“Increase speed one quarter,” Julian ordered, wanting to get past them as fast as possible.
As he continued to watch, he became sure that in fact each mech was staring directly at him as the HC Ballistic Cruiser approached. Once the very front of Julian’s ship touched the edge of the hologram, however, the entire image—the ship and the four mechs atop their transports—began to disappear. By the time Warwick’s and Exeter’s ships passed, the image was completely gone, replaced by the asteroids that had been behind the hologram the entire time.
Another thought struck Julian then, sending so much fear and doubt into him that he had to take a seat. Yes, the Carthagens had designed these images to try and scare them away. And yes, the holograms were technologically advanced. By itself, neither of those pieces of information would sway him from his mission. But the first two projections had also detailed real ships, displaying holograms with precisely accurate engineering, ship capabilities, size, and design. If the holograms of his own fleet and of the battle at Dela Turkomann had been completely accurate, it meant that somewhere out there, the ship—that juggernaut—and the mechs accompanying it might also exist.
28
The nine Carthagen warriors gathered at the opening of a long, dark tunnel. In addition to Lancelot, all of the other warriors who usually gathered to fight in front of the Dauphin were there. Lancelot, as the victor of those fights, was their leader.
“Bowcast, take a warrior with you to the northwest passage. Curveddeath, take one to the northeast tunnel. Swordnew, take the remainder to block the main passage once the enemy has arrived.”
The other warriors understood that Lancelot alone would be at the point of attack. With their helmets on, with thick armor covering every inch of their bodies, it was impossible to tell by their expressions what they thought of this. Perhaps they admired Lancelot for facing the challenge alone. Perhaps they resented him for putting himself in the position to gain all of the Dauphin’s praise and admiration.
Lancelot remembered what it was like to sit on the back wall of the Dauphin’s chamber and to watch as two other warriors battled for the chance to be the Carthagens’ top fighter. He remembered resenting the warriors who had fought in front of him because they weren’t as good as they thought they were. That was why it was only a matter of time until he stood in the center of that room.
Because if this, he understood the other Carthagen warriors had no right to resent him. They were not better than he was. He had given them ample opportunity to take his place and in every duel he was victorious in short order.
His ability was proven. His leadership was unchallenged. Therefore, he didn’t need to explain his tactics to the others. They would proceed to the locations as ordered and that was all they were entitled to.
“Any questions?” he asked, knowing there would be none.
A few of the Carthagen warriors shifted their weight back and forth from their front legs to their back legs in anticipation of getting to prove themselves in real combat. None of them said anything, however.
Reaching his two longer arms up behind his head and his two shorter arms behind his lower back, Lancelot drew all four of his weapons and disappeared into a tunnel, The other Carthagen warriors split up as instructed and began making their way to their assigned positions.
29
“Those were some giant mechs,” Exeter said, his hologram joined only by Warwick’s as they spoke privately to Julian. “Gave me the creeps, that’s for sure.”
They spoke informally as they did anytime they were in private. Julian shook his head, trying to figure out the latest of the Carthagens’ holographic warnings for himself.
“One of the things that bothers me is that they weren’t Carthagens. We have reports of what they look like—four arms, four legs. Those things were unlike anything I’ve heard of before. And I’ve never, not in any book or around any spaceport, seen a vessel as big as the one those things came out of.”
“They’re getting scared,” Warwick said of the Carthagens, the conviction in his voice evidence that he thought everyone within the Orleans asteroid field would soon be part of the Round Table. “They tried to play mind games by showing us a reflection of our own forces. When that didn’t work, they showed us the battle at Dela Turkomann. When that didn’t succeed, they tried something different. That’s all.”
“But those mechs...” Julian said, trailing off, trying to think of an explanation for why each unit was a different color and carried a distinctly different type of weapon.
With his two closest friends, he could speak freely, without concern for his tone. If he were in a room full of commanding officers, he would have to put on a display of being unimpressed. With his son, he would not only have to put on an air of confidence, he would have to act as though he knew exactly what to do and say. More so than anyone else, he wanted for his son to view him as supremely capable in everything he did.
“You know what those four mechs were?” Warwick grumbled, his voice scratchy and low. “The Carthagens tried to think of something unlike anything we’d seen before. That’s all it was. Well, personally, four mechs and one vessel, no matter how big they are, don’t bother me. I say, bring ’em on. Look at all the ships we have with—”
As he spoke, two things happened at the same time. The first was Warwick’s holographic image being thrown to the side and disappearing from Julian’s command room. In real life, Julian knew what that meant: something had tossed Warwick across the officer’s quarters of his Solar Carrier, his body yanked away from the device that transmitted his hologram.
The second thing that happened was a bright flash of light outside. For an instant, the air rushed out of Julian’s lungs and made him feel lightheaded. The burst was on the port side of his HC Ballistic Cruiser, in the same general area as Warwick’s Solar Carrier.
Exeter’s hologram vanished as he dashed away from the holo-projector and looked out the viewport to see what was happening. Julian did the same. He got to the window just in time to see the side of the Solar Carrier become enveloped in explosions.
