“Incoming ships,” Bonnie shouted over the sound of the cannon cycling. “Translation from M-space complete. I read over two hundred vessels heading our way, sir. All Ch’Tauk.”
“Good job, Bric,” Jakes said, looking up at the screen. “Fire when you’re ready, guys. Don’t stand on formality.”
“We’ve got incoming from the planet,” Rene called from above. “They know they’ve been shot at and they know by who.”
“I bet they think they have back-up coming too,” Ortiz said. “Look, they’re adjusting formation for the new arrivals.”
On the screen, the Ch’Tauk ships which had just entered their space were swinging wide to meet the fleet orbiting the planet. But as the two armadas met, the new arrivals opened fire. Caught by surprise again, the enemy ships broke formation and tried to fire back. Another bright blast from Trinity vaporized two destroyer analogs and damaged a third.
“Hey, boss,” Parker called. “How do I know which ship is which? There’re too many of them.”
“If they shoot at us,” Jakes called back, “they’re the bad guys.”
“I’ve got pressure warnings from all over this thing,” called Rene from the other side of the room. “Trinity’s not gonna last much longer.”
“Take one more shot and then get to Liberty,” Jakes called back. “I think we’ve done all the damage we can do here.”
On the screen, the chaos was nearly absolute, with every ship reading as a target. Crippled sensors refused to identify targets between the two fleets, and even if they could, there was no way to fire at one without hitting the other. For Jakes, it was a satisfying fight to see the enemy apparently fighting itself. The irony made the battle that much more enjoyable.
“I bet they regret giving my shipyards their plans now,” Jakes whispered to himself. “Kinda brings a tear to your eye.”
“Did the pod get away?” Ortiz asked over a shoulder. “Did Henry make it?”
“I don’t know,” Bonnie replied. “I lost contact just after the cannon fired. There’s a lot of surface noise too. I think they got the signal when we blew up that first ship.”
“Godspeed, Henry Moore,” Ortiz said. “I hope you find yours.”
“Sir…” Rene called from above.” How many of those ships did you order?”
“What you see is what you get, Rene,” Jakes replied, watching the power relay system red-lining as the cannon fired one last time. “Why?”
“I see them,” Bonnie interrupted. “More vortices opening, sir. Hundreds of them. I can’t get a lock on the energy signatures.”
“Aw hell,” Jakes said, turning away from the panel and looking at his crew. “I just know you’re gonna say it. Go ahead and say it.”
“I’ve got it, sir,” Bonnie called, her voice full of dread. “It’s the Gizzeen. They’ve come back.”
“Great,” Mendel said to his captain. “Now what?”
“Only one thing to say now…” Jakes replied, stepping away from his console with a quick tap on the controls.
“Abandon ship.”
31
Doctor Elliot Reeves was forced to carry Henry Moore under one arm to the nearest ladder access. The lift in this section was inoperative and the ladder was the only way to get to the lower deck. Neither Henry nor the older doctor was in the best of shape, and the size difference made the going very slow. Reeves’ tall stature and Henry’s bulky frame did not match up well, and after the beating Henry had taken, the man was not moving fast enough for the plan they had in mind. At the ladder access, Henry grabbed the rungs and pulled himself away from Reeves.
“Be careful, Henry.” Reeves smooth British voice showed the kindness he’d always had for Henry. “I don’t believe the ship is entirely true here.”
“I know how to climb a ladder, Doc,” Henry replied, gripping the access ladder and descending to the lower deck. “I’m not that bad off yet.”
“Well, you could have fooled me,” the doctor said, stepping to the rungs and beginning his own descent. “I venture to guess you have a few cracked ribs under that rather fetid shirt of yours.”
