by Sid Kar
“Or until killed” someone whispered. Segwyk lost his cool and barked, “who said that?”
“Commodore,” Alvyk, the gravitron scanner officer began to speak.
“You said that?” Segwyk asked in dismay. He had known Alvyk to be a calm and sober officer.
“Oh no…” Alvyk said, “I mean to bring all of your attention to our gravitron scanners.” Segwyk and Neryak leaned in closer to the terminals and Alvyk continued, “we have 75 battleships entering Nestor’s system from the other side. Computer identifies them as Jak Blackships.”
“Jak?” Neryak expressed bewilderment but Segwyk was relieved and let out a sigh of relief as he walked up his central section and sat down in his chair.
“Must be here to help,” Alvyk said, “Mercurian fleet is slowing down to a stop while still near the outer planets.”
Few hours later, the fleets held their positions. Mercurian admiral was under no orders to attack Jak Confederacy’s starships and he wasn’t going to start a war against a new state all by himself. But Jak Fleet wasn’t going to help Segwyk and Starfirians attack Mercurians either. Their commander intoned that he was here to keep the peace. Hence, an official standoff had begun.
Chapter 13: Operation
There was a stream of swears and curses out of the mouths of Tollvyk, Raptor, Styx and Hartar after Col. Maktar of Strike Soldiers had informed them of his failed operation to cross the two connectors and that no other option immediately came to his mind to reinforce rest of the starship with his troops. Only VC Barryett remained calm but his facial muscles tensed too showing the stress on his face.
“Doesn’t look good,” Styx then added, “They are storming our command room. Look at this screen,” Styx pointed to the screen in front of them where the increasing blue dots indicated the amassing enemy soldiers in front of the red dots noting their own starship guards.
“Almost 10 to 1 against us,” Detective Hartar said.
Eradicator: Correction sir. It is 8 to 1; there are 2,000 of the enemy soldiers.
“Fine,” Hartar grinned, “I still don’t like those odds.”
“At least we have heavy laser cannons, and they won’t be able to bring their own,” VC Barryett said, “And it’s one thing to drop them from starship roofs straight down like Renegade Romvyk did in the two atriums, another to haul them miles across a starship.”
“My guards can hold for long,” Styx said, “But not indefinitely.”
“It is too bad we are out in deep space,” Raptor said, “We can send a distress signal but no idea how far away the nearest Starfire Army spaceship is.”
“There might still be a way for Strike Soldiers to get to us,” Barryett said and the rest of them turned to look at him. He continued, “It is not as if we have filled our starship with metal everywhere except our own quarters. The remaining space is off-limits due to safety and operational concerns. We are choke filled with high level radiation regions, dangerous inflammable liquids, extremely sensitive circuits, reactors and all abroad this starship. But there is space around them, restricted space but navigable, and a VC’s codes can access most and Commodore Raptor’s codes override every restriction.”
“You are right,” Raptor said, “Capitan Styx, get the battle AI to map a path for us.”
Eradicator: Already on it, sir.
Even as the Battle AI spoke it had created a red line from their section to the Strike Soldiers barracks in the rear.
“Let’s get Col. Maktar back on the terminal,” Raptor said.
Eradicator: Just a note, sir. Some of the locks can only be opened one way – from this side.
“Why?” Tollvyk asked exasperated.
Eradicator: Reason is not in my database.
“They don’t want them to melt or freeze if some machine breaks down or reactor melts down and corrosive chemicals are released,” Barryett said, “Locks cannot be as easily hardened since they need to be accessible.”
“I remember that from the course on Starship Engineering,” Raptor said, “Glad to have an experienced officer like you with us, VC Barryett.”
Barryett simply nodded his head.
“What are we, a bunch of chumps?” Tollvyk said, “Com. Raptor, you and VC Barryett are needed in the command room and Capitan Styx needs to lead his starship guards, but I am standing here useless twiddling my toes and I can’t fire my rockets at them fellas. I will go, and I will take Col. Kartar and Agnosis with me. We just rescued Alvina from Segwyk’s clutches in a similar operation.”
