Shadows of the Son

by E L Strife

  “One down!” Corin shouted.

  Tanner thrust them skyward as a rocket flared up from a small ground unit. “Damn it. We’re on the same team!”

  “Got another!” Corin bounced excitedly inside his harness.

  Leveling them out at a higher altitude, Tanner scanned the ground. He caught another ship headed for another H.Co. on the other end of the city. “Cutter, twelve-o’clock.”

  The soft whirring of Cutter swiveling in his seat matched the forward movement of the triangle in the gunner’s bubble on Tanner’s screen.

  Kicking them into another dive, Tanner sped them toward the last aircraft. Coming up fast on its tail, he waited for Cutter to take the shot.

  “Take it!” Tanner barked.

  “Something’s wrong!” Cutter replied. “Bank right!”

  Tanner did so without asking.

  Corin grabbed his harness and hung on tight, face screwing up with frightened doubt.

  A torrent of e-bullets ripped through their recent position.

  “I guess Command didn’t give Earth the memo about us using damned collectors!” Tanner shouted back.

  Circling them around, Tanner saw a troop transport approaching H.Co.’s backside. The fourth aircraft had pulled a loop too and was quickly lining up for a shot. For a moment, sunlight slipped over its retro wings exposing a K painted in black under each. Tanner seethed with mounting rancor. I’ve taken more than one poisoned bullet from you shits.

  “Tango maneuver!” Tanner shouted back, sinking them low between the buildings.

  “Roger,” Cutter replied.

  Tanner banked them sharply through an intersection and closed in on the enemy trajectory from the side. Corin wheezed from the change in velocity beside him. Just as the aircraft flitted across their path, a missile’s rocket ignited under a wing. Pulses thumped out from Cutter’s position, and the jet vanished in a plume of fire and smoke, pieces of metal showering the streets below.

  Relief eased Tanner’s hands over the controls, but he knew better than to drop his guard. Tapping the flashing communication request from Bennett on his screen, Tanner pulled them up to patrol a loop around the city, one of Earth’s few oases of precious civilization. “Krage’s enlisted more than we knew about. Four aircraft, late 2200 era.”

  “Copy,” Bennett replied. “I’ll pass the message on to Sergio.”

  A familiar deep voice rattled the speakers. “Seeing some ChromeHoods like we encountered at the Unveiling as well.”

  “Panton?” Tanner spluttered.

  “You didn’t expect me to stay in that damn bed, did you?” he chuckled.

  Tanner smiled. “Not really.”

  “Don’t tell Josie. I don’t want to deal with it.”

  Tanner guided them around a hillside, scanning for any secondary forces like Krage typically hid in the ravines. “Copy. Where are you at?”

  “In the troop transport you just saved. I know it was you. Saw you pull a Tango.”

  Tanner couldn’t hide his smile. It was a relief to know Panton had recovered. The ground forces could use his strength and upbeat sarcasm.

  “Hyras is piloting upfront. We’ve got two improvis—crews to kick the kids out of the hot zones. Send—em off to civilian duty. We drop in five,” Panton said through a bit of static. “Take ‘em down, Sprinkles. And tell Cutie hi.”

  Cutter groaned. “I can hear you, old man.”

  A hearty snort-of-a-laugh barked through. “I figured.” Sirens whined behind his booming voice. “Don’t die, either of you.” Voices shouted indiscernible orders in the background. “I can’t lose another family.”

  “Agreed.” Tanner glanced once more to the dusky troop ship hovering over H.Co. “Jeh corm madra. Go with courage.”

  “What language is that?” Panton asked.

  “Primvera.”

  “Man, you are lovesick.” Panton chuckled. “See y’all on the flipside.” He let out a war cry that faded in a rush of wind, and the transmission clicked off.

  An incoming message from the troop transport popped up on Tanner’s screen with Hyras’s voice. “Thank you for your help.”

  Corin took the controls and pointed them toward the stars. “Mad flying in strong gravity.”

  Tanner had to admit the surge of angry adrenaline was empowering, but unnerving. Using the minutes it took to return to space, Tanner calmed himself with deep breaths and happy thoughts, thoughts of Amianna.

