Final Clash (Messenger Corps Book 4) by J.N. Chaney & Terry Maggert & D. Glenn Seguin

Author:J.N. Chaney & Terry Maggert & D. Glenn Seguin [Chaney, J.N. & Maggert, Terry & Seguin, D. Glenn]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Variant Publications
Published: 2025-02-02T00:00:00+00:00

The Task Force made its slow and careful way toward the Radiant Point, aligning itself so the ships would enter the insertion zone. They took their time, ensuring that they gave the Voidborne still circulating around the Radiant Point the widest possible berth. By then, Pariah had been able to provide enough context to the aliens’ radio emissions that their translators were able to start making some basic sense of their language.

Which was interesting, but with the Radiant Point right there, Lawson really just wanted to get the Task Force through it and back to the Kingsport. Sentinel, though, doused him with a big bucket of cold reality.

“Lawson, this Radiant Point is operative, but it currently isn’t paired with another to form a functioning Gate,” she said.

Lawson’s heart sank like a dropped rock. “You mean that after all of this⁠—”

“Before you get all dejected, I would point out that the reason it isn’t currently paired is because its intended counterpart back at the Kingsport was repurposed to allow us to return from the Orion Arm to the Kingsport with the Swift and the Polaris. I can use the Perfected Variable to reestablish the connection.”

Lawson’s heart stopped its plunge. Of course. When they’d traveled to the Orion Arm to retrieve the mechs currently flown by Agata and Kamryn, they’d brought a Radiant Point with them to effect their return to the Kingsport. They’d connected that one to the Radiant Point intended to connect to this one. That would have established a permanent link between the Kingsport and the Large Magellanic Cloud, which had been the original purpose of these Radiant Points, after all. But Lawson got that Sentinel wasn’t just being pedantic here.

“So what are you getting at, Sentinel?” he asked. “Is there a reason you can’t just do that, connect them?”

“I can. The question is, rather, whether I should.”

“Why shouldn’t you? What am I missing?”

“Darius Spann. It is possible that he has control of the Kingsport, or that he may have even destroyed it. We saw how easily he was able to destroy the Fulcrum.”

“Oh. Shit. You’re wondering if Spann’s going to be there, waiting for us.”

“It’s a possibility. I thought I’d raise it in case you would prefer that I create a gate to another Radiant Point, such as the one in the Backwater System, or even the one that we left in the Orion Arm. That would be a more indirect approach and could give us the opportunity to learn the state of the Cygnus Realm before committing to a particular course of action.”

Lawson frowned. Sentinel was making a good point. Maybe not heading straight back to the place Spann would most likely expect them to go wasn’t a bad idea. As soon as he considered it, though, the downside hit him.

“If we’re going to fight Spann, we need the Kingsport and the Forge, right? So if that’s gone, or Spann controls it, then we’re kind of screwed anyway, aren’t we?”

“Succinct, but brutal way of summing it up.”

Lawson

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