The Stars Came Back

by Rolf Nelson

  Ship AI: (OC, through Lag’s com unit) Sail in sight, and firin’ upon us, yur martial-ness, sir. Best keep yer head doon!

  The base commander and Lag look at each other in surprise.

  Ship AI: (OC) Hell’a storm comin’ down, sir. Duck’n’cover.

  CUT TO

  Cargo bay

  Helton, Bipasha, the Compliance Monitor, and some soldiers stand together talking over each another, no clear conversation, everyone talking at once. They are interrupted by a warning klaxon.

  Ship AI: (OC) Incoming fire! Incoming! All personnel take cover! Impact in 16 seconds!

  All the civilians freeze for a moment, and all the military folks drop what they are doing and scramble, heading through side hatches. The Compliance Monitor looks shocked and runs for the main door and down the ramp, apparently headed for his personal bunker.

  Ship AI: (OC, over Helton’s com unit, enthusiastically) Permission t’ commandeer th’ guns and return fire, sir!

  Helton: WHAT?! YEAH, SURE, DO WHAT YOU CAN!

  Ship AI: (OC) AYE-AYE, CAP’N!

  CUT TO

  Near perimeter vehicle emplacements

  Warning sirens and klaxons blare. Automated warnings scream “TAKE COVER.” Every tank and APC and gun jerks skyward, aiming at various high angles, and starts unloading at high speed, with a slightly stuttering full-auto thunder. Spent brass is pouring out of auto-cannons, Gatling guns, and every other self-loading mechanism mounted on a platform. After about ten seconds the view pans skyward. High above and all around there are abrupt blossoms of explosions, many lines of detonations in a descending cascade as all guns continue to fire, tracers arcing up into the heavens to meet the metal rain falling. No sounds from the supersonic incoming rounds above, just the guns, not so much distinct shots as a ripping, rolling wave of deafening sound, as powder is turned into gas and flying metal. Soldiers dive into trenches, through bunker entries, behind sandbag walls, anywhere they find cover.

  Rounds start landing. The top of Tajemnica is wreathed in smoke and fire as battalions of shit fall upon her. Vehicles are hit, some with a dozen or more rounds almost simultaneously. Shell fragments and shrapnel whizz wickedly about. An APC with a 25mm open-mounted gun on top is shattered, parts go flying. As the first rounds impact they are joined by the sounds of the shells detonating higher up, further away, a torrent of vibration from larger bombs and shells exploding, a concussive wave of sound felt as much as heard. In the open areas, some smaller shells kick up dust and flash brightly.

  CUT TO

  Open ground between bunkers and Tajemnica. Cooper runs as fast as he can for her, uniform only half on, red jacket unfastened. Guns are blazing away all around. Incoming rounds start exploding. One detonates near him, and he spins with several bloody wounds ripping open on his legs and body. He falls, bounces, rolls, and lies still, next to the bloody body and lifeless eyes of the Compliance Monitor.

  CUT TO

  Cargo loading ramp, view from inside

  Allonia sprints up the ramp, clutching Quinn. She sprints in and goes into the stairwell, holding him close, ducking down as the frightful din cascades around them. Then, as suddenly as it started, it ends. She raises her head to look at Quinn. His eyes are wide, trembling as he huddles against her.

  Allonia: (Comforting) It’s OK, it’s over. We’re safe. It’s over.

  She raises her hand to stroke his head, comforting him. There’s blood. She inhales sharply, worried.

  Allonia: QUINN. Are you hurt?

  Quinn nods a small nod. She stands up and heads fast up the stairs for the infirmary.

  Allonia: (Shouting) Medical! Quinn’s hit! Infirmary!

  CUT TO

  Cargo bay ramp

  The 25mm cannon, disconnected from its APC, lays on the edge of the ramp. A mechanical arm hatch opens, the loading arm unfolds to extend downward and prods the gun into a slightly different position, hooks onto it. The arm lifts, and swings the gun around experimentally, as an experienced shooter would heft a new gun, then folds away, the hatch snapping closed behind it.

  CUT TO

  Tajemnica’s bridge

  Quiritis looks over the screens, hands dancing to get more and different views.

