In exchange, however, they destroyed every single drone, leaving the Crucible defenseless, except for its own weapon emplacements.
As they reached weapons range with the station, waves of light blue medium lasers flickered out, raking through the Vulture’s formation in flashing lines.
But all the less-skilled pilots had been weeded out already, and these Vultures knew better than to fly in a straight line. None of those lasers found their mark.
Darius activated his comms and said, “All fighters, neutralize enemy gun emplacements. This is just like what we practiced. We’re almost through this.”
The double clicks of acknowledgments echoed inside Darius’s helmet as he targeted one of the station’s weapon emplacements.
In between executing evasive maneuvers he let off a few linked-fire bursts and watched on a magnified target camera as the lasers burned molten holes through the turret he’d targeted. The weapon emplacement didn’t explode, but it stopped firing. Darius targeted the next one in line and repeated the process.
With more than twenty-five remaining Vultures all doing the same thing, the Crucible was left utterly defenseless in a matter of seconds—except for the guns hidden on the other side of it—but as they approached, the station rotated, and they picked off those guns, too, leaving only the ones on the underside of the station.
Tanik’s gravelly voice came over the comms just before Darius could wonder about whether or not they should try to take out those guns as well. “Crack open those hangars. Our boarding teams are launching in five minutes.”
“Yes, sir,” Darius replied, and brought up a detailed target display in order to select the doors of one of the Crucible’s hangars as a sub-target. Unlike the Deliverance, this station didn’t have its hangars hidden away behind five decks worth of vehicular airlocks and launch tubes. Instead, the Crucible’s hangars were mounted along the outer hull, with nothing but armored doors guarding them from space.
“All squadrons, target hangar doors with Hornet missiles,” Darius ordered. “One missile per hangar. Mark your targets, and make sure you don’t double up. We’re not trying to crack the whole station open, understood?”
“This is understand,” Ike said, and Ra voiced his consent as well. Blake was still quiet, but Darius assumed that was because he was angry over Lisa’s death, and not because he wasn’t listening.
A moment later, however, he was proven wrong as Blake opened fire with not one, but two Hornet missiles.
“The hell?!” Darius muttered. “Red One, disarm those missiles immediately!”
“What? Why?”
They were only seconds from reaching the station.
“Just do it!”
But it was too late.
Blake’s missiles hit with a titanic boom and an accompanying flash of light. They ripped open that entire side of the Crucible, leaving decks exposed and debris flying free with the angular momentum imparted by the station’s rotation. Darius zoomed in on the damage and saw that some of the debris wasn’t debris at all.
It was bodies.
Chapter 57
Darius blinked in shock at the sight of the tumbling, flash-frozen dead. His heart was in his throat with the thought that one of them might be Cassandra. “Blake, you fekking idiot! I said one missile!”
“I...” Blake trailed off. “I didn’t hear you. I just... I thought...”
“You were in the sim runs! You know the drill!”
“I know. I didn’t check.” Blake’s voice was shaking. “I just fired...”
“Get back to the Deliverance, now! Black Leader, you are now in charge of Red Squadron.”
“Understood,” Ra replied.
“Deliverance, we need emergency rescue and recovery at the Crucible. I’ve got...” Darius scanned his contacts panel to check how many people were out there, but their life signs were fading fast.
“It’s too late,” Flight Ops replied. “There’s no hope for any of them, Commander.”
“You can’t say that! People can survive exposure to vacuum for a few minutes!”
“A few minutes. Not fifteen or twenty. There’s no way we’ll get to any of them in time. Carry on with your mission and fly cover for the transports. Ops out.”
Darius glared furiously at the drifting bodies spinning away from the Crucible, and shook his head. He zoomed in on them one after another to see the frozen, horrified faces of children: human children, alien children... Cygnian children.
Some of them had glowing triangles with glaring eyes on their wrists. Others bore the sickle-shaped Seal of Death.
Darius’s heart was pounding so hard he was afraid he would have a heart attack.
Then he realized something. Tanik had said that Cassandra was going to be a Revenant. That was how he’d been able to sense that she was on the Crucible. Revenants bore no such marks on their wrists, because they were never sent back to the USO. These were the tributes who’d been selected to return to the USO because they had no active ability to touch the ZPF.
Darius let out a shaky breath and shook his head. Cassandra was still alive. He could have jumped for joy. But then he remembered that those dead children had all meant something to someone. They’d all had their lives snuffed out in an instant because of one trigger-happy idiot. Darius scowled. He couldn’t bring himself to feel very sorry for the Cygnian children, but the others... they were all floating there together, hunters and hunted alike.
Darius watched Ospreys full of Marines jetting out to the shattered hangars of the Crucible, and he thought about the firefight that was about to ensue aboard that station. Cassandra was still on board the Crucible. How easy would it be for her to become the victim of another friendly fire incident?
Apprehension swirled for an indecisive second in Darius’s brain, and then he slammed the throttle forward, aiming his Vulture for the nearest hangar.
“Flight Ops to Blue Leader, return to your flight group.”
Darius shook his head, but said nothing.
