Fleet of Knives Read online

  CHAPTER SIXTY-THREE

  TROUBLE DOG

  The captain’s voice came through from the airlock.

  “Alva’s dead.” She sounded curiously detached, shocked to the point of being unable to express the emotions within.

  “Yes,” I said. I had been monitoring Clay’s vital signs, as I monitored those of all my crew. My external cameras on that side were damaged, but when her heart rate and respiration spiked and died, I knew the worst had happened.

  “Kill them.”

  “How? There are too many of them to use the defence cannons. We’d deplete our reserves. And a torpedo would only damage me.”

  “Use the engines.”

  “Captain?”

  “Fire the main engines up to maximum thrust for two or three seconds. Scour those fuckers from the tunnel.”

  “Aye-aye.”

  My rear end pointed upwards at an angle, so the crustaceans on the tunnel floor wouldn’t receive the full force of my fusion exhaust, but they’d be close enough that it’d probably fry them anyway. They’d also find great globs of liquefied rock falling on them from where the fusion flame brushed the tunnel’s ceiling. And if they required air to breathe, well, there wouldn’t be much of that left in the tunnel after I’d incinerated everything.

  I powered up and felt the hull flex and creak as I brought the thrust up and held it for one second. Two seconds. Three… At four seconds, I let the power wane, dwindling back to default standby mode.

  Behind me, the tunnel glowed all the colours of molten lava. A few of the armoured pests still skittered around on my hull, but the majority had been cremated. Without spectroscopic analysis, it was impossible to tell what had once been metal and what had once been rock. And somewhere out there in that glowing hell floated the blasted atoms that had once formed the flesh, blood and internal organs of Alva Clay—but like everything she had ever thought, seen or felt, they too were gone now, scattered and gone forever.

  * * *

  To further our woes, the rock that had fallen from the ceiling was now hardening into a barrier behind me, leaving the gap between the tunnel’s floor and ceiling a few metres too narrow for me to squeeze through. I could fire my engines to clear the blockage, but it would only bring more rock down from the roof. Unless we could come up with an alternative plan, it seemed I was destined to remain trapped here for the foreseeable future.

  But the captain was in no mood to discuss anything right now. She’d pulled out her earbud and taken herself down to the cargo hold, where she had zipped herself inside the inflatable life raft she kept down there, and curled up in a blanket. I tried calling her a couple of times, but she gave no response.

  With Clay gone, Preston Menderes now held the highest rank on the ship—but he was busy in the infirmary, helping our new arrivals to clean and patch their various cuts and scrapes.

  And Nod was busy. If I hoped ever to fly again, I’d need to leave it to patch up the holes in my hull, and do what it could to salvage the weapon emplacements and sensors that had been crushed against the exterior of my hull during the crash. I couldn’t disturb it without delaying those repairs, and frankly I don’t think it would have been much help. Engineering was something that came naturally to it, but battle strategy was almost an entirely alien concept to the peaceful Druff.

  No, if we were going to get out of this one, it seemed I’d have to manage by myself.

  Or so I thought.

  * * *

  “Hello, Trouble.”

  “Hello, Lucy. Where are you?”

  “I’m down in the sick bay, but there’s nothing wrong with me. I’m just a little dehydrated, apparently.”

  “Is that what Preston says?”

  “Yes, he’s nice, isn’t he?”

  “He’s very young.”

  “Aren’t all doctors these days?”

  “How can I help you, Lucy?”

  “It’s not so much how you can help me, as how I think I can help all of us.”

  “Go on.”

  “Well, I happen to know that there’s an identical tunnel running parallel with this one.”

  “So?”

  “There’s only a metre of rock separating the two. If you could bring a section of it down, you’d have room to turn around and a clear path back to the outside.”

  “It’s going to take a few hours yet before I’m ready to fly.”

  “I know, but in the meantime it’s something to think about, isn’t it?”

  “Yes. Yes, it is. Thank you, Lucy.”

