“Then, there’s what happened to the ship,” Jason continued. “People started seeing things. Seemed like the ship was haunted. But I don’t think the crew was going crazy—not in the least. I think the entity was testing them. It used the info it got from Darin to design various scenarios, and the Andvari’s crew was its lab rats.”
Wil’s brows drew together. “I could see that. But to what end?”
“I haven’t a clue.” Jason shook his head. “All I know is that the entity looked at Darin as a tool to be used until he was no longer helpful. It was only a flash, but that’s not a feeling I’ll forget anytime soon.”
Wil folded his hands on the desktop. “All right, let’s say this wasn’t an attack but some sort of… scouting mission. What would it have learned?”
“That’s the problem.” Jason swallowed hard. “I think the crew probably pissed it off.”
“By destroying the ship,” Saera murmured, having put the pieces together for herself.
“Yep. Let’s assume it came through the Rift to scout out what Tarans are up to—possibly in response to what went on with the Gatekeepers, and the Andvari became the ambassadors for our race. Upon first contact, one person passed out, another threw themselves out an airlock, and the others gave their lives defending their ship. And in their final moments, they sent comatose Darin in an escape pod with all the information they had before turning their ship into a bomb with the express purpose of hurting the thing that had been terrorizing them. And maybe they succeeded; we can’t be sure what happened after the escape pod was sent, only what their intentions were and that the Andvari did eventually explode. In any case, we know what happens when a plaything tries to hurt us.”
“Your curiosity turns to hate, and you discard it,” Wil said.
“Or destroy it,” Saera added.
Jason looked between them and nodded. “Right. Now, we may never know if this scout was coming here to figure out how best to wipe us out—as the Gatekeepers said the ‘others’ would—or if it may have been looking to extend a peace offering. But I can imagine what kind of impression it left with.”
“Assuming it even ‘went’ anywhere.” Wil groaned softly. “A higher-dimensional being could… We have no way to guess what kind of abilities it might possess. Fok, it could be listening to us right now and we’d never know.”
“Well, it did single out Darin and the Andvari. That wouldn’t have been necessary if it were that omniscient,” Jason pointed out.
“True. I guess that is a bit of good news.” Nothing about Wil’s expression indicated he received any solace from the observation.
“There might still be an opportunity for diplomacy,” Saera said. “We’ll reexamine the existing information from this new perspective and see what else we can learn.”
“I hope so.” Jason looked down. “I don’t know how we’d defend ourselves against something like this. Whatever we’re facing, I feel confident now that it’s the darkness from my vision.”
“We’ll find a solution,” his mother assured him.
More than he’d ever wanted anything, he hoped she was right.
— — —
Wil took in Jason’s account of the interrogation at the Prisaris base, growing increasingly concerned with each new detail. The written reports hadn’t done the situation justice.
What the fok are we going up against? He tried to keep his expression neutral as his fatherly instinct kicked in to shield his son from additional worry; he needed a response plan before he raised the alarm. “Anything else?”
Jason shook his head. “Nothing that seems relevant. I’ll, of course, let you know if anything else comes to mind later.”
Wil nodded. “Well, at least now we have confirmation and can plan accordingly.”
“I’ll be standing by,” Jason said as he rose from his seat.
“Thanks, Jason. Good work out there.”
His son inclined his head and left Wil and Saera alone in the office.
“I’ve just gotta say it…” Saera slumped back in her chair, “this sucks.”
He couldn’t help chuckling. “It is less than ideal.”
She straightened. “But we’ll find a solution, because we’ve fought too long and hard for our children to not be safe.”
Wil nodded. “I will never stop fighting to give them the best possible future.” He always put his children first. The future of the Empire was their future, and it shaped every decision he made as a leader.
When it had come time for him and Saera to start a family, they’d made the difficult decision to keep the twins in the dark about the Taran Empire—to preserve their innocence for as long as possible. Between the messy politics on Tararia under the Priesthood’s rule and the aftermath of the Bakzen War, there was too much baggage to dump on young children. Wil knew firsthand what it was like to grow up in TSS Headquarters with parents serving dual roles as Agents and dynastic scions; he’d never had a chance to just be a kid. So, he’d done everything he could to give the twins a proper childhood unburdened by galactic-scale responsibilities.
Saera had grown up on Earth—before being recruited into the TSS—and had extended family there, so the planet was their best option for them to escape the Empire’s influence without going too far. Since Primus Elite Agent Michael Andres was Saera’s childhood friend, he and his wife Elise had also moved down to Earth so they could raise their daughter alongside the twins.
Logistically, a little creative engineering had made it feasible to reside on Earth while still maintaining their day-to-day roles within the TSS. Wil had designed a transdimensional spatial dislocation device—or TSD arches, as they were commonly known—which functioned like a gate-ring system to create a tethered portal for short-distance subspace transit without a
