“I need to tell you something,” she said.
“Yeah, me too,” said Jolo. And then he paused for a second. He brushed her hair away from her eyes. “I love you.”
“I love you, too.”
Jolo stood there for a moment wondering if they should leave.
“You’re supposed to kiss me,” said Katy.
“Oh.” He kissed her and held her in his arms. And even though the very ground under his feet was heating up he felt a calm overtake him, a deep peace and feeling of wholeness that his new self had never felt. A synth can’t do this, he thought.
Duval
Duval
0 days left
The Argossy set down next to the burned out, charred remains of the transport, flanked by three Fed gunships and five smaller Wasps. Two of the gunships, including Trant’s old boat Nymeria showed signs of a fight. Trant’s ship had scorch marks along the aft skirt near the port engine and a heat plate had been blown off. Black smoke was pouring out of the other gunboat’s starboard engine.
“Did you get Bertha and the kids?” said Jolo, when Barth, Koba and Greeley came down the rear hatch. Before anyone could answer five skinny kids came running down the ramp onto the hot sand. “It’s not safe here,” said Jolo. “Get them out of here. We can’t defend against an attack on the ground.”
“All the BG boats have turned tail and jumped out,” said Barth. “Besides, we’ve got other problems.”
“Worse than a planet blowing up?” said Katy. Barth didn’t smile.
“Bastards blew all the transports,” said Greeley. His left arm was held close to his body with gray conduit tape. “No one got out of Jaxxon except the kids and we had to fight off a mob of people at Bertha’s that gotta burnin’ desire to get off this rock.”
“How many?” said Merthon.
“There’s probably 500 or so from Jaxxon and there’s more all over the planet. We got the kids but couldn’t hold the rest,” said Koba. “We got reports from all over Duval on the radio network.”
“The BG bastards are trying to wipe us out,” said Jolo.
“Well let’s take as many as we can,” said Katy. “The Argossy could maybe hold a hundred more and each gunboat could hold another hundred each.”
Jolo squatted down, his leg burning up, his head in his hands. He felt Katy’s hand on his shoulder. Too late, he thought.
“Let’s go!” said Katy. “Save the kids and go.”
No, Jolo thought. We’ve come too far to end like this. He stood up again. “Merthon, do the towers release all of the galaxite at the same time?”
“No, if they did it all at once it wouldn’t get hot enough and the galaxite would burn up.”
“Koba, will a tower show a heat signature if it still has galaxite?”
“It should. The alacyte tower will conduct the heat and give us a good reading of what’s inside.”
“Good idea, Captain,” Merthon said to Jolo. “But we should look for cool towers. The hot ones will have already released the galaxite.”
“How many do we need to take out?” said Jolo.
“They planted just enough to push the core beyond its limits once all of the galaxite is dropped,” said Merthon. But we have to hurry. I don’t know how far along they are. But its certainly started.”
By then Trant had joined. “You in?” said Jolo. The older gray-haired captain nodded.
“We’ll give you all we got, Captain” he said.
“The crippled boat still got guns?” Jolo said.
“Yep, ion cannons are full up.”
“Okay. Koba, you and Hurley take the kids up into orbit and stay out of trouble. Okay?” Koba nodded.
“I’ll send the Wasps along in case there’s trouble,” said Trant.
“Koba, run if you have to. Nothing we do here means anything if you… If you lose the ship.”
“Captain Trant, your Wasps know the mission?”
“Yes, Sir. They’ll fight to the last and give your boat time to jump out if there’s trouble.”
Koba ran to the Argossy and soon the rear hatch was closing and Hurley was winding up the engines.
“The rest of you take down as many cool towers as you can as fast as you can,” Jolo said. “We can use the big guns because the BG won’t be coming back to defend them.”
Jolo took the crippled gunboat Vassily. The captain and most of her crew had been injured in the fight near Jaxxon and were moved to the Argossy’s med bay. Merthon had gone up in the Argossy also to tend to George.
