by G J Ogden
A low rumble through the deck plating caused Sterling to look toward the viewscreen. The Invictus’ combat shuttle had just maneuvered past the windows of the alien bridge. Sterling switched back to the remote piloting interface on his computer and commanded the vessel to latch onto one of the porthole windows and begin cutting through. However, the bridge of the Sa’Nerran cruiser was thick and heavily armored. The process would take time – time they were rapidly running short of. He heard the combat shuttle thump against the porthole and its cutting beams activated. The countdown had begun, but he knew they weren’t going to escape without a fight.
“We need to hold off the reinforcement for as long as we can,” he called over to Lieutenant Shade. “It’ll be down to you and me.”
His weapons officer nodded and moved over to the door, holding one of the powerful Homewrecker heavy plasma rifles in her hands. Unlike his freakishly-strong first officer, Lieutenant Shade had to use all her strength to wield the mighty weapon. Collecting one of the plasma hand-cannons from a dead commando, Sterling moved up beside Shade on the opposite side of the door. The sound of heavy boots was already filtering along the corridor, signaling that the first wave of warriors was close. Sterling glanced back to Razor, expecting to still see her frozen in pain and concentration, but instead the engineer was on her feet and appeared calm. He noticed that Banks had released her grip on the alien commander. Incredibly, the warrior walked over to one of the computer terminals, seemingly of its own free will, and began to operate it. The puppet master was now in control.
Sterling’s computer chimed an alert and he saw that the second of five firewalls had failed. A plasma blast slammed into the wall inches from his head and he pulled back into cover, cursing himself for dropping his guard. Shade stepped out into the open and returned fire with the Homewrecker, doing more damage to the ship than she did to the advancing horde. She pulled back into cover and two alien warriors rushed out, charging toward Sterling armed only with semi-circular blades. Sterling stepped out and allowed them to advance. The hand-cannons had limited range, but in close quarters they were even more devastating than the heavy plasma rifles. The rasping hiss of the warriors grew to a roar then Sterling unleashed with the hand-cannon, blasting the first warrior back along the corridor as if it had been hit by a truck. The second continued its attack unfazed by the fate of its companion. Sterling gritted his teeth then fired again, blasting the head and upper torso of the alien into charred chunks of flesh and bone. The smell of burning alien meat assaulted him, as vile and as nauseating as ever.
Sterling’s computer then chimed again and he knew that the third firewall had fallen. He was about to call out to Banks for an update before four more warriors rushed out. They were only partially decked out in armor and only two had plasma weapons. Sterling assumed they had just thawed out and had merely grabbed whatever weapons and armor came quickly to hand.
Lieutenant Shade opened fire, obliterating one of the warriors with her first volley, then a plasma blast struck her chest and she fell back. Sterling returned fire with the hand cannon, temporarily halting the aliens' advance then glanced down at Shade. Smoke was rising from her armor and she was clearly in pain, but his weapons officer fought through it and pushed herself up. Sterling continued to fire, but the aliens were too far away from the hand-cannon to be fully effective. He felt a thump to his side followed by a burning sensation of pain. Returning into cover, he saw that his armor had soaked up the bulk of the energy. He’d been lucky – but fortune favored the brave, he told himself. Shade then fired again, killing the second of the two-armed aliens before her strength failed and she was forced to release her hold on the heavy weapon. Sterling’s computer chimed again and he cursed. The fourth firewall was down. It was do or die time, Sterling told himself, but there wasn’t a chance in hell he was the one doing the dying.
Stepping out to meet the two advancing warriors, Sterling fired at the closest and blasted the alien’s leg off at the hip. A flash of plasma raced past his face, temporarily blinding him, but he pressed on and squeezed the trigger again. This time the weapon jammed. Cursing, he had just enough time to raise the cannon to block a strike from the warrior’s serrated blade. The clang and scrape of metal on metal felt like someone raking fingernails across a blackboard. Sterling was then kicked to the chest and sent down, but he rolled back and was on his feet before the alien could make a killing blow. Shade grabbed the warrior’s ankle as it raced past, still in pursuit of Sterling, toppling the alien to the deck. Seizing his chance, Sterling hammered the butt of the plasma cannon down onto the back of the alien’s head, striking the Sa’Nerran's weak spot with deadly precision.
