that fifth dimensional beings have to shuck their mortal coils, so to speak. The ones we’ve all encountered began as AIs, so they had no bodies to begin with—well, not ones that were useful when it came to moving around.”

  Tanis paused and looked down at herself, then held up her left hand and snapped her fingers before continuing.

  “I, on the other hand, rather like my body. Especially now that I’ve reconfigured it.”

  “I noticed you regrew your arm,” Saanvi said. “I assume that happened down on Pyra, as well?”

  Tanis nodded. “I was able to strip apart molecules and atoms and reform them into anything I wanted. I harnessed the energy and used it—”

  “You almost killed yourself,” Priscilla interrupted. “At least, that’s what I think was happening.”

  Tanis shook her head. “I wouldn’t have died. But I think I would have burned up this body…and our distinct minds. Then there would have been no going back.”

  “Mom,” Cary shook her head certain that horror was writ large on her face. “You’re going to give me a headache. How is this possible?”

  Tanis took Cary’s hand as well and led her daughters toward the nearest lift bank. “For some time now, Angela and I have been…growing a new brain. Its interleaved with our current ones, and is directly connecting them in millions of locations. Down on Pyra, it came awake, and our consciousness shifted to it. Now it’s…asleep again.”

  “Wouldn’t that brain have been burned up, as well?” Saanvi asked.

  “Maybe…or maybe it would have transferred into other, non-physical dimensions…it’s hard to say. I don’t really want to try it and find out.”

  “Good call,” Priscilla added as she fell in beside them.

  Tanis looked over at the avatar, and then paused, her gaze shifting to the mechs and humans gathered nearby.

  “Just a moment,” Tanis said. “I need to go thank Rika for saving me.”

  * * * * *

  Tanis didn’t let go of her daughter’s hands as she turned toward Rika and her team.

  The tall cyborg woman was surrounded by three humans, with a platoon of her soldiers coming down the Derringer’s ramp to join them.

  Tanis had to admit that she was impressed by these mechanized warriors. By her standards, what had been done to them was a horrible disfiguration, but the cyborgs bore their mech bodies with pride, never flinching or behaving as though they were in any way inferior to those around them.

  “Rika!” Tanis called out as she approached. “I owe you and yours a deep debt of gratitude.”

  Rika turned, a tired smile on her lips as she held out her left hand and Tanis slid hers from Cary’s tight grasp.

  “Admiral Richards,” Rika said as the two women shook hands. “I’m glad to see you’re doing better. You were in rough shape back on the planet…I imagine doing an impression of a starship engine is exhausting. No pun intended.”

  Tanis hadn’t realized that Rika must have seen her unleashing the energy barrage that had obliterated the Nietzscheans. She wondered what the woman thought of that—she still had no idea what to think of that.

  Angela advised.

  Tanis said with a laugh.

  “I was feeling a bit of burnout.” Tanis grinned at her joke, but then her smile disappeared. “I am deeply sorry about General Mill and Captain Ayer. I feel somewhat responsible for what happened to them. They died honorably.”

  Rika squared her shoulders and shook her head. “You may have been the catalyst, ma’am, but the blame lies with traitors in the Septhian and Theban governments. What happened here was going to occur sooner or later, anyway.”

  “You’re probably right about that,” Tanis replied, while reaching up to tuck her hair behind her ears. “We’ll have to determine how deep that sickness goes.”

  “What are your plans here, then?” Rika asked.

  Tanis looked the mechanized woman up and down. “First we’re going to finish off the Niets…there’s still a battle raging around us—though one can barely tell in here. Then we’ll restore this system to order and summon Prime Minister Harmin to see what he has to say for himself.”

  One of the men standing with Rika, a stocky dark-skinned soldier, snorted a laugh. “This I would love to see, the PM coming here with his tail between his legs.”

  “Barne, stow it,” Rika said, making a slicing motion through the air with her left hand.

  Tanis gave Barne a small smile. “As far as I can tell, Septhia recently lost Pyra, maybe all of Thebes. Not to mention that it was never really theirs in the first place. I’m not entirely certain that we should cede it back to them.”

  A small smile crept across Rika’s lips. “I like the way you think, Admiral.”

  Tanis placed a hand on Rika’s shoulder. “No ‘Admiral’ for you. To you, Rika, I am ‘Tanis’. I look forward to talking with you further. I think we can benefit one another greatly.”

  Rika’s cheeks lit up with a small flush, and she ducked her head in a nod. “Of course, Ad—Tanis. I look forward to that. Now that we’ve found the likes of the ISF, we’re not keen to run off on our own any time soon.”

  “Except that we need to get back out there,” one of the men with Rika—a young man named Chase, Tanis saw by the indicators on her HUD—said. “There’s still a fight to be had and a world to save.”

  Tanis nodded. “There is. I need to get to the bridge.”

  Angela said.

 

  Angela’s silvery laugh filled Tanis’s mind.

