by L Bowers
We shot forward letting our own guns lead the charge. Many of the ships in our path were of the smaller variety, gunships and fighters. As such, the nimble ships dodged our shots more than we were killing. Due to our made dash forward the ships we missed ended up behind us. Not a favorable scenario.
This is not going as you planned.
“I figured that out already, buddy. We’re going to have to adapt and overcome,” I said.
What do you have in mind?
“Watch and find out.”
Our cannons fired in a wide arc sending our attackers scattering like roaches. The extra space gave us the time we needed to correct our mistake. We spun and drew our blades from the green disc in our chest. We flew toward the enemy with our arms outstretched Superman style with the blades sticking out to either side. The left blade hit the side of a gunboat slicing a gash along its hull.
The gunboat blew up behind us. The rest of the ships engaging us moved away and fired from a distance. We picked another gunboat as they were hitting us harder than the fighters and made a beeline for it.
The ship turned and shot off away from us. We were faster, but the rest of the ships concentrated their fire giving the ship the time to get clear.
An alarm sounded and my vision flashed red. A miniature model of Titan appeared on the right side of my Heads Up Display with a section of his middle flashing red. The left arm and right leg flashed yellow.
We have taken severe damage to our core. Secondary life support offline. Power core A 12 offline. Servo-motors eight, nine, and two hundred and twelve offline. If we take a direct hit to our core we risk catastrophic failure of several key systems.
“Shit. Thanks for the heads up, Titan. We need a new plan,” I replied.
What will you do?
“Heck if I know. I think I’m going to have to go on the defensive until an opening presents itself.”
An opportunity came alright. I was blasted from several directions at once I was got to see how well our arms could defend our midsection. The pinging and banging of the impacts echoed through Titan’s metal frame. His arms held though, and I knew at that moment the armor on his forearms was thicker and stronger than the rest of him.
We return our left blade and wrapped our left arm around our midsection. With the right we lashed out at any and every enemy that came close. We managed to slice through two fighters, and one gunboat. The super sharp blade damaged three other ships as they dodged but were still clipped.
The damage we inflicted was the same as hitting a charging rhino in the face with a pebble. It amounted to jack-shit and we were still going to get corn holed on that damn horn.
Our comms crackled then a long scream came through.
“Titan! What was that?” I shouted.
The call originated from Foe Hammer.
So, caught up in my own fight that I didn’t see the struggles Francine was going through. I paid attention now and saw a pair of fighters rake her flank with bolts of energy. She shifted to fire back but she was too slow and they were gone by the time she turned. From what I saw up until then Foe Hammer was much faster than any of these craft. If they were out running her now it meant Francine was getting slow.
“Shit!” I yelled as we kicked our thrusters into overdrive.
Titan and I flew to our friend and shoulder checked another pair of fighters going for a strafing run. The craft exploded against our shoulder doing no damage to us. We grabbed Foe Hammer with our right hand, careful to keep our left covering our middle.
The moment our hand closed on the smooth hull of the ship I felt the connection made. There was a synergy between Titan and Foe Hammer. Data flowed freely between the giant and the ship. In an instant I was aware of the specs of Foe Hammer, her payload, thrust capacity, maximum travel distance on one fuel cell, and a host more. But, there was one file blocked from us.
The hidden file intrigued me. Unfortunately, the Cruiser Class ship all the smaller craft moved out of the way for, didn’t allow us the time to investigate. The ship was a thing of beauty. It was sleek and sexy like a European super car. If not for the fact that it was heading at us with the intent to kill, I might have geeked out over it.
Hatches all along the length of the ship opened and cannons eased out of the holes. The weapons were just as attractive as the rest of the craft and twice as deadly. The business end of all of the canons took on an orange glow as my HUD light up with weapons lock warnings.
“Oh shit.”
Chapter 33
“Don’t just stand there,” Francine’s strained voice said over the comms.
Her words shook me out of my shiny guns envy and we kicked on all of our thrusters to the max. A host of new alarms came to life as we slid out of the way of the orange beams. Through Titan I knew how to stow Foe Hammer so I reached back and set it against our upper back where it stuck. Not so much stuck as docked with mechanical devices holding her to us and cable connecting the two machines. No time to dwell on it though.
The beams dies out a moment after they fired. Unlike the beam from earlier these didn’t follow. The cannons did start their glow almost immediately after the first shots died down. I was hopping for a few more seconds of recharge time.
We dashed forward using our thrusters at max. The cannons fired again and we slide sideways. The shots were staggered instead of all off at once. We weaved our way around the myriad of blasts while we ate up the distance between us and the ship. The beam cannons stopped firing an we were swarmed with fighter craft.
We shifted our orientation so our front was facing the big ship but kept our left arm in place. We sliced a few of the smaller ships and stepped on the closest one. Our foot thruster sent out a burst that propelled us up and burned a hole through the small craft. We stepped on two more fighters and cut three others in half. Then we were in front of the big ship. It was much bigger looking close up, a fact I found unsettling as the ship towered over us.
