by J N Chaney
“That was a close one,” Lukov said. “You are good?”
“Yeah,” Warren said. “These old buckets just keep going. It’s a bit sluggish and the control stick feels mushy. I’m not sure how much help I’m going to be, but I’m good.”
“Incoming!” Lukov called out
“Got it,” Oplin replied. He shot away from the rest of Alpha Flight. When he was close to the missile, he shot at it. The incoming round exploded and faded away harmlessly.
“And that’s how it’s done,” Oplin said, finally sounding smug.
“Yeah, and that’s how you blow your damn wing off, too,” Warren said. “Good job, but maybe next time don’t cut it so close.”
“Eh,” Oplin replied. “Nobody’s perfect.”
“We’ve disabled the Conquest’s engine thrusters,” Warren transmitted. “Headed to you.”
“You took some damage,” Baker replied. “Maybe you should head back to the surface?”
“I’ve still got my missile,” Warren said. “I’ll head back when I’ve used it. Anyway, I think the Conquest is out of the fight.”
Another blast from the Conquest’s point defense systems said otherwise. The enemy ship was still holding together. Warren’s ship had suffered more damage and lost another ten percent of its power.
You’ve got this, his internal voice assured him. And if not, you’ll never know. Maybe they’ll bring you back. Maybe not. In the end, it doesn’t matter. There is no yesterday. There is no tomorrow. There is only now. Take your time. Make this count.
With his resolve hardened, Warren banked his sluggish craft toward the enemy.
“Make way,” Warren said, targeting the last particle cannon on the side of the Conquest facing the planet. “I’ll be coming in hot.”
He advanced through the enemy fire, heedless of the risk. Invisible lasers burned holes in his ship—one burning clean through the hull of his fighter. A lucky glancing hit vaporized a thumb-sized piece of skin from his inner thigh, forcing an involuntary yelp. Ignoring the pain, Warren closed the distance with the enemy.
Warren checked the specifications for the enemy guns on his HUD. The particle cannons were only able to traverse thirty degrees from center. So long as Warren kept his ship close to the Conquest, he wouldn’t be taken out with a single shot.
So focused was his attention that he didn’t notice two other pilots take position to his port and starboard, both slightly behind him. “What are you two doing?”
“Supporting you, boss,” Lukov replied.
“Besides, while they’re shooting at you, they aren’t shooting at us,” Oplin added.
Warren’s HUD alarmed as enemy fire hit Warren’s fighter, spinning it around. He fought to regain control, bringing the little craft back on course in time to avoid more inbound attacks.
Warren launched his missile when he was within range. The timing was tight, only giving him seconds to back away. If he hesitated, he’d be shot by the big cannon or enveloped by its explosion. Despite missing his biological body, he still felt his ass pucker at the riskiness of the maneuver.
It was a good thing that all of the cyborgs could communicate so seamlessly, or the tandem maneuver wouldn’t have been possible. There was no time to warn the others.
His wing mates moved when he did, nimbly dancing around and among the symphony of chaos. He felt and saw Lukov’s eyes as his wingman started cutting his throttle hard and lifting away from the ship. At the same time, he was in the cockpit with Oplin while the cyborg cut hard to the right, going around the other side of the gun. There was a brief burst of static, and the last particle cannon facing the planet went silent. A second later, an alert appeared in Warren’s HUD.
THOMPSON: KIA
RETRIEVAL DATE: 2486.02.14
The shock of Thompson’s death struck Warren harder than he thought it should have. It was as if he could feel the man’s surprise all the way down to his bone—bones which were not really his.
Warren slowly forced his fingers open, thankful he hadn’t crushed his control stick in his rage. No tears filled his artificial eyes. He placed his hands back on his control stick, and refocused his attention on the battle at hand. Thompson would be reset. He’d have a fresh biological and a new cyborg body. Warren would tell him what happened, play it back for him from the war computer’s recording if he liked. There was always time for revenge.
