When the Stars Fade (The Gray Wars) Read online

  Cameron laughed so hard tears formed. He leaned against the wall, catching his breath.“I swear, George, I’ve never seen anyone go through a uniform as fast as you.”

  The short pilot fumed.“I’m so glad I entertain you. What am I supposed to do? Clothing and Sales has been closed for hours.”

  Cameron wheeled around, producing the folded cap with a flourish and a bow.“Next time I’m leaving it on your seat.”

  George’s face brightened as he snatched the hat and placed it slightly askew on his head. He made a show of wiping down his suit and putting his nose in the air.“Well, it would seem I shall be buying the first round.”

  “It’s an open bar,”Cameron said, giving his friend a quizzical look.

  George’s grin returned.“Still counts.”

  * * * * *

  The lights appeared shortly after dinner, lunar time. They were so small as to go unnoticed by the thousands of ships, transports and satellites flitting about the invisible tether between Earth and the moon. Flashes of blue snapped off in clusters, like groups of fireflies, then vanished, leaving a winking white strobe behind. The orb tumbled and turned, drifting in the planet’s orbit lazily. Then it began to sing.

  On the bright side of the moon, far from the bubble-domed buildings and housing units, Raymond Lee sat at his computer and stargazed. He was the only intern for the fall cycle, and lucked into the graveyard shift more often than not.

  The Andretti Observation Center was alive with the hum of dozens of computer terminals. The size of an airplane hangar, the civilian telescope acted as a watchdog for a rather boring sector of the sky. Its enormous lens was pointed in the direction of the withering emptiness. Aside from Raymond, his supervisor and a janitorial robot, the building was empty. Everyone else was home or on vacation for the holiday.

  The Andretti Observatory was the last man-made structure leading out beyond the crater from which it took its name. Without any light pollution, the building had an unmolested view of the stars. The scientists of the Terran Space Initiative (TSI) had used Andretti to chart out the paths that led to the colonization of extra-solar planets and moons. Not that the history of the place had anything to do with Raymond’s position there. He liked the solitude, the salary was decent, and they paid him to babysit a computer.

  “What’s the Master Controller say?”Raymond’s boss, Olivia, adjusted her rumpled clothing and frowned. She wore her white coat over a smart suit, and had comfortable sneakers instead of heels. Her face looked ghostly in the glow of computers, aging her far beyond her twenty-nine years. She had to look up to see Raymond’s eyes.

  Raymond didn’t take his gaze off the wall monitor. The strange signal was displayed as a rolling set of hills and valleys; the frequency made for an oddly beautiful graph.“Same as before. It’s not pinging any of the relays, and Terra Node has no scheduled jumps this late in the day.”He shivered. It was always too cold in the observatory, but he never remembered a sweater. He put both hands on his head, weaving his fingers through his straight black hair.“It is strong, though.”

  “Strong for a rogue bandwidth, maybe.”

  “Seems more like a long range buoy, but not one I’ve ever seen.”Ray frowned.“Should I be worried?”

  She shrugged. It would be well within their rights to hit the panic button and drag Fleet officers from their families to deal with the situation. Most likely, however, the signal was just the front end of a large transport scheduled for the next day. Long-haul pilots often used older Blue drives, and those opened wormholes hours before arrival. Starting as pinpricks of light, these pre-exits could spit out garbled transmissions and play havoc with electronics. But Raymond couldn’t shake the feeling that something else was going on. He played a hunch, pulling up the relay traffic from the previous cycle. He ran the transcript on his personal station, his eyes jumping from jumbled text to jumbled text looking for any red flags. He found one near the bottom of the page, a note from a day before.

  “Here,”he said, pointing.“Relays caught a note from a flare at 2215 tonight. Who uses flares anymore?”

  His supervisor leaned in, pushing her glasses up her sharp nose to read the screen.“Probably a lumber company from Eros. They’re always using ancient tech to haul their loads.”She marked the flag on her tablet and switched on the computer’s speakers. Immediately the sounds of the relay network echoed in the vacant bay. The symphony of dull tones was nothing new to the two scientists; a fairly mundane assortment of high and low notes from the various relays. Then, at the very end of the recording, something different.

