Conflict: The Pythan War, Invasion

by DK Williamson

“We shall inspect your engineering section, and then decide what is to be done. We saw you with sensors before we arrived. The ship assisting this vessel fled, correct?” Munaka asked.

  “Correct, commander,” Carey said. “This way to engineering.”

  Turner stayed on the bridge and waited until the group was out of earshot. “Notify the men at engineering that the Pythans are on their way. I’m going to keep an eye on the other two near the hatch,” he said to one of Cassiopeia’s crew at a commo panel.

  “Will do,” the young crewman said. “You think we have a chance of getting out of this?”

  Turner nodded. “Crazy as it sounds, yes I do.”

  The lieutenant removed his jacket and readjusted the pistol stuffed in the beltline at the back of his pants. He left the bridge and pulled himself down the railing in the passageway.

  -(o)-

  “Until the Pythans fire up those crappy engines of theirs, I can’t tell you where to use the mag gun,” Duck said.

  “About that,” Tom-Tom said. “We have a problem.”

  Tark and most of the deck crew looked Thompson’s way.

  “Unless we want to reorientate, we can’t bring the mag gun to bear. The gun can’t depress enough. The engine banks are too low relative to our position.”

  Tark rapped a hand on the armrest of his command seat. “Shit! Any suggestions?”

  “Offhand I can think of two options,” Tom-Tom said. “Demolition charges or cutting cord.”

  “You take a walk in the Black and plant the things? That’s your plan?” Tark said.

  “Didn’t say it was a plan, said it was an option, but now that you mention it, yeah.”

  Tark sighed and looked around the deck. “Anyone have another idea?”

  “I have one, but Tom-Tom’s is way better,” Chimp said.

  Tark sighed loudly. “Do I want to hear it?” he asked.

  “I seriously doubt it, boss,” she said.

  Tark looked at his number two. “All right. What do you need, Tom-Tom?”

  “I need Alphabet, he knows how to handle cutting cord. I need Pop and Taco to go with us, they’re top hands. We need time to suit up, and while we’re doing that I need someone to get enough data tether for us to be able to stay in touch with Franklin without the Pythans picking up any broadcasts. I need someone to get cutting cord for both teams, and most importantly, I need to know where we put the cord.”

  “And how the hell do we do that?” Duck asked.

  “We give the Pythans a reason to use their engines,” Tark said.

  “And how do we do that?” Chimp asked.

  “You tell me. You and Duck are the ones that’s going to do it.”

  -(o)-

  “What is wrong with the drive?” Munaka asked as he looked over the part of the engineering section where Brownie and his crew were working.

  Franklin’s repair crew all wore Piedmont garb, as did the members of the ad hoc resistance force Lieutenant Turner had placed in engineering.

  “The engines are fine, commander,” Captain Carey said. “It’s the controls. Engineer Brown can explain,” he said gesturing at Brownie.

  “Do not try to deceive me,” Munaka said, squinting his eyes at Franklin’s Repair Chief. “I have some knowledge of such things.”

  “Wouldn’t dream of it, commander,” Brownie said. “This is all connectivity regulators that have to be recalibrated,” he said gesturing at the open bays stuffed with large bundles of cables and monitor panels, with bags of tools and gear floating tethered to the walls. “But I would imagine you know all that.”

  Brownie pointed to the rear of the bay. “Back there is the real problem. The hyper torsion motivator linkage,” he said as Carey’s eyes grew large for an instant realizing that Brownie was speaking nonsense. “Never seen the like of that mess. Want to see? You won’t believe it.”

  “Show me,” Munaka said curtly.

  “Follow me then,” Brownie said as he pulled himself to the back section.

  Munaka uttered something in Pythan to his men and gestured at the large number of Piedmont crew near the entrance, then followed Brownie.

  The four Pythan soldiers eyed the repair crew with suspicion and contempt.

  -(o)-

  “Don’t worry, boss. It’ll be subtle,” Chimp said.

  “If they figure out what’s going on things will get ugly,” Tark said.

