Since the end of the Krenaran war, the E.D.F didn’t have much use for a former captured Krenaran stealth ship, turned into one of the most advanced and deadly ships in the fleet, though they still retained her services.
During the early stages of the re-building of the devastated outer colonies shortly after the war, her immense speed and hitting power had made her an excellent anti-pirate patrol ship, although over the past couple of years the navy slowly recouped their massive losses and gradually re-asserted control over E.O.C.A space again. As a result, pirate activity died down once more to pre-war levels. This unfortunately left the Liberty virtually surplus to requirements amongst the more multi-role ships of the navy nowadays.
The two men made their way aboard the berthed ship to stow their gear, as they had done a thousand times in the past.
“Smells just like home,” Johnson said as he stepped aboard.
Kinraid nodded in agreement, “That it does, that it does.”
The two officers headed to their separate quarters to change into their full naval uniforms, Logameier headed to engineering to check if things were okay down there, while Kinraid headed to Michael’s quarters to hear about this new emergency that had everyone flapping.
“Ah Quinn, welcome back, have a good time away?”
“Yeah thanks cap’n, although the crew are not appreciatin’ having ta’ hurry back like this, what’s goin’ on?”
“We have new orders Quinn, the Copernicus has been destroyed.”
“That’s little Kathryn’s ship!” Quinn said in alarm.
“I know.”
“When’s the briefin.’”
“As soon as everyone is back aboard.”
“Whatta’ you think cap’n?”
Michael hesitated for a moment, contemplating his answer, “I think we owe it to Kathryn to go in, find out what happened, and get those still on the surface out of there.”
“There ‘r’ people still on the surface?”
“Yes commander, and they don’t have much time, it will all be in the briefing.”
“I understand,” Kinraid nodded respectfully.
Michael rubbed his chin in thought, “my gut tells me this won’t be easy Quinn.”
“Is anythin’ we ever do easy cap’n,” Kinraid replied smiling.
“I guess not.”
Less than an hour later, a small Lincoln class supply ship dropped off the remainder of the Liberties crew, they all hurried aboard to get their equipment stowed and begin to make the ship ready for departure. Eldathar, the tall Solarian pilot, returning from his stay on the Solarian homeworld itself, was last to arrive. Kinraid had informed the crew there was to be an immediate briefing as soon as everyone was aboard.
They all assembled on the ships bridge, it was a tight squeeze, but the crew of forty one just about managed to fit into the oval shaped room.
“First of all, I’d like to apologise for making everyone rush back like this,” Michael began, “however this is a unique situation, if there was any other way, we wouldn’t have done it.”
The crew all silently nodded their understanding.
“Those of you who were with us during the Krenaran war will remember our former medical officer, Kathryn Jacobs. The ship she currently serves aboard was destroyed by a new unidentified enemy, resulting in the deaths of over two hundred naval personnel and scientists. The Copernicus itself is an unarmed survey vessel under the command of the research division; it was conducting a survey of the Auriga system. Although not everyone died, sixteen people are still trapped on the surface of Auriga III, including Kathryn in some unknown alien structure. The vessel that destroyed the Copernicus is still out there, and is still a threat. Here is all the information we currently have on it.”
Michael played a video feed containing the sensor data and the ships logs of the Copernicus through the shimmering holographic main viewer.
It showed the dark shape of the enemy ship closing with its prey, Michael studied the reactions of his crew intently as they watched; in particular Eldathar. The Solarian’s eyes widened in shock as he instantly recognised the alien vessel.
The crew witnessed the devastating impacts of the torpedoes, and the carnage wrought onboard, the smoke, fires, and lifeless broken bodies, and then the final coup de grace from those deadly laser lances, the video went black.
The crew stood in silence, not since the Krenaran war had they witnessed this kind of wanton destruction, and for many it brought back uncomfortable memories of that dark time.
“The E.D.F has initiated an alert level three, the highest alert level since the Krenaran war in response to this, so this is absolutely as real as it gets gentlemen. The Liberty is the only ship in the area fast enough to rescue the stranded science team. This is what we’ve trained for, what the Liberty is built for, we won’t let her down, and we won’t let those scientists down; for Kathryn!”
The whole crew echoed solemnly, “for Kathryn.”
“Dismissed.”
The crew all fell out and began to filter through to their familiar stations throughout the six decks of the one hundred and forty metre long ship.
All that is, except Eldathar. Michael needed to know what the Solarians knew about this new alien species.
“You know who that was, don’t you?” He probed gently.
“Yes; they are a people long thought forgotten, and one I didn’t expect to see again,” he bowed his head low as though in shame. “They are called the Dracos, and were once Solarians; a breakaway radical group who placed the infliction of pain and torture above that of peace, culture and science.” Eldathar took a long deep breath, as if trying to re-open a long suppressed memory buried deep within his people’s psyche, and never told to anyone. “They once tried to overthrow the Solarian government over three hundred years ago, causing a brief but bloody civil war, in the end they were defeated. Our people went mad, seized by a vengeance to right the wrongs they had done to us, we chased them relentlessly through our space, the warfleet mercilessly harried them world from world, system-by-system, until they disappeared forever. We devastated their key facilities, infrastructure and bases from orbit, and thought we had destroyed all trace of the Dracos. In doing so we had destroyed a part of ourselves, though now three hundred years later they have returned.” Eldathar sighed sadly as he recounted the tale.
