Beyond The Frontier

by J Malcolm Patrick

  But with clusters of missiles coming from all directions—it really put a damper on that.

  Flaps fixed their course away from the closest flight of missiles. Some of the hostile ordnance didn’t even burn directly for them, but vectored to flank. The up side was it took a while for the enemy ordnance to maneuver into the most efficient intercept positions. If Aaron could increase that intercept time, point defense accuracy would increase.

  Explosions popped all around in randomness as missiles closed on Phoenix and her point defense slugs intercepted some.

  The dreadnought wasn’t moving much at all, a few thousand meters at most. It just sat and gave as good as it got.

  “Ensign, head directly for them.”

  “That’s certain death, Commander.”

  “Not so certain as those missiles, Yuri.”

  Phoenix now held her vector straight for the dreadnought. Those missiles were certain death for anyone and anything.

  The dreadnought’s plasma turrets opened up. The initial bursts could be dodged with bursts of thrust from the maneuvering thrusters. But as you continued such maneuvers, eventually to keep the targeting foiled you had to thrust the opposite direction of the ship’s momentum, which in turn pushed against the current momentum. It became counter-productive.

  Plasma bursts slammed into the polarized armor.

  “I can’t dodge anymore of those shots, Commander!”

  Aaron grimaced. The power drain on the defense field was extraordinary.

  “Hold course!”

  The hits from flak cannons hurt too.

  “Now—take us under!”

  The helmsman had waited for the order. Aaron wondered if it never came if Flaps was content to ram the ORA ship.

  The pursuing missiles didn’t have a choice but to detonate or risk hitting their mother ship.

  “Now what?” Flaps asked.

  Aaron didn’t answer but returned fire with the railguns. They were too close for fusion torpedoes. A detonation would damage them too.

  It was infuriating. The railguns just weren’t packing enough of a punch against a ship that size. Not enough to destroy them soon enough. He could destroy half of the ship and the other half would have enough power and weaponry to continue fighting.

  Phoenix moved away. The dreadnought unleashed more fury.

  “Flaps, bring the bow one-eighty relative to target.”

  Aaron gritted his teeth. “Herman? We need something soon!”

  “Working, Commander. Their counter measures are scattering the scans, but I’m making head way. That close pass did it, analyzing the readings now.”

  The thrusters pushed Phoenix around as she continued to increase distance from the behemoth, and she now faced it.

  A full volley of fusion torpedoes thundered out from their launch tubes. Aaron fired all that was left. That hurt for sure, the sensors registered a power fall off throughout the enemy ship.

  Zane finally came through. “I’ve got them! Twenty power signatures. It must be the weapon caches near the superstructure. Ninety percent certainty.”

  “Bless you, Herman.” Aaron checked his board. “Get us some more distance and bring us around again, Ensign.”

  “Same thing?”

  “Affirmative.”

  “I’ve got a lock on a weapons cache,” Ayres said. “Plotting a firing solution and best potential attack vectors, sending over to the helm now.” She swiped the information over to the ensign’s station.

  Aaron incorporated her firing solutions. “I want to hit it when some are being primed.”

  “I’ve got it. Plotting attack runs,” Flaps said.

  “Maybe we can just repeat that first maneuver, Commander. Their missiles won’t be able to touch us,” Herman said.

  Again the plasma turrets volleyed. Flaps piloted the ship along the dreadnought’s ventral quarter maintaining too fast a transversal for the hostile ship’s turrets to track.

  Just before Phoenix could complete the attack run, an explosion ripped through the underside of the ship. Aaron knew exactly what it was, an antimatter mine.

  The enemy captain had played him.

  Chapter 27 – I’m Taking You Home

  “I promise you” - Malcolm Lee

  Indri-3

  Lee couldn’t recall a time when such hate boiled in him—and hate was a powerful thing. It could consume you. Maybe even turn you into the thing you hated most.

  Bile rose in his throat.

