Apex (19 page)

“So long as one Human lives,” he said loudly, “so too does the Empire.”

The Vespa's eyelids retracted, revealing the full extent of her black eyes. “You plan to rebuild?”

“We have a war to win,” Riax said, walking back over to her as the kelzat waited patiently in its berth.

She laughed . . . an odd noise for the otherwise melodic species, basically equating to a clipped, high pitched shriek. “You cannot defy Apex. You tried once before, and your race was wiped from the face of the galaxy. You may effect great change given the current state of affairs, but the Human race's time is over, as is ours. Other races will rise to replace us, and our time would best be spent advising and guiding those races along the proper path.”

“Quitter talk,” Riax declared, examining the fried neural clusters on the Vespa's worktable, “as usual.”

“Apex is a fundamental of nature,” she reminded him. “It cannot be denied nor circumvented.”

Riax sighed, both at the irreparable damage done by the self-­destruct programming in the cluster that the Vespa had triggered, as well as the resumption of yet another old sticking point between the two races.

‘Apex' was the term applied to the ultimate level a race could physiologically achieve, when their lifespan became defaultly infinite, their biological advancement stalled, and they lost their ability to reproduce. Many races older than both the Vespa and the younger Humans had gone through this cycle, gaining great power and influence, only to gradually diminish in numbers and fade from the galaxy. It was widely held by all races with knowledge of this fact that it was the way nature was intended to be, continuing an endless galactic, or even universal, cycle of life.

Any race actually reaching Apex was statistically improbable, but given the fact that the final generation of each race that did could theoretically live on forever if they weren't killed by accident, illness, or intent, there were several remnants of past races lingering on in obscurity for millions of years. The Human Empire had encountered a few during their rise to power, then met many more that made themselves known as the Humans advanced.

Last he knew, there were 31 Apex races known to the Empire, with the Vespa among the youngest and still retaining the majority of their population. The others had been reduced to a handful of individuals . . . but individuals millions of years old, with skills and knowledge from the past that the Empire was interested in learning from.

By the time Humans had reached Apex, they were no longer reproducing sexually and were subsequently unaffected by the sterility that fell upon them. They continued to grow in number and power, ‘birthing' subsequent population and becoming the first known Trans-­Apex race.

The Vespa and several others decried the Humans' defiance of what they believed was a fundamental element of life to be an abomination and inherently unstable, citing that the natural cycle would inevitably reassert itself. Many of the Apex races subsequently declared the Humans' annihilation a result of their defiance of Apex, though none of them knew the origin or identity of the mysterious race that had appeared out of nowhere to destroy them.

“The proof stands before you,” Riax argued as he sifted through her other components. “I have reached Apex and have ascended to the next level through training. I am Trans-­Apex, reproduction aside.”

“Impossible,” the Vespa declared. “Physiological adaptation ceases upon reaching Apex. Your genetic upgrades are technological alterations, not true advancement.”

“I'm not talking about genetic engineering,” Riax said, dropping three broken components back on the table. Apparently she had little knowledge of Human tech. “The cessation of experiential advancement is a myth. Rather, what it is, is a plateau. It can be surpassed through intense training. A lethargic race such as yours, well, I highly doubt you're capable of ascending. It takes a lot of spite.”

The Vespa listened for a moment, her scientific curiosity temporarily overriding her former race's dogma on the subject. “You're claiming you've recovered your ability to reproduce sexually?”

“We never tried to recover that,” he scoffed. “It's not like we were using it anyway.”

“Then you have not transcended Apex,” she declared. “None can.”

“Believe what you want, but I'm living proof that you're full of it. Now, where have you been sending the tech from the upper levels?”

“Offworld, where we can study the technology in depth,” she answered, ignoring his derogatory speech, which Terran was overly laced with.

“Why then are you tinkering with these here?” Riax said, holding up one of the dead control clusters.

“I need them operational to unlock the rest of the mechanisms in your walkers. Transporting one out of the system for analysis, then transporting it back after activation is logistically excessive. Better to conduct the work here and send off only workable components.”

“Have your scientists had any luck yet?” Riax said as he was telepathically interrupted by a message from Orrona, who was still hanging back in cover.

“Limited,” she admitted, “but any insights are invaluable given the technological gap.”

“You expecting company anytime soon?”

The Vespa checked her timepiece on her wristband. “Yes. My transport back to base.”

Riax telepathically told Orrona to comm the others to stay out of sight and allow the mercs to enter the outpost.

The Vespa inhaled and looked up to the ceiling, searching for any visible vents. “Though that may be unnecessary if this facility's support systems have reactivated. I believe the air is thinning.”

“It is . . . they are . . . and you do understand that now that I'm here, this is my facility, not yours.”

She blinked slowly. “I have been in possession for nearly 80 cycles, and as you can clearly see, it was abandoned long ago.”

