by Mack Maloney
Sheez never thought he'd miss Megiddo. But compared to this place, his old home seemed like paradise to him now.
His group of 5,000 was marched off the high plain where they'd been deposited and into a narrow, three-cornered canyon. It was hard on the edge of a mountain range that stretched north for as far as the eye could see. Sheez knew that he was somewhere way up in the upper half of the planet. He'd caught a glimpse of a snowcap as they were entering the rarefied atmosphere. He guessed he was now about twenty miles south of the frost line.
The three-sided canyon was only a few acres in area; once his group had been jammed in, it became as crowded as the putrid cargo hold they'd just left. They were being guarded by a hundred or so enormous red-suited SG troopers who had stationed themselves on the high rocks bordering the canyon.
There had been more than 15,000 people on his ship, but just where the SG had dropped off the rest of them, Sheez didn't know or care. Their erstwhile protectors seemed intent on leaving large groups of refugees piecemeal around the planet. Spreading them out, for reasons unknown.
At first, many of those in the crowd thought that they had been brought here because the SG was going to distribute food and water soon. Sheez was not so naive. Like every tin-pot leader in the Two Arm, he'd had many dealings with the Solar Guards in the past, and the REF in particular. Most of these encounters had been unpleasant. And these red-suited SG troopers especially frightened him. No, the refugees had not been brought here for any kind of nourishment or rehabilitation. It was more likely that they were here as pawns in some cruel, unknowable game.
Either that, or they'd simply been dumped here to die. Or to be killed. Whatever the reason, Sheez wanted no part of it.
No sooner had he been shoved into his sitting space when he began looking for a way out While the narrow canyon was bordered on three sides by the high peaks, the fourth side held the remains of an ancient hillside city.
It was one of many built on Doomsday 212 ages ago, when the planet's puff was still vital. Although the SG soldiers were strung along the peaks, the old city was not being guarded at all. Behind the ruins was the mountain, and what was beyond Sheez had little idea. He'd barely caught a glimpse of that area on their descent, and as it was still several hours before dawn, all he knew was that it was flat and vast.
But it had to be better than where he was.
That this was not a food and water stop was beginning to sink in to the crowd by now. Some of the women started wailing. Many of the elderly were already having trouble breaming. Sheez's own substantial stomach was aching badly. Worst of all, he was getting thirsty. And the sun would be up in a few hours. And that's when it would begin to get hot.
Very hot…
The unfortunates would have to face that heat without any kind of overhead protection. Again, a weak puff meant all kinds of cosmic rays were able to get to the ground. Some acted quickly, others very slowly. In any case, they were all deadly, and combined with the oppressive temperature, Sheez guessed a third of this group might be dead by noon. Maybe him included.
He checked the soldiers on the peaks again. A bolt from a blaster gun could be fatal at 300 yards.
Trouble was, there was nothing but open space for at least 400 yards or more before the cover of the small, ancient city. There was no way he could get away under these conditions. He was so big and slow, if he tried to make a break for it, he'd be shot down like a target in a shooting gallery.
He pulled his shirt over his head for cover and sank his head into his knees. Sheez was hardly a religious man. He had never prayed before in his life.
But he was praying now.
The question was, could anybody up there hear him?
Twenty Light-Years Away
The all-black Space Forces Starcrasher was named the XenoVox.
Officially it was an LRC, a long-range communications ship of the type that frequently accompanied SF fleets on long patrols. Unofficially, though, the Xeno belonged to a top secret SF unit called the Omega Force. And it was hardly just a radio ship.
The Omega Force was the SF's own version of a rapid deployment fleet. It was made up of the best soldiers and warships from the SF's five sectors, they being the Space Navy, the Air Service, Planet Forces Infantry, Space Marines, and the Orbital Bombardment Group. Unlike the Solar Guards Rapid Engagement Fleet, which consisted of thirty-six Star-crashers crammed with corps of Star Rangers, the Omega Force had 100 ships and three times as many soldiers, and those soldiers were good at doing many things. The unit was so secret, few people inside the Empire hierarchy knew it existed, including many inside the SF itself. On the other hand, everybody knew about the REF. There was another difference between the two outfits: once on the scene, Omega still took all its orders from SF headquarters. The REF always acted on its own.
The XenoVox was the forward eyes of Omega. It carried a crew of just fifty people and flew without weapons. Its role was to go into a trouble zone first and do vital recon, which was then flashed back to the fleet. But how could a ship that was nearly two miles long be able to fly near a flashpoint without being detected? Simple. The Xeno could become invisible. By engaging vast energy deflector screens, string comm dispersers, and a highly reflective opaque paint scheme, the vessel could not be seen on long-range scanning arrays, either coming from other space vessels nearby or from planets below.
In other words, it was a stealth ship.
The Omega Force had been deployed to this section of space near the edge of the Two Arm forty-eight hours before. The deployment had been done by the order of just one man, the Secretary of SF Intelligence himself. Without a doubt it was to be Omega's most classified mission.
