Shadow War

Chapter Two

Chapter Two

Jas’ office was bare and functional. She had a desk with an embedded interface and a seat. A couple more chairs stood against the wall in case she ever felt the need to invite anyone to sit, but the seats were rarely used. She wasn’t a commander who was in the habit of having long conversations with her crew.

With a sigh, Jas swept the screen of her interface, and it blinked to life. The damage report from the battle was in. She scanned it, her tired gaze moving down the screen. The Thylacine had sustained severe damage to the launch bay doors, but repair crews were already working on them. The area would be without an atmosphere until the doors were fixed.

She had sent First Officer Trimborn planetside to sweep the population for Shadows. He and his defense units and troops would work through the government and other positions of influence in the local population, employing Shadow scanners to root out the aliens. Control of the planet would be returned to its sentient species, and Trimborn’s team would train key personnel in the Transgalactic Council’s Shadow protocol: rigorous, systematic testing for the Shadows’ presence in every area of their society.

How the locals dealt with the Shadows they discovered was up to them, providing they ensured the hostile aliens would no longer pose any threat to the galaxy. In Jas’ experience, most of the invaded populations chose to put an end to that threat once and for all.

Some armed resistance during the Shadow sweeping process was almost inevitable, but Trimborn had troops, weapons, and armored vehicles. The fighter ships could also operate in an atmosphere if needed. Trimborn was well-practiced at his task, and Jas had every confidence in her first officer, even if he was prone to getting a little over-excited at times.

As she finished reading the damage report, she frowned. The enhanced capabilities of the Shadow ship and its fighter pilots, and its surprise retreat, still bothered her. With a sinking heart, she pulled up the list of pilots. Where there should have been dots, many blanks remained next to the names. She lifted her comm button to her lips.

“Squadron Leader Correia, report on the missing pilots.”

“We’ve finished our search, ma’am. Everyone who’s coming back is aboard ship,” came the man’s reply.

Krat. The list on the display screen looked more than half empty. “We seem to have suffered higher than average losses.”

“Yes, we have, Commander. Thirty-three missing.”

Thirty-three of seventy-eight. “How do you account for those numbers, Squadron Leader?”

The man took a moment to answer. “If I’m honest, Commander, I’d say we were outclassed. If it weren’t for the fact that the second ship jumped, I don’t think we could have lasted much longer.”

“I see.”

“I’ve been a part of this war for nearly three years, ma’am,” Correia went on, “and the Shadow fighter pilots just get better and better. At the same time, our recruits are younger every time we receive a new batch, and they’re worse-trained. When I joined up, I thought the caliber of our pilots was poor and we were scraping the barrel. Now, if it weren’t for the fact that we’ve got a war to win, I would send half of every new intake back to pilot school.” The man’s tone rose. “They simply aren’t ready, ma’am. And we send them out there like...like...”

“I understand, Squadron Leader,” Jas said. “I understand. Please let me know when we’ll hold the memorial service for the lost pilots.”

Correia had recovered his composure. He answered firmly, “Yes, ma’am.”

Jas closed the comm link and returned her attention to the screen. She prepared to write the first mail of thirty-eight. Pressing on a pilot’s name brought up his or her details, including the next-of-kin’s mail address and any last messages or requests from the pilot in the event of their death. She always read each entry carefully and crafted personal mails based on what the pilot had written. She pressed the first name:

If don’t make it, please send this message to my parents:

Dear Mom and Dad, don’t cry too long or too hard over me. Please don’t be mad over what has happened. I did what I had to do, and fighting the Shadows was it. Put on a brave face for those who need you, and celebrate my life.

Jas read the woman’s birth date. She’d been twenty-two when she died. Her eyes sad, Jas began to write.

She always referred to the lost pilot’s status as ‛presumed dead’. If the searchers couldn’t find a signal from their chip, the person was almost certainly going to die if they weren’t already dead. Deep space was so vast, the chances of being accidentally found were just about impossible. Though Jas recalled a case where the pilot’s arm that held her chip had been blown way off into space, and it was only when she managed to comm her ship that anyone knew she was still alive.

Jas had only written two sentences of the first mail when her interface chirruped. The message wasn’t marked urgent, so she ignored it. Whatever it was, it could wait until she’d gotten at least one mail written. Almost immediately, however, there was a second chirrup. This time, she checked to see who was messaging her. It was Admiral Pacheco’s office requesting a vidcall.

She rolled her eyes. Vidcalls across space required excessive power. A simple mail should have sufficed if he wanted to discuss something, and whatever it was could probably have been handled by his office too.

She pressed her acceptance, and Pacheco’s familiar face appeared on her screen. She’d worked with Pacheco in one way or another ever since had volunteered to join the Shadow War and he was first officer aboard the Infineon, where she’d been posted. Jas had been commanding a team of defense units, and Pacheco had earned a quick promotion to commander when the Infineon’s commander had his head blown off by a Shadow.

Jas and Pacheco had both come a long way since then, and the admiral’s dark hair had silvered at his temples. Over the years, Jas had developed a comfortable acquaintance with the short-tempered man.

If only the admiral’s feelings about her had been similarly neutral.

“Commander Harrington, good to see you, as always.”

“Hello, Admiral. Is there something I can do for you?”

The man’s features clouded. “Ever efficient and straight to the point. Would it hurt to just chat for once, Jas? It isn’t like we’re strangers.”

Jas rubbed her brow. “I’m in the middle of something, Pacheco. So, if this is about the meeting, don’t worry, I haven’t forgotten. Now, I really need to—”

“You’re writing to the pilots’ families, aren’t you? I keep telling you—”

“And I keep telling you that I want to do it. Now, please, krat knows how much power this call is using, so...”

“Okay, okay,” the admiral grumbled. “Yes, it was about the meeting. But not only that, you’ll collect your new intake of personnel while you’re here and jump back to your ship with them. You have some newly trained pilots, a team of defense units, a chief engineer, and relief maintenance crew as your current set are at the end of their duty tour, some medics, and—”

“Fine. I’ll make sure to collect them. I’ll see you at the meeting.”

“Wait,” Pacheco said. “There’s one more thing I thought you might be interested to know.”

“What’s that?” Jas asked, wondering what else the man would think up to prolong the call. She lifted her hand, ready to close the connection.

“As your intake were talking among themselves, I overheard something I thought you might find interesting. One of them already knows you, someone said. From way back before the Shadow War began.”

Jas’ hand halted on its downward trajectory to end the call. “Someone who knows me?” Her voice quivered.

Pacheco’s eyes narrowed as he studied her reaction. “Yes, that’s right. That was all I heard, though.”

Someone who knew her. For a brief moment, Jas forgot where she was and who she was talking to. But she didn’t dare to hope.

She returned to the present and saw that Pacheco had been watching her silently during her moment of distraction.

“Okay,” she said, with some effort. “Thanks for letting me know. I’ll see you soon.”

She closed the call without waiting for an answer from Pacheco. Her heart was racing and her blood was rushing through her ears, making her light-headed. Could it really be him? It was hardly possible that he’d survived five years as a pilot in the Shadow War. The attrition rate was too high. Jas hadn’t met a single pilot who had been in the war since the beginning.

Her stomach was so tight, she felt sick. It was strange. She thought she’d given up hope of ever seeing Carl again years ago, when she’d accepted the remoteness of the chances of him still being alive. Yet this small remark passed on by Pacheco had thrown her back into a state of ridiculous, stupid hope. A hope she’d tried hard to give up.