  “They’ll think it’s a malfunction, or that someone bumped a control or something,” Duck said. “If the Pythan’s are anything at all like us, their bosses are just waiting to find something to chew someone’s ass over. It’ll be just enough that I can pin down the points for Tom-Tom and company.”

  “All right,” Tark replied. He keyed his transmit button. “Tom-Tom, you guys ready to go?”

  “Roger-dodger, just need a location,” he replied from his position near an exit hatch just above the lamprey skirt on the starboard side, Alphabet and his partner were similarly placed on the other side of the vehicle.

  Tark switched to a general vehicle setting. “Everyone hang tight. Chimp’s going to work her magic.”

  “Hey, what about me?” Duck said with feigned offense.

  “I thought you said your job was all technical,” Tark said with a glance at Duck. “Do your thing, Chimp.”

  “On it,” she said.

  Bev thumbed the attitude jets control on her left, and applied the slightest pressure, incrementally increasing it over several seconds.“Duck, let me know the instant they start to correct.”

  “Will do,” he replied, his eyes flitting between screens.

  The Joursto began to rotate ever so slowly along its longitudinal axis due to Chimp’s manipulations.

  “They are correcting,” Duck said.

  As the rotation stopped and the Joursto began to rotate back to its original orientation, Chimp brought up the jets that were facing the opposite direction they were moving, which slowed the velocity of the Pythan vehicle and the piggybacking Franklin.

  The Joursto finished its rotation correction and the main engines came up for a moment as the crew realized they were moving slower than the Cassiopeia.

  “Got it!” Duck said. He tapped a series of keys and glanced at his primary screen. “Tom-Tom, look at your display. I marked the spot. Four control conduits linking from the engines and capacitors. Sever those, she goes out and her beams got no juice.”

  “Got it,” Tom-Tom said. “You ready Alphabet?”

  “As I’ll ever be.”

  “Let’s go.”

  Tark looked at Duck. “You sure about this?”

  Duck grinned. “Reasonably.”

  Tark glared and shook his head. “Fucking salvors. Every damn one of them is a comedian or a smartass.”

  “Or both,” Chimp said.

  Indicators on most of the deck crew screens showed that hatches on the port and starboard side of Franklin’s hull had opened. The pair of two-man teams were in the Black.

  “Hey, boss? Taco here,” Repair and Rescue Hand Luis Tacoma said, in his voice could be heard the effort of moving along the exterior of the two vehicles. He was paired with Alphabet.

  “Yeah,” Tark answered.

  “Me and Pop figured we ought to get an extra share for this, I mean it’s above and beyond, yeah?”

  Tark smiled. “That right? Is that true, Graham?” he asked Graham Popovich, one of the rare crew who had been with the Franklin from the start.

  Tark heard Pop’s chuckle over the headset.

  “That’s right, boss. Kid Taco comes to me with that idea. Sounded good to me. I figured we got you over a barrel on this one, so there’s no negotiation, right?”

  Tark smiled again. “You got me. Hell, you guys pull this off, I’ll give you two shares.”

  “Two!” Taco said.

  “Tell him what we get, boss,” Pop said.

  “You get to remain a living citizen of the Coalition a little longer, that’s what,” Tark said.

  �
�Two shares of…” Taco said, “sounds like a good deal.”

  -(o)-

  Brownie stopped near a Piedmont crewman who was peering into an open panel at the back of the engineering bay. “Foster, this is Commander… didn’t get your name, sir,” Brownie said looking at Munaka.

  “I am Commander Munaka.”

  “Glad to see you, commander,” Foster said in a deep and gravelly voice as he turned toward the Pythan.

  Munaka was taken aback by the scarred man’s appearance. He looked as if he’d been in dozens of fights or had been in a terrible accident sometime in the past.

  Brownie looked to the front of the engineering bay and locked eyes with Carey, then made a slight gesture with his head.

  “Now!” Carey bellowed, startling the four Pythans nearby.

  Munaka turned his head to see what was going on and didn’t see Foster launch himself at the Pythan. The impact hurtled both men into a nearby equipment bank. Brownie closed on the two.

  At the front of the bay, nine men moved on the four Pythans, slow to react after Carey’s call to action. A general melee ensued, in a crowded and weightless space.

