Echo Terra Chronicles: A Peace of Space

Rose

Rose sat in the cockpit of her N-class galactic flyer, gazing out at the asteroid field surrounding the ship. The silence of space, if she could hear it, would be deafening. Like after a flash blast does its number on your eardrums and the world around you goes silent. With the ship’s systems shut down, only the slightest whoosh of air from the life support system hummed in her ear. She was safe, for now. But held no illusion that Romy’s sensors could not detect her, even in silent mode. And new intelligence indicated the Amari may even have developed cloak-busting technology.

It had been a long day and all she wanted to do was sleep. “Edison, are sensors picking up anything?”

“No Rose, the only movement detected is that of the asteroid field.”

“If you say so Edison,” Rose responded.

“I can only speak the truth, as you are well aware.”

Rose sighed. She was more than weary, after three long months of reconnaissance, with only the ship’s AI for company. Tracking the Amari in an effort to determine their next target in the Canis Major galaxy had been harder than Echo Terra Command had predicted. Days passed without signs of life, let alone enemy ships.

“This galaxy blows,” she muttered under her breath. Checking the dim lights of the control panel.

 “Edison, tell me a joke.”

“No Rose, you know that’s not in my programming. Is my name Siri? Or Alexa? I don’t think so,” retorted Edison, with serious attitude.

“Fuck you, Edison.” Rose sighed and rolled her eyes.  

“You wound me Rose.”

“Edison, damage report.”

“We took moderate damage, but main thrusters and warp drive are operational. Shields are at 72 per cent and the communications array appears to have sustained damage. I can run further diagnostics, but that activity could be picked up by long-range scanners.”

“Shit. Let’s hold for now. We don’t want to trigger any alarms.”

The War

Being at war was getting old. It had been seven years since the Echo Terra colonies were first hit by the Amari. A warring race of the conquer and plunder variety, who must have grown weary of their old conquests and set out to find virgin territory.  

The first Echo Terra colony, Earth II, had been ravaged in the first attack. A relic of the past, it was home to the first Earth exiles. Settlers who’d braved a 20-year journey in hyper sleep within the ark of humanity, carrying hundreds of plant species, and animal DNA for cloning. Earth II turned out to be a fruitful world, mostly friendly to Earth species, with abundant natural resources. Their population easily grew to two million over the course of the next 100 years.

The Amari put an end to that. Luckily, additional colonies had been populated over the past 200 years. Or it would have been lucky if the Amari didn’t insist on tracking and destroying as many as they could find. The bastards never gave up.

Rose’s planet, Ryse, was home to less than a million, but central to Echo Terra’s military and tech development. Most advances in the past 50 years had been developed there – cloaking technology, impervious military apparel, and of course, weapons. Lots and lots of weapons.

Wake Up Call

A sudden jarring jolt woke Rose from her unintended slumber. She’d dozed off, unable to keep her eyes open after being awake and on the run for the past 40 hours. She’d been dreaming of her bare feet in warm sand, with ocean waves pounding in the distance and the sound of seagulls overhead. Except Ryse didn’t have seagulls, and Rose had never seen them before.

Alarms began to shriek.

“Edison, report!”

“An asteroid bumped the ship Rose. No evident damage. You must have fallen asleep at the wheel.”

“Oh, now you decide to be funny.”

Rose checked the controls. Recognizing the asteroid, sure. But there was something else.

 As she peered into the view screen, a ship slowly rose from behind the asteroid. It was a cruiser, 10 times the size of her two-person fighter flyer.

“Romy,” Rose growled.

 “Edison, transfer as much power to the shields as you can. Ready weapons. And see if the communications array is operable.”

 “Communications appears to be functional.”

 Rose engaged the navigation console and quickly dropped the ship behind the asteroid, offering a little temporary cover at best.

“Open a channel.”

Romy

A face appeared on the screen. Humanoid. Dark short hair, blue eyes, and a few days growth of facial hair. He might have been attractive if he wasn’t a merciless, killing bastard.

“Rose. Disengage weapons. I’m here to talk. I promise.”

“Your promises are hollow, swine,” Rose pitched her voice low, trying to sound as ominous as possible, knowing her physical image lacked the power of intimidation. “Is this a white flag? Because the way to a girl’s heart is certainly not by blasting her ship into the next solar system.”

“I tried to communicate at our last encounter. But you fired on me before I could establish a channel,” Romy replied.

She didn’t trust him. This was all too familiar. A trap. This wasn’t her first dance with this ship and her captain.

“Rose, the Amari ship’s weapons are not engaged,” Edison said flatly.

 “And that’s supposed to make me feel better how?”

 “I’m merely implying we have the upper hand for the moment, as our weapons are locked and loaded. Recommend attack and run. That is Echo Terra protocol when facing down a larger enemy.”

 Rose was usually quick to react. This was one of the features that catapulted her to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel in the span of five short years. That, and her piloting skills were unapproachable. But her weary mind was getting the best of her. And she’d run out of stims two days ago.

 “You’ve got 15 seconds, so make it good.”

 “My people have encountered a new race. Vicious. They make the Amari look like pacifists. They’ve infiltrated the outer systems of Canis Major, and it’s reported they’ve destroyed three worlds already. No resource scavenging. Just total destruction.”

 Rose tried to make sense of his words. “And?” was all she could think to say.

 “Amari command believes joining forces with Echo Terra is the only way to defend this galaxy. I mean, we were here first,” Romy tried to smile. It might look good on him once he got the hang of it.

 “Why should I believe you?” Rose raised an eyebrow, looking straight into the screen, with her most serious scowl.

 “I’m sending you coordinates, and a transmission captured as they destroyed one of the planets.”

 Rose pulled up the transmission. A huge, unrecognizable carrier spewed thousands of small craft that engaged and destroyed the planet’s air defense. Then a large beam weapon aimed a clear white swath of energy that appeared to be miles wide. In seconds, the planet was gone.

 After a long minute, she looked up from the devastation, eyes glistening slightly.  “You know these decisions are above my pay grade.”

 “I know,” Romy replied. “But you’re here. And the only one who has agreed to communicate with us. So far.”

 Rose took a deep breath. She rolled her neck, trying to stretch out tension from the past few months. No, years. “Edison, stand down weapons.”

 She looked up at the screen, trying to peer more closely into Romy’s eyes, through the void of space that hung between them, thinking about the seven years of war, and the thousands of lives lost.

 “Romy,” Rose shrugged. “Welcome to Echo Terra.”