by Nick Webb
The singularities were almost an affront against nature. A place where reality broke down, space compressed to something smaller than a point, time seemed hopelessly at its mercy, and on the other end….
Something. There was something on the other side to come back from, and it wasn’t just death.
“Ballsy, too fast, man!” Fodder’s voice blared in his ear, and he realized he’d pushed on the accelerator full-bore, blazing straight toward the singularity.
Fly faster, Ballsy.
He shook his head and eased back on the controls. “Sorry, got carried away. Fodder, Spacechamp, and I will handle those fighters coming toward us. Pew Pew, deliver the package when you see an opening. Looks like Roadrunner squad is attempting the same thing—let’s see if we can’t catch the bastards in a crossfire. Move!”
In a well-rehearsed maneuver, Volz—who’d been flying point—Fodder, and Spacechamp peeled off hard in three different directions as Pew Pew maintained his course. They wheeled around, blasting at the stray bogeys, picking off the ones that tried to take aim at Pew Pew and his osmium brick.
He was closing. Less than a kilometer. Time seemed to compress as Volz watched his friend streak toward it, weaving in and out of intercepting fighters, avoiding the explosions of others as Spacechamp and Fodder caught them in their sights.
And the brick was away.
“Woohoo! Yeah, man, I—” Pew Pew started celebrating into his headset.
But he was premature. With a sickening lurch, the osmium brick banked out of the path of the singularity as a Swarm fighter slammed into it. A second fighter collided with Pew Pew’s craft, and he spun out of control, out of sight. On Volz’s scope, he lost contact with his squadmate’s fighter, the other pilot’s electronics fried and dead.
Fodder screamed into the comm. Spacechamp swore.
In the commotion, Volz thought he heard Commander Pierce’s voice. Something about omega runs. Ram the singularity. He heard the CAG order Fodder in.
Fly faster, Ballsy.
“Well boys,” Fodder began, clearing his throat. “If death’s good enough for my brother, it’s good enough for me. Take care, friends, and remember—” he punched his maneuvering thrusters and veered away as he finished, “—don’t fly like—”
And in another sickening collision, his fighter lurched as a Swarm craft rammed him, sending him tumbling away end over end, soon disappearing out of sight in the dim blue glare of the terminator line of the atmosphere below.
Both brothers gone, within moments of each other.
And the singularity grew larger.
Chapter Seventy-Eight
New Dublin, Eyre Sector
Bridge, ISS Warrior
“Last question, Eamon,” she began with a heavy sigh. The gun was still aimed straight at his forehead, just a foot away. He slowly raised his hands, though he couldn’t fathom why—it was obvious he had no way to fight back, no way to stop the inevitable. He saw the look in her eyes. She hated him. Loathed him. That much was clear.
“You won’t kill me.”
“I will. There’s nothing that can stop that now. I either kill you now, or….” She cocked the gun. “Or, I let you live for a few more years and make you my bitch.” She chuckled softly. “You chose the wrong president to cross, Eamon. I’ve littered the political landscape with bastards like you. People who put their own interests, their own profit, their own hormones ahead of the good of our society.”
He clucked his tongue. “Oh, please. You do the same. We all do it, Barb, don’t—”
She pulled the trigger. The cell exploded with a loud percussive shock wave from the blast and his hands instinctively went up to cover his face. When he opened his eyes moments later, he saw her still standing there, gun still pointed at his head. He turned and saw a hole gouged out of the wall behind him where the bullet had ricocheted.
“Don’t call me Barb, Mr. Vice President. Now listen closely. You have a choice to make. Either I own you for the next three years—you do exactly what I tell you, when I tell you, how I tell you, for how long I tell you and with the attitude I tell you, serving at my whim, beck, and call at every minute and second of the day, every day—or this bullet goes into your brain and I can notch a small win for humanity by relieving it of your continued miserable existence.”
His jaw moved but no words came out. He could barely hear her—the ringing from the gun still overpowered his ears.
