Fires of Oblivion

by Anthony James

  As he waited, he couldn’t stop thinking about Commander McGlashan - the warm comfort from holding her, the smell of her hair and the look in her eyes when she accepted his embrace.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  “Fifteen minutes until we enter local space,” said Breeze. “On most other ships that could mean any time from now, but on the Crimson I think we can be fairly certain it’ll be fifteen minutes.”

  Duggan expected Lieutenant Chainer to come up with a wisecrack, though nothing was forthcoming. The mood on the bridge was good – the adrenaline-fueled pretence that all was well. Duggan was familiar with the charade – he’d seen it many times before and taken part in it himself. It was infinitely better than misery and barely-suppressed dread.

  “What happens if the Dreamer battleship isn’t here?” asked Chainer.

  “In that case, we’ll do the Ghasts a favour by destroying the pyramid for them.”

  “Where will we go after that?” Chainer persisted. “We’ll have nothing else to go on by then and no clue about the enemy’s location.”

  “True,” said Duggan. “We’ll have wasted nothing apart from a couple of days spent with the threat of death hanging over us. That’s no different to any other mission. If the battleship is gone, we’ll report in to Admiral Teron and he’ll probably send us somewhere else. Eventually we’ll find something that wants to shoot us down and we’ll get our chance to show how mistaken they are for trying it.”

  “I see.”

  “Don’t act so shocked, Lieutenant,” said McGlashan.

  “I’m not shocked. I know we’re at the whim of luck – it’s got to the stage where I’d rather get things over with now, instead of waiting and waiting. Eventually we’re going to come up against that mothership and I don’t want it hanging over me forever. It’s like when I have to visit the dentist, I prefer to get an appointment straightaway, rather than wait for a couple of weeks.”

  “No one gets tooth decay these days!” said McGlashan.

  “Yeah well, you know what I mean, don’t you? No one likes going to the dentist, and I don’t enjoy knowing I could die at any moment.”

  “That’s a real Chainer-ism,” said Breeze. “Using a nonsense example to back up an obvious point.”

  “I like to think I put across an eloquent argument,” said Chainer.

  “While I appreciate the philosophical discourse, gentlemen, I feel we should spend the next few minutes in preparation.”

  “I’ve spent the last two days in preparation, sir,” said Chainer. Nevertheless, he rotated in his seat until he was square-on with his console again.

  Breeze did the same. “Five minutes to go,” he announced.

  “The time has come for us to show what we can do,” said Duggan. “The ES Terminus and Rampage were a step up for us, but compared to the Crimson with its stealth modules, those two were much less effective weapons. The Dreamers have limited forces in Confederation space and each time we knock out one of their warships, they lose an irreplaceable resource. I’m sure we’re aware this won’t be the last we see of them – even so, that doesn’t lessen the significance of what we’re trying to do. This is about buying time. The more time we buy, the greater our victory will be. If we get two years out of this, we’ll have earned the chance to advance our own technology in order to reduce the gap between us and our opponents. We can’t let Atlantis fall.”

  One by one, they stood and saluted. Duggan saw the fire in their eyes and knew there was no fear which would prevent them from doing their best. He returned the salute and thanked them for what they’d done so far.

  “We’re out of lightspeed,” said Breeze.

  “Kidor dead ahead.”

  Duggan didn’t hesitate and he increased their sub-light speed to maximum. The Crimson reached a velocity of almost nineteen hundred kilometres per second – a speed which exceeded anything else in either the human or the Ghast fleets.

  “Activate stealth modules,” he said.

  “Done.”

  “Engines at fifty percent,” said Duggan. “The Crimson’s far better equipped than the Lightning to carry this technology.”

  “There’s nothing close or on the fars,” said Chainer. “Unfortunately, we’ve come in on the blind side. I can’t see the pyramid site from here.”

  “I’ll bring us over and around,” said Duggan. “It shouldn’t be too long at the speed we’re holding.”

