by David Gunn
A line of words scrolls across the glass plate.
Information already entered.
‘Genotype human equivalent. Status DH class 2, override . . .’
It’s reading a bloody identity chip fitted when I was on the general’s mother ship. Knew I had one in that arm Colonel Madeleine made me. Obviously got one under my skin somewhere as well.
There are three combat seats in the B79.
The colonel gets one, because he’s ranking officer. I get one, because I’ll be handling the cannon. Also, Vijay might be younger than Neen, but he is not stupid, he knows who’s winning this war for him.
Haze gets the last seat, because he’s a braid.
I run that thought back, decide I agree with it, and realize just how bloody odd that sounds. ‘Sit there,’ I tell Haze. ‘Before I change my mind.’
Emil is not happy. He outranks Haze in theory. As do Neen and Franc. But they’re not braids, and they don’t chat up machinery the way the rest of us joke with whores. That leaves five people without proper seats.
A low ledge runs round the back of the crewpit. Five people sitting together on the ledge should help cushion each other from the worst of the acceleration shock. All we have to do is what we did in that tug.
‘Tie yourselves into place.’
‘Sven,’ says Emil, sounding horrified. Turns out, he’s flown in a B79 before.
‘So you’ll know what to expect,’ I tell him. ‘And it’s sir. You’re a trooper in the Aux and you’ll remain one until I tell you otherwise.’
Chapter 51
LIGHTS FLASH IN FRONT OF US. FLASH, FLASH FASTER, AND THEN stutter to a halt. A second run ends the same way. And then a third. I know what the ship’s AI is glitching against, but we have enough time to let it reach its own conclusions.
‘Give me three sixty.’
Screens come to life around the crewpit.
At my nod, Haze revolves the entire pit, letting me check the new arrivals. The lenz in the hangars might be blind, but we have our own on this ship and they’re showing us a major and fifty Death’s Head troopers bundling through an emergency door, and stopping in the darkness, backlit from the stairs.
‘Idiot,’ says Neen.
Also lazy and arrogant. Any half-decent NCO would kill those lights before coming through. If we were out there, we’d have cut them down by now. But luckily for the major, we are in here and keeping the surprise.
At an order from a corporal, the lights go out.
Lasers play across the emptiness of the hangar. A couple of NCOs turn on the torches on their rifles. And then, the panels on the ceiling above us all flare into life again.
‘Sven,’ says Colonel Vijay. ‘Perhaps . . .’
‘We should think about leaving?’
He nods.
‘And maybe not,’ the SIG says.
Lights or not, the wall bolts are still powered down.
As Haze checks that the SIG is right, a dozen Silver Fist hurl themselves through the opening doors of an elevator, guns drawn. They stand down the moment they realize there is no enemy in sight. Another three elevators open a second later. We’re drawing ourselves a big crowd, and soon someone is going to begin scanning the pods and work out where we are.
‘Sir,’ says Neen. ‘Do you want me to take the attack outside?’
‘No,’ I tell him. ‘It’s all going to plan.’
That earns me a stare from Colonel Vijay.
So I grin, letting adrenalin flood my body. This is the bit I like. Only we’re not there yet. More troopers must be on their way, and I would hate to deny anyone their share of the fun.
It takes five minutes before a braid appears.
The first thing he does is send a dozen Silver Fist to check the fancy-looking launch next to us. Maybe he reckons we can’t all get into the B79 bomber. He’s wrong, but looking at Shil, Rachel, Franc, Neen and Emil tied under a cargo net behind me, I can see how they might feel he’s right.
When the Fist start coming towards us, I decide it’s time to move. ‘OK,’ I say. ‘Let’s go.’
‘Sven,’ says Colonel Vijay. ‘The bolts are still dead.’
I know that. Why does he think the B79 won’t start? My gun is going to override the safety routine that prevents ignition. ‘Fuck the bolts, sir,’ I tell him. ‘I’m going to put a rocket through the wall.’
‘You can’t,’ he says. ‘There’ll be an equal and opposite.’
