by David Bruns
“Hard starboard, helm!” Rimaud cried. “Engineering, give me everything you have left.”
The Swarm laser tracked them, cutting a heavy swath of destruction across their exposed side as they turned.
Then it stopped.
“Put the Swarm ship onscreen, Welby.”
The alien vessel was expanding like an enormous fiery balloon. It exploded, and the shock wave rushed at them. Victory rolled, slamming Rimaud back in his chair.
“Damage report, Welby!”
“Engines are gone, shields are gone.” He hammered at his console, then looked up. “Sir, we’re falling.”
Rimaud’s head was still ringing from the knock he’d taken. “Falling? What does that mean?”
Welby pointed at the screen. Earth, blue and green and brown, wreathed in wisps of clouds, looked so peaceful from this height.
“We’re caught in Earth’s gravity, sir. We’re going to crash.”
Chapter 37
ISS Invincible
“What the hell did they do down here?” Lieutenant Don “Mustang” Havers asked his crew chief. Although they’d managed to restore artificial gravity and rig up a force field to keep atmosphere in the hangar, the flight deck of the Invincible was an unholy mess.
The older man laughed. “This is what happens when the XO gets angry, sir.” He pointed to a wrecked fighter mashed against the bulkhead. “That’s what’s left of her fighter.”
Mustang took in the shattered canopy and shreds of fuselage. “Cannonballs flew in on that?”
“Yep, right through the blast doors, I hear.”
Mustang let out a low whistle as the crew chief closed his canopy. “Remind me never to piss off the XO again. Ever.”
He moved his craft into the flight pattern. “Greyhound, Piledriver, Shrek, radio check.”
Mustang nodded as his flight team checked in. Soft-spoken Greyhound, a tall, thin girl with a Midwestern accent, gruff Piledriver, and the twangy-voiced Shrek.
He keyed his microphone. “Alright, boys and girls of the Blue Team, they’re finally letting the best pilots in the entire galaxy into the fight, so watch out, bad guys.” He paused. “All bullshit aside, guys. Stick to the basics. Fly straight, shoot straighter. With a little luck, we’ll kill some bad guys and live to tell the story.”
His headset crackled. “Blue Team, you are cleared for launch.”
“Roger, Control, Blue Team is released.” He punched his throttle all the way forward. “On me, Blues.”
Mustang got a split-second view of the shattered blast doors as they blew past. Damn, the XO really had blown them open.
The open space outside the Invincible was littered with debris. Mustang dodged a chunk of metal with slagged edges. “Watch for space debris, guys. It’s like a junkyard out here.”
“Look at that,” Greyhound said. “Is that the Victory?” A Constitution-class warship had entered the earth’s atmosphere. The leading edge of the ship glowed with heat.
“Where’s the bad guys?” asked Piledriver. “I only see one Swarm ship.”
“Looks like we’re whupping their asses,” said Shrek.
The lone Swarm vessel, unharmed, loomed ahead of them. As they watched, the alien ship released a weapon toward the earth. North America was passing beneath them, and Mustang watched as the fiery weapon shot through the atmosphere, landing somewhere in the Midwest.
“Oh my God,” said Greyhound.
“Blue Team, vector to ISS Constitution to provide fighter support. Incoming coordinates.”
“Roger, Control.” Mustang fed the new coordinates into his system. The Connie was drifting, surrounded by dozens of Swarm–human dogfights. He swung close to the Invincible’s hull. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw movement—it looked like two tiny figures moving on the outside of the ship’s hull.
“Hey, did you guys see that?” Mustang said.
“See what?” Shrek replied.
“It looked like someone was climbing the hull on the outside of the . . . oh, never mind,” Mustang said.
***
Addison tried to pace her breathing. Sweat ran freely down her back and legs and she could feel it pooling in her magnetic boots. If they made it through this alive, she had some serious design suggestions for the pressure suit engineers.
