Trapped

by Scott Bartlett

  “Sir,” Winterton said. “The Stomachs are unloading their Wayfarers.” Even as he said it, Husher could see the red dots bursting from their biological carriers.

  “How are the Stomachs we hit with missiles doing?” Husher asked.

  “Both incapacitated.”

  “And the third?”

  “Engaging our air group. Difficult to say what the outcome will be.”

  Husher had Long put him through to the Idaho, which was right behind the Relentless. “Captain, kindly lead the column toward our primary target. The Relentless and her air group are going back for the O’Kane.”

  Captain Beverly Halger looked nonplussed. “We need the Relentless more here if we’re about to make an attack run on that big gang of Brood.”

  “Admiral Iver took a portion of the strike group around to the other side of this vector. He’s going to hit another of the five potential hive mind locations, then meet up with you and take command of the column.” Husher hoped Iver would do that, anyway. It had been the plan, but who knew what kind of resistance he might be facing from other Stomachs sneaking among the asteroids?”

  “And in the meantime?” Halger asked.

  “In the meantime, we’ve disabled two Stomachs. I see that you’ve been able to damage a third. And the Wasp did the same to a fourth.”

  “We still have heavy fighter involvement. And some of those Wayfarers have already landed on my ship.”

  Husher paused, considering that news. “We’ll leave the main starfighter fleet with you. We’ll take the Relentless air group to go back for the O’Kane.”

  “I really don’t think—”

  “It’s not up for discussion, Captain. I was given operational command by the admiral, in case you forgot. The O’Kane has no fighters to defend her. She needs our help. Besides, you’ll rendezvous with the Providence shortly and be reinforced.”

  “Understood,” Halger said, her lips a straight line. “But I’m not happy about it.”

  Me either. The connection ended. “Bring us around, Helm. As quick as you can.”

  He leaned over his com and relayed a message to Major Callum to bring his fighters around. When he looked up again, the scene on the viewscreen was flashing past in a blur that Husher might have mistaken for the universe tumbling out of control. He was suddenly very aware that without the artificial gravity, he’d be thrown from his seat, along with everyone else working quietly at their stations in the CIC.

  Well, I did tell Moens to be quick.

  The view stabilized, revealing a grim scene. The O’Kane had been flanked by two Stomachs. Two thick columns of Pseudopods streamed from the bulbous alien vessels, hurtling toward the beleaguered destroyer.

  Chapter 45

  Relentless Air Group

  Asteroid field in Scion space

  Callum had never been in a fight like this in his life.

  “On your six,” shouted his wingman Rooster as two more of the Pseudopods flashed past.

  The bigger Stomachs didn’t seem to be playing their game of jumping in and out of space, and Callum wondered to himself if that wasn’t because of the asteroids that were everywhere. His sensors kept picking up on smaller debris that could damage his craft. Having to constantly dodge it was wreaking havoc on his concentration.

  “I can’t see a thing in all this,” Z-man shouted.

  “Thanks for the update,” grunted Thunder from somewhere farther down the engagement.”

  “Two o’clock high, I’ve got inbound.”

  Callum spied the incoming pair of Pseudopods. He spun his fighter around and smashed down on the controls, sending kill slugs flying even before his computer could find a lock. They tore into the front Pseudopod, but the rear one managed to evade his entire stream of kinetic impactors.

  He flipped to a Sidewinder and waited for a good tone, then let it fly. He was close to the target, probably too close, but he couldn’t be sure it wouldn’t jump out of space. The Pseudopod tried to evade, but it didn’t have enough time to react.

  The explosion rocked Callum’s Python. Red lights flashed, accompanied by alarms. A portion of hull plating was highlighted in red on his HUD.

  “That was a little too close for comfort, Major,” Rooster said.

  “Two more,” snapped Callum, allowing inertia to take over as he spun the outer shell of his fighter around. The target shrank for a moment, but the computer compensated. He loosed a string of kinetic impactors. Again, he was only half-lucky. One Pseudopod was clipped and spun wildly out of control, but the other kept coming.

