Empire (Empire, Book One)

by Logan Rutherford

  The Mambas closed in and took up positions around the small squad of seven ships—all that remained of the USS Hayes’s crew. Hayden patched himself into their comm network.

  “Stay inside our shield. We’ll take care of you. Full speed back to the Empire,” Baxter said to the lead ship.

  “Roger that. I don’t know what you guys are doing to take them out, but give them hell,” a gruff-sounding man responded.

  “Will do. Empire out.”

  The Mortuk fighters were now taking a head on approach. Hayden fired at the oncoming ships, taking out a few. Lasers soared all around him. Some found their targets, and one of his fellow soldier’s ships was turned into nothing more than space junk. With each one, a small voice reminded him that this was real. This was actually war—not just a simulation.

  He glanced down at his oxygen levels. Still good. He turned his focus back ahead of him, and couldn’t help but glance at the Empire. Seeing it side-by-side with the newer USS ships—much less the Mortuk mothership—its age really showed. It was bulky and looked much more scarred and worn. But the sheer size of it inspired awe. It was massive and the fact that he had command of it for just a few moments gave him a burst of pride.

  He turned his attention back to the Mortuks ahead of him. His whole body clenched and his eyes narrowed. No way in hell was he going to let them take the Empire down.

  Hayden jerked the control stick to the left, twisting out of formation. He pushed on the stick, dropping straight down. He slammed the speed lever to his right as far as it would go, his engines fired at full speed.

  “Hayden! What are you doing?” Vick screamed into the comms.

  “Thinning the herd!” Hayden yelled back. Adrenaline rushed through him. This isn’t a simulation. This is real. He smiled. This is real.

  He got underneath the Mortuks, then pulled on his stick, flying straight up towards them. He pulled the trigger and yelled as he unleashed a flurry of bullets at the underside of the fighters. Hot lead tore through their sophisticated, bulky ships. He took out two, then three, then, with the fourth, flew straight through the explosion and was now flying above the wall of fighters.

  “Get back here, you asshole!” Baxter screamed.

  “I’m not letting them take any more of us!” Hayden yelled as he twisted around, flying back towards the enemy. His eyes widened when he saw a small group of six enemy fighters flanking the convoy. “Got Mortuks coming up on your six!” He cursed under his breath. He couldn’t believe the people in the back weren’t watching behind him but he had to remind himself that, technically, they were still all cadets—highly trained, extremely deadly, top-of-the-line cadets, but cadets nonetheless.

  “Breaking away to take care of them,” Vick said. Hayden saw his ship twist out of formation and face the other direction.

  Two more pilots broke ranks and followed Vick’s lead. Hayden came up behind them fast.

  “Oh shit, they’re drifting!” yelled a pilot.

  Hayden looked down to see what she meant. Without explanation, the squad of seven ships from the Hayes had completely shut down. They twisted and spun in space.

  “Evasive maneuvers!” Baxter shouted.

  The Mambas had to scatter to keep from crashing into the out-of-control vessels. “Come in Hayes convoy, Hayes convoy come in, over,” Hayden said.

  Nothing.

  “Hayes convoy, do you read me?” Baxter said.

  “Their comms are down!” Vick yelled.

  Hayden had to hold back a scream when a group of needle-shaped ships came out of nowhere, slammed straight into the drifting ships and flew right out the other side. The convoy exploded, debris flying across space.

  “I can’t see them!” Hayden yelled. The needles moved way too fast and were pitch black. Unlike the mothership, these were way too small and dull to have any legible reflections. They were like ghosts, invisible in the vacuum of space.

  “Guys, believe it or not, I think we might have bigger problems,” Vick said.

  Hayden looked around to see what he was talking about and, when he saw it, his stomach dropped.

  All the ships except for the Empire had stopped firing. The three USS vessels and the Comoran base were floating through space, burning shells of what they’d once been. It was much quieter. Eerily so. Not even the mothership fired her weapons. It just sat there, taking every hit from the Empire in stride.

