After Moses: Wormwood

by Michael F Kane

  “Is there a purpose to this little therapy session?”

  She sighed and dipped her head. No, there wasn’t any hope in it. No real goal. She felt Elizabeth shuffle closer to her, and the other woman’s presence was a comfort. And that she would still offer herself now that she knew how terrible a woman she was. Just like Matthew and Abigail, once they knew the full truth.

  Maybe it was because, in the end, she was right. They were all in the same situation. Broken people in a broken universe. The battle was opening your eyes and realizing that truth. Logan had seen but a fragment of it. That life was full of misery, but missed the fact that in the end, he was part of the cause and had thus become an even greater source of suffering. But it was most likely far too late for him. Her feeble attempt at pity couldn’t reach a heart of stone.

  “No,” she finally answered. “I suppose there isn’t much use. But if we’re all going to die here together, I thought maybe you would take some peace in knowing that someone else understood you.”

  He turned away and the clock continued counting down.

  WHITAKER SCROUNGED Benson’s weapon and comm before stashing the body in a cabinet. At least it was a bloodless kill. Odds were the Abrogationists would never find what remained of their comrade. The gun, a modern military rifle of Russian manufacture, would be nearly impossible to use one-handed, but he could always cross his fingers, pull the trigger, and hope the spray would find a target.

  He was running out of time. Benson’s disappearance would be noticed soon, and Whitaker would be discovered hiding in a briefing room watching the cameras. It would be a pathetic way to die. The single corridor design of the facility completely eliminated the possibility of sneaking around the patrols in the hall. Even if he got the jump on them and cut them down with gunfire, the whole facility would be alerted to his escape. So he was still stuck without a reasonable way to get to the survivors in the dormitories.

  He grabbed Benson’s comm and manually keyed a line to the Imperious Doubt. The call connected, but there was no sound on the other side. “Come on, Cole. I know you’re there.”

  “Whitaker! Sorry, having a bit of a tense moment. Shotel Two watch out for that cannon fire!” Shotel Two?”

  Another voice spoke up, “We’ve lost Shotel Two.”

  “Oh,” Whitaker said. “I see that the Minister of Law is along for the ride. This is a lovely get together. Now, if you’re not actually dying, will someone please talk to me?”

  “Have you escaped? Cole demanded. “Where are Yvonne and my mother?”

  “Still held by Logan in the control room. I got put in isolation for poor behavior. My captor has been dealt with, but I’m trapped. There are other survivors aboard the facility as well.”

  “Whitaker, if you have any shred of human decency, please, save my mother and Yvonne.”

  Whitaker sighed. “You found the nuclear torpedoes.”

  “Grace, we’re losing air on the lower deck. Must have taken a hit. See if you can get it patched before we make the next pass. If not just close off the deck.”

  “You will use those torpedoes whether or not we make an escape,” Whitaker said. He voiced it as if it were an order. If the damn priest’s over-developed ethics made this more complicated...

  “We’ll do what we have to do. Stay safe. You do what you can.”

  “And I’m getting another call. Which means my escape is about to be discovered.”

  He cut the call and stared at the comm. They would come for Benson any moment now. He turned the comm off, shut the computer’s monitor off, and swatted the light panel. There was only one place to hide in the room. Thankfully the cabinet was double wide and mostly empty because sharing a tight spot with a body was going to be unpleasant enough.

  He barely managed to get situated before the door opened and the light turned back on. He held his breath, aware that his heartbeat thundered painfully in his injured shoulder. One moment lingered into several.

  “They’re not in here. Keep moving.”

  The light flicked off, and he started breathing again. Just for safety, he decided to give it a count of one hundred. And then he was still without a plan, other than that if he didn’t come up with one, Cole was going to kill them all.

  EWAN HYWEL WAS SWEATING bullets. Truth be told, much as he loved the Ddraig Goch, it wasn’t well suited to this sort of fight. Unlike the other ships in Lantern Fleet and even Shotel squadron, it wasn’t armed with thumpers. He had two thirty-millimeter chain guns. Which meant he had to get closer, and his gunners had a harder time leading their shots to account for the kilometers of distance between their targets.