  As Corin parked them alongside Krett, Tanner reinitiated the ArcString pairing process. He was silently relieved they’d made it before the Suanoa had arrived. He honestly hadn’t watched the time. Tanner selected Plasma Test. A flash of blood-orange popped in a string shape between them, tugging their ships a little closer. Tanner and Corin swayed in their seats.

  “Mind merge countdown on your mark,” Tanner called to Krett.

  Bonding with Krett’s mind was like daydreaming but still seeing what was in front of him. Through the window, he saw Krett’s green eyes light up the darkness.

  How are you feeling, Sergeant? Krett asked. I see the change as you see me, you know.

  Later. Tanner selected every system on board, checking its status on the screen before him. If there is a later.

  Jeh Corm Madra.

  “Jeh Corm Madra, sir.”

  “We are equals in this battle, Remmi. Equal in battle, equal in death. Are you ready?”

  “Never am, but I do not let the thought control me, sir.”

  The distant stars distorted, warping inward along a spreading seam. The center bloomed with harrowing reds, stretching until the fire faded beyond the boundaries of their window.

  Corin swallowed audibly next to him, inclining his body for a closer look.

  Tanner’s heart kicked in his chest until he could feel his pulse in his fingertips. It was one thing to read Suanoan code. Bearing witness to the gravity of the symbols and words made Tanner wish he’d been born in a different galaxy.

  Two black spires poked through like wicked pincers, open and ready to slash through anything in the way. The tapered extensions widened before a second and third set broke through. Even under the ripping light of the gate, the surface of their ships reflected almost nothing.

  The radio connection symbol switched off on their screens, and a message appeared.

  You have your assignments.

  Maintain radio silence until Hope commands otherwise.

  May the stars be with you.

  The entering vessel spread to a diameter of thirty kilometers. Tanner’s fingers tensed over the controls. Hundreds of red lights ignited in rows on the underside of the mothership. Smaller ships peeled off like fragments of black glass as if the universe had blown on a mutated dandelion made of obsidian. They fell into ranks of fifty, or so Tanner estimated, taking the little red lights with them. One rank headed for Earth, another for Agutra. The third took up a perimeter around its host.

  Panic squeezed Tanner’s throat.

  “Clear head, clean shot,” Corin mumbled, the stripes on his face paling in the dim dash lights.

  Tanner wasn’t sure if the comment was directed at him, or just a personal reminder from team conversations he’d overheard. It was a phrase UP trained into every sniper to help them maintain their accuracy in battle. Bennett had left him with a different notion; change was sometimes inevitable, and he had to roll with it.

  “Screw it,” Tanner growled. “Bastards deserve what’s coming. Let’s kick some scrawny Suanoan ass.”

  Chapter 45

  THE SLASHGATE DIDN’T CLOSE. Another fifty ships dismounted their host at the rear, trailing like a mechanical tail from the conflagrant portal. From the top of the mothership sprung ten blades of black, taking a different path. From what Bennett could tell as he tracked their movement from Space Station Hope, Agutra was the target.

  It’s what everyone expected, but that didn’t ease his worry. If Suanoa made it onto Semilath, they could take control—and countless lives. It wasn’t a risk
Bennett was willing to take. He couldn’t let Suanoa board Agutra. They would confirm a mutiny when the squadrons attacked.

  His insides chilled at the sight of the black dragon of death closing in on them, the choreography eerily precise. Every ship moved as if they were all of one mind.

  The screen before Bennett showed the wristband codes of every living shepherd and doku on the left. The right side, Final Mission Complete, was empty.

  Above Bennett hung glass panels displaying video feeds from satellites and headsets worn by squadron leaders. Commander Lee stood to Bennetttt’s right, monitoring formations of their fleet. Miskaht was in charge of communications systems and stood to Bennett’s left. Glato had positioned himself to her other side and watched the festering wound in space. Beyond Glato was Teek, responsible for maintaining the connection with Agutra. Three Hope shepherds sat at engineering stations before them. All others were tasked to Hope’s guns and dock stations.

  Screeches overlaid garbled sounds from Agutra’s communications link. Bennett tried to listen to the language he’d heard before, in Interrogation when Atana was unconscious.

  “That’s not one we have on file,” Miskaht said behind Bennett. “I don’t need to look to know.” Opening a channel to Agutra, she asked, “Any idea what they’re saying?”

