‘There’s too damned many!’
Corporal Ben Hodgkins was pinned with four of his men across the far side of the corridor, the Marines firing in controlled and coordinated bursts to maintain a constant stream of withering plasma fire on the charging hordes before them.
‘Keep firing by sections!’ Agry yelled. ‘Don’t let your weapons overheat!’
The octopedal animals poured like a tangled gray flood over the fallen bodies of their brethren, a wave of wild black eyes and gnarled fangs and scuttling legs. Agry fired again, counting in his head both the number of rounds he had remaining and the pauses between each section firing.
The Marines were split into four sections of five men each, rotating their firing duties to prevent their plasma rifles from overheating and allowing their positions to be overrun by the enemy, but even such professional tactics were no use against so many.
‘Fall back by sections!’
Agry fired two more rounds that seared through the belly of an octoped and sent it reeling in agony, trailing a cloud of blue smoke and savage black plasma wounds tearing its flank open. He glanced over his shoulder and saw the rear–most section of the platoon fall back ten paces down the corridor and then open fire once more.
Agry ducked low and dashed back toward them under their covering fire before taking up position again and firing on the first enemy he saw.
Through the thick smoke and vivid, flashing light of plasma blasts he saw an octoped rear up to leap toward them, its thick limbs clawing the air and its even thicker hind legs coiling to pounce. The creature shook under the tension in its muscles as Agry aimed to shoot it square in its chest.
In the light he saw something moving behind the octoped, and then the creature squealed and arched its back as blood sprayed in black arcs from its hind legs and it toppled over sideways. Agry saw a towering figure slashing left and right, a heavy blade severing the octoped’s tendons and rendering it disabled as blinding beams of white light broke through the clouds of smoke clogging the air.
The figure raised the blade again and brought it crashing down into the octoped’s skull, the creature slumping dead.
Agry’s breath caught in his throat as he saw the figure rise up, humanoid but taller, a shaggy mane of hair and bright yellow eyes hungry with blood lust as it pounced on the next octoped before it and slashed down with savage blows, severing entire limbs with each devastating attack.
Ayleean.
Even as Sergeant Agry thought it so he saw dozens more Ayleean warriors pouring over the mound of dead octopeds, their blades flashing in the brilliant white light as they screamed and charged and crashed into the octopeds from behind. The charging creatures suddenly found themselves cornered between two forces and Agry saw the sudden surprise and anguish in their expressions.
‘Hold your fire!’
Agry’s command rang out in the corridor but it was several seconds before the Marines responded and their streams of plasma fire ceased. Agry crouched with his plasma rifle aimed into the hordes as they were decimated by the charging Ayleeans, the warriors coated with glistening sheens of purple blood as they hacked and slashed their way through the enemy, one of them doing so despite his other arm hanging by tenuous threads from his shoulder, his eyes wild with unstoppable bloodlust.
Three of the remaining octopeds reared up to charge at the Ayleeans and Agry switched his aim and fired upon them. The Marines behind him followed suit without orders, the hail of searing plasma fire cutting the octopeds down into smoldering shreds of burning tissue amid roiling clouds of blue smoke.
The plasma fire ceased, the corridor thick with smoke and the smell of blood and burning flesh. Agry kept his weapon in place, aimed down the corridor as through the smoke strode the Ayleean warriors. They walked side by side, blocking the corridor, advancing with chests heaving from the exertion of battle, eyes wild.
‘Er, sergeant?’
Hodgkins glanced across at Agry uncertainly, his own rifle trained on the Ayleeans.
Agry glanced behind him at the boarding chute, a clear way back into Titan for an invading force.
‘They could be shape shifters,’ said another Marine.
Agry gripped his rifle tighter and called out.
‘Stay where you are! Don’t come any closer!’
The Ayleeans kept moving, driven by rage and the need for combat, their huge weapons smeared with blood that drooled from the tips of the blades.
‘Don’t make me shoot!’ Agry yelled.
