“Echidna, find the largest building in the largest population concentration on the planet.” I spoke while double checking the outer seals on Card’s acceleration couch. Tang and Del Rio already each floated in their own protective layer of gel.

“There are three large cities, two of which have large multi-story buildings. I could do a detailed analysis to determine actual populations, but that might take a little time.”

“We don’t have it. Take me to the one more central to the populated landmass.” I finished checking the seals, locked my feet to the floor and my hands to the couches beside me. “Full military power.”

The view through the synthetic sapphire blurred, clouded momentarily by a haze of splinters and expanding gas; all that remained of the first trees before we gained altitude. After the initial shock of our launch, the view cleared save for a faint glow where atoms from the atmosphere impacted with our shielding and burned away.

“Slow us before we flatten any structures. Quick?”

I stared unseeing at the glowing cloud streaming past us until my First replied. “Yes, sir?”

“Find an uninhabited high biodiversity spot. Send the Middies down in armor. Harvest everything down to bedrock. Send the Juniors and Seniors down to the nearest large body of water to where the Middies are harvesting and bring up as much as they can carry.”

“You got permission from the locals?”

I grimaced, and not at the sudden switch from acceleration to deceleration. “We’re not waiting for permission. I’ll give you more details when I get them, but it looks like the apparent tech level here is the actual tech level.”

“Oh.” I could practically feel Quick’s mind racing. “The ‘Sects are following us.”

“Yeah. I’m aware of that, First.”

We both went silent for a moment, considering what would happen to an undefended planet in the way of a ‘Sect invasion. Every man, woman, and child would be eaten alive from the inside out, as would every other plant and animal on the surface. Once in a while the microscopic decomposers would be dragooned into service until every single erg of the planetary biosphere was ‘Sect biomass.

The view outside the windows slowed to a stop. I accessed the shuttle’s belly cameras; a building a few hundred meters on a side, the top covered with a pattern of painted domes.

“Just get them started. I’m going to determine if there’s anything more here than we’ve seen and give them what warning we can.”

“Yes, sir.”

***

I dropped from the extended bay to the ground twenty meters below. The doors to the big building stood open, and droning voices echoed from inside. I took a step that way, and two men in stiff outfits leapt from the sides of the door. They brandished long poles in my direction and shouted incoherently.

I needed to speak with someone responsible for defense, warn them about the danger they faced. No time like the present. “Take me to whoever’s in charge.”

The two glanced at one another for a second before one spoke. “Who the hell are you?”

“I am Captain Dabig of the Imperial Creche Ship Echidna. Who’s in charge here?”

He shoved his spear in my general direction, punctuating each word with a stab at the air. “I’m asking the questions. Why do you have your Ee-kid-na above the Bridge?”

“Pardon?”

He nodded toward the shuttle, then toward the building behind him. “That thing. Why is it above the Bridge?”

It took me a moment to make the connection. “You… you think that’s Echidna?”

“I’m asking the questions here!” Emboldened, the guard prodded at my chest with his spear.

I had no time for this. Ignoring the guards, I strode to the doors of the temple. The one prodding at me slammed his spear into my side. It bowed, bent, and shattered. His partner leapt at me; I grabbed his spear by the haft before the blow landed.

“Stand down!” He recoiled at my snapped order, and I took that opportunity to push past him. “I do not have time to explain more than once. Now, fall in!”

Inside the building I found a forest of columns holding the deck above my head. In the center of the room a wide triple ring of heavy chairs filled an open area lit by a windowed dome above. A thin crowd of people loitered in amongst the columns, and a line of raggedly dressed petitioners stood angled out to one side. Dozens of guards armed like the pair at the door rushed to place themselves between me and the central ring, but they’d lost a few precious seconds to shock at my sudden appearance.

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I took all that in at a glance, never stopping my march toward the middle of the room. A trio of figures standing next to a lectern under the center of the dome turned from the latest of the line of supplicants to face my approach. The tallest of the group, a plain man with gray and black striped hair, leaned over to hear what one of his partners, a twisted, wrinkled goblin-looking thing, had to say. Just before I reached the outer ring of gaudy seats, the tall guy’s voice rang out over the sound of boots and metal crashing into formation behind me.

“What is the meaning of this interruption!”

I strode forward, pushing at the minds of the soldiers behind me, forcing them to remain in formation. Forcing someone to do something they’d practiced until it became second nature required so little of my attention I could do it in my sleep. A pink light strobed in the corner of my vision, and I twitched my head once to clear it.

Essie, public address mode, full volume until I stop, then twenty percent until I’m done.

Ready.

