Trapped

by Scott Bartlett

  Winterton shook his head. “It will depend on how big the underlying craft is, and since we don't know where it starts and where the layers of fliers begin….”

  “Surely we can arrive at a reasonable estimate. Take its total mass, and subtract the amount likely to be taken up by the systems and infrastructure required to field a ship that size.”

  “I’ve already done that, sir, but it makes no sense.”

  “What did you arrive at? How many ships?” Husher stood to join his XO in front of the main display.

  “According to my estimate?” Winterton’s voice was wary. “At least seven hundred, sir. And that’s my estimate after they released that first cloud of nearly three hundred.”

  “A thousand ships,” Shota said. “From a single ship.”

  “It’s like our Hydras,” Tremaine put in. “Just like they can explode into thousands of kill-masses, that ship can convert itself into hundreds of smaller ones. Except when it does it, it increases its versatility by orders of magnitude.”

  Winterton spoke again. “Sir, it looks like it’s finished shedding the second layer of ships. Based on the new data—”

  “What the hell is that?” Shota snapped.

  On the tactical display, three more red dots had appeared, each roughly the same size as the first behemoth.

  Winterton’s voice faltered. “It’s…it’s three more of them.” He looked up, eyes locking onto Husher’s. “They’re releasing their own layers of ships.”

  The tactical display was getting overwhelmed by the sheer volume of threats appearing on it. A mass of angry dots poured toward the line of destroyers.

  Then, the display merged them into a single red wave.

  The green dots representing the destroyers practically disappeared.

  Chapter 18

  Tactical War Room

  UHC Relentless

  “Sir, we have to leave. Now.”

  Husher had moved from the CIC into the war room. It was just ten feet away from the command chair, but it might as well be a million miles away. Their conversation would be private. The last thing he needed was to show up Admiral Iver.

  “We had success—”

  Husher shook his head sharply. “We had limited success and we took losses. We still have a half-dozen of those things loose inside my ship. I have pilots in emergency pods waiting for pickup. And we have three times as many of those things inbound. Another onslaught like this and we’re going to start losing warships.”

  “They’re on board your ship?” Iver asked.

  “I don’t have exact details. I just know Major Gamble and his marines are dealing with the situation. Once those things got close enough to us, they slingshotted some kind of pods at us. And whatever’s in those pods then set to burrowing through the hull.”

  Iver looked shocked. “How did this happen?”

  Husher wanted to scream, You let it happen! But he simply shook his head. “We’ll have to get those answers later. Right now, we need to get out of here. The destroyers need to fall back to the battle group, and we need to jump back out of this universe. We can skim along the multiverse just like our Python fighters do in subspace, and then drop back in at another location.”

  “And if those things can follow us?”

  “We’ll have to deal with that scenario if it occurs.” Husher felt a strong sense of déjà vu, and it wasn’t hard to see why. They’d had this exact conversation less than an hour ago, back when Husher had had a hell of a lot more fighters, and no crazy creatures on his ship.

  Iver sighed, sitting back. “Very well. I’ll give the order to jump out of the universe.”

  Husher began to thank him when the screen went blank.

  He stood and returned to CIC. Shota caught his eye, and Husher gave him a small nod.

  As soon as he returned to the command chair, Long spoke up. “Sir, the admiral is ordering an immediate jump from the dimension.”

  “Very well. Make ready for jump.”

  “Captain.” Tremaine turned from the Tactical console to face him. “The marine teams still report—”

  “I’m aware,” Husher said. “But we need to get the ship to safety before we can clean up that mess.” He was still pissed off at Iver for putting them through this. They were taking more damage with every second.

  He turned to his XO in time to see a scowl on Shota’s face as well. The man found it hard to mask his emotions in the best of circumstances. Something he’ll have to learn if he ever gets his own command. “Let’s talk, Commander,” Husher said. He wanted to work through this slowly with someone, and his XO was the obvious choice. “Consider it part of your training.”

  Shota smiled. He and Husher had joked about their relationship from the start, and in spite of his short temper and reckless streak, Husher liked the man a great deal.

  “Shoot, Captain.”

  “If these creatures are the creation of an AI—”

  “We don’t know that,” Shota said. “We know the Progenitors made lots of AIs and sent them all across the multiverse, but it’s not as though there wouldn’t be other life in those dimensions, both before and after the AIs arrived.”

  “Fair enough. But let’s try and understand the devil we know before we start hypothesizing about a new one.”

  Shota nodded. “Okay. So these things are the creation of one of the Progenitor AIs.”

  “And if that’s so, then there’s no way it can follow us when we jump out.”

  “Right. The Progenitors took the precaution of installing limitations that wouldn’t allow them to get back out of the universes they were dropped into. I read your report on them.”

  Husher took a moment to consider that. Shota hadn’t seen first-hand the destruction wrought by the Progenitors when they’d unleashed AIs on the Milky Way in an attempt to destroy humanity in its infancy.

  After they’d finally foiled the Progenitor plan, Ochrim had been the one to discover that the process for sending AIs back into a universe’s timeline was an imprecise science at best. As a result, the Progenitors hadn’t just fired their AIs into the human universe’s past. They’d been forced to fire them into any number of other universes, peppering the multiverse with the deadly machines.

