Collision of Worlds - Chapter 5

Maven leaned against one of the pillars in the gaudy throne room Darius had set up, listening to her sister Alyssa and Darius argue and bicker like a couple of angry schoolchildren. They didn’t have a clear goal about what they were trying to accomplish and kept making ignorant decisions, and Maven was starting to get tired of it.

The problem was they were allied against her and she was voted down at every turn. Darius had declared himself a leader of this little rebellion because he was the first to turn against the Ministry and flee.

But, when she really got down to it, Darius was just an ignorant braggart in way over his head. He didn’t know strategy well enough to actually make any headway against the Republic, nor could he make any of his actions count. Killing Captain Lyle Questan, for example, could have been the sort of thing that they turned into an advantage for their side.

Instead, it had been nearly two years and everyone had forgotten about it. Worse, it meant that no other Captain would risk turning against the Republic. Darius’s arrogance had cost them a steady source of new recruits.

Right now, the pair were standing up on top of the raised platform in the throne room, shouting and gesticulating their arms wildly at each other as they argued about the best course for their rebellion to take: Alyssa wanted to do something, even if it got their fleet destroyed, and Darius was trying to counsel her to be patient.

Maven hated this room as much as Darius loved it. The long hallway leading up to the pedestal, the sheer expense and gravity of the throne, it all just annoyed her. Darius thought it made him look like a powerful leader, but it did exactly the opposite: it made him look like he was just a pretender.

Real leaders didn’t need affectation or theatrics to get their point across.

Of course, she had to admit a touch of hypocrisy in her own situation. She knew her breathing mask and robes intimidated people, as well as the stories and rumors about the disfigurement she’d experienced as a child.

She’d helped perpetuate those rumors and exaggerated the situation, but she wasn’t doing it only to intimidate people. She did it because showing people the real scars or wounds she carried could never live up to what their imaginations could create.

“We need to stop wasting resources,” Alyssa shouted, catching Maven’s attention and drawing her out of her thoughts. “We need to stop trying to win the hearts and minds of the Indeil Kingdom and win their loyalty instead!”

Maven glanced up at them and saw that Darius had sat down on his throne and was trying to calm Alyssa down. Trying…and failing. Right now she looked much like a ravenous animal standing in front of Darius. Maven folded her arms across her chest and watched the show unfold.

“Do you understand how many ships we could get if we turned them to our side? How many soldiers?” Darius asked. “If we win them over, we get all of them.”

“We already tried,” Alyssa said, casting a sidelong glance at Maven. “And failed.”

They were talking about the unallied Kingdom of Sector Six, and Alyssa was making sure to remind everyone that it was Maven’s failure that kept the Sector from joining their rebellion.

That was, at least, Alyssa’s interpretation of what happened, but not the reality. The original plan had been shortsighted and reckless, intending to scare Jaril into joining with force and brutality. Alyssa had been insistent that an overwhelming show of force would win them over.

She thought of Jaril and the Indeil Kingdom as hopeless peasants who only understood violence, and they would have to crack a few eggs to bring them into the fold. She was ready to kill half of them if it meant the other half would serve her.

The problem was, the exact opposite situation was the reality. Just because Sector Six was a long way from the Core worlds didn’t mean it was backward. The people there were well educated and independent, and a show of violence would only increase their loyalty to the crown. They would fight to the death against Darius and his army, which would end up costing them everything.

Alyssa’s plan was doomed to fail from the outset, yet Maven had been forced to prove it to Darius; he wouldn’t take her at her word. She’d taken a fleet to the Kingdom, installed a blockade, and attempted to negotiate with the Royal Family. Not even a week had passed before they turned against her and attacked.

“Maven should have attacked,” Alyssa said, addressing Darius but staring at Maven. “She had an entire fleet to command. She could have broken their will in a day.”

“It wouldn’t have worked,” Maven replied.

“We had every advantage on our side. They were wholly unprepared for an engagement. You could have crippled them and forced their submission.”

“Then we would have spent every waking hour watching our backs and wondering when they would seek their revenge. What happens when they turn against us in the middle of a large conflict against the Republic?”