“And as you can clearly see, our tech responds to our physiology, not yours. It's a safety protocol, to ensure that it doesn't fall into the wrong hands. To have designed it otherwise would have been
reckless
,” he emphasized for irony's sake.

“Perhaps a joint venture then,” she offered.

“To what end? Give your mercs some more toys to play with? I don't think so.”

“They are not mercenaries per se. They answer to me, not because I pay them, but because I created and command them.”

Riax stared at her for a long moment. “No side contracts?” he asked after a brief conversation with Orrona.

“On occasion,” the Vespa admitted. “The Concordat is quite large and requires significant resources to operate, but most of their operations are defensive in nature.”

“Still unscrupulous guns for hire, with an inept military commander to boot,” Riax noted. “They aren't getting advanced tech from me.”

“We already have some,” she reminded him.

“A few pieces that you can't understand, let alone replicate.”

“Perhaps not now, but with time . . . and I have an abundance of time.”

“Do you?” Riax asked, picking up on another thread. “You said there were less than 800 of you left. Last I knew, you had a population between 3 and 4 billion. What happened to the others?”

The Vespa remained silent.

“That bad? You guys never shut up.”

“Attrition ensues,” she finally said, “for some faster than others.”

“Pacifists don't last long in a galaxy tearing itself apart,” Riax guessed.

“Unfortunately not,” she admitted.

Orrona telepathically signaled him that the mercs were nearly here and he mentally reached out to confirm their location, frowning. It was quite a long walk down from the surface and it should have taken them much longer to reach them. Riax wondered exactly what race they were.

He got his answer as four bipedal armored mercs ran into the kelzat bay, skidding to a halt when they saw that the Vespa wasn't alone and raising two pistols in Riax's direction.

“He is known to me,” she told them, holding out her spindly hand in a gesture of disarmament. The two armed mercs reholstered their weapons as the other two stepped by them and approached their leader.

“We have a problem,” one of the Presca reported after removing its helmet and giving Riax a side glance. “A Nevax warfleet has jumped into the system, and we've received word that several more factions are on the way. There is a large reward posted for the recovery of a freighter carrying a contingent of Cres in possession of a Human relic, and it is believed that the ship is currently in this system. All nearby systems are also being fortified to ensure that the freighter does not elude capture again.”

“With all the military presence in the system,” the other Presca merc continued, “the location of this facility may be compromised.”

The Vespa turned her oblong head toward Riax. “This is your mess, I presume?”

Orrona, still hidden, provided him with a brief translation of the mercs' report.

“I'm the relic, though they don't know it yet. We barely escaped the Hellis System, repelled a boarding party midjump, and took out a frigate upon arrival. I have a feeling that's just the warm-­up.”

“We cannot allow them to discover this facility,” she said quickly, “or it will spark a war the likes of which we haven't seen for centuries. Where is your ship now?”

“In orbit, I presume.”

“We must hide it,” she said, standing up to her full height and looking down on all the others. “Does this facility have operational sensors, now that it is powered?”

“If you haven't already stripped them, yes,” Riax confirmed. “Follow me.”

 

Chapter 21

F
ORTUNATELY
,
THE
OUTPOST'S
control center had been sealed with a blast door and inaccessible to the salvagers. It was also 167 levels down, but with the lift system now active they avoided the long walk down the ramps.

Riax telepathically waved the doors aside and strode into the well-­lit spherical chamber on the center level. A large workpit spread out below them with another two partially open levels above. The Human went directly for what appeared to be a random console and activated a huge holographic map in the center of the chamber.

Once active, he accessed the telepathic controls and began to highlight and tag ships. The Zaklorn freighter parked in the Lagrange point between the moon and the gas giant overhead he tagged as the
Resolute
, while the distant battleship he tagged as Concordat. Several smaller ships around the visible side of Agas he recognized by design as part of the planetary security fleet.

Large swaths of the system, however, were blacked out due to line of sight issues. Without a proper surveillance net there were dead spots where ships could hide, which was probably what Jalia had in mind considering that her position close to the gas giant blocked most of the system from her view. However, the backside of the moon, as well as the far side of the planets and star, were out of sensor range for the outpost. There could be a thousand ship fleet on the other side of the world he now stood on and they'd be completely unaware of it until they orbited around into view.

He doubted that was the case though. Presently sensors were tracking another fleet in the vicinity of Agas, but keeping well clear of the planet. That was probably the Nevax fleet, but he refrained from tagging them as more intricate sensor profiles on each ship were being updated by successive scans.

The four mercs began muttering amongst themselves, which Riax couldn't make out, but apparently they were in a bit of awe . . . and very curious about who he was.

“Our ship is out of sensor range from Agas and will continue to be for several more hours,” he pointed out.