  The first bogey crashed into a small asteroid, about twice the size of a Python. The asteroid exploded, sending chunks of debris whizzing. Alarms sounded in Callum’s cockpit as his hull absorbed the impacts.

  This time, Callum noticed something else. The second Pseudopod, the one that had somehow evaded his slugs, was now floating dead in space. It took him a moment to be sure, because of the nature of their amoeba-like structure.

  It was the asteroid explosion. It had damaged his hull, but apparently the Pseudopods didn’t have the kind of hulls that could withstand such an impact.

  Debris was proving to be a real hazard—to both sides. His pilots were flying more cautiously, but the Pseudopods seemed downright frightened, with their erratic movements. Weren’t they supposed to be mindless drones? Maybe when not being directly controlled by the Brood mind, they did have some form of cognition.

  “Asteroids,” Callum shouted over the radio. “Shoot the asteroids around you. Anything you see. They can’t take the impacts.”

  “Uh, we can’t really take it either,” Rooster shot back.

  “We can take it better than they can. Just don’t get carried away.”

  The strategy turned out to be easier to outline than execute. Soon enough, the battlespace was clogged, and his fighters had to pull back. He lost two fighters in the effort.

  But it worked. The Pseudopods were dropping like flies thanks to the wayward asteroid chunks.

  Callum pulled open a priority channel to the CIC. “Captain, the Pseudopods are susceptible to blunt impacts. We’re destroying as many asteroids as we can out here to create a debris field. It’s making it suicide for the enemy to fly through.”

  “Sounds suicidal for your fighters too. Your hulls aren’t indestructible.”

  Callum was reminded again that Husher wasn’t just some plush seat-sitter. He’d spent time in a cockpit too. “We can manage. The thing is, without this, I’m not sure we stand a chance.”

  “Understood. We’ll do what we can to assist.”

  A moment later, the Relentless fired a secondary particle beam into the heart of an asteroid that would have been too large for a Python to blow up. Then, she hit another.

  “Pull back,” Callum ordered as the debris field swept through the remaining Pseudopods struggling to make it to the O’Kane. As the debris overtook them, they broke up and scattered.

  The Relentless had already turned one of her particle beams on the nearest Stomach, and Callum watched, pleased, as it burst apart and blew organic chunks out into space.

  “Go get some, big girl,” he whispered as the beam lanced into the split-open Stomach, which yawned open like diseased roadkill.

  “Let’s form up and get ready for another run,” Callum said. “We still have a second Stomach out there.”

  Rooster pulled tight after a moment, and Callum did a quick count-off as his team started to reform. He’d lost six fighters, and at least two more didn’t look like they’d even get back home.

  But the O’Kane was hanging in there. He instructed his fighter to give him a zoomed-in visual of the cruiser. Then, he frowned.

  “Captain,” he called to Husher. “It looks like some Wayfarers landed on the O’Kane. Her mech team is engaging them on the hull.”

  “Affirmative,” Husher said. “I’m in contact with her captain. She also has all her marines engaged at the moment. They’ll either stop them from getting to her reactor or th
ey won’t.”

  Callum nodded to himself. Couldn’t argue with that. He could only control the fight in front of him. He had to trust his fellow soldiers to handle their business.

  “This asteroid field might be the advantage we needed,” Rooster said. “How’s my nose look?”

  Callum boosted his Python forward so he could take a look. His wingman was nursing damage to his nose that had incapacitated one of his rocket ports, but his other weapons looked intact. “She’s ugly, but she’ll get the job done.”

  Thunder cut in. “I gotta tell ya, boss. I’m starting to like our chances—”

  An intensely bright light flashed, like a star going supernova right next door to them. It flickered, then went out.

  “What the hell was that?” Z-man said, who was late returning to the formation. His was the last Python Callum was waiting for.

  “Looked like a reactor drive going critical,” Rooster said.

