Eyes of Tomorrow (Duchy of Terra Book 9) by Glynn Stewart (best e book reader TXT) 📕

There was no response. The bioform just veered away to hunt another ship.

“They’re leaving,” Tosolor said, his astonishment clear even without the translation. “Maintaining course for Night-Moon-Light Station. Tosonak—pass on the Alavan code and…and…everything to every suns-burnt shipper in the system.

“I think they’ll let us keep the stations running. I…wouldn’t try getting to the fleet base or leaving the system, but I think they’ll let us make sure people can eat and breathe!”

The recording froze.

“Tosolor is a billionaire by Imperial standards and owns roughly twenty percent of the civilian shipping in the Tohrohsail System,” Shotilik observed. “Tosonak is his declared heir. They were likely being more formal than usual, as the recording was to be distributed if their delivery was successful—as it was.”

“So, the Infinite let the locals travel around the system unimpeded?” Morgan asked.

“Eventually,” Shotilik said. “They wiped out everything that fired on them. No surprise there. Initially, they also fired at any vessel that maneuvered anywhere near them, and they were everywhere in the system.

“By the time they drew their forces more toward the fleet base, everyone in the system had gone to ground,” the Rekiki noted. “The fact that the Infinite hadn’t attacked—or even interacted with—any of the settlements that hadn’t tried to fire on them was considered a good sign, but Tosolor was the only one crazy enough to try to make a supply run.”

“To a station that was almost out of everything,” Morgan said.

“Yeah. The station in question was due for its five-cycle resupply when the Infinite arrived. Their reserves were just about gone when Tosolor decided to risk himself to make the delivery.”

“And the Infinite continued to allow deliveries after that?” she asked.

“Except for one half-cycle period after someone tried to make a run for hyperspace, yes,” Took confirmed, the Yin looking through her own data. “Interestingly, they told the locals that. Omnidirectional transmission telling all ships to lock down and that any ship making for hyperspace would be destroyed.”

She shook her head.

“It wasn’t great Laian, but it was understandable to the locals. They weren’t good at communicating, but they were capable of it.”

“That’s promising,” Morgan replied. “Do we think they’re likely to follow similar allowances for mercy missions and necessary supplies in other systems?”

“Probably, but…” Took and Shotilik exchanged looks.

“So long as we don’t betray the trust,” Morgan guessed. “Everything we’ve seen says they were relatively calm to the Alava, even, until something changed.”

“While we have no confirmation that Swarm Bravo was in communication with the main body in the Astoroko Nebula…um…” Shotilik shook her head. “I would suspect that any abuse of their goodwill will result in a lot of long-term pain.”

“So would I,” Morgan agreed. “I’ll include the recommendation against using that in our report in the strongest language possible.”

“Whatever you’re planning, find a way to make it even clearer,” Took suggested. “If the Infinite had locked down all shipping in Tohrohsail, best guess is about a million people would have died before we liberated the system.”

“There might come a time when we need it anyway,” Morgan warned. “Rumor has it we’re going to be stepping back from full tactical coordination to operating as separate fleets with operational and strategic coordination.

“It’s not a good plan; it’s just the one that stops our allies from thinking the other is backstabbing them.”

“I’m glad that's the Fleet Lord’s problem,” Shotilik said drily. “And that I just have to work out what a brain the size of a planet thinks is appropriate war strategy.”

Chapter Thirty-Six

“I don’t know why Tan!Shallegh wants me in the meetings,” Rin admitted, passing Morgan a glass of wine as he settled onto the couch in her quarters. She was still standing, pacing back and forth in the small space with the nervous energy of a caged tiger.

“I suspect we’re well past the point where anything I know about the Alava or the Infinite is really going to have an impact,” he continued. “That war is fifty thousand years dead and so are the Alava.

“We don’t know what they did to turn the Infinite genocidal and we don’t know how to avoid doing it ourselves. They already seem to have adopted a shoot on sight policy with us and everybody else.”

“I suppose the Queen tried to talk to me originally, but that conversation didn’t go for very long,” Morgan told him. “I think the local shippers had more constructive conversations with the Infinite than I did—and theirs were basically just ‘Please don’t shoot me.’”

“I’m surprised that worked,” Rin admitted. “It suggests that the Infinite are both more able to communicate with us now than they were when we took Defiance into the Nebula and, well, more…reasonable, I guess, than we’ve been anticipating.”

“They’re still pretty damn angry with us,” his lover replied. “Swarm Bravo didn’t attempt to talk at all before they came out ready for a fight.”

“They were here to eliminate the combined fleets, though, weren’t they?” Rin asked. “Threat management, I guess.”

“That’s my team’s guess, too. They’re trying to identify and eliminate threats to their base in the nebula, but with the Wendira in play, they underestimated our forces here. So, we came out ahead…but I have no way to judge how material the loss of Swarm Bravo is to them.

“Eleven hundred bioforms seems like a lot, except we know they have at least five hundred Category Fives and Swarm Bravo had four. It’s going to be a long, messy war—and that’s assuming we get the reinforcements and allies to hold.”

“It sounds like it, even if the Wendira and Laians are getting twitchy about working in the same systems,” Rin told her. “Tidirok has apparently been promised another hundred war-dreadnoughts in the next sixty cycles.”

“And we’re getting the rest of the HSM-equipped Imperial ships in the same time frame,” Morgan told him. “That’s classified, but you’re sitting in the damn meetings with Tan!Shallegh. You’re as cleared for it as I am.”

“And our associates?” he asked quietly.

“I’m assuming they’re part of why the Ren have actually