The way everyone was flying—more or less in straight lines from their last vector—told him he wasn’t alone in his shock. They’d felt it too. They were stunned, each of them thinking about the death rather than the mission. It was time to rally his troops.
“Snap out of it and get your heads back in the fight,” Warren called to every cyborg in Wraith Squadron. “Worry about what we’re going to tell him when he’s reset later. Focus on the mission for now and don’t get shot!”
His pilots recovered and began shooting away from their dead comrade’s remains, gathering a short distance away.
“Attention Conquest,” Warren transmitted to the enemy ship. “We are waiting to accept your surrender.”
“And you’ll keep waiting,” Captain Dupre returned. “This is a warship of the Grand Republic of Unified Systems. We’ll perish first.”
“So be it.”
The captain was silent long enough to make Warren wonder if maybe the Conquest’s transmitter had gone dead. “The Republic will return, whether you destroy this vessel or not. This is far from over, so-called Reotian Defense Force. We have resources and capabilities you cannot imagine. And yes, we have our cyborg slaves to do our bidding. When I return, I will take great personal joy in seeing your head brought before me. I will scoop out your biological and use the remains to eat oatmeal from. All of your backups will be deleted permanently. It will be as if you never existed.” He continued to transmit, breathing heavily into his microphone for several seconds before going silent.
“Danger close,” Baker announced.
Instinctively, the Wraiths split from their formation, reforming into two flights again a moment later. There was a new player on the field. A Commonwealth ship had just emerged from hyperspace only three thousand kilometers from them. Its dissipating energy plume was still visible as a cloud of ionized gasses—a slowly cooling mirror image of the weird cigar-shaped vessel.
Warren knew that the cloud would be there for several more minutes and cursed its location. The ship was so close to them it distorted their sensor readings, but it was so poorly placed that they couldn’t hide behind its wake.
“Make it a party, why don’t ya,” Oplin said, his frustration on full display. “Who invited these assholes?”
“Ah hells,” Lukov grumbled. “Just when I thought we were going to win.”
26
Warren didn’t need to tell the others to make evasive maneuvers. Each of them was already moving, dispersing to make a smaller target for the new threat.
Missiles began pouring out of the cigar-shaped CoW vessel. Warren tensed, unsure how their small numbers could do anything against a barrage like that.
“What is that?” Lukov asked. “Have not seen one of this before.”
“Neither have I,” Baker replied. “Warren, what’s the plan?”
“We keep our distance and watch for now. That ship is fresh and only three of us have missiles left. No way we can take it out.”
Without its primary thrusters, the Conquest had to rely on its maneuvering thrusters to try to bring its remaining defenses to bear on the new enemy. Even though it was essentially hobbled, it was still deadly within a small radius. As the missiles approached, it became clear it wouldn’t be able to mount any kind of real defense in time.
Distant flashes of light announced some of the incoming missiles had been destroyed, but there were so many, most made it through. Warren watched in awe as the Republic vessel began to vent atmosphere and secondary explosions deep within it buckled the hull at odd intervals.
A second wave of missiles left the C
ommonwealth vessel just as the first wave were destroyed or impacted the Conquest’s hull.
“Do we have time to reload our fighters?” Oplin asked. “Even some of us? We’ve got spare missiles in the warehouse. 128 of them.”
“No,” Warren replied. “It would give away our position. They probably already know we have a hangar. They might even know where the entrance is. But if they don’t, I don’t want to make it easy for them. Curet, do you have that new ship in range yet?”
“No, nothing yet, came the reply. “We could try, but I doubt it’d be more than a fancy light show.”
Warren wanted to punch something—anything—but everything within reach would work better if he didn’t break it. “I don’t have any memory of seeing it or anything remotely like it before. Any idea what we’re dealing with up here?”
His Gun Chief was silent for a moment. “I can’t get a good look at it with these CoW scanners, but from what I can tell, no. I don’t recognize it, but it’s weird all right. What’s it doing?”
