Conquest Rising

By Eli Celata

A fight behind enemy lines turns friends to foes.

The USS Intrepid set out to explore neighboring star systems, but the moment it passes into interstellar space, an enemy awaited, and a massacre ensued. Cut off from Earth, the few survivors can only hope their warning reached the planet in time.

One by one, the scientists and soldiers find themselves subjects to the alien's experiments. None expect to live - especially Kat. Behind enemy lines with no hope of aid, they have few choices, but when the emperor shows his hand, revealing his intent to keep one alive as a trophy of his conquest, their last move may be to determine who survives amongst themselves.

The revelation that the emperor's trophy is key to his species' revival cements Kat's determination to ensure the one who lives will mean the empire's doom. Kat aims to clear the ranks - whether by riling their captors or cutting down her own - she’ll set herself on fire if it means the empire burns.

CONQUEST RISING is a dark military science fiction horror with a diverse cast, a ruthless villain, and henchmen that would make Dr. Moreau's Island look tame.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Hidden Helm Press
• Release date: Mar 15, 2024
• ISBN: 9798224121076

Book preview

Conquest Rising

Eli Celata

CONQUEST RISING by Eli Celata

This is a work of fiction. Names, places, characters, and events are fictitious in every regard. Any similarities to actual events and persons, living or dead, are purely coincidental. Any trademarks, service marks, product names, or named features are only for reference. There is no implied endorsement if any of these terms are used.

CONQUEST RISING

Copyright © 2024

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without prior permission in writing from the publisher.

Table of Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter One

The proud USS Intrepid moves closer to the edge of space as we have known it. Jacobi narrated under his breath. He studied his monitor, searching for any sign of danger as the ship slipped beyond Earth’s solar system.

At the station beside him, Kat laughed. You’re such a geek.

God, if I was anything else…what a miserable life that would be, he retorted with a smirk. The monitors’ light illuminated his mocha skin and the black of his coiled hair. Just think! In a few seconds, we’ll be further than anybody’s ever been. In a few days, we’ll have reached Alpha Centauri. How’d we manage to sneak aboard a ship like this?

From behind them, Thomas snorted. You two suffered through the Academy just like the rest of us.

Suffered? Kat scoffed. We’re going to be the first humans to reach another solar system. The first to walk on a planet under a star other than our sun. Her lips curled into a smile. Jacobi’s right. This is brilliant.

Thomas slid his chair to sit between the other two. Just because we haven’t run into trouble yet doesn’t mean we’re getting there safely. Plenty could go wrong. He plucked a pin from Kat’s bun. Swatting his hand away, her long fingers went to work, putting the bit of plastic back into place. Her tawny eyes glowered playfully.

Shoving Thomas back, Jacobi returned to his screen. There’s nothing there, carrot top.

Drifting back to his own station, Thomas hummed softly. The strange little tune bounced around their area. Fluctuations and star charts covered their screens. Their eyes sought the familiar blips forewarning black holes. Anything else could be easily overcome.

While everyone focused on their work, Jacobi shifted in the silence. His eyes moved like magnets drawn to Kat’s face. He watched the freckles across her nose dance as she crinkled it in concentration. Her olive skin seemed paler than Thomas’s brutal white beneath the artificial light, but her smile stole his breath away. A flush spread across Jacobi’s face when Kat’s eyes jumped to him.

Shit, Jack! Her hand stretched, pointing to something on his monitor, but anything else she might have said fell away as the ship shook beneath a foreign onslaught.

Alarms blared overhead. Alien weaponry shredded shields meant for asteroids. Though the pilots attempted to maneuver and run, the engines tore from the haul. Through the tears, bodies flew, spat into the vacuum. Grabbing Jacobi’s arm, Kat tugged him from his seat. She ran down the corridor, leaping over the mess of consoles. Jacobi followed close behind. Another shot threw them forward, but Kat didn’t pause. Pulling on her outer suit, she sealed the helm and threw another to Jacobi. Her hand curled around a hold point, and when the ship shook, only her firm grip on his arm kept Jacobi from flying backward.

Thomas wasn’t so lucky. As Jacobi slammed on his helmet, sealing and equalizing the pressure too quickly, their floor was torn asunder. Thomas’s body snapped back. If he screamed or struggled, no one could hear, but Kat’s eyes widened, and she pulled Jacobi tight to her as he lurched against the artificial gravity failed.

