War from a Distant Sun (Savage Stars Book 1)

by Anthony James

  “War happened and this node got taken out,” said Recker. “Or so its enemies thought.”

  Sergeant Vance came on the comms. “Sir, we’ve found bodies. Lots of bodies.”

  Recker looked up from his console and spotted Vance further around the circle, waving to get his attention.

  “I’m coming over, Sergeant.”

  Reluctantly, he backed away from the console and ran towards Vance. For a few seconds, Recker couldn’t see the bodies at all. Then, a darkly twisted heap of discoloured forms came into view – they were piled up next to the central pillar, out of sight from the console he’d been working at. With each stride around the curve, Recker gained an increased view of the dead and he prepared himself mentally for the close-up.

  He slowed at the last minute and shook his head at the sight. The corpses were blackened and shrivelled, wearing charred clothing of indeterminate original colour. Their limbs were intertwined like they’d known the end was upon them and they’d gathered to say their goodbyes. Recker tried to understand how they’d appeared in life and the best he could judge was that the aliens were taller and slimmer than humans, with the same two arms, two legs and a head.

  Corporal Hendrix and Private Raimi were close by, the former crouched next to her med-box and holding a probe against one of the bodies.

  “How many?” It was the first question that came to Recker’s head.

  “Two hundred. Maybe more,” said Hendrix. “Must have been the entire crew of this control level.”

  “Heat death,” said Recker.

  “Yes, sir. Best guess is this cylinder got attacked and the crew weren’t expecting it, else they’d have been wearing protective suits.” She reached out her free hand and pinched a section of the burnt clothing which was wrapped around the corpse in front of her. “They had clothes on, but they didn’t provide much protection.”

  Recker added everything up. “The heat from that beam weapon on the lower level was enough to kill everyone up here,” he said.

  “That’s what it looks like,” said Hendrix.

  “And the crew huddled, in the hope that the personnel in the centre would be protected until the life support cooled the air again.”

  Hendrix straightened and Recker could see that she was affected. “They say that life is what you make it, sir. That doesn’t mean much when someone comes and takes it away.”

  “It’s a shitty war we’re fighting, Corporal.”

  “And from this…” Hendrix indicated the mound of bodies. “…it looks like we’re about to crash someone else’s party as well.”

  “That’s not in the plans. My gut tells me this happened a long time ago and we’ve found the leftovers.”

  “Maybe not such a long time ago, sir.” Hendrix’s face looked pained. “It’s cold enough in here to keep them preserved but tissue decay indicates these poor bastards died eighty years ago.”

  Recker had been hoping this unknown war was centuries past and the truth of it must have reflected in his expression. He met the eyes of Hendrix and then turned to look at Vance. They understood what this meant, and they desperately wanted it to be otherwise.

  “Eighty years is a long time,” said Recker at last. “The species fighting this could be dust in the wind.”

  “In my experience, when two sides fight, there’s always a victor, sir,” said Vance.

  “Let’s hope that whoever won this one, they’re a long way from here, Sergeant.”

  The words sounded hollow to Recker, even as he spoke them. He’d always accepted that the universe held plenty of secrets and had, in his younger days, imagined what it would be like to unearth some of them himself.

  Now the moment had come, and the emotions weren’t anything like he’d expected. Recker wasn’t given time to worry about the ramifications. A channel opened in his comms unit and Aston spoke. Her voice was even, though the effort required to keep it so dripped from every syllable.

  “Sir, a Daklan shuttle entered the cylinder.”

  It was the news which Recker hadn’t wanted to hear. The Daklan were on their way and they usually came in big numbers. He swore and kicked out at the nearest console.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Aston was in danger, but she was also in the best position to gather intel.

  “Have they found the deployment vessel?” asked Recker, forcing himself calm.

  “Not yet, sir. They must have entered through one of the further openings. I caught sight of them flying between two of the spokes.”

  “Heading your way?”

  “That’s unclear, sir.”

  “What about the troop capacity of the enemy vessel?”

  “Again, that’s unclear, sir. The shuttle was larger than the deployment vessel, but I didn’t recognize the type.”

  “Was it alone?”

  “I only saw one. I’ll keep watching.”

  “No. Leave the sensors running and if needs be, we can view the stream through our suit comms. Now get out of there,” said Recker.

  Aston didn’t argue. “Yes, sir, I’m on my way.”

  Recker stayed in the channel and he could hear her breathing as she ran from the deployment vessel.

  “I guess you didn’t find a way to turn off the clamps,” she said.

  “Lieutenant Eastwood’s checking it out, Commander. Seems like he’s going to be too late.”

  Aston had been following the squad’s progress on the open channel and she didn’t require directions, allowing Recker to exit the channel and turn his attention elsewhere.

  “Sergeant Vance, the Daklan sent a shuttle into the cylinder.”

  “An armed shuttle?”

  “We’ll assume so. Troop capacity unknown. It’s certain they’ll locate our deployment vessel.”

  “Will the annihilator destroy the cylinder when that happens, sir?”

