by G. H. Holmes
She smiled at him with her bright blue eyes and gave him a thumbs up, pulled on her helmet and climbed into her slender fighter. While her crew jumped on their cart and sped away towards the hangar, she snuggled herself into her seat. The x-jet's door closed automatically and immediately a broad red harness came down and tightened itself around her, fixing her in her seat. As soon as its lock clicked home, her seat sank back until it was arrested with Charity looking straight up. The control panels were now in front of her.
She looked out through the vitrum dome that covered her cockpit and saw that Juggernaut had already fired up his engines. But Jug was twenty and had trained even longer than she. He was wing king today and she was his portside wing woman.
Got to get a move on.
With practiced movements she woke up the screen and checked its meters. All dials were green. There was not a red one among them.
Good.
Cherry inhaled deeply, closed her eyes and smacked the big black button with the palm of her right hand. The four engines in the wings rumbled to life and she exulted in the vibrations that ran up her spine.
"Systems ready?" said Juggernaut's voice in her head.
"Rambler's ready," Rambler replied.
Her gaze flashed over her screen one more time before she said, "Cherry's ready."
"Three, two, one," Juggernaut counted down with a calm voice.
Their engines whined and roared. The next moment the three x-jets arched straight into the clear blue sky like arrows fired from a bow.
Charity wore a G-suit under her flight suit, but the pressure was still excruciating. For a moment she couldn't breathe and she felt her eyeballs being pushed back into their sockets. When the pressure exceeded 9G, Cherry grayed out, in spite of the G-suit, which did what it could to keep her blood from leaving her brain and from pooling in her legs and lower abdomen. A real-life alpha scramble was much more brutal than one in the simulator, Cherry found when she came back after a moment. She blinked furiously. Was she still where she was supposed to be?
Yes.
A glance at the HUD showed that she was flying staggered on Juggernaut's left side, like she was supposed to. The computer was taking care of many of the routine jobs of the x-jet, independent of the pilot and his or her condition. Strictly speaking, only the lethal decisions depended on the pilot.
Gazing out through the vitrum dome, she saw the glow of Juggernauts four engines about a half a klick ahead. They shone like four tiny suns in the cloudless sky. Looking hard right, she could see Rambler's silver needle a kilometer away.
Several intergalactic transports had been coming and going in the last few days, not just interstellar ones like those from Bagong Lupa. Most were cargo ships. Their transponders all identified them as such. What prompted the alpha scramble on this newest arrival was the fact that this craft had come in way too fast to begin with and then hadn't broadcast any IFF code. It had not identified itself as friend or foe. Its icon on the screen in the tactical command center never turned green, but remained orange. Since the military's business was defense, it considered everything that was not a friend to be a foe and worthy of instant scrutiny.
In this case the wariness proved fully justified.
When the explosions of the intruder's plasma bombs registered on the planetary sensor grid, the scramble was already underway. And now three young fighter pilots were chasing what seemed to be a foreign menace.
They were above Harrow's Dale right now and Cherry could see the orange flames of the forest burning. For a few seconds black smoke billowed in front of her, then she'd passed it and the sky was blue again.
A red speck appeared above the artificial horizon on her panel. "Bandit at one o'clock," she said.
"I've seen him," Juggernaut replied, all businesslike. "I'll talk to him, you activate your shields."
With energy shields active, communication was impossible in a tactical fighter like an x-jet, even in space-capable versions such as the alpha task force was flying.
Immediately Cherry touched a button on the HOTAS-stick between her legs and heard an aggressive crackle as the shield enclosed her jet. The world beyond her canopy acquired a weird yellow sheen. It got colder, too. She felt it first in her feet. The coldness wandered up her legs and spine and her skin began to pucker. On top, she felt as if charged with a monster load of static electricity. Ants seemed to crawl around on her scalp and she wanted to scratch badly, but couldn’t of course. If she hadn't worn a helmet, she was sure her hair would have stood on end.
