by Ryk Brown
“The walls are starting to come down!” Jessica yelled from the cargo door as she pushed Tobin’s corpse out the hatch.
Nathan looked out the windows and saw the wall to the left of him, toward the back corner, come apart under the force of the continuous barrage. Finally, a large section of it came crashing down, taking three emitters with it. The shield overhead flickered several times.
“It’s failing!” Tug yelled.
Another section of the wall, on the same side but nearer them also collapsed, burying the greenhouse below. The shields flickered a few more times then disappeared altogether.
“Get us in the air!” Nathan ordered.
Jalea pushed the lift throttles forward and the ship began to slowly rise. Rocks and debris fell off the crumbling walls and bounced off the ground, striking the side of the ship. They were only eight meters off the ground when the first salvo struck them in the aft port thrust pod. Their tail dropped sharply and the ship began to roll over to port.
“Compensate!” Nathan yelled.
Jalea tried to compensate by increasing the lift on the port side, but the thrust pod was damaged and not responding. Alarms began to sound as the ship rolled completely over, causing her still firing lift thrusters to drive her hard, upside-down, into the ground. A moment later, they all found themselves lying on the ceiling of the ship, alarms whooping away and the acrid smell of leaking propellant filling their nostrils.
Nathan shook his head, spitting dirt from his mouth. All the windows on his side of the cockpit had been shattered by the force of impact, and dirt had flown into the cockpit as they rolled over. Sections of the overhead control panel, which he was now laying on top of, dug into his side as he tried to get his feet under him. “Jalea!” he yelled. She wasn’t moving. “Jalea! Are you okay?” She began to stir, her consciousness returning. “Come on, we’ve gotta get outta here!”
Nathan grabbed Jalea and pulled her toward him. “Come on, come on,” he urged pushing her out in between the partitions toward the back of the ship. “Let’s go! Everybody out!”
Vladimir slid out of the ship, face first down onto the dirt two meters below. The ship was upside down, slightly on its starboard side. Dust and smoke was everywhere, making it hard to see more than a few feet in front of him. Alarms continued to warble and beep.
“Vlad!” Jessica called from above. “Catch her!” Vladimir extended his arms just in time to catch Tug’s youngest daughter as she fell from the ship. He set her down next to him.
“Do not move, little one,” he instructed. He reached up and grabbed Deliza by the waist as she tried to climb down from the ship, helping her down to the ground. “Grab your sister’s hand and do not let go, no matter what. And stay by my side!” Deliza nodded instant agreement.
Nathan jumped down to the ground, followed by Jalea. Suddenly, pinpoint blasts of energy from sniper-fire started striking the ship and the ground around them. The dust and smoke was still too thick to see very far, so the snipers were taking blind shots in the hopes of hitting something or someone.
“Son-of-a-bitch!” Nathan swore. “We’ve gotta get to cover!” Nathan spun around as shots struck the dirt on either side of him, as he tried to get his bearings. In the haze, he could barely make out the shape of the main house. “Over there!” he shouted. “Head for the house!”
Jalea ran for the house. Vladimir scooped up the little girl, and grabbed Deliza’s arm and followed.
“Jess! Let’s go!” Nathan ordered.
“Tug is hung up on something!” she yelled from inside the ship.
Nathan could hear the sound of the enemy ship that had shot them down before they could get airborne as it turned and headed back toward them. “They’re comin’ back around, Jess! You gotta get out now!”
Jessica struggled to free Tug’s leg, which was pinned between a twisted section of the bench seat and the wall. Somehow, as the ship had rolled over, the bench had pulled free. Tug’s leg had slid in between the bench and the wall, and when the ship came down, the bench folded back and trapped his leg between it and the bulkhead.
“Leave me!” Tug begged her.
“Oh, don’t be so fuckin’ dramatic!” she scolded.
“Come on, Jess!” Nathan called from outside.
“Go, Nathan! We’ll catch up in a minute!”
“God damn it, Jess!” Nathan swore as he departed, running for the cover of the house.