  “Negative,” said Recker with conviction. “That shuttle came inside for a reason and I have a feeling the Daklan will be keen to find out what’s on these upper levels. I’d like you to take charge of the squad and stop them.”

  Vance smiled dangerously. “They won’t find it easy getting their shuttle docked and climbing up the shaft will be a hundred times harder.”

  “That depends how much destruction they’re willing to commit in order to reach their objectives, Sergeant. Some of their shuttles carry missile launchers and I would hate for you and your squad to be caught unawares.”

  “We’ll handle it,” said Vance with such utter certainty that Recker didn’t doubt the words. “Permission to take whatever action is necessary, sir?”

  Recker understood the meaning. “If you have to plant explosives on the deployment vessel, do so.”

  “Yes, sir. What about the shuttle that’s clamped next to ours?”

  “Do what you have to, Sergeant, but I’d rather we didn’t burn every bridge.”

  Vance laughed. “I don’t think Enfield’s carrying enough explosives to take out both anyway, sir.” The laughter faded. “Do you need me to leave anyone here with you?”

  “No – the Daklan can’t reach this level without coming through you and the squad. I’ll stay up here with my crew and Commander Aston’s on her way. I’ve got a feeling we’re on the brink of discovering something here.”

  “If this cylinder is a weapon and its power source is online, maybe there’s a way to use it, sir.”

  Vance’s words cut through the fog and focused Recker’s mind. He nodded in acknowledgement. “I’ve been thinking too much about intel and escape, Sergeant.”

  “Nothing wrong with either of those things, sir.” Vance turned to his soldiers. “Raimi, Hendrix, if you don’t want to join those dead bodies, pick up your shit and follow me.”

  The words galvanised everyone. Vance sprinted away with the two soldiers, shouting orders on the squad channel. Meanwhile, Recker cut across the room towards his console. As he ran, he created a separate comms channel for his crew and invited them to join. It was important that Rec
ker could hear the squad and he remained in their channel to receive updates and to provide updated orders if necessary.

  “Were you two listening to what I said to Sergeant Vance?” he asked Burner and Eastwood.

  “Yes, sir. The Daklan are coming,” said Eastwood.

  “And we’ve got our hands full with the alien hardware,” added Burner.

  Recker approached his console between the two men and found it exactly as he’d left it. “Discovered anything new?”

  “Mostly technical stuff, sir – output charts, monitoring readouts, schematics - without an explanation as to how everything is tied together,” said Eastwood.

  “Makes sense,” said Recker. “Why would the original personnel need documentation telling them what their own kit does?”

  “That’s what I said to myself. I’m still hunting – I reckon there’s plenty to be found, it’s just going to require me to dig a lot deeper.”

  “What about you, Lieutenant Burner?”

  The other man looked up. “I’m pulling out some good data, sir. This tenixite converter is one node out of twenty-four.”

  “Can you locate the others?”

  “Yes and no. As far as I can gather, each node only communicates with two others and this cylinder has received a fail response from one of those two.”

  “What about the second?”

  “Coming through loud and clear.”

  “Why the limitation? Why don’t all nodes speak to the others?”

  “Security, sir. Whoever created the defence platform didn’t want the entire network being compromised if one node was taken over.”

  “Can you pinpoint the location of the active node this one is speaking to?”

  “Again, that’s a yes and no answer, sir. This node holds only a limited star chart and I assume that’s also for security. The connected node is visible, but I have no way of tying the position of the stars with the HPA chart.” He tapped the side of his head. “The suit computers only carry a fraction of what a warship navigational computer holds.”

  “You’re about to tell me another problem.”

  “Yes, sir. Whoever built this cylinder plotted their sky map from totally different positions and I don’t even know if they record the same celestial data as we do.”

  “Is there a way around that?”

  “Extensive study and a bunch of high-end processing cores, sir.”

  Recker grimaced. “Can we get any of this back to base?”

  “I’ve recorded the transmission direction to the linked nodes. That should be enough for us to locate the two other cylinders, even if it sounds like one of them is offline or destroyed.”

  “The top-level menu on this console names this cylinder as a primary node.”

  “I think they’re all primary, sir, which means there’s some secondary kit elsewhere. I don’t think we should waste our time guessing what that does or where it’s located.”

  “I agree. Now, gentlemen, we’re in the crap and I want us to concentrate on finding out exactly how this defence platform works. I didn’t yet come across a method of defence that didn’t involve blowing an attacker into small pieces.”

  “I don’t think the high-level command options are available on these consoles here, sir,” said Eastwood. He pointed at the nearby hardware. “Notice how every station is identical?”

  “What’s your point?”

  “The senior personnel had different consoles and they sat elsewhere.”

  Recker swore. “There’s no time to explore this whole damn cylinder.”

  “Maybe we don’t have to, sir,” said Burner. “Could be that one of the squad came across a command station and didn’t mention it.”

  It was worth a go and Recker got onto the open channel to ask.

  “Me and Steigers saw something counter-clockwise of your position,” said Drawl. “Three other consoles facing outwards not inwards.”

  It was tempting to ask the soldier why he hadn’t reported it at the time, but Recker held his tongue. “How far?” he growled.

