by Jay Allan
But, she still couldn’t think of anything but the dead, the hundreds of spacers and Marines already lost…and the ones who would never make it off that cursed planet.
Including Devon Cameron.
* * *
“Get moving, all of you!” Cameron was standing against a wall of metal, leaning around and firing out across the room as he yelled into his comm. The shooting volume had slowed, but there were still spurts of fire coming in…from a single remaining enemy bot, he thought. Half a dozen of his Marines, all volunteers, had stayed behind with him to hold off the enemy attack while the others withdrew. Cameron didn’t think there was any way First Imperium bots could stop him from blowing up the facility—it was too late for that—but he also knew he had to buy time for the rest of his people to get back to the surface.
“Sir…we can’t leave you here.”
“That’s an order, Sergeant.” He fired again, sending three semi-automatic bursts out into the shadowy darkness. “Leave me your extra cartridges and go.” A pause. “Now, move!”
“No, sir!” The sergeant was standing across from Cameron, wedged behind a large pillar he was using for cover. “There’s only one more of them down there. We can finish it off, and then we can all get going.”
“There’s no time, Sergeant. Now, follow my orders, and get the hell out of here!”
Cameron was angry…but he was also overcome by the loyalty of his last few comrades. He was proud of the spirit of the Corps, the grim comradeship…but he wasn’t going to let them sacrifice what slim chances they all had left. The remaining Marines had a poor enough chance to get out…waiting any longer, and dragging his wounded carcass with them, was only going to turn unlikely into impossible.
“No, General…we’re all leaving together, or we’re not leaving at all.”
Cameron turned his head abruptly in anger, bringing on a wave of dizziness as he did. The disorientation blunted his rage at the Marine’s insubordination, and he stood where he was, trying to stay focused, to decide how to handle the situation.
He was about to repeat his order, but then he realized the Marines weren’t going to listen. They were determined to stay with him, to get him out of there…or to ensure that he didn’t die alone, abandoned, kilometers below the surface. He could feel his fists squeezing tight, anger, frustration, gratitude, all combining together in a storm of uncontrolled emotions.
Finally, he said, “Alright then…we’ve got to take that thing down now, so we can get the hell out of here.” He paused for a few seconds. “So, on three…everyone with me.” He didn’t want any time to think about what he was doing.
“One.” He leaned forward, his tired grip tightening on his rifle.
“Two.” He took in a deep breath, ignoring the pain in his battered chest and sucking in every drop of oxygen-rich air he could.
“Three.” He lunged ahead an instant early, an attempt to put himself out in front of his Marines…but there, he met with limited success. As far as he could tell, every one of them had jumped forward early, and now they were charging across the room, opening up with all the firepower they had left in their depleted stocks.
There were no storage tanks in the enemy bot’s direction, at least, so there was no need to exert any care at all in where they fired. The whole thing was a desperate attempt to clear out the last of the enemy, to score a lucky hit and clear the way to make a desperate last dash to escape.
Cameron kept running…until he realized the incoming fire had gone silent. He raised up his hand as he snapped out, “Halt,” and then he stopped and checked his scanner display. Nothing. No fire at all. No enemy movement within the range of his detection capability.
He’d been resigned to death, but now he felt a surge of enthusiasm, a desire to get the hell out of the enemy base, to survive, somehow, against the odds. He knew the chances were poor, but even if he’d been ready to give up on himself, he wasn’t about to surrender the lives of his last companions who had stayed with him.
“Activate countdown,” he said to his AI, watching as the small clock display appeared on his projection. His eyes were fixed as one hour gave way to fifty-nine minutes, fifty-nine seconds. “Let’s go, Marines…we’re on the clock.” He shot a thought toward his AI, a demand for a massive hit of stimulants. He disregarded the computer’s compulsory warning that the dose he’d requested was dangerous, and he renewed the order. Nothing was more dangerous that being slowed now by wounds and fatigue.
He could feel the drug pouring into his bloodstream, replacing the exhaustion with a surge of energy. He knew all the damage such a big injection could cause him…but none of it seemed to compare much to still being in the tunnels when some undetermined but massive amount of antimatter escaped containment and annihilated.
* * *
“We’re out of time, Major.” Strand hated herself for the words coming from her mouth, but Stanton’s report had only confirmed what she already knew. The charges were activated…and they were set to go off in less than twenty minutes.
Unless an enemy bot moved into the area…in which case the explosion would be immediate. Every second Stanton and the last few Marines stayed down there, they risked utter destruction.
Strand had almost given up on Cameron…at least until the Marine general and his tiny rear guard had gotten close enough to reestablish contact with the surface station. Cameron had brought news that the charges were in place, that the mission was moments away from success…and also that, somehow, he and his companions had managed to get three-quarters of the way back up to the surface.
It was unexpected, miraculous, inspiring. It was also too late.
She’d run the calculations a dozen times, instructed Midway’s AI to process every signal received and update the reported locations of the Marines. Every one of them had told her the same thing. There wasn’t enough time.
