by PP Corcoran
The drum rotated as the computer selected an air-to-air missile. A final health check confirmed the missile was good to go. Locking clamps retracted, and the missile fell from the drum. The hold doors closed again, returning the drone to near radar invisibility. Clear of the drone, winglets popped out from the missile’s main body, the chemical rocket engine ignited, and the missile accelerated to Mach Three. The data link from the drone allowed the missile to keep its radar in standby mode until the final attack on the target, concealing its presence until the last possible moment.
* * *
The radar, mounted in the tail of the armored flitter, caught the handful of seconds the drone’s weapon’s bay doors were open, and obediently reported them to Mhairi Sinclair.
“Possible missile launch! Evade! Evade!” Outwardly, Mhairi’s voice remained cold and professional as she reported to Lapole, but inwardly, she struggled to keep her thoughts from her two children strapped in on the other side of the cockpit doors.
Lapole flung the flitter into a tight, four-G turn, hauling on the stick to force the heavy flitter around, dropping the nose and adding power, desperately trying to hide the infrared signature of the flitter’s turbofans while masking the flitter’s bulk behind the steadily rising terrain as the flitter headed inland.
“They’ve still got us locked up!” called Mhairi, as the radar warning buzzer continued its steady warbling. The green, tree-covered landscape was flying past the cockpit windows, the low sun casting long shadows across what would have been beautiful vistas, but Mhairi and Lapole were too busy trying to save their precious cargo’s lives to admire the view.
The terrain following radar threw the fleeing flitter a desperately needed lifeline.
“High terrain, two o’clock, three miles.”
Lapole’s eyes flicked in the direction Mhairi had indicated for a split second as she fractionally corrected her course. A bead of perspiration dropped into her right eye, blurring her vision, and she blinked madly to clear it. The flitter was flashing across the ground at 450 miles per hour, and a single mistake would see the flitter and its Human contents plow into the ground, leaving nothing but a long gouge of light brown earth and a few charred remains.
* * *
High above, the inscrutable brain of the drone noted the flitter’s evasive maneuvers, and its cold calculations resulted in a lowering of the odds of a successful prosecution of the target. This was not acceptable. Once more the weapons bay doors opened and released an arrow-shaped missile which shot away. However, this time the missile, rather than following the flight path of its compatriot, maintained its altitude. Spearing forward at speeds nearing Mach Five, it was less than forty-five seconds from its destination.
* * *
The warbling of the radar alarm changed in an instant to a high-pitched screeching as the seeker-head on the missile went active. Mhairi may have been retired from active duty, however, as her husband, Charlie, took great relish in pointing out, once a merc, always a merc. He laughed at his wife as she read tech manuals and kept abreast in the latest weapons developments. It was a pastime she found strangely cathartic after chasing two kids around all day. Those moments of relaxation came in use now, as the onboard computer identified the hunting missile’s radar type.
“HecSha series XC270. Usually fitted to their Tol 9 missiles,” Mhairi recited from memory. “Missile has an infrared and radar seeker. Proximity warhead. Radar goes active only on final target acquisition. Susceptible to...”
“Radical course changes of its target at the last minute,” finished Lapole for her.
Mhairi turned her face to Lapole in time to see the merc captain flash her an evil smile. “Flares and chaff on my command.” Lapole flexed the fingers of her right hand on the control stick, as her left dropped to her side and found the turbofan maneuvering controls by touch. “And let’s pray to God that the techs kept this bird in good nick. I haven’t tried this trick since I was in flight school…and my instructors grounded me for a month afterward.”
Mhairi let out a half mumbled, “Oh, shit,” as she slipped a hand around the fixed handle above her instrument panel, and began a range countdown. “Missile at one mile...one thousand yards…Break! Break! Break!”