  As a result, his dives into the cloud were deeper than the others. And they’d taken more than a few stray hits. Thankfully the Dragon was well armored, and nothing important had been damaged, but it was only a matter of time at this rate.

  They would be the first Guild Lantern crew killed in the line of duty. Would that be an ignoble or heroic death? Probably both. Maybe if they won, history would memorialize the brave Welshmen that made it possible.

  “Dragon, you doing okay? You’ve got a smoke trail coming from your starboard.”

  “Just fine, Shotel Five. Minor electrical fire. Nothing important.” He hoped. “Get ready for our next pass.”

  They were making headway, but it wasn’t going to be enough. In trying to clear a relatively safe path, their passes were taking them into more and more dangerous territory on the entry and exit, and while the gunners had been picking off any extra satellites they could get a mark on, everyone was getting a little cooked. And they had less than ten minutes left.

  He pushed the throttle forward. “Dragon making a dive. Faster this time. We have to cut deep if we’re going to clear a path.”

  They hit the danger zone, and a few nearby satellites opened fire with cannons. His own gunners returned fire. And then his co-pilot started shouting.

  “Torpedo! Close! Two-hundred meters!”

  “I see it but don’t have a shot,” Shotel Five replied.

  Ewan’s mind almost blanked, but out of the corner of his eye, he saw the torpedo’s position and started a spin to give the gunner’s a fighting chance at hitting it. They’d thought the defenses this far out had run out of torpedoes fifteen minutes ago. Apparently, one vacuum brained satellite had other ideas.

  “Fifty meters!”

  Ewan closed his eyes and heard the deep rumble of the chain guns firing.

  The torpedo took a hit and detonated a split second early, just meters shy of their hull, showering them with shrapnel that sliced through the Ddraig Goch. Depressurization sirens wailed through the ship, and lights flashed all over his console. He hit the maneuvering controls to stop their tumble, but they didn’t respond.

  “Not good. Not good. Not good,” he repeated over and over under his breath. They were deep in enemy territory with no way to alter course. He tested the main engines, breathing in relief when they responded.

  “Lantern Fleet, this is the Ddraig Goch, we’re hit and hit hard,” He pushed the throttle to maximum when the ship’s rotation lined up with their trajectory. “I’ve lost all maneuvering. I’m going to try and push through the field.” He cut the engine as they spun away from their path to keep from slowing their velocity. “I’m turning my flight group of Shotel Squadron back over to Lantern Fleet. Good luck. And wish me some as well.”

  “Godspeed, Ewan,” came Cole’s short reply.

  “Thanks,” he muttered back, throwing the throttle to full as they lined up with their trajectory again. He dug an oxygen mask out of a nearby compartment. “What’s the word?” he shouted at his co-pilot over the alarms.

  “Rhydian and Evann are trying to lock down the air loss. Marten is checking on the maneuvering thrusters.”

  “We need maneuverability now.” Ewan glanced at the tactical display. Red marks showed nearby satellites firing on them. He opened up the throttle again. The additional speed made it harder for the automated track
ing systems to keep up with them, but that luck could only last so long. In fact, they were heading directly for a cluster of satellites. The straight-on approach would make them an easy target.

  “Everyone,” he said. “It’s bad. Real bad, but if there’s a chance, we’re going to find it.” The satellites were nearly in range.

  “Cut the melodrama Ddraig Goch.”

  A trio of interceptors, Shotel Four through Six, blasted past them straight at the approaching cluster. “I told you to get out of here,” Ewan growled.

  “Not our style, leaving men behind,” Five said. “Keep working that throttle. We’ll fly escort until you’re through the field, then rejoin the fight.”

  Ewan growled in frustration. Heading straight at those satellites was just as dangerous for the interceptors as it was for the Ddraig Goch. He primed one of his torpedoes, one of only two in their arsenal. Sadly, they weren’t too useful against a swarm of satellites, but he could at least give the defenses one more target to shoot at. He released it just as they came around and it blasted ahead, quickly overtaking and passing the interceptors.

