by Ryk Brown
“You’re a sick little guy,” Connor declared. “You know that, don’t you?”
“So I’ve been told.”
“Seiiki, Raker Five!” Ensign Auklud called over the comms. “Take the valley to the north! We’re on the other side of the ridge. We can jump them from above as they follow you in!”
“Raker Five, Seiiki!” Josh replied. “I’ll line’em up, and you take’em down!”
“Anwar! Telles! Sit rep!” the general called over comms.
“We’re good for now!” the sergeant replied. “The Seiiki shook them up, and we finished them off.”
“You need to find cover before more landers show up,” the general warned.
“Cargo Two, inbound,” another pilot reported.
“Cargo Two, Telles. Land behind the hangar.”
“Cargo Two, copy.”
“Jess!” Josh called out as he turned into the canyon, just as Raker Five had instructed. “We’ll swing back and pick you up, as soon as we get rid of these two pests on our back.”
“Make it quick!” Jessica shouted back.
“Arm up and get to the cargo bay,” Connor instructed over the loudspeakers.
Marcus burst through the forward hatch of the cargo bay onto the landing, leaping down to the cargo deck. As he headed aft, Dalen entered the bay from the starboard landing.
“What the hell is going on?” Dalen asked in a daze, looking like he had just woken up.
“We’re going to come in low and fast, and touch down just long enough to pick them up,” Connor continued over the loudspeakers. “Bring the ramp level, then drop it as we land. Touchdown in thirty seconds.”
“Land where?” Dalen asked. “Are we already at Rakuen?”
“We’re back at Burgess,” Marcus replied as he activated the ramp. Air rushed into the back of the Seiiki, filling the cargo deck. “Wake the hell up, kid!” he added, as he opened up the port weapons locker and pulled out two rifles.
“The LZ is cold now, but more Dusahn landers could jump in at any moment.”
Dalen slid down the access ladder, coming down beside Marcus. “What the fuck is going on?” he asked again, as he took the rifle that Marcus handed him and flipped on the weapon’s power switch.
“The Dusahn are attacking Burgess!” Marcus yelled over the sound of the rushing air and the Seiiki’s engines. He pressed the ramp controls again, stopping the ramp when it was level with the cargo deck.
“And we came back to help?” Dalen asked, still in disbelief as he donned his safety harness and headed across the cargo deck to the starboard side. Once across the deck, he hooked up his lifeline to the side safety track, then donned his comm-set. “How the hell did he even know?” he asked over the comms.
“Just be ready to shoot at anything that shoots at us!” Marcus instructed as he stood, ready to drop the ramp to the surface.
Jessica looked up as the Seiiki crossed only a few meters over their heads, kicking up dust and debris with her lift thrusters. Sergeant Anwar grabbed the collar of her chest armor and pulled her up, helping her climb back up onto the side of the roadway.
Two blue flashes appeared directly behind them, their thunderous claps barely audible over the sound of the Seiiki’s engines. Corporal Volmara spun around and opened fire on one of the two Dusahn landers hovering a meter above the roadway, only twenty meters away from them. His first two shots hit the sides of the lander on the left, causing minimal damage. The doors on the lander slid open, revealing a Dusahn soldier directly facing him. The corporal’s next four shots struck the Dusahn soldier square in the chest, burning through his armor. The soldier jerked, slumped, and fell forward from the lander as his other three comrades jumped safely to the ground. “Go!” the corporal yelled over his shoulder to Sergeant Anwar and Jessica. He continued firing as both landers began to climb, disappearing behind jump flashes a few seconds later. He quickly dropped two more soldiers, but the other five made it to cover, returning fire as they ran.
Corporal Volmara stood fast, firing with pinpoint accuracy, but he was one against five, and was without adequate cover. Yellow bolts of energy fired from three different Dusahn weapons slammed into his torso and legs, but he continued to stand and fire, covering the escape of his fellow Ghatazhak. He managed to place two shots into the face of a Dusahn soldier who poked his head up a bit too high, just before the corporal’s stand was ended by three more shots to his chest, neck, and head.
