In the scale's second pan, this one farther away from Marco, stood Kemi and Lailani.
Both women were bruised, their uniforms torn, and somebody had taken their guns. They were leaping up, trying to reach a mezzanine above, but it was too high. As the sack kept losing more sand, the pan with Kemi and Lailani kept dipping closer toward the monsters. The creatures howled, drooled, and kept jumping toward the two women. The monstrous claws nearly reached them now. One brazen monster managed to graze the bottom of the pan, and Kemi and Lailani screamed.
And still more sand spilled into the pit.
Kemi and Lailani sank another centimeter.
Marco wanted to run forward, but there was no way around the pit. No bridge. No ledge. He could not reach them.
"Lailani, get on Kemi's shoulders!" Marco cried to them. "Try to reach the mezzanine!"
"What the fuck is a mezzanine?" Lailani shouted to him, barely audible over the screeching monsters.
"That balcony above you!" Marco shouted.
"So why not call it a balcony?" she cried back.
"Balconies are outside of buildings," Marco yelled, "mezzanines are inside, and—oh for chrissake, it doesn't matter, just try to reach it! Onto Kemi's shoulders!"
Kemi knelt, and Lailani climbed onto her shoulders. When Kemi straightened, Lailani reached up, trying to catch the mezzanine.
The sand kept spilling out the split sack.
Lailani's fingertips grazed the mezzanine.
The pan she and Kemi were in dipped farther down—closer to the monsters.
"Come on, Lailani, you can do it!" Marco said.
"Stand on her shoulders!" Ben-Ari cried. "Stand up on them! Acrobat style!"
"I'm not a fucking acrobat!" Lailani shouted back, but she obeyed. Gingerly, swaying, she rose to stand on Kemi's shoulders. She reached up toward the mezzanine, and—
A monster leaped from below and hit the bottom of the pan. Kemi swayed. Lailani fell, and Marco's heart skipped a beat. Lailani nearly tumbled into the pit, but Kemi caught her and pulled her back into the pan.
They made another attempt, but the sand kept draining, and the scales kept tipping. Lailani and Kemi sank. Deeper. Deeper. Soon they were so low the monsters kept scratching the pan. One creature grabbed the rim, and Kemi kicked its claws, and it tumbled back down to its brethren.
But within seconds, Marco knew, Kemi and Lailani would tip the scales.
And the monsters would feast.
Marco began to fire his gun. Bullets slammed into the pit. Monsters squealed and died, but the living tugged down the dead and climbed over them. Ben-Ari added her fire to his, but the pit ran deep with creatures. Whenever they killed one, the living pulled its body down and climbed back up.
Soon they were out of bullets.
Marco tossed his rifle into the closer pan, the one with the draining sack, adding three kilos of weight. Ben-Ari tossed her gun too, adding another three kilos. They tossed their backpacks in next, then their helmets, then their boots.
Lailani and Kemi rose a meter higher, momentarily saved from the leaping monsters.
But the sand kept draining.
Soon they would sink back into the pit.
"We need more weight!" Marco said.
Ben-Ari nodded. "We'll get stones from outside."
They ran toward the doorway, but the doors slammed shut and locked. Marco and Ben-Ari banged against them. They wouldn't budge.
"Damn!" Marco shouted and ran back toward the pit.
The sand kept draining.
Kemi and Lailani were low in the pit now. The monsters were scratching and grabbing the rim of their pan.
The two women looked at him.
"Goodbye, Marco," Kemi said. "I love you."
"Goodbye, Marco," Lailani said, tears in her eyes. "Ruv you always."
Marco stared.
So here it was.
His final test.
He inhaled deeply.
He raised his chin.
The scales tilted farther.
Marco ran, leaped toward the scales, and landed in the pan with the torn sack.
At once, his weight shoved his side of the scales downward. Kemi and Lailani shot upward, high enough to grab the mezzanine. They quickly scurried up to safety.
Marco sank into the pit.
As the claws grabbed him, as the teeth tore into him, he gazed above, and he saw Kemi and Lailani on the mezzanine.