  Shotel Four through Six opened fire just as the satellite cluster locked onto the torpedo. The satellites began to wink out on the tactical display. Then the torpedo disappeared. Then Shotel Five disappeared.

  Ewan closed his eyes as their ship blasted through the debris of the battle. “What was Five’s name?”

  “Abel,” came the solemn reply. “His name was Abel.”

  “Arglwydd, dyma fi. Ar dy alwad di,” he sang softly. Shotel Four and Six took out a pair of torpedoes as he opened up the throttle one last time, finally clearing the field. Thankfully their trajectory had taken them up and over Phobos rather than into its line of fire. Their orbit was going to be a mess to sort out, but they would live, so long as they didn’t have any fuel leaks catch fire. “We’ll be fine. Go back to the fleet and avenge Abel for us.”

  “We’ll do that, Dragon.”

  He looked at the tactical display one last time. It was frustrating to be out of the fight, but then the Ddraig Goch was lucky to be in one piece. A spot of movement on the scopes caught his attention. A shuttle moving toward Phobos. Civilian. “No, no, you can’t do that,” he muttered, trying to hail it on the comm.

  It didn’t answer. But the Phobos Platform didn’t fire on it either.

  “Must be more bad guys,” said his co-pilot.

  “Either way, it’s not our fight.” He switched to the local intercom. “Get your pressure suits. We’ve got major repairs on our hands.”

  MATTHEW CHEERED THE survival of the Red Dragon but lamented the loss of yet another interceptor. They were now down four of the twelve. Regardless of the outcome, Shotel Squadron would be mourning the loss of friends and comrades tonight.

  Unfortunately, they were all out of time, and while a corridor had been thinned, it wasn’t clear. He pulled them out of their current pass, sweeping back out toward the Queen of Sheba and let its gunners easily pick off the pursuing torpedo.

  “Queen of Sheba, I think we have to give this a shot, we’ve got less than five minutes until Kyoto breaks the horizon.”

  “If you fire that torpedo from a safe range, it will never make it. The defenses have been prioritizing our torpedoes over our ships.”

  “We could deliver it half-way,” Thompson suggested. “Drop it at high speed and hope.”

  “I don’t really see another option,” Matthew conceded. “We couldn’t even go for a suicide close range run, because the odds are good we’ll need more than one in sequence to crack the moon, and if we don’t make it out for subsequent runs, this was all for nothing.”

  “Deliver it half-way,” ‘Elwa said. That’s your best hope. “Four minutes.”

  “Everyone hear that?” Matthew asked.

  “Confirmed,” Captain Dominguez said. “We’ll make the run with you to divide fire.”

  “The Qolxad is not in a position to assist,” Tamru said. “We’ll finish our current run and hold by the Queen for subsequent passes.”

  “Everyone ready?” Matthew asked his crew. Grace, Abigail, and Davey gave short acknowledgments. “This is the one that has to count, so say your prayers that this torpedo lands.” He thought about his mother and Yvonne still on Phobos. “And pray that when it hits, Logan sees reason and surrenders.”

  His breath shuddered. There was no other way. He could feel Thompson’s eyes on him, but what was he going to say to the man? Argue that it was the right thing to deliver a nuclear strike on his own family?

  “It’s alright, you know,” Thompson said. “I’d be doing the same thing if it was my wife or teenagers. And I can’t imagine.”

  Matthew blinked the tears away. “Azure Dream I’m starting my run.”

  “In formation five hundred meters off your starboard.”

  Matthew opened the throttle to full, punching straight down the corridor. He hit the comm and called Whitaker. The seconds ticked down as he neared the release point for the torpedo. Sporadic cannon fire from the remaining satellites began to trace across their path.

  “Answer already,” he begged. Then there was a click as Whitaker picked up.

  “This better be important.”

  “I’m about to launch a torpedo that may or may not make it to Phobos. Please tell me you have my loved ones.”

  “I’m afraid I haven’t been able to move from my position. They’re still patrolling the main hall and I— Wait. I’m hearing gunfire. It’s coming from the direction of the hangar.”