  They had stuffed his people in a metal box like cattle. You didn’t do this to anyone. He imagined he could feel the pulse in the neck of the person responsible as his fingers tightened.

  The laser optics had mapped out the interior well enough. Although, the heat signatures were intermittent. Likely a result of the ongoing and unseen battle between his armor’s software, and the enemy countermeasures.

  The enemy thermal signatures winked out and reappeared as though they were teleporting.

  He moved down the narrow corridor. Only an arm’s length of room on either side. It’d be a shuffle getting the crew out. Tight space. Not tactically sound.

  He rounded a curved corridor. Ahead, there was a single entrance with a sensor above it. A facial recognition scanner to permit authorized personnel.

  He attached a hacking device to the door. Five seconds later it was undone. Security was just a delay mechanism. Not impenetrable.

  Each half of the door recessed into the walls.

  He froze.

  At the end of a hundred-foot corridor, a lone man stood with a shoulder-deployed mobile missile system. There was only one way out of this.

  Forward.

  ***

  Knees bent Lee launched into a sprint. The missile-toting goon fired.

  He slid with the forward momentum. Feet first and onto his back. Just before his back hit the ground, he fired a reverse pulse from the jump-pack.

  Lee shot along the floor of the corridor on his back, the missile streaked by his face mere inches above. He raised his legs and crashed feet first into the speechless goon. This goon wasn’t wearing armor. Perhaps they didn’t have any left for the base defenders. The trooper’s ribs compressed into his lungs and jutted out his side at an odd angle.

  Lee continued. At the end, another door. He hacked it.

  The room opened to a square space. Inside the space was a simple enclosed, square structure. The thermal readings told him what he wanted was in there. This wasn’t a mechanically locked door, it was an antique door with hinges. He slammed the hinges with his arm weakening them. He pried it loose and threw it one-side. Lee comm’d Corporal Chen. “I’ve located the crew. Stand by to receive us by the north side of the outer wall.” Chen clicked back an acknowledgement.

  Inside, their backs against each wall, with their heads oriented to the floor, Endeavor’s crew. Their necks, hands and ankles bound to the wall by round half-circle rigid straps.

  Hate wasn’t a strong enough word. He scanned the faces quickly on his HUD. Vee wasn’t there.

  He moved around to each. They groaned and stirred. Most looked bewildered. Soiled. Nasty. The suit saved him from the smell. One by one he freed them and gently placed them on the floor.

  “Lieutenant Lee,” he said. “United Starship Phoenix. I’m taking you home boys and girls.”

  They were in no shape to do much. But they could hear.

  Some whimpered. Others nodded in silence. Some struggled to speak. Someone hugged him.

  “Does anyone know where Commander Alvarez is?”

  No answer. Some shook their heads.

  “Anyone? Commander Alvarez. Your captain. We have to find him.”

  The one who hugged him spoke. “They took him a few days ago. We don’t know where.” She looked frail.

  Lee dropped the bag of stimulants and his ration pack.

  “One stim for each. Half a cup of water and a separate booster. It’ll prevent the stim from allowing you to damage yourself.”

  Lee survey
ed the hellhole. “You’ve been through a lot. I can tell. But I need to ask a bit more of you. You’ve got to move. I can’t carry all of you. Things are bad down here and they’re worse up there.” He pointed skywards. “Just stay close. Follow my orders.”

  He un-shouldered his rifle. “The strongest or best shot among you take this.”

  “I’ll be back.”

  They started to protest.

  “I promise you.”

  He left the box to look for Vee.

  ***

  The other three doorways surrounding the metal “box” each had small rooms. Likely individual interrogation rooms. Each had a single chair and an overhead light. The crew had gathered outside the box. The stronger among them helped the others.

  Lee closed on the second door. His HUD told him the material was weak enough to smash. He balled his fist and punched through it. He then gripped it and pulled it from the attachments.

  In the center was Vee, manacled to a chair. A man stood behind Vee with a weapon aimed at his head.

  “Glad you could join us, Mr. Lee.”

