“The more the merrier,” said Max.
“Welcome to the team,” Ritter said over the comm. “Does that make Jean-Claude a suicide prince?”
“Joining combat against a mortal foe is not suicide,” Jean-Claude explained.
“Wait till you fight these Dolphs.” Artificial thunder split the sky as Max accelerated to Mach 1. Surprisingly, Veillantif kept up. Maybe Zeklov CFs aren’t just status symbols for shallow bluebloods.
The Soc CF team snapped into view one klick off the Lloyd George’s port side. Max eased back the throttle and lined up Mjolnir’s targeting reticle with the leftmost Ein Dolph. The energy weapon-optimized CFs’ armor was insulated against Max’s electrolaser, but he’d bet the family farm their exposed thruster nozzles weren’t. A well-placed shot of weaponized lightning darkened the rockets on the Dolph’s back.
The damaged combat frame fell behind its comrades and rapidly lost altitude. The other four wingmen came about with the single-minded precision of a school of spooked fish. “Take evasive action!” Max warned Jean-Claude.
Four plasma rifles flared red. Max was already bobbing and weaving to stay out of the line of fire. One red bolt buzzed the Thor Prototype’s left tail fin, searing the paint off and rattling the whole aircraft. Wen gave a startled squeal.
Max steadied the jet’s flight and fired his Vulcans at the center-left Dolph’s rifle. The weapon exploded, and Max screamed past the armless CF. The other three Ein Dolphs sped after him.
“You alright?” Max asked Wen.
“Just a bit shaken,” she said breathlessly.
Veillantif resumed its position off Max’s right wing. “Thank you for the warning,” Jean-Claude said.
“Thank me later,” said Max. “The leader used that diversion to reach the Lloyd George. Catching up won’t be easy with his buddies on our tail.”
“Then I shall employ a distraction of my own.” Veillantif spread its barbed wings to decelerate and wheeled on the pursuing Socs.
Don’t get yourself killed, you crazy frog bastard. Max spared a glance at his rearview monitor. Jean-Claude had used Veillantif’s speed advantage to close with the three combat-worthy Ein Dolphs. He harassed them with his rapier, some type of whip, and his CF’s chainsaw wings. The Socs couldn’t get away, nor could they use their plasma rifles without risking friendly fire.
Just buy me enough time, Max silently urged his new teammate. The Lloyd George’s stately, flat-topped hull grew to dominate his view. The lead Dolph with its flared pauldrons and backswept command crest orbited the supercarrier. A crewman could have thrown a wrench at it.
“What’s he waiting for?” Max wondered aloud.
“A light transport helicopter just powered up on the Lloyd George’s flight deck,” said Wen. “Admiral Omaka is aboard.”
“Show me,” said Max. The image of a light gray helo, its rotors just starting to turn, filled his HUD. A middle-aged Asian woman in a Navy BDU sat at the controls. “How did she make it all the way from the bridge?” he pondered aloud. Gatling fire and missiles sprayed the sky in answer.
“The crew’s too busy fighting for their lives to worry about the CO going AWOL,” Wen spat.
Max’s palms sweated as he narrowly slipped through the carrier’s hail of defensive fire. The Soc leader deftly avoided the ship’s guns while picking them off with his shield-mounted plasma cannons. He worked his way aft until his midnight blue CF hovered beside Omaka’s helo.
“Naryal was right,” said Max. “The Admiral’s defecting, and this psycho’s her escort.” He flipped his weapon selector switch to ready Mjolnir and agonized over whether he should shoot his honest enemy or his traitorous former ally.
A blazing red blade sprang from the tip of the custom Dolph’s staff and split in two. The Soc pilot swept his plasma fork across the deck and through the helo’s cockpit, vaporizing the treasonous Admiral inside. A wall of flame erupted from the trench carved in the ship’s hull.
“Fire on the gallery and hangar decks!” reported Li Wen. Her voice fell. “He hit the officers’ quarters.”
“The Soc leader fragged Omaka’s helicopter,” Max shouted over the comm. “This ain’t an extraction. It’s an execution!” He fired a wild shot. The custom Dolph’s murderous pilot blocked the lightning with his shield and fired his twin plasma cannon with a flick of the same arm. The searing bolts hit the Thor Prototype like a train.
“Critical damage to drive systems,” Marilyn warned over the shrill din of cockpit alarms. Max struggled with the controls as his plane spiraled toward the Lloyd George’s burning flight deck. Wen screamed.