  Ship AI: (OC, quietly, intensely) They flew their flag ‘n fired the first broadside. Now, I be thinkin’, it’s time we fly ours.

  Quiritis eyes dart at the various screens with grim determination.

  FADE TO BLACK

  AARAS

  FADE IN

  EXT - DAY - Open area not far from Tajemnica

  Lag and Colonel Zendek stand next to the body of the Compliance Monitor, looking down at him and Cooper, then at the destroyed camp around them. Zendek seems a bit dazed, looking at it all.

  Lag: (Urgent) Too much, too accurate. You need to bug out now.

  Zendek stares at him, expression hardening.

  Zendek: No. I will not abandon my position unless ordered.

  Lag: You are being jammed, and you have lost essentially ALL your transport. You have injured. You must leave. Now.

  Zendek: You can’t carry us.

  Lag: I don’t see how this could be a proper tech-level strike. It was far too massive and accurate. They are in violation.

  Zendek: Tell him that. We can’t call. Jammed and cut lines.

  Lag: Get the injured aboard, and start salvaging everything you can, get it near Taj in case we find out more. Surely you can do that.

  Zendek relaxes slightly.

  Zendek: Yes. Yes we can do that much.

  Shaking his head, he clenches his jaw as he faces the reality of the situation and starts taking action.

  CUT TO

  Atop Tajemnica

  Lag and Helton stand surveying the ship topside and the surrounding smoking base. There are hundreds of new small blast marks all over the ship, dozens of larger ones as well. Helton whistles. Lag squats, runs his hand over one lightly. Helton looks at some of the larger one near a drone launch tube bump. Few of the blast marks are much more than splatters of color, with little penetration or cratering. Lag stands, and ponders the smoking ruins of the base around the ship. Only one vehicle, an APC with 25mm gun turret, survives. Most of the piles of gear, supplies, and cargo containers are burning. Few craters are not on a target. Soldiers are salvaging what they can and extinguishing fires. The base has been virtually wiped off the map as a military asset. Helton stands up, runs his hands through his hair, and walks back to Lag.

  Helton: Don’t see any holes, so I guess the old gal’s armor is as good as Stenson said, unless we only got hit with smaller stuff than those things (tips head toward wrecked tanks). Hard to believe only six got killed in all that shit that landed on us.

  Lag: (Looking thoughtful) Yes, it could have been much worse.

  Helton: Not a good way to start the day.

  CUT TO

  Ground near the lowered cargo ramp.

  Base soldiers hustle around with salvaged gear and supplies. A soldier carries a pair of boxes, about 30cmx50cmx20”, with a pattern of 72 circles (6x12) on top. He pauses to talk to one of two sergeants on the ramp.

  Flare Soldier: Where these?

  Ramp Sergeant1: Stack ‘em with the rest of the mixed ammo, next to-

  He gets interrupted by BEEP BEEP and the sound of a small hatch retracting. They look over to the side of the ship and see an indentation exactly the same size as the boxes the soldier is carrying, and there is a small flashing light inside it.

  Ramp Sergeant1: (Points to the hatch) May as well mount ‘em. One here, and (walks over to the other side and looks up) the other over here.

  The soldier inserts the flare dispenser with a shove, and the hatch slides back over it.

  CUT TO

  A couple of soldiers carry a tube (about 3m long, 20cm diameter) up the ramp. Ordnance specs run along the side. They pause on the ramp next to the RampSergeant2 directing the loading to wait for directions. He looks at his tablet, scans the tube with it, looks at it again
, then leads them around to the side of the ship. There are a set of three angular, streamlined, slightly raised launcher covers. Slowly, with sand and dust falling out of crevices, it hinges open to reveal the round opening of a launcher. The Sergeant eyeballs it briefly. It looks clean, and a small status screen exposed by the open cover reads “Operational: Ready To Load.” He nods in satisfaction and points to the others along the flank of the ship.

  Sergeant2: Load as many as you can. Empty canisters on the cargo deck aft.

