“This doesn’t bode well. What do you think they’re up to?” Kate asked.
“No way to tell. Everyone, stay on your toes,” Saint said.
On the feed from the drones, the reason for the delay was revealed. Several enemies had been carrying components to a larger weapon, which had protected it from Pandora’s strafing runs. They inclined the barrel toward the top of the wall and fired. A cascade of tiny orbs shot out, cleared the wall, and landed in the courtyard with a metallic clatter. Once there, they paused for a second then wobbled into motion and accelerated at the defending Marines.
“Look out,” Kate yelled, firing at the ones rolling toward her and finding them difficult targets to hit.
“They’re homing in on the metal, using a magnetic field to propel themselves,” said Winstel.
“Jump back,” Saint ordered, and the Marines used their suit jets to leap away from the incoming metal. One wasn’t fast enough, and the tiny spheres flowed up his armor until he was fully encased in them. There was a blast of light and the smell of ozone. Then the Marine fell, his suit scorched and blackened.
Saint charged the downed figure, attaching a tether and pulling him along the line of retreat. “Civilians, take out the little balls if you can.” He heard firing intermixed with more sparks and sizzles as the magnetic orbs found the metal rifles of the defenders.
Kate and her team stepped forward to block the way. “Our suits have figured out a reverse magnetic field,” she said. “We can take the first line.” Sure enough, the metal balls grew confused as they neared the Domeki combat armor and rolled around ineffectively until they ran out of power.
The aliens had taken advantage of the distraction to create a beachhead inside the wall, and the lead elements poured fire at them. They were forced to give ground by the sheer volume of incoming damage, which steadily depleted the suits’ physical and energy protection.
“Grenades,” Kate called, and a mix of munitions sailed into the enemy ranks and detonated. Fire and electricity mixed with percussion and smoke, creating a precious lull in the incoming barrage. “Webs,” Kate ordered, and the web grenades Pandora had constructed based upon UAL schematics flew in to coat the invaders in that sticky substance and provide a momentary barrier to those seeking to enter.
Kate’s team turned and ran, taking cover positions along each of the three lanes that led from the outer wall to the inner portion of the colony.
GeeWhiz announced, “North and south enemy columns have been eliminated. Our heavy weapons have taken damage but are still functional. The ones to the east will assist with that column, but the ones to the west have no angle.”
“Get the operators out of there,” Saint said, and the tiny figures hopped out of the protective shells and ran along the walls toward a safe position to climb down.
“It won’t be long until the enemy decides to take them out,” Saint said. Sure enough, shortly thereafter loud explosions marked the destruction of the heavy weapons in those directions.
Xroeshyn scouts crept carefully down each of the streets. Kate and her team watched them advance, sharing camera feeds in their displays. As one, they eliminated the exploring aliens, then fell back to secondary positions as the enemy evacuated the entrance bottleneck by climbing or bounding up to the tops of the structures.
The sniper rifle sounded repeatedly as the enemy came clear of obstructions, but they were too many and too quick. “They’re burning the buildings,” Easy said from her perch atop the highest.
Curses flew across the channel as the humans vented their outrage. The fire raced from building to building and chased the enemy toward the town square. When they arrived, they marched into the teeth of twelve angry Marines and two incensed gunnery sergeants, who mowed them down as quickly as they appeared. The Pandora’s crew fell back, and soon they’d corralled the remaining enemy troops, seven of them, who gathered in a rough circle, rifles pointed out at the encircling humans.
Kate triggered her external microphone and translation protocol. She said, “Lower your weapons and you’ll be permitted to live.”
The apparent leader made a disgusted sound. “Become prisoners of you vermin? Not a chance. We’ll instead die and go on to paradise when your scourge is wiped from the universe.”
“As you wish,” Saint said, and head shots decapitated six of the seven as they started to move. The remaining one was wounded but charged at Kate, arms outstretched as if he’d grab her. She stumbled backward, and the world seemed to shift into slow motion. She saw the devices, tiny and blinking right at the edge of her visual range, so much so that it hurt to focus upon them.
It took Sinner forever to scream the word, “Sacrifice,” syllable by drawn out syllable.
Kate started to twist away, certain her depleted armor couldn’t save her from death if those really were the explosive devices they appeared to be.
Her last thought during the slow time was, this was an incredibly stupid way to die, and she would’ve wished for a better one.
Everything sped up again as she fell to the ground, and the two gunnery sergeants tackled the soldier. There was a shattering explosion, and they were hurled aside like projectiles from a siege weapon, slamming into, and in Sinner’s case through, the walls of the nearby structures. Where the alien had been was just a smoking stain.
“Ow,” Sinner said with a notable whine.
“At least your wall gave,” Saint replied in a rasping growl. He coughed. “Mine hurt a lot more.”
“I can’t believe they packed such a big wallop in such a small package.”
“Thank all that’s holy we hadn’t used our personal shields,” he panted.
“Saint?”
“Yes, Sinner?”
“You turned your shield on first. Coward.”
Kate released the fear and the stress and the pain in a long laugh she hoped didn’t sound as hysterical as it felt.