The Ayleeans paused, standing no more than five meters from the Marines, a wall of muscle and rage and hate glaring at them, their eyes flickering in the dim light and reflecting the flames licking around plasma scars in the walls. Slowly, the Ayeelans’ blades lifted up, pointing at the Marines, a known sign of a challenge in Ayleean culture.
Agry wasn’t about to waste any time second guessing their intentions, and he took aim at the lead warrior.
‘Platoon, fir…!’
‘Wait!’
The cry sounded like a cat that had just noticed its own tail was on fire, a bizarre and high–pitched squeal that was loud enough to cause everybody to look at it. Agry peered past the Ayleeans and saw a CSS pilot stumbling toward them, covered in blood and with a small white kerchief waving frantically above his head. To Agry’s amazement, the pilot shoved his way past the towering, bloodied Ayleean warriors and waved the flag at him as he spoke.
‘Th…. wth…mee.’
Agry squinted at the pilot. ‘Say what?’
The pilot pointed at the Ayleeans and then pointed at himself. ‘Wth... me.’
Sergeant Agry glanced at the Ayleeans, still poised to attack. The pilot turned and grabbed the leading warrior’s blade and pushed it down as though he were a naughty child, pointing at him as though to warn him to behave.
‘What the hell?’ Hodgkins uttered.
Sergeant Agry stepped out of cover and stood up as the pilot staggered toward him, one hand moving to massage his throat. His voice was thin and wheezy, but now Agry could hear him more clearly.
‘They’re with me,’ he said, ‘they’re with Defiance. We survived, and so did they.’
Agry looked over the pilot’s shoulder suspiciously, but then his communicator crackled.
‘Marine One, we have regained control of the fleet, be advised, allied aboard with you, allied and Ayleean!’
Agry heard the relief and surprise from his men, and he looked at the pilot and the Ayleeans with renewed hope.
‘I have no damned idea what’s happened here and I don’t want to know,’ he growled, and then louder so that the Ayleeans behind them could hear. ‘Let’s go take this ship for ourselves!’
A thunderous crescendo of screams seared the air as the Ayleeans waved their blades in the air and rushed past the Marines toward the ship’s bridge.
***
XLIV
CSS Titan
Admiral Marshall watched as the CSS fleet began to turn in unison once more, and he heard the captains of the various ships reporting with joy as they recovered control of their vessels. Somewhere, somehow, Detectives Foxx and Ironside had come through once more.
‘This is it!’ Olsen said as he clenched a fist. ‘This is where we turn it!’
Marshall watched as the massive harvester spacecraft hove slowly closer, its four flanking Marauder guards easing out from their formations to engage the CSS fleet. With so many of the capital class enemy ships facing them, even a fully united CSS fleet was already heavily out gunned and he knew that in a straight out fight with the gargantuan Marauders they would be utterly destroyed.
‘Titan, this is Marine One, we have the Marauder’s bridge! Repeat, we have the bridge!’
A cheer went up from the crew around Marshall and he looked about him with immense pride rising up like a swollen river inside him as he realized that Sergeant Agry’s Marines had also prevailed. Titan’s bridge was bathed in blood red light, half of her decking and wall panels blown out and w
ith a faint haze of smoke in the air from fried electrical panels, but she was holding together and so were her people.
He looked at the Marauders closing in on them, and he knew what he had to do.
‘Admiral Marshall to all vessels, heave to and cease fire.’
Olsen’s joy collapsed into confusion and he stared at Marshall in horror.
‘Admiral?’
Marshall stepped off the command platform and strode to the center of the bridge deck.
‘All vessels, heave to and cease fire immediately,’ he repeated.
Marshall could sense the dismay on the bridge as his crew stared at him, wondering why on earth that he would choose to capitulate, to surrender at the moment that victory became possible.
Olsen hurried to Marshall’s side. ‘Admiral, we can win this!’
Marshall shook his head. ‘No, we can’t.’
‘Damn it man, we have the fleet back! We can take them on!’