Safe.
They were safe.
I saved them. I saved them . . .
Claws ripped his skin, tore out his flesh, and the monsters feasted. He sank into their darkness.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
He saw it ahead, hovering in the darkness.
The Red Planet.
The God of War.
Mars.
General Petty stood on the Minotaur's bridge, hands clasped behind his back, staring.
There it is, he thought. The hour of our greatest triumph . . . or the hour humanity falls.
It was eerily silent on the bridge of the HDFS Minotaur, flagship of the human fleet—or what remained of that fleet, at least, which wasn't much. Officers stood at their stations, ready for battle, watching the planet grow closer.
Petty placed his hand on a railing as if to caress his ship.
Here, from aboard the Minotaur, the fate of humanity would be decided.
The Minotaur—badly damaged, her hull breached at several places, two of her engines, three of her launch bays, and six of her cannons destroyed. Even before the ravagers had battered her, the Minotaur had been old, rattling, days away from being decommissioned and sold for scrap metal. She limped, she creaked, but she was still ready for battle. And she was still the best damn ship Petty had ever flown.
"You can still fight, old girl," Petty whispered—too softly for anyone to hear. His chest felt too tight; it had felt wrong since the heart attack two years ago. "We're both old and broken, but we both still have a lot of fight left in us."
Through the viewports, Petty saw the other ships in his fleet.
There weren't many.
Only several years ago, humanity had flown with tens of thousands of mighty vessels. With a massive armada, among the largest in the galaxy, they had struck the scum in their homeworld, had emerged victorious. Humanity had become a superpower of the Milky Way, a dominant military force none could challenge. They had forged a galactic empire.
Today that empire was gone.
Today, from that vast armada, only shreds remained. Only three warships flew around the Minotaur: The HDFS Cyclops, badly scarred, barely flying, her cannons still ready for battle, her thousand marines still eager to fight; the HDFS Chimera, the legendary ship that had torn apart scum formations in the old war, that had saved thousands of lives, that today was ready for one more battle; and the HDFS Medusa, among the oldest vessels in the fleet, the warship where Petty himself had first served as a young man.
Between these mighty beasts of steel glided their last Firebirds, single-pilot starfighters. At the height of the scum war, a hundred thousand Firebirds had fought for humanity. Today only hundreds still flew.
Petty thought back to himself as a young lieutenant, a cocky pilot in his twenties, during the years following the Cataclysm. He had flown the first generation of Firebird. The legendary Evan Bryan himself had taught him, had commanded his wing. Back then, the fleet had felt so new, so vigorous, the might of humanity growing every year. What did the young pilots feel today? Not hope. Not that feeling of immortality and unbridled power Petty himself had felt as a young man. It was likely they would not return from this war; they all knew it.
We were stronger then, Petty thought. The cosmos was ours to conquer. But we are wiser now. And we are braver. And we will not turn away from our duty.
"Sir, we're detecting several thousand ravagers orbiting the planet," Osiris said. The android turned toward him from her control panel. "They're taking battle formations. They've seen us."
Petty nodde
d, hands clasped behind his back. "Open a fleet-wide channel, Osiris."
The android nodded. "Yes, sir. Channel open, sir."
Petty cleared his throat. For a moment, he could not speak.
For a moment, he needed a drink.
For a moment, he wanted to lower his head, to despair.
For a moment, the pain—of losing most of his fleet, losing thousands of soldiers, losing his family—was too great.
But the moment passed. He shoved that grief and terror aside. He was a Brigadier-General. He was a leader. He was a father to the thousands who still fought for him, many of them war orphans. He led, perhaps, humanity's last chance at survival. And he would keep fighting until victory or death.
He spoke into his communicator, his voice carrying across his fleet.
