by David Hardy
“Sounds good. Keep firing the masers. Whoever is in charge over there is probably on the verge of panic. Let’s see if we can add to their discomfort.”
“Captain Tolliver,” said Romanova. “We’re about to have company.”
She switched the view on the screen to the surface of the asteroid. The second ship was lifting off. It was the first time Marshall had taken a good look at it. The basic design was similar to the Pershing, but whereas the Pershing had a more rounded central area for transporting troops and light equipment, the ship had two large guns. They looked like lasers, but they could have been masers. The basic design for each was pretty much the same, with the difference being in the frequency range they used.
Being colonized by primarily US citizens and organizations, the Colonies had built on US technology. The US had adopted masers as the primary weapons on their ships before the Independence Initiative, as Lance Tolliver and Marshall Van Buren’s destruction of the jump gate had come to be known in the Colonies. The UN had tended to use both lasers and masers, although lasers had been displacing masers on the newer ships when the Initiative had been launched.
This ship had been sent to a secret base in a hostile system. It was going to be armed.
Marshall wondered how long the base had been in operation. It didn’t seem to have been there long. Were there other ships associated with it? If so, where were they? ColSec hadn’t seen any indication that there were UN, or rather the United Earth Peoples, ships in the system. But that didn’t mean there weren’t. At this point the possibility couldn’t be ruled out.
ColSec was monitoring the situation out here, and they had certainly detected the explosion of the jump gate. Or they would once the light traveled to Baldwin’s World. All ships in the system would be issued a general alert as soon as the Pershing’s confirmation of the gate had been received. Couriers would be heading for the other colonies through the other three jump gates in the Baldwin’s World system. The L2 jump gate would be used for this operation.
“Keep an eye on them, Lieutenant. Let me know the instant you detect them firing on us, lasers, masers, or missiles. If so much as a spitwad starts heading our way, I want to know.”
“Aye, sir.”
Montoya was outgoing and garrulous in social situations, but when on an operation, he was one of the quietest, and at times taciturn, men Marshall had ever met. He’d not said anything throughout the battle. Marshall wasn’t bothered by that at all. There was no one he would rather have at his side in a firefight on the ground.
Montoya finally spoke up.
“Sir, we’re getting updated orders from ColSec. They say do whatever you deem appropriate. If that means attacking the base, then do so. If you feel we should break off and run, then do that. Our orders are to come back alive if possible. The task force is on the way and should be here within twenty minutes.”
“Understood, Lieutenant Montoya. Thank you.”
Marshall addressed the crew.
“People, we are descended from settlers who came from the old United States. More specifically those people who embodied the pioneer spirit that built the US. We’ve modeled our society on those virtues that built that country. Independence. Self reliance. Courage. Duty. And protecting those who can’t protect themselves. We will not run. We can win this fight, and we will.”
The crew responded with a small chorus of cheers.
Evasive maneuvers continued as they approached the larger ship. The other ship fired a second salvo of missiles. They got closer than before but were still cut down. The Pershing’s masers continued to do damage to the enemy vessel, just not enough to completely cripple it. The Pershing didn’t get through the encounter unscathed, though. Its defensive maneuvers were good, but they weren’t perfect. As the distance between the ships diminished, each ship became easier to hit.
Klaxons sounded and red lights began flashing.
“We’ve got a hull breach,” said Montoya. He turned off the alarms.
“Where?”
“Cargo bay.”
Marshall breathed a sigh of relief. It could be worse. The cargo bay was where they were going to confine any prisoners they took.
“How bad?”
Montoya touched a couple of controls and looked at his display before he replied. “Not too bad. We’ll have to patch it. It’s bigger than the automated sealing system can handle.”
“Understood. The patch will have to wait. How long until we’re at optimum missile range, Sergeant Butler?”
“Forty-five seconds, sir.”
“Let’s not wait. Fire!”
Three missiles launched towards the Earth ship. The first erupted in a ball of fire before it reached its target, taken out by a laser. The second and third missiles hit, one amidships and the other near the rockets at the stern. Both produced explosions, then the spot where the missile had hit near the rockets exploded. The explosion wasn’t enough to destroy the entire ship, but it did significant damage. The force of the blast produced a rotation on the vessel, causing it to twirl and turn away from the Pershing and the asteroid, spinning about both its long axis and an axis perpendicular to the length of the ship.
Marshall didn’t wait to see what direction the disabled ship ended up going. It was heading away from the action. He had other concerns.
“Where’s the other ship and what’s it doing?” he asked.
“Heading straight for us,” said Romanova.
“Good. Set a collision course.”
“Sir?”
“We’re going to play a game of chicken.”
“Yes, sir.” Marshall could hear the gulp in her voice as she swallowed.
“Sergeant Butler, lock onto that ship and begin to fire. I don’t care that we’re too far for the masers to have much effect. I’m playing a psychological game. Target the bow. Assume the bridge is in the same location in that design as it is in ours and give it everything you’ve got. Don’t change target except to take out missiles. Once we’re in missile range, launch one salvo from both sides.”
“Aye, sir.”
