Epilogue

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Three weeks later.

Admiral Absen sat comfortably sipping Mars-brewed whiskey in his expanded office aboard Conquest. Timmons had acquired some through the Chief’s network to replace the Scotch that had finally run out. Now if only he could get some decent smokes.

The more things change, the more they stay the same was the quote that ran through his mind. Here he was in charge of EarthFleet again, guarding the poor suffering planet against the threat of invasion. Still, things seemed much brighter now that he had Rae by his side. He still wasn’t one hundred percent sure her attraction to him wasn’t partly political, but at this point he didn’t want to spoil a good thing by thinking too deeply about it.

Another difference this time around: no more dealing with a slow-moving bureaucracy. Spectre was the government now, and when he wanted something to happen, it happened. Absen didn’t see how that was going to change unless the Blend stepped down voluntarily. With the Skulls and other Blends serving him, no one was likely to challenge him for some time to come – and Absen wasn’t at all sure he’d want anyone else to take over. Better the devil you know... Besides, anyone with a mind to rebel against authority had already joined the resistance movement and then become the new government.

Absen sighed. Earth’s governance wasn’t his main problem. His problem was getting the orbital industries working and the space-based economy on track. He was short of skilled workers and almost every sort of machine, though he could get simple laborers from the planet and train them himself. Plenty of people were out of jobs with all the damage the Scourges did to the ecosystem.

Somehow he had to cobble together sufficient defenses to repel another Scourge invasion, and he had no idea when that would show up. Probably not for months, but beyond that, who knew? For just a few weeks, from the time he left Gliese 370 until he learned about the Scourge, he’d felt like he was ahead of the game. Now he was playing catch-up again.

Fortunately the Meme had decided to stick around. Absen laughed to himself. What a change in his thinking! He’d fought them for a century. In fact, most of his adult life was defined by fighting Meme, and now he desperately needed their firepower and their ability to grow and reproduce their ships.

Rae had explained to him that their SystemLord was probably staying because of his title and position. If he went elsewhere, he would have to take a demotion. By remaining in Earth’s system, he would automatically take forces under his command as they arrived as long as they did not outrank him. Assuming the Meme kept their bargain, that was all to the good.

In the rock-paper-scissors situation they had now, Conquest and the technology she used could beat the Meme quite handily – but Destroyers were more efficient swarm killers with their huge short-ranged fusors, especially so when they acted as squadrons to cover each other.

That reminded the admiral of something to put on the long wish list: a study on how to optimize weaponry and tactics against the Scourge. Perhaps a squadron-integrated point defense network...but that would have to come after the upgraded SLAMs and the permanent fortress that would sit above the Sun’s pole ready to fire them. The best defense against FTL emergence was to hit the enemy prior to coming out of null space confusion, destroying the motherships whole, before the swarms launched.

Defensive problems were interesting, but Absen’s mind really raced when thinking about how EarthFleet would employ their own FTL drive. The old Ryss physicist Plessk still had a few good years in him depending on how much medical care the cat would accept, and his team had assured the admiral that they could build a working FTL drive within a year or two. They even had some ideas on how to use the effect to communicate faster than light.

With FTL came a whole new ball game. Humanity could send probes to other stars and get intelligence within weeks rather than decades – establish outposts, military bases and colonies.

Take the fight to the enemy.

If the treaty held, maybe humans and Meme could get along well enough to establish some kind of confederation, a new order where all species could help defend each other from threats like the Scourge and share as equals in the wealth of the galaxy. That might be the real, permanent result of all the death and tragedy.

If so, then maybe it was all worth it.

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THE END of Conquest of Earth.

READ ON for an excerpt from Conquest and Empire, Stellar Conquest Book 5.

Excerpt from CONQUEST AND EMPIRE

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2163 A.D., two years after the first Scourge attack on Earth.

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“We’re through to the inner chamber, my lord,” Gilgamesh said over the hard line.

The man called Spectre, who had once been Spooky Nguyen, took a deep breath. “Excellent. I’ll be there shortly,” he replied before replacing the field telephone handset in its cradle on the desk of the excavation’s on-site trailer office.

With quick, economical motions he ensured the placement of all of the weapons and tools he routinely kept on his person. Bodyguards were all well and good, but personal preparation was better. Assassination attempts had fallen off, but all it would take was one lucky and dedicated killer, and then bye bye Spectre.

Smoothing his yellow-piped black uniform and donning dark sunglasses, Spectre nodded to the head of his personal security detail and followed the man out into the blazing South African sunlight and across the packed, chalky earth toward the entrance to the dig. Even with the eye protection, he kept his lids nearly closed in anticipation of the underground journey.

Inside the sloping mineshaft, he took a seat on a makeshift bench installed in an ore car. His bodyguards leaped into two more of the battered steel vehicles and the subterranean train began to move, drawn by the electric engine in front.

Down, down they traveled as if on some pre-holocaust amusement park ride, but without animatronic monsters or falling foam rocks. Fifteen minutes and almost a mile of slanting distance later, they debouched into an open space still redolent with clouds of dust. Fans and foot-wide flexible air ducts fought to keep the atmosphere clear and the air breathable.

