That action would cost him, Maddox knew. It might even cost him his command. Worse, letting Becker take the three women hurt. Maddox was going to have to do something about that…later. Maybe chase Becker down himself and free the women. But he’d given Becker his word. The man had saved not only Star Watch but also the Commonwealth and maybe all of humanity. Wasn’t that worth three crewmembers?

  Maddox didn’t want to make those calculations. Sometimes, though, there were hard choices. Sometimes a man didn’t want to make those choices or keep his word. Maddox was made of sterner stuff. Even so, he asked God to forgive him for what he’d done. Then, Victory entered the hyper-spatial tube, jumping back to Earth.

  -68-

  Earlier, the Spacer saucer ship fled through the Laumer Point back to the Barnard’s Star System. From there, it used the hyper-spatial tube back to the Paran System.

  Following the map Mu had of the various hidden Builder nexuses that could form one-way hyper-spatial tubes they reached the Vincent System only to discover a destroyed First Assault Fleet.

  The saucer ship hadn’t traveled as fast as the Star Watch vessels due to some delays and then feeding by the alien thing in Venna.

  It quickly became apparent to Mu and Venna, with Dax’s help, that Star Watch must have used a hyper-spatial tube to sneak up on the maulers and destroy them.

  “I don’t understand this,” Venna said. “How could Star Watch possibly have learned the location of this hidden system?” She turned to Dax. “Didn’t the Grand Strategists do everything they could to hide these locations from the enemy?”

  “Yes, Great One. This is inexplicable.” Dax was privately reciting mathematical equations like crazy. He knew exactly how the enemy had learned, by one named Becker tricking him.

  Mu looked sharply at Dax.

  For once, Venna must not have been paying attention, as she didn’t catch it. “This is unfathomable,” Venna complained, “a freak of luck. Let us go to the next assembly point.”

  They reached the star system with the red supergiant and found destroyed remains of maulers. They went to the third system and found wreckage there as well.

  “Star Watch must have cracked the code,” Venna said. “Yet, how could they have broken it? This strikes me as strange. Why did Star Watch wait so late in the day to attack these assembly points if they knew about them all along?”

  Dax shook his head as if perplexed.

  Venna peered at him accusingly. “Mu, tell me. Is Dax the culprit?”

  “I do not see how he could be, Great One,” Mu said.

  “That is not a precise answer,” Venna said. “Is Dax the one responsible for this disaster?”

  “No,” Mu said.

  “Why are you lying,” Venna said, “I will feed on you for lying.”

  Mu dropped to her knees even as terror struck Dax. “I am not lying, Great One,” Mu said in a high-pitched voice. “I would never lie to you.”

  Venna stared at Mu for some time, finally nodding sharply. In the most grotesque hag-form that she’d shown so far, Venna turned and shuffled from the chamber. Was she going to feed on someone else to regain strength? It seemed likely.

  “Do you realize that she is destroying your crew?” Dax said after Venna had departed. “Soon, there won’t be anyone left to fly the saucer ship.”

  Mu climbed to her feet and stared at him, even as perspiration dotted her brow. Had she been trembling? “How did you give away the assembly points to Star Watch, and why would you give them away?”

  “I never gave them away,” Dax said with a straight face.

  “My reader says otherwise,” Mu said, as she tapped the tiny screen on her left wrist.

  “I don’t see how that’s possible.” Dax was working overtime on the equations. Mu should not have been able to read anything.

  “Easy,” Mu said. “You’re working too hard to keep something secret from me. Don’t you know that I know that the more you work on those equations, the more you’re seeking to hide something? What are you hiding?”

  “Nothing,” Dax said, “at least nothing of that nature. Besides, how could I possibly have told anybody of Star Watch where the assembly points were?”

  “I sensed something earlier near the Solar System’s Asteroid Belt,” Mu said, staring at him. Perhaps she even used a modification on him.

  Dax strove on the hardest of equations from his earliest days in the Conservatory. He worked through them, and he thought about anything he could. Then his mind touched on the great secret.

  “What secret is this?” Mu said.