  On Callum’s HUD, a yellow blinking icon appeared, indicating a direct line to the CIC was open. A knot of dread took shape in his stomach.

  “We just lost the Wasp,” Husher said.

  Chapter 46

  Combat Information Center

  UHC Relentless

  The Wasp was ripped in half, the rupture exactly where her reactor core would have been.

  The rear quarter of the ship was continuing to hurtle forward, dragged on by inertia in the dead stillness of space. The front of the ship was slowly rotating and tumbling away, giving off no energy signatures. Completely dead.

  “Send out rescue teams,” Husher snapped.

  “Aye, sir.” said Long. “On it.”

  “That’s the second destroyer we’ve lost in two days,” Shota said. “And even if the O’Kane can fight off the Wayfarers clawing their way inside her, they’ll still have damage to deal with.”

  Husher nodded slowly. He’s right. What’s more, we can expect no reinforcements. No new ships. No replacement parts. No more ordnance.

  We’re on our own.

  He shook himself. “Tactical, how’s that debris plan working out? Is Callum on to something?”

  “Seems so, Captain. The Brood are definitely more susceptible to kinetic impacts than we are.”

  “Why did they come in here at all?” Shota asked. “Why not bypass the asteroid fields all together?”

  “Catch-22.” Husher said, remembering Fesky using that phrase to describe her effort to get cleared to fly. I’d sure like to have her out there. “Say what you will about those Scion pulse cannons, they made it impossible for the Brood to make a direct approach into the system. The asteroid belt might be a deadly obstacle for them, but it was also the best section they could have targeted. It afforded them enough cover to take out two cannons—and to protect their hive mind while getting it close enough to coordinate the assault.”

  Tremaine turned to face him. “Sir, I don’t think we can continue to target asteroids. The smaller support ships are going to struggle if the debris field gets much denser. They don’t have our protective hull plating.”

  “Understood.”

  “We’re getting a transmission from the admiral,” Long said.

  “Put him on screen.”

  “Husher,” Iver said briskly, “I’m ordering the carrier group on to the next potential hive mind location. According to our analysis, it has the best line-of-sight vantage point on the rest of the system. So it’s the most likely place to host the actual hive mind.”

  Husher furrowed his brow. “Sir, do we have actual intel to back that up? It’s possible line of sight doesn’t make a difference when it comes to controlling the Brood.”

  “We have eyes on the asteroid in question, and there are definite signs of a Brood presence, even at this distance,” Iver said. “The asteroids we were focused on before were a dead end. Both show every indication of being deserted. They’re clearly just decoys.”

  Shota was shaking his head. “We just lost a destroyer trying to close with our current target. That seems like a good indication we’re going in the right direction.”

  “Son,” Iver said, “you spend enough time in the deep black, you learn there’s no rhyme or reason to why ships are lost. That’s war.”

  Even Husher grimaced at the fortune-cookie platitude. “You mentioned a presence at this other asteroid?” He still felt unconvinced.

  “Based on what the Scion told us, we aren’t encountering the levels of resistance we’d expect if we were currently pressuring the real hive mind. We need to push deeper into the belt and see if we can get a stronger reaction. When the Brood come at us with everything they have, we’ll know we’re hitting them where it hurts.”

  Husher thought of the fight to save the O’Kane and the loss of the Wasp. If this wasn’t the Brood giving them everything they had, he wasn’t keen to see that. But he also knew Iver was right. If they really were right on top of the actual hive mind, the Brood would do everything in their power to stop them.

  Based on what Regan had said, hive minds were critical to how the Brood operated. They might be able to apply generic attack patterns without one, but it sounded like they were unable to form a complex attack strategy without one. When a hive mind wasn’t present, it seemed they were just blunt killing machines.

  “Understood, Admiral. We’ll follow your lead. We just need to recall our fighter wing and make sure the O’Kane can get underway.”

  Iver nodded. “See to the O’Kane. The rest of the battle group will accompany the Providence. With any luck, I’ll end this before you catch up with us.”

