The Immortal War Read online

  The sentence had a profound effect on the Pleab. He pressed back in his chair, the dark tone of his skin turning a shade lighter.

  “What has happened, Coric? You are in distress.”

  “Distress! Yes, I am in distress. Are you not?”

  “The array will be functioning again soon.”

  “Shall I summarize for you, Sindus? We had two brief exchanges of information before your facility was damaged, verifying the existence of the Aris Kracion, as was relayed in the ancient documents. This was good. Yet the news of a massive colony of Klin was not. For eight hundred years the Olypon were under the control of the Klin. Yet they are now gone, and the Olypon control our own destiny. That destiny was to include an affiliation with the Aris, one which would lead us to power and glory within the galaxy. Now we learn that the Klin have been partners with Kracion for all this time. Yes, he will surely accept our assistance, yet in what capacity? Subservient to the Klin once again?”

  “That will have to be negotiated,” Sindus replied. “Once contact is reestablished, we will receive the honor we deserve for freeing the Aris from his prolonged exile. It is a feat not easily dismissed. Not even the Klin—either here or in the other universe—could accomplish such a task. We will be rewarded.”

  Coric was not placated. He was shaking his head. “And with that recognition was also to come protection, protection against the forces of the galaxy who would see Kracion—and us—as a threat. At this point, there is so little we know of the Aris and his powers. We were to learn of that before exposing ourselves. Now with the array inoperable, we are at a loss.”

  “Of course, yet this is only temporary.”

  “Even so, we may not have time. Adam Cain has already alerted the Union, and as a consequence the Expansion, of our intentions.”

  Until this point, Sindus had been standing before the governing desk. Now he sat in a chair to relieved his weakened legs.

  “How do you know this?”

  “I received a link from Earth.”

  “Directly? What did they say?”

  “They asked about your facility, knowing it to be a trans-dimensional portal.”

  “They…they….”

  “I told them they were mistaken; that it was a communication array of considerable complexity due to the location of Olypon within the Dysion Void.”

  “Did they believe you?”

  “The CW signal was routed through Mon-Sim, yet I very much doubt they are believing. Adam Cain would not let them accept such a deflection.”

  “But we are not ready—”

  “That I am aware. We have but two hundred ships, all clustered within the Void. We could easily be barricaded at the Volseen Corridor. And without Kracion and any miracle weapons he could provide, we would be no match for even a small force from either the Expansion or the Union. We were to remain hidden until the time of our choosing. Now our plans—all of our plans—are in jeopardy.”

  “I understand now your concern, Coric. I was not aware of what has taken place.”

  “Everything is dependent on getting the array operational again, allowing for Kracion to enter the Void. He will provide guidance and our needed protection.” Coric gnashed his teeth in a fit of frustration. “At this point, I would even welcome the Klin, anything to save Olypon from certain doom.”

  “I will expedite all efforts at the facility.”

  Sindus stood up, just as an assistant entered the chamber unannounced.

  “My Pleab, a development on Mon-Sim!” said the excited young Olypon. “The report is being relayed on channel six.”

  With all the unexpected events over the past several days, Coric was not upset with the messenger and his abrupt appearance and report. Instead he turned to his control device and activated a large-screen monitor on the wall. The three natives stood in awe of what they saw.

  It was a selection of aerial views of the transport facility on Mon-Sim, taken from orbit above the planet. It only took a moment to realize that the station had been attacked. Smoke still filled the thin air, and dozens of guards and repair crew lay on the ground between the tower array and what had once been the control center. One of the towers was on its side, a mangled mass of red metal strewn across the gray dust.

  Sindus fell back into the chair. He knew the facility better than anyone. There was a backup control station in one of the generator buildings which could be modified if need be. But it was the loss of the tower that was the most devastating. The other two towers were still upright yet leaning at strange angles. The scientist knew the effort required to replace the tower and correct the others. That would take longer than rebuilding the control center.

