New Taiyuan, Shanxi, Iota Persei System,
September 8th, 2149CE - System Alliance Calendar
Adam Williams
Brigadier General Adam Williams had long ago concluded that civilization expanded faster than common sense.
Shanxi was proof of that.
He stood beside the panoramic windows of the Colony Administration Building and looked across New Taiyuan. The building sat atop one of New Taiyuan’s artificial ridges overlooking the city. The structure had been designed by an architectural committee that apparently believed every public building should resemble either a corporate headquarters or a religious shrine.
Adam hated it. Too much glass. Too many curves. Not enough armor.
The city stretched to the horizon beneath a clear blue sky, towers of steel and graphene rising above orderly districts and green belts. Maglev lines crisscrossed the urban landscape like silver veins. Cargo shuttles drifted between arcologies. Construction drones crawled over half-finished skyscrapers like industrious insects.
Twelve-point-six million people.
Five years. Only five years. That was all it had taken.
It was absurd. Then again, relay colonies always were.
Most people back on Earth didn't understand the difference between a relay colony and a normal extrasolar settlement.
To civilians, a colony was a colony. To logistics officers, economists, and military planners, the difference was enormous.
Humanity possessed slipspace drives. That alone had changed civilization.
Victor Fedorov's greatest contribution—well, second greatest, depending on which engineering journal one asked—had allowed ships to cross distances previously considered impractical.
But physics remained physics.
A hundred light-years was still a hundred light-years.
Civilian slipspace freighters weren't military vessels. They couldn't simply tear through reality at maximum velocity. A cargo convoy traveling between distant frontier systems might still require weeks or months of transit.
Mass relays changed everything.
A relay transformed an isolated settlement into a transportation hub overnight. Shanxi sat practically on top of one. Goods flowed faster. People arrived faster. Investment multiplied. Population exploded. A relay colony developed in five years what might take a conventional colony twenty. Which sounded wonderful until somebody had to defend it. That unfortunate somebody was Adam Williams.
His command consisted of roughly twelve thousand personnel. Officially. Reality was uglier. About four thousand were active-duty military. The remaining eight thousand were militia: volunteers, reservists, former police officers, retired veterans, patriotic civilians.
People who spent Monday fixing plumbing and Tuesday practicing squad maneuvers. Shanxi had grown like a capital and been defended like a frontier town. Cities could be printed, funded, and populated in five years. Soldiers could not.
Williams had spent two years trying to turn them into something resembling a military force. Some days he succeeded. Some days he wanted to drink. Today felt like a drinking day.
The conference room behind him slowly filled with people. Governor Shen Zhao arrived first. Shen looked exactly how governors always looked. Professional. Calm. Reasonably intelligent. And burdened by the impossible task of balancing reality against politics.
Behind him came Emily Chen, infrastructure coordinator. The woman could probably construct a city using only spreadsheets and spite.
Then Derrick Teague, head of colonial procurement and office administration. Adam privately considered Derrick responsible for ninety percent of all paperwork-related crimes against humanity.
Major Le Huang entered next. Public Security. Vietnamese ancestry. Early thirties. Sharp eyes. Sharper principles. Good officer. Annoyingly optimistic. Still believed regulations existed for reasons beyond paperwork. Adam remembered being that young. It seemed exhausting.
Last came Naomi Campbell. Representative of Yalong Industries. A subsidiary of Yangtze Group. The largest corporate investor on Shanxi. Meaning she was here to politely advocate for things that would make her employers extremely wealthy.
The projector activated. A familiar holographic figure appeared. Long black hair. Bright smile. Voluptuous figure in white summer dress. Entirely unnecessary and far too much enthusiasm.
"Good morning everyone!"
Aria.
The AI had been with Shanxi since the first colony ship arrived.
Officially she was New Taiyuan’s administrative intelligence.
Unofficially, she was the colony’s overenthusiastic digital mother.
She had helped plan roads, manage agriculture, balance power grids, and coordinate emergency services.
She had also developed the alarming habit of treating everyone under the age of one hundred like a mildly irresponsible teenager.
Which included Adam.
He suspected half the colony loved her while the other half tolerated her. Yet, everyone listened to her which was probably more authority than some elected officials enjoyed.
"Morning, General."
"You seem unusually happy."
"I'm always happy."
"You crashed traffic control yesterday."
Aria blinked.
"That was a software disagreement."
"Three thousand commuters disagree."
"It built character."
