Fulcrum Gun (Savage Stars Book 4)
Page 23
Riding the shuttle across the Oracon-1 base was another strange feeling. Recker didn’t mind heights but he didn’t peer below, unlike Private Drawl who pretended he was walking a tightrope along the roof’s edge.
The battleship set down on several fields of what might have once been grass but was now scorched black and sodden with ankle-deep water. The landing legs sank deep, but Recker wasn’t concerned the warship would become trapped.
“The boarding ramp is down,” said Drawl.
Recker landed the shuttle as close as possible. The soldiers descended the ladder with great motivation and sprinted over the ground, creating char-saturated splashes with each footstep.
Having ascended the ramp, Recker dashed through the airlock and into the warship’s interior, Corporal Hendrix and her medical box two paces behind. They made it to the bridge and he hesitated at the closed door.
“Whatever is done,” he said, steeling himself.
The blast door opened and he entered the bridge space. His crew were slumped in their seats, eyes closed and unmoving. Recker halted and his shoulders slumped.
Hendrix wasn’t so easily discouraged and she immediately began jabbing the crew with her spare booster needles. She didn’t have enough for everyone but the medical box was loaded with many additional doses.
“You should get us out of here, sir,” she said, crouching next to Commander Aston.
Recker prepared the battleship for departure at the same time as he scanned for Lavorix warships or – worse – the Galactar. He located nothing within sensor range. He glanced across. Aston’s face was deathly pale and her lips were blue. With an expression which gave nothing away, Hendrix extracted a tool from the med-box.
“We’re leaving,” said Recker on the internal comms.
Delaying no longer, he lifted the Fulcrum vertically off the ground. He’d had enough of Oracon-1 but he couldn’t prevent his eyes from looking at the underside feeds. The visit to the Meklon base had been an interesting one, though he felt that description didn’t catch the nuances.
Damaged it may have been, but the Fulcrum was not slowed by it. Faster it climbed, tearing through the smoke and leaving the planet far below. When it left the upper atmosphere, the clouds of nuclear smoke were clearly visible from space, like a rotten wound on an already dead corpse.
In the clear depths of space, one of the topside sensor arrays identified an unknown object far in the distance. Recker hesitated and switched the engines to mode 2. The Fulcrum accelerated through the vacuum.
“Commander Aston is alive, sir,” said Hendrix.
Recker tipped his head back and stared at the ceiling.
“What about the others?”
A minute later he had the answer. Lieutenant Fraser was dead. The others were alive and comatose. Already, the Frenziol, or maybe something else Corporal Hendrix was doing, showed signs of bringing them round.
Hendrix didn’t say much as she worked and Recker was too focused on the sensors. Sergeant Vance and Sergeant Shadar arrived at the bridge. They arranged for the ship’s crew to be carried to the medical bay, which Recker remembered contained only four beds, one of which was already occupied by Private Raimi. He was sure they’d cope.
“Let me know if you need anything, sir,” said Hendrix as she followed them through the exit.
Recker only nodded, unsure if she was looking.
Ten minutes out from Kavlon, he came across the Galactar, or what was left of it after a two-point-five gigaton nuclear warhead detonated inside its hull. The destruction of its propulsion had thrown it from lightspeed without any significant retained velocity. A cluster of irradiated alloy and ternium drifted on a slowly diverging course that would last until the universe was no more.
Recker allowed himself to watch for several minutes. Then, he selected a destination, a task which took him much longer than either Burner or Larson would have managed it. After that, he transferred the destination data into the ternium drive controller.
Several minutes later, the Fulcrum entered lightspeed.
End
The Oracon-1 Gateway was still operational, reinforcing Recker’s view that the Lavorix intended to put the network to use when they decided the time was right. Eight days after leaving for an empty part of space, Recker had deemed his crew ready for duty. They weren’t in good condition and the robot in the medical bay hadn’t done anything to improve matters. Corporal Hendrix declared that further improvement would only come from expert attention on an HPA world.
On the plus side, the Meklon bot had done wonders patching up Private Raimi and the man was back on his feet, though he spent most of his time on his ass in the mess room, exchanging tall tales with both the human and Daklan soldiers.
“Ten minutes and the Gateway will fire us back to Excon-1,” said Eastwood. He sounded utterly exhausted, even though he’d spent much of the previous eight days asleep. “After that, it’s an easy flight home.”
“No sign of hostiles,” said Burner. He took a swig of his moffee. “Damn my mouth’s dry.”
Eight days hadn’t improved the situation on Kavlon much. The floodwaters had receded, except in the Oracon-1 construction trenches and parts of the surrounding countryside. Aside from that, nuclear winds blew and snow blanketed nearly a quarter of the planet. Recker refused to feel guilty.
“Five minutes and we’re out of here,” said Aston. She didn’t usually watch the clock and Recker took this as a sign of her anxiety. He smiled at her, though it was hard to make it genuine. The lines in the corners of Aston’s eyes made her look fifteen years older.
“We did it folks,” he said, when the timer fell below sixty seconds. “We beat the Galactar.”
“I’ll enjoy the victory more when I stop feeling like shit,” said Burner, following up with a yawn.
Recker sat back in his seat. It was a huge victory, yet he didn’t feel like celebrating. He couldn’t pretend to himself that the cost was too high since he’d have given much more than he did. Perhaps, he reflected, he was losing his resilience.
Hell no.
The thought didn’t make him smile, but it made him feel better.
Right on time, the Oracon-1 Gateway activated. The experience of being hurled from one part of the universe to another in an unmeasurably small amount of time was not one to be enjoyed and Recker’s crew, in their weakened state, suffered it worse than he did.
They emerged near the ruined shell of Excon-1. Recker didn’t linger. He piloted the Fulcrum away at maximum velocity and, when he felt safe enough to do so, brought the battleship to a halt and ordered Lieutenant Eastwood to set a course for home.
Six minutes and ten seconds later, the Fulcrum entered lightspeed.
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