  “That shuttle,” Matthew mumbled. There was only one person he could imagine that could slip past the defenses and have the grudge to go for Logan. “Whitaker, I think Stein is there on the platform.”

  “Hmm. That’s a strange turn of events. But it may be the distraction I’ve been waiting for.”

  “The nuclear strike may get their attention too,” Thompson said. “Twenty seconds to release.”

  “And that’s my signal,” Whitaker said, cutting the call.

  Matthew reached for the torpedo controls, but Thompson slapped his hands away. “I authorized the nuclear strike, I’m firing the torpedo. You don’t need that on your conscience.”

  Matthew nodded. “Thank you,” he said and had never meant it more than in that moment.

  Thompson launched the warhead. “Torpedo away,” he announced softly.

  Matthew waited until he saw it streaking ahead of them and pulled up, keeping the throttle wide open. Their arc and speed would take them up and out to safety. The Azure Dream passed them, picking off a pair of satellites in their path and then sped on ahead. “Give me the good news,” he muttered.

  “Torpedo is still on track. Twenty kilometers from Phobos. Fifteen. Te—” He broke off and Matthew already knew why. “It’s gone,” he confirmed.

  Matthew sighed and threw his hat aside. “Lantern Fleet, the first strike was a failure. Form up for another run. We’re going to have to release a lot closer to Phobos this time.”

  “We have no more time,” ‘Elwa’s cool voice answered. “I’m afraid Kyoto has crossed the horizon. The Phobos Platform has line of sight on the grav plate factory.”

  YVONNE WAITED UNTIL the timer hit zero and then caught Elizabeth’s eye. Every soul in the control room, prisoner and Abrogationist, had watched the Guild ships chip away at the defensive constellation. Logan was nearly frantic at the progress they were making. But it was too late. Time ran out, and the factory was in their sights.

  “Fire as soon as you have a lock on the production lines,” he said, a manic grin spreading across his face. “As promised, we’re only destroying three.”

  Yvonne tasted bile in her throat and wondered how Elizabeth could remain so calm. The woman had lost everything and been dragged into hell itself.

  “We’re ready to fire.”

  “Do it,” Logan commanded.

  There was a faint buzzing sound and the lights dimmed, followed by a slight turn of her stomach as the platform’s tho
usands of combined thumpers worked together to launch a single massive gravity gradient toward Mars. Nothing could survive a blast like that.

  Logan had won.

  THE LIBERATION OF KYOTO began only ten minutes after Yuuto Kagurazaka and his wife reached the top of the ridge. Coming in low over the horizon from the west, a formation of ships and skyhoppers used the disarray in the HiTO’s ranks at the loss of the Phobos Platform to make their strike. The first desperate wave went after the surface to air defenses, giving as well as they received. Room was made for a second wave, carrying ground armor and soldiers that were deployed to retake the factory. The sound of explosions and death rang across the valley.

  All over Kyoto, the local militia was coming out of hiding, picking off HiTO patrols in the street, reclaiming public and government buildings, and hitting strategic targets.

  It was a good plan, but a lot depended on what was going on in low orbit. Phobos would soon rise into the sky, and if the HiTO had regained control of the situation, they might rain precision shots on the reinforcements. Or worse, someone far more sinister would be behind the controls.

  There was no silver lining.

  And so Yuuto and his wife sat hand in hand, waiting for the moon to rise. It was appropriately named after a pagan god who brought the terror of war. When Phobos appeared over the horizon, they stood and turned to face it, waiting for whatever would come.

  It fired.

  Yuuto had time to see the distortion in space-time as it streaked from orbit. He pulled his wife to himself. If this was to be the beginning of the end of his homeland, he would not turn away from it.

  Streaks of yellow ran across the sky as a field of energy appeared to stop the blast while it was still some distance from the ground. There was a flash of light as the distortion disappeared, and then all was still. A few seconds later, a crackling explosion like a thousand bolts of thunder rocked the valley, followed by a great wind. And then they wept that the factory still stood and hope remained.