Jolo sat in the captain’s chair of the Fed gunboat, his wounded leg hastily tended to by a med bot, now wrapped in white second skin. Katy, with a bandaged head, had insisted on piloting. Jolo relented when he realized the only other option was Barth, who was busy working on the smoking engine, or a young Fed officer whose face was as smooth as Katy’s. Greeley, Hurley and Marco were there also, along with a few remaining Vassily crew members. Barth, Hurley and the engineering crew got the broken engine back to about 70% efficiency and they were good to go.
The three gunboats set out from Marco’s, each heading in different directions. Jolo went North, and at first, all the towers had already dropped their galaxite. When they crossed over a ravine, the ship gained altitude because of the intense heat rising up from the lowest points on the planet. Steam rose up from the rivers and shrubs in the lowlands had started to burn.
“Are we too late?” said Katy.
“We’ll know soon enough,” said Marco. But then they came on a cluster of cool towers. Barth focused the big ion cannons of the Vassily on the base of each tower and after a few concentrated bursts, each tower fell, the galaxite still safely stored in the cones. And in this way they took down as many as they could, Katy expertly moving the ship from one tower to the next, getting the Fed gunship as close as possible yet with no blowback damage from the cannons. Barth metered out the ion cannon bursts to knock them down as quickly as possible while using as little juice as he could. After taking down twenty or so, everyone’s spirits had lifted. The reports from Trant’s Nymeria and the other gunboat, Kubata, were good. Barth relayed exact specs to the other boats on how much energy would take down a tower as efficiently as possible and things moved along well.
But then they saw smoke on the other side of the Caledelle mountain chain. When they came down the other side towards the valley there wasn’t a fire. It was the remains of a large lake called Nouvelle, great billowing clouds of steam rising up so you couldn’t see the surface. Further along they crossed another ravine and the bottom was on fire. At one point they came across a small house with one man standing on his roof holding a pig.
And the gunboats continued to take down towers.
“Do we get him?” said Katy.
“No. He’ll be fine. The planet ain’t going anywhere just yet,” said Jolo.
Soon they had to turn back the way they’d come and when they made it over Marco’s ravine again there was smoke and lava rising up. It had swallowed Marco’s house and threatened to reach the top of the cliff.
Jolo got Merthon on the comm and explained the situation while Katy and the crew kept right on taking down towers still holding galaxite.
“The planet is trying to vent. That’s not a bad thing,” the Vellosian said. “If there were more vents we might have a chance, but I think the bottom of the ravine is the lowest elevation.”
Marco stood on the bridge next to Jolo with a stoic face, all of them staring at the large vid screen. The entire ravine was a nasty red, roiling mess, smoking orange lava creeping outward onto either side of the ravine like a river flooding. Just then a chunk of hot, orange rock shot up with a loud BOOM and nearly caught the rear of the gunboat. The other captains checked in and reported similar conditions.
Katy looked at Jolo. By then Barth had come to the bridge also. Jolo knew the end was near.
He got on the comm to the Nymeria and Kubata. “New plan: Save as many as you can hold and get out.”
There was pandemonium in Ja
xxon. People fought each other to scramble on top of the smattering of low-slung Duval houses and buildings. One building in the center of town was covered with people, more trying to make it to the top, some falling down on to the hot earth then scrambling up again. Some not so fortunate lay burning on the ground, smoking.
Computer, Jolo thought. How many adult humans can a Federation gunboat hold with a crew of 18?
472, based on an average weight of 85 kilograms per human.
Jolo swallowed hard when he stared down at the mass of people below his ship. The gunship was meant to carry heavy ion cannons, heavy armor, extra fuel cells. She was no transport. Katy lowered the Vassily and dropped the rear hatch. Jolo sent two marines down to lock the doors to the main areas of the ship so the refugees couldn’t flood the bridge and engineering.