“Countermeasures, now! Now! Now!” cried Lapole. As she flung the flitter into a radical five-G turn, the towering walls of the glen rose high above as Lapole fought to level the protesting flitter. If Mhairi had not braced herself against the handle she would have been flung back in her seat by the turn. As it was, she barely managed to hang on, sending the required command via her pinplants to the flitter’s defensive measures pod. On the rear of the craft, a series of soda can-sized objects ejected, and their integral detonators ignited the tightly-packed phosphorous, which burned with the intensity of multiple suns and completely blinded the missile’s infrared system.
Mixed in with the flares were an equal number of containers which, when they burst open, formed a cloud of highly radar-reflective metallic strips, offering the missile’s radar-seeker head a big, juicy target. In case that wasn’t enough to fling the missile off, Lapole carried out the second part of her plan, and her left hand twisted hard on the turbofan vector controls.
The effect was like slamming the brakes on a ground car going at over three hundred miles per hour. Every ounce of energy propelling the flitter forward now blasted in the opposite direction.
In a maneuver perfected by the pilots of VSTOL fighters in the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries, Lapole waited for their airspeed to bleed to virtual non-existence before redirecting the vector thrust which was normally used to control landings and takeoffs. In a maneuver no missile could imitate, the flitter shot ninety degrees away from its previous position.
Blinded by the burning phosphorous and the floating metallic cloud, the missile’s onboard systems did the only logical thing. The sound of the warhead detonation reverberated off the glen’s walls as it spewed forth its deadly cargo harmlessly into the soft, green grass and bracken.
Lapole closed her eyes and tilted her head back into the padded pilot’s seat, releasing a long, slow breath. Mhairi reached across and placed a reassuring hand on the merc’s arm.
“Damn good flying, Captain.”
A gurgling laugh escaped Lapole’s lips. “Let’s never do that again, shall we?”
Mhairi joined in the tension releasing laugh. “Agreed.”
Lapole reopened her eyes and rolled her shoulders. “What say we get our asses to the Lodge? I need a drink.”
“First round’s on me,” said Mhairi, as she killed the still-sounding missile alarm. For a brief second, the cockpit descended into grateful silence, before the missile alarm once more screeched its warning. Mhairi interrogated the system, realizing too late the oncoming danger, which caused the blood to drain from her face as she looked into Lapole’s questioning eyes.
“I’m sorry...” was all Mhairi had time to blurt out as death overtook her.
The second HecSha Tol 9 detonated its warhead from a distance of less than ten yards, directly above the stationary craft, while still traveling at a little over Mach Two. The effect was akin to firing a shotgun at a block of cheese at point blank range. Fifteen hundred hardened carbon fragments flashed through the skin of the flitter as if its armor was nothing. Slicing through controls, electronics, flight surfaces, fuel, and oxygen tanks, and the soft, yielding flesh and bone of the flitter’s precious Human cargo. For the forty-two souls aboard, it was over in an instant. If the multitude of flying razor-sharp fragments did not kill them, then the expanding fireball of superheated hydrogen fuel did.
Ironically, the only piece of the flitter to remain intact after the missile’s impact, was the defensive pod within which the search and rescue transponder was located.
When the transponder failed to register input from the flitter’s flight control computers, it activated its downed aircraft procedure. The ghostly signal began transmitting on the search and rescue fre
quency, telling the world where to find the remains of its passengers and crew.
* * *
An attention tone caused the Tactical Officer of the Great Claw to check his Tri-V, and the blinking icon caused his lizard-like mouth to drop open in satisfaction. “The escaping flitter has been destroyed, Commander.”
G’Yal waved a hand dismissively at the news. He had bigger fish to catch, and the chase of the fleeing merchantman was moving the cruiser invariably westward and closer to the ongoing battle with the few Human mercenary ships which had joined the fight.
* * *
The urgent, repeated pinging of the search and rescue beacon echoed in the silence of the comms bunker. Katrian Quant sat stock-still in her seat, vision blurring as tears filled the mercenary veteran’s eyes before gently rolling down her cheeks. Quant sat there for a long moment, her mind filled with the memories of running, laughing children, as they pretended to be their parents, marching in ludicrous fashion, all out of step and producing some of the sloppiest salutes she had ever seen. Sorrow was slowly replaced with a deep, burning hatred. A hatred that would stoke the fires of revenge. One final time, Quant checked that the Salamanca had received her feed before reaching up and slowly disconnecting her pinplants.