  “I can’t find Paramor.” Azure huffed as if he were running down the stairs. “Cutashk! Cutashk, I need you to translate!”

  Glato looked over at Bennett. “I thought you said Tanner and Atana could translate the code.”

  “System code isn’t spoken voice.” Bennett replied. “Only a handful of Elite Healers and Saemas know Suanoan language.”

  “At least they think it’s Suanoa who took over,” Teek remarked, studying Agutra’s active schematic on his screen.

  Tiny explosions lit up the sky through the windows of Space Station Hope. They spread through the drifting grid of Agutra’s empty containers—a carefully planned passive attack. Bennett wasn’t kidding himself into celebrating. It was a minefield he’d had the maintenance workers of Agutra set up. Only two Linoan fighters made it through. It was a small victory, and it looked like an accident. No weapons were fired. No personnel were present.

  A pinhole of white light caught Bennett’s attention. From underneath the Slashgate, one UP ship arced toward the belly of the mothership.

  Glato rested a hand on Miskaht’s shoulder. “Mavene must’ve latched onto a fighter.”

  Every being in the room stood quiet and attentive to the view of the battlefield outside the radial windows. Fighters dove from the tail, chasing the single ship, spraying red missiles.

  “She’s not going to make it.” Miskaht reached as if to tap on her screen.

  Bennett caught her hand. “Radio silence or we give away our position.”

  Miskaht’s lips parted in despair, but she relented, knotting her hands together instead.

  The tiny ship hooked upward toward black tentacles, which swirled like layers of metal pinwheels in a storm. Fighters flocked around her like sharks on fresh meat. A cluster of blue electricity shot out from her nose, an EMP to keep the fighter, whose access codes Bennett figured she leached off of, subdued. The second she was through, Mavene’s ship released the fighter, the Kyra’s shield disbursing friendly Linoan fire in red shockwaves. It had been a last-minute plan of hers, one Bennett disapproved of at first, until Miskaht described the potential impact.

  “The bomb is jammed from entry! It won’t release,” Mavene called out. After several breaths, she sent one last static-laced transmission. “It was always a suicide mission, Miskaht. Long live freedo—”

  Through Hope’s observation window, a tiny pop of light was visible between the lower tendrils of the Kyra. Mavene’s code blinked three times on Bennett’s main screen then solidified under the heading: Final Mission Complete (FMC).

  Miskaht gasped, frantically scanning the dark sky. “It didn’t work?” She covered her mouth with her hands and looked away.

  “Cutter doesn’t make mistakes,” Bennett said, doing his best to portray confidence he didn’t feel but knew others needed. “Neither do you. Must have a harder exoframe than we—”

  The ship sunk inward just enough to catch his eye. Bennett lashed a hand around Miskaht’s arm, and she peeked out at the sky. Streaks of green and gold sliced through the vessel at angles. The mothership opened up like a necrotic black flower.

  Teek laughed in disbelief.

  Miskaht nodded subtly as if deep in thought. “Note for the future: rhizoras coated cluster bomb with shape-charges. I wish we could’ve made more.”

  “They won’t fall for it twice.” Bennett looked down at his screen as two more codes blinked to life in the FMC column—one doku, one shepherd. Hot prickles squeezed his stomach until he read the codes and realized they were not from his team. Still, he watched with a heavy heart.

  “Four imperial ships evaded the minefield,” Commander Lee reported. “Domer and Bradley took out three before they were spotted.”

  “What are they doing?” Glato asked, directing to the remaining fighters of the Kyra ship as they broke off of their courses and regrouped at the entrance to the gate.

  Teek slid open a video feed on his screen, expanding it to show the two points of the second Kyra pierce through the portal’s edge. “Awaiting link to new Suanoan host. Remember, it’s why we had to make mods so we could move freely in battle.”

  Tracking the single imperial ship on Commander Lee’s screen, Bennett signaled Miskaht with a nod. “Romeo is closest. Time to break our silence.”

  Miskaht selected the squadrons on her screen. “Romeo, Hope. Imperial on approach from Agutra. You are clear to fire.”

