Guns and missiles fired a second time, still aimed at the Battleship, which had altered course to cut across Seasprite's obvious circle.
The first pulses hit the Battleship in the rear, and tore off most of its engine section. The missiles had followed the ship into its turn, and slammed into the middle of its length. A huge hole appeared, and explosions lit up space for a few seconds. The ship broke in half.
The Cruisers swept past their broken flagship, and took up the chase. Seasprite continued to circle around them, now targeting the lead Cruiser.
The second broadside slammed into the front section of the Battleship, and reduced it to tumbling debris.
Both sides were firing everything they had now, but only Seasprite was landing blows.
By the time Seasprite was on the other side of the fleet, with four more ships reduced to debris, the remaining enemy fleet still hadn’t managed to turn around fully to engage her properly. The fire from them dropped off as Seasprite continued around to be behind them now, and still firing everything she had, while the enemy only had rear rail gun turrets and their single missile launcher to fire back with.
Seasprite completed the first circle. Eight ships down now, and the enemy had finally wised up. The force broke into two formations, one of which continued to try to get behind her, while the other formation broke for the other side of the circle in an attempt to be there when Seasprite arrived again.
Jamie laughed.
"What's up chuckles?" asked Snark.
"It's nearly time to thread the needle."
"Huh?" said Anna.
"Wait for it," said Seasprite.
The ship changed direction as another Cruiser disintegrated. Yellow dots suddenly winked out nearby, as some of the enemy missiles were able to get within striking range for the first time.
"What were those?" asked Preddle.
"Mosquitos," said Snark.
"I hate mosquitos," said Sissness.
"Love these ones," said Jamie. "They only target enemy missiles."
The ship turned violently again, racing away from one set of ships, and coming around out of their range. Another violent change of course and the ship settled on a course directly between the two formations, which were still heading away from each other.
The turrets realigned again, half firing to one side and half to the other. They kept firing the whole time, as did the missile launchers.
Seasprite threaded the needle between them, and two more ships on each side suffered heavy damage. The ship kept going straight ahead for a while, until the guns fell silent.
"We need a wee break," said Seasprite, in a fair imitation of a Scots accent.
"Why?" demanded Snark.
"We're almost out of missiles," said Jamie.
"Make that readily available missiles," said Seasprite, "and you'd be right."
"Won't that make things harder?" asked Anna.
"Well that’s odd," said Jamie.
"What's odd?" demanded Snark.
"The missile counts are going up again."
"How's that possible?" asked Preddle.
"Been making them since the ships appeared," said Seasprite. "You did know a fabricator was installed by Admiral Paxton's people, didn’t you?"
"Ah," said Jamie. "Is that what that was?"
The ship turned violently again, and headed back the way it had come. The missile launches had never stopped, and two more ships had broken up. Now the turrets started firing again, reoriented to fire frontwards. This time they went head to head with the nearest Cruiser formation, now down to four ships. The lead ship disintegrated, as for the first time, Seasprite started taking hits.
More missiles launched from the ship, these ones being much smaller, although a lot bigger than the Mosquitos. They intercepted each of the rain gun shots, blowing them into shrapnel, which impacted the shields and simply vanished.
"Image recognitions?" asked Jamie.
"Aye," said a Scots accent. "I bet you couldn’t possibly do the aiming fast enough to hit them all."
"No bet. I know when I'm outclassed."
The rest were silent. The battle went on, Seasprite charging through the remaining formation, leaving only a single undamaged ship behind her. It began to run away.
Seasprite changed course violently again, and their dot on the tactical display now started after the last few ships, now all aimed for the nearest jump point. It took a few minutes to line up on the rear most ship, and Seasprite slowed to match its course and speed. The big guns fired, the missiles launched, and Seasprite changed targets.
And suddenly it was over. Debris was scattered over a huge area of space.
Seasprite came to a stop.
Twenty One
"Who needs a drink?" asked Brindle.
No-one answered. Brindle interpreted the lack of response as a yes, unbuckled, and went off to get a selection. The rest of them sat there, stunned.
"Movement," shouted Snark suddenly. "Some of those grey dots are moving."
"Escape pods," said Seasprite. "We have survivors. What do you want to do with them?"
Snark opened his mouth, paused, and closed it again. A fist came up under his jaw, and he pondered for a moment. He dropped the fist, and opened his mouth again.
"We have to pick them up," said Anna.
"Where do we put them?" asked Patters.
"Ship's brig," said Snark. "Didn’t I see one on the schematics?"
"You did," said Seasprite. "Normally I’d get some butler droids to get it ready, but apparently we don’t have any. Who wants to do the honours?"
Jamie and Patters reluctantly left to check out the condition of the brig, while Snark stayed to supervise the pickup operation.
Seasprite moved slowly through the debris fields, with her shields down. Salvage droids scouted around for escape pods which couldn’t move, while those which could, slowly moved towards the ship. Their single search and rescue droid was out looking for spacesuits.