  And then Coric’s words came back to him, speaking of the Humans and the Expansion knowing of their purpose. In no reality would they give the Olypon time to repair such damage before entering the Void in force.

  “My Pleab, what is that?” asked the young assistant, still in the room, having been caught up in the graphic nature of the video.

  The scene had shifted, taken now from another of the many warships in orbit above the planet, showing a vast stretch of space lit by the ever-present glow of the Dysion Shield. Sindus knew what was happening, even if the Pleab did not.

  A portal was opening.

  * * *

  The small Klin fleet shot through the rip in the space-time continuum, along with five of the Olypon ships before it closed. Unlike a traditional single-sided link, this was a one-time affair, a two-tower creation that would burn out after a single use. If Kracion had remained on the other side, he might have been able to rebuild the system. But not the Klin. Any future transits would have to be initiated from the Olypon side until the ancient TD array was rebuilt completely.

  After a very brief period of disorientation, Kracion checked the location screens. He knew the portal would be open to his home galaxy, but exactly where was not known. It should be in the vicinity of the Olypon array, since the fabric of space-time had been joined by the creases of the TD arrays. But that was not guaranteed. His first concern was whether or not he was in the right galaxy at all. If he wasn’t, and without another array nearby, he could be trapped in a second lost universe for eternity, however long that was for him.

  To his relief, he was sitting in space directly above a planet with an anomaly identified as a trans-dimensional portal array. He had made it. After four thousand years, Kracion was home….

  “My Lord,” said a voice behind him. He had designated the title simply for convenience. The Klin insisted on calling him something other than his name. They seemed embarrassed to use it.

  “Report.”

  “Several contacts closing. Energy weapons charged.”

  “Pilot, place the ship to the center of the formation! Order the Olypon in to form a screen around us. Shields up!”

  “They are Olypon vessels, my Lord,” said the same officer.

  “Olypon? Why are their weapons energized? Connect me to First Sentry Harkor.”

  The Olypon commander appeared on a screen a moment later. He was in the lead alien ship, one of the five that made it through the portal.

  “Your forces are engaging, why?” Kracion yelled. “Back them away or they will be destroyed. Defensive stations, prepare to fire.”

  “My Lord Kracion, I am in contact with them at this moment. I have ordered them to stand down. They were on alert and not expecting our arrival. It was simply a reaction; no hostilities were intended.”

  “Maintain alert status,” Kracion ordered the Klin bridge crew. “Answer any overt acts with full retaliation.”

  “Yes my Lord.”

  Kracion fingered his security vest, absently stroking the smooth leather straps. It would save him in case of the ship’s destruction, yet only temporarily. He was in a strange universe, one he’d not visited in four thousand years, and as long as he remained mortal, he was vulnerable. He was not known here; even the subservient Olypon had turned against him in a moment of confusion. He ha
d a long way to go before his position in this galaxy would be secure.

  “My Lord, other developments.”

  The high-pitched squeal of the Klin officer was grating on Kracion’s nerves. The alien had given him nothing but bad news since their arrival in the home galaxy. What now?

  A screen lit up next to the main monitor, this one showing a section of the planet below. The image zoomed in.

  Kracion didn’t need to ask what these new developments were; he could see them on the screen. It was a magnified view of the portal array complex. It was a total loss, with one of the towers spread out on the ground to the west and only two of the three buildings remaining intact. As it was at the facility on the moon Zanor, the control center was gone. But there was more.

  A number of beings in spacesuits were running from the complex in panic, while others lay motionless on the gray ground, spread haphazardly about. And in the light atmosphere of the planet, dust and smoke lingered in the air. What had happened to the facility had just occurred.

  Kracion was stunned. There had been a high probability that Adam Cain did not have a chance to cause severe damage to the facility, not after jumping into the middle of an Olypon fleet. He would have been fortunate to escape alive. However, there was also a chance he had engaged in a suicide attack to prevent Kracion from entering the galaxy. But even that would have caused minor damage. So Kracion was expecting a facility that could be easily repaired, which would provide him the means to return to the Newfound—and his encasement chamber—if the need arose. Now it appeared he was trapped in this universe and without options for return.

