Star Force: Capitulation (Star Force Universe Book 73) Read online

  Kiran-011 shrugged in his seat. “Same as it has always been. Kick ass, train, kick more ass, invent new weapons, write new tactical manuals, same old same old.”

  “To what end?”

  “Don’t know. Find out when I get there.”

  Paul pointed at him. “That’s a viewpoint I lost a while ago. Maybe it’s my naval brain playing things out well in advance…”

  “Obviously,” Megan-026 said a split second before three others did.

  “But I couldn’t see any purpose left. Tasks to do, yes, but purpose no. I had lost its scent a while back, and I still can’t remember when. I got it back here, talking to Davis, but it’s a tentative grasp elicited from fear. Right now threat of danger seems to be my only access to that feeling of purpose. I’m hoping you guys can do better than that.”

  “What danger?” Landon-019 asked.

  “A wake up call I got. Not from the Hadarak or the Founders, but from the universe itself. I thought Riona died because we lacked information on the Hadarak, and now that we have it we can predict and avoid the threats. I was beginning to think we knew too much to really be in danger that we couldn’t manage, then it dawned on me we’ve…or maybe I’ve…been lulled into a false sense of security. We can still die at any time, even with the Essence defenses we’ve added here. Could be nothing more than a big falling rock at the wrong time, or a really good assassin from a race we know nothing about. Point is we’re not safe, and never going to be. That epiphany was enough to crack the fog in my mind and let me see a glimpse of our future. We’ve been working that out while you guys were arriving, but we’re not finished. We need all of you, including Miss Add-On.”

  “Hey,” Kara protested from the back row where she was sitting alone like she didn’t belong…because she kinda didn’t.

  “You got here by a different path, as did Davis. There’s no replacing the time you missed, but what you’ve added since has earned your spots. And he’s not really a Monarch. You can’t be to do what he’s done. He’s a trailblazer with a unique path and a really weak body that he should be working more on,” Paul said, glancing to his right at him, “but that gives him a long road ahead to look at with plenty of challenges to overcome and our scores to dream of matching. But for me…I’m at the top of the naval ranks just like Morgan is tops in Commando, Cora in mechs…and yes, Morgan you’re tops. I don’t care what marks Ginsi has. If I hadn’t forgone the additional Saiyan upgrades I could take her. She’s fast but easy to read, and you trained her, so you know her inside and out. So let’s not kid about who’s tops, alright?”

  “Easy for you to say,” Morgan-063 scoffed. “When was the last time you sparred with her?”

  “Irrelevant,” Paul admitted. “I can see her style, and it’s AOE straight up. I can analyze a lot, and a lot faster than most of you…”

  “All of us,” Logan-036 corrected.

  “But I can’t analyze myself worth crap. Not into the future. Every time I try I get fog. I can’t see ahead, but I know there is some supreme purpose that I’ve always been trying to achieve. It comes and goes, I can’t quantify it in sufficient ways to hold onto it. It’s lightside, and it’s survival, and constant adaptation and growth, and a lot more descriptions but I can’t put my finger on it. The thing is, now that we’re basically getting control of everything except the Deep Core and the unexplored frontier, we have the opportunity to make things the way we want them to be in a way we’ve never done before. Not out of desperation, but by grand design. So what should that grand design be?”

  Greg-073 did a double take. “I’ve never even thought about that, but you’re right. We’ve always been adapting to the threats, doing what needed to be done, but now we’ve got a clean slate to do what we want. And I have no idea what that is, but I can see the potential. Too much, actually. I don’t know where to start without some sort of mission parameters.”

  “It’s small scale,” Dina-077 said. “Not big. One of us on a solo mission has it. All the little things we do or don’t do. Not something empire-wide…except when that has an effect on the small stuff. The personal stuff. That’s when I’ve always felt ‘the call,’ as I’d describe it. It never does stick, and flirts with you after harrowing experiences or flashes you for a moment during a revelation or hard workout. But it’s there, and I’ve been absent from it for a long time too. Possibly because we’ve been apart so much. I feel the jazz again just being around all of you.”

  “That ends,” Davis interjected, “as of now.”

  That caused a stir in the assembled Archons, with many sitting up straighter and whispering to each other…despite the fact they were all telepathic, but nobody seemed to remember that, for the social dynamic was right back to where it was when they were trainees.

  “The future of us is the future of Star Force,” Paul explained, echoing Davis’s words from an earlier conversation. “The empire has grown up enough to handle everything else on its own. The big stuff is ours, and figuring out our path forward before the second gen catches up with us and figures out we don’t know where to go is our primary mission now. We have to keep laying down path for the others to follow, and we’re running really short of it right now.”

  “We’ve got other stuff going on, Davis,” Blade-097 reminded him. “Some that needs us.”

  “I know,” the Director said regretfully. “When will that stop?”

  “Probably never,” Blade admitted. “You want us to just bite the bullet?”

  “Unless it’s extreme, then yes. Let the second string handle what they can. You guys will always be a little better, but unless that better is life and death, back away from everything else. I need you here doing what you did before, only under considerably different circumstances. Is there anything you’re involved with that absolutely requires you to go back?”

