"Fuck, guns inactive, it's just missiles," Prem scrambled to get a lock, "No good, the high res sensors are fried."
"Shoot from the hip then! Just inflict some damage!"
Prem keyed in some trajectories as best he could, and then fired a salvo of missiles off. They pounded into the side of the shipyard, causing explosions and jets of flame as they depressurized some of the interior compartments.
"Haur, let's get to the hold," said Kepp.
"Roger that," came the reply. The two Paragons marched off.
"300 km."
One of the battleships began to move, lifting up off from its berth. Support structures retracted, leaving the ship free to rise slowly, ominously, from its birthing place.
"Fuck, that's them. Take them out!" ordered Curtis.
Prem hastily recalibrated the missile targets, and then fired off another salvo. His aim was good - the missiles scored hits all down the side of the newly birthed spaceship, leaving scorch marks where they impacted.
"50 km."
Prem kept firing, but the battleship seemed to be undeterred in its rise. Salvo upon salvo thudded into the side of the ship, with no obvious ill effects.
"1 km," shouted Spence.
"They've locked us," shouted Prem, "Brace for impact!"
The battleship let off a salvo of its own missiles, which streaked through the space between the two ships.
Curtis jerked the controls to jink the ship off its intended trajectory. Some of the ordnance streaked past them, but two impacted into the starboard side. Warning sirens began to go off on the bridge as the hull was breached. The out of control Keysturn twirled through the landing trajectory, leaving behind a trail of flame and debris, before crashing heavily into the deck of the shipyard. The ship gouged its way along a flat section along the center of the structure, scattering storage containers and machinery away in a shower of sparks and tortured metal, before finally grinding to a halt.
Above the stricken frigate, the main engines of the battleship fired, washing the shipyard in a white-ish blue light, almost as bright as a second sun. It began to move away, beginning its return journey to Earth.
Curtis hauled himself up from the floor he'd been thrown onto by the collision. He batted at the emergency core shutdown button displayed in bright red on his screen to power down the ship - they weren't going anywhere anymore.
A crackly voice made itself known through the comms.
"Paradigm to Keysturn, this is Paradigm to Keysturn, do you copy, do you copy?"
Curtis hobbled over to the communication officer's terminal. Jay was slumped over it, having been knocked unconscious in the collision.
"This is Keysturn," said Curtis, with effort, to the sound of cheers in the background, "We've crash landed heavily on the shipyard. All systems are down. Unknown casualties. Over"
"Roger that Keysturn. Hold on tight, we're debating the best course of action. Over.
"Roger that, I'll be standing by, over and out."
Curtis noticed Spence groaning and waking up.
"Shit, skipper," he muttered, massaging his neck, "Nice landing."
"Save it, son. Go check Engineering and do a headcount of the crew. Their comms seems to be broken."
"Roger that, sir."
In the hold of the frigate, the SAS squad lined up in front of Lieutenant Hill, and the two Paragons.
"Right, secure the immediate perimeter, and wait for further instructions," barked Hill, before hitting the open button on the ramp door. The ten members of the SAS squad poured out of the exit swept around the ship, weapons at the ready. They began gathering nearby block of debris, stacking them into piles of cover, working with the efficiency and speed of a well-oiled machine. There was no enemy fire though.
"So what now?" asked Hill, as he and the two Paragons walked down the ramp.
"Just had a message from Curtis, he says that he's been in touch with base, they'll give us further instructions," replied Haur.
Kepp seemed to be distracted by something. He suddenly pointed at the other battleship, moored in front of them.
"How finished is that?" he asked.
Hill's eyes widened as he realized Kepp's plan.
"You're not suggesting-"
"I think that's our best shot," interrupted Haur, "I'll fill Curtis in." He quickly got on the radio.
"And how are you planning to pull this off?" asked Hill, turning to Kepp, slightly incredulous.
"You read the brief right? This place is mainly civilian, just a research and development center really. There's gotta be people around here who know how to fly that thing. I think if we headed to their control room we'd have a good shot of finding out how."
Hill seemed skeptical.
"Curtis just radioed through to Paradigm. They don't seem to have any better plans so I guess we're going with this," said Haur, "Curtis says he and the crew will stay with the Keysturn until we notify them, it's probably safer that way."
"Fuck, alright," swore Hill, "Let's do this."
He walked off to gather the squad and give them new orders.
"Hey Haur, didn't think you'd be up for pulling this stunt," said Kepp.
"It's like you said, ain't it? If we don't pull this shit off, the whole Earth is fucked," he paused, "Thanks for that."
Kepp nodded, and moved off to join the squad, Haur barely a step behind.