  And until he found the Aris station, he would remain mortal for all that time.

  Could this be the work of Adam Cain? Possibly, yet eight days local time had elapsed. Would he have remained in the area for that duration? Could he have mustered an assault team from local resources, possibly even among the Olypon? Or was this something else? His questions were many, and for a creature like Kracion, having questions without answers was a sin.

  “Search the survivors for the perpetrators,” Kracion ordered.

  “How…how can we tell, my Lord?” asked a brave—or foolish—crewmember.

  “Study the spacesuits. Beings with suits like those lying dead on the ground are to be discounted. Look for others.”

  “Yes, my Lord.”

  “Would you wish to inspect the damage?” asked the Klin captain, Benorin Velosi. “Shall I prepare a shuttle?”

  Kracion cringed. A shuttle? No! That would be too exposed, and the terrorists may still be in the area.

  “No…instruct the Olypon force commander to escort my ship to their planet. I seek an audience with their leader.”

  “Yes, my Lord.”

  10

  Having left the TD facility in a sprint, Adam and the team reached the Mustang Sally ten minutes later and ran inside, huffing and puffing even in the light gravity of Mon-Sim. Monty took up piloting duties while Copernicus sat at the nav station and Riyad designated a free console for the ship’s limited weapons. Tidus rotated a chair next to him.

  “I’m calling up the threat board,” Riyad raceannounced. “Damn…looks like twenty-one of those oblong Klin ships above us, plus a whole slew of Olypon.”

  “How can we escape from such a force?” asked the Flin mercenary. “They will destroy us the moment we lift off.”

  “He’s right,” said Monty from the pilot seat. “And we can’t sit here. Eventually they’ll scan farther out and see us.”

  “This thing has landing skids, doesn’t it?” Adam asked.

  “You know it does. We’re sitting on them right now.”

  “Then we need to put some distance between us and the TD array before we make for space. How small of a gravity-well can you create ahead of us?”

  “Small? You want us to be pulled along the surface with a gravity-well? Are you crazy?”

  “A little. But we can’t use chemical drive, that would leave a trail.”

  “Yet the Sally skidding along the ground won’t?” Riyad asked.

  “Yeah, but most of our dust will be sucked into the singularity. We’ll leave a line in the sand, along with some torn up soil, but nothing that should be visible from seventy-five thousand miles in space.”

  “You hope not,” Copernicus said. “I say go for it. What do we have to lose?”

  “My thoughts exactly. What say you, master chief? You up for some cross-country skiing?”

  Monty Pitts already had the generators humming. It would be a minute or so before they would be charged enough for the focusing rings to create a series of miniature blackholes out of nothing. Monty fingered the controls to the gravity-well with exquisite precision, moving the dial until there was barely a signal. The well would have to be incredibly small to avoid being detected from space. And to make it move the ship, it would also have to be incredibly close. The graphic on his display placed the microscopic dot only nineteen feet beyond the farthest point of the forward section of the Sally. The ship began to move.

  Then it rumbled to a stop, plowing a portion of the nose into the loose soil. Pitts made adjustments, angling the focusing rings up slightly, giving the Sally a little extra lift. They began to move again.

  Moments later they were skiing over the gray surface at a respectable clip. Adam was disappointed to see that not all the dust was being sucked forward into the gravity-well. It wasn’t strong enough to pick up all traces.

  “There,” Adam said, pointing. “Get behind that hill. It should give us some cover.”

  “From the surface, but not the air.” Copernicus noted.

  Adam ignored him, although he was closely studying Coop’s nav screen, watching the miles click off.

  The mountain range dissecting the planet was not a contiguous feature. At various intervals one mountain would descend to the high plain before another rose up to take its place. At one of these gaps, Monty pulled the Sally off the ground and began to thread cautiously through a steep valley. Fifteen minutes later they were on the other side of the mountain range.

