The Arwen Book one: Defender

by Timothy Callahan

  Seconds later she responded. “They have a static force field. You won’t be able to get through but it doesn’t seem to be strong enough to deflect any attacks.”

  “Can you destroy it?” he asked.

  “Not from here. Do you have any ideas?”

  A good leader always has a plan, even if they’re making it up on the spot. “Would the shuttles be able to pass through the force field?”

  He had to wait a few seconds before she could answer. “Yes, they can. You’ll lose a lot of them before you land.”

  “All I need is a handful of men. Those who die will be immortalized as heroes.”

  “Try to save as many as you can. I’ll order the shuttles to pick you up. In the meantime we’ll provide a distraction.”

  “Thank you, Captain Cook.”

  His troops stopped when he gave them the order. The shuttles moved closer. From the distance, where the fleet was, the Rulla witnessed something that caused glee in his warrior soul. Every ship in the fleet fired a volley of missiles which streaked from behind the shuttles and above his formation. As they passed, their engine glow was all he could see and, after a few seconds, even that blended in with the background stars.

  The explosions on the Gyssyc ship, however, were easy to spot. Chunks of debris were blasted high as the missiles penetrated the surface and exploded. Small columns of fire, fueled by the nuclear furnace which each missile carried, quickly burnt out in the vacuum of space. The attack would have been devastating against any other ship. The sheer size of the battle cruiser made it easy for them to shrug off the attack.

  The shuttles arrived quickly and efficiently picked up the large groups of people who floated in wait. The Rulla would be the last to be picked up and the first to land on the surface. His body shook with anticipation.

  ~*~

  “The shuttles are on their way,” Commander Pippleton said.

  Captain Cook nodded and looked at her screen. The Gyssyc ship seemed to ignore them until they fired their volley. She found that odd. Perhaps they didn’t think such a small fleet was a threat, but she was going to prove that wrong. The enemy continued to concentrate its firepower on the moon bases. The rate of fire from those bases had all but stopped; it seemed like was more of a clean up effort now and not a full on assault.

  From the monitor that pointed behind the Arwen, she saw several lights suddenly blink into existence. She saw her sensor officer turn to say something but she stopped him. “Wormholes, I see them. Who are they?”

  Commander Pippleton ran over to the station and looked at the readout. “It looks like the armada has regrouped.”

  Captain Cook weighed her options. That fleet was nearly destroyed. Still, she couldn’t let them out flank her. “Contact Captain Lipton, I want to talk to him.”

  Seconds later the captain’s face appeared on the screen. “You want me to lead some ships out to intercept that fleet, don’t you?”

  She suppressed a smile. “I’ll give you the carrier and her escorts.”

  “I’ll take what I can get,” he replied.

  “All you need to do is keep them off our backs.”

  “I’ll keep them off as long as you need.”

  “Good, get going.” Marjorie turned him off. She looked down at Commander Pippleton. “What is the status of the shuttles?”

  “Still approaching the ship. They’re taking causalities.”

  “Let’s go,” she ordered. “The fleet moves forward now, we need to try and draw some fire away from those shuttles.”

  ~*~

  Rulla Plooma stood next to the two pilots as they moved forward. The shuttle next to him exploded as a missile crashed into it. There was no time for evasive maneuvers; he was either going to land on the surface or not. That kind of certainty brought an odd peace to his mind.

  “Hang on,” the pilot said, “we’re hitting the static field now.”

  Plooma grabbed onto the chair as the shuttle buckled around him. The friction from entry caused the ship’s nose to glow. It wasn’t unlike entering the atmosphere of a planet going full speed. He had seen human pilots in action more than once and knew they were skillful enough to land safely. “We’re landing.”

  Plooma ran to the back where his men sat. “Get ready, we’re leaving.” He flipped a switch on his belt activating the force field around his body. Each member of the mixed Ulliam, human, and Regal force had warrior lust in their eyes. “Remember your mission,” he said. “If I fall someone else take my belt with the bomb components and head to the center of the ship. If you fall, someone else take his place.”

