by Jake Elwood
"Someone show Mr. Crabtree to the docking ring on Deck Two. And make sure the boarding party is ready to go." The plan was to send in Dalton Hornbeck and a dozen cadets. Half of them would carry food stores to the Alexander while the others made a quick search of the station.
"Remind them not to dawdle," Hammett called to the departing cadet. "We don't know when our friends outside might come back for another round."
"We came through that scrap okay," said Carruthers. "They're learning from us, though. They didn't give us any good missile targets this time."
Hammett nodded. The alien ships weren't fleeing in disorder like they had after the detonation of the nuke. They were waiting for something, and whatever it was, he knew he wouldn't like it. His only hope was to be gone before the hammer fell.
CHAPTER 25 - CRABTREE
Metallic clatters echoed through the corridor in front of the aft docking ring, and John Crabtree smiled. He was leading men into a hostile environment full of unknown danger, something he hadn't done in a very long time. He was surprised to realize how much he'd missed it. He'd been a Sergeant of Marines until the corps had been disbanded twenty years back. By that time he'd been well and truly addicted to adrenalin.
Now he was back in action, and it felt good.
All of them wore vac suits and helmets with the faceplates retracted. They would be able to move through depressurized parts of the station, or areas filled with smoke. The suits would also offer some protection if they were attacked, or if there was an accident.
A light over the hatch turned green, and he turned to the crowd of cadets. He had no authority over them, but it felt natural to take command. "This is it. We're going to go in and move quickly. No one goes anywhere alone. If you're on a search team, you keep an eye on your companion. This should be quite straightforward, but we could encounter anything from hostile aliens to panicking civilians, so keep your eyes open."
He looked each cadet in the eyes. "We don't have any time to waste rescuing one of you, so keep yourselves safe. If you get hurt, I'm not carrying you back to the Alexander. I'm kicking your ass every step of the way. Is that clear?"
A couple of cadets nodded.
"The suit radios are fried. Once we hit vacuum it's all hand signals and charades. So keep your eyes open." The hatch slid open and Crabtree said, "Follow me." He headed into the station at a trot.
He was three steps past the hatch when he felt his helmet bump the ceiling. The station gravity was down. He glanced back, and saw to his annoyance that the cadets were handling zero gravity better than he was. He hadn't experienced null gee since about the time most of them were born, but the basics came back to him quickly. He got an elbow against the ceiling and spun along the axis of his torso. Once his hands were against the ceiling it was easy. He pulled himself along, ricocheting down the corridor, bouncing from walls and ceiling and floor as he went.
They came to a hatch, a red light on the panel showing vacuum on the opposite side. He pried the panel from the bulkhead, found the emergency handle by touch, and took a firm grip. "Venting atmosphere," he announced, and closed his faceplate. "Everyone check the person beside you." He waited a couple of seconds, and then pulled the handle.
The hatch popped open a hand span, and a sudden wind pulled him forward. The air in the corridor was gone in a moment. He peered through the gap, saw darkness beyond, and heaved the hatch open.
He moved through to the Sunset Deck, a broad enclosed plaza with restaurants and a promenade lined with actual living trees. They were dead now, he supposed. The glow of a dozen helmet lights didn't do much to push back the darkness, but he was able to make out a jagged tear in the ceiling. Stars gleamed in the darkness beyond.
"This way," he said. "Don't get lost." No one reacted, of course, and he chuckled as he realized he'd forgotten the dead radios. He launched himself forward, sailing along a couple of meters above the deck. He slid neatly between the stretching branches of a couple of trees, pleased at the accuracy of his jump. On and on he went, until the opposite bulkhead loomed before him. He brought his legs up, curled his body, turned, and bent his legs to absorb the energy of impact as he hit the wall. He got it just about perfect, coming to a halt beside the bulkhead.
Cadets sailed in around him. Most of them landed flawlessly, but one cadet hit the wall head-first. Another cadet landed feet-first, but bounced away and had to use a squirt from a compressed-air maneuvering jet to get back to the bulkhead.