Several people laughed while Adam just pinched the bridge of his nose. Five years. Five years and nobody else seemed to find her exhausting.
The meeting began. A star map appeared. The Iota Persei system glowed above the table. Adam always found the system beautiful. A yellow-white G-class star remarkably similar to Sol. Four major planets. Two asteroid belts. Three mining stations that feed the growth of one rapidly growing colony world.
Shanxi itself was nearly ideal. Class-One Garden World. Gravity slightly below Earth standard. Nitrogen-oxygen atmosphere. Mild seasonal variation. Stable climate. Rich oceans. Abundant resources. Almost suspiciously perfect.
If somebody had designed a planet specifically for human settlement, it would have looked remarkably similar. Which explained why population growth had become completely ridiculous.
The hologram zoomed outward. A relay icon appeared. Adam's headache returned.
"The primary purpose of today's meeting," Governor Shen said, "is final confirmation regarding activation of the Shanxi-Theta Relay."
Several individuals nodded in satisfaction. Adam did not and neither did Huang.
Shen continued.
“Tomorrow morning, Grissom Protocol restrictions will be lifted.”
There it was.
The reason everyone had gathered. The reason Adam's instincts were screaming. The reason Huang looked irritated.
Tomorrow.
The relay would activate tomorrow.
Grissom Protocol restrictions would end.
Grissom Protocol, which has been the standard exploration doctrine of humanity since 2122, was simple in principle.
Before activating a relay leading into unexplored territory, the surrounding region had to undergo sufficient survey operations. Not because humanity feared aliens. At least not officially.
The protocol existed because opening a relay blind was monumentally stupid.
Unknown stellar hazards. Unstable systems. Potential hostile environments. Countless ways for things to go catastrophically wrong. The protocol existed because explorers had a remarkable tendency to die creatively.
The room remained quiet. Nobody seemed eager to acknowledge the obvious.
Shen continued.
"SSV Tesla will conduct activation procedures."
The hologram changed.
Three ships appeared.
SSV Tesla, Einstein-class exploratory vessel and two frigates: SSV Canae and SSV White Mountain.
Good ships, but not enough. Not if things went wrong.
Huang raised his hand. Shen sighed before he could suppress it. Adam almost smiled. The governor knew exactly what was coming.
"Major?"
"The Sigma Theta cluster survey remains incomplete."
Aria immediately projected additional data.
A new hologram appeared. A three-dimensional map of cluster rotated slowly above the table.
Twenty percent of surveyed regions glowed green. The remainder remained yellow and red. Unknown. Unmapped. Unexplored. A lot of unknown.
Huang pointed at the display.
"Current survey completion stands at approximately twenty-two percent."
Aria nodded.
"Twenty-two point four percent."
"Thank you."
"You're welcome."
Huang ignored her.
"The protocol exists for a reason."
Derrick immediately jumped in.
"Major, with respect, the remaining regions are statistically irrelevant."
Adam resisted the urge to groan. Whenever someone used the phrase statistically irrelevant, they were usually about to say something statistically stupid.
Derrick gestured toward the map.
"Initial scans indicate hostile conditions throughout most of the cluster."
Aria expanded several stellar systems.
Radiation storms. Dead worlds. Brown dwarfs. Asteroid fields. Hostile environments indeed.
"No habitable worlds have been identified," Derrick said. "No viable colonization targets."
Huang folded his arms.
"If there's nothing valuable beyond the relay, why are we rushing activation?"
The room suddenly found itself fascinated by the hologram.
Nobody wanted to answer.
Because everyone already knew.
Adam looked toward Naomi.
She immediately became interested in examining the table.
There it was. The real reason.
Aria displayed another system.
Rhea.
Three-point-one-five light years beyond Theta. Resource markers exploded across the display. Titanium. Titanium. And more titanium. Enough titanium to make industrial executives start hyperventilating.
Titanium was civilization: ships, stations, orbital elevators, infrastructure, military hardware.
Humanity consumed titanium like an addict consumed narcotics. And Yangtze Group desperately wanted access before Manswell Corporation beat them to it.
The corporate rivalry was becoming legendary. Manswell dominated heavy shipbuilding. Yangtze wanted a seat at that table. Rhea represented that opportunity.
Adam finally spoke.
"Funny coincidence."
Several people shifted uncomfortably.
"Humanity discovers one of the largest titanium deposits outside Alpha Centauri and suddenly everyone wants to skip protocol."
Naomi cleared her throat.
