Kali's Doom
Page 20
“We’re within the ring’s arch.” Sonja checked their distance. “Oh shit. We’re thirty meters away.”
She pushed the throttle to max, and they accelerated away. Cody watched their distance. Forty, fifty, sixty. On top of that, the torpedoes were still incoming.
“Five seconds to impact,” Cody said.
The ring flared, and the canopy polarized to compensate for a flash brighter than the local star. The hopper’s sensors went haywire, showing electromagnetic readings and gravimetrics spiking beyond what any ship should survive.
Cody bounced within the straps of his seat as the hopper’s hull groaned and creaked. Sparks showered from the rear of the hopper, and an alarm sounded. Through the mass of confused readings on the HUD rose a message: Hull Integrity Critical.
The hull groaned more loudly than Cody had ever heard. He clenched his jaw, wishing he had his flight suit on and could retract his helmet in case of a breach, but they hadn’t had time to put them on yet. That meant as soon as the hull cracked or the canopy split, he was a dead man.
And Sonja would die with him.
~~~
Jericho watched as the flash vanished, along with the monstrous ring.
On the hologlobe, the torpedoes flew erratically, struggling to find new targets. His fleet was still too far away for the torpedoes to target them, and if any did lock onto them, they would likely run out of fuel before they could impact any ship in the fleet.
But that didn’t concern him at the moment. “Where is Banshee One Eight? Did she make it?”
“No sign of her, sir,” the sensor operator said. “Can’t tell if she was destroyed, due to all the debris from the control center.”
“Let’s pray they made it,” Jericho said. “I want a firing solution on those ships. Fire as you have—”
One by one, the toad vessels vanished from the hologlobe.
“What the hell is going on?” Jericho turned around and faced the bridge. “Tactical. Where are they?”
A visual came up on the hologlobe, showing a close-up of the Kali fleet. A distortion wrapped around each ship. Jericho recognized it as an Alcubierre field. Seconds later, the ships vanished. At first, he thought they were cloaking, but then the Kali ships wouldn’t be able to see the fleet or even each other. Also, Jericho didn’t think the toads had the cloaking technology used by the Reed Entity. On the other hand, the configuration of the field was within normal limits.
After a few seconds of frantic searching, the tactical officer’s eyes bulged. “Sir, they engaged their Daedalus drives. They’re headed for Kali Prime.”
Jericho nodded with respect. That took guts. Using a Daedalus drive in system was tricky, like hitting a fastball in one’s living room. Incredibly precise calculations and planning would land a ship where it needed to be. Otherwise, the interstellar traveler would end up hitting something, which would be the end of said ship.
If they can do it, so can we. Jericho straightened his jacket. “How fast can you calculate a course to Kali Prime via Daedalus drive?”
The ensign at navigation stared at the admiral, startled, but with one look from Jericho, he regained his composure. “Two minutes, sir.”
“Send the order to all ships,” Jericho said. “Stand by to engage Daedalus drives. Set course for Kali Prime.”
~~~
The shaking stopped suddenly, and the light vanished. The canopy depolarized, revealing the blackness of space. Planet Kali sat just along the edge of the canopy.
Cody ignored the fact that he and Sonja were the first humans to travel through a wormhole. “Hon, are you all right?”
She gave a quick nod. “Yeah. That was weird.”
Cody brought up a damage report. “Reactor needs repairs from when you pushed her. Some more scarring on the hull from when we left the control facility. This thing is really going to need that paint job. Hull integrity is still intact, though.”
“That’s good to hear. Did the ring make it?”
He brought up sensors and did a sweep. He immediately picked up the ring, hovering some twenty thousand kilometers from Kali Prime in an orbit that was stable at the moment. It needed to remain stable only long enough for the fleet to arrive and activate the system, which would be a few hours.
They didn’t have a few hours.
