Warlord 2: The Nobility Read online

  The Nobility

  Book Two of the Warlord Series

  By CJ Williams

  © 2016 CJ Williams

  All rights reserved.

  This is a work of fiction. Any reference to actual names, characters, places, products or incidents is fictitious or coincidental.

  ISBN-13: 978-1539637134

  ISBN-10: 1539637131

  Kindle Edition.

  Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1 – Bad News

  Chapter 2 – Misfire

  Chapter 3 – Repercussions

  Chapter 4 – Moonbase One

  Chapter 5 – Family Reunion

  Chapter 6 – Exile

  Chapter 7 – Teeny Jim’s

  Chapter 8 – Bloodline

  Chapter 9 – Succession

  Chapter 10 – Ebene Three

  Chapter 11 – Jontu Four

  Chapter 12 – Bonbu Two

  Chapter 13 – Moonbase One

  Prologue

  Luke put all the sincerity he could muster into his voice. “Come on.”

  “Forget it,” Annie said. “Tyler called over an hour ago.”

  “He can wait. It probably wasn’t even important.”

  “No!” Annie turned away, effectively cocooning herself in the covers. “Leave me alone.”

  Sadie’s voice, more strident than last time, issued from the speakers overhead. “Commander, Ambassador Robertson is calling again.”

  “Talk to him,” Annie’s muffled voice said.

  “What does he want?” Luke asked, looking at the ceiling.

  Sadie cleared her electronic throat delicately. “The Ambassador made a reference to barnyard animals but I believe his call is about the large-scale replicator. It will be back online in two hours.”

  Annie sat straight up in bed, indignation written across her features. “He said what?”

  Luke tried to hold back a bark of laughter but enough mirth escaped to focus Annie’s anger in his direction.

  “I mean,” he backtracked hastily, trying unsuccessfully to look affronted. “That was a terrible thing to say. I would never—oomph!” He was far too slow to avoid Annie’s heel. She kicked at him a second time, but he had moved out of range.

  “Put him on, Sadie,” Annie called. “You there, Tyler?”

  “Yeah. Hi, Annie. Sorry to bother you lovebirds but it’s been two days now. I know that’s not much of a honeymoon, even here on Jigu, but the replicator will be up soon and you wanted it to make some message drones first thing.”

  “Understood,” Annie replied. “We’re on the way. Where are you?”

  “I’m at the new replicator site. We’ll have power to it shortly, but we need Sadie. The first thing on the agenda is a new planetary AI. I’d like to get Priscilla back if we can. I was getting used to her.”

  “We’ll be there in about thirty minutes,” Annie promised. She reached over and slugged Luke on his shoulder. “I’m going to take a shower,” she said. “And you are going to stay out here. Understood?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Luke replied with an obedient but happy grin.

  *.*.*.*

  “It looks good,” Luke told Tyler after examining the almost-completed replicator installation. “Too bad we lost so much to the virus.”

  “I know,” Tyler replied. “But frankly, I’m just as glad to start with an entirely new setup. I still have nightmares about our AIs going turncoat.”

  Luke understood completely. He had unwisely placed too much trust in George, the artificial intelligence from Moonbase One. To discover that even George, a level-three AI, had been so easily corrupted by the Bakkui had made Luke question several of his core beliefs.

  As a precaution, Tyler insisted they remanufacture all mechanical devices with an AI brain, no matter how small. Probably an overreaction but he was afraid of any more surprises.

  “How much longer?” Luke asked.

  “Probably an hour,” Tyler replied. “The generator is in place and they’re sorting out the power cables. Who would think that with all this technology our holdup is getting the connections soldered?”

  “Never fails. Once we get everything running, you should replicate some new ones and keep those as a backup.”

  “Yeah, I was thinking the same thing. I got sloppy; started thinking of this as a retirement job. Won’t happen again.” Tyler paused and looked at the sky; it was clear and cloudless. “While we’re waiting, let’s take a look at the damage up north. You really ought to see it.”