“Flight Ops to Blue Leader, you are not authorized to board the Crucible. I repeat, you are not—”
Darius muted the comms and jacked the throttle up another notch. “Authorize this, Kakker.”
Then he felt a pang of guilt for his dereliction of duty and sent a message to Ra. “Black Leader, you’re the CAG now.” Having said that, Darius muted his comms again. Ra could handle things from here on out.
* * *
By the time Tanik Gurhain’s Osprey landed aboard the Crucible, he felt like an empty shell—brittle, and cracking from the strain of exerting himself so much in such a short time. He needed to rest, to meditate and recover. He couldn’t take this for much longer.
But he also couldn’t entrust this mission to Marines. They wouldn’t even know what to look for. He opened his acceleration harness and was about to stand up, when he realized that he’d fall over if he tried. Even in a suit of power armor, the simulated gravity of the station was too much to resist.
There was a logistical problem with their boarding operation. The direction of the station’s gravity was space-ward, meaning that the floor of the station was situated along the outer hull—the same outer hull that the Vultures had just blasted open with missiles. As a result, they’d landed on one of the walls of the hangar, which meant that walking around inside the Osprey was like walking up and down the sheer face of a metal cliff. Getting around in the hangar outside would be the same, but Tanik had actually prepared for that. He and his Marines were all equipped with zero-G thruster packs. The one thing Tanik hadn’t considered, however, was how he was going to get himself down from the cockpit to the rear airlock. It was now a fifteen meter drop, straight down, with half a standard G of gravity tugging him down.
Tanik considered the problem. He couldn’t fire his thruster pack inside the Osprey. He could, however, draw on the source field to cushion his fall. But what would the Marines waiting in the troop bay think of that?
He didn’t relish the thoug
ht of exerting himself still further to suppress their shock and subsequent confusion. He’d exerted himself enough already in order to shield the Deliverance from that torpedo exploding above its hull—not to mention the constant effort it took to keep the crew under control.
But then again, why bother to ease the Marines’ shock? He wouldn’t need to hide for much longer, anyway. Let the rumors spread.
Tanik climbed out of the pilot’s chair and left his feet to dangle directly above the cockpit door. Then he opened the door and let go, dropping straight down.
He landed with a boom on the rear airlock doors, and the entire squad of Marines turned to stare at him in unison. They were in the midst of carefully helping each other down from their own positions along the walls of the Osprey.
“Captain... are you okay?” the squad sergeant asked.
“I’m fine, thank you, Sergeant. Let’s go.” Tanik opened the airlock doors and jumped down inside. He waved the Marines down, and they joined him after just a moment. They were all still staring at him like he was a ghost.
Tanik shut the inner airlock doors above their heads, and then turned to the sergeant. “Ready?” he asked.
“Yes, sir,” the sergeant replied.
Tanik cycled the airlock open and they all fell out, sailing straight down to the starry blue nebula below.
Then they activated their thruster packs and used them to guide their fall to the ruined remains of the hangar doors. They landed on the mangled edge of the door frame, right beside a regular-sized crew access door. It was sealed, and they couldn’t afford to just blast it open with the hangar currently bathed in vacuum.
Tanik turned to find the pair of Marines carrying a chest of equipment between them. Inside was an inflatable airlock, a cutting torch to get through the doors, and half a dozen pressure suits for any tributes they might find and rescue aboard the Crucible.
Tanik nodded to the Marine sergeant. “Get those doors open.”
“Yes, sir,” the sergeant replied, and then began snapping orders at his squad.
Chapter 58
Darius picked the nearest hangar, one where he’d already seen an Osprey land, since he didn’t have any breach equipment with him, let alone a portable airlock. He matched speed to the rotation of the station and then carefully flew in through the ruined doors of the hangar. He hovered inside the hangar for just a second, using his maneuvering jets to maintain the same angular trajectory as the station (essentially flying in a circle) while he tried to figure out where to land. He couldn’t land beside the Osprey, because he didn’t have a thruster pack like the Marines who’d been specially equipped for this mission. But...
Darius spied a group of Marines in the far corner of the hangar, standing on the jagged, mangled remains of the hangar doors. They were busy setting up their portable airlock. Darius noticed an empty space on the wall above their heads that looked just big enough for his Vulture, and he used his fighter’s maneuvering jets to line up with it, making sure his cockpit was as close to the ground as possible. Marines looked up and pointed at him as he came into their line of sight, but Darius ignored them. He extended his fighter’s mag clamps and docked it to the wall. Finding the portable oxygen tank under his chair, he connected it to his suit. That done, he carefully released his acceleration harness, taking care to grab the bars so he wouldn’t fall straight out. Clinging to the two halves of his harness, he strained to hit the open/close button for the cockpit canopy. A warning alert sounded, and red lights flashed, indicating the cockpit was about to depressurize. Then the canopy popped open and a gust of air billowed out.
Darius climbed down over the nose of his Vulture, using whatever handholds he could find, until his feet were dangling just below the pointed tip of the fighter, some twelve feet above the ground. He activated his comms to speak with the Marines below.
“Would someone mind catching me?”
“Darius? What are you doing here?” It was Tanik, and he did not sound amused.
Just my luck, Darius thought. “What does it look like I’m doing? I’m joining the boarding party.”
