The Expanding Universe 4: Space Adventure, Alien Contact, & Military Science Fiction (Science Fiction Anthology)

by Craig Martelle

  What was I going to do?

  Die.

  Yeah I got that already. No need to highlight it. A part of me didn’t want to die. But now was too late to voice it. I'd made the decision by getting into the bird.

  "Just escort me in," I heard myself say.

  There was a pause, which I assumed was Thumper swearing under her breath.

  "You don’t have to do that," she said quietly.

  "Got your back," said Falldown, who I assumed was in the pair following us.

  "God Speed Redline," said the Captain.

  There was nothing else to say, so no-one said anything. Even the combat chatter behind us had stopped.

  I checked the nav to find out why.

  Everyone was chasing me now.

  And when I mean everyone, I mean everyone. Yorktown was moving, with her screen in V formation ahead of her. Following me. It was a sight to behold, and I never thought the Admiral would do something like this. He was strictly a launch and forget admiral. The captain on the other hand was a go getter. There was no way we could take out both carriers on our own, which meant fleet action. Maybe we'd have lost, but even in losing we could defend the American sector. A slug fest with two equal fleets would most likely be a draw. I wished them luck. I wouldn’t be there for it.

  "Target missiles," I said.

  I’d already added them, but the others wouldn't have. We were used to our ECM keeping most missiles off us. Now we'd have to take them out the old fashioned way, by treating them as an enemy fighter. It took balls of steel to pick off missiles with only your guns. But as they say, no guts, no glory.

  The minutes were ticking down.

  The engines were heating up.

  My shorts were sticky wet.

  Seven

  "You don’t need to kill yourself, you know."

  "What? Who said that?"

  "Who are you talking to Redline?"

  Thumper sounded confused. She wasn’t the only one. I flipped off the coms.

  "You don't have to die," the voice said again.

  "Who are you?"

  A face appeared in the rear view part of the HUD. I was so surprised, I actually turned to look behind me. Which was stupid, because there was nothing behind me to see, but the rear end of the bird. Which was why the rear view was on the HUD in the first place. Pain was my reward.

  "You can call me Thirteen."

  "Why?"

  The head seemed to shrug, but a grin formed on the face.

  "It's my name. At least in your language."

  "What do you want?"

  "To pass on a message."

  "From who?"

  "Your grandson."

  "I don’t have a grandson."

  "Not yet."

  My brain flipped out. Maybe loss of blood. Maybe a conversation which made no sense. I began to shiver, my eyes closed, and for a few seconds, I was no-one, nowhere.

  "JEDBURGH!"

  I startled awake, and groaned, as the movement made my body pull against the harness.

  "Get it together Jedburgh. Your grandson wants to be born, and we need him."

  "What?"

  The face changed, and an image of a man wearing four stars on his shoulders appeared instead. And damned if he didn’t look a lot like me.

  "I don’t have a son, let alone a grandson."

  "You will. If you decide to live."

  "Too late now."

  "No, it isn’t."

  Eight

  For a moment I wasn’t even sure where I was.

  The rear view was showing the rear view, and had I even seen anything else? The coms was off though, and I flipped it back on.

  "Redline you bastard, talk to me!"

  "Sorry, lost it for a bit."

  "Are you alright?"

  "That’s a big negative, but I'm hanging in there."

  Which gave me an idea.

  "I repeat, what's the plan?"

  "Bunny hop, with a twist."

  Silence.

  "You're crazy."

  "Yes. Now's the time to peel off. "

  I figured I was now less than a minute from the point defence range of the enemy fleet. It was designed for missiles, not anti-fighter, but all the same, I was just a slower and bigger form of missile. Although, not as slow as their systems expected. I was gambling on no-one thinking to up the max speed of the fighter lead calculations.

  The fleet ahead of me was moving now too. But it took me a few seconds to work out they were breaking off. The entire fleet was turning towards the jump point they'd come in through, leaving only two cruisers as a rear guard.