A diamond formation of X-23 fighters flashed by them, vectored toward the Constitution. At least part of the Invincible was getting into this fight, but unless she managed to stop Baltasar, they’d all look like the Connie—or worse.
It was hard not to just stop and watch the battle around them. It looked like maybe the Fleet had finally figured out a strategy to defeat the Swarm ships. If they could penetrate the Swarm hulls with enough projectiles, the Fleet energy weapons were able to do some serious damage on the interior. Otherwise, the lasers on the Fleet ships seemed to have as much impact as shining a flashlight on the alien vessels.
The Swarm lasers, on the other hand, were fearsome things, able to punch through the weak shields on the smaller warships in only a few seconds. Only the Constitution-class warships with their heavily armored hulls and high-capacity shields stood a chance against that much directed energy.
But the new Fleet attack strategy came at a fearsome cost. The Connie was a floating hulk being picked apart by fighters, the Indy was still capable but wounded, and the Victory . . . the Victory—and her best friend—were hurtling through Earth’s atmosphere like some giant piece of space junk. She’d seen the escape pods raining from the Victory before she made her final run at the Swarm ship. Hopefully, Sam was on one of those. Knowing her best friend’s never-give-up attitude, Addison didn’t hold out much hope.
Addison set her chin. The Victory’s sacrifice would not be in vain. Not if she had anything to say about it.
The combined Russian–UEF fleets had taken down three of those big alien bastards, but the last Swarm ship was unharmed. It coasted through space in front of the Invincible like a whale, unfazed by the sea of destruction around them. Laz tapped her on the shoulder, pointing at the Swarm ship.
A bubble of light exited the bottom of the ship, entered the atmosphere, and sped toward a spot in the middle of America.
Addison tore her eyes away from the spectacle and climbed even faster.
***
It’s a common misconception by civilians that all ships of a class were built exactly the same. Not true. They were mostly the same, but each ship had variations. Sometimes these differences were new systems or design changes that were being phased into future builds. Usually they were minor: a few extra rivets or a larger control panel.
But sometimes they were major changes. The Invincible had one such change.
Most warships of the era had bridges that were exposed at the very top of the hull—some even had windows. But the control room of a Constitution-class warship was buried deep in the hull, under ten meters of tungsten shielding. When designers did this, they gave up a key factor: survivability of the bridge crew during an abandon ship event. The exposed bridge designs had a means of escape for the crew. Not so on the Constitution-class ships.
So one warship designer set out to fix that issue by building in an escape chute that allowed the bridge crew to exit the Invincible in an emergency. It was a narrow affair, only wide enough for one person, and curved so as to send the survivors out toward the stern of the ship like a slide in a water park.
That was her way in.
Addison angled their track to travel over the edge of the ship until she was walking upside down on the hull beneath the bridge. The earth spread out under her like some giant beautiful tableau. The Swarm weapon had detonated somewhere in the mid-Atlantic region, and the entire East Coast was obscured by the mushroom cloud. The flaming wreck that was once the Victory had crash-landed in the vicinity of Salt Lake City. A fresh dust cloud was forming in that region.
It took her precious minutes to find the bridge escape hatch. She turned on her helmet light to illuminate the area, kneeli
ng to get a closer look at the access panel next to the hatch. Addison held out a hand to Laz for the wrench. Quickly, she removed the access panel cover, letting the bolts float away. She moved the switch inside to the position marked Maintenance, then jumpered the sensor so there would be no indication on the bridge that the hatch was open.
She nodded to Laz, who turned the handle on the access hatch. The door hung open, revealing a black entrance into the hull. They’d agreed there would be no comms between them on the off-chance that the bridge crew might pick them up. He made an exaggerated “after you” sweep of his hand.
The bridge escape exit was deliberately designed to be narrow, so Addison had barely enough room to crawl on her hands and knees, and she couldn’t even turn around to check on Laz, but she could see his helmet light shining past her. That would have to do for now. Laz pulled the hatch shut behind them with a solid thunk.
