Interloper (The Askirti Chronicles Book 1) Read online

  Interloper

  The Askirti Chronicles

  Book 1

  By

  Danny A. Brown

  Copyright © 2017

  Table of Contents

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Epilogue

  Afterword

  Future Releases

  Prologue

  They came with no warning. The attack was so sudden and so overwhelming. The Earth’s defenses, while decent, were no match for the armada. The orbitals were quickly overwhelmed, the patrols quickly defeated.

  Batteries of artillery lit up the sky as the ground-based defenses swung into action. Unfortunately, it wasn’t nearly enough, amounting to only a few drops in the bucket for what was upon them.

  The dropships came, so many it seemed they filled the skies. Each pregnant with enemies bent on death and destruction. As they made landfall, troops poured out like a flood upon the earth, dozens per ship. And there were thousands of ships. The enemy fought with almost a religious fever, a blood lust and desire for total conquest.

  The better armed and armored invaders cut through the defenders like a hot knife through butter. The natives fought valiantly, but it was all for naught. Their weapons were almost powerless against the enemy. They were outnumbered, outclassed, and outgunned.

  Only as they were overrun did the defenders realize the enemy could do what they wanted with impunity. And for the weeks that followed, they did that.

  Cities burned with no one to put out the fires. Wholesale collapses of infrastructure happened overnight. Fresh water sources were cut off, and waste management ceased, edibles disappeared.

  Losing antiquity and important sites was beyond comprehension as so much history disappeared on the whim of the invading commanders, if for no other reason than for target practice. From the Spires of Artemis to the Great Wall of Decision the destruction was complete. The Citadel of Ur, thought at one time to be indestructible, was laid to waste along with every temple and sacred structure.

  The citizenry was raped, beaten, plundered and raped again. Indiscriminate killings became everyday events. Life had become worth so little as the extermination of it was daily entertainment for the enemy.

  Every resource was stripped, every bit of wealth was confiscated, and hard assets were seized to be sold elsewhere.

  Many of the young, both men and women, who were lucky enough not to be killed, were carried off to be sold as slaves in human trafficking rings.

  But it was not so for citizens of Orlando, Earth’s capital. There were no slaves. There were no survivors. For the pittance of resistance Earth gave, an example was set. The people here received the full fury of the invaders. No, those in Orlando were cut down in the thousands, then in the millions.

  Orlando, the capital of Earth, the cradle of humanity, had been turned into a lifeless ruin, the only occupants being the rotting corpses which littered the streets, a haunting sign and a warning tale to all of what could be visited upon them.

  Chapter 1

  15 years later

  WFS Colt

  The Kapa-Alpha-15 System

  The Ice Queen cometh, she mused as she walked onto the bridge. She heard the rumors before and cared little about what they thought of her. Talking always died down when she entered a room, any room. She always knew when they were talking about her by the looks in their eyes, which she was keen on reading.

  Commander Jacqueline Campo, executive officer of the WFS Colt, was as precise and as polished as they came. First in her class at the academy, was accomplished in every area of her military life. Expert martial artist, expert sharp shooter, domineering of most in hand-to-hand combat against both male and female. She was a fierce competitor.

  Misjudging her by appearance was easy. Her lithe body standing at barely more than a meter and a half did not exactly shout out to run for your life. And her soft features, a face that looked like that of a teenage youth, a breathtaking youth at that, appearing to be one not old enough to have joined the academy, much less be an officer on a warship.

  She had lied about her age upon joining the military, a trick that most women would appreciate. Her specialized genetics made her look so young, nobody would be the wiser. Then with the military’s anti-aging treatments standard to anyone who joined, she would be shocked if she had aged even a day since. At forty years old, she could easily pass for seventeen, though according to her military records she was twenty-five.

  Her pure white hair was just below shoulder length and was kept in a ponytail in accordance with the regulations while on duty. Her sparkling emerald green eyes stood out as unique among her peers.

  And as if to underscore that uniqueness, her alabaster white skin was memorizing. It lacked all pigmentation, was perfectly smooth and unblemished. She had an unsettling, even startling, beauty about her that distracted more than a few.

  As an officer in the Westerly Federation, Commander Jacqueline Campo, or Jackie as she was known, was beautiful, confident and the model officer.

  The Westerly Federation was a medium sized empire, with over two hundred worlds and an elected leadership, if not an utterly corrupt one. It was many hundreds of years old, owing its existence to the rediscovery of space flight.

  Much of human history had been lost, and much technology had been lost and rediscovered, only to be lost again as the race of progress seemed to compete with the battering ram of destiny.

  As human civilization progressed, there were ruins of the past all around them. Mysteries of science that had to be relearned. And relearning these sciences required acquiring knowledge lost so long ago that the fundamentals were not even understood for many centuries. It was unknown what all was lost, leaving a mystique to what will be found. One thing was clear; humans spent a lot of time retracing their steps, and rebuilding that which they once had.

