SODIUM Trilogy Part One

by Stephen Arseneault

  We were trapped more than a light-day away while the enemy bore down on our planet. After receiving my signal, our forces at home would only have twenty-four hours to prepare for the more than 300 fighters that fast approached.

  At last count we had 37 Defenders at the ready along with more than 500 heavy space-based coil guns and 260 ground-based guns. Our factories had been feverishly pumping out ground-launched Drillers, but I had no idea of how many.

  With the main alien fleet only fourteen months out, we would need the help of every man, woman, and child on the planet to continue to raise our defenses. This pack of fighters could cause enough damage and distraction to make that defense impossible.

  When the twenty minutes had passed, I powered on the sensors and blasted out the warning. The fighters had indeed continued on their course toward Earth, leaving us spinning helplessly away in space. At one-half light speed, it would take the alien fighters two days to reach Earth. Our comm blast would reach home in one.

  After sending the blast, I turned to the team and asked what we could do to change our situation. Tork immediately volunteered a spacewalk in an attempt to do an on-ship repair or at least bring a BHD ring inside the ship for an attempt there.

  I was just about to give the go-ahead when Raven threw out the facts. The fact that we were traveling at nearly half the speed of light was a big problem—and the fact that beyond the active skin, we did not have adequate shielding from the stellar winds and their charged particles that freely moved about outside the heliosphere.

  If Tork went outside the craft, even with his suit and helmet, he would likely be irreparably cooked from the inside out within a short time. We were trapped until such time as someone at home could attempt a rescue. A full day was spent spinning in the black void of space.

  When the news reached Earth, there was a scramble to assemble all ready forces. A fast Defender was dispensed to attempt a rescue of my crew from our stranded position just outside the heliosphere. Every available trained pilot was needed for Earth’s defense.

  The fast Defender was powered by four reactors, which would allow it to reach us in less than eight hours. This would also allow time for a rescue and for a return to Earth before the alien fighters attacked. Our Defender would first have to be stabilized so a door-to-door transfer of its occupants could be made. It was a risky maneuver considering the stranded Defender’s speed and the stellar winds.

  A volunteer crew was selected and sent within an hour of receiving the comm blast. They would have a four-hour window available to attempt a transfer. With the alien threat having moved on toward Earth, we were free to use our sensors. We racked our brains looking for anything that could better our situation.

  After an hour of nothing, Randy offered up an idea. He reasoned we could momentarily turn off the active skin and fire a round from one of our coil guns. The inertia from that round might slow our spin. If he could calculate which gun would offer the best chance at slowing our out-of-control spin, we had a shot of at least increasing our chances of a rescue.

  There was no question of time involved, as we had enough nutrients and fuel to last us for a month. It was a question of wanting to get back to protect our world. There was one aspect of Randy's plan that he was unsure of. What would happen when the active skin went down?

  Would the inertial forces that the skin held back splatter us all against the interior walls of the ship? Would the supercharged particles of the stellar wind come streaming through and cook us? Those were the questions we had no answer to. I put the measure up for a democratic vote from the crew.

  Randy—aye. Raven—aye. Tork—aye, and me—aye. It was unanimous. Randy reran his calculations and set up the computer to best time the shot. Involving the computer in this instance was an irritant to him, but the computer’s precision was needed if the plan was to have a chance at success.

  With the calculations complete and the parameters entered, Randy enabled the computer to take its best shot. A countdown timer appeared on our consoles, and we each watched as it ticked down to zero. The ship jerked violently and then three seconds later jerked violently again. The computer continued to repeat this pattern in an attempt to bring our spinning to an end.

  After twenty-seven rounds, the Defender slowed to an almost imperceptible turn. Randy's idea had worked. Raven worked over the interior sensor data and concluded that our exposure to the stellar winds had been minimal. But, it was a risk we would likely not know the outcome of for many years down the road.

  I took the opportunity to train our sensors on the alien fighters and to broadcast that information toward home. I hoped they could somehow put it to use. I gave Tork the order to plan for his extravehicular ring repair in case we had no alternative. The one thing we had was time.

  I then began to think about how unfair it was that the alien craft each had repair robots attached to the outer chassis. They could effect repairs while zipping along at any speed... even during battle. I made a log note to post the idea up to our techs when we got home, although I was sure they were already fully aware of its potential.

  For the next several hours, we all sat quietly wondering about each of our existences. I thought for a few minutes about my crew. Randy was from Connecticut. He had lost family in New York when the carrier and its horde of fighters had attacked. He had joined the USAC a year earlier after eight years as a low-level commercial pilot.

  He loved the travel but did not care for hauling freight. There was no glory in hauling boxes of clothing or toys or bean sprouts. It was a job he was happy to move on from. Raven was from Vancouver. She made her way into the Corps through a simulation game that had been put on the market several years earlier.

  The geniuses behind our Defender craft had put out a holo-game called ZZ Defender. Those who scored well through competitions had been recruited into the USAC directly, at a time when Defender crews were sorely needed. The game continued to be a recruiting tool, bringing in much-needed talent.