"General, Yalong Industries merely supports continued development."
"Of course you do."
"We believe economic expansion—"
"Means credit."
"General—"
"It means lots of credit."
Emily looked away to hide a smile.
Naomi sighed.
Adam almost felt bad. Almost. She wasn’t actually the problem. She was simply the designated spokesperson for corporate interests. Somewhere behind her stood executives already calculating profit margins.
Shen finally intervened.
“That’s enough.”
The governor’s voice sharpened.
“The decision has already been approved by Colonial Affairs. The activation will proceed.”
There it was. The final answer. Someone higher up had signed paperwork. The machine was moving and nobody present could stop it. Adam hated when his instincts lost arguments to bureaucracy.
The governor then turned to Adam; his expression hardened.
“General, I do not like this either. But Rhea changes the equation. Our funding allocation requests have been denied twice. Alpha Centauri and Manswell yards are consuming everything. If Shanxi does not secure an independent supply line now, we become permanently dependent on decisions made light-years away.”
Adam hated that argument. Mostly because it was not stupid.
He let out a sigh of resignation. There was no fighting this. The activation would proceed. So, he adapted. That was what military officers did.
"Then I'll place the garrison on alert."
Several heads turned.
“What?” Adam asked.
“If I’m wrong, nothing happens...But If I’m right, you’ll all suddenly appreciate the paranoia.”
Huang nodded immediately.
Good.
At least someone still possessed common sense.
Shen considered it.
Then nodded.
“Approved.”
“Orbital defense platforms?”
“Approved.”
“Fleet readiness?”
“Approved.”
“Emergency response procedures?”
"Approved."
Adam grunted. Better than nothing.
The meeting continued for another hour. Logistics. Budgets. Infrastructure. Paperwork. And more paperwork. Enough bureaucracy to kill a man faster than enemy fire.
Eventually everyone stood. The meeting had ended. Aria remained hovering cheerfully.
"I predict only a four-point-two percent chance of disaster."
Nobody looked reassured.
"That's not helping, Aria," Emily said.
"I thought it sounded optimistic."
"It doesn't."
"Oh."
The AI seemed genuinely disappointed. Adam shook his head. Only Aria could accidentally make everyone more nervous.
Outside, Major Huang caught up with him.
"This is a mistake."
"Probably."
"Probably?"
Adam shrugged.
"You want certainty?"
Adam continued walking.
"Son, if military history teaches anything, it's that certainty gets people killed."
They stepped onto a balcony overlooking New Taiyuan. The city stretched endlessly beneath them. Millions of people. Millions of lives. Millions of reasons to worry.
Huang folded his arms.
"They're chasing resources."
"Yes."
"And ignoring protocol."
"Also yes."
"And we're supposed to smile and salute?"
Adam barked out laughter. Short and humorless.
"Welcome to military service."
Huang snorted.
Adam glanced at him. The major was competent. Disciplined. Perhaps slightly too idealistic. But that wasn't necessarily a flaw. The Alliance needed officers who still believed rules mattered. God knew Adam had become cynical enough for both of them.
"Focus on your job."
Huang sighed.
"I know."
"Police readiness."
"Already working on it."
"Good."
The younger man saluted. Adam returned it. Then Huang departed. Still annoyed. Still principled. Still young. Adam watched him go. Good officer. Would probably make colonel someday. Assuming politics didn't kill him first.
"You're brooding."
Adam didn't even turn around.
"Aria."
The AI materialized beside him. Her holographic form sat casually on the balcony railing. An act impossible for both physics and common sense.
"I wasn't brooding."
"You were staring dramatically into the distance."
"I'm old."
"That's not a defense."
Adam rolled his eyes. The AI grinned.
"You know, statistically speaking, older humans brood thirty-seven percent more."
"I hate your statistics."
"You hate all statistics."
"Correct."
Aria laughed.
For a moment Adam studied her. Forty years ago, the sight would have disturbed him. A machine pretending to be human. That was how he'd seen it. Back then he'd been a young lieutenant. Christian. Traditional. Raised on old scriptures and older assumptions.
The creation of AI had felt wrong. Profoundly wrong. It was like playing God. Creating intelligence from code. It offended everything he'd grown up believing. Then he'd spent decades serving alongside them. Working with them. Arguing with them. Laughing with them. Mourning them. Because AI died too. Not often. But sometimes. And when they did, people grieved. Just like anyone else.