  The debris ring around Earth flickered orange. The Suanoan ship’s dot on the Commander’s screen blinked and disappeared.

  Linoan fighters poured in from the Slashgate, advancing back into Earth’s orbit. Kyra Ones’s fighters congregated with them. Their grouping tightened and changed course, heading for Earth’s debris ring, where Romeo and Mike ships hid.

  Bennett took charge of the coms from his screen, calling out, “Romeo Squads, go dark! Go dark!” The subtle glow of hot guns faded. He knew their heat signatures would still give them away. “Mike squads, vent!” From containers recalled from Earth, clouds of soil and water sprayed out. “All teams, retreat to Stage Two formations!”

  The same screeching language played out over Agutra’s com feed, but this time with a soprano tone.

  Cutashk’s thicker Mirramor accent filled the silence. “I am Marlit, first born of Klethir, imperial ruler of Zephyr Station. Respond!”

  Peeps from the console in front of Commander Lee made Bennett look. Agutra’s maintenance ships—M45s—and Earth’s ArcStrings were in Stage Two positions.

  Marlit’s noisy rant continued as did Cutashk’s translations. “You have killed apogee Jutsha and his aimids. Prepare to be boarded, Semilath. If you do not surrender, we will destroy your fields and capture your survivors to be taken to Zephyr for interrogation and punishment!”

  A rumble from the speakers made Bennett wonder if Azure had laughed or growled.

  Linoan fighters in the hundreds closed in on Earth, filtering through the clouds as the nose of the third Kyra crested the fiery gate.

  Miskaht pressed a finger to her headset. “Ground forces, fighters on approach!”

  “ArcStrings, cut them down! Mike squad Alpha, EMPs!” Bennett directed to the fleet. “Focus on keeping them away from Agutra and the surface!”

  Bennett watched on Commander Lee’s illuminated schematics as sixteen M45s sank themselves into the rear of the Linoan clusters racing toward Earth. Lights off, using only pneumatic releases to adjust their positioning, they were completely invisible to the naked eye. The infrared scanners barely noted the distortion on the Commander’s screen.

  Another display hanging in front of them showed a different angle of Earth’s orbit and the three pairs of ArcStrings approaching clusters of
Linoans. A beam of plasma ignited between a pair. Tanner- Krett appeared in the center of the map—a warning Tanner had insisted on programming at the mere thought of killing a fellow shepherd he couldn’t see. The other pairs followed suit at the last second, spreading out and initiating their spirals.

  A smattering of blue sheet-lightening crawled over the Linoan fighters around Mike-alpha ships. This was the most daring and dangerous move Bennett had planned. M45s didn’t have shields. If an EMP unit bounced back at them or didn’t release, they’d lose power, and the pilots would freeze to death in minutes or crash to Earth. Ronux was flying one of them.

  Three strings of red light stretched apart like opening nooses onscreen, spinning as they drilled through clusters of Linoans approaching from Kyra Three. Bennett couldn’t help the spike of worry for Tanner.

  As fast as they had lit-up and consumed, the ArcStrings darkened and disappeared. Linoan ships broke apart and tumbled into one another, taking out other ships that couldn’t dodge the fallout. Groups of fighters peeled off in chains, curling around to hunt. Propulsions systems glowed brighter, and guns painted red stripes between the stars.

  Bennett checked another video feed. “They’re breaking off, ArcStrings. You’re going to lose enemy-concentration. Again!”

  The M45s moved forward as they tagged Linoan fighters with their EMP discharges, sending them plummeting to Earth. They managed sixty-eight before the Linoans left formation and circled for the attack.

  “Mike-alpha, on your six!” Bennett shouted. “Retreat; retreat!”

  Three explosions, like tiny fireworks in the sky, led six wristband codes dropping one after another on Bennett’s screen.

  The sight of the numbers sent a pang through Bennett’s core. Damn it! No!

  One M45 kept on course, chasing the fighters into Earth’s atmosphere.

  What are they doing? Bennett watched as the other ships, including Ronux’s, veered off. Pulling up the assignment chart on his screen, he called out, “You’re too low, Reyin! Pull up! You’re not ground worthy!”

  He got no response as the M45 sped toward a trail of Linoan fighters, taking out another nine before disappearing in a plume of red plasma.