  Any given universe had a chance of hosting an AI, especially the ones intertwined with the human universe. At least some of those AIs were bound to have taken root—and to have devised ways to take over the universes they found themselves in.

  But the Progenitors had at least been smart enough to understand that their own creations could turn on them, so they’d designed them with fail-safes that wouldn’t allow them to pass between dimensions.

  “The AIs shouldn’t be able to circumvent the failsafe.” Husher watched Shota’s face closely. “But things that shouldn’t happen have a way of happening anyway.”

  The XO’s eyebrows shot up. “You think they can jump interdimensionally, just like us?”

  “I think that’s another thing I’d like to find out. Either they were made by a Progenitor AI, in which case the same limitation might not apply, or—”

  “Or they’re a hostile alien native to this universe.”

  “Either way, knowing if they can jump through the multiverse would be good to know.”

  “We are on a recon mission.” Shota’s voice dropped to a mutter. “No matter what the admiral thinks.”

  Husher decided to let that comment slide. “We’re about to find out what they’re capable of.”

  “And if they can track us? Follow us?”

  Husher shook his head. “Then we might just have started the Fourth Galactic War.”

  “Warp bubble generating,” the Helm officer said, using a misnomer that had become popular throughout the Fleet. To travel between universes, the quantum engines actually generated a spherical wormhole.

  Time seemed to slow as the CIC grew deathly quiet. Husher was sure he could hear the helmsman’s hands slide across his console. He waited for the familiar distortion
to fill the main viewscreen.

  Instead, nothing happened.

  Chapter 19

  Relentless Marine Company

  Outside the Engineering Plant, UHC Relentless

  “Get down!” shouted Major Gamble as two marines screamed in agony, pressure suits melting off their bodies.

  Only two marines remained near Gamble, and they reacted instantly to his order, turning and rolling away from the creature that had fired the mucus-like sacs of acid.

  Whatever the thing was, it wasn’t like anything Gamble had fought before. It had disproportionately long claws that looked like they had a series of hooks running along the edge.

  The alien was one of the half-dozen that had burst through the hull. Given they’d managed to elude the mechs outside the ship, Gamble had expected them to be tough hombres. What he hadn’t expected were creatures which were practically as big as mechs themselves.

  Big, but not dumb. The intruders were making their way toward the Relentless’ main reactor. They were clearly on a mission to disable the ship.

  The engineering plant of the Relentless was familiar ground for Major Gamble and his platoon of marines—it wasn’t far from the skirmish rooms where they trained for combat situations just like this one.

  But training in pressure suits was a world apart from actually fighting in them, against hulking alien foes, in a depressurized compartment.

  Gamble fired his R-57 assault rifle in a controlled burst aimed center-mass, letting the computer in his pressure suit guide his shots. The hammer lock in his helmet’s targeting system flashed red as he hit the target again and again.

  But the alien wouldn’t go down. Instead, its strange bulbous head began to slide open. The gap grew larger and larger, impossibly wide, like its gaping mouth was set on a single hinge. Razor-sharp fangs gleamed from the edges of its oddly shaped maw.

  It wasn’t hard to tell the creature was about to fire another round of acidic mucus from its ugly face. Gamble screamed and charged forward, waiting for the acid to coat his pressure suit at any second. The rifle pounded against his shoulder.

  Bam. Bam. Bam. The weapon kicked as he slid his aim past center-mass to send slugs right down the thing’s open throat.

  Its head bucked, and something like bone fragments bubbled up from its esophagus, like it was gargling white rocks.

  Then the back of the head seemed to collapse. With that, the creature’s lower appendages buckled. It sputtered, and acid splattered upward, to Gamble’s left. He didn’t know if any got on him, but he didn’t have time to think about it.

  He was practically on top of the creature now. Then, he realized there was another one right behind it.

  On instinct, he kicked the dying creature toward the still-healthy one.

  It slammed against the lower limbs of the second alien just as the newcomer tried to spray an acid bath of its own. This time, Gamble was sure he was going to get acid in the face.

  Then the second alien bucked and jerked around, the left side of its face perforated with the slugs ripping through it.

  The two marines behind Gamble had both opened up on the beast, taking a cue from him and firing at the head as it opened up to spit acid.

  But neither had a good angle from where they were firing, and the best they could do was riddle the side of its head with slugs. The combined impacts weren’t enough to kill the alien, but it did spin away, sending its acid harmlessly away from Gamble.

  Except, of course, it wasn’t harmless.

  “What is that acidic shit!” screamed Private Davis, rushing up beside Gamble. He continued to pump rounds into the alien they’d knocked sideways. It bounced and jerked, trying to turn away from the barrage, but a second spray of slugs prevented that.

  “It’s growing!” shouted Tammery, his R-57 bouncing in his arms. Gamble and Davis both glanced over at him, and he pulled his hand off his assault rifle long enough to point upward before turning his attention to the alien that was now prone on the ground. He gritted his teeth and kept firing.