Standing, she walked across to an ordinary looking console and keyed in a seemingly random but complex series of characters. A bulbous optical scanner extended on its pencil-thin stalk with a small whirring sound. When it had locked in place, Quant pressed her left eye against the scanner, which read the pattern of rods and cones laid out on her retina. Happy with her identity, a flat metal cover popped open at the side of the console to reveal a fat red button. Without hesitation, Quant pressed down on it so hard, the blood was forced from her finger. On each of the Tri-V displays in the comms bunker, a clock began to count backward from five minutes. From the computer memory core came a flash of light, and a puff of smoke, as the drives fried. When the timer reached zero, the C6 explosives rigged on each piece of sensitive equipment would detonate, completely trashing the bunker and ensuring nobody would learn the secrets of the Scorpions.
Quant ignored the acrid cloud permeating the bunker from the smoking computer drives, as she strode for the door, pausing to retrieve her Gal 12 Assault Rifle from the weapons rack. Like any professional soldier, she had a go-pack stashed under her bed with the minimum of spare clothes, food, water, and ammo. Without a backward glance, she shouldered the rifle and headed up the stairs, her face blank and expressionless.
Somebody had just made a blood enemy of Katrian Quant, and whomever that person was, it had become Quant’s sole purpose in life to end them.
* * *
“Oh, dear God, no!”
The moaning statement dragged Kate Preissman’s attention from her tactical display and the HecSha cruiser that was rapidly closing to within range to launch its small craft. Kate’s eyes found the source of the sound, and the rebuke that had been forming in her throat died as she saw the haunted look on Jacobsthal’s face. “Report, Mr. Jacobsthal.”
The bridge officer cleared his throat loudly, opened his mouth to speak, and nothing came out. Shaking his head, he squared his shoulders and tried again. “The flitter with the families on board has been shot down—the S and R beacon indicates no survivors.”
Kate felt like someone had slapped her across the face. Her sense of time and reality escaped her, as she tried to grasp what Jacobsthal had said. Her conscious mind rebelled against it. You just didn’t kill civilians. That was wrong. Just plain wrong. Then, like a stretched elastic band snapping back into place, she returned to the here and now. Put it away, Kate, she told herself. There’s no time to mourn. For now. We must concentrate on getting out of here alive, and to do that I need to lead by example.
Kate took a breath and forced herself to be calm. When she spoke, her tone remained even and almost unwavering, as she addressed the entire bridge. “Listen up, people. Put what’s just happened in a box and close the lid. We have the bastards closing on us, and they have no idea what they have bitten off, so let’s keep them fat and happy until we can kick them right in their HecSha balls!”
* * *
“Range to target?” demanded G’Yal.
“Three hundred miles, Commander,” replied the Tactical Officer, concentration etched on his face, as his gaze fixed on the radar. Something had appeared, momentarily, before disappearing amid the hundreds of geo-stationary satellites and hovering near-space stations that seemed to infest its orbit. He dismissed the momentary image as a partial reflection, a sensor ghost. “We have matched speed and course with the merchantman, Commander. Permission to launch small craft.”
“Launch,” ordered G’Yal, his attention already turning to the Communications Officer. “Order that bucket of bolts to maintain its course, reduce speed, and prepare to be boarded.”
“At once, Commander.”
* * *
“They’re ordering us to slow and prepare to be boarded, Captain,” said Jacobsthal.
“I’ll give them ‘prepare to be boarded,’” muttered Kate, as she activated her link to Alastair Sinclair. “Alastair. Keep your men on their toes, the HecSha have a couple of boarding parties on the way over, and you might need to take care of any that we miss.”
