by J. N. Chaney
Most of the damage was done, but that wasn’t going to stop us from trying to help.
“How long until we’re in range?” I asked.
“Five minutes, sir,” Sigmond replied. “It would be faster if our forces departed Tartarus now to prevent congestion.”
The Star was already primed, as was the rest of our fleet. We wouldn’t use the modified ships yet—I wanted to keep that under wraps until the last possible second. As far as the enemy knew, we were a small army of inferior humans who managed to get lucky. When the time came, they’d get to see their own tech helmed by lesser beings and know that they shouldn’t have been so cocky as to underestimate us.
I changed the comm so I could address my people inside the hangar. “This is Hughes. Prepare to move out.”
The rest of the Alliance forces were still trailing behind, but they began to edge out around the massive bulk that was Tartarus. With the Star leading the way, we joined the front lines. The Celestials, who had been ignoring us up to now, finally paused their razing. Their ships turned as one and surged toward us.
I wasn’t going to give them any chances. “Fire pulse cannons!”
Despite the transparent quality of the pulse weaponry, there was no doubt that the Alliance had just attacked. A gargantuan efflux of power rocked my ship as every cannon with a line of sight was unleashed. Staying to plan, they didn’t form any semblance of a pattern. Some of the Celestials shuddered and came to a halting stop. Others were able to steer clear of the blasts. It was no less than we had expected.
Two sped at us, undeterred, and were met by a line of Sarkonians firing in unison. The weapon upgrades made a difference, but it wasn’t enough. Within seconds, they were cleaved in half, the pieces spinning away from each other and spiraling into the black empty. Before I could give the order, Abigail was on the comms from the Galactic Dawn. “Distress beacons detected. Initiating retrieval drones.”
This had been Octavia’s idea. If anyone could be saved, some of our manpower should be dedicated to that end. Aside from obvious reasons, every soldier lost was one less to fight. It was a morbid way of looking at things, but true nonetheless. We figured drones were the best option on that front to avoid the possibility of more human losses.
I toggled the controls and joined with a cluster of strike ships under Bolin’s command. Like our last encounter with our admittedly overpowered enemies, it would take teamwork to inflict any damage. I couldn’t help the surge of pride at the scene unfolding around me as I fired streams of blue energy beams in tandem.
Our mode of attack destroyed three Celestial raiders in quick succession, their silver hulls blown apart from the sheer amount of overwhelming hellfire. It was under terrible circumstances, to be sure, but the Alliance had achieved something I never thought possible. Unity. Three nations of people worked together in tight formations to beat back the threat. It was no longer fear that drove them, but a single purpose.
Even with our padded numbers and upgrades, our path was anything but easy. For every Celestial ship that faltered or fell, five or more Alliance were lost. One bore down on us, brilliant violet beams lancing out. Still together, we shot up to avoid it and found another right behind it.
“They’re tracking us,” I barked into the comm. “Peel off, give them more targets.”
We split apart, dividing our numbers but in the process forcing the enemy to pursue only one of us. The trick worked and the fighter chose to go after Bolin, according to the tag. It fired on his position, but instead of one large beam, it spewed a volley of short bursts that forced Bolin into a series of erratic rolls.
I came around and turned my own beam on the Celestial. The Star was better equipped than most of the Alliance ships, but even still, its firepower could only do so much.
Without warning, the Celestial ship stopped attacking Bolin and took off in the opposite direction. I was about to pursue when I noticed Bolin’s ship had gone still.
“Bolin, talk to me,” I said over the comm.
There was silence on the other end for what felt like too long. I felt my side tense as I leaned forward, about to send a rescue team to pull him out by hand. “I’m fine,” he finally answered, the words helping me to relax. “My engines are dead. If someone could pick me up, I’d appreciate it.”
“Dispatching a retrieval drone. Stay put,” Abigail cut in.