  “Ready to go,” his pilot said. “Lowering the ramp now.”

  The ramp fell open and the Rulla ran out onto the surface. The gravity wasn’t strong but it held him down. His other troops followed him, each pulling out a plasma torch, each making quick work of the ground below them.

  All around them other shuttles landed and troops ran out and tried their best to gain access through the hull. It was a quick and efficient attack, just like he trained them.

  Plooma managed to get a hole cut more than halfway before he felt himself starting to lift off the surface. He looked up and saw the shuttles were also slowly drifting upwards. “They have reversed the gravity,” he said, “those who can get in do it. Others try to find a way to hold on.” Grabbing a hold of the hole he just made, the Rulla was able to finish cutting the surface. He looked up to see several dozen of his men floating off the surface. The static field surrounding the ship interacted strangely with the force fields, shorting them out, exposing the men to the vacuum of space. That was not a warrior death, but they would be remembered for their bravery.

  ~*~

  Kel struggled to keep his mind on the battle in front of him. He wanted to be next to the Arwen, not here cleaning up the remains of an already beaten fleet.

  He ordered his bombers and fighters to launch and then watched as they streaked toward the enemy. “Move the fleet forward,” Kel ordered. “Fire all weapons.”

  “Sir,” his second yelled, “we’re reading an activation of a particle accelerator coming from the enemy.”

  “Could they be getting ready to leave?” he asked.

  “I can’t tell. It seems to be coming from the back. I’ll highlight it for you.”

  Kel looked at his computer and saw one ship, a small cruiser, light up. Could that ship be the new flagship? It seemed as if the entire fleet was organized to protect it.

  “Keep an eye on that ship,” Kel said.

  “Sir, its firing a volley of missiles. The other ships are firing as well.”

  His scanner lit up with the images of a hundred missiles. Each ship had an anti-missile defense which quickly activated. Kel had little worries, the first attack was always the ‘soften up the force field’ phase. This battle had just begun.

  A monitor on his left lit up unnaturally bright. He looked over to see his carrier dissolve in a very familiar flash. A tiny wormhole that quickly closed replaced the carrier. “They’re using strangelet missiles,” Kel gasped. “I don’t believe it. Alert Captain Cook, all forces concentrate firepower on that ship. Keep an eye out for other ships that have their particle accelerators active and destroy them.”

  There were very few things more frightening than a battle like this. His ship could be lost at any moment. One misplaced missile could destroy the Earth. Strangelets were too dangerous in war to be used like this.

  ~*~

  “Tell Kel to keep his distance,” Captain Cook said. “Send him as much help as he needs.”

  “Captain,” Commander Pippleton said, “should I charge up our accelerator and get ready for retaliation?”

  “What?” Captain Cook asked, surprised. “Didn’t we have this conversation? I will not use strangelets as a weapon.”

  “You said you won’t want to use them first. They used it first so it’s only natural to assume you would want to retaliate in kind.”

  She shook her head. “No, Commander,
it’s not. Do as I ordered and know that I will never use strangelets in battle.”

  His shoulders hunched upward a bit, angry and tense. “Yes, sir.”

  The fleet spread out and surrounded the Gyssyc ship. The gamma guns fired rapidly at the fleet, destroying smaller ships and damaging the larger ones. So far the Arwen hadn’t been hit, but she knew it would be soon.

  On her monitor she observed Kel’s attempt to hold back the other fleet. She watched in horror as ship after ship was destroyed by missiles carrying strangelets. At this rate Kel’s feet would be nothing and, unless they could destroy the ships creating those missiles, they would continue onward to help their Gyssyc allies. Ordering the use of similar weapon would even the odds. They stepped over that line, why can’t I? she thought.

