The Hive Invasion- The Complete Trilogy

by Jake Elwood

  "Roger," said a man, and another fighter pulled out of the cloud of metal. Hardy watched them race away from the battle, wondering if he should follow.

  An alarm blared in his ears. He'd been scorched in passing by a laser. A moment later, the Bumblebee rocked as three or four rail gun rounds banged into her nose.

  "To hell with this," Hardy muttered. He hauled on the stick, feeling the ship vibrate as his nav thrusters swung him around. The one alien attack had bubbled some of the paint on his starboard side, but all the real damage was coming from friendly fire.

  He pointed the nose of the Bumblebee at the tails of the two retreating fighters and goosed the engine.

  I wonder where we're headed? The EDF pilot had said she had a 'secondary target', and that, Hardy decided, was good enough for him.

  As he raced into the darkness he glanced back at the battle. Most of the aliens were swarming the Cassandra, but a few ships were going after corvettes as well. He saw one ship drop in close to the Theseus, then break apart and scatter as the Theseus swung around, bringing her aft guns to bear. For an instant he considered turning back, trying to help. But the little alien ships, although they evaded the Theseus' main battery, were disintegrating, ripped up by lasers and ballistic rounds. The Bumblebee wouldn't last a minute in that maelstrom.

  And how long will I last, without a fleet to go back to?

  A yellow pulse glowed on his tactical screen. A rock had just gone past, a kilometer or so to starboard. A moment later he saw another flash. The Cassandra, despite the way she was being mobbed, was still firing.

  Your 'secondary target' had better be worthwhile, he silently told the fighters ahead of him. It's probably the last thing we're going to do.

  The battle raged on behind him as the three fighters raced into the dark.

  CHAPTER 12 - HAMMETT

  Park against the side of the Cassandra. We need to be able to shoot those things without hitting her."

  Eddie gave Hammett a quick, frightened glance over his shoulder, then turned to his controls. The Theseus was close to the aft end of the elongated ship. As they moved closer, the absurdly long structure of the Cassandra wobbled and shook through the front windows in vertigo-inducing swoops.

  The Cassandra was essentially a massive gun with an eight-hundred-meter barrel. A dozen holes gaped along the length of that barrel, showing twisted metal struts still glowing with heat. The gun still worked, though. Hammett caught a flicker of motion as the armature retracted from the forward end of the ship, ready to fire another round.

  He wondered briefly if it had all been worth it, then dismissed the thought. Of course it had. They were doing real damage here today. Crippling the Hive, if he was any judge. If even one ship could escape to bring word back to Earth about the location of the alien nest, humanity might be able to return before the aliens could recover.

  They might wipe the Hive out completely.

  In the meantime, every shot the Cassandra managed to fire was a victory. He felt a vibration through the deck plates as the Theseus bumped against the Cassandra. Many of the smaller gun turrets could be aimed, but the big guns, the nine rail guns pointing forward and the nine pointing aft, could not. They pointed wherever the ship pointed.

  And now, they pointed along the ravaged hull of the Cassandra.

  A Hive ship swooped in a hundred meters or so ahead. It noticed the Theseus and jerked back, then moved sideways, coming in close to the hull of the Cassandra well off to one side. Eddie and Hal got busy without waiting for orders, working the ship's nav thrusters with the skill of virtuoso pianists. The Theseus drifted sideways, staying close enough to the Cassandra that the two hulls bumped several times.

  The forward rail guns began to fire as the Theseus lined itself up with its target. From Hammett's position this close to the hull of the Cassandra the EDF ship looked like a long silver plain stretching away before him. The alien ship was a strange lumpy balloon floating just above the plain. Silver gave way to red just beneath the balloon as the heat weapon burned into the Cassandra's hull.

  The balloon began to shred as massive rounds tore into it. It drifted sideways, but Eddie and Hal kept the Theseus drifting along with it. Round after round hit the alien vessel, and at last it came apart. Component ships banged into the hull of the Cassandra. Others spun away, tumbling into space.

