by M. R. Forbes
It was as though God had dropped a steel wall from the sky. The Magellan seemed to float a dozen meters in the air beside him before tumbling straight down, countless kilograms of mass dropping onto four heavy landing gear that extended from the hull just in time. The ground shook harder as they hit the surface and began to sink, hydraulics flexing to catch the rest of the bulk. He knew the ship had anti-gravity technology within it that would make it lighter, but it was still a heavy beast.
The ship dipped slightly and then rose again, coming to rest on the gear with a satisfied thunk. The plasma cannons on the starship continued to move and fire, tracing airborne targets and slamming the ground forces now blockaded by the Magellan's sizable bulk.
Then the next part of the miracle came. Three ramps dropped from the side of the ship, extending to the ground below. Soldiers poured out from them, men and women in neat gray uniforms charging down the ramp and into the battle. They avoided the heavy armors but swept across and back toward the city, where the embattled infantry was making its stand. They moved with a uniformity that Donovan had never seen from the rebels, a clear contrast to the two different types of training they had received.
Donovan shifted his mech away from Ehri's, looking down as he did. Her cockpit slid open, and she climbed out, looking up at him. She pointed at herself and then at the Magellan. She was going to it.
He decided to follow.
FIFTY-THREE
"STATUS," GABRIEL SHOUTED, GETTING to his feet as the Magellan came to rest.
"We're down," Miranda replied. "No luck getting through to Major Peters, though."
"Colonel Graham is deploying the units to the ground," Colonel Choi said. "Hopefully they'll remember to follow their training, instead of marveling over the fresh air."
"It doesn't look that fresh," Gabriel said. "It probably smells like burned flesh out there. We went over it all with them a dozen times on the way over. They'll do their jobs. Colonel Choi, you have the bridge."
"Where are you going?" Choi asked, not breaking her concentration from operating the plasma cannons.
"I have to find Colonel Peters and the clone," he said.
"Why?"
"My father didn't tell you?"
"No." She dared a glance at him. "What are you two up to?"
"Trying to save the world," Gabriel replied. "Give me three minutes to get off this boat, and then get her back in the sky. We can offer wider fire support hovering over the site than sitting down here."
"Who's the Colonel here?" Choi said.
"If you will, ma'am," Gabriel added.
"I'll take care of it."
Gabriel broke for the exit before pausing. "Miranda," he shouted. She looked up from the DSS display. "I love you."
"I love you too," she replied, but he was already out the door.
He ran down the corridor, his boots clanking along the metal flooring as he headed for the nearest exit. He paused at the armory; a single Dread rifle left intentionally for him to claim. He grabbed the weapon before continuing on, spilling out into the wide hangar where light from outside was filtering in from the open ramp.
He hurried toward it, his heart racing, hoping beyond hope that the mechs they had saved were being piloted by the Colonel and the Juliet clone. So much had gone right so far, why not that?
He was halfway across the hangar when two figures appeared at the top of the ramp, silhouetted by the light. At first, Gabriel raised the rifle, unsure of their intentions. Then he caught a glimpse of the long red hair and cherubic face of his mother, dirty as it was.
"Captain St. Martin?" Donovan said.
"Colonel Peters," Gabriel replied, unable to hold back his smile. "Thank God."
"We got your father's message," the Major said. "Where is he? Where's the Ishur?"
"In trouble," Gabriel said. "We need to go."
"Go? What do you mean?"
"You," he said, pointing at the clone. "What's your name?"
"Juli... Ehri," she said, catching herself.
"Colonel, we need to get into the Dread capital asap. It doesn't matter how, but we have to find a way. My father is a hell of a pilot and a hell of a commander, but there are seven Dread fortresses up there trying to blow him into space dust."
"Captain, I appreciate your enthusiasm," Donovan said. "We're nearly four kilometers away from the domo'shah, and there's a battlefield separating us."
"I don't care," Gabriel said. "In four minutes, those ships are going to reach the Ishur's position and start firing. Do you know what happens then?"
