Star Force: Rift Read online

  Riley had been the natural choice, for he’d been involved with the Uriti from the beginning and had the closest relationship with them after the Wranglers. When the 5 that had visited and fought the Hadarak returned, the others did not take the news well. Most of them were in denial, for they hadn’t been directly attacked themselves and only had the memories of the others to share. They couldn’t comprehend that their kin could turn on them, and now that Riley knew that they were in fact a Hadarak/minion hybrid he could understand that.

  While living beings, minions existed as pieces within a hive mind. They were individuals, but they didn’t see themselves as such and the idea of one turning on another was, from their point of view, impossible. It would be like Riley’s right hand attacking his left, and was such a foreign concept that the Uriti here almost accused the others of lying…except they couldn’t do that either, for the Uriti never lied.

  The past 5 years had been rough for them, coming to grips with the fact that they were not only alone but hated by those that should have been their allies. How the Hadarak would react to them now was unknown, for the one they’d encountered had left confused as well, but the Uriti knew they wouldn’t be coming out to them anytime soon and with the truce between Star Force and the V’kit’no’sat they also knew they wouldn’t be fighting them for a while.

  That meant all they had was their training and the promise of a few field trips to the nearest black holes in Star Force territory. It wasn’t much, but they clung to it even in their despair as the years passed, but the dynamic between the Uriti was not the same as it had been before. They were hurt, and even while Bahamut’s injuries had healed, he especially was broken emotionally. The very foundation of what it meant to be a Uriti was gone, and that had rocked all of them to the core.

  Fortunately the KoQ were continuing to hunt for the remaining Uriti hidden across the galaxy and had found another 4 years ago. Acquiring it and transporting it around the Core to avoid the V’kit’no’sat had taken all 4 of those years, with it finally arriving today, and the Wranglers feeding Riley information from all 73 of them that had been gathered together for the occasion. The sheer destructive power of that ‘herd’ was mind boggling, but Riley wasn’t worried. Star Force and the Uriti were on good terms, and frankly, they were the only family the Uriti had in addition to each other.

  Powerful as they were, they were not a threat even without the emergency overrides each of the Uriti were subservient to. Riley was glad they had those as backup, but hadn’t needed to use them even once since the Hadarak contact mission. The observing races here, however, were not so confident…which left them trying to get ‘close’ while staying far away at the same time.

  Star Force had drawn a line to make it easy for them, but you could see the various ships moving around that line constantly repositioning, and when one of the Uriti drifted closer to it half of the ships would pull back while the other half held position. Fear was a constant here, and as a certain Sith Lord had said long ago, Fear attracts the fearful.

  Riley hadn’t understood that tenet for a long time, but now it was obvious. Those who were afraid often ran away, but others wanted to get close to the fear without getting too close. They either wanted the rush of adrenaline, or perhaps the feeling of being so close to such great power. Then again, maybe they were just stupid, but whatever their motivation they were here, by the thousands of ships, to witness the combined Uriti herd as it welcomed its newest member.

  And it wasn’t just for today. Ever since news of the V’kit’no’sat truce had begun to seep out across the galaxy new ships had been arriving in the Preserve to take a look at the beasts that had scared the V’kit’no’sat into withdrawal. Riley knew that wasn’t entirely true, but it didn’t matter. No one stood up against the V’kit’no’sat and lived, yet the massive empire had agreed to a 243 year truce with Star Force…who possessed these living monsters that were more powerful than anything the V’kit’no’sat wielded, their Mach’nel included.

  Riley knew this was just the beginning, for even after 5 years word of the truce was still reaching new systems and would continue to do so across the galaxy for decades to come. And anyone who had ever heard of the V’kit’no’sat would be curious about those who had successfully stood up to them, with the key to their defiance being the Uriti in the Preserve…so this was the focal point of curiosity and diplomacy, as it had been for a long time, but now it was literally exploding with activity as ships moved about the Devastation Zone freely without having to worry about being attacked by the V’kit’no’sat.

  New trade routes were already opening up, redrawing the map with regards to Star Force’s neighbors as if roads were being added where none had been before. The closest black hole routes had seen traffic increase over 100 fold, and the best routes between those endpoints and here were now being packed with ship traffic and even some entrepreneurs setting up shop on worlds that technically Star Force still owned, even if they were abandoned.

  Riley had dealt with several of them personally, driving off a few but striking deals with others to sanction their presence as they took advantage of all the traffic passing through. Davis had made the decision not to recolonize the Devastation Zone other than Sol, and instead use the available resources to harden the current border, increase the industry on already inhabited worlds, and to make a much larger push into former Nexus territory.

  Riley hated that, but the Director’s logic was sound. 243 years was a long time, but not even close to what they needed to rebuild the Devastation Zone. It was enough time to recolonize a lot of it, but making it war ready in less than three centuries was not doable. What had been destroyed there had taken millennia to build, and Star Force wasn’t going to make the mistake of overreaching only to see system after system destroyed for the second time.