Marshall stood for a moment amid the silently tumbling waterfalls of sparks and the dull red glow of battle. He could hear the sound of other ships still engaged by the enemy, the commands of fighter pilots and bridge crews echoing around the bridge, but right now all he could think about were words that Arianna Coburn had said Doctor Schmidt had emphasised to her and others. Divide and conquer.
He turned to Olsen. ‘Disengage from the Marauder and order Defiance to do the same. Drop our shields and shut down our plasma batteries.’
A rush of gasps filled the bridge and Olsen stared at Marshall in horror.
‘But we’ve taken control of the Marauder and…’
Olsen’s eyes widened as Marshall watched him, and understanding suddenly blossomed like a newborn star in his eyes.
‘How about we give them some of their own medicine, XO?’ Marshall suggested with a grin.
Olsen almost stumbled over his own words as he whirled to the crew. ‘You heard the man! Disengage from the Marauder, send word to Defiance to follow our lead!’
Marshall turned to the communications officer.
‘Send word to Agry’s Marines,’ he ordered. ‘Find out if they think they can control that ship.’
The officer nodded in reply as Olsen hurried to Marshall’s side.
‘How close do you reckon we can get?’
Marshall judged the position of the harvester space station. ‘Probably not close enough before they realize what’s happening. Even a sustained barrage probably won’t be enough to break her hull, she’s just too damned big.’
Marshall kept one eye on the tactical display and watched as Titan slowly disengaged from the Marauder, Defiance likewise descending away from the capital ship with her shields down and her plasma batteries draining of their charge.
‘Admiral Marshall?’ Captain Lucas’s voice echoed across the deck from Defiance. ‘I take it there is a method to this madness?’
‘I want them to think we’re beaten,’ he replied. ‘Let them drop their guard and let them think our Marines failed to take the Marauder.’
There was a long pause and then Captain Lucas’s holographic form appeared before the admiral on Titan’s deck.
‘Get this wrong and we’ll be right before their guns.’
Marshall nodded. ‘Right where we want to be.’
Lucas peered at the admiral curiously. ‘I’m all for out of the box, admiral, but I’m not sure what you’ve got in mind here and our Marines are now trapped aboard that Marauder.’
Marshall gestured to the tactical display before him.
‘You got under their guns and so did we,’ he replied. ‘They didn’t fire on us while there was a danger of them hitting their own. Same tactic, but this time we hit that harvester with everything we have from close range.’
Captain Lucas bit her lip as she thought about the idea. ‘It’s too big.’
Before Marshall could reply, he heard Sergeant Agry’s voice cut in.
‘We have control of the Marauder. It’s not going to be pretty, but we can do some good here.’
‘Good,’ Marshall said. ‘Charge her cannons, and open fire on Titan.’
‘What?!’ Olsen yelped.
‘Break away from us and hit us with one shot on the port stern,’ Marshall continued and then turned to the XO. ‘Direct all shields to that quarter to protect us from the blow. I want the enemy to think the Marauder is still theirs. Make it happen!’
Captain Lucas pressed on.
‘Insanely clever, or just insane,’ she said, ‘but even with that ship on our side, we can’t guarantee we’ll take out something as large as that harvester!’
Marshall knew that she was right, but then another voice piped up from somewhere on Defiance’s deck.
‘Use her like we used Fortitude.’
Lucas turned and Marshall saw a young blonde Ensign standing close behind the captain.
‘Say what now?’ Olsen asked, looking wearier by the moment.
Captain Lucas replied. ‘We used Fortitude as a missile to take out one of the capital ships pursuing us out of the Ayleean system. It bought us enough time to leap out and get away. That Marauder is a quarter the size of the harvester but if it was on target at full pulse power…’
Titan rocked violently as a plasma salvo slammed into it from close range, and Marshall crashed sideways against his seat as he looked at the display screen and saw the nearby Marauder’s plasma cannons glowing from where they’d opened fire.
‘Some warning would have been helpful!’ Marshall roared.
‘Oops,’ Lieutenant Hackett’s voice crackled over the Marine’s communications frequency.