  Once the science was understood, and the materials and manufacturing capabilities were built up, they again took to space to explore and discover. What they found were Space Gates. They seemed to exist in most systems, usually on the outer edges and were not overly complicated to operate. Who placed them there and for what purpose was a mystery. What wasn’t a mystery was that they were ancient.

  Some panicked thinking a mysterious alien race had placed the Gates near them in preparation for a later invasion. Then, when more study was done, the scientists concluded these Gates were older than anyone believed possible, measuring over one hundred thousand years, possibly older. Not only that, but the technology did not appear to be a facsimile or even a distant cousin of the ancient relics which seemed to litter the stars.

  When people figured out how to use the Gates, it was a shock it was so easy to employ. A signal was sent, a destination requested, and a window was opened to another space in this galaxy.

  Monitoring Gate emissions, scientists believed they operated in six dimensions. Wormholes were tossed out early on as an explanation for how they worked, as a real wind
ow was opened, a genuine tear in the fabric of space and time, tightly controlled by the Gate. The window allowed spacecraft to see their destination clearly, and likewise the targets defenders or Gatekeepers to see them.

  At ten thousand meters in diameter, the Gates let fleets of ships through at a time, if need be, or a few larger ships side by side with room to spare.

  When people first opened the Gates, the first thing they discovered was more human civilization. There were humans at every destination. Each system contained a society at various stages of development, all working to reconnect to their lost past. Some were space bound, while others were close to approaching that level of development.

  As trade routes opened, alliances were born, and enemies were made. Many wars ensued over many hundreds of years.

  Every Gate became a fortress as stations ensured security and protection from pirates or rival empires. Each Gate became a potential beachhead for those looking to loot and steal.

  By this system of Gates, the enemy came to her home, to her people, to Orlando.

  This enemy that destroyed my people, I find them, all of them. I will use the Federation as my tool to hunt down and punish those responsible and those involved. I will destroy them utterly.

  “XO? Report!”, Captain De Vitis demanded.

  Captain Jeri De Vitis was an old soul, at one hundred and twenty years of age, and by appearances, he looked it. Well, maybe not look one hundred and twenty years old, but it was evident he forewent anti-aging treatments some time ago.

  Jackie found it amusing that in this Federation she found such opposites that made no sense. Her ultra-white skin, virtually unheard of, contrasts with the rareness of his charcoal black skin. His skin was so very dark and smooth; she found him attractive and very distinguished. She figured out that Jeri was not the only one with such good and unique looks in his family. Some time back she met Ester, Jeri’s wife, and their daughter Amelia, at her academy graduation ceremony. If she thought De Vitis was handsome, Amelia was stunning and Ester equally so. She wondered if they had enhancements to achieve such looks, but banished the thought quickly after remembering how much her captain disdained falseness.

  She loved and adored her commanding officer. He was a great mentor, a great captain, and a greater friend. And more than that, Captain De Vitis had reminded her so much of her father. A kind and fair man, with a strong sense of justice, and a deep desire to protect the innocent.

  The captain was a rarity among the leadership in the fleet. He was competent. That is not saying other captains were incompetent. It was just they were not much of a leader. Most were political appointees who gained their position by favors earned or given.

  In such a fleet, how many would do what was right? If a real war came, would they even fight? It baffled her mind to think the fleet was run so poorly. How did politicians become ship commanders? Corruption and dishonesty ran so deep in the Federation.

  The captain had paid his own price for his sense of honor and duty. Had he been more “political” his seniority, much less his service record, would have earned him a ship of the line, or even a squadron of his own ships!

  No, he upset the wrong people with the truth and as a result was hung out to dry. Now he was the captain of an old destroyer doing pirate patrol. Now he was kept out of sight and out of mind.

  “Nothing much but an old mining settlement on that larger asteroid,” Jackie responded. “It looks like it was abandoned a dozen or so years ago. The probe shows a radioactive decay consistent with a station that has been in disuse for at least a decade. If our pirates did use this as their hideout, the evidence is not there.”

  Jackie did not doubt the pirates were outsmarting them, at least on the technology side. The WFS Colt was an old ship. Centaur class destroyers like it were turned out like clockwork during the second dynasty wars, one hundred and twenty years prior. While the Federation did not leave it out on refits and upgrades, it had been refit no less than four times; refit does not mean modern. And unfortunately, it had been seventeen years since its last refit. As such it was conceivable the pirates were hiding right in front of them, and they would not be able to detect them.

  “Lieutenant Shepard, is there anything else the probe can tell us?” Jackie asked.

