by M. D. Cooper
We need to get ready, they thought. We don’t have any more mines, and not enough missiles to take out two ships.
The girls considered their options, aware of the risks, but also aware that everyone in New Canaan was prepared to sacrifice whatever they had to. They could do no less.
Cary-Saanvi lined up with the two Halcyon Class carriers, the two massive ships only four hundred kilometers apart, bunched together so the dreadnaughts could provide cover. They formed the ships of Epsilon Squadron into a ragged line, no ship directly behind the others, though they would fall into a single spear before they hit. The Illyria took up the rear, ready to execute their last-ditch plan.
The destroyers were in the fore, and in the final three seconds before impact with the first carrier, they spent their remaining uranium pellets, tearing through the carrier’s shields and into the aft, port-side of the ship.
Then the destroyers slammed into the carrier.
At the same time, Cary-Saanvi released all their final RMs, which fell behind the Illyria, before drifting outward to pass around the first Halcyon Class ship.
They tried to discern the fate of the destroyers at the head of their formation. Scan data suggested that two had been destroyed within the carrier while the other two had torn clear through the enemy ship.
Then, the cruisers hit—one smashing against a section of the carrier’s shields, which had re-initialized, before the sheer mass and kinetic energy of the colliding ship disabled the carrier’s shields once more and made a hole for the other cruisers to pass through.
The Illyria entered the gaping hole in the carrier’s side, disgorging its final supply of nuclear warheads, while the girls prayed to whatever ancient gods were listening that it would be enough.
An instant later, they were through the ship and into the scant four hundred kilometers between it and the second carrier. Ahead, two destroyers collided with the last enemy carrier, and three cruisers a half-second behind.
Behind them, the first carrier exploded at the same instant as a series of kinetic rounds fired by nearby Trisilieds ships slammed into Epsilon’s destroyers and one of the cruisers, knocking them off-course. Ahead, the final cruiser executed emergency evasive maneuvers, and Cary-Saanvi struggled to keep the ships of Epsilon Squadron on course, but they had taken too much damage to manage the tight maneuvers required.
They were all going to miss—all except for the Illyria.
Cary-Saanvi made emergency corrections, desperate to keep their ship on course for the carrier. They pushed the engines far past their maximum tolerances and felt the internal inertial dampeners waver, then fail, as the burn executed.
A hundred g’s of force slammed into the girls—they could feel bones breaking, and organs splitting open in each-other’s bodies—before Cary separated their minds an instant before the final impact.
ASSAULTING ORION
STELLAR DATE: 04.01.8948 (Adjusted Years)
LOCATION: Sabrina
REGION: Stellar North of Carthage, New Canaan System
“Sure would have been nice to have a stealth system like this when we were back in the Perseus Arm,” Cargo said with a broad smile.
Jessica gave an appreciative chuckle, while Misha raised an eyebrow and shook his head. “I feel like we’re cheating. I understand—sort of—why it is that they can’t see us, but I still can’t believe it. We’re flying right above them!”
“Let’s not test that,” Cargo grunted. “Jessica, how long ’til we’re lined up with their flagship?”
“Gonna take another hour,” Jessica replied. “For all Sabrina’s boasting, it’s a pretty delicate dance we’re doing here. There are fifty thousand Orion ships around us. Even if gamma rays from our AP drive are hard to spot, it’s also hard not to slam them right into a ship behind us.”
“If anyone can do it, you can,” Cargo said.
Jessica knew he meant it as a compliment, but it still stung. Everyone—including her—wished it was Cheeky in the pilot’s seat. Flying this mission almost felt like an affront to her memory.
“We’re only going to get one shot at this,” Colonel Usef said from his seat at the auxilary weapons console.
“Piece of cake.” Jessica flashed Usef a smile, glad to have the burly Marine with them. “Besides, you just did a run like this on the Galadrial a few days ago.”
Usef laughed softly. “Well…we had their ship surrounded by a fleet they couldn’t see, outnumbering them ten-to-one. This is the exact reverse of that situation.”
“Do you think that OG officer…Kent…provided good intel?” Misha asked. “It was pretty interesting to learn that this Garza guy and the OFA’s Praetor don’t share the same goals here.”
“Was a lucky break,” Jessica agreed. “I chatted with him for a bit after Tanis, got a few more details out. I’m better at sweet talking than Tanis—though she’s improved, from what I saw. Bob says what we’ve learned and inferred matches his models, and that’s good enough for me.”
“Bob…” Misha muttered. “You guys put a lot of faith in your god-AI.”
“We do,” Jessica agreed. “He’s earned it.”