Blood rushed his head. Both eardrums popped, bursting from the contrasting pressure. Kat grabbed his helm. Her lips moved, but any sound drowned in the aching pulse within his ears. She clung to him. The pressure of her hands held him as an anchor against the vacuum of space. Deaf — temporary or not — he could endure. Floating through space, that was the pressing matter. The propulsion systems permitted them to travel in the open ship as others drifted into space.

Life vessels lined the exterior of the ship, and the nearest one was only a few yards away. They flew and crawled forward despite the bodies lifelessly floating around them. The door was sealed and meant for bio-access. With the exposure, the locks could be overridden, but the sky was visible, and that damn enemy ship flew around them without halting, sending more and more lasers to tear through the metal. From his memory, the whoosh of the doors echoed as Kat unlocked a pair. His eyes met hers. A breath passed, and they closed them. No one else was coming. The evacuation vessel’s artificial gravity set them back on the floor as they slid into the pilots’ chairs.

The ship disconnected from the main ship, floating slowly into space. Searching through the computer, Jacobi could not find a reason for the slowness until he glanced up at Kat who held a gloved hand to her helmet miming silence and pointing upwards. The attacking spacecraft was like something from a twentieth-century science fiction television show. Black metal in crude edges with what looked to be fins like a fish covered the body. Cannons swiveled seeking targets, but Kat flew them like debris. She kept the craft’s energy output low. Other pods sped out. Lasers slammed into them, scattering their ashes into the growing cloud of the Intrepid’s wreckage.

Flickering electronics, Jacobi kept the signals blurred, mimicking malfunctioning junk. His own scream blared on repeat in his deafened ears. If they survived, he could deal with whatever damage deafened him. For now, Jacobi stared ahead, glancing between the ship above and the debris. His heart raced at the sight of other escape pods, but one by one, the alien vessel blew them out of existence. Hope withered, and then the cannons turned on them.

They lept, flinging themselves to the back of the pod as a laser tore through their hull. They stilled as the world around them shifted. Gravity failed. Head over heels, they both spun, clinging to each other as spheres descended from the ship above. Jacobi swallowed, holding faster to Kat. The metal balls flew through the wreckage toward them. Expanding like a balloon, the metal opened and swallowed them. In the darkness, Kat raged beside him. She pounded against the thin shell, but it held firm.

When the metal cleared away, chains and gravity weighed Jacobi down. Kat stood over him. Vicious and beautiful. He couldn’t see her face. Couldn’t see the beautiful curves of her lips, but his body ached as they took her away. Two aliens in black suits dragged her away. She kicked, slamming her head into theirs.

Another suited alien sauntered toward Jacobi. It was humanoid in shape. Two legs and two arms with an oval shaped head. Blue and white swirled across the black suit. They looked more like a motorcycle gang than an alien armada. Not the rough and rumble sort but the pretentious sons of millionaires playing at being from the wrong side of the tracks. Drumming its fingers against its leg, the alien stepped closer. A section of its suit detached. Two prongs extended toward Jacobi like a taser, and as the alien took aim, Jacobi could only guess it was a weapon. Nothing happened. The alien shook its hand, inching closer. Kat flailed even more.

I can’t hear anything. Though Jacobi attempted to keep his volume normal, his voice thrummed in his skin. My ears blew, I can’t —, it was a gun.

The laser blasted through his suit. Copper coated his tongue as air flooded him. A mix of gasses swirled around his nose. Something poison turned his cells against each other. Held hostage by suited aliens or behind bars, the remaining crew of the Intrepid watched as he fell. Twenty-four — he counted idly as the world grew dark. There were only twenty-four survivors, and he could not imagine they would be alive for long. Like magnets, his eyes looked to Kat.

I love —

Chapter Two

Over the coms, pleas and panic echoed, but Kat only wanted to see his face. Instead, his body sunk into the floor. A scream ached in her chest. She fell back against her captures, letting them hold her up when her faith would have sent her to her knees. Their four-fingered hands encircled her bicep, and all the synthetics in the world could not guard against that cold. Beneath her helm, tears gathered along her lower lashes. A chill settled in her bones. A world without Jacobi. Impossible. Yet suddenly real.

The lanky aliens dragged her body to the next narrow cell. They threw her inside, leaving her as they chirped and clicked — chatting to each other. Translucent panels formed walls.. In full suits, Kat could not identify who surrounded her. On her left, one of the crew of the Intrepid sat against the far wall. They curled their hands around their legs. Drawing their knees to their chests, the unknown member shrunk in on themselves. Closing her eyes, Kat stretched her arms, pressing her hands against the panes.