  Into the midst of that wreckage came a corvette, one of the EDF ships, lasers and rail guns blasting. The hull of the corvette was strange, lumpy with parasitic shapes. Limpet ships, Hammett realized. He'd encountered them on the Alexander, where they had torn through the hull to put commandoes into the corridors of his ship.

  That was months ago. Now, the aliens knew so much more about human ships and technology. What horrors would they be unleashing inside that corvette?

  Even as the thought formed, the corvette lost control. A nav thruster flared on the port side and the corvette collided with the Cassandra. The two hulls scraped together, and then the corvette bounced away, tumbling end over end.

  "Oh, my God." That was Vicente Ramona, eyes glued to the window, hands locked to the arms of his chair in a deathgrip. He spoke again, more softly this time. "Oh, my God."

  I need to get him off my bridge. It's not like we need him for communications, not on this side of the Gate.

  Before Hammett could order the boy to go, Hal twisted in his seat. "What do we do, Admiral?"

  "We keep on fighting," Hammett said grimly.

  "But—shouldn’t we help them?" Hal made a helpless gesture toward the corvette. "Try to dock with them? Get survivors?"

  Dock with them? Like hell. I'm not letting alien commandoes on board. "We fight," Hammett repeated. "We keep the Cassandra firing."

  Hal locked eyes with him for a moment longer, then turned away. The Theseus drifted sideways, circling the hull of the Cassandra, looking for more Hive ships.

  It didn't take long to find some. The next attack was close to the forward end of the ship, almost half a kilometer distant. Eddie and Hal lined the Theseus up as best they could, and the ship began another barrage. It was hard to see if the rail guns were even hitting their target.

  "Lieutenant Nicholson says they're getting low on ammunition," Eddie announced. "He says they're below ten percent of the big stuff."

  "Acknowledged," said Hammett. What do I do when the ammunition runs out? He shrugged to himself. Keep on improvising, I guess. This battle can't last much longer.

  As if to punctuate the thought, the forward end of the Cassandra blew apart in a storm of flying steel. At first Hammett thought it was the alien ship, maybe struck by another missile. He could see the alien moving away from the wreckage, though, still largely intact. He gaped through the window, then said, "What the hell just happened?"

  "I think it's the armature," Sanjari said. "Something blocked the track, or the track twisted. When the armature reached the blockage …" She mimed an explosion with her hands, then looked at her screen. "I'm pretty sure the armature shot out the end and kept going."

  Hammett imagined the metal cup, separated from its cargo of stone, sailing through the void and striking one last blow against the Hive base. "Is there any chance the Cassandra is still firing?"

  Sanjari, eyes on her display screen, said, "None at all, Sir."

  Then it's time to think about survival. About getting home. Getting a message back to Earth. He tapped his tactical display screen. "Let's see if they're going to give us any breathing room."

  The aliens, though, showed no sign of withdrawing. Instead they shifted the focus of their attack from the Cassandra to the surviving corvettes. They'd made several ineffective attacks on the Theseus. Now, it seemed, they were saving her for last.

  "Let's get out there and do some damage," Hammett said. "Eddie, bring her-"

  "Wait," said Hal. "We're getting a request from the Cassandra. Their engines are dead. They want to come aboard."

  "Tell them to get a move on," Hammett snapped. "Vicente." He gestured at t
he nose of the Theseus. "Go to the airlock. Help the survivors get onboard. Then get them settled."

  The boy gave him a jerky nod and hurried from the bridge.

  "Be careful," Hammett yelled after him. "Your mother will kill me if you get hurt."

  The only answer was the clomp of Vicente's boots as he hurried forward. Hammett sighed, feeling the weight of his rank pressing down on him. He's just a boy. If I can't keep him safe …

  And then there was nothing to do but wait. The Theseus held its position, ignored by the alien swarm, as crew streamed out of a hatch in the side of the Cassandra, sailed through fifteen meters of hard vacuum, and piled into the lock at the aft of the converted freighter. Hammett, fidgeting with impatience, watched the first few refugees through the feed from a camera above the lock. Then he turned his attention to the battle raging around them.