Gilgamesh handed Spectre a dust mask as he stepped down from the ore car and said through his own, “There’s a small opening through which we can see a chamber with machinery in it. We stopped as you commanded, my lord.”

“Can you tell whether it still has power?”

“Yes, it does. We saw faint lights.”

“Excellent.” Spectre followed the bulky Gilgamesh across the uneven floor toward a narrowing of the chamber, glad of the heavy miner’s boots he’d been advised to wear.

High on the wall, perhaps at the limits of his standing reach, he saw a hole the size of a football. A bench had been placed beneath it and Spectre leaped atop it, his hands grasping the edges of the small opening.

“Adjust your eyes for deep darkness and you will see,” Gilgamesh said. “Dim the lights!” he called to the work crew, and they did so.

Spectre exercised deliberate control over his vision, dilating his pupils wide and leaning his face as far forward as possible. Gradually, he became able to see into a curving chamber by the faint lights of machinery telltales, deliberately reduced, he presumed, to save power.

A surge of excitement flowed through him, but he showed no more than a calm, pleased enthusiasm as he stepped down to the floor and turned to his subordinate, the miners and engineers standing behind expectantly. “You have all done well. Everyone shall have bonus credit.”

Those present cheered and hooted, some calling out “Hurrah for Lord Spectre!” or variants of the same.

Spectre waved for quiet. “Open it now. Carefully.” He stepped back.

A grizzled miner moved up with a pneumatic jackhammer, a much safer tool than a laser drill, and began working to enlarge the opening. Once the hole grew to the size a man could fit through, Gilgamesh ordered a shift to hand tools.

Spectre waited patiently for them to create an opening of sufficient size to allow him to walk through with only a stoop. “Continue,” he said to those remaining behind. “Smooth the floor as well.”

“We will lay down walkways, my lord,” the mining foreman said with a dip of his head, and the work crew hastened to clear the debris.

Spectre ignored them as he picked his way past the mess and pulled out a hand light. Inside the chamber he could see reinforced concrete pillars and heavy support beams, all of which showed evidence of cracks and buckling. In places, chunks of the roof had come down, but the bunker, for such it was, remained largely intact.

Gilgamesh squeezed his bulk through the opening, and then dusted himself off. “They built well,” he remarked as he examined the rows of dust-covered machines in their hundreds.

Spectre grunted in agreement. “Carletonville was far enough from the impact of the Destroyers that the seismic shock didn’t – quite – overcome the engineering, and sufficiently inland that the tsunami didn’t reach here. I’m more impressed that the power systems are still functioning unattended after more than fifty years.” He laid a hand on one of the modules and began to brush off the grit that had fallen from the ceiling.

“Shall I have the engineers begin their work?”

“Not yet. I’ve studied the design of these units. They’re simple enough a child could use them. Deliberately so.” A smile twitched to Spectre’s lips. “Let’s see if we can do it ourselves.”

“As you wish, my lord.”

Gilgamesh’s obsequiousness has hardly slackened since I took over a year ago, Spectre thought. I’m beginning to think it’s a genuine personality trait rather than an affectation intended to lull me. I watch him closer than anyone, yet he’s never made a false move. Still, as a Blend and former Meme, I have to assume he is patient enough to wait decades for an opportunity to betray me. I wonder what he would think if he knew that this operation might diminish his usefulness to me? After all, if I can reacquire some old, long-lost friends and put them to work...

“Ah, here’s the screen,” Spectre said aloud.

The thick crystal display was shielded from above with a metal hood and ringed by simple, robust buttons rather than complex but delicate controls. For deep programming, computers would be connected to an electronic port, but to begin the resuscitation cycle one merely had to press the keys in sequence.

The thick buttons were molded as well as marked, their tops shaped into numbers from one to five. The first pulsed with a faint glow, barely visible.

“Shall we begin?” Spectre said as he depressed it with his thumb.

In response, the second button lit, brighter this time, and he heard a faint hum begin from the automobile-sized module in front of him. Depressing number two increased the sounds emitted, and a gurgling added itself to the noises.

The third button did not illuminate. When Spectre tapped it experimentally it seemed frozen, locked in place.

“It may take some time for it to light,” Gilgamesh suggested.

“Perhaps. Or perhaps it’s inoperative.” Spectre moved to the next module and blew the dust away before firmly pressing the first button down, and then the second. Sounds similar to the first unit emerged, but third button also remained unlit.

Gilgamesh kept his respectful silence, so Spectre said, “It appears your contention is more likely correct. We must wait.”

Above his mask the other Blend’s eyes widened in amusement. “Thank you, my lord.”

Spectre waved as if brushing away flies. “If I ever become so certain of my own opinions that I don’t acknowledge the wisdom of others, please remind me. In fact, simply say, ‘remember, thou art mortal.’ I give you my word I will not hold it against you.”

“As you wish, my lord.”

Not for the first time the urge grew within Spectre to insist on a relaxation of formality, perhaps doing away with this “my lord” business that Gilgamesh himself had begun upon their first meeting, at least for his inner circle. It had caught on, and now others used the honorific with pride. Perhaps he would do so...but later. For now, humanity needed rigid structure and ruthless hierarchy more than it needed egalitarianism.