“So they are like the Solarians smaller, evil little brother?”
“In a way, yes.”
“So why don’t the Solarians get involved, help us to stop them?”
“It is not a time we are proud of as a people, we derived no pleasure in turning weapons against our own kind. No matter how wayward they had become they were still our brothers and sisters, this was a time of nothing but universal sadness for the Solarian people. Before this, no Solarian had killed another in anger, and to us it was like killing our own family. Now three centuries on we feel exactly the same, and that is why the Solarian empire cannot intervene.”
Michael searched the Solarian’s features as he looked up at him, the sadness was plain to see, this news must be tearing him apart on the inside. “I understand, I will not force you to go on this mission Eldathar, if you wish to remain behind I will not hold it against you.”
“I am a Solarian yes, though I am also a member of this crew, and I will continue to do my duty; Kathryn was my friend too captain.”
Michael smiled knowingly, this was exactly the kind of response he had come to expect from his number one pilot, although he couldn’t imagine how difficult this must be for him.
The Solarian quietly took his place in the Liberties pilot’s chair, while Michael took up the centre seat.
“Kinraid, contact engineering, tell them to bring main power online.”
There was a pause of a few seconds while commander Kinraid transmitted the order down to the Liberties engineering section from his console. “Engineering confirms, Solarian power core’s charging up and is stable, we’ll ‘ave full power i
n two minutes for ‘ya cap’n.”
“Excellent, contact Charlie Gamma base control, and request permission to get under way.”
Kinraid worked the controls again, after another brief pause the response came, “clearance’s been granted.”
The holographic viewscreen shimmered into life once again, before becoming crystal clear, the face of Commodore Valente and the rest of the command team in the background became visible. “Good luck Liberty, and god speed.” The viewscreen shimmered out of existence, leaving just the bare bridge wall.
Lights flickered into action and consoles came to life throughout the ship, the half-orb that housed the ships plasma drive system beneath the vessel, covered in a lattice work of delicate conduits, began to power up. Navigation lights fitted to the widest part of the Liberties sloping, angular hull began to blink their respective green and red. The primary negative Ion propulsion drive lit up into its brilliant electric blue, as did the ships Ionic turning thrusters nestled within wide indents halfway along the ships hull.
Everywhere onboard people were glued to their stations, checking over the readouts of status displays flashing across a plethora of terminals.
The elongated barrel of the ships most deadly weapon, that Solarian designed fusion cannon lit up; being the most energy intensive system on the ship it was always last to fully power up, although the weapon itself wasn’t active, that would only happen once the Liberty entered into a combat situation.
Finally, Michael gave the command, “blow docking hatch, release all moorings, reverse thrust one quarter power, manoeuvring thrusters at users discretion.”
Keeping his eyes glued to the sensor readouts in front of his chair, Eldathar gently pulled on a small throttle control nestled within the palm of his hand just a fraction. The one hundred and forty metre long vessel gradually began to reverse. The confines of the small dockyard were tight, and the Solarian had to guide the ship skilfully around the hull of the Lincoln class supply ship that had docked earlier.
The Liberties port turning thruster flared a brilliant electric blue as power was shunted to it, lighting up a section of the transports hull as it gently glided around it, slowly edging its way out of the dockyard and into the star filled blackness of deep space. The only object to impose upon that universal blackness was the bright blue-green atmosphere of Malthus IV below them, the site of the Malthus colony, and the dull grey hull of Charlie Gamma base itself ahead, festooned with its numerous shining portholes, and lit sections.
From a distance, the station resembled a giant oblong, with a tall cylindrical main structure at one end, it was in this cylindrical section where the stations crew lived and worked. The large oblong structure extending outwards from it was the dockyard itself, providing shelter for the ships huddled within, and wherefrom the Liberty had just emerged.
“Okay, now that we are clear, set a new course, bearing zero-six-seven degrees, elevation twenty one.”
“Aye captain,” Eldathar replied as he raised one arm of his pilot’s chair, while simultaneously lowering the other. The ship instantly responded to the pilot’s movements and rapidly spun around to face this new direction. The fore section and fusion cannon was pointed away from the station, as the ship raised itself as though on a gentle incline to match the co-ordinates given for elevation.
Michael had to hold onto his seat as the ship manoeuvred into position, unlike a big, bulky E.D.F ship that took a veritable age to turn, the Liberty was almost instant. At times Michael wondered whether the Ionic thrusters were too good, though he rarely complained as they had proven to be such a boon when in battle.
“Full power to main engines, then initiate maximum plasma drive once we are clear.”
“Understood captain,” Eldathar replied, as he pushed sharply down on the same throttle control, the Liberty rapidly accelerated, soon leaving the colony world and its small orbital facility far behind.
After about ten minutes of sub-light cruising, the planet was little more than a tiny speck, barely visible in the surrounding vastness of space. In-fact the only thing that was visible was the bright yellow-orange of the Malthus sun.