  “The fighters are retreating! We did it!” a much too eager pilot yelled over the comms.

  Even though he knew nobody could see him, Hayden shook his head. The pit in his stomach grew, just like it had when he first encountered the Mortuks.

  “All fighters, return to the Empire immediately. I repeat, return now!” Millie yelled over the comms.

  Hayden didn’t need to be told twice. He flipped his Mamba around, and headed for the green glow of the Empire hangar bay.

  A white light filled his cockpit, followed by the boom of a giant laser that reverberated in his bones. He looked behind him, and watched as a giant white laser fired through the USS vessel on its starboard side. The laser tore through one side of the ship and out the other like it was nothing. The vessel exploded in a brilliant burst of light that was quickly put out by the vacuum of space.

  Hayden felt as if he’d been punched in the gut. Thousands of souls on that ship—gone in a second.

  “IT BLEW THE WHOLE THING UP WITH ONE SHOT!” someone screamed in his ear, their voice filled with terror.

  “GO GO GO!” Baxter screamed. “WE GOTTA GET OUT OF HERE!”

  Hayden didn’t think he could go any faster. “Come on, come on, come on, get us out of here,” he whispered to his ship.

  Another white glow flashed across his vision.

  “It took out another one!” someone yelled.

  Hayden was almost there. Just a little bit farther. He’d be safe inside the Empire. They’d jump out of there. Everything would be okay. His heart slammed against his rips. His fingers wrapped around the control stick so hard he thought they might fall off. He breathed so fast that he just knew he was going to run out of oxygen.

  He was so close he could taste it.

  Another flash.

  “The Hayes! The Hayes is gone!”

  Hayden flicked a switch above his head. The landing gear lowered. He lined up for landing, slowing down only a bit.

  He crossed the threshold, slamming his Mamba into the ground. He slid across the landing strip, spinning out of control. He brought down his speed as fast as he could. The interior of the hanger whirled around him. He got a glimpse of fighters landing in the bay around him, their landing just as hard. He caught a flash through the green shield that separated them from the mothership and her devastating white laser. He was still alive, so he knew it must’ve been the Comoran. An entire military outpost, big enough to hold a dozen Empires, gone in a flash.

  “Brace for emergency FTL jump!” a voice yelled over the intercom.

  Hayden held on tight and clenched his eyes shut. So many lives lost. So much destruction. All in less than an hour. He wished this was just a simulation—he wanted it to be, more than anything. But you couldn’t simulate the sickness he felt in his very core. There was no denying this was war. Real war.

  He felt the jolt as Empire made the jump.

  The Mortuks were behind him for now but he knew it would only be a matter of time before he encountered them again.

  “You know what’s crazy?” Vick said, his voice sounding almost intoxicated. He chuckled. “We volunteered for this shit.”

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Ivan collapsed into the captain’s chair, his entire bridge staring at the screen in stunned silence at what they’d just seen—what they’d just been a part of. Destruction that nobody, not even the most advanced USS ships, could stop.

  “We just had the CAG check in,” someone said from behind, her voice quiet.

  Ivan turned around in his chair, trying his best to look calm and collected. “Yes? What did
he report?” he asked the red-headed young lady.

  “Sixteen pilots were lost in the battle, sir. There’s forty-seven of them left, not including L-Cadets, that is.”

  The words sunk in, dwelling in the center of Ivan. “Thank you.” He turned back around in the chair. Sixteen souls. Each of whom had a career, a whole life, ahead of him.

  This felt all too familiar. He’d hoped he would never have to experience these feelings ever again. Yet here they were, banging down the doors of his subconscious, not taking ‘no’ for an answer. He was already getting used to the twisting knot of stress and anxiety that settled in his chest. It was like an old friend, coming back from a long trip, greeting him with open arms.

  There was no time to wallow in pity. He had a ship to run. A war to fight. Ivan stood from his chair. He turned around and faced the red-headed lady who’d spoken to him earlier. He read her name tag. “Cadet Ridell, get me whoever it was that came up with the idea to use bullets instead of lasers. Tell them to meet me in the conference room next to my quarters.”