The moisture that had collected in her boots leaked forward to cover her shins as she crawled along. The tunnel sloped upwards into the hull interior, and she had to use the narrow handholds in the wall to climb against the ship’s artificial gravity. She was breathing heavily again by the time she reached the access to the bridge.
Addison closed her eyes, remembering the layout. The emergency access hatch was positioned at the rear of the bridge, adjacent to the lift and concealed behind a wall panel. The hatch opened outwards. Her plan was to unlatch it from the inside and burst into the bridge.
There was a bit more room here, enough for her to be able to look down at Laz. He smiled grimly from behind his faceplate, then gave her a thumbs-up. Reaching down, he pulled out a pulse pistol.
Addison slid her own weapon from the holster on her thigh. She swallowed hard and, using one hand, tried to turn the large blade switch that held the access hatch in place.
It wouldn’t budge.
She reholstered her weapon, then used both hands on the hatch. The switch moved a few millimeters. She braced her feet against the wall and put her back into it.
With a cracking sound and a whoosh, the hatch fell inward. Bright light flooded over her. The atmosphere of the bridge rushed into the narrow tunnel, pinning her in place.
Addison rolled into the room, clumsy in her pressure suit, her right hand scrabbling for her weapon. Someone tackled her from behind, knocking her face-first onto the deck. There was a flash of laser fire behind her and she tried to buck off the person on her back.
She screamed and struggled, but it was all over in a few seconds. Lieutenant Anders, the comms officer, rolled her over and sat astride her chest. She craned her head. Lieutenant Yorke, the weapons officer, had a laser burn on his shoulder, but he also had a pistol trained on Laz.
His hands raised, Laz climbed into the room and sat down heavily next to her.
Anders pressed the button to release her faceplate. The thick glass swung up into her helmet, fresh air caressing her sweaty cheeks.
She felt Baltasar’s heavy tread next to her head and his face came into view, blue eyes shining brightly.
“XO,” he said. “You’re just in time.”
Chapter 38
ISS Independence – Bridge
Captain Preble watched the main viewscreen, mesmerized. The Swarm ship they had just attacked was billowing out in a ripple of secondary explosions. Beautiful, deadly.
No one cheered.
“Sensors, status of the Victory?” he asked. His voice sounded tinny in his own ears.
He’d just watched their sister ship tumble end over end in the blast wave of the exploding Swarm vessel like a toy in the ocean surf. The ship had shed dozens of escape pods and shuttles in her last run toward the alien vessel and these were scattered across space now.
“She’s lost all propulsion, sir. Caught in Earth’s gravity . . . she’s going down, Captain.”
He cleared his throat. By teaming up, they’d managed to take out three of the Swarm vessels, but now . . . Independence was the only Earth ship that stood between freedom and an alien victory.
“Weapons Officer, what’s our status?”
“Rail guns are at eighty percent, Captain. Lasers are at sixty percent capability and shields at forty-seven percent.”
Preble grunted. “Torpedoes?”
“None, sir.”
He wanted to curse at whatever pinhead bureaucrat decided that they should not be fully armed, but it would do no good. “Engineering?”
“We’ve got five of six engines, sir. I’ll figure out a way to give you whatever you need, Captain.”
He wanted to crawl through the intercom and kiss the engineer right on the lips.
“Very well, Engineer.” He paused. “Helm, intercept course to the Swarm ship. Full power. Weapons Officer, target that big bastard with all rail guns and commence firing. Whatever happens, don’t stop. As soon as we’re in range, you are free to use lasers as well.”
“Aye-aye, sir,” they replied in unison. The ship pulsed with the comforting rhythm of the rail guns.
“Sir?” It was the comms officer. “The Invincible is sending out an open hail. It looks like he’s communicating with the president.”
In his mind, he damned Jason Baltasar to the deepest, darkest pit of hell.
Out loud, he said, “On screen.”
