by Mars Dorian
“I don’t know.”
“Then ask them.”
She drew more symbols while the auto-turret on the LRV’s mount continued to fire. Yeltzin re-aimed his launcher and unleashed the blasting goodness. The oval-shaped projectile blew through the air, leaving a gray after-burn before it disappeared into the clouds.
“And?” Rosco said as he watched Yeltzin’s impression through his helmet.
“Negative. Projectile was shot down.”
“Wonderful.”
“Three scouts descending,” the engineer said.
Rosco snapped a deep breath and evaluated the situation. He realized that their gear and arms weren’t made for ground-to-air battle. Even scout fighters had an advantage thanks to their 3D maneuverability and AI-aim assisted long-range fighting abilities.
“All enemy drones down,” Ekström said.
At least some good news.
“Little Tiger gets a lil' cookie when we make it out of this alive.”
“If,” the engineer said.
Rosco saw the air assailants through the magnifying option of his helmet’s HUD. The remaining scout fighters engaged in a new attack trajectory.
“Doctor, what do our alien snails say?”
She tried her best to sound collected over the comm. “They say we’re going to disappear.”
“That’s encouraging.”
The LRV’s turret stopped shooting; smoke belched from its barrels because they had overheated.
“Out of ammo,” Yeltzin said.
Rosco wanted to uppercut that metal junk on top of the vehicle. “That sentry was an overpriced firecracker.”
“Incoming.”
A blur trailed through the sky and cut the air.
Boom.
The sound of the LRV as it exploded caused Rosco to yank away and brace himself for the worst. But the shock wave didn’t impact as hard as expected; the weak atmosphere prevented strong wave patterns from forming. Rosco pushed himself up from the rocky ground and assessed the situation. Every other member managed to stand.
“Team, tell me your status?”
Everyone confirmed they were okay…
Except nothing was okay.
Rosco had no FLAK and no vehicle support. His helmet panned toward the rugged surface below his boots. They were not just sitting ducks; they were sitting ducks with glowing target pointers over their heads.
Rosco closed his eyes.
I hate ground battles…
69
Sky on fire.
Vehicle in shambles.
Three fighters on an attack vector; their cannons ready to rip the squad’s atmogear apart.
Man.
Rosco aimed his LZR Coil at the sky. He knew it was pathetic, but he wanted to die with a weapon in his gloved hands. The whole 'not going down without a fight' thing.
“Well, that was a short mission,” he said to his comrades over the comm. “I should say something along the lines of 'it has been an honor to serve alongside you, blah blah blah', but that would be a big-ass lie. Yeltzin was the only member I liked.”
The team frowned in unison.
“No offense, Doctor Brakemoto and Ekström, but I personally would have never chosen a delusional narcissist and an antisocial moron as teammates. Too much of a risk factor.”
He paused and flicked a glance at the gentle giant kneeling next to him. “Maybe we’ll all regroup in the afterlife of the 'verse.”
The trio of fighters rained down in V-formation. Rosco counted down the seconds before he’d feel their projectiles piercing his atmogear. But then something else happened…
They disappeared.
70
Not their bodies, but the surrounding area.
Rosco noticed fragments glistening in the air. The world around them changed, at least optically.
“A holographic illusion,” the doctor said.
“The aliens are helping us.”
No more rockets rained down. Not even kinetic impactor shells.
“The fighters are turning away,” Yeltzin said through his helmet.
“Correct,” the engineer said, “triangles disappear from Lily’s sight.”
The holographic fog thickened. Rosco deepened his breathing and wondered what Fata Morgana he had turned to. New symbols materialized over Ming Brakemoto’s datapad. “Apparently, we’re a canyon.”
“That rocks,” Rosco said with a boyish smile.
Yeltzin chimed in. “I bet the aliens wanted to see if we were serious about taking down the Sunbleeders. This moment was our crucible of trust.”
“Yeah, well, they could have helped us out a bit earlier. Shooting down one fighter should have been obvious enough.”
“You’re judging by your limited human mind-set. These life forms do not think, nor act, like us. I already told you that.”
Doctor Brakemoto’s comment reeked of attitude.
Rosco noticed that she dropped the ‘sir’ but this situation was too hot to worry about proper addressing. “Let’s hope the illusion is strong enough to keep ‘em off our tail.”
“We’re still alive, aren’t we?” Ming said.
For now, Rosco thought.
Although the break allowed him to recover from the ground action, he knew the conflict was far from over. Yeltzin must have noticed his lingering suspicion. “What’s the matter, Captain? Do you think these Sunblood scout fighters were looking for the freighter?”
“Possibly. There’s nothing else in the area that we know of. Maybe the survivor transmitted a distress signal. But then again, why would they send a group of scouts to rescue a single survivor? The syndicate isn’t known for their camaraderie.”
Another terrifying thought held his mind hostage that Rosco better not tell him, not that it mattered now. “These fighters are short-ranged E-to-D class ships with no TemCom drive. So how did they make it all the way to this exoplanet?”
Yeltzin narrowed his eyes. “What do you mean?”