“It’s launching missiles at the Republic vessel. Only about ten percent are hitting. Stand by.” Warren watched in fascination as the Republic vessel began to come apart and wondered if by some miracle the Commonwealth ship was an ally.
“Back off, everyone,” he ordered.
The flash of light was incredible and made him pause. Brilliant colors lanced within his vision, momentarily blinding him. He recovered quickly enough to see the last gasp of the ship and the lives it contained. A secondary explosion destroyed the remaining fragments of the ship, scrambling his HUD. When it was over, a debris field was spreading in all directions.
“Stand by for incoming,” Warren warned the cyborgs and the gunners. “Curet, tell your people to hold their fire unless they’ve got something headed right toward them. I don’t want them to give away their positions unless it’s absolutely necessary.”
“Copy,” Curet replied.
Pieces of the Conquest streaked toward the squadron. Each bit of detritus from the cruiser moved at thousands of meters per second, but none of the cyborg ships were damaged. Each pilot in Wraith Squadron could share what their sensors were picking up. The new tech capability they’d added made them aware of where every particle was and allowed them to communicate their intentions subconsciously.
The sight of the Conquest’s pieces flying past him was shocking. It was more damage to the enemy vessel than Warren had expected from a Commonwealth vessel. He’d wanted to disable the ship, wait them out, and force them to surrender. After Captain Dupre gave up his ship, Warren had planned on offering their cyborgs freedom, hopefully to add to their ranks. The plan had seemed so neat in his head—clean and surgical. Now he had to come up with something new.
“So far they haven’t attacked us,” Warren said. “I don’t care if the Republic and Commonwealth want to continue their war. Not our circus, not our monkeys. Our objective is to make sure they keep Reotis out of it from now on.”
“Looks like something’s about to change,” Rigby announced. She sounded awed, which could be good or bad.
After peering over at what she was seeing, Warren agreed.
It looked like the CoW ship was coming apart. Confused, he stared intently at the scene unfolding in front of him. Warren hadn’t seen the vessel take any damage. None of it made any sense to him. Rings began to form about a quarter of the way back from the bow and stopped a quarter from the stern. Whole sections of the ship were separating from the main body. It was too orderly, and the lines between the pieces too distinct, for it to be happening because of damage.
He realized the mismatched lines and colors had been hiding a secret.
“They’re deploying... something,” Rigby whispered. “What are those—drop ships?”
“Kind of looks like it,” Warren said, his brow furrowed.
“Where are they going?” Baker asked. “It doesn’t look like they’ve got any kind of organization. Did you see that? Two of them just bumped into each other. Maybe we should sit back and let them smash each other to bits.”
“Bad idea,” Lukov said. “I say we attack now before they get too close to the surface. I would guess they are full of troops waiting to take over the colony again. We don’t want any civilians to die.”
“Nobody’s going anywhere yet,” Warren replied. “They might be putting on a show for us. These might be some kind of new weapons. We need to stay put for a moment and figure out what we’re dealing with.”
“Why haven’t they tried to contact us?” Oplin asked. “We are flying their ships after all.”
“You’re right,” Warren said. “They should want to coordinate with us, or at least discover whether we’re friendly or not.”
“Should we try to contact them then?” Oplin asked.
Warren thought about it for a moment. “No. We don’t know what frequency they’re using. Maybe we can use this to our advantage. Is everyone else seeing dropships? That’s what they look like to me.”
A flurry of icons on Warren’s HUD told him everyone agreed.
“They came to the battle late, so I don’t think they know we’re the enemy. They might hold their fire, at least until we’re close enough to do some serious damage. Let’s head out and see how close we can get. We’re down to forward guns, except for the three of us who still have missiles. Hold your fire, even with the missiles, until everyone’s in range. We’ll try to take them all out at once.”