The star of the Malthus system was a very old one, almost twice as old as the sun the Earth orbited, and had all but used up the hydrogen contained within its corona. As such it was beginning its expansion, slowly transforming from a yellow star into a red giant. Scientists had predicted that unless no unusual phenomena interfered with the stars natural metamorphosis, the colony wouldn’t need to be evacuated for at least the next five hundred years.
The Liberty reached a safe distance and then engaged its plasma drive, the half-orb beneath the warship glowed with barely contained power, as plasma energy filled the myriad conduits adorning the sphere. The plasma built up, and then shot forward along a wide slightly raised channel, running from the plasma drive itself along the length of the Liberties hull, to a sharp frontal emitter, where an intensely bright blue beam of raw plasma energy lanced out from the front of the ship. Exploding into the swirling multi-hued plasma wake, fringed with its distinctive halo of bright white light. The Liberty itself, still hurtling along at full sub-light speed, dove headlong into the plasma wake and entered plasma drive.
Now travelling at plasma factor seven, seven times the speed of light, the small yet deadly warship shot through the swirling tunnel of colours that was the plasma wake, racing towards its destination just outside the Auriga system to pick up the commando assault team, before venturing into the system itself.
Michael prayed for the scientist’s sake, that they would make it in time.
8. Extreme measures
The Liberty continued to race through plasma drive, though the Auriga system was relatively near Malthus, it was still a journey of several hours.
Drax however, was enjoying hunting down the interlopers, he found them resourceful, worthy, but ultimately easily killed. Although his own men had taken severe casualties, his other team virtually wiped out, and his own team reduced to seven out of the original ten men. Now they were bolstered by the arrival of the two survivors from the second team. Even better news was on the cards however, as word had reached him of two more Dracos ships that had come to join in the fun, and would likely be despatching their own assault teams shortly.
He and his men had checked every room on the second floor, quietly creeping through ventilation ducts and service passages, never along the main corridor itself. Now they were heading down toward the third and lowest floor, he knew they had to be here, there was simply nowhere else they could hide. The thought of the slaughter to come excited him greatly.
Further they crept, through the narrow square shaped metallic interior of the ventilation ducting. Following precisely the outline of the map displayed on the A.R. uplink over his left eye.
Finally, when he switched his view onto thermal imaging mode, he was rewarded with what he was looking for; thermal signatures given off by his enemy’s body heat. Drax waved for his men to follow cautiously.
The Dracos Kallan warriors crept forward slowly, and with such skill that barely a sound was made, just metres away from their prey now, some were sleeping while others kept watch, a few others were acting as sentries out in the corridor beyond the large room being watched by the arrayed men.
Drax quietly ordered his team to split up, there wasn’t much point in keeping all his men together as had been proven by the ill-fated second team, he ordered two Kallan to drop into the next room, come around and eliminate the sentries, thereby creating a diversion allowing himself and the four other Kallan to swoop in and wreak havoc.
Drax and his guards silently waited as the two other Dracos peeled off down the narrow ducting.
The two scientists Matthew Broadhurst and Pablo Gomez were guarding the entrance to the briefing hall. They were tired, heck everyone was tired, though they didn’t know just how long they had been down here. Everyone had lost complete track of time after the chaos of the initial attacks, together with the
business of staying alive. For all they knew it could have been weeks, Broadhurst however doubted it was any more than a couple of days. The rations wouldn’t have lasted that long anyway, food was already becoming scarce, if they didn’t think of something soon, they would all starve to death down here.
Kathryn was still tending to the injured Thorsson as best she could under the circumstances, and as for poor Corporal Jankov, without his sight he was effectively a walking dead man. Broadhurst and Gomez continued to scan the dark, wide corridor that extended into the gloom as far as they could see in either direction.
Broadhurst thought he could sense the faint shuffling of feet, a paralysing fear came over him, his skin ran cold and clammy, his nerves set on edge. The gentle hairs on the back of his neck began to rise.
He swung his weapon in the direction of the sound, “what’s that?” he whispered nervously.
“What’s what?” Gomez whispered back.
“I thought I heard something, I’m going to check it out, stay here.” Broadhurst crept through the darkness.
“Get back here!” Gomez shouted after him, but it was no use, he had already disappeared into the darkness.
Broadhurst ventured through the gloom alone, the flashlight from his pistol illuminating the various dark foreboding panels, casting deep shadows along their edges. He nervously crept further and further away from the briefing hall doors, his weapon shook gently in his hands as he mentally tried to calm his jangled nerves. The shuffling sound was getting steadily louder, there was definitely something down here, and close. He risked a quick glance back over his shoulder, and could still see the faint glow given off from Gomez’s flashlight; it reassured him a little.
He stopped at the entrance to the next room, the environmental systems monitoring station that had been damaged earlier in the fighting. He tentatively shined his torch inside, almost afraid of what he might see, his heart pounded in his chest; there was nothing. He breathed a huge sigh of relief, perhaps he had just imagined it? After all, tiredness and extreme stress can do strange things to a man.
E.D.F Chronicles : Eye of the Dracos Page 10
