Invasion: The complete three book set

by J. F. Holmes

  “Major Ikeda, give me one sustain,” he began, pointing at the Japanese Scout whose team had been tasked with seizing the reactor.

  “The plan is sound, as long as conditions in the base mirror those here on Earth.”

  “They should,” interjected Doctor Morano, who was providing Invy ‘expertise’ to the mission. “The aliens have as much difficulty with the effects of low gravity as we do, and with their advanced tech, they can easily simulate one G, as well as pressurizing the shield bubble over the base. The Lexington’s sensors confirm this.”

  “Just remember, if power IS cut, hope you’re indoors,” said Agostine, “and be prepared to blow through airlocks. Your suits should give you a good fifteen minutes of environmental protection. Adjust your long-range shots for one-sixth gravity if that happens, also, as well as grenades, and even moving.” The discussion continued long into the evening, until Agostine was satisfied that they all knew the plan.

  He collapsed on his cot, exhausted, not fully recovered from his near-death experience less than a week ago, and took off his leg. Nanos did what they could, but he was suffering from a broken spirit as much as broken health. He didn’t even look up when Colonel Singh asked Doc Hamilton to give them a moment.

  “Nick,” she said softly to his closed eyes, though she knew he wasn’t sleeping, “are you up for this?”

  “I will be. Then I can rest. Or whatever,” he said, not opening his eyes. “Of course, no farm or kids for me now that Brit is dead.” It was to remind her that General Warren had, after all, gotten the woman he loved killed.

  She was quiet for a moment, then said, “Warren is going with us. I can’t stop him. He’ll be going after the AI, plugging Hal in.”

  Agostine grunted but said nothing, eyes still closed.

  “Please, do me a favor. Don’t kill him until the mission is over,” she said. She knew how much O’Neill had meant to the man, and the death of her husband in the disastrous fleet battle weighed on her as well.

  “No promises, but I’ll do my duty like I always do. You shouldn’t have to ask. Just like you did your duty on that last mission, killing humans in cold blood.” He still hadn’t opened his eyes, and she cursed the bond between them that had been broken on Long Island.

  “I saved your life, you know. Please, this one favor. We need him,” she said pleadingly.

  Nick Agostine finally opened his eyes, looking at her, and his grief at his loss made her get up and walk out. She passed Doc Hamilton walking back in.

  “Hey brother, how long are you going to bust her balls like that?” the ex-biker asked.

  Agostine sat up, though he looked exhausted. “Until I decide otherwise. We don’t kill innocents just because it’s expedient, Rob.”

  “Come on, she knows she fucked up, and we don’t have time for problems in the chain of command right now.”

  His friend sighed and said, “I can’t get Brit out of my head, and that shitbag Warren is alive when she’s not. For Christ’s sake, I didn’t even get to bury her properly.”

  “You know what she would say to you right now?” asked Hamilton. “She’d say, ‘quit feeling sorry for yourself and get to work, old man.’”

  “I know,” said Agostine quietly.

  “Listen, brother, you have twenty guys out there who are going to pull off the most spectacular raid in history. They need a leader, not someone’s pity party. They aren’t going to follow Rachel; word’s gotten out about her killing those scientists, and they ain’t too happy with her right now.”

  “Who told everyone about that?”

  “Come on, Nick. They aren’t stupid, and the teams are tight,” said Hamilton, with a guilty look on his face. “Point is, they need YOU to turn them into the hammer of Thor and swing it on those Invy bastards’ faces. If you’re not going to do it for them, do it for Brit, and for Ziv, so their lives aren’t a waste.”

  “Cheap shot,” said Agostine.

  “I’m a medic, giving cheap shots is my job. Come on, let’s go get a beer.” He held out a burly hand and helped his friend stand and strap on his leg. Outside, they made their way to the GP Medium tent that served as a bar. A crooked sign hung over the doorway, with the words “TEAM ROOM” burnt into it. Under that were the words, “Humans Only, No Invy Allowed.”

  They pushed the canvas flap aside and walked into a brawl.