  Tim...Tim...Tim...

  Raymond isolated the track and played it again, his stomach tightening into a knot.“Okay, I’m no expert on traffic codes, but I’ve never heard anything like that.”He turned to face his supervisor.“What should we do?”

  She chewed on her lower lip, furrowing her brow.“I’ll call the Director. Maybe he knows something we don’t.”

  Raymond swallowed, his mouth suddenly parched.“Do you think...is it Mars?”

  “No,”she said with some certainty.“That’s been done for ten years.”She tilted the monitor, inspecting the text with a sudden intensity.“If anything, this seems to be extra-solar.”

  He nodded, but the anxiety didn’t ebb a bit. Raymond grabbed a bottle of water from his desk and gulped it down, his hands shaking.“And if this is an invasion? Are we safe here?”

  His supervisor didn’t answer at first. She walked to her station and picked up a phone, dialing in her code and waiting for an operator on the other side. Her normally stoic face was etched with lines and a shade paler.“If this is an invasion, nowhere is safe.”

  * * * * *

  Fort Yonkers hadn’t been built for Fleet. That much Commodore Hiro Osaka knew. Grown from the skeleton of the first lunar colony, the sprawling base lacked the facilities and equipment to properly care for anything larger than a six-man Griffin. The complexities of a Terran carrier seemed to baffle the gaggle of civilian engineers that pored over the flagship like ants on a picnic. Two weeks into the refit and they were already a month behind schedule. The fifty-year-old officer had walked the halls of his ship only hours before and had been horrified by the disastrous mess left behind. Cables hung down from the overhead panels and entire sections of the walls were missing, exposing the innards of the vessel.

  As the commander of Carrier Battle Group Sol, Hiro oversaw a flotilla of the most advanced ships in the Terran Fleet. But even without the support craft, Hiro had the Alpha vessel. Midway, the Terran Flagship, was unlike any carrier before it. Designed during the final days of the Emigration War, she replaced the fallen TFC Shiloh. Fully three times as large, and holding eighty more fighting craft than her predecessor, Midwayhad become the unquestioned symbol of the Federate’s supremacy in the dark skies. It wasn’t hard to see why; unless one saw her in person, they never believed the stories of her size.

  In recent years, even as newer ships-of-the-line flew out from the various yards over Titan and Phobos, Midwayhad remained a sentinel in Terran space. Her crew could populate a small town, or conquer a small moon. Though armed only with standard weaponry, the carrier was a match for any fighting vessel in the known universe. Hiro’s weapons officer lamented that they never installed some of the latest and greatest tools of destruction, but a forty-inch gun still packed a hell of a punch. With all of the group’s efforts combined, they could truly occupy a solar system.

  Which made it all the more frustrating to have it sitting on the filthy, dust-choked surface of the moon while the former enemy of the Federate orbited 200 million kilometers away. Hiro looked out the small glass window next to him, imagining he could see the red planet. Such an unimaginable distance from the ground, but almost unbearably close to a military man. He took a final look at his prone and gutted berth before heading back down the hall. The civilians and soldiers he passed couldn’t help but stare as the high-ranking officer walked by. His jet black uniform seemed weighed down by the she
er amount of badges and medallions and cords; and this wasn’t even his dress uniform. With his closely cut gray hair and piercing blue eyes, Hiro was as recognizable a face on a military post as the High Chancellor himself.

  He pinched the bridge of his nose, his other hand holding a small phone to his ear. His jaw clenched and relaxed, and he tried to slow his breathing down to calmer levels.

  “I don’t care about the old plates,”he said. His voice was calm, but he felt the acid rising. “I can’t fly until you replace the port hangar’s armor shielding.”Hiro paced back and forth in the hall, his eyes locked on a distant point of the Earth’s surface. He so rarely got to see an Earthrise these days, and he couldn’t even enjoy this one.“You have until I reach the OpCenter to have a better answer.”He hung up, lingering in place a moment longer to soak in the spectacle. For a moment he considered calling his daughter, maybe asking to speak to his grandson, but it was already late. With a sigh, he put his phone away.

