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  NOMAD FLEET

  RISE OF THE EMPIRE SERIES

  BY IVAN KAL

  Copyright © 2018 by Ivan Kal

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

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  Table of Contents

  Glossary

  Timeline

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Epilogue

  Timeline

  November 2103 – A faction of humanity—Olympus—leaves to colonize a planet in a star system 600 light years from Earth.

  February 2159 – An alien race called the Ra’a’zani conquers Earth.

  May 2164 – Olympus arrives at their destination; they name the planet Sanctuary. They get involved in a conflict against an alien race called the Sowir and ally themselves with the Nel of Nuva.

  March 2170 – Resistance from Earth contacts Olympus on Sanctuary, asking for aid.

  December 2171 – Olympus and Sowir Dominion make a pact of non-aggression.

  January 2172 – Olympus fleet arrives in the Sol system, engaging Ra’a’zani forces. The battle for Earth results in narrow human victory, but the cost is Earth. The Ra’a’zani weapon makes the planet uninhabitable.

  March 2172, Year 1 of the Empire – Tomas Klein, leader of Olympus, creates the Empire.

  December, Year 30 of the Empire – Sowir attack Nelus system, homeworld of the Nel. Empire breaks the non-aggression pact with Sowir by simultaneously sending aid to Nelus and invading the Sowir territory. Clan Leader Adrian Farkas overuses the Watchtower command interface, and falls into a coma.

  January-March, Year 31 of the Empire – Adrian Farkas wakes up and hears the telepathic beacon from the sphere left by the originator of the human and Nel races, unlocking all the knowledge and technology contained inside.

  March, Year 36 of the Empire – Empire wins the war against the Sowir.

  Year 36-Year 54 of the Empire – The Empire is at peace, focusing on exploring, developing technologies from the sphere of the People, and expanding their borders to reclaim Sol.

  June, Year 54 of the Empire – The Empire meets an alien star-nation called the Erasi.

  July, Year 54 of the Empire – Lord Sentinel Adrian Farkas meets Dai Sha Anessa of the Shara Daim, the third race created by Axull Darr. Anessa attempts to capture Adrian; the fight ends in narrow victory for Adrian and his people. They take the Dai Sha prisoner.

  January, Year 55 of the Empire – Shara Daim Elders recall all of their forces for an attack on the Empire, seeking the device left by Axull Darr.

  June, Year 55 of the Empire – The Lord Sentinel releases Dai Sha Anessa.

  August, Year 55 of the Empire – The Empire defeats the Ra’a’zani, leaving their people abandoned on their worlds with no way of getting back into space.

  September, Year 55 of the Empire – Three Shara Daim Legions attack Sol. The Lord Sentinel defends, defeating the invading forces, allowing Dai Sha Anessa and her remaining forces to leave Sol.

  December, Year 55 of the Empire – The Erasi invade Shara Daim territory.

  September, Year 56 of the Empire – After finding out about a conspiracy by the Elders of the Shara Daim, Dai Sha Anessa removes them from power, taking the rule of the Shara Daim for herself, claiming the title Kar Daim.

  March, Year 57 of the Empire – The Shara Daim reach out to the Empire, inviting the Lord Sentinel to their homeworld Shara Radum for diplomatic talks.

  June, Year 57 of the Empire – The Empire’s diplomatic task force is ambushed by the Erasi on their way to Shara Daim homeworld. One battleship is destroyed, but the rest of the taskforce manages to escape.

  July, Year 57 of the Empire – The Empire and the Shara Daim reach an agreement, forming an alliance. The Empire becomes obligated to help the Shara Daim against the Erasi invasion.

  November, Year 57 of the Empire – A large Erasi force is detected at the border of the Shara Daim; more than one hundred fleets move to reinforce the Erasi invasion.

  July, Year 58 of the Empire – The Erasi attack the Empire embassy on Tarabat.

  September, Year 58 of the Empire – The Shara Daim begin operations to retake their territory back from the Erasi. An Erasi stealth taskforce infiltrates Empire territory.

  November, Year 58 of the Empire – The Shara Daim, the Empire, and the Erasi meet on neutral ground for negotiations. The Erasi break the truce and attempt to assassinate the Kar Daim and the Lord Sentinel. As a result the Empire joins the conflict fully on the side of the Shara Daim. At the same time, the Erasi taskforce in the Empire territory executes an attack on Sanctuary, killing millions of civilians and damaging the Hades Yards. The Star-Guard station is used for the first time, destroying the Erasi fleet.

  December, Year 58 of the Empire – The Lord Sentinel of the Empire executes an advanced attack on the massive Erasi force, hoping to reduce their numbers before their invasion of Kaleras system. The attack is successful, but not enough. The Erasi force moves against Kaleras with overwhelming numbers. The defending Shara Daim and Empire forces fight a losing defensive battle. After days under siege, help from the Empire arrives in the form of the World-ship Enduring, the personal ship of Axull Darr. Adrian pilots the ship and destroys the Erasi force.

