Hoff snapped into action, taking Destra and Atta’s hands in his as he strode down the gangway. “Helm!” he called out as he went. “Full throttle. Aim for the hole in the side of that ship. We’re going to cut her in half.”
“Yes, sir. . . .”
“Comms, have all our nonessential personnel abandon ship. They won’t have long, but maybe a few can still escape.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Where are we going?” Destra asked suddenly.
Hoff ignored her. “Tova!” he called out as they drew near to the alien. “Tell your people to stop firing on us as soon as they see the command cruiser destroyed. I’m trusting them to hold up their end of this deal. If they do, it might not be too late for humans and Gors to work together, after all.”
“I tell them,” Tova said, closing her eyes. “But I do not promise we work with humans again.”
Destra squeezed Hoff’s hand. “Tell me you’re coming with us.”
He shook his head. “I have to make sure this works, Des. I’m sorry.”
“Hoff!” Destra burst out, and suddenly she stopped walking.
He dragged her along roughly despite her protestations, and Atta began to cry. Hoff nodded to Sergeant Thriker, who stood watching Tova and Roan with the squad of sentinels. “Sergeant!”
“Sir?” Thriker asked, striding up beside them.
“I need you to look after my family for me,” Hoff said as they reached the back of the bridge. They stopped in front of a recessed door with glowing warning labels pasted all over it. It was an escape pod. Hoff passed his wrist over the control panel, and as soon as the door opened, he shoved Destra and Atta inside.
“Hoff, please!” Destra pleaded.
“This is the only way, Des! I love you both.”
He was about to tell Thriker to join his family in the pod when something heavy hit him from behind, and he went stumbling into his wife’s open arms.
“They took my family from me, Admiral. Make sure they don’t take you or yours.”
Hoff whirled around just in time to see Sergeant Thriker shut the door and seal the escape pod. Then came a flash of light as the launch tube energized. The pod’s IMS buffered their sudden acceleration, so no one was knocked off their feet. Hoff turned to see them racing down a long tunnel past consecutive rings of red light that flashed brightly as they roared by.
Destra clung to his arm while Atta clung to his legs. Hoff clung to hope. If the Sythian Cruiser were disabled when the Tauron collided with it, and if the Gors surrendered after that . . . then maybe—maybe Dark Space still had a chance.
Suddenly the tunnel of light disappeared, and they roared out into the dark unknown.
* * *
Adram’s finger tightened on the trigger—
And a high-powered rifle blew him away. Caldin watched him hit the deck beside her with half of his face missing. She listened to the sounds of laser fire on the bridge briefly intensify, and suddenly she was very glad that the Sythian ship didn’t have a real viewport. By now it would have been shattered and all of them sucked out into space.
Caldin forced herself to breathe despite the fiery ache in her side. Moments later the sounds of laser fire ceased, and a familiar voice called out, “She’s over here!”
Her chief engineer appeared, kneeling at her side. “You’re going to be okay,” Delayn said as he found her hand and squeezed it.
Then a gruff voice called out in concern, and she turned to see a familiar corpsman rushing toward her. He knelt on the other side of her, and took her other hand. “Loba!”
Delayn shot the man an odd look, but he covered his surprise to hear a fellow petty officer calling their captain by her first name, and asked, “How is she?”
“Terl . . .” Caldin whispered, her eyes softening with a smile.
“She’s lucky,” the corpsman said, quickly checking her injured side. “It must have been a glancing hit. She lost a lot of blood, and she has a bad laser burn, but she’ll live.”
Caldin rocked her head from side to side, her eyes turning to the engineer. “What happened, Delayn?”
The folds of skin around Cobrale Delayn’s pale blue eyes tightened as he winced. “We lost a few good men.”
Caldin tried to sit up, but Terl held her down. “Don’t move,” he said. She heard an aerosol spray of some kind dispensing. Nanites. “That should stop the bleeding,” he said.
Then came a flurry of gasps and exclamations, and Caldin couldn’t stand the suspense any more. “What’s going on? Help me up.”
