The tide turned.
Several human corvettes exploded. The lines crumbled.
They fought back. They fought back hard. They took out many Rattlers.
But the dynamics were different now. Earth could not afford to lose any more ships. Every warship gone—another breach in the wall protecting Earth.
The basilisks just needed to get one ship through. Just one nuke could devastate Earth. And humanity could not hold back the horde forever.
"We need our ships more than they do," Bay said, his belly curdling.
Brooklyn shuddered. "And we're losing ships too fast."
Both forces were being decimated.
All around Bay floated the hulks of dead human starships. They had fought well. They had taken out many Rattlers.
But as time went by, more and more chinks appeared in Earth's armor.
And more basilisks were making their way through, racing toward Earth.
An entire wing of Copperheads—twenty of the scaly little bastards—sneaked through the thinning defenses. Bay and Rowan had both lost half their Firebirds. They merged their squads together and gave chase. They caught the Copperheads only thirty thousand kilometers from Earth and opened fire, pummeling the alien starfighters.
But they were too slow.
The Copperheads fired lasers onto Earth, carving up fields, forests, towns.
Several scaly missiles flew toward Earth.
"Bay!" Brooklyn cried. "Those are nukes!"
"Let's go, Brook!"
They swooped in pursuit. Bay fired his rotary cannon. Several Firebirds dived with him. From low Earth orbit, defensive satellites fired rockets at the incoming weapons.
Bay hit one nuke with his bullets. Rowan swooped with her Firebird, taking out another two.
The satellites intercepted the rest.
Bay held his breath, expecting nuclear blasts. But thankfully, nuclear reactions were finicky things, requiring exact physics. The alien payloads shattered in space, spilling radioactive material—but not detonating.
"Bay, more coming in from four o'clock!" Rowan cried on his comm.
Bay turned to look. He saw them. Three Rattlers, charging toward Earth.
"I'm on it!" Brooklyn said, flying to meet them.
The Rattlers were larger, tougher than the Copperheads. The Firebirds surrounded them, pounding them, tearing them open. The Rattlers weren't even defending themselves—just firing on Earth.
More laser beams carved up the landscape.
More nukes flew.
The satellites fired their anti-missile rockets, but they were struggling to keep up. Brooklyn swooped toward the flying nukes. Bay peppered the nukes with more bullets, shattering them in space. More radioactive material spilled, raining toward the oceans.
"Damn it!" Bay said.
He glanced back toward deep space. The bulk of the human fleet was still there, trying to hold off as many Rattlers as they could. They were hammering the enemy, destroying many basilisk ships.
But not enough.
More Rattlers made their way through.
"Brook!"
"I see 'em!"
They flew toward the Rattlers. They fired, destroying more nukes.
Bay sent a broadcast to the fleet. "Leona, we can't keep up! We need your corvettes!"
His sister was commanding dozens of corvettes—fast and agile warships, smaller than frigates but larger than Firebirds.
"You'll have to handle them, Firebirds!" came Leona's reply. "We're holding off as many as we can. Take care of those who fly through."
Bay cursed again and again. The Firebirds were now flying in low orbit, just below the satellites, leaving the corvettes and frigates deeper in space.
More Rattlers and Copperheads flew toward them.
There were no dogfights. The enemy wasn't attacking the Firebirds—just trying to get a nuke down to the surface.
Brooklyn flew in a fury, whipping between the descending nukes, as Bay fired again and again, taking them out. Finally he ran out of bullets. He took a desperate flight toward an ammunition ship, waited for agonizing minutes as he reloaded. By the time he charged back toward orbit, even more enemies were there.
He took out another nuke. Another. Rowan and her squad flew around Earth in a fury, firing on anything that moved. The nukes kept shattering in space, spilling radiation. Bay wasn't sure how much of that radiation was making it through the atmosphere. He didn't want to even think about that now.
Radiation is bad, he thought. But if a nuke actually detonates on the surface—that is catastrophic.
