Garlin was near the Swarm orb, waiting placidly as his tentacle, now attached to the orb, made a report.
On the gurney, Duncan slowly opened her eyes, the virus having repaired the physical damage done to her mind. She lifted her right arm — a fully formed hand with smooth skin was at the end.
There was a throbbing noise inside the spacecraft, something she vaguely recognized. She stared up at the ceiling for several seconds, trying to orient herself. It too was familiar although she couldn’t immediately place it. Her head hurt and it was hard to concentrate.
Her last conscious memory was of Garlin cutting off her hand. She stretched the fingers of the new hand. It was strapped to the table at the elbow, limiting her movement. Another strap ran across her ankles, thighs, and chest. She lifted her head, noting the dried blood encrusted on the robe she wore.
Immortal.
The word echoed in her consciousness as her head slumped back on the table. What good was immortality in the current situation? Where was she? That was the question that bothered her as this place seemed familiar, almost comforting despite her predicament.
Her spaceship — the Fynbar. It came to her with a wave of sharply conflicting emotions. A warm, familiar feeling, spiked through with the realization that the Swarm was in control of it. Memories poured through her mind in an overwhelming cascade. Her conditioning had been broken. If she could remember, then the Swarm knew what she did. She felt despair, then, as she was able to sort through the memories, she was crushed with a flood of grief.
Duncan turned her head as tears streamed from her eyes. Two cloning/sleep tubes were at the edge of the room, pressed up against the bulkhead. Her hand closest to them strained against the strap as she reached toward one.
“My love,” she whispered in a language she had not spoken for over a thousand years. “My love.”
Ten thousand kilometers behind Duncan’s ship, the mothership was moving away from Earth. Yakov was in the pilot’s seat, directing the ship onto the vector that Larry Kincaid had programmed in order to intercept Mars. On his lap he had the thin instruction manual containing all the material that Majestic had managed to assemble on the workings of the mothership after studying it for fifty years.
“How long until we get there?” Yakov asked.
Turcotte was seated behind Yakov, eyes closed, head back, apparently asleep. A slight opening of one eye indicated he was awake and also waiting for the answer.
“Just over a day at this speed,” Kincaid said. “And the Swarm and Talon?” Yakov asked.
Kincaid checked his laptop. “The Talon will get to Mars about two hours before us. The Swarm ship about two hours after that.”
“At the same time we arrive?”
“Roughly,” Kincaid said. “We’re faster than the Swarm ship, but moving at pretty much the same speed as the Talon. I think we might even get to Mars before the Swarm ship.”
Two hours. Turcotte considered that. “When will the array be done?” he asked, still without opening his eyes.
Kincaid shrugged, the motion lost on Turcotte. “Hard to say. The convoy just arrived at the construction site.”
“What we need to know,” Turcotte said, emphasizing the last word, “is whether it will be done before the Talon arrives. If it is, I’m sure Artad can get a message out in two hours.”
“We should get an idea pretty soon,” Kincaid said. “I think it’s going to take them a while. They’ve got to complete the third pylon by hand, and then who knows what else they have to do to get operational.”
Turcotte opened his eyes and wearily got out of the seat. “I don’t know much about space travel, but since Mars is moving around the sun, our track isn’t exactly a straight shot, right?”
Kincaid brought up an image of the inner four planets of the solar system’s orbits on his laptop. “We’re heading for this intercept point right here.” He indicated a location on Mars orbit ahead of where the planet currently was. He tapped the touch pad and a green dot was fixed in that spot. “The Talon will reach Mars when it’s here.” Slightly before the mothership intercept a red dot appeared. “And this is its vector.” The Talon’s path was to the “right” of their track.
“What about the Swarm ship with Duncan?” Turcotte asked.
“Here.” A third track and dot appeared, this time to the left of the mothership’s.
Turcotte rubbed the stubble on his chin. “You said we’re going faster than that ship, right?” Kincaid nodded. “Somewhat.”
“If we change our path to intercept it, where would that happen and how much time would we lose?” Turcotte asked. Yakov had left the pilot’s seat and come over during the conversation.
“What do you have in mind, my friend?” the Russian asked. Turcotte ignored Yakov for the moment as Kincaid calculated.
“We would intercept here.” He indicated a spot well short of Mars orbit. “Because we’d change vectors slightly and then have to redirect to intercept Mars, we’d lose a little time, but not much. A couple of minutes, give or take.”
“How far out from Mars would the intercept be?” Turcotte asked. “Three hours.”
Yakov cleared his throat. “We must stop Artad first. That is our primary mission.”
Turcotte shook his head. “We have to stop both. They’re equally important. Artad is first because he gets to Mars first. But”—Turcotte dragged the word out—“if the array isn’t complete, then it doesn’t matter. And if it is complete, then it doesn’t matter if we get there a couple of minutes late.”
Yakov frowned. “Are you suggesting that we intercept the Swarm ship first?” “Why not?” Turcotte asked in turn.
“But what if the array is completed during that few-minute window?”
“Then we screwed up,” Turcotte said. “But if we intercept en route, then we have three hours after that to get ready for Artad. If we go straight to Mars, we have to attack Artad and the array, then have the Swarm ship show up a couple of minutes later. Things could get very busy.” Something had occurred to him as he spoke. “And we have three, not two, groups we have to stop. Artad and the Swarm aren’t enough. We also have to stop the Airlia on Mars. Even if we stop Artad, the Airlia on the surface can still send a message. And let’s remember something else. The Airlia on Mars were Aspasia’s. We can’t be sure that Artad is going to be welcome when he shows up. That might gain us some time.” Turcotte turned to Yakov. “What do you think?”
“It is taking a chance intercepting the Swarm ship. I agree, though, that having the Swarm show up right after we get there could be a problem. We could be battling the Talon and it could go straight to the array to send a message. If we do intercept the Swarm ship en route, how do you propose to stop it?”
“The old-fashioned way,” Turcotte said. “We board it. Just like pirates used to in the old days.” Yakov shook his head wearily. “Pirates in the old days. Another great plan.”
Artad was lying on his back, his command chair enclosed by a curved display. He brought up the tactical situation, noting his ship’s projected course to the fourth planet. He also saw the two spacecraft chasing him.
The mothership he expected. The humans were nothing if not persistent.
The other ship, though, was a puzzle. There was no record of its type in the Talon’s database. Of course, much might have happened in the universe during the ten thousand plus years that he had been disconnected from the Airlia Empire. There was even the possibility that the empire no longer existed.
That was something Artad choose not to dwell on. The empire had existed for millions of years. There was no reason to believe that something drastic had happened in the relatively short time span Artad had been in deep sleep to change that. Even the war with the Swarm had gone on for such a long time, more a war of attrition along a front encompassing galaxies than one of vanquishment. The universe — and empires involved — were simply too large for decisive strategic victories. It was a bitter lesson the Airlia and other species had discovered when they moved out among the stars.