“I’m not done yet!” Terl hissed.
“You can finish treating my injuries in a moment,” she replied.
Corpsman Terl and Delayn helped her to her feet, and she planted her palms on the captain’s table, leaning heavily on it. She was just in time to watch on the grid as the Tauron collided with a monolithic Sythian cruiser. The Tauron disappeared inside a gaping hole in the side of the alien vessel, and for a long moment, nothing happened.
Caldin frowned, wondering if the two ships had actually hit each other after all.
Then a bright ribbon of fire shot out from the larger ship and it cracked in two flaming pieces. The fires died quickly as their oxygen ran out into space, leaving the massive halves of the enemy ship slowly drifting apart amidst a dark cloud of their own debris. The Tauron’s gravidar icon reappeared on the grid. She was also drifting through the cloud of debris, but barely moving, and her icon was dark—indicating that she was derelict, without power. Caldin zoomed in on the battleship until she could see not just an icon of the ship, but the ship itself. The Tauron’s front end was completely ruined, and her bridge had been scraped clean off, along with most of her guns. Even so, she was not yet completely destroyed. The core of the ship had survived.
“Comms!” Caldin called out in a weak voice. She swayed unsteadily on her feet, but forced herself to stay conscious. “Hail the admiral. I want to know if there any survivors.”
The comm officer didn’t reply.
“He’s dead, ma’am,” Delayn whispered. “Grimsby called the sentinels for help, but Adram’s men shot him for his trouble.”
Caldin turned to Delayn with an angry scowl, but her anger wasn’t directed at him. “Find me a replacement, then!”
“Yes, ma’am.” Delayn started off, staring idly at the captain’s table as he walked by. A moment later, however, Caldin saw him suddenly stop and gape at the grid.
“What?”
“The Sythians,” Delayn said. “They’ve stopped firing.”
Caldin turned to look, and now she noticed it, too. The entire Sythian armada with all its hundreds of encircling cruisers and thousands of swarming fighters had suddenly stopped shooting. Space was calm except for a few scattered shots from human ships that were late to realize their enemy had just surrendered en masse. For a moment Caldin thought the alien ships had stopped firing because the Tauron was no longer a threat, but that didn’t explain why they weren’t still shooting at the Valiant, or for that matter, at any of the handful of the admiral’s surviving transports and fighters.
“You think the Gors were telling the truth?” Delayn asked.
Caldin blinked and shook her head, unable to believe it. “I don’t know. . . .” But she couldn’t think of another explanation.
* * *
Brondi watched, dumbfounded with fascination as the admiral opened fire on empty space. Then, mere seconds later, he was even more dumbfounded to see a massive Sythian warship appear where the admiral had been firing. Now he understood what the admiral’s plan had been, but Hoff was skriffy if he’d thought that even together they could bring down such a massive ship. The Tauron had carved a big chunk out of the side of that cruiser, but Brondi had a feeling that now it was the Sythians’ turn to do some damage.
“Helm! How long before we can start spooling for a jump?”
“We still have to get clear of the enemy formation. A minute or two at most.”
“Good.”
/> “Where are we going?” Alara asked.
Brondi turned to her with a gaping smile and he chucked her chin with mock affection. “Somewhere safe, Sweet Thing. Don’t worry. Then you and I can find some time to be alone.”
Alara smiled at him and looped her arm through his. “That sounds good.”
Brondi unhooked his arm from hers and gave her a gentle shove. “Be patient,” he said, ignoring the look of hurt which crossed her face. “I need to focus,” he explained as he gazed down on the captain’s table. Real affection had always made him uneasy.
He watched the Tauron turn toward the giant Sythian warship, and his brow furrowed. “What are you thinking, Hoff?” Brondi wondered aloud. A cluster of Sythian missiles splashed across the Valiant’s viewports, eliciting a roar from her bridge speakers and shaking the deck underfoot. Loose objects rattled all over the bridge, and Alara screamed. She all but jumped into his arms, and Brondi shoved her away with a scowl. “For frek’s sake, Alara! Just . . .” Brondi smoothed a rigid hand over his slick black hair and tried to calm himself. “Keep your hands to yourself for a moment, Sweet Thing,” he said, smiling sarcastically. “Can you do that? We’re quite safe in here.”