  Applications to the USAC had been through the roof since the last devastating attack. Raven and a team of three others had been the West Coast ZZ Defender Champions. The rest of her gaming crew had been accepted into the USAC and divided amongst three other Defender teams. I was happy to have Raven on mine. Tork had come from the Midwest, somewhere in northern Missouri. He was about as small town as you could get. As far as engineers went, I would not have traded him for any others I had known.

  As my thoughts wondered, I began to daydream about my earlier days on my grandfather's farm. He had a small herd of goats, and it had been my job while in school to keep them fed and keep them happy. I had developed a fondness for the simple life on a farm, but I now knew that was largely because my responsibilities had been few.

  I had spent much of my time hacking into our automated feeders in an attempt to have them handle more of my feeding chores. Several minor alterations had worked wonders until I crashed and ruined a very expensive piece of equipment. My parents were livid, but my grandfather took it in stride. He told me that man would never have accomplished much if he had never taken risks. It was a statement that had ruled much of my adult life.

  After seven hours adrift, I was elated to hear an incoming message. A rescue ship was fast approaching. My team got loud in celebration. The plan was for the rescue ship to match our speed and to move in close enough for a door-to-door transfer attempt at getting us out. Their ship had a pilot and one crewman to handle the winch line.

  The rescue Defender would be maneuvered until its rear door and ours were facing one another. Their ship’s computer would attempt to bring the ship within three meters for the transfer. We had been monitoring the stellar winds, and they seemed to build and then ebb in an eight-minute pattern. We would attempt our first transfer during the lull.

  The pilot of the other ship introduced himself as Bumba. He was South African. He manually piloted his Defender to within one kilometer before turning it over to the ship’s computer. Within mi
nutes the two Defenders were facing back to back while traveling at one-half light-speed. We again watched a timer tick away, waiting for a lull in the stellar winds.

  With precision timing, the active skins on both Defenders shut down and the doors lifted. Rocko was at the ready with a line and winch, with Tork being the first to hook up and cross. The process took four minutes.

  The doors once again closed, and the skins reactivated as the stellar winds again began to build. When the easing cycle repeated, the transfer process began again. This time it was Raven, who was then followed by Randy. As the squad commander, I felt it was my duty to go last. When the time came for my turn, the stellar winds did not die down.

  We waited patiently for almost three hours for the ebb, but no change came. Bumba then made a command decision of his own. I asked what they were doing when the Defender began to slowly pull away.

  I was told that our time was limited and that Tork had volunteered to go out on a tether in an attempt to change one of the damaged rings on the front of our ship. I thought it a bad idea to risk the lives and safety of five in an attempt to rescue the one. Tork reasoned that we would be needing the ship if it was at all repairable. We had more than 300 fighters looking to destroy our world.

  It was a reasonable argument, but one that was easily countered with why five live crewmen and a good Defender were not worth risking. My arguments were ignored. Bumba brought the Defender in close before putting the plan into action. The door opened, and out floated Tork with the tool needed to make the exchange for a spare ring that the rescue ship had brought to us.

  The stellar winds still raged as Tork hurried through his repair attempt. With no active skin, the rescue crew was taking a big risk. I felt unworthy of their gamble. Seven minutes into the ring exchange, Tork was reeled back into the other Defender. When their door had closed and the ship had moved safely away, I was ready to give the new ring a try.

  I applied power slowly and checked the status. The exchange appeared to have worked. I took a moment to thank Tork and again chastise him for taking the risk. But, I was glad to be heading home in my own ship. Bumba then told us to say our goodbyes because he needed to get back as soon as possible. There was much that needed doing.

  I watched the green blip from the sensors as the fast Defender quickly sped away. I pushed my throttle to full and watched my own speed climb at what seemed like a snail’s pace. If I was lucky, I would arrive just before our attackers. Our Defenders were much slower, with only one BHD ring, but, just as the fully capable ship, they would continue to accelerate. My trip counter ticked away from more than seventeen hours.

  When I arrived at the base near Lake Pleasant in the Adirondacks, I moved quickly into a hangar. A crew was waiting to effect repairs. I hurried away to the elevators to take me to Chamber 2 for a briefing on the fight that was almost upon us.

  I hustled into the briefing room, where I was met by my crew. I took note that Tork was not looking well. Just as the briefing was about to begin, he collapsed. I was sure it was due to the sacrifices he had made to get us safely home.

  When the medic team had him on the way to the infirmary, the briefing began. Our Battle Commander, Admiral Rex Hall, strode in with a stern look on his face. We would be fielding forty-two Defenders against the alien fighters. It was not good odds. We would be deploying our fighters in squads of six based on a perimeter around where the alien fighters were expected to arrive.

  Our newest space-based coil guns were now on mobile platforms, but there were only eight of them, and they were still relatively slow to move. Our strategy would be to try to quickly move forces to wherever the heaviest need was.