  “As soon as I see anything, I’ll shout, sir.”

  “What happens when we fire our weapons?” asked McGlashan. “Does it interfere with our cloak?”

  “No,” replied Breeze. “The power draw from launching our missiles is comparatively tiny. We’ll be able to maintain stealth.”

  “Except the missiles themselves aren’t cloaked, so the enemy will be able to identify our location fairly easily by watching where the warheads appear from,” said Chainer.

  “Unless we move quickly and erratically,” Duggan added.

  “It’ll help, sir. It won’t fool them for long.”

  “The disruptors draw from the fission drive, right?” McGlashan asked.

  “Yes they do, Commander. That might stop us making a quick escape if we need one but it shouldn’t interfere with our ability to stay hidden.”

  Minutes passed and the image of Kidor became gradually larger on the viewscreen. Duggan had been concerned that memories of his failure here would continue to haunt him. They did not, and when he stared at the slowly-rotating sphere of rock, he felt only determination.

  “Oxygen levels at twelve percent on parts of the surface,” said Chainer. “If we extrapolate, it’s probably more or less breathable close to the pyramid.”

  “How long until you can see what you need to see?”

  “Any moment now, sir.”

  “Keep looking.”

  Chainer’s estimation was an accurate one. Barely ten seconds passed before he spoke again. “There it is!” he exclaimed. “That’s the pyramid, exactly where we left it.”

  “What about the battleship?”

  “If it’s in an orbit I might not see…” He stopped himself mid-sentence. “Nope, there it is. Seventy or eighty thousand klicks above the pyramid and circling the area.”

  Duggan picked up a hesitation in Chainer’s voice. “What’s wrong, Lieutenant?”

  “I don’t think it’s the same ship, sir. This one is smaller.”

  Duggan swore. “There’s definitely only the one ship? Or could there be another somewhere close by?”

  “Your guess is as good as mine. We did say that a battleship was an awful lot of hardware to leave here. Maybe it was called off to perform another task.”

  “I don’t like surprises. I’ll bring us closer until we’re directly above and at a million klicks. That should be far enough for us to watch without being easily seen.”

  They were soon in position. The stealth modules allowed for a completely different approach to combat. Without them, the Dreamer warship would have spotted them from well beyond a million kilometres away. Now, Duggan could wait patiently until he was sure it was a good time to strike.

  “It’s my belief that the battleship is gone and has been replaced by one of their cruisers,” said Chainer. “The warship down there is the same as the others we’ve seen before.”

  “Could the battleship be in a slow orbit?”

  “If it is, they’re moving with much less speed than I’d expect, sir. Not that I have a vast wealth of experience in how the Dreamers usually operate. They could have landed for a sight-seeing tour for all I know.”

  Duggan chewed on his lip. “We’re not in such a hurry that we need to rush in at the first sight of the enemy,” he said.

  “They’ll detect us at some point, sir,” said Chainer. “At that stage, we’ll have lost our ability to launch a surprise attack.”

  “Can you provide an estimate of how long it might take them?”

  “I wouldn’t like to try. The battleship and mothership didn’t t
ake long, but it comes down to distance, capability and plain old chance.”

  “They could detect us at any time, in other words. We’ll give it another five minutes and then we’ll go in for the attack. Report any change in the enemy behaviour at once.”

  “Of course.”

  The five minutes went by without the battleship making an appearance and without the enemy cruiser deviating from its course. Duggan didn’t wait a second longer and aimed the Crimson directly at the Dreamer warship. His skin prickled and his mind was in perfect focus. “Let’s get those bastards,” he said.

  “Six minutes until we’re close enough to use the disruptor. Want me to disable the homing modules on the missiles?” said McGlashan.

  “Yes please,” Duggan replied. “How long until we’re right on top of them?”

  “Eight minutes.”

  The planet came closer and the enemy ship remained teasingly in place – a large, red dot upon Duggan’s tactical display.

