Resurgence of Ancient Darkness Read online

  I took a deep breath to steady my voice and said, “Karathlathornka, Grandmaster Vydor never forgets those who helped him. Can you walk?”

  “Yes,” he said in a weak voice.

  “Cymeion, barricade the door. Darkstone, get those chains off him. Spectra, we will need that exit in a moment,” I said.

  As they moved to comply, Karathlathornka kept his eye on me in a way that made me very uncomfortable.

  “Master, they are activating the gas,” said Cymeion.

  “It’s okay. Our armor will protect us long enough to get out. Just get those chains off him,” I said.

  “Your armor will not protect me,” said Karathlathornka.

  “Here,” I said as I placed a mask over his mouth. I was kicking myself for forgetting that.

  “Okay, he is free,” said Darkstone.

  “Spectra?” I asked.

  She nodded and cast her gate spell.

  “Everyone, out!” I ordered.

  Once we came out the other side of the gate, I sent, “Phoenix, we got him! Get us out of here!”

  “On it!” he sent.

  “Karathlathornka, welcome aboard the Dust Dragon,” I said.

  He turned and gave me a hard look. “Why are you helping me? I have ceased to be of use.”

  “I told you: Grandmaster Vydor does not forget those who helped him. We’ll see to your injuries as soon as we’re clear of the defenses. Until then, try to rest.”

  Chapter Five

  “Hello, sir,” I said to my father as he came on the observation deck. It had been several months since he officially joined Alpha Academy as a Battle Wizard Third Rank and over a year since I had originally invited him. We had spent that time studying the Imperial Navy’s structure and organization, hoping to use as much of that knowledge as we could as we set up our new military force.

  “Hello, Master Shadow,” responded my father. It was still odd to hear him address me as one of superior rank, but he seemed to have adjusted well to it. Officially I was not supposed to call him “sir” but instead use his name, Douglas Dougherty; but I had been calling him “sir” all my life and changing that habit was very difficult for me.

  It was not long before the recruits started to arrive. Each of them had eagerly volunteered for this new position once it was announced. I was surprised by the response and actually had to turn away quite a few in order not to drain the school too heavily too soon.

  We watched in silence as they walked into the hangar. They had as yet had no military training of any kind, and I knew that meant that some of them would be in for a rude awakening. They had spent the last several decades living and working in a school which was fairly informal in structure, at least when compared to a military unit such they were about to experience.

  My father looked over the ragged lines. “Well, I certainly have my work cut out for me.”

  “You would not have it any other way,” I said with a smile.

  My father turned to Starbiter, the elite wizard assigned to assist him, and asked, “Are we ready?”

  “Yes, I think we are, Master” he responded.

  I was still a bit unsure of their relationship. Starbiter was a quiet type who would stand in a corner and merely observe the world around him if he could. Master Mathorn had nominated him for this role, and I trusted Mathorn’s judgment. I wished, however, that I could get a better grasp of Starbiter’s character.

  After a parting comment, my father and Starbiter headed down to the hangar. Twenty-five of the Dark Knights had already filed in and were attempting to group the wizards into formal lines.

  As my father walked in to the room one of the Dark Knights called out, “Attention! C.O. on deck!” and all the Knights snapped to strict attention. The various wizards did their best to imitate the Knights, but could not help but bend and twist to see who was coming in.

  My father, decked out in the full deep purple armor of his rank, walked on to the deck in a perfect military manner. His back was straight as a rod, and his shoulders were square. I had not seen him look so regal in a long time. Age had considerably weakened his body, and I knew it put a strain on him to march like that. “Show them no weakness,” he once told me. He knew that he was at a serious disadvantage being a mundane among wizards, and he wanted to make a grand first impression. Behind him walked in Starbiter, wearing the purple robes of an elite wizard.

  A look of surprise came over the faces of the trainee wizards, as they presumably realized the truth of the rumors that a mundane would be leading them. I was not sure how they would take it. They were all good people, but more and more it was becoming apparent that mundanes and wizards did not get along. Both would be polite, but they preferred to stay with their own kind. This is something we were likely to struggle with until the end of time.

  I watched silently as he barked out orders and cleaned up their lines. He gave them a powerful lecture on how hard the road was before them and how they were the first to pave it. I had never before seen him give a lecture like this to recruits, and to watch him in action was amazing. It was not long before they were all correctly standing to attention with a look of determination on their faces. The general attitude of the students was one of respect for my father. They would work hard to earn his respect in return. After a while, I left him to see to my own troops.

  At my father’s advice, we had reserved the name of Battle Wizards for the regular forces, and named the elite forces the Dragon Guard. Their missions were distinctly different from each other. The Battle Wizards were more of a general standing army, while the Dragon Guard would be running special missions deep behind enemy lines. The names would keep that separation visible and eventually act as an impetus to prospective members of the Dragon Guard to take pride in its elite status and push them to higher dedication and excellence.

