by Geoff North
Nash spoke at his side. “Captain, I’ve detected a power spike in Sciences section, sub-level four.”
Sulafat kept his eyes glued to the main view screen as six of Ambition’s heavy torpedo chambers slid out past the open doors. Sub-level four was cryonics. Why was a power spike being registered there? “Will it affect in any way what we’re about to do now?”
“Negative. Readings are dropping back down to normal already.”
“Then you can investigate the cause after we’re done here.”
Vin unlocked a small console cover on the top half of her weapons board. A single button lit in red waited underneath. The light turned green. She pressed down on it forcefully with one thumb. “Collapse bombs away.”
Six cylindrical objects shot out from the cannons. “Drone view,” Sulafat commanded. The single image of Ambition’s receding torpedo chambers was replaced with half a dozen nearly identical shots of outer space. Mantus’s rocky surface appeared at the bottom of each as the drones picked up speed. Another advantage of using video drones as bombs was a bird’s eye view of the destruction to come. “How long until they intercept?”
Vin struggled for only a moment to find the right readout screen on her board. “All drone fold drives have engaged towards their targets. Optimal damage can be achieved in… twelve seconds.”
“Did you hear that, Gacrux?”
“Affirmative. I’ve set the drives to malfunction accordingly.”
“The Pegan ships are firing at the drones,” Vin reported. “Impact in four seconds.”
Two of the six images on screen went black a few moments later. The bridge crew could hear Gacrux curse over the open line.
“Patience,” Sulafat said. “We still have four to go.”
A spread of lights larger than the background stars appeared in the remaining drones’ view. The lights quickly took form as dozens of Pegan ships flying in formation bore down on Ambition. The alien vessels wouldn’t get the chance to fire a second time.
All four remaining images on the view screen went black. Sulafat clutched the arms of his chair and waited. Gacrux made a whooping noise loud enough to cause the speakers to crackle. “It worked, Captain! Four fold drive overloads, four implosions.” There was a pause as the propulsion chief gathered more information. “Thirty-eight alien ships have vanished and the rest are turning back.”
The bridge erupted with cheers.
“Impressive,” Nash said.
Sulafat winked at the robot and gave Vin Vir the thumb’s up.
“Captain!” Argus had to shout to be heard from her communications station. “Captain, one of the Pegan ships is still advancing—sir, they’ve opened a direct line… They wish to talk to us.”
Chapter 34
Hail had hidden the unconscious mechanic behind the office desk while the slowly recovering Kella cleaned up the remains of human and Pegan blood from the floor. If they were going to be discovered, they first needed time to figure out exactly where they were, and how best to defend themselves.
“This is insane,” Hail whispered as they snuck down a dimly lit service corridor. Their helmets were back on, lighting the way ahead. “We should go back to that mechanical bay and see if we can get one of those vehicles going.”
“And where would we go if you managed to get one running? Back up onto the moon’s surface? Maybe we could fire our side cannons into space for Ambition to see a hundred million kilometers away.”
“I thought you said you were going to stop being such a smartass.”
“It’s a tough promise to keep when you say such stupid things.” She squeezed his arm affectionately. “I know you’re scared, I am too. We should’ve been dead half a dozen different times by now, but we’re still here.”
“If that’s meant to encourage me, it isn’t doing the job.”
They crept out into a wider tunnel. “It’s meant to make you think there might be a reason we’ve come this far.”
The lighting inside the tunnel was even dimmer than it had been inside the service corridor. Energy was being conserved in this part of the alien facility. “Are you talking about some kind of divine intervention? I might have my hang-ups, but believing the Spirit of Sol is watching over our every move isn’t one of them.”
“I don’t believe in any of that either. I was starting to wonder if the Pegans were intentionally allowing us to get this far.”
“Tell that to the guy back there you took a shot at.”