  “Yes, sir,” she said, tapping away at the tablet in front of her.

  “And find out where the hell my XO is. Have him meet me there, too,” Ivan said, not hiding the annoyance in his voice.

  “Yes, sir,” she repeated.

  Ivan around him at all the young faces who were staring down at him. They didn’t even try to hide the fact that they were watching him. They wanted him to know that they were looking for guidance. “You just experienced your first real battle. Nothing can train you for war quite like war itself. You all performed well. I want everyone to focus on getting this ship back to one hundred percent, understood?”

  “Yes, sir!” a cacophony of voices shouted down at him.

  “Alright. I’m going to go find out how to kill these bastards. Keep up the good work.” Ivan walked up the steps and out the door towards the elevator. They stood at attention the whole time, watching him in silence. Ivan remembered how scared he was when he experienced his first battle. He knew exactly what they were feeling. They needed a strong figure to look up to. He only hoped he could be the person they were looking for.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Mia trudged along the side of the road, using the thin line of trees to stay out of sight. The early morning sky was turning gray, the smoke from the ashes of D.C. mingling with the clouds in the sky. She had no hope of seeing the sun anytime soon. Her whole body shook, although she wasn’t that cold. The shock and horror had settled over her like a blanket, pressing down tighter and tighter, suffocating her.

  At least the baby had finally stopped crying. At first, when the crying stopped, she panicked, thinking something was wrong. But she had just cried herself to sleep. Mia’s arm went numb long ago, the car seat hanging loose from her fingers at her side. It reeked of piss, although her nose had begun to adjust to the smell. She felt horrible. The baby surely needed a diaper change but she didn’t have much of a choice. She hadn’t come across any convenience stores. At least, none that seemed safe to enter. Already there was a real looter problem, so she stayed clear of the mania that was electric car stations. People seemed to have gone feral, destroying everything—everyone—that stood in their way.

  Diapers and food. That’s what she needed. Both for the baby, just the latter for herself.

  The deep rumble of a convoy of trucks sounded in the distance. Mia crouched, searching up and down the road for any sign of the vehicles. In the distance, the first of the large transport trucks came into view—U.S. Army from the looks of it. Hope pushed aside the blanket of fear and for a moment she allowed herself to believe that everything would be okay.

  She jumped out into the road but only once she was standing in the middle of the asphalt did she realize that it wasn’t the best idea. What if this wasn’t military? What if this was a bunch of looters—or worse—making off with stolen equipment? Would they show mercy on a twenty-two year old and a baby?

  The large trucks came to a slow stop. Mia breathed in deep. No turning back now.

  The camo doors of the first truck swung open and two soldiers jumped out. From the canvas covered backs of the three trucks, four soldiers jumped out of each one, setting up a perimeter.

  Mia suddenly felt very small. All this commotion just for her. The driver—called that despite all the cars were controlled by autopilots—of the first truck waved her forward. The woman soldier seemed friendly enough, though rushed.

  Mia stumbled forward, the aches and pains from walking through the night without rest coming down on her at once. She could’ve sworn her right arm was moments away from falling off. “Please,” she said through heavy breathing as she approached. “Do you h-have any supplies f-for the baby?”

  The woman soldier nodded. She put an arm on Mia, while using the other to signal the man next to her to lower his weapon. Mia hadn’t even realized the barrel of a plasma rifle had been pointed right at her. “In the third truck,” she said as she led Mia around and to the back. “Let me take the baby for you.” She reached for the car seat.

  Mia pulled her hand back, stopping in her tracks.

  “Okay, okay.” The woman held up her hands. “I understand. Just follow me.” They continued walking, the soldier keeping her hands to herself. “My name is Sergeant West. If you need anything, let me know,” she said once they reached the back. She turned and tapped one of the soldiers next to her on the shoulder. The man turned around.

  “Yes ma’am?” he asked, fumbling with his weapon as he lowered it.