"Okay men, listen up. We are going to see if we can't steal this mountain of junk floating next to us here," he pointed at the remaining battleship for emphasis, "and use it to stop Morian. Our destination is the control room. Standard room by room sweep - we don't know how heavy their internal security is, but judging from resistance so far, it's next to nothing. Still keep your eyes peeled. Go Go Go!"
The squad broke formation, forming into point, cover and rear guard groups with practiced ease. Kepp and Haur were directed into the cover group by Hill. They proceeded away from the Keysturn, towards what seemed to be a metal staircase, leading to a door. Their magnetic boots clanked loudly on the metal, slowing their progress, but keeping them firmly affixed to the shipyard.
They reached the door, it was ID-locked.
"Saro's given me unrestricted access," said Haur, stepping forward. He brought his datapad up against the scanner, and it slid open with a hiss. They stepped into the depressurization chamber, and waited for the pressurization procedure to take place. Finally, the door on the opposite side unlocked, and the squad surged forward along the corridors.
They met absolutely no resistance, only surprised maintenance staff and engineers, who were quickly searched for weapons then left to their own befuddled devices.
Corridor by corridor, room by room, they neared the control room, located within the bowels of the shipyard. Before they knew it, they had arrived outside the entrance.
The point man signaled to halt.
Haur swiped the datapad past the scanner. The lock light turned from red to green.
The point man counted to three with his fingers, and then they burst into the room.
"Hands up, drop your weapons!" the SAS squad shouted, nearly in unison, as they fanned out into a large open plan office, where at least twenty or thirty were working at their terminals. The engineers and researchers stood and raised their hands, expressions of shock mirrored across their faces. There were no weapons to be seen.
Deathly silence reigned as the squad members fanned out amongst the office, patting down each civilian for weapons.
"Who's in charge of this place?" asked Kepp, standing at the entrance.
"I am," said a balding man the far side of the room, both hands still held high in the air.
Kepp made his way over to him, the gaze of every person in the room was directed at him.
"What's your name? What do you do here?"
"I am Willhelm Hersch, Lead Engineer on the Dragon Project," he replied, with a German accent. It was rare for people to have accents anymore, as the global population became more integrated. Kepp r
aised an eyebrow - this man must have been brought up in a very secluded environment. Rich family, no doubt.
"The Dragon Project?"
"These ships, they are the twin dragons, if you will," Willhelm smiled nervously.
"The one that's left, can it fly?"
"It is not finished, it is only a test vessel for prototyping."
"I don't care, can it fly?"
"Well we put prototype engines in, and it completed an installation flight and..."
Kepp cut him off.
"Tell us how to make it fly! We need that thing to go after Morian."
Willhelm looked disgruntled at being cut off, then realized there were still guns being leveled at his head.
"It...it needs a crew. Morian has taken the crew. You cannot fly that thing without it."
Kepp swore under his breath.
"What about the people left behind? The engineers?"
Willhelm thought about it for a second.
"It is possible. But who are you? You come in here and hold us at gunpoint, then you want to make us fly that ship?"
Kepp took a deep breath, there was no time for this!
"Ok, Willhelm. Here is the situation. Morian is taking that ship to Earth, and he's going to destroy society as we know it. He's got planetary bombardment missiles loaded and he is going to use them. Now, we are Paragons, and have been sent by the United Earth Alliance government to stop them, so we need the other ship."
Willhelm looked visibly shocked.
"He said he was taking the ship for a technical demonstration for the Earth authorities." He then paused, "How do I know you aren't lying to me?"
Haur could tell Kepp was on the verge of exploding, and put a calming hand on his shoulder. He plugged his datapad into one of the nearby display screens, and displayed the official Paragon ID page for the whole room to see.
"Satisfied?" he cocked an eyebrow at Willhelm.
The engineer looked back and forth between the two Paragons stood before him and the screen. The information finally began to sink in.
The expression on his face slowly turned from shock to one of determination. He punched a fist into his open palm.
"Gentlemen, let's get moving. We have a ship to catch."
Kepp grinned, relief flooding through him. They might just have a chance after all.
Chapter 14 – The Knight
Jenson pushed his glasses up his nose again; they were perpetually slipping down his face.
"You need us to do what?" he asked again through the crackling communications link, disbelief written over his young features.
"I am preparing the control software for upload now," came the German accented reply. "It is the prototype engine that we test; we can only work it remotely."
"You're crazy," said Jenson down the line, "Curtis! Can you hear this? Tell him he's crazy!"
"It seems that we have no choice," replied Curtis, in his usual gravelly tones. "Once we pass out of the dark side of Mars, the station operators will no longer be able to control the battleship - not enough signal bandwidth. That means your team will have to do it."
Jenson turned in his seat, forehead lightly sweating, pushing his glasses up his nose.