‘A what, sir?’
‘Newton’s Third Law,’ he says. ‘You must remember.’
God . . . Do I look like someone who knows Newton’s Third Law?
Turns out it’s not a problem. If firing a rocket will make us slam into the escape craft directly behind us, then surely all we have to do is fire our engines at the same time? One can cancel out the other.
Seems I have reduced Colonel Vijay to silence. But that’s OK, because the SIG is back up and chattering probabilities.
Our best choice is three rockets, apparently. That gives us a seventy-eight per cent chance of removing the wall, with only a thirty-eight per cent chance of killing ourselves. Four rockets would guarantee the wall but total our odds of surviving in one piece.
Two rockets, barely worth discussing.
‘Three,’ I say. ‘Fire the engines at the same time. And then hold us steady.’
The gun wants to tell me this can’t be done and then decides it can. Obviously, such a feat will take brilliance and inhuman levels of skill.
It’s disgustingly smug as it says this.
As I wait for the SIG, a helmet drops from the crewpit roof, so I slot it over my head. Flipping down the visor reduces the pit to a ghostly haze. I have schematics where the bulkheads are. And I’m looking at the hangar outside as if there’s no hull in the way.
‘Not meant to work like that,’ says Emil.
Flipping the visor up, I discover my helmet schematics are also on screen, and the ex-Ninth officer is looking around at the walls of the crewpit in shock.
‘Get used to it,’ says Neen.
———
Every fucking thing in the hangar not nailed down begins moving as the wall blows out and vacuum sucks away what it can. Firing retros, the B79 lurches forward and then reclaims its position.
The troopers closest to the blast are lucky. They die quickly. As do the ones standing behind our engines. It’s the rest who suffer. A roiling wall of flame swallows them for a second, before they’re sucked into space, their lungs rupturing as air is dragged from their bodies.
It is a bad way to go. We know it without needing to see it on screen.
‘Behind us,’ shouts Haze.
Slipping to the left, the B79 shudders as something glances off its side. Retros fire, and we stabilize again. ‘Neat,’ says the SIG. ‘Though I say so myself.’
The vessel it dodged tumbles once, slides sideways and blocks our exit. It’s bigger than we are, a lot bigger. We’re staring at the general’s launch.
Emergency routines are running in the hangar. If a whole hangar has to be sacrificed that’s what will happen. The troopers nearest the exits aren’t stupid, they know that. That is why they’re gripping on for dear life, while scrabbling over one another to get out.
A sergeant fails to make it through a door.
We get one half, from shoulder to knee, which is sucked towards the broken wall. The rest of him disappears inside the elevator. It’s not going anywhere because the lift shafts have already sealed themselves. ‘Clear our way,’ I tell the gun.
‘My pleasure.’
Launching a fourth missile, it fires a fifth just for the hell of it.
As the general’s little liner shatters, a lieutenant is sucked off his feet, his hands scrabbling for anything to grip. As we watch, he’s dragged across the deck and disappears. Just one of a hundred.
‘You know how to fly this?’ demands Colonel Vijay.
‘Of course.’
Haze looks surprised.
‘Fle
w a skimmer round the landing fields,’ I tell him. ‘At Bosworth. How different can it be?’
Opening his mouth to answer, Colonel Vijay realizes it’s a joke and shuts it again. Leaning across, he offers me his hand to shake. That is how I know he expects to die.
Chapter 52
ACCELERATION WELDS MY COMBAT ARM TO THE CHAIR AND squeezes air from my lungs. As we roll, my ribs creak and my shoulders try to dislocate. Everything around me is turning black and white. Only there is no around me, because all I can see is directly ahead.
A shrinking circle going fuzzy at the edges.
‘Seven g,’ says the gun. ‘Twenty-five seconds.’
Colonel Vijay is unconscious. Other than me, only Haze is awake, and he looks terrified. Turning to forward again almost breaks my neck.
‘Nine g,’ the gun tells me. ‘Thirty-two seconds.’
It hesitates.
‘Say it . . .’
