There was a huge fireball where the ship had been. That was magnificent! What wasn't magnificent was that they were instantly back in warp space. Crap! They must have figured out what we did and realized we could eliminate every mother-lovin' one of them. They had to hope against all hope we couldn't land on them in their warp bubbles.
“Can you repeat that landing while they're in warp space?”
“I've never had cause to say this before, but are you insane, Form?”
“Can you? Yes or no?”
He was quiet almost a minute. “I've run a few simulations. It is possible, but it is exponentially riskier. If we disrupt a bubble while in one, we will be vaporized. The chances of such an outcome are one-in-ten, give or take.”
“Give or take? Why, Wrath, I don't think I've ever heard you sound so human.”
“Form, this is not the time or place for insults. We must focus on the complete destruction of our enemy.”
Yeah, that was the Manly I knew and didn't love. I did a back-of-the-envelope calculation. At faster than light speed, the armada would reach Azsuram in less than an hour. Based on my past effectiveness blowing them up in warp space, there was no way I'd finish them off in that short of time. I could either fall back home and join the defense or do something really stupid and way too risky. Yeah, you had to know which I chose.
“Wrath, do you have any idea which Berrillian vessel is their flagship?
“No, at least not for certain.”
“Do you have a best guess?”
“I do not guess. I have a highest probability based on configuration and past tactics.”
“Plot and execute a course to put us on board the flagship.”
“Form,” he responded with actual fear in his tone, “I must advise against such a rash act. Let us blow away a few more ships first. It is the prudent course.”
“Put us on that ship, or I'll manually set off an infinity charge in your belly. Understood?”
“Yes, Form. The calculation will take a few moments.”
“You have thirty seconds.” I didn't want him to stall into not doing what he'd decided he didn't want to do. The SOB.
“Al,” I asked, “please download a translation program to me for whatever Berrillian language we know.”
“It's mostly what these barbarians spoke a million years ago,” he replied, “but it's done.”
Without checking with me further, after twenty seconds we materialized in what looked to be a passageway. Outstanding! I stepped out into the corridor and closed the portal behind me. If I was captured or killed, I didn't want these bozos to have access to the vortex. I tiptoed in one direction a few meters when I heard someone coming from around the next corner. Simultaneously, a very high-pitched alarm sounded. It was like fingernails on a chalkboard blasted through rock and roll speakers. Ouch! An artificial voice said something harsh that sounded like “intruder alert,” which made sense.
I raised my hands in defense. Around the corner came the scariest-looking thing I’d ever seen or dreamed of in my nightmares. It was a four- or five-hundred-pound tiger with red fur accented with yellow lightning bolt stripes. And he walked on two feet. His head was enormous. His fangs were extra enormous. The teeth he then bared in anger were beyond enormous. Gargantuan only began catch their essence. He sprang at me with a blood-curdling roar, his moon-size paws raised and eight-inch claws uncovered.
I seized him with my probe wires and, to his surprise and my relief, held him suspended in midair. When he realized he was helpless, he roared even louder and swiped at me with his impressive paws. In my head I said, Who are you?
My mind raced with alien knowledge. Tamark, male, Clan Duniritad, fifth aide to pack. Thirty-five years old, carnivorous, never mated, second killed before bonding. Berrill was a forest, no, a jungle world. And I felt his pain, his humiliation, and his rage. Killing the Deavoriath was the only thing that mattered in this world. He wanted to rip me to pieces. His language flowed into my head. It had morphed a lot over time.
I ascertained where the bridge was and who the commander was—a cat named Havibibo. I slammed Tamark against the nearest wall as hard as I could. He collapsed in a limp, bleeding lump when I released his body. I raced toward the ladder leading to the bridge. I didn't encounter anyone else along the way, thank goodness.
When I got there, I charged directly onto the bridge. Man, did I get everybody's full attention quickly. Yeah, a giant mouse just stepped in between a dozen hungry felines. A huge male not a meter to my left sprang at me like he was fired from a cannon. He was on me before I could even ready my probes or finger laser. The dude was fast!