In the familiar surroundings of his Mark 8 CASPer, with two more CASPers from Third Platoon covering his right and left flanks, Alastair stood positioned on Deck Two Aft. The remainder of Third Platoon and First Platoon Zulu were spreading themselves out at tactical locations throughout the Salamanca, ready to respond to any penetration of the hull. The rest of Alastair’s command were already in lightweight vacuum suits, standing by to assist the freighter’s crew with damage control.
Alastair automatically checked his fuel and ammo levels before replying to Kate. All topped off and good to go. “We’re ready to give them a warm welcome.”
Kate terminated the link to Alastair before she blurted out the ghastly truth that was burning on her lips. Not now, Kate! Later. If we survive this shit.
“Light them up, Mr. Jacobsthal!”
A command flashed from the South African’s pinplant, triggering the Salamanca’s search radar. The twin radars mounted on the bow and the stern of the freighter went from passive standby mode to active tracking, filling the space around the Salamanca with enough electromagnetic energy to cook anything made of flesh and bone that was not protected by thick shielding. In each small craft’s cockpit, radiation alarms went berserk as the flood of searching energy passed easily through the craft’s thin skin, irradiating every living thing on board. In Jacobsthal’s Tri-V display, the Great Claw went from a shadowy return to a finely detailed image, while the two small craft carrying the boarding party were lit up like deer in the headlights of a moving vehicle. With no input from Jacobsthal, the Salamanca’s fire control computers assigned an equal number of railguns to each of the two targets. On the hull of the outwardly defenseless freighter, servos whined as turrets swung to the correct bearing and elevation. The targeting reticle around each small craft went from amber to green, and Jacobsthal gleefully gave the release to fire.
In the blink of an eye, each of the assigned railguns spat forth two baseball-sized projectiles. Each projectile left the gun’s muzzle with an energy equivalent to fifty Mega-joules, or roughly the kinetic energy of a five-ton school bus traveling at 316 miles per hour. They flashed across the gap between the Salamanca and the small craft faster than any creature made of flesh or bone could possibly hope to react. The first railgun round hit the small craft and barely slowed at the impact. For the shuttle, its pilot, and the dozen HecSha soldiers eagerly awaiting the chance to kill some Humans, the fight was over before they even had a chance to realize they were in one. When the second railgun round arrived, it struck the still expanding gas and random pieces of solid debris, immolating any piece it struck as it transferred its kinetic energy into heat and light. To the casual observer, it was as if both small craft had simply exploded o
f their own accord.
Kate slammed her finger down on a key on her armrest, which sent a klaxon blast reverberating throughout the ship. A warning to its crew to standby for radical maneuvers. She hoped that the sudden demise of the HecSha’s boarding party, and an unexpected course change by the merchantman, would be enough to buy her the time to get away from the avenging HecSha’s missile batteries. A desperate gamble, but she could see no alternative.
“Mr. Horak...” Whatever instruction Kate was about to give to her helmsman was stayed, as three beams of coherent light struck the HecSha cruiser amidships, literally cutting it in half as the concentrated fire of megawatt output lasers sliced through the cruiser’s armor like a hot knife through butter. The two, now distinct, pieces of the cruiser tumbled away, bleeding air and debris out of control, no longer a threat to Kate or the Salamanca.
“Incoming hail, Captain,” said a still-shocked Jacobsthal.
Kate accepted the hail, and her surprise was complete as the face of a smiling, surprisingly young, Human male filled the Tri-V. “Looks like you needed a hand there.”
Kate recovered quickly, stilling her features to present the face of a captain who had everything under control. “Thanks for the assist. And you are?”
“Ah, excuse my impoliteness,” the man said. “Jim Cartwright, commander of the Bucephalus, Colonel, and owner, of Cartwright’s Cavaliers. At your service, ma’am.”
“Kate Preissman of the Salamanca. Currently carrying a contingent of Sinclair’s Scorpions.”
Cartwright’s left eyebrow rose as his interest was piqued. “And your destination?”