Her head would have looked like a yellow porcupine.
Her ears loaded with a soft hum, Charity couldn't hear Juggernaut hailing the bandit flying above and towards them. She locked her jet's camera onto it and moved her fingers to zoom in on the object.
A delta-shaped craft with a black underbelly came into view. It looked different from any flyer Cherry knew. This was an intergalactic visitor, she was sure.
Or something out of Bagong Lupa.
You never knew what professors Cho and Guofeng were up to. But she'd been to the naval yards on that planet recently on an educational tour and, while there, hadn't spied anything like this bandit.
Charity was still going through images of spaceships in her head, some from history books, when her x-jet was suddenly hit by fire and she felt as if she'd slammed a wall. Violently thrown forward, she groaned with pain. Good thing she was harnessed in so tightly, even her helmet, or the whiplash would have wrung her neck.
And good thing her shields were up.
But the attack-analysis readout on her panel said, "Stunner, nonlethal." She would have survived this even without her shields up.
A glance out the cockpit showed that the delta-shaped bandit was racing straight up now, towards space. This was obviously a hostile craft, but not one in the mood for a dogfight. It was as if he'd said, "What do you want? I have no business with you. Back off! Leave me alone!"
But she couldn't just let him go.
She craned her neck, but couldn't see Juggernaut or Rambler. That was odd.
Where were they?
Perhaps they hadn't been hit by just stunner fire. Whatever happened to them, she'd have to pursue this menace.
Instead of deactivating her shield in order to communicate with her wing king, Cherry quickly canceled auto-formation and pulled her fighter up, until she was—literally—hot on the heels of the bandit. Within minutes both glowing craft had reached the edge of the atmosphere of Terra Gemina and raced out into the darkness of space like giant sparks. The frigidity of their new surroundings chilled them quickly and the hulls of the crafts returned to their natural colors.
Even now Charity flew directly behind the bandit, hiding in his heat signature, which was a broad band spanning the entire backside. Here, the chance of obscuring her own signature from the enemy's sensors was greatest.
A glance at the coordinates to figure out where the bandit was going revealed that he was vectored towards the entrance to the pylon road, which would enable him to leave the solar system in the blink of an eye.
She couldn't allow him to do that—especially since he had no shields up. At least her sensors detected none.
Her hands on the HOTAS-stick between her legs, she cycled through her available weapons systems. She didn't want to blow him up, even though she could have, she was sure. He'd only stunned her. He hadn't tried to liquidate her. She had no reason to kill him.
What would it take to disable this wall of fire in front of her?
Well, he'd attacked her with stunner fire.
Now she'd return the favor.
Cherry pressed down on the red button atop her black rubber stick and released rapid impulses of stun shocks into the bandit's thruster bank. On impact the left half flamed out and was reduced to glowing orange circles.
They were delicate machines, weren't they?
Suddenly aware of a threat, the bandit spun around in a hundred-and-eighty degree transposition maneuver, but kept o
n flying in the same direction as before. He was now facing Charity's x-jet head on while sliding further away from her.
"What do you want?" he seemed to say.
With great presence of mind Cherry pushed forwards on her HOTAS-stick and dove under him, thus evading the blue laser beams that were coming at her, meant to puncture her jet's fuselage.
The gun dome on the bandit's belly now locked onto her. Its pointing muzzle followed her and fired a steady stream of high-powered laser impulses after her, painting a short-lived fan of blue light onto the black canvas of space.
Once she was exactly behind him again, she slewed her fighter around and again hovered by his thruster bank, the left half of which was still out as she noted with satisfaction.
But this time the bandit didn't take it lying down. Instead, the craft tilted upwards and rose in front of her like a wall. A blue sheen that hadn't been there before now surrounded the craft. He had activated his shield.
She saw the gleam of the rotating gun dome on the bandit's topside. The gun was searching for her.