He slammed into my chest, fangs first, and wrapped his arms around me. A normal human—or Kaljaxian—would have been driven the floor and likely split in half by those jaws. With my augmented strength, I was able to flip him judo-style over my head and push my arms open to break his grasp. He took a goodly chunk of my clothes with him, but my polymer surface remained intact. I needed to shake Toño's hand, yet again, for his unbelievable work.
As two other Berrillians rushed toward me, the initial assailant rolled over seamlessly and sprang at me again. That time I caught him with the probe and smashed him into his two crew mates. All three tumbled awkwardly into a corner and didn't get back up.
I identified the one I figured to be Havibibo. Commanders had a universal look about them. They knew they were in change and everyone else was their bitch. I threw my hands up and shouted, “Havibibo, call off your boys. I want to speak with you. We don't need to do this.”
A smaller figure at his side, presumably a female, put her arm in front of him and charged me. “The night-demon speaks as one of us. I will eat his lungs and breathe his blood.”
Wow, corny line. I caught her with my probe before she really got going. She squirmed even more than the others had. She kicked, howled, and went through a litany of colorful swear words.
“Havibibo,” I repeated, “I don't want to hurt any more of your people. Please, talk to me.”
He held his massive paw in the air and said, “No one attacks him.”
Immediately, everyone but the she-devil I restrained stood frozen. She continued her suspended rampage. I pointed to her with my right hand, kind of a what-do-I-do-with-this implied question.
“Kelldrek,” he shouted, “be still!”
Slowly, reluctantly, she relaxed. I set her down but kept the probes right in front of her. She looked at Havibibo, started to move in my direction, then literally sat her butt down on the floor, panting mightily.
“You are here,” said Havibibo, “and we are listening, Deavoriath scum. Speak.”
“Nice to meet you too,” I replied.
“There is nothing nice about this meeting. Hold your tongue in your mouth or I will hold it in my hand.”
Okay, I'd lighten up in the interest of interspecies harmony.
“I'm Jon Ryan. I'm human, not Deavoriath.”
“I don't know of humans. Where are you from?”
“A place called Earth, but it was destroyed.”
“Good. It will save me the trouble. I can see you're not Deavoriath slime. You stand on two legs, not their three.”
“Then you see we have no bad blood between us. There's no reason for us to kill one another.”
His smiled. If ever I'd seen an insincere, mocking smile, that was it. “Ah, but you see, there is. You possess a Deavoriath machine. That alone is reason to kill you. Plus, once we dispense with your three-legged friends, you humans will be our next target.” He addressed the female he'd called Kelldrek. “A new meat to tantalize our pallets. Life just gets better and better, does it not, second?”
She growled and rolled her head. I guess that meant yes.
“I don't want to destroy you, but I will gladly if you force me to,” I said as coolly as I could.
“Interesting species, you humans. You don't want to kill? How every odd. How very weak.” He waved his paw at me. “Let me make it clear. We do wish to kill y
ou. All of you. The galaxy is large enough for but one ruling race, and that race is ours.” He swung a dismissive paw my direction. “The rest of you exist only to amuse and feed us.”
“Or,” I replied, “to exterminate you. I'm beginning to see why the Deavoriath made it a point to try and do that.”
“Your Deavoriath friends will soon pay the highest price for their actions, I can assure you.” He looked to his bridge crew. “I'm sorry, Jon Ryan, but this conversation is now boring my stripes off.” He passed a directing hand from the crew toward me, as if to say have at him, boys and girls.
I sliced everyone in half with my laser, all but Havibibo and his mate. I grabbed her with the probe and held her near the ceiling. “I spare you, commander, so you can consider my words of peace. I take this one as a hostage because I can. Know that you are up against a will and a technology you cannot defeat.”
