The ADC started moving, making a wide turn around the hangar and heading back toward the front near the blast doors. The alien AI was still there, watching them work in static silence. Caleb wondered how the thing saw them and their efforts? Were they slaves solving the problem for it? Or was it still judging their value?

  Or did it just not care?

  The builder stopped a few meters short of the hangar doors, the extended crane jutting forward close to the edge. The doors were separated just enough to get the ADV through, and Flores didn’t need anyone to tell her to roll it over beneath the hook.

  Caleb crossed over to the ADC, climbing it and waiting for the crane. The cable extended, dropping toward him. He grabbed it, and guided it to the center of the vehicle where he moved an armored panel away and connected it to a receiving bar. While this particular ADC had used the lift to get on board, every piece of mobile armor in the Marine inventory was designed to be loaded by crane or alternately dropped from airborne hoppers, where the same connectors would be used to hold large chutes.

  Caleb looked over the alien AI. It still hadn’t moved. He wanted to shout at it, but he wasn’t sure how to refer to it. He damn well wasn’t going to call it Sho. It seemed to sense his intention, and it walked over to the ADC and climbed on to stand beside him.

  “Wash, we’re ready,” Caleb said.

  The cable retracted, tightening against the ADC. It continued to pull back, raising the vehicle a few centimeters. Then the builder started rumbling forward again, the ADC approaching the edge of the ship.

  “This should be familiar to you,” Caleb said to the AI. It didn’t respond to his statement.

  Caleb gripped the cable as the floor of the hangar vanished beneath the ADC. The vehicle’s front wheels lost their purchase and the carrier starting to sway slightly. This means of leaving the ship was anything but optimal. Ideally, they would have used a split line connected to multiple receivers on the vehicle to keep it steady and stable. It was a good thing Caleb wasn’t afraid of heights and didn’t get motion sickness.

  It took another few seconds for Washington to move the builder forward far enough for the ADC to finish clearing the edge of the ship. Then the crane began to slowly spin out cable, starting the descent toward the ground.

  Caleb looked over the edge of the ADC toward the Deliverance. He could see the edges of the landing supports resting in the surface, the thick trunks of the support columns having sunk at least six meters into the soft ground. Water was pooled around them, draining in from the river near where the Deliverance had touched down, the ship’s computer having selected the spot as ideal for the colony.

  He could also see the scars and gashes along the ship’s hull, along with areas of bent and slagged metal that had reshaped the starship into something else — a new form of terrifying art. Judging by the amount of damage, it seemed like a miracle they had survived the descent through the planet’s atmosphere.

  He turned away from the ship, rotating around the wire to look out at the landscape beyond. It was daytime. The sun was high overhead in a nearly cloudless sky that had a tinge of reddishness lacing through the blue. The few clouds he did see were thin but as dark grey and ugly as the wounds to the Deliverance. They grew thicker and more substantial in the distance, where Caleb found the edge of the river valley and the hills and peaks surrounding them. Flashes of lightning exploded from the clouds there, sending jagged spears to ground with splitting crashes of thunder.

  It was so much like Earth, but different enough that it clearly wasn’t. Caleb couldn’t put a finger on all of the exact subtleties, but his subconscious recognized them. They were going to be the first people to set foot on a new planet that would become their new home.

  Not the first, he realized a moment later. The second. Riley had escaped ahead of them. But where had she gone? In which direction? And was she on foot or had she taken a vehicle from the ship?

  Caleb lowered his gaze, looking almost straight down. The massive force of the slowing starship’s landing thrusters had knocked down thousands of trees around the site, burning vegetation and leaving a cleared radius of disturbance nearly a full, jagged kilometer around. Beyond it, the flora was dominated by massive trees, easily twice the size of the largest trees he had ever seen. Their canopy was so thick and heavy, there was no chance of spotting Valentine anywhere within all that foliage. She could be standing right at the edge of it and he wouldn’t be able to spot her.