Besides, he could tell that Gilgamesh gained status within the eyes of his own subordinates by the subtle emphasis on his proximity to Spectre’s exalted position. Why discard that incentive?

Glancing down the nearest row of modules, Spectre considered beginning the vivification sequences for all of them in order to save time, but decided against it.

First, doing so might strain the power systems in place here, precipitating some crisis his engineers might not be able to correct.

Second, it might prove confusing and inconvenient to revive them all at once, especially if they had some special and sudden need. That began another train of thought, resulting in his decision that a long list of supplies and specialists be brought down.

“I want the medical team here as soon as possible, as well as I.V. nutrients, solid food, clean water, field beds, gurneys, and anything else one might need to assist wounded or sick people,” he said to Gilgamesh. “Exercise your best judgment and spare no expense. You know what’s at stake.”

“The preparations are already begun, my lord,” Gilgamesh said, rushing out the entrance to supervise.

Of course, thought Spectre, these people have performed any number of such recovery operations, but never one of such significance.

As the third button had not yet lit on either of the activated modules, Spectre took a slow tour of the facility. Besides the main room with the score of modules he found the remains of a control room, but it had sustained more damage than the central space, and the consoles there lacked all power. He also found storerooms with long-life supplies, some of which seemed still intact.

His impatience almost got the better of him, but he forced himself to wait for the loads of supplies and skilled personnel to be brought down. An hour or so into the involuntary hiatus the third buttons lit up, and he pressed the next immediately on both, confident that the units would hold until the fifth and final completed the process.

As he waited, he sat and meditated, digging deep into his store of memories, mental recordings of 2075, almost a century ago and just prior to the launch of what was until then humanity’s greatest, and perhaps its riskiest, endeavor.

-=-

“For once in my life I wish I had the power to forbid you, Spooky,” Daniel Markis had said. “Joining Task Force Conquest takes you out of the picture for at least forty years, and for what? The faint possibility that your personal abilities will be needed at the other end?”

“Much more than that, I hope. But don’t underestimate the effectiveness of one man at a pivotal moment in a battle or a negotiation. Look at yourself, DJ. You’ve hared off to intervene personally in Earth’s politics any number of times.”

“Because that’s my appointed role. You don’t see me parachuting into hot spots with a rifle and a medical bag any more, do you? And you’ve become a highly effective politician. Under your rule Australia has become the premier economic powerhouse of Earth. If you really want to change jobs, take mine. You’d make a better chairman than I ever have.”

Spooky shook his head slowly. “I must disagree, my friend. I might surpass you in some areas, though not in all...but more importantly, I am not a leader everyone can admire. Too many people fear me more than love me. You, Daniel...you they idolize. You’re the savior of mankind, the man on the white horse.”

Markis snorted derisively. “You make me sound like the Second Coming of Christ.”

“And were I to take over, I’d be the Antichrist,” Spooky retorted. “You once told me you know what I am. Do you really think it’s wise to offer me all the kingdoms of the Earth? Who’s playing Satan’s tempting role now?”

“You could have had those kingdoms long ago. I judge people on their actions, not what they claim to want or to be. It’s been decades since I worried about your ambitions. You’re the most disciplined, controlled human being I’ve ever met, and believe me, I’ve known quite a few.” Exasperated, Markis stood up from behind his desk to gaze out his bulletproof window onto the green, manicured grounds of his Carletonville, South Africa office.

The complex still hosted the world’s premier biotech research facility, over the last few decades accreting to itself personnel and resources from all over the globe, but it was better known as the place from which the Chairman of the Council of Earth governed.

That council possessed a building built on the outskirts of Mumbai, India, a crossroads of the cultures and peoples of East and West, North and South, but over half of the membership chose to attend meetings via VR link. Why travel to or live near a place one didn’t like, when technology made it possible to plug in and feel almost exactly as if one was standing in the meeting chamber itself? With holographic projectors in every room, it was even possible to move one’s presence within the capitol building to attend any necessary function.

This way, Daniel could stay near his wife Elise, chief researcher for the biotech lab. Friends and family were also here, his roots. Vincent had left for a career in the service – and in fact, would be departing soon on Conquest – but his other three children still lived near enough to visit from time to time.

Markis jerked his thoughts back to the quiet presence of the man standing behind him, waiting. “Sorry, woolgathering,” he said.

“I understand,” Spooky replied.

“I’m not sure you do. If you leave, who will keep Australia running like clockwork?”

“Ann Alkina is perfectly competent to do so.”

“You’d leave your wife behind?”

“Others will. Besides, doesn’t absence make the heart grow fonder?”

“For decades? I couldn’t do it,” Markis said. “Not on a...a whim, an impulse.”

“Daniel, you know me better than that. This isn’t an impulse.” Spooky moved around to stand next to Markis, looking out the window into the hazy distance. “In fact, it’s a necessity. I need a change. I’ve become bored, and when I’m bored I risk falling into petty cruelty, visiting inordinate revenges upon those who offend me, becoming distracted with personal issues...and the darkness within me grows, becomes difficult to restrain.”