“Then we teach them another lesson.”

Maven could only shake her head in response, wondering why she’d ended up with such an ignorant woman for her twin sister. Alyssa was violent and angry and knew nothing about how people functioned.

Which made sense, considering she grew up in the Ministry. It was a violent and shady organization masquerading as a religious institution. Everything Alyssa had learned about dominating and breaking people she’d learned honestly.

Still, it would have been nice to have a sister who transcended the ignorant brutality of her childhood. They would be able to accomplish so much more together. Instead, they were very nearly enemies.

“We need to try again,” Darius replied. “There’s nowhere else in the galaxy we can turn to for even half as many troops and ships to supplement our fleet.”

“Sector Two,” Alyssa argued. “Peter Gavriel hates the First Citizen as much as we hate the Ministry. He will join us in a heartbeat. He would bring ships, money, power, and legitimacy to the Union.”

“He would never join us,” Darius replied. “He would hijack the Union from us and use it for his own goals. At best, he would sacrifice everything we’ve built to further his own goals, and at worst, he would betray us to give himself a leg up in his own dealings. Either way, it would cost us everything.”

“It would at least be a step in the right direction.”

“What direction is that?”

“Destroying the Republic.”

“What good will that do us if we just replace it with something worse? No, we aren’t ready for that confrontation yet. We need more ships before we can take that step. When we approach the Consul, we need to offer him an equal partnership with what we’ve already built, which means we need our own fleet that can at least come close to rivaling his.”

“We need more than that,” Maven spoke up. They fell silent, glancing down the steps at her. Darius frowned at her, and Alyssa just looked annoyed that she was interrupting their discussion.

“What do you mean?”

“Peter Gavriel hates the First Citizen, but his people—the people of Sector Two—love the Republic. Sure, there are some that would cherish an opportunity to break free of the taxes and bureaucracy, but by and large they are happy with what they have.”

“Whatever the Consul decides to do, the people will follow” Darius replied, standing up from his chair and looking down at her. “If Peter declares his intention to join our Union, then the other planets will have no choice but to follow his lead.”

“You’re looking at it backward,” Maven replied. “Whatever the people decide to do, Peter will have no choice but to follow…if he wants to remain in charge.”

“That’s silly,” Alyssa said. “You’re suggesting the people would overthrow him if they didn’t like his choices?”

“In a heartbeat,” Maven said. “The people have no love for him, and they have no real desire for war or rebellion. But…if we give them a reason…”

Darius was silent for a moment, scratching his chin and thinking. Maven hated waiting for him to make up his mind like this, but she knew better than to interrupt him. He had quite the temper. Finally, he turned to face her.

“What do you have in mind?”

Maven stepped away from the pillar she was leaning against and walked toward the center of the room. The only sound in the great hall was her breathing mask.

She took a few seconds to savor the look of seething rage on her sister’s face. Alyssa hated when Darius took Maven seriously because it weakened her hold over him. She hated the idea that he could have thoughts of his own.

“First, we focus on Daer.”

“Why Daer?”

“Daer is full of cutthroats and bandits and all kinds of unsavory individuals. They have no love for the Republic, but they won’t love our Union either. Their only love is profit. Offer them that and they will seek to join us.”

“Offer them money? That won’t be enough to win them over.”

“No, it won’t, but it’s a start. Plus, they already have incentive to want to leave the Republic after what Captain Grove did two years ago. They have long memories and won’t soon forget the culling.”

“Peter Gavriel won’t listen if the seediest planet in his Sector wants to join us.”

“No,” Maven agreed. “But if Regamon and Daer want to join our Union, the Consul will have to seriously consider his options if he wants to remain in control of Sector Two. At that point, any deal you offer him he’ll accept, including an equal or lesser partnership.”

“Why would Regamon want to join us?” Alyssa asked. “They are the richest planet in the Republic and almost rival Axis in power. They are all rich, fat, and happy with their lot in life.”

Maven smiled, though she knew they couldn’t see it behind her mask. “Trust me, by the time I’m done with them, they’ll be begging to join us.”