“Say it again, Eamon.”
“I … I will.”
“Good.” She lowered the gun. “And understand this. I’m putting this gun back into my handbag. But it is still aimed at your face. One wrong step, one wrong anything, and I fire. I’ve got a confession out of you that will make the entire human race scream out for the reinstatement of not only the death penalty, but immolation, water boarding, castration, the rack, disembowelment, and every other ghoulish practice our society has outlawed over the years. It’ll all come back, just for a brief moment—just for you—if you step out of line.”
The door opened behind her. Men and women in white lab coats stepped forward.
“Put your arms through the bars, Mr. Vice President,” she said.
Numbly, without a word, he obeyed. One of the men clamped a sort of restraining device over both arms and attached them to the bars so that they stayed motionless no matter how hard he struggled.
“Don’t fight it, you’ll only make it hurt more.”
His eyes grew wide as one of the attendants stepped forward with what looked like an ultra-high-tech gun of sorts. She held the tip up to a spot on his forearm and pulled the trigger.
He screamed. White hot pain shot up his arm like molten metal. “What the hell are you doing!”
She paced the outside of the cell. “Insurance, Mr. Vice President. I’m tracking your every move, I’m listening to your every word, and I’m reading your every emotion. You sneeze, and I know it. You lie, and I know it. You get laid, I know it. And if you do any of those things without me telling you to, the device in your arm will release a toxin at a word from me and you die instantly.” She paused, glancing sidelong at a technician. “Or was it terrible, mind blowing pain? I can’t remember, can you?”
The tech chuckled, and then pressed the gun up to half a dozen more spots on his arms—each causing him to shriek in pain—before reaching the device through the bars and onto his torso. The gun fired at least twenty more times—he lost count at ten—each one stinging like the world’s largest and most violent hornet had burrowed into his skin and started eating him from the inside.
Finally, the tech stepped away. “There,” said Avery, pleased. “That’s … what, thirty? They all do the same thing, but I thought thirty would be a nice failsafe if you suddenly tried to take one out. They’re made out of silver, you know, Eamon? Thirty pieces of silver shoved up your ass as a testament to your treason. The human race nearly died because of you. And now, through you, I’m going to save it.”
She motioned to the guard who had escorted the techs in. With the press of a button, Isaacson’s cell door clicked open, and the restraints attaching his arms to the bars fell away to the floor with a clatter.
“Follow me, Eamon. We’ve got work to do.”
Chapter Seventy-Nine
New Dublin, Eyre Sector
Bridge, ISS Warrior
“All ships, fall back! Form a perimeter. Task Force Granger Three, cover the Granger One ships—they’re getting slaughtered.” He glanced at the tactical readout and watched in horror as the new arrivals tore through the task force led by Admiral Zingano. One ship blew, then another. Three light cruisers got caught in between the advancing Russian ships and a handful of Swarm carriers and were cut to pieces within fifteen seconds.
The Warrior shuddered as more anti-matter beams struck the hull and red lights started flashing all over the ship schematic at his console, indicating numerous breaches. He heard the XO shout orders over the din on the bridge, sending emergency response crews to th
e damaged areas of the ship.
His console beeped with an incoming call from Zingano and he mashed the comm link button with a clenched fist.
“Looking pretty grim here, Tim,” said the admiral.
“We’ll hold. We had the advantage before the traitor bastards showed up. We’ll still prevail, Bill, and now we’ll take the Russians down a few notches too.”
“Tim,” began Zingano. Granger could hear the hesitation in his voice. “We’re outnumbered. This is suicide.”
Suicide. How appropriate, after all the suicide runs he’d ordered against the Swarm, he was leading up the last, final fleet on a final suicide mission himself. But it felt right. Somewhere, deep inside, it felt like the right thing to do. Something whispered in his ear that this place, this world, was still the place to be.
