by Jake Bible
"My side," Reck said.
"Same," Nimm said.
"Totally my side," Yellow Eyes said. "We're gump stew buddies."
"I can call BR and Ally and get their opinions," Hessa said. "Ally is secure in Roak's cabin and BR is in the armory."
"I give up," Agent Prime said.
"Probably best," Reck replied.
"What's BR doing in the armory?" Roak asked.
"Arming himself," Hessa said. "He's also making repairs to the Chassfornian armor he's wearing."
"BR? Why are you arming yourself?" Roak asked.
"I have an idea," BR replied over the comm. "I already discussed it with Hessa. She's not happy with the idea, but she isn't stopping me."
"Broad strokes, Hessa," Roak said.
"He's going to emulate the Chassfornians' strategy," Hessa said. "With a little moltrans help from me."
"What? Why?" Roak asked.
The ship finally broke from the tunnel and raced out of the opening in the mesa.
Roak's questions were answered as Hessa sent the ship diving under the group of GF corvettes. A group that had grown to over three dozen.
"Yeehaw!" BR shouted over the comm then was silent.
"I'd never say yeehaw," Roak stated. "That's all him."
"Missiles!" Reck announced. "A lot of them!"
"Hold on!" Hessa shouted.
Hessa executed a series of maneuvers that included no less than five barrel rolls, two three hundred and sixty degree loops, and endless dives, climbs, and a couple of times where the ship simply fell out of the sky to avoid the incoming missiles.
The maneuvers were almost completely effective.
More klaxons blared.
Then the ship was sent into an uncontrolled spin.
"Hessa!" Roak yelled. "What happened?"
"BR did what he set out to do," Hessa replied. "He destroyed five of the corvettes and has caused a chain reaction within the group."
"A chain reaction that is about to get us killed!" Roak yelled.
"Please," Hessa scoffed. "I've got this."
And she did. The ship righted itself and Hessa aimed them straight for the upper atmosphere.
"We still have six corvettes on our tail," Hessa said. "Make that five. Now four. Three. Two. And…"
Everyone waited.
"Huh," Hessa said. "I've lost BR. I can't single out his reading. I can't moltrans him back. He's still on that last corvette."
"We're being hailed," Nimm said. "From the corvette."
"Put him on," Roak said.
The view screen shifted from the sight of the planet's atmosphere to a bruised and bloody GF commander. The being was a female Leforian and had a heavy pistol in one of her four hands. She sneered at Roak.
"Son," the GF commander said. "You have been busy."
"Not your fucking son," Roak replied. "What do you want?"
"I want you to watch this," the GF commander said. She turned and took aim at a hobbled BR. Several GF troopers stood around the huge clone, all with rifles aimed at his head. "We are going to obliterate this…thing."
"So? What do I care?" Roak asked. "It's a clone. Expendable. You think you're going to piss me off? Get me upset? You aren't."
"We'll see," the GF commander said then squeezed the trigger.
The plasma bolt from the heavy pistol hit the midsection of one of the troopers, killing her instantly.
BR was no longer there.
"What?" the GF commander shouted.
"I was able to piggy back off your comm signal," Hessa said. "You screwed up, asshole."
The GF commander went silent as Hessa muted the comm.
"There is a very wounded BR in the cargo hold," Poq called over the comm. "Should he be moved to the med bay?"
"Yes please," Hessa said. "I was afraid he'd crush the pods if I sent him directly to the med bay."
"Do we have a med pod big enough for him?" Nimm asked.
"We do," Reck said. "But the real question is if it will work or not."
"He is new enough that it should help him heal somewhat," Hessa said.
The GF commander was still yelling and shouting on the view screen.
Roak waved at her and killed the comm completely.
"We're exiting the atmosphere," Hessa announced. "We should be far away enough now…"
"Evil?" Roak called. "You good down there?"
"Never better," Evil replied. "I am about to melt, though. You folks safe and sound?"
The ship left the atmosphere and entered pure Hell.