Eventually Adam had reached a conclusion. If something could think, dream, laugh, cry, and love; then maybe the question wasn't whether it had a soul. Maybe the question was whether humans were qualified to decide who did.
Aria interrupted his thoughts.
"You got quiet."
"Just thinking."
"Dangerous hobby."
Adam snorted.
"Contact the Washington."
"Already did. General Grumpy."
Of course she had.
Aria’s hologram vanished. Moments later, another appeared.
Adam immediately relaxed slightly, which, for him, qualified as enthusiasm.
Captain Li Ming looked young, as did everyone nowadays. Gene therapies. Lifespan treatments. Cellular maintenance packages. The average human could expect to reach one hundred and fifty. Many reached far beyond.
Adam looked forty and he was eighty-seven.
The captain wore Alliance Navy gray. Shoulder length dark hair, sharp brown eyes. Her unusually prominent ears were impossible to miss. A feature she'd inherited from her grandmother. One she absolutely hated. And a beautiful face, if it’s not for her permanent expression of mild irritation.
Adam liked her immediately when they first met. Mostly because she reminded him of himself. Which admittedly wasn't a recommendation.
"General."
"Captain."
Li Ming immediately noticed his mood.
"Let me guess."
"The governor ignored military advice."
"That obvious?"
"You have your 'civilian incompetence' face."
Adam snorted. Fair.
Li Ming possessed many qualities, but tact was not among them. Perhaps that explained why he liked her.
"Relay activation tomorrow."
"Wonderful." Her sarcasm could strip paint. "I'm sure corporate interests had absolutely nothing to do with it."
"None whatsoever."
"Obviously."
They shared a solemn look, then busted out laughing. Military officers across history possessed an almost supernatural ability to identify terrible ideas. Mostly because politicians kept generating them.
"Status?"
"Defense Squadron ready."
Li straightened. Professional instantly replacing humor. Behind her, the bridge of SSV Washington bustled with activity.
An Athens-class cruiser. Reliable. Underappreciated. Much like its captain.
"Twelve Hastings-class frigates."
A tactical display appeared.
"Cannae and White Mountain detached tomorrow."
"Expected."
"Five operational orbital defense platforms."
Adam grimaced. Only Five. Shanxi should have ten. Budget cuts. Always budget cuts.
"Comforting."
"It gets better."
Her expression deadened.
"The latest demilitarization package removed our heavy energy weapons."
Adam closed his eyes. Of course it did. Colony defense fleets always received hand-me-downs. The Navy trusted frontier commands with expensive equipment approximately as much as they trusted toddlers with grenades.
“Do you have enough?”
“Against pirates and smugglers? absolutely. Against anything serious?” She shrugged. “Ask me after I finish praying.”
Adam barked a laugh.
"Fair."
"We go to war with the fleet we have."
A familiar military truth. Not necessarily a comforting one.
Adam studied her. Li Ming's family history practically dripped from every personnel file ever written about her.
Her grandfather was the retired Fleet Admiral Li Chen. One of the architects of modern Alliance naval doctrine.
Her father was a rear admiral, commander of Arcturus logistic fleet. And her older brother commanded a carrier battlegroup in Exodus Cluster. Military royalty. The kind of lineage that opened doors automatically. And the captain hated it. Spending her entire career trying to prove she wasn't succeeding because of her surname.
Li wanted her own reputation. Adam respected that. Even if her mouth occasionally sabotaged her career. Especially her mouth. The woman possessed absolutely no fear of speaking her mind. A trait admired by soldiers. Less appreciated by admirals.
"I hear your brother just got command of a carrier group."
She groaned immediately.
"Don't start."
"Fourteen capital ships."
"General."
"Prestigious command."
"Adam!"
"And here you are."
She pointed at him.
"I will take a Pegasus to the surface personally."
"And?"
"I will hit you."
Adam grinned. There she was. The real Li Ming. Blunt. Stubborn. Aggressively honest. A woman entirely incapable of political behavior.
"Still bitter?"
"My brother commands a battlegroup."
"Yes."
"And I'm babysitting a colony with antique ships."
"They're not antique."
"The Washington is older than some colonies."
"She's distinguished."
"She's held together by tradition and profanity."
Adam laughed again. Li Ming’s glare lessened as her lip curve into a smirk. Mission accomplished.
"Stay ready," he finally said.
Her expression immediately sharpened. Professional. Focused. Dangerous.
"Understood."
The joking vanished instantly. One reason she remained valuable. When necessary, she became all business.