The other ship was growing larger. Alarms began to go off. The Pershing lost its antenna array, suffered another hull breach, and lost the use of one maser. Infrared sensors burned out.
“We’re in missile range, sir.”
“Then fire before we’re completely blind.”
Butler launched the missiles. “Sir, they’re firing their missiles as well.”
“Take them out.”
“Sir, they’ve fired four from each side of the ship. We’re outgunned.”
“Evasive maneuvers.”
Marshall felt the ship lurch. On his screens, he saw six of the missiles explode, one after the other. The seventh flew past. The rear maser took it out.
But the eighth clipped the starboard side of the engine. If it had been a direct hit, the Pershing might not have been destroyed, but it would have been out of commission. As it was, the ship was crippled.
The lights dimmed, came back up, and then went out. A vibration shook the Pershing. The sound of twisting metal was like fingernails along Marshall’s spine. He felt a chill run down his back and settle in the pit of his stomach, while sweat poured down his face. He wanted to wipe it out of his eyes, but he’d locked his helmet in place on the approach to the jump gate.
In the darkness, one of the crew was praying and saying Hail Mary’s. It sounded like Montoya. His family had been instrumental in establishing the Colonial Catholic Church in the early days of the Independence Initiative.
Emergency power kicked in, the lighting giving everything a pasty yellow overtone.
“Status.”
Montoya stopped praying. “Starboard engine is offline. I can’t determine the extent of the damage, but we aren’t getting any thrust from that engine. I wouldn’t expect to make it home in time for last call.”
“Understood. We’ll make do.”
Marshall looked at the image of the enemy ship on his screen. The
masers had done quite a bit of damage, but none of their missiles had gotten through the other’s defenses. Since beginning evasive maneuvers, they were now on the other ship’s port side. That gave them the advantage of being out of the line of fire of the starboard laser and missile launchers.
“Sergeant Butler, continue pounding the bridge with the masers, but as soon as you see any indication of another missile launch fire everything we’ve got on those missile tubes. And Lieutenant Romanova, continue evasive action as best we can.”
The Pershing continued to try to evade the lasers of the other ship.
“Missiles launching on their port side,” shouted Butler. His hands were flying over his console before the words were out of his mouth.
Marshall watched, his stomach knotting, as the masers took out two of the missiles on the ship’s port side. The resulting explosion caused the other two missiles from that rack to blow as well.
“Captain, the blast locked one of the missile tubes open. We’ve got a clear shot down the tube. Firing now.” There was a tone of elation in Butler’s voice. He was good enough to make that shot, and the man knew it.
A moment later the maser’s beam heated the casing on the next missile in the tube. The resulting explosion broke the other ship in two. The center of the explosion was fore of the midship guns. The small forward portion was propelled on a course that took it past the Pershing, while the engines’ forward motion was stopped by the force of the blast, leaving them hanging in space.
Debris flew by the Pershing on all sides. Pieces ranging in size from a grain of sand to basketballs peppered the hull. The impacts echoed in the ship, reminding Marshall of rain on the metal roof of his hunting cabin. More red lights appeared on his console.
“We’ve got multiple hull breaches, people. Lieutenant Romanova, can we land on that asteroid?”
“I think I can get us down, but it won’t be pretty. And it probably won’t be in one piece.”
“Understood. Do the best you can. All we have to do is hold out until the cavalry arrives.”
Romanova fired the steering rockets. The Pershing began to adjust course, but it also began to rotate.
“We don’t have full steering control,” Marshall could hear the frustration in Romanova’s voice.
The ship lurched as Romanova cut the set of rockets that were causing the spin. She managed to compensate enough that the worst of the rolling was mitigated, but there was still a small rotation.
The asteroid grew in the display. An aperture opened in the dome on the right. A second opened a third of the way around the dome.
“We’re being targeted. They just hit us with a ranging laser.” Butler swore something under his breath. Marshall didn’t catch what, but he suspected it was in Gaelic.
Two small missiles fired almost simultaneously. They didn’t make it to the Pershing. Butler took them out with the masers without being told and targeted the missile launchers.
“Do we have any idea which dome is the main habitat?” asked Marshall.
“Not entirely certain,” said Montoya, “but the one closest to us seemed to have all the foot traffic before those ships launched. I’d say that’s the habitat and operations center if I had to guess.”
“Put some holes in it.”
Butler mumbled something about the slow rotation of the Pershing. Marshall ignored him. He knew Butler could hit the dome. A few seconds later missiles launched towards the dome.
They were swiftly followed by missiles from the other dome. One of them detonated before it could move away from the dome. The explosion pitted the surface of the far dome.
The missiles fired from the Pershing put three holes in the near dome. As the fireballs cleared, debris was carried out by the outrushing atmosphere.
The Pershing was flying low, its retro-rockets firing. Marshall imagined he could feel his safety harness through his suit. The rotation of the ship had oriented it upside down to the surface when the missiles launched and was now bringing it back upright with respect to the surface. The Pershing’s current trajectory would have it clearing the near dome and impacting to the left of the far dome. Marshall could see a low ridge in the distance. The shortened horizon made estimating distances difficult, but Marshall judged it to be roughly a kilometer away. That was where he expected his ship to come to rest.