“That might be our best hope,” Styx said.
“Let me come with you,” Detective Hartar said.
“Sure,” Tollvyk replied
“Take some starship guards along,” Raptor said.
“I would rather not add any more,” Tollvyk said, “Greater chance of detection.”
“He is right, Commodore,” Hartar said, “There won’t be very many of Dark Star mercenaries around the path that the Battle AI has mapped given its restricted nature and the need of special codes to open hardened metallic doors.”
“Alright fine, I trust Tollvyk’s experienced judgment in matters of brawls and laser fights,” Raptor said with a chuckle to lighten up the mood.
Their makeshift operation began less than ten minutes later. Kartar and Agnosis were not in the command room but they were behind the section where Starship Guards had established defensive lines and were quickly fetched. Capitan Styx equipped them with two fully charged laser pistols, special armor and individual rocket packs. Raptor handed Tollvyk a special card encoded with his own personal codes.
Tollvyk, Kartar, Hartar and Agnosis accessed the ventilation system of the command room by climbing onto a stack of terminals and pulling themselves into the ventilation duct. There they turned on their rocket packs on their backs and zoomed for a few miles through the wide air circulation system of the starship till they reached their destination. The easy part was over.
Tollvyk entered Raptor’s codes to open a vent into a cold section with pipes and tubes carrying very hot fuel to and removing wastage from the reactors. They had to be careful not to touch any piece of metal that were super cooled by smaller, supplementary pipes carrying liquefied helium and nitrogen. Their armor could protect them from instant freeze burns but it would turn brittle and break. They slowly but dexterously navigated around the pipes with Tollvyk in the lead. They reached their first destination at the other end without any incident.
Here was located the maintenance entrance to the central pipe for cooling supply, sealed with a circular metallic door that would not have been out of place protecting a bank vault.
“Com. Raptor,” Tollvyk spoke on his radio, “Have you shut off the coolant supply.”
“Yes, we have,” Raptor answered, “But give it five minutes to ensure whatever was already in there has flown out.”
“We are freezing here,” Tollvyk said slightly shivering even under the heated armor.
“If you step in even a few inches of coolant, say goodbye to your leg that will turn to ice instantly,” Capitan Styx said.
“Burr…” Tollvyk grunted.
“We will wait,” Hartar said.
Back in the command room, Raptor asked, “I hope shutting off the coolant doesn’t bring any components to a boil.”
“I wouldn’t fret it,” Barryett said, “We are a warship after all; supposed to keep fighting even if large parts of the ship are damaged or destroyed. Multiple redundancies built in for every critical system.”
Tollvyk and team waited seven minutes instead, Styx had spooked them more than a little. Then Tollvyk scanned Raptor’s card into the access panel and his codes slowly opened the circular door. He looked down and sideways before stepping in. It was completely empty but even colder than the room.
The central pipe was large enough for them to stand inside upright and yet not be able to touch the top with their hands raised but not by much. They once again ignited their rocket packs and were off flying down the
big tube. Tollvyk in the lead was looking at his handheld display and when it blinked a red light he braked his pack and his team did likewise.
There was a quirk to the design of this coolant pipe; usually access to such pipes was only from the original supply depot or their destination. But there was a large wheel like lock, enough for an individual to walk in or out, near the section that housed the pipe maintenance and repair crew. Tollvyk entered Raptor’s codes once again, then turned the wheel to open it inwards. He carefully leaned out with his neck and looked either way.
“Damn,” he whispered getting back in, “four mercenaries on our left, around 50 meters out, but positioned and facing away from us. Floor is about ten feet below.”
