by Daniel Gibbs
Precisely four minutes and eight seconds after launch, the first fusion warhead exploded in a brilliant flash of pure white that lit up the orbit of Saturn. One by one, the other eleven missiles followed suit, and when they were done, what had once been a tribute to human ingenuity lay utterly destroyed. In its place was a twisted mess of alloy tumbling in its decaying orbit and soon to be gobbled up by the atmosphere of the gas giant.
Justin could scarcely believe how successful the assault had been. Secondary explosions continued to blossom from the stricken station’s hull, and finally, a section of it blew apart with a sustained flash of orange flame. “Scratch one fuel processor.”
A general broadcast transmission from a ship or station nearby caught Justin’s attention, and he put it through to his cockpit speakers. It took a few moments for the translation program to catch up with the rapid-fire Russian. “We’re under attack!”
“Impossible. This is the heart of the League. No one would dare attack us here, comrade. You must be experiencing technical difficulties.”
“You idiot, we registered multiple LIDAR contacts before the explosions started going off. I tell you something is shooting at us!”
Justin had a strong desire to cue his commlink to the same channel and loudly announce the Coalition Defense Force was here, but he suppressed it. That’d be suicide right now. As the local authorities kept bickering, he searched for another target.
Feldstein interrupted his thoughts. “There’s a freighter convoy about two hundred klicks out, sir.”
“I see it,” Justin replied. He pulled up the sensor display on his HUD. At least fifteen cargo vessels were moving together, headed to Jupiter. Going after them would serve a dual purpose: hitting other targets while letting them synch up with Martin’s squadron. “Let’s do it. Remember Colonel Tehrani’s orders, though. We only fire on cargo transports. If there’s a passenger liner in there, it’s not a valid target. Confirm scan results before weapons release.” I won’t be responsible for an atrocity.
“Acknowledged, sir.”
Another fifteen minutes passed for Nishimura. The wait for each cycle of the airlock was an agonizing eternity. Terran Coalition Marine Corps tactical doctrine was to concentrate overwhelming force against the enemy, shock them with extreme firepower, and push through. As MacIntosh and the electronics specialist entered the ship, the plan he was working on continued to form.
Nishimura keyed his commlink. “Master Guns, change of plans. I’m taking eleven shooters and our el cheapo fleet engineer, and we’re storming the ship.”
A pregnant pause came over the commlink. “Are you sure, sir?”
“I’ve got a feeling we’re out of time. Just call it a sixth sense.”
“Understood, sir. Watch your corners and stay frosty,” O’Conner replied.
Nishimura could almost feel O’Conner’s grin through the communications system. “You know it, Master Guns. Get the rest of the team in and secure aft of the airlock. If we get in over our heads, I’ll let you know.” He clicked off the commlink and pointed at four Marines. “Hold this position, Corporal.”
“Yes, sir,” he replied crisply. “No one’s getting by us.”
“Good. Marines, on me. Armstrong, take point. Captain MacIntosh, you’ll take up the rear, and try not to shoot any of us. Got it?”
“I’ll do my best, sir,” MacIntosh replied cheekily.
Nishimura decided against a witty retort, instead directing his attention forward.
“On it, sir.” Armstrong took a few steps forward and raised his battle rifle. The rest of the squad took positions behind and to the side of him. They advanced at a rapid pace toward the first bulkhead. The four stunned Leaguers still lay on the deck, hands zip-tied behind their backs. Armstrong pulled a mechanical lever and opened the hatch into the next section.
The freighter was remarkably uniform and well kept. Barely a speck of dust seemed to be present, leading Nishimura to ponder how they managed to do that with the limited crew complement.
Proceeding at a brisk walk, the Marine squad moved down the passageway, passing cargo holds and computer equipment. After another twenty-five meters, they reached the next hatch. Again, they opened it and pushed through.
When they were halfway to the next bulkhead, the heavy alloy door behind them clanged shut.