  In the back, Brownie and Foster had Munaka pinned against the bank and a pole that ran to the ceiling. Foster locked a leg around one of Munaka’s while Brownie grabbed Munaka’s left arm. Munaka moved to draw his sidearm with his right.

  The twisting, rolling, wrestling match at the front was going against the Pythans, until one of the soldiers tore loose and with panic-stricken eyes brought his rifle to bear, firing a wild burst. A louder single shot echoed in the bay, a shot fired by retired Sergeant Major Johnston, stopping the threat by killing the Pythan who went limp, his body doing a slow pinwheel toward the wall. He was no longer a threat, but his actions alerted the two Pythans near the entrance hatch that there was trouble.

  In the back of the bay, Munaka grasped the grip on his pistol as Foster locked the commander’s wrist just above the holster on the Pythan’s waist. Foster smiled savagely and said, “This ain’t my first dance in zero-G,” as he brought a sledgehammer fist arcing onto the Pythan commander’s jaw at high velocity. The commander’s view went black an instant after impact and the fight in the engineering bay was over.

  -(o)-

  “The cutting cord isn’t adhering very well,” Tom-Tom said, static hissing at the beginning and end of each broadcast. “I’m going to try and lash it down with Palmer mesh.”

  “We don’t have any mesh, Tom,” Alphabet said. “Our gear’s set up for rescue. We’ll try and cross the cutting cord over on itself and put the remote fuses at the cross.”

  “Do the best you can,” Tom said.

  “Next time we have to disable a hostile warship out in the Black we’ll do better,” Taco said.

  “My plan, my fault if it goes bad,” Tom said. “I’ll issue a formal apology in the prison camp.”

  “Ain’t a bad plan considering we only had fifteen or twenty minutes to get it together,” Pop said. “You’re a lot smarter than Tark gives you credit for.”

  “That witty banter getting the job done quicker?” Tark said from the control deck.

  “You know it is,” Alphabet said. “Just finishing up on the fourth control conduit. We’re going to need decontamination on our return. These engines are hot, some kind of residue slaking off.”

  “We’ll be ready,” Tark said. “How long, Tom?”

  “Heading back, approaching the hatch. Thirty seconds. Wish we could test the fuses, but the Pythans might pick up the broadcast.”

  A few minutes later both teams we back inside Franklin and were undergoing a rudimentary suit cleansing, enough that they could shed their suits safely. The rest could be cleared up later, if they were still alive.

  -(o)-

  Turner heard the weapons fire from engineering. A quick peek around the corner of the passageway revealed one of the sentries was pulling himself down the railing as fast as he could go, right at Turner.

  The other sentry was removing something from his equipment belt, but Turner was more concerned with the sentry closing on him.

  Turner leaned around the corner, his sidearm in his left hand, his non-dominant hand. Fifteen meters, halfway down the passage, if he looks at you, fire, Turner thought.

  Two more cycles of the Pythan’s arms and he looked. His eyes squinted in anger when he saw Turner with his weapon pointed at him. The Pythan stopped and scrambled to bring his slung weapon around when Turner fired.

  His first round hit the Pythan in the right shoulder, and the lieutenant could see red globs of blood exit from the wound and wobble as tiny undulating balls in the air. The Pythan still tried for the weapon as Turner fired twice more, a miss, then a hit in the Pythan’s throat.

  The Sentry at the hatch drew a sidearm and fired one-handed at Turner, the rounds missing badly.

  The Sentry still held the object he had drawn from his belt. It dawned on Turner what the object was, a communicator!

  You never were good with sidearms, Turner, he thought. You were good at zero-G maneuvers though, so go with what you know.

  Turner transferred the pistol to his right hand, then pulled himself around the corner and placed his feet on the lip of the wall, his knees almost fully bent. A hard push and he was headed straight for the last sentry, the man at the handrail hung limply with one hand still affixed to the rail, Turner saw him as he passed.

  The sentry with the communicator looked wide-eyed and angry at Turner and stopped in midsentence to drop the communication device and bring the pistol up two-handed.