  “Sure,” Luke agreed. “Let me tell Annie.”

  “Tell me what?” Annie said walking up behind the two men.

  “Tyler and I are off to check out the crater near the local North Pole. You okay here?”

  Annie’s face darkened on hearing the topic. “Yeah, I’m fine. That’s a good idea. It looked really bad to me. Go on and let me know what you think.”

  Ten minutes later the two men sat in Sadie’s cockpit while she approached the desired area. Luke instantly saw why Tyler was so concerned.

  “You see what I’m talking about?” Tyler asked, watching Luke’s expression change.

  “The Bakkui never did that,” Luke said grimly, looking at the massive crater.

  “That’s what I’m saying,” Tyler agreed. “The local academics thought they did. They tried to use it as justification for stronger planetary shields. When I first heard about a Bakkui impact crater, I didn’t pay much attention because for the most part their shields held out during that first attack.”

  “I remember. We didn’t know they had their own shield technology. I thought we were too late at the time, but they held up just long enough.”

  “That’s right. We saved their ass that day. Anyway, a while back one of them showed me a photo of this impact. I didn’t have a reference for its size, but it looked a little big to me. So, I took a look from one of our shuttles. That’s one big crater.”

  “No kidding,” Luke said, nodding. “I flew over Meteor Crater in Arizona once. You know the one I’m talking about? About four thousand feet across.”

  “Sure.”

  “They say it was caused by a hundred-foot meteor traveling twelve miles a second. About ten megatons.”

  “That’s my point,” Tyler said. “This is five times that size. Sadie, take us to the canyon.”

  “There’s more?” Luke asked.

  “Oh, yeah. And it doesn’t get any better. There,” Tyler said pointing. “See it coming up?”

  Luke turned his gaze north of the crater. Once he spotted it, the canyon was just as obvious as the crater. A deep fissure on the flat frozen tundra that extended in a perfectly straight line for about ten miles. It appeared as though the edge of a gigantic ruler had been pressed against the planet’s surface, leaving a single groove in the ice pack. The bottom of the frozen canyon was perfectly level.

  “So you think we did this?” Luke asked.

  “I am absolutely sure of it,” Tyler said emphatically. “These are impacts from our own warship cannons. I think we’re just damn lucky it wasn’t any worse.”

  Luke gave Tyler a grim look. “The people of Jigu were the lucky ones. I can’t believe we didn’t notice this sooner.”

  “To be fair, we had a lot on our plate back then. We were still getting our feet under us. And it didn’t help when I wimped out on you.”

  Luke waved away his friend’s often repeated apology. “I guess we should have known better, but I never once thought about something like this.”

  “Me neither,” Tyler admitted. “In wartime, you shoot a gun and you don’t think about where the bullets go when you miss; you only care about what they hit. And space is so vast it just never occurred to either of us.”<
br />
  “We need a solution,” Luke said. “I can think of a few ideas, but we’ll get our engineers on it. Thanks, Tyler, I owe you one. If we hadn’t caught this…well…you know, sooner or later.”

  “I do know, trust me. I worked on EOD projects in Germany. You wouldn’t believe how much unexploded ordinance is still in the ground from World War II and even from the First World War. But it’s always some innocent who finds that damn stuff.”

  Luke sighed heavily. “That seems to be the way of things. Well, let’s get back. This is one more thing I need to brief Carrie on. She’s got all of our engineers, anyway. We’ll just put this on her shoulders too.”

  “Does she even know you’re alive? Ensign So’wie said she sent out notification to everyone that you were dead. That bad news should get there any day now.”

  “I know. I sent a message of my own just before I attacked that last Bakkui dreadnaught. I didn’t think I’d survive. Carrie and Bradley are going to think they’re on their own. I need your new replicator to cook up some message drones first thing. I imagine she’ll be glad to find out I’m still kicking.”

  “So you hope,” said Tyler, deviling his friend. “You might get back and find out she can manage your Milky Way Alliance all by herself. I told you she’s a real barnburner.”

