"Admiral," Tilas replied in a low voice, "those two projects are classified, class 2 clearance if I'm not mistaken."
"Iggy, don't pull 'classified' on me," Merlow muttered back, "I'm the gottverdammt Fleet Admiral. I initiated some of these programs myself, and I think I have the authority and right to know exactly what went down."
Tilas' eyes darted about, "Come with me to my office, Admiral."
The two men walked past numerous scientists conducting research on this level, past the giant test chambers, and into a gigantic office space. His office was cluttered with notes, tables with various pieces of equipment, charred metals and plastics, a whole variety of crazy items from projects past and present. Tilas lead Merlow to a pair of desks, each with a built in computer console. Tilas motioned Merlow to sit at one of the desks. He remained standing, pacing in the small open space he had in front of those desks. He pressed a button on the first desk, bringing up a holographic image of the subjects of the predecessor to the Sadukar Program, their status and their stats.
"Admiral, the details of the Fahrenheit Zero-Alpha program are buried in years of cover-up and fabrications. The men that participated in that program all went either crazy or disappeared. The one who disappeared are all confirmed dead, all except for one." One of the holo-images flashed, "This is the one subject that we couldn't pin down. We never knew what became of him."
Merlow leaned back in his chair, "What does that have to do with the Sadukar program?"
"I'm getting to that, Admiral." Tilas changed the images to the members of the first Sadukar Battalion, "These men were the first Sadukar successes. They were all stable and successful, but there was one subject who was a bit out of whack, a few technical glitches and some minor sync problems. We thought nothing of it until he fell off the grid after the Battle of New London in the Evolved universe." The holo-image was taken up by that man, "This man fell off the grid, seemingly unhappy with how things went down on New London. We don't know what happened to him."
Merlow rose from his chair, looking over the holo-image of the man, "Tilas, what is this man's name?"
"For some reason his records disappeared as soon as he left. The only thing we were able to salvage was his middle name."
"And that would be?"
"Jyant."
Commander in Chief of the Migrant Fleet / Former Fleet Admiral of the Liberty First Fleet Second Survivor of the Mentat Program. We must give and take with good measure. Give too much, we become complacent. Take too much, we incur the wrath of our own. Tread Lightly. --Supreme Bashar Robert Merlow--
Shortly after Sayne's mention of the fighters in space, Merlow left the bridge. That was a foolish mistake on Sayne's part. He slipped up, maybe he was getting into his part to well and was starting to get overconfident. He quickly exited the bridge and walked off to the right of the bridge down a hallway. He nodded to a woman as she walked by carrying a datapad. She returned his nod with a smile and continued down the hall.
He waited until she had passed when he pulled the bulkhead off the lower part of the wall revealing a crawlspace. He hacked into the computer across the way to mask his own biosignature to the ships sensors. He then covered up this act with a multitude of deadends that would take days even weeks to decypher, by then they would be in the new Universe, and Sayne would be far gone from the ship. He smiled and crawled into the crawlspace, sealing the bulkhead behind him.
He crawled for a while until coming to a large ladder going straight down into darkness. This was the main access tunnel into the lower sections of the ship. These were even below the engine room, on the other side of the wall was litterally space. He climbed down the ladder to the very bottom and jumped off, he grabbed some food out of a storage pocket, ate it gone, and then laid his head down on the cold metal, and drifted off to sleep.
The utterance of the word Jyant triggered a cascade of thought, connecting it all together for him. Right there, it all made sense to him. This Sayne was from Evolved. He knew this Sayne, fought along side this Sayne, and knew of his intense hatred of Admiral Marcus Scarman. He must have replaced the Sayne from the last universe, either killing him or displacing him.
Merlow tapped on the side of his head, linking him to the Bridge. In his head, an image of Tessa appeared.
"Sir?"
"Tessa, General Search Pattern Beta-6. We're searching for a Sadukar-Fahrenheit Hybrid."
Tessa's eyes widened, "Sir, that's..."
"Yes. Sayne is on the loose."
"I'll dispatch what HiME are on the ship to search for Sayne."
"Good. Keep me informed. Merlow out." Merlow cut off the comm link, returning his attention to the outside world. He saw Doctor Tilas running straight for him, focusing on something behind him.
Doctor Tilas rushed out of the room, knocking over Merlow as he sped for the door. He cocked his head back.
"Sorry, Admiral!" he called as he rushed out of the door.