Before I could say a word, Sigmond’s voice interrupted us. “Sir, I’m picking up abnormal movement. A number of the Celestials are breaking away.”
On the holo, three quarters of the battling ships were indeed on a different course. That lightened the pressure on our forces, but I didn’t like what was happening.
“Can’t do anything about that just now, Siggy.” I helped Bolin’s team take down one of the sacrificed Celestial strike ships. “If they’re running, mores the better for us.”
“Forgive me, sir. I don’t believe that they are running. Their current vector will take them back to Prosperitas. To the surface,” he clarified.
“It’s not hard to imagine what they have in mind,” Abigail interjected. “Remember what just one of the scouts did to Verdun.”
“Hard to forget,” I said.
Images flashed through my mind of the destruction she spoke of. One scout had leveled our entire airborne city in a matter of days, and that Celestial had done so with the intention of getting its hands on something specific. I couldn’t imagine what an army of those things might be capable of, especially if their entire goal was total destruction.
“Captain Hughes, their target appears to be Prosperitas’ largest power plant,” Major Sanchez advised. Precautions have been taken to guard it, but…”
“They won’t be enough. I hear you, Sanchez.” I jerked the controls and sent the Star tearing after them. “Ground squadrons, you’re up.”
The group of ships capable of landing planet side broke away from the fighting to join me. Much as I wanted to avoid engaging in close quarter combat with Celestials, we’d prepared for the possibility. Pulse cannons were mounted on a good number of our fleet, but we only had a handful of the portable ones. They had been placed on the specific vessels currently moving toward Prosperitas’ surface where the Celestials were already landing.
Upper orbit still raged with the ongoing skirmish.
“Jace, watch out,” warned Abigail. “A few are taking off to stop you.”
“I see them,” I responded.
Three enemy fighters barreled toward us, violet beams spearing out. No way we could handle that many. As I watched, deciding what action to take, one of them stopped firing. A second later it was spiraling out of control.
“Got your back, Captain.” Alphonse’s steady voice took a weight off. It was helped along by the line of Alliance defenders drawing the Celestials’ attention.
Unimpeded, we shot down to the surface, punching through the atmosphere like fiery bullets. I flew low, ready to lay down cover fire, and stopped short. The Celestials had already hit the surface, close enough to the Sarkonian forces that I risked hitting them. A sizable group of Berserkers spilled out of one of the larger vessels. Fists up, their hard light blades materialized. An invisible force rocked them backward, halting the advance.
Sarkonian soldiers had fired a pulse cannon from their cover around the facility. Thanks to Davon and Dressler, the Empire had been able to get some rigged up here as well. I couldn’t take a chance firing near them. “Damn it. Siggy, your turn.”
“With pleasure, sir,” returned the Cognitive.
The holo display chirped and blinked to alert me that the Star’s bay door was open. I watched on the secondary feed as a mobile armor suit came to life.
“You good, Siggy?”
“Integration complete. On your command, I shall engage, Captain.”
“Do it,” I ordered, not wasting any time.
The suit disappeared, signaling that Sigmond had activated the phasing capability.
“Are you ready for my a
ssistance, sir?” asked a familiar voice with just a hint of computerized latency.
The mobile armor required a great deal of processing power for operation. I had no doubt that our Sigmond could handle it as well as the Star, along with any other task, but why take the chance? Junior had been built to take over in his predecessor’s absence anyway.
“Yeah, Junior,” I confirmed. “Get Siggy on all holo maps—I don’t want anyone to take him down accidentally.”
A green marker appeared on the holo. The live feed supplied by our people on the ground showed that Sigmond was already in the thick of things. It took five glorious seconds for the Celestials to understand what was happening. During that time, Sigmond put down four of the hulking Berserkers using his hand cannon. They dropped to the ground like boulders.
I had to stop watching then because Junior announced a warning. “Sir, an enemy combatant has just locked onto the Star.”
“Where? I’ve got nothing on the holo.”
