One Good Soldier

by Travis S. Taylor

"We've got incoming missiles and cannon fire, sir!"

  "Roger that, CDC!" Wallace gripped his chair. "Brace for impact!" Timmy, sound the warning.

  Aye, sir.

  "All hands, all hands! Brace for impact! Emergency crews stand by! Multiple threats detected. Repeat, brace for impact and prepare for incoming fire." Uncle Timmy's voice boomed over the 1-MC intercom, shipwide.

  "XO!"

  "Aye, Skipper?" the XO replied.

  "Larry, we need to report back to Washington. Get the first courier loaded with as much info as we can and snap him back to the Oort Cloud base." The admiral uploaded some thoughts very quickly to Uncle Timmy.

  Timmy, get as much data as possible summarized for President Moore and get it on the courier.

  Aye, sir.

  He needs to know about DeathRay and about the size and strength of this new Seppy fleet.

  Aye, sir.

  "Quartermaster of the Watch!" the XO shouted. "You heard the admiral! Let's get courier one ready to snap-back in less than ninety seconds."

  "Yes, sir!"

  "Sir, another one of the Seppy supercarriers just went into hyperspace!" the STO announced. "I've got a conduit opening up behind us, sir. They'll be right on top of the Roosevelt!"

  "Thanks, STO." RADM Jefferson adjusted his mindview to see the battlescape around the Roosevelt. If they played it right, they could get into a game of cat and mouse using the QMT asteroid as cover. "CO Madira to CO Roosevelt!"

  "Go, Madira!"

  "Jaunt behind the asteroid. I want to see if this Seppy bastard will pursue. If he doesn't, then jaunt back and press the attack! We'll focus on a crossfire gambit." The admiral knew that pulling the Roosevelt off their rear flank would leave the backdoor open and put them in a bad crossfire situation. But he needed to know if that was the Seppy battle plan or not.

  Just how clever is their fleet captain, or are they fighting as individuals?

  I see, Admiral. This will tell us how orchestrated their attack is.

  Yes.

  "Roger that, Madira."

  "Sir, the Roosevelt just jaunted out of the battle to a cover position behind the asteroid," the STO said.

  "Doesn't look like he's going after the Roosevelt, sir." The XO added, "We're gonna be in a serious crossfire any second now."

  "Good."

  "CO Madira to Fleet! Tyler and Lincoln, take up point on the two lower bogies and give the Roosevelt and the Madira cover to take on the one that just jaunted to our backdoor."

  "Sir! The Roosevelt is waiting for your order to jaunt back into play!"

  "Tell them to bring it!" Wallace ordered.

  Chapter 20

  July 1, 2394 AD

  Ross 128, Arcadia Orbit

  Friday, 3:21 PM, Earth Eastern Standard Time

  "Gotcha!" Karen toggled her mecha into fighter mode even as she passed through the debris field of the Seppy she had just splashed. She looked for her stand-in wingman, Dragon. The rookie was good, but Fish had flown as DeathRay's wingman for over a decade. Partnerships like that are hard to beat. Fish was as much a pro as DeathRay, and it was only a matter of time before they had new rookies that needed to be teamed up with more seasoned pilots. No matter, when DeathRay was away the Gods of War would notice the absence. Fish knew she'd just have to make up for it. Besides, wasn't nobody better than her anyway.

  "Hard right, Fish! Hard right!" Dragon shouted. "Guns, guns, guns!"

  "Ho, woo, shit!" She pulled back right on the stick, huffing and puffing against the g-load of her maneuver while adding throttle and slip. Her g-suit squeezed the hell out of her thighs and midsection, as her teeth clenched the mouthpiece, releasing oxygen and stims. A mecha-to-mecha missile passed way too fucking close to her plane.

  "Dragon, where the hell are you?" She could see her wingman out there behind her in her DTM mindview but couldn't get a visual on the rookie pilot. The blue dot in her virtual battlescape displayed him bouncing around like a wild man. She hoped his physical stamina would hold up. Not pacing themselves was a big mistake that a lot of new pilots made in their first combat missions. Fish needed to get him to settle down.

  "Fox three!" Dragon shouted as he barrel-rolled over Fish, going to his mecha-to-mecha missiles. "Ha! That's two of you mothers!"