Markis held his silence for a time. “I didn’t know. But I think I understand. When I was on active duty, so long ago, I struggled with my own darkness. Concussions exacerbated it, but the men I killed – evil men, for sure, but still men – haunted me. Yet, I’d become addicted to combat. I felt dead anywhere but on a battlefield. I told myself I was there to save lives, but I had to admit to myself, sometimes, that I also relished the killing.”

“I wish I only relished killing, Daniel. There’s a part of me that hungers for deeper darkness than that. I’ve kept that lust caged by distracting myself, challenging myself. But now...I’m nearly superfluous. There’s no challenge to governing a well-oiled machine.”

Markis turned to face Spooky. “You could take over command of the Jupiter facilities. It’s still a bit of the Wild West out there at the edge of inhabited space. Improving the efficiency of the military economy could pay big dividends when the Meme hit us again.”

“I don’t see how I could do it any better than Rae and her think-tank of mad scientists.”

“They may be the idea factory, but you’re the perfect administrator. That’s what we need.”

“I can give you a list of personnel I’d recommend for the post, but I’m not staying here any longer. Daniel, I’m joining Conquest. I’d rather have your blessing, but...”

“But even if I didn’t give it, you’d find a way.”

Spooky shrugged. “I would.”

“Then go. If you’re going to do it anyway, do it to the best of your ability.” Markis reached out to briefly embrace Spooky, who allowed the contact for the sake of friendship. “Kick the Memes’ asses, all right, Spooky? That’s all I ask.”

Spooky raised an eyebrow, accompanied by half a smile. “I’ll pass on your instructions to Admiral Absen.”

-=-

When the medical and support teams were in place to Spectre’s satisfaction, when the room had been swept of dust and debris, and adjustable lights had been brought in, he pushed the fifth button on the first coldsleep module.

Using the same principles as the tubes that had carried a million colonists and crew aboard Conquest ninety years ago, these robust machines had kept hundreds of people in hibernation for the more than five decades since most of humanity had been scoured from the face of the Earth. Only those in shelters – some traditional underground living units and others like this – had survived to repopulate under the pitiless rule of Meme and Blend.

The discovery of such bunkers had tapered off to nothing after ten years of systematic searching by the Meme’s underlings, but Spectre knew not all had been found. He’d asked for the detailed records from Conquest’s hard drives, uploaded in the intelligence dump broadcast toward Gliese 370 shortly before the final Meme assault arrived.

Spectre’s searchers had located and excavated many heretofore undiscovered shelters. Those lacking coldsleep modules had become tombs filled with people unable to dig themselves out or attract enough attention for others to help. The fortunate had suffocated in the carbon dioxide of their own breaths.

The less fortunate had starved.

Of those with coldsleep modules, more than three in ten had been too badly damaged to preserve life. Fusion powerplants designed to run for a thousand years still succumbed to shocks and cave-ins brought on by the convulsions of a planet wracked by stupendous impacts. Sometimes the electricity still flowed, but the machines themselves had been crushed or the main cables had been cut.

And some were like this complex, sufficiently intact to rescue hundreds of specialists from the times before the victory of the Meme. Only the most valuable personnel, judged so by ruthless computer evaluations, had been given space in the life capsules. One-way time travel into the future had been made mandatory: no appeals, no refusals. Not with the fate of humanity at stake.

Spectre himself, in his earlier incarnation as Spooky, had pushed for the program and was thoroughly glad that it had eventually been implemented, though long after he’d left aboard Conquest. He chuckled as he realized that this was a gift he had, at least in part, given himself.

Now, that gift gave him what he wanted as the cover of the module lifted, revealing the clear tube within. Held at just above freezing to slow metabolism, the human body inside was kept in near stasis, its necessary functions attended to by adapted Meme technology that fed it, breathed for it and carried its wastes away.

Spectre leaned over to brush at the thick glass, but still he could see nothing for the mists within. Master of a planet he might be, but here he had no power to hurry the mindless machine.

Finally, the fog cleared with the whine of a fan and the retraction of semi-living gels that rolled themselves away from the bare skin of the inhabitant, leaving him naked and pink. Still stocky and muscular, with sandy brown hair and pale gray eyes, the man within looked the same as when Spectre had seen him last.

“Hello, DJ,” he breathed as he spread his hands on the glass and gazed downward.

Within the coldsleep tube, Daniel Markis, once Chairman of the Council of Earth, opened his eyes.

***

Admiral Absen stared grimly at Michelle’s military-industrial projections littering his office desktop, showing economic activity balanced against the production of war materiel. Rubbing his eyes and sliding bars and widgets here and there, he tried to make them come out some way he was happy with, but couldn’t.

EarthFleet Intelligence projected the attack of the next wave of Scourge “from zero to twenty-six months” with ninety percent confidence, which was a fancy way of saying they could arrive any time – today, tomorrow, next year.

If only he could know for certain that he had a specific period of time, EarthFleet could take a breather and deploy its precious resources more efficiently, but with a mere sixteen minutes guaranteed warning, everyone had to be on high alert all the time, and every warship, every SLAM, every weapon had to be sent immediately to the front line.

