by Ryk Brown
“All four octos are on our six!” Jessica warned.
The ship rocked again as the octo-fighters opened up. Sparks flew and smoke spewed from a console behind Dylan.
“We’ve got a fire back here!” Jessica exclaimed, grabbing the fire extinguisher by the hatchway.
“Aft shields have failed,” the AI reported.
Jessica pointed the bottle at the smoking panel, but nothing happened when she pulled the trigger. “What the fuck!”
The ship rocked again, after which all four octos streaked overhead, passing from aft to forward, and peeling off in pairs in opposite directions.
“Shield generators are down,” the AI added. “Reactor containment at forty percent. Jump drive offline.”
“Great!” Nathan exclaimed. “I’m taking evasive action!” He yanked his flight control stick hard left and adjusted his throttles. The ship groaned, trying to respond to the radical stick inputs.
“You can’t fly it that way!” Dylan warned.
Another warning beeped from the sensor display.
“Oh, shit,” Dylan gasped.
Nathan looked at the display. “Missiles?”
“Two of them,” Dylan replied.
“I don’t suppose this thing has escape pods,” Nathan commented.
“Thirty seconds to impact,” Dylan reported.
“AI? Any chance you could get the jump drive working in fifteen seconds?” Nathan wondered.
“Negative,” the AI replied. “This vessel is not equipped with automated maintenance and repair systems.”
“We’re screwed, aren’t we?” Dylan asked, knowing the answer.
“We’re not dead until we’re dead,” Nathan insisted, yanking his control stick in the other direction. “Can we jettison anything?” he wondered. “Maybe reduce our overall mass?”
“We’re not carrying anything to jettison,” Dylan replied. He glanced down at the sensor display again. “Ten seconds.”
“Jess!” Nathan called, reaching back for her.
Jessica stepped up, grabbing his hand as the missile closed in on them.
The sensor display beeped another warning as a large blip appeared directly behind them.
“What the…” Nathan was cut off when a barrage of reddish-yellow weapons fire streaked over them, slamming into the incoming missile, blowing it apart.
The explosion rocked the ship more violently than before, knocking Jessica to the deck, and nearly bouncing Nathan and Dylan out of their seats.
“What just happened?” Dylan wondered, his eyes wide.
The cockpit suddenly darkened as a massive ship flew over them, slowing as it passed less than a hundred meters above them.
“YES!” Jessica exclaimed as she climbed back to her feet.
“Nathan, is that you?” Cameron called over comms.
Nathan laughed out loud. “YES!” he replied earnestly. “What the hell are you doing here?”
“No time!” she replied. “Starboard bay! Quickly!”
“I’m on it!” Nathan replied, grabbing his flight controls again.
“Who the hell is that?” Dylan wondered.
“It’s the Aurora!” Jessica exclaimed.
“Who?”
“It’s our ship!” Nathan added.
“That’s your ship?” Dylan said in disbelief as Nathan guided their busted-up vessel across the Aurora’s underside, passing to starboard and climbing up her side. The Aurora’s shields flashed brightly as a hail of red-orange energy weapons fire slammed into their forward shields, courtesy of the Dusahn warships directly ahead of them.
As their beleaguered cargo ship climbed above the Aurora’s midsection, Nathan fired his thrusters to translate their vessel to port, sliding into line with the Aurora’s starboard aft landing bay.
“Captain!” Cameron called. “We have to turn ten degrees to starboard to get a clear jump line!”
“Go for it,” Nathan replied. “We’re on final. You can jump in ten seconds.”
“Are you sure?”
“No,” Nathan replied, easing his throttles forward to accelerate and begin a ten-degree turn to starboard.
They all watched out the front windows as the Aurora began to slip to the right. Nathan struggled to keep up with the turn as their ship accelerated toward the landing bay entrance.
“We’re not going to make it,” Jessica warned.