  It took three years of training before we were ready to launch my new command vessel, the Nevermore II, with its crew of a hundred Dragon Guards taken from the best that Alpha Academy had to offer. There was some concern that we were taking too many wizards from the school and leaving it somewhat anemic, but I knew that would work itself out over time as more and more wizards continued to pour in. The bigger concern was making sure we had sufficient forces to defend ourselves and to secure the realm.

  Chapter Six

  I had been reviewing the training logs of my new crew when Master Shadow called me into his office for a special meeting. We had made great progress with our training, but now that the Nevermore II had launched it would become harder to fit in training missions, so I needed to make sure to maximize the little time I had.

  “Dusty, I have been reviewing your training reports, and I am pleased with what I see. It seems you have been doing a fine job preparing your crew for their future missions,” he said.

  He looked at me as if he expected me to respond to that, but I did not know what to say so I just sat there quietly. Eventually he continued, “Dusty, as you know our borders are under constant threat from many sides. It is only through the work of the Battle Wizards and our mundane naval forces that our little section of the galaxy stays peaceful. It has been a little while since the last tribe tested our defenses, but that could happen again at any time, so we are keeping constant watch on the space around our borders. Recently we discovered a space station being constructed close to our region, close enough to be used as a base from which to attack us. I want you to take the Shadow Fox and destroy it.”

  When we first annexed the ailing Aleeryon nation we picked up some of their enemies who moved to try and take advantage of what they thought to be a state of weakness due to the transition of power. In response we sent elite and journeyman-level wizards to the borders to show everyone we meant business. In some short and very violent battles, we wiped out countless numbers of attackers. This turned many against us out of fear and resentment but brought an end to any active aggression on our borders.

  “Master, if it is
outside our borders, do we have any grounds to attack it?” I asked.

  “It is a threat to the security of our space, and we have sent many warnings, all of which have gone unanswered. At this point, the Council considers it as potentially an advance base being built in preparation for a new attack on our region. As such it cannot be allowed to stand uncontested,” he said.

  “Master, why only send the Fox and not the Nevermore?” I asked.

  “Unfortunately, we are being sent to investigate another section of our space. I do not want to risk delaying either mission, so we will split up and handle them both at the same time,” he said.

  “Master, do we at least allow them the chance to surrender?” I asked.

  “That chance has already been offered, and they gave their answer by destroying the messenger drones that were sent to them when they failed to respond to more normal means of communication,” said Master Shadow.

  I thought about that a bit, but I still had little liking for this mission. “Master, things have changed a lot since we were in school together.”

  He sighed and seemed to think with care about what he was going to say next. “Yes, Dusty, they have,” he said. He stood, then paced a little. “Sometimes I wonder if we would have been better off if we had not closed those tears. The original wizard council ended this war for ten thousand years, and we restarted it in a period of less than two months.”

  “Master, the war may have restarted, but that does not mean we have to become cold, hard warriors. Could I not at least offer them one more chance to surrender when I arrive? They are likely to be less than eager to attack a living representative of the Wizard Kingdom rather than a robot.”

  “The Wizard Kingdom?” he asked with a smile.

  “Well, Master, no one thinks of us as just a school anymore, so why not?” I said.

  “Why not? Maybe because it is not your prerogative to choose the name?” he said with a grin. “I think the Council is coming around to it, though, since it is what the rest of the realm calls us. However, with regards to the station, you may be right but the offer would be at great risk to you and your crew, as you would not be able to use stealth and surprise to your advantage.”

  “Master, it’s an acceptable risk to prevent bloodshed,” I said.

  “There certainly has been enough of that these past years,” he said. “Very well. It is your ship, your crew, and your mission; if you want to do this you have my permission.” He paused there and said, “Dusty, you must understand that, even with the addition of the mundane naval forces, we do not yet have the numbers to defend this section of space from a concerted attack on our borders. Our enemies these days are without limit, and the only reason they do not unify and attack as one is because they have not yet realized our limitations. If we fail to deal with this threat, they may decide to test our borders, and that could spell the end of what we have built here. They may hate each other, but their fear and envy of us greatly outweighs that.”

  “Yes, Master, I understand. I really do,” I said, and I did. The Wizard’s Council was the most powerful force in the known universe, but in the end, they were only seven people against trillions and trillions among our enemies’ forces. I had no doubt we would win, even against a united attack on our borders, but the death toll and devastation such an attack would cause was beyond my ability to imagine. “Do I therefore have permission to do whatever I feel necessary to remove that base?”

  “Dusty, we cannot win a war with darkness if we become darkness ourselves. We must keep fighting for light, no matter what the cost. As long as you can honestly say that you are fighting to bring light and not darkness, then do whatever it takes to crush that station. Even if they surrender, give them time to escape and then destroy the station. It cannot remain standing,” he replied.

  “I understand,” I said. “When do we leave?”