“Yet, he couldn’t see through that other AI’s deception. Helen, the one that was in the head of the Transcend President’s daughter.”
A precise maneuver stole Jessica’s attention, and Iris replied for her.
“What does that mean?” Cargo asked.
“That seems a little off the mark,” Cargo replied. “How can humanity ‘be all that we can be’ if Airtha is guiding us down her path?”
“Maybe she still views herself as human,” Usef offered. “In that case, her guidance is still human guidance.”
Sabrina groused.
Jessica laughed aloud at that.
Sabrina gave a resolute nod over the Link.
“Any excuse to have some cake!” Misha grinned.
Jessica was glad for the team’s banter; for some reason, it calmed her nerves. This mission that Tanis had sent them on was daunting, to say the least. They would have little room for mistakes.
The Orion Guard fleet was only half an AU from Carthage, silent and nearly invisible as they drifted through the system closing in on their prey. If they maintained their vector, they would reach the Carthaginian homeworld in two and a half hours.
It was going to be tight. Board the OFA flagship, a behemoth named the Britannica, plant a hack that Bob believed would allow them to gain control of the ship, secure General Garza, and pull the ship away from Carthage before Tanis’s final strike.
Easy.
Jessica smiled to herself. Funny thing was, the operation was on the same scale as half the jobs they had pulled over the last nine years. Breaking into Orion Guard installations was almost second nature to them at this point—which made
them the perfect team for this job.
“It’s a shit-show no matter which way you look at it,” Cargo said absently as he reexamined the rough specs they had for the Britannica. “Helen had us all fooled—though we didn’t know there was anything to be fooled about, I suppose. Hell, I never even knew there was a Transcend, let alone evil once-AI that were plotting everyone’s demise.”
“You have an unexpected, but valid, logic,” Jessica said. “Funny how all of us are here as victims of crazy circumstance. Me because some megalomaniac wanted me to watch as he became king of everything…or whatever he wanted. Cargo and Nance because an evil entity lived in Sera’s head, Trevor because I wanted to have a fun night out, Misha because we accidentally jumped to the Perseus Arm.”
“Doesn’t really bode well for what we’re about to do,” Usef said as he sat ramrod straight in his seat.
“Usef, seriously, when did you become such a wet blanket?” Jessica asked, twisting in her seat to catch his eyes. “We had some good times back in Victoria—and after, too.
Usef frowned and opened his mouth to reply, then shook his head and smiled. “You’re one of a kind, Jessica. Here we are on a crazy mission to secure an enemy ship in the midst of the biggest fleet any of us have seen since we left Sol, and you’re still the same old Jessica, cracking jokes and having a good time.”
Jessica shrugged. “After what we’ve been through, this feels like just another day at the office.”
“You’re going to have to tell me those stories sometime,” Usef replied. “Sounds like you guys had a rollicking good time out there in the Perseus Arm.”
Jessica glanced at Cargo and Misha, who both smiled at the memories.
“Hell yeah,” Jessica said. “We all live through this and I’ll buy you a round…or twenty…and tell you all about it.”
VICTORY AT ANY COST
STELLAR DATE: 04.01.8948 (Adjusted Years)
LOCATION: ISS I2
REGION: Stellar North of Carthage, New Canaan System
Cheers erupted across the bridge of the I2 as they watched the ISF cruiser punch through the first carrier, then tear a hole through the second Halcyon Class ship, making an opening for the twelve RMs which followed close on their tail.
The twelfth, and final, Trisilieds Halcyon Class carrier flew apart in a massive antimatter explosion, destroying many of the fighters it had released.
“Find that ship!” Tanis called out. “I want to thank its captain and crew personally. They’ve saved untold lives.”
Scan searched for the ship, tagged as the Illyria, on an exit vector from the explosion. Debris and energy from the two carrier’s spectacular deaths made the search almost impossible, but given the number of other Trisilieds ships and fighters enveloped and destroyed in the explosion, the Illyria’s survival began to appear unlikely.
“Stars, that was bravery,” Captain Espensen said with a solemn shake of her head. “Who was managing that Squadron? It was too far out for Symatra to do that.”
Sera nodded, “whoever it was deserves a commendation.”
“I don’t know,” Tanis said with a frown. She knew all the humans and AIs in Symatra’s fleet, and couldn’t think of any who could have pulled off that final attack run—though she supposed that in times like this, any of them could have risen to the occasion.
She reached out to Symatra, seeking Fleet Group 5’s ship assignments while watching a small group of a hundred Trisilieds ships that had slipped ahead and were already approaching Carthage and exchanging fire with the remaining orbital defenses.
Cary and Saanvi Richards. The names didn’t register at first. They didn’t make sense. Then the weight of it slammed into her with the mass of a planet.
