She was a blade.
She was a bullet.
She was Jael with a nail.
She was Ahab's harpoon.
She was David's sling stone.
She was Spitfire.
She let out another burst of afterburner, exhausting her fuel.
Leaving a streak of light, flying faster than it had ever flown, her Eagle shot into the flaming maw of the dragon.
Spitfire ejected.
She tumbled through space, still strapped into her seat.
Below, her starfighter flew into the caldera of swirling plasma.
"From the depths of hell, I stab at thee," she whispered.
Fire blazed deep inside the Venom. Tongues of flames licked through cracks in the hull. Her starfighter was still flying, carving through the beast. More explosions rocked the clawship.
Spitfire flew on her ejected seat. The momentum hurled her into the distance at breakneck speed.
She watched it happen.
The center of plasma heated, turned blue, then white.
And then the Venom burst open.
A massive explosion lit up space. A supernova. A nuclear storm. It was like the birth of a star.
A huge claw flew by Spitfire. It nearly sliced off her head. Another claw spun beneath her. Fragments of the clawship were flying everywhere. A shock wave of debris blasted into the distance.
Then it was over.
The enemy ship was gone.
Sitting in her seat, breathing from her oxygen tank, Spitfire shut her eyes.
You were a great pilot, Dad, she thought. What Prince Robert did to you I cannot forgive. If you're watching me now, I hope that you're proud.
Cheers sounded in her MindLink.
"You took the bastard out!" a pilot cried, laughing.
"Woo, Spitfire did it! Spitfire killed the ship!"
"Spitfire! Spitfire!"
"You're a major badass!"
Spitfire laughed, blinked away tears. "Actually, I'm a colonel, not a major. Somebody come pick me up. I'll squeeze into your Eagle. There's still one clawship left. This battle ain't over yet."
Neither was the war.
This war would be a long one, Spitfire knew. But she vowed to fight this war every day until victory. She was no longer a stunt pilot. She would never be one again. Today Spitfire was a warrior.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
The Starship Freedom
79 million kms from Earth
05:04 December 26, 2199
On the portside monitor, the Freedom's bridge crew saw it.
An Eagle flying into the Venom, as small as a wasp flying into a campfire. The alien clawship exploding. Steel claws hurtling into space, spinning like scythes.
Aboard the Freedom, everyone cheered.
"You did it, Spitfire!" Jordan cried, raising his fist.
"Two clawships down, one to go!" somebody added. A few people clapped.
King stared at the monitor, heart nearly stopping.
That had been Spitfire's Eagle.
"Spitfire!" he said. "Spitfire, are you there?" King could barely breathe. "Gal?"
For a second—nothing.
Then Spitfire's voice came over the MindWeb. "I'm all right, Freedom! I ejected just in time. Got that son of a bitch for ya."
Everyone on the Freedom cheered again. King exhaled in relief.
I almost lost you, Gal. I couldn't handle that.
But they couldn't celebrate for long. The Freedom was still engaged in bitter battle.
There was still one clawship in the fight—the largest and meanest one. The Bloodlust. Red stripes marked her gray hull. War paint. Her claws glinted, eager to carve up more of the Freedom.
King stared at the enemy dreadnought.
Hel'rah's ship.
The bastard who had gutted their hull, killing hundreds. The bug who threatened Rowan.
King sneered. Pure, raging hatred blazed inside him.
"Fire everything you have at that son of a bitch!" he shouted. "Turn our portside toward him, and fire everything!"
Mimori stood at the head of the bridge, facing the main viewport, gazing out at the enemy ship. She moved her arms and tilted sideways. Motors hummed. The Freedom rolled around her horizontal axis, matching her movement, raising the port hull toward the incoming enemy. The Angels of Liberty wheeled atop the starship, facing the clawship.
The Bloodlust came swooping hard and fast, claws at the ready.
The Angels of Liberty fired.
They had no actual torpedoes to fire. But the crew had loaded the bores with everything they could find. Old refrigerators. Scrap metal. Broken chunks of machinery. Even parts ripped out of the amusement decks—gondolas, golf clubs, carousel horses, anything that would fit.