Creaking, the walls leaked as if crying. Cold spread through her fingertips, and she tore her hands away. Squares of clear crystal encased her gloves. Though protected from the extremes of space, the chemical drew heat away unnaturally fast. Liquid dripped from the walls. It pooled, bubbling up to splash against the ceiling of Kat’s cell. Sitting up, she watched it fly. The screams echoed in her ears. Close together, she could hear their pain. Any injuries resulted in death. Unable to bear the quiet, Kat let the screams fill the void where her voice would not sound. Her eyes remained glued to the gravity-defying liquid.

Helium, a voice crackled through the com above the screams and panicked cries. The walls appear to divide the ship, exposing pooled tubes to the extreme cooling by the vacuum of space.

Good to know some lab monkeys survived, another voice joked, more familiar than the first.

Kat leapt to her feet. Rachel?

Kat’s eyes scanned each cell for anyone calm enough to have spoken. Three cells away, a thin suited human waved. Came in with Chelsea and Bill.

Here! Chelsea called.

Her hand rose from where she lay on the floor as Kat had. Stretching to fill the space with her five foot two frame, Chelsea drummed her fingers along the perimeters but avoided the walls.

One of the three aliens handling them turned. A twirl of clicks twilled through the room. Growling, Kat pressed against the front of her prison. She switched her personal com to project out. Her hands curled around the cold cylinders of metal caging her. Slamming her foot, Kat shrieked. The aliens did not move. As her hand covered in crystals shifted, the metal crushed them into fine particles. It was stupid. Begging for disaster to demand their captors’ attention, but Kat leaned forward, clicking her tongue in mimicry. All three of the long-limbed extraterrestrials paused. One, with a blue star on his back, slid a foot back. Without any obvious eyes, she could not tell if the movement was more to redirect visual tissue or audio. Repeating the noise, she pressed her helm against the bars.

Chelsea sat up. The screaming died away as the aliens threw the last crewmember in a separate hold. Blue-Star clicked. Kat replied in kind. From the ceiling, silver orbs descended. They spun, rotating in the hall between the cells. Blue-Star trudged to stand before her. One of the silver orbs followed, bouncing above their heads. The alien clicked twice and chortled. Inhaling slowly, Kat repeated the sounds. The surface of the orb rippled, and Blue-Star gestured with two of his four wriggling digits back at the others. They came closer. All attention rested on Kat.

Body count! Rachel exclaimed on closed com.

Private Brandon Baylor present and accounted! came the first.

Standing, the human in the cell beside Kat proclaimed, Dr. Margaret Cho!

Science Officer Qamar Karim present.

Private Chelsea Walker here!

Sergeant William Jacobs present, the person on Kat’s other side announced.

The number rose to twenty-four all included. Three doctors, two mechanics, and the rest a mix of science officers and military members from the latest academy class called in total. Not a single high ranking officer. Nineteen students trained to be astronauts and anthropologists, not prisoners of war.

Slamming her fist against the side of her cell, Kat spat, Fuck you! at Blue-Star before clicking against her incisors then her premolars as if she could translate her hatred into a language she’d only just realized existed.

When she swore, the orbs paused. They hung like ornaments in the air. As she clicked, the ripples repeated, releasing a buzz. Gurgles erupt from their three captures. Rolling its round head, Blue-Star backed away, flicking its fingers at Kat while turning. It left the room, followed by the two. Locked up and without anywhere to direct her rage, Kat muted her com, screaming as she fell to her knees. Nodes and thin lines of illuminants painted the brig in dull green light.

So… Chelsea hummed. Aliens exist.

Odds were good, Dr. Cho pointed out.

On the far end of the room, Level II Mechanic Cameron McNamara toyed with the liquid helium. Safety protocol should’ve automatically sent initial findings to Earth. We didn’t get a chance to measure their ship’s speed, but it should give them a few hours to prepare.

Prepare what? Rachel asked, crouching and fiddling with her cell’s bars.

The military? All the militaries, Cameron retorted.

Releasing a harsh laugh, Private Ngawang Pema reclined on the floor. They tore a hole in our hull in a single shot. Nothing back home could stop them.

Not necessarily true. Private Amondi Njeri sat on her feet, resting her hands on her thighs.

Ngawang rolled to her side to face her. Proof?

The Russian Academy of Sciences has been working on a nanite shield as a nuclear defense system for the last two decades: Project Svalinn, Amondi replied. The United Nations will convene. Representative Alexander will reveal we’ve been aware of the project. Representative Yakovlev will fold. Nanite shield goes up. All a matter of timing.

Project Svalinn? That’s Norse mythology, Private Aisling Thompson pointed out.

And people never use other people’s mythology for code names, Rachel mocked as she sat back.