“You’ve got to leave yourselves time to get out of the atmosphere, Major. That’s no normal explosive down there.” Strand understood the hesitancy of Cameron’s Marines to leave him behind. She even agreed, on a personal level. But, she was the fleet commander, and she had her own responsibilities…to all the men and women under her authority.
She might have let the Marines decide to stay if they insisted…but she had a ship crew down there as well, and she felt responsible for their lives…so much so, that she’d ordered them to lift off at once, whether the Marines liked it or not.
And, they had refused. Her crew had thrown in with the Marines, and they had told her, with all the respect it was possible to attach to insubordination, that they were waiting for General Cameron and his people no matter what.
She’d gotten angry at first, furious even that her own spacers would disobey her in such a desperate situation. But, then it passed…and on some level she was even grateful to them for relieving her of the burden to give up on Cameron.
She watched as the time passed, each second seeming almost like an eternity, even as she saw the report that the Marines had reached the surface, that they were racing toward the waiting ship. Her hopeful thoughts were quickly squashed, however, when she saw the countdown clock.
Less than three minutes. Not enough time.
She watched, a feeling of helplessness growing on her, even as the ship sent back a flash comm, confirming everyone was aboard, and the hatches were bolted shut. Strand had calculated the minimum amount of time to get the retrieval boat to a safe altitude, even abandoning all safety precautions.
Six minutes.
Her people had one minute, forty seconds. She’d dreaded having to leave Cameron behind, but now she was going to have to watch all of them die…moments from the fleet. Her mind raced, wondering if there was some way to delay the explosion, get some kind of signal to the charges…but even before her mind focused, she knew there wasn’t.
She watched as the small dot appeared on the scanner…the ship blasting up, heading toward orbit at a dangerous, almost crazed trajectory, especially in t
he thick atmosphere. She stared, knowing the ship could break up at any second from the insane maneuvers, even before the charges detonated, but somehow the vessel held together. It was farther up than she’d imagined, but any excitement she felt was quickly crushed as she saw the countdown clock slip under ten seconds.
She lurched her had back, checking the ship’s location. It was still too close.
No…they can’t come so close and miss it…not after what they did…
She could feel tears starting to well up in her eyes. It was her people in that ship, spacers and Marines…and a lot more she’d lost over the past few days, finally pushing past her ability to control it all.
She could feel the wetness streaming down her cheeks, even as the countdown hit zero.
For an instant, nothing seemed to happen…but then every instrument on the ship went crazy. The display went almost blindingly white. She waited for the screen to reset itself, to feed in scanning data on what was happening on the surface. But, even without the reports, she could see the image in her eyes.
Mountains surging up, their deep roots giving way as the rock that made them melted, and even vaporized. Earthquakes tearing thousand-kilometer-wide fissures in the planet’s crust, loosing giant eruptions of radiation. The atmosphere itself, virtually torn from the ruined planet and blasted off into the frozen depths of interplanetary space.
Strand had been a combat veteran her entire adult life, but she had never seen devastation like that she imagined—and seconds later, actually saw—on the doomed planet beneath her ships.
She realized the mission had been a complete success. Nothing functional could have survived that cataclysm, however deeply buried. Whatever accelerators or storage facilities or warbots that had been down there were gone…completely and utterly gone.
She knew she should be excited. The mission had been a desperate gamble…and somehow her people had seen it done. They were heroes, all of them.
But, she had no joy for the ‘victory.’ All she could see was the cost…and the men and women most responsible for the victory gone, killed right before her eyes.
“Admiral…I think we’re getting a signal.”
She turned, shaking her head as she did. There was no way Hercule could pick any scanner signal out of the apocalyptic mess down below Midway. “It’s got to be from the explosion, Henri.” She couldn’t imagine the billions of tons of earth obliterated, and the great clouds thrown up into what remained of the atmosphere. There was no way…
“Negative, Admiral, I’ve got a signal. It’s faint…but I’ve definitely got it.” He spun his head around a few seconds later. “It’s the retrieval boat, Admiral. It’s drifting, its engines and reactor are out…” A pause, and then Hercule continued, the excitement in his voice ramping up considerably. “But, all hands are accounted for…including the Marines.”
The aide stared across the bridge at Strand, and even as he did, she felt his words sinking in almost as if in slow motion. It was too much to believe…and a small number of men and women compared to those she had already lost, but it was a miracle beyond any she’d dared hope for. She struggled to hold back the tears, but a few made it past even her focused vigilance.
She wiped her hand across her face, and she let out a deep breath.
Then, she turned toward Hercule. “Let’s get the rescue ships out, Commander. We’ve got some of our people to pick up.”
“Yes, Admiral.”
A smile pushed out on her lips. She knew she’d feel the guilt for all those she’d lost…and the aching, almost unimaginable worry about what was happening to Erika and the rest of the fleet was there, a dark shadow over every thought. But, for that moment, all Strand could think about was Cameron and his Marines…and the almost inexplicable miracle that had brought them back out of those tunnels in time.