‘Going to kill them,’ the SIG says.
‘No, they’ll pull through.’
‘Not those two,’ the gun says. ‘That lot.’
A screen flickers to show me Rachel, Shil, Emil, Neen and Franc . . . They are twisted into the bulkhead. Far from helping, the curve of the crewpit seems to be forcing them into a single mass. One of the straps holding their net has snapped, another cuts so deep into Rachel’s arm it is bruising already.
‘Thirteen g,’ says the gun. ‘Thirty-seven seconds.’
‘What’s the tolerance . . . ?’
‘For them?’
‘No,’ I say. ‘For this ship.’
The SIG feeds me a figure so high we will be slop in a bucket long before I can shake the engines off this thing. As always, the limits are our own.
‘They’re human,’ says the SIG.
‘So am I.’
It laughs, darkly. ‘You really believe that?’
I’d nod, but g-force glues my skull to the seat. So I grunt, ease back a little and roll a turn. We just miss a Z7x fighter, which explodes as our rocket hits.
‘Five,’ says the SIG.
My gun is firing, the combat AI target-spots, and I fly. Should be Haze, but he’s away with who knows what. So far the combination works. Hekati is behind us. A bloody great ring hanging off the edge of a mined-out—
‘Concentrate,’ says my gun.
Another fighter explodes in front of us.
Out here, you don’t get sound; you don’t even get shock waves. You just get a burst of light and endless high-speed shrapnel. The trick is to outrun the shrapnel, or slide it off your force field like flat stones off water. Easier to describe than do.
My screen shows a fighter coming up behind. No way is it going to miss from this distance. As I roll the B79, the Silver Fist fighter fires, and the SIG burns each of its rockets in turn with a short pulse of cannon.
Rolling again, I loop my own path to take the Z7x from the rear. It goes up in a ball of flame, and enough shrapnel to make me twist viciously.
‘Sven,’ says the gun.
‘What?’
‘You’re killing the Aux.’
‘If I don’t do this,’ I say, ‘they’re going to be dead anyhow.’
‘Well,’ it says. ‘Perhaps they’d rather be killed by the enemy.’
‘How are they going to know?’ I ask, checking a screen. ‘They’re all unconscious anyway.’
The gun says nothing. Probably not a good sign.
Taking a slow curve, I see the edge of the asteroid belt.
It is that jumble of rocks, slashed like a broken line inside my screen. Should have thought of it before. 1500 klicks. We can do that.
‘Behind you,’ warns the SIG.
There are two of them, fighters in tight formation. And then, when I check again, I see it is three. One waits higher than the others, further back. That one intends to kill me. The others are just along for the hunt.
To unsettle me.
‘Incoming,’ the SIG says.
Yeah, I’ve seen them. The outriders sweep in behind me.
They intend to cross, which means they’re flying staggered. Although both open fire at the same time. Give me a knife, and I’ll take down anything. But this, slamming around inside some bloody machine, it’s not natural.
If I’m going to kill someone, I want to see their eyes.
Firing the retros makes Haze double over and lose the contents of his gut direct into his lap. Proves he’s still alive, at least. The SIG swears, but that’s only because it is flipping across the crewpit to hit a screen.
Somewhere in the middle of that, the SIG thinks cannon, and reduces both fighters to shards of metals, exploding gas and a flash of blinding light. ‘Ungrateful bastard,’ it snaps, when I remain silent.
But I’m too focused to answer.
Anyway, the third Z7x is beginning its run. The pilot is spooked, which makes him careless. This isn’t what he expects. Coming out like that in a group of three, only to be alone. Now, me . . .
I was alone to start with.
And here he is, chasing an enemy towards the edge of the asteroid belt. An enemy who’s just killed both his companions. It is not a big jump to deciding he’s next.
The fighter comes in fast, and I loop, with darkness eating at the edges of my vision until the world becomes a tiny circle of straight ahead. What I need is to get behind the enemy pilot and let the SIG do its thing.
How hard can that be?