  “Time to make a break for space?” Pitts asked. The question was out of respect for Adam’s rank, but he already had the starship angled upwards.

  “Ready on weapons,” Adam ordered.

  Riyad and Tidus had been ready for forty minutes, tensely gripping the firing controls, waiting for a target.

  To their surprise, the space above the planet was relatively clear of hostiles. Coop expanded the range and picked up a large mass of ships bolting away, heading for Olypon; the Klin vessels remained in formation while following the signatures of the native ships.

  “This is our opening, guys!” Adam explained. “Mr. Pitts, get us to the Shield as soon as you can.”

  “You are not expecting another transit of the nebula, are you?” the master chief asked. “We’re pretty beat up, and I don’t know the way from here.”

  “Just hide us somewhere,” Adam said. “It looks like Kracion is going to Olypon. Let’s wait and see what his next move is. If he decides to stick around until the TD array is repaired, that will give our people time to get here, and maybe even the Expansion, if Sherri and Arieel have any success. The longer he stays in the Void, the better. At least here he’s contained.”

  * * *

  Coric’s office was swarming with heavily armed Klin. He had many years of experience with the silver-skinned aliens, yet he found these to be different. These seemed stronger, rougher. The Klin who had occupied Olypon for all those centuries had been more gentle, delicate even. Not these Klin from the lost universe.

  They cleared most of the people from the building, over the protests of the natives, staring down several members of Coric’s security force until he ordered his people to obey. This was what he feared, that the Aris would treat the Olypon as second-class citizens in his new regime. Yet he could not blame the alien. He did not know the Olypon, only from the brief contact he had with First Sentry Harkor and his small fleet. It wou
ld be Coric’s job to win over the powerful being.

  Kracion eventually entered, a disappointment in Coric’s mind. The god-being and the Source, as he was called by various contingents of the Klin, was a slender, frail-looking creature of modest height. On the streets he would have been barely noticeable, someone to ignore. Coric did his best to put aside his preconceptions. This was the alien referred to in dozens of ancient documents, the genius who had single-handedly formed what the galaxy had become, and who not only helped create races, but also provided the wonders that allowed the Klin to set the stage for the Expansion and all the other empires it has spawned, including the Human Orion-Cygnus Union. Standing before him could be the creature who created the Olypon from primordial mud. By all definitions, Kracion was a god, no matter what he looked like.

  “I am Kracion,” the Aris stated. “Who are you?”

  “I am Coric Son Kal Sorum, Pleab of the Olypon. I welcome you to our world. We are at your service, having done all we could to make this moment possible.”

  “Yes, you built the array, using ancient plans I left with the Klin. For that I am appreciative. For allowing the facility to be destroyed, I am not. You will devote all your efforts to its rebuilding. Spare no personnel or resources. The array must be functioning in twenty days.”

  “Twenty days?” Coric gasped. “My…my Lord, it took us four years to build it initially.”

  “You will complete the task as I have ordered. The generators are intact, as are two of the towers. I will instruct your technicians in new production methods and will provide a pair of my service modules to supervise the construction. It will be done.”

  With that statement, Kracion moved behind the governing desk and sat in Coric’s chair. The Pleab was standing in the center of the room, there to greet the Aris. He did not protest the appropriation of his seat and position. Kracion motioned for him to take a chair on the other side of the desk.

  “We shall have a discussion, Pleab Coric. I have been away from the home galaxy for a long time; there is much I must learn. I was not aware Olypon was located within a void area within a nebula. The names you call these regions will mean nothing to me initially. At the time I was stranded within the Newfound Galaxy, no such names existed. You will give me a briefing as to our location and the forces of the galaxy as you know them to be. I wish to learn of opponents, of political and military alliances, as well as scientific technology with regards to transport and weaponry. Bring in what prompts you need. I can absorb the knowledge much faster than you can provide it. I seek first a living perspective on the missing history of the galaxy, after which I will access your computer databases.”