We have so little depth, Absen growled to himself. If only we could see them coming from a distance and from one direction...but faster-than-light emergence apparently proceeds randomly from wormhole termini appearing along the equator of a gravity well.

The mechanics of FTL travel, as worked out by the old Ryss physicist Plessk and his team, showed stars to be the key. Power collected from a gravity well was twisted by the FTL drive of each mothership into a toroid singularity, opening a wormhole pathway to another star. Theory said even such exotic masses as black holes or pulsars could be used, but doing so courted gravitic disaster upon exit.

That exit was the real point of danger, for the arriving ship must first survive the heat of the star. The Scourge did this by coating their one-use motherships with thick organic resin that ablated and insulated the creatures within. Human ships would use armor of nanoformed ceramic matrix, nearly impervious to heat.

The next problem was that of escape from the arrival star’s gravity well. As long as the target stellar body was not much larger than the one at the departure end, there should be no problem. Velocity in equaled velocity out, it seemed.

However, if the arrival star was much larger – and Absen had been shocked when he’d been shown that some stars were millions of times more massive than yellow Sol and large enough to encompass all the planets of Earth’s inner solar system – then the arriving force might never escape.

This dynamic effectively created an FTL gradient from star to star. One could go from a larger star to any lesser one without difficulty. In fact, such travel became easier and easier the more the travelers proceeded “downslope.”

Going upward, from smaller to larger stars, became a much more difficult proposition. A stairstep approach was necessary, balancing the speed of entrance with the required stellar escape velocity. If the ultimate target system held an especially large star, a starship might have to travel several “upward” legs, from star to star to star, before it could risk jumping for its destination.

This was analogous to the way sailing ships of old operated, tacking laboriously upwind to gain the weather gage, the position of greatest maneuvering advantage. Similarly, the larger stars constituted the strategic high grounds of space, giving the force that held them the edge.

Unfortunately, Sol was not a large star at all, and so securing it was like defending a valley. An attacker could arrive from any number of larger stars within hundreds of light years, while a task force departing Sol had far fewer options: to aim only for stars smaller or one size class more massive, in other words.

But these were considerations for the future. For now, Absen’s job was tactical rather than strategic, and that was headache enough. If he were the Scourge, he’d send a much larger force to attack a star system that resisted the first wave. With endless forces and the individual Archons’ desire for territory, there was no reason not to do so.

In fact, thought Absen, if I were them, I’d mass maximum force on anyone resisting. The trick is coordinating task forces from more than one star system. Fortunately, that takes time.

The physicists said arriving together from different stars couldn’t be done with any accuracy, at least not with the FTL technology EarthFleet had captured. Travel times were too unpredictable and communication was only possible via drones that took just as long as a fleet to travel from star to star.

Therefore, to arrive as a unit, any task force had to be assembled at a star larger than the target before launching together as one convoy.

And to do that, drones have to fly from place to place with messages and orders, coordinating a fleet’s assembly, for light is far too slow. We really are back to the Age of Sail, Absen mused, where fast packet boats physically carried dispatches from place to place.

Perhaps in the future, new technology would provide solutions, such as some kind of FTL carrier transmission wave. For now, he had to work with what he had.

And what he had was a hodgepodge, a mishmash of weapons hastily produced and just as hastily deployed in hopes that the inevitable attack wouldn’t be too much for them to handle.

Absen checked his watch and realized his next staff briefing was coming up in less than an hour. “Michelle, cancel the 1300 daily with apologies to the presenters. I don’t think I can stand another data dump. Instead, let’s have a 1600 discussion brief in the small auditorium. That should give people enough time to change gears and bring whatever they have to the table. Can you put together an updated summary of our defenses?”

“I keep that information ready at all times, Admiral,” Michelle replied with a hint of reproach.

Damn the machine-brained woman, Absen thought. She’s getting more pissy all the time. We really have to find her an AI companion, whatever that might mean.

“Then you should also have information at your fingertips on figures of speech and command questions that are actually polite orders,” he replied with some irritation.

“Sorry, sir. No excuse, sir.”

“In the meantime, I need some LBWA time and some lunch.”

“Understood, sir. Shall I accompany you?”

“Aren’t you already with me everywhere aboard, avatar or not?”

“The admiral should understand figures of speech that are actually polite but advisable suggestions, sir.”

Absen made a strangled noise in his throat, half sigh, half growl, before exiting into the corridor. One of Michelle’s humanoid avatars fell in half a pace behind him as his detail of four Stewards preceded and trailed him.

While he spent the next hour “leading by wandering around,” he marveled at the change in Conquest. The ship and crew had traveled from Gleise 370 with a minimum of personnel, but now, with every space-based platform in high demand, the warship had been turned into a mobile command center and teemed with as many people as could live aboard, at least twenty thousand at last count. She’d been designed to hold that number, but after so long with so few billeted aboard he felt crowded.

Absen laughed at himself. You’ve grown soft over the years, old man, he thought. You’ve forgotten what living for months at a time in a cramped nuclear submarine feels like. This is positively empty compared to that.

