Soundless Conflicts

by S. Walker

  The whole transformation looked pointless until she noticed movement on the front plates: They were folding. Every six-sided shape folded in half over itself, turning from a smooth almost-circle into a three-pointed prong, every sharp end aimed directly forward along the ship's flight path. Multiplied by thousands of hexagons across the hull it turned the ship from a smooth oval into a forest of thorns, layered dozens deep. Knives, ringing the hull, moving at hundreds of miles per second.

  Jamet tried to imagine what getting hit by that would do and flinched, shying away from visions of eviscerated hulls and blown-out armor plates gouged all the way through. "Dead stars, what kind of attack strategy is that? For anything?"

  "It's a swarm, lieutenant." Siers sounded just as uneasy as she did, but fascinated at the same time. "Each individual piece doesn't matter, just the whole. Every unit is sacrificial, but all of them are adapted to inflict maximum damage for every loss the swarm takes. Just a guess but those plates aren't single use weapons," highlights popped up on her screen, indicating the base of the folded-over hexes. "I think they're meant to come off. Like burrs stuck in skin; damage and an invasion board all at once."

  "So they just... go through anything like a high speed saw?" Janson obviously didn't like the idea. His voice was the equivalent of a vocal frown. "An' even if they don't win, they leave behind boarding drones with those hexes? Who the hell would design something that horrible?"

  "Corporate would." Jamet said it without a moment's hesitation. "If it was cost-effective enough to use? And could be somehow recovered afterward? They'd have fleets of these... no." She got a horrible feeling, goosebumps racing over bare skin. "You don't think?"

  "No." Siers seemed very certain. "I would have heard of something like that. Especially on a scale that endangered entire systems at once. Anything like that I would have spent a great deal of time opposing. But at the same time it's- it's very familiar, somehow." His tone turned dreamlike, vague. "Like I have heard of or seen something like this. With someone, before."

  Emilia's voice blasted everyone's ears. "Holy shit! Look! Look at the pansy!"

  "Tulip?"

  "Whatever!"

  "Proper nomenclature is always... oh." Paul sounded surprised. "That is a rather beautiful thing. And somehow appropriate."

  Jamet wasn't sure what everyone else was doing, but she couldn't look away from the leftmost callout. She watched with wide eyes, mouth open, throbbing arm and cold feet forgotten.

  The Tulip was blooming.

  Facing an army of jagged knives the ship opened like a deadly flower. Curved lines on the hull widened into long, tapered leaves that unfolded gracefully outwards to reveal more layers beneath. They in turn folded back as well, rotating slightly to fill outside gaps until the entire arrangement became a huge dish shape, cupped and held in miles-long, delicate looking streamers. Each broad leaf flexed in ways that defied metallic rigidness, aesthetically scolding the very idea of being held in one place.

  The revealed interior was an immense flat disc of slowly undulating hull, hosting a single titanic column of pearlescent material, miles wide and long, aimed at the incoming swarm in deadly threat.

  "That's a weapon." Jamet had never been more certain of anything in her life.

  "Well no shit, Impossible! Unless it's about to breed that swarm with the universe's longest-"

  "Comms, hush. If you haven't checked for radiation and energy signatures I think now would be a very good time to start. I think we're about to see what they can do."

  On her left side callout the flower ship was brightening, leaves cupping slightly inward as light surged up every edge in a brilliant outline. The light writhed somehow, wavering like heat haze as the tip of every leaf gathered a huge ball of energy, then dipped all at once to touch the central column.

  Jamet's screen whited out. She flinched sideways in shock. "Dead stars!" When it cleared the afterimage of an impossibly thick beam still lived on screen, wisps of white streamers coming off it like steam. At least a third of the swarm was gone: Struck completely out of existence by a thick line of living energy that arced across the system display at the speed of light. She stared in shock. "What the hell is it firing?!"

  Siers answered her, sounding distracted and not completely engaged. "Plasma. It fired raw plasma, but the problem was in how to keep it focused. That was the issue, always was. Couldn't make it work. But who...?"

  "Captain? What?" She looked at the comm link, concerned. "What was an issue?"

  "It sure looked like plasma-- see the smoke-like stuff? That's spillage. Tachyons and strange particles lighting up from solar radiation." It was like someone gave Janson a particularly interesting puzzle. "Huge amount of energy output, wow. Think it's a one shot?"

  "With a hit like that? Who would need a second blast? There'd be nothing left unless you shot a- I don't know! A planet or something!" Emilia audibly whooped. "That thing's going to take care of our whole problem, one BAZOWW at a time!"

  Paul sounded thoughtful. "Tachyons. I wonder: Does that explain our imagery problem? From earlier? Does just having that weapon cause problems with time?"

  Jamet caught movement on her display. "Heads up! It's not over!"

