by Daniel Gibbs
“Okay.” She finally seemed to let go. “You’d better reiterate the target packages to everyone. They’re beyond jittery.”
“Thanks for the heads-up.” Justin flipped the channel to squadron command. “Okay, ladies and gentlemen. We’re here, and we’re spoiling for a fight, but it’s gotta go down the right way. Clear?”
“Point me toward the nearest Leaguers, Captain,” Green replied tightly. “I’ve come a long way for this dance, and it’s not nice to leave a lady waiting.”
Martin and Justin laughed.
“Aye, what she said, mate,” Martin said. “I’m ready to blast some of these buggers into hell.”
The reference to hell caught Justin by surprise. Martin was like him, somewhere between agnostic and atheist, and didn’t seem to have much in the way of faith. Turn of phrase, maybe.
“Lieutenant Martin, I’m tagging the shipyard we pinpointed at Jupiter’s L3 point, and for the Black Hogs, the Astute has locked down a freighter convoy with industrial parts as its primary cargo heading away from Uranus. Legitimate military targets, all.”
“I’m really hoping to hit some League military hardware,” Green interjected. “Anyone can shoot up civvie freighters, but only the best tangle with warships and survive.”
Everyone was on edge, and Green’s words highlighted the spirit of—sometimes false—bravado—that pilots engaged in. We’ve all got a different coping mechanism.
“Careful what you wish for, Lieutenant.” He grinned. “I want us all to hold here until a complete cooldown cycle has finished for the Lawrence drives. If you jump into a hostile ambush or, worse, get unlucky, you can still execute a double jump if we’re completely green.”
“Acknowledged, sir,” Martin replied. “So, what’s the plan for the next thirty minutes, then?
“Ponder the meaning of life. Listen to a holovid recording,” Green said with a chuckle. “Or in my case, offer up a prayer before we rush into the maw of death.”
“Didn’t figure you for the religious type, Lieutenant.” Justin had thought she was too hard-nosed for church.
“Most don’t. I’m private about it, sir. Then again, it’s difficult to know what’s coming and not offer a prayer up to something. If that makes sense.”
Justin thought back to when he’d ejected from his Saber during their first convoy duty action. Even I managed to say a prayer. So he understood where she was coming from. “Completely, Green. Okay. I’m going to coach up my squadron. I suggest you both do the same, and we’ll check in before our respective jumps. Spencer out.”
Hour after hour passed in the cramped weapons bay. Nishimura’s legs cramped several times, and he relaxed them by bending his foot in the direction the cramp seemed to be coming from. A drill instructor had taught him the trick during advanced zero-G power-armor training during officer candidates’ school. But worse than the physical pain was mental pressure. Nishimura thought of himself as a pretty tough customer, but being locked under the fighter was possibly the worst situation he’d experienced so far.
“You still with me, Marines?” Whatley asked.
Nishimura grinned despite it all. “It’ll take more than a rough ride in space to get rid of us, CAG.”
“Well, file this one under proof there is a God. League freighter popped out at the Lawrence limit five minutes ago. We’ve got an excellent intercept vector and will be coming alongside in a few minutes. No sign they’ve seen us. Get your boys ready.”
“Understood, Major.”
The commlink clicked off, leaving Nishimura to silence. He cued the Marine squad-leader channel. “Okay, everyone, it’s showtime. Limber up as best you can.”
One of the other Marines snorted. “Major, muscles I didn’t know I had have gone to sleep on me. I’ll be lucky to walk straight, much less kick doors and shoot people.”
“You’re fifteen years younger than I am… and if I can do it, so can you,” Nishimura replied in a snarky tone. “Otherwise, live with the shame of an officer outperforming you.”
Peals of laughter swept through them in a release of tension, needed after so many hours spent in the dark silence.
“It’s on, sir,” the younger Marine said.
“That’s the spirit, gentlemen.” Nishimura toggled on the sensor link in his helmet and superimposed a view of space around them on the integrated HUD. Whatley wasn’t kidding. The League freighter was less than one kilometer away.