Nathan did not reply; all his concentration was on forcing the battered cargo ship to keep up with the Aurora’s turn. “Easy, Josh,” he called over comms.
The Aurora kept slipping to the right, leaving them headed directly for the inboard edge of the landing bay’s entrance.
Another alarm sounded.
“We just lost maneuvering,” Dylan announced.
“Brace for impact!” Nathan warned, his eyes widening as the edge of the landing bay came hurtling toward them.
At the last second, the Aurora stopped drifting right, then shifted back, slightly left. The cargo ship’s nose slipped inside the landing bay entrance, but their port lift nacelle was unable to clear and slammed into it.
The ship lurched violently, yawing right as it entered the landing bay. A brilliant blue-white flash filled their cockpit momentarily, and the ship slammed down onto the Aurora’s landing deck.
The cockpit was filled with the sound of metal grinding on metal, bulkheads twisting, and systems coming apart all over the doomed cargo ship. The sickening sounds continued for several seconds as the ship shook violently, sliding across the landing deck. Finally, they came to a stop. The grinding sound was gone, and all that was left was the hiss of leaking systems and a cacophony of warning alarms.
Dylan looked over at Nathan, his eyes pleading. “Can I go home now?”
CHAPTER TEN
Nathan climbed up through the emergency hatch, helped by two rescue technicians, atop the wrecked Tekan cargo ship, which was lying on the Aurora’s starboard aft flight deck. Once out, he climbed down the access ladder to the deck below.
“Welcome aboard, sir,” the rescue chief greeted.
“Thank you, Chief,” Nathan replied, looking aft at the closed emergency doors. “Are those doors going to hold?” he wondered. “We smacked the tracks pretty good on our way in.”
“We had a hard time getting them closed, but they’ll hold,” the chief assured him.
Nathan turned to find Jessica and Dylan, standing a few meters away. “You guys okay?” he asked, heading toward them.
“I’m good,” Jessica replied.
“Me too,” Dylan said, looking at the wreckage, “I think.”
“Any landing you can walk away from,” Nathan said, patting Dylan on the shoulder as he passed.
“Bridge?” Jessica asked.
“Where else,” Nathan replied.
“What do you want us to do with this heap?” the chief asked Nathan.
“Jettison her,” Nathan replied.
“It might have some useful tech,” Jessica reminded him.
“We can’t afford to tie up a landing bay,” Nathan explained. “We can come back for the wreckage later, if we’re still alive,” he added, turning to head for the exit.
“What about him?” Jessica asked, pointing back at Dylan.
“With us,” Nathan replied, his stride unbroken.
Dylan looked confused. “Who, me?”
“Yeah, him?” Jessica agreed, equally confused.
“He’s the only Tekan contact we have right now,” Nathan replied as he walked.
“Come on, kid,” Jessica instructed Dylan as she turned to follow Nathan.
“Where are we going?” Dylan asked, following Jessica and Nathan, looking around the massive landing bay.
“To the bridge,” Jessica responded.
“Sweet,” Dylan said,
jogging a few steps to catch up with them.
Nathan stepped through the midship hatch, into the rescue trunk connecting the starboard aft landing bay to the main hangar bay.
“Your comm-set, sir,” Sergeant Dixon said, handing Nathan a comm-set as he passed.
“Thank you, Sergeant,” Nathan replied, donning the comm-set.
“Lieutenant Commander,” the sergeant said, handing Jessica one, as well.
“Thanks, Dix,” Jessica replied.
Nathan tapped his comm-set as he stepped through the next hatch into the main hangar bay. “Cam, we’re aboard.”
“Nice landing,” Cameron congratulated sarcastically.
“You saw that?”
“We all did. Not your best.”
“What’s our status?”
“A few overloaded circuits, a bit of a drain on several shield sections, but nothing Vlad can’t handle.”
“What the hell are you even doing here?”