***
ISS Invincible – Bridge
Addison was hoisted up, dragged across the bridge, and forced to her knees in front of Baltasar’s command chair.
She sat back on her haunches and bowed her head, the full realization of her defeat crushing her into submission in front of a man she’d once respected.
“Look at me, XO.”
She kept her eyes on the floor.
“Addison,” he said in a gentle voice. “Look at me.”
She raised her gaze, resolving that no matter how bad it got, whatever happened, she would not give him the satisfaction of seeing her break. She would not cry, she would not beg, she would not help him destroy the only home she’d ever known.
He looked the same . . . and yet not the same. His eyes, she decided; they burned with a brightness that unnerved her.
“They are coming,” he said.
“Who?” she replied, her voice sounding hollow in her helmet.
“It doesn’t have to be like this,” he said, ignoring her question. “They are a peaceful race, benevolent rulers. I know. I’ve been with them, been one of them, since birth.”
“You’re a spy then?”
Baltasar smiled and shook his head. “Not a spy, a messenger. We came to show you that violence is not the answer. Accept us as friends,” he said with sudden sincerity. “You will not regret it.”
“I think she already regrets not stopping you when she had the chance,” Laz replied from his kneeling position next to her.
“You.” Baltasar swung on Laz. “If it wasn’t for you, I would have used the Gift to change Addison, to show her the light of freedom. You ruined all that.” His lip curled in disgust. “I should kill you now, but the masters accept all, even worthless vessels like yourself.”
“What do you want with me?” Addison said.
Baltasar blinked. “To stop the killing, of course. I want you to tell them to lay down their weapons and submit.”
“Never,” she hissed.
“You cannot win. We are just the first wave, Addison. We will kill as many as necessary to achieve unity.”
A chill swept up her spine. There were more coming?
Her former captain nodded at the comms officer. “Open a hail to the President. Let’s see if we can talk some reason into the man.”
President Quentin Chamberlain’s head and shoulders filled the screen. The dark circles under his eyes showed the strain her commander in chief was under.
“Greetings, Mr. President,” Baltasar said. “I have someone I want you to meet.” He forced Addison to face the screen. “Allow me to introduce Commander Addison Halsey, formerly Executive Officer of the ISS Invincible, and now my prisoner.
“Your pathetic resistance is over, Mr. President. Your Fleet is in ruins; we have leveled two of your cities as well as more around the world. We are prepared to destroy as many as needed to ensure your compliance. You will notice the Chinese have not responded to your call to arms. That’s because their leaders have already seen the light.” Baltasar allowed a dramatic pause.
“This is where you surrender, Mr. President,” he prompted.
“Go to hell,” said Chamberlain.
Baltasar sighed. “This resistance is tiring, sir. I have told my friends to target San Francisco this time.”
“Captain,” said the sensors officer. “The Independence is approaching at full speed. She’s firing on the mother ship.”
Baltasar’s tone hardened. “Intercept course to the Independence, helm. Weapons Officer, fire as soon as we are in range.” He turned his attention back to the screen. “I’ll be in touch as soon as I finish destroying what’s left of your Fleet, Mr. President.” He cut the channel.
Addison’s eyes drifted to Laz. His gaze was unfocused and his lips moved as if he was counting to himself. He caught her eye and smiled.
“Take a deep breath,” he whispered.
From deep in the hull under her knees, Addison felt a thump. Her ears popped and the breath was sucked out of her lungs.
Chapter 39
ISS Invincible – Bridge
Addison’s faceplate snapped shut and her lungs filled with the dry, ozone-tainted air from her pressure suit. Laz had one arm wrapped around the base of the command chair and the other clamped around her waist.
“Are you okay, Addie?” Laz’s voice in her ears was the most beautiful thing she’d ever heard.
“What happened?” she gasped. She struggled to her feet. The vented bridge was eerily empty; Baltasar and his people had been sucked into space.
“I put a small explosive on the outer door hatch,” Laz said. “Five-minute timer.”