Her vision swam and she felt her knees buckle.
She hit the deck, reaching out for Joe, but he wasn’t there, he was too far away.
A tortured shriek escaped her lips, and in her mind, Angela echoed her cry of woe. The pair—human and AI—sank for a moment into despair and a feeling that nothing mattered, that there was no purpose swept over them. Then, a spark of anger, followed by rage and cold determination, took its place. If this invading scum wanted death, she would bring it to them.
When Tanis rose to her feet and looked around the bridge, she saw that every ashen face was staring at her. She straightened her jacket and fought back tears that threatened to spill down her face.
“Everyone…” her voice came out in a hoarse whisper, and she cleared her throat. “Everyone has lost today, mine is no more significant—and they could have survived, it’s impossible to tell.”
Sera reached for Tanis’s hand. “There’s a lot of radiation and debris. They could have made it to an escape pod.”
“Or used the in-place stasis fields on the bridge,” Captain Espensen added.
“I want the I2 to push to the center of the Trisilieds fleet,” Tanis said with a steadier voice. “We’re going to finish this fight.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Captain Espensen replied soberly. “What is our primary target?”
Tanis gestured to the holotank. “Those carriers still released many of their fighters. Our Arcs can take them out, but we have to get them closer first. I want our atom beams to make maximum draw from the CriEn modules. Let’s show them what war with us will cost.”
Captain Espensen nodded, and Tanis watched with grim determination as her fleet boosted toward the Trisilieds ships, the bulk of which was now passing the moon, angling to brake around the planet. In a detached frame of mind, she wondered if they would bombard Carthage, or drop troops to secure the cities and hold the population hostage.
Let them try. Brandt and the ISF Marines were spoiling for a fight.
She checked over scan and saw that Greer’s Fleet Group 2 was only thirty minutes behind the Trisilieds ships, but in an effort to catch up, their v would be too high for anything other than a single pass. It would take them an hour to come back around again.
She considered Fleet Groups 3 and 4, commanded by Joe and Sanderson. They were still in position, ready to strike when needed. She considered pulling them in, but knew that if her suspicions were correct, bringing them into the fight prematurely would result in the ISF losing.
Tanis began to say privately to Angela.
Tanis nodded and pushed the thought from her mind, willing herself to calm. She and Angela spread their minds once more across their section of Fleet Group 1—still braking hard above Carthage’s north pole. She wasn’t yet close enough to the ships below the world’s south pole, nor to Symatra’s ring of ships around the moon, for direct control, but she would be soon, and then she would shape them into the final hammer blow to destroy these intruders.
The I2 pulled toward the Carthage-Hannibal L1 point and pivoted, its length perpendicular to the system’s plane. It waited as the leading edge of the Trisilieds ships rounded the moon, still engaged with Fleet Group 5.
“Give it to them,” Tanis ordered.
The enemy met the withering fire as the I2’s thousands of weapons discharged. Still, there were so many ships, including tens of thousands of fighters and
assault craft, that many slipped past.
Scan showed assault craft dropping into Carthage’s atmosphere while the capital ships looped tight around the planet. Thousands of ground-based anti-aircraft batteries opened up, shooting down enemy craft by the hundreds, but still some got through.
Tanis knew she couldn’t worry about the ensuing fights around Landfall and the other cities on Carthage’s surface. Her fight was up here, to make sure that as few ships landed as possible.
“Target that cruiser!” she heard Captain Espensen call out and saw that a Trisilieds ship was making a run for High Carthage, the station atop the first of Carthage’s space elevators. Her momentary distraction—worrying about the battle on the surface—had caused her to miss it.
The I2 fired a series of proton beams into the ship and an explosion near its engines shoved the ship to port.
“It’s going to hit the station!” one of the ensigns on the scan team cried out in horror, and Tanis watched as the disabled ship, over a kilometer in length, drifted toward the High Carthage at over seven hundred meters per second.
The station had already taken an unimaginable amount of damage from passing ships, and its stasis shields had failed in several sections. Tanis looked at her available options and realized that no kinetics could hit the ship with enough force, at the right angle to move it. The Trisilieds cruiser would tear right through the station, killing everyone aboard, and dropping the strand on the city of Landfall.
Then an ISF cruiser, also with failing shields, streaked across the battlespace and smashed into the enemy ship, pushing it off course. The hulls of both ships interlocked and somehow caught, causing the pair of ships to pinwheel through space and fall into the planet’s atmosphere, on a trajectory to land in the ocean.
The desperate battle intensified as shields wore thin and ships tore into one another, filling Hannibal’s L1 with drifting hulls and debris