  Nobody answered, looking around at each other, then they started shaking their heads ‘no’ in unison.

  “That’s what I thought. I don’t like backing out of existing projects, but I’ve learned to delegate. I hate it, but I do it out of necessity. I’d micromanage everything if I could, but I can’t be in more than one place, and if we’ve built a proper empire then it’s a team effort. Let the rest of the team carry your current tasks if they’re able. If they’re not, make adjustments and accommodations as necessary.”

  “Sounds like this is going to be for a while?” Devan-000 asked.

  “It’s permanent,” Paul answered, shocking most of them. “Assume we beat the Hadarak and drive them out of this galaxy. What do we do then?”

  “Pick the next galaxy,” Kip-022 said bluntly.

  “This one is so large we don’t even have it all mapped out, let alone pacified,” Paul countered. “And how much do we really have our own territory pacified? How many small scale darkside situations are hiding underneath our nose, especially with our neighbors who honor the basic rules but like to keep their privacy to do bad things where we don’t notice? Do you really want to run off to another galaxy and leave those little bastards running free because we’re dealing with the big ones elsewhere?”

  “Do both.”

  “How?” Paul asked, genuinely. “I can’t see it.”

  “Flush out the baddies,” Oni-081 said. “We’d have to really up our intelligence gathering, but if we actively try and bait them into identifying themselves we don’t really have to have eyes everywhere on the neutral worlds. Or are you referring to on Star Force ones too?”

  “I don’t think there’s a current problem with ours, though there are always exceptions that can’t be avoided. However, I feel like our worlds are a contained time bomb set to go off if our leadership would suddenly go away. It would take a while, but the wheels would fly off with time. What we’ve built isn’t permanent, and that’s the threat that’s sobered me up. We have a temporary victory, and the universe is chomping to wreck it and return things to their anarchic normal.”

  “Because the Star Force population isn’t made up
of Archons and Mavericks,” Leo-072 noted, “and it never will be. They’re our wards, not our peers, and in truth not even our friends. Our light is heavily influencing them, but they don’t produce it themselves. They do reflect it, however. We are making their lives actively better, but if we stop shining the masses won’t be able to maintain it.”

  “And a lot of people who shine now couldn’t before without us showing them how,” Javier-068 added. “They will sustain without us now, but they could not have found the light without us. We can, because that’s part of who we are. We crave it and search it out on our own. Others can’t or don’t, but once they find it they will actively shine the rest of their lives. Those victories are permanent, but the masses are only reflective, and not fully so. The civilian population is a far cry from those in this room, and though we always try to drag them a little higher, it’s just not going to happen as far as needed. Leo is right, they’re our wards, nothing more.”

  “That is the unending task,” Paul noted, “that continually confounds me. We are shining the light on our wards because they need it, and they’re better for it. But for how long? Are we just to maintain it indefinitely? That doesn’t feel right. It feels like we need to do it temporarily in order to achieve a level upgrade, but I can’t see it.”

  “I can…at least partially,” Rafa-080 said. “We, those in this room, need to find the light and shine it brightly long enough for that middle group that can’t find it themselves to absorb enough to fully convert to the lightside. They will continue to shine as long as they stay alive. So those are our immediate objectives. Like beacons in the darkness. We find and light them, then leave them behind to keep shining while we search for more. As long as the empire doesn’t fall, they’ll survive indefinitely.”

  Paul sighed, not believing he couldn’t see that before. “I’m a dumbfuck.”

  “Occasionally, but we all are at times,” Rafa half agreed. “We work better as a team when one of us doesn’t have to do all the trailblazing. Sometimes we get a better view from path that is already cut.”

  “Which is why you’re all permanently reassigned to Basic Training 2.0…which Kara will be included in this time,” Davis said with a wink thrown at her in the back.

  “And so will…Sean,” Paul said, still having occasional difficulty using his first name as old habits tended to stick. “Lord Daegan is being given the keys to the kingdom for a while to see how he handles in, during which time Sean-939221 is going to be full time with us.”

  “Seriously?” Greg asked, looking at the Director.

  “Is that a no?” he asked.

  “That’s a welcome onboard, can’t believe we have you, newb,” Greg clarified. “You’re worse than Kara, but we’ll gladly take on the burden of indoctrinating you.”

  Davis frowned. “Meaning what?”

  “You’ve watched us train and fight, but you’ve never done it with us. If you’re going to be part of the team, you gotta be part of the team and not Director organizing everything. You gotta face things from our angle.”

  “As long as it doesn’t involve hazing. I don’t have the strength to stop you if you tried.”

  Paul frowned. “We don’t pull that crap. We never did.”

  “That’s refreshing,” Davis said, easing up his demeanor a bit. “But seeing as how I had a hand in writing the definition of Archon, I’m not following on what ‘indoctrinating’ means in this situation.”

  “I do,” Kara said, knowing she was probably the only one who could translate. “They have a…unique…social dynamic built off years of interaction with each other. More than just inside jokes. I’ve picked up some of it, and the best way I can describe it is the camaraderie of the gods. Only those who are worthy can interface with it…which is why I never fully could.”

  “Make that two we have to indoctrinate,” Greg added.