“Our operatives on Takara picked up some unusual comms traffic about distant operations. Shinoda put two and two together, and figured out that the Dusahn were on their way to SilTek. We didn’t know when they would arrive, so we just jumped immediately.”
“How did you know it was us in that freighter?” Nathan wondered.
“It was the only ship being targeted, so I figured it was a pretty good bet,” Cameron replied.
“Remind me to give you a raise, later,” Nathan joked. “We’ll be there shortly,” he added, tapping his comm-set again to end the call.
“Holy…” Dylan exclaimed in awe as he entered the main hangar bay. “How big is this ship?”
“About one and a half clicks long and half a click wide,” Nathan replied.
“What’s a click?”
“Kilometer,” Jessica explained.
“And this ship can jump more than three hundred light years at a time?”
“Nearly twice that,” Nathan replied as they walked around the end of a row of Reapers and headed forward.
“That’s incredible!” Dylan exclaimed. “What are these?” he wondered, pointing at the ships to their right.
“Reapers,” Jessica replied.
“Ominous name. Are they fighters?”
“Multi-role, combat utility craft,” Nathan explained as they neared the forward hatch. “Our fighters are out on assignment.”
“You’re awfully curious,” Jessica commented suspiciously.
“It’s my first time on a spaceship,” Dylan defended. “On two spaceships… Hell, in space! Can you blame me?”
* * *
“Captain on the bridge!” the guard at the entrance announced as Nathan entered.
“Welcome back,” Cameron greeted, rising from the command chair.
After Jessica passed, the guard stepped in front of Dylan, giving him a death stare.
“Uh, Jess?” Dylan squeaked.
“He’s with us,” Jessica told the guard.
“Yeah, I’m with them,” Dylan repeated.
“Just stand there, by the comm-station,” Jessica instructed.
“Here?”
The guard pushed him over next to Naralena’s console. “Here, and don’t move. I’m watching you.”
“You bet.”
“I take it your negotiations did not go as expected,” Cameron commented.
“We only met with the leader of SilTek briefly,” Nathan replied. “We were supposed to meet again with her later today. Frankly, I don’t know why they were trying to arrest us.”
“Is it possible they think you led the Dusahn to them?” Cameron suggested.
“Anything is possible,” Nathan replied, tapping his comm-set. “Vlad, how’s my ship? Can she fight?”
“Good to hear your voice, Nathan,” Vladimir replied. “Shield power is fully restored, and we’re working on the minor damage now, but you’ve only got about five percent remaining in our jump banks, and our recharge rate is going to be reduced if we’re pumping energy into shields and weapons.”
“Run the ZPEDs at one hundred twenty percent if you have to.”
“That is not advisable during combat,” Vladimir warned.
“It can’t be helped,” Nathan insisted, ending the call. “How far from SilTek are we at the moment?”
“About five light years,” Cameron replied. “Are you planning to return to SilTek?”
“How much range do we have left, Loki?” Nathan asked his navigator.
“Thirty-two point six five light years,” Loki replied.
“So, we have enough to put up a good fight and still be able to escape if we have to,” Nathan surmised.
“Barely,” Josh commented.
“Nathan,” Cameron cut in, “I’m not sure that’s a good idea. Both the Rogen and Orswellan systems are vulnerable right now, and it’s going to be hours before we can jump back if they need us. And now they’ve got four more ships than we originally thought; two of which are battleships.”
“SilTek is loaded with technology that can be used against us, should that world fall to the Dusahn,” Nathan explained.
“Maybe, but, even if we manage to drive them off for now, they’ll come back, and we don’t know how many more ships they might have or where they are located. They could be a single jump away from Rogen right now, just waiting for us to jump away.”
“In which case the Rogen system is already doomed,” Nathan pointed out.
“I don’t think so,” Jessica argued from her position at the tactical station. “We spent days interrogating the crew of Andreola’s ship. Their account of how many ships had been built or upgraded with jump drives in the Orswellan shipyards was a bit varied, but it pretty much lined up with our accounting of Dusahn ships.”