“We’re in!” Banks shouted over to Sterling. “The data is downloading now.”
Sterling checked his computer. The final firewall was holding, but he knew it could fall at any moment. Then the thump of boots and the hiss of alien cries again filtered along the corridor from outside.
“Hold them off while I ready the shuttle,” Sterling called back to his first officer. He then rushed over to the porthole window where the shuttle was still cutting through. The seal was holding, but it was as precarious as Razor’s firewall.
Banks grabbed another plasma hand-cannon then ran over to Shade and helped her up. There were no concerned words. No asking, “are you okay?” Banks and Sterling both knew that Shade would fight on even if she was dying. Whether she was ‘okay’ or not was immaterial. Shade took the hand-cannon while Banks picked up the Homewrecker, carrying it with the same inhuman ease as she had done earlier. Both unloaded their weapons along the corridor, creating such a torrent of plasma fire that nothing living could possibly hope to advance through it.
The cutting laser then finished and the porthole fell onto the deck of the alien bridge with a resounding crash. Sterling ran over to Razor and grabbed her shoulder, turning her to face him. Her skin was soaked through with sweat and blood vessels bulged in her neck and around her temples. Sterling turned her head to inspect the engineer’s own neural interface. The skin around it was red and inflamed, but it showed no evidence of the spidery corruption that the first-generation neural control weapons caused.
“Lieutenant, do we have the data?” Sterling asked, but Razor was on the verge of collapse and unable to answer. Releasing his hold on her, Sterling turned to the portable console his engineer had been working on. They had about seventy percent of the alien ship’s database. Then he checked the computer on his wrist and saw that the final firewall was about to collapse. They were out of time.
“Get back to the shuttle, now!” Sterling called out, directing the order at Banks and Shade, who were still unleashing hell on the Sa’Nerran reinforcements.
Sterling then turned to face the alien commander. It was standing like a statue, its yellow eyes wide and unblinking. Blood was leaking out from the modified neural translation matrix that had attached itself to the alien’s brain and Sterling could see corruption spreading like wildfire. Grabbing the alien behind the back of the neck, Sterling took hold of the neural interface and dug his fingers into the alien’s flesh. Then with all his might he tore the device out of the warrior’s head, like pulling giblets from the neck of a turkey. Blood gushed from the wound, coating Sterling's hands and face in the hot, crimson liquid. The alien hissed wildly, its cries horrific and haunting, like an evil spirit being exorcised. The alien then collapsed to the deck, dead. Razor collapsed moments later, but Sterling caught her and threw her arm over his shoulder. He glanced at the computer on his wrist. The final firewall had fallen, but he had no idea whether it had failed before or after he’d torn the device from alien’s brain. Banks and Shade then rushed past, still firing through the door to hold off the alien warriors.
“Go!” Banks called before unloading another fierce volley from the Homewrecker, obliterating two more warriors in an eruption of blood and guts, like bursting balloons full of water.
Sterling grabbed Razor’s portable console, threw it into
the backpack then grabbed the bag with his free hand. Dragging the barely-conscious engineer onward, Sterling shoved her through the hatch and inside the combat shuttle before hauling himself inside after her. Banks and Shade followed and the hatch sealed. Leaving Razor on the deck of the shuttle, Sterling jumped into the pilot’s seat and blasted away from the alien cruiser, tearing a hole in the bridge as he did so. Seconds later, the remaining alien reinforcements were blown into space through the rupture. Incredibly, the dying warriors still tried to fire at the shuttle as it departed, despite their bodies swelling and asphyxiation setting in. Sterling almost admired their tenacity, but at the same time he enjoyed watching them suffer. The alien race had shown humanity no mercy and they would get none from him.
The Shuttle then cleared the cruiser and Sterling thumped the console and cried out, overcome by the euphoria of their victory and narrow escape. Banks whooped and cursed the alien warriors that had been condemned to a painful death in space. She then grabbed Shade and pulled her into an embrace, though the weapons officer’s response was as austere as always. However, their elation was short-lived. The shuttle’s scanners chimed an alert and Sterling saw that the three Sa’Nerran Destroyers were almost on top of them. Against all odds, they’d won the first round, but the fight was not over yet.