  Dax gulped and knew he had to say something. What could he say that wouldn’t anger Mu? Then it struck him. “This is the secret: we must kill Venna if we’re to survive. If nothing else, once the last crewmember is devoured, we will be next.”

  “Nonsense,” Mu said. “We can’t kill Venna.”

  “We’d better think of a way fast then. You heard her. She threatened to consume you. She’ll consume you and me long before we reach the planet Ector. It’s far in the Scutum-Centaurus Spiral Arm. That means months of travel for us. Are you listening to what I’m saying?”

  Mu looked up. ‘Don’t you dare lecture me, you cyber spy. You’re not even fully human.”

  “I’m not human in the slightest,” Dax said, “though I am humanoid.”

  “Whatever,” Mu said, although she dropped the subject. Maybe she was too shaken to think about it anymore. Shortly afterward, she left the chamber to investigate something else further.

  Using hidden one-way nexuses, the saucer ship soon reached the other two assembly points. This time they didn’t find any wreckage. They didn’t find anything. There were no maulers or any indication maulers had been here.

  “This is unfathomable,” Venna said in a rage. They were on the saucer-ship bridge. “Where did the maulers go? Senior Dax, you must know.”

  “I have an idea,” Dax admitted.

  “Then spit it out, you piece of filth,” Venna shouted. “Where did they go?”

  “I suspect they went home.”

  “What?” said Venna. “Did the mauler commanders disobey Great Leviathan and desert their posts?”

  Dax shook his head. “Anything but,” he said. “Likely, they discovered that the other assault fleets were destroyed. I’m sure they had instructions that at a certain point, they were to retreat back to the home spiral arm rather than remain here to be annihilated.”

  “Retreat?” said Venna. “I need those maulers. I need them in order to achieve my wonderful plan.”

  Dax hesitated. The hag was angry and ready to punish someone. This seemed like a bad time to broach hard topics. And yet, he was running out of time. That struck him as obvious. Thus, he forced himself to speak. “Great One, if we chase the maulers, follow them, we might be able to catch up so you can implement your plan.”

  “That’s madness. The maulers can surely travel much faster than this saucer ship. This is so enraging.” Venna’s weird eyes smoldered as she glared at Dax. Abruptly, she turned to Mu. “I gave you orders to watch this little traitor, and now somehow he has thwarted me. I will consume you because of it. I will enjoy feasting on your etheric forces. You are the plumpest raisin of all, little adept. Did you know that, dearie?”

  “Oh Great One,” Mu said, once more dropping onto her knees, imploring with clenched hands to the horrible hag with burning eyes. How much of the original Venna still lived? It was hard to tell. Maybe little to nothing, but if there was nothing, was that why the thing feasted endlessly on the crew?

  “No, it isn’t quite time,” Venna muttered. “You are still of some use to me.” Venna turned to Dax. “I should devour you, you little prick. I… I… No. We will chase the maulers as you suggest. Perhaps we can catch up if we strive hard enough. And if we find them… Yes, you live for now because I still need you. But after that—”

  Venna whirled around, perhaps pretending to herself that she hadn’t just given him a death threat.

  Venna left the bridge.

  Dax and Mu traded glances.

  Do you see what I mean? Dax thought.

  Mu climbed to her feet, her features waxen and pale. She glanced at the wrist reader and nodded.

  “How would we do this?” Mu whispered.

  That was when Dax believed he might be able to escape these witches after all.

  -69-

  For three days, the saucer ship gave chase until Dax realized using the hyper-spatial tubes caused Venna’s quick diminishment, or whatever the thing in her was that consumed the crew. Soon, there wouldn’t be enough Spacers left to make the saucer ship work. That would be the end of their chances.

  Thus, when they came out of the next hyper-spatial tube, and one of the sensor officers detected a mass signature exhaust of maulers, Dax said, “We’re close. The exhaust trail shows at least fifty maulers were here just a short time ago.”

  “Aha!” Venna cried.

  “We should jump immediately to ensure we reach them,” Dax said.

  “Immediately?” asked Venna. “I need a rest—after I feed.”

  “I don’t recommend waiting,” Dax said. “Every time we pause, the maulers pull away more.”