“We have a camouflaged hangar on the surface,” the Vespa revealed. “It would be best to hide your ship there.”

“It's a two kilometer long cargo ship. You have a hangar big enough to fit that?”

“Yes,” she said.

Riax raised an eyebrow. “Where?”

She walked toward the hologram as Riax shrank it down to show only the planet, most of which was merely dataless wireframes. “Here,” she said, pointing her long arm towards a position just inside the scanning perimeter of the base.

The hologram zoomed in again on that position and Riax ran a more detailed scan. Sure enough, a large subsurface facility updated onto the map, with a large central open area over ten kilometers wide.

“You built this?”

“No, it was discovered and reclaimed during our exploration of the moon. It is not of Human origin.”

“I knew that,” Riax said, looking over the architecture. He didn't recognize it.

Plotting the course from the Lagrange point to the moon, Riax saw that the
Resolute
would have a blind spot corridor for the next two hours, assuming that the merc fleet didn't change position. If they were going to go to ground, now was the time.

“No,” he decided. “Our best chance of survival is staying ahead of our pursuit. Our ship has already refueled, all we need to do is get to the jumppoint and go.”

“That is most unwise,” the Vespa said, stepping back from the hologram and walking towards him. “Your enemies are arriving not just in this system but the surrounding ones as well. They will be lying in wait for you to arrive. You must hide.”

“This is why your race is ill suited to warfare,” he admonished her. “They're not just going to give up, and the longer we linger the more forces they bring into the fold. The chances of us being discovered rise with intensified scrutiny when our ship isn't sighted but is known to have traveled to this system.

“They will begin looking at facilities beyond Agas,” he continued, “and if you've had operations on this moon for any length of time someone else will have noticed, and word will get out. Then they'll start searching the moon and any surface facilities they find. Your mercs will talk, or they'll find transit records for the transports that you've used. They will backtrack to your nearby facility, and from there to here. After that you can probably guess what will happen.”

The Vespa considered that, then conceded his logic with a simple nod. “You will leave this facility in my care?”

“I'll even leave the lights on, so long as you promise not to break anything.”

“Computer access?” she asked.

“Not a chance,” Riax said, heading for the door.

“What race is that?” one of the Concordat mercs asked the Vespa after he'd left.

“Unbelievable as it may be,” she said slowly, noting that the hologram also shut off when he left, “that is a Human.”

“It can't be,” another merc protested. “I thought they died out a long time ago?”

“So did I,” she admitted, “but somehow this one survived. He is Human, I am certain. I have encountered their kind before. Make note,” she said, her tone altering slightly, “the secrecy and security of this facility remains of the utmost priority, but ensuring the Human's survival is now paramount. He could be the key to solving many of our outstanding problems, but not if his pursuers succeed in capturing him.”

She turned to one of the mercs that wasn't a Presca. “Return to base and signal all our forces insystem to stand ready. Also, I want courier ships standing by to depart with a message that I will soon supply. We must send for all available ships to protect him.”

The Fret nodded and hurried off, not understanding what was going on but knowing better than to question orders as he headed back to the surface.

R
IA
X
HEADED
DEEPER
into the outpost on a scrounging mission, with Orrona stepping out from the shadows and joining him as he briskly walked down tracts of endless hallway.

“Get the others down here,” he told her. “We have work to do.”

“What's the plan?” she asked, activating her armor's comm and contacting the others.

“Same as before,” he said, darting into a side room, glancing around briefly and not finding what he wanted. He pulled back out and continued on. “Pick up some odds and ends and get the hell out of the system.”

“You trust this . . . Vespa?”

“You're unfamiliar with their race?” he asked, checking another storage room, with similar results.

“Yes. I am also unfamiliar with this ‘Apex' you mentioned.”

“Part truth, part myth,” he said, continuing to bounce in and out of the seemingly infinite number of small storage compartments. “The Cres are too young a race to worry about it, but at some point in your future you will probably lose your ability to reproduce while your regenerative systems advance to the point where you will be able to survive with very little physical maintenance. The Vespa are a lazy race, yet they're hundreds of thousands of years old . . . maybe more.”

“That one?” Orrona asked, hardly believing it.

“Yes, far older than me,” he admitted, “but still stupid. They're pacifists, negotiators, and all around snobs. I have no idea how they advanced to reach Apex, but they did so long before we came to dominate the galaxy. Their first contact with us was a long list of criticisms and the proper steps we should make in reforming our decrepit society. Needless to say, that didn't go over well.”

“Yes, I picked up on the animosity earlier, but I couldn't read its mind.”

“I can only get bits and pieces. They have some sort of unconscious telepathic dampening mechanism that prevents memory search. They can still be influenced, but information recall is minimal at best,” he said, finally finding the room he wanted.