The Angels fired this collection of junk at hypersonic speed. It was like firing a thousand little asteroids.
The Bloodlust fired her plasma, trying to burn the oncoming fusillade. The flaming spray disintegrated half what the Angels had fired. Tongues of plasma licked the Freedom's hull, searing through armor, melting sensors and machine-gun turrets. A monitor went dark, its sensor burned out.
But the Bloodlust could not stop all seven portside cannons. Chunks of scrap metal slammed into the clawship, digging into the hull. One claw dented, nearly tore loose.
For a second, King dared to feel hope. But unfortunately, the damage was skin-deep. The Bloodlust came charging closer. She pulled her claws together, hiding her churning core, her Achilles' heel.
Hel'rah learned from his comrade's mistake, King thought. He won't expose his plasma core again. He'll claw us apart.
"She's coming in fast!" Jordan said.
The Bloodlust was seconds away.
"Mimori!" King said.
The android had her eyes closed, swaying on the bridge. The Freedom rolled and swerved. The Bloodlust rushed by them, narrowly missing them. They were like two jousting knights.
But we have two dead rails, and they have a hundred claws, King thought. We can't win a jousting match.
"She's turning around and coming back at us!" Jordan said. "Gunnery station—why did you stop firing?"
The gunnery officer's voice came over the MindWeb. "We're all out of scrap. We need time to collect more."
"We don't have time," Jordan said. "Fire whatever you have. Yank out the goddamn deck plates and fire them if you must."
The Angels swiveled and fired again. But not much came out the cannons. A few pieces of scrap metal. Most missed. A few grazed the Bloodlust, scraping her hull but doing no significant damage.
"This isn't going to work," King said.
Jordan took a deep breath, nodded. "Agreed. We need another plan."
King stared at a viewport. A severed claw from the Venom, the clawship the Eagles had destroyed, was spinning through space a hundred klicks above. It was the length of the Freedom. King stared at it, frowning.
The Bloodlust charged again.
Mimori swerved. A claw scraped across the Freedom's underbelly, slicing off a radio dish. The entire ship jolted.
"Oliver!" King said. "I need you."
Darjeeling stepped forward and snapped a salute. "Sir!"
"Head down to hangar 5. Get the tugs. You fly one, Oliver. Have your people fly the other four." King pointed at the viewport. "I want you to connect to that flying claw, which Spitfire blasted off the Venom. Understood?"
Darjeeling nodded. "Yes, sir."
The sergeant raced off the bridge, already barking orders through his MindLink, summoning his soldiers.
King remained on the bridge, waiting.
The Bloodlust charged at them again. Mimori cried out, managed to rise above the enemy, trying to roll away from the claws. But another claw nicked their starboard hull. Alarms blared. More air whooshed out, along with the corpses of several men. The ship shook as hatches slammed shut, sealing off the breach.
The tugs were small vessels, barely larger than starfighters. The Freedom had five of them. They were desi
gned to attach onto starships with dead engines, then haul them to safety. The Freedom sometimes used tugs to stabilize and guide the dreadnought while docking at space stations.
"If the tugs can grab that giant severed claw …," King rasped.
Jordan nodded. "We'll wield a mighty sword."
"But we need to distract Hel'rah. Or he'll shoot the tugs just as they launch." He turned toward a communication officer. "Get me on the line with the Bloodlust."
The officer tapped a few buttons. "Yes, sir."
A monitor came to life.
Hel'rah appeared there. The hideous spider cackled.
"Had enough, King?" The rah roared with laughter, shaking his web. "I'm gutting you like a tunnel worm!"
King took a step closer to the monitor. He stared at the creature with its gleaming, bulbous red eyes.
"Hel'rah, I call on you to surrender now. Before we destroy you."
Hel'rah laughed harder. His trapped victims jangled on the cobweb. "You destroy me? Your ship is unarmed! Burnt! Breached! You are moments from death. And yet you threaten me?" He tossed his spiky head back, roaring with laughter. "No, King. You do not get to threaten a rah prince. Kneel! Kneel before me and beg for your death to be quick."