Titan and my first encounter was against a much larger ship, so I wasn’t too worried. We hadn’t taken any damage then so there was that, but oh well.
As we charged in for the kill our guns fired but our projectiles bounced off the smooth surface. We flew up along the top hull and swung down hitting the metal with our blade. The blade bounced off without a scratch. We continued striking to no effect. The cannons proved to be an obstacle we had to dodge as we tried piercing the armored hull.
I changed up our tactics and hit a cannon with our blade. The cannon held up but the blade snapped in half. We returned it to the green disc and stopped our cannons.
Our feet came up so our thrusters could stop us on a dime. We settled onto the ship and smashed our right fist down on the hull. The sound of a rung bell echoed through Titan, but no damage was done. We stood back up and leaned against the cannon. Our head moved back and forth as we surveyed the battlefield.
Not much changed. The Liberator was fighting for her life and we were surrounded by a metric ton of bad guys. If I didn’t find a way to resolve the situation soon all the people counting on me were doomed. So no pressure.
How are we going to resolve this situation? The stakes are high and this is starting to look hopeless.
“Hopeless might be a little too strong of a word,” I said. “More like really challenging. Like any challenge, we just have to find the thing that will allow us to overcome. There has to be a way,” I said as we taped our right index finger on our chin. The rhythmic clang was soothing.
We pushed off the cannon and looked back over our shoulder at it. From that angle I saw something I hadn’t noticed before. With the hatch open and the weapon extended there was space around the cannon leading inside. Titan’s sensors scanned the opening and reported there was enough space for us to get in if we got the cannon to point up a few more meters.
The way I saw it we had two options. The first, and the one I like the least, was to present the cannon with a target, namely me, causing it to angel the gun up. I chose option t
wo. We crouched in front of the cannon and pushed up on the hexagonal shaped barrel. The connecting point was not as tough as the material the weapon was made of and it groaned as the barrel slowly raised.
When you let go it will spring back into position.
“Then we’ll have to be fast,” I said through clenched teeth. Even though the giant robot did the work we were connected enough for the strain on Titan to be a strain on me.
We managed to point the barrel up several more meters than we needed to fit. I let go and dove in feet first. We hit the mechanism responsible for the cannon’s mobility with a clang. A hose tore loose under us and shot grey smoke out filling the cramped space. To make matters worse the cannon started to sink back into the alcove. Which meant it was coming down on top of us.
I grabbed the barrel and pushed up, which got us nowhere. Our arm was forced to bend as the weapon continued downward. It pressed against us causing Titan’s chest armor to groan. Then the floor gave way and we fell through. The cannon followed then slid back and away from us. It stopped in a cubby it shared with two other cannons.
“Are those spare cannons?” I asked.
It would seem so. If every canon emplacement has two spares this vessel is formidable indeed. We must render it useless quickly.
“How do you suggest we do that?”
Have you looked around?
Other than the three cannons I hadn’t looked around. The metal above me was the same strange substance that was the outside of the vessel. Attached to it were metal struts Titan’s sensors identified as a trilltanium alloy. My gaze followed the struts to a pitted and scarred white sheet of metal.
The metal looked out of place in here, like it had seen a lot of space travel. While my time in space was brief, I’ve seen a few ships up close now and recognized the wear and tear of space travel. I reached out with Titan’s senses and things became clear.
The outer hull is protecting the ship within.
“This is weird. Why not build a new ship? Why coat an older one in new metal?” I asked. “Never mind, it doesn’t matter. All that matters now is that we can hurt this thing.”
We opened up with our cannons punching holes in the white exterior. Our remaining blade materialized and we flew along the hull slicing struts as we continued to shoot. We stopped just short of the rear. The exterior shell slopped in and hugged the inner hull just before the rear engines protrusions. Which made sense since the engines need to push the craft. Can’t do that if the rear thrusters are covered.
What this told me was exactly where I needed to hit. We punched down into the hull igniting our foot thrusters as we did. Titan and I shot through the ship with our blade leading the way. Decks tore open like tissue paper until we reached our destination, the ship’s engine where we did a reverse burn to stop.
Hovering a few meters off the deck we took in an unexpected sight. Instead of the usual configuration we were met with a sphere twice our height. The ball floated perfectly centered in the room. Hoses and cables as thick as our arm attached along the top and bottom.
Through Titan’s memory I knew he saw something like this before. It was similar in design to Foe Hamer’s power plant.
“What does this mean?” I asked. “Should we continue?”
If we do not, Liberator is doomed.
That was an excellent point. We needed a clear path of escape for our ship. With that being the case there was only one option left to us. We let loose with our cannons.
Magnetically accelerated projectiles punched holes in the sphere. A lance of white light shot out from each hole almost making the thing look like a disco ball.
We need to flee, NOW!
We cut off our cannons and shot up through the holes we made coming in. As we passed one deck a guy in armor shot at us with a hand held rifle sized weapon. I let a chuckle free through our external speakers as his rounds bounced. Then we were back out in the space between the ship and the outer skin.