  "Yorktown to all fighters, job done, come on home."

  For a moment I didn’t believe it. I could feel myself failing, and now it was the ears turn.

  "Redline," yelled Thumper. "Break off now."

  I shook my head for a moment, and looked again at the nav. There were new dots at our jump point. Two large ones, one of whom was the old Midway herself. The two escort carriers were launching fighters. Four squadrons each.

  The stick seemed to move of its own accord, and the bird curved upward, taking me away from the rear cruisers. Thumper followed me, and Falldown and his wing followed her.

  The nav was crazy now. Yorktown and her escorts were still coming on. The remainder of our birds were heading back, while the remaining enemy fighters were still heading for their carriers. I figured they had enough time to land, rearm, and launch again, before the Midway group's squadrons were on them.

  I sighed.

  There was still a job to do. And only I could do it.

  "Redline, are you heading home or not?"

  "Go on Thumper. I'm going to have to slow down for the trip back. You better too. Save me a park."

  I took my left hand off my side, and pulled back the speed slider dramatically. The blood flow increased, but I left my hand where it was. I rolled the bird over towards Yorktown, and Thumper led the other two home. I was well off the track of the enemy fighters now, and they were showing no interest, and I knew damn well she wanted to refuel and rearm, and get back out here again with the Midway group.

  For me, it was limp home time.

  Or not.

  The roll continued, until I was pointed at the rear carrier, and my hand rammed the slider to the stops again. There was a squeal from somewhere behind me.

  "Hold it together baby," I muttered.

  The engine temps were nearing the end of the red now, but we didn’t have much further to go, and I needed my hand back on my side. Even a gentle clamp on hurt like hell, and I knew neither of us had much longer to go.

  I had one shot at this.

  And the odds were, the future would have to do without another Jedburgh.

  Nine

  "What the hell…"

  I flipped off the coms. I didn’t need to hear Thumper yelling the obvious.

  The nav was taking up all my attention. The oncoming remaining enemy fighters were catching up to me, but I was high side of them, and heading down. I hoped I’d timed this right.

  Just to make it look good, I started a slow roll, trying to make it look like the pilot was dead, and the bird was losing it. It wasn’t far from the truth I figured.

  The fleet ahead of me was definitely running, but they'd opened up the formation to let their fighters land from the rear. Most carriers were designed with a single flight deck down the middle of the ship, allowing recovery from both ends if need be. At speed, recovery from the rear was the only option.

  My head shook, the stick wobbled as a result, and my eyes blurred.

  "Keep it together" I muttered.

  It looked right. I was coming down just in front of the lead fighters, and I didn’t think they could catch me. If there was any point defence fire, I couldn’t see it, but I was counting on their own birds being too close to fire at me.

  At the last second, I turned and headed for the landing deck.

  My finger tightened on the gun trigger, and well before ente
ring, I was spraying gun pulses ahead of me.

  At full speed, I went through the middle of the carrier, hand working the joystick in tiny movements, making the pulses spray along the walls, deck, and ceiling. I was praying for a miracle, where a pulse would hit a window, and blow it in, or a hatch and jam it. Or if I was really lucky, a shuttle or something with a full fuel load I could make an explosion with. Several puffs of gas and debris showed me several explosive decompressions, but no luck on the fuel explosion.

  Near the end, I took my left hand away again, pulled the slider back all the way, and came to a stop right at the end of the flight deck. The carrier kept moving ahead, and I started to go backwards.

  A no engine flip pointed me back the way I’d come, and I toggled select nearest enemy. The Carrier was too close to count, and it locked the only enemy fighter to have come in behind me. Tap, and I sent it one of my remaining missiles. I was a quarter way down the flight deck now, and the explosion was a quarter the way from the other end. Debris went in all directions, and still moving down that way, I could see hull breaches in several places.