  Chapter 111

  “AT EASE!” shouted the bartender, Specialist Roy from Team Two. Despite the fight that had been going on, he was standing calmly behind the 2 x 8 on sawhorses that served as the bar. Seeing Agostine and Hamilton come in, he’d called out, then calmly reached into a cooler full of ice and pulled out two home-brewed bottles.

  The fight, such as it was, came to a standstill, to the point where Jonesy gently set Private Atkins down and brushed off the man’s uniform. The Japanese contingent sat in one corner, quietly drinking their beers, but the Americans and English were mixed in a pile. They slowly separated themselves, moving to their respective sides of the tent.

  “I’d say carry on, but that might be a bit much,” said Agostine. “Major Ikeda, I trust no one was seriously hurt?”

  “I would have intervened if it had gotten out of hand,” said Ikeda. Both studiously ignored the smashed field tables and chairs.

  “Captain MacIvers, Sir?” asked Agostine.

  The red-haired Scot stood, arms folded, impassive. “In my great grandfather’s time, in the real war, this was called ‘blowing off a wee bit a’ steam’ before a mission’.”

  “That’s what we call it in the US, too. I guess no harm, no foul.”

  The quiet abated as men and women started talking again, and Hamilton and Agostine took their beers back to sit with Ikeda and MacIvers. The conversation shifted to how MacIver’s team had gotten to the US.

  “There we were, about to make the Invy’s lives a merry little insurgent hell, when POOF! Their base goes up in a nice little mushroom cloud. Never thought I’d be thankful for a Russian sub nuking Scotland, but there you go.”

  “So how did you get here?” asked Doc.

  MacIvers took a sip of the beer, looked at it, and said, “Wish we had a microwave to warm this piss up, but I supposed it’ll do. So two days later, a C-17 lands at the airfield outside our destroyed base, and this American officer comes storming out, asking for IST-14. Naturally they were dead, so I stepped up and volunteered our little scratch band of fools. And here we are, drinking beer that’s cold and as thin as water. Bloody disgusting, I’ll say.” He did, however, drain the bottle.

  “I heard about you capturing that Dragon, Major,” said Hamilton, turning to Ikeda. “Hell of a deal.” He tipped the neck of the bottle to him and then took a long drink.

  “Ask him about the fight in the station,” said Agostine, who was cleared to know, and didn’t really care who else knew now. “Apparently it came down to him and his Empress having a sword fight with a Dragon.”

  “Ha, bullshit!” said Doc. “Ain’t no one going to take on a Dragon in a swordfight.”

  Ikeda shot him an angry look and said, “I will hear no disrespect of our Empress!” but his face grew red.

  “Whoa! Struck a nerve there! Samurai Jack’s got a crush!” laughed Doc.

  “She. Is. My. Empress!” growled the JDF officer.

  Hamilton raised his beer and said, with a shit-eating grin on his face, “I don’t blame you, I’ve seen pictures, she’s smoking hot!” then proceeded to start chugging. Agostine groaned and leaned back in his chair, out of the way, while Major Padilla, the other team leader, smirked at what was coming.

  Ikeda launched himself across the table, forgetting all his training in his anger. Hamilton knew exactly what he was doing, and rolled off the chair, out of the way. The Japanese crashed to the floor, and the medic landed on top of him, putting the smaller man in an arm bar. Ikeda’s teammates started to get up, but Agostine held up his hand. All four sat back down, as Hamilton spoke urgently in Ikeda’s ear. Everyone else in the b
ar ignored them.

  “Listen, Takara, I’ve known you for eleven years now. There’s no way in HELL you would ever have let me even get out of the way. Either you’re getting old, which I doubt, or you have your head so far up Captain Ichijou’s ass that you can’t see any light. I watched you today, and your performance sucked, because you keep thinking about what comes AFTER the mission. We need you to get your head in the game, or there isn’t going to BE an after, got it?”

  Ikeda grunted, and Hamilton helped him back up. “It’s bad enough I have to deal with Nick’s death wish, brother. I’m counting on you.”

  “I…understand. I will take what you said into consideration,” said the major. Without looking at any of them, he bowed slightly and headed out of the bar.