  “My pleasure, dearie.”

  CHAPTER SIXTY-FOUR

  ONA SUDAK

  Through the collected feeds of the Fleet of Knives, I watched a compilation of violence, a symphony of fast, surgical destruction that encompassed over forty star systems. One by one, warships were picked off. Fortifications were reduced to rubble. Whole navies died. The spectacle felt overwhelming, heady and strangely compelling. Never had I seen a military operation with such coordination, such elegance and efficiency. And when Bochnak spoke, I could hardly bring myself to tear my attention from the unfolding subdual of humanity.

  “What?” I glared at him.

  He frowned back at me. His creased and rumpled hockey jersey appeared to have been slept in, and his long hair looked to be at least two days overdue for a wash.

  “I am concerned.”

  I raised an eyebrow at him, trying to convey how little his concerns meant in the grand scheme of things.

  “Really?”

  His scowl deepened.

  “Aren’t you?”

  “That’s none of your business.” I disconnected myself from the Fleet’s primary feed and walked back to our living quarters. I’d been on the bridge for hours now. My mouth was dry, and I needed something to drink. He trailed along behind like a sulking cat.

  “I’ve found something,” he said. “Something that might interest you.”

  “What is it?”

  “I’ll need to show you.”

  We reached our rooms and I pulled a cold bottle of juice from the food printer.

  “Then show me.”

  I unscrewed the lid and sipped while he conjured up a three-dimensional map of the Generality.

  “Camrose is here,” he said, pointing to a yellow mid-sequence star in the middle of the projection. He stepped back and glowing lines burst from that central star, branching out to touch all the surrounding systems. “And these are the paths the Fleet’s taking as it expands from world to world.”

  I looked at the burst of light, thinking of fireworks.

  “What of it?”

  He scratched his stomach through the baggy jersey.

  “There’s one system they haven’t visited. In fact, they seem to have gone out of their way to bypass it.”

  I stepped closer. “Really?”

  He stepped to one side, and highlighted a region of space a dozen light years spinward from the Fleet’s starting point. More than a dozen white ships had passed this region en route to other stars and other targets, but all of them had bent their courses away from it, apparently giving the whole area as wide a berth as possible.

  “Maybe there aren’t any armed ships there?” I suggested. But Bochnak shook his head solemnly.

  “As far as I can tell, there are military vessels there from the Conglomeration, the Outward, and several minor human factions, as well as a number of armed and armoured merchant ships.”

  “So, why are we avoiding it? What’s there?”

  “The Intrusion.”

  Now it was my turn to frown. I tapped a finger against my chin, trying to remember what I knew about the anomaly. Some said it was a naked singularity; others that it was a wormhole, or a place where our universe brushed up against another. It was a place where the laws of physics became malleable and open to sudden change; a place of legend and rumour, and the subject of a thousand crackpot theories. And the white ships were definitely eschewing contact with it.

  “So, what d
o you think?”

  Bochnak glanced around and lowered his voice. “I think they’re scared.”

  “Scared of what?”

  He shrugged. “Their former masters, perhaps?”

  He dismissed the projection with a wave of his hand. It broke into pixels and evaporated, leaving us facing each other.

  “Anyway,” he said. “I thought you should know. Although I’m not sure what you can do with this information.”

  “Thank you.” He might not see an immediate use for this knowledge, but at the very least it showed there was one place armed human ships could gather, and potentially organise a counter-strike against us. The next time I spoke with the Fleet, I would suggest they spared a few ships to form a perimeter around the site, to prevent more ships availing themselves of its shelter.

  I was more troubled by the second implication of Bochnak’s news: namely that there was something the Fleet of Knives feared, something so unsettling to them that they would actually deviate a higher dimensional course to avoid coming anywhere near it. These were battleships designed to fight a higher dimensional enemy, to be the thin line between life and chaos. They should have been immune to such paltry emotions as fear. No, whatever reason they had for keeping away from the Intrusion, I was sure it ran deeper than Bochnak’s glib explanation. And not knowing what it was, finding this sudden unknown variable in the equation of our battle plan, troubled me. We were corralling humanity for its own safety. At this point, a flaw in our defences, however minor, might unravel all we hoped to achieve.