“Major, I’m going to open the weapons bay doors in fifteen seconds. Stand by to deploy.”
“Acknowledged, CAG,” Nishimura replied.
To the other Marines, he announced, “Fifteen seconds to showtime.”
Right on schedule, the external doors of the munitions hold slid open, revealing the blackness of the void. For a moment, Nishimura took in the utter beauty of the stars and a barely visible nebula set against the inky darkness, which was all-consuming. Then he went to work. His power armor suit had a special maneuvering unit attached to the back, as did the rest of the Marines’ suits. Using short, directed bursts of propellent, Nishimura gracefully exited the bay. Since he had the same relative motion as the fighter, his speed was greater than the freighter’s, allowing him to plot a touchdown location on his HUD. “Slow and steady, everyone. Maintain focus and engage your magnetic boots.”
“Yes, sir,” one of the Marines near him replied.
Over the next sixty seconds, one after the other, they locked onto the hull of the freighter. Nishimura’s heart skipped a few beats as one of the enlisted Marines overshot his buddies, but he quickly fired the maneuvering unit and recovered a few meters farther down the ship.
Once they were all attached, Nishimura cued his commlink. “CAG, I show an airlock fifty meters down the dorsal superstructure. Can you show me a video feed of it from your fighter?”
“No problem, Major,” Whatley replied.
The requested image quickly appeared in Nishimura’s HUD. He took a few moments to examine it. Most importantly, the hull had no apparent damage, and it looked large enough to handle several bulky power armor suits at a time.
Nishimura keyed the command channel. “Master Guns, get the squads moving. We’ll see how many fit in there and ingress as quickly as possible.”
“Yes, sir,” O’Conner replied.
Methodically, Nishimura and the five others crossed the freighter’s hull, avoiding pitfalls and taking their steps carefully. He had no idea what sort of defenses the vessel might have but wasn’t interested in finding out if he could help it.
Several minutes later, they arrived at the airlock hatch to find most of the remaining Marines already there, as they’d dropped out later than his squad.
“How’s it look, Master Guns?”
O’Conner pointed toward the hatch. “I haven’t tried to open it yet, but it looks like a standard emergency airlock. Call it four heavy suits per cycle.”
They would be vulnerable at first, but the crew of a civilian transport ship wouldn’t have a large security presence. At least, that’s what he chose to believe. “Okay. I’m going first.” He pointed at three others from the squad. “You’re with me. Master Guns, if all hell breaks loose, find another place to ingress and continue the mission. Clear?”
“Yes, sir,” O’Conner replied. “Good luck, sir.”
“Good luck to you too.” He addressed the squad’s electronics specialist. “Get this door open pronto.”
“Hoorah, sir.” The corporal bent over and examined a keypad next to the hatch before pulling out some tools. It took a few minutes in the zero-G environment to open the housing to the device, after which he pulled several wires out and attached a probe to them. “Sir, I can’t guarantee this won’t trigger an alarm. We don’t know enough about the enemy computer systems.”
Nishimura put his armored gauntlet on the younger man’s suit shoulder. “There’s no guarantee to anything in this life, Corporal. All you can do is try. Now, pop it.”
“Yes, sir.”
After a series of electrical sparks from the opened keypad, nothing happened. Nishimura chided himself for listening for mechanical whirring or noise from the hatch. Of course there’s no sound in the vacuum. Instead, he waited, presuming that the airlock was completing its decompression cycle. Finally, after almost five minutes, it opened.
He gulped and bounded through the opening. “Corporal, can I trigger pressurization from inside here, or do you have to do it for me?”
“I’m not sure, sir. Do you see any controls?”
The chamber’s far wall had a series of knobs and buttons, and several screens displayed information in what appeared to be Chinese script along with Cyrillic. One monitor had a red strip lit across its top. Going to assume that’s an indication this thing is depressurized. He pressed one of the buttons once the other three Marines were inside with him. Nothing happened, so he hit the next one, repeating the same cycle.
“Uh, sir, may I make a suggestion?”
“Go ahead, Private.”