There were shelves filled with large cubes that encompassed the small, squarish storage chaber that was far smaller than the others he'd been checking. When the pair walked in the cubes began lighting up as Riax activated a number of them. They floated out of their racks and began to unfold into small, bipedal walkers, barely half a meter taller than Riax.

“Follow,” he ordered, leading the automated workers out of storage where they'd sat inactive for 16,000 years.

Orrona watched silently, keeping about a meter off Riax's shoulder, as she gleaned as much about the Human Empire as she could. So far her expectations had been validated . . . and then some.

Riax took the twelve machines to a maintenance bay, where he repaired and refurbished the minimal amount of decay that had occurred during storage, as well as fully recharging their energy cells. While he was working the Vespa caught up with him, absent her mercenary guards.

“Drones,” she commented, walking whisper quiet into the bay as Riax had the torso of one torn apart on a workbench. “And a Cres.”

“Yes, I have several other personnel on their way down,” Riax said, his head and focus buried inside the walker. “Might want to tell your mercs so they don't get themselves killed in a needless fight.”

“You doubt the skill of my troops?” she asked as she touched a small jewel on her necklace, activating her communicator. She had a brief conversation in the commerce language, then reverted to her native tongue when speaking with Riax.

“Mine are professionals,” he added after she'd finished. “And they're bigger.”

He pulled out of the drone as a stray thought occurred to him. “By the way, do you know what happened to the Kayna?”

“I'm not familiar with that race.”

“Bummer,” Riax muttered, digging back inside the drone.

“May I ask what you're going to use those for?”

“I need the main bay dug out.”

The Vespa was taken aback. “You'll risk exposing this facility.”

“Not all the way,” he said, finishing his internal modification and pulling out. A swirl of components lifted off from the workbench and began to fit themselves back into place as Riax physically and telekinetically began to reassemble the machine. “Just enough to get some bigger items out underneath the canopy. They'd have to have scouts on the ground to notice.”

“And do you plan to bring your ship here to load it?”

“Yes.”

“If they detect the ship it will lead them straight here,” she argued.

“We can use the gas giant to shield it from view on approach to the moon. Once inside the atmosphere it will be almost impossible to detect from range.”

“And when you leave?”

“We can circle around to the far side and exit on a trajectory that can't be backtracked to this location.”

“I see,” she said, conceding the point. “Where then will you go?”

“We have a few options.”

“I meant ultimately.”

“I'd rather not say. Word could leak out through your mercenaries and that would make our journey more difficult.”

“I need to know if I'm going to move my fleet to escort your ship,” she said sharply.

Riax stopped his work on the drone and turned around. “Say again?”

“I do own a large mercenary fleet,” she reminded him. “I will order them to protect you until you reach your destination.”

Riax stared at her for a long moment, gleaning what he could from her mental state. “Cres space. Once there we'll be safe.”

“How fast is your ship?”

Riax buttoned up the drone and reactivated it. “Slow, but I'm going to install some upgrades during our next jump. And you're still not getting computer access.”

“That is not my motivation,” the Vespa said as Marren and Ella entered the room covered head to toe in golden armor. Behind them the two much larger Kayna thudded into the maintenance bay, sniffing in the direction of the Vespa.

“Ah, good,” Riax said as they entered. “We've got a lot of work to do. First item on the agenda is clearing off part of the soil above the main bay, but without toppling any of the trees while we do it. We need to keep the canopy more or less intact as camouflage. These,” he said, turning around and thumping the drone on its chest, “are automated workers. I'm outfitting them with digging equipment, and I'm going to need one of you to take them up to the surface and put them to work. I'll provide you with coordinates.”

“I'll handle that,” Marren offered.

“Be wary of the predators,” Riax warned. “Not sure how they'll take to the ruckus, but don't worry if you lose a few of these. I've got more in storage, it'll just take some extra time to get them refitted.”

“A mobile shield generator would be helpful,” Marren suggested.

Riax pointed at the Cres. “Good idea, I've got some of those. Don't know why I didn't think of that.” He turned to Ella. “I need a lot of small cargo moved into the main bay. There are antigrav sleds that will train together and autonavigate, but they each need a point of origin programmed and I don't have time to do it remotely. I need you to take each individual sled into the main bay and manually set that location, then you can take the sleds anywhere else in the facility, load them up, and they'll find their way back to the bay.”

“How many sleds?” she asked, her voice somewhat metallic as it was processed through her helmet.

“At least 50,” he said. “I want Wes with me loading sleds while Steve unloads them in the bay . . . and you keep track of me telepathically and bring the empty ones back to refill.”

The Cres nodded her understanding.

“Orrona, I'll have need for you later. Stick with me.” He looked over at the Vespa. “You . . . never got a name?”

She blinked once. “I am Lilitha'mulissasseverna'ya.”