by Ryk Brown
Yanni swallowed hard. He looked around and saw that, while the others were unbuckling their flight harnesses, none of them stood. He unbuckled his shoulder straps but waited on his lap belt for the moment.
A minute later, the lighting inside the shuttle reverted back to the plain, white lighting used when the ship was not in flight. The other men all stood, preparing to disembark. Yanni unbuckled his lap belt and stood, remembering to rise slowly. Despite his best efforts, he still felt as if his feet were about to come off the deck of the shuttle and instinctively reached one arm up to keep himself from rising into the overhead.
The man next to Yanni smiled. “Don’t worry. It’s only this light on the flight deck. It’s nearly normal when you get inside. Just don’t jump in the hangar, or you’ll go flying.”
“Really?” Yanni answered. “Why is it so much lighter on the flight deck?”
“Makes it easier to handle cargo, and it’s easier for the shuttles to take off and land. The outer transfer airlocks are only ten percent gravity. It’s twenty-five in here.”
“What is it inside?”
“Seventy-five, I think,” the man told him as the rear cargo ramp came down.
“Let’s go, people!” the crew chief yelled. “We’ve got to move this cargo to the Celestia, now!”
Yanni stood silently, watching as the crews moved the cases containing the data cores from the shuttle to the waiting carts outside. All he could think about was that the Celestia was the sister ship of the ill-fated Aurora, and as far as he knew, she wasn’t even half finished. Again, Yanni wished he had eaten a lighter lunch.
* * *
Workers out on the tarmac at the North American Fleet Academy Spaceport ran for cover as alert sirens blared in the distance. Ground crews scrambled to get the last of the shuttles off the ground before it was too late. The sound of something moving through the air at an incredible speed roared in the distance, causing many people to pause and look upward. They reacted in surprise when a massive explosion on the far side of the spaceport rocked the ground under them. More explosions followed as precision Jung ordnance rained down on them from orbit. The blasts walked their way across the spaceport, striking buildings, storage tanks, parking lots, and the mostly empty tarmac. The remaining shuttles began launching, regardless of the fuel state, in the hopes of escaping the horrific bombardment. One cargo shuttle accidentally maneuvered into the path of an incoming weapon and was blown out of the sky a mere one hundred meters above the spaceport, sending a shower of burning debris and fuel raining down onto the fleeing workers below.
Within a minute, the bombardment was over. Little of the spaceport remained standing, most of it a pile of burning rubble. Screams of the injured could be heard in between the roar of the burning fires and the secondary explosions of fuel tanks and stored ordnance. The afternoon sky overhead was blackened by the rising smoke, and the sirens of approaching fire and rescue vehicles could be heard in the distance.
A worker rose from behind the tow vehicle where he had taken cover. His face was covered with dust and soot from nearby fires, and his overalls were torn and bloodied where flying pieces of debris had cut through both his clothing and skin. He looked himself over briefly. He suffered from several deep lacerations and a burn on his arm where burning fuel had caught his clothing on fire. He was amazed that he was still alive.
He looked out over the devastation: the craters, the burning wreckage of vehicles that had not made it to safety, and the shuttles that had never gotten off the ground. The bodies of his fellow workers were everywhere and in various states of dismemberment, their blood staining the tarmac beneath them. Many scrambled to help the injured survivors while others stood like him, staring at the carnage before them. This was unbridled aggression. This was the face of war. “My God,” he exclaimed.
* * *
“Admiral,” Rear Admiral Duncan called, “the cruisers have begun orbital bombardment of surface targets, starting with the Fleet Academy spaceports.”
“Get all ships off the ground, Marty, before we lose them all.”
“Most of them are already in the process of launching, sir. The fighters all took off a few minutes ago.”
“Good,” the admiral said. “Get those shuttles up as well. Short-hop them to nearby fields or parking lots if you have to; just get them out of harm’s way. If we lose all our shuttles, we won’t be able to support our warships in orbit even if we stop this invasion.”
“Yes, sir.”
“What about those troop landers?” the admiral asked, pointing at the tactical display. “Where are they headed?”
“Most of them appear to be following the fighters and bombers in. They are headed primarily for main seats of government.”
“What about our facility? How are we doing on the surface?”
“We’re taking our first strikes now, sir. They’ve already taken out our rail guns, but our missiles have all launched, and our fighters are already on their way up.”
“Good,” the admiral said. “It’s a lot easier to replace buildings and guns than it is fighters and missiles. Any word on the Celestia?”
“The data cores arrived at the OAP a few minutes ago and are being moved to the Celestia now. The officer of the watch on board says they are at twenty-five percent of their overall fuel capacity. They’re spinning up their reactor now, but they will need at least thirty minutes before they can depart.”
“I wanted that ship out of there as soon as the cores were on board!” the admiral said.
“They don’t even have a pilot yet, Mike. Give them some time,” Rear Admiral Duncan said.