Katy had a hard time getting the rear hatch close enough without crushing anyone because the mob had surged towards the ship, not away from it. In the end she just got the edge of the hatch as close to the building as she could and people started jumping in. Once the main surge calmed down, she set the tail down on the top and more kept pouring in. That’s when Jolo realized there were more people than they thought. He hadn’t made it to the third building and Katy was already having a hard time maneuvering the gunboat because the ship wasn’t designed to carry that much weight. And there were people still inside the buildings as well they hadn’t considered.
Finally, Jolo told Katy to gain altitude. Several hundred remained. Jolo stared down at the mass on the top of a big house all reaching up to the gunboat. He spotted a woman holding a baby in the middle of it all. Jolo was numb and there was nothing left to do.
“Take us up and out,” said Jolo. He watched on the screen as the gunboat gained altitude and he couldn’t make out the woman any more, but there was still movement on most of the rooftops. People were going to die. He stood next to Katy as she slowly brought the Fed boat up, and just before she started the burn into orbit, Barth jumped out of his chair and started hollering. “They came!” he yelled.
Suddenly the sky was full of ships: big ones, small ones, medium sized ones, all with Fed markings.
“Captain, you got some help coming,” said Koba on the comm, still in orbit above Duval.
Two giant Defenders appeared on their screens, one within visual range and one on the other side of the planet. Admiral Filcher came on the comm. “Captain, Vargas, what can we do to help?” he said.
“Have your defenders and gunboats take out every tower with a heat sig under 400 degrees,” said Jolo. “Send transports to Jaxxon and all surrounding communities and get everyone off this rock.”
“Roger that, Captain. Fed Transport ship Carthage is full burn to Jaxxon. Molokai is heading to the other side, and any other ships capable of carrying more than ten people are searching for survivors.
And then all hell broke loose. The fleet spread out and Filcher’s big Defender Persephony took down a tower a second with concentrated blasts from her ion cannons, all three fixed on the same point. The big ship didn’t slow down. There were another eight gunboats, three frigates, a dozen wasps assigned to the Persephony, and several patrol ships, all pounding away at the BG towers. Jolo wished George was here because there was no way to tell if they were making progress.
But soon Jolo realized he wouldn’t need George to tell him the numbers. Everyone could see for themselves. Even after an hour of tower busting by the best guns the Fed had to offer, Duval was burning. The transports had lifted everyone out of the populated areas and were in orbit with the Argossy, and the warships had continued the assault. But staring down onto the surface told them all they needed to know. The ground was smoking and hot, the lower elevation areas covered in lava. The rivers were gone, replaced by steam rising into the air, the sky above still blue and clear. And the Fed ships were hard pressed to find any more cool towers.
Jolo got on the comm to Filcher, “Are we done?”
“We can’t find any more towers to blow. Rendezvous with the fleet.” Jolo watched as all of the blue dots started to pop off the screen. But he did not give Katy the order to make the burn.
“Take us North again,” said Jolo. Katy didn’t argue. She brought the Fed boat around and headed over the lava flow that used to be Marco’s, past the mountain chain and the steaming lake, and then she slowed instinctively, keeping their altitude higher than normal, the gunboat still sluggish with all of the extra people in the hold below.
“There,” said Jolo, pointing down to a small gray square surrounded by smoke and steam. Katy slowly decreased altitude and there, still standing on top of a small farmhouse, was the man, still holding the pig.
“We can’t lower the hatch,” said Jolo. “It’s hot down there and we don’t want anyone to spill out the back.” He paused for a second and then glanced at Greeley.
Soon Greeley was being lowered down into the heat in a Fed blue battle suit, which would keep him from getting burned. He grabbed the man, who was desperately clinging to the squirming pig, and they were safely in one of the lower holds a few minutes later. A med bot was waiting and the old man was a little hot and dehydrated, but otherwise okay.
By then the surface of Duval was a cauldron, most buildings had caught fire, trees burned like candles.
“Take us out, Katy,” said Jolo. And the gunboat gained altitude and then started the burn into orbit. They watched the orange planet grow smaller on the vid screen until the picture went black. And that was the last they ever saw of the planet Duval.