  She thought back to the prime message of her training: Do whatever it took to protect Earth and the Corps. To fight with every weapon available. To fight until you take your last breath. However, in her ethics class they told a different story. The story of how close the world came to nuclear destruction in the mid-twentieth century and again in the late twenty-first. How, after the destruction of Callisto caused by an experiment which accidently produced a stray strangelet, an agreement to outlaw the use of strangelets in war was drawn up and no one has ever broken that treaty. Yet here she was. Faced with the destruction of Earth. Faced with the possibility of losing this war. Could she step over that line? Could she be the first captain in Corps history to use a strangelet missile and if she did, how would history view her decision?

  ~*~

  A high-energy projectile whizzed past the Rulla’s ear and exploded into the wall behind him. He fell to the ground, his body not actually touching thanks to his force field, and fired his own gun at the Gyssyc troops. The corridor exploded in debris as stray bullets impacted with the material. A cloud of gray and brown dust stuck to the slight static charge of his force field making it difficult to see. Based on the screams he heard from in front of him, he knew he had killed or wounded his targets.

  “Move on!” he yelled, standing. He quickly deactivated his field; the dust fell to the ground in a small pile.

  He lost almost half his men while landing, the others had been ordered to scatter throughout the ship to cause as much confusion as possible. He was the only one who carried the deadly bombs this time and he knew exactly where he wanted to set them off.

  He was hit with small device that stuck to his force field right in front of his eyes. The box blinked green a few times. He waited for something to happen, for some kind of explosion but instead all he heard was a loud snap. The device fell to the ground. He felt the breeze from the hallway and realized whatever that was had deactivated his only protection.

  All around him the same thing happened. Troopers used to the near invincibility the force fields gave them cursed as they fell.

  The hallway was once again filled with projectiles, some of his men died while others dove to the ground or tried to find cover in door frames and rooms. The Rulla pressed his back tightly against the wall under an archway. They where trapped, it would be easy for another group to come up behind them. They needed to keep moving forward toward the center of the ship.

  “Move!” Plooma yelled. “Push them back, we can’t stay! We must always move!” He felt the courage in his heart burst in the form of a battle wail. As he stepped out from his hiding place, he blasted away blindly, keeping the Gyssyc attackers behind their cover, preventing them from stepping out. He heard the others, the mix of races he had trained, screaming the same battle cry as they overran the Gyssyc stronghold. It was hand to hand combat from there and the Rulla had no concept of fear or pain as used his rifle like a club and killed the way his ancestors did thousands of years ago. Red blood splattered against the wall as he crushed a Gyssyc skull.

  He felt a very sharp pain in his back and when he turned he saw another had stabbed him with a knife in his lower back. In a human or Ulliam it would have killed them, but in a Regal it was an annoyance. He grabbed his attacker by the throat, a weak spot all humanoids had, and crushed the windpipe. He looked around, wanting to kill someone else, but there were none left. Some human and Ulliam bodies lay in the pile of Gyssyc kills. He looked at his remaining troopers and with nothing but a nod moved on to the next hallway, closer to his goal.

  ~*~*

  “Captain, we’re getting murdered out here,” Kel yelled into his communicator. Captain Cook’s face was on the screen, unreadable.

  “I’m sending as much help as I can spare, but you must keep that fleet away from us until the Rulla completes his mission.”

  “They’re destroying us with strangelets! I’ve lost half my fleet in a matter of minutes!”

  “I can’t spare any more ships. So do your duty.” She turned the communicator off, leaving Kel to fume in his seat.

  “Full speed ahead. I want the fleet to intermingle with their fleet.”

  “We won’t last long that close.”

  “I know, but that should prevent them from firing their missiles if there’s a chance they could hit one of their own ships.”

  “Are you sure of that?”

  “No, but we’re sitting ducks out in the open like this. Get the engines at full speed and go. We don’t have much time.”

  The Peter Wiggins moved forward at full speed. They closed the gap quickly, taking the armada by complete surprise. He lost a few more ships to the strangelets before entering the enemy’s space. He could only imagine what the commander of the armada was ordering.