On his MindPlay hallucination, which was invisible to others, King watched the tugs launch. Darjeeling flew one, and four of his men flew the rest. The boxy vessels raced toward the spinning claw in the distance. The severed claw was now thousands of klicks away and still flying fast. Darjeeling and his boys needed a few more moments.
Keep talking to the bug, Jordan telepathized. You're getting it angry. You've always been good at annoying people.
I learned from the best, King thought back.
Hel'rah was still cackling. King cleared his throat.
"Are you done giggling?" King said. "Good. Now listen to me, you bloated, festering cockroach. I just destroyed two of your dreadnoughts. I might consider sparing you, if—"
"Dreadnoughts?" Hel'rah laughed. "Isn't that the name you humans give your largest starships? You haven't seen our large ships yet. Our mothership will make your precious Freedom seem like a fly!"
King glanced at his hallucinatory monitor. A few thousand klicks away, the tugs had caught up to the spinning claw. They were busy attaching their tethers to the gargantuan blade. They needed more time.
"Well, why not run along to your precious mothership?" King said. "You can hide behind her skirt. Or are you so dumb you prefer to keep jousting with me?"
"I could destroy you in an instant!" Hel'rah said. "I chose to keep you alive for a while. Because I enjoyed toying with you. But now it's your time to die, King!"
The tugs began dragging Venom's severed claw back toward the duel.
"Wait!" King said. "Hel'rah, one moment! Listen to me. There's one thing you don't know."
The spider narrowed his eyes. "What is this? More trickery? Speak!"
The tugs flew closer. Closer. The blade gleamed.
King smiled thinly. "There's something behind you."
Hel'rah laughed. "Do you truly think you can distract me with such trickery? I—" The spider went silent. He spun around. His eyes widened.
The transmission died.
"Seems like he finally noticed the giant claw bearing down on him," Jordan observed.
The Bloodlust began evasive maneuvers. Darjeeling and his tugs kept pulling the blade. The colossal claw dwarfed the tugging ships. But they were powerful little beasts, and the tugs pulled the claw faster, pointing the tip at the Bloodlust. They were like ants carrying a steak knife.
The Bloodlust yawed, began flying away.
"Mimori, ram it!" King shouted.
The android nodded.
The Freedom charged.
The rails were cold. But they still delivered a punch. They slammed into the Bloodlust.
The Freedom shook. King swayed on his feet.
At this speed, the rails couldn't penetrate the Bloodlust's thick hull. But they did shove the clawship back through space.
Right into the path of the tugs and their blade.
The enormous severed claw, a blade the length of the Freedom Tower in New York City, plowed into the Bloodlust and burst out the other side.
The mighty clawship split in two like a coconut.
Cheers erupted across the Freedom's bridge.
"Gotcha!" King said, clenching a fist.
Thousands of rahs spilled out from the halved clawship. They tumbled into space, legs twitching, jaws snapping. The Angels of Liberty had fun with them, firing chaff at the aliens. Without a hull to protect them, the chaff made minced meat of the bugs.
Spitfire and her Eagles came streaming back. The pilots cheered as they flew through the devastation, firing more chaff onto the floating spiders.
"Woo, Commander, this is fun!" Spitfire cried, zipping between the marooned spiders. "Bug hunt!"
King suppressed a laugh. Almost losing Spitfire had shaken him badly. He realized how much he loved her, how much he loved all his pilots. They were all like his children.
"All right, Spitfire, bring your flock back home to roost," he said.
The Eagles turned like a school of fish, heading back toward the Freedom's hangars. If any rah were still alive in space, they were tumbling into the distance, harmless. King would let the vacuum take care of them.
He took a deep, pained breath. He realized his knees were shaking. He had not slept all night, had not eaten since yesterday morning. The adrenaline began to wear off, leaving him feeling weak and dizzy.
"Good work, everyone," he said. "Now we can proceed to Merc Mory, patch up our hull, and get some real ammunition in us. You all performed magnificently today. I'm proud of—"
Then he saw it.