  CHAPTER SIXTY-FIVE

  JOHNNY SCHULTZ

  Addison and I were sitting beside Lucy’s bed. The girl was sleeping. Preston had put her on a saline drip to help with her dehydration, but she’d pulled the cannula out so many times in her excitement to talk about what we’d experienced, he’d finally given her a sedative to keep her quiet. Resting, she looked like a perfectly ordinary human child—with all the beauty, potentiality and vulnerability that implied.

  Addison leaned forward and brushed a strand of hair from Lucy’s face, tucking it gently behind the girl’s ear.

  “I can see why her father didn’t want to lose her,” she said.

  “But cutting out her brain and sticking it into a ship?” I made a face. “That’s a pretty drastic solution.”

  “Is it?” Addison ran her finger down Lucy’s cheek. “How far would you go to save someone you loved?”

  I felt like laughing, but I was too tired. “After everything we’ve just been through, you have to ask?”

  Addison shrugged and looked away, and we sat in silence for a while, listening to the ebb and flow of the sleeping child’s soft breath. We both had strips of brilliant white dressings covering the cuts and scrapes on our foreheads, cheeks and knuckles. The smell of bleach lingered in the air, and around us, rows of empty beds stretched away in both directions, eventually vanishing around the curve of the hull. We might be trapped in this ship, but I felt safe for the first time in days. Whatever those crawfish-things were, I doubted they’d be able to burrow their way through a warship’s hull. We had time to draw breath and regroup. Time to think about the future.

  Addison pulled on her index finger. “Listen, what you were saying about taking care of her and being a family.” She scraped her teeth across her lower lip. “Did you mean all that, or were you just humouring her?”

  I looked her in the eye. If ever I was going to back away from my promises, the moment was now. But for some reason, I didn’t want to. At that moment, looking at Lucy’s head resting on the soft hospital pillow, I think I would rather have sacrificed a limb than ever contemplate abandoning that little girl.

  My throat was dry. I tried to keep my voice level.

  “I meant every word.”

  “Even the part about me coming with you.”

  “Yes.” I felt my cheeks flush. “If you still want to?”

  Addison looked thoughtful. Then she gave a tired smile, and reached to squeeze my hand.

  “We’re not out of the woods yet,” she said. “But thank you.”

  CHAPTER SIXTY-SIX

  NOD

  Ship’s avatar comes to see me.

  “I’m worried,” says Intractable Mutt.

  “No worry,” I tell her. “Work being done. Breakages being fixed. Given time, even straighten out dents in nose.”

  “No,” she says. “I’m not worried about that. I know you and your charges are doing a superlative job.”

  “Then what?”

  She puts chin in hands.

  “I’m worried about the captain.”

  I feel alarm.

  “Captain hurt?”

  “No, physically, she’s fine. But mentally, I’m not so sure. It’s the loss of Alva Clay, you see. She’s taking it very badly.”

  “Captain broken?”

  “Possibly.”

  “You can fix?”

  “I’m not sure. Some things can’t be fixed.”

  I feel my fingers curl. Irreparably broken things make my faces itch.

  “I could try.”

  The Trouble Dog smiles.

  “That’s very kind of you, Nod, but I’m not sure there’s anything that can be done right now. She’s just got to work her way through the grief.”

  Avatar fades away.

  I look down at tools.

  So many tools.

  Tools to fix anything.

  Except humans.

  I throw wrench against bulkhead. It makes big noise.

  Stupid wrench.

  Captain broken.

  Need to fix.

  Need new tools.