The lieutenant shook his head but Rosco noticed the emerging frown. The gentle giant didn’t get the memo.
Rosco wanted to swallow down the answer. “They were launched from a carrier.”
His statement hit like a ton of lead. Ming looked the most shocked. “The cartel is sending a carrier down here?”
“They want something on this planet, and they want it bad. Maybe you can tell me what that is?”
Ming turned left and right as if to look for help from her fellow team members. The rest of the team was silent, so her hesitant glance traveled back to Rosco.
“Why would I know?”
“I don’t know. Someone has to.”
Rosco exchanged short glimpses with Yeltzin and the engineer but both either shrugged or shook.
Collective crew cluelessness.
“Either way, we initiated the contact, left on a somewhat peaceful note, and we have the footage to prove it. As far as I’m concerned, our mission is done.”
He turned to leave but Ming grabbed his atmo-geared arm. “What about the aliens?”
“What about them?
“What if the Sunbleeders use their carrier against them? They’re no match. They couldn’t even stop us.”
“Isn’t my problem.”
Ming stiffened. “Tellride.”
The mood frosted, if that was even possible. They had just barely escaped death, which should have been a mutual wake-up call.
Rosco looked up the holographic fog that floated around him like a layer of morning dew. It was comfortable being hidden from the trouble, even if just for a while.
“You know, in the chain of command, the captain of the crew should know the most, not the least. But when I’m with you guys, I’m starting to believe I didn’t get the full mission briefing that you all did,” he said.
He looked at Yeltzin, who expressed a confused face. The gentle giant wouldn’t know, he was just a soldier, and they received the least intel necessary to fulfill the mission. His next object of attent
ion was Ekström, but the guy was too socially inept to be trusted with secrets. That left only one member in the round.
“What do you want from me?” Ming said.
“The truth. You know why Sunblood’s here; that’s why were you weren’t surprised when we found that derelict freighter in the badlands. And if you knew, Lo-Skova knew.”
He stepped toward her until her face shield was about to knock against his. Rosco focused his stare and pierced her irises until every micro-gesture became visible. Her pupils widened, sweat collected on her forehead and pearled down her temples.
“Doctor Ming Brakemoto. I’m going to ask you this question only one more time. And if you give me another one of your BS answers, I’ll leave you on this canyon craphole.”
“You don’t have the authority to do that.” She snarled but it took effort.
“I’ll give myself the authority. Who’s going to stop me?”
He pointed at Yeltzin. The gentle giant looked lost. “Is he going to stop me?”
Rosco directed his right arm at the engineer. “Or Ekkie over here? Is he going to send one of his drones after me?”
Ming pressed her lips. Rosco could hear the friction of her teeth tearing at each other all the way through the helmet and the thin atmosphere.
“What does the Sunblood want from this planet?” he said.
She breathed heavily and opened her mouth when the engineer’s squeaking voice interrupted. Rosco tried to shut him up with a hand wave. “Not now, Ekström.”
“Incoming.”
Rosco broke the eye contact.
“More ships?”
“No. Projectiles. Many.”
71
Either it was the best distraction attempt, or the worst timing known to Tellride ever. Because now even his motion sensor depicted a barrage of red triangles trailing down the holo-fogged gray sky. He craned his neck and saw black dots piercing through the cloud layers.
Rosco knew what was happening. “The scout fighters sent our coordinates to their carrier. It’s using long-range missiles.”
“What should we do?”
His first instinct was to fan out, but you couldn’t outrun that kind of ordnance. His second thought made more sense—run toward the alien’s ground vehicle and hope the armor was thick enough to withstand the volley. Rosco wanted to update Ming with his next suggestion, but an unusual sight stopped him midway through. A shadow moved through the sky, shaped like a tactical knife but fifty layers more stylish. It prematurely detonated the missiles in the sky, now only few kilometers away from the ground crew. It looked as if the projectiles exploded by themselves, but Rosco knew that wasn’t the case. Point-defense lasers took them out. Point-defense lasers charged by his favorite ship in the galaxy.
The DSS Vanguard.
The prototype vessel hung in the air like a heavily-armed crown jewel and disposed of the projectile threat. A familiar voice crackled over the comm.
“Did you miss me, Captain?” eQuip said.
He couldn’t help but smile. “You have no idea.”
The Newtype landed the ship a hundred meters next to the crew’s position. Everyone ran toward the opening hatch then waited in the decompression chamber until the airlock closed from the outside and the inner gate made way for its returning members. Rosco led his pack to the lockers and immediately unstrapped the atmogear. He targeted the bridge in the center first. eQuip waited inside her terminal, pulsating like a heart. The Newtype’s grin shone brighter than the LEDs of the consoles around her.
“Yes, you made it.”
“Thanks to you. How did you arrive at the perfect moment?”
“I listened to your comm chatter. When you left the alien base with the LRV and spoke of nearing the derelict freighter, I thought I’ll meet you halfway.”
Wasn’t a command, but for once, Rosco welcomed the fact that eQuip acted independently. He ordered his crew to man the pod-seats and prepare for lift-off.