Nishimura instantly went on guard. “Brace yourselves!” he bellowed. Ambush? Not until he floated free of the deck plates did he understand what was happening. Artificial gravity ceased, and the atmosphere alarm triggered in his HUD. “Switch to internal suit oxygen reserves and deploy magnetic boots.”
Going from floating in the middle of a zero-G space to back onto the right surface, even with mag-boots, wasn’t simple. Power-armored Marines flailed around, seeking hand- or footholds wherever they could find them. A few got stuck to the overhead and had to walk back down to the deck. While Nishimura had taken a zero-G combat course many years prior, most didn’t train for it in peacetime. This is where defense cutbacks bite us in the ass—reduced training.
MacIntosh went flying by, out of his element, and knocked a Marine over before finally getting footing by locking his boots to a wall. During the confusion and rush to get some solid metal under them, at least two minutes went by.
“Who’s got charges?” Nishimura bellowed.
“I do, sir,” Armstrong replied.
“Set ’em on the far door immediately. Everyone else, covering position. MacIntosh! Get your rear end behind us before I box your ears.”
“Aye, sir,” he replied in his brogue.
It only took the point man—Armstrong—a few seconds to set strips of detcord around the bulkhead hatch. The explosive putty was another story. He molded it to the hinges and contours of the opening before sticking a detonator in. “Charge set, sir!” Armstrong scampered away and stood next to Nishimura, battle rifle pointed at the door.
“Fire in the hole!” Nishimura yelled.
A moment later, a flash of orange flame was followed by a thundering roar. A smoking hole existed where a solid hatch had once sat.
Armstrong charged forward the moment the smoke cleared, bounding through the opening in one leap. “Clear, sir!” he yelled.
Nishimura brought his hand up and gave the signal to move out. The group of Marines made its way through the bulkhead, weapons at the ready. With MacIntosh directly behind him, Nishimura was second to last through. The sight that greeted him was similar to the previous section. A long corridor lay before them, the same dull metal alloy coating seemingly every surface. The far hatch was closed.
“Okay, people, heads on a swivel. Advance slowly, and we’ll take out this obstacle too. One hundred meters away from the bridge.” I hope, anyway. Who knows how these Leaguers build ships. For all we know, they could put the control center in the tail of the vessel.
“Major,” MacIntosh began, “atmosphere is returning to this section, according to my readings.”
“Defensive position,” Nishimura barked. He wasn’t sure what was coming next, but it stood to reason the enemy had something planned for them.
It didn’t take long for them to find out what was coming. The far hatch opened, and what could only be described as a horde of robotic maintenance drones erupted from it. They glided over the alloy deck, a black mass of twirling arms.
Nishimura’s heart twisted as the mechanical beasts rushed forward. “Load armor-piercing rounds now,” he barked as his hands worked on muscle memory to drop the magazine loaded into his battle rifle and slap a new one in.
The drones’ first target was Armstrong and another Marine standing next to him. What looked like plasma spot welders or similar technology flashed at the end of the robot’s arms as it tried to burn through the Terrans’ power armor. Both men went down in a heap, and piercing screams echoed through the communication system.
Breaking through the initial shock, Nishimura finished reloading his battle rifle and switched it to full auto mode with a click of
the fire-selector switch. He aimed at the mechanized monsters and squeezed the trigger, sending dozens of rounds into the swirling mass. Other Marines joined in, creating a fusillade of fire that destroyed several attackers as internal electronics fried, and they fell to the deck in twisted heaps, smoking and spraying sparks.
A few of the drones broke free of Armstrong’s suit and headed straight toward Nishimura. The lead robot fired its plasma torch, causing immense heat to radiate through his left shoulder. Struggling to get his battle rifle reloaded, Nishimura fumbled with and dropped the magazine. At the last moment, the attacker took a directed energy beam to its center mass. Nishimura glanced over his shoulder to see MacIntosh aiming his sidearm, while concentrated armor-piercing rounds from the rest of the Marines felled the rest.