They continued down the tunnel, both side cannons drawn. She pointed with her weapon to what looked like another opening in the wall further ahead. A deep rumbling sounded somewhere behind them. Moments later a bright light appeared at their backs. They jogged towards the opening and slipped into a shadowy alcove. A vehicle thundered by on eight giant tires, pulling an open container filled with rocks.
“It’s a mining facility,” Kella said resting her hands on her knees, attempting to catch her breath. “That vehicle, the ones we saw back in the bay… designed to carry heavy ore.” She holstered her side cannon and trained her helmet light on a door behind them. There were no keypads built into it requiring secure access, just a plain handle. She gave him a look to prepare, and Hail trained his weapon on it as Kella pulled the door open. Rubber flaps sealed along the top and bottom edges scraped across ceiling and floor.
Hail stepped through with his side cannon leading the way. Rows of narrow metal doors were lined on either side of them. Kella opened the first one on her right. There were clothes hanging on a hook inside. Dirty boots and safety goggles were sitting on the floor. “Worker storage lockers,” she whispered.
They moved in deeper, passing by an open area of shower stalls, toilets, and sinks. Kella found a side corridor and motioned Hail to follow. They came into a room of tables and lounge chairs. There was a large map pinned to one of the walls—an immense overview of the entire complex.
Kella whispered softly. “It’s a lot bigger than I thought.”
Hail rested a finger on a red dot at the upper most part of the map. “I think this means we’re here.” A collection of thin lines surrounded the dot, like roots beneath a tree; a few snaked away up to the moon’s surface—represented as a thicker jagged line—but the majority of them sunk down even deeper. Here they joined up with what looked like a massive conglomeration of industrial complexes, retail centers, and living areas. “Those weren’t mining vehicles we saw, Kella. They’re excavators. We’ve just stumbled into a gigantic city buried under Oread’s surface.”
“It’s more than a city… you can see the curvature of the moon’s surface. If this map is to scale, almost half its interior has been cleared out and colonized. It’s a world inside a world.”
Oread was the smaller of Pega’s two moons, but it could hardly be considered tiny. A thousand Ambition-sized ships could fit within the area they were looking at.
Hail stepped back to take it all in. “And it’s obviously been here a long time. That might explain why things are running on minimum power up in these higher levels. The heavy work of removing so much rock has already been done.”
“Tens of millions of people could be living here.”
“More likely hundreds of millions.”
“We have to get out of here, Hail.”
“I’ve been saying that ever since the emergency landing. Why are you suddenly agreeing now?”
She smacked the center of the map with an open palm. “Take a closer look. I can’t see any militarized zone—no guns, no missile silos, not even a sign of any exterior shielding. This place is practically indefensible. That’s information Ambition can use to win this war.”
Kella was right. Oread was what the ancients once called a sitting duck. But there was one major flaw in her plan. “How the hell are we going to get back home and tell them? What’s left of Bee is sitting a kilometer above our heads in a thousand little pieces.”
She indicated towards the map with a half nod. “You don’t think we’ll find a
nother space ship in all of that?”
Hail winced. “I’d rather not try. I have this aversion to being captured and tortured.”
Kella had already unpinned the map from the wall and was beginning to fold it up. “Who’s being the smart ass now?” She grabbed onto his arm and pulled him towards the door. “Come on, let’s go find a ride home.”
They had made it back into the big washroom area when they heard voices coming from the locker room. Hail pulled her into a corner next to a row of stand-up urinals, and they listened. He held up three fingers, indicating how many different voices he could detect. Kella shook her head and showed him four fingers. A moment later she showed her thumb as well.
“Five?” He whispered. “That’s too many to try and shoot with our side cannons.”
Kella nodded and pointed to one of the eight toilet stall doors in front of them. She started creeping for the first one, but Hail pulled her to the furthest stall. “If any of them have to go, chances are they’ll pick the closest one.”