“The vessel appears to be cloaked.”
Of course they were, I realized. Putting all their numbers down at once would have made it easy for us to take them all out. Nothing was ever easy. “Scan the airspace for any out of place emissions,” I ordered.
“Working.”
I banked hard to circle back around. Sigmond now battled with two Berserkers while the rest resumed their assault on the power plant. Alliance forces on the ground flanked from behind, trapping them. So much for that Celestial brain power. I had a feeling they hadn’t figured on humans retaliating with such force, but it still seemed a little too easy for my liking. “What’s the hold up, Junior?”
“Apologies, sir. I believe I have found the assailant.”
“Gods, they’re close enough.” There wasn’t time to say more because the Celestial shot at me. I jerked the controls, pulling the Star into a steep climb that pinned me to my seat. As fast as I’d risen, I sent the ship into a dive and delivered a fresh hit from the pulse cannon. The other ship didn’t fall like I hoped, but it did decloak.
Now that I could target the damn thing, I set off after it. A barrage of purple counterfire came my way, forcing me into a side maneuver.
“Incoming flank attack. Brace for impact,” warned Junior, before I could reorient and return the same. Alarms screamed another warning and the Star shook violently. “Shields at 77%,” the AI informed.
“What the hell?” I barked.
“Sorry, Captain Hughes.” The voice on the comm was unfamiliar but the accent had me thinking Sarkonian. “Target has been neutralized. One more to go.”
“Copy that.” I checked the holo for the enemy and found they were gaining altitude, fast. I briefly considered giving chase, but a cheer went up on the comm, drawing my attention. It only took a quick glance at the display to see that the last Berserker had been defeated and the remaining functional Celestial vessels were attempting to retreat.
Above, a similar situation took place. Without the support from their now fleeing brethren, the rest couldn’t continue laying waste to White Cross or the Alliance forces. Still, it could be a trap, and likely was. Splitting our numbers now could be just what they wanted.
“Captain, we have another problem,” said Alphonse.
Of course, why not, I thought. “What now, Al?”
“The Celestials just opened a rift. Maybe about half of them made it through.”
“We can’t follow them,” said Abigail. “Not unless we know where they’re going.”
She wasn’t wrong. Trying to follow someone in slipspace without that information was next to impossible. Even the Celestials hadn’t been able to track Tartarus, though that had been our main concern. There was one person who might know where they were headed.
I tapped the comm for a private link with the Vice Admiral. “Vick, if you have any idea where they might be going, now’s the time to share.”
The line stayed silent for a few seconds and I thought he might not bother to answer.
“Sir, the Vice-Admiral would like to open a private line of communication.”
“Put him through,” I said, even though we really didn’t have time for theatrics.
“Our estimation is the Navi system. A research facility on Priscilla,” he finally said. “One you and Mr. Malloy should be familiar with.”
I knew exactly what he was talking about. Priscilla was an unlisted planet deep in Union space. One that me and my crew had infiltrated to steal a tritium core and borrow Dressler from. At the time, the good doctor had called it kidnapping, but she eventually came around.
“Is it still chock full of Union secrets and priceless assets?” I asked, already knowing the answer. Priscilla was one of the safest locations in all the known systems. Or it should have been. The only reason we found it had been because Athena could detect the Tritium core. That was the problem. The information was in the memory drives that the Celestial had taken. Unfortunately, that meant our enemy knew exactly where Priscilla was, and just how important it was to the Union.
“It is.”
“Then we have to protect it. I assume this is a one on one because the Union isn’t too keen on sharing Priscilla’s location?”
“Yes, Hughes, that about sums it up. However, I understand what my superiors don’t. The Celestials are bigger than our secrets. The research facility can be rebuilt elsewhere, but not if there’s nothing to put in it.”
“Then why are we talking about it?” I snapped. When Vick didn’t reply, I put it together. “You want me to tell everyone so you don’t have to.”