  Five minutes later found him standing outside the large tent set aside for the female soldiers. On most field ops, quarters were shared, but when given the chance, everyone liked a little privacy. In front of him stood one of the regent’s bodyguards, noticing everything. Ikeda bowed slightly to her and asked for the Empress. The woman called into her radio, eyes not leaving the darkness, and after a minute, Ichijou came out, wearing a comfortable kimono and combat boots, her long hair unbound. Smiling, she hurried toward him, but stopped when she saw the look on his face in the lantern light.

  “Takara, what’s the matter?” she asked, fearing some accident.

  He bowed deeply and formally. “Empress Kiyomi,” he said, “I ask permission to speak with you alone.”

  She looked at her bodyguard, who instantly took the dismissal and went back in the tent. “What is it that you would like to speak to me about, Major?” she asked, mirroring his formal tone.

  “Empress, I am requesting replacement on this mission. I am unable to carry it out with one hundred percent efficiency, and I request that my second in command take over.”

  “I see. And why?” she asked, more woman than Empress.

  He hesitated, then said, “Because I cannot stop thinking of you as Kiyomi, instead of Captain Ichijou, or as Empress. It is affecting my judgement. I must put you out of my mind and leave this mission.”

  There was silence between them, a very long heartbeat. He waited for her to speak, and when she finally did, it wasn’t the answer he expected. “No,” she said. Simply that.

  “No?” he asked, incredulous.

  “No. You are not going to be relieved at this late hour, and no, you will not stop thinking of me,” she answered, with all the authority she could muster. Inside, though, her heart was breaking, because she knew he was right.

  “Empress,” he started to say, then hesitated. “Kiyomi,” he began again, more personally, “I cannot think of you, and of my men, at the same time. I have a duty that I must perform, and I MUST focus on our mission. If we make it back, then maybe, maybe there will be time for us.”

  “I understand,” she said stiffly, with all the reserve of a traditional Japanese woman. “I, too, have my duty, which is greater than yours. Thank you for reminding me of it, Ikeda-san. Perhaps we can speak again when this is over.” Then she bowed, extremely formally, turned, and went back into the tent.

  “Shit,” muttered Ikeda, and he walked back to the bar.

  Inside the women’s tent, the Empress sat dejectedly on her cot, ignoring the other people moving around her. To the pilot, the world had just become a very grey place, and she felt a blackness in her heart. When someone sat down across from her, she barely looked up at first, then with surprise, she saw it was the scientist, Doctor Morano.

  “I was listening to your conversation with Major Ikeda,” began the Doctor, taking out a notepad and a pen.

  “Excuse me?” said the Empress. Purposefully listening to others converse was a serious breach of custom in Japan, even now, after the invasion.

  Morano continued, oblivious. “Do you think your interactions with Major Ikeda are going to actually interfere with your ability to accomplish your mission?”

  “Are you Americans always so rude?”

  No expression changed on Morano’s face, but she said, in a formulaic way, “My apologies, but can you answer the question?”

  “Why?” asked Ichijou.

  “Why what?” said the Doctor.

  “Why are you asking me this?”

  “Because I am a scientist, interested in the social interactions of humanity versus the Invy. Their proper name, for the Dragons, by the way, is Draco Spatium. I named them myself.”

  “Space Dragons? REALLY?” And the Empress, despite her misery, laughed out loud. “Piss off, as you Americans say.”

  Morano got up in a huff, stared at her, and walked out.

  Chapter 112

  Rachel Singh sat in the command tent, worrying over last-minute details. Across the table from her sat David Warren, talking softly to Hal through a set of VR glasses. It was, honestly, annoying as shit. Colonel Jameson, the CEF air wing commander, was writing on a legal pad and tapping a calculator, figuring out speeds and vectors.

  “Can you take those off, please?” she asked politely, with a hint of waspishness in her voice. He ignored her until she reached out and pulled them off his face. Only then did he seem to come back into the real world with a puzzled look.

  “What, why did you do that?” he asked.

