by James Palmer
All of his people were professionals. His senior staff was comprised of some of the best group of people he could have hoped to piece together as a single unit. He, along with Lt. Commander Allison Grady, Communication’s officer Natalie Vortex, ace pilot Chris Walker, and weapons expert Dexter Freeman headed the briefing.
The plan they laid out required them to take three squads of officers with them to Space Lab where they would rendezvous with the Ulysis. The threat must be neutralized there.
Even though Vortex himself wished that he could set foot on the planet where his people had come from he knew that he must first uphold the law. Like it or not, Earth was off limits. As always, his wants were of secondary concern. The job and the mission came first.
Always had, probably always would.
After passing out the assignments, Marshal Vortex turned the briefing over to Grady. She began by breaking down and categorizing the information at hand. As she did so, Vortex quietly surveyed his troops. Many were excited, as he himself was, at the prospect of going into battle. Others seemed a touch nervous. This too was to be expected.
The ones that concerned him were the officers whose faces he could not successfully read. They were the ones whose actions he could not accurately anticipate. That worried him somewhat.
His staff was still fairly new. There was still quite a bit of training to do to get this latest pool of officers tightened into as smooth an operation as his command staff.
Time enough for that after the mission.
With one ear on the briefing, he was aware that it has reached its conclusion as a murmur passed through the crowd.
Stepping beside Grady, he looked out at his troops. Most of them were still kids, hardly any older than Natalie. “I know this is a little nerve wracking for some of you,” he began. “This may turn out to be a simple operation. But if it turns into something more as we fear, it could get hairy. People could die. Are there any questions or comments?”
He eyed the crowd before turning to look at his command staff, applying the same question to them. “If so, now’s the time. Speak up or forever hold your peace.”
His pride swelled when the room remained silent.
“Then let’s get cracking!” Grady shouted, spurring the troops into action.
“We’re wheels up in an hour,” the marshal announced as the troops filed out of the room.
“And so it begins,” Grady whispered.
16
Alliance Starship Pegasus
Captain Harmon was fast asleep in her office when the alert claxon sounded.
Jolted awake, she leapt to her feet. In her disoriented state she had forgotten where exactly she was and came crashing down hard on the floor. “Well, this is a good image,” she cursed. “The captain sprawled on the floor.”
Hefting herself up and after making sure nothing was broken, she took off in a run toward the bridge. She had contemplated changing into her uniform for about half a second, but decided that there was no time.
Besides, who cares what I’m dressed like?
She slowed and grabbed her uniform jacket off of the chair before exiting through the office door. “Better safe than sorry,” she said as the door sighed closed behind her. Seconds later she was racing past the elevator, speeding her way along toward the bridge at a full run. The access door opened at her approach and deposited her on the half-staffed bridge.
“Captain on deck,” someone shouted when they saw her.
Taking her position in the command chair on the upper level of the bridge, she slowed her breathing. “Status?” she asked.
The regular communications officer stepped forward. His large frame bounced from station to station. He had apparently taken charge during her absence. She would have to commend him on his actions later. Officer Andersen, whom she had moved earlier, was currently manning one of the auxiliary pilot stations.
There was an emergency of some kind and the staff was handling things very well. The captain was impressed.
“We are receiving a distress call from Space Lab,” reported the communications officer whose name she did not know. Or just couldn’t remember. There were still a lot of names to memorize.
“Space Lab?” Harmon asked. “One of their little projects get away from them?”
“No, sir. They have an incoming vessel. Contents and intentions unknown.” He double-checked his console. “The ship is on an intercept course and does not appear to be decelerating or changing course. We have been asked to detain and/or divert it if possible before it crashes into the station.”
“And destroy it if not, right?” she asked, already aware of the answer.
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Where is our first officer?” Captain Harmon scanned the bridge, but there are only three crewmen on station not counting herself. “Someone try to find him please.”
The busy communication’s officer input information to his screen then scowled. “I cannot seem to find him, Captain. Is it possible that the first officer has left the ship?” He tapped a new set of controls. “Could he have gone back over to the Bridger Corporation for some reason?”
“He’d better hope not,” Harmon said, an irritated edge to her voice. No executive officer should leave the ship without her approval. “Find him!” she shouted the order to the third crewman on deck, a security officer.
“Yes, Captain,” the junior security officer replied before snapping off a quick salute before exiting the bridge in search of the missing first officer.
With the communications officer currently at the tactical console, Captain Harmon moved to the comm station controls and engaged the ships internal communications relay. “All hands, this is the captain,” she said. “We will be shipping out a little ahead of schedule, people. There is a crisis at Space Lab that we must investigate. I know we’re short handed so we’ll all have to pitch in until our support arrives.” She paused to let that sink in then pushed the alert klaxon button on her console that piped the red alert status throughout the ship. “All hands, man your stations. This is not a drill.”
She turned to the communications officer. “Do we have enough crew to drive this behemoth?”
“We are at a minimal of support. No pilots have reported in.”
“What about Officer Andersen?”