Jessica struggled to keep up with the sergeant as he dragged her toward the landing Seiiki. Through her tactical helmet’s face shield, she could see the Seiiki touch down ten meters ahead of them, its cargo ramp dropping to the ground a second after. She could also see the green icon identifying the position of Corporal Volmara flash orange, then disappear completely.
Marcus and Dalen saw the corporal go down, and opened fire from either side of the top of the Seiiki’s cargo ramp. Firing over the top of Jessica and the sergeant, they pounded the Dusahn position with as much fire as they could muster, but it was not enough. Their rifles were no match for the Dusahn body armor, and the Dusahn knew it. They rose from their positions, emboldened by the new attacker’s lack of firepower, opening up on the Seiiki itself, no longer concerned about the two combatants the ship was attempting to rescue.
Jessica and Sergeant Anwar reached the bottom of the Seiiki’s cargo ramp. The sergeant dumped Jessica onto the ramp, tossing her nearly a third of the way up in the process, after which he turned and opened fire on the advancing Dusahn soldiers.
Marcus ran down the ramp toward Jessica, still firing his woefully underpowered rifle at the advancing enemy line. Two more flashes of blue-white light appeared behind them as he reached down and grabbed Jessica by her chest armor.
Sergeant Anwar raised his rifle slightly, taking aim at one of the landers that had just jumped in, destroying the lift thrusters on either side and toppling it over. It struck the ground and exploded, just as four Dusahn soldiers were jumping from the second lander. The explosion sent the descending soldiers flying, and knocked the soldiers already on the surface to the ground.
That was what the sergeant needed. He stopped firing and ran up the ramp, grabbing Jessica by the arm and helping Marcus drag her along.
“Go, go, go!” Marcus yelled over their comm-sets.
Josh pushed the lift throttles forward, and the ship began to rise quickly off the surface. He glanced at the monitor at the top of the center console, and noticed, on the cargo hatch camera, that Marcus and the others were having a difficult time making it up the ramp as the Seiiki climbed. Josh decreased the thrust level on the ship’s forward lift fans, allowing the back of the ship to rise more quickly than its nose. Another glance at the monitor showed the three of them tumbling along the ramp toward the cargo bay, as Dalen ran across the deck to activate the ramp controls.
Connor watched in amazement, as his copilot flew his ship with a level of expertise he had not realized the young man possessed. Weapons fire from the Dusahn soldiers on the ground had resumed, and they were taking repeated hits in their aft ventral shields as they climbed. At the same time, four contacts suddenly appeared on the sensor display, all four moving toward them from the starboard side at considerable speed. Yet despite all of this, Josh was grinning from ear to ear, as if he were having the time of his life.
“Get us to my parents’ farm!” Jessica pleaded over the comms.
“Just tell me where it is,” Josh replied confidently.
“I know where it is,” Connor replied as he started scrolling the ground map to locate it.
“Seiiki! Raker Six! Two bogeys at your four high, five clicks!”
“Raker Six, Seiiki! I have four on my scope!” Josh replied.
“Seiiki, Six. We’re spoofing so they can’t tell friend from foe. We’ll have them in ten. Suggest yo
u turn hard left and climb like hell.”
Josh pushed his throttles to full power, yanked out his forward lift fans, and pitched up and left, just as four yellow bolts of plasma energy shot past them to their right.
“Combat Three is down hard!” the pilot of Combat Two reported.
“Any survivors?” General Telles asked over comms, as Combat One began a climbing right turn to evade weapons fire from the ground.
“Negative!” Combat Two replied. “There’s no way anyone survived that impact.”
“Telles, Willem. I think they’ve stopped their advance!”
“Kellen, Lazo, Todd! Can you confirm?” Telles inquired.