The missile launchers on the far dome were below the rim of the near dome. A missile came flying over, and Romanova wasn’t able to avoid it. Nor was Butler able to shoot it down. It penetrated the cargo bay. By some miracle, it didn’t detonate. The impact still shook the Pershing. Marshall’s monitor display turned red and crimson as most of the warning lights lit up.
“Abandon ship!”
Everyone unbuckled their safety harnesses. Marshall entered a code that would only be accepted when input from his console. Explosive bolts blew a four meter square hole in the roof.
Each crew member toggled rockets on their armored suits and shot out through the hole, beginning with Butler. As the senior officer, Marshall was the last to leave. The Pershing’s rotation caused the edge of the hole to clip his ankles, spinning him. He fought to control his trajectory. He managed to bring himself under control, but it cost him half his rocket fuel. The rockets in the armored suits weren’t intended for long distance flights, just small jumps or to provide a controlled landing.
“Everyone to me,” he ordered as he landed. “Maintain radio silence.”
The rest of the Pershing’s crew were scattered in a line arcing away from the first dome. Just as they began to move towards their commander, the Pershing made contact with the asteroid. The impact detonated the missile in the cargo bay, and that explosion detonated the remaining missiles.
The shock wave was tremendous. A crest moved through the soft rock of the asteroid’s surface, throwing all four of them off their feet. Marshall’s teeth clashed together when he hit the surface, and he bit his tongue. The taste of blood was in his mouth. Debris flew everywhere. Visors automatically darkened as the fireball expanded. Marshall expected that if anyone were looking in their direction, the explosion would be visible; then he remembered they were facing away from Baldwin’s World. Still the task force behind them should be able to detect it.
He climbed gingerly to his feet. Nothing seemed to be broken, and other than the cut his teeth had made in his tongue, he seemed to be uninjured. Marshall wished he could spit out the bloody saliva, but he couldn’t.
As he looked around, he noticed two things. First, his crew seemed to be okay. They were all climbing to their feet.
The second was that two figures were moving towards the three hoppers he’d seen earlier.
One of the hoppers was on its side, the impact from a piece of debris clearly visible, even from this distance. A second tilted against the side of the dome. One of the people was climbing into it. The other person was already in the one hopper that appeared to be undamaged.
Hoppers were small as far as heavy equipment went. Basically large exoskeletons, they were most often used in construction to move large objects and maneuver loads into place in situations where a forklift wasn’t practical. They’d been around since humanity had seriously begun to settle space and got their name from rockets built into the framework that allowed them to hop when not carrying heavy loads. The operator was harnessed in the middle and operated the machine by moving his arms and legs. The hopper would follow the operator’s movements. A metal framework behind the operator held him in place while a steel beam over the harness added protection from dropped objects. A very efficient design for lifting and carrying heavy materials.
But hoppers could also be fitted out with weapons.
These hoppers appeared to be used for construction, but when Marshall zoomed in on the beam on top of each one, he could see a laser. Its configuration and size suggested it was military rather than construction grade. He hoped he lived to see his sister’s tiger roses again.
The first enemy soldier started movi
ng his hopper toward them.
“Look alert, everyone. We’ve got company. Forget radio silence. They know where we’re at, and they’re coming to join us.”
The regolith at Marshall’s feet began to vaporize.
He jumped to his left, away from the others. The low gravity resulted in a higher trajectory than he intended. He would have almost hung there, an easy target, but he fired his rockets. He moved down and further away from his crew.
“Sergeant Butler, you and I will flank this one. Romanova and Montoya, take out the other hopper.”
He got a chorus of “Ayes” in return.
Butler used his rockets to launch himself to the right. For a moment the enemy soldier didn’t seem to know which target to shoot. Then he chose to attack Marshall. It was the obvious thing to do, as Marshall was the closer opponent.
This time the laser made contact, albeit only a grazing contact.
That was when the strategy came to him.
“Sergeant Butler, take cover! That’s an order.”
There was a slight depression a few meters away. Marshall dove for it, hoping he wouldn’t overshoot it. He didn’t.
The hopper disappeared from his view as an intense pain struck his calf. He’d been hit.
Red warning lights lit up on the display below his faceplate. A prerecorded message warned him of an air leak. Marshall pulled a patch the size of his palm from a pouch on the side of his suit and slapped it over the hole the laser had left. It was an oblong hole, created as the laser passed across his leg. There wasn’t a hole on the opposite side. The laser hadn’t penetrated all the way through. His motion had saved his life.
The pain wasn’t too bad, which was good. Marshall had to act quickly if he wanted to put his plan into effect.
He vented air from his oxygen supply. Not a lot, but enough for a small cloud of mist to be visible. With luck, the enemy soldier would think Marshall was out of commission and turn his attention to Butler. Now if Butler had managed to take cover somewhere…
Marshall counted forty-five seconds on his chronometer, then popped his head up over the edge of the rise.
The hopper was busily engaged with Sergeant Butler, who most definitely was not in a position of cover. The hopper had fired its rockets, giving the operator a view of the ground in Butler’s direction. Marshall lifted his left arm. He had five small missiles in launchers built into the forearm.