The ship began to shake with increasing violence as the salvos from the approaching enemy ship grew closer with each strike. Finally, the last two energy bolts struck the ship, chopping its rear section clean off. Ironically, the shearing force rocked the ship and freed Tug’s leg. Falling free of his entrapment, he landed on top of Jessica as they both fell against the far side of the upside-down ship.
“Well how about that?” Tug exclaimed.
Suddenly, flames ignited from the leaking fuel lines. Within seconds, the flames blocked the starboard cargo hatch, which had been their intended route of egress.
“This thing’s gonna blow!” Jessica exclaimed as she tried in vain to find a way past the flames.
Nathan finally reached the front steps of the porch when the sound of an explosion came from behind him. A searing hot shock wave launched him forward, crashing through the partially opened front door.
“Nathan! Are you all right?” Vladimir shouted as he ran to help his friend to his feet.
“Oh my God!” Nathan exclaimed as he realized what had happened. He spun around and tried to go back out the front door. “JESS!” Another explosion rocked the house, sending hundreds of small pieces of flaming debris showering in all directions. Nathan had to brush some of the burning fuel from his own clothing to avoid going up in flames himself. He turned to Vladimir, “Jessica and Tug! They were still in there!”
Vladimir grabbed Nathan and pulled him inside. “Come, my friend. There is nothing more you can do for them.”
Kaylah zoomed in on the landing party’s last reported location. As the small farm had just come over the horizon on the moon below, her observation angle was quite steep, making it difficult to see much of the compound contained within the sinkhole. But there was no doubt about what she did see-a large explosion followed by flame and smoke.
“Commander, something is happening at the landing party’s last reported location. There’s been an explosion,” Kaylah reported.
“Can you see the landing party?”
“No, sir, there’s too much smoke, and our angle is still too steep to get a good overhead.” Kaylah noticed movement above the smoke. “Standby, there’s something else.” She quickly changed sensor mode from visual to radar, allowing her to clearly track a small ship circling the sinkhole. “It’s a ship, sir. Same size and configuration as the one that tried to land on us earlier.”
Cameron didn’t like the sound of Ensign Yosef’s report. “Any sign of Tobin’s ship?”
“I’m not sure, sir.” Kaylah reset her sensors back to visual mode and applied various filters to try and discern the shape of the burning object. After keying in additional commands, information detailing the chemical properties of the smoke she was seeing began to list on one of her side screens. “I’m pretty sure that’s Tobin’s ship that’s burning. Its shape is very similar, but there’s no way to be sure. At least not until we get closer.”
“Any luck contacting them over comms?” she asked the communications officer.
“No, sir. And I’m trying all modes, even open channels on the wide band.”
“Damn it,” Cameron swore. “We’ve got less than half an hour to get them back, or we’re going to have to leave them behind. And for all we know that is Tobin’s ship burning down there. We need another ship.”
A smile formed on the face of Ensign Mendez as he stood at the tactical station. “Last I looked, there were two of them in the hangar bay.”
“Contact those ships,” she instructed the comm officer. “See if one of them is willing to fetch the la
nding party.”
“You think they’ll do it?” Mendez asked. “I mean, willingly?”
“Maybe, if we pay them enough,” Cameron mumbled.
“Commander,” the comm officer said. “The only one answering is the harvester pilot. Shall I transfer him to your comm-set?”
“Sure,” Cameron answered. She was feeling a bit overwhelmed by the constantly changing circumstances. It felt like every time she came up with a plan, something happened forcing her to change it. For someone who always liked to have a solid plan to follow, it was frustrating.
A moment later, Josh’s voice came over Cameron’s comm-set. “What can I do for ya, love?”
Cameron rolled her eyes at the cocky pilot’s attitude. “We’ve got people on the surface, presumably with no way back up. Think one of your shuttles could go down and get them, really quickly?”
“How quick we talking?”
“Thirty minutes, max?”