Wide-eyed, Cherry cycled through her weapons store and selected her potent red laser cannon. She tried to get the ornery thing to lock onto the gun dome, which she kept selecting for a target. While she was still at it, a soft ping came on, notifying her that her adversary's target system had locked onto her.
She lifted her gaze and stared at the alien craft beyond the vitrum panels of her cockpit.
The muzzle on the bandit's gun dome began to blink. Blue light was rushing towards her. A moment later her fighter was rattled and she felt like sitting in a shack of corrugated metal that got pounded by hail. When the pounding didn't let up, Charity decided not to take chances. She accelerated and dashed away.
A glance at the meter revealed that her energy shield was now depleted by about fifty percent. It would take a few minutes for it to get replenished. She couldn't risk taking another hit like the last one until then.
When the bandit followed her, she zigzagged like a hare that fled a dog. For many minutes she dashed and darted around, trying to shake her pursuer, but to no avail. Even though half his engines were out, he still kept up with her easily.
In a daring maneuver Charity finally pulled all the way back on her stick and did a full looping. Since her craft was smaller and nimbler, she outraced her pursuer momentarily. This maneuver bought her enough time for her laser cannon to lock onto the bandit's topside gun dome. She set the cannon to full blast and her thumb pushed down on the red button.
Red pencil lines crashed into the bandit's weapon station, which began to glow under the impact.
Just then four porthole-sized ports slid open in the ship's topside and Charity realized that she was in over her head. The gun domes were merely the small arms on this craft. In the heat of the chase, and because she couldn't immediately see them, she'd completely forgotten about the possibility of plasma cannons.
Those were dangerous.
Shield or no shield, a well-directed plasma jet might cut her vehicle—and her in it—asunder. Or fry her into dust.
It was time to bail.
She was convinced that her craft was better equipped to cope with entering Terra Gemina's atmosphere than the massive bandit. Thus Charity aimed her fighter at the planet and dove towards it.
The bandit chased her. But while he was slowing down as they entered the planet's atmosphere, she got faster. She even switched off her shield to gain extra energy and accelerated her x-jet even more. It was a white-glowing pin in the sky by now.
Her heart was pounding as he fell behind.
She'd make it!
She was outracing him. Charity was excited to have escaped the threat that she'd sought so recklessly—when suddenly a ping came on and her craft was rocked by a powerful impact. Two of her engines exploded and Cherry's x-jet spun out of control.
That was it.
She was going to die.
God! She was going to die!
Then her training broke through. She closed her eyes, settled her thumb on the number-pad of her HOTAS-stick, and punched in the three single-digit coordinates of Gemina City's alpha station. Then she reached down between her legs and grabbed the handle of the ejection seat in which she sat. She inhaled deeply and pulled up on it with both hands.
For the longest time nothing happened. She pulled on the handle again and began to doubt her sanity.
"Come on! Go off!"
Then she remembered that the seat hadn't engaged because the x-jet's fuselage was momentarily too hot to make this a safe procedure.
She closed her eyes and waited patiently.
Suddenly the seat's rocket motors flared. She was still way up in the atmosphere when the cockpit-bubble and Charity in it shot away from the tumbling fighter, which kept on spiraling downwards and soon vanished in the blue abyss.
The ejection force was strong enough for Cherry to black out for good. She didn't wake up while she fell towards the planet in her pressurized capsule without wings.
Chapter 5
For the longest time Ben Harrow had the hardest time to concentrate. Try as he might, he couldn't get a clear thought into his head. His mind seemed couched in cotton. He felt no pain. Instead, he felt incredibly dull.
He seemed to tumble, to roll with the clouds, to be carried upon the wind. Unable to think, he merely existed, remotely aware that he belonged to the living, but feeling more like a rock or a plant than a human being.
He had no idea how long it took, but he seemed to become aware of himself again only when the sun was already westering. High up in the air, he seemed to float in an orange cloud of energy.
