“Innocent?” the captain roared back. “There was nothing innocent about those soldiers. How many Terrans have you killed since joining the military, Michael? Dozens? Hundreds? How about thousands? You can preach to me all day long that you were doing it for the good of the Alliance in a time of war. Hopefully, you’re smart enough to realize that’s all I did, too. I defeated my enemy in the name of the Empire during a time of war.
“You’re a hypocrite, Michael, and you should’ve had the common decency to die on the planet with the rest of them.”
“But I didn’t.” Vance’s stoic exterior returned. “I had a greater purpose, one I had yet to accomplish.”
Captain Young chuckled. “Do tell, Michael. What’s this great purpose?”
“To kill you before you can turn this ship over to the Terrans.”
The captain smiled wickedly. “And how do you propose to do that?”
“With this.” Vance reached into the dark leather pouch strapped to his hip and pulled out a dark-black sphere. Activating the thermal nuclear bomb was easy while sitting in the darkness after entering the Goliath. As the countdown neared zero, red lights flew around the exterior of the sphere in a dizzying blur.
Screams of protest and fear erupted, as the guards ran for the door. Though stunned, Captain Young stood his ground and watched Vance smugly step forward into the room. Thick laughter rolled from deep in Vance’s chest, filling the room and echoing in the vaulted chamber, as the men frantically tried to flee.
“For Ixibas! For Tusque!”
“Shut up!” Captain Young screamed, drawing his pistol and firing.
The first round slammed into Vance’s gut and dropped him to one knee. He clutched his stomach with his free hand, trying to stem the flow of blood. Grimacing, he looked up at the Pilgrim traitor.
“For Nova and Ainj.”
The captain fired again, hitting Vance’s shoulder. He spun on his knee and fell prone to the floor. Groaning with pain, he said, “For Eza.”
“Shut up! Shut up!” Frantic, the captain fired twice more. Both slugs tore into Vance’s back, piercing a lung and leaving gaping exit wounds through his chest.
The metallic taste of copper filled his mouth, as sticky blood poured from him. His vision darkened, as his strength fled. Sucking oxygen into his remaining lung, he whispered, “For Aleiz.”
The bomb rolled from his limp fingers.
Captain Young lunged forward, snatching the orb from the floor, and hurried toward the airlock.
Two steps from the door, the flickering lights stopped moving. A solid red bar illuminated the sphere’s equator.
The Cair Ilmun nearly cleared the last planet in the system when the Goliath was consumed in flames. Starting with a bubble on its hull, the side of the ship swelled and split, as fire engulfed the warship’s interior. Light as bright as a second sun spilled from cracks in the hull before the ship’s armored plating gave way.
The entire vessel exploded in a soundless vortex of heat and radiation, leaving little more than flecks of debris in its wake. The remains of the Goliath were pulled into the atmosphere of the planet around which it orbited. Small pieces of alloy burned away in the atmosphere. Larger pieces burned like meteors before disappearing into the planet’s cloudy interior.
Within moments of the explosion, nothing remained of the once-massive Alliance ship.
Adam silently joined Yen in the cockpit, choosing to watch the empty space ahead instead of the vanishing debris behind. He sought the right words, but they failed to come. Instead, he settled on simple conversation to pass the time and help him think of something else.
“How long until we reach an Alliance outpost?” he asked softly. Glancing over his shoulder, he wasn’t surprised to see Buren in a sullen pose.
Yen cleared his throat, brushing away the thick emotion in his voice. “It’ll be almost a month before we’re able to find anything capable of transmitting to the High Council.”
“Once we get there, that’s only the beginning of what we need to accomplish,” Adam added, beginning a mental checklist of their future work. “We have to notify the High Council of the Empire’s invasion. We need to tell them about the genetic mutations on Purseus II. We have to warn them that something like it could exist elsewhere in Alliance space. We have to….”
The rest of the sentence went unsaid for fear of upsetting Yen further.
Finally, Yen said what Adam couldn't. “We have to notify them of all those who died.”
“I’m sorry, Yen. I truly am. Once we get there, we’ll have a whole lot to do.” He remembered his final conversation with Vance and the promise he made to look after the survivors. “We have lots of promises to keep.”
Yen slipped the ID tags from under his shirt. Holding them in his hand, he read the laser-etched name printed on both metal tags-Eza Riddell. “More than you know,” he whispered into the quiet cabin.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Keryn, wiping sweat from her brow, drank in the cool air of the Academy’s auditorium. Her muscles still burned from the day’s aerial joust, but it wasn’t her solid finish in that exercise that kept an excited smile on her face. It was the two-month anniversary since she began training at the Academy, though even that milestone didn’t make her giddy. After two months, the first-year cadets were finally being given a long-denied luxury-mail.
Since their arrival, the instructors kept the students focused on their studies, not wanting them distracted by letters from home. Attrition rates dropped when cadets lacked access to letters telling them what they were missing. Two months into their training, those who wished to quit were already long gone. By then, mail made little difference to their training, aside from boosting morale.
Finding a seat in the crowded auditorium, Keryn sat in a chair beside Iana. Anticipation was palpable in the air, as others joined them. Since their inception of teamwork during the joust, both their popularity and core group of friends grew significantly. More than six students took seats around the pair, chatting idly about their successes and failures in the joust.
Keryn listened halfheartedly, knowing her true focus was on the stage and the mail that would soon be delivered.
A hush fell over the room, as a line of instructors entered from the rear of the auditorium and filed forward, carrying heavily laden bags of letters and boxes. By the time they reached the stage, the cadets were seated and quiet.
Speakers rumbled, as Victoria threw a hidden switch. When she spoke, her musical voice was amplified, filling the large chamber.
“As I call your name,” she began, sticking to the straightforward dialogue that marked her as the head instructor, “please come forward and collect your mail. Once you’ve received your packages, you may file out quietly and return to your rooms. You’re officially released for the rest of the day.”
One by one, instructors stepped forward and began calling off names, as they emptied their bags. Keryn frowned, as they went down the list. They were going alphabetically, which meant she was toward the end. She made herself comfortable, knowing nearly 150 students would receive mail before her, Iana included.
She tapped her foot impatiently against the back of the chair in front of her, much to the chagrin of the student occupying it. Keryn knew she should be calmer, that it was only mail from home, but she couldn't shed the eager energy flooding her system. Her anticipation turned to irritation, as she waited nearly half an hour before they broke into the higher range of the alphabet.
“Ralston,” an instructor called.
As that student claimed his mail, the instructor continued.
“Raylor. Reavil. Reihlaard. Ricynth.”