Onboard the CES Retribution
Flagship of the First Intergalactic Admiral of the Celestial Expanse Fleet
The planet was a blackened ball hanging in space, a collage of white ash and gray smoke and ebony char, its monochromatism broken only by the smallest hints of green. Iolanthe—once the most verdant planet in the Expanse, now just a lifeless rock floating in space. She’d carried the hopes of a straitened empire upon her back, though few knew it, and with her death, all those hopes might soon follow.
“Is there anything left?” the Admiral asked.
From the other end of the link, Captain Nye-Tang—once the Chairman’s creature, now her own—gave a diffident shrug. “Some pieces here and there—structural remains, scattered acres of Rainforest—but as far as we’re concerned? No. The specific flora required to create both Psi-Lac and Spec 1280 burned with the planet.”
“And there’s no other source.”
“No. These plants were unique to Iolanthe. According to the records they left behind, the TruCon team did attempt to grow them both in labs and off-world, but they were never able to replicate the conditions on Iolanthe closely enough to succeed. That’s why they had to base their operations here. The Chairman thought if he kept the operation secret from all but the most need to know, the scientists could continue their work there indefinitely, but somehow the enemy found out. The Specs knew what they were doing when they hit this planet. They knew this place would be both the beginning and the end.”
The Admiral’s lips twisted. “The Chairman was a squatter; of course, the enemy knew. Just like they knew about R&D, just like they knew about the Archangel.” Folding her hands behind her back, she paced three steps to the right and then back again, contemplating the situation. At last, she turned back to the screen. “So once our current supplies of Psi-Lac and Spec 1280 run out, that’s it. We’re done.”
“Unfortunately, yes. The Spectranol, at least, is less of problem. As you know, it was the Tellurians who originally pioneered the serum. Though the ingredients are not common, there are still places they can be obtained.”
“What about the enemy? Did any of the Spectres escape?”
“No ships made it off the planet—”
“Good.”
“However”—Nye-Tang paused—“though no ships left, the enemy seems to have . . . disappeared.”
The Admiral leveled him with a cold stare. “Explain.”
“There were thousands of ghouls on that planet, and yet since the burning of Iolanthe, my people have yet to find a single one.”
“Then they must have hitched,” the Admiral stated with a shrug of her shoulder, “hidden inside a squatter either during or after the firestorm. The ghouls are incorporeal; as far as we know, there’s no limit to how many can hide within a single host. All it would take is one squatter.”
“That’s what we assumed, but . . .” Nye-Tang shook his head. “If there is a squatter harboring hitchers, we have yet to find them.”
“Have you found any survivors at all?”
“Just two, both teenagers. My people contacted me about them barely half an hour ago. The first is a girl who managed to escape the fire by hiding in the river. My people didn’t even pick up her life signs until she stumbled out of hiding. She was badly injured, so they haven’t gotten a lot of information out of her, but based on what we know, she seems to have been at the center of things.”
“Was she?”
“It gets even more interesting. We IDed her using her chit, and it turns out she isn’t just anybody. Her name is Teal Sorenson. She’s the younger sister of Michael Sorenson, and it was her family who hosted Lia Johansen on New Sol Space Station before she went Nova.”
Sheer astonishment froze the Admiral in place for a long moment. “Teal Sorenson.” She spoke the name carefully, almost reverently. “So first her friend strikes the opening blow in the war by blowing up New Sol. Then her brother is front and center for the Fall of R&D. And now here she is, one of only two to survive the Burning of Iolanthe. This can’t be a coincidence.”
“It seems unlikely.”
She thought for a moment, then asked, “Who is the other survivor?”
“A boy who was imprisoned underground.”
“I thought everyone in the TruCon bunkers drowned.”
“They did, but this boy wasn’t in the main TruCon bunker. He was in a separate installation, sealed off from the main network. I believe I have his name here.” He brought up the intel on his tip-pad and offered it to the Admiral.
“I know this name,” she said after a glance, surprise arching one perfect eyebrow just the smallest bit. “This is the boy from the Nguyen school, a Tellurian refugee and the only person to escape the bombing. Every person there died except for him. I wanted to question him, but by the time I received the report, he had already disappeared.” She scanned the details on the tip-pad and laughed sourly. “Of course—the Doctor. I should’ve known it was him who’d hidden the boy from me. My father always did have a penchant for strays. No doubt he thought the boy would be safe here. If only he’d known—” She fell abruptly silent.
A beat passed, then, “I assume they’re both infected?”
“The girl, yes, though we checked, and she’s not carrying any hitchers, but the boy is clean.”
“Is he? Interesting.”
Hands still folded behind her back, she walked slowly to the viewport, lost in thought as she considered all the connections suddenly in play. Pieces of a cosmic puzzle far too vast to see were suddenly coming together in ways she hadn’t foreseen, and she didn’t know what to make of it. Minutes passed, and then came the tentative clearing of a throat.
“Admiral? My people are asking me for orders. What do you want us to do with these two?”
The Admiral pivoted on one heel and turned to face him. “Send the girl to Interrogation. It can’t be a coincidence she’s connected to both the New Sol bomber and the Doctor’s emissary from R&D. Whatever she knows, they’ll get it out of her, one way or another.”
“And the boy?”
“He was on Tiersten when the last of the Tellurian Resistance went down, he was at Nguyen when it was bombed by squatters, and now he’s escaped the Burning of Iolanthe without a scratch. Three encounters with the enemy, and still he’s uninfected.
“He’s an Immune,” she declared. “He has to be. And there’s only one place for Immunes.”
“Helios,” Nye-Tang slowly stated, understanding dawning in his eyes. “But that’s—” He stopped, as if suddenly realizing it would be better not to finish his thought aloud, then finished softly, “He’s just a kid.”
“So?”
Nye-Tang opened his mouth to reply, then closed it again, uncertain what to say. That the military’s secret bioresearch facility was no place for a child? That it was wrong to experiment on a kid just because he happened to possess a valuable trait in this misbegotten war? But no. Helios, and everyone in it, was hers. If the Admiral wanted him, she would have him, and there was nothing he could do to stop it. Instead, all he said was, “I just think it would be a shame to send him to his death after all he’s survived.”
The Admiral stared at him levelly. “Don’t worry, I’ll take good care of him.”
“Yes, Admiral.” Nye-Tang paused, then added, “There’s one more thing.”
“Yes?”
“The girl’s brother, Michael Sorenson. Ever since Iolanthe went down, Sorenson’s been kicking up a fuss, trying to ascertain his sister’s fate and badgering his superiors for a chance to rescue her. He’s been at it for six months now; he’s not just going to go away. He’s going to come looking for her.”
“Just because he looks doesn’t mean he’ll find her.”
“Maybe not,” he conceded, “but he won some powerful allies after his service at R&D. With them on his side, he may get further than you think.”
“I think you overestimate his abilities. Nevertheless, you’re right. We should take care of this nuisance now, before it becomes an actual problem.” The Admiral considered for a moment. The barest hint of a smile spread across her lips. “The girl’s brother wants to know what happened to his sister? So we’ll tell him.”
“Admiral?”
First Admiral of the Fleet Icaria Avery Angelou arched one perfectly-shaped eyebrow over a frost-blue eye. “Add her name to the list of the dead.”