“Not a pilot. She’s running diagnostics now to make sure we’re rated to ship out ahead of schedule.
He glanced into the pit at the pilot’s section. “I could...”
Captain Harmon cut him off. “No. Man tactical. I need you where you’re at your best. Try to get through to that ship. I’ll drive.”
“Ma’am?”
“You heard me,” Harmon said. “It’s not my first time in the driver’s seat. Get moving.” With that she crossed the bridge to the pit area and dropped into the pilot’s couch. “Are we clear to launch?”
“All systems in the green, Captain,” Lt. Andersen answered. “She’s ready to fly.”
“Excellent. Back up the lieutenant. Uh,” she felt embarrassed. “What’s his name?”
“Lt. Marc Allen, Captain.”
Harmon mouthed a thank you. Back up Lt. Allen at communications, please.”
“I’m on it, ma’am.”
Captain Harmon strapped herself in, locking the pilot harness into place with a click. It had been quite a long time since she had actually piloted a ship the size of the Pegasus. Her first pilot posting had been aboard the Constellation, a lumbering ship that looked a lot like a flying brick, but flew like a dream in the black. “Oh well,” she muttered. “It’s just like riding a bike, right? Too bad I used to fall off of mine a lot.”
Even as she said it she hoped no one heard her.
“Engine room?” she called after opening a channel.
“Thomas here,” came the chief’s quick reply. “What can I do for you, Captain?” She could read in his demeanor that he had a good idea what was about to happen.
“I need this ship up to speed and f
ree of the docking clamps and I need it five seconds ago. We’ve got incoming, Chief, and they’re moving quick.”
“I’m on it, Captain. Stand by.”
Seconds ticked off slowly.
“The engines are yours, Captain. You are free and clear to navigate.”
“Bless you, Harry,” she muttered. “We’re gone.”
The thrum of the ship’s massive engines reverberated throughout the entire length of the Pegasus. Captain Harmon resisted the urge to giggle like a kid at Christmas as she powered up her ship’s mighty engines and maneuvered the ship out of Bridger Corporation’s space dock.
“Captain,” communications officer Andersen called out. “I’ve got Bridger Corporation on the line. They are ordering us to power down and settle back into orbit with the space dock. I’m afraid they are very insistent. They are reminding us that our departure is not scheduled for another three days.”
“Tell them, if they want it back they can damn well come out here and get it themselves,” Harmon said as her hands danced across the flat paneled controls of the pilot’s station. “Understood?”
“Yes ma’am.” Se relayed the message, then decided that now was not the time to share with the new captain the less than cheerful reply from the Bridger Corp representative on the other end of the line.
“Time?”
“We are three seconds out of dock, Captain,” Lt. Allen replied. “Will rendezvous with Space Lab in five and one half minutes if we keep present speed.”
“And the incoming ship?”
Allen gulped as he read the information off his screen. “It will be there in just under five minutes.”
“Lt. Andersen. Inform Space Lab to evacuate as many of their personnel as they can. We’re going to be a little late. Then tell Engineering that we need more speed.”
“Aye, Captain,” Andersen acknowledged as she opened a comm channel to the station.
From the pilot’s den, Captain Harmon cursed under her breath. “Damn it. Hell of a way to start a career.”
Chief Engineer Harold Thomas worked his magic.
Keeping a starship’s massive engines running smoothly was no easy task. Especially since the captains and pilots had a nasty habit of trying to coax more out of the engines than they were built to handle. He was happy to report that the Pegasus’ engines were performing far better than he would have hoped for their first voyage into space unaided.
Five minutes aboard ship and already they were smack dab in the middle of a crisis. “God, I love my job,” he said as he moved on to the next task.
His outburst brought an onslaught of looks from various crew members as he realized that he had said that out loud. He glanced quickly at the mostly unknown faces around him. “What’s the matter,” he asked no one person in particular. “Don’t you love your jobs?”
Peels of laughter greeted him from a corner of the room. Then, as suddenly as it had started the laughter stopped and the work resumed. Chief Thomas knew he and his crew were going to get along just fine.
“Chief, I need more speed,” the captain’s voice cut through the room above the roar of the engines. “C’mon, Harry. Show me what this baby can do. I heard it was supposed to be fast.”
“What does that blasted woman want from me?” he groaned.
“I beg your pardon, Mr. Thomas?” the captain’s voice filtered back at him.
Between gritted teeth he muttered a curse. Dammit, Harry, he chastised himself for forgetting to turn off the comm channel again.
“More speed, Captain,” he said. “Aye.”
The others were looking at him with that deer in the head lights look. He gave them all a sly smile.
“Oh yeah,” he whispered. “This is going well.”
The hostile vessel had not changed its course.
It remained on its previous heading, on course straight toward the heart of Space Lab. The station’s docking ports were essentially used for docking, supply drops, and other emergencies. The incoming vessel would hit them in a matter of minutes.
The one thing Captain Harmon knew for certain was that the Pegasus was not going to make it in time. “Tractor beams?” she asked, tossing out ideas left and right.
“Negative, Captain,” Lt. Allen replied. “We are still too far away. Same for grapnels.”