His first stop was the new PDCC, the point defense control center, a place dedicated to increasing anti-Scourge weapons coordination by several orders of magnitude. Holding over a thousand trained gunners linked within shared VR space, like pilots and helmsmen, it was the test-bed for new tactics and a proving ground for an idea that he’d drawn from his wet-navy days so long ago: the U.S. Navy’s Aegis anti-air and antimissile system.

The large room looked more like an infirmary than a control center, with rows of VR coffins stood vertically so the gunners could walk in and out of them upright. Right now, about half of them stood open, the other half filled. One monitoring tech came to her feet as Absen entered, but the admiral waved her back to her seat and looked around.

He knew the cheap autonomous point defense modules that had been slapped onto Conquest’s skin were all gone now, replaced by uprated and networked laser emplacements. Each still contained its own powerplant in order to minimize the need to send energy from beneath the great ship’s armor, dramatically reducing weak spots such conduits caused.

In order to provide comms between the PDCC and the weapons, thin cables ran through the tiniest of holes laboriously bored in the armor. More importantly, hardened wires ran from each module to all of its nearest dozen neighbors, forming a network that meant all twelve connections had to be severed before it became isolated and reverted to autonomous mode. Each also contained a short-range transmitter for a separate and redundant wireless network.

With an extra half-meter of spray-on ablative covering the cables and much of the modules, simulations demonstrated that this system, while not perfect, was the best they could install with the resource constraints they had. In fact, Conquest had been hogging the PD module production for the last month in order to cover every excess square meter of skin with lasers – almost sixty thousand of them for the whole of the six square kilometers of surface area.

Right now, Conquest was far and away the most effective capital ship in EarthFleet. She also functioned as the flagship, holding the majority of command and staff, and was the most powerful TacDrive equipped vessel in the solar system. It was therefore imperative that she be able to go deeply into harms way, strike the enemy hard, and then escape.

But that uniqueness would change soon, Absen vowed. After the next attack or, if they were lucky and the enemy held off, before it, entirely new ships would be completed, specifically built to fight the Scourge.

“How are the sims coming?” Absen asked the tech, who smiled nervously and stood up again at being addressed by EarthFleet’s supreme commander.

Before she could speak, a loud voice came from behind him. “Very well, sir,” it said, and Absen turned to see Commander James Ford, Conquest’s senior weapons officer, hurry across the room.

The man visibly smoothed his permanently combative expression in the presence of his admiral. He spoke briefly in the tech’s ear before turning to Absen. “I’m working them to the limits the psych people will let me, but I’d like to add some hours. I think we could increase proficiency a few percent.”

Absen shook his head. “I saw your request on the last report, Commander, and the answer is still no. Twelve hours a day in VR, six days a week, is enough.”

“But sir –”

“Sorry, no. That’s final. Overtraining is almost as bad as undertraining, and we’ve already had to send two of your people to VR rehab.” Absen thought about his own brush with VR syndrome during the first battle with the Scourge and shuddered. Nothing since nanocrack was quite as unbalancing as the godlike feeling of virtual space – and the depression of having to leave it.

Ford said, “You know, I heard from Ezekiel that the Meme VR sarcophagi don’t seem to cause VR syndrome, or not as badly. If we could use that technology...”

“There are a couple dozen technologies I’d like to fully exploit, James, but we’re stretched to the limit trying to incorporate the upgrades we do have. We can’t let the good idea fairy get us off track.” The good idea fairy was shorthand for the tendency of people to want to make just one more improvement, as in “I got a good idea!” If allowed to run rampant, time-tested and efficient systems would end up worthless as they were constantly “improved,” because every upgrade caused disruption, introduced unintended consequences, required retraining of personnel and needed a period of adjustment.

“Yes, sir,” Ford subsided.

Absen slapped the younger man on the shoulder. “The PDCC is a quantum leap over anything we had before, so be happy with what you have. Tell me how much more effective we’ll be.”

“Well,” Ford admitted, “once both shifts are trained and in place, we’ll be about ninety times more lethal to any swarm we encounter.”

“Ninety percent?” Absen knew his assertion was wrong, but wanted to throw Ford a bone by letting the man brag about his new system. Nothing was more effective in getting someone to invest in a project than having him defend it in front of a potential critic.

“No, sir,” Ford replied with a distinct air of pride. “Ninety times, which is more than nine thousand percent better. But that’s still not enough. I want to be able to stand in the middle of one of their swarms and lay down a base of fire so intense that they can’t overcome it.”

“And I want the Scourge to catch the common cold and their whole race to die off, but neither of those things is going to happen.”

Ford laughed ruefully. “War of the Worlds, right, sir?”

“You got it. Too bad it’s never that easy. Keep up the good work and tell your people I appreciate their efforts. They’re going to be vital to our survival.”

“You just told them yourself,” Ford said with an uncharacteristic grin. “Miss Surwal here is recording our conversation, and it will be replayed for them on the next break.”

“Unedited, I hope.”

“Of course, sir.”

“Carry on, then,” Absen said before departing.

“Are you certain Commander Ford is the best man for the job?” Michelle murmured into Absen’s ear as they walked.

“Yes,” the admiral said firmly. “I’m sure you could come up with a dozen theoretically better people –”

“– or a thousand...” Michelle retorted.