Merlow was curious. Doctor Tilas was usually much more controlled, much more relaxed. What could get him so riled up? When he walked out of the room, rubbing his head, he found out why. In the middle of the Astrometrics Lab was a full image scan of Void Space, and what was there was spectacular. It looked like the works on an entire civilization, Dyson spheres built around dark matter pockets, space stations built around dark planets, "Void Space" wasn't a void after all, but a negative version of the universes that it linked together.
"Admiral! We've done it!" Tilas exclaimed, hugging the nearest researcher, "Ha! We've done it!"
Merlow smiled, happy that there was something positive for once. That wasn't to last.
"Admiral!" Tessa called over the comm, "We have some sort of object incoming!"
"Time till intercept?"
"Fifteen minutes at constant velocity."
"Roger that." Merlow turned to Tilas, "Adjust the sensors to lock on to these objects. I want that data routed to tactical. I'll be on the Bridge." Merlow turned around and entered the lift, calling the computer to bring him to the bridge.
Commander in Chief of the Migrant Fleet / Former Fleet Admiral of the Liberty First Fleet Second Survivor of the Mentat Program. We must give and take with good measure. Give too much, we become complacent. Take too much, we incur the wrath of our own. Tread Lightly. --Supreme Bashar Robert Merlow--
The shapeless vessel slipped in and out of subspace, each time appearing closer and closer to the human flagship. The wraiths contained within began chattering telepathically, their thoughts seemingly meshed with the next. Closing on human vessel. Distance, one thousand units. Confirmed. Shadow vessels, prepare to close on flag ship. The humans must not be allowed to pass. What of the Zeta ships behind them? They don't need to be destroyed. We can feed off of them for at least one hundred cycles if we trap them here. Will the families approve? That doesn't matter. We cannot feed off of the humans. They must be destroyed.
----------
Merlow arrived on the bridge. He walked through the door, a lieutenant promptly handing him a datapad. He walked towards Tessa, who silently looked over her small chair console. She looked up at him as he approached, a look of worry on her face.
"Admiral, this object is slipping in and out of our sensor grid, as if it's simply disappearing from existence. No energy spikes indicating cloak, or any other kind of stealth technology. It is as if it simply... vanishes."
Merlow looked over his datapad again, "So I've been told. Has Tilas patched through the data from Astrometrics to Tactical?" he asked, taking the second in command's chair to Tessa's right.
"The data is being patched through... now." Tessa watched the Tactical Officer, their fingers pressing the buttons, making the necessary adjustments. The Lieutenant Commander looked over her console, picking up the signals of the vessels closing on them.
"Ma'am," she called, "We have hostiles on the scope!"
"How many?" Tessa asked.
"It looks like six or seven different signatures. I can't determine anything more than that, Ma'am."
Tessa pressed a few buttons on her console, preparing to record what she assumed to be an upcoming battle. She looked back at her tactical officer, proclaiming confidently,
"Evasive maneuvers! Alert all surrounding ships of the threat, and transmit the data they need in order to make the modifications they need to in order to detect them!"
Merlow hopped the rail in front of him, landing in front of the tactical holo-board. It showed the current position and progress of the Migrant Fleet, and the incoming objects that seemed to be trying to intercept the Danaan. The seven objects were increasing speed, their heading matching the Danann. He looked back up at Tessa, who was giving orders all over the bridge. She linked herself into the ship-wide comm system.
"All hands, general quarters! Prepare for battle!"
----------
The wraith ships shifted into their corporeal forms about two hundred thousand kilometers off of the human flagship's starboard stern. The ships resembled black solid squids, their tentacle-like engines powering them through the void. The lead wraith ship opened fire on the human flagship, it's main gun unleashing a barrage of antimatter rounds towards it's opponent, hoping to destroy it in the first volley. The commotion on the wraith ship began to pick up, their telepathic conversation becoming quite cluttered. Antimatter weapon fired, switching target. Affirmative, moving to engage the smaller vessel. We have a transmission coming through from the Oligarchy of Families. Alert the other ships. We have more than we anticipated. Call for reinforcements. They are keeping their larger ships in the center of their formation. Should we focus fire on the center ships? Nonsense! We must destroy the military vessels first!
The wraith ships began maneuvering, closing the gap between themselves and the human vessels. Their objective was in sight, they expected a quick and painless victory. How wrong they would be...
Commander in Chief of the Migrant Fleet / Former Fleet Admiral of the Liberty First Fleet Second Survivor of the Mentat Program. We must give and take with good measure. Give too much, we become complacent. Take too much, we incur the wrath of our own. Tread Lightly. --Supreme Bashar Robert Merlow--
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