In deeper space, Earth's warships were winning the battle. They were fighting well, pounding the enemy, slaughtering the basilisks.
But they were too slow.
Ten Copperheads charged toward Earth. The Firebirds intercepted, destroyed nine of them.
The tenth Copperhead reached the atmosphere.
The basilisk starfighter plunged into the sky—and released a nuke.
A nuke heading toward Port Addison.
Bay stared, and for an instant, fear paralyzed him.
Brooklyn shoved down the throttle.
They swooped after the nuke, diving into the atmosphere, wreathed in fire.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Port Addison, a city of a quarter million people, spread across the landscape below, nestled between river, mountain, and plains. Here was the first colony humans had founded on Earth since returning from exile. Here was the jewel of humanity. Here was Bay's home.
The nuclear weapon was diving toward it, leaving a fiery trail through the sky.
Bay groaned, gritting his teeth, barely clinging to consciousness as his Firebird swooped after it.
The civilians were in their bomb shelters.
But Bay knew: If this nuke hits the ground, they're dead.
He opened fire. The Firebird's rotary cannon spun. His bullets missed … then ran out.
Bay stared in horror.
"We're out again!" he shouted. "Rowan! Anyone! We need more Firebirds!"
But the others were too far above, still fighting in orbit.
"Oh Ra," Bay said. "Brooklyn, we can't do it."
Brooklyn shared the cockpit, squeezed beside him in the seat.
"We're not letting it blow," she said.
"But—"
"We're not letting it blow!" she said, shoving all her weight against the throttle.
The Firebird swooped. Seventy kilometers above the surface. Sixty. Fifty.
The nuke was dropping fast.
Brooklyn sneered and gave the Firebird every last drop of power.
Twenty kilometers above Port Addison, they passed the nuke.
Just a few meters below the nuke, Brooklyn swerved and flew back upward, engines blazing on furious afterburner.
The flames from their exhaust bathed the nuclear weapon.
Its casing twisted, heated up, began to melt. Brooklyn swerved again. Again. Washing the nuke with her afterburner until the bomb ripped open.
The nuke did not detonate. A nuclear reaction required a meticulous chain effect, one the weapon was probably programmed to initiate closer to the colony. But as the nuclear weapon tore open, uranium spilled. It rained toward the colony, highly radioactive.
"Our boys on the ground will have to clean up the mess," Bay said. "It'll be a big mess. And we might be eating three-eyed fish and talking bananas for a while. But we just saved a quarter million lives. You saved them, Brooklyn."
She grinned. "Not bad, considering I've only been human for a couple of months. Brooklyn Emery, savior of the Earth!"
"Oh, you're an Emery now, are you?" Bay said.
"Sure am. I'm living inside Rowan's clone, remember? And she's an Emery, so so am I." She frowned. "So so. Is that proper grammar?"
"We'll figure it out later. Get us back into space. We still have to—"
On the horizon, a massive white ball of light flared.
A shock wave slammed into Bay's Firebird, hurling it
backward in the sky.
A mushroom cloud flared, shrieking, expanding, shaking the atmosphere and ground.
It must have been a thousand kilometers away. But it rocked even Port Addison below, flipping trailers over and cracking the Terranon.
"That blast came from Kemtown," Bay whispered. "Brooklyn, what is the population of Kemtown?"
She stared, eyes wide, face pale. "Seven thousand and fourteen people," she whispered, voice cracking.
Silence fell across the comms.
Pilots were staring.
Bay heard a few pilots gasp, others cry.
Bay took the joystick from Brooklyn.
He narrowed his eyes, gritted his teeth, and soared back into space.
Only a few basilisk starships remained. The human forces were still pounding them.
But we already lost, Bay thought. We already lost so much.
He let out a cry of fury and anguish. He launched his Firebird into battle.
He rammed between Copperheads, stopped at an ammunition ship, then launched himself back at the enemy, firing at them with missiles and bullets and shells, tearing them apart. Shouting. Cursing. Weeping.