"Sarge, are you hearing this? This is insane. Bat shit crazy insane," he added some arm waving for good measure.
"Shut your pie-hole, Jenson!" shouted Sarge, fixing him with a sergeant's stare and a stern finger point. "If they need that ship piloted, then you goddamn better try your best to do what they say. All our lives are on the line here!"
"Sweet Martian rockpops..." Jenson exhaled, calming himself with obvious effort. "Okay, okay, okay. I'm setting up a secure data line. You can transmit the program now."
"Oh, and you will need extra people for the successful control. The required number is six."
"Oh that's convenient," commented Jenson, for there were exactly six operators in the room.
"No can do!" boomed Sarge from his desk, "Someone still has to take care of the regular communications traffic."
"He said we needed six!" said Jenson, plaintively.
"Hey!" Jess stepped forward, or rather, was pushed forward by Tenzen. She immediately curled a lock of her dark hair around one finger when she realized the attention of the room was on her. "Er...maybe I can help?"
Sarge cracked a laugh, it dominated the room. "There's your sixth!"
He waved at the other operators. "You idiots, re-route your traffic to me, and go listen to Jenson."
Then he pointed a thick finger at Jess, and gave her what she supposed was an encouraging smile, "You, girl. Do your best!"
Jess looked at Tenzen; she was absolutely terrified. He gave her a smile and a ‘you'll be fine’ wink. It wasn't quite enough to calm her hammering heart.
"Here, Jess, have two of my screens," said Jenson, "There's a spare chair somewhere around here." He glanced around, but couldn't spot it.
"On it!" said Tenzen, wheeling himself off.
"Hey, why doesn't Tenzen do it?" spurted out Jess, her knees felt rather weak at this point.
"Me? I can tell you fifteen different ways to disarm a man, but let's just say science isn't my forte," his voice disappeared down the hallway as he wheeled off in search of a chair.
"Jess? Is that Jess?" She snapped back around to face the source of her brother's voice, coming from the speakers in Jenson's desk.
"Kepp?" she replied, her voice wavering a little.
"Jess. Don't be nervous, okay? You're going to do great." She couldn't see him, but she could imagine his expression, sober and encouraging, and it almost felt like he had placed a comforting hand on her shoulder.
"I'll try my best," she said. "Please take care!"
"Ok, switch to headsets people, it's too noisy."
Jenson offered her a headset without looking, which she donned; the program had finished uploading and he was deploying it across their workstations.
"Okay, it's installed," he said. It would have been odd to see him sat next to her, and yet hearing his voice coming out of the headset, but she had been an avid user of total noise cancelling headphones for as long as she could remember.
"We’ve left the shipyard," said Willhelm. "There are approximately five minutes before we need to make the switch-over. I presume you are all familiar with the operation of a PFM drive?"
Jenson glanced at Jess.
"I read a book on it," replied Jess, whispering. Jenson looked impressed.
"Ok, this prototype is slightly different, so I will explain it now to you," began Willhelm. At this point, Tenzen returned with a chair for Jess, which she sat down in, never once taking her attention off the instructions Willhelm was giving.
Prem settled himself into the weapons officer seat on the bridge of the battleship. It was one of the two functioning parts of the bridge - the other two being the communications consoles. He felt a slight acceleration as the engineers operating vessel lifted them smoothly out of the docking bay and on their way back to Earth.
The command console spread out in front of him wasn't unlike that of the Keysturn, so he felt quite at home, although there was more of everything. His vision was taken up with 180 degrees of curved transparent display screen, and there were console panels to match both above and below the screen. It felt like its own complete cockpit. The bridge, located in the center of the ship, comprised of eight of these cockpits, spread out in a broad semicircle.
Would've been a sight to see this fully crewed, thought Prem, taking an idle glance around as the computer ran the initial diagnostics. At the moment, the bridge was manned solely by himself, Jarrod, the communications officer, and Commander Curtis, who was in deep discussion with the two Paragons and that SAS guy. That German engineer, Will-something was here too; trying to teach the Earth team how to work the engines. Prem wished that they would stop broadcasting the comms across the whole bridge as all that could be heard now was a steady stream of cursing from the other end of the line, where apparently the team were havi
ng troubles getting to grips with the software on a simulation run.
Prem was a focused individual, not given to worrying about things out of his control, but this time, he dearly hoped that when they had to take over the engines for real there would be no more swearing.
A flash from his screen caught his attention. The diagnostics finished, and Prem's face lit up; he had shiny new toys to play with.
The five minutes training time passed far too quickly for Jess' liking. She had been given the task of setting the main drive and manipulating the auxiliary thrusters - basically, flying the ship, as that was determined to be the easiest job.
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