After a few hours of rest, recuperation, bandaging, and debriefing, Kate and her crew stood facing the Marines. “I miss you all,” Kate said.
“We miss you too, Red,” said Saint.
“You’re still welcome to run with us any time, Kate,” added Sinner. “The rest of you as well. You’re wasted on a ship.”
Kate laughed. “Hear that, Cross?”
The jamming defeated, he was able to reply, “Don’t let them fool you. They’re just jealous you have skills in both areas.”
“It’s true,” Sinner said. “If only more of you, certain captains, let’s say, possessed such skills, we might have won this thing already.”
“Washington out,” Cross replied, and the humans on the planet shared goodbyes. Kate watched the colony diminish underneath her as the tether from Pandora pulled her up. The hatch closed to block the sight of the planet away, and the ship launched itself toward its next task.
Chapter Eleven
Cross surveyed the sector through the front viewport of the shuttle carrying him to the Chicago. The vista was filled with ships, decks of every size and configuration. For the first time in history, all of Earth’s armada was in one place.
Well, all the fully functional ones. They’d addressed the argument that sending so much of their force on the assault left their territory undefended by leaving behind damaged but still viable ships at strategic defense points.
Cross thought doing so was most likely an exercise in denial, but the decision hadn’t been his to make. He jerked his attention back to the present. The sight of Alliance ships hanging side by side with those from the Union gave him a warm feeling, even amidst the dire concerns that had brought them together here.
He drummed his fingers as the pilot slipped the shuttle deftly into the Chicago’s hangar and was walking down the ramp before it had finished descending. It took but a moment to pick her out from the crowd, and he dodged ship personnel to gather Kate into a giant hug. No words were exchanged, the physical contact sufficient to provide all the commitment and reinforcement necessary.
“Break it up, Commander, Captain,” said the amused voice of Captain First Rank Dima Petryaev as he approached. Cross shared a handshake with Dima and complimented him on the new medals adorning his uniform.
Dima said, “They tell me I’m very brave and give me trinkets with which to display their notice of it.” He reached up to polish one of them with the uniform sleeve. “I think their interpretation of bravery might differ from mine, but they nonetheless committed our forces to this endeavor, so I’m content.”
“Do you think we’ll get medals for this?” Kate asked, a wry grin on her face.
“Hopefully, we’ll be around to receive them,” Cross answered. The others nodded in response, and they headed together for the lift to take them to the admirals’ conference.
Admiral James Okoye intercepted them before they entered the meeting room. “Flynn, Petryaev, Cross, good to see you.” He gripped Cross’s hand warmly when it was his turn and put his other hand on his shoulder. The evident apology on his face was met by Cross’s own look of understanding, and just like that, everything was right between them again.
“Feels good to have the old team together,” Kate said.
“Feels good to all be on the same team for once,” Dima replied.
With a nod of agreement, Okoye opened the door and ushered them into the meeting room.
The space was enormous, plenty large enough to provide seating for all the assembled captains and admirals. The chairs were arranged in concentric circles, with aisles at intervals and an empty space in the middle. Admiral Wilder stood from his place in the inner circle and strode to the exact center of the arrangement.
“Captains, Admirals, thank you for coming. New information has come to light that’ll influence where we go from here. And the admiralty believed it too important to be decided by us alone. Commandant Gillian, would you please summarize the situation?”
He sat, and a tall, muscular woman, the top-ranking Marine, took his place. “The Xroeshyn have launched a series of attacks on colonies belonging to both the UAL and the AAN. Similar to the attacks some of you have already encountered, they are committing a significant amount of personnel and equipment to these assaults. What we must decide, here and now, is how we will respond.” She waved an arm at an aide, and a holographic display of the relevant systems appeared over her head. Planets with colonies were represented as solid, rather than just outlines, and those under attack pulsed with a faint red highlight. “As you can see, they’ve struck at a wide variety of worlds. Our strategists can identify no particular reason for these colonies to have been chosen, other than the clustering might suggest reinforcement vessels ready to deploy.”
At her words, zones appeared, shaded subtly in different colors to show groupings and potential support locations.
Wilder rose again and took center stage. “Thank you, Commandant Gillian.” He paused a moment, letting the side conversations that had begun during the transition fall away. “We must decide what to do now. Do we pursue our original goal of a fast attack on the aliens’ home world, or do we delay and protect our colonists from the Xroeshyn attacks?” He gestured, and another member of the inner circle stood. “I have asked Admiral Clifford to provide the argument for continuing on as planned.”
A portly man, easily in his seventies, Cross judged, stepped into the circle. His uniform was festooned with countless medals, earned as the primary strategist for the UAL Navy. “Simply put, Captains, this is at best a delaying tactic, and at worst, it is a delaying tactic with traps awaiting the ships that ride to the defense of the colonies.” He gestured at the display above. “We’ll need to head away from our objective, the home system of the Xroeshyn, to travel to these settlements. Based on data collected from the ships we sent to deal with the attacks closest to Earth, the Xroeshyn are sending significant numbers. Enough that we’d need to submit more than half of our fleet to ensure even strength, and additional ships at in between points to respond to unexpected situations.”