Just like that, the battle was over. A few dozen robots lay at their feet, disabled or destroyed. Given a choice between fighting the mechanical drones or League security forces, Nishimura would’ve taken the human foe any day. He caught his breath then flung himself forward, grabbing at the defeated enemies to see what remained of the two fallen Marines. In his HUD, the vitals of both were flatlined. Once he’d uncovered them, it was easy to see why. The men’s armor was pierced in multiple locations, and blood freely flowed down the deck.
Anger took over, and he stood, giving a guttural roar. “Get that next bulkhead open! We’re going to track down and kill the bastards who did this. You hear me?”
Grim, resolute faces greeted him as the squad medic performed life-sign checks on their fallen comrades.
“Some good news, sir,” MacIntosh said, kneeling next to one of the more intact robots.
“We don’t have all day.”
“This thing has a schematic of the ship built into it.” MacIntosh gestured to the tablet he’d hooked up to the thing’s exposed circuitry. “The bridge is beyond the next bulkhead, as you surmised.”
“Good. Let’s finish this.” Nishimura stared at the closed hatch while thoughts of revenge roared through his mind. Civilians, my ass. They tried to kill us, and when I find them, I’ll kill the entire lot of them. Even though part of him knew it wasn’t the right thing to do or think, anger remained firmly in control.
14
Jupiter and its massive red spot loomed in front of Francis Martin’s fighter. Part of his brain said it was just another gas giant, much like the hundreds of other gas giants he’d seen in different solar systems all over the galaxy. He didn’t believe it, though, because they were in the Sol System, home of humanity and headquarters of the League of Sol. Numerous space-based installations ringed the planet. His sensor system identified many of them as industrial complexes, others as orbital habitats, and still others as military bases.
A shame we don’t have twenty carriers and five hundred ships laying waste to the entire thing. Martin and his fellow pilots were a bit out of their element, flying craft whose handling capabilities were somewhere between those of bomber and space superiority fighters. Ironically, it was to his benefit, as Maulers turned like snails.
“I think there’s something in the shipyard,” one of his wingmen said. “Sensor resolution is still spotty.”
“Let me see if I can clean it up,” Martin replied. He used the integrated tactical network to direct several of his squadron mates’ forward LIDAR arrays toward their ultimate target—the League Navy shipyard. A few moments later, a sharper image came into focus. “Yeah, a Rand-class cruiser. From what I see here, it’s undergoing a refit. Half the armor panels are missing.”
Ripples of aftershocks from Justin’s assault on the fuel complex in Saturn’s orbit radiated throughout the system. Incredibly, no large-scale launch of fighters or military vessels had been observed by their systems. Martin spent little time focusing on it, though. His one mission was to erase League hardware, by any means necessary. After seeing so many of his friends die, hatred for the enemy was one of the few things he had left. Most didn’t see it. On the outside, Martin was still his happy, wisecracking self. But in the dead of night, when the tortured landscape of his soul came to the surface, he had to admit the truth to himself: the war’s toll was extreme, to the point that Francis Martin didn’t recognize who he was anymore.
As the kilometers ticked down rapidly, Martin had no time to dwell on his mental state. Hatred filled him as the shipyard grew larger in his flight helmet’s integrated HUD. The yard was a small part of a much larger orbital facility, but the section they were after was far older than the rest. As such, the eggheads back on the Zvika Greengold felt they had a higher chance of a successful attack. “Close to fifty kilometers and prepare to release Javelin missiles on my mark.”
Freighters, corvettes, personnel transports, and all manner of civilian vessels crowded the HUD—so many that it overwhelmed Martin’s ability to process the mass of dots. Friendlies showed up as blue and enemies as red, while civilian ships, which the computer determined were off-limits based on the specified rules of engagement, were displayed as green icons. Martin darkly mused that it wouldn’t be so bad if one of the anti-ship warheads hit a Leaguer hauler with its shields down. Take some more of these buggers with us.
The lock-on tone sounded in Martin’s cockpit, and he focused entirely on distance and approach vector for the shipyard. Leading the squadron in a downward motion relative to the Z-axis plane they flew on, Martin sought to avoid some of the clusters of vessels. Maybe they have predesignated routes. Probably do, the commies—and send anyone who deviates to a reeducation camp. The range crept down, each second bringing him closer to the enemy.