Chapter 21
A duel in Sa’Nerran space
Sterling steered the combat shuttle toward the Invictus and increased power to the engines. He’d hoped to make it inside the protective cocoon of his ship before the alien vessels arrived, but it soon became clear that wasn’t going to happen. An alarm rang out and Sterling threw the shuttle hard to port, narrowly avoiding a stream of plasma blasts that flashed past the cockpit then vanished into space.
“We’ve got Wasps…” Sterling called out, activating the shuttle’s combat mode. “The destroyers must have launched them in advance.”
“How many?” asked Commander Banks, sliding into the second seat of the shuttle. She was holding the backpack full of equipment that Razor had used to download data from the Sa’Nerran cruiser.
“I have six on my scanner,” Sterling replied, pulling in behind one of the Sa’Nerran fighters and opening fire. The small attack craft exploded, showering the combat shuttle with fiery debris. “Make that five,” Sterling corrected, though without any hint of boastfulness. “With these things buzzing around, there’s no way I can dock with the Invictus before the destroyers arrive.”
Banks pulled the portable computer console out of Razor’s backpack and slotted it into the shuttle’s systems. “I’m uploading the data from the alien cruiser to the Invictus now,” said Banks, tapping out a short sequence of commands into the computer. “I’ll run an analysis and try to extrapolate anything that looks like navigational scan data.”
Sterling nodded then glanced over his shoulder. His chief engineer was now strapped into a seat in the rear of the shuttle. She was still unconscious, but was being attended to by Lieutenant Shade. However, at Sterling’s instruction, Shade kept a pistol close by. He had no way to know whether the firewall had failed before or after he’d torn the neural translation matrix from the head of the Sa’Nerran commander. If there had been a moment when the two interfaces were connected without a protective barrier between them, he had no idea what effect that might have on Razor’s brain. However, he wasn’t taking any chances. If Razor showed any sign that she was about to turn then she’d have to be put down. It was that simple.
Sterling focused back on the controls and the Invictus soared into view ahead of the combat shuttle, plasma blasts flashing into space from its turrets. A Wasp was hit and exploded, burning a fiery trail through space to Sterling’s right, like a comet. He adjusted course to stay close to the Marauder, in the hope that its more accurate and powerful guns would make short work of the Wasps. Slotting in behind the Invictus, Sterling then tapped his neural interface and reached out to Commander Graves.
“Commander, we have the data and are running an analysis now,” Sterling called out to the temporary commander of his ship. “But until we have a new course, we’ll have to stand and fight. Can you handle those destroyers?”
The Invictus initiated a full-power turn, putting itself between the combat shuttle and two of the attacking Wasps. Blasts from the Sa’Nerran fighters thumped into the Invictus’ regenerative armor, but it was as ineffective as firing BB-gun pellets at a rhinoceros. Focused fire from the Marauder’s turrets then obliterated one of the fighters, while the other narrowly evaded being hit. The alien combat ship panicked and turned away from the Invictus, allowing Sterling to pick it off with ease.
“We can handle the destroyers, Captain,” Graves replied. His tone was so level that the medical officer sounded almost bored. “I would recommend you dock before they are in weapons range, however.”
Sterling was about to answer when the shuttle took a hit and was buffeted like a dodgem car at a fairground. He glanced at the damage control console and saw that their armor had absorbed the bulk of the energy. The weapons systems of the older-generation Wasps lacked the punch of their modern equivalents and the damage was minor. Even so, Sterling knew they couldn’t last long, especially with three destroyers closing fast. Sterling then glanced at the scanners and saw that the alien warships were already within weapons range. However, Sa’Nerran Destroyers hadn’t yet opened fire. Sterling guessed that their alien commanders thought they were being smart by waiting until they were within optimal weapons range. However, they were unwittingly playing into Sterling’s hands. When it came to close-quarters fighting, the Invictus was devastating, combining the grace of a ballerina with the punch of a heavyweight boxer.