Kat steadied her breath and unmuted her com. Whatever happens on Earth, we can’t do shit. We need to sort out our priorities.

Dr. Cho nodded. Standing, she leaned against the bars of her cell. Primary objective: minimize all and any intel provided to the enemy which could endanger humanity’s ability to defend itself. Second, acquire all information possible.

Recon? Yeah, that’s a priority when we’re locked up and never going home, Science Officer Level I Lupita Henderson snorted. Down on all fours, she traced the edges of her cell. Priority One: Escape.

A collective groan sounded through the ranks. Kat pressed her back against the bars, sliding down to stare at the wall. Lupita was young. Age seemed so insignificant when she thought about it. Thought about how twenty-two of the twenty-four were between the ages of twenty and twenty-two. At twenty, Lupita was not that much younger than the majority, but she’d been the baby growing up, and when her overly intelligent self arrived at the academy a whole year younger than anybody else, she’d been the baby there too. Kat doubted Lupita realized how young she sounded. Escape made no sense. There was nowhere to go. A ship crawling with enemies surrounded them, and they had no idea where anything was. They needed more information before proceeding, but Lupita was as headstrong as she was smart.

This tech wasn’t made for humans, Cameron offered.

Lupita scoffed. Doesn’t mean we can’t outthink them.

There’s probably a failsafe, Dr. Cho pointed out.

Running a finger along a nearly invisible seam, the twenty-year-old did not respond. However, Ngawang did. If the kid wants to show us all the failsafe, I’m all for it. Somebody always ends up dying revealing the traps. Might as well be little Lupita.

She’s not wrong, Rachel agreed.

A moral label – as if that mattered. Kat shook her head, but her eyes never left Lupita. Though she agreed in discouraging the kid’s recklessness and had done so as Lupita’s squad leader, a part of Kat wanted her to pull up parts of the hull. Maybe the fail safe would send them all spiraling into space. Cold might linger but not enough to kill. Water systems might even recycle enough to keep them alive for weeks. Everything depended on current dehydration levels. Sleep or suicide would be their primary killer. Most would not sleep while floating through space unless pushed to the breaking. Hallucinations would set in. Falling, floating, flying through the vacuum would break them, but Kat was willing. Let them all freeze. Let them all fall into a black hole’s event horizon.

Private Henderson! You will desist! Mechanic III Theresa Jane ordered. Her voice vibrated over the lines. A trill of desperation curled around her words.

Don’t care, Lupita grumbled. I’m getting out.

Theresa sighed, kneeling to press against the same panels. You’re twenty. Here or on Earth, you’ve got time. If anyone’s getting spaced, let it be me. I’m fifty-one. My life’s been good.

Dr. Cho rushed to the front of her cell. Don’t you dare, Theresa. She reached out, her forearm stretching between the bars. Private Henderson! Stand down, damn it! the doctor commanded, but the science officer struggled on with the edge of the panel.

Lupita struggled with the panel, bending it back. Theresa popped out the sheet of metal with an ease born of practice. Though the aliens had taken the humans’ weapons, there were subtler tools available embedded in a mechanic’s spacesuit. Each one had a basic repair kit. Standing on her toes, Kat balanced to watch as Theresa traced the buzzing gold lines painted on the interior of the metal. Beneath the exterior panel, a line of thin rectangles passed the gold-painted lines from one side of the cell to the other. Withdrawing her circuit tracer, Theresa followed the lines, but her eyes were not on the screen. Instead, she kept track of Lupita’s panicked progress.

Tearing off the panel, the twenty-year-old crowed in victory. Her force, however, had bent the edges, curling them upward. If Lupita noticed, she did not adjust her fervor. She tossed it over her shoulder, and the panel bounced over the floor, slamming into a corner. Helium dripped. The liquid ran up the sides. With each minute, it gathered on the ceiling, looming over her head.

Private Henderson! Kat spat, and Lupita froze. Eyes up! That disregard for your environment kept you from achieving a ranking. Move the panel and follow Mechanic Jan’s example.

Instinct moved Lupita when reason would not. Grumbling too quietly for her microphone to pick up, she stood, stormed over, and grabbed the panel. Her hands shook as they wrapped around the metal. Falling to her knees, Lupita slammed the panel back in place. Shoulders drooping, she pressed against the misshapen sheet. All the while, Theresa watched and waited. When Lupita fell back against the back of her cell, Theresa released a sigh and slid her own panel back into place. A collective exhale echoed across the com.

Ngawang blew a raspberry. Now what are we going to do for entertainment.