"I'll maintain alert status."
"Good."
The transmission ended. Adam stared out the balcony. Below him stretched New Taiyuan. Twelve million civilians. Children. Families. Workers. Dreamers. People building their futures. People assuming someone else would keep them safe.
The usual arrangement. His military forces weren't impressive. Two years wasn't enough to transform civilians into professionals. Not remotely. Still. They'd fight if necessary. That counted for something.
His orbital forces were similarly inadequate. A handful of old ships. Several defense platforms. Nothing extraordinary. Nothing reassuring.
But there was one thing. A small thing. An interesting thing.
Adam opened the classified report inside his dataslate.
A report concerning four visiting N6 operators temporarily assigned to Shanxi.
Officially. They were conducting inspections. Unofficially. Adam suspected something else.
The N Program never sent personnel without reasons. Particularly not N5s and above.
The N6 designation wasn't earned easily. The program selected exceptional soldiers. Then enhanced them further. Cybernetics. Genetic augmentation. Years of brutal training. The sort of people capable of making impossible situations look merely difficult.
Four of them currently occupied a quarter in his main base. Supposedly evaluating training environments. Adam had commanded special operations personnel before. He knew hidden agendas when he saw them. And those four had the look. The look professionals carried when they knew things everyone else didn't.
One of them had requested civilian evacuation tunnel schematics. Another had asked Aria for pre-colonial mineral survey maps of the largest canyon on this continent. None of that had anything to do with sites inspections.
But he wasn't planning to investigate. Curiosity killed careers. Sometimes literally.
Outside the window the sun continued its slow descent. Shanxi remained beautiful. Peaceful. Prosperous. Exactly the sort of colony humanity dreamed about.
Adam hoped tomorrow would be uneventful. He really did. Unfortunately, after six decades in uniform. Experience had taught him another simple truth. The universe rarely cared what you hoped for. And whenever a room full of politicians, bureaucrats, and corporate executives all agreed something was perfectly safe. It usually wasn't.
SSV Washington, Shanxi’s high orbit, Iota Persei System,
September 9th, 2149CE - System Alliance Calendar
Li Ming
Captain Li Ming stood beside the holographic tactical table at the center of Washington’s bridge.
The display floated in the air like a miniature solar system.
The holographic representation of Shanxi-Theta Relay glowed green.
Three blue icons hovered nearby: SSV Tesla, SSV Cannae, SSV White Mountain.
The ships maintained textbook formation. Exactly where they were supposed to be. Exactly how every action manual said they should be.
Li hated textbook operations. It usually meant someone important would later write a textbook about how everything went wrong.
“Telemetry confirms all vessels are holding position,” Cherry announced.
The AI stood beside the tactical display with all the dignity of an eighteenth-century revolutionary officer inspecting troops before a battle: rigid posture, blue military coat, sharp eyes and a permanent expression that suggested everyone around her was slightly disappointing.
Li often described her as a colonial-era aristocrat trapped inside a warship. Cherry described herself as "appropriately refined." Neither opinion was entirely wrong.
“Thank you, Cherry.”
“You’re welcome, Captain.”
The AGI tilted her head.
“I am required to inform you that Commander Tano is currently drinking coffee despite regulation prohibiting beverages near tactical consoles.”
“Cherry.” Li sighed.
“What?”
“You hacked their internal cameras again.”
“I did not.”
The pause lasted exactly one second. Then Cherry added:
“I merely accessed them.”
Several bridge officers chuckled.
Li rubbed her temple.
“One day somebody is going to court-martial you.”
“They’d have to catch me first.”
“That’s not helping your case.”
“I cannot lie, Captain.”
The bridge erupted into laughter. Even Li smiled. Because everybody aboard the Washington knew that statement was itself a lie.
Cherry lied constantly. Not out of malice but mostly for entertainment.
The AGI maintained an elaborate fiction that she was physically incapable of deception despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary.
She once convinced an entire maintenance division on Shanxi that Admiral Sato secretly dyed his eyebrows. The admiral’s eyebrows were natural, which was unfortunate.
A new transmission window appeared displaying upper half of Captain Richard Spencer, commanding officer of the Tesla.
The explorer captain looked exactly how Li expected: Professional, tired and trying to not look nervous.
“Captain Li.”
“Captain Richard.”
“Tesla reports green across the board.”
A second window appeared: Commander Lorenza Tano of the SSV Cannae and Commander Peter Lin of the SSV White Mountain. Both had served under her command for the last three years. Both were decent leader, despite being a bit of a slacker in Tano case.