  CHAPTER SIXTY-SEVEN

  SAL KONSTANZ

  I lay curled in the bottom of the inflatable life raft, with a survival blanket for warmth and a life jacket for a pillow. I had zipped the awning shut, creating a snug cocoon, illuminated only by the circling light of the emergency beacon on the roof of the raft, its orange glow seeping through the waterproof material like sunset through fog.

  I had no idea how long I’d been lying there. I’d been drifting back and forth across the border between wakefulness and sleep, unable to fully distinguish between either state.

  How had I lost another?

  After George’s death, I’d sworn to keep the rest of my crew safe and out of danger. But here we were, less than a year later, and I’d failed. Just as I’d failed to protect George, and just as I’d failed to hang on to Sedge or save my parents. Everyone I’d ever cared about had been taken from me. Everyone had gone away, and I wasn’t sure I was strong enough to continue without them. And with the white ships sweeping like a destructive blizzard across human space, I couldn’t even go back to Camrose. My world had, almost literally, disintegrated beneath my feet. I had no remaining friends, no family, and no home. All I had left were my responsibilities to Preston and Nod, and my position as captain of a crashed, trapped ship, surrounded by enemies and soon to be embroiled at the centre of a conflict between two alien fleets.

  I’d come here to rescue the crew of the Lucy’s Ghost, but now who was left to rescue me? If the reports we’d received were to be believed, the House of Reclamation had been swept aside along with the Conglomeration and Outward fleets. Those human ships that had escaped the carnage would be too busy running for their lives to come and search for us. We were alone, just one more lost ship among thousands. Out there among the stars, people and ships were dying in uncounted numbers. And right outside this rock, three of their executioners were waiting to finish us as well.

  I knew I should be on the bridge, working with the Trouble Dog to try and figure a way out of this mess, but the weight of my grief kept me pinned to the floor of the raft. I felt we had, by whatever measure you cared to employ, failed in every way that mattered. Lying there in my grief, death seemed inevitable. All I had left to lose was my life. The only uncertainty was how much longer I had to wait for it to be taken from me. I felt powerless and miserable, and every time I closed my eyes, all
I could see was Alva’s torn boot bobbing and tumbling on the backs of those frantic alien crustaceans.

  She hadn’t deserved to die like that. She was tough; she must have known what she was doing. She was clever enough to have seen the danger, and brave enough to have stood and faced it in order to give the rest of us time to reach safety.

  She had chosen to make that sacrifice, but I wished she hadn’t. I wished it had been me. If I’d known it meant saving Alva and sparing myself the torment I now felt, I would have gladly taken arms against that sea of pincers, and thrown myself into battle against them.

  Without Alva, everything seemed hopeless. And without hope, what point was there in struggling? Why spend my final hours searching frantically for an escape from the inevitable when it was easier to lie here and watch the sweep of the revolving beacon play across the roof of my inflatable tent? With luck, the others would be making peace with whatever deities or ancestors they prayed to, and would forgive this abdication of responsibility on my part. After all, I had nothing to offer them, no magical solution or words of comfort. All I had was the aching void of my own grief, and a profound desire to be left alone for whatever time remained.

  CHAPTER SIXTY-EIGHT

  TROUBLE DOG

  While Lucy’s body slept, her avatar met with mine. I had let her choose the venue, and she had designed a virtual reality space that resembled the terrace of an old Victorian hotel, perched on a cliff overlooking the North Sea. Sunlight shone on clean white linen tablecloths. Waiters wove unobtrusively between tables. Delicate china cups clinked against saucers. Teaspoons rattled elegantly.

  “Do you like it?” Lucy asked. She had dressed appropriately for the occasion in a long dress with a fitted bodice and a wide skirt with petticoats and calf-length boots. She had a fur stole around her shoulders and a diamond pendant hanging from her neck, casting little rainbows across her chest. Her hair was piled up on the top of her head like a confection. In contrast, I’d opted for my default appearance, and wore my long black trench coat. I’d left my hair free to tumble down my back any way it pleased. Being stuck in a tunnel, damaged and trapped, I felt in no mood to show off or play dress-up.