Hornbeck was the only real civilian in the group. His borrowed vac suit was the same design as that worn by Crabtree and the cadets, but Crabtree had no trouble picking him out. The man had only the most rudimentary zero-gee skills. He clung to the branches of a tree halfway across the concourse. As Crabtree watched, the administrator braced his feet against the trunk and kicked off. He bounced from a patch of grass and floated helplessly toward the ceiling. He managed to stop himself at the junction of floor and ceiling, then worked his way cautiously down to rejoin the group.
Crabtree led them to a narrow service corridor between restaurants. He sent the others ahead, then paused to examine the mouth of the corridor. There was an emergency pressure door, he saw. It should have closed automatically when the Sunset Deck lost pressure. It had failed, like every other computer-controlled system on the station.
There was a manual override, of course. He found a small plastic dial on the corridor wall, marked "Emergency Use Only". He pulled out a metal pin that kept the dial from being turned by accident, then gave the plastic circle a good hard twist. Somewhere behind the wall a canister of compressed air opened, and the pressure door slid shut.
He followed the cadets down the corridor, watching helmet lights play across the walls. A cadet reached a closed pressure door at the opposite end, then tapped a panel beside the door where a green light glowed. There was air on the other side.
"Open it up," said Crabtree, then lifted his hands above his head where they'd be visible to the cadets at the other end of the corridor. He mimed a door opening, and got a wave in reply. There was nothing to hold onto, so he braced his feet against one wall and his shoulders against the other.
A bar of light appeared as the hatch slid open several centimeters. Air rushed in, a gale that sent cadets tumbling and bouncing. A couple of people banged against Crabtree, not quite knocking him loose. No one could hear him, so he went ahead and cursed.
A couple of cadets pulled themselves from the tangle and heaved the hatch open. They swarmed into the room beyond, and Crabtree pulled himself along behind him. While he was trying to think of a safe way to test the air he saw a cadet retract her faceplate. She didn't die, so he copied her.
He was in some kind of storage bay for the restaurants. Tables and chairs loomed around him in precarious stacks, and he saw bins of napkins and table linen. This was a part of the station he had never explored. He said, "Mr. Hornbeck?"
"I can guide you from here," the administrator said. "If your assignment is to purvey foodstuffs, come this way." He headed for the far end of the room, and six cadets trailed after him.
"Search teams, come with me," said Crabtree. He headed for a closed door in one corner. It was a proper hinged door, not a hatch, and he twisted the handle, hearing the lock click open. Then the door slammed against him and he tumbled back, spinning through the air. A figure came at him, a burly man in a dirty jumpsuit with hair as red as tomato sauce. The man's face was twisted in a rictus of fury, and he hurled himself at Crabtree.
"We're taking your ship!" A wave of fetid breath washed over Crabtree's face. The two of them were still flying through the air, the man gripping Crabtree's upper arm with one hand, clawing for his throat with the other.
Crabtree hadn't been in zero-gee combat for a very long time, but his muscles hadn't forgotten a thing. He twisted his body without conscious thought, pressing his knees to the other man's stomach. He cupped a hand around the back of the man's head and pulled, and by the time they collided with a stack of crat
es the two of them had turned completely around. The man's back collided with the crates, and then Crabtree piled into his stomach, knees first. A fresh wave of stink hit his face as the air left the man's lungs.
By the time the man had his breath back, Crabtree had him in an arm lock with his wrist up high between his shoulder blades. Several more men loomed in the doorway, looking wide-eyed from Crabtree to the cadets and back again.
"Let's try this again, shall we?" Crabtree said. "You want to take my ship?" The man struggled, Crabtree lifted his wrist another centimeter, and the man yelped. "I'm thinking about breaking your arm," Crabtree told him. "Do you think it'll be necessary?"
"Sorry, mate," the man said hoarsely. "We was scared, that's all. You can't leave us here. You gotta rescue us."