  “A hundred or a hundred and fifty metres. We were searching for exits, sir, and not looking out too closely for anything else.”

  Recker let it slide and switched to his crew channel. “You heard the man. 150 meters that way.”

  The three of them ran along the aisles in the direction indicated.

  “Where are you, Commander Aston?”

  “I’m nearly with you, sir.”

  They arrived at the place Drawl had described. Three larger consoles faced the others and had some extra space around them. A chest-high rectangular device stood nearby, looking suspiciously like a food replicator, though Recker wasn’t of a mind to investigate the produce.

  He chose the centre of the three command stations and studied it for differences. This one had five screens instead of three, as well as an extra keypad and some other touchpads that weren’t on the smaller consoles.

  “Let’s fire this one up,” he said, waving over Commander Aston, who’d just emerged through the far door.

  Within a short time, Recker had the command console online. It presented the same menu as the others, though with a bunch of additional options.

  “Paydirt,” said Eastwood.

  Recker was distracted by words from Sergeant Vance.

  “I think we just lost the deployment vehicle, sir.”

  “Is that a visual confirmation?”

  “No, sir. The sensor feed dropped. I was just about to send Enfield to fix some charges in the shaft.”

  “Lucky man. Any idea if they took out the second docked shuttle?”

  “I’ve got a couple of soldiers looking for a way to get onboard that one. I’ll let you know when we find out.”

  “The Daklan won’t hold back, Sergeant.”

  “I know that as well as anyone, sir.”

  Aston arrived, hardly out of breath from her sprint across the operation room. Without asking questions, she stopped at one of the smaller consoles, her eyes searching for the interface panel.

  “I’ll upload the language module and then do what I can to help out.”

  Recker nodded, his mind elsewhere as he explored the additional options available on the command console. It seemed like the senior officers on the cylinder used the same software as everyone else, with the benefit of a few hundred additional options.

  “The sensors are offline,” he said.

  “I just found that out, sir,” said Burner. “There’s no indication of hardware failure – they may have gone into sleep mode because of extended inactivity.”

  “I’ve got plenty of new stuff to look through,” said Eastwood.

  “More than I was expecting,” Recker admitted. “Let’s get on.”

  It was slower going than he anticipated. He guessed something was chewing through the converter’s processing core cycles because navigating through the command menus was taking an age, like the backend software was housed on a dedicated unit situated elsewhere and the data connection between this console and the remote hardware was running at a crawl.

  “Sir, the Daklan used a missile to destroy the deployment vessel,” said Vance, after a couple of minutes. “The wreckage is still held by the clamps, but the enemy is using their own shuttle to knock it free. They’ll be able to dock in the next few minutes.”

  “What about the second shuttle?”

  “I’ve got someone watching the hatch above it, sir. If any of those alien bastards poke their heads through, they’re going to be eating gauss rounds.”

  It sounded like the squad was on top of things, though it was possible the Daklan could be carrying a few surprises on their shuttle. Recker’s impression of Vance was that he was a shrewd operator and wouldn’t let his soldiers be sucker-punched by anything so crude as a shoulder launcher missile coming up the shuttle exit shaft.

  He continued his search, with Aston looking on. She asked few questions and Recker was sure she’d have the alien tech figured out soon enough.
>
  Recker’s earpiece came to life again and he could hear the background fizz of gauss rifle discharge.

  “Sir, we have engaged the enemy,” said Vance. “They have superior numbers and a shoulder launcher.”

  “What’s your assessment of the situation, Sergeant?”

  “My assessment is that we have a fight on our hands, sir.”

  “Nothing you aren’t accustomed to.”

  Even under fire, Vance could find the humour. “A walk in the park.”

  The comms went quiet and Recker found the urgency helped clear his mind. A moment after that, he found a new option in the control software.

  Targeting. Sounds promising.

  He accessed the menu, which gave him access to a list of targets the cylinder had acquired while operational. The majority were clustered a long time ago – he assumed eighty years past, when the attack came. Worryingly, some others happened more recently, though Recker couldn’t be sure how far back. One target, however, he was sure about.

  “The cylinder is aware of the annihilator,” he said. “The targeting software assumes the battleship is hostile.”

  “Aim and fire,” said Burner at once. “Shoot those bastards out of the sky.”

  “There’s no obvious way to give the command,” said Recker.

  He dug around further, without finding what he was looking for.

  “Sensors coming online,” said Burner proudly. “Let’s find out what they show.”

  The four other screens on Recker’s console – which had so far been awaiting input - lit up. The annihilator was on one, its menacing features revealed in sharp detail, like the sensor tech on the cylinder was twenty or thirty years in advance of the HPA equivalent.

  From the angle, Recker guessed that the enemy ship was above and a couple of thousand metres to the side of the sensor lens, so that its underside and flank were visible. His eyes roved across the multitude of turrets and launchers, along with a single dome the purpose of which he didn’t know. The warship’s hull was unblemished except for the faintest signs of particle erosion along its nose section.

  “I think this is the same battleship we encountered at Etrol,” Recker said. “Either that or the Daklan put more than one into service recently.”