  No. Star Force intended to hold the line firmly when the truce ended, and that meant building more shield generators on top of those that already existed. Not starting from scratch on dead worlds.

  Sol was the only exception, and the trailblazers expected it would be the first system hit when the war restarted, so they weren’t going to allow a civilian population. It was going to end up being a war zone, so they were planning for such, making Earth, Mars, and Titan essentially battle fields in the making while they repaired and refurbished the other planetoids for industrial output but skimped on the defenses that they knew wouldn’t last more than minutes against the size of a fleet they expected the V’kit’no’sat to bring back with them.

  Morgan was there now, taking up permanent residence and overseeing the building while several High Admirals were out patrolling the Devastation Zone. The rank had just been commissioned for 18 of the most experienced Admirals that had truly outdone themselves during the war. Liam had suggested the upgrade, tasking them with select duties that Archons would normally deal with.

  High Admirals were also given priority naval command over all Archons save for the trailblazers. They’d been doing such things during the war as needed, but now official command was given to them even with Archons in their fleets. Those Archons could override the High Admirals if needed, but they were no longer looked to first for decision making. The High Admirals had higher naval rankings than them anyways, but the fleets the High Admirals now commanded would always have Archons in them just to cover the unforeseen problems that might pop up. Other than that, they were second string to the High Admirals.

  So right now there were 4 High Admirals with fleets out patrolling the Devastation Zone while smaller Archon units were dealing with the races and organizations that intended to colonize the empty systems. Sweeping them up and kicking them out was a waste of a trailblazer’s time, so Riley and Morgan left that to others unless something huge happened. The other 98 trailblazers were assigned elsewhere within Star Force territory while Kara’s Clan Ghostblade had disappeared beyond the known borders, out exploring new territory and doing some priority tasks for Davis that even Riley didn’t
know about.

  He had information on what all the trailblazers were doing to some degree, but most of what was going on he would only know after the fact if he dug into the records. Star Force was so large at this point that no one knew what all was going on and Riley and his peers relied on each other to take care of their piece of the puzzle, along with Davis and the Monarchs. Trust was the only thing that kept their empire together, otherwise it would have fractured by now without another means of unification.

  The V’kit’no’sat, whose empire was far larger than Star Force’s, did not operate on trust as much as the Human-led empire did. Theirs was a much more complicated puzzle that kept their races partially separate but beholden to the others. Killing those who didn’t obey also offered an intimidation factor to force results or remove those that were not conducive to the goals of the empire, but Star Force couldn’t and wouldn’t use such measures.

  The Monarchs and the Archons were the key to maintaining the unity of the empire, but the larger the empire grew, both in territory and people, the harder it was to maintain control over. More Monarchs were being added, as were Archons, but there was only so much any one of them could do, making Davis’s job continually harder…for he had to oversee everything.

  Riley had a personal relationship with him, as did all the trailblazers, and he’d insisted that was key going forward…which was why Riley and the other trailblazers were now returning to taking on apprentices so they could build personal relationships with the newer additions. Being an Archon meant a lot of common ground with every other Archon, but a personal connection was needed amongst the ultra high leadership.

  All of the High Admirals had served directly under the trailblazers, so personal connections already existed there, just as almost every Monarch had served as a Clan Marquis and had a personal relationship to at least one trailblazer. Now Riley had taken on an apprentice, a Piccolo-level Archon named Bisa-10006, who was slightly more innovative than other Archons and was being groomed for semi-trailblazer duties above and beyond combat.

  She was with him now, and traveled everywhere he went in the Devastation Zone, but this was the first time she’d been present when a new Uriti arrived. Seeing the arrival was one thing, which anyone could review later, but feeling the Uriti’s emotions as both Archons were now was something entirely different and Bisa was clearly getting overwhelmed with all 73 of them in her head simultaneously, even if in a muted state.

  “Focus on one now,” he suggested as the carrier vessel opened and the sedate Uriti drifted out while the ship slowly reversed course. “Try Bahamut.”

  “That’s better,” she said, now with only one Uriti in her head, though that was still too much to take without the dampeners. “How do the Wranglers deal with this?”

  “The more familiar the minds are, the easier they are to process. Even with minds of this magnitude.”

  “I can’t make out much, even from just Bahamut.”

  “It takes time. Their mental language isn’t based off vocal communications, so it can get a bit wonky.”

  “I’ll say,” she said with a huff, having to constantly keep resetting her mental stance as Bahamut’s emotions kept blowing her virtual ‘fuse’ and overwhelming her with information.

  “There he is,” Riley said as the 74th mind began to poke into existence as three of the Uriti rushed up to the 28 mile long, 4-hulled banana and began raking it with telepathic electricity to undo the sedative as fast as possible.

  The Uriti was a single piece at the front and back, but those pieces split into four segments that arched out and around an empty central space before recombining into the back piece. A ship could fly inside the Uriti and out again if it wanted, making this another odd design the Chixzon had come up with, and based off the Ancients’ combat data that empty space served multiple purposes…one of which was a charging chamber for a death star-like weapon.