“I’m guessing your hurry has something to do with that Ta’Akar battle cruiser heading our way?”
“That would be a good guess.”
“Sorry, but the second shuttle’s all shot up, and it’s blocking the first one from launching. Maybe if we had more time to move it-”
“What about your ship?” Cameron interrupted. “Can you still launch?”
“Sure, but how many people we talking about? I’m made for scooping up rocks, not hauling passengers.”
“Four or five?”
“Yeah, I guess I can squeeze them in. So long as they don’t mind a bumpy ride. This thing’s not built for comfort, you know.”
“Great,” Cameron exclaimed. “But how much is it going to cost me?”
“You can buy me dinner,” Josh suggested playfully.
“I’m sure we can figure out some manner of payment. But I think I should warn you, there may be some trouble at the pick-up point.”
“Then make it two dinners!”
“How soon can you depart?” she asked, ignoring his solicitations.
“I’ll be wheels up in a few minutes, love. Just send me their coordinates.”
“Thanks, Josh,” she told him. “And good luck.”
The harvester began quickly backing out of the hangar bay, headed for the transfer airlock at a rate slightly faster than normal. The helmeted pilot, his faceplate still hiding his facial features, constantly rotated his head from side to side as well as looking down at his consoles as he tried to keep from hitting anything in the chaotic aftermath of the earlier boarding attempt.
“Any luck contacting them?” Cameron asked the comm officer.
“No, sir. I’m pretty sure someone is jamming communications on the surface.”
“The harvester is rolling onto the flight deck now, Commander,” Ensign Mendez reported from the tactical station.
“Warn the pilot about the comm-jamming going on down there,” she ordered Mendez.
The harvester continued to roll quickly backwards as it came out of the transfer airlock and out onto the open flight deck. It immediately applied slight upward thrust, its gear retracting as soon as it left the deck. Another short burst shooting forward from braking thrusters embedded in the harvester’s nose caused it to float back away from the ship more quickly. Applying side thrust, the little ship quickly slid to the right, clearing the ship just before the large drive section was about to slam into it from behind. As it cleared the side of the ship, it snap-rolled to the right and swung its nose down, firing its main engines at full thrust as it accelerated quickly away from the Aurora on its journey to the moon below.
“The harvester’s away,” Mendez chuckled. “Damn that guy-”
“Flies like a nut,” Cameron finished. “Yeah, I know. But that nut’s the only hope they’ve got right now.”
Nathan continued looking out the broken front window of the main house. The air outside was still thick with black and gray smoke from the burning wreckage of Tobin’s ship, less than a dozen meters away. Thankfully, there had been no more shots fired at them by the snipers since they had made it inside the house. “What the hell are they waiting for?”
Deliza sat in the corner, holding her younger sister in her lap, keeping her little head against her chest to keep her from staring at her mother’s corpse on the living room floor. Jalea knelt beside them, trying to calm the child.
“Reinforcements,” Vladimir suggested.
“Yes,” Jalea agreed, rising from the girls to move back toward the others at the windows. “They must be coming from elsewhere-a ship in orbit, perhaps-or they’d already be upon us.”
Nathan looked outside again, trying to see the snipers through the smoke. “If we could just get past those snipers, we might be able to make our way back to town on foot, maybe find another way off this moon and back to the ship.”
“I expect there is a Ta’Akar ship nearby,” Jalea advised him. “If so…”
“…then the Aurora’s got her own problems to deal with,” Nathan surmised. “Hell, they’ve probably already jumped away.”
“You worry too much, Nathan,” Vladimir said. “They will come for us. You will see.”
“God, I hope you’re right.”
Suddenly, the snipers began firing through the windows. Blasts of energy broke through the remaining glass, slamming into floors and furniture, sending splinters flying in all directions and charring everything they struck. Jalea grabbed the girls, dragging them down to the floor and pushing them into the corner tucked in behind a cabinet.