  The close combat fighting was going to be fierce. Kel wished he could somehow board the ships. He knew his troops would easily win in any hand to hand fighting. That kind of combat was lost to history.

  There was a loud explosion near the bridge which caused the entire ship to shutter. Smoke filled the room. “What happened?”

  “We were hit with a missile. Close range. Our shields weren’t strong enough to defect it.”

  The space around his ship filled with missiles, debris from destroyed ships, human and enemy bodies, and hundreds of fighters with no place to land. The chaos was beautiful in a strange way.

  Another blast rocked the Peter Wiggins causing Kel to grab his armrest. “Commander!”

  “Sir, we’re taking heavy damage with high casualties. The entire fleet is taking a pounding.”

  “What about the armada?”

  “I’m getting reports that several cruisers have engaged the ships producing the strangelets. All have been destroyed!”

  A powerful blast drowned out anything else the second was going to say. The bridge shook and a crack appeared on the ceiling. Another blast knocked Kel and the others off their stations and onto the floor.

  Black smoke filled the bridge and choked Kel’s lungs. He felt the heat from outside the door. Kel struggled to his feet, his eyes stung, his lungs burned. He was thankful he transferred Fran to Ulliam before the battle. He thought this was going to be his last fight—and he was right.

  He looked at a screen with the Arwen on it. Captain Cook was locked in a heated battle with the Gyssyc ship! It was badly damaged but still fighting. He placed his fingertip on the monitor and closed his eyes as a fireball engulfed the bridge.

  Chapter Forty-One

  Another blast from the Gyssyc ship rocked the Arwen’s shields, threatening to collapse them. They held and the battle cruiser returned with a volley of her own. It caused very little damage but she knew that wasn’t the point, they just needed to get the ship’s attention, to be sure all its crew were too busy fighting them so the Rulla had a chance to complete his mission.

  Commander Pippleton turned from a station, the stress of the battle showed in his flat face, and his shoulders were high and unmoving. “Captain, the Peter Wiggins has been destroyed.”

  “Thank you, Commander,” Captain Cook replied coldly. Don’t let Marjorie come through. There is no time to grieve for Kel. He did his duty. He followed your order and did what he was trained
to do. Worry about Fran and his family later. Don’t focus on it now. There are more important things to worry about. “What’s the status of the armada?”

  “They’re in full retreat with only twenty smaller ships left.”

  Captain Cook felt Marjorie start to rise inside her heart and pushed her down, pushed her as far down as she dared. “Any word from the Rulla?”

  “No. We haven’t detected any explosions from inside the ship yet.”

  Where are you? Captain Cook thought. She had asked so much from the Rulla, so much from a person she thought was her enemy before all this started. Like everyone else around her, he acted with great courage. More people would die this day, more ships would be lost.

  ~*~

  Bloodied, battered, and close to death, the Rulla and his last five remaining soldiers found themselves trapped by a hail of gunfire. They had made a fatal wrong turn and found themselves in some sort of cafeteria. Tables were overturned; chairs lay across the ground in dense piles. There was hardly any cover to speak of, the enemy was firing from across a huge room, and they were outnumbered ten to one.

  Behind them he could hear the Gyssyc trying to break down the door they had entered. His men sealed it with their laser torches as fast as possible. They had done a good job but the seal wouldn’t last much longer.

  “Well,” Rulla Plooma said to the man next to him, a human who had been fighting with him from the start. “What is your name?”

  “Private Rottiger, sir.”

  “You have fought well.”

  He nodded, sweat poured down his smooth, dark face. “Thank you, sir. I thought Regals were timid. Glad to see I was wrong.”

  The Rulla laughed. “And I had heard the same about you. We all have warrior hearts. Even the Gyssyc. They fight well, yet I can’t respect them for retreating all those years ago on Ulliam.”

  “If they had stayed we’d still be alive in ten minutes, wouldn’t we?”