  “Help Miss…” she turned to Mia.

  “Mia,” she said, answering the unasked question.

  “Help Miss Mia here into her vehicle. Get the other mother we have in there to share some of her supplies.”

  “Yes ma’am.” The moved the canvas flap out of the way and climbed up into the back of the truck.

  “Stay safe, Mia,” West said, before turning and walking back to the front of the convoy.

  The soldier reached out a hand. “Baby first, then I’ll pull you up.”

  Mia hesitated. She looked down at the sleeping baby. It’ll be fine. She wasn’t even sure why she felt such a connection to the baby in the first place. She lifted the car seat over her head and into the hands of the scrawny soldier. He set the car seat down next to him where Mia couldn’t see it. Panic washed over her.

  “You next,” he said, reaching down a hand.

  Mia grabbed it and climbed up into the back of the truck. The baby slept in its car seat next to where she stood. She bent down and picked the seat up, a spring of emotions welling up within her.

  “We’re ready to go!” the soldier shouted out the back. Boots dragged across the asphalt outside as they piled back into their trucks.

  Mia searched for somewhere to sit. Two benches lined the sides of the truck. A bunch of supplies occupied the middle, including stacks of food and a pallet of pillbies—a whole meal in a pill. They didn’t taste like much, and going too long without eating, tasting, savoring real food was a sure fire way to go crazy. Still, Mia knew they’d come in handy.

  “Sit back here,” the soldier said, leading her to an empty spot in the back of the truck. She sat down on the hard bench and he sat next to her.

  “Name’s Samuel,” he said, reaching his hand out. “Or Sam, really.” An incongruous smile stretched across his face, curly dark hair sticking out from under his helmet.

  “Mia,” she said as she shook it, feeling suddenly aware of how dirty she probably looked. There was probably a stick or two in her dark wavy hair.

  “Nice to meet you, Mia. I’ll go get some supplies from Georgia over there.” He pointed to a sleeping woman who sat holding a baby against her chest.

  Mia nodded. Sam got up and walked over to her, keeping his head down to keep from hitting it on the curved beams above them that held up the canvas roof.

  Around her, people stared. Six other civilians filled the truck. Mix them with six soldiers and you had a recipe for whateve
r stench it was that filled the tight space. Mia didn’t mind, though. She was just happy to be sitting down, even if it was on a hard wooden bench. She could feel her legs turning to jelly. She hoped there wouldn’t be another encounter with the Mortuks anytime soon because, if so, she wasn’t sure she’d have it in her to get up and run away.

  “Here you go.” Sam returned with an armful of supplies and set them down on the floor next to the car seat. “Got a couple diapers, bottle, some formula. She looks big enough that she could eat some solid foods though.”

  Mia nodded. “She’s around one as far as I can tell. Has a couple teeth, not many though.”

  “Wait, so you don’t know how old your baby is?” he asked. “At least I was right about her being a girl though. That was a total guess,” he said as he sat down.

  “She’s not mine,” Mia said as she reached down to pick up the diaper. It was a little small, but not too bad. Anything would be better than the dirty one she was wearing.

  Mia stared down at the sleeping baby. Sam said something but it was distant. All she could focus on was the beautiful baby girl. Mia’s hands shook as they hovered over the loose buckle. Tears welled up in her eyes. She’d done it. She’d gotten not only herself but also the baby to safety. For once, she did something good. She saved a life. She didn’t even want to know what would’ve happened had the baby been left alone in the back of her dead parents’ car.

  Mia smiled as the baby yawned in her sleep. She couldn’t delay any further. She forced herself out of her mind and into the present. She unbuckled the seatbelt and pulled the baby. Holding the girl in her own hands for the first time, Mia’s emotions broke through. Had she not been so tired, she probably wouldn’t have cried in front of everyone in the truck. But she’d spent all day and all night running from the aliens—running to safety. Leaving behind everything she knew, the only man she loved—who was most assuredly dead. She’d been through all that in less than twenty-four hours. Dammit, she was going to hold the baby and cry.