Henry had stepped off the access ladder and now waited below. Reeves had never liked heights and took the rungs very carefully. Once both men were on the deck, Reeves motioned down the corridor towards the nearest pod entry. Neither spoke. After the brief exchange, an uncomfortable silence had grown. Once, the two men had served together on the cruise ship Terran Princess under the command of Alfredo Ortiz. After the fall of Earth, Henry’s family had succumbed to a death cult led by the chief of security. Reeves had been the one to finally end the man’s reign of terror at the point of a gun and the situation had sent the doctor into a spiral of alcoholism and despair. Now it seemed it was Henry who had fallen into the same situation and the doctor who was the stronger.
“Henry, before I strap you into that damned thing, I need to talk to you.”
“I don’t think we got the time, Doc,” Moore replied. “Jakes said we only had a few minutes.”
“Henry, I know what you’re going through,” the doctor said, stopping and placing a hand on his shoulder.
“Don’t…” Henry said, turning on his old comrade. “Don’t you even pretend to know what I’m going through. We may have shared some tense moments back on the Princess, but I don’t think you have any idea what I’ve been through since.”
“You’re feeling desperate and angry at the galaxy,” Reeves said. “I get it. I know all about angry and desperate. You’re not the only one who lost family back then.”
“I’m not worried about the last time, I’m worried about this time,” Moore replied, spittle flying from his lips as he spat back. “I’m talking about a wife who might be hurt down there and a kid I ain’t even seen yet! Do you have any idea what it feels like to be this close?”
“As a matter of fact I do,” the doctor replied, anger now slicing his cultured accent into something darker. “Do you want to know what I’m going through? When we were there, at Earth, fighting for the planet and everything else, I came face to face with the enemy. Those bastards had taken everything from me and I was ready to die. All those years ago I was left on that ship during the invasion. I had to watch it all fall down and I wasn’t strong enough. When the Ch’Tauk came aboard, I saw the face of everything evil in the world. I took that creature in my hands and snapped its shell in two. I wanted nothing more than to get revenge for what they had taken from me. I went on a rampage, Henry, I killed them all—everyone I could get my hands on until I got to the bridge.”
“Doc, I had no—”
“Of course you didn’t, you stupid git. You and your kind always think you are the only ones who sacrifice. I had to watch my patients die on that damned cruise ship, you know. I had to watch as the galaxy turned the whole human race into slaves, or worse. Do you know what they took from me?”
“Elliot, I remember the ship and how bad it got—”
“You have no idea.” The doctor began to advance on the old soldier. “I watched as the passengers panicked and ran to their deaths. I had to watch as my friends and the people I swore to protect committed suicide, and when it came down to it I wasn’t any better than the creatures that caused it all. I was supposed to retire to Earth and be with my wife one last time. She was dying and I was supposed to be home with her to hold her hand.”
“I didn’t know you were married,” Henry stammered, intimidated by the anger in the doctor’s eyes. “I’m—”
“Don’t you dare say you’re sorry,” Reeves said. “They took it away from me. They took my wife’s last breath from me and I wanted to kill them all. I crawled into a bottle and didn’t leave for six years. Do you know what happened that day we took back the planet? I discovered my sons had survived. All that time they had lived under the Ch’Tauk. They organized a medical clinic in one of the camps and tried to help people. The day we liberated the planet, my two boys were put to death. Killed because the Ch’Tauk panicked and ran when you and yo
ur soldiers attacked one of their bases. I found their bodies, Henry. I found what was left of my family while the rest of the world celebrated. If your people had waited just a few minutes to attack, my children would have been alive and I would have been complete. Do you have any idea what that feels like?”
“Doctor, I had no idea,” Henry said, backing away from the doctor’s passion. “It was war and we were fighting for our lives. We didn’t know…”
“I thought I could work through the pain,” Reeves continued. “I thought I could help put everything back together, but all I found was more pain. Hasn’t Ortiz told you what happened and why he’s here?”
“I thought he was—”
“You didn’t think anything,” Reeves said, pushing Moore back towards the bulkhead. “You weren’t thinking about anything but yourself, were you? I’ll tell you what happened. Ortiz was offered a chance to send off the Terran Hope as a museum ship to honor the sacrifice of the war heroes. Ha! War doesn’t make heroes, Henry, it makes corpses. Just before the damn ship was ready to launch, he got a call from his wife in Costa Rica. His grandson had died in a mudslide.”
