Fire Ant

by Jonathan P. Brazee

  Tala closed the gap, and Beth increased power to her forward shields and then started firing five-second bursts of the hadron as the bogies continued to close in on the lieutenant.

  “Ant, is Swordfish . . .” she heard Bendick pass, but she ignored whatever he had to ask. It took too much effort to keep focused on the enemy.

  She took a hit from one of the enemy weapons, all of her alarms going off at once, but somehow, Tala held together despite the punishment. Another hit rattled her fighter, but she kept flying.

  Thank you, Josh, she thought, grateful for his tireless work keeping Tala in top condition.

  The next blast of her hadron connected. The bogie simply came apart as the tiny particles penetrated the ship—and a moment later, the shot the bogie had gotten off before it was destroyed hit her.

  This time, she wasn’t so lucky. Her lower weapons pod was damaged—the pod with the hadron and laser. With no laser, no hadron, and no more torpedoes, Beth was out of major weapons, and the lieutenant was a sitting duck for the last bogie.

  But Beth and Tala were closing fast, very fast. With thoughts of physically ramming the enemy ship, she shifted her course to intercept.

  Wait a minute, girl. Think. Fight the G-shot!

  She did have one more weapon: her rail gun. It might not be designed for long-range ship-to-ship combat, but it could still get the job done. It was accurate only to a hundred or two hundred klicks, which meant she had to get in close.

  With a supreme effort of will, she checked the status. To her relief, it was up. She brought it online, then watched as the distance closed. She felt like a Zulu warrior, armed with a spear, facing a fleet Marine in full combat armor. Still, a spear would kill if it hit the target.

  The enemy bogie fired on the lieutenant, and only then seemed to realize that an avenging angel was on its ass. Beth croaked out a shout as she opened the rail gun, and five thousand tiny pellets, each traveling at .93 C, crossed the distance between them. Whether one of the depleted uranium rounds or a dozen hit, it didn’t matter. At that velocity, the results were catastrophic, and the enemy ship turned into so much space dust.

  The G-shot was taking its toll as Beth zoomed past. She’d been under it too long already, and she barely managed to hit the purge and start to slow the ship down.

  “Way to go, sister,” Mercy passed as the rebound meds kicked in, rendering the universe a fuzzy dream.

  Chapter 13

  “Beth, wake up,” Mercy said.

  “No, ten more minutes.”

  “You’ve got to wake up now.”

  “I feel like crap.”

  “I know you do, honey, but you’ve really got to get up. We’re not going to be able to keep the gate open after Uncle and Ranger make it.”

  Gate? What’s she talking about?

  As her mind cut through the fog, she remembered. The mission, the fight . . . the lieutenant!

  “Where’s Swordfish?” she mumbled as she forced her eyes open.

  Her body was still sluggish, but her mind was snapping to.

  “He didn’t make it. But he got two of the bastards. You, too.”

  She felt a hollowness in her heart—not anger, not sorrow, just hollowness. She knew the rebound meds were affecting her emotions and she would grieve later.

  “And the others? The other seven?” she asked, pulling up her display.

  “Tuna got one with a torpedo, and the others hung back.”

  “I think they’re like gunships, there for support,” Beth said.

  “Maybe, but listen, Beth, no time for that. You’re on a course for deep space, and you’ve got to get turned around. Are you up for that?”

  It took her a moment to make sense of Mercy’s words. She finally realized that if she didn’t take action, she could be left flying out of this system forever, a system with at least six enemy ships. The thought didn’t bother her too much, and it just seemed like too much effort to start turning Tala around. She stared at her display, wondering what it would be like to just keep on going. There was something else on her display, just flying up ahead of her. She could join that.

  Wait, what is that?

  It was inert, but moving fast, and not in an orbit around the binary stars.

  “Rose, run a reverse azimuth on the object,” she said, almost forgetting to highlight it.

  The AI plotted a course that led back to the binary star around which Delta slingshotted.

  “I’ve think I’ve found Bull,” she said, slurring the words as she tried to stay alert.