"This is Brigadier-General James Petty. In a few moments, we will arrive at Mars. Nine months ago, the marauders captured the planet, destroying all its defenses. Based on our best intelligence, fifty thousand colonists are still alive down there, prisoners of war. Thousands of ravagers still orbit the Red Planet, and thousands of marauders are still on the surface. We expect heavy resistance. We expect the enemy to fight hard. We, the last human warriors, are outnumbered and outgunned. We fly to war with only four warships—the Minotaur, the Cyclops, the Chimera, and the Medusa. We carry only several hundred Firebirds and only eight thousand marines. We are the underdogs in this fight. But fight we will! With human spirit, determination, and unflinching courage, we will do our duty. We will defend our colony. We will defend our species. Our mission is simple: We must destroy the enemy, every last one, and free the colonists. We will succeed! We must. Humanity depends on us today. We are soldiers of the Human Defense Force! And we will prevail." He raised his chin. "All Firebird squadrons—emerge from your hangars and take attack formations. All marine companies—head to your landing craft and prepare for invasion. Follow your commanders. Take courage from your comrades. And fear no evil. Good luck, warriors of humanity, and may God, the stars, and the cosmos bless you."
The warship hangars opened. The Cyclops, Chimera, and Medusa released fifty Firebirds each. From the larger Minotaur emerged two hundred of the starfighters.
Each Firebird carried a shard of azoth inside a small metal heart.
Normal azoth crystals were the size of bullet casings—large enough to bend spacetime itself the way a diamond scattered light. From the starship graveyard, Petty had retrieved nearly a hundred of these priceless artifacts. Painstakingly, the fleet's best engineers and androids had labored day and night, cutting the azoth crystals into smaller shards, each no larger than the stone in an average engagement ring. Such a small crystal would not bend enough spacetime for a massive warship, but it was just enough for a Firebird . . . and maybe enough to crush those damn ravagers.
Petty inhaled deeply, struggling to calm his nerves. The physicists always warned pilots about bending spacetime too close to a planet; the interference could rip a ship apart. According to them, the smaller crystals might work near Mars without crushing the Firebirds. Might.
They were drawing close now. The enemy was charging toward them. It was time to roll the dice.
Hundreds of ravagers came charging toward them, claws opening to reveal their flaming innards. Thousands more orbited Mars, shielding the planet. On the surface, Petty knew, thousands of marauders were waiting.
The Firebirds took formations above the warships, streaming forth. The best sons and daughters of humanity flew them, prepared to give their lives if necessary. Petty had never been prouder of them—and more afraid to lose them.
They are all my children.
"All warships!" Petty said as the ravagers stormed closer. "Fire a volley."
The warships' cannons blasted out their rage.
Shell after shell flew toward the enemy.
Explosions rocked the ravagers.
"Another volley!" Petty said.
More shells flew. They burst against the ravagers, cracking their formations, washing them with fire.
Yet from the inferno, the enemy fleet emerged with barely any losses. The hundreds of ravagers kept charging forth.
"First wave of Firebirds—fly!" Petty said.
A flight of Firebirds charged toward the enemy, then scattered into several smaller formations. They flew around the enemy like claws stretching around prey. The ravagers blasted out plasma. The flames washed over Firebirds, melting a few of the starfighters.
"Firebirds, engage azoth engines!" Petty shouted.
Ahead, only a few kilometers away, the starfighters' engines glowed blue.
With flashes of light, they warped spacetime and blasted away, leaving only blue streaks.
The ripples of spacetime cascaded out, tossing the ravagers into tailspins.
"Fire!" Petty shouted.
From the warships flew a barrage of cannon fire. The shells slammed into the reeling ravagers. Explosions rocked the ships. Shells drove between their claws, entering their fiery cores, and ravagers burst apart.
"Second wave, fly!" Petty commanded.
The hangars opened. Another flight of Firebirds—the second half of the fleet—charged toward the enemy.
This time the ravagers were better prepared. The enemy broke its formation at once, sending ravagers flying in every direction like the shrapnel of a grenade. The clawed ships tore through the Firebird squadrons. Starfighters shattered, burst into flame, and careened into the darkness. Missiles and plasma flew. Every instant, claws or plasma tore apart another Firebird.