“Let’s proceed quietly,” Hartar said and rest of them nodded their heads in agreement. Tollvyk was first, he slowly floated down as he steadily reduced fuel to his rocket pack and was set down on the floor without a noise behind the corner of the wall ahead. Hartar and Agnosis followed him likewise. They had all drawn their laser pistols but weren’t planning on engaging. Then it was Kartar’s turn, he stepped out of the circular vent, then his boots landed on the floor with a metallic clank. Kartar swore violently in his own mind, he had forgotten that he had shut off the rocket pack.
The four Dark Star mercenaries were startled but turned around on the fly with their laser guns swinging around with them. Kartar was faster, he had drawn his laser pistol even while he was damning himself for carelessness, turned his arm around and let loose a few laser shots while letting himself fall down to the floor. He dropped one mercenary dead with a laser shot to the chest, a second had fired but his laser beams narrowly missed Kartar and went over his body when he hit the deck.
Tollvyk, Hartar and Agnosis jumped in from around the corner cutting loose with their laser pistols and downed two more mercenaries then pulled themselves back just before the fourth one fired at them. Kartar was still exposed on the ground even while trying to roll himself behind the corner by kicking his rear wall. The fourth mercenary still standing, aimed his laser gun at Kartar when suddenly another laser struck him from his back and dropped him on his knees. He fell forward dead.
Six starship guards came running from further down the narrow corridor.
“Who shot that bastard?” Kartar asked.
“I did, Col.” a younger starship guard stepped forward and saluted him.
Kartar leaped forward and hugged him for one second then pulled back and said, “Boy, I am going to personally ask Commodore to medal and promote you.”
“Thank you,” the young boy grinned.
A dozen armed crewmen also came rushing from the corridor behind the guards.
“Who are you fellas?” Tollvyk asked them.
“We were patrolling this section when they surprised us and hemmed us in there, with the coolant pipe crew,” the leader of guards said.
“How many from the crew are armed?” Tollvyk asked.
“All fourteen of us,” the crew leader stepped forward, “but it’s open, narrow corridor so we couldn’t move against them.”
“Alright, we are in a hurry, I am on a mission from Com. Raptor,” Tollvyk said, “Guard this area, that is your primary and only objective.”
“Yes sir,” they replied in unison and started setting themselves up.
Tollvyk and his team turned to the door in the opposite wall from the coolant pipe. It was the entrance to the reserve storage for spare parts. Tollvyk used Raptor’s codes to open the door and four of them stepped inside. It was a dark and dimly lit warehouse stretching ahead further than the eye could see stacked and packed with racks filled with thousands of different parts and components. They could not use their rocket packs because overhead shelfs dangling from the ceiling came down almost ten feet from the ground. The door on the other end was about a mile away. They started sprinting through the maze of fixtures.
Romvyk jumped out from behind the storage box just in time before the laser from heavy cannon shattered it to fragments but the two soldiers taking cover along with him were not so lucky. He dashed back towards the more heavily protected area twenty five meters further behind before the starship guards could aim the unwieldy but deadly cannon once again. He had taken a risk to go out in the front and inspect the battle but apparently some sharp guard had picked up on his demeanor and deference shown to be him by other soldiers and accurately identified him as a leader and thus a top target.
“That was close, Commander Romvyk,” Nanja Panga said to him when he returned to a makeshift operational command behind multiple stacks of metallic boxes, “you should send me ahead if you want frontline report.”
“Nevermind, I saw what I needed to,” Romvyk said, “fuckers have 14 to 17 heavy laser cannons, usual Starfire ships’ command rooms have 8 to 10.”
“We are still moving ahead,” Nanja said.
“At glacial speed,” Romvyk said. Taking a Starship’s command room from inside the ship was just like what he imagined ancient sieges of castles would have been like. He had always enjoyed watching movies on archaic warfare before the spacefaring days, but he wasn’t sure how accurate they were. However, the command rooms were just like fortresses and castles. There was a vast open space in front of them with no cover while the command area itself was fortified with walls and moats and heavy laser cannons and rapid fire laser guns were built into it. They were moving forward a step at a time by using makeshift cover constructed from large, metallic objects hauled from around the starship.