  “Because the battle isn’t out there, it’s right here. And we need to go over this plan one more time, so we can think of anything we may have missed.” She forcefully tapped the large map of Schickard Crater, right over the buildings by the west rim.

  “Listen, David,” Singh said, ignoring his rank. “I know you’re more strategic than tactical, and I did tell you to stay out of my planning, but Sergeant Major Agostine and I have been over this a hundred times. If we missed something, we’re dead.”

  He looked at her for a moment, and she looked back at his scarred face. This man in front of her was far different from the one her scout team had brought in. Had it really only been a few short weeks? Maybe a month? God, she was so tired.

  For his part, Warren felt like the same person. The ghosts of his sister and his nephew still sat in his mind. Yes, they had achieved an impossible victory, but little of it, besides the space battle, had been his plan, and that had been Lex’s as much as his. Kira’s death, after finally finding her again, had also rocked him to the core, as had the death of Brit O’Neill because of his own tactical incompetence. Agostine’s hate was well deserved, he felt.

  “OK, then. Let’s run through it. First, the approach,” which had been his plan, again along with Lex. “CEF Fleet Carrier Lexington leaves low Earth orbit, constant acceleration at a bearable thrust, carrying the Teams in a shuttle and Captain Ichijou in the Tigershark. On approach, Lex brakes once past the Invy base horizon. This allows the two smaller ships to decelerate and approach from the far side. We’re probably going to take missile fire as we go past,” said Warren. “Lex is getting pretty damn beat up.” Singh stayed silent; this wasn’t her area of expertise.

  “How do you know that?” asked the Air Commander.

  Warren smiled a bit and said, “Because, since the fight against the two cruisers, she’s been blazing past the moon on a regular basis, testing their defenses and hopefully getting them used to it. Of course, she has nothing to attack them with.”

  Smug bastard, thought Singh, but again, she said nothing.

  “What about her fighters?” Jameson had the report of the battle but wasn’t sure exactly how many had remained in the carrier afterwards.

  “Just the one, on a long-haul trajectory to the Gate; it’s our ace in the hole, so to speak, though control of the Gate would be better than destroying it.”

  “OK,” interjected Singh, growing impatient. “I see you flyboys are all happy. Assuming we get on the ground without getting shot out of the sky, here’s the plan.”

  She pointed out several buildings on the western side of the crater, then another in the center. “These, as far as we can tell, are the control facilities. Barracks here,
” and she pointed to another building about twenty kilometers from the rim where they would attack. “We think they’re less barracks than scientist housing and Invy R&R. Lex hasn’t seen anything more than a couple dozen at any one time in her passes.”

  “Why put the control facilities close to the rim? Why not in the center?” asked Colonel Jameson.

  Warren answered, “Ease of access outside the shield. They probably have a tunnel/airlock system that goes under the crater wall and leads to other places, like their cargo rail launcher.”

  “I’m not complaining,” said Singh. “Makes our job easier. Once on the ground, three teams will assault the gate control room, the reactor, and the AI housing.”

  “How do we know which is what?” said Jameson, maneuvering his wheelchair around to get a better look.

  “Hal can answer that better than I can, Colonel,” said Warren, and he flipped open a small briefcase. A pint-sized hologram of the Artificial Intelligence flickered into being, getting stronger and fading out.

  “Microwave relay from Raven Rock, for field communication,” explained the diminutive avatar, his voice sounding tinny. “To answer your question, the reactor gives off tons of electromagnetic emissions. It’s pretty much screaming ‘Here I AM!’ As for the AI housing, I’ve been able to pinpoint the ansible node point. The Gate control has heavy cabling running from it to the satellite dish farm in the center of the crater, backups for Gate control if the ansible fails.”

  “So what can go wrong, and how do we mitigate?” asked Singh.

  “Well, we’ll have the Empress flying top cover. If she can get inside the shield, a big if, she SHOULD be able to fly below any anti-ship weapons they have set up. They’re designed for heavier stuff anyway, but a plasma rifle hit will take her out just as easily.”

  Warren nodded. “But she’ll have a hundred and twenty miles of vertical to maneuver in, too.”