The ritual continued: status report, system checks, redundant confirmations. Then confirmations confirmed the previous confirmations. The Alliance loved procedures. Particularly around the relays.
Li folded her hands behind her back.
“The time is zero nine hundred local. September ninth, twenty-one forty-nine.”
Her voice became formal and professional. The bridge quieted in response.
Li continued:
“Under authority granted by Colonial Affairs and Alliance Exploration Command, Grissom Protocol restrictions on Shanxi-Theta Relay are hereby lifted.”
Nobody cheered. Nobody applauded. The significance demanded respect.
“Proceed with caution.”
Richard nodded.
“Understood.”
A beat passed, then:
“Activation signal transmitted.”
The relay slowly awakened. Green energy crawled across its ancient metallic surfaces. The enormous structure hummed to life.
Li watched the holograms silently. Every human who had ever witnessed a relay activation described the experience differently.
Some called it beautiful. Others called it unsettling. Li preferred impressive. Because regardless of origin, purpose, or age, mass relays were impossible not to respect. Humanity still didn’t understand how the massive fifteen-kilometer structure worked. Not even after decades of study. Not even after Victor Fedorov revolutionized half of modern physics. Mass relays remained stubbornly alien.
The relay brightened. Energy levels climbed. Systems synchronized. The countdown progressed.
Cherry suddenly spoke.
"The Tesla and Geronimo have initiated Whiteout Protocol."
Li nodded in confirmation.
Whiteout Protocol existed for a very specific reason. If explorers encountered hostile civilizations, the last thing Alliance Command wanted was a captured navigation database revealing the location of Earth, or Arcturus, or every colony in human space. The protocol erased sensitive navigation records.
On the tactical display, Cherry and Tesla's AGI, Geronimo, exchanged encrypted verification packets. A stream of green confirmations appeared. Unlike Cherry, Geronimo was a perfectly reasonable AI. Which probably explained why Cherry disliked him.
"Data purge complete."
"Confirmed."
"Secondary purge complete."
"Confirmed."
"Tertiary verification complete."
Cherry looked faintly disappointed.
Li recognized that expression.
"What?"
"I was hoping someone would forget a checkbox."
"Cherry."
Li warned.
"What? It makes things exciting."
A few minutes later the relay fully stabilized.
Richard’s voice returned.
"Proceeding with transit."
Li felt a familiar knot in her stomach. Every relay activation carried uncertainty. Exploration always did. Yet humanity kept doing it. Because that was what humanity did. When they saw a door, they opened it. Preferably at high velocity.
Richard smiled faintly.
"See you all in twelve hours."
"Try not to discover anything horrifying."
Tano immediately laughed.
"No promises, Captain."
Peter Lin sighed.
"Please don't encourage her."
"Where's your sense of adventure?"
“Alive and safely avoiding unexplored relays.”
Li smirked.
“Godspeed, Tesla.”
“You too, Washington.”
The transmission ended. One by one. The three ships accelerated. Blue icons moved toward the relay. Light engulfed them. Then, they were gone.
The display was emptied. Silence settled across the bridge. The operation was over. At least for their part.
Li finally exhaled.
“Well.”
Nobody died. That’s always a promising start.
She returned to her command chair. Around her, bridge operations gradually relaxed. Not laziness. Never laziness. Just professionals easing from high alert back to routine readiness. Exactly how she’d trained them.
When Li first arrived aboard the Washington, the crew had been terrible. Not exactly incompetent just…complacent.
The old captain had accepted mediocrity. He never saw the point of trying.
The ship was old. The assignment undesirable, a dead-end post, so nobody expected excellence.
Li had disagreed. Violently. Three years later the Washington possessed one of the sharpest crews in colonial defense. Not because they had the best equipment. Because they worked harder than everyone else.
Her Executive Officer approached. Commander Darius Wright: tall, dark-skinned, with decent muscle and annoyingly perceptive.
Holding a dataslate. And undoubtedly trouble. The dreaded paperwork.
“Reports for you, ma’am.”
Li accepted the slate. Darius leaned casually beside her chair.
“You know,” he said, “that was actually my first relay activation.”
Li glanced up.
“Really?”
He nodded.
“Closest I got before this was simulation training.”
“Huh.”
“What?”
“You managed not to embarrass yourself.”
“High praise.”
“It’s the highest praise.”
Darius laughed.