  “We’re in disruptor range,” said McGlashan.

  “Hold fire.”

  The seconds went by. Lieutenant Breeze cleared his throat a few times, the only sign of tension amongst the crew.

  “We’re less than a minute away,” said Chainer.

  “Let me know when,” said McGlashan.

  “Hold fire.”

  “I can confirm their energy shield is powered up and active,” said Breeze.

  “I wasn’t expecting anything else, Lieutenant.”

  The numbers on the distance counter were a blur as the gap between the Crimson and the enemy vessel diminished.

  “Sir?”

  With fewer than ten seconds left before they reached the Dreamer ship, Chainer spoke, his voice steady and matter-of-fact. “They’re changing course, sir.”

  Duggan faced McGlashan. Whatever fear she’d once felt was gone, leaving the familiar excitement of battle clear in the set of her face.

  When the range dropped below three thousand kilometres, he spoke. “Fire.”

  Chapter Thirty

  “Disruptor fired,” said McGlashan. “Shatterer tubes one and two away, along with ninety-six Lambdas and four nukes.”

  As soon as the words left her mouth, Duggan turned the Crimson sideways and into a violent roll, to bring more of its missile tubes to bear. McGlashan didn’t need to be told twice and she fired as soon as her console advised her it was possible. Another ninety-six Lambdas and two nuclear missiles followed the first wave.

  “Their shields are down, sir,” said Breeze. “Our fission drive is at sixty percent of its maximum.”

  Duggan changed course again, to allow another four of the Crimson’s missile clusters to fire. The warship felt clumsier than usual because of the stealth modules, but compared to the Lightning, it was agile and fast. Everything happened at once and by the time his crew provided updates, the fight was almost over.

  “Shatterers one and two have impacted,” said McGlashan. “The nukes have detonated close by and I’m reading twelve Lambda strikes.”

  “Fourteen,” said Chainer to correct her.

  “Their energy output has plummeted to effectively zero,” said Breeze.

  “I’ll bring us close up – keep firing,” said Duggan. “Don’t let up.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Duggan took the Crimson away from the rapidly-expanding sphere of gamma rays which engulfed the enemy warship. The Space Corps’ vessels were exceptionally well-shielded, but he didn’t want to risk staying too close given the monumental quantities of radiation in the area.

  “Forty-Eight Lambdas away. No sign of a counter-launch from the enemy.”

  Chainer focused one of the sensor arrays on the cruiser. The feed was grainy and blurred from the radiation, when it would have otherwise been a perfect image. The Shatterer explosions faded, leaving two white-hot holes through the enemy warship’s armour. In places, the alloys still burned from the ferocity of the blasts. A number of smaller holes showed where the Lambdas had scored hits.

  “Their engines are coming back online,” said Breeze.

  “What about their shield?”

  “Not a chance. Not while they stay within this radiation.”

  “Seventeen more Lambda strikes,” said McGlashan. “I’ve launched seventy-two more and another two nukes.”

  Plasma explosions appeared along the entire length of the Dreamer warship’s flank. Towards the rear of the vessel a five-hundred-metre section of struts and plating detached itself from the superstructure. The enemy vessel accelerated slowly and ponderously, but even this was sufficient to rip away another damaged piece from its port side.

  “It’s breaking up already,” said Breeze, wonder in his voice.

  “Take away their shields and they’re fragile,” said Chainer. “Who needs armour when you’ve got shields?”

  The light from the plasma cleared, providing the Crimson’s crew with a glimpse of the extensive damage they’d caused. The Lambdas were designed to penetrate armour before they exploded, and against the cruiser they had caused a terrible amount of destruction.

  “They must have hardly anything left,” said Breeze. “Their engine power is all over the place. They’ve not even got enough for their particle beam.”

  “And we must have knocked out whatever controls their missiles,” said McGlashan.