 

 

  While Tanis and Angela debated possible names, and reached out to the ship’s command network, Rika replied.

  “We’ll speak again soon, I hope, Tanis.”

  Tanis gave a crisp nod. “You can count on it. Just don’t get blown up out there.”

  Rika snorted. “Killed by Niets? Very unlikely.”

  “Good.” Tanis turned back toward the lift banks, her daughters and Priscilla in tow. Behind them, the Derringer was lifting off once more, turning back to the dock’s exit and the fight raging around Pyra.

  “Even we don’t get to call you ‘Tanis’ in formal situations,” Saanvi said with a grin, as they settled into the dockcar with Tanis at the controls.

  “She won’t either, but informally…I don’t know. There’s something about that Rika. She feels like a kindred spirit.”

  “She’s a warrior, that’s for sure,” Priscilla said from the back seat. “And a survivor. She told me some of her story during our journey insystem. That girl is built out of pure, unfiltered, hardcore moxy.”

  “Good,” Tanis replied. “She’s going to need it for what I have planned.”

  “What’s that, Mom?” Cary asked.

  Tanis glanced at her daughter—daughters.

  She was still amazed by how she could see Faleena within Cary’s mind. Tanis knew one thing was for sure: she wasn’t ascended—yet—but she wasn’t…whatever she used to be. It was as though she had one foot in each world.

  “Mom?” Cary asked. “Star Command to Mom.”

  Tanis shook her head and smiled. “Sorry, trying to coordinate the battlespace better. Joe did a good job setting it up, but there are optimizations.”

  “What about Rika, and what you have planned?” Saanvi inquired, as the dockcar reached the lift bank.

  “Oh, well, it’s obvious that we can’t let these Nietzschean scumbags stew for long. We’ve set them back, and now we have to finish the job. But I’m not willing to let the Trisilieds build up for much longer, either. They dropped a damn starship in our backyard on Carthage. That deserves recompense.”

  Saanvi chuckled. “JP said it
scared the horses all the way out at his farm.”

  “I wonder how he’s doing,” Cary murmured as they walked onto the lift. “He joined up for you, Sahn, and now you’re out here.”

  “Indeed,” Tanis raised an eyebrow as she regarded her daughters. “I seem to remember all sorts of stipulations being placed on you two after your escapades at Carthage. Ones that required you to finish your time at the academy—yet here you are, thousands of light years from the Palisades.”

  Cary shrugged, while Saanvi’s eyes widened in worry.

  Faleena giggled.

  Cary groaned. “It’s so disturbing when you call me that.”

  Angela said, a soft laugh accompanying her words.

  “I thought I was Good Mom and you were Mean Mom, Angela,” Tanis said.

  Cary snorted, and Saanvi raised a hand to cover her mouth.

 

  “She’s right, Mom,” Cary said with a sheepish nod. “It’s just how you are. We love you for it.”

  Tanis sighed. “Man…when you’re out-funned by an AI…”

  The doors opened a moment later, and Tanis was surprised to see the Carthage’s bridge foyer, and not the administrative concourse.

  “The Mark II’s have a dedicated dock-to-bridge lift tube,” Cary explained. “I think Abby had it added in. She complained it was always such a pain to get to the bridge on the Intrepid and I2.”

  Tanis shook her head as she surveyed the space—which was barren except for three empty pedestals at the far end. “There’s a reason why you don’t have direct access from the dock to the bridge.”

  “They added safety precautions,” Saanvi replied.

  Tanis wondered about that. Not that it mattered right now. “No avatars on the Carthage yet?”

  a new voice reached into Tanis’s mind.

  Angela replied with a warm glow in her voice.

  Kerr replied.

  “That we have,” Tanis replied, as the group walked across the foyer toward the short corridor that led to the bridge. “I’m glad you passed muster in time to ship out.”

 

  Tanis noticed Saanvi giving the empty pedestals a long look as they walked past, and felt a momentary burst of protectiveness.

  she asked Angela.

 

  Tanis wondered about that. Her plans to build dozens of I-Class ships meant she needed at least twice as many avatars. Over half the population of New Canaan was under the age of fifty, and she wasn’t prepared to allow outsiders to take on the role, so she may have to loosen her restrictions.

  She also wondered about the wisdom behind building more AIs as powerful as Bob. I’m not sure the galaxy needs more ‘hyper-intelligent’ beings.

  Angela commented.

 

  Angela laughed.

  They reached the bridge’s door, and Tanis squared her shoulders.

  Time to put on my game face.

  The doors slid open, and Tanis walked out to see a near-perfect mirror of the I2’s bridge. Her gaze slid over the rows of consoles, the captain’s chair, the holodisplays and tanks…until she saw Joe.

  He stood with his back to the door, arms akimbo, studying the battlespace projected on the main holotank, barking out orders and requesting details and analysis from the teams surrounding him.