Gravimetrics picked up one, then two, then dozens of bogeys, all a good five hundred thousand kilometers away. The hopper’s sensors immediately recognized them as Kali-style ships. Each ship folded its Daedalus struts and accelerated toward the planet.
“Shit.” Sonja tracked their course. “They’ll be in range of the ring long before the fleet gets here. Then they’ll destroy it.”
“They’ll do more than that.”
Cody zoomed in on three ships in a triangular configuration. They were anchored to a large, dark sphere, and the three ships accelerated slowly toward Kali Prime.
“That’s what they used on the neutron star.” Cody shook his head. “I thought it was destroyed by the Spicans.”
“Guess they had a spare.” Sonja maneuvered the hopper. “We’d better get out of here.”
Cody stared at the planet below as it came into view. “Hey, what happened?”
The red haze had vanished, replaced by the familiar yellow sky from the time before the Reed Entity had poisoned the planet, when humans first saw Kali. Not perfect, not without fault, but at least lively.
“I’m detecting life forms,” Cody said. “From what I can see, they’re the similar to life present before the change.”
On the HUD, lidar picked up the Hive hovering in orbit. Whatever it, and Stripe, wanted to do, they would do it before the fleet arrived.
A thought occurred to Cody. Deveau’s codes couldn’t possibly work. The ring was new, and his codes likely wouldn’t have been part of any security measures. But Cody didn’t have any other ideas.
Cody pinged the control beacon of the ring and received a response. He entered Deveau’s access code. Green text popped up: Access Granted.
“What?” Sonja shook her head. “How?”
“The Reed Entity, maybe,” Cody said. “Maybe it knew… whatever. I can activate the ring, but it’ll take time.”
Sonja maneuvered away, setting a course for Kali’s moon. “I hope you can do it while we’re on the run because I’m not sticking around.”
Cody ran through the command structure. Activation was straightforward. The coordinates, for a location farther away than Cody had ever seen, had already been inserted. The problem was that the ring had to expand and align itself around both the planet and the moon. It might be ready before the toads arrived, but not before the Hive did whatever it was going to do.
Cody started the sequence, and the ring expanded, the plates growing farther and farther apart but maintaining a circular pattern. Soon, they’d be far enough apart to encompass Kali Prime and her moon.
Sonja accelerated away from the planet. “Think they’ll make it?”
Cody didn’t know if she meant the planet or the fliers on board the Hive. The comm chimed before he could ask.
Stripe’s visage appeared on the HUD before Cody could answer. “You are trying to save our world.”
“Yes,” Cody said. “And your world is no longer poisoned.”
“Yes, and that is well.” Stripe’s wings ruffled briefly. “However, the toads will end it all.”
Numbers appeared on the HUD. The ring’s control system had calculated the time necessary for it to get into position, accounting for gravitation, motion of the moon around the planet, motion of the planet around the star, and hundreds of other vectors. It would take a little less than half an hour.
The toads would arrive long before that.
“I’m sorry.” Cody kicked at the control console, making the holocontrols flutter. “Goddamn it. I thought…”
“You did what you could, and I thank you,” Stripe said.
“You’re not going to destroy the planet?” Sonja asked.
“What deal?” Cody asked.
The sensors alarmed again. Multiple contacts lit up gravimetrics as ships appeared out of nowhere and came to a complete stop between the planet and the approaching Kali fleet.
“The cavalry,” Cody said.
The large, spine-covered Spican vessels drifted through space toward the Kali vessels. The toads outnumbered the Spican ships, but the Spicans were bigger and, as all humans knew, highly aggressive when the mood struck them. The Spicans and toads were already exchanging torpedoes.
“Funniest looking cavalry I’ve ever seen,” Sonja said. “But it’ll do.”
The comm chimed, and a Spican spoke in its hollow, human-imitation voice. “Fly to the far side of this planet’s moon and proceed outside the range of the transportation ring. Your brothers will arrive shortly.”
Sonja laughed out loud. “Understood. Happy hunting.”