  “Agreed,” Paul said with a frown. “Batgirl doesn’t realize she’s wearing a cape.”

  “She can also kick our ass at will,” Morgan reminded them. “So her holding back doesn’t feel right, just like it didn’t when she had her Vorch’nas added.”

  “Guess that means we gotta beat her up team style,” Hank-075 said with an eager clap of his hands.

  “Oh yes,” Greg agreed. “And we gotta show Sean that he isn’t helpless by incorporating him into the beatdown team.”

  “That twig? I’ll break him on accident,” Kara said sarcastically.

  “I’m afraid I agree,” Davis said, uncertain how he’d suddenly lost control of this situation…but then again maybe that was the whole point they were trying to make.

  “Give him armor,” Olivia-051 said with a smirk, “and some other stuff to even things out.”

  “Petricite armor, to make it interesting,” Kerrie-057 said, pointing a finger at Davis. “And don’t say it’s a waste of resources. You’re not getting out of this.”

  Sean…which he knew he was going to like a whole lot less than being ‘Davis’…slowly facepalmed as he felt a wave of reckless foreboding wash over him. “Paul…”

  “Bit of advice. Just dive in head first and learn to like it. That’s what you did to us, and now it’s payback time in as equally a beneficial way as we can manage.”

  Sean finally looked up, first at Paul and then the others, before slowly shaking his head. “Why do I suddenly feel like Archon 00 negative 1?”

  “Coined!” Jason-025 declared before the Director could take it back, and the others nodded their approval as Sean decided to take Paul’s advice and just roll with it. The regenerator would put his bones back together almost as good as new afterwards…

  6

  March 3, 154929

  Yian Ti Tredo System (Unexplored Frontier)

  Neofan Outpost

  The Zak’de’ron warship had entered the system alone and unstealthed, passing through the mildly heavy primitive traffic springing off of four overpopulated worlds that Star Force was trying to give some guidance to. That empire’s small ships were showing IDF markers around the 2nd planet, and a meager showing at that for the mess they were trying to clean up, but the Zak’de’ron were not here for them and did not make contact.

  Instead they headed out to the very edge of the star system where there was even more traffic, but of the more advanced kind. Ships the primitives inhabiting this system couldn’t even comprehend, let alone build, and they were parked around a floating fortress many times their size sitting in about as high an orbit as you could get while still circling the central white star.

  The fortress was an outpost built by the Neofan that linked to the nearby nebula where a hidden Temple was concealed. It was occupied by the Neofan and a small Star Force delegation to keep watch on their guests, but aside from those interlopers it was all Neofan possession and they had not allowed a spacial tap to be carved out of the Temple’s hull, so the only way in or out was via ships equipped with the necessary Essence drives, or through the outpost link, which also served as a sort of embassy for all travelers wishing to ply the Neofan with their myriad of unimportant requests…though judging by some of the vessels here, they might not be so unimportant, for the hulls shapes indicated extragalactic races along with the known ones, and all were parked at precise locations around the perimeter of the fortress outpost.

  The Zak’de’ron ship had been invited, so when it arrived they were given priority access to dock with the fortress itself, and through an umbilical three dragons boarded the outpost on foot, trodding up an empty corridor and following the telepathic beckons through a seemingly empty station until they arrived at a receiving room with a single individual sitting on an elevated throne.

  It was a Neofan, and this was the first time the Zak’de’ron had ever encountered one in person.

  “You requested our presence?” Bi’noen said, with his yellow scales shining from all the reflective blue light coming off the torches ringing the circular room as well as dotting the dome-like ceiling and others hidden under glass pockets
in the perfectly smooth deep black floor that seemed to suck the light in as fast as the torches produced it.

  “Not I, but I am intrigued to meet you,” the Neofan said, using the V’kit’no’sat’s own language since they appeared not to know the common language of the Bond of Resistance. “I have never seen such large cowards before.”

  Bi’noen huffed a bit of fire out of his nostrils as he stared into the smaller race’s eyes, but he knew the power they possessed was unrivaled, both Essence and something else contained in their wings, though no one knew what exactly, and the Neofan were not eager to share such information.

  “Is there a recommendation in that statement?”

  “How did you lose control of this galaxy? I have reviewed the public records, and you held an immense advantage over Star Force, and before that your own creation of the V’kit’no’sat. You have been bested twice by inferiors of your own making. Now you wish to flee to another galaxy to do what? Raise a third inferior legion so you can succumb to them for a trifecta? Perhaps we should employ you as such, given the success of your creations against the Hadarak.”

  “We did not come here to spar, Neofan. Cease attempting to provoke us. What is the purpose of our summons? We were told the deal was already struck.”

  “It is. But unlike your Star Force offspring, your knowledge of Essence is pathetically low, as are most new to the Bond of Resistance. Since your relocation will not be immediate, we are choosing to begin your education now. The three of you will travel to the Temple and be instructed in the true nature of galactic power. Perhaps then you will be better able to keep a handle on your servants.”

  “We are taking none with us, for we want none. We will forge our own destiny from here on out. The decision has already been made.”

  “Interesting. So you will not acquire new servants in your next galaxy?”