They had the numbers advantage but the laser firing from both sides was intense and blinding. And despite their name, the starship guards protecting the command room were not like the other guards with whom they shared the insignia, the uniform and the division. They did not maintain order abroad, their sole duty, for which they trained incessantly, was to protect the command room. Romvyk would have classified them with the best of the strike soldiers.
“Team 144 at Section 892 just went down,” a battle coordinator sitting down next to a computer terminal said to his partner.
“Starfirian scoundrels must have rushed them,” his partner replied, “But it’s not important, just spare parts and coolant pipes around there.”
“I am a Starfirian too, don’t forget lizard boy, or I will strung you upside down from your tail,” Romvyk turned to the reptilian alien whose large gray-green tail hung outside his uniform.
“Sorry Commander,” he replied and went back to checking the blueprint.
Romvyk was about to turn back when the blueprint on the terminal display of Team 144’s location caught his eye.
“Zoom out of that,” Romvyk said and the two coordinators followed his orders. Romvyk looked at the bigger picture of the map and jumped, “Nanja, grab yourself half dozen troopers, fast.”
“What are you thinking, Boss?” Nanja asked as he put on a rocket pack and waved his finger at a few of his soldiers to do likewise.
Romvyk moved his finger over the blueprint on the terminal. “It’s a wild shot for them but there might be a route through ship’s mechanical entrails to connect this front half with strike soldiers’ barracks in the rear. This ship is a new design and I didn’t have time to study the vast blueprints in intricate details, but Raptor is a real yahoo of a Commander likely to try the unexpected. His recent battle history speaks to that. I hate the thought that I am going to have to kill such a warrior and hero of my country; but the money for this operation is beyond our wildest dreams.”
“I will shoot him for you,” Nanja said then put his finger on a spot in the blueprint, “There is an atomic reactor section in between. They couldn’t make it through that!”
“It a smaller reactor to heat starship’s water, not the central engine reactors,” Romvyk said, “They will have armor in the command room to cover for that and so will the strike soldiers. Now,” Romvyk said and put his own finger on another spot just before Nanja’s, “Take position on this bridge till relieved.”
“Yes commander,
” Nanja saluted him and took his soldiers and they turned on their rocket pack to fly at breakneck speed.
It was the fastest mile they had run in their lifetime. And it was not a straight run, and it was not a curved but consistent run like a track mile; it was a chaotic, panting, jumping run through a maze, turning left, now turning right, jumping over equipment, pushing away shelfs run. They were out of breath when they reached the door at the other end and rested with their palms on their knees for just a couple of moments. But they had made it in less than five minutes.
Then Tollvyk used Raptor’s codes to unlock the door.
Back in the command room, Battle AI suddenly made a declaration in its usual calm, mechanical tone that belied the urgency of its content.
Eradicator: Seven biologicals detected in the lobby outside the spare parts warehouse.
“Toll, did you hear that!” Raptor yelled into his radio.
“I did,” Tollvyk replied, “who they?” He took out his laser pistol.
“Not ours for sure,” Capitan Styx said.
“Thanks for the warning, but we will smoke them; quietly this time.” Tollvyk said and slowly opened the door outward halfway.
But he saw nobody. They must be on the other side of the door. Perhaps they were facing the door, had seen it open and taken position. Or if they were lucky they were facing the other way. Tollvyk had no choice, there was no other way. He slowly pushed out his laser pistol, then turned his neck to take a quick peek and yanked it right back.
Nanja Panga opened fire with his laser gun and missed Tollvyk’s face, instead striking the corner joining the wall and the floor.
“Fuck!” both Tollvyk and Nanja yelled at the same time. Tollvyk fired a couple of shots blindly out of rage and Nanja returned fire splattering the door with laser.
Then Tollvyk, Agnosis and Kartar took turns firing out of the door in the general direction of incoming lasers but not knowing where the enemy lay. They could not stick out anything except their laser guns beyond the door. Nanja and six mercenaries were unleashing a torrent of continuous laser fire.