There was no one here. Jimmy could see that immediately, since the shelter was just one long rectangle with no walls separating it into sections—not even any privacy barriers that he could see. The four walls were lined with cots, except for a kitchenette and pantry in one corner and male and female restrooms on the opposite side. A working space occupied a third corner, with two long desks topped with four computers.
“Home sweet home,” Jimmy muttered under his breath, and Vick chuckled from nearby.
The other survivors seemed about as impressed as Jimmy as they trickled into the basement and took in their new residence. This would be bare-bones living, with not much to do other than grow increasingly irritated with each other. He supposed it wasn’t much worse than the close quarters these people had endured since the invasion. Fort Benson hadn’t had enough room to accommodate them all either—not by modern standards, anyway.
Nevertheless, when Chambers and Benson left, along with the others they’d selected for their mission into the Rockies, Jimmy stayed. He didn’t know why, exactly. It wasn’t a conscious decision—just a failure to act until it was too late. Maisie, who Benson and Chambers had entrusted with the only key, locked the door behind them, then slipped the key into her pocket.
A sullen silence fell over those who remained, then. The evening was wearing on, and some climbed into a cot immediately after setting their things down nearby.
Jimmy chose a bed as far from the others as he could get. Maybe after everyone was asleep, he might be able to get away with sparking a bowl, but definitely not before. It would stink up a fair amount of the shelter, though he’d read that places like these were supposed to have pretty good air filtration.
He sat on the edge of his cot and stared into space, waiting for everyone to fall sleep. And one by one, they did. What else was there to do? Everyone was exhausted, and no one expected very much to happen.
Before he’d left, Chambers had instructed them not to leave the shelter under any circumstances. They could decide their next move after he and Benson returned. But until then, it was safest to stay in here with the only entrance locked.
Finally, Maisie turned out most of the lights, leaving only the kitchenette aglow. The last person climbed into their bunk. Jimmy waited five more minutes before hauling his bag onto the thin brown comforter and rummaging through it for his pipe.
Where did the damn thing go? The bag was stuffed full now, of old clothes Benson had given him, some snacks, and some reading material he’d ‘borrowed’ from the wide bookshelf that had been in Benson’s office. He was on the verge of dumping out the contents when someone spoke from beside him.
“Hey.”
Jimmy dropped the bag, barely restraining a shout. The pack fell to the floor, where some rifle cartridges tumbled out.
He looked around to see Tara standing to the right of his bed, wearing an amused smile.
“Uh, hi,” he whispered.
“Come on.” She tilted her head back, toward the shelter exit.
“Come on?” he repeated. “Come on where?”
“Let’s get out of here and go find Max.”
Jimmy furrowed his brow. Find Max? Was that something he wanted to do? Sure, he was worried for the guy, despite having learned his true colors. But actually finding him would also involve finding a bunch of heavily armed government operatives.
He decided to point out the most obvious obstacle to Tara’s suggestion. “The door is locked. Maisie has the key, and there’s no way she lets us leave.”
Tara held up her hand, and something glinted in the dim light coming from the kitchenette. The key.
“How’d you get that?”
“I’ll tell you later. Right now, we have to get out.”
“Why are you so anxious to find him, anyway? You spend one night with him, and now you’re in love? Desperately so—enough to risk your life?”
“I didn’t say that. But I heard Chambers as well as anyone else. He’s basically the Chosen One, right?”
Jimmy frowned.
“Besides, he is a good kisser. Come on, Jimmy. He might need us.”
Jimmy looked into Tara’s beautiful green eyes, striking even in the shelter’s dimness. He sighed. I guess it’s better than dying of boredom in here.
“Yeah, okay. Though I’m not sure how you expect to find a secret government installation buried deep in the Rockies.”
Her grin widened. “Don’t worry. I have a plan.”
44
3 days to extinction
“Earth 2, please confirm all fighters are started with checks performed and ready for scramble.”
“Confirmed, sir,” Major Brianne Lindeman replied over the radio.
Max drew a deep breath. It felt wrong to hear an O-4 refer to him as “sir,” but clearly his pilots were trying to accustom themselves to the new command structure, with him at the top.
All because I have a different type of brain from theirs.
By rights, he should have been a lieutenant colonel in order to be squadron commander, or at least a major. Maybe that had been the hope, originally: that he would have advanced through the ranks enough that he’d know what he was doing by the time the aliens arrived.
Well, that hadn’t happened, and here he sat in command of men and women who’d put in years of hard work to get where they were. Just last month, they would have seemed like demigods to him—a lowly cadet finishing his first year at the Academy. Now, he was expected to command them.
His squadron was currently divided between two hangars, with Flight 1 surrounding his Lark in Hangar A. They were awaiting his order to take off.
“Listen,” he said to the pilots of his squadron—to the lieutenants, captains, and major who’d been placed under him. “I don’t think it’s any use pretending that I have the qualifications or the experience necessary to command this squadron all on my own. Strange circumstances have put me in this position, and if I don’t have your trust, then we won’t be able to operate as a cohesive unit.”