A portal at the end of the hall opened. Blue-Star and his compatriots sauntered back into the brig. They wasted no time. Two aliens dragged Private Jelle Holt from his cell.

Ngawang sat up. Crossing her legs, she curled her fingers around the bars. Nobody turned away. Everyone kept their eyes on Jelle. As long as they watched, the man being forced to kneel was theirs. When he grunted instead of screamed, their minds became records of his courage. They looked, so he lived even if he died.

Reaching to the wall, Blue-Star clicked and chortled. A quiet moment passed. Blue-Star trudged to stand before Jelle, but everyone waited. Jelle inhaled, swallowed, exhaled, and repeated. Drumming his fingers, Blue-Star rolled his neck. He shook his shoulders, clicking a line. The others gurgled. Kat chewed the inside of her cheek to keep from swearing. Only assholes told jokes to kill time before killing people. Two long minutes passed. Shuffling echoed in the hall; a fourth humanoid alien entered. Entirely black like the two holding Jelle, the fourth had thinner limbs than the rest. Clicking at Blue-Star, Thin-Limb rolled his wrists. He swung his arms back and forth, stretching as if preparing for a workout. Blue-Star clicked in a low tone. More gurgles from Tweedledee and Tweedledum.

And there went Jelle’s helmet. Gasping, Kat stepped back. This was not right. Jelle purpled. His eyes bugged out, and he gurgled. Not an alien laugh. A wet, sloshing as his lungs bled inward. Thin-Limb clicked, gesturing at Blue-Star. Blue-Star clicked twice. The air around them shifted. Like a blanket, heaviness fell over them. Above Lupita’s head, the helium splashed down. Screaming, Lupita sprang back, bouncing against the walls like a pinball. Nobody paid attention to her. Everyone watched as Jelle’s corpse sank through the floor, and Blue-Star prowled the corridor.

He took Cameron next. They peeled the spacesuits off him like shelling a lobster. One by one, the men gasped for air where there was none. Each time, Thin-Limb clicked a line, and Blue-Star returned two before the room’s atmosphere changed. Cameron lived a few seconds longer. Private James Graves lasted a few minutes. Three dead – not counting Jacobi. Kat had not even gotten to see his face one last time. See the mole on his neck or that scar on his ear where he’d stabbed himself with a needle in ninth grade when Mary Andrews said she liked boys with pierced ears. No, the last human male face she ever saw alive was William Jacobs. He breathed in an adjusted environment and kept on breathing.

A chortle. A click. Wires descended and no more Private William Jacobs. Thin-Limb shoved a plug between William’s two first cervical vertebrae as Tweedledee and Tweedledum held his head down. Two shakes, eyes rolled back. Chortle. Click. Body dropped, and the floor swallowed him whole. Blue-Star tapped two fingers with Tweedledee and Tweedledum. Gurgles all around.

Later, the surviving women of the Intrepid would wonder if the wires just stole basic survival information or something else. Whatever the aliens found, it was enough to feel comfortable dragging the last three men from their cells and shooting them. One by one, the floor swallowed them. Seventeen women remained. Not even a single percent of what had been on the Intrepid. A crew in the thousands dwindled to seventeen.

The number itched. A familiar sort of downsizing. Kat closed her eyes, waiting. This was a cull. Everything on the ship stressed order from the alignment of the cells to the height of the guards versus the height of the room. Whoever ruled would want seventeen to become a clean number. Without knowing their mathematics system, she could not be certain what they’d end on. Seventeen was prime. Maybe that would do. Or maybe they grouped by sevens – cut down three. Grouped by tens, kill seven. Circled three, murder two. No way of knowing yet. The guards clicked, shaking their weapons when a whisper slipped from Kat’s lips – projecting when she had not intended. For now, silence and waiting. Reclining on the floor of her cell, Kat stared at the ceiling, counting the twinkling luminescent nodes and praying the goal was not to get down to just one.

Chapter Three

If the adrenaline had not kept Kat awake, the drumming from the upper decks would have. The ceiling vibrated. Each node sparked, flickering like incandescent bulbs on the fritz. Every third glow jumped brighter. All the voices in her head murmured as those over her com jumbled. Prayers and whispers meant for the hallow sanctity of individual helmets echoed. Each - a sign of fear. Maybe this would be the last night. God help us all. I want to live. Please, God, I want to live. If they waited long enough, would anybody save them? Rebels? Impossible. Possible. The unknown itched beneath her skin. Not that she could scratch it. Odds were Kat wouldn’t touch her own skin before she died.

William had breathed. Taken several gasping breaths after attempting not to, but he