With that, I turned and ran toward the cube. Kelldrek, suspended above, made an unbelievable racket. What a bitch! Overhead, Havibibo's voice thundered, “Kill the intruder. He is heading to Deck 8, Section 161. He has my second. She must not be taken alive.” Did he mean they should stop me from absconding with her or that they should kill both of us on sight? Not a very sentimental second to Kelldrek, was he?
I arrived at the cube before anyone else. I opened a portal, dashed in, and shut the wall behind me just as several cats slammed into the hull. They clawed impressively at the exterior but did no damage.
“Wrath, fire a series of laser blasts toward the engines to disable the ship. Then take us home. And don't wait for them to drop into real space before we split.”
“By your command.”
What an annoying acknowledgement. Gotta reprogram this guy.
TWENTY-SEVEN
I returned to the main village. Sapale and the key leaders were all there. I gave them the bad news. Around five hundred ships would be there in half an hour. Yeah. They looked at me like I'd just killed their puppies with my bare hands. Then they looked at the enraged Berrillian female I held behind me, and their mood slipped another few notches. Yeah, that's what they were up against.
I wanted to return to orbit and take out a few more ships, but Tao pointed out that it really didn't matter. “Five hundred and three ships in orbit as opposed to four hundred ninety-nine will not turn the battle.”
Crap, I hated it when other people were right. I wanted to be doing something, not just sitting and waiting for an ass kicking. Toño button-holed me and said the AI simulations on the gravity waves looked worse than he'd thought possible. All the while, he stared at Kelldrek, an expression of aghast disbelief on his face. His assessment was that the gravity waves crushed and fractured solid materials quite easily. The frequency of the waves he'd seen used against the cube were centered on the range most likely to damage wide areas of land. He concluded that the gravity weapons were designed as planet killers. That was more bad news than I really needed.
“Doc,” I said, “there's always another way, an alternative. Don't tell me those assholes are going to swing into orbit and smash Azsuram to pieces. Tell me a solution, even a crazy, Jon Ryan–type solution.”
He shook his head as if it weighed a ton. “No, my friend, there is not. It's too late to evacuate more than a handful.” He pointed upward. “Though, come to think of it, that's probably the best use for the vortex right now.”
I turned to Sapale. “He may be right. Put all the children into the cube. They'll all fit, right?”
She looked at me like never before. There was a tragic disappointment in her eyes. Her magic man had just run out of miracles. I'd never felt so wretched in all my days.
Finally, she said at barely a whisper, “Yes, I think so. I'll pass the word.”
“You be there too,” I said. I knew she never would. She'd stand in defense of her dream until well past her last ounce of strength. “Someone's got to mind all those urchins. I'm not the nurturing type.”
She forced a sad laugh. “I'll see to it that Dolirca is there. Those two Toe cubs of hers will keep them all smiling.”
“Where will you be?” I asked her as I stroked her cheek.
“Central Command with JJ and Tao. We're coordinating the defense from there.”
“I'll be with the cube, obviously,” I said slapping the side of my head. At least I can keep firing from the ground. Wrath's power supply is unlimited.”
“After the battle, I'll meet you,” she said cupping my hand to her face.
“Cool!” I replied. “Where?”
“Davdiad's lush gardens, where she never wears her veil.” The Kaljaxian version of heaven. Oh boy. She was serious.
“Or maybe the canteen, for a big ol' bowl of calrf.” I rubbed my tummy. “Mmm, mmm good!”
She smiled ever so sadly. “Or for a bowl of calrf.” She kissed me, then left in a rush.
Back at the vortex, I asked for an update. “How many ships when?”
“Five hundred twenty-eight are flying in warp space. They should be here in five or six minutes.”
“Open fire with everything we've got when they're in range.”
“By your…”
“Manly,” I said with frustration, “could you be like everybody else and just say, aye, aye or yes—yowzer—anything but that?”
“Yowzer, Form.”
“Oh, please form a sealed compartment for this thing,” I held up Kelldrek. I set her in the corner and Manly threw walls up to surround her. I could still hear her putting up a terrible racket, but she was secure. I had no idea what I'd do with her, or even why I took her captive. If, or rather, when I was killed, she'd die in her little prison. At least there was one upside to death for me. Thinking of her suffocating made me feel all warm and fuzzy.