“Hunting is always joyous.” The signal from the Spicans cut out.
“Things unfold as they should,” Stripe said. “Such is the way of the universe.”
Stripe’s face vanished from the HUD.
“Cryptic.” Sonja continued to accelerate toward the moon. “I’m going full burn. They’re going to see us anyway, no matter what we do.”
“What about the planet?” Cody asked. “What if they get that weapon in range of the planet before the ring is set?”
“Nothing we can do about that in a hopper. The best we can hope for is—”
An alarm sounded, followed by red text: Target Lock.
The HUD counted several dozen, one of which had peeled off from the rest and maneuvered toward the hopper. Whether that was by accident or design didn’t matter.
“Oh shit.” She activated the comm. “Spican fleet, Spican fleet, this is Banshee One Eight. We have torpedo lock on. Request assistance.”
The response came back several seconds later, the delay probably due to distance: “We will assist you.”
“Much thanks. Please hurry.” Sonja swiped at the comm then dropped the throttle until the engines cut out.
“What are you doing?” Cody stared at the holoconsole. “We have to get away from those torpedoes.”
“They’re attracted to the gravity drive,” Sonja said. “I can’t get behind the moon before they reach us. Shutting off the drive is our only option.”
But the shutdown didn’t help. The torpedo continued on its course. Cody knew little about torpedoes, other than that they made a big boom when they went off. The fact that the torpedo was still approaching meant it had the hopper on lidar.
“It was worth a shot.” She slammed the throttle to max, and the hopper jumped forward. She banked the hopper toward the torpedo barrage. “Maybe I can get inside the torpedo’s turning radius.”
Torpedoes were so fast they couldn’t make very sharp turns. Still, trying to outmaneuver a torpedo was gutsy, but he couldn’t see any other option.
Cody’s eyes widened. There was another possibility.
He pulled up fire control. At once, the hopper targeted the incoming torpedo, and he fired. The HUD traced the path of the graser around the dodging torpedo. How it knew the path of light-speed weapons fire, Cody had no idea. Either it detected the power buildup on the graser’s port, or it was simply dodging according to programming written by someone he would never meet. Whatever the case, the torpedo was damn hard to shoot down.
“I can’t get it.” Cody hoped those wouldn’t be his last words.
~~~
The journey from Kali VIII to Kali Prime was the longest two minutes of Jericho’s life.
For the entire trip, the viewing globe showed sparkling lights caused by ionized particles mixing with the Alcubierre field. He’d seen such a display more times than he could count, but this trip had a more dazzling show than any other. Inside a star system were tons of ionized particles, which was why navigators avoided using Daedalus drives in system.
The countdown hit zero, and the field dropped. Jericho let his breath out slowly at the sight of Kali Prime on the main hologlobe. Surrounding the planet was the ring, which was expanding. The individual ring-plates were separated by thousands of kilometers. Soon, they would be far enough apart to encompass the entire planetary system and whisk Kali Prime away to a part of the galaxy no human had ever been.
Jericho smiled. Good work, Dr. Brenner.
The cheers across the bridge were short-lived as the Tokugawa came about. Spican vessels had engaged a good three dozen toad ships. They couldn’t have been at each other’s throats for long, but one Spican vessel was already burning, not that this kept it out of the fight. Spicans were like that.
“Why are they bothering?” Jericho stroked his chin. “The gamma-ray burst will kill the toads anyway.”
Then he saw it. The hologlobe had flagged a grouping of three ships in the distance, and between them was another black sphere.
Jericho turned away from the globe to his sensor operator. “Can the ring wrap around the planetary system and begin transportation before the Antediluvian device comes into range?”
After a pause, the sensor operator answered, “Negative, sir.”
“Then let’s get in there and help our friends!” Jericho shouted the order loud enough to be heard across the bridge. “Group three, assist the Spicans. Groups one and two will go after the sphere.”