Every meter of space was filled with ships of various types, sizes, and allegiances fighting it out. The space that wasn't filled with fighting ships was filled with the debris from former fighting ships.
"Safe and sound doesn't apply," Roak said. "Go ahead and be the hero. Blow the fuck out of the nexus point."
There was no response.
"Evil?" Roak called. "Did you hear me?"
Still no response.
"Shit!" Roak yelled and slammed his fist on the console. Even with his armored glove still on, it hurt like all the Hells. "He melted…"
"It'll be at least ten minutes before he can detonate the nukes," Hessa stated.
Roak sighed then looked at everyone else.
"We're going back down, aren't we?" Reck asked, but it wasn't a question.
"Father will be sending more GF ships to that mesa," Roak said. "We have to at least hold them off until Evil solidifies again."
"Already making it happen," Hessa said and banked the ship from the immense battle before them and back down towards the surface of the planet. "I am glad I don't have a digestive system. This can't be good for your stomachs."
"We've been through worse," Roak said. "A lot worse."
The ship raced into the thick clouds and broke through just above the mesa they needed to defend. Hessa opened fire as a group of GF speeders was about to dive into the tunnel.
None of the plasma blasts or missiles impacted with the speeders. But they all impacted with the mesa itself. The mesa collapsed, crushing the speeders.
Hessa didn't stop firing until a warning announced that the ship was out of missiles.
"You couldn't have saved a couple?" Reck asked.
"I wanted to be sure no one could get inside," Hessa said.
The image of a gigantic pile of rubble that had once been a mesa filled the view screen.
"Yeah, I think you accomplished that," Nimm said. "But I'm not getting a comm signal from any of the relays anymore. Either they're destroyed or they're too buried."
"Five minutes until he solidifies," Roak said. "Get us back out of here, Hessa. He's going to set those nukes off as soon as he can."
"How do you know that?" Agent Prime asked.
"Because that's what we'd do," Reck said. "Without hesitation."
"Of course," Agent Prime said.
The ship shuddered.
"Dammit!" Hessa yelled. "How many GF ships is Father going to send after us?" But before anyone could answer, "That was rhetorical. He's going to send them all. I know."
"Three minutes," Reck said.
"Hessa, go!" Roak ordered.
"What do you think I'm doing?" Hessa snapped as the ship climbed at a near ninety-degree angle.
"Wheeeeee!" Yellow Eyes said, his nubs waving above his head.
The pressure on Roak's body was almost too much. He felt the climb in the very marrow of his bones. It took every ounce of his willpower not to pass out.
"One minute!" Reck shouted.
They shot out of the atmosphere for a second time and were plunged right back into a battle that not even the War had seen.
It was nearly impossible to tell which side was which as ship after ship was destroyed. The field of vision was nothing but brief explosions and floating debris, all surrounded by intact ships trying to avoid the brief explosions and floating debris. Fighters, destroyers, transports, corvettes, all makes, models, and allegiances.
Although it was
quickly apparent that one side was winning.
"Father is killing-" Roak began then stopped abruptly as a pressure behind his ears turned into excruciating pain.
"Ow! OW OW OW!" Yellow Eyes screamed.
"What in all the Hells?" Agent Prime yelled.
"Hessa!" Reck shouted. "Did we lose pressure?"
"No," Hessa replied. "I believe Evil detonated the nukes."
"Underground!" Nimm yelled. "The nexus point is underground! And on a planet! How can we feel it out here in space?"
"That," Roak said as he struggled to breathe. He pointed at the view screen. "We blew up the whole planet."
The image in the view screen was unexplainable. Roak tried to wrap his mind around it, but gave up after half a second of pure confusion.
It looked as if Earth had been split into a hundred pieces then stitched back together by strands of shimmering, swirling energy. In less than a couple of seconds the strands had encompassed the fractured planet completely. All that was left was a massive orb of the shimmering, swirling energy.
Earth was gone.
And a gigantic nexus point stood in its place.
"It worked," Hessa said in a hushed tone.
"Worked?" Roak asked. "What worked? Hessa! What did you do?"