  At that moment, the final two nuclear warheads detonated and fifteen more Lambdas cascaded against the cruiser’s flank. The vessel was ripped into three and the pieces thrown apart from each other.

  “There’s still engine output from the largest of the three sections,” said Breeze. “It’s uncontrolled.”

  “They’re done,” said Duggan. “Cease fire.”

  It was over – a series of secondary explosions occurred in the depths of the cruiser’s hull. Then, there was a single, catastrophic blast which turned the whole of the Crimson’s bulkhead viewscreen into vivid white. By the time the sensors had adjusted and filtered out the plasma light, there was nothing left which could be identified as a warship. A hundred thousand pieces of wreckage spun and turned as they followed their random courses. One such piece came within a kilometre of the Crimson, travelling at such a velocity that it caught Duggan entirely by surprise. It didn’t seem important, somehow.

  Chainer was the first to find his tongue. “Crap,” he said, the single word expressing a dozen feelings.

  Duggan blew out the breath he’d been holding. “I can hardly believe it,” he said, his eyes fixed on the bulkhead screen.

  “I’ll bet they’ve not been on the receiving end of something like that for a long time,” said McGlashan. “Serves them right.”

  “Get on the comms to Admiral Teron or one of his team and let them know what’s happened,” said Duggan, bringing himself back to matters at hand.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I’m bringing us into a position directly above the pyramid. We’re going to knock out their shield and then blow them to pieces.”

  The fight had been a short one, but it had carried them away from the site of the Dreamer artefact. Duggan turned the Crimson about and set a course that would bring them a few thousand kilometres above the location of the object.

  “Admiral Teron acknowledges our success,” said Chainer. “We’re to proceed as planned.”

  “Understood,” said Duggan.

  “Sir?” asked McGlashan. She didn’t usually use the word as a question unless she was concerned about something.

  “What is it, Commander?”

  “What if we destroyed the cruiser before they could signal their distress?”

  Duggan laughed. “We may have done. That’s why we’re going to allow the pyramid plenty of time to send a message. I have no doubt Lieutenant Chainer has been watching them like a hawk.”

  “I certainly have, sir!” said Chainer. “They’ve sent nothing I recognize as a distress signal so far.”

  “There’s no way they could have missed what we’ve just done to their warship, i
s there?”

  Chainer shrugged. “I have no idea what facilities they have in those pyramids. I doubt they have a comprehensive set of sensor monitoring equipment.”

  Duggan swore. “So there’s a chance the enemy doesn’t know we’ve destroyed their cruiser?”

  “I didn’t want to be the one to say it while everyone was happy,” said Chainer. “I’m glad we didn’t give the cruiser an opportunity to fire back at us if that makes you feel any better.”

  “Not really,” said Duggan. He stood and walked twice around the bridge, while the others watched expectantly. In spite of his concern, it was almost certain the enemy warship had sent off a warning signal before it had been destroyed. In fact, it would have been a sign of gross incompetence if they had not. Even so, Duggan would have preferred to know for definite, since it would make the waiting much easier. As it was, he had to deal with the worrying notion that he’d accomplished an excellent victory, whilst simultaneously cutting off the only lead to the Dreamer mothership. With no way to resolve the situation, he turned his attention to the one thing he could proceed with.

  “Commander McGlashan, fire one of our nuclear missiles at the pyramid below. I want them drenched in radiation to keep their shields offline.”

  “Hold!” said Chainer urgently.

  “What is it?”

  “I think I’ve picked up a reading from the pyramid, sir.”

  “A distress signal?”

  “I don’t think so. They’re sending a regular high-speed pulse into space using a method that isn’t suitable for carrying complex data.”

  “Talk sense, man!” said Duggan, impatient for Chainer to get to the point.

  “I thought I was, sir,” said Chainer. He saw Duggan’s face and quickly continued. “This is more like a network handshake than a bunch of aliens having a chat.”

  “It’s an automated check-in?”