“Time is something we do not have, Marty. You tell that man that he doesn’t need his reactor to be at full power in order to leave. As soon as he’s got enough power flowing, he can thrust out of there and move away. Once his reactor is up to sufficient levels, he can fire up his mains and get under way.”
“Yes, sir.”
* * *
Four Jung frigates, their sunward sides glistening, came up over the moon’s horizon and accelerated toward Earth. A minute later, the four ships cut their main engines and rotated ninety degrees, bringing themselves into a sideways flight attitude in order to bring all missile batteries to bear. In perfect unison, all three missile batteries on each of the four frigates fired four missiles. The barrage of missiles streaked away from the frigates in a perfect line abreast and began slowly spreading out into a wider, more uneven line.
The Jung frigates slowly rotated their noses back onto their flight paths once again and began to disperse slightly as well while they continued on their course toward Earth.
“Multiple targets!” the Intrepid’s sensor operator announced. “Tracking forty-eight high-speed objects launched from the frigates leaving the moon! Probable missile launch!”
“Can you identify their targets?” Captain Christopoulos asked.
“I’ll need a minute,” the sensor operator said.
“Combat, Captain,” the captain called through his comm-set.
“Captain, go for combat,” Commander Nasser answered.
“Load all missile launchers with fragmenting interceptors and target those forty-eight incoming targets. As soon as you launch the first wave of intercepts, load anti-ship and fire the second wave on the frigates themselves.”
“Aye, sir.”
“Objects have been positively ID’d, sir. They’re missiles.”
“Their targets?”
“The OAP, sir, every single one of them.”
“Time to impact?”
“Twenty minutes, sir.”
“Missiles away,” the tactical officer reported.
Captain Christopoulos glanced at the forward view screen as sixteen of his own missiles streaked away from the Intrepid en route to intercept the inc
oming enemy missiles. “Time to intercept?”
“Ten minutes,” the tactical officer reported.
“Comms, notify the OAP and contact Fleet Command. Let them know we are attempting to intercept and destroy the incoming missiles. We’ll deal with the frigates as soon as we take out that first wave of ordnance.”
* * *
Luis moved quickly through the massive corridors that ran between the OAP’s many hangar bays. He wove in and out of the technicians and platform personnel along the way. Kyle, Devyn, and Tilly followed closely behind.
“Do you have any idea where you’re going?” Devyn wondered as she followed Luis through the chaos.
Luis stopped at a map display attached to a column along the side bulkhead of the corridor. He quickly scanned the map. “The cargo boarding tunnel is closest!” he announced. Without waiting for approval from his friends, he turned and started running again, following the directions from the map.
As Luis turned down a corridor, he nearly ran into a line of carts carrying large cases that were rushing toward the Celestia’s cargo boarding tunnel. The carts were being hurriedly pushed by flight personnel wearing patches from the European Fleet Academy. As they passed, Luis did a double take at the pale, slender, nervous-looking civilian that seemed to be following the carts as well.
A moment later, they arrived at the entrance to the Celestia’s cargo gate and headed down the long boarding tunnel. The tunnel was filled with men and women pushing carts of equipment and supplies into the ship as quickly as possible. Others were moving away from the ship along the outer edges of the tunnel.
“Whoa! Hold up!” the lieutenant at the Celestia’s cargo hatch said, holding up his hand.
“We missed our ship. We were told to report to the Celestia instead,” Luis told him as he panted.
“Rating?”
“Huh?”
“What’s your rating? What are you trained for?”
“Tactical,” Luis answered between breaths.
“Environmental systems,” Devyn reported.
“Engineering,” Tilly answered as the lieutenant pointed to him next.
“Weapons maintenance,” Kyle said.
“You three enter here,” the lieutenant ordered, pointing at everyone except Luis. “You, Ensign, are at the wrong gate.”
“What?” Luis looked confused.
“You need to go back out, go up four levels, and head forward to the personnel boarding gate. They need you on the bridge,” the lieutenant explained.
“Why can’t I just board here?” Luis asked.
“This ship isn’t finished,” the lieutenant told him. “There’s no inside passageway that connects the main drive with the command deck.”
“What?” Luis said.
“Most of the forward section is still unfinished. There’s a lot of unpressurized, open space between us and the command deck,” the lieutenant explained, “which is where you need to report.”
“Can she even fly?” Kyle wondered.
“How the hell do we operate a ship that…” Devyn began.
The lieutenant held up on hand, palm forward to cut her off mid-sentence. “She can fly,” he assured them, “and we’ve got pressure suits to get from engineering to the command deck.”
Alert sirens began sounding from the OAP end of the boarding tunnel, causing them all to look back down the tunnel.
“Alert! Alert! This station is under attack! All unnecessary personnel report to the hangar deck for immediate evacuation! Damage control teams, man your stations!”
Luis looked at his friends, fear and uncertainty in their eyes. They all looked exactly like he felt at the moment.
“Don’t just stand their staring at each other!” the lieutenant said. “Get to your posts!”
Luis looked at his friends again. “Good luck.” He turned and ran back down the boarding tunnel as his friends entered the ship.