They squeezed inside, their boots on either side of the toilet. Kella closed the door and pulled the slide lock into place. The voices got louder. Two men entered the washroom. There was a six-inch high opening at the bottom of the stall. Hail pointed it out to Kella, grabbed onto her shoulders for support, and climbed onto the toilet seat rim. She did the same until they were both awkwardly squatting in front of each other, their knees touching.
They could hear one of the men urinating. The second one said something and laughed. Hail and Kella heard the clunk of his boots approaching the toilet stalls. He didn’t stop at door one or door two. He kept on walking past doors three, four, five, and six.
Kella almost fell back into the wall reaching for her side cannon. She steadied herself against Hail and pointed the weapon at the door. Toe boots appeared in front of their stall. There was a clunk and slight shudder as the worker attempted to pull the door open. He said something quietly and tried it again. He pulled harder, rattling the handle back and forth. The man shouted a single word—a profanity, Kella and Hail were sure—and went to use the toilet beside them.
He flushed, used one of the sinks, and left with his companion. Kella started to lower herself back to the floor, but pulled her boot back up into place quickly when they heard more voices. A lot more voices. Toilet stall doors opened and closed. Urinals were being pissed into. Showers started running. Hail leaned in close and whispered directly into Kella’s ear. “There’s a lot more than five now.”
“Quiet. They’ll be gone soon.”
They held onto each other and waited as the place started to steam up and stink. Hail’s legs were beginning to ache. Kella’s were shaking. They wouldn’t be able to last much longer.
Chapter 35
Sulafat stood up from the bridge command chair and straightened his tunic. How is a leader supposed to look when confronting an alien species for the first time? Was he expected to stick out his chin in open defiance? His hands—what was he going to do with them? Arms crossed over chest? Legs spread apart how far?
These thoughts, and a hundred other worries flashed through his mind in less than a second. I’m far too old to be worrying about crap like this. He let his arms rest at his sides, his stance remained normal. “Put them on the screen, Argus.”
He could sense the collective shock of his officers around him as the alien vessel hanging against space was replaced with a looming grey face. Below the bulbous skull and terrifying black eyes was a bump of a nose, and a slit for a mouth.
Sulafat wondered if the Pegan was as equally shocked at the appearance of Ambition’s bridge crew. “I am Captain Ly Sulafat of the Sol Ship Ambition.” He waited a few moments for the grey face to reply. It didn’t. “You have attacked our scout ships… inflicted minimal damage on this ship. I call for the immediate surrender of your vessel.”
The creature blinked. Its head tilted slightly to one side, as if it were trying to understand what Sulafat had said, or perhaps listening to the input of another alien off screen. It turned its attention back to the Captain and replied in a deep voice that rumbled over the speakers. “Ly… Sulafat. Aggressor representative of Sol star system… Earth planet… Your Ambition is guilty of attack … and casualties to Pegan citizens.”
“We defended ourselves against the hostile actions of your people.” Unless the alien could read his mind, Sulafat couldn’t see the need to confess they had travelled to the Pegan system to begin the war that had already broken out. “I say again, surrender your vessel or suffer the consequences.”
The view screen went black. Sulafat turned to communications. “Did you do that?”
Argus shook her head adamantly. “No sir. Nothing wrong on our end. The Pegans cut the line.”
He looked over to Vin. “Instruct Gacrux to load another collapse bomb. Kalin—prepare to back us away from that ship.” Sulafat sank down into his chair and exhaled heavily. “So what did you make of that?” He asked quietly.
“I have been observing human behavior for over seven centuries,” Nash answered. “I have had less than one minute to study the behavior of Pegans. Based on that exchange, I would surmise the alien truly believes—forgive the old expression—that we started it.”
Sulafat nodded. “Exactly what I was thinking. It’s either telling the truth, or its lying right out of its ugly mouth. Do you know what a poker face is, Nash?”
“It’s what Commander Ries accused me of having the last time we met for games in your quarters.”
The Captain chuckled, remembering the night with a combination of contentment and sadness. “That alien wears the same expression, I’m afraid.”
