Admiral Pearson sat on his flag bridge and steadied his stomach for the queasy feeling he always got when coming out of hyperspace. It was more imagined than felt, as if his body was in two places and then merged back into one. As the data plots began to stabilize and render the system data once more, he confirmed what his intelligence officer had provided; a complete map of every starship in the Antares system--accurate in every detail. No fleet commander could fail to act on this priceless data, the knowledge of exactly where his opponents were, their strength, dispositions, and timing, while they knew nothing of his. In fact, they were still coming to a state of advanced readiness when his fleet arrived--a fact he intended to exploit with a vengeance.

This time, he was prepared when the fast response carriers began to disgorge their fighters. He targeted over one hundred and seventy missiles on the five carriers tasked with guarding this approach. Only two were able to bring defensive weapons to bear, but it didn’t matter. Many of the fighters tried to target his missile strike, which left them vulnerable to direct fire from his fast battle cruisers. He followed up his attack on the carriers with heavy beam cannons, and in less than forty seconds, his fleet was the only one left. The remaining fighters had nowhere to rearm; his escorts fanned out, leaving the small fighters no easy openings. Although they tried to break through, every beam weapon in his armada targeted and erased them all.

He had also picked up a number of reinforcements on the way in, bringing his order of battle up to nine dreadnoughts, thirteen battle cruisers, six battleships, and nineteen heavy and light cruisers. In addition, he had brought up six of the Armadillo class minelayers and four fleet tugs.

His fleet began moving at maximum speed for the spatial rift. There were no ships coming through it at the moment, but that was his primary objective. As he neared the rift, other elements of the enemy defense force began to leave their defensive posture and race to meet him. It must have been obvious to them what his objective was, and they knew the importance of preventing him from controlling the rift.

But he arrived first and deployed his fleet. Protecting the minelayers, his escorts spread out and prepared for incoming fighters, but there were none. Their intelligence proved correct again. All of the carriers must have been sent forward with the assault fleets. He was now in the rear areas of the invasion, where it was vulnerable.

Twelve battle cruisers raced forward to meet him, and he began to give way. As the battle cruisers moved into missile range, they launched their seekers and followed closely behind them to follow with beam cannons. But when the leading battle cruiser found the first mine, half the forward section of the ship blew off, spiraling into space. Its fellows did no better, as they also found mines that they did not expect. Six of the twelve BCs were destroyed before the others peeled away. Pearson’s thirteen battle cruisers leapt into action and hunted the fleeing ships down before they could retreat further into the system. In a matter of moments, the rift was secure.

He detached two task forces, TF-21 and TF-23, to secure the system at its hyperspace junction points. He knew what forces would be waiting there too, and adjusted his fleet elements to ensure his enemies’ total destruction. They were just now coming to full readiness, but not before they found themselves overwhelmed by superior forces that knew exactly where they were.

After gaining control of the system, Scott Pearson set to work laying a pattern of mines crisscrossing the spatial rift on this side. The mines included triggers for capital ships and fighters; he was taking no chances. Only Terran ships, with their Identification, Friend or Foe signals, would be able to pass unharmed. He only had explosive mines, anti-matter and matter containers separated by a thin magnetic screen, that he could deploy immediately. He was still scraping together stores of the more advanced beam weapon and missile platform mines from sector command. He was also issuing orders for sector shipyards to immediately begin transferring mines forward to his position. It was his intention to secure this star system from any attack before taking the offensive.

* * *

Once he was sure the task of securing the system was underway, Pearson detached a light task group, including his flag, to the Antarian refinery station orbiting the asteroid moon Antares III. Once in orbit, he sent a signal to the sector command posts on the massive moon, but there was no response. Instead, he received a response from a single heavy cruiser that was hiding, not on the surface of the moon, but deep inside one of the large craters on its dark side!

Admiral Pirelli looked up from his console and met the gaze of Commodore Santos. The identification of the vessel was Imperial heavy cruiser designation War Hammer. The War Hammer, commanded by Captain McKenzie, had perished with all hands over five years ago. So what was it doing here?