25.
The battle halted almost immediately as the hundreds of ships surrounding the space around what was once a planet dealt with the repercussions and after-effects of the sudden birth of a massive nexus point.
Stunned chaos was what came to Roak's mind.
It was also the state of Roak's mind as he tried to figure out what in all the Hells had happened.
"Hessa. Talk," Roak said. He shifted in his seat, winced, slammed a fist down on the arm rest, and winced again. "Talk!"
"I thought the objective was to destroy the nexus point," Agent Prime said. "Not make it bigger."
"What he said!" Roak shouted. "And shut up, Prime!"
"You gave me the idea, Roak," Hessa said.
All eyes turned to Roak.
"No. Pretty Eight Million Gods damn sure I didn't give you that idea," Roak said and pointed at the view screen. He ignored the stares directed at him. "That was the opposite of any ideas I had. Get to the nexus point and blow it the fuck up. Blow. It. The. Fuck. Up."
"We did," Hessa said with a nervous laugh. "It blew up. Like a balloon. Now it's bigger."
"Hey, Hessa?" Roak said. "Remember back when you entertained the idea of having a body instead of being housed in this ship? That is an idea I can get behind. Do you know why?"
"So you can kill me?" Hessa replied.
"So I can kill you," Roak said. "Put my hands around your throat and squeeze. I'd keep squeezing and squeezing and-"
"We get it!" Reck snapped. "Hessa, ignore the ass and tell us what you did and why."
"-squeeze and squeeze-"
"Roak asked me to figure out a way to send a message through the nexus point," Hessa said while Roak continued to drone on. "I did and we sent the message. Help. Roak sent the message to all the universes connected to the nexus point."
"-and squeeze and squeeze-"
"Help? Who is he asking to come help?" Reck pressed.
"Himself," Hessa said. "Or selves."
"-squeeze and squeeze-"
"Knock it off, man," Yellow Eyes said. "Too much."
Roak stopped. "I wanted to send a message to all the Roaks in all the universes. I figured maybe they could come help us against Father and Mother."
"Other Roaks?" Agent Prime asked. "There are more of you?"
"In theory, there are infinite Roaks," Hessa said. "Just like there are infinite versions of all of us. And I do mean versions. None could be the same and I am certain that many universes have no versions of any of us."
"Not a horrible idea," Reck said. "If anyone can help kill Mother and Father it's going to be a bunch of Roaks. Except there's one problem."
"There are a lot more than one," Nimm said.
"Why send the message if we were going to blow the nexus point the fuck up?" Reck asked. "How would they get through?"
"I didn't say I thought the idea all the way through," Roak said. "It was worth a shot."
"Good thing Hessa thought it through," Nimm said. She frowned at the view screen. "Or not. I can't decide if this is a good thing."
"I didn't figure it out," Hessa said. "Boss Seven told me. He said to use nukes so that Roak's idea would actually work. He said we had to expand the nexus point, not destroy it."
"You're taking orders from an SMC boss?" Agent Prime exclaimed. "You should be deprogrammed for that."
"Man, you should really learn to be quiet," Yellow Eyes said and pointed a nub at Agent Prime. "This guy, am I right?"
"There is a reason," Hessa said. "You'll see."
"When?" Roak snapped. "When will we see?"
"Not now!" Nimm shouted as plasma fire filled the view screen. "War's back on!"
She was right. The brief pause in the battle was over and the multitude of ships were back in the fight.
But not all those fighting were ships.
"Those are the Chassfornians," Nimm said, her voice filled with awe. "Sweet Hells, they're punching through the hulls of the Skrang and GF ships."
Everyone watched as a Chassfornian in full battle armor slammed into a Skrang destroyer. It was just a dot on the surface of the huge ship. Then the dot punched through the hull and was lost from sight. In a matter of seconds, fire erupted from deck after deck of the destroyer. Flames several meters long flashed briefly before the vacuum of space extinguished them.
Then starting from the engine drive deck and continuing all the way to the bridge, a rolling explosion ripped the destroyer apart.