Donovan's face turned pale, and he nodded. "Okay. How are we going to get there before that happens?"
Gabriel pointed to the corner of the hangar. There was something low and long sitting in the shadows there. An excavator they had brought in from Alpha Settlement. "It doesn't look like much, but it's as heavily armored as anything else we have. Let's go."
The three of them ran to the machine. It had a drill mounted to the front of it, and a mechanical arm with a second drill attached to the rear. Gabriel led them onto the top of it, and then down into a manual airlock.
"Close that up for me, will you?" Gabriel asked as he moved to the front of the narrow internal confines and fell into the driver's seat.
Ehri paused, grabbing the hatch and pulling it closed.
Gabriel pressed the ignition, bringing the machine to life with a soft hum. The battery was only good for a hundred kilometers or so, but they didn't need to go anywhere near that far.
"Here we go," he said, pushing the control yoke forward.
The excavator shuddered and jerked as it built up power, and then kicked ahead toward the ramp and onto it, heading down and building speed. Donovan grabbed for the side of the machine as it slammed into the ground, bouncing back up and shaking from side to side before leveling out.
"Sorry," Gabriel said. "Major, we had a pilot crash land after our first meeting. Captain Soon Kim. I don't suppose you know what happened to him?"
Gabriel turned his head, his heart sinking when he saw Donovan's expression.
"I'm sorry, Captain. We rescued him after the crash, and he was with us for a while. He was killed in action back in Texas."
Daphne was going to be heartbroken. He felt his own sense of loss at the news. There would be time for mourning later. "I understand. Thank you, Colonel."
"He was a good man. A hell of a mech pilot, too."
"He was." Gabriel paused, pushing those emotions aside. "Colonel, there's a standard radio over there. You should be able to tune into your people's frequency through it."
Donovan dropped into a small seat beside a series of analog switches. "Please, call me Donovan. How do I use it?"
"Donovan, the dial tunes the frequency. Press down on the button to speak. It's old tech, but it works. By the way, my name is Gabriel."
"I know," Donovan replied. "You St. Martins have quite a reputation."
Gabriel felt the ground shake as the Magellan fired her bottom thrusters, beginning to process to regain altitude. It would have put an impossible strain on her original power supply to stay inside gravity for any length of time. With the Dread reactors, she could remain almost indefinitely.
"We can't see if anything is attacking us in here," Ehri said, finally making her way to the front.
Gabriel scanned the world outside through a narrow window. He could see the Magellan's troops ahead of him, working their way toward the city. "The armor is meant to withstand mountains falling on top of it. We can take a pretty solid beating."
"I think I've got it," Donovan said from the co-pilot seat. "Actual, this is Delta, do you read me? Over. Actual, this is Delta. Over."
"Colonel, is that you?" Kroeger said after Donovan repeated himself a few times.
"Kroeger," Donovan replied. "What's your sitrep?"
"I've got three guys from my unit with me, holed up in a building near the front lines. We've been sniping any of the clone bastards that show their faces and trying to help
the rest of the units through to the fortress, but they've got a serious barricade in the way. Mechs and tanks, and they ain't moving."
Gabriel looked back at Donovan. "Colonel Choi will spot the defenses and start hitting them. We need to be ready to move in."
"Roger that," Donovan said. "Kroeger, did you see the starship that landed behind you?"
"Yes, sir."
"She's one of ours, and she's ticked off. See if you can organize a team to make a break for the fortress when she starts clearing the field. We'll be right behind you in a big ugly thing with a pointed front."
"Hell yes, sir," Kroeger replied. "Sir, it looks like she's got a lot of mosquitos biting at her neck."
Gabriel didn't like the sound of that.
"Oh, there goes one," Kroeger said a moment later. "Ouch. That had to hurt. Who's shooting on that thing?"
Gabriel smiled, keeping the excavator on track.
"The tide is turning, Donovan," he said. "I can feel it."