“Yes, Bill. It may be suicide. But it’s necessary. Think about it—when will we ever get this chance again? It’s clear from the Swarm’s response that this is their homeworld. Why else would they force their allies out into the open like this? It was far more beneficial to them to keep their relationship with the Russians secret and ambiguous. It was throwing us off balance. But now we’ve forced their hand. We took the initiative and surprised them, and now they’re off balance. They’ve called in their allies to defend their planet. The only explanation is that if they lose this, they lose everything. There’s something about this place, Bill. Something about this place that has made them willing to put all their chips down. We need to win this fight, then raze the surface. It’s our only option.”
His logic was convincing, he knew. But asking the admiral to potentially sacrifice all their lives on a last ditch effort at wiping out the Swarm might be too much.
But to his credit, the other man swore, and laughed. “Tim, you old bastard. Fine. Let’s turn this around. All hands, all ships,” Zingano raised his voice, keying the commlink into the entire fleet, “people, this might look like a setback, but they’re only fighting harder now because their backs are against the wall. We’ve got Granger with us. We’ve got The Hero of Earth. We’ve got half the entire fleet of United Earth and all its member worlds. And our cause is just. We will prevail. Zingano out.”
“Sir,” began Lieutenant Diaz, “these Russian ships are cutting through the smart-steel armor at an alarming rate. Nothing like the Swarm three months ago, I mean, they clearly haven’t cracked our quantum field modulation frequencies or anything, but—”
Granger approached the tactical station. “But what?”
One of the other tactical crew members jumped in. “But the Russians are using some type of … well, it looks like a positron-based particle beam.”
“Anti-matter?” Granger shook his head. Looks like Avery wasn’t the only one engaging in anti-matter research over the last few years.
“Positrons technically are anti-matter, sir, but there are no anti-protons or anti-neutrons present. Not like the Swarm’s anti-boron beam. Just a whole bunch of free positrons in a bath of high energy photons.” The tech looked up. “Basically a really big laser, but with anti-electrons along for the ride, and they’re having a field day with the quantum modulations of the smart-steel armor.”
Granger grunted. “Anything our ships can do to counteract it?”
The tech shook his head. “No, sir. No amount of remodulation could fix this. It seems that free positrons fundamentally disrupt the quantum field of the smart-steel, no matter what its modulation.”
Damn. The Russians had been playing them for years, supposedly contributing to smart-steel research, all while developing a back-door weapon to defeat it in case they ever found themselves on the opposite side of a conflict.
“Fine. The Constitution to the rescue. Again.” Several bridge crew members glanced up at him, confused. “I mean, the Warrior.”
Damn. He missed the Old Bird. “You know, we’ve never given our temporary home a nickname.”
Lieutenant Diaz looked up. “Old Wolfram.”
Granger paused. “After the governor of New Dublin?” he said, confused.
“No, sir. The original Constitution was nicknamed Old Ironsides because the iron cannonballs just bounced right off the hull. Our hull is ten meters of tungsten. The old name for tungsten is Wolfram. So therefore—”
“Got it. That’ll do.” He turned to Ensign Prince. “Turn Old Wolfram about, Ensign. Looks like we get to be the battering ram again.” Cocking his head toward the comm he continued, “Strike Force Granger One and Granger Two, stick with the Swarm. Strike Force Granger Three, back up the Warrior. We’re going to go hand the Russian’s asses to them. Follow us in—we’ll take out as many of their positron beams as we can, then you clean up.”
Finally. After two months of ordering other ships and men and women to their deaths, he was about to do the same to himself. Turn the Warrior into another brick. He watched on the screen as the dozens of Russian cruisers grew larger on the screen as the Warrior approached, and soon, they were upon them. Granger punched the internal comm. “Hang on, everybody. It’s about to get choppy.”
Chapter Eighty
New Dublin, Eyre Sector
Bridge, ISS Warrior
“Spacechamp, you’re up!” The CAG’s voice sounded grim, and reluctant. As if he were doing a detestable duty. He was, Volz knew. How anyone could order someone to sacrifice their life was beyond him. He knew he’d never be a CAG, or a captain, or an XO, or anyone who could have that burden thrust upon them. Ever.