Not to mention Captain Graham, and his people from Vaughn. She’d almost forgotten the survivors they’d found still alive in Vaughn’s crippled innards. There had been twelve survivors in all, and every one of them was back aboard Midway, resting in sickbay. They had radiation sickness, dehydration, and a host of other conditions…but none of them were life threatening.
Strand had trouble reconciling herself with two unexpected rays of light amid the darkness and despair of the past weeks…and, she wasn’t about to push her luck any farther.
“Tell the shuttle crews to hurry, Henri. Because once we’ve got them all aboard, the way I see it, we’re done here.” A paused, and a deep sigh. “And that means it’s time to go home.”
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Flag Bridge, E2S Cain
F-74 System
Earth Two Date 02.27.43
Ships exploded all around Cain, great blasts of hard radiation roiling through the vacuum of space as more and more of Compton’s vessels were blasted to chunks of useless wreckage, or simply vaporized when their fusion reactions lost containment before they could scrag. Hundreds of spacers he’d served with on the journey to F74, that he’d commanded since Raj Chandra had been nearly electrocuted on the bridge and carried away unconscious hours before. For a few fleeting moments, perhaps an hour, of the most intense combat he’d ever imagined, he’d done all he could to sustain the spirit West had helped to cultivate. He’d spoken silently to the shade of his father trying to find the strength to continue, shouted encouragements to his officer and spacers. But, now, he could feel his spirit slipping away despite his desperate efforts to cling to hope. There just seemed no possible victory in F74, no defeat of the enemy. Just death, and then more death.
The First Imperium forces were suffering as badly as his own, and for all the damage that had been exchanged, the battle was no more decided than it had been hours before.
The last of the fortresses were gone now, the single laser pit that had outlasted every other emplacement on the twenty asteroids, finally taken out by the concerted attack of two First Imperium battleships. Even in death, however, that valiant crew continued to strike back as Cain had moved in and taken the first of the attackers in flank. Compton had burned out two of his laser turrets to do it, cranking the power to one hundred thirty percent and holding the shot until point blank range.
The enemy ship had tried to pull away, to escape the deadly assault coming upon it, but it had been too late. The great beams ripped forward, fusing their own turrets into useless scrap as they lanced out and slammed into the enemy Colossus.
The enemy battleship shuddered hard, and it rolled over in an uncontrolled spin as its engines gave out and internal explosions wracked its dying frame. Compton stared at the display, feeling the predator’s joy of the kill…but only for a second or two. Then, his eyes were on the second target.
The next fight was a tougher one, more even a contest, and the two ships exchanged all they could at each other, one volley after the next tearing across the narrow gap of space. Great sections of Compton’s ships were shattered, bulkheads blown out and whole compartments ripped open to the ravages of space. The intraship comm systems were damaged in areas, and he had no idea how many of his people had been killed…blown out through great rents in the hull or blasted to death by radiation. But, what he did know, finally, was that the second enemy ship was no more. He’d been watching when the last hit struck…and seconds later when the great vessel exploded with an almost unimaginable ferocity.
Cain had taken down two of the First Imperium’s frontline battleships…but Compton knew his flagship was nearing its own limit. He looked around the display, at the battered chunks of wreckage that had once been his fleet. He knew his force had little left to give, that he was lucky if ten percent of his original firepower remained. But now, West’s vessels had taken over most of the fight.
The enemy had come far to close to completing its goal of destroying his fleet before the main Earth Two forces could engage…but his people had held out, just long enough.
Long enough to see West’s ships hit the enemy main body like a thunderclap. A cheer wen
t up across Cain’s bridge, as Compton suspected one had on most of his ships. Help had finally arrived. His weary and battered crews deserved a chance to break off, to pull away from the fight and regroup.
But, that was not to be.
Even as West’s ships plunged into the battle, it was clear that the enemy forces still held the upper hand. Whatever Compton’s people had left, whatever power and weapons their broken and damaged ships could muster, it was desperately needed. The battle had entered its final stages, and it was beginning to look like some mythical nightmare, a horrible struggle to the end that no one seemed like to survive.
Terrance Compton found himself in the terrible fighting, even as he mourned for his lost spacers. He was still scared—anyone in F74 who said he wasn’t scared was a liar—but that didn’t matter anymore. There was one thing left among those gasping, sweating, bleeding spacers…the ongoing battle to endure the longest, to emerge from the carnage with some kind of victory, Pyrrhic or otherwise. To die, if they had to die, holding back the deadly enemy, fighting with their last breaths to keep family and loved ones safe.
“Bring us in. Order Saratoga forward to our starboard.” Cain didn’t have much left to give, but what she had, Compton was going to extract from her. Saratoga was another of his battleships, the last besides the flagship still moving under its own power. The name was a mystery to him, another swiped from some old ship on the other side of the Barrier, he suspected, but the vessel and her crew had fought hard, next to Cain in the line, and now the two great ships were going back in one more time.
He was staring straight ahead, waiting for Cain to come into arc and open fire…when his eyes caught Garret.
He sat still, distracted, his gaze fixed on Admiral West’s flagship.