The next five minutes were a blur. I helped Dolirca herd kids as far away from me as possible. I couldn't have them getting underfoot, and didn't want them distracting me with questions and crying. I also kept checking both my internal chronometer and my handheld's clock. I checked and rechecked weapons status. In short, I was a nervous wreck.
Finally, the call I'd dreaded for weeks came. Al announced the fleet was dropping into real space and configuring itself overhead. They were a hundred kilometers high. As soon as they were in position, the radar screen looked like a snowstorm. Thousands of landing craft were launched and began descending. That's when the gravity waves began to hit. It was like a battleship of old firing on the beach the Marines were about to land on. They were softening us up.
Right from the first impact, the tremendous effectiveness of the waves became evident. The ground shook, buildings swayed like tree branches in a hurricane, and things started falling everywhere. Within a few seconds, I could see huge fissures opening up in the surface. Buildings and rocks outside the membrane wall crashed to the ground or fell into the new abysses. The inside of the membrane wall was more stable due to the membrane's inherent strength, but significant damage occurred very quickly. Worst of all, I could see the ground under the membranes beginning to give way.
After a minute, the first of our main structures collapsed. It was the unoccupied theater. On the other side of the complex, a shielded building fell onto its side, membrane intact. Things were looking very bad. Our cannons were firing at maximum, and hundreds of the landing craft exploded spectacularly. Al estimated around one hundred would survive long enough to land. That meant several thousand vicious tigers were about to attack us on foot. Then, out of nowhere, Al announced the miracle.
“Captain, the warships in orbit are being destroyed.”
“What? How…who?” I stammered.
“Unknown. The ships are rupturing in a straight line, one to the next.”
“Wrath,” I called out, “what's going on up there?”
“A craft of unknown origin and design is piercing the warships at extreme speed. The last of the enemy fleet is…there. All enemy warships destroyed.”
The gravity bombardment stopped immediately.
“
The craft is heading toward the cluster of landing craft,” Manly went on. “First impact. Now the ship's firing a laser at the ships it isn’t ramming.”
“Between her action and our ground defenses, how many enemy shuttles will land?”
“Few. Possibly less than ten.”
The tide had definitely turned, but there were still maybe a thousand foot soldiers about to land. Maybe we could handle a thousand.
“Al, hail the vessel lending assistance.”
After a few seconds, he reported, “No response, Captain.”
“ETA on the assault force.”
“Three craft have landed, two more…one more about to touch down.”
“Can you confirm deployment of foot soldiers?”
“Yes,” replied Al. “Several hundred are running this direction.”
I exited the cube but left it open. If I was killed, there'd be no way to get the children out if I didn't leave an opening. Dolirca and a couple adults stood guard with rail rifles. It was the best we could do.
I ran toward the control center. Our rail guns were now directing fire in the direction of the assault force. Individual aiming was not possible. As a consequence, the forest around the village exploded and ripped into flames like it was raining hell.
Before I was half way to Central Ops, the first of the Berrillian foot soldiers burst into the clearing. AI guided guns targeted them immediately. Their losses were horrific. But they never slowed their charge. Most ran on two feet, but some came on all four. They carried rifles slung over the backs. That way they could run on all fours and not drop their guns. I could hear their war cries as well as their screams of agony. They were perfect warriors. Too bad they were on the other side.
A few tigers made it to the membrane wall. They ran at full tilt and slammed into in a manner that would have been comical if they weren't so damn scary. Faces crushed, and blood sprayed against the invisible barrier. The cats behind them stopped before impact, noticing also that their shots were being deflected at the shield wall.
Then, one attacker found an opening. Where a building had been toppled to its side, there was a break in the membrane. Several cats poured through in a blur—dozens. It was hand-to-hand time. Fragile Kaljaxians versus five-hundred-pound killing machines.
The Forever Fight: The Forever Series Book 3 Page 20