  “Tomorrow morning. Your crew is already due to assemble at that time for their review and the planning of the next training mission. You will do your review and give everyone four hours to prepare for the new mission,” he said.

  “Wow! That’s one heck of a turnaround,” I said.

  “Yes, I know, but we have let this stand for too long already. We must move quickly before that station is battle-ready,” he said. “At this time you should find it a fairly easy target to eliminate, but if we delay your launch even by a few weeks they might be able to bring main power online, and then more drastic measures would be required.”

  “Master, what should we do if anyone interferes?” I asked.

  “I do not know who would, but that station must be destroyed. If anyone gets in your way, you will have to deal with them in whatever way you see fit. We cannot risk looking weak at this time. We have to appear stronger than we are until our forces are sufficiently large that we need no longer keep up a pretence.”

  “Understood, Master,” I said and, after some parting words, I left to prepare for my first real mission at the command of the Shadow Fox.

  Chapter Seven

  I left Master Shadow’s office and headed to my ship, the Shadow Fox. The Fox was a new experimental design known as a Dark Conure Mark II. The Mark II was the next generation of the Dark Conure, created mainly to compensate for the areas that our combat experience with the Dust Dragon had indicated to be weak.

  There was one key difference between the Mark I and the Mark II: this was the addition of an illuminescence battery array which Shea had created, based on the design of the illuminescence canisters we destroyed during Operation Show of Force. This battery array allowed several key systems to be removed from the traditional power grid, which extended the fuel efficiency of the craft by twenty per cent. The added power reserves which the illuminescence batteries provided allowed us to add a fully-fledged cloaking system, making the Shadow Fox a true black ops vessel. These batteries also allowed for advanced control systems that improved reaction time and control, but had the side effect that only a magus could operate them. The Shadow Fox was the next step towards truly merging magic and technology.

  I was grateful that I was able to choose my own crew for my new vessel, and immediately named Shea and Spectra as crew members. I would have loved to have had Phoenix as part of my crew, but he took command of the Dust Dragon when Master Shadow was given the first command class vessel of the Battle Wizard Navy, the Nevermore II. Doctor Leslie was another person I wanted on my crew, but she elected to stay at the Academy and serve as chief medical officer, as our numbers had grown to the point that Headmaster Rannor could no longer run the school and the hospital at the same time.

  Since taking command, I had been living on the Fox full time. During training exercises, my crew would also stay on the ship with me, but as we were currently between exercises, the ship was mostly empty. Shea would stop by from time to time to tend to her gardens in the hydroponics bay, but she was not on board at this time. Spectra stayed on board with me; at first I had not been happy with this plan because I wanted my privacy, but I had come to really enjoy her presence and was glad of the intrusion.

  As I boarded the craft, Spectra ran forward to greet me, “Well? What did he want?”

  “He’s sending us on our first mission in command of the Fox,” I said.

  Her eyes widened and she said, “But we’re not ready!”

  “We are ready enough, it seems,” I replied. She was right. Our crew was still struggling to make its marks. We were doing well based on the level of experience we had, which was none, but we were well below the level I had wanted to reach before launching from the Nevermore II.

  “What’s our mission?” she asked.

  “Someone is building a secret base near our borders. We’re to eliminate it,” I said.

  “That hardly seems like a job for a black ops cruiser,” she said.

  “The base is still under construction, so it should be a fairly soft target,” I said.

  Her long black tail twitched a li
ttle, indicating that she was a bit nervous. “Then we’d better get working on supplies for the mission. Gathering them could take a couple of days.”

  “We leave by midday tomorrow,” I said.

  “Ugh! I guess we’ll have a late night of packing and fetching supplies,” she said.

  “Do we really need all that much?” I asked.

  “That depends: do you want to fly out of here and try to destroy the station with training ammo or the real stuff?” she asked.

  “Valid point,” I said.

  Spectra had changed greatly in her years as a Battle Wizard, and yet in some ways she had not changed at all. Around me, she was delightful, if a bit mischievous, but with most others she went back to being her dark and solemn self. In truth, besides myself I did not know if she trusted anyone except possibly Shea, but everyone seemed to trust her. She was one of those people you meet that seemed full of light. I could not figure out what it was about her that made her stand out, but whenever she was around everything just seemed better.

  “I guess we should call Shea. She’ll need time to get our food supplies organized,” I said.

  “Yeah, good idea. Go ahead and contact her. I’ll head to engineering and see how badly off we are for supplies,” she said.

  “Shea?” I sent.

  “Yes, Master Dusty?” she replied.

  “I hope I am not disturbing you, but something came up that is likely to need your immediate attention,” I sent.

  “Master, I was just eating a late dinner. What can I do for you?” she asked.

  “This will not be public knowledge till tomorrow morning, but about midday we will be taking the Fox on her maiden mission. I do not know how long we will be out there; probably weeks,” I sent.

  “Master, we do not have enough food and other supplies for an extended mission. I need at least a day, if not two, to prepare,” she replied.