“Okay . . .” she said quietly.
He turned back to the captain’s table just as the admiral’s flagship collided with its target. A gleeful giggle bubbled from his lips as he watched that. His eyes grew wide and his mouth gaped in a broad grin as the Sythian command ship split in two flaming halves and the Tauron appeared in the middle, her icon dark and derelict.
“Gravidar, enlarge the Tauron and put it on the main display. I want to see her in all her lovely brokenness.” A moment later, a magnified view of the battleship appeared on the main screen. She was dented and scoured beyond recognition. Her prow was completely mangled, and her decks gaped open in dozens of places. Not even a single viewport still glowed with light. The ship was unrecognizable.
Brondi was so distracted that for a moment he didn’t notice the sharp, ringing silence which had fallen across the bridge. He’d grown so used to the simulated roar of missiles exploding against their shields that the absence of those booming blasts was almost painful to listen to. A quick look at the captain’s table confirmed what his ears had already told him—the Sythians had stopped firing.
“The old skriff did it!” Brondi crowed. “Weapons! Stop firing! We don’t want to rile them up again.” Brondi turned to Alara for lack of anyone else to share the good news with. “Alara! The admiral did it!” he said, shaking his head wonderingly.
“That’s great . . .” Alara said, avoiding his gaze. She sounded strangely subdued.
Brondi offered her his best apologetic look. “You’re not mad at me are you, Sweet Thing? Because you know I just love you to bits. You’re my favorite girl. That’s why you’re going to celebrate with me after this is all over, instead of any of the others. I’ll be all yours, and you’ll be all mine, to do with as I please.”
“I can’t wait,” Alara said, still not looking at him.
Brondi frowned. He wasn’t used to feeling rejected by women, especially women he’d chipped to be willing companions, but he decided to ignore it for now. There were bigger issues to deal with. “Helm! Set course for that Sythian command cruiser. It’s time to find out why they’ve stopped shooting at us. While we’re at it, we can destroy what’s left of the Tauron.”
“Our trajectory is locked,” the navigator said. “We’re already spooling for our jump.”
“Re-set, it,” Brondi said. “What’s the frekking point of us running away if there’s nothing to run from anymore?”
“You’re going to attack the admiral?” Alara asked, holding a hand to her head and wincing, as if she had a bad headache.
“Never leave an enemy at your back—especially a wounded one. . . . what’s wrong with you?” he asked as she almost fell over.
“They just sacrificed themselves to save us,” Alara said, shaking her head as if to clear it.
“Don’t be silly, Sweet Thing. The only reason the old skriff did what he did was to save Dark Space—not us. We’re criminals, remember? He’d line us up and shoot us if he had the chance.” Brondi’s eyes narrowed with sudden suspicion, and he took a quick step toward her. He grabbed her by the shoulders and squeezed painfully hard. “Who’s side are you on?” he asked, his eyes searching hers. “Don’t forget who took you in and fed you, Alara. I clothed you and looked after you. I raised you. That makes you mine.”
Alara looked chagrined. She gazed down at her feet and shook her head. “I’m sorry, Brondi. Let me make it up to you.” Her big, beautiful violet eyes met his once more, and his expression softened.
“Don’t worry about it. I’m sure I’ll think of something you can do for me later.”
Alara nodded. “Okay.”
* * *
Reset. That was all Alara heard. It was all she needed to hear. The code word activated the interrupter which had been implanted during the time she’d been aboard the Defiant in order to fight her slave chip, and now she remembered everything; she knew who she was, and she knew who Brondi was. She also realized that Brondi had been calling her Alara rather than Angel for the past five minutes, and that was all the proof she needed.
She winced as her head began to pound, but she fought through the dizzying waves of pain, eventually calming herself enough to function.
“You’re going to attack them?” she asked.