“You’re wrong,” an oily male voice giggled over the comm. “I’m here to extract you!” The custom Dolph’s left hand reached for the falling jet. An instant before its metal fingers closed, the custom Dolph rocketed to the right.
A violet beam lanced through the curtain of smoke where the dark blue CF had hovered a moment before. Dead Drop burst through the inferno to hang in the hellish air, facing its bastard offspring.
“You,” the lead Soc hissed.
Max’s cockpit spun to face Jean-Claude’s battle with the three Ein Dolphs. One of the Soc CFs pivoted behind Veillantif. “Jean-Claude!” Max cried helplessly.
A purple plasma bolt streaked over the water and blasted into the Ein Dolph before it could shoot Veillantif in the back. An orange fireball ripped the Soc CF into smoking chunks as the Thor Prototype whipped back toward the burning carrier.
“Merci, M. Dellister,” Jean-Claude said.
“Hold on!” Max told Wen as he fought to land the damaged fighter. The world inverted, and the cockpit spiderwebbed against the Lloyd George’s flight deck with a final shock that probably realigned Max’s organs.
“You okay?” he croaked to Wen over the plaintive alarms. She didn’t answer. He looked back and saw the fragile-looking woman hanging limply in her chair.
“This is Captain Maximus Darving,” he shouted into the comm. “I’m in the jet that just crash-landed on the Lloyd George. Lieutenant Li Wen is with me. She needs a medic, ASAP!”
No reply came. “Communications systems offline,” Marilyn said in a staticky staccato.
Max beat against the cracked canopy till blood soaked through his gloves, to no avail. The Lloyd George had taken severe damage. The custom Dolph and Dead Drop were about to cause even more. I have to get us out, he thought, barely stifling the onset of panic, or we’re as good as dead.
26
The constant feeling, like someone breathing down his neck, had started when they’d locked Zane up at the institute. Now, in the smoke-filled sky above the Lloyd George’s burning deck, what had been vague discomfort throbbed as if the Soc pilot were stabbing Zane’s temples with icepicks.
“Masz,” Zane snarled into Dead Drop’s comm. “You helped Megami murder our brothers. Now you come here in that knockoff and insult me!”
Masz laughed. “I could never insult you worse than our sister. She chose me and left you to rot!”
Zane’s twitching lip curled upward. “Megami did me a favor. If I’d been shipped off to space, I wouldn’t have found Dead Drop.”
“Your pathetic machine is nothing next to the Sentinel set over the earth!” Masz thrust his forked plasma blade skyward.
Zane detached the barrel of Dead Drop’s cannon, ignited his plasma sword, and held the brilliant purple blade in a high ready position.
The custom Dolph extended its plasma fork horizontally as if to bar its opponent’s way. A second red blade sprang from the other end and split in two. “It’s not too late,” said Masz. “Our sister will take you back. Rejoin our family and cleanse this infested world!”
“It was too late for you the second you stole what’s mine.” Zane charged, aiming his plasma sword’s tip at Masz’s cockpit. The custom Dolph darted right and swung its crimson fork as Dead Drop rocketed into the space it had occupied. Zane parried the blow with a twist of his CF’s arm. Blood-colored sparks flashed from the locked
energy blades.
Masz canted his fork’s lower head upward. Zane fired reverse thrusters, saving Dead Drop’s right arm from the burning red arc. He lunged for Masz’s cockpit again. The custom Dolph levered its double fork in both hands and caught Dead Drop’s blade.
Zane Jabbed his violet blade between the scarlet tines. Masz barely forced the rocket-assisted thrust aside. The custom Dolph’s armored knee crashed into the black CF’s side. The shock numbed Zane’s hands, but he held tight to the controls.
A second kick, and a third, rattled Zane like the ball bearing in a can of spray paint. With a feral cry he opened the throttle. Dead Drop slammed against its opponent. The custom Dolph pushed back, but even its enhanced drives were no match for the black CF’s thrusters. Both combat frames hurtled out to sea. Zane cut his main engine and fired reverse thrusters, bringing Dead Drop to a sudden stop. Masz’s CF continued tumbling into the distance.
Zane wheeled around and flew back toward the burning carrier at full speed. His sensors picked up the Thor Prototype through the smoke. The crashed plane was lying upside down near the flaming rent in the deck. Zane landed, quenched his blade, and reached Dead Drop’s hand down to right the wrecked jet.