Clifford shook his head and spread his hands in a beseeching gesture. “Simply put, this will halt our advance for an unknown time. During that delay, we can rest assured the enemy will not be still.” At a gesture, the display changed into a linear plot with the aliens’ home system on one end and the endangered colonies on the other. Trajectories were drawn in to illustrate ship routes as they’d be if the group chose to defend the colonies. It was quickly obvious the fleet would wind up dispersed and unable to launch a direct attack without again gathering in a common location to coordinate the action.
“So, basically,” Cross whispered to Kate, “if we defend the colonies we throw away the time spent getting here.”
“Thanks, I could never have figured that out for myself,” she drawled in sarcastic response. She punctuated it with a backhand slap to his solar plexus, and he doubled over in pretend agony.
Admiral Clifford continued, “It’s clear we cannot just abandon the efforts we’ve made so far to respond to these attacks. When we push forward into the aliens’ home, they’ll be forced to withdraw their own forces to defend against us. That protects our colonies better than responding to this provocation does. Thank you.”
He returned to his seat, and the room filled with low conversation. Several moments later, an officer in the uniform of the Allied Asian Nations rose and stepped into the center of the circle. In a booming voice, he said, “I am Admiral of the Fleet Victor Volkov. I’ve been asked to present the opposite case, a rationale for protecting our colonies and delaying our advance. There are two reasons to make this choice. The first is purely strategic. The enemy has distributed its ships across a wide swath of the galaxy. We can build a strategy that allows us to bring overwhelming force to one after the next, rather than separating our ships as they no doubt expect us to do. This imposes additional risk upon the colonists, but we can prioritize according to their likelihood of defending themselves without our assistance. We’ll engage first in defense of those colonies with the greatest population at the greatest risk and work our way toward smaller risk and smaller populations from there. We’ll attack each with overwhelming force and move on to the next.”
As he spoke, the hologram over his head redrew itself yet again, this time offering the original display with ship trajectories marked upon it. “I caution you these aren’t final analyses, as we’re still assessing risk scenarios. However, this approach gives us the numerical advantage to smash their ships while they’re away from the support of the rest of their fleet. It will cost us time, but we’ll trade that time for the ability to weaken the resistance we’ll ultimately face in their home system.”
The display blanked, and the admiral folded his hands in front of him. “The second reason, of course, is the more important one. Our enemies have judged rightly that we’re not a species that will casually spend the lives of our civilians to reach a military end. When necessary, we have before, and we will again make that terrible choice. But I’d argue that it’s not now essential, and we must live up to our best ideals and protect those who cannot protect themselves.” He stopped speaking and stood silently. The weight of his words sunk into Cross’s soul and planted a pit of anger and frustration into his stomach. He sensed the rest of the room grow still and hard as well, and the space remained silent for several seconds.
Volkov broke the stillness with a quiet, “Thank you,” and returned to his seat. There were no conversations this time, only anticipation.
Admiral Wilder rose and regarded the gathered officers. “Does anyone wish to add additional commentary before we judge the will of the assembly?”
No one did.
“Those who believe we should move to defend our colonies in the manner Admiral of the Fleet Volkov suggests, please signify by raising your right hand.”
Fully ninety percent of the hands in the room extended toward the ceiling. The admiral nodded. “Thank you, Captains, Admirals. I believe to this question, there is indeed a right answer. And I believe you’ve chosen
it.”
Wilder detailed the existing plans for that option, which included sending probes far and wide to gather additional information about their enemy during the time they’d be distracted from their main purpose. Hours later, after an extensive discussion of strategy and tactics for the defense of their citizens, the meeting broke up and everyone returned to their ships.
With one or two exceptions.
“I can’t believe we’ve got all these ships together, and now we’re all going to split up again,” Cross said. He reached over and brushed a stray lock of hair out of Kate’s eyes, and reveled in the sensation of his fingers on her skin.
She propped herself up on an elbow, mimicking his posture, and replied, “You know it’s the right thing to do.”
“Of course, no question. Still, I’d like to slap whatever alien came up with the strategy.”
Kate laughed. “Hopefully, we’ll get that chance sooner rather than later.”
The hitch in her voice told him the topic she’d been avoiding was soon to be revealed.
He looked around her cabin, admiring the way the candles flickered and wafted the scent of vanilla throughout the space. For just a moment, he could imagine they were together in a shared abode, with nothing more to worry about than the daily tasks of life on a forward colony.
He snorted inwardly. Colony life didn’t really seem all that romantic, right at the moment, regardless of what long-told stories of nostalgic frontier adventure might suggest.
“Cross, I have to tell you something.” Kate’s voice was soft, and he heard regret in it.
“Okay,” he said, looking into her eyes.
“When we depart to defend the colony we’ve been assigned, the Pandora is going to go somewhere else.”
“Where?”
“She told us we need to visit another Domeki base that’s nearby. She assures me we’ll be back in plenty of time to rejoin you either for later colony attacks, or for the final assault.”
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