  In the few months since the carrier attack, the Australians had constructed and opened a factory that was now pumping out three hundred light coil guns a day. These new light guns were mobile and were being rushed to every major city in an attempt to beef up its defenses. There was also added emphasis on protecting our factories, as further destruction could end any attempt at rearming ourselves for the main fleet.

  When the briefing ended, we had our orders. We also had a new engineer. He would be meeting us at our Defender, as he was being pulled directly from training in the DSims two weeks early.

  I was not happy with the current crew change, but being happy was not a requirement. I would have to give the new crewman the chance to prove himself. I had ten minutes to spend before returning to the hangar. I decided on a call to the family. I wanted to hear my parents’ voices, and I wanted the encouragement I knew would come from my grandfather.

  My mother had her usual worried tone. Why would I be calling after not talking to her for weeks? I told her everything was fine and to just stay on the farm and tend to business. She was, of course, suspicious.

  I then moved on to the real purpose of my call... my grandfather. I needed his wisdom, his support, his calm and confidence. I had no problem going headlong into whatever was coming my way. But, that did not mean my guts would not turn to jelly.

  I was nervous, and Gramps always had a way of putting my mind at ease. He told me that man makes mistakes. That all you can do when times are tough is do the best you can. That worrying never solved anything... action did. He ended by saying that he had complete confidence in his granddaughter. After all, she had his genes.

  The talk had been just what was needed. As I rode the shuttle toward the hangars, my inner thoughts turned from worry about my loved ones and for all mankind to ones of fight and determination. In less than two hours, the alien fighters would be upon us. Earth would again be fighting for its survival. As I stepped out into the hangar and viewed all the crews, handlers, and support personnel hurrying about, I had a renewed feeling of strength... of confidence. We would be giving the aliens the best of what we had.

  ~~~~~

  Once again, this Human is asking for your help! If you enjoyed the book, please leave a review on the site where it was purchased. And by all means, please tell your friends! Any help with spreading the word is highly appreciated! I have a free science fiction eBook short story, titled "THE SQUAD", waiting for anyone who joins my email list. Also, find out when the next exciting release is available by joining the email list at comments@arsenex.com. Visit the author's website at www.arsenex.com for the rest of the series and other works!

  Thank you for reading my work! I hope you have a great day!

  Stephen

  Books by Stephen Arseneault

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  SODIUM-AMP-OMEGA trilogy series

  SODIUM: (At the time of this pub, the first eBook in the series was free. Try it!) A six-book series that takes Man from his first encounter with aliens all the way to a fight for our all-out survival. Do we have what it takes to rule the galaxy?

  AMP: (At the time of this pub, the first eBook in the series was free. Try it!) Cast a thousand years into the future beyond SODIUM. This eight-book series chronicles the struggles of Don Grange, a simple package deliveryman, who is thrust into an unimaginable role in the fight against our enemies. Can we win peace and freedom after a thousand years of war?

  OMEGA: (At the time of this pub, the first eBook in the series was free. Try it!) An eight book series cast a thousand years into the future beyond AMP. The Alliance is crumbling. When corruption and politics threaten to throw the allied galaxies into chaos, Knog Beutcher gets caught in the middle. Follow along as our hero is thrust into roles that he never expected nor sought. Espionage, intrigue, political assassinations, rebellions and full-on revolutions, they are all coming to Knog Beutcher's world!

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  There's more! Flip the page!

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  HADRON: (At the time of this pub, the first eBook in the series was free. Try it!) An eight book modern day Human survival story. After scientists using the Large Hadron Collider discover dark matter, the world is plunged into chaos. Massive waves of electromagnetic interference take out all grid power and forms of communication the world over. Cities go dark, food and c
lean-water supplies are quickly used up. Marauders rule the highways. One group of citizens takes a stand. Can they make a difference? And the devastating EM waves, where are they coming from? A benevolent species will arrive in their spaceships to rescue the Human race. Only, are they really so benevolent? Is our little corner of the Milky Way a hostile place? With HADRON we're about to find out.

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  ARMS: (At the time of this pub, the first eBook in the series was free. Try it!) An eight book space opera set in one possible Human future. Two thousand years ago humanity fled to the stars to escape an Earth-bound cataclysm. After settling and restarting on two planets, two factions of Humans began to war, a war that went on for almost two thousand years. When the Great War ended in a truce, two Biomarines, Tawn Freely and Harris Gruberg, end up in an impossible situation. Humans aren't prepared for what's coming. Will we survive?

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  There's more! Flip the page!

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  FREEDOM: An eight book adventure about future Man's quest for freedom. For 500 generations Humans have been slaves to the other species of the Markux Empire. We are bought, sold, and traded, our value only measured in credits. Addicted to a drug called Shackle, we exist as little more than worker drones. But a mysterious virus is sweeping through the Human population, altering a gut bacteria and making us immune to the addictive effects of the drug. And with that immunity comes awareness of our condition and a yearning for change. Will the legends of our past be enough to guide us to FREEDOM?