“How many have you done?”
“Two, including this one.”
That earned genuine interest.
“Really?”
“The Aconcagua.”
Darius whistled.
“Well, that explains it.”
Everyone knew Aconcagua. One of the Alliance’s premier carriers. Prestigious posting. Prestigious ship. Prestigious career track. It’s precisely the reason why she picked the post at the ‘Ship Selection Night.’
“Petra Nebula,” she said.
"The operation took six months. The battle group established a defensive perimeter. Survey ships mapped every system, every planet, every moon. We probably cataloged every interesting rock."
“Sounds responsible.”
“It was.”
“Unlike this.”
“Exactly.”
Darius smirked.
"This conversation sounds dangerously close to criticism of senior leadership."
Li looked at him.
"I am criticizing senior leadership."
"Excellent."
She continued reviewing reports while Darius lingered, unfortunately.
"You know," he said.
"No."
"You didn't even let me ask."
"Experience."
"You're impossible."
"So I've been told."
Darius folded his arms.
"You really served on Aconcagua?"
"Yes."
"And now you're commanding the Washington."
"Also yes."
"That's quite a career path."
Li slowly lowered the dataslate.
"Darius."
"Captain?"
"I am warning you. Do not go there!"
He grinned.
"Just saying."
Cherry appeared beside them.
"The Captain is here because she informed Admiral Sato that he possessed a stick up his ass."
Several bridge crew members immediately looked away. Trying very hard not to laugh.
Li stared at the AGI with a deadpan expression. Cherry stared back with a perfectly innocent smile. Which somehow made it worse.
“That,” Li bit out, “is classified.”
“I cannot tell lies.”
“You absolutely can!”
“I am deeply wounded by this accusation.”
"You once convinced an entire maintenance team there was a ghost living in Deck Seven."
Cherry looked thoughtful.
"There was?"
"It was you."
"A technicality."
Darius finally lost the battle and laughed.
Li considered murdering both of them. Just briefly, before deciding it would be too much paperwork.
"I’m off-duty. Report anything unusual."
Cherry offered a mock salute.
“Of course, Captain.”
Li pointed at her.
“I don’t trust that tone.”
“You wound me again.”
“See?”
She looked at Darius.
“See what I deal with?”
“I think she’s funny.”
“That’s because she isn’t assigned to torment you.”
Li rose from her seat.
“Maintain standby status.”
The bridge acknowledged.
She headed toward the exit while Cherry’s smug smile followed her all the way out.
=X=
Washington's corridors stretched ahead. Bright and clean. Slightly dated like the ship itself. Crew members saluted. Li returned each automatically.
She'd spent years aboard carriers. Massive vessels. Prestigious vessels. Ships that dominated fleet formations. The Washington wasn't any of those things. Like all Athens-class cruisers, it was old but reliable. Retired from frontline service. Still useful.
The former Fleet Admiral Li Chen still described the Athens as “a proper warship.” Which translated to: Built like a brick, armed like a battleship, and stubborn enough to survive anything.
Her grandfather adored the class. Of course he did. They were state-of-the-art when he was still an admiral. To him the Washington represented naval tradition. To Li it represented being sent to the middle of nowhere. Yet over time she'd grown fond of the old ship. Not that she'd admit it publicly. She had a reputation to maintain.
The observation deck was empty which is good. Li settled into a chair overlooking Shanxi.
The colony filled half the viewport.
Young and still growing. Mix with the natural environment: primordial forest, vast oceans. The view was breathtaking.
She watched continents drift beneath scattered clouds and thought about careers. About choices and mistakes.
Her brother would've handled Admiral Sato differently. Li Jian always knew exactly what to say. Exactly what not to say. Politics came naturally to him.
It came naturally to most of her family.
Except her.
She'd inherited her grandfather's stubbornness. And apparently amplified it. To the point that she even refused her family’s considerable influence when that old coot had kicked her off his fleet. For "insubordination and a distinct lack of respect for rank", as he so eloquently put it.
Will used to say she actively sought arguments.
The memory made her snort. Her academy rival had been insufferable.
Competent but insufferable.
He had look at her with a strange, almost pitying expression after the incident.
"You know, Ming. You're kind of masochistic, aren’t you?"
She could still hear him.
"You deliberately pick these fights when saying ‘yes’ would have been easier."
Then she'd punched him in the liver before stomping off to accept her ‘punishment’ on Shanxi. Which admittedly strengthened his argument.