Thunder rolled in the clear sky. A red streak that left a green afterimage in Zane’s eyes slashed through the ship’s mast, sending the antenna-studded tower plummeting. The severed structure hit the flight deck with a riot of metallic booms and squeals. Zane punched the ignition, but a ruby bolt exploded into Dead Drop’s main thruster bank before it could take to the air. The black CF fell facedown onto the scarred deck.
“Get up!” Pleaded Zane. Dead Drop rose to its hands and knees as its pilot wrestled with the controls.
Masz’s custom Dolph touched down beside the Thor Prototype and planted one midnight blue foot on Dead Drop’s back, forcing it back down with bone-jarring force. Masz swept his plasma fork across the plane’s inverted fuselage to shear off the cockpit and nose. He racked his fork and reached down with his CF’s right hand. His Dolph’s giant fingers closed around the canopy over the navigator’s seat.
“Let go, you Soc son of a bitch!” Max shouted.
Zane wrenched the control stick to no effect. He pounded his chair’s padded armrests in frustration.
The custom Dolph pressed its shield-mounted twin plasma gun to Dead Drop’s back. Zane felt the heavy thud directly behind him.
“Miss Megami doesn’t tolerate defectives,” Masz hissed. Capacitors hummed down two huge barrels.
The twin cannon and the surrounding shield blew apart in a blue-white flash. The blast threw Masz off balance, and Zane rolled Dead Drop out from under the custom Dolph’s foot. Masz ignored him and fixed the black v of his main sensor array on a streamlined blue dot in the water off the port side.
“Ritter!” Zane radioed to the Mablung that had destroyed Masz’s cannon. “What the hell are you doing?”
“What I should have done back in Kisangani,” Ritter said. Dead Drop’s main camera zoomed in, showing the Mablung aiming its railgun for another shot at Masz.
“Get out of there,” yelled Zane. He pushed Dead Drop up and sprang, but the custom Dolph rocketed out of reach. Still holding the Thor Prototype’s cockpit in its right hand, the midnight blue CF took its staff in its left and activated one set of forked plasma blades. Masz skimmed over the water, sending up a frothing rooster tail. He anticipated Ritter’s shot and veered clear of the hypersonic dart.
The Mab didn’t get off a third shot. Masz slashed his fork through its domed head and upper torso like a great red pendulum. Steam boiled from the sea, followed a moment later by an explosion that sent a geyser of white water and blue CF parts fountaining into the air.
Zane howled. He launched Dead Drop toward Masz on secondary thrusters. One of the two Dolphs still jousting with Jean-Claude broke off to intercept the black CF. Even with half its engines gone, Dead Drop closed before its imitator could fire. Zane ignited his plasma sword and jammed the immolating blade through the Soc wingman’s cockpit. He maintained his course and speed as the unmanned Dolph splashed down. Masz receded over the waves.
It’s no good. I can’t catch him. Zane considered racking his blade and picking off Masz’s thrusters with pinpoint plasma fire, but there was too much risk to Darving and Li.
Jean-Claude quit running interference. He danced clear of a shot from the last Ein Dolph and beheaded the Soc CF with his heat whip as he darted past it. Raking Veillantif’s chainsaw wings across the headless Dolph’s engines sent the disabled CF plunging out of the sky and beneath the waves.
The bronze gargoyle soared after Masz. Defensive fire from the Yamamoto slowed the custom Dolph enough for Veillantif to catch up. Jean-Claude switched back to delay tactics, avoiding the wicked plasma fork while keeping Masz boxed in with wavering hot rapier, whip, and wings.
Zane held his breath all the way from the Lloyd George. He only exhaled when he entered close combat range with Masz. Dead Drop’s overtaxed thrusters shrieked, but Zane kept the throttle open as he readied his plasma sword and locked the custom Dolph’s engines in his sights.
Veillantif charged the midnight blue CF head-on, drawing Masz’s attention and creating the perfect opening for Zane. He thrust his plasma blade, but the custom Dolph suddenly dropped out of sight. Zane’s heart missed a beat as Dead Drop and Veillantif sped toward a midair collision. Each pilot swerved to his respective left at the same instant. Veillantif’s exhaust buffeted Dead Drop as they careened past each other.
Zane furiously searched his sensor screen for Masz. “Where is he?”