“We seem to be holding our own on the west side,” Lieutenant Commander Kellen replied.
“Same to the northeast,” Sergeant Todd added.
“I haven’t seen any more landers in the last few minutes,” Master Sergeant Lazo reported. “You don’t suppose we shot them all down, do you?”
“Unlikely,” the general admitted.
“I’m picking up jump flashes outside of the spaceport perimeter,” Lieutenant Latfee reported from the copilot’s seat. “Just inside Lawrence proper.”
“Circle back to the north,” the general ordered. He moved back to the side door as the jump shuttle began its turn. Squinting to see through the wind and smoke, he could barely make out Dusahn troops to the north of the Ghatazhak flight operations ramp. They were moving away from the Ghatazhak positions, back toward the city. “They’re retreating,” he realized. “Those pods are to pick them up!”
“That means they’ll have to land to load up,” the lieutenant said. “That means they’ll be sitting ducks!”
“It also means the Dusahn are going to start glassing the planet!” the general concluded. “Raker Leader, this is General Telles of the Ghatazhak. Are you on frequency?”
“Telles, Commander Jarso. Affirmative.”
“Jarso, Telles. The Dusahn are recalling their ground forces. Suspect they intend to glass the planet. I need you to take down that ship!”
“Telles, Jarso. We’re trying, sir, but their shields are too damned powerful. The lowest we’ve been able to get any one section is twenty-eight percent. We just don’t have anything big to throw at them!”
“Understood,” the general replied. After a moment, he spoke again. “Commander Jarso, have half your forces continue the attack on the assault ship. Send the other half down to cover our evacuation, in case those ground forces change their minds.”
“Understood,” Commander Jarso replied.
“Telles to all Ghatazhak forces. Disengage any Dusahn forces that are withdrawing. Repeat, do not pursue withdrawing forces. Concentrate on getting our people out of here. Lazo, call the boxcars in while we have fighter cover. We need to get all our people off this world before the Dusahn glass it.”
“Understood,” the master sergeant replied.
Lieutenant Latfee turned to look at the general. “There are at least a million people on this planet, General.”
“I am well aware of that, Lieutenant,” the general replied solemnly.
Jessica’s parents sat quietly in the family bunker located on the far side of their farm. Her mother, Laura, sat with little Ania and her other grandchildren, trying to keep them distracted in the cold, poorly lit facility.
“I don’t know why we even left Earth,” Alek’s wife muttered woefully.
“Enough,” Alek said. “Besides, you know you don’t mean that. You love it here, just as much as everyone else.”
“A lot of good that does,” she argued. “Look where we are now.”
They heard a low rumble from outside.
“Did you hear that?” Drew asked.
“It came from outside,” Drew’s wife said.
“It’s getting louder,” their father realized.
The rumbling increased, then quickly turned into the distinct sound of spacecraft engines, screaming as they strained to keep something aloft. The sound quickly became overwhelming, and Jessica’s father motioned for his sons to get their weapons. As they armed themselves and moved into position, Laura, along with Alek and Drew’s wives, herded the children toward the back of the bunker behind the storage crates.
There was a thud, and the scream of the engines quickly subsided. All three men prepared themselves, taking aim at the entrance to their hiding place.
A minute later came the sound of metal striking the door from outside. “Nash family!” a voice called from outside. “I am Sergeant Anwar of the Ghatazhak! I was sent by your daughter, Lieutenant Jessica Nash, to rescue you!”
“How do we know you are who you say you are?” Alek yelled back.
After a moment, the voice yelled back. “Am I speaking with Alek, or Drew?”
“Why would I tell you?”
Another moment passed. “If it’s Alek, Jessica says her nickname for you when she was a child was ‘Butter Butt’!”
Alek’s father looked at his son in confusion. “Butter Butt?”
“Don’t ask,” Alek replied, lowering his rifle with obvious relief. “We’re coming out!” he shouted back to the sergeant. “Please don’t shoot us!” Alek went to the door, unlocked it, and pulled it open.