  “Good hunting, Admiral.”

  Iver actually smiled. “We’re going to win this.”

  Chapter 47

  Combat Information Center

  UHC Providence, Battle Group Flagship

  Iver spun away from the Coms officer as the screen went blank, and glanced at Captain Daniels.

  Daniels gave a tight smile. He’d been captain on the Providence for some years now, and he felt he’d learned how to keep the supercarrier and her crew on their A-game. He didn't need Iver breathing down his neck.

  “You have command of our half of the battle group, Captain. Let’s end this thing.”

  Finally. Daniels didn’t have anything against Husher, who’d proven himself more than capable during his time as captain of the Vesta. After all, the breakthrough that had won the Third Galactic War had happened on his ship, although that was less to do with anything Husher had done.

  Daniels knew better than most captains what it was like to command a ship as big as a supercarrier—considering he now captained one himself. You got all the credit when things went right, and all the blame when they went wrong. That was the nature of command.

  “Very well, sir.” He glanced at his Nav officer. “Do we have a course plotted?”

  “Plotted and set, sir.”

  His sensor operator spoke up. “Captain, there are a number of enemy vessels on intercept.”

  “Can we outrun them?”

  “Most of them. Not all.”

  “Acknowledged. Tactical, get a full missile barrage in the tubes, just in case we need it. If they enter firing range, you have my permission to launch our barrage.”

  “Aye, sir.”

  His sensor operator, the gray-haired Macmillan, spoke again. “Sir, we should have visual on our primary target within thirty seconds.”

  “Very well, put it on screen when you have it.”

  Daniels expected his CIC to function like clockwork, and his crew were once again rising to meet that expectation. His father, a decorated fighter pilot, had taught him that much. Jerry Daniels’ voice echoed in his mind now: Control what you can reasonably control, with as much precision as you can muster.

  The part Daniels struggled with was having grace about what he had no control over.

  His sensor operator turned to face him. “Sir, the enemy’s behaving oddly.”

  Daniels didn’t allow the CIC crew to use names like “Brood” a
nd “Scion.” He hadn’t come on this mission to discover new alien species. There was friend or foe. That was good enough for Daniels, so it was good enough for his crew.

  “Spit it out,” Daniels said.

  “They aren’t moving to engage us.”

  Daniels felt the admiral whip around in his seat. For his part, Daniels kept his cool.

  “What makes you say that, Ensign? Show me on the tactical display.”

  The sensor operator flicked a data package to the main viewscreen from his console. “See, sir? They’re holding back.”

  “It looks like they’re closing to me,” Iver said.

  Daniels bit his tongue. For most of the mission, Iver had stepped all over him like this was his ship. Given the man’s rank, there was little Daniels could do, except remain calm and professional. But he found it trying when the admiral insisted on directly interacting with his crew, sowing confusion among them more often than not.

  “They aren’t closing as quickly as they were,” Daniels said coolly. “There’s no way they’ll catch us before we reach the target, at their current velocity.”

  “Why would they slow down?”

  “Captain, I have visual of the target.”

  “On the main viewscreen, Ensign,” Daniels said.

  The screen came to life, showing a medium-sized asteroid, shaped like a cashew and sporting a clear impact crater. Discoloration covered the bottom of that crater—a mix of dark greens and purples that put Daniels in mind of the Stomachs they’d been fighting since arriving in this universe.

  “Zoom in on that crater.”

  The sensor operator complied, and the section Daniels wanted to see leapt into view.

  As expected, the asteroid was crawling with Wayfarers. Their presence was consistent with the number of Stomachs and Pseudopods that swarmed around the broad rock, and it lent credence to their conclusion that this asteroid held the Brood mind.

  Except, whatever had made that crater now seemed to be smeared across its bottom.

  Daniels noticed that his breathing had accelerated. “Admiral, whatever crashed into that crater…I don’t think it’s intact anymore.”