  The Commodore turned to walk toward the Operation Center and nearly collided with two young men running down the corridor. They stopped cold when they saw the golden star on Hiro’s collar, the scarlet S designator at the top point. Recognition hit the pilots at the same time as they realized who stood before them. Each snapped off a crisp salute, which the commander took a moment to reflect on before returning. The ranking officer walked around the two pilots, glaring as only a superior can. His perfectly polished shoes clacked on the tile with a satisfying echo.

  “What unit are you with?”Hiro asked.

  The taller of the two turned to speak. His charcoal gray dress uniform was neatly pressed, the array of medals gleaming. Silver pilot wings crested his lapels with a large A in the background.“Sector Patrol, Wolf Squadron, sir.”His friend, a head shorter with dark and unruly hair, grinned in agreement. Both men wore bronze badges on their left side underneath rows of ribbons: a fighter in front of an exploding star.“We’re on our way to officer’s call.”

  “With your unit crest on the wrong side?”

  They both looked down. The shorter pilot cursed and began pulling pins from the golden shield and spear on his left breast pocket. The taller pilot laughed.“Are you serious?”

  “I did this in the mirror. I got mixed up.”

  “George, I am literally without words.”He helped his friend get sorted out, then returned to a position of attention.

  Hiro couldn’t help but laugh.“You can relax.”The tall pilot went to parade rest, his hands clasped tight behind his back.

  “There,”George said, adjusting his medals and ribbons.“Is this better, sir?”

  “It will do. But I’d reread the regs for dress uniforms in your free time. And spend a few hours on those shoes.”He saluted, signaling for the boys to run off. George immediately began speed-walking away, but the other remained a moment.

  “Is that your ship, Commodore?”The young man pointed out the nearby window. From almost any area inside the post, the supercarrier could be seen. It blocked most of the view, not that there was all that much to miss. Just a sea of gray stretching to the horizon.

  Hiro smiled.“Midwayhas been my home for seven years now, but I can never claim her as my own. She belongs to the crew and the pilots, to the engineers who brought her to life. Though she does do what I ask. Most of the time.”He took a moment to take in the younger officer. The dirty blonde hair was a bit long for regulation, but one couldn’t deny the man possessed a powerful bearing. There was something in his manner that Hiro found wholly likable.“What is your name, pilot?”

  “Davis, sir. Cameron Davis.”He checked his cufflinks, wiping off a smudge with his thumb.“We sort of met before, sir, at my commissioning ceremony. You talked about the battle at Phobos, said it made you wish you’d been a pilot again.”

  “I apologize. Did we speak then?”

  “No. I was laid up in a chair in the back. My Dodo bricked out fifty yards from the deck. I was lucky; only sprained. They had me on so many meds, I slept through my pinning.”

  “But you remembered my speech?”Hiro asked.

  “Some things stick with you.”

  Hiro looked at Cameron’s shoulders, noticing the silver bar on either side. He almost called him a Junior Grade, but he recalled that SP worked off the Army ranking system.“May I ask you a question, Lieutenant?”

  “Of course, sir.”

  Hiro stared out the window, fingers brushing against the cold glass. His breath fogged the view when he pressed his face closer.“Why SP? Why not Fleet?”

  “I failed the health test.”

  The Commodore could hardly believe that.“You look perfectly fine.”

  Cameron tapped his chest.“Hypertrophic cardiomyopathy. Fancy way of saying I have a genetic disposition towards a bad heart. Fleet wouldn’t accept my packet without a letter from a doctor saying I would live forever.”

  Hiro nodded. He’d seen more than a few good soldiers turned away from service because of geneticism.“What does the disease do?”

  “For now? Nothing. But, if the wrong things happen, my heart gets thicker and I can’t pump blood as well. Makes it hard to be a pilot.”He waved off the look the Commodore was wearing.“It doesn’t bother me, sir. Sector took me, and they let me fly whatever I want. Besides, I’d never fit in with the active side. Too rigid.”

  “Is that right?”

  Cameron laughed.“Sorry, sir. No offense meant.”

  “Well, Lieutenant Davis, you’d better make sure your wingman hasn’t gotten lost on his way.”