“I would be… grateful.” The Vice Admiral sounded like he’d never had to say the word before, which wouldn’t have surprised me at all.
“Fine. But you owe me.” Not waiting for an answer, I cut the transmission and checked the holo.
The remaining Celestials were floundering under the change in balance. That didn’t mean they would be easy to cull, though. As predicted, a rift opened on the other side of the system.
“Would you like to address the fleet, sir?” prompted Sigmond.
“Yeah, Siggy. It seems we’ve still got a ways to go.”
“Indeed, sir. Comm line open.”
“Alliance forces, this is Captain Jace Hughes of the Renegade Star. The Celestials have opened an S.G. Point and intend to head for Union space next. This fight ain’t over just yet.”
16
I didn’t know what was about to happen. I guessed that all of my people, along with the Union fleet, would go while the Sarkonians would stay behind to tend to themselves. The reality turned out to be far different. A Union carrier and an impressive assemblage of assault ships remained behind to assist the Sarkonians.
Carl opened the rift and took us through. I had picked up Sigmond from Prosperitas before returning to Tartarus’ hangar. The tunnel that Tartarus created cut the typical travel time in half. In normal slip tunnel, it would have taken us somewhere around five standard days to reach the Navi system. Current slip travel theory still appeared to hold and we couldn’t speed up to close any distance between ourselves and the enemy, but that also meant they couldn’t pull away either, so it worked both ways.
However, travel speed seemed to be the only normal thing about these new tunnels. For one, there was the fact that we were cutting through normal slipspace by moving through a totally different spatial dimension. Titan could certainly cut through existing tunnels by creating and redirecting its own, but Tartarus seemed to move inside a different dimension of slipspace altogether.
“Why’s it look like that?” asked Lex, talking around a mouthful of deki fruit, the juice of which was dribbling down her chin.
I glanced out the viewport. “Look like what?” I asked.
Lex swiped the back of one hand across her mouth and pointed outside, still chewing on the fruit. “The color, it‘s the wrong kind of green.”
Abigail stepped closer to peer out the window. “She’s right. It looks lighter.”
Unconvinced, I
checked again, but it still didn’t seem any different. “Sigmond, can you or Carl verify what she’s saying?”
Sigmond’s construct manifested beside me a few moments later. “Indeed. Most astute, Lex,” he said, smiling kindly at the girl.
Lex grinned back, then shot me a smug look. “Told ya.”
“Yeah, yeah, alright. So, what does that mean?”
Carl arrived next, appearing next to Abigail. “Yes, there is a difference in the magnetic field of this tunnel when compared to those you may be familiar with.”
“Is that why I saw those towers before?” I asked.
“What towers?” asked Abigail.
I explained the strange faded image that had briefly been visible on our way to Novo.
“You saw that in the tunnel?” she asked.
“I thought I did, but it could’ve been the sky playing tricks on me,” I said.
“Wow,” said Lex, eyes wide. “Can we visit it?”
“Sorry, kid. It’s probably not even real,” I said.
Her shoulders drooped a little. “But it sounded so cool.”
“I’ve heard about this before,” Abigail said.
“Heard what?” I asked.
She tapped a finger thoughtfully on her chin. “Your eyes playing tricks and the mind making familiar patterns out of the random.”
Carl brought up an image on the nearby wall. “While possible, his account does match the sketch by a Celestial who claimed to have seen the same thing.”
“Still, that doesn’t mean it’s real. You don’t have any recordings of it, do you?” she asked.
“I’m afraid not,” said Carl.
Was it possible that I had imagined it? I was generally a skeptic, but the picture Carl had in front of me was unusually similar to the one I’d seen before. “Then explain how we saw virtually the same thing. That building juts out in two particular angles. No way that’s a figment of two different people’s imaginations.”
“Okay,” she conceded. “But how would you build a city inside a slip tunnel? That doesn’t even make sense.”