  January, Year 59 of the Empire – The Lord Sentinel of the Empire uses the threat of the Enduring to force the Erasi out of the Orion Spur. The Erasi agree to the truce under those terms and abandon all of their territory in the Orion Spur, ceding control to the Shara Daim and the Empire.

  Years 59-563 of the Empire – A period of peace and advancement; the alliance between the Shara Daim and the Empire grows stronger, and both increase the sizes of their territories.

  May, Year 563 of the Empire – One of the Enlightened, Aranis, arrives in the Empire and assumes the identity of one of
its citizens.

  November, Year 563 of the Empire – A joint attack by the Hand of the Empire and the Fleet on a pirate base suspected of colluding with the Erasi is carried out. Plans for the invasion of the alliance are discovered. On the rim, Lord Sentinel Adrian Farkas makes contact with an enigmatic and powerful race called the Krashinar.

  February, Year 564 of the Empire – A preemptive attack on the Erasi is executed by the Shara Daim, the Empire, and the Krashinar. The invasion of the Erasi territories begins.

  January, Year 565 of the Empire – The war with the Erasi grinds to a halt in the Erasi outer systems. The Empire and the Shara Daim struggle to break through to the Erasi core worlds.

  March, Year 565 of the Empire – A task force is formed and sent into the Erasi core with the task of destroying their military infrastructure, led by Sentinel Ryaana, daughter of Adrian and Anessa.

  February, Year 566 of the Empire – Valanaru, Weaver of the Erasi, deploys a secret weapon, the Crescent, backed by a large Erasi force, against the task force. The resulting fight forces the Enlightened Aranis to act. Aranis destroys both forces and kills everyone on both sides who could identify him, saving only Ryaana, who was unconscious at the time.

  December, Year 566 of the Empire – Valanaru, enraged by the loss of the Crescent, accuses O’fa Vorash of betrayal and triggers a civil war.

  January, Year 567 of the Empire – Vorash arrives in the alliance staging system via an access point before revealing that he and Adrian had been working together in order to change the Erasi from within. Vorash asks for help against Valanaru.

  February, Year 567 of the Empire – The combined forces of the alliance and the Erasi loyal to Vorash invade the capital system of the Erasi. Adrian uses his Sovereign to punch a hole in the Erasi planet’s planetary shields and drops an elite team to the ground to deal with Valanaru, led by Ryaana and Lurker of the Depths. In the fighting, Lurker of the Depths kills Valanaru, and Vorash gains control of the system and the Erasi.

  April, Year 567 of the Empire – A peace treaty between the alliance and the Erasi is signed.

  PROLOGUE

  Year 597 of the Empire — Clan Warpath territory — The Forge

  Adrian Farkas, the former Lord Sentinel of the Empire, and now simply a citizen of Clan Warpath, looked out through the windows of the Forge. The massive shipyard embedded deep inside the asteroid was filled with movement: drones flying from one side to the other, unfinished hulls lying in their berths covered with people and construction robots working on them. But his eyes were drawn to something else, looming in the distance on the far side of the Forge. A large section that, from where he stood, looked simply like a black wall that obscured an entire third of the large cavern where the shipyard loomed in the distance. But Adrian knew that the wall would look much different if he were closer; from a shorter distance, there would be no way of missing that the wall was in fact organic in nature.

  Adrian stepped away from the window and made his way to the shuttle that was already waiting for him. He entered and took a seat, the shuttle moving almost immediately after. The shuttle itself was controlled by one of the Forge’s AIs, and it made its way toward the far side of the shipyard. Adrian waited patiently as a piece of the wall opened up and allowed the shuttle inside. Adrian stood and walked out into a cavern-like chamber and was met by a tall and terrifying looking being.

  “Adrian,” the Old Scar greeted him.

  “Old Scar, I assume that we are still on schedule?” Adrian asked.

  “We are, but I am not certain if we should proceed with your plan. Already there have been many changes; it is impossible for us to foresee all the consequences,” the Old Scar answered as the two of them made their way deeper into the spawnery.

  “I understand your concerns and why you do things the way you do. But your beasts are made to serve all of Krashinar, and this… It is not the same.”

  The Old Scar didn’t respond immediately, but Adrian knew that he was thinking—after all, Adrian knew the Old Scar as well as he knew himself, and the Old Scar knew Adrian in the same way. And it was not like Adrian didn’t understand the Old Scar’s concerns. He had the knowledge of the time when the Old Scar had served as a spawner, had the knowledge of how the Krashinar birthed their great beasts; he knew why the Old Scar was worried. What they were about to attempt had never been attempted before.

  “Very well, Adrian. We shall do this your way,” the Old Scar said finally.

  Adrian nodded in gratitude. The Old Scar was still in charge of the project and had the last say.

  Finally, they reached their destination: a large chamber with a Olympic-sized pool in the middle. And in the pool, submerged inside a strange, purple liquid, was a membrane sack. Adrian saw a small movement from inside the sack and looked on in fascination at the still-developing great beast. It was different seeing it like this, in person, rather than seeing it as he had in the memories of the Old Scar. Those memories had faded a bit over time, and though he still had access to the Old Scar’s life, to his knowledge, the images were somehow less now. They’d lost their vibrancy.