Only Omega's half-dozen squadron commanders had been briefed on the very secret operation, and even they only knew what was going on up to a point. Essentially, the squadron commanders had been told two things: that no one knew how and when the fighting between the SF and SG would end, and that no one knew what the rampaging REF would do next. However, despite these two things, there was a good possibility that the fleet that invaded the Two Arm about five weeks earlier — the one that started all this trouble in the first place— still existed. That it hadn't been destroyed by the REF as the SG had originally claimed.
Omega's orders were to look for this rebel fleet, as it was thought it would soon turn up somewhere inside the Two Arm, near the place where it first disappeared. And what would happen if the mystery fleet was spotted? That's where the Secretary's order took an unusual twist: if the Omega Force did detect the rebel ships, they were to intercept and destroy them immediately, without waiting for any further instructions from SF Command. In fact, while the entire secret mission was going on, Omega was ordered not to have any contact at all with Earth or anyone else. They were to operate under a complete communications blackout. That's how sensitive this operation had to be.
To this end, the stealth ship XenoVox had been operating deep inside the No-Fly Zone for the past forty-eight hours. And it had seen at least a couple strange things so far.
Because the ship was, in effect, the ears and eyes of the Omega Force, most of its ultralong string devices scanned space at 360 degrees. Just two hours after arriving on station, the Xeno picked up a strange group of vessels, not inside the No-Fly Zone but apparently heading for it. This was not an organized fleet of any kind. They were all ion-ballast driven and seemed to be of all different types and sizes. But as they drew closer, it was obvious they did have one more thing in common: they were interstellar gunships, vessels that carried one or two big weapons and just enough people inside to operate them. In many cases, arms dealers themselves drove these, kinds of ships. These ships were rare in the Galaxy though, and it was odd to see more than two of them flying together. Yet here were more than a dozen.
But the strangest thing of all was the direction from which these ships were coming. Their combined subatomic wake traced them back to their point of origin: way, way over in the Five Arm. And it was
a rare ship indeed that came to the Two Arm from that far away.
The Xeno had also been watching the strange events unfold on Doomsday 212. Sometimes flying no more than a half light-year away, they'd detected SG ships dumping millions of people onto the desolate, hazardous planet. People, it would soon be determined, that had come from the floating refugee camp at Andromeda Zee. More important, the SG ships doing the relocation appeared to belong to none other than the infamous REF. But why they were doing this was a mystery.
Even stranger, mere were faint indications that something else was going on either on the planet's surface or in low orbit just above it, something besides this mysterious delivery of innocents. Subatomic debris. Indications of huge blaster discharges. Excited but distorted comm messages. Was a small battle taking place somewhere on the dead planet as well? Or even a series of small battles? It was hard to tell, because the planet's weak puff actually hindered the Xeno's eavesdropping capabilities; there was not much air for the signals to bounce around in, so they could be quickly lost in space. And the stealth ship's commanders didn't want to get too close to the graveyard planet. But clearly something very unusual was going on down there, and it involved the infamous REF.
All this put Omega Force in a difficult position. With one call, the 100-ship fleet could have swooped down and engaged the murderous REF and at least put a dent in its activities.
But that wasn't Omega's mission.
They were out here for one reason, and one reason only.
That was to find and destroy the rebel fleet.
Doomsday 212
Alfx Sheez lay on his back, at the edge of the crowd, staring up at the stars, terrified by the dawn that was soon to come.
He'd been like this for about an hour now. Alternately cursing and praying, fighting off waves of bitterness, not quite believing his life was going to end here, cooked alive on this bastard planet, with a bunch of wretched people he didn't even know. If only he'd been a better person in the past. Would it have done him any good now?
In between battling these emotions, he could clearly see pin-pricks of light moving high overhead.
Were these the last of the refugee ships leaving orbit, heading for destinations unknown? Or were they something else? Oddly, he thought he could see bright flashes of light coming from somewhere near orbit, too, almost as if a space battle was going on up there. And at one point, he swore he saw first one, then two space-ships plummeting through the thin atmosphere, on fire and trailing debris, presumably crashing hundreds of miles away.
Then he began to see all sorts of things flying overhead, way out, moving very, very fast. Different shapes, different colors. In the distance he thought he heard heavy weapons fire, and at first he wondered who the hell would be shooting at the SG. It wasn't like anyone lived on Doomsday 212 and had suddenly decided to protect their planet. It was more likely that the REF had finally turned its weapons on the refugees.
That was the only scenario that made sense.
Another hour went by, and the dawn drew closer. The conditions in the small canyon were getting worse. It was growing very hot. Kids were crying. Some of the adults were, too. Fear was rising among the refugees.
Sheez sat up again and resumed whispering the only prayer he knew over and over again, this while continuously watching the SG troopers up in the peaks. They seemed fanatical about guarding their captives, scanning the mob with high-intensity star lamps and viz-screen rays. They had melted several huge weapons into the rock, with muzzles pointed to the heart of the crowd below. Sheez put it all together and came to one sad conclusion: unless something extraordinary happened, the chances of his getting away now were nil.
He began praying even harder, though it didn't seem to be doing any good.