  “I won’t argue that one. She’s always pushing me to try out new ideas and she’s got Lindsey wrapped around her little finger. He thinks she walks on water or something.”

  Tyler barked a laugh at the comment. “That’s probably good for him. He was always such a stick-in-the-mud. I’m glad Carrie is keeping him honest.”

  Chapter 1 – Bad News

  Carrie Faulkner, captain of the gigantic spacecraft, Lulubelle, and temporarily in command of the Milky Way Alliance, completed her walk-through inspection of Sisko Space Station. Her team had just moved the new facility into orbit over Bradley’s Planet.

  She had begun construction on the space station shortly after the Commander left for Jigu. A crew rest facility was needed for the defense forces they kept on alert for the J97 system. The station had been adapted from an asteroid two thousand feet in diameter.

  “Nice job, Rico,” Carrie said to the officer showing her around the station. “Really nice.”

  “Thank you, Captain,” Rico replied, his pride obvious. “Most of this was Justin’s doing. I’m still finishing up the new situation room. And of course, we couldn’t have done half of this without the new Sisko AI. Thanks for giving George the go ahead.”

  George was the super-intelligent AI from Moonbase One that the Commander had replicated to reside inside Lulubelle.

  “You needed it,” Carrie said. “You and Justin are two sides of the same coin. I hope you get to meet Riley Stevens someday. He’s an engineer too. The three of you would be an explosive mixture, no doubt about that.”

  George’s voice that suddenly intruded into her mind. Captain! We just received a message drone; Earth was attacked by the Bakkui. Their defenses have failed and Moonbase One is being bombarded.

  “What?” The devastating news, delivered without preamble, hit Carrie like a sledgehammer. She clutched Rico’s arm in shock.

  “You okay, Captain?” he asked.

  “R-Rico,” Carrie stammered. “I just…. Never mind.” With a mumbled apology, she hurried to her shuttle in the transient hangar bay.

  “Jamie,” she said to the shuttle’s AI after settling into the pilot’s seat. “Take me to the surface. I want to see Governor Lindsey.”

  “Course set, Captain,” Jamie replied.

  The shuttle lifted off the hangar floor and flew slowly through the force field that served as the barrier to empty space before nosing over, heading for the planet below.

  “George,” Carrie said. She could have communicated mentally with Lulubelle’s artificial intelligence but she preferred to speak aloud. As long as she was in an AI-controlled vessel, George would relay his verbal response through ship’s speakers. It was as though she was holding a conversation with him in person.

  Like most of her colleagues, she had tried mind-to-mind dialog. It worked, but there were drawbacks. For one thing, it was strangely difficult to organize one’s thoughts into coherent sentences without also transmitting a jumble of stray feelings. It left her feeling a little more exposed to the omniscient George than she wanted.

  Like most people, she spoke to George aloud, even if she was alone. Now that George had become such an integral part of everyone’s lives, it was not unusual to see people walking around apparently talking to themselves.

  “I’m here, Captain,” George replied, the AI’s pleasant baritone voice filling the cockpit.

  “What’s going on?” Carrie asked.

  “Displaying message.”

  The side canopy became a view screen. A visibly shaken man that Carrie did not recognize spoke into the camera.

  “Commander Blackburn, Doctor Higgins ordered me to inform you that we are under attack. A force of alien vessels, that he believes to be the Bakkui, has entered the solar system. They decimated our forces and have started a bombardment on Moonbase One and Earth. We have lost contact with Mars and the Gateway so we assume they have been destroyed. If we survive, we’ll send more information tomorrow. Godspeed, Commander. Moonbase One, out.”

  In the background Carrie could see terrified faces rushing in and out of the communications center. She recognized some of her old friends and caught a brief glimpse of Amanda Carlson, one of her early mentors. Amanda’s clothing was covered with dust and her face was ashen. She wore the expression of someone who fears they are about to die. A Bakkui attack on Earth was the nightmare scenario that everyone dreaded, but no one spoke about.