“Where are we heading?” eQuip said.
“We’re going to have a little rendezvous with our hostile Sunblood carrier in space.”
He flicked Ming an insider glance. She picked it up with a faint nod and activated the side-screen attached to her seat.
eQuip didn’t comprehend. “You want to fight a carrier, sir?”
“We have to get a little creative. Firepower alone won’t get us out of this alive.”
“What do you propose?”
Even Yeltzin looked up from his post to the left of Rosco’s elevated pod-seat.
“One of the best lessons at MAME was to always take your environment into consideration. David can kick Goliath’s oversized ass if he knows the pros and cons of the perimeter he’s fighting in,” the captain said.
eQuip looked hooked. She seemed curious by artificial nature. “Can you elaborate, sir?”
“Soon. But first…”—he swung his glance to Ming, sitting to his lower right—“I need your help, Doctor; you’ll be vital to my strategy.”
72
They made a plan, they updated the aliens, and they returned to the astral ocean.
“Reaching sub-orbit.”
Rosco “VR” Tellride.
Back in the dark womb of the verse. Solar radiation, zero gravity, and debris to die for.
The most hostile environment known to mankind, and yet Rosco felt at home. Heaps better than the bleached canyon hell on the ground. He closed his eyes and pretended to hear the stars singing back at him.
Music to the mind.
“Captain?”
eQuip always found the right intonation between pressing and courteous.
“I’ve located the carrier vessel. It is decelerating and reaches the ten thousand kilometer combat range.”
Not even at sublight, Rosco thought. “What kind of ship are we dealing with?”
The 3D avatar showed a heavy freighter with various armaments. The scan revealed dozens of turrets and rocket pods. Its elongated block design gave the ship the look of a horizontal skyscraper. Typical syndicate-style—all function and no form.
“C-Class heavy military freighter,” eQuip said.
It looked like the ménage à trois between a battle cruiser, a small carrier, and an illegal off-world shipper. It was big enough to harbor a hangar probably filled with ground units, such as tanks, APCs, and civilian cargo vehicles.
Rosco noticed doctor Brakemoto staring at the tactical screen. She was sweating and trying to suppress the stutter in her voice. She was clearly out of her domain. “I hope your plan works.”
“Well, it was you who proposed immediate engagement with the enemy.”
Her next words tumbled out. “I had no idea—”
“The ship was that big? I told you it was going to be a capitol ship. Sunblood has already lost a freighter and isn’t too keen on committing the same mistake. Those vessels burn through a fortune.”
Even when bought on the black-market and upgraded with illegal and expensive upgrades. To a cartel that only thought about profit-maximization, it was a laser rip through the heart.
eQuip updated the crew. “Ship decreasing speed.”
“They have detected us,” Yeltzin said.
“Of course they have,” Rosco said.
He intertwined his finger and waited. The tension inside the bridge surged with the approaching armed freighter; even Ming couldn’t keep her cool. “Isn’t that the moment you’re supposed to engage… sir?”
“I am.”
He tapped on his display and counted down the seconds while focusing on the incoming freighter. When he reached number fifteen in his head, eQuip said, “The freighter is hailing us.”
“Accept.”
A semi-transparent 3D avatar of the freighter’s captain pixilated into existence. The figure appeared in the center between the main screen and the captain’s elevated ergo seat. He recognized the opponent the second his torso showed up.
“Captain Slayton.”
Ming threw him a confused glance
. “You know this guy?”
“I blew up the asteroid’s Burrn distillery he was in charge of.”
Brakemoto's face registered shock and something that could be respect. Even Yeltzin’s eyes beamed at him. “That was him?”
“Don’t be surprised, Lieutenant. You’ve met the guy before.”
Yeltzin’s eyes said it all. “I did?”
“Back inside the freighter wreckage. That loony survivor with the rail gun going all gung-ho? That was good old Slayton, more batshit crazy than usual.”
The Sunblood captain's semi-transparent avatar grinned. “Over twenty crew members died after the crash-landing, only I survived.”
“Let me guess… you ate ‘em all?”
Slayton rolled his eyes. “Those mercs were too weak to deal with the failing life support system of the freighter. When resources became tight, they lost it. If money’s your only motivation, the will to survival takes a shit.”
Rosco clapped melodramatically. “Let me finish the story—you’re were the last man standing and sent a distress signal so your fellow Sunbleeders could come to pick you up.”
“You got it half right.”
“Please, enlighten me. What the hex does a lowlife like you do on a planet like this?”
“The same as you, Tellride.”
“Trying to power up Daystellar’s public image?”
Silence hummed—and it wasn’t because of the transmission. The avatar of the rival captain narrowed his eyes.
“The problem with you, Tellride, is that people don’t know whether you’re full of it or just pretending to be. That planet’s an ugly goldmine ripe for the taking. Daystellar was fast, but not fast enough.”
“Slayton, what do you want on this planet?”
The middle-aged captain ran his thick fingers through his thinning hair. He seemed to search for the right facial expression and settled for a smug smile. “Someone at Daystellar didn’t give you the full mission briefing.”