  This was the definition of a cosmic joke. A very bad one. Ben James’ hideous grin was recognizable anywhere.

  How many times did he have to kill this insufferable goon?

  Chapter 28 – Hold A Little Longer

  “Any last words my United Fleet friend” – Rylar Kane

  Indri-3

  At the same time the door to Lee’s right opened.

  A man exited with a female officer. Lee recognized her as Endeavor’s Executive Officer. She too had a weapon aimed at her head.

  The man pulled his hostage away increasing the distance between him and Lee and stopped. To his left through the door was one problem and to the right another.

  “Let these people go and that’ll be the end of it,” Lee said.

  “No one is going.” The one to the left said. “You are staying. Your people outside are dead. Your ship in orbit was destroyed by our dreadnought. You can’t shoot both of us with your one weapon before one of these dies.”

  “I only made the offer to make myself feel better,” Lee said.

  The unknown one to the left seemed surprised. “About what?”

  “About killing every last one of you.”

  Those who blinked missed it. Lee shot the grappling hook spear through the forehead of Vee’s captor and shot the other one holding the Executive Officer through the left eye.

  Vee slumped next to the trooper. Lee moved in and hit him with a stim. Vee stirred and opened his eyes.

  “Lee…” He groaned.

  Lee triggered the recoil for the grappler as he hoisted Vee and carried him. The others helped Endeavor’s XO and hit her with a stim.

  Lee led the survivors through an alternate route and back into the interior section before the walls.

  Vee stirred. “Lee, I’m good I can walk. The stim is kicking in. You need to focus ahead.”

  Lee moved slightly ahead and continued along an alternate route to the final exit. He stopped. A man clad in black stood there. He felt a bump from behind. Lee gave Vee a questioning look.

  “I don’t know,” Vee said. “All I can tell you is it seems he is the man calling the shots down here.”

  That was all Lee needed to hear. Chen waited at the far side of the enclosure within the walls.

  “Follow Corporal Chen,” Lee said. “He’ll get you to the extraction point. I’ll deal with this goon.”

  Vee hesitated. “I don’t know. This guy . . . don’t underestimate him.”

  “Go. Now.”

  Vee signaled for the others to follow him.

  Lee comm'd Chen. “Corporal, lead them to the extraction zone. I’ll be along shortly.”

  “Will do, Lieutenant.”

  He watched them leave. All the while the man just stood and stared.

  “Get a good look,” Lee said. “I’m going to be the last thing you ever see.”

  The man smiled. “I am Ryler Kane.”

  “I don’t really care who you are.” Lee said.

  “I thought you should know the name of the man who is going to kill you. Your friend Avery won’t get far. He’s a weak one. But you, I don’t think you’d break as easily or as quickly as he did.”

  Lee and the man circled each other.

  “Your feeble taunts won’t stir me to stupidity, but I am going to hurt you for what you’ve done.”

  The man smiled. Lee didn’t blink and yet he almost missed it.

  Kane rolled and pounced with a forward kick towards Lee’s groin. Lee managed to slip a foot in the way barely, but the strike knocked him onto his back foot.

  Before Lee could shift his weight and recover, the man swept his legs out from under him. He was staring at the sky. His vision blurred. A strike to his face dazed him but also infuriated him. He lashed out with his bionic arm at the man’s head.

  The man dodged and rolled away.

  Kane pulled a slim two-foot object from his back. He waved it both ways, and it extended into a staff. Lee sighed.

  At least it’s not sword.

  The man moved in swinging. Lee blocked one strike near his face, another at his stomach, and wham! His face went numb. Another strike knocked him over again.

  Kane grinned and circled slowly. Lee braced on one knee and spit blood.

  “First the enclave you call the Terran Union will burn,” he said, as he brought the staff down toward Lee’s head.

  Lee rolled sideways.

  Kane swung again, Lee blocked it with his arm. He kicked at the man’s legs as he’d overreached, but the man skirted over his kick and backed away.