“I am Captain Dustie Dabig of Her Majesty’s Ship Echidna.” My voice echoed from the far walls, driving the greying speaker back a pace. “Within five days, this planet will be under attack by forces of the Insectoid Swarm. While Echidna does not have the capacity to evacuate your population, she will act as best she can in defense of this world, but given our limited resources it is likely some infestations will occur. You are requested and required by Her Imperial Majesty to ready any and all local defensive forces in order to destroy those infestations by any means necessary to prevent them from maturing into Hives.” I projected certainty and acceptance with every word. By the end, the men and women in the circle of chairs nodded along, and I felt the soldiers gathered behind me responding to the martial call in my voice and mind. The crowd lined up to see the oligarchs stood frozen with fear, at least as much directed at the response from the elders as at my echoing speech.

The young man in the center, however, shook himself free and whispered in the ear of the tall, graying leader, who jerked as if waking from a trance. “Now, see here, young lady. I’m not sure how you pulled off this prank, but we,” he spread his arms, gesturing to the group seated around him, “are not without humor or mercy.” His lips curved in a consummately professional and utterly fake smile. “Go with the nice soldiers and they will see that you’re not harmed while we investigate this matter.”

“You’re in charge of this world, then?” My voice no longer echoed, but it still filled the room far more thoroughly than the old politician’s.

“Don’t be silly, young woman. You know who I am.” He actually had the nerve to sniff derisively. Buoyed by strobing pink and blue lights, my temper flared.

“I am Captain Dustie Dabig, and you will address me as Captain Dabig, Captain, or just Sir if those are both too long for you to remember. I ask you again. Are you in charge of this world?” This time I focused solely on the man I faced, pushing him to obey. Sweat broke out on his forehead.

“Since you continue with this farce, I will remind you that I am the Captain Irving Johnson of Ship One Two Nine, twentieth of that name and twelfth of my line to hold the title of Captain. I advise you to think very carefully on the ramifications of anyone barging into the Officers Meeting and claiming the title of Captain. When you’ve thought it through, you can tell us who put you up to this.” With that he turned back to the petitioners my arrival interrupted.

I paid no attention to the last half of what he said. “Echidna, records check on interstellar ship registries…” I subvocalized.

Echidna finished my sentence. “Looking for anything with a One Two Nine designation. Way ahead of you, Captain. I’ve got nothing from Unity shipping registries, although I suppose one of the richer worlds might have put together an unregistered ship. Of course, they’d probably name it something a little more…”

“Focus, Kid.”

“Multitasking, Captain. I have one possibility. A Post-Cataclysm, Pre-Unity business unit called Smythe, Adbal-Alim, and bin-Jon purchased a series of ships for use as cargo haulers. None of them were named, most of them wound up scrapped, lost, or crashed, and they had at least two hundred over the course of the company’s history.”

Again, I almost lost the last half of what someone said to me. At the mention of Smythe, Adbal-Alim, and bin-Jon, a wave of memory washed over me, more emotion than vision or sound. A smarmy guy in fancy dress; burning penetration as the cannon round punched through by body to lodge in the tarmac; flinging the fancy guy over the edge of a building while he screamed for mercy; and above, around, and permeating everything else the fiery rage of thousands of burning suns.

“I do not have time for this clutter!”

My shout took everyone by surprise. I reached out with my implants and brought the shuttle above the dome. As I did, I interrupted whatever Irving had opened his mouth to say. “You don’t have time for this either. You lost-in-space clutterheads have been sitting on your hands for the better part of three thousand years. That’s probably just as well, since you would have wandered into ‘Sect space before you got back to the Unity, but now you’re out of time. In less than a week, you’re going to have ‘Sects falling from the sky.”

Irving opened his mouth to interrupt. I cranked up the volume and drowned him out.

“If and when they do, you’ll need to quarantine and burn at least a one-mile radius around the landing area. Do not attempt to fight them; you’ll only be giving them more food. Most of them can’t survive long outside their mother ship without a constant supply of organics to consume, so burning that one-mile radius will generally starve smaller ones before they can get out. Do not take time to evacuate; just light the fires. If someone can get out, let them, but you’ve got, at best, ten minutes to get those fires lit.”

Irving timed his next shout to my pause, and this time I let him finish. I’d said what needed to be said, anyhow.

“Now see here, young lady! How dare you interrupt a session of Officers’ Meeting and suggest that we burn our people alive, just for some… what is it, a meteorite?”

His words broke the fugue of the soldiers behind me, who advanced on me in a solid mass. I’d had enough, and I needed to get back aboard Echidna, where I might actually do some good. I raised one fist above my head and focused my shields around it.

“An Insectoid. If one catches one of your people and begins impregnation, burning to death will be a mercy.” With that, I lit off my gravitics and left the sticky, stinky planet behind.