As the Silver Fist opens fire, I pull up and it flicks below me. Looping takes all of my concentration, and as we level out again the SIG starts firing. You can see pulse cannon in space. It burns green. Don’t ask me why.
This guy is good. He twists away, and I follow. As he jerks up, I begin to follow him into a loop and suddenly he isn’t there, because he’s out of the loop and back on his original heading. Any moment now, he’ll do a second twist and roll himself behind me.
‘Wait,’ I tell the SIG.
Slipping sideways, I flip the B79 and fire boosters. The kick nails me to the chair and turns my vision to a tiny island of light surrounded by waves of blackness. As we level out, the SIG sights.
Looks like a clear shot to me.
‘Targeted,’ the SIG says.
‘Take it.’
Warnings obviously fire inside the fighter, because the pilot weaves from side to side and then rolls into a dive. There is no gravity out here, but that dive instinct still kicks in.
As we go for a kill, the pilot kicks in extra boosters.
Heat flares from his afterburner. And the fighter explodes into a weirdly flattened ball of flame and razor-sharp fragments. Only the shrapnel’s all heading in our direction. On the far side of where the fighter was, lights spark in their millions.
‘Pull up,’ shouts the gun.
At this level of g-force, that is easier to say than do. Executing a tight turn, I roll the B79 into the early stages of a loop and begin to climb.
‘Tighter.’
Bastard SIG.
Somewhere down the line, I black out.
Doesn’t matter, the combat AI keeps me on track, and I’m awake before it can turn one loop into two, or do something stupid like go take a closer look at all those little explosions.
‘What the fuck happened?’
An area of blank space hangs between us and Victory First, with Hekati looking vast behind that. There isn’t a Z7x to be seen.
‘All gone,’ says the SIG.
‘Fuck, how many?’
‘Twenty-three.’
We killed twenty-three fighters . . . ?
‘Fish in a barrel,’ says the SIG, sounding disgusted.
‘Them?’
The gun snorts. ‘Us,’ it says, and tells me why.
We didn’t kill that fighter. It crashed into the inside edge of a force field Victory First threw up the moment this battle began. If the field can destroy their fighter, it can destroy us.
And I have problems that are more pressing. We are almost out of fuel, our oxygen’s
nearly gone, and we’re using what is left faster than the converters can replace. Eight people in a B79 bomber designed for three is a shit idea. Even if it was mine.
Also, we’re suffering.
My sight is blurred and my throat sour from the kyp. Haze is sticky with his own vomit, and what didn’t glue itself to the walls or the rest of us now hangs in the air, tiny spit balls of half-digested supper.
As for the others . . .
Colonel Vijay is unconscious. But at least he’s upright and safe in a chair. Looking at him reminds me of a very young General Jaxx, which is weird enough to make me decide to think about something else.
It is the rest who need help.
Shil’s chest rises and falls as she struggles for breath. A shoulder tab on her uniform reads orange. She has taken damage, but it’s not yet fatal. At least, not if we can get help and that’s one hell of a—
‘Sven,’ snaps the gun.
‘What? ‘
‘You might want to pay attention.’
Chapter 53
ONE WHOLE SIDE IS RISING FROM VICTORY FIRST. if the Enlightened ship is a city, then an entire neighbourhood is detaching itself to lift slowly away. It reveals a hole in the mother ship that begins to close as walls shift and hangar doors move.
Soon the Victory First will look as it used to look. Just a bit smaller. ‘What the fuck is that?’ I demand, pointing to the detached bit.
‘Epsilon-class cruiser,’ says the gun.
We can play question and answer or I can use the kyp. The thought doesn’t make me happy. ‘Using it already, sir,’ mutters Haze.
Blood beads his lip. It wells into little blue spheres and flips free like floating pearls to join the vomit, spittle and all the things we forgot to lock down.
Blue? I think. And then I have my answer.
Oxygen loss starves haemoglobin. In a flash flood, I understand more than I want about human biology. And Haze is human; well, as human as I am. Just as quickly, I dismiss the fact.
Who needs memory when this stuff can be pulled from the air?