  “Bull’s dead, honey. Just make your course change and come back.”

  “No, I really think it’s him.”

  There was a delay, then Bendick came on the net and said, “That tracks, Ant. But Bull’s dead. He was hit early in the fight. You need to come back now.”

  “How do you know he’s dead?” she asked, feeling frustrated.

  “His Wasp’s got no power. Nothing.”

  “But there’s no debris. It’s one solid mass.”

  “How can you tell that, Ant? You’re too far away.”

  Beth cackled like a crazy woman, then said, “I’ve got 55 missions analyzing systems. I know how to read the data.”

  There was silence for a moment, which hopefully meant Mercy and Bendick were talking it over. Neither Ranger nor Uncle would be much good if they were in the same state as she was.

  It was an effort to speak aloud, so she sub-vocalized and told Rose to adjust course to match that of the object’s.

  “Beth, there’s no way Bull’s alive, and if you don’t come back now, you’re going to be stuck here. And you’ve kicked G-Shot, for fuck’s sake—you need to get to sickbay.”

  Beth smiled. It felt good to have a friend who cared. And Bull wasn’t her friend. But he was a wingman. She had no choice.

  “Beth, you’ve changed course. What are you doing?”

  Beth turned down the sound. It was easier to just sit there in silence, not moving.

  ***************

  Bull’s Wasp was in visual range, less than 600 meters just ahead. Beth ceded the controls to Rose—her body was not responding well enough for her to trust herself with them. Her arms and legs were numb while the rebound drugs forced her G-Shot-thickened blood through the oxygenated fluid in her lungs and to her vital organs.

  The Wasp looked whole, but there were no power readings. Beth began to fear that Mercy was right and Bull was dead. She had to make sure, though.

  Not that it would matter in the long run, she knew. Back at the gate, Warthog was about to pass through with his precious comms pod. Uncle and Ranger, who were in the same condition as she was, would be next, then Mercy would bring up the rear. Their orders were clear—the gate had to be destroyed, and there was no longer any way that Beth could get there in time. The six remaining alien bogies had not made a move toward the gate, but all of the aliens had managed to remain invisible to Purple Flight before the attack. For all Beth knew, another fighter force was moving to the gate, unseen.

  Beth had a bottom aspect of Bull’s Wasp. There was the slightest bit of both gamma radiation and mercury leakage from his hadron cannon, but the weapons pods looked undamaged. That pointed to some sort of particle beam weapon instead of a kinetic or laser. Beth ordered Rose to take Tala to the other side. As the ship slowly—relative to the other fighter—as they were both still moving at a fast clip to leave the system—swung around Bull’s Wasp, Beth contemplated turning her comms back on. She’d cut the connection after too many calls from Mercy and Warthog, trying to convince her to return to the gate. She didn’t really have anything to tell them yet, though. It made more sense to wait until she could confirm Bull’s death.

  The canopy of the Wasp came into view, but Beth couldn’t see anything from this angle. She had to get a better view. A Wasp’s “canopy” was not a clear bubble as with old-time atmospheric and early spacecraft. It was made of the same material as the skin of the Wasp, fashioned to be able to recess to allow
the pilot to enter and exit the cockpit. It had polarizing cells that allowed for full opaqueness for normal operations but would become transparent when the fighter was powered down.

  As Tala moved to an upper aspect, she could see Bull’s helmet and the shoulders of his bright red Stinger flight suit. The rest was lost in the shadows. Bull was not moving, and any hope Beth had evaporated. She had expected it, but she still felt a sense of loss despite the numbness the meds created in her.

  “Bring her in to twenty meters, canopy-to-canopy,” she told Rose.

  She wanted to take a holo shot of him in what would be his tomb, recording his course and speed. She’d pass those back to Mercy. Someday, maybe far into the future, someone might want to track the derelict down and bring Bull home.

  Rose brought Tala up. The shadows were too severe to see much more, but Bull’s helmet looked fine. There was no blood splashed against the inner surface of the canopy. He looked peaceful, and Beth hoped his passing had been painless.