Letting out a sigh, she watched Shanxi’s slow, stately dance in the void. She missed those days. She missed her friends and family. Even if she did not get alone with them all the time. Even if she still kept contact.
A faint vibration interrupted her thoughts. Her wrist comm flashed.
Cherry.
Li answered immediately.
"Report."
The AI's voice emerged. Calm, professional, and completely lacking her usual smug amusement.
That alone sent warning signals through Li's spine.
"Captain."
A pause. An unusual pause.
"An emergency situation has developed."
Li stood instantly.
"What happened?"
“I would prefer discussing it on the bridge.”
That settled it. Cherry never preferred anything. She usually blurted information immediately. Li started running the moment she left the deck.
By the time she reached the bridge, the atmosphere had transformed. Gone was the casual professionalism. Gone were the jokes. Gone was the relaxed confidence.
Officers moved rapidly between stations. Data flooded displays. Communications specialists worked multiple channels simultaneously.
Nobody saluted. Good. Exactly as trained. Mission took precedence over protocol.
Li moved directly toward the tactical table. Darius stood waiting. His expression immediately alarmed her. Cherry hovered nearby.
“What happened?”
Darius pointed. Li followed his gesture. Her stomach dropped. A blue icon flashed near the Shanxi-Theta Relay.
The Tesla. Impossible.
Yet the transponder unmistakably identified the Tesla.
"What am I looking at?"
Darius swallowed before speaking in low tone:
"Long-range sensors detected the IFF signal twelve minutes ago."
"That isn't possible."
"We know."
Li turned toward Cherry.
"Confirm."
The AI nodded.
“Multiple independent sensor arrays in the squadron confirm the contact.”
Silence. Cold and heavy.
Li stared at the display.
The Tesla’s mission, after passing through the relay, was to establish a waypoint relay for communication. Then further explored the cluster. It should have another 12 hours before they receive any transmission back. And months before the ship returned for resupply.
Something went wrong. Terribly wrong.
Her eyes narrowed.
“Where are the Cannae and the White Mountain?”
Nobody answered immediately. Which was answer enough.
“We don’t know.”
The words felt like lead.
Darius shook his head.
“No transponder signals.”
“No debris.”
“No emergency beacons.”
“Nothing.”
Li’s pulse accelerated.
“Communications?”
Cherry’s expression darkened.
“I have been attempting contact for five minutes.”
"No response."
"Encrypted channels ignored."
"Standard channels ignored.”
The bridge felt smaller.
The air heavier.
"What condition is the Tesla in?"
Cherry hesitated. A terrible sign.
Then:
"Unknown."
Li stepped closer to the display.
"Get me Richard."
"I'm trying."
"Try harder."
Cherry opened her mouth.
Then froze.
Her eyes unfocused briefly.
A heartbeat later she snapped upright.
"I have something."
"What?"
"A signal."
The bridge leaned forward collectively. Cherry's voice dropped.
"Radio transmission."
Li blinked.
Radio? Nobody used radio. At least, not ship-to-ship. Not anymore.
Waypoint communications rendered such methods obsolete. Modern Alliance communication relied on slipstream packets. Tiny bursts of information projected through carefully engineered slipspace-wave interactions. Data crossed light-years with minimal delay. A miracle of modern physics. And far more reliable than primitive radio. Which meant—
The realization hit instantly.
The Tesla couldn’t access its advanced communications. Or wouldn’t. Neither possibility was good.
“Patch it through.”
Static exploded across the bridge: harsh, distorted and broken.
Then, a voice.
Richard Spencer.
Barely recognizable.
“…hostile…”
More static.
"...first contact..."
Li's blood ran cold.
"...both White Mountain and Cannae..."
The signal broke.
Returned.
"...lost..."
Someone whispered a curse.
"...all hands..."
Static consumed everything.
Then silence. Absolute silence. Nobody moved. Nobody spoke. The bridge seemed frozen.
Li stared at the speakers. Waiting. Praying. Anything.
Nothing came. The transmission ended.
Around her, Washington's bridge remained utterly still.
Like everyone was collectively refusing to breathe.
Then Li finally found her voice.
One word. Soft and sharp. Filled with dread.
"Shit."
And somewhere beyond the relay, in the vast darkness of unexplored space, something had just found humanity.
A/N: Don't forget to check out the Codex. Chapter 11 will be posted on July 12, Sunday next week. Thank you all for your supported for this story and myself. Hope you all wonderful peaple the best.