“If you haven’t already used it, there’s a pretty decent translation program built into the HUD now. We got it right before shipping out.”
Why didn’t I think of that? “Private, let this be a reminder to you… rank doesn’t always equal reading the bloody manual.”
Scattered snickers met Nishimura’s comment.
“Thank you, sir.”
Once he’d toggled the translation app on, the script in front of him became readable. It wasn’t perfect, and some letters didn’t display correctly, but it was enough to make out that one of the buttons was marked with Pressurize Airlock. Nishimura depressed it and waited. A progress bar started on one of the displays, showing a four-minute countdown. Now we’re getting somewhere.
Much like pilots detested waiting for the enemy to enter engagement range, Marines found it equally challenging to wait with an artificial time limit on getting the rest of the force inside to do battle. Little was said during the countdown, and the moment the screen turned green, Nishimura pushed the interior hatch open.
First through the foreboding entryway, Nishimura stepped up and over the reinforced alloy bulkhead and entered the passageway beyond. At first glance, the area was remarkably similar to a CDF vessel. It would make sense that humans design things the same way. The color schemes were different, and the ship had an overall gray hue to most of its surfaces. Every so often, something resembling a computer interface panel jutted from the wall, and colorful screens displayed slogans in Chinese, Russian, and what appeared to be French, at least to Nishimura. “Keep alert. Take defensive positions.”
The other Marines spread out.
“Master Guns, decompress the airlock and send the next team.”
“Yes, sir. We’re on it.”
Now is the moment of truth. Will a dozen Leaguers appear with heavy weapons and slaughter us before reinforcements can get inside? Or is the freighter precisely what it seems to be—a lightly armed civilian ship with a limited crew? Tension built, and even Nishimura had beads of sweat falling off his forehead. Every so often, the groan of a metal alloy rang out.
“You hear that, Major?” one of the privates asked.
“Steady, Marine. It’s just operating sounds. Something this big is bound to make some noise.” What he didn’t say was that it appeared to be getting closer. Worst-case scenarios went through his mind. Maybe the crew detected us and is going to blow its holds off or something like that. Training kicked in. Screw ’em. We’ll work through it if they try.
The groaning grew closer as the seconds slowly ticked down. “Major, we’ve got another four in the airlock. Beginning pressurization sequence now,” O’Conner reported.
Nishimura thought he saw movement down the passageway, which was blocked by a bulkhead door twenty-five meters away from them toward the ship’s bow. “Eyes front, Marines.” He brought his battle rifle up as the hatch opened.
Four human figures emerged, all wearing distinctive dark-gray jumpsuits emblazoned with a red star and a fist superimposed over it. They clutched unfamiliar black rifles, which they raised and fired, sending several bolts of red energy sizzling down the corridor.
Muscle memory kicked in as Nishimura and the other three Marines squeezed the triggers on their weapons. Three-round stun bursts hit three out of the targets.
“Drop that rifle and put your hands in the air!” Nishimura shouted to the remaining Leaguer, keenly aware of a need to obtain intelligence on the freighter’s layout.
Screams in a foreign language and more bolts from the black rifle were the only response. One of the enemy’s rounds hit Nishimura square in the center of his power armor chest plate.
The corporal to his right put the Leaguer down with another burst of stunners. “You okay, Major?”
“I think so.” Other than a scorch mark, there was no evidence of damage to his armor. He ran a quick diagnostic to confirm. “Whatever they were shooting at us is low-enough power that it doesn’t do much to our heavy suits.” After a deep breath, Nishimura took stock of the situation. “Police those weapons, Corporal Armstrong.”
“Yes, sir!”
The airlock opened, and four more Marines surged through.
“We heard shooting, Major,” one of them announced.
“They sent a few guys to challenge us,” Nishimura replied. He jerked his finger, pointing down the corridor. “Didn’t end well for them. The four of you, post security ten meters aft of our position. We’re going to hold here until the rest of the team gets in then press forward. If the League builds its ships remotely like ours, our objective is one hundred fifty meters ahead.”