The others fought with him. Rowan in her Firebird. Leona in her corvette. Emet and Tom in the Byzantium, their flagship. From Earth rose artillery. The satellites' cannons fired. The human fleet surrounded the enemy above Earth, taking out Rattler and Copperhead until none remained.
The battle ended.
The battle was won.
But the cost was almost too great for Bay to comprehend.
Half their fleet—destroyed.
Hundreds of starships, the hope of humanity—gone.
Kemtown—wiped out, its thousands of citizens dead.
"Xerka did this with only ten percent of her force," Bay whispered, gazing at the destruction. "We can't repel another attack."
Hundreds of soldiers were floating through space, ejected from their ships. Medical shuttles moved among the wreckage, picking them up. Some were wounded. Nearly all were dead.
Bay looked back at Earth.
He looked at the burning crater upon the plains. Like a cigarette's scar on flesh.
Kemtown. Gone.
"Bay," Brooklyn whispered, sitting beside him. "I'm sorry."
She embraced him. They had won the battle, and Bay lowered his head.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
They gathered in the war room, a cavernous bunker beneath the Terranon.
Emet had a bandage around his head, red on the temple. Tom had suffered burn marks along his arm. Both men had been wounded when a dreadnought had rammed into the Byzantium. Rowan's leg was in a cast; a rogue Copperhead had slammed into her Firebird, shattering her bone. Bay stood with a dour face, his body unhurt but his eyes haunted, and Leona stood behind him, face unreadable. A handful of generals stood among them, fists clenched, faces hard.
Emet stared at them.
His lieutenants. The High Command of Earth.
He spoke in a gravelly voice, hoarse from shouting commands throughout the battle.
"We don't have a final death count," Emet said. "But it will be staggering. We estimate that we've lost three thousand soldiers. Five hundred starships—half our fleet—were destroyed. There are ten thousand civilian casualties on Earth, most of them from Kemtown. Many more might succumb to their wounds, and we'll be dealing with radiation poisoning for years to come. This attack caught us by surprise. We weren't ready. We won—but barely, and at a horrible cost."
They all stared back, fear in their eyes. Brooklyn, still in her pajamas, covered her eyes.
Leona broke the silence, speaking the words on everyone's mind. "We won't be able to withstand another assault. We know that Xerka is planning more attacks. She tested our defenses. She found them barely adequate. She'll keep attacking, again and again, sending fleet after fleet. She'll never stop. Not until she's won. Not until she's killed us all."
"Way to spoil the mood, Leona," Bay muttered. His tone perhaps was snarky, but there was fear in his eyes. He knew this too. They all did.
"We'll improve our defenses!" Rowan said, stepping forward. "I'm making progress with studying weaving. Soon I might be able to build a shield of aether around Earth. That will help. And I have a plan for rapid production of more defensive satellites. If we can get our new 3D printers working, we can really scale up our factories. And—"
Emet interrupted her. "Rowan, we can't keep defending ourselves forever. We can't keep losing ships. Losing cities. The time has come to launch our assault on Sskarsses, the basilisk homeworld."
Gasps sounded across the room.
"But sir!" Rowan said. "We're not ready! We only have five hundred ships left. Even with a thousand, we weren't ready. We need time to build more. It's not enough!"
"It must be enough," Emet said. "And it must be now. We must fly out. Tonight. And we must strike Sskarsses."
Glances passed around the room. A few people seemed ready to voice objections. But they remained silent. Faces hardened. Determination filled their eyes.
Rowan stepped forth first. She came to stand at Emet's side. Her legs trembled.
"I'll fly with you, sir. Tonight." She took a shaky breath but managed to square her shoulders. "Though to be honest, sir, I'm scared shitless."
The others stepped up too. Leona and Bay, his children. Cindy, the woman he loved. The others—generals, pilots, leaders.
Across Earth, Emet knew, thousands more were ready.
They had to be ready.
They had to win.
Or we all die, Emet thought.
"You have the next eight hours to prepare," Emet said. "To say goodbye to your loved ones. At midnight, we fly out. The entire fleet. And we win this war."