The ship had just narrowly avoided running head first into a large asteroid. If it had run directly into it the vessel would been utterly destroyed. Instead, the Carrier’s side had impacted and been ripped away.
The ship’s systems would automatically prevent as much damage as possible by shutting containment doors, rerouting life support, and extinguishing internal fires and chemical ruptures. With damage as extensive as colliding with a large asteroid, however, no amount of computerized safety measures could stop the explosions that were ripping away even more of the ship. Each time one of the vessel’s oxygen reserves was punctured, it detonated in a brilliant explosion that extinguished itself as the void of space dispersed the fire’s only fuel. But with each explosion, no matter how quickly it put itself out do to the lack of air in space, another section of the ship was damaged, and another explosion triggered.
Julian knew there was no way the people piloting that ship would knowingly allow it to run straight into an asteroid. He could see that the giant rock that the Solar Carrier had collided with was merely floating among the others and not hurtling through space at any great speed. There was no reason, even with the brigadier in command having stepped away from the command deck, for the crew to let that happen.
For the second time in a matter of moments, the air went out of Julian’s lungs. The only way that would happen was if the crew had no idea the asteroid had been there.
He was running, racing back to his own command deck. Alarms began to sound.
Even before the command door had slid shut behind him, he said, “Tell me what’s happening.”
“The Solar Carrier, Hunley,” an ensign said, referring to the vessel Warwick was commanding, “ran into an asteroid.”
That much was obvious from the explosion beside them and the giant rock that was damn near attached to the side of the Carrier. Julian asked how it happened.
“Not sure, sir. Nothing was detected by our sensors. No object was visible.”
The two alarms that had been sounding were joined by a third alarm, which blared loudly enough that nothing else could be heard.
An asteroid had appeared directly in front of them even though it hadn’t been there a moment earlier. The ship’s sensors hadn’t picked it up until whatever cloaking technology had hidden it allowed it to become visible to the human eye.
“Evasive maneuvers!” Julian shouted over the din of the alarm.
Before he could sit down and buckle in or even grab hold of the nearest control panel, the ship lurched to the right. For a split second, Julian felt as if he were floating as if the artificial gravity of the ship had failed. Just as the sense of his weight returned, he was thrown to the side. The officers who were strapped into their chairs struggled to fight through the forces and keep performing their duties. Anyone who wasn’t buckled in was flung across the deck.
Julian crashed face-first into the control panel next to where the lieutenant in charge of shields was tapping at various screens as fast as he could.
The entire command deck seemed to spin as he got his senses back. Even as he collected himself, the ship gave a second hard turn to starboard. Although he was already sitting on the floor, he tumbled over his shoulder again, this time colliding with the chair of the officer seated next to the lieutenant.
Both of his hands squeezed at the sides of his head to keep the pain from spreading and to help him regain his equilibrium. Julian had just enough time to see the asteroid, the giant mass of rock they had been trying to avoid, hit them to the side of the command deck.
The piercing alarms had been silenced but the relative quiet was soon shattered by the sounds of explosions engulfing the ship.
“Everyone armor up!” Julian shouted.
His eyes darted all over the command deck for his son. He saw Talbot sitting near the front viewport, buckled into his seat and getting weapons systems ready for a counterattack even though it hadn’t been commanded.
Good boy, Julian thought. That’s my son.
Everyone, Talbot included, heeded his command and began rushing to find and put on their space armor. Before doing so himself, Julian found Talbot, put a hand on his shoulder, and told him it was time to leave the ship.
The young man seemed strangely unaffected by what was going on. It struck Julian as odd that his biggest fear had been his son’s emotional and physical wellbeing. Yet here Julian was, screaming instructions, blood trickling from his face, while Talbot remained calm and collected.
“Yes, sir.”
The formality of the comment during a life or death situation made Julian flinch an instant before another explosion erupted further down the side of the ship, closer to the middle of the vessel. Nearly every system on the HC Ballistic Cruiser was knocked out.
30
Talbot might have looked serene, but he was actually terrified. The people who knew him best—his friends from the academy—were familiar with his reaction to calamity and extreme stress in a way that Julian was not. Rather than shouting or going into a frenzy, Talbot had a tendency to shut down. This meant barely talking. It meant standing still. Some people had a defense mechanism to smile or laugh during crises. Talbot, on the other hand, became a statue. If his father knew him half as he thought he did, he would have understood this.
The emergency lights were flashing in the corridors as he and Julian and everyone else from the command deck raced toward the room where their space armor was stored. In the adjacent room, two dozen other officers were already getting into their reinforced suits.
Talbot had just picked up the boots of his armor when an explosion rang out nearby, loud enough that he lost his hearing for a few seconds. When it came back, everything sounded muffled. Confused, he looked around for where the blast had occurred. An officer that had been in the next room was running down the hallway, covered in flames. Another, blanketed in soot and blood, stumbled into the doorway of the room where Talbot and Julian and the others were preparing to evacuate from the HC Ballistic Cruiser. Another explosion rang out and threw that already injured officer a dozen yards down the hallway. Smoke was filling the room. All around them, the ship was suffering catastrophic failures and erupting into explosions.
