Yirella regarded the shimmering orb with immense distrust. ‘That strikes me as unlikely. There’s got to be something on the other side to attack us when we pass through.’
‘Yes, but not yet. Time is slower inside the enclave. They might only just be registering our appearance. It will take days, if not longer, in their timeframe, to assemble a defence fleet.’
‘Once we’re inside, it won’t take so long. We’ll all be in the same time flow.’
‘Yes, but until we’re through we have an advantage.’
Yirella reviewed the hordes of approaching Resolution ships. The numbers were bad news. ‘We have to safeguard the wormhole terminus. It’s our only route out of this system afterwards.’
‘Acknowledged,’ Immanueel said. ‘Once the neutron star has exited, we will withdraw the terminus from this system at high acceleration. At the very least, the Olyix will have to split their forces. We conclude that most will enter the enclave in pursuit.’
‘Okay. So when are we going in?’
‘Right now,’ Ainsley said.
Yirella felt her heart rate bump up. Fighting their way across the gateway system had been tense, but she had confidence in their warships and tactics. This, though – this was truly a step into the unknown.
She used her neural interface to pull in as much real-time tactical data as she could. Battle cruisers were taking up position outside the gateway, with large particles flowing out of the wormhole terminus. As soon as they emerged, their copper coating swirled away to reveal weapons platforms, adding to the protective layers that were building up.
‘See you on the other side,’ Ainsley said.
She wanted to say, Wait, no, be careful – just something that might help, might let him know she cared. But the big white ship accelerated smoothly and slipped easily through the shimmering surface. Seconds later, a stream of armada battle cruisers followed. The wormhole terminus was manoeuvred until it was holding position a mere two kilometres above the gateway’s ethereal surface. Thousands more battle cruisers accelerated out of the wormhole and vanished immediately into the enclave.
‘Any response?’ Yirella asked desperately.
‘None,’ Immanueel replied. ‘I have no contact with any aspects of my corpus self that have gone through. In fact, this aspect group is now in a minority; our intellect is shrinking. It is an unusual circumstance, and one I find disconcerting. Being separated into two conscious entities is unnatural.’
Yirella exchanged a look with Kenelm. Having Immanueel confess that was somehow demoralizing.
Most of the armada was now inside the enclave. Or through the gateway, anyway, she told herself. Oh, Saints, what if it’s the most elaborate trap in the universe? What if any species that manages to break free of the initial invasion is lured here? What if—
The Morgan accelerated forwards, quickly clearing the wormhole. Within seconds its nose was entering the tenuous photonic bubble of the gateway. She couldn’t intervene. She couldn’t stop this now even if she used every network subversion she possessed.
‘Ohhh, shit!’
Eyes jammed shut to deflect the agonizing death blow as fire and fury ripped the Morgan apart.
Nothing.
She looked around. Tactical displays were building swiftly as the Morgan regained contact with the armada and . . . Ainsley. Yes!
But there was surely something wrong with the visual image; the cafe windows were showing a swirl of colourful clouds. It was as if they’d emerged into a gas giant’s atmosphere. Which she knew was wrong. She just couldn’t judge the perspective – to start with.
‘Great Saints, it’s a nebula,’ she gasped.
‘You made it, then?’ Ainsley said.
Yirella let out a long breath of relief. ‘That we did. So what local intelligence have you got for us?’
‘Even my sensor fronds are having trouble seeing through this murk. They’re spreading out now, so we should get a more comprehensive picture, but it’s not easy. The good news is that there aren’t many ships in here, and none of them are close to us. The star has got two power bands wrapped around it, and some other bands above them, which I’m guessing are the exotic matter generators creating this place. There’s only one planet in here, a gas giant; that’s the patch of the nebula that looks like it’s on fire. It’s got a massive energized ion tail, and thousands of small moons in a polar orbit, which I’m assuming are arkships. Should be able to get some decent resolution on that soon.’
‘And the Olyix have no large force of ships here?’ Yirella asked. That just didn’t seem possible.
‘This is one big thick nebula, kid. There could be anything hiding in here, especially if it’s not under acceleration. I am detecting some odd . . . twinkles appearing.’
‘Twinkles?’
‘Points of light that appear, then vanish. Random distribution.’
‘Radiation impacts on nebula particles?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Are they a potential threat?’
‘Still unknown. Any more dumb questions?’
She pressed her lips together, not quite in amusement.
‘We will dispatch a trio of battle cruisers to the nearest twinkle coordinate to investigate,’ Immanueel said. ‘But the rest of the armada needs to move now. The Olyix will soon be arriving in force behind us. We will set a course for the gas giant. That will suffice until our knowledge base of the enclave expands.’
*
The transmitter drone lifted on three small thrusters, each one producing a tiny spire of icy blue static below its fuselage. It slowly rose to head height, then steered itself carefully around the cavern.
‘That’ll do,’ Yuri said. ‘It works.’ In his mind, reluctance was warring against eagerness. To get this done. To finish it. But as he had learned so painfully during his career, rushing into a hostile situation never produced a good result.
‘Man,’ Alik grumbled. ‘The Wright brothers had a bigger first flight than that.’
‘To be fair, they had a bigger beach,’ Calum said. ‘And we’ve had centuries of flight experience since then.’
‘I’m sure the brothers would be very proud of all of you,’ Jessika said. ‘But there are a hell of a lot more human ships in the enclave now. They’re starting to move away from the emergence point. We need to do this.’
Yuri eyed the three other transmitter drones