  “How can that be?” said Venna. “The cybers of Leviathan have the slowest jump lag recovery of all. We should be catching up. We are clearly catching up. What are you trying to pull, you little schemer?”

  “The cybers surely consider this an emergency situation,” Dax said, working hard to keep calm. “They will have taken injections to speed up the lag recovery process. They are going fast in order to tell Great Leviathan a disaster has struck. The invasion of the Commonwealth—”

  “Very well,” Venna said, interrupting, “but I must retire for the moment and strengthen myself.” The hunched creature shuffled off the bridge.

  When the hatch shut, Dax sidled up to Mu, staring at her.

  “I don’t know about this,” Mu whispered. “If we fail, we’re dead.”

  “If we succeed, we have a chance,” Dax whispered. “If we hesitate, the game is over.”

  “What chance?” said Mu. “I’m pariah to the Spacers of Third Fleet. I’m an outcast to my people.”

  “Then come with me to Leviathan.”

  Mu looked at him. “You dare to go home after such a disaster?”

  “I need to report to my strategist…” Dax paused, rubbing his chin.

  “What now?” said Mu.

  Dax had a second thought. Enigmach was an up-and-coming Grand Strategist. It had been his idea to use the Phantasma Synth Crystals. Those crystals had caused the disaster. What if he reported to one of the other Grand Strategists? Perhaps he wouldn’t receive an automatic death sentence for failure then but a reward for warning Great Leviathan about this.

  “Why are you grinning like a fool?” Mu demanded.

  The question astonished Dax. He realized that he’d finally learned to fully shield his thoughts from Mu. The Spacer had indulged herself in the beginning, delighting too much in mocking him. Thus, he’d learned from his failures and successes, which helped him master the correct method of mind shielding.

  “What are you thinking?” Mu said.

  “That we must act now, or the instant we come out of the next hyper-spatial tube. If we don’t, you and I are doomed. We will die.”

  “Everyone dies,” Mu said.

  “Do you want to die tomorrow?” Dax asked. “Do you want to die because all your etheric forces are sucked out of you? Do you want to let an alien monster destroy you and your saucer ship? Destroy the Spacer Third Fleet’s chances of eliminating the menace of Star Watch. With the Commonwealth shattered, you Spacers could reclaim Human Space and continue searching for the Builders.”

  “You have a point,” Mu said. “I must risk everything, but the thought of failing chills me to the bone.”

  “Then allow me to do this,” Dax said.

  Mu studied him. “You shield your thoughts too well and often for me to trust you.”

  Dax shrugged. “It’s up to you. You hold the cards. I merely give you possibility. Let me do it, and we will succeed. You can go your way afterward. I can go mine, or you can join me.”

  “What about the phase ship?” Mu said. “What if I decide to keep it?”

  “You have the power, and you have the right because you have the power,” Dax said. “The Python, the Kraken-class spaceship I used to reach the Orion Arm will have probably joined the maulers returning home. Frankly, I’m sick of this spiral arm. I’m sick of dealing with all these differences. I just want to go home. I really want to be free of the witch. What say you, Mu?”

  Dax almost threatened her as well, but he thought that would be a step too far.

  “Yes!” Mu hissed. “I’ll do it. I’ll do it, but we must not fail. I forbid you to fail.”

  “Then give me the means to do this.”

  “Very well,” Mu said. “Come with me.”

  -70-

  The method of assassination was simplicity itself. A blaster to the guts might have been best. But Mu refused to give Dax a blaster. Instead, they waited together.

  The saucer ship went through the next hyper-spatial tube. Afterward, Dax and Mu waited outside Venna’s private quarters.

  Mu dared use her Builder modifications to sense movement in there, not to seek any telepathic communication.

  Did the vile thing inside Venna understand what was about to happen? Was that why she wasn’t showing? Or did she sleep overlong? Even better, could she have died because of this jump? That would be awesome. That would be—

  The hatch opened and Venna shuffled out. She looked haggard, horrible, worse than at any other time. Her head was down. Maybe she didn’t even know they were there.