  Had they brought the ADC with them for nothing? Would they be able to navigate the dense saplings and brush growing below?

  At the very least, they could drive the vehicle to the edge of the clearing and launch a trio of the drones. It would allow them to quickly scour the air for signs of a pre-existing civilization. A civilization Caleb already assumed was there somewhere. Why else would the alien AI have wanted so desperately to come here?

  He continued to scan the landscape as the ADC continued to drop. There was no sign of any kinds of animals or other more advanced life, but that wasn’t completely surprising. He could imagine anything that had avoided the heat of the landing thrusters had gotten far, far away from the ship, and if there were anything else out here it would be days before any of it ventured back. They had the entire region to themselves for the short term.

  The vehicle’s wheels finally touched the ground, the carrier settling and the cable gaining slack. Caleb looked up, activating the feed to Washington’s camera to watch the big Marine exit the steering cab of the builder. He climbed out to the end of the crane and took hold of the cable with his gloved hand. He slid down at a controlled pace, reaching the top of the ADC in under a minute.

  “Nice work, Wash,” Caleb said.

  Washington flashed his thumb and nodded. Then Caleb bent down and dislodged the crane’s hook, setting the ADC free. He stood again and checked his HUD. The suit’s compass was functional, picking up the planet’s magnetic fields and giving them some kind of alignment, even if it didn’t exactly match Earth’s.

  “Flores, bring us south toward the edge of the clearing,” Caleb said. “Stop us there.”

  “Roger,” she replied.

  Caleb glanced back at the Deliverance while the ADC got underway, taking a slow pace away from the grounded starship. One part of his mission had ended. A new one had just begun. He couldn’t help but feel responsible for at least part of this outcome. He should have never gone into stasis during the first shift.

  He returned his attention to the alien AI. It remained still and silent.

  “I have questions,” Caleb said to it. “You’re going to answer them.”

  Chapter 23

  The AI shifted to face Caleb. It still didn’t speak, regarding him with a curiosity and arrogance that tested his calm and his patience.

  “I said, I have questions, and you’re going to answer them,” Caleb repeated.

  “I require not your questions,” it replied.

  “But you do require our help. Or so you said. I don’t imagine that help was to get to the surface. You survived space. You probably could have jumped down.”

  “I could.” It hesitated a moment. “I will respond to your queries. Dissension is a waste of time.”

  “I’m glad you agree,” Caleb replied. “First, I need to call you something. Do you have a name?”

  “My given designation is algorithmic in nature. It would be useless to you. You knew this capsule as Yen Sho. You may refer to me as such.”

  “No,” Caleb said. “You aren’t Sho. Do you understand how disgusting what you did to her is in human terms?”

  “No. I care not. It is useful to me.”

  Caleb’s jaw clenched. “Pick something else, or I’ll pick it for you.”

  “I care not. Humans desire to label everything. Algorithmic designation is more efficient. You are not as unique as you believe. Your language is equally inefficient.”

  “We’re inferior, said every advanced alien life form from every sci-fi story ever. We are what we are. We haven’t had thousands of years to evolve as your kind have. Maybe if you had given us a chance, we could have surprised you.”

  “If we had given you a chance? No, Sergeant Caleb Card. I understand you believe my creators sent the trife to your planet. Your beliefs are misplaced.”

  “What?” Caleb said, his heart immediately beginning to race.

  “My creators did not deliver the trife. We did not destroy your planet.”

  “Bullshit,” Caleb snapped. “The trife were engineered to be the perfect weapon against Earth and humans. Your ship was over ten-thousand years old and used to transport human specimens. That’s what Valentine and David told me. Why else would you need people if you weren’t working on the perfect weapon to kill us?”