  But there was more to it—the beast before them was unique. It was the culmination of years of joint research between the Krashinar and the Empire. After the end of the war with the Erasi, the Krashinar and the Empire had grown closer, had established a true alliance. And then, one day, the Old Scar came to Adrian with a proposition.

  The Old Scar was aware of Adrian’s Skywrath project—he knew that Adrian planned on building a hybrid bioship—and so he proposed that they attempt to make a great beast.

  The original plan for Skywrath was for an integration of technology and biology. The Empire had already experimented with that; most of their ships had biological components. The power and network conduits in all of their warships were biological in nature. Nerve-like conduits stretched through the ships, allowing for much faster transfers of data, as well as protecting the ship systems from EMP attacks. It had been this way for a long time—almost since the founding of Warpath. But over the years they had been attempting to do more, to integrate more biological systems into their ships. They had not been very successful. Skywrath was supposed to be the first, a warship with more a far greater ratio of biological over traditional systems.

  They had finished the hull and were attempting to integrate a biological computer with other systems when the Old Scar had made his proposition. The plan required a significant change from what Adrian had initially planned, and he was sure that if the decision had been anyone else's to make, the Old Scar would’ve been refused. But Skywrath was Adrian’s private project, funded solely by him, and he had seen the potential in it, as well as an advantage that he could use. After they agreed, the Krashinar came to Warpath, and built a spawnery inside the forge, and there they had started their experiment.

  And now Adrian was standing before the result. The great beast inside the pool yet to be born was a culmination of all that the Krashinar knew, augmented by the Empire’s genetic knowledge and all reinforced by Axull Darr. The beast was going to be unlike any other birthed before. The Old Scar had used the genetic base from its own beast, the great Araxi, as a template. In many ways this beast was a child of Araxi. That fact was reinforced by Araxi’s presence just outside the shipyard. Even here, deep inside the rock, Adrian could feel the great beast outside, watching over the soon-to-be newborn.

  The Empire’s geneticists had given their contributions as well, reinforcing and adding their skill and knowledge to the new beast. Lastly, and perhaps more importantly, it was the changes that Axull Darr had provided to Adrian that were going to make this great beast truly unique. The People had been masters of genetic manipulation, and while the Empire had caught up to them, Axull Darr himself had had a lot of time to expand on his knowledge. His additions were going to allow the great beast a greater control over its Sha abilities.

  All Krashinar great beasts could use the Sha to some degree, and their size allowed them grea
t power, but they needed the control of their tamers to utilize it. The beast before them would not—it would be able to do so on its own. The Old Scar had warned Adrian that it was dangerous to allow the great beast that much control, but Adrian didn’t want a beast like theirs, he wanted something more. A partner. It was why Adrian had decided to do what they were about to do.

  This was the moment when they were going to bring the infant great beast to consciousness, to wake it for the first time. Ordinarily this would be done with hundreds of spawners, who would take great care not to influence the beast, only to give it a simple intelligence. But Adrian was about to wake it up a different way, to share a part of his life and knowledge with it.

  He wanted something more than a simple great beast: he wanted a being who could think for itself, a being that shared his goals. It was however impossible for him to copy his goals into it, to program its mind—not because it couldn’t be done, but because Adrian did not want a being programmed to do as he wanted. He wanted it to accept his vision on its own. To do so he would need help. He knew next to nothing of what a being such as this needed, how it should think and act, and so Araxi had agreed to give Adrian aid in his plan.

  Adrian approached the access node and put his hand on it.

  “Are you sure you want to do this, Adrian?” the Old Scar asked.

  “I am. The Enlightened have great power, and I have seen records of their bioships in combat. We need all the advantages that we can get,” Adrian sent back.

  The Old Scar didn’t respond, but Adrian felt its resignation. It would let Adrian do as he willed.

  Adrian reached out with his mind through the access node, guided by memories of the Old Scar doing the same countless times. He knew how to spawn great beasts, just as the Old Scar knew. His mind brushed against the being in the pool: it was a blank, a mold, just waiting to be awoken. And Adrian did just that, as he had done countless times when he had lived the Old Scar’s life.

  He pushed the Sha into it and felt the beast wake, as a spark of true intelligence was born. He slowly and with great discipline and care shaped his thoughts, allowing only that which he intended to pass through, hoping that the beast would accept it. Then, when he felt he had done enough, he reached out to Araxi, who had already connected itself to the amplifier beast and was ready and waiting. Araxi’s mind brushed inside, and Adrian halted it. the great beast had a vast mind, but it was a simpler mind. Adrian guided Araxi to share its experiences and knowledge, imprinting the lessons that Adrian wanted the new great beast to know: How to fight, how to fly the void, how to communicate as the other great beasts did. Adrian added his own lessons, as well: How to communicate like humans did, how to form thoughts and words. Most importantly, through all these lessons, Adrian tried to instill in it the same goals and drives that Adrian had, hoping that the beast would accept them as its own. A desire to become strong, to push forward always, to seek greater and greater challenges.