"Engage azoth engines!" Petty shouted.
"Sir, they're not in formation!" cried Osiris. "They'll slam into one another, they—"
"Engage now!" Petty ordered, knowing he had no choice.
In the cloud of battling starships, the surviving Firebirds engaged their azoth engines, bending spacetime through their crystal shards.
The ripples burst out.
Ravagers—but also other Firebirds—shattered.
Some Firebirds, traveling at millions of kilometers per second, slammed into their fellow starfighters. Lines of light criss-crossed, and fire blasted where they intersected, and metal shards cascaded.
"Warships, fire!"
Again the shells flew, slamming into the assaulting ravagers. Many of the enemy ships had fallen, but hundreds still flew toward the warships, closer every instant—too many to repel without the Firebirds.
Come on, where is that first flight . . .
There!
With streams of light, the first flight of Firebirds returned from warped space.
"Charge at them and reengage your warp drives!" Petty ordered.
The Firebirds swooped, firing missiles, drawing near the ravagers. But the enemy kept changing formations, a massive swarm, writhing, expanding and contracting. It was impossible to engulf them all in a neat bubble. Their plasma ripped through the Firebird formations.
One by one, the starfighters were blasting back into warped space, casting out ripples that shattered ravagers. The second flight returned. They rejoined the battle. Firebirds zipped through the enemy lines, flying as close as they could to the ravagers, then bending spacetime again, knocking the enemies back, only to return instants later for another volley.
Slowly, they were destroying the ravagers . . . but not fast enough.
Too many Firebirds were falling.
And from the planet ahead, thousands more of the clawed, living starships charged toward them.
"Shoot them down!" Petty said. "Damn it, shoot—"
The thousands of ravagers tore through their ranks.
The Minotaur shook. Fire blazed. Plasma washed across them. Explosions rocked the vessel.
"Ammunition bay three is breached!" a voice cried out.
"Sir, the Cyclops! She's—"
Through the viewport, Petty saw it. Hundreds of ravagers were tearing through the Cyclops, the mighty warship that had slain many scum and marauders. Only a few kilometers away, she cracked open
. Explosions rocked the legendary starship. With blasts of searing light and flying shrapnel, the Cyclops shattered into a million pieces.
Petty stared, for a second frozen.
He had known every commanding officer—and many enlisted soldiers—aboard that ship. They had been his friends, as close as family.
Gone.
A thousand lives—wiped out.
And more ravagers kept coming.
Petty clenched his jaw.
"Osiris, take us full speed ahead. We plow through those bastards."
The android spun toward him. "Sir, we can't withstand their—"
"That's an order."
"Yes, sir!"
The Minotaur began to lumber forth, plowing into the battle.
Back in the starship graveyard, they had shattered the harpy vessels in their path. But ravagers were larger and tougher; it would be like a man charging into a hailstorm of bullets.
"Osiris, engage our azoth engines," Petty said.
"Sir!" She spun toward him again. "We're too large, too close to Mars. We cannot—"
"Slingshot maneuver," Petty said. "Captain Sinclair used it successfully in the year 2106. Raise our nose. Position our ship to slingshot around Mars's orbit. We'll spin around the planet, aligning our warp curvature with the gravitational forces. We might knock out more of those orbiting ravagers too." He smiled thinly. "The gravitational pull will only increase the effect."
Osiris gasped. "Sir, that story is just a myth! A tale soldiers tell. The math on that would take . . ." She frowned, scrunched up her lips, and tilted her head. "Math completed." She winced. "It might work. But the odds are small."
"That's all I need." Petty nodded. "All Firebirds, give us a wide berth! We're going into warp."
Along the prow and starboard, the cannons were firing in a fury, desperate to knock the ravagers back. Mars grew closer ahead, larger than a full moon from Earth's surface. The Firebirds pulled back to a safe distance, still firing missiles at the ravagers.
"Engage!" Petty said.
The Minotaur rattled. Its azoth engines, still warm from their flight here, blazed with blue fire.
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