Debris bumped its way down the hull as they passed through thick areas of it, and several of the escape pods banged into the ship, sending loud thunks echoing through the empty areas inside. Snark, Jamie, and Patters escorted each group of survivors from the droid airlock nearest the brig, into their new temporary quarters. They each had guns drawn the whole time, but their prisoners were beaten, and did what they were told. With one exception.
In the last pod, there was a single being. None of them had seen his kind before, but as soon as he started complaining about being left out there so long, they recognised the voice. Snark made a point of jabbing him with one of his guns, hard enough to shut him up.
"Don’t call me 'little puss'," Snark snarled, as he slammed the door closed.
After several hours looking, and another couple salvaging useful hull material, Snark put the ship back on its original course. Seasprite began the process of recycling the hull material, so at their next stop, their repair droids could repair their hull themselves.
They'd picked up sixty seven survivors, out of thousands.
Anna was sickened. All that destruction, and those beings she’d seen voided into space to die. It was as if the combined weight of the killings she’d witnessed, both up front and personal, and at a distance in space, had finally made her crumble. Post-trauma? And the ghosts of her people now clamoured for her attention. Eddie and Zema, but so many others who had been such a part of her life for so long. All gone. And she'd done so little to mourn them.
Anna was in her room’s tiny ensuite, throwing up. She also couldn’t seem to stop crying. It was if her body had woken up from a long sleep, and was reacting to everything all at once rather than in small doses. She washed her face at the basin, and still crying, shifted her suit to a belt, and stepped into the shower. If only standing under a blast of hot water would wash it all away. She cried even harder, and the tears were washed away.
She climbed into bed naked, wearing only her belt. She hiccupped, and started crying again. If s
he could just sleep. But sleep eluded her. Her ghosts were too near, too close, whispering to her.
A knock on the door reached into her misery.
"Go away!" she snuffled, and called out plaintively.
The door cracked open, and Sissness’ head appeared.
"We’re all really worried," she said quietly.
Anna sniffled, and then burst into a fit of crying. Sissness came and sat on the side of her bed, and curled up, holding Anna’s hand in her much smaller paws.
"I don’t understand, but I want to help," she said.
"It’s all just, so…" Anna broke off, and blew her nose violently into a tissue.
"Sometimes, we supress our emotions, but they always catch up with us in the end,"
Anna wailed with frustration.
"Emotions! I just wish they’d bugger off!" she cried.
Sissness waited, not saying anything, not moving.
"It wasn’t the battle," Anna said after a while of silence. "Oh, that was bad enough." She sniffed again. "But I saw….I saw…"
Sissness waited.
"So many bodies just floating there in space. Some of them looked like they were asleep. Some of them were just body parts. I saw a bat woman. She was frozen, her face screaming silently. There was something in her hand, and I zoomed in the display to see what it was. Something heart shaped. We left them all there. It was all horrible." Anna took in a shuddering breath. "It could so easily have been me."
Sissness purred in empathy.
The sound and vibration, seemed to calm Anna. She took another deep breath, and blew her nose hard.
"So many people and beings are dead. And what for? Some crazy hunt for a stone. Something I’ve never actually seen. How do I know it actually exists?"
"We know it exists," said Sissness soothingly, as she continued to purr. "There are the records. But is it what people believe it to be? That we won’t know until we find it."
"Do you think we ever will?"
"Who knows?" Sissness shook her head. "And there’s a great cost. But I believe we have to keep going. Research is funny. It’s like searching for the truth, and testing everything we think we know, until we know from proof."
"I just want to block it all out."
"Your body and mind are telling you to embrace the pain. It’s the only way to make sense of it." Sissness sniffed herself. "But I brought a sleeping shot from the doc droid. It might just help you get to sleep, and stop you thinking so much." Sissness frowned like a stern matron nurse. "But don’t get used to it. Just one. And then you’ll still have to do the work."
"The work?"
Anna pressed the device against her neck, felt a slight sting, and immediately felt drowsy.
"You need to heal, and that will take lots of time, and lots of work."
"Great."
Anna lay back in the bed. Sissness kept purring, until she slept.
"How is she?" asked Jamie, as Sissness came out of Anna’s room.
"Sleeping."
"I wish I could help."
"Just be here for her."
Jamie took a deep breath. "I…"
Sissness put a paw on his leg.
"It’s ok. I know." She smiled. "I think we all know." She sighed. "Just…"
"…not Anna," Jamie finished.
"Don’t try and push her. She’s just not ready."
"Will she ever be?"
"Of course."
"I wish I shared your optimism."
Sissness smiled. If Jamie was a cat, she would definitely be interested.
"Just be patient."
Jamie humphed exactly like Snark would have done. They both supressed giggles.
"Thanks" said Jamie
"You’re welcome," said Sissness.
They said their goodnights and went off in different directions.
Twenty Two
Anna had stopped crying, but had lost interest in anything and everything. She couldn’t concentrate, and didn’t want to listen to the endless discussions of what to do next. The team were torn between continuing directly to the Scylla system as fast as they could go, now they’d destroyed the ships pursuing them, or a more cautious system by system 'stepping stone' approach. They needed to make sure they weren’t being followed.