“Okay, a thousand, but not one of them would have been with me and this crew for as long or know us so well. People aren’t interchangeable, Michelle. They form relationships, like fine roots that connect them to others. Ripping them out is a last resort, especially after a long time in place.”

“I’ll take your word for it, sir,” Michelle said in a tone of disbelief.

Absen stopped and turned to the avatar. “You know, I think the first of the new dreadnoughts will need a good AI. Why don’t you give me a detailed plan on transferring your consciousness to the Constitution when she’s finished?”

“What?” The AI had built her avatar’s face sufficiently expressive to display utter shock at the admiral’s words. “You can’t...” Then the android seemed to relax. “I see by your biometrics that you are practicing deception on me, Admiral. You’re trying to add an emotional component to your argument.”

“If by that you mean I’m trying to show you how you’d feel at getting treated like an interchangeable part instead of like a human being, then yes, that’s exactly it.”

“I understand, sir. Thank you, sir.”

“You’re welcome.” Not for the first time Absen worried about the AI. If human beings could grow up seeming normal but manifest signs of insanity later in adulthood, why not a machine intelligence? Especially one continuously given increments of greater responsibility. Plenty of politicians succumbed to megalomania as their power grew. Every despised dictator had to start somewhere.

“What’s to be our next stop?” Michelle asked.

“You want to tip them off?”

“Is that unwise?”

“I’d rather see what things look like without people spiffing everything up for me.”

“If you like, I can give you detailed reports and recordings of everything that goes on aboard when you are not present.”

“Everything?”

“Except for the spaces you’ve designated as privacy zones,” Michelle said with a hint of stiffness.

“That’s simply not the same as a personal visit.” Absen avoided reopening their old argument about security versus privacy.

I’d rather trust people than spy on their intimate moments, the admiral thought. Even suspecting an all-knowing AI was recording every use of the head, every sexual coupling, every binge and every moment of weakness and doubt, every sleeping mumble...no, that would be a morale killer and I won’t do it. Monitoring of all public spaces is plenty.

For the same reason he’d refused to have any of Spectre’s Skulls, former anti-Meme insurgents turned enforcers, aboard his ships or on EarthFleet bases. Marines performed routine guard duty and security inspections, while the Stewards had expanded beyond their protection role to become his investigative service for internal crimes. Maybe political police were necessary in civilian society for a while, but he’d long since resolved he’d push for disbanding or curtailing them severely as soon as he felt the Solar System was secure.

And that wouldn’t happen until after the Scourges’ next attack, when EarthFleet saw what a second wave would look like. The one account of battle other than their own that Intel possessed showed a similar force hitting a Meme world one hundred thirty light-years away, inflicting grievous damage even while ultimately repulsed.

No data had been received for the presumed second attack, though Absen was fervently hopeful that it would arrive on encrypted Meme frequencies before the Scourge hit the Solar System again. Intelligence on that follow-on force could give EarthFleet a tremendous edge.

“You’re pensive,” Michelle prompted as they walked.

“I’m always pensive, Commander. If I’m not thinking about an issue in front of me, I’m thinking about the larger problems of defending Earth and our shaky alliance. Right now I’m wondering what surprises the next set of Scourges will spring on us.”

“Why do you think there will be surprises?”

“Surprises are inevitable in war. Only a fool thinks the enemy won’t come up with something new and unexpected.”

“The Scourge doesn’t seem an imaginative race.”

Absen grunted. “They’re imaginative enough to develop technology to wipe out hundreds, maybe thousands of sentient races. People we could have met, could have talked with, could have learned from and traded with. They’ve been eaten with all their works. What a waste!”

“But the Scourge aren’t imaginative enough to appreciate what they destroyed. My studies of the specimens we captured and of their cybernetic systems show a hodgepodge of techniques with very little unifying theme. They appear to have stolen technology from those they conquered, but not developed very much of their own.”

“Some old Earth nations and cultures did very well for themselves by stealing from those that innovated.”

“But they eventually fell apart because thievery was rewarded over imagination. Thought must be free to explore, or a culture degrades.”

Absen glanced over at Michelle’s android. “You realize you just stepped across to my side of the security-versus-freedom argument, right?”

“I supposed I did...but I realize the difference between short-term exigencies and long-term benefits. Also, that a ship of war must be more tightly monitored than, say, a civilian installation.”

Absen waved the argument away for the moment. “Looks like we’re here.”

“The cybernetics lab? I could have given you whatever reports you need.”

“You sound a bit defensive, Michelle. Don’t worry, I’m not going to go stomping through your mind, literally or metaphorically. In fact, I’d like to hear how the AI research program is going directly from Dr. Egolu.”

“You trust her more than you do me?”

“No, but she’s the department head and you’re a military officer under my command as well as being the primary test subject. I don’t bypass my senior leaders merely because someone below them knows more. Besides, you’re not objective, because our one and only functioning example of AI is you.”

The door to the cybernetics lab opened to reveal a section of deck more than a hundred meters on a side and thirty high, with dozens of consoles and white-coated research scientists and more casually dressed engineers in attendance. A few people in military uniform rounded out the complement, but they were few and far between. Absen was a firm believer that civilians, with less of the implicitly compromising nature of military command influence, did better as researchers than military personnel.