Everyone followed their orders eagerly. Jericho just hoped that enthusiasm would last through the battle. The toads had a lot of ships.
~~~
Cody was bracing for impact, wishing he had already told Sonja the words he wanted to say, when out of the corner of his eye emerged a massive, jagged object. Lidar hadn’t picked it up, and neither had gravimetrics, despite the fact that the speed of the monstrosity meant it had to be using gravity drives.
“Where the hell did that come from?” Sonja asked.
Cody could only shake his head as he watched the Hive place itself between the incoming torpedoes and the hopper. The torpedoes crashed into the surface but didn’t detonate.
“Contact.” Sonja pointed at the HUD. “My God.”
A Kali ship had broken off from the main engagement and was on an intercept course. A barrage of torpedoes traveled ahead of the Kali ship, which were quickly closing the distance.
“I can’t dodge all of those,” Sonja said. “And there’s no way we can shoot… The hell?”
The Hive altered course again, far too quickly for any ship. For a moment, Cody thought the Hive would intercept the torpedoes. Instead, it accelerated directly toward the hopper.
Sonja went to full burn, but the engines cut out. She pounded the throttle, but nothing happened, as if the engines had simply been switched off.
The Hive blotted out the local star as it approached.
~~~
Cody blinked several times in the bright light, just wanting to go back to sleep. But someone kept shaking him.
“Cody?” Sonja shook him again. “Hon? Please tell me you’re okay.”
The polarization filters in his eyes helped him adjust to the brightness quickly as he sat up. “Where are we?”
“On the Hive, it looks like.” Sonja pointed. “Not sure how we got here. One minute, we were in space with grav plates at max. The next, my drives are shut down, and we’re here.”
Outside the hopper was the interior of the Hive. In the distance, fliers took to the air and circled the plateau for a moment then approached the hopper.
Sonja unstrapped herself. “We didn’t go through one of the docking ports, that’s for sure.”
Cody followed Sonja out the rear hatch. Five fliers circled and landed some ten meters away. Four stood in place, their wings folded, while the fifth, Stripe, hobbled closer.
“What’s going on?” Cody asked. “How’d you get control of the Hive?”
Stripe held out the small sphere he had fo
und when Cody was last aboard.
“I understand now.” Stripe’s voice came from the sphere. “This place… You found it at the edge of our star system.”
“Near the heliopause, yes,” Cody said. “When we learned this facility could duplicate any environment, we brought it here to house your people.”
“Then you know where it came from, don’t you?”
“It came from here.” As soon as Cody said it, everything made sense. “Your ancestors built this place, didn’t they? That’s why it responds to you.”
Stripe gave a very humanoid nod and fluttered his wings. “We have a history that dates back long before your people discovered fire. I am rediscovering that history myself. But first…”
Stripe waved a wing at empty space, and a shimmering curtain of colors appeared, flashing across a four-meter square area then forming into images. An image of Kali Prime appeared. In the distance, several ships were engaged in combat. They were far too distant for Cody to tell which were fleet and which were toads, or even which ones were Spican.
“Two species work together to save ours.” Stripe lowered his wing, but the image remained. “For this, we cannot repay you. But what will happen must happen.”
“You know about the gamma-ray burst,” Cody said, “don’t you?”
“Of course. It will arrive very soon. And you must be gone by then.”
“And you know what we are trying to do,” Sonja said. “Are you going to stop us?”
Stripe regarded Sonja for a moment. “What will happen must happen.”
Cody was getting tired of the old-man-on-the-mountain wisdom. On the visual, three ships approached the planet. He walked closer to the image, and it zoomed in on the three ships. Cody caught his breath. The three ships carrying the black sphere had gotten very close to the planet.
Cody turned to Stripe. “Can you stop them?”
“Your people are doing just that,” Stripe said. “We, on the other hand…”
The planet grew larger, and the ships fell out of view. Soon, Kali Prime filled the entire view, and Cody could make out distinct cloud formations.