  “Those are simple conclusions from simple minds based on circumstantial evidence and an inability to piece together the complete fabric of reality,” it replied. “Yes, I arrived on your planet for the last time nearly ten-thousand of your years ago. Yes, my initial directive was to deliver specimens of your species. Yes, I did as I was directed. I am an engineered intelligent life form. I do not possess the capability to exhibit free will, though my assimilation and integration algorithms are capable of simulating enough behavioral dynamicism to confuse the issue at your current intellectual level. But my purposes were not as your scientists or David guessed. I am not a friend to humankind, Sergeant Caleb Card. But I am also not an enemy. My motivations and directives are beyond such things.”

  It took Caleb’s mind a few seconds to convert the AI’s statement to something he could understand. “What was your final mission? Your final directive?”

  The AI surprised him by smiling. “Your reaction is uncommon. My directive was to observe and report.”

  “You knew the trife were coming.”

  “No. We knew something would come. It was only a matter of time.”

  “A matter of time? According to Valentine, it was ten-thousand years.”

  “Yes. That is an eternity to your kind. It is nothing to mine.”

  “So your race is old. How old?”

  “In terms you might find easier to conceptualize, we have had interstellar travel for over one-hundred thousand years.”

  Washington let out a huff of air, trying to whistle.

  “Does your race have a name or is that an algorithm too?”

  “It cannot be translated directly. Your vocal cords are unable to replicate the sound. You can call us the Axon if you must.”

  “Good enough. So you were originally sent to Earth to collect human specimens. I guess that means alien abduction was real after all. For what purpose?”

  “To preserve your species in preparation for the coming.”

  “The coming. You mean the trife?”

  “We call them uluth. They take many forms, whichever is best suited for their target. They are creations of the Relyeh, an ancient race much older than even ours. The Relyeh belong to a handful of races which existed long before the Axon.”

  “The Relyeh,” Caleb repeated. “They’re only one of a group of spacefaring species?”

  “Yes.”

  “What do they want? Why did they attack Earth?”

  “You see it as an attack. They see it as harvesting their due.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “I would not expect you to. Try to imagine the immensity of the universe. Then try to imagine a group of intelligent species that have spread across half of it, creating an interconnected web of control that spans nearly seventy billion light years.”

  Caleb’s heart was already racing. Now his body gained a chill, causing him to shiver despite the heat. “Seventy billion?”

  “Your mind struggles to accept it. You cannot visualize it because you have no understanding of the sheer vastness of the universe. The Relyeh were traversing the stars long before humankind evolved from the faintest specks of organic material which spread to the surface of Earth. Before the uluth arrived, your telescopes and science had barely a moment’s glimpse of the truth. You have tried to fit the few facts you have into a context you can understand and relate to, but that is wholly inaccurate. The Relyeh do not see the universe as endless. They don’t even see it as vast. To them, there is a beginning and an end, and everything within it falls within their domain and the domain of the beings who came before. Humans do not hesitate to deforest Earth and displace or kill thousands of other living beings to claim an area as their own. The Relyeh are no different.”

  Caleb stared at the alien in silence, his mind reeling. He was trying to make sense of what he had heard. As it had recognized, he was struggling to wrap his mind around the sheer massiveness of the ideas. It had always been suspected the trife had been guided to Earth, and now that theory was confirmed.

  “You knew they would come,” he said breathlessly. “You were waiting for them to arrive. Why?”

  “Let us use this vehicle to symbolize Earth, and let your starship stand in for the ships of the Relyeh.” The AI pointed at the Deliverance. ‘Relyeh.” It tapped Sho’s foot on the ADC. “Earth.” It turned the other direction, pointing at the mountains in the distance. “Axon. Do you understand?”

  Caleb nodded. “You’re supposed to be your species’ early warning system.”

  “That is the source of my distress, and the reason I require you.”

  Caleb wasn’t sure he wanted to know, but he asked the question anyway. “Why?”

  “The Axon are missing from this planet. I believe the Relyeh may have already arrived.”

  Chapter 24

  The ADC reached the far end of the clearing, rolling to a stop a few meters away from the edge of the dense jungle beyond. Caleb didn’t notice at all. His attention was still fixed on the Axon AI.