Darius rubbed his white goatee. “What would you need?”

“You can’t seriously be listening to this?” Alyssa argued, grabbing Darius by the shoulder. He brushed her off, ignoring her.

“Identities in the Sector,” Maven said. “Four of them, and they need to be perfect and untraceable.”

“That’s not going to be easy,” Darius replied. “I’ll have to call in a lot of favors to get something like that.”

“It’ll be worth it.”

“You just want to put your little toy soldiers on Regamon,” Alyssa said, shaking her head. “But they haven’t been very effective yet, have they? You’ve had two years of this little charade with the Academy and what have you accomplished?”

“We have turned three planets to the Union and crippled the economies of four other planets.”

“And, in the grand scheme of things, that is almost nothing.”

“So far we’ve only sent out new recruits to smaller planets to test the waters,” Maven argued. “We haven’t tried something on this scale before.”

“Why would we assume this is anything different?”

“This is the first group of recruits, and they have been training for this mission for the last two years,” Maven replied. “I trust you remember them well?”

Alyssa’s expression turned dark. A few years earlier Alyssa had gone to the Silvent Academy to ruin her sister’s plans, but she’d managed to get herself kidnapped by Jayson and his crew instead.

Maven had never let her live it down.

“We should have executed them.”

Maven shrugged. “Or given them medals.”

“What is your plan?” Darius asked, ignoring the banter.

“To sow dissent in the region. We can infiltrate and invade their systems of government and turn the planet against the Republic.”

“You think you can do this? We don’t have a lot of resources near the Core worlds, and if I burn them for nothing, it could severely cripple us.”

“I know I can,” Maven said. “Trust me.”

“Like we trusted you before?” Alyssa asked. “You promised us you could take Sector Six, and it’s been two years and it still isn’t ours.”

“I never promised anything, and it was your preposterous theory that crippled our efforts there anyway.”

“You had an armada. You could have taken the planet by force in an afternoon.”

“Should I have attacked them and destroyed the very fleet we were there to acquire? The cost would have been too high. Taking Jaril by force would serve us no purpose. We need for them to follow us willingly, which means we need for them to join us willingly.”

“We could execute the ones who aren’t loyal.”

“Like we did with Captain Lyle’s fleet? We lost over half of the soldiers and are still short of fully manning any of the ships. No, we need for the Royal Family to join us willingly and bring their entire fleet as allies, and building something like that takes time.”

“Too much time.”

“I will turn them to our cause within a few years. If you are so intent on promises, then you can have one for this. I promise to gain their loyalty, but I will do it my way. The same as turning Regamon, which means you need to trust me.”

Alyssa pursed her lips. “Our patience is wearing thin,” she said, turning to Darius. “We should deploy another fleet to Jaril, and this time put someone more suited to the task in charge of winning the Kingdom. We can take Jaril, and when we do, their entire fleet will all fall into line.”

Maven bristled at the words and nearly lashed out at her sister. All three of them had begun this rebellion together, yet Alyssa seemed to think she held a higher station than her twin sister.

Maven forced herself to control the anger and took a deep breath. She didn’t need to have it out with Alyssa. Not here. It was the wrong time and place, so she simply filed the insult away in her memories for when she finally paid her sister back in full.

“I will take the Sector my way,” Maven said slowly. “They will join us willingly. All of their ships and soldiers will fight for us, and I won’t need to kill a single one of them to do it.”

Darius stared at her for a long while before finally nodding.

“Fine,” he said, waving his hand in dismissal. “We won’t deploy a fleet…yet. But we need to see some results, Maven. You can’t keep everything to yourself. I’ll give you the resources to send your soldiers to Sector Two, and you give us some results.”

Maven nodded. She assumed the conversation was over and started to leave, but then Alyssa spoke up.

“What about that research center on Alderson?”

She spun. “What about it?”

“You said you were looking into it. That was the only reason we let you reopen your stupid Academy anyway. We need the research that they were working on before the Republic abandoned it.”

Darius nodded. “Yes. You said it would contain information about genetically engineering the perfect soldiers. Have you recovered it yet?”