He drew a breath, then expelled it slowly. “It’s fine for me to say that, but right now you have little reason to trust me. That’s why I want to spend what time we have earning your trust. Enough to get the job done, at least.”
“Sir…” It was Lindeman again. “We’ve seen your performance scores from all the combat sims you’ve run, and we’ve been briefed on your high level of competence in multiple areas. We know you’re as good as you can be, given the circumstances.’
Max nodded, though none of them could see the gesture. “I appreciate that, Major. But I’m just smart enough to know that what you just said is effectively meaningless. You still have no sense of me as a leader. You don’t know what it’s like—to take orders from me, or to operate under my command. Maybe you trust me with your heads. Maybe. But to trust me with your guts, you’ll need to see what I’m made of. For that reason, if you hear me give an order that doesn’t seem prudent to you, I want to hear about it.”
Janet’s voice cut in: “You also need to consider whether any pilot questioning you has been compromised by the neural dust and is trying to sabotage you.”
“Yes. But I think I know enough to tell whether I’m being given dangerous advice.”
A brief silence followed his words. Then, Janet said, “Get on with the simulation, please.”
Max frowned. She doesn’t like the team-building, does she? Lindeman had said that she and the other pilots had been briefed thoroughly. No doubt they had. Just as Janet sought to control him, she’d probably found ways to remind his pilots who was really in charge.
But if the pilots in his squadron came to trust him more than they feared her, then whose directives would they follow once they’d left Earth? Janet’s, or his?
She won’t allow me to establish that kind of rapport with them. She’d rather break me and cow them into obeying.
“Okay,” he said. “Let’s do this. The 1st Earth Strike Fighter Squadron will take off momentarily. As so
on as we’re out of the bay, Flights 1 and 2 will break into finger-four formations. It’s unlikely we’ll encounter immediate resistance, since to the best of our knowledge this installation is a secret from the enemy. But I also don’t plan to take any chances.”
No one questioned his orders, or tried to advise him to alter his plan. That was a good start.
“Squadron is go for launch,” Lindeman said.
His curved screen showed the portal at the end of the hangar bay slowly opening, a yawning aperture of light. The first half of Flight 1 accelerated toward it, and in less than a second, they were out.
The speed shouldn’t have surprised him, given what he’d heard about element 115, but he still hadn’t been ready for it. Now, he throttled his own fighter forward. For a split second, the end of the hangar crawled toward him. The next instant, he was rocketing out of it—out of the Colorado mountains, and into the sky.
The landscape shrunk below him. A thick blue beam lanced through the air, missing his Lark by what must have been several meters, but felt more like centimeters.
He toggled his view to show the quadrant that had to contain the beam’ source. A vast saucer was speeding toward his squadron as they accelerated up into Earth’s atmosphere.
Then, it hit him: of course. Denver was to the east. Colorado’s capital. If any nearby city would have one of their ships hovering over it, it was Denver.
Another beam shot out, scattering half of Flight 2 as they took evasive action. The ship’s acceleration didn’t make sense, given its vastness, but it easily kept pace with the Larks all the same. In fact, it was gaining on them. Max’s brain was trying to scream at him, to tell him that this was impossible. He ignored it, focusing instead on his tactical options.
His birds were capable of incredible acceleration, he knew, so they could try to outstrip their pursuer. But even if they could outstrip the saucer—which was a big “if”—it would no doubt chase them to their destination, and cause even more trouble for them as they attempted to take out the mother ship.
That left only one option.
“We have to take that thing out, people. Its beam is emanating from the energy buildup at the bottom. That weapon was designed to attack planetary surfaces from above—not to defend against fighters striking from above it. Let’s teach them something about underestimating humans. I want us to maintain finger-four formations and do everything we can to stay above that ship.”
“Roger that,” said Lindeman, her voice perfectly level. The other pilots echoed the sentiment.
As Max banked, coming around for his attack run, the ship fired again, its energy weapon coming within mere feet of his left wing, this time.
But it hadn’t been aiming for him. The fighter to his left, his Flight Wingman, was blown apart.
“Second Lieutenant Richards is down.” The words appeared in red on his display.
Damn it. “Punch it, everyone. Get on the other side of that beam and rain down holy hell on that thing.”
They did. The remaining fifteen fighters flashed forward, stopping on a dime to turn and start strafing the enormous craft’s upper side with Gatling guns.
The maneuverability afforded by the Larks’ gravity manipulation capabilities was incredible. It seemed to defy the laws of physics. Max thought back to every UFO story Jimmy had ever told him, about crafts that could essentially perform miracles, and he felt foolish for not believing his friend.
I hope Jimmy is safe.
He was letting himself get distracted, and now it appeared the simulation would try to make him pay for it. Smaller craft poured out of four different openings, evenly spaced along the saucer’s circumference.
So they do have a way to defend themselves against attacks from above. At least, the simulation thinks they do.
According to his fighter’s computer, the interceptors outnumbered Max’s squadron almost five-to-one. The enemies raced toward the Lark X-1s, and he realized that finger-four formations were too rigid. Too predictable.