Snark surprisingly was in favour of a cautious approach, while Jamie was keen on getting there as fast as they could. The others were divided. Anna however, wasn’t interested. She just didn’t care.
The team were very uncomfortable around the 'new' Anna. It was hard to have a conversation with her, and she was not her usual bright and intelligent, 'say it how it is' self. She didn’t engage, and seemed lost in thought.
Brindle thought she should just 'get a grip'. Sissness was more thoughtful about the situation. She had 'diagnosed' depression and anxiety, but of course she was no medical doctor. Patters was a bit aloof too at the moment. As a hunter, she gave thanks for the sacrifice of the hunted so they could provide sustenance for the hunters, however out and out killing on a scale such as the battles she'd witnessed, and participated in, were something she couldn’t process, let alone rationalise through her simple philosophy and spiritual practice.
Jamie was practical and still optimistic. In a fight, the enemy were the enemy. They should be respected, but it was them or him, and he knew they had to kill to win. He’d been trained in a very practical society, where if you had to fight, then you did so to the best of your ability. But a fight was not always the answer. And the dead should be honoured.
Snark seemed the least affected of the team. He kept on planning and checking systems, and getting on with things.
What the team couldn’t see, was Snark’s inner struggle. He’d watched as Jane had annihilated the owl forces. But she had done so to liberate countless species from servitude and slavery. The owls had given her no choice through their extreme aggression and ignorance. What had Snark’s team done and why? To find a stone? To gain power? To seek truth? He was very conflicted about what they were doing, and the cost being wrought to get there. But he kept going, doing things, so as to not dwell on his thoughts. He'd been given a quest. He would see it through.
The team were still in discussion about next steps. Snark decided to finish the talking.
"I think we progress, but at a steady pace. We still need to make sure there aren’t any surprises in this part of the galaxy, and we can make our way back safely. We also need allies, like Elothera and her people."
There was a pause. No-one else spoke.
"Let’s vote," said Snark.
Patters and Sissness voted with Snark. Jamie and Anna wanted to push forward more quickly. They all looked at Brindle.
"I agree with Snark," she said tentatively.
"Steady pace it is then."
Jamie looked at Anna.
"Are ye ok?"
Anna was looking straight ahead. Her eyes were glassy, and she had a vacant look.
"Anna?"
There was no reply. She was sitting at the coms console staring out into nothing.
Twenty Three
Anna was somewhere else. She'd been transported to a different place. She knew it was a vision, but it seemed real. She was walking beside a tall man, who she recognised as the man from the pictures in Elothera’s palace. His long, thin aristocratic features, his height, and a supercilious look on his face, were all reminiscent of the painting.
"Come, Anastasia," he commanded.
She followed along half beside him, half behind him, as he strode through a field of what looked like a grain crop. They were surrounded by the golden plants, and they swished as they forced their way through. Birds were circling overhead. It was hot. Several of their people followed behind them.
There was a barking noise, and a strange haunting cry followed. It was repeated in the distance.
Overhead appeared a dragon like creature. Anna thought it looked what she would imagine a dragon to be, a lizard creature with a wide stretch of bat wings, a long tail, l
egs and arms, scaly skin, and a long neck leading to a head. All it needed was fire to come out of its mouth to complete the picture. The dragon circled over their heads, and emitted the bark and cry again. It was repeated far off in the distance, where they could see a speck in the sky.
The man half in front of her, who she knew as Vasily, stopped and shielded his eyes to follow the dragon. He pulled a long gun from the holster at his side, put it to his eye, sighted, and fired. The dragon checked her flight, and circled around to come at them directly.
Vasily fired again.
Anna seemed unable to act. She wanted Vasily to stop. The creature was beautiful, magnificent in its power and grace.
There was another shot. The creature seemed to check again, and came in to land, not a smooth landing at all, but a sudden plummet towards the field in front of them.
"Come on!" shouted Vasily. Mastiffs dashed past them, headed for where the dragon had descended, and the people behind them broke into a run. Anna followed.
When she came into the clearing in the grain field, made by the dragon’s descent, a scene of horror was revealed. The dogs were harassing the dragon, some fixing their teeth on its neck and limbs, some barking and bearing their teeth. The dragon was bleeding from several places, the results of the gunshots no doubt. Vasily was laughing, his teeth bared, and levelling his gun at the creature’s head. Others were aiming guns as well, but waiting for instructions from Vasily.
Anna did nothing to stop him. She wanted to, but she seemed transfixed. The creature’s eyes seemed to plead with her, it snapped at the dogs crowding it, and fought with its last breaths to survive. The tail thrashed out, and several men were thrown backwards across the field. It thrashed again and caught some more.
Vasily fired, once and then again. The creature was struck in the head, screamed, and collapsed slowly to the ground. A glassy eye stared vacantly up at the innocently blue sky. It was dead.
Destiny Stone (A.I. Destiny Book 4) Page 11