  If the massive hit bothered the swarm they didn't show it. Light sparkled from thousands of glittering points as the formations angled out, then inwards, centered on the flower ship in a gliding wave of edges. They struck like a hurricane of metal, spraying pieces of broken units and shredded hexes in a fan of discarded fragments. Petals took long whip marks of damage, gouged deeper and deeper as every line of drones blurred by in a grinding torrent. Jamet watched in horror as an entire petal sheared off, struck off at the base and spinning away from the soundless conflict in a ten mile long curl of twisting color.

  The ship shuddered in response, leaves slapping outward in motions that seemed languid but crossed hundreds of miles in seconds. The tail end of the drone swarm took the hit and smashed apart, becoming another spray of unguided debris.

  But revenge cost the ship. "Look, at the petal!" Jamet wished like hell she could highlight something using only her feet. "Captain, you were right-- those hexes stick like burrs."

  "I see it," he murmured back over the link. "That must be hundreds left behind every hit. But the question is how much continuing damage can they do? Is there anything beneath to even board?"

  "I have a better question for everyone." Genuine worry seemed to pour over Emilia's voice. "Why is it getting that close at all to begin with? Look at the range on that shot! The ship probably could have sat outside the entire system and blasted things forever."

  "Oh no." For the first time in the last few minutes Jamet was suddenly very, very conscious of where she was. It felt like putting on a wet shirt: Unexpected, cold and slightly worrying. "Um, Janson?"

  "Ma'am?"

  "That was a plasma shot, you said?" She looked down at the workspace, noting callouts for the singularity generator. And right next to those controls was an indicator for the other purpose of the smelter.

  "Actually, cap'n said that. Ah just agreed. Pretty amazin' when you think about it, but why? What's wrong?"

  "Because I think I know why it came in." She eyeballed the display, wishing for the ability to plot courses from a generic console. "Emilia, is it still on course? Still coming directly for me?"

  "I... think so, yes? That's a worrying thought, you might want to get out of there. You know," she sighed. "If you could, I guess."

  "Right. But captain-- I think I called it." She looked down at the controls for the smelting system, waiting patiently to be told to restart. "What are the odds the plasma bottle for the smelter looked enough like their ship drive to make them worry? And then when I turned it off..."

  Siers groaned. "I get it, lieutenant. On sensor that would have looked like destruction."

  "Ohhhh shit." Emilia sounded unhappy. "It's a momma bear."

  On Jamet's console the fight continued, swarms of drones looping around like
a sadistically augmented flight of birds against the flower ship's determined push. The Tulip fought back, smashing waves and getting shredded in return, but never varying from a course directly at the smelter.

  "Well, shit." Was there another lifeboat? Could she jump for it, turn her earlier joke into reality? Would it matter?

  "I think it's coming to save me."

  Chapter 42

  Tense Times

  "Alright, crazy thought here: How about we just run like everything's on fire?"

  "Seriously, Em." Jamet was having trouble focusing. Something about combining adrenaline highs and stress seemed to be making the medication wear off faster. That warm, comfortable quilt of numbness was more like a thin blanket now, thrown over the smoking oven of agony that was her arm. Fear and worry made every reply a biting snap. "If you can't think of anything-"

  "Actually, that is not too bad of an idea." Accidental peacemaker wasn't a role Paul typically played. "We have two opposing forces here, both far out of our ability to handle. Why not hunker down, or leave entirely? Let them fight each other?"

  "Would that work?" Siers seemed to be honestly considering the merits. His quiet voice filled the comm link and bounced off the dirty walls of Jamet's control center. "The Kipper's drive is available, after all. We simply couldn't use it because of the risk. But with those manufacturing drones distracted by the new arrival could we make use of it in the confusion? Escape the system?"

  "Ah, not to throw a wrench in this or anythin', but ah'm currently in a lifeboat? While ah do like you all, especially Em-"

  "Aww, that bought you a free pass." Fake sniffles drifted through the transmission.

  "-ah'm not really interested in dyin' out here while everyone makes a run for it. That's more the LT's thing."

  "It's been less than an hour and already that's going to be a joke?" Jamet shifted slightly, trying to find a position that relieved pressure on her arm. There wasn't any such magical angle or adjustment (of course) but her hindbrain couldn't help it. Something was wrong and instincts as old as humanity kept her moving restlessly in search of comfort. "I really feel like being willing to literally explode for you all should get me some credit. Seriously!"

  "Maybe if you pulled it off, Impossible, but that ship's blasted off." Emilia made whooshing noises. "Since you're sticking around it's gonna be nonstop comments for a loooong while."

  "Back on track, everyone. Lieutenant?" Siers sent an updated system map, all combatants tagged with distance and speed markers. "What are the odds we can pick up Janson's lifeboat and get to you before the fight lands on your doorstep?"