Pearson received the communication on the flag bridge main viewing screen.

“Captain McKenzie. This is an unexpected surprise. I think I am glad to see you are still alive, if a little confused by it.”

“Yes, sir,” came the reply. “Permission to come aboard, admiral?”

“By all means. I’ll meet you in the shuttle bay myself.”

* * *

Thor lowered her aft quarter shield as the shuttle carrying Captain McKenzie and his staff made its final approach for hangar door number four. The station-keeping thrusters fired, taking the shuttle into the massive hanger bay and settling her on the lighted pad she was cleared to access. The shuttle made the necessary thruster corrections to bring her velocity almost to rest relative to the massive dreadnought’s receiving bay, and was received by a gentle docking cradle that wrapped itself neatly around her lower portion.

Once the shuttle docked, the bay floor began to descend into a smaller compartment. Captain McKenzie watched the walls move upward as his shuttle descended, noting the designation on the walls, DN-026. This ship certainly outmassed his own command, by almost an order of magnitude.

Once the bay floor had finished its decent, hangar doors closed overhead, sealing the compartment before fresh atmosphere was pumped in. The compartment went through a series of decontamination steps using various electromagnetic and pulse wave sweeps, followed by an atmosphere flush and refill.

Finally, the compartment was ready for occupancy, and the indicator on the shuttle pilot’s console changed from flashing amber to solid green. Out of habit, Captain McKenzie reviewed the atmosphere readout to the left of the debarking door and noted the percentages of argon, nitrogen, and oxygen. All normal.

As McKenzie and his staff exited the shuttle, he kept his expression grim as he saw the navy rating stationed just inside the doors leading into the dreadnought’s receiving area. He stepped across the door frame, still behind the black and green line indicating official entrance to the warship. As he came through the door, he stepped out of the way, moving forward to make room for his staff, and the shrill notes of the bosun’s pipes greeted him as the hatch closed behind them.

The marine honor guard inside the shuttle receiving gallery snapped to attention in its green and gold dress uniforms, and naval personnel in the black and green of the Imperial Terran Navy saluted smartly.

McKenzie and his officers returned an answering salute.

“Permission to come aboard?” he stated automatically.

“Welcome aboard, Captain,” Pearson said, clasping McKenzie’s hand in a firm grasp. “If you and your staff will follow me, we can debrief you in staff room four. This way, please.”

Neither man said a word, and the normal introductions of McKenzie’s staff were overlooked. This was expected. After all, he and his crew were supposed to have been killed by pirates almost a half decade ago. There was going to be a reckoning soon, and it was not going to be pretty.

The marine honor guard fell in behind McKenzie and his senior staff. The fact that they carried fully functioning sidearms was not lost on him.

As the visiting staff filed into the large briefing room, they noticed that the admiral’s staff was already present. As the arrivals took their seats, the marine guards took up positions both inside and outside of the compartment. It set an ominous tone.

“Captain, allow me to present my staff. Admiral Pirelli, my chief of staff, Commodore Santos, my ops officer, Rear Admiral Charleton, Captain Veiga, and Captain Ganner, whom you may already know.”

Captain McKenzie introduced his staff as well, and then a slight frost descended around the table, as the pleasantries had run their course.

“And now, captain…” said Admiral Pearson, leaning back in his chair.

McKenzie took a deep breath and began his tale. “Admiral, what I am about to share with you will take some time to fully sink in. Be advised that I am acting under the highest government authority, and that I am prepared to share all of my data with your staff at their convenience. Also note that my staff are loyal Terran officers, and were not aware until this moment that I am acting contrary to my own orders.” McKenzie’s command staff kept their expressions neutral, but darted their eyes as they looked at each other.

“Six years ago, then-Commander Ganner was in pursuit of a pirate raider that was caught in active piracy in this very system. It was pure random luck that this pirate had stumbled upon what we later discovered was a type IV spatial rift, as you now know. The intelligence you received regarding the rift and the data you used to plan your attack on this system came from my ship.