Jean-Claude’s unintelligible curse gave Zane his answer. The custom Dolph appeared in his rear view monitor behind Veillantif. The gargoyle slashed its buzzing pinions. Each end of Masz’s plasma fork blocked one wing.
The exchange bought Zane time to close with Masz again. He stabbed at the rocket nozzles on the Dolph’s back. Masz slid left and pivoted to face his foes.
As if at a silent signal, Zane and Jean-Claude renewed their attack as one. Dead Drop’s violet energy blade sought the custom Dolph’s cockpit with a series of vicious thrusts while Veillantif’s heat rapier probed the enemy’s defenses for an opening. The spinning double fork denied them at every turn.
Smoke streamed between the fingers of the Dolph’s raised right hand as the Thor Prototype’s ejection system fired. Only the pilot’s seat shot into the air above the blue CF’s crested head. The navigator remained locked in the Dolph’s iron grip.
Jean-Claude took a bold swipe at the hand holding the jet’s cockpit. Masz darted left and swung his fork as Veillantif slashed thin air. Masz’s precise backhand swing parted the overextended CF’s gargoyle-like head from its winged body.
Zane saw his opening. He aligned the tip of Dead Drop’s plasma blade with the hatch in the Dolph’s unguarded chest and jammed his control stick forward.
He was a split second too late. The custom Dolph inverted its weapon hand and flexed its elbow, catching the purple energy sword in the tines of its fork. The three plasma blades spat sparks as Zane strove to pierce the cockpit that filled his screen.
Zane switched off his plasma sword. Suddenly lacking resistance, the red fork stabbed past the Dolph’s right arm. He once again pressed the “fire” switch on his weapon control stick. Before the sword could reestablish a magnetic field, a backhand snap of Masz’s fork cut into Dead Drop’s left side. Another thruster bank died in a blast that hit Zane like a punch to the kidney.
Without enough thrust to stay aloft, the black combat frame fell from the sky. The sea swallowed Zane’s curses.
27
Charcoal-uniformed Kazoku marched Sieg down a stygian tunnel that followed the curve of Metis’ largest crater. Megami’s shock troops kept their sidearms holstered yet prominently displayed—a silent statement Sieg heard loud and clear.
Masz had thrown him onto a shuttle after their duel at Kisangani. Sieg probably could have hijacked the flight and headed home to L3, but h
is burning curiosity about the Coalition’s new SecGen had prevailed. Members of Megami’s private army had met him upon landing. Now they escorted him to a long hoped-for reunion or his execution.
A meter-thick window of silicon alloyed with powdered graphite and aluminum replaced the wall to Sieg’s left. The barren crater floor stretched ten kilometers from the curving glass to the far wall of striated blue-gray rock. A cluster of rocket nozzles the size of sport stadiums mushroomed from the crater’s center. Work frames and spacesuited figures swarmed over the colossal engines like ants.
That’s one cluster of the old fusion rockets they used to move Metis from the asteroid belt, thought Sieg. Looks like Megami’s making them operational again.
The smooth stone tunnel opened into a wide gallery echoing with the distant snarl of industrial drills and the screeching of diamond-bladed saws. Fifty meters away, an improvised partition of I-beams painted with diagonal black and white stripes fenced off a jagged trench over which a drilling rig had been erected. Magmatic red light filtered up from below. The smell of burning stone completed Sieg’s sense of having descended into hell.
“Sieg!” A lithe figure leapt down from a catwalk eight meters above. Her blue trench coat flared around her slim hips, and her long black hair fanned out as the low gravity brought her to a gentle landing before him. She regarded him with lupine eyes.
“Madam Secretary,” Sieg said with a slight nod.
Megami probed Sieg’s forehead with spidery fingers. Her touch stung as she traced the outline of his cut. “Masz showed atypical restraint,” she said. “Or else your fight was closer than he let on. We’ll get you something for the pain, plus a new uniform to replace those dusty old togs.”
“Thanks for your concern,” said Sieg, “but I expected you to grill me, not mother me.”
Megami’s hands fell to her sides. “I’m not our mother, Sieg. I’m your sister.”
Hearing his hope confirmed evoked a reaction Sieg hadn’t expected. He laughed. “You’re lying. Sanzen Kaimora had my mother and my sister executed in response to my failed rescue attempt.”
Combat Frame XSeed Page 20