"Oh, shut up," Crabtree said, let go, and gave him a little shove. He pushed the man up and out, which drove Crabtree against the crates but sent the man tumbling helplessly into the center of the room. He spun, arms and legs waving, every surface out of reach.
"You lot are drafted," Crabtree announced. "You're going to help Mr. Hornbeck and some nice cadets carry food out to the Alexander. If you work hard and behave yourselves, we may lend you vacuum suits and let you come on board. Now, how does that sound?"
"Great," said the man in the doorway. "We'll help." The man beside him nodded vigorously.
"How about you?" Crabtree said to the scarlet-haired man. He was drifting slowly closer to the ceiling. In fifteen or twenty seconds he would be able to kick off and get back in control of himself.
"Brilliant," said the man. "We'll carry your groceries for you."
"See that you do," Crabtree said, "or we'll revisit the question of breaking arms." He kicked off from the stack of crates and sailed over to the door. "Now, is there anyone else alive on board?"
The men in the doorway exchanged furtive looks. "I don't know."
"I take that to mean 'Yes, but we've been terrorizing them'." Crabtree shook his head. "You've got me to answer to now. You act up again and I'll slap you down." He moved back from the doorway. "Now go make yourselves useful."
They found three families and a handful of station staff huddled in a laundry room, swathed in layers of sheets and blankets. Crabtree, covered by a vac suit, hadn't noticed the cold, but the survivors shivered as they emerged from their cocoons of fabric. "You're going to need those blankets," he told them as he played his helmet light across their faces. "That's something nobody thought of. Take it all with you, as much as you can carry, and follow me."
By the time he reached the restaurant storage room all the search teams had returned and the inner pressure door had been re-sealed. There was no food in sight. The five would-be bullies floated near the ceiling. "Your other people are taking supplies over to your ship," the red-haired man said. "Say they'll be back with vac suits for us." By the look on his face he doubted it.
Crabtree looked at his gaggle of refugees. There were seventeen of them, including a handful of children too small for any suit on the Alexander. Someone would have to bring over some emergency vac sacks. In the meantime, he couldn't even signal the others until they closed the far pressure door and opened this door from the outside.
How much food had they collected? How long would it take to ferry it all through the Sunset Deck to the ship? "Too bloody long," he muttered. "We better hope nothing goes wrong."
CHAPTER 26 - HAMMETT
A tense silence filled the bridge of the Alexander. Every head turned when a tinny voice came from a telephone set along the wall. A cadet said, "Please repeat," listened intently, then looked at Hammett. "Something's coming through Gate Eleven."
More people pressed earpieces to their ears as other spotters called in. "The first batch is still hovering there," a cadet reported.
"It looks like five small ships have come through. Uh-oh. Five more."
"Get word to the boarding party," Hammett snapped. "Tell them to get back on board now. I want someone standing by to open the docking clamps."
"They'll come through slowly, until they're sure it's safe," Carruthers predicted. "Then we'll get a huge storm."
It was one possibility. There was no way to know what the aliens' strategy was. That they had a strategy, Hammett didn't doubt. I need to disrupt it. I can't just sit here and react to them. I need to force their hand.
"We have six cadets on board," the cadet announced. "They found survivors. They have to go back with suits."
"Forget it," Hammett said. "We're uncoupling now."
"Captain!" He wasn't sure who'd spoken, but more than one shocked face was pointed in his direction.
"We'll come back," Hammett said. "First we need to clean up the neighborhood."
Carruthers said, "We can pick 'em up faster if they're all suited up."
It was a valid point. Hammett said, "Send the cadets back with enough suits for the survivors. Then open the docking clamps."
"Aye aye, Sir." Thirty long seconds passed while Hammett tried not to fidget. Then a cadet looked up and said, "We're clear."
"Bring us about," snapped Hammett. "We're heading for the Gate."
Cartwright spoke into her mouthpiece, and Hammett felt the ship move. A faint hum and a hint of vibration through the deck plates told him the main engine had just engaged.
"Group One is coming toward us," said a cadet. "That's what they're calling the first bunch, the ones we already fought with."