“The pirate did not know the full extent of his find. For him and his partners, it was a way to hide briefly from local authorities and then return to fence their stolen goods. When Commander Ganner discovered their hiding place, she pursued them and sought to bring them to justice.”

At this moment, all of Pearson’s staff turned to face Traci Ganner.

“Captain Ganner, your report stated that you were attacked by pirate vessels six years ago, and that your vessel was destroyed and lost with all hands, with the exception of yourself and twenty-six crewmen in lifeboats,” Commodore Santos stated with malice in his eyes. “Captain, did you falsify facts in your report, and did you, in fact, have knowledge of this spatial rift?”

Traci Ganner looked back at Santos without flinching. “Yes, Commodore.”

McKenzie stepped into the stunned silence. “Commander Ganner engaged and destroyed one pirate vessel, but its accomplice ran while she gave chase. He was lucky enough to run across a hyperspace lane, and randomly selected a jump point. He emerged near what we now know is one of the home worlds of a people we call the Valdi, after their system. Commander Ganner gave pursuit and destroyed him in that system.

“His destruction was assisted by an asteroid defense force consisting of a surface-to-space strike fighter squadron that engaged the pirate. Commander Ganner was forced to destroy the strike fighter component and retreat from the system.”

“Captain McKenzie,” Pearson said, his voice edged with molten lava, “I would like to hear Captain Ganner’s version of this.”

“Yes, Admiral,” Ganner responded crisply. “Once back on this side of the rift, Captain McKenzie and I proposed a plan to the Council of Twelve, the ruling body of the Orion Star Cluster. Our plan was to sacrifice my own light cruiser, with its minimal damage, as a gift to the Valdi.”

“What the devil?!” exclaimed Admiral Charleton.

“Continue if you please, Captain,” said Admiral Pearson, the words clipped and dangerous.

“We intentionally purged the cartography database of all star systems not directly en-route between Antares and Earth. We retained all plans and designs of our technology, however. The problem was how to remove the crew. Those wounded in the pirate exchange were evacuated, and certain of the crew were placed in life pods; there was enough post-combat confusion to do that much. The ship’s environmental safety detectors were manually deactivated, and all decks of the ship were flooded with argon gas, which is heavier than air, but completely undetectable by humans.”

“You murdered your own crew!” spat Admiral Pirelli, clearly disgusted.

“Captain,” stated Pearson, “you will certainly be court-martialed and hanged for this,” he said. “Do you wish to have council present before completing your testimony?”

“That won’t be necessary, sir,” she said, and continued. “We delivered the ship virtually intact after the damage control parties completed what repairs they could, and set it adrift toward their populated worlds. We had observed their strike fighter behavior, and noticed that they would descend upon a crippled vessel and board it. What they would find aboard the Corsair would be a dead crew and an intact database with working technology--a priceless find.”

“Admiral, you will recall that my ship was listed as missing the next year,” McKenzie said, taking up the story. “We made several trips into the rift to perform reconnaissance on the Valdi and monitor their progress. They are very warlike, Admiral, and they understood not only that they now had access to interstellar hyperspace technology, but a complete listing of our weapons and fleet strength between Antares and Sol. In addition, they also had complete fleet class readouts of every ship in all four fleets.”

“I simply can’t comprehend a conspiracy of this magnitude,” Commodore Santos said, shaking his head. “When the emperor hears of this, you will be taken directly to Earth and executed by means of his own imagination.”

“Unlikely, sir,” Ganner responded. “Since Captain McKenzie and I are both Orion, your emperor had declared war on our people long before we discovered the rift. In fact, we were among a number of sleeper agents specifically instructed to look for any means necessary to bring down the Empire.”

“That makes sense,” Pearson said, looking at the bulkhead. He couldn’t bring himself to look at his intelligence officer. Now he knew how she always had such priceless intel on the Orion fleets--they were feeding it to her. It was as genius as it was diabolical. Sacrifice some of their own fleet in order to secure her place in his command. And he didn’t even see it--none of them did.

