Prominence

Part 10 - First Steps to Peace

Del fidgeted with the collar on his dress uniform as he waited for the Rear Admiral to respond. He did not appear to have heard the question and was silently staring out of the private view port in his quarters onboard the Prominence. He too was dressed in his full ceremonial uniform and he cut a striking figure despite his advancing age.

"Rear Admiral did you hear me?" he asked a little more loudly this time. When the Rear Admiral turned to face him Del could see the irreversible toll this war had taken on him.

Del had his own deep scars that were likely to change him forever too, not the least of which was being away from his Tata and living with her emotions and feelings directly linked inside his head. It was enough to drive you crazy being connected with someone without actually being with them. Feeling their presence every day as though you could reach out and touch them at any moment. Knowing they had lived an entire life with that same feeling that for him had been a torture for only 6 years by comparison.

Even so, Del could tell by the look in the Rear Admiral's eyes that he had fared even worse. The weight of winning a war with billions of lives at stake, a war that he had seen the start of, a war that he had unknowingly been party to starting. It was too much for any one person and it was testament to his grit and determination that he was still standing.

"I heard you Del. When we are in private you can call me Relv, you earned it."

"Thank you sir, that may take me some time to get used to."

"You are going to have to get used to a lot of new changes if this peace delegation goes well," he said solemnly.

"You sound disappointed that the war is ending."

"Not at all. I am just not sure how I am going to be able to fit into a normal life that does not span hundreds of years. Vaslus will be as strange to me as its people and its ways by now. What do you intend to do when this is all done?"

"I will keep my promise and return to Hebra to my Tata."

The Rear Admiral looked at him with eyes wide. "You are bonded via the Tata and you fought anyway? I thought my problems were bad."

Del managed a short chuckle.

"The ship is ready for jump, the Orlak delegation is on board. Glax is getting impatient to get us back home."

"Let's get it done then shall we."

Del marched alongside the Rear Admiral as they made their way from his quarters up to the bridge. As he walked he found himself reflecting on the past week and a half. It had been a hard road just getting to this point. Proving to the Orlak that they had the technology to destroy Drrdetala was one thing. The demonstration got their attention, but that was only half the battle. Making the Orlak understand that the war was never something the Vaslusian's wanted or intended was a whole other problem.

There were some long and grueling sessions on the planet's surface with a substantial amount of distrust on both sides, each waiting for the other to spring some kind of trap. Eventually though they came to the realization that neither side really wanted the war.

The Orlak had been drifting nomadically around the galaxy in regions that the Vaslusian's had yet explored. They extracted everything they needed from desolate moons and asteroids. The whole time watching and waiting for their day to return to Drrdetala. It was inevitable that the two civilizations should eventually come into contact with each other, but beyond all odds that the first contact would be the attempted terraforming of their holy world. A worse travesty could not have been committed if they had planned it.

Whether the Orlak truly believed that the Vaslusian's actions on Drrdetala were unintentional or whether they were simply scared of the Singularity Pulse did not matter for now. The main thing was that they had agreed to stop the fighting on Plorus and cease future offensives against other worlds until the eldest ones in their peace delegation had met with the Primariate.

Del snapped out of his reverie when they reached the security door leading to the bridge. The Rear Admiral paused momentarily with his security chip hovering just above the security access panel.

"You ready for this?" he asked Del.

"I have been out of my depth ever since we stopped shooting each other sir!"

The Rear Admiral broke into a brief mischievous smile.

"Good, I'd hate to be the only one."

The Rear Admiral opened the security door and they stepped onto the bridge. Inside was the usual array of bridge staff at their various consoles, but off to one side four eldest ones stood motionless and crowded together like some small artificial forest.

The Rear Admiral greeted them formally and then explained to them that they were about to jump to Vaslus. They were fascinated by this aspect as their own gravity wave technology was still in its relative infancy compared Vaslusian technology and they all began to whistle and chirp amongst themselves.

"Mr Glax please broadcast to all stations and all ships that we will be making the jump to Perimeter station on my order."

"Aye sir!" came the eager reply.

"Initiate the jump."

Del had never suffered badly from jump sickness, but he knew that the Rear Admiral did, so he was ready to subtly steady him as soon as the jump was over. However the moment the Prominence came out of jump alarms rang violently throughout the bridge as console after console trumpeted various warnings. The Prominence lurched and groaned as it was thrown about in what was supposed to be the vacuum of space and Del was too preoccupied keeping his own feet on the deck to worry about the Rear Admiral.

"Tactical report!" the Rear Admiral ordered Ibek as he hugged a nearby console to brace himself.

"The external temperature is extreme, cosmic radiation also extreme and we seem to be inside an ultra high speed solar wind! Another minute in this and we will be cooked alive or torn apart! We need to initiate an emergency extraction!"

"Defense I want shield to maximum power! Glax alert all stations and ships to initiate immediate jump to the emergency extraction point beta!"

"Aye sir! You heard the man Jump Master get us out of here now!"

Seconds later they were jumping again, but not before the temperature inside the ship noticeably increased.

"What the hell just happened?" demanded Del to Glax. "Did something happened to screw up the jump?"

"No General, everything appears correct according to the Jump Master."

"Then he'd better recheck his numbers because there is no way that was Perimeter station!"

"Ibek show me full range scanning results in the direction of Vaslus on the main tactical display," said the Rear Admiral ominously. As they came up onto the holographic display the Admiral's shoulders slumped and he had to steady himself again on the nearby console. Del could not understand the data, it looked like all the sensors were maxed out. The rest of the bridge was deathly silent.

"I don't understand. What is wrong?" Del asked Ibek quietly.

Ibek turned to him with tears streaming unabashedly down his face.

"Vaslus is gone..."

The Rear Admiral was not able to sustain his legs any longer and suddenly collapsed to the deck. Del and Ibek raced over to him and pushed away the other more junior bridge officers and helped him prop himself up into a sitting position.

"Rear Admiral," Del repeated but to no avail. The Rear Admiral's eyes had glazed over as though he'd just had a stroke. He slapped the Rear Admiral gently on the cheek. "Relv...you have to snap out of it.

"It's gone...I don't even know if she had a chance to evacuate..." he mumbled.

"If the Primariate is gone Relv, so is the government whether they evacuated in time or not," said Del."That means all remaining worlds are under martial law until a new central government is formed. With no Grand Admiral you are the next highest in command."

"I am a soldier not a politician!" protested the Rear Admiral meekly.

"Not anymore, Primariate," replied Del. "You had better pull yourself together because you have a galactic wide peace treaty to negotiate."

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END Part 10

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