  Hal tilted his head, then slid his hands through the opening in the front of his helmet, reaching back to plug his ears. He listened, then murmured a response. In theory, communications were supposed to go through Sanjari. Eddie and Hal were the ones with working implants, though.

  "Admiral," Hal said. "There's more survivors on the Cassandra. It's the bridge crew, and they're trapped. They want someone to come for them with a laser cutter."

  Hammett stared at Hal for a long moment, heartily wishing he'd never decided to become an officer. This was the kind of decision that would never, ever stop haunting him.

  But it had to be done.

  "No. We can't wait. If they can't reach our airlock, they aren't coming aboard. We have to go."

  Hal's face twisted like he was going to be sick. He nodded, though, and turned away, murmuring again. His hands reached for the thruster controls in front of him—and then froze.

  He swiveled his chair around. "Admiral? You're not going to like this."

  CHAPTER 13 - VICENTE

  Vicente left the bridge on legs that wobbled and shook. Panic nibbled at his brain, telling him to break into a run. He gave in and ran, galloping down the catwalk, and arrived panting a moment later at the aft airlock. He entered the lock, feeling his weight decrease, and waited while the lock began to cycle.

  Metallic clangs echoed through the little metal chamber, loud at first, then muffled as his suit detected the drop in pressure and the faceplate on his helmet closed. The first refugees had arrived, and were banging frantically on the outside of the lock.

  I forgot to close my faceplate. Stupid, stupid, stupid. The next mistake may kill me. I've got to pay attention. I have to get things right. I could die. Oh God, I could die.

  The outer hatch slid open, mercifully interrupting his gibbering thoughts. Figures in vac suits pulled themselves in, shoving Vicente aside in their haste. Five or six people entered the lock, almost filling it. Vicente was reaching for the 'door close' button when another survivor grabbed the edge of the hatch and pulled herself in.

  Vicente forced himself forward, pushing past Spacecom sailors until he could see outside. The Cassandra was like a glittering road beneath him. He could see another handful of survivors gathering on the side of a rectangular structure almost directly below him. As he watched, the first of them began to kick off, soaring toward the airlock.

  They wouldn't all fit. Vicente pulled his head in and slapped a fat yellow button on the wall. The hatch closed, air rushed in, and the inner door opened.

  More frantic banging started on the outer hatch. Vicente sighed, doing his best to ignore it, as the first batch of survivors hurried onto the catwalk. The inner hatch slid shut and the lock began to cycle.

  A hand closed on Vicente's arm, and he jumped. One of the refugees was still in the lock, a short young woman who stared into his face with dark eyes that burned with intensity. "The captain is trapped," she said.

  "The captain?"

  "It's the whole bridge crew," she said. She had both hands locked around his forearm, and she was squeezing. "They can't get out. Someone needs to rescue them."

  The outer hatch opened and more refugees poured in. Vicente endured another jostling, then stuck his head out the hatch.

  Nothing moved on the surface of the Cassandra.

  He closed the hatch, waited while the refugees trouped into the Theseus, then turned his attention back to the girl.

  "I need tools," she said. "A laser cutter. Maybe a pry bar. And maybe some help."

  He stared at her, wondering if he should call the Admiral. Then something clicked in his memory. "I saw toolkits," he said. He stepped out of the airlock. "Here they are!"

  Bulky lockers lined the bulkhead just inside the lock. The lockers held vac suits and emergency vac sacks, a full set of firefighting gear, and a couple of boxes simply labelled "Tools". He dropped the toolboxes on the catwalk, and they each opened one.

  Each box held a tool belt. The belts had laser cutters and small pry bars, which was all Vicente cared about. He strapped on a belt and headed back into the lock. The girl followed him, strapping on her own belt.

  As the lock cycled he wondered if he should call the admiral. The man was busy, though. He was an admiral, after all. I'll be proactive. I know what needs to be done, after all. Shrugging to himself and hoping he was doing the right thing, Vicente grabbed a safety handle and leaned outside as the outer hatch slid open.