  Cameron grinned.“Not possible, sir. There’s an open bar.”He became serious, extending his hand to his superior.“It’s an honor to meet you, Commodore.”

  The commodore smiled, taking the offered hand.“It was very nice to meet you, Lieutenant Davis.”

  The pilot saluted and ran off toward his friend. Hiro sighed. The young officer couldn’t have been more than a few years out of training. Too young for a Mars veteran, but he’d worn combat pins on his uniform. Fighting raiders maybe, Hiro thought. Or handling some of the brushfire wars in Europe. There are no innocents in uniform.

  He turned back toward the OpCenter, clearing his thoughts. It was going to be one of those nights.

  * * * * *

  Raymond pushed his digidisk player aside to make room for more files. When he worked, if his essays were done, Raymond could sit and listen to music his whole shift. Not that he shirked responsibility. But, given the three hundred and twenty-three satellites on automated routines in the space above him, the facility could almost run itself. If a problem arose, the alarms were loud enough to wake the dead. Tonight, however, he was as alert as ever. His supervisor paced in the back of the room, speaking sternly into her phone. She’d been on the line with Director Chavez, the TSI big boss, for the last hour. Ray leafed through the various reports, relieved to see the same stamp on each one: NCFA, no cause for alarm. Ray collapsed into his chair, letting out a deep breath.

  “It’s like this every year,”Olivia said, pocketing her phone as she walked over. She had her tablet cradled in one arm while her other hand pushed information to the adjacent computer screens.“The satellites are old, and the relays even older.”

  “What did Chavez say?”Ray asked.

  “Observe and Report.”She shook her head.“His best guess was a blown relay somewhere near Io. Those haven’t been serviced since the administration change.”She made a face as the strange signal sounded over the speakers again.

  Ray rubbed at his eyes; he’d been staring at monitors all night and they were burnt out.“Have you ever heard anything like this?”

  “No,”she said softly.“But that’s no reason to panic.”

  Raymond shook his head.“Should we call Sector Patrol? Maybe get a flight in the air to investigate?”

  She rolled her eyes.“And send them where? The signal isn’t just in one location, and we can’t very well ask them to just‘look around.’”

  “So what am I supposed to do?”


  “You’re job.”She collected her equipment and threw it into a messenger bag. Hoisting the leather satchel onto her shoulder, she walked off toward the door at the rear of the room.“Get the Observers back on mission and keep an eye out for anything else. If it’s what I think, we’ll get a burst transmission from a hauler soon.”

  “And if it’s an invasion?”

  Olivia sighed.“Then we’ll see the Blue exits before they arrive. Don’t forget, Fleet has its best ships up there.”

  Raymond stared at his supervisor in disbelief.“And you’re just going to leave me here?”

  She stopped with her hand on the doorknob, nostrils flaring slightly.“Raymond, I just got off a double shift at the lab before I had to come all the way out here to hold your hand through all this. I’ve been up for thirty-six hours.”She shot him a withering look.“I’m going to bed. Don’t bother me.”She was out the door before he had a chance to respond.

  Raymond didn’t move for a full minute. His chest still felt tight from the excitement and stress of the entire ordeal. Still, he had to admit that the worst seemed to be over. He had a mission of his own, and there was still a routine to follow. Logging into the TSI server, Raymond activated the Observer Control Master (OCM) and let the computer begin roll call for the satellites overhead.

  That’s enough excitement for one day, he thought. Before he let himself relax, Raymond turned the audio for the relay transcript back on. He closed his eyes, listening to the strange signal repeat itself over and over.

  Tim....Tim....Tim....

  - II -

  October 13, 2236

  Each Observer satellite resembled a black beachball with antennae jammed in at odd angles. Barely the size of a chair, and with a brain just smart enough to work a camera, the drones were the first line of defense against a variety of unexpected company.

  Established years before the Mars Rebellion, the Observer Cloud had originally been intended to detect asteroids on approach to Earth. After a rock the size of a passenger jet destroyed a small city in Europe, TSI devoted a fortune to designing and launching the robotic tripwire. Unable to stop such an object unless spotted millions of kilometers out, the network of satellites grew until they dotted the skies over every major planet in the Federate.