“Sir, yes, sir!” the youngster replied then immediately turned on his heel and marched down the passageway.
Nishimura sucked in a breath. Okay. We can do this. They sent four lightly armed rent-a-cops after us, and that’s probably all they have. A lot could still go wrong and probably would, but he remained convinced his small force of Marines had a chance. We must succeed. I’m not spending the rest of my life in some commie labor camp, moving rocks.
The next group entered the airlock.
On the other hand, when the idiots we just stunned don’t report in, whoever’s in charge will get antsy. We might have to move out before everyone’s inside. Nishimura’s mind churned on a tactical plan as the minutes ticked down.
13
“Can you believe this? We’ve been flying through Sol for hours, and no one’s found us,” Feldstein remarked.
Justin took another glance at the sensor systems on his Ghost recon fighter. He’d repeated the action every five or six seconds. While the coast was still clear, he felt like they were on borrowed time. “Well, that’s going to change in a bit. When we start taking out targets.”
“I can drink to that,” Mateus interjected.
They’d jumped in about an hour away from the fuel depot, doing their best to avoid being caught by surprise while being as stealthy as possible. Saturn and her rings loomed ahead. Justin found it one of the most beautiful sights he’d ever seen. I can’t get over being in the cradle of humanity. Earth, beyond every other planet, is our home. Sad to know it's in the hands of people who want to erase us from the universe. “Adjust heading by .2 degrees to starboard.”
As the eleven other fighters fell in behind him, Justin noted with satisfaction that the minor course correction would put them on track for a fuel refinery in the upper reaches of Saturn’s atmosphere. The closer they got, the better their sensor resolution was. Dozens of installations dotted the gas giant’s moons, and it appeared as if a permanent settlement had been built into a moon labeled as Titan by the onboard computer.
“Final weapons check.”
One by one, green lights appeared on Justin’s squad-readiness display, confirming their onboard weapons systems were fully functional and ready to fire. SM-14C Javelin anti-ship missiles had a range of nearly five hundred kilometers but in practice were rarely fired anywhere near that far out. Combat experience taught them
that up close and personal was the only way to defeat mass point-defense systems. But not when the enemy doesn’t know you’re here.
“Captain, I’m getting suggested targeting information for weak points,” Feldstein said. “Do you concur with the computer’s suggestions?”
“I’ve never liked letting a computer decide what and where to shoot,” Justin replied. He realized how much like Whatley that sounded and stifled a chuckle. “But we’re dealing with unknowns here. I don’t have a better idea, so let’s go with it. Red Tails, pick a weak point and deconflict your targets via our tactical network. One Javelin per fighter.”
“Wilco, sir.” Adeoye’s voice rang out above the rest.
Onward they pressed, each second bringing the League installation closer. What had started as a small speck, barely visible to the naked eye, revealed itself as a massive collection of storage tanks, an industrial-processing system of some sort, and docking ports for at least fifteen freighters. It rivaled anything Justin had ever seen in the Terran Coalition in size. I wonder if this is a centralized fuel-processing center or something. In the end, it didn’t matter what the Leaguers had built. What mattered were the dozen fusion warheads they were about to unleash.
“We’re in range, sir,” Feldstein reported.
“Red Tails, launch on my mark. Three, two, one, mark.” He double-checked the squadron-status display to see everyone had a separate target on the fuel depot locked. “Alpha One, Fox four.”
The Javelin anti-ship missile dropped out of the internal stores bay on the underside of Justin’s fighter and blasted off into the darkness of space. Joined by eleven others, it accelerated toward the target. Without the usual electronic countermeasures and rapid-fire point-defense weaponry directed to them, the warheads flew in roughly straight lines at a constant rate of speed.
It took the Javelins four minutes to fly from their launch point to the enemy installation. They were the longest four minutes of Justin Spencer’s life. Each second seemed like an eternity, and he expected hundreds of League fighters to jump them at any moment. He utilized every stress-reduction technique he knew, from deep breathing to allowing his thoughts to wander to Michelle and Maggie.