  His body moved past the limits of the force field that gave the ship its artificial gravity. He felt a moment of giddy vertigo that faded as he grabbed a handle on the outside of the ship and drew his entire body out. The Cassandra looked terrifyingly far away, and he gulped, wondering how he would find the courage to let go of the Theseus.

  Then the girl sailed past him, arms stretched out ahead of her, soaring toward the crippled ship. Vicente took a deep breath, braced his feet against the hull of the Theseus, and kicked off.

  He wanted to scream from a mix of terror and exhilaration. Only the suit radio kept him silent. He worked in vac suits all the time, but zero gravity was mostly a new experience. He couldn't decide if he was falling or flying, soaring toward his target or plunging hopelessly out of control. The side of the ship came closer, moving at alarming speed, and he wondered if he'd kicked off too hard.

  Then his body banged into a thick steel girder and he bounced away. He grabbed for the girder, missed by a few centimeters, and watched helplessly as the ship moved farther out of reach. For a moment he thought he was a dead man, doomed to tumble endlessly through the void.

  His hands were already moving, though, guided by some part of his mind that had been paying more attention than he realized. The toolbelt had canisters of compressed air on either hip, little propulsion systems for situations just like this. He pointed his head at the ship, his feet into deep space, and fired a tiny squirt of air from both canisters.

  He floated forward, ever so slowly, scared to use the canisters again. After several seconds he got a hand on the girder and looked around.

  "This way." The girl's voice was impatient but directionless. He finally spotted her behind him, clipping a safety line to a handle on the outside of a spherical lump just forward of the ship's engines. He started toward her, pulling himself along the lattice of girders that formed the biggest part of the ship.

  When he reached her he spent a moment fumbling at his belt, looking for a safety line. He had just clipped the hair-thin cable in place beside hers on a safety handle when he heard Hal's voice over his implants. "Vicente! What are you doing? You need to get back here right now."

  For a moment Vicente froze. The girl's booted foot was in front of his face, and his eyes tracked upward, from her leg to the toolbelt to her helmeted head, which was peering through a small steelglass window. A couple of people stared out from the inside, helmeted heads together, gloved hands pressed against the pane.

  "Vicente, do you hear me? The admiral is furious. You need to get back here now."

  He looked through the window. A man and a woman looked back at him. He couldn't seem much through their helmets, but their eyes were unnatu
rally wide. "I can't leave yet," he said to Hal. "There's people trapped. I have to help them."

  "No, no, Vicente. You need to get back here now. The admiral's going to leave without you."

  Returning to the Theseus was impossible, of course. Perhaps if the call had come a minute earlier he could have done it, but not now. Not with those desperate, frightened faces staring out at him. He said, "I'll be as quick as I can." Then he grabbed a laser cutter from his belt, pulled himself up beside the girl, and got to work.

  A metal flap covered the edge of the steelglass pane on all four sides. He started cutting away the flap, then muttered a curse as he realized just how long it was going to take.

  "Make two cuts," said the girl. "Then bend the flap back." She was working on the far side of the window, making a finger-long cut at one end of the metal flap on her side. Vicente nodded and copied her.

  When he had a cut on each end of the flap he jammed a pry bar between the flap and the steelglass and tried to bend flap back. The metal gave slowly, and he cursed again, wondering if the Theseus had left yet. He was too scared to look.

  The girl poked his shoulder. "Switch sides," she said.

  He looked up. She had made a third cut, in the middle of the metal flap. He switched places with her, jammed his pry bar into place, and started to heave.

  With the flap of metal cut in half the bending was easier. It took a minute or so, but he got both pieces of the flap bent back until he could see a thick rubber gasket covering the edge of the glass. He played his laser cutter over the gaskets, which burned away was gratifying speed. He could see the edge of the steelglass, covered in bits of charred rubber.

  By that time the girl was done cutting the flap on the opposite side of the window. She moved around, rotating clockwise, and he took her place.

  He was heaving on the pry bar when he saw movement reflected in the steelglass. At the same time, the man on the other side of the window opened his mouth. Apparently the suit radios had found a channel to share, because Vicente heard him cry, "Behind you!"