“Finish off these Wasps then prepare for an emergency landing in the docking garage,” Sterling replied to Commander Graves while also firing at, and missing, one of the nimble alien fighters.
“Understood, Captain,” Graves replied. “We’ll be waiting.”
Sterling was about to close the link then he remembered about Lieutenant Razor and her possible neural injuries.
“And Commander Graves, as soon as I’m back on the bridge, I need you in the medical bay. Lieutenant Razor is injured.”
“I will alert my medical team, Captain,” Graves replied.
Another volley of plasma shot out from the Invictus, clipping the wing of one of the Wasps. The fighter spiraled out of control then collided with the Marauder, bouncing off the dorsal armor like a bug hitting a windshield.
“One last thing, Commander Graves,” Sterling continued, as the burning remains of the Wasp sped above them. “Keep Lieutenant Razor restrained and watch for any signs that she is turning. If that happens, you know what to do.”
“I understand, sir,” Commander Graves replied, with barely a breath of pause before his answer. Perhaps more than anyone else on the ship, Graves had the least trouble with taking life. Considering that he was the officer responsible for keeping the crew alive, Sterling had always found this perversely amusing. Though mostly he found it disturbing. It was another reason why the stone-cold doctor creeped him out.
“I think I’ve found the raw data from the cruiser’s navigational archives,” said Commander Banks, momentarily distracting Sterling from watching his ship make mincemeat of the remaining Wasps. “Fortunately, it looks like nothing has come this way for a long time, so it's a good chance this is Colicos’ shuttle.”
“Send the data to Ensign Keller and get him to plot a course,” said Sterling, pulling out of the shadow of the Invictus, ready to initiate the docking maneuver.
“Aye, Captain,” replied Banks, returning to work.
Only a single Wasp now remained and the diminutive ship was running scared. However, Sterling was not about to allow the infuriating combat craft to escape. Like a fly continually buzzing around his head, he was determined to squash it. Increasing power to the engines, Sterling pulled in behind the Wasp and locked on. Beyond the engine glow of the fighter, now within visible range, were the three Sa’Ne
rran Destroyers. The safe and perhaps even smart thing to do would be to let the Wasp escape and return to the Invictus. However, that wasn’t Sterling’s style. Fleet had spent too much time trying to be smart and playing it safe, and look where it had got them. This was a war and as far as Sterling was concerned there was now only one rule of engagement. It was the same rule that had allowed the Sa’Nerran Empire to turn the tide of the war. The rule was simple; kill the enemy, any way you can.
Plasma blasts flashed out ahead of the combat shuttle and the Wasp exploded. Sterling turned hard and rammed all available power into the engines. Alerts rang out and plasma blasts from the destroyers flashed past their windows. However, Sterling was unafraid. All the alien destroyers were doing was depleting their own energy reserves. The more power they wasted shooting at the shuttle the less they had to take on the Invictus.
“Stand by, Invictus, we’re coming in hot,” warned Sterling over an open comm channel to the ship.
The shuttle bay had already opened and the Invictus had slowed to allow the combat craft to approach. Even so, their relative velocity was dangerously high, but it was the only way to get the shuttle back on board, without making the Invictus a sitting duck.
“Hold on, Lieutenant,” Sterling called back to his weapons officer. Shade then planted herself in the seat opposite Razor and grabbed onto a combat harness. She had a pistol on hand, resting it across her lap, ready to use it should the engineer’s neural interface show signs of corruption.
Sterling glanced at Banks, but there was no need for them to exchange words, verbally or through their minds. Both had experienced emergency combat landings before. Both hated them.
The shuttle hammered into the landing bay of the Invictus and began to carve through the metal decking toward the end wall. A magnetic net caught the craft, arresting their forward momentum as suddenly as a pigeon flying into a window. The harness bit down tightly across Sterling’s chest and he felt the breath being literally squeezed from his lungs. Forcing another breath into his bruised chest, Sterling popped the emergency escape hatch and unbuckled his harness. He could already see a medical team approaching, carrying a grav-stretcher for Lieutenant Razor.