  She eyed it, leveraging less than a week's worth of manual navigation refresher courses. "That's a good question. That new ship? The Tulip? It seems to be much slower than the drones, it's barely over a four thousand miles a second. If that's their top speed even the Kipper could beat it in a straight line." Jamet stuck a leg in the air, then used her heel to slide the system map around. "Uh, just doing math in my head but it looks like fifteen minutes or so before my location becomes a brawl. Someone check that?"

  "Seems correct."

  "Eh, about right. Lifeboat's giving me a little under seventeen, though."

  "Alright. In that case my professional opinion is," the line went silent as everyone metaphorically leaned in, breath held. "It was wonderful knowing you all."

  "Booo!"

  Siers didn't sound amused. "Hush, Comms. Explain that, lieutenant? And please be very persuasive, because I am a moment away from undocking and giving it a serious attempt." A confirmation beep echoed over the line, followed by the tap of an authorization being entered. "In fact I am already shutting down non-essential systems. Paul? Please close down Environmental in case we suffer more boarders."

  "I will need Janson's access for ship bulkheads and hatch closures."

  "Granted. Make a note please, Jackson."

  "...uh. Ah will?" Then, in quiet confusion: "Jackson?"

  "Whoa, hold on! Don't!" Jamet leaned into the console pickup like physical distance would help the argument. "That's not possible-- it took the lifeboat at full burn most of a day to get here. The ship can move a lot faster but you're also talking about doing it by manual navigation, with a casual stop to pick up a lifeboat on the way. How hard do you think that is?" Visions of her failed simulated Kipper ships tearing apart filled Jamet's imagination, spewing pixelated coins and crewmembers across hard vacuum. "Because I'm here to tell you I don't think I could do a drive-by pickup without a ridiculous amount of practice."

  "Understood, lieutenant. I'll be using automated navigation, then. Comms, could you mind plotting a course, if you haven't already..?" More clicks and a ringing confirmation.

  She sped up, distracting herself from a throbbing sensation that seemed to be making the entire room jump in time with her pulse. "Too slow! The automated system would plot an intercept, move there, decelerate for a mandatory five minutes, then coordinate with the lifeboat for an easy coupling." Jamet blew an exasperated breath. "Which takes another ten minutes minimum because of safety systems. By the time the ship turned this way you'd be looking right at a cloud of pieces where the smelter used to be."

  "Well just do it in reverse, then?" The short technician practically added a 'duh' on the end. "Go straight to the smelter, pull the Princess out of her tin castle and turn around."

  Jamet leaned as far to the left as she could, setting a sweat-covered forehead on the skinsuit's forearm. It felt cool, refreshing. Or maybe her face was just burning up. Was it possible to have a fever from a broken arm? Or from too many injections? "Damn this hurts."

  Paul was immediately suspicious. "What hurts?"

  "Doesn't matter. Em, even if you started right this instant it would be something like fifteen minutes just to get here." She took a deep breath and immediately regretted it as everything went fuzzy. "You'd still be going... through docking... when it hit."

  He wouldn't let up. "Jamet. Can you hear me? What hurts? Medications in those kits are exceptionally strong. You should not be feeling anything."

  "Arm. Throbbing, making me dizzy." Stars crossed through the room, diving from the overheads. Moving her head caused afterimages to jump from every surface-- dozens of consoles like ghosts, only coming together into a solid object when she stopped moving. "Everything is jumping around, catching up to itself." Did that make sense? Someone was shouting about explosions now, tone loud and scared. "It's okay. It missed." Jamet tried to be reassuring but everything felt like it was spinning out of sync.

  "What missed?" Paul seemed confused and alarmed in equal measures. "Lieutenant, be completely honest-- did you take the other medications? Because if you used the air cast without-"

  Emilia broke in, yelling. "It's firing again! Look! The ship is lighting up!"

  Jamet lolled her head to one side, fighting through dozens of afterimages until the workspace came into view. It was true: On screen the damaged flower ship was lighting up. Every remaining leaf slowly gathered a limn of white fire that moved like congealed smoke, power smoothly arcing forward from the bright ring at the back of the vessel. Whatever process the Tulip used to charge up was obviously hampered by losing petals; at least four of the huge pieces spun in freefall behind it now in torn segments. Swarm drones buzzed and dove around it like angry insects.

  Its course, however, was undeterred-- still aimed directly at the smelter and the battered co-CEO inside. In fact, it was aiming very directly at it. Janson took control of their shared transmission, sounding extremely concerned. "Uhm, it is about to shoot the LT?"

  "Oh shit! Impossible, that thing is about to blast you!" She could practically hear Emilia's arms waving around. "Get out! Or find something to hide behind!"