Gacrux’s voice came over the speakers. “I have a drone loaded and ready to go, sir. Auto-launching in ten seconds”
“Hard to port, Kalin,” Sulafat instructed. “Get us out of here.”
The alien face suddenly reappeared on the view screen. “Hadar… Cen.”
Sulafat straightened up in his chair. “Hold us where we are! Gacrux, do not let that drone out, I repeat—do not launch the drone.” The Captain’s fists clenched as he stared into the black eyes before him. “I’m not sure I heard you correctly… That last communication was garbled.”
“Hadar Cen,” the alien repeated. “Unless you agree to… negotiations, his life will be terminated.”
Negotiations.
Minutes ago both species were set to annihilate one another. Now the Pegans wanted to negotiate terms. A human life hung in the balance, but it was a starting point, Sulafat figured. Perhaps the war he’d been born to lead humanity into could be averted after all.
“We will meet with a small, unarmed delegation of your people to discuss this matter further.”
“Approved,” the alien agreed with a human-like nod of its head. “We will receive you aboard our ship in… one hour.”
“No. The meeting will be held here, on my ship.” He stuck his chin out without realizing he was doing so. “It’s either that, or I’ll collapse you and your vessel into oblivion.”
The head nodded again slowly a few seconds later. “Approved.”
Chapter 36
“End of the line,” a soft-spoken computer voice announced. “Please remain seated while compartment recharges for return trip.”
“Recharge the compartment and wait here.” Military CS Seginus Boo stood and opened the travel tube door. “I won’t be that long.” He stepped out into a dimly lit cavernous area and straightened his uniform. Seginus was on level one in the extreme aft end section of Ambition. Once, many hundreds of years ago, it had been a storage bin for processed ore. Now it was just a dead and neglected part of the ship, located too far from the vessel’s heart and hub of activity. The crew referred to it as Ambition’s ass-end—a final resting place for centuries worth of expended materials and broken parts.
The CS began walking past towering stacks of half-filled crates and containers, headed towards the small shipping office at the back of the bay. He checked
over his shoulder once to make sure the travel tube was still there. If it left him here now, chances were high it wouldn’t return for at least another hour, perhaps longer. The tubes and lifts still functioning were busy carrying Ambition’s officers to more important sections of the ship. Anyone this far from the action would be last in queue, and Seginus couldn’t afford to be missing that long—not with the company they had preparing to come onboard.
He rapped softly at the office door. “Open up, I’m here.”
The door slid open. “Thank you for coming, CS.”
Boo was shocked at the haggard appearance of the man seated behind the solitary desk, but did his best not to let it show out of respect. “I can’t stay long, General. We’ll have to make this quick.”
Shain Agle attempted to stand, belched loudly halfway up, and sank back down into the chair. “And thank you for calling me General. It’s been a… difficult adjustment.”
“Are you drunk, sir?”
“Drunk, stoned, wasted.” Agle bent over with considerable effort and retrieved an empty liquor bottle from the floor. “Thought maybe if I got shit-faced, the Captain might put me back in command of the military again.” He threw it against the office wall, hoping for an impressive explosion of glass. It clunked down to the floor still intact and rolled to a stop at Boo’s feet. “Sulafat likes drunks running things, doesn’t he?”
The CS took a step back towards the door. “Don’t do this to yourself, Shain. You might be able to get your command back when this is all over.”
“I don’t think so.” Agle reached into a breast pocket and pulled out a smaller, plastic bottle. He fumbled with the lid and spilled a few pills onto the desk. “The booze doesn’t agree with me like it does Emin… but these little beauties have always made me see things crystal clear.”
Seginus watched him chew two of them down. He’d always known of the General’s habitual opiate use; Dr. Gulum had first prescribed the white tablets as pain management after Shain had broken his leg during a training exercise ten years earlier. The leg had healed fine, but the drugs had remained a permanent crutch. “Give me the pills, General. I know the last few hours have been hard, but you’re going to kill yourself if you keep this up.”