In Orbit
In orbit above Arcana, three jumps from the empty debris field that was once the planet Duval.
14 hours later.
Jolo and Katy walked through the large white corridors of the Federation Defender Persephony surrounded by a mix of ragged, dirty Duvalites and blue-uniformed Fed personnel. Some of the survivors from Duval were crying, some just stumbling along wide-eyed and shell-shocked. Jolo noticed the mothers carrying children had tired faces but still held their heads up, almost hopeful. They were alive, and that is a very good thing. But somehow Jolo couldn’t process what just happened. It was his job to save Duval, and he failed. Katy put her arm around him and smiled.
“How can you smile?” said Jolo. “You’re the one who wanted to save Duval. I was the one who was ready to evacuate early.”
“You’ve got no reason to be sad, Jolo,” said Katy.
“I couldn’t save Duval,” he said.
They kept walking down the large, hallway of the Persephony. It reminded him of when they snuck aboard the big Fed ship Leviathan. It seemed like ten years earlier.
“You did save Duval,” Katy said. “Look,” and she pointed through a window into a huge open room. There were kids everywhere, skinny, threadbare clothes and bare feet. Duval kids. Mothers with babies. Old pirates. Bertha came and gave Jolo and Katy a hug. They surrounded Jolo and Katy and everyone came up to Jolo and said thank you. Little kids grabbed his hands, pulled on his shirt, and mothers kissed him.
“I knew you would take care of us,” said Bertha.
So Jolo and Katy hung out with the kids for awhile and Jolo managed to smile, especially when the kids came and asked to play or wanted another of his famously bad jokes. He couldn’t play because of his leg but did get a few jokes in before he and Katy had to go to the meeting Filcher had called.
On the way to the meeting Katy pulled Jolo aside and gave him a hug. She looked up at him, her eye still covered in white gauze.
“What’s the matter?” said Jolo. “Filch is waiting.”
“I finally found someone to love and now we’re all being hunted by mech aliens,” she said.
“Bad timing, huh? But we’ve got each other. And it ain’t over yet.” A few barefooted kids ran past, the sound of their voices echoing through the hallway. “Not while I still draw breath.”
“You getting cocky?” said Katy, grinning. It was the same Katy he knew when they still had a home, back when they were pretending t
o be pirates.
“Yeah, I’m going to kill all of them.”
She hugged him tighter and he took a deep breath and for a second he was back at Bertha’s with the wind blowing through the trees and he could smell the grass and feel the heat, the sky above so bright he could see orange even though his eyes were closed. They were all in shock. Duval was gone but a large part of everyone there still couldn’t believe it. Soon, when the reality slowly sunk in, they would cry and mourn their loss. Katy, too. And Jolo would be there for her.
……
Everyone gathered in the big meeting room on level four of the Persephony. Filcher, dark under his eyes and the top button of his sleek Fed Fleet Admiral’s uniform undone, stood on a dais at the head of the round wooden table, a big vid screen behind him. Jolo, Katy, Marco, Merthon, Barthelme and even George were seated with the other Federation officers, a glass of water on a paper napkin for each person.
The Feds were all clean-shaven, spit-shined buttons, sharp creases and stinking like Fed issue dry-soap. Jolo’s crew were a pack of dirty, bandaged, wounded riff-raff from a nothing planet. Jolo could feel the stares, and Katy, Duval dust still covering her boots, still under her sweaty collar, started to fidget. But Jolo couldn’t hold anything against the Feds. They came. Late. But they came.
Marco nudged Jolo, holding up the glass of water with a smirk on his face. Fed extravagance. But Jolo was wondering why Filcher had come for them--Filcher, the man determined to lead his people to safety, to turn and run and bow down to the BG and take what they were going to give.
Filcher stood, both hands on the lectern like an old man clinging to a walker, and cleared his throat to speak. But Jolo jumped up and beat him to the punch: “Why did you come for us?” said Jolo. It was more of an accusation than a question.
43 Days to Oblivion (The Jolo Vargas Space Opera Series Book 2) Page 20