The importance of what the doctor had said slammed into Henry just as his back hit the bulkhead. He knew Alfredo Ortiz had escaped the Gizzeen invasion by moments by captaining the old cruise liner out just as the cataract had opened. The idea that he had left his wife behind again during an invasion must have devastated him.
He realized how selfish he had been. He had abandoned his friends during a battle, and before that he had tried to drink his way out of despair without ever seeing the cracks in the people around him.
“I’m sorry,” Henry said in a meek voice. “I didn’t know about any of this.”
“I know, Henry,” Reeves said. “I know what it feels like and that’s why you need to step aside.”
“I can’t do that,” Henry said, surprised at the turn of the conversation. “Emma is down there and I need to get there now.”
“You need to step aside so I can reach the controls,” Reeves said, pointing to the panel at Henry’s back. “The hatch is right here.”
Henry blinked at the man for a moment. He slowly followed the man’s finger towards the panel at his back. A quick side-step and Reeves pressed the buttons. Once again, at his back a hatched cycled open, nearly toppling Henry backwards into the escape pod.
“Now get your ass in there and go get your wife,” Reeves said, pushing Henry the rest of the way into the tight pod. “She’s waiting for you, and the captain is waiting for me.”
With a twist, Henry flipped around and slid into the small engineering escape pod. Not much more than an anti-grav engine and shields, the pod was designed for a single occupant in case of an engine overload. Henry assumed it was one of the last still operable on board the damaged ship. The panels lit up under his touch and he felt the power systems vibrating the pod. It was the last Elliot Reeves saw of the man before closing the hatch and activating the launch system.
“Launch the pod,” Jakes’ voice came over the speaker.
Reeves pressed the button and felt the explosive bolts release. Power systems were activating all over the damaged ship. Melaina Petros and Tuxor were waiting on board Sweet Liberty with a few technicians. He knew all hands would be headed towards the pirate ship. As he rounded one of the corners, he was surprised by the sight of a pleasant-faced woman standing in the middle of the corridor. She was holding a large container of golden liquid and had a smile on her face.
“Doctor Elliot Reeves,” said the woman. “It is time to go. My name is Glory.”
*
“Parker, you’d better have set those things right,” Connor said, racing into the bridge of his ship. “We don’t have a lot of room to spare.”
“I know my business, boss,” the little man replied, taking a position by the computer console of the ship. “She’ll go up good, but you need to get those bugs closer.”
Trinity may have been a hulk in orbit of the planet, but they had used their valuable time to wire her superstructure to explode. Plasma lines had been repaired and rigged to blow all over the engineering section. The final system to be rigged had been the weapons bay. The big carrier used a magnetic drive system to accelerate the projectiles, and Parker had figured out how to use that to their advantage.
“Precious, you got a lock on those friendlies?” Jakes asked Melaina. “I need to bring those ships a bit closer to home.”
“I’ve got a good signal from the drivers,” the olive-skinned woman replied, brushing away a spare strand of hair from her face. “Bric’s got the bugs so wrapped up fighting themselves they should be easy to pull over.”
“We’d better get movin’ then,” Jakes replied, standing at the command console and tapping keys. “The Gizzeen’ll figure all this out soon and we need to clear a path.”
Bric was the young alien running the shipyards at Aleinhelm. He was from a race of creatures known as the Conduits. The Ch’Tauk used the race to extract knowledge from other races and gain control. Bric had been raised by a human and trained to steal knowledge for business. That man had perished at the hands of Connor, and the boy had absorbed the knowledge of how to run the business. The shipyards had fallen into the control of the original owner’s son, who had willed that the boy be in charge. Luckily for everyone, the son happened to also be known as Connor Jakes.