They left the war room, silent and grim.
* * * * *
Emet marched down the tunnels below Port Addison. He left his officers behind. He headed down a narrow pathway.
Eight hours, he thought. Months too early. In eight hours, we fly.
He kept walking, muscles stiff.
Cindy joined him, hurrying to keep up.
"Emet, there's so much to do before midnight," she said. "Rally the troops. Repair the ships. Stock supplies. Draw up final battle plans. The list is endless. How can I help? Give me a task. What do we do?"
"I'm going to our chamber," he said. "And I'm going to have a nap."
He reached the door, unlocked it, stepped inside.
Cindy paused, then followed him into the room.
"A nap?" The doctor tilted her head.
Emet nodded. "And a long shower. And a good meal."
"But—" Cindy began.
"Cindy, we have a long war ahead of us. We'll need our strength. I know we're not ready. I know there's still a lot to do. But right now, this is an oxygen mask situation."
Cindy frowned. "What's that mean?"
Emet doffed his coat and kicked off his boots. "Something Rowan taught me. Something from those old movies she watches. Back in the Golden Age, passenger planes came with oxygen masks over the seats. Parents were taught that during a disaster, they were to apply their own oxygen mask first, and only then place oxygen masks on their children."
Cindy nodded. "You must help yourself before you can help others." She sighed. "I've barely slept in two days. Too much work at the hospital. Clearly a lesson I need to learn."
They took a long shower.
They ate a warm meal.
They lay in bed.
They were silent all the while. A knot filled Emet's belly. He could see the same fear in Cindy.
Six more hours.
Six hours until the most pivotal moment in human history. Until he flew to what could save Earth—or plunge humanity into the abyss.
He lay on his back, staring at the dark ceiling, mind racing. Cindy lay at his side, silent, her hand on his.
Emet spoke into the darkness.
"Did I make a mistake, Cindy?"
She rolled toward him and st
roked his cheek. "No. We believe in you. All of us."
Emet gazed into the shadows above as if gazing into space. Such horrors lurked there in the darkness. Such evil.
"There are five million humans left in the galaxy," he said. "Three million on Earth, the other two still in exile, waiting for liberation. Five million, that's all. Such a small number. We used to be billions. We are so few. So precious. Each life—my duty to save."
"We can't save them all," Cindy said. "We know that. You as a general, me as a doctor."
"Yet I must save the spark," he said. "Save enough that from the ashes we can rise again. This war, Cindy … I don't know if we can win it. It's likely we will lose. We have five hundred ships. Xerka commands a hundred thousand. We have a small army, barely armed, barely trained. She commands tens of millions of basilisk troops. Should we run?"
"Run?" Cindy frowned. "What do you mean?"
"Maybe this was a mistake," Emet said. "Returning to Earth."
Cindy gasped. She propped herself up onto her elbows. "What do you mean, Emet? This is what we've fought for all our lives!"
"We won Earth," Emet said. "But can we keep it? Did I gather humanity here only for Xerka to destroy us all? Maybe we need to leave. To return to exile. To spread among the stars again. To hide. It wouldn't be much of a life. But we would survive!"
"Emet." Cindy kissed his cheek. "Our people don't just want to survive. They don't want to hide. They want to fight! To show the galaxy that humanity is strong again! That we'll never be weak like we were, never be meekly slaughtered again. Not after what the scorpions did to us. After how the basilisks hunted us. After generations of torment. For two thousand years, aliens hurt us, butchered us. Genocide after genocide—every generation. Now is our chance to stand tall and strong!" She caressed his cheek. "You tell us these things all the time."
"I do," Emet said. "In my speeches to my soldiers. In meetings with my generals. But here in the darkness, in my own bed, I feel the weight of five million souls press down on me. And I wonder: Am I dooming them?"
"Maybe," Cindy said. "That's why this is a hard decision. But you still have six hours to reverse it. Are you asking me for advice?"
The Legacy of Earth (Children of Earthrise Book 6) Page 15