“Damn.”
“I’ve got Space Lab’s chief administrator, a Doctor Cynthia Morgan,” Lt. Andersen called from her station. “She wishes to talk with you, Captain.”
Harmon threw her a quick grin, which she could not see from the communication station behind the pit. “Tell her I’m a little busy trying to save her station and that I’ll get back to her as soon as possible.”
“Captain,” this time the interim communications officer yelled over the din filling the bridge. “Space Lab reports that they are detecting dangerously high levels of radiation emanating from the approaching vessel.”
“How high?” Harmon asked, suddenly very interested in talking with the scientist.
As if in answer to her question, the shields on the giant cruiser shuddered as automatic safeties engaged them. The normally invisible polymorphic shield flared a greenish-blue as the radiation wave hit, sending severe shock waves throughout the Pegasus.
“Toxic,” Andersen said.
“Oh, that can’t be good,” Captain Harmon remarked.
“Captain! The radiation is exploding outward in...”
A second shudder tore into the ship, tossing crewmen about. Then a third struck, quickly followed by a fourth. Lights flickered and sparks rained from a busted panel in the bridge ceiling.
The communication’s officer, currently manning the tactical station, picked himself up from the deck and returned to his station. Hitting a particular button, he engaged the passive restraint system and the chair’s safety harness snapped into place with a loud click.
“The radiation is coming at us in bursts, Captain,” he said, finishing his earlier statement. “There’s no real way to automate that. That ship must have a crew of some kind.”
“Robots?” an ensign asked from the science console. He had been unconscious when Harmon had arrived on the bridge. There had been no time to call in the medics. The young man was now awake and asking good questions. He was holding a torn off strip of his uniform over a cut gushing blood from his forehead. “The ship could have some A.L.’s aboard, acting as the crew.”
“A.L.’s!” the communication’s officer exclaimed. “Nobody’s seen an A.L. this far inside civilization in years.”
“It’s as good an assumption as any,” the captain said as she fought the ship for control. “See what you can do before...”
The ensuing blast drowned out her command as the Pegasus was jolted furiously by the latest blast. Harmon felt the deck lurch beneath her feet as the Pegasus was pushed back by the force of the attack.
“The blasts are growing in intensity as the ships draws closer,” Lt. Allen reported.
“You don’t say,” the captain muttered as she fought the controls to hold the ship on course.
“What are those radiation bursts doing to this ship?” Harmon shouted while fighting the controls. “There’s definitely strain on navigation.”
“Better yet, what are they doing to us?” the junior officer at the science console whispered before another radiation burst slammed into the Pegasus. The bridge crew was tossed about like toys in a toy chest.
Despite the straps holding her in place, Harmon had to fight to stay upright in the pilot’s chair. Through blind luck and determination she managed to stay in her seat, but just barely.
Finally, the din died down and the three-person bridge crew struggled to return to their respective positions. The young man at science was the first to return to his seat, the blood still pouring from his wound. It was nothing less than miraculous for the kid to be standing at all, much less working. Unfortunately, the last radiation burst had achieved its goal.
“We’re slowing down!” the cap
tain shouted from the pit.
“Power is fluctuating all over the ship, Captain! Shields are on the verge of collapse and our forward momentum is negligible.”
Harmon hit the communication button that connected her to Engineering. “Chief, I need more power up here! We’ve got to get closer before...”
But it was too late.
Captain Harmon started ahead at the view-screen at the front of the bridge. She watched helplessly as a large pulse burst of radiation penetrated Space Lab’s outer shield perimeter. Several exterior sensors lit up on the outer perimeter as the radiation pulse barrage pummeled the station’s shielding. Station shields were mainly created to keep out particles of space dust and debris from getting close to the station’s hull. Microfractures from space debris had been common before shields had been invented and then later perfected.
The crew of the Pegasus was forced to shield their eyes as a blinding white light filled their view-screen, bathing the bridge in brilliant white light before the automated filters kicked on to screen the radiation.
Wave after wave of radiation pulses finally took their toll. The space station’s shielding gradually lost strength before finally succumbing, then failing completely.
“Space Lab’s shield are at fifteen percent, Captain.” Lt. Allen grunted. “It’s not going to hold much longer.”
“Convey our apologies to Dr. Morgan. We weren’t fast enough,” Harmon said as she slammed down a fist onto the console. “Dammit!” she yelled.
Unable to reach the hostile vessel in time, the four crew members on the bridge of the Pegasus stared in horror as the radiation bursts destroyed the shields just seconds before the ship crashed into the docking pylon. Unfortunately, the devastation did not end there. The enemy ship continued plowing through toward the heart of the station.
Sadly, all Virginia Harmon and her crew could do was watch helplessly as those who needed their help died.
“The vessel will strike the station in twenty two seconds,” added in the young science officer. Try as he might, he could not keep the quiver out of his voice.
Drumming her fingers impatiently, Harmon looked around the vacant pilot’s pit area for any ideas. Finding none she punched the comm system. “Chief! I need this ship moving!”