  I turned the bird to point to the starboard side of the flight deck, and waited for the flight control windows to come into view.

  Tap.

  The missile went straight through the strengthened glass, and exploded well inside.

  As quick as I could, I locked up the carrier, selected the bridge as primary target, turned the bird to point towards the hole, and tapped again. The missile launched into the hole made by the previous one, and turned upward.

  I spun the bird to point out the back of the carrier, and goosed the speed slider to push me out faster. There was a massive explosion above and behind me, and the whole ship staggered, bouncing me off the deck, just before the end.

  I pushed the slider to the stops again, and had just cleared the end of the deck, when there was another explosion behind me, this time being one of my engines. The bird started spinning, and I eased back the slider to stop the other engines doing the same thing.

  But I was too late.

  Another explosion, and the bird started tumbling uncontrollably, spinning at the same time.

  I cried out in pain, my eyes blurred to the point I couldn’t really see at all, and my last thought was the life support system hadn’t switched over to my emergency supply.

  Everything went black.

  Ten

  "Welcome back sunshine."

  It was the same nurse I'd had after my accident. She didn’t have to say anything to keep me lying flat, as I couldn’t move at all. She waved in the direction of the door, and left though it.

  The captain came in, and stopped beside my bed.

  "That was a pretty stupid stunt son. I didn't figure you for suicidal. No, don’t speak. Listen. I ought to be court marshalling you for disobeying orders, but as it happens, most of the command staff would be in the dock with you, along with all our remaining pilots. Thumper and Falldown went back after you as soon as they figured out what you were up to. The rest turned around as well. After you went in, they were still too far away to help you, but the exploding fighter scared off the remaining enemy fighters, and they landed on the other carrier. The two of them stayed with you until the search and rescue bird could get there."

  He looked at me seriously for a moment.

  "I don’t know if you'll ever fly again, but if you do, you can paint a carrier symbol on the side of it. We think one of your missiles hit something explosive, and it tore a huge hole in the top and side around the bridge area. Secondary explosions continued for an hour after, and they abandoned ship. We picked up the survivors, since the rest of their fleet left them behind, and jumped out. About two hours after you hit it, it came apart. I'm putting you in for a commendation."

  I sighed. I should have been thankful I was alive, but I wasn’t sure why I was. But there was one thing bugging me.

  "Sir? How come the fleet came after me?"

  He laughed.

  "Well now, we had a stroke of luck. The CAG and I were trying to get the Admiral to move the fleet to support you, but he was adamant. Worked himself up so bad, he actually had a stroke. Left me in command, and I got us moving. Probably saved your life too. They tell me you were only minutes from death when the SR bird got yours on board and down the lift. Had we not been as close as we were, we'd have been down yet another pilot."

  "I guess you are anyway."

  "Possibly. But heroes have options, where crash victims don’t. Just concentrate on getting well, and we'll see what the options are when you’re back on your feet. Yorktown is heading home for that refit we should have had last year. So no shuttle ride this time, you get a carrier ride instead."

  "What about the German fleet? Won't they need us?"

  He sighed.

  "Well, they don’t tell us everything. Our job was to meet whatever advance force they were sending, and to delay it if we could. Thanks to you, we did our job. When we down jumped into Jamaica, we found the first elements of a battle fleet. Intelligence thinks they sent one of their own, and we’ve been trying to get everything we can here to meet it. Midway was sent in to reinforce us, and instead managed to save us. There were three battleships at the jump point when we came through, along with Lexington and Hornet. Midway is scouting to give us warning, and has orders to fall back without being seen. As far as I can see, there'll be another two Midway class here by then, and we already passed a cruiser squadron and another battlewagon."

  He looked wistful for a moment. I didn't say anything.

  "I'm sorry to be missing this fight. But they want us in the nearest shipyard for a refit, on the theory this war is only just starting, and another upgraded carrier needs to be ready before we can go on the offensive. Hornet won't be making that trip, she's older than Yorktown is. In fact, I thought they mothballed her. Anyway, we have our orders."