Cascading confirmations filled Warren’s HUD. He accelerated at twenty percent of his vessel’s maximum speed, then increased it to thirty. He didn’t want to look timid, but he also wanted to appear less threatening. It was a balancing act, but one that would buy them more time to close the gap between their forces.
The Commonwealth dropships were in motion. Warren wasn’t sure if that was in fact what they were, but his gut said he was right on target about the purpose of those crafts. They’d already separated from the main Commonwealth vessel and begun accelerating toward the planet.
“Change of plans,” Warren said. “Alpha flight, we’re going to soften up the smaller craft that are still separating. If we come under fire, spread out. Maybe we can run them out of missiles. Bravo flight, focus on the ones closest to the planet.”
Warren accelerated to his ship’s maximum thrust, which was still slower than any of the others due to the damage he’d taken. He clenched his jaw as he charged toward the enemy vessel, the rest of Alpha flight in formation behind and beside him.
“Incoming!” Lukov said.
Missiles erupted from the open ports on the larger Commonwealth ship, twenty-six in total.
“Spread out!” Warren said. The Wraith Squadron formation opened, giving each of the pilots more room to maneuver. Warren squeezed the trigger of his control stick, vaporizing three missiles targeting him.
A flash of light illuminated the interior of Warren’s cockpit an instant before shrapnel tore the canopy off his fighter. His head and upper torso were now exposed to the chaotic combat environment. Debris from the multiple explosions were flying at him, but he kept going. His eyes squinted against the micrometeorite particles slamming into his helmet’s visor through the damaged cockpit. Still, he pushed his fighter toward the enemy.
It wasn’t a desire to die. It was the acceptance that it could happen. The Commonwealth would capture or destroy the war computer if they got through. There was no chance the cyborg known as Warren would ever return.
After switching his HUD to the targeting reticle, Warren sighted in on the nearest dropship. The vessel was just beginning to slide away from its mooring. He pressed the trigger on his control stick and fired his lasers, working to concentrate every blast on the same spot. It jerked to his right, causing him to spread out his shots instead. He got it back into his reticle, squeezed the trigger again, and drilled a hole in the side of the vessel, but no atmosphere plumed from the breach he’d made.
“They aren’t pressurized,” Warren announced, hardly believing
what he was seeing.
“Confirmed,” Baker said. “I just drilled one all the way through. No atmo. What the hell?”
Warren grunted, narrowly avoiding another volley of fire as he and the rest of Alpha Flight banked around for another pass. According to Warren’s HUD, 36 vessels had launched. Of those, 34 remained. They’d only managed to destroy two of them.
“We’re hardly making a dent on them. We’re not going to be able to keep all of them from reaching the surface,” Baker said. His voice sounded stressed as he spoke in a private channel only to Warren.
“I see it,” Warren said. “Take out as many as you can. When they land, start strafing whatever emerges.”
“Nasty.” Baker laughed. “I love it.”
“They aren’t shooting back,” Rigby said, confused. “Why aren’t we killing more of them?”
“Because of that badass armor they’ve got,” Lukov replied.
A second pass from Alpha Flight team knocked out another two ships from the fight. Several of the dropships had spun around and nearly reached the surface of Reotis. When they were still 50 meters away, they began to disgorge their cargo.
Warren zoomed his vision in. He still couldn’t quite make out what the Commonwealth vessel had disembarked toward the Reotis surface. The objects looked like people, except they were a lot bigger than an average human and they weren’t shaped quite right.
Twenty-seven of the smaller enemy ships remained. While Warren’s flight made multiple attack runs on the dropships, Bravo Flight fought their own war with the Commonwealth. They figured out they could break up into several smaller groups and simply follow the ships toward the surface, since the enemy wasn’t shooting back. With three or four of the cyborg pilots blasting a single vessel at the same time and combining their fire, the dropships didn’t stand a chance.
“Maybe we should just shoot their thrusters?” Rigby suggested. “That way the whole lot of them can just crash into the planet.”