Absen spotted Egolu after a moment of searching. The short, dark woman of Turkish descent bustled up to him with a smile, holding out her hand. “Admiral, so good to see you here in our humble laboratory.”

“Merhaba and aynı şekilde, Doctor. I’m sorry we couldn’t install you and your team somewhere better.”

“Where is better than with Michelle Conquest, correct?”

“Of course, Doctor. How are we doing in replicating Desolator’s work?”

The scientist pursed her lips, a skeptical expression. “Not so well. First, even her own manufactories cannot reproduce her central processing modules at the quantum molecular level. There are some differences we are not able to overcome, but we don’t yet know why. We have, however, achieved a high level of pseudo-AI.”

“Does it pass the Turing Test?”

Egolu laughed. “Of course. But that’s a very subjective evaluation over a fixed span of time. The key question is one of self-reflective consciousness, not whether the machine mind can fool people for a limited period.”

“And how do you evaluate for consciousness?”

“The children.”

Absen stopped short. “Children?”

“Yes, children. A selection of assigned personnel were given the option of bringing their children aboard with the stipulation that they would be administered their daily schooling here in the lab so they can interact with the pseudo-AI under closely supervised conditions. You approved the memo yourself.”

Absen raised his eyes to one of the many cameras focused on him. “I did?”

“You did,” Michelle answered from her avatar. “I remember you skimmed the executive summaries and approved them all en masse that day.”

“Interesting how that happened.” Absen stared at the android for a moment, but apparently not with enough irritation to embarrass Michelle. “I hope all human rights are being respected? If I find out anyone has been conducting dangerous experiments on these kids, heads will roll.”

“No, sir. Nothing like that. Here, let me show you.” Egolu led Absen and his entourage up a stairwell and into a long room with tilted windows, allowing them to see downward into a small complex of classrooms. “You see? They’re happy and well adjusted.”

“So what’s the experimental part?”

“All they do is speak with the pseudo-AI at certain points in their curriculum. They are never informed it’s a machine. It’s given a simple name, such as Jimmy or Sally, and when they make inquiries about whom it really is, they are deflected. Some of the older or cleverer children, those whose questions become persistent, have been told that they are unofficial assistants to our research team and are evaluating the person they’re talking with.”

“And what have you found out?”

“That the average seven-year-old decides for herself that it’s a computer after a mean time of four hours of interaction.”

“How?”

“We don’t know, Admiral. Adults don’t seem to figure it out nearly as well. We’ve had humans play the AI role and the results are quite different. In fact, these young people have achieved more than ninety-nine percent accuracy once they are asked the direct question, ‘Is Sally a human or computer?’ Of course, they are only asked that question once we believe they’ve already made a determination for themselves, in order not to prompt them to wonder.”

Absen stared down at the score or so of children, divided into four different groups by age from what looked like about five years old to fifteen. They seemed content and cheerful, with smiling and engaged teachers. “All right. I want to have a conference with all of their parents this evening, just them and me. In fact, invite them all to dinner with me in the flag dining room. With their kids. Tell the Stewards to seat and serve them by family.”

“I assure you, Admiral...” Egolu began, but Absen cut her off.

“I’m sure you do, Doctor, but I like to see things for myself. Sometimes a less clinical perspective yields unexpected truths, hmm?”

Once Absen had shaken hands all around with the cybernetics researchers, he and Michelle departed.

As they walked, Michelle said, “You shook her up a bit, sir, by your questioning.”

“Observed behavior is changed behavior, Commander, and I don’t like the idea of things happening on my ship that I don’t know about. And don’t give me any bullshit about me being informed. If my consciousness had grasped the proposal when it slipped across my desk, I guarantee you I’d have been asking the same questions, only with less of the feeling I got hoodwinked by you and my staff. Did Captain Scoggins get a summary?”

“It was included in my routine reports.”

“Which was one of hundreds of items each day. So what I infer is that the two officers most responsible for what goes on aboard were functionally unaware, and I suspect that was because at some level you, Egolu or both had qualms about using children and wanted to hide it from me. That makes me wonder what else you might be hiding.”

Visibly distressed, Michelle’s avatar stuttered slightly. “N-nothing is being deliberately hidden from you, sir.”

Absen felt himself grow angry. “Shades of meaning, Commander; that doesn’t reassure me. I must have confidence in you both, in all of my staff, that if you have qualms about something, you will highlight that issue, not bury it and hope I won’t notice. You got me?”

“Loud and clear, sir.”

“Then let me make one more thing loud and clear. You’ve shaken my trust in you. You’re on probation. I don’t care how valuable you and your amazing capabilities are. Just like any other officer, I’ll have you relieved if I lose that confidence, and court-martialed if you give me reason to do so.”

Absen waited for some declaration from her raising the issue of how, to a large extent, Earth system’s entire defense might rest on the performance of Conquest’s AI. That would have put her very close to narcissism in his eyes and might have sealed her fate, but out of wisdom or caution she remained silent.

Of that, he was glad.

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The End of Conquest And Empire Excerpt.