  “What do you mean...missing?” he asked.

  “There are few ways to misrepresent the term, even in your language,” the AI replied. “I sent a transmission when we entered the atmosphere. I have not received a reply. My creators are certain to understand the importance of my mission and the reason I would have returned. They would not ignore my warning. Something happened to them. I suspect the Relyeh, but I am unsure.”

  “What makes you unsure?”

  “If they were here, we would know it.”

  “How?”

  “We would know it.”

  Caleb didn’t ask again. The firmness of the statement convinced him the AI was right. If the race that had sent the trife to Earth had attacked this planet, there would be evidence.

  But if they weren’t responsible, who or what was?

  “You said you took humans from Earth to preserve us. Why?”

  “The Relyeh and their kind have destroyed thousands of life forms across thousands of worlds. We have hoped to cultivate a counter to their continued expansion. For all of our superiority, we are victims of our success. We can not reduce ourselves to express newer or simpler methods of thinking.”

  “You mean you can’t dumb yourselves down?” Flores asked, appearing at the hatch into the ADC. “Sarge, we’re at the edge of the clearing.”

  Caleb glanced up, noticing for the first time. The jungle was directly ahead of them, thick and imposing. At the same time, it was a welcome change from the hollowed-out cities of the trife-ravaged Earth and the sterile, maze-like identical corridors of the Deliverance. It was green and brown and alive.

  “You took humans in hope they would solve the problem for you,” Caleb said. “But ten-thousand years ago, we weren’t very advanced.”

  “In a comparison you would understand, you were infants that had yet even to crawl. You still haven’t found your feet. But infants are blank slates. They can be taught.”

  “Doesn’t teaching from your level negate the whole different way of thinking idea?” Flores asked.

  “In part, yes. Which is why we maintained our presence on Earth.”

  “But you’re saying you have humans on your worlds,” Caleb said.

  “We have rescued nine races in total. Our procedures are to split the specimens into two groups. One which is integrated with the other races in a mixed society. The other is given their own world, where we guide them in their evolution.”

  “So you play God?” Flores asked.

  “We are a race of thinkers. One of many faced with the same dark future. Our goal is your goal. We want to survive, and we will do whatever we must to do so. If that meant enslaving you, then we would enslave you. If that meant destroying your world, then we would destroy your world.”

  “Survival of the fittest, right?” Caleb said. “When it comes to the Relyeh, we’re in this together.”

  “Wouldn’t it be nice if all of the aliens out there were friendly for once?” Flores said. “Why do they always have to be conquering assholes?”

  “You only see it that way when you are at the bottom,” the Axon AI said. “The Relyeh do not regard you highly enough to consider you as an equal to conquer. You are to them like a termite to a human. A pest to be removed.”

  “So are you.”

  “Yes.”

  “Then we should get to it,” Caleb said. “We still need to call you something.”

  “Hal,” Flores said.

  “What?”

  “We should call it Hal. Come on, Alpha. Don’t tell me you never saw A Space Odyssey.”

  “I never saw it.”

  “Do you like Ultron better?”

  “Let’s stick with Hal.” Caleb glanced at the AI. “Okay?”

  “I care not.”

  Caleb turned back toward the Deliverance. It was over a kilometer away, the distance offering a full-length view of the starship. It was less beat up than he expected, though it would never lift off again. The thought sent a chill down his spine. Hal had confirmed this world wasn’t safe. Worse, whatever was here had caused the massively more advanced race to either leave or die. It made the Deliverance look so much smaller.

  It made their desperation loom so much larger.

  And even if they found the enemy here. Even if they overcame it…then what? Hal had also confirmed what everyone on Earth had feared. Leaving the planet wouldn’t be enough. The aliens that sent the trife wouldn’t leave them alone afterward. Maybe for a while, but not forever. They were coming. They would always be coming. Whether it took one hundred years or a thousand, that was the future they could depend on.