Luis could hear the lieutenant yelling instructions at the fleet personnel entering the ship as he headed back out the cargo boarding tunnel.
“Stay away from hatches marked with red paint! Those lead to unpressurized areas…”
The lieutenant’s voice faded away as Luis neared the end of the tunnel. He again noticed the pale, frightened civilian as he followed the carts down the tunnel toward the Celestia. The poor man looked even more frightened than he had in the corridor a minute ago.
Luis found himself back in the OAP. He looked about, finding an access ladder farther down the corridor. He made his way across the corridor and down somewhat until he reached the ladder. As he stepped up to the ladder, he noticed the gravity change line on the deck at the edge of the tunnel. He reached out and grabbed the ladder, feeling the sudden lack of gravity on his hands as they passed the line on the deck. He had heard about the zero-gravity ladders but had never used one. He looked up. The ladder went up at least a few hundred feet, connecting several levels of the massive assembly platform. He stepped across the line, pulling his body into the ladder as he floated, weightless, in front of the ladder. Remembering what he had heard about using zero-G ladders, he pulled himself sharply upward and let go, keeping his hands on either side of the ladder to guide himself as he floated upward. A few more pulls got him ascending at an acceptable rate. By the time he was passing the second level above him, he found himself wishing he had the time to go all the way to the top and then back down, as the OAP was the only place that had such ladders.
As Luis passed the third level up, he began sliding his hands along the ladder rail to slow his rate of ascent enough to grab the ladder rungs and bring himself to a stop at the correct level. After carefully positioning himself, he turned and faced away from the ladder. With left foot and left hand on the ladder, he stepped out and placed his right foot on the deck. He could feel the gravity pull his foot down, and he pushed off the ladder, transitioning smoothly from zero gravity to near normal gravity.
He turned to his left and continued forward. The corridor was narrower on this level, and the ceilings were lower. He made his way forward, weaving between the people hurrying to report to their stations in response to the alert horns that still sounded, or to get to the hangar deck for evacuation. He found the personnel boarding gate that led to the Celestia’s command deck and followed two others, a man and a woman, down the tunnel. It was much longer than the cargo boarding tunnel, as the Celestia was narrower in her forward section than she was aft. The other difference was that the upper two-thirds of the tunnel were clear, giving him a full view of the ship as he approached her. The Celestia was smaller than the Intrepid by at least a third, and she was much sleeker. Her curves were gentle, tapering inward at her midsection before suddenly jutting outward at her massive main drive section on her aft end. Her exterior looked complete, her hull true and clean. She did not sport the usual light and dark grays of the other fleet ships, only a flat medium gray undercoat that appeared somewhat uneven in sections, as if its application was unfinished. He could also see into the forward end of the outboard sections of her main drive, into the deep, forward caverns that shrouded her deceleration thrust ports, as well as her forward torpedo tubes. She didn’t even have her name or designation painted on her hull yet.
Luis made it to the boarding hatch, falling in behind two other fleet personnel, both of whom were reporting for duty on board the partially completed ship. On the ship’s hull, to the left of her boarding hatch, someone was finishing up a quick stenciling job. The technician finished applying the black paint and pulled away the stencil, revealing the words ‘Celestia: CV-02’. It was hardly official, and it lacked the customary logo that was unique to each ship in the fleet, yet its mere presence spoke of the pride that her makeshift crew was already taking in their ship.
One by one, the fleet personnel in the line reported their area of expertise t
o the officer at the hatch and received their instructions. Most were assigned to the bridge, with two of them assigned elsewhere in the command deck.
“Delaveaga, tactical,” Luis declared.
“Report to the bridge,” the ensign at the hatch told him as he entered his name in the ship’s crew roster. “End of the corridor, turn left.”
* * *
The backup presidential shuttle touched down on one of the many landing pads at the airfield of the United Earth Republic’s headquarters in Geneva. Eli Scott, the eldest son of the new President of the North American Union, and his chief of staff looked out the window at the terminal in the distance, noting the increased security, as well as the presence of armored vehicles. Combat airships roamed the night skies overhead, their powerful searchlights sweeping the compound below them looking for threats to the security of the Earth’s main seat of government.
The attendant appeared at the door and moved closer to Eli. “Sir, the flight crew was wondering what your orders were.”
“Tell them we wait,” Eli said.
The attendant looked at him, trying to hide his confusion. “Yes, sir.” He turned to head back when Eli moved his left hand, revealing a small weapon in his right. Eli raised the weapon and took aim at the man, firing a small probe into him. The attendant fell to the floor, spasmed once, and went unconscious.
Eli rose, looking behind him toward the doorway to make sure no one had seen the man fall. He disconnected the nearly invisible wire that had transferred the incapacitating shock from his weapon to the probe, leaving it in a pile on the floor next to the man. Next, he pulled a large, plastic zip tie from his pocket and secured the man’s hands together. He repeated the process for the attendant’s feet before moving to the door at the back of the compartment.