  “Fucking hell, Beth! Why did you switch off your comms?” Mercy shouted the second Beth came back up.

  Beth ignored the questions, passing the single word “Sending” instead.

  “Oh, hell, Beth. We knew it, right? I told you. And now . . .”

  “Sending my course as well. I don’t intend to deviate,” she told her friend.

  She knew she was on a one-way trip when she decided to go after Bull, but it was sinking in now. She idly wondered how long it would take for her to die, whether it would be the effects of the G-Shot left untreated or running out of life-support. Hopefully, the rebound meds would keep her from feeling too much regret.

  “Beth, you can’t just drift on out into the black.”

  “My choice,” she said, keeping it short.

  “Uh, no, it’s not. You can’t . . . we can’t let the fighters fall into enemy hands. You need to . . . well . . . you need to destroy Bull’s fighter, then you need to get back here now. And if . . . you know . . . if you can’t get through the gate in time, you need to self-destruct.”

  Silence took over the net for a long, long pause.

  “I’ve been told to tell you that we can fire a torp if you can’t initiate the self-destruct,” Mercy said, her voice catching.

  You mean if I don’t have the guts.

  She understood the reasoning, however. They couldn’t let the aliens have access to a Wasp, damaged or not.

  “No problem, Mercy. I’m on it.”

  “But promise me this, Beth,” Mercy said in a rush. “Try and get back here, first. We’ll hold the gate open as long as we can.”

  “Is that the official word, Mercy?” Beth asked, her voice calm.

  “That’s my word, sister. And I’ll keep it!”

  Beth didn’t think she would hesitate to initiate the self-destruct, but that could be the drugs talking. Maybe she would. It would kill Mercy to have to fire the torpedo before she went through the gate, and that was something Beth didn’t want to lay on her friend.

  Her best friend.

  First things first, though. She had to destroy Bull’s Wasp. All she had left was the rail gun, but that would do the job. She had to get much farther away than 20 meters, though, or she could get knocked out by debris—knocked out, but not destroyed.

  “Take her out to five klicks, then come about to fire,” she said, struggling with the sub-vocalizations.

  As Tala started to pull forward, she gave one last look above her to Bull’s Wasp . . .

  . . . and he suddenly looked up as if seeing her for the first time.

  “Stop!” she yelled, then went into a fit of coughing.

  Bull was waving desperately.

  “Can you hear me, Bull?” she asked over the flight net.

  “Beth, what’s going on?” Mercy asked, and Beth switched to the S2S.

  “Bull, can you hear me?” she asked, laboriously bringing a heavy arm up so she could cup her ear.

  Bull shook his head, bringing up his hands to his ears as well.

  Of course, he can’t. He’s got no power.

  Beth was surprised that Bull was even alive, but she shouldn’t be. One of the many reasons that humans were still used in ships was that one of a particle beam’s effects, Bremsstrahlung radiation, could fry electronics at relatively low power and yet not kill a person. Beth didn’t know the specifics of the alien weapon, nor did she know how far Bull had been when he’d been hit, but it had been far enough for him to survive it. She should have considered the possibility that he was alive inside a dead Wasp.

  But what to do now? Fighters didn’t have tractor beams. Tugs did, of course, but even if she were in a tug, it would take weeks, if not months, to get his Wasp to the gate.

  There was only one choice. Bull had to come to her.

  She motioned for him to come over. He didn’t hesitate but nodded and gave her a thumbs-up.

  Wasp pilots all had to conduct an evac during training, but to a rescue ship, not another Wasp. A fighter wasn’t called a single-seat for nothing. There wasn’t room for two people. Beth was small, however, and Bull wasn’t huge, either. It might not work, but it was their only choice.

  Beth had Rose bring Tala in closer. Fighter jocks did not have powered suits. They relied on their legs, jumping from their craft to the receiving craft. During training, they had safety spacewalkers all around them to collect errant cadets. Here, it would be just the two of them.

  She had Tala stop five meters away from him, but held up her hand, palm out, while she ran her checklist, something she hadn’t bothered with after the dogfight. It hadn’t seemed to matter much one way or the other. Now it did.