  "Great flying, Dragon. Try to pace yourself and don't make it harder than you have to," Fish ordered him.

  "Got it, Fish," he panted back to her.

  "We're getting pounded, Fish!" Lieutenant Commander Charles "Stinky" Allen complained over the net. "Just once I'd like to be on the side that has superior numbers. This shit is thick."

  "Just another target-rich environment, Stinky," replied Fish.

  "The best way to give us superior numbers is to kill a shitload more of them. Then we'll outnumber 'em and really give them hell," Lieutenant Denise "Crash" Fourier added.

  "Roger that, Crash." Stinky grunted against a high g-load maneuver he was huffing and puffing his way through. "Damnit! Guns, guns, guns!"

  "Dragon, you with me back there?" Fish scanned her DTM for more Seppy Gomers—there were plenty of Gnats and Stingers everywhere. She spotted a group of four Gomers moving in on Stinky and his new wingman, Lieutenant Junior Grade Song "TigerLady" Davis.

  "Roger that, Fish," Dragon replied.

  "Upstairs, angels ten, twelve o'clock high." She waited for Dragon to spot the bogies in his DTM.

  "Got 'em."

  The flight-wing missions were usually the same for the Madira pilots. The Gods of War typically kept the outer part of the ball clear and watched the backs of the Demon Dawgs. The Dawgs in turn watched the backs of the Utopian Saviors so the Marine mecha pilots could get in close with the objective, in this case an enemy supercarrier, and inflict as much damage as they could.

  Fish pitched up ninety degrees and finally caught a clear visual of her wingman. Ensign Zeke "Dragon" Franklin was almost directly behind her, rolling around and around her line of flight, still wasting too much of his physical endurance. She pitched back over and then pulled in tight on his right wing, forcing him to settle into formation with her.

  "TigerLady, Stinky, you've got four Gomers on your six. You'd better watch your ass before they get the drop on you."

  "Roger that, Fish! I see 'em," Stinky replied.

  "Stinky, these bastards are hellbent for us," TigerLady shouted. "We better do something quick to shake these motherfuckers! I'm getting pinged by a targeting tone!"

  "Hold on for a few more seconds. We're coming."

  Fish slammed the throttle all the way forward and pulled the stick to her stomach. Dragon stayed tight on her wing. They shot up into the higher altitudes of the engagement zone, in the direction of the QMT facility. They were already pulling six gravities, but anytime they had to juke or jink, the g-load shot up in the nine gravities range. Time was critical. If they didn't get up to Stinky and TigerLady in time to disrupt the Gomers on their six, the two pilots would be in serious trouble. Fish wasn't going to let that happen. DeathRay would kill himself to prevent that from happening. If that was what it took, that would just be what it took. Fish was beginning to realize the burden of being the squad commander. She couldn't imagine how it must feel to be the CAG.

  "What's the plan, Fish?" Dragon said faintly against the added gravity.

  "Okay, Dragon, we'll use DeathRay's favorite approach," Fish replied.

  "Yeah, what's that?" the young ensign asked eagerly, hoping to learn some new wisdom and tactic of being a fighter pilot.

  "DeathRay would say, 'All right, Fish, we fly in there, and we kill those motherfuckers.' So I think we should do that," Fish grunted.

  "Uh, right. Good plan."

  Spike, work the scenarios. Too bad Jack ain't here. He's missing all the fun, she thought to her AIC.

  Roger that, Fish. He's probably goldbricking. A bunch of flight vectors jumped around in her virtual mindview, showing the flight paths of the Gomers, how they intercepted with Stinky and TigerLady, and where she and Dragon
could converge on them and take them out. The red and blue lines twisted around and around each other in a confusing mess that looked like a sky full of multicolored spaghetti. The spaghetti was sinewy and tied up in knots with itself and was damned near indecipherable.

  Remove the ones taking more than thirty seconds and all that require more than ten gees.

  Roger that.

  Most of the flight solutions vanished. There were three left that showed where they could get the drop on the enemy fighters if they did it right.

  That one, Fish thought and made the other two go away. Give it to Dragon.

  Done.

  "Okay, Dragon, hold on to your ass and follow me in. Don't underestimate your kinetic energy or we'll overshoot them. We don't want to do that until we've mixed them up. Stay on my wing, but barrel-roll for the shot if you can get it."

  "Roger that, Commander!"