  But the moment she stepped across the threshold, his head snapped up, and he turned to face her, a look of relieved joy spreading across his features.

  “Tanis,” he said, the single word cutting through the cacophony surrounding them.

  Tanis had intended to walk across the bridge calmly, filled with grace and poise, to give the love of her life a chaste embrace in the view of the crew.

  She did none of those things.

  One moment, her hands were clasped in those of her daughters, and the next, she was running across the bridge, weaving around consoles and crew, to crash into Joe—who ended up careening into her at the halfway point.

  Momentum spun them around, and Tanis brushed her hair out of her face a moment before their lips met, and their bodies pressed into one another in a desperate embrace.

  “Told you to be careful,” Joe mumbled, as their mouths slid past one another and came to rest near each other’s ears. “You nearly got killed, what…three times while you were gone?”

  “Who can keep track?” Tanis whispered as she continued to crush Joe against herself.

  Angela chuckled softly in their minds.

  “Stars, don’t actually tell me, Angela,” Joe admonished as he pulled away and stared into Tanis’s eyes. “So you’re still the pair of you in there, eh? The briefing Colonel Smith forwarded led me to have some doubts about who I’d meet.”

  Angela said.

  “Huh,” Joe cocked an eyebrow. “So much for hoping.”

  Tanis was surprised to hear him say that—though she wasn’t entirely certain he wasn’t joking. “I didn’t think you were anticipating our eventual merger.”

  “Tanis, I’ve been waiting for it for decades. You two just need to get on with it already. The anticipation is killing me.”

  Tanis said privately before turning to the main holotank. “So, how’re things going?”

  Joe turned and walked alongside her toward the view of the battlespace. “As if you don’t already know. I could see you nudging things long before you even got up here.”

  Tanis surveyed the allied fleets interspersed throughout the Nietzschean half-sphere of ships. What Joe and the allies had pulled off was almost beyond comprehension; to jump so many ships into such a small area simultaneously was an unparalleled marvel. The timing alone would probably be the subject of thousands of dissertations in the future.

  “All hail the QuanComm system,” Tanis said in a near whisper as she watched a detachment of ISF ships push through the Nietzschean forces, and engage a pocket of enemy vessels that were inflicting heavy losses on a group of Scipian cruisers.

  Nearer to the Carthage lay the wreckage of a thousand Nietzschean vessels that had attempted to boost away from Pyra and burn the world as they fled.

  “Looks like you gave them what they deserved,” Tanis said, gesturing to the remains of the fleet, which was moving into a loose orbit high above Pyra.

  “Cowards,” Joe shook his head. “Nietzschean master morality is such a crock of shit. Only they would consider something like burning a planet honorable. Whoever made a civilization based on Nietzsche’s teachings needs to have their head examined.”

  “I imagine they’re long dead,” Tanis replied. “Which is lucky for them.”

  “Well, there’s still their emperor—some pretentious ass who took on the name ‘Constantine’.”

  Tanis nodded. “Yeah, he’s on my list now.”

  “Good, mine too.”

  As Tanis began sending commands to the fleet, a pain stabbed through her stomach, and she realized something was missing.

  “Any chance someone can get me a BLT?”

  RELIEF

  STELLAR DATE: 08.28.8949 (Adjusted Years)

  LOCATION: Presidential Stateroom, Keren Station

  REGION: Khardin
e System, Transcend Interstellar Alliance

  [They got her. Safe and sound.]

  Sera reread Joe’s message four times before she allowed herself to believe it. She had half a mind to grab a ship and jump out to Thebes just to set eyes on Tanis herself.

  Jen sounded relieved as well.

  “Yeah, well, Tanis is pretty important to our efforts. I don’t know who I could put in charge of the Inner Stars offensive without her—stars, I don’t even know if the ISF would remain in the fight.”

 

  Sera nodded. That was true, but would those two men be able to muster the entire populace of New Canaan to the war effort like Tanis had? They had their Starflight plan, their Aleutian backup location—wherever that was. If ever there was a people fully prepared to drop off the face of the map, it was they.

  Give them more credit than that, she admonished herself. They’re putting everything into defending a galaxy that they don’t even know—and that has tried to wipe them out more than once.

  Sera rose from her desk and walked to the window that looked out over the inside of Keren Station’s habitation cylinder.

  The peaceful scene of gently rolling hills and grassy plains was incongruous with the events going on elsewhere. The fact that the ships of the alliance were even now engaged in a pitched battle with the Nietzscheans while she watched birds wheel above was hard to swallow.

  She sighed and leant against the sill. Life doesn’t stop everywhere else when something bad happens. It just soldiers on.

  Jen suggested.

  “You sure like to mother me,” Sera said with a soft laugh as she ran a hand through her hair.

 

  “It’s OK,” Sera interrupted Jen. “I didn’t mean it like that. I said it without even thinking of Helen. That’s progress, I guess, right?”