  “Does Governor Lindsey know about this, George?” Carrie asked.

  “He does, Captain. I’ve been discussing the matter with him during your descent. He is on his noon break at the pier.”

  “Arriving at destination,” Jamie intoned, setting down on the reserved shuttlecraft landing pad in the center of Jabon City.

  Carrie stepped out of the shuttle onto the capital’s wide plaza near Government House, the administrative headquarters of Lindsey’s growing bureaucracy. The structure sat on a high point of land above a picturesque mountain lake. It was the same location where the then Colonel Lindsey had stood beneath a simple canvas pavilion and laid out his recommendation for the planet’s future to Commander Blackburn. How long ago, Carrie wondered; it seemed like ages.

  After Lindsey took charge, giant replicators supported on anti-gravity platforms had turned the mountain glade into a growing metropolitan area. Part of that growth included a bricked pathway down to the lake’s edge where a small pier had been constructed. An unspoken rule was the governor had first dibs on the pier during the lunch hour.

  Carrie shielded her eyes against the noonday sun and spotted Lindsey. He was gathering up his fishing gear. She set off at a jog in his direction.

  Carrie had come to rely on the governor for advice. His army background gave him a keen insight into the challenges she faced managing her own military organization. When he saw her coming, he put down his tackle box and sat on one of the park-like benches to wait for her arrival.

  When she arrived, he spoke without preamble. “George gave me the message.”

  “It’s terrible,” she said, breathless. “It’s a disaster.”

  “Maybe,” he replied in a philosophic manner. His countenance was worried, but he didn’t show the utter panic that Carrie was feeling.

  “Maybe? What do you mean?”

  Lindsey gestured for her to calm down and then patted the bench next to his.

  “Just think about it for a moment,” he said evenly. “This is the first, and only, report we’ve gotten of the incident. I can tell you from experience, when things go south, the first report is always wrong. The reality of the situation could be worse; or it might not be as bad as it sounds.”

  “Well, which is it?” Carrie demanded.
r />   Lindsey shrugged. “I don’t know. But I can promise you that this report is wrong. We’ll get more information. Maybe tomorrow, maybe in a couple of weeks. I’m just saying that until we know for sure, it’s too early to panic. Wait until we have a better idea.”

  “Then what should we do in the meantime?” Carrie wanted to know. Since the Commander left, she had grown comfortable with her command responsibility. But this was different. She was out of her depth.

  “What do you think?” Lindsey prompted. “Based on what you know.”

  Carrie closed her eyes and leaned back. Good question. Just asking a solid question made her stop and consider the entire situation. The panic receded if only slightly. She took a deep breath.

  “For one thing,” she said. “The message is two months old. It’s not like we can help. Our force is probably no larger than what Earth must have in place by now. Doctor Higgins had planned to focus on expanding their system defenses once he realized the Warlord was actually leaving.”

  “That’s correct,” Lindsey agreed. He raised one eyebrow, encouraging her to continue.

  A dozen thoughts ran through her mind at once. No sense in tearing off back to Earth. The solar system survived or it didn’t. If she were to head there now, she could arrive to discover everyone was dead and gone, or the message had been in error and everything was fine. In either case, she would not arrive until four months after the attack. That was the problem with interstellar distances. Getting anywhere took a long time.

  If she left, she might come back to find that Bradley’s Planet had been hit during her absence. The Bakkui had already struck here twice; once just before the Commander’s force arrived and again more recently. On both occasions, Alliance forces had decimated the attacking fleet.

  But that’s why it didn’t make sense that the Bakkui could have launched a successful attack on Earth. In every encounter with the mechanized invaders, the Alliance had prevailed easily. Unless the Bakkui had a new weapon or tactic, she couldn’t understand how they could hit Earth so effectively.

  That question was something she could focus on now. If, by some horrible twist of fate, Earth had been destroyed, then she needed to know how it had happened. What trick did the Bakkui have up their sleeve? Carrie looked into the sky. “George, is the crew aware of this message yet?”