Marshall turned to his crew.
‘Do it,’ he said to Olsen. ‘Tell the Marines to program that Marauder onto a collision course, full power, and then get the hell off that ship!’
Marshall turned back to Captain Lucas as Titan’s crew swung into action.
‘Don’t fire until they’re almost on top of us,’ he said. ‘Lead us in, captain.’
‘Aye, admiral.’
Marshall watched as the CSS fleet slowly began to break up under the barrage of plasma fire coming from the Marauders, scattering as though defeated and in disarray. He saw Pegasus turning away from the fight, her vast hull trailing a sparkling stream of metallic debris and gases, Defiance descending away from them as though disabled but turning slowly toward the incoming Marauders.
‘Captain, we have a signal coming from CSS Victory!’
Marshall raised his chin.
‘Open the channel.’
For a moment nothing happened, and then on a screen on the bridge appeared a face that they all recognized. Captain Travis Harper’s features looked identical to the man they had all once known, but instantly Marshall knew that he was looking at something else.
‘Your fleet is lost,’ the entity said, it’s eyes devoid of humanity, utterly without remorse. ‘The battle is over. Surrender your forces and stand by to be boarded.’
Marshall kept his tone defiant as he replied.
‘We demand the safe passage of all human beings and civilian vessels and the…’
‘You are in no position to make demands,’ Harper cut him off. ‘Any delay in your surrender will result in your fleet’s destruction, as occurred on Ayleea.’
Marshall ground his teeth in his jaw.
‘Very well,’ Marshall snapped and turned his head toward Olsen. ‘Order the fleet to stand down and wait to be boarded.’
Olsen turned slowly and relayed the command. Marshall turned back to the entity.
‘What the hell is it that you want with us?’
Travis Harper’s features took on the appearance of contentment, as though victory was guaranteed, but it was an expression that looked oddly out of place. Harper’s mannerisms and nature had never been that way, the captain a humble man who had risen through the ranks to his first command.
‘You will be cared for,’ came the reply, and then the entity leaned closer to the screen. ‘Give us the new codes fo
r your fleet’s vessels.’
Marshall looked at the position of the huge harvester spacecraft now dominating the viewing screen before them. The escorting Marauders were moving to surround the fleet with the Marauders already present, the CSS fleet stationary amid a glowing cloud of heated gas and vast, sparkling veils of spinning debris. The Marauder under CSS control was facing directly toward the huge harvester, barely two hull lengths away, and the CSS ships were arrayed around it.
Marshall suppressed the urge to smile as he again looked at Olsen and directed a barely perceptible nod in Travis Harper’s direction.
‘Let ‘em have it.’
Olsen spoke to the Marines aboard the Marauder. ‘Give them all what they deserve.’
*
Tyrone Hackett heard Olsen’s command as he stood on the bridge of the Marauder, the deck littered with the remains of octopedal crew.
Before them were a series of hexagonal screens, as though the bridge were the gigantic eye of some kind of insect, and beyond were multiple images of the same scene of the huge harvester craft. Whatever species had built these spacecraft saw the universe in a very different way to human beings and the species that had taken the vessel.
‘Roger that,’ he replied.
Tyrone looked down to where holes in the mossy control panels had been filled with metallic instruments to allow the octopedal species to control the ship. Before them, it appeared that some kind of biological appendages would have been inserted into the cavities to control the ship more directly. Now, with the octopedal species somewhat similar to humans in having limbs and digits, it had taken Tyrone and the Marines only a few minutes to figure out the basic controls.
‘Hit it!’ he ordered the Marines.
Without hesitation the soldiers opened up the throttles and aimed directly for the massive harvester vessel. The Marauder surged forward as it accelerated directly toward the bridge of the spacecraft facing them.
‘Lock the harvester as a destination and then blast the communications console so they can’t take back control!’ Tyrone yelled. ‘Then let’s get the hell out of here!’
Predator (Old Ironsides Book 3) Page 34