"You and me both, Gabriel. You and me both."
FIFTY-FOUR
THEODORE KEPT HIS EYES glued to the Magellan from the time it backed out of the Ishur's hangar until it vanished around the dark side of the moon. He felt a heavy mixture of fear and pride at the sight of it, knowing it was his boy out there instead of him, running the gauntlet on a mission that was as impossible as anything they had ever tried.
A mission as impossible as getting a starship away from Earth during an alien invasion.
Once the Magellan had vanished from sight, he settled back into the Dread command chair, shifting a few times to get comfortable. Alan was sitting at the station directly in front of him, and he glanced back knowingly. The two men had their past differences, but their goals had brought back the friendship they had once shared. Grudges were pointless, especially when lives were at stake.
"Alan, how long do we have?" he asked.
"About twelve minutes," General Cave replied.
Theodore shifted in his seat again. He picked up the tablet that was spliced into the terminal in front of him and checked the threat display for himself. Seven ships. Seven! He smiled. The Domo'dahm wasn't taking any chances with them.
"The question now is, how do we stay alive long enough for Gabriel to do what he needs to do?"
He said it out loud, posing it to his bridge crew. He was down some of his most trusted people after they volunteered to go with Gabriel. James, Vivian, Miranda, Guy and Sarah Larone. Had he made a mistake letting Spaceman Locke go with Gabriel? Would she have accepted his decision if he had said no? He doubted it.
"We can slip away and come back," Reza said, offering up a suggestion.
"And leave our people behind? No. Never again."
"Then what if we reverse course? Back away? We can gain about six minutes."
"And be that much further away from Earth," Theodore replied. "Let's split the difference. Colonel Ames, reverse at half."
"Yes, sir," Colonel Ames replied.
"Any other ideas?"
There was silence on the bridge.
"Mr. Mokri, can you give me an estimate of how long we'll last against seven Dread fortresses based on our shield accuracy from that tangle with the last two coullions?"
"Yes, sir. One minute."
Reza began working on his tablet while the precious seconds ticked away. Theodore didn't waste them, considering their other options.
"What if we charge one of the flanks?" General Cave asked. "Get in close. It will make it harder for them to all target us at once."
"Not a bad thought, but close range makes the DSS less effective. We need to find the right balance."
"Do we have time to slip past them, and get them all gathered on one side? That will lower our profile and make it easier to cover the area with the shields."
"Except it won't. The modulation only covers a small area at any given time. Multiple angles of attack give us four points to try to defend ourselves with instead of one. Again, it's a balance."
Another minute of silence followed.
"I have the calculation, sir," Reza said. "At optimal DSS positioning, we can gain another eight minutes."
"Giving Gabriel about twenty," Theodore said. "That's not enough time."
Two more minutes of silence had passed when the edge of the first fortress appeared around the corner of the moon, dark and imposing.
"They're launching fighters, sir," General Cave said a moment later.
Small ships would be hard-pressed to take down the Ishur alone, but they could get in close and weaken it.
"ETA?"
"Four minutes, seven seconds."
"Scramble the defenses," Theodore said. "Get our units out there."
"Yes, sir."
General Cave reached out to Lieutenant Bale, who got the squadron launched. Sixteen fighters, a mix of human and Dread configurations, along with the two ek'shah, moved out ahead of the backing up fortress, shooting ahead toward the oncoming swarm of enemy ships. If they were lucky, the Dread either hadn't figured out how to shrink the modulation to cover their fighters or didn't care enough about them to bother. It had taken some time for the assemblers to make the phase paint, but it was the one advantage they held.
"Ishur Actual, this is Red One," Lieutenant Bale said, her channel patched into the bridge. "We are in position."
"Roger, Red One," Theodore said. "Don't dilly-dally on my account. You see a snake; you choke it."
"Roger," she replied. "You heard the General. Let's give them hell."
