An Epic Space Opera By Mark Laporta
Anxious to capture the powerful Kadervax to use against the increasingly menacing Quishiks, Shol engages Eldrinaj in a kind of Cosmic Chess and forces her to reveal the whereabouts of the ancient device. In this episode of Infinity Afterglow, old enemies grapple for domination. Read Infinity Afterglow from the beginning..
Of the many feints and dodges that Eldrinaj had mastered over the course of her young life, she was most grateful for the evasive navigational maneuvers she’d learned from a lonely Terran Protectorate pilot. A human Ensign with little charisma and minimal social skills, the pilot had welcomed the Olfdranyi’s attentions like a sunburned desert straggler welcomes a tall glass of water.
At loose ends one summer night, in a nearly empty bar on Caleda 4, Eldrinaj saw in the pilot a simple route to improving her dismal flying skills. At that point, only a year after abandoning her study of classical Ootravian for a career in petty crime, the stress of spaceflight, even with autonav, had become intolerable. More than once, the AI embedded in her stolen trading ship had demanded she choose between available options before continuing to her destination. On every outing, her fear of making the wrong choice and careening into the nearest star had only grown stronger.
Ironically, with a little more digging, she might have discovered that even her tiny ship was programmed with standard failsafes against such a disaster. The AI’s navigation queries were only intended to capture the pilot’s personal preference. At the correct settings, the AI was perfectly capable of navigating with complete autonomy.
Back then, in her fearful mindset, Eldrinaj saw every reason to wheedle a whole host of classified information out of this singularly unattractive young man. And because the poor soul was at a loss for how his luck had changed, he was exceedingly patient over the next few days with his lovely companion’s nagging requests for flight training. Three weeks later, after exhausting his shore leave allotment for the year, the unlucky pilot was subjected to a devastating breakup. The Olfdranyi’s fictional aunt at the far edge of the cosmos had come down with an equally fictional case of Gelistrian retro virus and needed round-the-clock care.
From then on, whenever Eldrinaj executed one of the complex maneuvers she’d learned from the heartsick pilot, she’d call out “Oh Poor Auntie,” and then dissolve into laughter. And now, with the help of the immensely powerful AI embedded in the Kadervax prototype, navigating the space lanes was easier than ever.
This time it was different. Though she’d expected, after emerging from her last space-fold, to be parsecs away from anyone who’d recognize her ship, she was in for a surprise. Her ship’s AI flashed the following message across her command console:
UNIDENTIFIED SHIP OF UNKNOWN DESIGN,
115 DEGREES OFF STARBOARD
The Olfdranyi’s pale yellow brow furrowed as she flicked on her main viewscreen. The unmistakable contours of the Odelaappeared in sharp contrast to the star field, thanks to the illumination provided by a nearby planetary system.
“Craters, it’s that old fool and his nursemaid gynoid,” she said. “At least I hope Shol had enough sense to leave them.”
But to the same extent that she’d over-estimated the success of her evasive maneuvers, she’d also underestimated the effect of the pkaholul ring on Shol’s ever-expanding consciousness. Her shock at seeing his holojection appear on her bridge was as sharp as it was terrifying.
“You stole something, like, real important,” he said.
Eldrinaj shrugged.
“You’re out of luck,” she said. “I sold the sucherch months ago. Looks like you came here for nothing.”
“Wasn’t talking about the sucherch,” said Shol. “Where’s the Kadervax?”
“Don’t know what you mean,” said the Olfdranyi. “Why don’t you go back to Grandpa and stop wasting my time?”
Eldrinaj gasped as a perfect holographic likeness of the Kadervax appeared next to his image.
“You don’t recognize this?” said Shol.
“Wow, that ring really lets you do some fancy tricks,” said Eldrinaj. “Too bad it doesn’t add up. I can’t tell you about a device I’ve never heard of.”
Shol’s image looked to his right.
“Yaldrint?” he said.
The Grashardi AI’s voice echoed in the trading vessel’s command center.
“Significant jump in heart rate, ocular dilation and blood pressure at the appearance of the last image.”
“So what?” said Eldrinaj. “How should I react when somebody barges in like this?”
“Guess I gotta ask the other thing you stole,” said Shol. “Kadervax prototype AI?”
“Ready,” said the AI. Eldrinaj sank lower in her command chair.
Eldrinaj listened in horror as Shol obtained the exact coordinates of the of the full Kadervax that had arrived from the alternative universe that was created by the Quishiks’ breakthrough. Though her mind raced with a thousand possible excuses, she was forced to realize that there was no way to cover her tracks.
From the expression on Shol’s face, the Olfdranyi braced herself for a torrent of abuse. But once he was finished with the prototype, Shol merely glared at Eldrinaj and canceled his holojection. Then, faster than she would have thought possible, the Odela left her olive-green trading vessel far behind. Eldrinaj rested her slightly comical face on her delicate right fist.
“Handsome brat,” she mumbled. “Too bad he’s so snippy. Probably learned it from that bloated old crusty. Well, at least, he left me the prototype.”
“Negative,” said the prototype’s AI. “Now that the full Kadervax is operational again, I can take commands only from it.”
“What about me?” Eldrinaj screamed. “Without me, that old pile of quantum circuits would still be rotting in a secure facility.”
“It still is,” said the AI. “You retrieved a parallel version from an anomalous iteration of the future.”
“But that means there are two….” the Olfdranyi said.
Yet, as the AI explained, the existence of either version of the Kadervax would be imperiled by any attempt to retrieve the device from its secure government bunker.
“The device Captain Mars returned in,” said the AI, “as well as the one in the facility exist in a bubble of anomalous spacetime. Any interference with the causal premise that brought the alternative version here will shatter the bubble and take both devices with it.”
“Interesting,” said Eldrinaj.
Despite everything, she was still in the game. All she needed was an easily manipulated fool with enough fire-power to threaten the continued existence of the Kadervax.
“Nevruleth,” she whispered into her hands. By now, she was sure, the curmudgeonly Skryntali was in complete control of his ancestors’ powerful fleet. All that was left was persuading him to sign on to her slowly unfolding scheme.“You’ll find out who really holds all the cards, my handsome little bug boy,” she said.
^^^
This concludes Episode 30: Cosmic Chess. A new episode of Infinity Afterglow appears every Saturday. Read Episode 31 now.
Read Ungent Draaf’s earlier adventures in Mark Laporta’s novels Probability Shadow and Entropy Refraction, which are available at a bookstore near you, on Amazon and at Barnes & Noble. Mark Laporta is also the author of Orbitals: Journeys to Future Worlds, a collection of short science fiction, which is available as an ebook.
His new novel, from which this episode is excerpted, will be published by Chickadee Prince Books. To pre-order, contact Orders@ChickadeePrince.com.
Image by Kalyee Srithnam