“Very well,” he said, standing. His staff stood as well. “Major Lexington, take these officers into custody. They are to be confined to the brig in separate cells with no communication between them.”

The marine major stepped forward and roughly hauled Captain Ganner to her feet. The other marines escorted Captain McKenzie and his staff out of the compartment and down the hallway, weapons drawn.

After they had left, the officers remained standing, too stunned to even sit. They clustered near Admiral Pearson.

“What does this mean, Admiral?” asked Santos.

Pearson let out a breath he didn’t realize he was holding and ran his hand over his shaved head. “It means, gentlemen, that we have lost our intelligence officer, and we could have additional sleeper agents among our crews. We need to go to intruder alert status delta and initiate sabotage watch.”

“Strategically, our plan remains unchanged. We will deploy the minefield around the rift, and then detach two task groups to recon forward toward Earth. If we move quickly enough, we can catch these Valdi in their rear areas and do some damage. Sebastian, I want ops plans drawn up to that effect. Roule,” he said, turning to the rear admiral, “I plan to detach your squadrons forward to do the recon. Put together what you will need in the way of a fleet train to make it work.”

“Yes, sir,” echoed around the table, and then staffers filed out, grim-faced and determined. Pearson sat down alone in the briefing room and looked at the chair his former intelligence officer had occupied.

* * *

Traci Ganner sat alone in her cell. The walls were plain white and offered her no comfort. She waited. It was done; her part had been completed, and the stage was set for the final acts. She was relieved that she was present when Admiral Pearson was given the true version of what happened those six years ago. It was one burden that was lifted from her already overloaded shoulders. A soldier had to carry many burdens after surviving combat. A spy had to carry more.

Being raised in the Terran Empire had not been all bad. She had grown up with her Terran mother on Pirenai, a planet in the Pollux system. She had attended the proper schools. Because the Council of Twelve had carefully studied family lines and picked out the best and brightest families, it was only natural that her mother was selected as a potential candidate. Seduced by the handsome young man that would become Traci’s father, her mother did not know she would be party to a carefully laid plot to plant sleepers in the Naval Academy, local government, and even the emperor’s own administration. Traci had shown amazing tactical and intelligence abilities early on. It wasn’t until her third year in the academy that she met her estranged father. Drawn to him, she wanted to know who she was and where she came from. Unfortunately, she learned more than she wanted. She was Orion. More than that, her people were oppressed by the Terran Empire that she served.

She had entered the academy upon the recommendations of various professors and tutors, even the planetary governor. She later learned that many of them were party to the plot. And she was not alone. Her military education came in two parts: classrooms and simulations by day for tactics and strategy; stories and images of the atrocities committed by the royal family by night, accompanied by grisly images and footage. Oh yes, she was serving in their military, but not the way they thought.

Her contacts were few. She knew of only one other cadet that was also Orion, senior classman Michael McKenzie. She didn’t know him well, and only had certain phrases that were to be used for clandestine communication. After graduation, her first middies’ tour was uneventful. She also served under various commands before landing her own. It was fortuitous that her first anti-piracy duty was in the same sector as Michael’s. In fact, he had already fought and destroyed two pirate vessels before their fateful encounter six years ago.

Her thoughts were interrupted by the sounds of approaching footsteps. She stood up and faced the door as it was unlocked. A very angry admiral entered the compartment, and the door was closed behind him.

“Sit down,” said Admiral Pearson. “You have not earned permission to stand in my presence.”

Looking Pearson in the eye, she sat back down on the bunk and folded her arms around herself.

“I need to know everything you know about the Orion dispositions--fleet strengths, everything. And don’t even think about lying to me.”

“Yes, your majesty,” she said.

Red faced, he rounded on her. “What did you call me?”

“You are now the emperor of the Terran Imperium.”

Pearson was startled out of his rage, and an icy claw wormed its way up his spine. He whispered, “Why would you say such a thing?”

“Your majesty, you have not yet been