He'd been resting his eyes, head on his knees, mouthing the words of the petition, when something streaked very low over the small canyon.
It was going so fast and was emitting a noise so loud, it literally shook the dust from the hard ground around them. Sheez immediately looked up but only caught the tail end of the object as it disappeared over the horizon. It appeared as if it was totally engulfed in flame. Was this another starship crashing? Or some kind of natural phenomena? Or something else entirely?
There was no way to tell.
But at that exact moment, the still-darkened sky suddenly became alight with something else. It looked like rain at first, coming down from high up in the very thin sky. Red rain. As everyone had been stirred by whatever had just rocketed over them, everyone in the mob saw this coming, too. Flames, smoke, and now an ear-piercing, hellish scream the likes of which Sheez had never heard before.
Then, just as they were about a thousand feet above them, Sheez realized what these things were.
Fire rocks. The deadly rain of loose particles left over from Doomsday 212 's deteriorating ring, one of the many things that made the planet a particularly hellish place to be. Though these things fell non-stop at the equator, they were much less prevalent up here in the northern hemisphere. Yet a swarm of the deadly boulders was coming down right on top of them, right now.
Or so it seemed.
Just as the fiery volley was about 500 feet over them, there was another sonic blast, and the formation of fire rocks suddenly began to break up. Instead of coming straight down, they began veering off in all directions; even sideways, some of them.
Then, in a vision that seemed like a dream, the fire rocks began slamming not into the mob of helpless people but into the red-suited SG troopers stationed on the peaks around them!
One by one, the soldiers were picked off, almost as if an invisible hand were directing the fiery chunks at the enormous troopers. Sheez watched in astonishment as the string of kinetic explosions went right around the top of the canyon wall. The noise was tremendous. Each fireball strike was blinding. It was so exhilarating and confusing at the same time, some people in the mob started screaming. What was going on here? How could this be? Sheez wondered. Then it hit him: somehow, some way, his prayer had been answered. This was just what he needed.
Without another second of hesitation, he got up and started running.
As he had estimated before, it was at least a 400-yard dash from die edge of the mob to the foot of the ancient ruins. As soon as he took off, Sheez heard some shooting behind him, but he didn't dare turn back to see where it was coming from. He stumbled several times in the waning darkness, badly cutting himself on the hard, rocky ground. But each time he managed to get up, right himself, and start running again.
Somehow he reached the edge of the ruins without having a massive coronary. He was out of breath and his knees were horribly scraped, but he was still in one piece. The ruins turned out to be those of a small settlement. A few dozen structures, made of ancient ion concrete, worn away long ago. But Sheez was hardly an aficionado of the past; he never even broke stride. He kept running through the ruins, up what was left of the main avenue, intent on reaching the summit of the small mountain and hopefully some cover beyond.
It took anotüer few minutes of hard climbing and heavy breathing, but reach the top he did. And on the other side of the mountain, he saw the vast rocky plain that stretched from one horizon to another.
But there were hundreds of thousands of refugees down on this plain, strung out in large clusters along the valley floor, with thousands — of REF troops watching over them. Even worse, there were dozens of REF armed shuttlecrafts flying overhead and even a handful of red Star-crashers hovering just a couple hundred feet off the ground. Sheez was crushed. Any thoughts that the other side of the mountain might provide some refuge were dashed, just like that.
Then Sheez heard a disturbing noise coming from behind him. It was loud and pounding, like a stampede. He turned, certain that he would see a small army of REF troopers running up the hill after him.
But he was in for another surprise. There were people running up the old avenue behind him, but they weren't SG. It was the rest of the crowd, the
mob of refugees from which he'd just escaped. They'd seen him make a break for it and had followed right behind him. This was not good. He could see a certain look in the eyes of the first dozen people climbing up to him, and as a politician, he knew that look well. These people had misinterpreted his act of cowardice for one of courage, and now they wanted him to lead them to safety. And that was the last thing Alfx Sheez wanted to do.
The first group of refugees reached the summit and begged him for help, begged him to save them all.
Sheez looked back into the valley before him; there had to be at least 50,000 REF soldiers within sight alone. There was no way he could go down there, alone or with the mob. But he couldn't stay up here, either.
Off to his left, to the north, about a quarter of a mile away, the ridge they were on split in two.
Between the two high grounds was another canyon, this one holding a patch of overhead vegetation, extremely rare on the planet. It was brown and it was dying, but it was also cover from the REF and maybe even the coming heat of day. Sheez thought about simply making a break for this sanctuary alone, but then something stopped him— physically stopped him — as if an invisible hand had taken hold of his chest and was preventing him from moving another step in any direction. The crowd was now bunching up on the hilltop and on the trail below. They were presenting themselves as a huge target. He had no doubt that if the REF saw them, they would simply blast them all away.
Sometimes life forces you to be a hero, he heard a voice whisper in his ear. He spun around, yet no one was there. A shudder went through him. He had heard those words so clearly. He turned back to the growing crowd of people reaching the top of the ridge. And that's when it dawned on him: the only way he was going to save himself was to save all of the other refugees along with him. And that's when the invisible hand let him go.