“Well don’t. I don’t need you getting yourself killed, and I certainly don’t need the distraction of looking after you.”
But Darius wasn’t going to take no for an answer. He let go, and the deck swept up to greet him. He bent his legs on impact, hoping to cushion his fall. He hit with a heavy whump and a painful jolt that instantly buckled his legs. His shoulder slammed into the deck, and he bounced up, sailing straight toward the nebula-soaked void.
Darius twisted around desperately, trying to grab something, anything to stop himself from flying out into space—
And then a firm hand closed around his ankle and pulled him back.
“You see?” Tanik said. “You’re a liability. Get back in your cockpit and get out of here.”
Darius planted his feet on the deck and his mag boots engaged with a soundless tug. He glanced up at his cockpit, now twelve feet above his head. “Yeah, I don’t think I can.”
“I’ll throw you,” Tanik replied.
Darius shot the man a dubious look, wondering if that was an empty threat or a boast of his abilities. It didn’t matter. He wasn’t going anywhere. “Cassandra’s here, and I’m going to find her.”
Tanik’s eyes narrowed to threatening slits behind the faceplate of his helmet, but Darius narrowed his right back.
“Fine. Stay back, and do exactly what I tell you, when I tell you.”
“Thank you,” Darius said, nodding slowly.
“Don’t thank me yet. We still have to get your daughter and get out of here alive.”
Sobered by that thought, Darius grimaced, but he refused to give into negativity now. “Do you have a weapon I can use?”
“You didn’t bring one?” Tanik asked. “Well, you are well prepared for this, aren’t you?”
“Here.” One of the Marines handed Darius a bulky black laser pistol that reminded him of the weapons he’d seen Ra and Captain Riker wielding. “Don’t shoot your own feet off,” the Marine warned, sounding decidedly cocky for someone who’d become a Marine not three days ago, and via downloaded skill sets at that.
Acting the part? Darius wondered. Or ex-military from Earth?
He nodded his thanks and checked to make sure the safety was on, just to be sure he wouldn’t accidentally shoot his or anyone else’s feet off.
A minute later, a Marine pushed his way out of the inflated airlock with a gust of air and waved to them. “Captain, we’re in,” he said.
Tanik spared one last warning glance at Darius before he turned and stalked over to the waiting airlock. “Follow me.”
Chapter 59
Darius flicked off the safety on his sidearm while he waited for the Marines to follow Tanik through the portable airlock. It was only large enough for one person at a time, so it took a few seconds for all of them to get through. Darius went last, because the Marines kept pushing him aside.
Tanik was waiting on the other side of the airlock, his armor glowing brightly just as the Deliverance’s hull had been earlier. It was obviously some kind of energy shield, but since no such technology existed, it was attracting a lot of attention from the Marines. Darius noticed them chattering on another comms channel and he switched to it to listen in. They were murmuring amongst themselves about that mysterious glow around Tanik, and about how Tanik had apparently survived a bone-breaking fall unscathed.
Tanik’s voice joined theirs a moment later. “Is there something you would like to say to me?” he asked. “Perhaps we can all stand around and chat about it while we wait for the Crucible’s security teams to find us?”
“Sorry,” the Marine sergeant replied. “Everyone shut up!” he ordered, and the comms fell silent.
Darius switched his focus to their immediate surroundings. A clean white corridor stretched out ahead of them, curving up and away with the curvature of the ring-shaped station.
Tanik motioned for them to follow him,
and set out at a brisk jog. The Marines ran after him, and Darius struggled to keep up. Their mag boots sounded like thunder as they ran, but Darius supposed they couldn’t hope to maintain the element of surprise after blowing the station open with missiles. Someone was definitely expecting them.
They ran past doors lining the walls of the corridor, and Darius began to wonder what was behind them.
He asked about it over the squad channel. “Shouldn’t we check those rooms for tributes?”
“No,” Tanik replied.
Suspicion raised the hairs on the back of Darius’s neck. “Hey, you said—”
“I said we’d get your daughter. There are tens of thousands of children aboard the Crucible. We can’t rescue them all. Only the Revenants. Do you understand?”
“The what?” one of the Marines asked. Apparently they hadn’t got the memo yet.
Darius didn’t like the thought of leaving thousands of innocent children behind. “There has to be a way to rescue the others.”
“There isn’t. There’s no time. You want to save your daughter or not?”
“Yes, obviously, but—”
“Then be quiet while I lead you to her.”
Darius clamped his mouth shut and tightened his grip on his pistol, thinking, You’d better not be lying about her.
A door appeared in front of them, and the corridor curved around it. Tanik slowed as they reached the door. A moment later, a molten orange line raced swiftly around the door in a circle. A bang, sounded from the other side, and the center of the door fell into the corridor, revealing a Marine with a cutting torch.
“Captain,” he said, and gave a brisk salute.
“At ease. Form up.”
Another squad of Marines came streaming through and joined the others. Tanik led the group around the hangar to a bank of elevators. One of them opened as soon as Tanik hit the call button. He crowded in with four Marines and said, “Meet us on C deck.”
Broken Worlds- The Complete Series Page 31