“Okay, mates, here it comes. Delta One, fox four.”
Twelve Javelin missiles sped away from the squadron of Ghosts, heading straight toward the enemy installation, their exhaust plumes trailing in the void. Sensors should’ve picked them up as soon as they launched, but that would’ve supposed the Leaguers had expected an attack. The concept of Sol itself being assaulted by an enemy—much less the hated capitalists of the Terran Coalition, who had been ginned up for decades as the next boogeyman preparing to destroy the League—was beyond all possibility.
The Javelins began their terminal approach, accelerating. A few bursts of disorganized point-defense fire met the missiles but not enough to matter. All twelve impacted, some on the shipyard’s superstructure and a few on the Rand-class cruiser itself. Bright flashes from the fusion explosions shone against the darkness of the void, briefly as hot as the surface of a star.
“Scratch one League cruiser!” Martin practically shouted. The HUD confirmed target destruction, and for a moment, he felt good, as if they’d struck a blow to repay the Leaguers for the battle of Canaan. It faded almost as quickly as the light did from the blast. The hate and anger were still there, though. They never went away, burning brightly in his soul. He started searching for a new target, as his entire squadron had another thirty-six Javelins between them—until a group of four red dots appeared on the HUD.
His Ghost’s internal sensors identified them as League Shrike fighters almost immediately. As a bomber pilot, Martin had limited experience in dogfights. Despite training nonstop for three months in the simulators both before and after they’d set out for Sol, it still felt surreal for him to rotate his craft toward the enemy and push up the throttle.
While they’d avoided detection for some time, the secret was out. The four enemies headed straight for them. I’ll give the buggers credit. Either they don’t know they’re outnumbered three to one, or they’ve got some balls.
“Delta One, this is Alpha One,” Justin announced over the squadron-commander commlink channel. “I show your primary target destroyed.”
“Confirmed, Alpha One. Just some trash to clean up before jumping out.”
“Understood,” Justin replied. “Secondary rally point beta. Leaguer reaction time is slow enough that I’ve decided to take a run at the Mars military orbital.”
Martin smiled. Blowing up yet another League space installation sounded like a great idea. �
�Can’t wait, sir. We’ll finish up here.”
“Taclink will coordinate the jump. Good hunting, Lieutenant. Spencer out.”
“Okay, mates, time to turn and burn.” Martin toggled his target-acquisition LIDAR array online and focused on the lead League craft. Your ass is mine, bugger. The enemy fighters continued to bear down on the flight of Ghosts in a nearly straight line. It hit him as suicide, but Martin only cared to erase them from the universe. “Delta One, fox three.” The Vulture missile dropped out of his internal stores bay and raced into the void.
Other fighters in the squadron loosed their warheads, and the moment they entered energy-weapon range, the blue glow of miniature-neutron-cannon bolts filled the blackness of space. Red plasma balls crisscrossed the void, but they were short-lived. One by one, the four enemy craft exploded.
Since his targeting reticule had been smack over the Leaguer he was attacking when it blew up, Martin thought it must be his kill. “Delta One, splash one.” How about that. First time for everything. Bomber pilots getting in on the fun. “We’re clear. Stand by to jump to coordinates provided by Alpha One.”
While the Marines were busy blowing up the remaining bulkhead between them and the freighter’s bridge, Master Gunnery Sergeant O’Conner and the rest of the VBSS force finished sweeping the aft section of the ship and joined the main element. They arrived as the last charge was set on the hatch leading to the vessel’s control center.
“Master Guns,” Nishimura began, “welcome to the party.” He jerked his thumb forward. “You’re here just in time to help us finish off these assholes.”
“Finish them off, sir?”
Nishimura gestured to his battle rifle. “I’m done with the stun rounds. Reload for lethal combat.”
“Sir,” O’Conner replied quietly. “Our orders—”