He stared at the monitors.
In space, the thousands of rahs were still alive. They began to sling webs.
The strands stretched out and grabbed the Freedom's hull. Thousands of strands.
"Cut them down!" King shouted. "Cut those strands down!"
A few Eagles, who had already landed in the hangar, burst back into space. One Eagle slammed into a strand, but instead of severing it, the strand hurled the starfighter back. The Angels of Liberty fired chaff. But whatever they tossed at the strands just got caught.
"We can't cut the damn things!" Spitfire cried.
King watched from the bridge, helpless.
Thousands of rahs reeled themselves in, gripped the hull, and began scuttling over the Freedom. On the bridge, Mimori twitched and pawed at her clothes.
"They're all over me!" she cried.
A few rahs found an airlock. They began clawing at the metal door.
King growled deep in his throat.
"They're boarding us," he said. "It's time to draw our sidearms. This is about to get ugly."
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
The Starship Freedom
79 million kms from Earth
06:07 December 26, 2199
Emily sat in the royal suite, listening to the battle through the bulkheads.
Every few moments, the ship jolted. Booms sounded. People screamed. The royal suite shook with every blast. Priceless Ming-dynasty vases fell and shattered. The original Titian crashed to the floor. Emily sat in her upholstered armchair, holding her drone, very still. There was little else she could do.
From here, she couldn't see what was happening, and nobody was bringing her any news. But she knew that Freedom was engaged in a great battle in space. Every few moments, a crew member ran just outside her door. She heard the footsteps. Heard them shouting.
"We got one! We got one rah ship! The railgun did it!"
"The bastards are ramming us!"
"Three decks are lost. Head up to deck 22. We gotta seal another hull breach."
"Those goddamn spiders!"
Throughout it all, Emily sat in her armchair, holding her jeweled drone. Listening. Wanting to help. Not knowing how.
She was not a soldier nor spacer. She knew
nothing about fighting nor operating a starship. All she could do was wait and hope and pray.
"We should never have come into this godforsaken ship," Niles whined, trembling in her grip.
"If we had remained in Buckingham Palace, we'd be dead now," Emily replied. "Along with the rest of my family."
"Oh, don't say such horrible things." Niles's jewels clattered as he shook.
"It's true, Niles. The royal family is dead. I'm the last. And I must be she who rebuilds the throne." She took a shuddering breath. "I just hope I don't die here in space."
Another boom shook the starship Freedom. An alarm blared in the deck above them. Machinery creaked and clattered in the deck below. An African tribal mask fell off the bulkhead. It cracked against the Italian marble tiles.
"Oh, this is intolerable!" Niles said. "What is going on? Why won't anyone tell us? We can't see anything from here. I demand that Commander King comes here and updates us."
"They don't have time to keep updating us," Emily said. "They're busy fighting. Even Mr. Darjeeling was called out to fight."
"Well, the least they could do is invite us onto the bridge," said Niles. "Maybe we'd actually see what's going on."
"Niles! We'd just get in the way. Now calm down. You're making me nervous."
The drone gasped, looked up from her lap. "I am making you nervous? I, your loyal companion? Not the alien starships pummeling us, but I, your dedicated robotic chaperone? Well, I never! You wound my deepest sockets. To think, after all the years I've served your family, that during our hour of need, you should—"
"Shut up or I'll turn you off," she said.
Niles huffed, but at least he stopped talking.
Still, neurotic as he was, the drone had a point. Emily did feel isolated in here, and maybe there was some way she could help. She was only seventeen, yes, but so what? Her uncle, the Prince of Wales, had been only eighteen when he had fought in the third world war.
This was a new type of war, a galactic war, and here in the royal suite, with priceless artwork shattering around her, Emily decided that she would fight in this war. She would not simply be a passenger of history. She would be a participant. A soldier. The royal family was gone, and the palace lay in ruins, but Great Britain still stood, and so did Earth. So long as there was something to fight for, Emily vowed that she would fight.
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