Maven hesitated. The research facility on Alderson had no doubt contained information about the Fists of the First Citizen, but that had been years ago. She was sure that all of it had been destroyed when the facility was abandoned years earlier.

Which meant that sending in recruits to clear it out was a waste of time and resources. But that had been one of the primary reasons Darius had given her the Academy, and he was expecting some sort of explanation for why it was still abandoned.

“It’s been overrun with wildlife and creatures. We sent some recruits in to clean it up, but they didn’t return.”

“Because of some animals?” Alyssa asked incredulously. “Did the rabbits give them trouble?”

“The Republic chose Alderson for the Silvent Academy specifically because it was dangerous,” Maven replied. “There are a lot of hostile elements native to Alderson, including unforgivable climates and dangerous predators.”

“So…where is the problem?”

Maven didn’t respond. She turned to Darius instead. “We can, of course, clear the facility out if you give me a few hundred soldiers. Any research that was left behind will be brought here within two months’ time.”

Darius hesitated and then shrugged. “Sure. I’ll dispatch a ship to go clear out the wildlife and—”

“Why soldiers?” Alyssa interrupted. “Why not have someone else take care of it?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, Maven wants you to put our assets on the line for her little pet soldiers. Why not have them take care of this problem as well?”

“They are spies, not soldiers,” Maven argued.

“They’ve been training to fight, have they not?” Alyssa asked. “You assured us that by the time they were ready, they would be the best soldiers and infiltrators we had at our disposal. Here’s your chance to prove it.”

“We need them for the mission to Regamon,” Maven replied. “We can’t risk them for something foolish like this.”

“On the contrary, we can’t risk our assets in the Core on unproven resources. You said yourself that they hadn’t been out in the field. From everything you’ve told us, these soldiers should be able to handle a situation like this easily. This will give them an opportunity to prove it before risking everything for them.”

“And if they die?”

“Then we shouldn’t have sent them to Regamon anyway, right? Are you saying your little toy soldiers aren’t up for the job?”

Maven hesitated. She knew she was in a rough position because from everything she’d heard from Alexander Robertson at the Silvent Academy, the creatures that had overtaken the research facility weren’t to be trifled with.

But she couldn’t risk looking weak or admitting that her infiltrators weren’t ready for Regamon.

“Of course, they can handle it. They are very resourceful. They could handle a situation like this unarmed, if need be.”

“Excellent,” Alyssa said, turning to Darius. “Then this should be a rather good test for them. We can make a game of it, if you like?”

“What do you mean?” he asked.

“We will send them in with no weapons or armor and tell them nothing about what they are to face. Then, we will see just how resourceful they really are. Once they handle this situation, we can be satisfied that they are worthy of calling in favors and planting them in Sector Two.”

“We’re playing games with their lives? We should send them in armed,” Maven argued.

“You said they didn’t need weapons. They are quite resourceful, are they not?”

“‘Resourceful’ isn’t the same thing as ‘magical.’ We should—”

“You don’t think they can handle it?” Darius interrupted, rubbing his goatee.

“Of course they can,” Maven said.

Darius nodded. “Then it sounds like a solid idea and the perfect way to test their training. We can have soldiers on standby to rescue them should things get out of hand, but let’s see if they can take care of it alone, first.”

“A wager,” Alyssa offered. “If you win and they survive, then we will give you anything you need to send them to Regamon.”

“And if they die?”

“Then, we send a fleet to Jaril and take the planet by force and ignore all of this foolishness.”

Maven looked at Darius, but he didn’t seem interested in getting involved. She hated Alyssa more in that moment than any other time in her life. She was petty and stupid but manipulative as hell.

“Fine,” she said. “Deal.”

“Should we shake on it?”

“Don’t push your luck.”

“It’s settled then,” Darius said. “Let us know when the research facility is taken care of, Maven.”

“Of course,” Maven said, stifling a groan.

“I’ll be there in a few days,” Alyssa said, smiling at her sister. “To make sure that the full terms of our wager are carried out. We wouldn’t want any cheating to take place, would we?”