  He fired several rounds as Turner closed, one of them stinging the lieutenant in the left shoulder. He grimaced, but held his fire. The Pythan paused to reload.

  At ten meters, They both opened fire, Turner saw his first few rounds hit to the right of his opponent. You are yanking the trigger, he thought.

  The Pythan was fighting to stay in a stable position and reached for the wall behind him.

  Turner aimed for the man’s face, and it appeared that the Pythan was doing the same to him. Turner knew that if he didn’t score a hit now, he’d find himself grappling with an unwounded opponent.

  Turner thought he felt a bullet buzz through his hair as he fired. The Pythan’s expression became blank and slack-jawed, then he rotated slowly, head going back and feet coming forward.

  Turner shifted so his feet now led and he hit the wall less than a meter from his opponent’s body. A neat hole just above the bridge of the Pythan’s nose was visible, put there when the polymer slug from Turner’s sidearm bored in.

  The lieutenant felt relieved to be alive, then pain and tiredness came over him. A look at his shoulder and a growing red patch on his shirt told him his wound was serious, then he heard agitated and unintelligible voices coming over the Pythan commo unit, now near the ceiling.

  He grimaced in pain. C’mon, Franklin. Save our tails.

  -(o)-

  “Now! Blow it now,” Duck said excitedly. “Commo traffic back and forth between the Joursto and the Cass. Something’s going down. They are powering up. A lot of activity with the conduits, going weapons I’d bet.”

  Tom-Tom looked at Tark, who nodded.

  Tom flipped a up pair of covers, exposing two switches on the console before him.

  “Joursto’s engines coming up,” Duck said.

  Tom threw the switches. Indicators on the screen in front of him told him only the starboard cutting cords fired. He tried the port side again, and again. Nothing.

  “We got a problem,” he said.

  “I see it,” Tark said. “Port side engines are still up. Chimp, that idea you had that you seriously doubted I wanted to hear? I want to hear it, now.”

  “In a nutshell, I rotate the Franklin on the chassis and use the engines to burn through the control conduits.”

  “You’re absolutely right that I didn’t want to hear that.” He glared at the ceiling and growled. “Do it.”

  “Hang on everybody,” she said. �
��This won’t be pretty. Things are gonna be pretty weird for awhile.”

  The complex machinery within the Franklin went into action and turned the upper hull ninety degrees as Chimp maneuvered Franklin’s port side engine to be in place when the Franklin completed her turn.

  With the maneuver complete, Chimp fired the port engine.

  “Tell me when that pile of slag is done for, Duck,” she said as the g-forces pushed everyone into their seats.

  “You’re there. Joursto’s good as dead,” Duck said just a few seconds later.

  “We’re tumbling. Let me get this mess straightened out,” Chimp said as her eyes darted across the screens.

  “You want me to check with the Cass, Tark?” Polo said.

  “You sure the Pythan heap is down for the count, Duck?” Tark asked.

  “Unless someone comes out and fixes the conduits, they are done. I got almost nothing going on inside the thing. Running active scans… nothing.”

  “Polo, find out what the situation is on the Cass, and apprise them of ours.”

  -(o)-

  A few hours later and the Cassiopeia was underway alongside the Franklin which was pushing the captured Pythan vehicle. They were en route to the navigation lane, then to the Prouste system.

  The Pythan prisoners aboard the Cassiopeia had been secured and were under guard. Turner’s shoulder was better, thanks to the doctor aboard the Cassiopeia— and Drama’s—ministering.

  The information available from the navigation lane beacons consisted of warnings of Pythan invasion, but little information about which systems were safe. This was not surprising. If the beacon’s feeds had not been updated by a message torp or authorized vehicle, the nav lanes were only capable of carrying information at the speed of light. That meant news traveled slow in the vast distances of space.

  The navigation lane ended at Prouste, and before they entered the system, their sensors told them there were Pythan and Coalition vehicles in combat within the system.

  “Boss, you think it smart us walking into the middle of a fight dressed up like the enemy?” Polo asked.

  “No I don’t, but this pile of slag under us is ours. We just need a way to make sure the Coalition doesn’t send a few missiles down our neck.”