  The soldiers unscrew a cap from the back end of the transport canister, reach in and pull out a remove-before-use safety flag with a pin dangling from it, and hold the canister up to the launcher opening. They wiggle it for a moment to align it, then hear a soft suction sound as the tube shifts to line up perfectly. An audible bump is heard and it drops free into their hands. Visible in the front of the launcher is the front of a missile, with a safety flag hanging on it. One soldier looks at the panel, which now reads “Safety 1 REMOVED. Remove Safety 2 Before Use”. He reaches in and pulls the second pin and flag out, looks at the panel again. It reads “Missile now in LAUNCH READY status. Close?” with YES and NO buttons blinking. He pushes YES, and the tube snaps shut. They toss the safety pins into the canister and close it up. The two soldiers turn to get another one.

  CUT TO

  Infirmary

  Medics patch up several injured soldiers, with people moving fast and efficiently, talking briskly and professionally as they work. On one bed, Allonia assists a medic helping Quinn as he affixes a bandage around his thigh. There is a lot of blood around. He is pale, but isn’t crying.

  CUT TO

  Tajemnica bridge

  Helton at command, Quiritis at helm, Bipasha at sensors, Major Farber at com.

  View is from an angle low to the console, focused close. Unnoticed by anyone on the bridge, a light on an otherwise dark fire control panel slowly comes to life, glowing a dim amber below one of the old fashioned 3-position switches (currently in the up position, like the rest in the row). Another lights, then another.

  Camera shifts focus from the amber lights to Helton sitting at the command station going over the preflight check list rapidly murmuring to himself. He’s talking fast and nearly inaudibly, and the words are lost in the hubbub of preflight checks and loading.

  Major Farber coordinates troops from the com console, speaking fast into a mic and watching activity on screens.

  Lag walks in slowly, hands behind his back, head down, thoughtful. He walks to a spot near the weapons control panel. He looks down at it, looks up at the screens as the view shifts around. In one of them, he sees the two soldiers with the missile canister drop it from the loading port and start carrying it away. A small smile appears slowly on his face. Lag stands up to a sharp parade rest position, faces a large screen, and begins talking in clipped, terse military tones, unlike his normal easygoing manner.

  Lag: AARAS display, 40km radius, all munitions and munitions flight paths, all enemy launchers, vehicles, personnel, and positions, all friendlies, everything of tactical significance.

  [AARAS, pronounced ARE-ass, After Action Replay Analysis Schematic]

  Everyone else in the room halts their work to look at him in surprise. A pregnant pause as the screen remains blank, and no one moves. Suddenly a complex graphic appears in front of him, a topographical map of the region depicting all incoming and outgoing missile tracks, shell and bullet trajectories, enemy positions, and icons for equipment of all sorts. Small spheres represent explosions overhead where incoming was intercepted by ground-fire, or impacts on the ground. There are a huge number of tracks from three separate enemy locations around the edge of the display, each with dozens of vehicle-group icons and numerous dots representing personnel. More tracks lead from closer locations surrounding them, and four sets of lines come in from orbit above. A pair of straight fuzzy lines connect two of the larger enemy bases directly to the firebase in the center. All the many enemy munitions trajectory arcs in red converge. Numerous short blue lines rise from Raptus Regalitur. The graphic slowly rotates, showing different angles. They are surrounded, and the huge volume of fire should have been fatal.

  Lag: Orbital launch locations?

  The diagram indicates four slightly separate positions high above and to the west.

  Lag: Play forward from first detected attack.

  All munitions paths and enemy locations disappear from the topographic map. One of the fuzzy straight lines pops into view, and the time counter on one side of the display rolls by rapidly. Taj flies in and lands at the firebase in the middle of the display. A second straight fuzzy line pops into view.

  Helton: What’s that?

  Lag: Jamming, hacking, anything electronic. Huh… No countermeasures.

  Enemy icons begin appearing. The fuzzy lines intensify and the time counter slows. Ballistic arcs start dropping from orbit. A fire hose of ballistic arcs emerge from each major enemy positions, first from farther away and in higher arcs, followed by faster and flatter arcs, then fired from nearer positions. They all look to be converging on them at the same moment. More enemy positions, vehicles, and units pop onto the screen. The time counter slows even more. A hopeless amount of incoming is about to crash on them. From the center there is a huge eruption of blue streaks upward, causing spheres in a descending stream to appear as incoming missiles, bombs, and shells are intercepted. The largest explosions are high, getting smaller as the cascade descends.