“Then these four additional ships are not a surprise?” Nathan asked.
“Yes, but not by much,” Jessica replied. “The point is, I strongly doubt there are more.”
“Are you willing to bet an entire world on that?” Cameron challenged.
Nathan sighed. “I don’t see that we have a choice. If the Dusahn take SilTek, there’s a good possibility they’ll become too powerful to defeat.”
“Doesn’t SilTek have defenses?” Cameron asked.
Nathan looked to Dylan.
Dylan looked at the guard. “Can I…”
The guard gestured for him to step forward.
“Uh, SilTek has defenses, but not against battleships.”
“What do you know about battleships?” Jessica wondered.
“Well, nothing really,” Dylan admitted, “but I do know that one has never attacked us, until now. Hell, no one in this quadrant even has a warship that big.”
“But you said you get attacked frequently,” Jessica pointed out.
“Yeah, by gunships and fighters,” Dylan replied. “One time, there was this big-ass pirate ship, maybe half as big as yours, but their guns weren’t worth a damn. Just how big is a battleship?”
“Pretty big,” Nathan assured him.
“Bigger than this ship?”
“Three to four times bigger,” Jessica added.
Dylan’s eyes widened, taking a step toward Nathan. “You have to go back and stop them!” he urged. He caught himself and turned back toward the guard, looking guilty.
“It’s okay,” Jessica assured the guard.
“Captain,” Dylan said, “you are the captain, right?”
“Yes.”
“Then you must help us. Even one of those ships can wipe us out, and you said there’s four of them?”
“Two battleships and two cruisers,” Cameron replied. “Who is this kid?” she asked Nathan.
“This is Dylan,” Nathan explained. “He helped us escape.”
“I don’t suppose cruisers are much smaller,” Dylan su
rmised.
“Not by much,” Jessica replied.
“Please,” Dylan pleaded. “My family is there. Everyone I know is there.”
“You’re going to have to choose which world you’re going to put at risk,” Cameron told Nathan.
“We’re going back to SilTek,” Nathan insisted.
“Nathan…”
Nathan held up his hand, cutting Cameron off. “If the Dusahn attack the Rogen or Orswellan systems, we’ll lose them, and millions will probably die, but if we lose SilTek, we’ll lose the war, and billions, possibly trillions, will die on all the worlds they will eventually conquer. There is no choice here, Cam. We must defend SilTek.”
Cameron sighed. “I agree.”
“You do?” Nathan replied, surprised.
“I do. I don’t like it, but I do.”
“Our only chance here is to hit them hard and fast, and then jump away quickly,” Nathan announced, taking his seat. “We have to try to draw them off and spread them out. If they stay together, they can defend one another. We’ll concentrate our strikes against the outlier. That should force them to rotate their ships around to give them time to recharge their shields.”
“Or, we could use our jump missiles,” Jessica suggested.
Nathan looked at her, surprised, then at Cameron. “We have jump missiles? I thought…”
“I commandeered forty of them before we left,” Cameron explained. “I figured we might need them.”
“You figured right,” Nathan agreed, smiling.
“This would be a lot easier if the Sugali fighters were still on board,” Jessica commented as she reviewed the Aurora’s weapons status.
“You use Sugali fighters?” Dylan wondered. “They make those on SilTek, or at least they did. But surely those would be useless against a battleship?”
“There’s something about their grav-lift emitters that allows them to pass right through the Dusahn’s shields,” Nathan explained. “We used ten of them to defeat four battleships a few days ago.”
Dylan’s mind was racing. “P-Seventy-Twos use the same emitters.”
“What’s a P-Seventy-Two?” Nathan wondered.
“It’s a single-seat vehicle—a real hot rod. Its nickname is Lightning. Their owners love to race them. There’s even an organized league for it. They use the same emitters as the Sugali fighters. A lot of small and midsize vehicles use those same emitters.”