“Everyone scatter,” he said over the radio. “Stay frosty and take those things down one by one. Let’s see what they’re made of before we commit to a more structured approach.”
His pilots broke apart in all directions, and the enemy followed suit, splitting into groups of four or five to hunt down each pilot, harrying them with thin, flickering beams.
Their weapons were lesser versions of the saucer’s, it seemed. They didn’t have the power to vaporize the Larks instantly, but Max didn’t doubt they could take one down in short order if they managed to concentrate their fire.
Luckily, the GDA had clearly chosen the best of the best for the squadron that would carry out Earth’s last stand. Not only that, but the Larks were faster. They flitted around their pursuers, and the predators soon became the prey.
For his part, Max led a formation of the gray interceptors on a merry chase, handily looping back around to take one down with Gatling guns.
Another went down, but the remaining three managed to get behind him again. He hit the brakes, then engaged his rear rotary cannon. Another interceptor blew apart, and the others broke away to seek a better attack vector.
He shouted in triumph—not over the radio, since it wouldn’t do anything for his authority to act like an excited farm boy over his first kills. But he was excited. Screw it, he was pumped. If he wasn’t busy fighting aliens, he would have thrust both fists in the air.
Instead, he scanned for his next target.
So far, no one had wasted rockets on destroying any interceptors, or even the extra Moscovium it would take to leverage gravity weapons. That seemed too big an expenditure to take down the pesky craft—and beside, the things traveled fast enough that there was a good chance of missing.
Better to anticipate the things’ trajectories, lead with the Gatling guns, and blow them apart. So that’s what they did.
“Excellent work, everyone,” Max said over the radio as the last of the interceptor fleet fell apart. “Now, let’s focus on that saucer’s undefended topside. Finger-fours again. Lindeman, I want just your formation to try a gravity cannon run. See what kind of damage you can do.”
“Roger that, sir.”
Lindeman’s fighters came around for their run. To Max’s surprise, the great saucer began to rotate its underside upward, to point into the sky. But why not? If they could defy gravity, there was no reason to keep any side oriented downward.
Lindeman reacted quickly, and the pilots with her followed suit. So did the rest of the squadron—they all accelerated around the ship at top speed, to keep pace and stay on the opposite side from the laser.
The attacking fighters engaged their gravity cannons, blowing four great craters in the saucer’s hull. Infernos sprang up at the impact sites, billowing smoke across the upside-down ship’s surface.
“Good work, Major. Captain O’Hare, your formation’s next. Finish that bastard off.”
But as O’Hare’s fighters moved in, another fleet of interceptors poured out of the same portals as before. This time, their numbers had multiplied: the computer’s tally told him his fighters were outnumbered twenty-to-one.
Two thoughts occurred to Max at the same time. One, he should have had Lindeman’s fighters aim for the interceptors’ exit points. And two, it made no tactical sense for the saucer to withhold so many units until after it took significant damage.
Which meant Janet was cheating.
“All fighters disengage, now,” he said over the radio. But it was too late. The interceptors swarmed, countless blue threads converging on the Lark X-1s. Lindeman’s fighter went down, along with two more in her formation. O’Hare’s blew apart. And then they got Max’s fighter.
Flames licked across his face, which was soon replaced by a black void with the words “Simulation over” shown in red.
He gritted his teeth and said nothing.
Someone pulled the VR glasses from his face, and the set’s left arm scraped across his forehead. Then, hands
were gripping him, pulling him out of the simulator to stand in front of Janet.
“You’re coming with me,” she said coldly.
The pilots remained in their simulators, but Wick and the soldiers filed out with Max as he trailed after Janet. The soldiers all held tranq guns at the ready.
They marched Max down the hall to a sizable office, sparsely decorated. The fighting men took up positions around the room while Janet stood facing him. Wick leaned against the desk just beyond her, wearing a slight smile.
Janet’s eyes were burning coals. “You should have disengaged immediately. Instead, you lost your entire squadron without ever leaving Earth’s gravity well. I’m interested in hearing your excuse for such a colossal mistake.”
“If I tried to disengage, I would have lost pilots. That thing would have kept pace with us and blown us from the sky, one by one.”
“You could have left fighters behind to engage it while the rest of your squadron escaped into space to fly toward the moon. Toward the actual target.”
Max narrowed his eyes. “I’m not going to leave people behind based on the chance it might work out tactically. I won’t waste lives like that. Besides, we would have been fine if you hadn’t cheated.”
Janet’s facial expression remained the same as she stepped forward to backhand him across the face.
He swayed with the blow, but didn’t stagger. His mouth stung as he blinked at the woman, brow lowered. He tasted blood.
She sneered. “That’s the last excuse I’ll hear from you. ‘Cheating’ is a meaningless concept, now. The aliens won’t restrict themselves in any way. They won’t honor any set of rules. There are no rules. They will come at you with everything they have, and they will try to exterminate you. Do you understand what’s at stake?”
“Yes. I do.”
“Good. Then you’ll learn to win, no matter the cost. I intend to make sure of it.”
45
3 days to extinction
Jimmy glanced over at Tara, then returned his attention to the road ahead. “This…is insane.”
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