  Lag: (Crisply) Freeze. Zoom ten kilometer radius.

  The display expands to show more details. A massive number of things are in the air, with rising streams from the local guns, a spray of missiles and shells destroying falling munitions in flight. There are now small symbols by the larger incoming rounds indicating what type they are. Lag looks closely at it, rotates it around a bit, grunts a bit. The XO quietly whistles his surprise.

  Lag: Continue at real time.

  The final bit takes only a few seconds to finish. Incoming fire rains down, a lot get intercepted, but enough gets through that the base vehicle symbols go dark. Only Tajemnica and one vehicle remain. Some people icons go dark as well.

  Lag: Freeze. Zoom to four thousand.

  The display zooms in, and the individual tracks are more clearly seen. But it’s clear that most of larger explosions (indicated by the size of the sphere when it blows) were higher up, and it’s mostly smaller stuff that made it through.

  Helton: What’s that?

  Helton points to where a bit more than a 3000 meters out, most of the remaining munitions had a slight bend in their arc, changing them from a more dispersed pattern to all head toward the ship.

  Lag: (Thoughtfully, almost to himself) …That… is… interesting. (Crisply) Confidence level of data presented?

  “100%” appears in a corner of the screen next to the time counter.

  Lag: Data source?

  The screen adds the note “hybrid data sources.”

  Lag: Remove inferred and external source tracks; display only organic observed.

  A few lines disappear, but the display doesn’t change significantly.

  Lag: (Softly to himself, staring at the screen) Well, well, well.

  Farber: Damn, that’s a better display than I’ve ever see, even on our best equipment.

  Lag: Yes. Almost too good.

  Helton: Those course corrections…?

  Lag: (Talking fast, crisply) Zoom out to 40 kilometers. Show current movement only.

  The display zooms out, and there are two small red dots near one of the bases.

  Lag: Zoom on activity.

  The display zooms in on them. The display shows an image labeled “Surveillance Drones”

  Lag: ETA overhead?

  Screen reads “16 minutes”

  Lag: (To Helton, sharply) Helton, we need to take off in 10 minutes!

  Helton: Like hell! It’ll take another 30 to do even a basic preflight!

  Lag: If we’re still here in 30 minu
tes, we’re here forever.

  Helton: (Grabs a mic to announce to the ship, heard also as OC) Now hear this! Load everyone and everything you can and get aboard. Lift in ten minutes, no excuses! Ship crew, man stations and get us spun up for lift! Base personnel, get what you can get on and secure it! Countdown on all screens!

  Every screen now shows a countdown clock: one big one per room, each screen with a small one in the corner, starting at 10:00, then counting down, 9:59, 9:58…

  CUT TO

  Cargo bay ramp

  Everyone stands around listening to the announcement. They all start moving very quickly, running, grabbing stuff, throwing it wherever and running out for more, and a there is a lot of yelling and noise and chaos as troops scramble to get salvaged equipment on board.

  FADE TO BLACK

  Trust

  FADE IN

  INT - DAY - Tajemnica’s bridge

  Lag, Helton, Quiritis, Bipasha, Farber

  Helton: Now we sound retreat and get the hell out’a here!

  Lag stares thoughtfully, quietly looking at the AARAS display

  Lag: …No.

  Helton: You just said-

  Lag: “Take off.” Not retreat.

  Helton: But how in the name of all that’s warm an’ fuzzy-

  Farber: (Putting hand on sidearm, voice dangerous) If he says no retreat, then we don’t.

  Helton: (Hotly) This is MY ship, and I say where we go!

  Farber: (Grimly, gripping gun in holster) It’s only yours as long as we says it is.

  Lag says nothing, still standing more or less at parade rest, looking at Helton.

  Every screen on the bridge goes black. The bridge is dark with stark shadows thrown by the light through the thick windows. On the main screen appears: “WRONG” in bold white letters. Everyone stares at them, then looks back and forth among themselves. The word disappears; in its place the words “Captain Strom is in charge” appear.

  Helton: What just happened?

  Lag: (In slightly amused wonderment) The ship likes you.