Smelling smoke, he turned over and looked down. A thousand meters below him his forest was still smoldering. A large part of it consisted of blackened stumps by now. The part with the glens and glades was untouched.
Ben couldn't see his house or the pond. After the bomb had torn him apart, he'd been unconscious for too long. He'd floated off too far.
Good thing the water had attenuated his disintegration. Otherwise he would have been history now.
Ben didn't believe in coincidences.
That he was still alive meant, there was still work for him to do…
It obviously had taken a while for his body to begin to reassemble itself and it would take at least another hour until he'd become a fully functioning human again. In the meantime he could do nothing but wait.
A capricious wind was blowing the cloud that was Ben Harrow towards Gemina City, which gave him the opportunity to see whether the attacking fighter had done any damage to it. But Ben found it unmolested. People were walking around down there. Hovercraft cruised in its streets. It seemed, the enemy had been after him only.
The spiraling breeze tossed him around for many minutes and carried him up to a height of about three thousand meters, when Ben became aware of a drifting object high above him. He felt stronger now. On barely present golden wings he flew closer and soon saw that an ejection seat was coming down.
Somebody was falling from the sky!
Ben noticed that the seat had got stricken with the white cords of its parachute. It had probably happened when the cockpit bubble was blasted away at a safe altitude and the parachute had come out too quickly. The seat was coming down too fast, since of the parachute never opened quite right. As it was, the seat hung almost upside down in a net of cords.
Ben flew closer and saw that a pilot was in fact strapped in. The pilot would perish if he hit the ground upside down.
Ben didn't have enough substance yet to untangle the heavy seat. How could he save this person? He figured it would be a mere two, three minutes before the seat would crash onto the planet.
The thruster pods!
The four pods were momentarily inactive. If he fired them up, the seat might rectify. But as ethereal as he still was, would he be able to push down on the thruster ignition?
Was there even enough energy left in them?
He'd have to find ou
t.
Ben's ethereal form now reached through the seat's material and hugged the pilot, who was still unconscious. But a heartbeat was present. It resonated in Ben's head. For a moment their hearts beat in sync.
Good.
He found the touchpad on the right-hand arm rest and focused all his matter and energy on the thruster icons displayed there. For a few seconds nothing happened. Concerned, Ben glanced down the planet's surface for a second while he kept his finger on the icon.
Suddenly one portside pod started firing.
It worked!
Ben quickly pressed down on the icon for the second portside pod. But instead of roaring to life, too, it merely fizzled and coughed.
The two active pod-cups were angling, swiveling around in their base. The seat was moving, trying to right itself, but the power of the second thruster was just not enough. Ben checked the fuel gauge. It showed that the pod had enough juice left. It should be working without problem.
Ben turned again and shot another glance at the surface of Terra Gemina. It was rushing closer. He didn't have much time left.
What could he do to save the life of this pilot?
He'd have to dive into the pod and analyze it.
Ben sunk into the matter of the seat, until he reached the hot metal of the malfunctioning thruster pod. Working backwards from there, he flowed through the fuel line, slid through the electric cables and flashed through the circuitry of the engine that connected it to the touchscreen. Going back down, he felt the tiny lines of electricity flowing through the cables and the coldness of the liquid hydrogen in the fuel hose.
It didn't take him long to find the cause of the breakdown. The hydrogen hose had a kink in it. He quickly straightened it out as best as he could and witnessed the liquid gas flow towards the thruster.
The heavy seat started to go round, messing up what little use it got out of its parachute.
Lightning-quick, Ben came back out of the seat and hovered over the touchscreen once more. He quickly punched the icons for the other two thrusters, which flared immediately. He deftly manipulated the power of the four pods, until the seat had righted itself and was now hovering in the air. When that was accomplished, Ben quickly released the tangled parachute, brushed it off and it fell away. Then he set the thruster power on descent and watched the seat sink towards the planet. He flew away from it until he was about three meters away and looked at the form of the pilot strapped in. He would survive. Ben was confident of that.