The smaller ships burst forward on flares of thrusters, splitting apart as they approached the oncoming enemy mass. Plasma bolts began littering the space between them seconds later as the battle was truly joined.
Theodore watched from the bridge, his eyes darting across the swarm of ships as they circled and danced around one another. He saw an enemy fighter get the drop on one of their fighters, firing plasma into its rear. He smiled when a flare of darkspace appeared, swallowing the bolt.
"Thank God for that," he said, as the same enemy starfighter was hit by one of Lieutenant Bale's bolts and stopped maneuvering, drifting away from the battle.
He was quickly snapped out of his reverie when a flare of light near the moon caught his attention. The first Dread fortress had completed its circuit and taken a long-range pot shot at them.
"We're under fire," General Cave said. "Sergeant Abdullah, that one's yours."
"Yes, sir. I have it, sir," Abdullah replied, manipulating the DSS. The bolt flared as it hit the darkspace shield and then vanished.
"What are those coullions thinking?" Theodore said. "They should know they can't slip one by from that range."
"There's no harm in trying," General Cave replied.
"No, I suppose not."
Theodore checked on the fighter groups. They were holding their own, making quick work of the Dread forces with the help of their superior shields. The ships were small enough that the modulation offered full coverage from enemy attacks.
"Another shot incoming from the port side," General Cave said, monitoring the domo'shah.
A second fortress had cleared the moon and fired. Three more were almost clear enough to join the attack.
"Here it comes," Theodore said.
Except there was no plan that gave them more than twenty minutes. Not without a miracle.
He closed his eyes, his thoughts drifting to Juliet.
"I know you're out there," he said softly. "Somewhere better than this. Somewhere peaceful and free. I know you've done your best to get us this far, and I know it isn't fair to ask, but I don't suppose you have one more blessing to pass on? It isn't for me. It's for the people on board. The civilians. The ones who trust in me to keep them safe. They're counting on me. They believe in me like I believe in you."
"Three more bolts incoming," General Cave said. "More fighters are heading this way."
Theodore kept his eyes closed in silent prayer, hoping that something would come to him. Some way of
keeping them alive. The seconds passed. The Ishur shuddered as the first of the Dread bolts slipped past their defenses.
"Damn," Sergeant Abdullah said. "They're spacing out their shots, but firing at the same time. I can't cover them all."
The Ishur shuddered again.
"Theodore, we need to do something," General Cave said. "We're out of time." He turned back toward Theodore. "Teddy? Don't quit on us now. We need you."
Theodore opened his eyes. Juliet hadn't answered him, and that was okay. He knew what it meant.
"Quit? Oh no, I'm not about to quit. Just thinking is all. Hoping for a miracle, too. If God isn't going to give us one, we'll have to make it for ourselves. Colonel Ames, reverse course."
"Yes, sir," Colonel Ames replied.
"What are you thinking?" General Cave asked.
"Stay alive, as long as we can, any way we can. Estimates are just estimates. It's our will to fight, our will to live that's going to decide our fate. Tell Red One we're on the move, and to either pack it in and hitch a ride or keep fighting. It's her call."
"Yes, sir."
Theodore surveyed the field ahead as General Cave made the call. He never expected the fighters to disengage and come home, and he wasn't surprised when they didn't.
He located each of the domo'shah. All seven had cleared the moon now, and the change in direction was bringing them in faster and faster. As Abdullah had said, they were synchronizing their attacks, firing all seven heavy plasma cannons at once, clustered but not joined. It was an impossible task for the Sergeant to continue to block them all.
"Colonel, evasive maneuvers, do your best to keep them guessing."
"Yes, sir."
The Ishur shook again, another plasma beam striking one of the long slipspace fins. It sparked and vented oxygen as it was torn from the fortress.
"Too close," Theodore said.
"General, shouldn't we attack them?" Reza asked.
"What good will that do, Mr. Mokri? We can't afford to sit still and pour energy into their shields, and we certainly don't want a wandering wormhole sucking up our planet."