  Fish continued to push the throttle forward, but it just wouldn't go any farther. She jinked and juked through the attack pattern that Spike had laid out for her, sticking to it like a magic spell. A couple times it looked like if she stuck with the precalculated spell she'd turn into a frog, a dead bloody one at that, so she made up shit when that happened. She didn't turn into a fairy princess, but in a furball like this one she'd settle for "boat cute." If her plan worked, she was sure Stinky and TigerLady would think of her as at least "boat cute" and likely even queen of the fucking dance.

  "I'm locked up!" Stinky shouted. The enemy Gnats had just about managed to drop in directly behind his six and put a bead on him and TigerLady. Seppy tracer rounds plowed through the space all around Stinky's mecha, and a few of them hit the rear portion of his empennage, rocking him pitch forward a bit, but he was lucky. His SIFs and armor plating held, and he managed to keep control of his fighter.

  "You two wheel each other, damnit!" she ordered them. The two started barrel rolling in and out and around each other, hoping to confuse the enemy targeting systems. The constant barrel rolls made them look like a big wheel rotating in space out in front of her.

  "They're too close, Fish!" TigerLady shouted.

  "All right, goddamn it! Pull into the shortest downward bank you can stand, now!"

  "Roger that! Banking down!" the two pilots shouted and grunted and cursed and grunted some more.

  Stinky's mecha dove into a very tight downward turn. The g-forces on him would push him to the brink of blacking out. Fish had done that maneuver hundreds of times and she knew that about then Stinky's seat would be several inches up his ass and his butt cheeks would be clenched as tight as he could get them. TigerLady, on the other hand, barrel-rolled over and around Stinky's mecha while staying with Stinky's vector. She continued in a wheel about him, and what she did next showed brilliance, superhuman stamina to withstand ungodly g-loads, and balls the size of the Jovian moons. She went to bot mode while keeping the same wheel vector about Stinky's downward roll-out.

  "Damnit, TigerLady, what the fuck are you doing!" Dragon shouted.

  Fish didn't think that the young pilot could take that kind of pressure for long. One of the enemy Gnats open fired with its cannon, and tracers lanced between Stinky and TigerLady, missing them both. Then another opened fired, but missed again. It was a good thing those Seppy Gomers weren't very good pilots, or things could have been a whole lot worse. As it was, a couple rounds pinged against TigerLady's hull plating, but they were glancing shots, and did little damage. Her bot-mode mecha yawed around to face her pursuers, and she opened fire with both forearm cannons.

  "Aarrrrgggh! Guns, guns, guns!" TigerLady shouted. "Get off my ass, goddamnit!"

  "Lookout!" Fish screamed through her bite block as friendly tracer rounds missed the enemy Gnats and flashed just past her cockpit. "Watch your firing solutions for blue on blue, goddamnit!"

  "Fox three!"Dragon yelled.

  "Fox three!" Fish followed up. Mecha-to-mecha missiles twisted out from Fish's and Dragon's mechas and both of them hit home on the Seppy Gnats. Two of the enemy fighters exploded almost simultaneously in a combining orange and white plasma ball. There was no time for the pilots to eject. Fish and Dragon plowed on through the fireballs where the two enemy fighters had been, passing the other three Gnats. They came into formation beside Stinky and TigerLady, who was still firing behind them at the remaining Gnats.

  "Shit!" Fish banked and rolled while trying to swallow her stomach, then pitched one-hundred-eighty degrees and yawed forty-five. "Guns, guns, guns."

  "Fox three!" TigerLady shouted. A missile screamed out from the bot-mode fighter's midsection and twisted its way right into the cockpit of one of the pursuing Gnats. "Hot damn! That's one!" the young lieutenant shouted.

  The two remaining Gnats continued to bank through the turn, trying to get a firing solution on any of the Ares. As the two Gomers pulled in tight behind them, their trajectories led them right across multiple firing solutions, and the four Navy aviators laid waste to the Seppies. But just before the last one crossed a firing solution, it did something that none of them had seen before. The Seppy Gnat transfigured into a bot mode and went into a Superman dive, going to guns with its forearm cannons.