  The Wranglers would work out what it could or couldn’t do over time and training, but right now it was the Uriti that were making first contact while Star Force simply observed, and for the first time since the Hadarak mission the Uriti were hopeful and happy. They’d gone to the Hadarak expecting to find new brothers and sisters, instead finding enemies, but now they had found a new sibling and the palpable depression that had been consuming them was lifting, and Riley could tell that all they needed was some good news to latch onto in order to start really healing.

  The new Uriti, which Riley had named ‘Green Lantern,’ woke up to a situation he had never encountered before…that being other Uriti around him. Up until today he had been the only one in existence, as far as he knew, with the only contact he had was the intermittent orders from the Chixzon.

  The reaction was not underestimated, and the other Uriti were also seeing it again through Green Lantern’s eyes, reminding them of where they had been before Star Force brought them together, and that memory seemed to be the breaking point to cleanse them of their depression. They’d come so far since then, rescued from a life of solitude just as Green Lantern was now…as well as realizing just how much he had to learn.

  They knew it was their responsibility to teach him more than it was Star Force’s, and Riley was thankful for that. Teaching the first few Uriti had been a very slow process, but once they had some veterans to Star Force training to talk Uriti to Uriti with the newcomers the learning curve had become far less steep. Even now Riley could feel the Uriti reaching out to the newest member of their family, thanks to the fact that they were allowing the Wranglers to eavesdrop, and ‘hearing’ his exciting, yet groggy reaction to the realization that he wasn’t alone in the galaxy.

  Riley glanced to his left, seeing a few tears welling up in Bisa’s eyes.

  “Yet one more reason to hate the Chixzon,” the trailblazer commented. “Uriti are built to act as a group, both as a Hadarak and as a minion. Keeping them isolated is a light, persistent torment that this one is now being released from for the first time.”

  “He is so big,” she said, still crying a few silent tears.

  “They are less advanced than us, yet they are more advanced. Remember that over the years as you become familiar with their minds, or you’ll constantly be misjudging them.”

  “I’ve never felt any mind even remotely like this.”

  “Neither have I. And it’s why they refer to us as the ‘little people.’”

  “That I can understand.”

  “I still can’t fully understand them, and neither can the Wranglers. Who knows what they think of us, which is why we have to focus on actions rather than words. Show them what we want, not tell them.”

  “Lucky for us we know how to talk training.”

  “Damn right, girl. That’s a language that all races speak…or will learn to speak. We all like to get more powerful.”

  “And the Hadarak?”

  “Training takes time, so if they shoot us on sight that’s not really an option.”

  “You really think they’re coming for us all the way out here?”

  “I don’t know, but we have to have a plan in place if they do. We’ll see them coming well ahead of their arrival, but if and when they get here, they’re going to be very hard to kill even with the Uriti’s help.”

  “You’re talking the planet-sized ones the Rit’ko’sor reported?”

  “Think of how much weaponsfire something a thousand miles wide can soak up. We can run and stay ahead of them, our planets can’t. We have to be ready long before we see the first one coming.”

  “And if they don’t come?”

  “Anything that can kill a Hadarak will probably be useful against the V’kit’no’sat.”

  “The spaceball program?”

  “We have to fight through the minions to even get in position to use it, and their tentacles mean a really big ship to get out of their range.”

  “What else have we got in the works?”

  “Not much yet. Have any ideas?”

  “Working on it,
” she said honestly, and Riley knew that challenge would bug her as it did other Archons. One of them would come up with something eventually, he hoped. Fighting planet-sized people was something new for Star Force, and if the V’kit’no’sat weren’t very good at it after all these years, he expected it would be a very hard challenge to conquer…but that wasn’t going to deter the Archons from working the problem. “How long before the Uriti get that big?”

  “Hard to say. Maybe a million years. They don’t grow as fast as the Hadarak, though we’re speeding up the process.”

  “How?”

  “Making sure they eat their Wheaties.”

  “Wheaties?”

  “Food. We give them specific food, faster than they could harvest it themselves, but the speed training we’re doing with them is fighting the bloated growth the Hadarak have.”

  “I thought the Hadarak were faster than untrained Uriti.”

  “That has to do with the tinkering the Chixzon did. More kill power for less speed,” he said as a green spark lit on the front prong of the new Uriti for a second, then dispersed just as soon in an energy cloud…which Riley took to be it just stretching after such a long nap.

  “Did any of them get pissed when woken up?”

  “No. They were all overly thrilled to realize they had brothers. Looks like this one is no exception.”

  “I can feel him now. His mind is…more chaotic than the others.”

  “Lack of a herd to align with. That will change rapidly.”

  “Any leads on the next one?”

  “Leads yes, confirmation no. The Knights of Quenar aren’t going to stop looking until they find them all.”

  “I’m still surprised they’re giving them to us.”

  “Mutual advantage. I don’t trust them, but we can work with them.”