Vladimir scrambled on his hands and knees to the side window and began firing blindly toward the ridge line with his hand gun, hoping he’d get lucky and hit one of the snipers. Following his friend’s example, Nathan scrambled to the opposite side and did the same.
Moments later, the shuttle began firing its pulse cannon at the main house. Each blast tore through the roof, passing through the upper floor and breaking through the ceiling above them, bringing a shower of debris down on top of them with every blast. The young girls screamed with each blast.
“Jesus!” Nathan yelled. He had little doubt that they were all about to be either buried in a pile of burning debris or completely vaporized.
“They’re trying to drive us out into the open!” Vladimir replied. “To force us to surrender!”
“By bombing the crap out of us?” Nathan asked as he continued firing wildly out the window.
One of the main beams cracked and bowed downward, bringing more debris from the ceiling above. With the following blast, the beam split completely, crashing to the floor narrowly missing Vladimir.
“We’ve gotta get outta here!” Nathan hollered, scrambling across the shattered living room toward the kitchen. “Through the back!”
As if the shuttle’s gunner had heard him, the next few salvos impacted the back half of the house, collapsing the kitchen roof. Nathan opened the kitchen door just in time to see the ceiling come crashing down, dust and debris bouncing up into his face in the doorway, knocking him backward into the living room. “Guess not!”
Josh looked out the forward windshield over the nose of the harvester as it raced along less than fifteen meters above the surface of the Haven countryside. In the distance, maybe twenty kilometers in front of them, he could see the pillar of black smoke rising from the surface, spreading to the right as it rose into the sky.
“Twenty seconds out,” his co-pilot, Loki, reported over the whine of the engines. The two of them had been flying the harvester together for nearly six months, ever since Josh had first arrived on Haven.
“Volander landing party, Harvester. Do you copy?” Josh waited a few seconds for an answer, but got none. “Guess we’re gonna have to surprise them,” he smiled.
Loki tightened the shoulder straps on his flight harness. Although Josh was an amazing pilot, he had a tendency to do things without warning. “You sure you wanna go in so fast, Josh?”
“This’ll have to do,” Josh chuckled.
As the distance closed,
they could begin to make out the shape of the enemy shuttle as it circled over the sinkhole, firing its pulse cannon at targets below.
“Pulse cannons,” Loki pointed out.
“I see them.”
“I’m assuming you’ve got a plan?”
Josh said nothing, only clucked like a chicken.
“Great,” Loki said, grabbing the hand-holds on the top edges of the front and side consoles to brace himself. He knew what was coming, and he knew from experience that he’d best hold on tight.
As they rapidly closed on the enemy shuttle, it continued its slow circle, turning toward the oncoming harvester.
“Oh shit!” Loki cried.
For a brief moment, Loki was sure he could see the faces of the flight crew on the shuttle as it suddenly rolled sharply to its right to avoid colliding with the onrushing harvester. Josh immediately rolled slightly opposite the enemy ship, pulling his nose up ever so slightly to send his ship into a tight, high-g turn. “YES!” he cried out in victory. “I NEVER FLINCH!”
The enemy shuttle did not pull his nose up as he rolled, which resulted in a sudden loss of altitude bringing him below the top of the sinkhole and sending him diving toward its wall.
Inside the main house, the sound of the harvester rocketing by at high velocity shook the entire structure, knocking them off their feet. For a brief moment, they were deafened by the roar of the harvester’s main drive as it blew past them at incredible speed.
“What the hell was that?” Nathan wondered as he picked himself up, noticing that the bombardment had stopped. A moment later the ground shook once more as a tremendous crash came from outside. Nathan spun around to look out the windows. Through the smoke he could barely make out the image of the enemy shuttle as it slammed into the side of the sinkhole, falling into the greenhouse below before exploding.
“Holy shit!”
“Volander landing party, Harvester. Do you copy?” The voice coming over his comm-set was unfamiliar to him, but Nathan answered the hail nonetheless.
“This is Captain Scott! Who’s calling?”
“It’s your ride, Captain! That sweet little commander of yours sent us to bring you home!”