“Atmosphere seals intact,” Mendel said, tapping keys on his own weapons station. “Disengaging mag-locks. The ship is free.”
“Take us outta here, Bonnie,” Jakes ordered, bringing up a large view from the bow of the ship. “Try not to scrape the paint this time, alright?”
Sweet Liberty 2 was a custom ship from the Aleinhelm shipyards. Designed with the assistance of Melaina Petros and Tuxor to Connor’s specifications, the ship was nearly invisible in space. She was a sliver of black armored metal which had been wedged between two sections of ablative bulkhead on the carrier. Bonnie carefully pushed the thrust controls, easing the ship from its hiding place and out into space.
Connor stared at the stars beyond with some excitement. In the center of his screen the battle was raging between Ch’Tauk ships. His shipyards had been a sub-contractor for the Ch’Tauk during the war, and they had left the plans behind when the war ended. It had been Admiral Chang’s idea to send the Liberty to Earth and call the shipyards for assistance. Blasts of energy, each indistinguishable from the other with the naked eye, flew between the ships, creating a no-man’s land of fire and fury. Jakes saw no opportunity to fly into the fray without being destroyed themselves.
“Alright, precious,” Connor called to Melaina. “Send the signal.”
“Sending.”
“Almost immediately the scene ahead changed as one section of the battle broke off. Rapid energy bursts between the apparently fleeing ships and the remaining insectoid vessels resulted in a chase across space towards the massive carrier. Connor watched as the ships exchanged fire. One group of Ch’Tauk ships suddenly began to fire on the pursuers. It was controlled chaos done by remote control. Somewhere near Luna, a set of nine ships were controlling the hundreds of vessels brought in for the battle. Connor hoped the enemy never found the signal. With the chaos, it might be an impossible task.
“Miss Estevez,” Alfredo Ortiz said from the rear of the bridge. “I believe our current course will put us directly in the line of fire.”
“Good call, Cap’n,” Jakes said. “Bonnie, hard to port. Sweep us around and take us in lateral to the battle.”
The view on the screen pivoted and whirled. Sweet Liberty was more maneuverable than most ships and Bonnie was a master at handling it. Connor saw open space and the curve of the Earth before she brought the ship back around to face the battle. The Ch’Tauk ships, friendly and otherwise, were now directly in front of them. Jakes could make out the scorching of the banded metal hulls, and debris that might have once been ships hurtling past the bow. Bonnie had slowed the ship to orient while Jakes called
up a tactical map. He quickly targeted several ships designated with red markers and turned to look at the weapons station.
“Mendel, you see what I did?” Jakes asked. “Take these out as we pass. I think they won’t even see us and it’ll take some of the nastiest fighters outta the mix.”
“Got it, Captain,” the big man replied. “Weapons at full. Targeting ready.”
“Full power,” Jakes ordered, turning back to his pilot. “Take us all the way through.”
The view on the screen leapt forward as the fighters drew closer. Jakes felt the whine of the cannons as they entered the kill zone. Power was shunted from other systems and poured into the plasma relays. Under Mendel’s handset, the ship fired again and again into the mix. Ch’Tauk ships ruptured and peeled away as the cannons found their marks. With no shields to protect them, the enemy vessels were ill prepared for the battle, while Connor’s ships had been equipped with regenerating shields.
The Sweet Liberty bucked as pieces of enemy hull collided with her shields. It took only a few seconds to clear the kill zone and then they were through. On Jakes’ tactical screen, the littered remains of the targeted ships continued to fly directly at the darkened hulk of Trinity.
“Status?” Ortiz called. “Did we take a hit?”
“We got some minor structural damage underneath, but we are fine,” Tuxor called from his engineering station. “I believe we may need more paint when this mission is over.”
“Bonnie?” Connor called to the pilot. “I told you not to—”
“Shut the hell up,” Bonnie called back as the ship bucked again. “We picked up a hitchhiker.”
Resolute Glory (The War for Terra Book 8) Page 25