“Hey Titan,” I said as I took a look around. “Any idea how we get out of here?”
With the hatch we came through closed I didn’t see another way out. The secondary hatch beneath the guns would keep us from going up and out a deployed weapon, maybe. With that thought I had a plan, or a simple idea I wanted to call a plan.
We raced along the lattice work structures until we found two cannons nestled next to an empty slot for a third weapon. We were out of luck. The mechanisms to operate the lift was in the chamber with the weapon. Then another idea hit me.
“Titan, can you point me to …”
A green line appeared in my field of view pointing the way back to the turret we entered through. We kicked our thrusters on and headed in that direction. In a few short seconds we arrived. A quick reverse thrust and we hovered just under the hatch. I flipped us and set our feet on the hull while unsheathing our broken blade.
The jagged tip pressed against the seam in the hull but when we applied pressure it slipped free. We gave it another try with the same result. On our third go round the blade broke off at the hilt.
“Damn it!” I shouted as I threw the hilt down. It bounced off the hull and flew away from us.
My vision flickered and I got a momentary look at the inside of my giant buddy. Static filled our vision enough that I could barely make out our surroundings. The data from the sensors came in sporadic bursts. Titan felt like he was a mile away and his voice was muffled when it came to my mind.
You must remain calm. Our link will shatter under high stress.
“Fuck,” I mumbled.
My eyes shut as I took a deep breath. My heart pounded in my ears and my face felt hot. I hadn’t realized how much the situation was stressing me out. The Liberator was in danger of being destroyed and everyone aboard killed. Titan and I might not survive the coming explosion, and no matter what I did, I couldn’t open a path for The Liberator to get free. No wonder I was stressed.
One thing every Marine should be able to do is take an honest assessment of themselves and seek to improve. While I breathed in, deep I did just that. The entire time I’ve been a badass space marine, I’ve been acting alone. No Marine acts alone. We succeed by accomplishing our missions as a team. Whether it’s the small unit team or company level. We don’t act alone.
A sense of calm washed over me as I understood. My eyes opened and the scene in front of me was clear. Data flowed from our sensors and I felt Titan as if he were standing shoulder to shoulder with me. Never had he felt so close before.
You are beginning to understand.
“Yeah, well, that doesn’t matter right now. We need to make something happen and fast,” I replied.
You have a plan?
“Nope.”
Chapter 34
Bright white light washed over us. We turned to look at the encroaching energy. The back half of the ship was obscured by the light and it crept toward us at an alarming rate.
“What happens if that gets to us?” I asked.
We are ended if that happens.
“I thought you might say that. I guess it’s now or never.”
We flew up with a burst of our foot thrusters and grabbed the closest cannon. We kicked our legs up and burned off our foot thrusters at maximum. As we did we pulled the cannon with every bit of might the arm and back servos could give. First there was no change, then the slow whine of metal groaning that built until something snapped.
While the weapon was either made of, or coated in, the same material as the exterior the support structure it was nestle in was not. We spun using the momentum from our thrust and batted at the hatch. The blow hit with so much force we were thrown down into the inner hull of the ship where we made a sizable indentation with Titan’s ass.
Everything went dark and the only sound we heard was the echo of metal running through Titan’s frame. Our vision returned and I saw the most beautiful sight ever. A corner of the panel was bent. It wasn’t much, but it could be just what we need. With our arms we pushed ours
elves free of the damaged hull. Metal scrapped at our legs and hips as we did making my teeth hurt from the nails on chalkboard sound it caused.
We fired our back thrusters with enough force to get us to the panel. The fingers of our right hand wedged into the space and we managed to get a tenuous grip. We flipped using our right arm as the pivot point and placed our feet on the outer hull next to the panel. Simultaneously we pulled with our arm, pushed with our legs, and fired our back and foot thrusters.
The panel was yanked free and the entire gun emplacement fell out of the hole smashing us into the ship once more. The weight and force of the weapon buried us in the metal of the ship.
White light grew in intensity almost blinding us and we knew there was no time to celebrate. We pushed the weapons equipment off and pulled ourselves free. The noise this time was maddening, so I blasted us free with the back thrusters. I kept them going to push us off the hull and into the opening.
The doors leading out into space and freedom had nothing holding them shut with all of the mechanism behind us. We slowed enough to push the hatches open without ringing our bell then we were free.
“Took you long enough, Tom,” Francine said over our coms. Foe Hammer was a few kilometers away from where we emerged. Francine had two small fighters on her tail and was chasing down a gunboat.
“Run, Francine!” I shouted as I gave our thrusters all they had.
Blue light flared behind us from the widespread energy we released to propel us forward. I imagined we would look like a comet to someone far away watching this battle through a telescope.
My fanciful thoughts were cut short by a wave of concussive force that slammed into us from behind. Our blue light was washed out by the wall of white that followed the wave we were now riding. Our thrusters continued to burn but it wasn’t enough.