"One Chassfornian did that?" Nimm asked.
"Damn," Reck said. "How many of those guys do we have?"
"Hundreds," Roak said with a grin. "I'm really coming around to Chassfornians."
"Yeah. Me too," Nimm said.
The view screen widened and they could see destroyer after destroyer, corvette after corvette, transport after transport become nothing but brief balls of flame then fields of debris.
Fields of debris that they were flying directly into.
"This is going to hurt," Hessa said.
The ship dove and spun to avoid colliding with the immense amounts of wreckage that was everywhere.
It became obvious that not all ships had the agility that Hessa and Roak's Borgon had. Or they at least didn't have a pilot that was Hessa's equal.
The debris fields began to tear ships apart just as effectively as the many plasma blasts and missiles that were still being flung in every direction.
Roak gritted his teeth against the pain that radiated through him as Hessa executed maneuver after maneuver to keep the ship from being shredded. He caught Reck staring at him, but ignored her. There was nothing she or anyone could do about his physical condition. He was even beginning to doubt Ally's bath would help ease the pain. It had turned up to a level that he hadn't felt before without being forced unconscious.
"I'm good," Roak snapped after Reck continued to stare at him.
"Just keep telling yourself that, man," Yellow Eyes said.
The ship dove under a hunk of a fuselage that had to be several hundred meters wide. They came up directly in the path of a scorched exhaust port. They missed it by maybe a meter, but were instantly back in danger as thousands of smaller pieces of debris blocked their path.
Hessa unleashed on the debris with the full power of the fore plasma cannons. She punched a hole in the debris and threaded the ship through with minimal impacts. Roak felt every one of those impacts.
"Sorry," Hessa said in his comm.
Roak grunted in response.
The ship banked hard to the right and avoided a series of missiles that were aimed for a squadron of Skrang fighters. Roak couldn't tell if they were Sha's Skrang or Father's Skrang. The question was moot since none of the fighters survived. He hoped they were Father'
s Skrang.
"So, I'm going to talk," Agent Prime said. "Hate me if you want, but are any of you seeing what's happening to some of the debris?"
"Busy thinking of staying alive, man," Yellow Eyes said.
Nimm switched the view and they stared as hunks of debris disappeared inside the planet-sized nexus point.
"That shit's going somewhere," Reck said.
"Or it's being annihilated," Nimm said. "We should avoid getting too close."
"Not my main concern at the moment," Hessa said and the view changed to a wide view of the Sol System. "This just entered the system."
There was a large, black dot racing towards them from the direction of Mars. The dot grew and grew until it became detailed enough for all to tell what it was.
"Pol's station," Nimm said.
"Mother," Reck said. "The little shit transported his entire station here."
"Gutsy," Nimm said. "Bringing it this close to the fight means it's now close enough to take out."
"And I don't have to try to hunt Mother down," Roak said. "I know right where the bastard is."
Hessa kept the ship from being destroyed, flying it in and around debris, plasma blasts, missiles, laser beams, and still intact ships. All the while, Pol's station got closer and closer.
"He's going to engage," Nimm said. "He's actually going to join this fight."
Roak realized what was happening.
"Not him," Roak said. "Me. He's bringing me to the fight."
"He's bringing all of us," Reck said. "All the siblings."
As the words left her mouth, hangar decks opened on the station, disgorging hundreds of sleek fighters.
"Are all of those Roaks and Recks?" Agent Prime asked.
"Roak, Reck, Rink, Rach, Runk, Rike, and Rake," Reck said. "The siblings are now in the fight."
The view quickly swung away from the incoming fighters.
"I'm getting us out of here," Hessa said.
"We can't run from them, Hessa," Roak said.
"We can try," Hessa replied. "Every one of those fighters is locked onto us and heading our way. They're ignoring the rest of the battle and focusing squarely on this ship."
Four fighters blinked into existence right in front of the ship.
"And they're cheating!" Hessa shouted.
She opened fire and shredded the four fighters before changing course and throwing them back into the debris field and hellish battle.