  “No, sir! These Troy-15 probes are pretty limited in what they can see, but they show no trace of the bad guys. The nicer Mark-4’s have more depth of resolution and broader wavelengths that are employed for detection, along with its own AI to help digest and process what it is looking at! Now that would be an astoundingly good asset for examining the bazillion rocks in this system!”

  Lieutenant Emilia Shepard was Jackie’s best friend at the academy. Being twenty-five years old, she only thought she was Jackie’s age, not being aware of her friend’s little deception. Jackie looked even younger than she did.

  Emilia was a fun and outgoing person. Jackie enjoyed her back then, but now she was too focused to have time or energy for friends. After graduation, they received separate assignments. They corresponded in the intervening time, but those correspondences got fewer and farther between, and more distant, at least on Jackie’s part.

  After a few years, and much to the surprise of them both, Emilia was transferred to the Colt around the same time as Jackie was appointed it’s XO.

  Emilia tried to reconnect with Jackie on several occasions, but was rebuffed each time or met with indifference.

  Ice Queen is more than a name; it has become who she is, Emilia thought.

  She still felt loyalty towards Jackie though she knew she was being pushed away. She always sensed something was hidden beneath the surface of her friend. Something made her afraid. Every time Emilia pressed, Jackie grew more distant, until she decided it was best to let it go. Perhaps one day her friend would come back to her.

  Emilia was better at recognizing secrets than most and knew Jackie had a secret of her own. This talent was already acknowledged by the powers that be as she was recruited by the secret police for being the political officer on board the Colt. Every warship had one, but nobody on board knew who it was as the position could vary wildly from ship to ship.

  The political officer always had a direct link to the top brass. A link that was never to be abused. If they saw things decidedly unFederation-like, they wielded immense power to have people reassigned, jailed, or even “disappeared.” At least at one point, it had been like that. Over the past few decades, the power of the political officers had wanned.

  Though the power of that office was in remission, this led to most of the ship captains being political appointees. To understand the game helps one to stay in it longer.

  Emilia had the smarts to read people, to understand situations, and had the connections. Her mother was high up in the intelligence community and played an active role in her recruitment.

  Emilia put little stock in the whole spy gig, though she was trained in the craft. She was stationed on an old destroyer doing pirate patrol. Not much to spy on out there!

  It was incredible to her she had been stationed with her old friend from the academy. She only wished they could be close again.

  “Lieutenant, you can drool over those Mark-4’s on your own time. The Federation has not seen fit to give those to ships such as ours,” Jackie calmly responded. She almost winced as the words came out. The very ships that needed those the most had none in inventory.

  “What are your orders, Captain?” she added.

  “We’ve been here for a week scanning rocks. This place is a dead end. Leave a probe here under stealth protocol. If it sees anything, it can fly home and tell us.”

  “Yes sir,” Jackie responded. “Helm, change heading to return to the Gate. Engage FTL drive at one-half power.”

  “Yes sir,” responded Lieutenant Marko Turov. “Changing course and engaging FTL.”

  At that moment, the wall screen showing the space around them darkened. Once the ship was traveling in FTL, the depiction of the area around th
e ship was no longer one that made sense and became highly distorted.

  FTL or Faster Than Light propulsion was stumbled upon while working on improvements to intersystem drives. With the Gate system, FTL capable travel was not needed for going from system to system. But that it sometimes took days to travel across a system, the FTL drive was a convenience, albeit an expensive one, employed almost exclusively by military ships. Even then, it was used judiciously within a system as to not “scare the locals.”

  ##

  “Exiting FTL now,” said Lieutenant Turov.

  Just then the wall screens snapped back onto a view of normal space. The Space Gate itself was just ahead, but it was easier to spot it by looking for the places where stars did not show. The Gate was matte black, like the Colt itself.

  Due to the human need to visualize everything, the wall screens illuminated where the Gate was with a faint white color, including all the details that were visible as were the relic white itself and glowing and a tag identifying it the object as a Gate and which gate number it was. Something about visualizing it helped humans process it.

  “Activate the Gate, send coordinates for the Kapa-Alpha-11 system,” said the captain.

  “Activating the Gate and sending coordinates, sir,” responded Marko.

  At that moment faint, red markers appeared to glow at specific intervals along the massive, ancient relic. Then with no particular fanfare, the stars changed inside the circumference of the Gate to those matching that of what is visible within the Kapa-Alpha-11 system.

  “Lieutenant Mansfield, take us through,” commanded the captain.

  “Yes, sir.”

  Chapter 2

  Six weeks later

  McKenzie Belt

  On approach to Anderson Station

  “WFS Colt you are clear to dock on AE-15-C” control commanded.

  “Copy that control, entering dock AE-15-C into the autopilot, engaging now” responded Lieutenant Rachel Mansfield, the chief navigation officer on the Colt.