  Gamble glanced up where Tammery had been pointing: there were holes in the overhead, where the creatures had dropped down from the compartment above. The holes were widening, the acidic substance oozing its way into cracks and crevices, chewing away at the Relentless.

  Gamble glanced back at the two marines that had been sprayed by the acid just a moment ago. Their bodies were almost completely dissolved. He could only make out a few intact pieces of combat suits. The floor below was partially melted away, but the remaining acid seemed to be pooling, and not corroding further downward.

  “It’s not melting through the deck,” Gamble said. How is that possible? The other marines followed his gaze. “If I didn’t know any better, I’d say the stuff knows it was supposed to help these ugly bastards get to the main reactor.”

  Davis’s eyes went wide behind his faceplate. “Are you saying the stuff is sentient? That’s impossible.”

  Gamble looked up again at the overhead. The holes were still growing. When would they stop? At this rate, it would take weeks to repair the breached bulkheads and decks, not to mention the hull. “I’m not sure I think anything is impossible any—”

  Searing pain racked his left shin as red warning signs lit up the interior of his helmet. He jerked back a moment before he realized that was the exact wrong thing to do.

  The creature he’d shot in the face and kicked was somehow still alive. The head was gone, replaced by a black-red stump, but one of the giant claws had slid over and smashed against his leg. As he jerked back, the serrated edges had ripped open a gash in his pressure suit.

  He grabbed a patch from his thigh kit and slapped it over the gash. Blood was already oozing out of the wound.

  The patch sealed on contact, and the red flashing in his helmet died away. Gamble flipped his assault rifle up and fired three more rounds into the prone alien until it finally lay still.

  “They’re tough as shit.”

  Tammery’s stating the obvious again. It was the man’s specialty when they weren’t in combat, and in some remote corner of his mind, Gamble found it amusing that even in life-and-death situations, the marine found it necessary to tell everyone what he was seeing.

  “That’s two down,” Davis said. “But Tate says there are four more that came in down the secondary access hall. They have a couple cornered, but they aren’t sure they can hold.”

  Gamble nodded, then winced as he stood on his lacerated leg. “Let’s go.”

  “You gonna be able to walk, Major?”

  “No,” he said. “I’m gonna run. And so are you. Move.”

  Gamble gritted his teeth and dashed toward Tate’s squad. He heard Davis and Tammery fall in behind him.

  “You know, Major,” Tammery said, “I’m starting to think we might have bitten off more than we can chew, coming to this universe.”

  “Great. I’ll make sure to bring up your concerns with command.” They turned down the secondary shaft. Gamble could already hear sustained fire, and he knew there was going to be an even bigger fight waiting for him ahead. “They always like to hear what a jarhead thinks.”

  Chapter 20

  Combat Information Center

  UHC Relentless

  Husher could almost hear the helmsman’s frustration from the way his fingers flew across his console.

  “The quantum drives are online, but they aren’t generating any substantial depreciation in energy density around the ship. We can’t spool up to superluminal speeds without that.”

  As they struggled to generate a spherical wormhole, the Relentless was speeding away from the oncoming cloud of alien vessels, and so were the other ships in the battle group.

  Clearly, no wormhole would form. If it was going to, it would have by now. Husher didn’t need Moens to tell him that.

  “What can we do about it?” he asked.

  Moens’ lips formed a thin line. “Nothing. But we still have local warp.”

  “We have warp, but n
ot interdimensional travel?”

  For a moment, the helmsman seemed at a loss for words. “T-that’s right, sir. They’re two completely different technologies. Our standard drives are still online. The warp bubble doesn’t involve—”

  “Can you plot a course out of the system and send it out to the rest of the group?”

  Moens glanced over at Lieutenant Fontaine, and the Nav officer shook her head. “It would take some time.”

  Fontaine was the queen of understatement, so Husher assumed it was going to be a monumental undertaking. “How long?”

  “Well, we’re in a new system with no charts, no data. Typically in this scenario—”

  “I’m not talking typical.”

  “—we’d be looking at a few hours to plot a safe course out of the system, sir. One that ensured we wouldn’t collide with any debris during warp transit. Which would start with waiting for sensor data to come in from the system’s periphery, and even then we’d need a certain amount of luck.”

  Shota moved up next to Husher as he glanced back at the tactical viewscreen, which showed the cloud of incoming aliens. “They’re still gaining on us,” the XO said.

  “We can only move as fast as our slowest support ships. That would be the two fuelers. The Kobishi and the Trenton.”

  Shota shrugged. “We’re sure as hell not leaving our fuelers behind. We’ll need a Plan B.”

  Husher turned back to Fontaine. “I’m looking for something more in the neighborhood of a few minutes, Lieutenant.”

  Her eyes grew large for a moment; then she frowned and turned back to her console. “The stars here are much closer together than in the Milky Way. That will cut down on the necessary calculations. If we can manage to get close to the periphery, we can probably plot a clean course more or less on the fly.”

  Husher turned to Long. “Open a channel to Providence.”

  The image of Admiral Iver snapped into focus on the main viewscreen. Captain Daniels was beside him, talking to an enlisted crewman.