  "Guns, guns, guns!" Fish's railgun cannon tracers cut in across space in front of the transfigured Seppy Gnat and tracked its trajectory until it flew right through the forty-millimeter cannon rounds. The enemy fighter was ripped to shreds by a fusillade of baseball-sized, high-incendiary, armor-piercing tracer rounds, scattering debris and gas vapors from it.

  "Guns, guns, guns!" Dragon followed up.

  "Guns, guns, guns!" Stinky shouted.

  "All wings, all wings! Be advised that the Gnats have a bot-mode! I repeat, the Seppy Gnats have a bot mode now!" Fish communicated wide, with full dispersion across all the flight-wing channels. She guessed that several others had to have seen the same by now and wondered why nobody had called it in.

  "Fish, Fish, Madira!"

  "Go, Madira!" Fish replied.

  "We need air support dirtside! It's thick down there."

  "Roger that, Madira. It's thick all goddamned over."

  Chapter 21

  July 1, 2394 AD

  Sol System, White House

  Friday, 3:26 PM, Earth Eastern Standard Time

  "Yes, Mr. President, it would appear that the fleet ships in the Ross 128 system are severely outnumbered," the young courier officer said over the holoview communication from onboard the QMT facility out in the Oort. "The final information is encoded, and I was told by the admiral himself that you would understand this message. The message is, quote, Operation Bachelor Party is in play and has visual confirmation of missing package. Missing package is on enemy supercarrier that QMTed out that DeathRay pursued. DeathRay also confirmed via sensors that missing package was aboard said enemy supercarrier-class vessel just before he vanished with it."

  Alexander Moore and his wife stood in front of the long mahogany conference table in the White House Situation Room, watching the holoview communication intently. The Situation Room had basically the same décor that President John Fitzgerald Kennedy had added back in the mid-twentieth century after the Bay of Pigs incident. President Moore stood grimacing with his arms folded at the head of the room where more than ninety-six other presidents had stood and pondered the heavy decisions of their time. As if the weight of the office bearing fully on his shoulders wasn't enough, now the fate of his teenage daughter was wrapped up in the decisions he would have to make. Was there some approach that his predecessors had used or some profound thought that had kept them on the right path that he could emulate? He wondered if other presidents thought the same things as they had stood there over the last couple of centuries.

  How had President Alberts felt when he learned that the Separatists were attacking Mons City on Mars just twelve years earlier? How Nixon must have paced the room during the bombings of Hanoi. What of the "Great Communicator" President Reagan during the many Cold War incidents with the Soviet Union? What of the father and so
n Bushes during their respective wars in the Middle East? How had they felt? How had William Jefferson Clinton handled the stress of dealing with the fighting in old Africa? How did the several presidents that followed during the Global War of Muslim Extremism deal with those troubles? And how had the many presidents to follow the "Great Expansion" of humanity handled their various "situations" of slow economies, overpopulation, civil unrest between colonies throughout the Sol System, and political infighting for territorial control? Alexander thought about the great men and women of history that must have stood in the very spot he was standing, thinking what he was thinking. He thought of how the great general and—Alexander laughed to himself at the thought—President Sienna Madira handled the Separatist Secession and the creation of the Reservation in the desert of the red planet. That crazy bitch probably had it all planned even back then, he thought. He wouldn't be surprised if she had caused it to happen to put her plans into motion.

  The one thing those presidents didn't have to deal with was the fact that their daughter had been kidnapped by the leader of the enemy forces. And the leader of those enemy forces wasn't the estranged mother of the First Spouse. This goddamned mess has to fucking end, he thought to himself.

  Yes, sir, his AIC agreed.

  "Are you sure that Captain Boland made it through the QMT jump to the other side?" Sehera asked the courier.

  "Yes, ma'am. There was no sensor evidence of his fighter on this side of the jump."

  "Only one place they could have gone, Mr. President," the secretary of defense said. "Tau Ceti."

  "Yes, I agree." Moore ground his molars together so hard that it was audible. There was no way to know if his daughter was safe or not. That thought made veins bulge out and throb with each heartbeat. At least Boland and, amazingly, that CIA agent that had been presumed dead since the Luna City attack were there trying to get to her. But that just wasn't enough for Alexander. His face was red with the fiercest anger that he had felt in more than forty years.

  "Alexander." Sehera put a hand on his shoulder and spoke calmly to him. "What do you think you are going to do?" Alexander could tell by the tone of her voice that she was being rhetorical.