Hammett nodded. There were no orders to give. Shooting would commence as soon as his gun crews had a target.
He heard a distant sound, like fingertips tapping on a tight drumhead, and he knew one of the rail guns was firing. A moment later a cadet said, "Aft rail gun firing. Group One is dead astern." A moment later he said, "They're dispersing. Still pursuing, though."
The rail gun was a powerful weapon, but it couldn't be aimed. Well, with luck they'd hit one or two of the bastards with that last barrage. For the thousandth time he wished for decent sensors. Oh, to be able to see what was going on!
"About thirty ships have come through the Gate," said a cadet. "It looks like all of them are coming to meet us."
Good. They're reacting, which means we're messing up their plan. Whatever that is. Maybe we can keep fighting them piecemeal, not let them gang up.
"Group One is closing in!"
At almost the same instant another cadet said, "Group Two is at ten kilometers and closing fast."
"Five more ships have come through the Gate," someone said. "And five more."
After that it was like listening to an announcer describing a vector ball match. Alien ships swept in, moving quickly to avoid laser fire, and scorched the hull of the Alexander. When that did no significant damage, they gathered together into clumps of five or six. Hammett had Cartwright make random small adjustments with the maneuvering thrusters, so the Alexander was never a stationary target.
"Firing missiles," said a cadet. "Eighteen missiles fired."
Hammett winced. That was almost half their inventory.
"Wow," said the cadet, holding the earpiece back from her ear. "Lieutenant DiMarco sounds really mad." Hammett could hear a faint string of profanities coming from the telephone. That would be the last panicky missile salvo, he guessed.
"Direct hit to a cluster of five ships," someone said. "Another cluster was damaged by a shrapnel warhead."
A girl said, "I just lost the engine room."
The cadet beside her said, "My line is dead too."
"We've got a hull breach on Deck Two."
"Lieutenant DiMarco reports a fire in the missile bay," a cadet reported. He shook the earpiece, pressed it to his ear, and said, "My line is dead."
Hammett made himself lean back in his seat, hiding his dismay. The ship was in real trouble. They might still fight their way free, though. It was a close match, but the Alexander was putting up a good fight. There was still hope …
"Oh my God." Hammett looked at a white-faced cadet in the line of telephone stations.
She said, "Forward telescope reports more aliens coming through the Gate. Hundreds of them."
CHAPTER 27 - KASIM
The shuttle burned.
Kasim floated, completely disoriented, watching smoke swirl against his face plate. His whole body hurt. He had a vague, distant sense of urgency, but he couldn't remember what he had to do. Well, he was wearing a suit, and suits had radios. He cleared his throat, then said, "Can anybody hear me?"
There was no response. Not only that, but he didn't hear the usual hum of static from the voice-activated mic. Wait. Didn't we turn our radios off? Because of the aliens … He started to reach for the radio switch, and hesitated. The aliens might hear.
Something bumped his arm, and he put out a hand. He felt a lumpy shape and explored it absently with his fingers. It felt almost like a person. There was only one arm, though. One entire shoulder and part of the chest was missing.
When the full horror of it penetrated his consciousness he flinched and shoved the body away. That sent him floating backward until his head hit a bulkhead. Waves of pain lashed through his skull, and he moaned. He couldn't see a thing through the smoke. There was no way to clear the smoke, though. If he vented the atmosphere …
He would lose nothing but air that was too polluted to breathe. If any of the technicians still lived, they had their suits sealed. Otherwise they would have asphyxiated by now.
He took his time, examining the thought from every angle. He didn't want to kill anyone by accident. Concentration was difficult through the pain and a strange mental fogginess, but he finally decided he was right.
He needed to pop the hatch.
The endless swirling smoke distracted him, so he squeezed his eyes shut and worked by touch. The familiar interior of the shuttle was impossibly strange in the darkness, and it took him an endless time to orient himself. At last he found the outline of the hatch. His questing fingertips found the control panel, and he pressed a thumb against the safety override. That allowed him to grab the release handle, twist, and push.