Maven turned on her heels and stormed out of the throne room before they could stop her again. She was furious with her sister and needed to blow off some steam.

She was also furious with herself for walking into her sister’s trap. Alyssa might be ignorant about a lot of things, but she was incredibly manipulative and good at getting her own way.

Now, everything was riding on her four recruits: Jayson, Richard, Brett, and Tricia. If they were successful in this upcoming venture, then she would be in the perfect position to accomplish many of her plans.

However, if they died in that facility…

Well, she needed to be certain that didn’t happen.

She had no doubt that her assets—these four that had survived from the original seven—could handle cleaning up the facility, but if any of them were compromised during the mission, she would never forgive her sister.

2

Maven, once she was safely back in her own sealed chambers, removed her breathing mask and went to her terminal to contact Alexander Robertson. She was still angry, but now her mind was sifting through possibilities to get everything done as safely and efficiently as possible.

He connected almost immediately, looking concerned.

“Is everything all right?” he asked.

“Mostly,” she said. “Only minor setbacks.”

Alexander was a kindly looking old man in his late seventies. He walked with a cane and had flowing white hair and a beard, but she knew most of it was for show and he was deadly in a fight. He wanted people to underestimate him so he could use their sympathies against them.

Much the same as herself.

“The mission will go off as intended, but there’s been a hiccup in the plans.”

“What do you mean?”

“Darius wants the research facility to be cleared.”

“He’s sending troops?”

“Not exactly,” Maven replied. “He wants the four to do it.”

“Risky.”

“Not my plan,” she said, “but Alyssa is still harboring a grudge. Soldiers will be on standby, but are not to interfere unless necessary.”

“That won’t do any good,” he said. “By the time they have to intervene, they will all be dead.”

“I know. But there is no alternative.”

“Should I give Jayson the armor to use?”

“No,” Maven said. “You can’t tell them of what they will find inside either.”

“The Wyrms?”

“They can’t know. This test is to see how well they can handle a situation they are wholly unprepared for.”

Alexander rubbed his chin. “Dangerous, yet it is a good way to test them.”

“Alyssa wants to test their resourcefulness. We’re to send them in unarmed and unprepared to deal with this threat and see how they handle themselves.”

“Unarmed? That is suicide.”

“I know,” Maven said. “But those were the terms of the wager to place them in Sector Two.”

“What do we do when they fail?”

“They can’t fail,” she replied. “I can’t risk losing this opportunity. Everything hinges on their success in this endeavor. Denigen’s Fist will be patrolling Sector Two in a few months, and we need to make this happen while Captain Grove is near Regamon. This little hiccup could cost me years of planning.”

“Maybe you should just tell Darius what you intend.”

“Alyssa would sabotage my plans if she caught wind of them. She’s desperate to see me fail, even at the cost of her own rebellion.”

“Then what do we do?”

“Bend the rules,” Maven replied. “Alyssa will be arriving in a few days to monitor the situation. Get them out of the Academy and away from her. I don’t care what it takes, but they must succeed at this mission and clear out the facility. Don’t let her know what you are doing, but see to it that things go according to plan.”

“And then what?”

“And then get them ready to go to Regamon as soon as they are recovered.”

“I’ll do my best.”

“Yes, you will. Do it as though your life depends on it.”

She ended the connection before Alexander could respond, satisfied she’d gotten her point across. She wasn’t sure if she would kill Alexander or not if he failed, and if anything that was a problem for another day.

She did know, however, that all of her careful planning and manipulation would be for naught if they didn’t survive this mission. She’d spent years forming her alliances in Sector Six and planning this mission in Sector Two, and she would lose all of it if this didn’t work.

She had a lot of things juggling in the air right now, plans in motion. It was like a house of cards, and if even one fell out of place, then her entire castle might come crumbling down around her.

Still, if she was successful in fracturing the Republic, and if she managed to turn Sector Six to their cause, then they would have a serious chance at toppling the Republic and building their own government from out of its ashes. She would be in a much stronger position than she was today, closer to finally ripping control of the Union from Darius and Alyssa.

She’d never been so close to achieving her goals before.