His boots were on. Looking up to find his father, Talbot had difficulty seeing anyone further than five or six feet away from him. The smoke was making his eyes water and his throat burn. Normally, the life support systems would have ensured a stable environment by sucking away the smoke and pumping in fresh oxygen. The fact that those systems weren’t functioning meant their vessel could explode at any second. If the ship broke apart before their space armor was on, they would all be sucked out to die in the vacuum of space.
“Faster,” Talbot heard Julian yell, although he could only see the vague outline of someone a few feet away. From inside the smoke and haze, Julian added, “We don’t have much time. As soon as your space armor is on, head to the nearest emergency hatch and deploy into space. One of our other ships will send a shuttle to retrieve you.”
Beside Talbot, a lieutenant was cursing and wrestling with his chest plating. Silently and methodically, Talbot put on each piece of his own suit exactly as he had trained in the academy. If he had enough time after he was finished, he would help the officer next to him.
The majority of his suit was in place when a hand grabbed him by the armor plate behind his neck and yanked him sideways.
“Come on,” Julian said, pushing gloves onto Talbot’s hands and then latching them. “We don’t have much time.”
Talbot tried to turn to see how the lieutenant was doing but Julian held him in place as he finished the last part of his son’s armor. Without saying anything, Julian scooped Talbot’s helmet off the bench beside him and put it over his son’s head, latching it into place. Talbot was now the only one with his helmet on, and once the suit was sealed it began pushing out the dirty air and giving him fresh oxygen.
Before he could return the favor and put on the last parts of Julian’s space armor, his father pushed him away.
“Go. I’ll be right behind you.”
Nothing could be seen in the smoke-filled corridor. Talbot turned back to see if the lieutenant had finished putting on his armor, but the smoke obscured any sight of him.
Talbot tapped a button on his wrist, causing his visor to switch to a perfectly clear black-and-white image of the hallway and room. He immediately saw people running in every direction, most in space armor, but one too panicked to think reasonably.
“Go,” Julian said, and instead of offering assistance to the other officer, Talbot obeyed the command and began toward the exit hatch.
He turned down one corridor, saw it was filled with flames, and took another route, pressing a button at the second door he came. He stepped forward, then heard the door close behind him. He was in an otherwise empty metal room with a hatch directly in front of him. On either side of the hatchway were multiple warning symbols. Beside that was a series of buttons, each with an override button to ensure no accidents happened.
Without turning back to look and see if anyone else was coming, not even his father, he reached forward and lifted a clear box that covered a red button beside the door. With the thick gloves of his space armor, he pressed a finger against it. Next, he did the same with a white button. A succession of three quick beeps sounded, then the hatch flew open.
Instead of an atomized steel door, he saw open space.
Before he could appreciate the sight, he was yanked out into the vacuum of space with enough force to pull him head over feet. The only thing in front of him was the open galaxy, asteroids, and the rest of the fleet. For a moment, he felt as if he had been punched in the stomach because of the velocity with which he was sucked out into the stars.
It took three attempts for him to breathe normally again. Once he had collected himself, he engaged one of the propulsion jets in his suit to stop h
is tumbling end over end. After the gentle puff of air, he drifted through space in a straight line.
From where he was, he could see his HC Ballistic Cruiser. It was engulfed in fire and still exploding from within. Crew members were streaming out of every hatch. All were in space armor, but a few either didn’t have someone to latch the final pieces together or else had to get away from an explosion and left the ship without ensuring the suit’s vacuum. These immediately clutched at their throats and faces and soon went limp. The asteroid that the ship had collided with was still at the rear of the vessel, tearing through bulkheads as it went.
Behind him, he saw Warwick’s Solar Carrier, the first ship to hit one of the asteroids, drifting closer and closer to yet another giant rock. The damage to Warwick’s vessel had initially looked much worse than what was happening to the HC Ballistic Cruiser, but Talbot saw that the other flagship was in the middle of an orderly evacuation.
Llyushin fighters, transports, and other ships, each holding as many crew members as possible, streamed out of the ship’s hangars. Talbot counted thirty-two such ships safely evacuate before the Solar Carrier reached the next asteroid it had been drifting toward. This time, instead of hitting the edge of its frame against a rock, the vessel went directly into it. For a few seconds, Talbot watched as the Solar Carrier’s front side crumpled into bent metal and debris. Then, having sustained too much damage, the entire ship erupted into a mighty explosion.
He turned to face behind him and saw the last ship in the fleet, Brigadier Maceus’ Flying Fortress, shift directions and begin flying toward where all the survivors of the evacuated ships were drifting. It barely made any progress before it too erupted in a series of explosions. As Talbot watched, a large asteroid appeared where there had only seemed to be empty space. His suspicions were confirmed. The Carthagens had used their unique holographic technology to hide many of the asteroids from the fleet’s sensors. Julian had taken his forces into what was the equivalent of a minefield, only with giant rocks rather than compressed explosives.
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