  “Then we’ll deploy another wormhole device at another location and strike. Your fleets can’t be everywhere.”

  Lee charged. The man side-stepped and struck Lee’s back. Lee charged again, swinging and kicking, the man pivoted and weaved, dodging each strike.

  Lee breathed hard.

  Just one lash with his favorite arm . . . but this goon moved too fast. Must be some kind of enhancement drug. The same kind banned by the United Systems.

  Lee tried again.

  This time while dodging, Kane flicked the staff around behind him while ducking beneath a strike from Lee’s arm, and cracked Lee in the right side of his head.

  Lee went down.

  The man pounced on top. Before Lee could react, the man slapped his bionic arm with a scrambler. It fell useless to the ground.

  One of Kane’s knees pinned Lee’s flesh and blood arm, and his other knee crushed Lee’s throat.

  Kane bared his teeth, leaning in close. “What’s that? Can’t quite hear you.”

  The pressure increased. The man was going to crush his neck.

  His chest felt like it would explode. Lee squirmed his flesh arm under the weight of the man who seemed content to ignore it. Lee choked—he vision started to go black.

  “We’ll open a wormhole to Earth, or Rigel.”

  Lee stirred.

  Kane carried on with his Sunday morning sermon. “We’re not interested in terms. Your generation has ended. I don’t know how the others feel about letting you scurry into uncharted space on what ships you have . . . just as you did my ancestors. Maybe we could have a great hunt.”

  The man was a good fighter. Best he’d ever seen. Lee hadn’t landed a blow. And Kane loved to talk, it seemed. He must have been a preacher in another life.

  But Lee’s flesh hand reached what he’d been squirming for. He gurgled trying to speak again. The pressure on his neck eased slightly.

  “Any last words, my United Fleet friend?”

  “I told you . . . I’d be the last thing . . . you ever saw.”

  The grappler spear discharged and impaled Kane through the chest. He dropped the staff, and stumbled back, mouth gaping.

  Lee crawled to his feet and ripped the scrambler off his bionic arm. Kane had a mortal wound but still had life in him. He swiped for Lee, much slower now. Lee struck the man’s arm with his bioni
c arm, shattering the bones.

  Kane yowled.

  Lee grabbed the man’s other hand and crushed the bones in it. He slammed his boot in the man’s chest and he fell flat on his back.

  Lee bent and smashed a fist into the man’s other arm in the area of the elbow. Lee leaned right into Kane’s face gripped his neck and slammed his forehead into the man’s nose. A satisfying bone crunch. “You should’ve opened your wormhole somewhere else, asshole.”

  Lee chucked him at a fatal velocity into the near base wall.

  He retrieved his grappler and sprinted off.

  Chapter 29 – The Race is not For the Swift

  “Yuri, bring our people home” – Aaron Rayne

  Phoenix

  Aaron wanted to kick himself.

  Perhaps the fancy capabilities of Phoenix made him complacent with tactics. The ORA captain anticipated he’d try that maneuver again and dropped some mines in his wake. While veering off from the last attack run, they maneuvered close to one of them.

  Fortunately, Aaron had retracted the railguns into the hull to protect them as they passed close to the dreadnought, so those were intact. However, the point defense batteries in the forward section were obliterated, and the forward armor plating had a hole the size of a small fighter craft.

  The forward sections sealed and prevented the rest of the ship from blasting apart from the stress forces.

  They seemed to be jabbing the dreadnought, while the dreadnought had delivered an uppercut, now Phoenix wobbled.

  Environmental systems extinguished plasma fires in the forward sections. The others were vented to prevent the spread. Emergency bulkheads slammed in place and force fields sealed tiny micro-breaches from other impacts from high-speed debris.

  Aaron hadn’t been idle. The scans pinpointed the most likely caches of missile ordnance. The caches had to be close to the superstructure of the vessel to allow for easy reloading of the missile batteries, not buried deep in the ship—where they’d have to be carried—or moved on some elaborate conveyance. Missiles weren’t small.