“Why would I shoot you?” Sergeant Anwar asked, his weapon hanging at his side.
“Sorry. But you Ghatazhak are a bit on the scary side.”
“After all these years?” the sergeant retorted.
“Where’s Jessica?” Laura asked, as she came out from hiding carrying little Ania.
“She is aboard the Seiiki. You will see her momentarily.”
“Why didn’t she come?”
“She is injured, but she will be fine. I will take you to her now, but we must move quickly.”
“Where are we going?” Alek’s wife asked as they moved past the sergeant.
“This way!” Marcus yelled from outside.
“Away from this world.”
“What?” Alek’s wife said, pausing. “Why?”
“The Dusahn are about to destroy it,” the sergeant explained, helping her up out of the bunker. “Please, we must hurry. We do not know how much time we have.”
General Telles jumped from the combat jump shuttle as it came to a stop, hovering two meters above the Ghatazhak ramp. As soon as his feet hit the ground, the shuttle rose and started forward again, its engines screaming, pulling it into a climbing left turn, back toward the city.
“General!” Master Sergeant Lazo called out as he jogged up to his commanding officer. “All of our immediate families have been evacuated. We are now working on getting the last of the critical equipment and supplies.”
“What about our civilian personnel?” the general asked. “What about their families?”
“I assumed that you would want the equipment and supplies first.”
“Our fabricators are already safely off-world,” the general reminded the master sergeant. “Our civilian support must come first. We owe them no less consideration.”
“Yes, sir,” the master sergeant replied. “I’ll make it happen.”
Lieutenant Commander Kellen walked up to the general, falling in beside him on his way to the hangar. “Getting soft in your old age, Lucius?”
“Elam was killed,” the general said as he walked, ignoring his friend’s wisecrack.
“I heard.”
“That makes you my second, Soron.”
“I know.”
“It doesn’t mean you get to call me Lucius, though.”
“Sure it does,” the lieutenant commander replied, smiling. “The last of the Dusahn troops have left the surface. I suspect the bombardment will begin shortly.”
“As do I,” the general agreed. “Have the men
help get people into the cargo shuttle.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And find some commander’s bars,” the general added as he reached the flight operations office door. “You’ve just been promoted.”
Laura and Ania ran up the Seiiki’s cargo ramp toward Jessica, who was sitting on the floor, leaning up against the port bulkhead. Ania raced into Jessica’s outstretched arms, wrapping her little arms around Jessica’s neck, holding on as tightly as she could.
Laura Nash also hugged her daughter, then looked at the wound on her thigh. “Are you all right?”
“I’m okay, Mom.”
“My, God, Jess, it looks terrible. Are you sure?”
“Trust me, I’ve had much worse.”
Explosions rocked the ship as bolts of plasma energy began to strike the surface nearby.
“Is everyone in?” Connor asked over the comms.
“Almost, Cap’n,” Marcus replied. “Let’s go, people!” he urged them as Alek and Drew guided their families up the ramp. Marcus moved over to the ramp controls on the side of the cargo bay hatch, as Sergeant Anwar and Dalen came running up.
“That’s it! Let’s go!” Marcus said over his comm-set as he pressed the button to raise the Seiiki’s cargo ramp and seal up the bay.
The building shook as bolts of plasma energy fired from orbit smashed into the surface all over the spaceport. Four impacts sounded in rapid succession, with the last one coming extremely close to the hangar. There was a sudden explosion outside, and the office shook violently. There was a terrible sound, like the tearing of metal, followed by two more secondary explosions.
“Two is down!” someone cried out over comms. “Oh, my God! Cargo Two!”
Telles ran back outside. The far corner of the hangar was gone, and the entire eastern side of the building was ablaze. He ran over to Commander Kellen, who had been knocked from his feet by the explosion. “Are you injured?” he asked as he reached down to help the commander to his feet.