“Never leave an enemy at your back. . . .”
The rest of what Brondi said was lost as Alara fought another lancing wave of pain and a sweaty rush of panic. She almost fell over.
“What’s wrong with you?” Brondi asked.
“They sacrificed themselves to save us . . .” she said.
“Don’t be silly, Sweet Thing . . .” She listened to the rest of his justification while swaying on her feet and blinking stupidly at him. He had done this to her. Ethan had tried to warn her. He . . . Ethan! Suddenly she remembered him saying goodbye, and all her doubt and uncertainty vanished on a wave of fury. Brondi had sent him out there in a nova fighter. It was unlikely that he had survived both battles.
Brondi took hold of her shoulders and shook her, asking whose side she was really on. “Don’t forget who took you in and fed you, Alara. . . .”
She listened as he reminded her of everything she supposedly owed him, but now she knew it was all a lie. Somehow she kept her ire from boiling over and had the presence of mind to hide what she was thinking.
“I’m sorry, Brondi,” she said, affecting an apologetic tone. “Let me make it up to you.”
“Don’t worry about it. I’m sure I’ll think of something you can do for me later.”
“Okay,” Alara said, nodding. Meanwhile, she would think of something else she could do for him.
Chapter 33
Five minutes earlier . . .
Ethan insisted they return to bridge after Atton treated his injuries. He flatly refused to be put in stasis, even though some level of metabolic suspension might have been advisable with the amount of shrapnel still lurking beneath his skin.
“I’m not going to die in my sleep, Atton, so don’t even think about it.”
Atton helped him back to the bridge and both of them stopped in the entrance to stare at the massive bulk of the Sythian behemoth cruiser which lay before them. “Now that’s a battleship,” Ethan said, sitting down with a grunt of pain and leaning forward for a better look. Atton sat down in the copilot’s station beside Hoff, and they watched as a brilliant streak of fire leapt out of the damaged side of the alien cruiser.
“What was that?”
“That was the Tauron,” Hoff gritted out as a missile lock alarm screamed through the bridge speakers. A second later the corvette shook with a booming impact. “Damn it!”
“What do you mean that was the Tauron?” Atton asked. “They destroyed it?! Mom was on board!”
Hoff made a strangled sound, but didn’t reply. Ethan
winced as a deep pang of sorrow lanced through him. That feeling was partly his, in memory of what he and Destra had once shared, and partly sympathy for Hoff. He reached out to squeeze the admiral’s shoulder. “I’m sorry. I know what it’s like to lose your wife.”
Hoff just shook his head. Suddenly Ethan realized he was comforting the admiral’s clone, rather than the admiral himself, and he withdrew his hand, feeling stupid.
A grim silence fell.
But then something new happened to distract them from their grief. “Hoi!” Ethan pointed. “Look!” As they looked on, the alien cruiser cracked in two. Flames roared out into space from both halves, and what was left of the Tauron emerged in the center of that brief inferno, looking charred and almost unrecognizable.
“They did it,” Atton whispered as he searched the grid. “And the Gors have stopped firing. They were telling the truth, Hoff. They really are just slaves.”
Hoff’s lips pressed into a thin, determined line. “We’ll see about that.”
“What are you going to do?” Ethan asked, his eyes narrowing.
“We’re going to go find the Sythians and have a chat with them.”
“Are you completely skriffy?” Atton replied. “They’re not going to chat with you! They’re going to kill you! Their ship is ruined, admiral. Just let it go, and let’s figure out what we’re going to do about Brondi.”
“There’s nothing to do about Brondi, Atton. We’ve saved Dark Space from the most immediate threat, but there’s no way to get on board that carrier now. Dark Space is Big Brainy’s to do with however he might please—at least until the next Sythian fleet arrives. As for chatting with the Sythians—help me get on board, and if I find out anything useful, you know where to look. The Tauron is ruined, but there are still parts of her that will have survived. Important parts. Find me there, and you’ll find your mother and Atta, too.”
Dark Space: Origin Page 35