  Dax touched the cyborg trooper on the shoulder. The trooper was alert and waiting for the signal.

  Things seemed to slow down for Dax. Venna raised her cowled head. A second later, her eyes widened. By that time, the cyborg trooper was already crossing the distance between him and her. The cyborg moved with insectile speed. Servos buzzed. Sheathed muscles contracted and hands like titanium knives thrust for the hag.

  Venna wasn’t nearly as fast as the cyborg combination of mechanical and biological. However, she raised a hand, and the construct slowed imperceptibly. Even so, the cyborg trooper reached for the hag. His hands smashed into her rough, bark-like skin. The fingers curled and ripped out a bloody, horrible, black chunk of her flesh. Venna screeched and raised her hand higher. The next hand of the cyborg trooper slammed home like a piston, repeating the process, tearing out another piece of her flesh. It was hideous. It was awful. It was, perhaps, Dax and Mu’s only chance for survival.

  Venna clutched the thing, even as her hands began to glow. Now the cyborg trooper moved its arms like a boxing champion, thrusting, yanking out, thrusting and yanking out at mechanical speed. The cyborg tore the center out of Venna until one could see her lungs and beating heart. Venna screeched worse. She aimed a hand at Mu.

  Mu twisted and cried out, “No, Venna, not me, not me. This was Dax’s idea. He’s the one.”

  Venna fixed her gaze on Dax.

  He ran at her. There was a knife in his hand. Where he had gotten the knife didn’t matter. Venna’s eyes widened even more. Now the cyborg reached up and clutched the grotesque beating heart. He squeezed with considerable force, but barely made a dent in the heart, though he left bloody marks.

  Dax thrust the knife even as he felt a terrible grinding force clutch his heart and mind. He continued thrusting nevertheless. The tip of the knife pierced one of Venna’s wooden-tough eyes. The knife slid in deeper and struck her brain. Venna shrieked. With a titanic burst of strength and maybe etheric force, Venna hurled herself back from Dax and the cyborg trooper.

  Mu employed her Builder modifications, attacking invisibly but powerfully.

  Venna fell and thrashed on the deck.

  This was the grimmest scene Dax had ever witnessed. It did remind him that once as a lad, he’d had to kill a cat-like creature amongst the hay bales of what was akin to horses. The cat had been pissing on the hay, making it inedible. Dax remembered that cat, a vicious creature. It raced away as he entered the barn, then turned and looked at him. Dax had lifted a shotgun-like weapon, firing and wounding the cat. It had spun and spun, meowing horribly. Then Dax had shot again, ending it.

  That was what it felt like in the corridor. But could they end it?

  The cyborg trooper leaped as invisible forces slammed against him. The forces tore pieces from his mechanical bio-form.

  Venna stood one last time, with the knife embedded in her eye and brain. She glanced at them with the good eye and pointed a bloody finger at Mu, and then at Dax. Then Venna collapsed onto the deck with a thud, and died as she seemed to deflate.

  Dax braced himself, wondering if the alien entity in her could leap from her to him.

  There seemed to be a thing like waves of heat. It left Venna’s corpse and began to crawl for him.

  “No,” Dax shouted, backing away.

  Mu drew a small Spacer laser pistol and fired. The heat waves halted where the beam touched. Then it tried to surge forward. Mu continued firing until the pistol’s energy depleted.

  Dax had watched, frozen in horror. He now expected the thing to finish what it had started, and leap onto and into him.

  But there was nothing. The alien entity must have used up the last of its ancient vitality. It had once been in the Phantasma Synth Crystals, a shard and then in Venna. Now, it had finally died.

  They were free from the thing from Ector. They were free from the savagery of Venna. It was time to see if they could unite and keep their agreements with each other.

  -71-

  Victory reached Earth, as did all the surviving battleships of the expeditionary force. The starship headed for the repair yards at the LaGrange Point Five. A large number of battleships headed there as well. They would be stationed there for some time.

  Despite the grand success, Maddox was troubled, and the reason was simple. He’d lied to the Lord High Admiral about sending Becker back to the Antarctica Prison Complex. That lie would come due soon, and when it did, there would be hell to pay.