  Tala had suffered more damage than she’d thought possible. She was mildly surprised the Wasp was still functional. One of the many problems was the integrity of the cockpit. There has been a slow loss of the inert gasses that filled it during combat operations. Normally, that wouldn’t matter. O2 was fed into her helmet and was still doing so. But if Bull was going to join her, well, there was only one helmet connection. He’d have to be on cockpit air.

  She decided just to go ahead. He was going to die anyway, so why not?

  She opened her canopy, the inert gasses escaping in a quick blast of mist. Still strapped in, she then leaned up, arms out to catch him. With a wave of her hand, she beckoned him over. He nodded and pulled the emergency canopy release. His suit itself would have enough air for about three minutes—more than enough time for the crossing, but not enough for her to go chasing him down if he missed. He slid his canopy back, pulled himself into the perfect classroom crouch position, and looked up at her for a moment before launching himself.

  He was right on target, crashing through Beth’s feeble attempt to catch him and smashing into her chest, knocking the breath out of her. He almost bounced out, but with a death grip on the edge of the open cockpit, he stayed in place.

  Between the crunch of bodies and her G-shot, Beth wasn’t able to do much, and as he struggled to get his feet inside, he was kicking the heck out of her legs. Finally, he was jammed in, and he hit the canopy closure valve. It started closing as he hugged her tightly, his helmet up against hers. She could see his eyes were huge—whether from panic or adrenaline, she couldn’t tell.

  The canopy hit his helmet and stopped. His eyes got wider as he struggled to bury his head into her shoulder while scrunching down into the cockpit, but there just wasn’t room. It wasn’t going to work.

  Her hands were trapped, so she banged her helmet on his three times. He turned back to her, and she mouthed, “Take it off.”

  His eyes got wider, and this time she knew it was panic. Without the helmet, he wouldn’t be able to breathe, and if the canopy still wouldn’t close, he’d be dead. But if they didn’t figure out something, he’d be dead anyway.

  “Take your helmet off!” she mouthed again.

  With a resigned expression, he nodded, pulling his hands up to his neck release. She watched him hyperventilate, then exhale all the air
from his lungs. Looking her right in the eye, he released the helmet and flung it free, out of the cockpit. Panic set in as he hit the canopy closure, and he pushed into her, trying to get his head low. She watched the canopy inch closed, barely clearing his head, and brushing his mohawk as it sealed.

  Neither one of them could reach the air release, but she didn’t need it. With a quick sub-vocalization, blessed air started to rush in. With something on him pressing under her sternum, she was glad she didn’t have to say it aloud.

  “Thanks, Ant. I don’t know how to thank you. I thought—”

  “OK, Bull,” she managed to croak out though her helmet mic. “I had to G-Shot.”

  Each word drained her.

  “Rose, accept orders from Warrant Officer Nicolescu, register now.”

  “I am Chief Warrant Officer Two Taurus Nicolescu,” he said immediately.

  “Registered.”

  “G-Shot?” Bull asked.

  “Yes. I’m about done. You’ve got to get us back.”

  They were slammed together like sardines, but his panic subsided as the professional pilot took over.

  “Tuna, I’m alive, thanks to Ant. Need a clear shot to the gate.”

  “Thank God, Bull. Tuna’s gone, Swordfish, too,” LTJG Bendick passed. “I don’t know if we’re going to be able to keep the gate open, but get back here as fast as you can, buddy. Godspeed.”

  The meds coursing through her body, the strain she’d been put through, and now being crushed by Bull were too much for her. She managed a soft, “Mercy, we’re on our way,” before, for the second time in the last couple of hours, everything faded to black.

  Chapter 14

  Beth opened her eyes to Josh sitting in the chair, eyes glued to a reader.

  “Don’t you have work to do?” she asked.

  Her plane captain looked up, a smile taking over his face.

  “Not with you off flight status,” he said. “Nothing much for me to do until you’re out of that bed.”

  “What about Tala? She all ready?”