He heard a confident voice pipe back, “Aye, aye, sir! One Spacechamp brick coming right up!”
She sounded so full of life. So lively. Like death was nothing to her. Like she’d already accepted her fate long ago, not resigned to death, but treating it like flying to see an old friend, or announcing she was going on a hot date.
Fly faster, Ballsy.
He couldn’t let her. Not another one. Not on his watch. He’d lost Hotbox, Dogtown, Fodder, Pew Pew, and of course, her. Fishtail. He wasn’t going to lose another one.
“Stand down, Fishtail, I’m going in,” he said. He pushed hard on the accelerator.
“Sir…?” He could hear the confusion in Spacechamp’s voice, and he immediately realized what he’d said.
“I said, stand down, Spacechamp. This one’s mine.” He pushed the accelerator to maximum. Fly faster, Ballsy. “You get to stick around and clean up the mess. So long, Spacechamp.”
He streaked toward it, weaving through a squad of Swarm fighters that seemed intent on ramming anything that came within a kilometer of the singularity.
But he was too fast for them. Liberated of his desire for life, he felt alive. Nothing could touch him. Nothing. He veered toward the light, toward oblivion, toward his fate. And on the other side?
Death.
Fly faster, Ballsy.
He plunged in, and all went white.
Chapter Eighty-One
New Dublin, Eyre Sector
Bridge, ISS Warrior
Dozens of Russian positron beams ravaged the Warrior’s hull, but she held. “Target all positron beam installations. All fighters, this is Warrior Actual. Target all positron beam positions. Ignore the fighters.”
They plunged into the Russian position, and the Warrior shook with the impact of nearly a hundred beams. Fortunately, the ten meters of tungsten held up to the energy of the positrons. Though the petawatts of laser energy was another thing entirely. Soon, the hull was pockmarked with deep holes carved out by the Russian beams.
But the Warrior held her course. “Redirect starboard fire toward Russian ship at five mark one,” said Granger, seeing the previous cruiser’s defenses had been neutralized. He grinned as he saw the Eddington and the Philadelphia swoop in and pummel the prone Russian ship with mag rail fire, and within ten seconds the vessel was spouting debris and fire as the internal atmosphere ignited and streamed out into space, carrying the smoldering bodies of dozens of crewmen. Poor kids—suffering for the poor choices of their leaders.
Minutes
passed. Gut-wrenching, heart-pounding minutes, but minutes that saw them carve up a dozen ships and pass them off to the task force. Granger surveyed the rest of the battle. Task forces One and Two were holding up against the Swarm. Barely. It was going to be a tight battle.
But they were going to make it. Maybe—if their luck held.
“Russian fleet down to sixty percent of their force, sir,” said Diaz.
“Good. Swing around to twenty mark five and target those ships over—”
More flickering on the screen, announcing something that was starting to get on Granger’s nerves. More ships.
“Sir! Nearly a hundred more sensor contacts!”
He put his head in his hands. “Please tell me it’s the rest of IDF.”
“Sorry, sir.” The sensor officer turned to him with a pained look. “It’s the Dolmasi.”
Chapter Eighty-Two
New Dublin, Eyre Sector
Bridge, ISS Warrior
Granger had wondered when those bastards were going to show up. In fact, by his reckoning, they were late. He scanned the tactical readout and was surprised—whereas before they’d only come to the Swarm’s rescue with a dozen ships or so, this time they’d arrived in force. Over a hundred ships. Each nearly as deadly as a Swarm carrier.
It was over.
The comm crackled to life. He heard Zingano yelling out of it, explosions and shouting in the background. It was chaos aboard the Victory. “Granger! We’re out of here! All ships, full retreat. Emergency q-jumps. Get back to the staging area at Britannia.”
Granger watched the tactical display. The Dolmasi ships swooped in and flanked the Swarm carriers, providing a formidable backdrop to an already formidable enemy.