  He stopped and smiled.

  "On that note, the CAG has orders to leave you alone. You did the only thing you were trained to do, and if it trashed his ship in the process, then so be it. Speaking of trashing things, the rest of the pilots were transferred to Lexington as we went past. Thumper was furious she wouldn’t be here when you woke up, and had to be bodily forced back into her fighter. She sent you a vid after she landed over there. The docs will let you see it, when they think you're ready for it. Your job is done. At least for now, so the only thing you need to worry about is getting well again."

  He saluted me, which wasn’t appropriate without a hat on, and in a sickbay. I appreciated the gesture though.

  He nodded and left, leaving me to drop back into sleep. When I woke again, I found I could move, albeit painfully. The doc came and went, and eventually my nurse sat me up. I had mail in the inbox, as well as reports. The damage to the CAG's bird made me flinch, which hurt. The SAR crew report also made me flinch. Apparently the emergency life support did switch on, and I was breathing just fine, or as well as you could with one lung, but the rest of me was giving out.

  The vid from Thumper was short.

  "They tell me you're going to live. You better. We have a war to fight. But after that stunt you pulled, we're changing your call-sign."

  She paused, and gave me a wicked grin.

  "Get well Bunny Hop!"

  Author Timothy Ellis

  I live on the Gold Coast, Queensland, Australia; where I constantly battle with my cat for possession of my desk chair, Daleks do guard duty, and I keep my sonic screwdriver next to my Lightsaber and wand. Years of playing space based computer games, from the original text version of Trek before the IBM or Apple II came out, through the Wing Commander series, to the Egosoft X2 and X3 series, prepared me for writing Space Opera. I binge read and watch all forms of Sci-Fi, and a lot of Fantasy.

  I'm the creator of the Hunter Legacy Universe, comprising The Hunter Legacy series of 15 books, the A.I. Destiny series of 6 books, and the Spacemage Chronicle trilogy. The universe covers over 3000 years, across 2 galaxies. 4 of thes
e books are with co-authors, with more to come.

  I started writing because I had 20 years of ideas slowly making me go mad, and because life had relegated me to the scrap heap. I had 3 books published on Amazon before I realized I really could write, and writing Space Opera was just as much fun as playing it. Writing is now my life, and living in the 27th century makes me very happy.

  You can find all of my books here: https://www.amazon.com/-/e/B00HRTTIJG

  Tuesday

  By Lyn Forester

  A gambler. A prostitute. An orphan. On a toxic planet where people live in stacked cities, segregated by social status, a lot can happen in one day.

  Location: Leton

  Season: Winter Cycle: Day 33

  Year: 890 PL (Post Landing)

  The Hungry Girl

  Time: 0145

  Like treasure, the crinkled foil wrapper twinkles on the sidewalk. A fallen star that promises to fend off starvation for another night.

  Her stomach cramps, a hollow ache just below the ribs. It growls to rush across the street, snatch up the prize, devour whatever contents can be scrounged from inside.

  She waits.

  The alley snuggles close; narrow, dark and safe. It shields her from passersby. Breath plumes in the air as goose bumps rise on uncovered arms. One month into Winter Cycle and the Weather Crafters show vicious pride in keeping Ground Zero glacial.

  Ice bites at her fingers, nails turning blue as she waits in stillness.

  The hologram starlight can't reach her. The streetlamps look like black spires reaching into darkness. Soon, the sky will shut off, too.

  Only the desperate or depraved venture out in the space between Star-Light and Quarter-Light. A dangerous time, the black of Lights-Out.

  She should find her hole and wedge herself into the high place above the trash bins. It's tight enough to scrape off skin and keep her body heat close.

  But the man was careless, in a hurry to get inside. His bad throw missed the incinerator and now the food wrapper winks with temptation.