Henderson started typing frantically on a keyboard. "OK, I think you did fine in the battle, dismissed."
Jack saluted and left the hospital compound.
* * *
Fleet assigned Jack to the construction crews rebuilding Orion. He didn't mind the work. His other option would be to train more in the hover tanks, and they had proved that they could defeat a sizable Lithorian force. Although they lost two tanks in the battle, spirits were high. A month passed while they rebuilt and practiced in their tanks on Sundays. Lexi stopped having periods and got a home pregnancy test, which came back positive. In kind of a primal way, it made Jack happy. The kind of happy where he smiled non-stop for days. He could stub his toe and still be smiling.
One day Jack came home, and there was a hover craft he didn’t recognize parked in front of his house. He stepped inside, and there was a man sitting at his kitchen table with an open briefcase.
Jack said, "Hello?"
Lexi and the man stood up. The man was oriental and wore a gray suit. He had neatly cropped black hair and brown eyes. He closed his briefcase and extended his hand to Jack. "My name is Ming Leung."
Jack shook his hand. Lexi said, "He's from the government."
"I'm a Chinese bureaucrat."
Jack looked from Ming to Lexi.
She said, "You understand I'm Chinese?"
Jack knew that already, but he thought everybody was Fleet now.
"We're doing our best to maintain our national heritage in this modern era," Ming said.
"They want me to see a Chinese doctor about the baby," Lexi said.
"That's fine," Jack said. "You can see whatever doctor you prefer."
"The child will have all the rights and benefits of being a Chinese citizen," Ming said. "And we're hoping Lexi will teach the child Chinese in addition to English."
"You speak Chinese?" Jack asked.
"A little," Lexi said.
"The paperwork is all in order," Ming said. "I wish you both the best of luck."
"Goodbye."
They went to Fleet medical services and waited to see a Lieutenant Hertsu, a young Chinese doctor, barely out of medical school. "So you think you're pregnant. Let's see what the scanner has to say about it."
Hertsu grabbed a scanning device and ran it across Lexi's belly. "There are two distinct signals. The DNA scan will take a second or two for results… Ok, you've got one boy in there and a girl."
"Dibs on the boy," Jack said.
"You can't call dibs on a child," Lexi replied.
"Sure I can. I don't know anything about raising girls. I can play catch with a boy, and teach him stuff like how to shoot a blast rifle."
Lexi asked Hertsu, "Twins seems like a lot, Doctor. What are the odds?"
"The odds are very low actually. When they gave you the pills to counter the injection, how many did they give you?"
"Ninety I think, three months worth…"
Hertsu shook his head and put the scanner away. "You're only supposed to take them for seven days. After that they start acting as fertility pills, strong ones."
"We're ok with it," Lexi said. "Aren't we, Jack? Although I do expect you to help with the girl too…"
"I'll help with the girl," Jack said with his widest grin. "I was just kidding about calling dibs…"
"You need to go online and research such a complicated pregnancy," Hertsu said. "There are exercises you'll want to start immediately, or you won't be able to move towards the end of the term."
"I will, Doctor," Lexi replied.
* * *
The rebuilding of Orion Prime wrapped up, and Jack went back to training with the hovers each day. Another month passed. Practice went as usual, but after the battle Wilson dismissed everyone to the obstacle course except Jack. Wilson told Jack to follow him; they went to hangar 17 to a door Jack hadn't been in yet. Wilson stopped his tank and climbed out. Jack followed suit. Wilson stepped up to a palm printer on the side of the door and pressed it. The door started to crank open.
Jack could see under it. The creature sat on legs like a hover tank in off mode. It had four .50 caliber machine guns. Its main cannons looked different from the laser cannons on the other hover tanks. Jack went, "Ewww…"
"The main guns are neutron cannons. They take five seconds to charge, but you only need to fire them one at a time to punch through a big tank, and they're about five times more powerful than a laser cannon.
"It has four fifty-cal's. The burst control is selectable, but its recommended setting fires the center two guns, then the outside guns, then the center guns again. It's intended to conserve ammo.
"It has 40, yes, 40 Gel-packs in the undercarriage.
"Its sensor capability is roughly double that of a standard hover." Wilson paused. "Are you even listening?"
"Yes," Jack said.
"It has fifty percent thicker armor in most areas.
"Oh, and guess what, Jack? It has TWO star drives in it, resulting in about fifty percent more accel than a standard hover."
Jack just stared, dumbfounded. He couldn't imagine a weapon short of an atomic that had more firepower than a hover tank. This hover tank was at least three meters longer than the other vehicles.
Wilson smirked, showing off his teeth on one side. "You like?"
Jack stuttered, "Is it mine?"
"We figure you may be the only one to fully utilize it, because of your high gravity muscles, skeleton, and reflexes. It comes with a high price tag."
Jack asked, "What's that, Captain?"
"We need somebody to fly point. We're going after Korwin. We sent a scoutship there, and we think the Lithor are using the base as a slave planet. We need somebody to fly this monster of a beast in a circle around the outskirts of the city before dawn, to scope out their defenses, so that the ships in orbit can rain fire on the hardest targets, and take out any nuclear devices they may have. Somebody has to take the tank and the job, Jack. Can I count on you?"
"Count me in, Captain Wilson. Count me in."
"Take her for a spin. She's keyed to your palm print already."
"Thank you, sir."
* * *
Jack pulled up the design notes on the onboard computer before firing up the engine. The designers called it a generation II hover tank. Jack liked it--he liked the speed and the improved weapons. He grinned to himself every time he realized he'd have 40 Gel-packs. When he made it to the obstacle course, the other pilots wanted to drive it, and Jack told them no. They'd have to see if they'd put together a simulator for it yet. Chewy begged and begged. He just wouldn't shut up, so Jack finally caved and let everybody take the thing for a spin around the track once.
Chewy stepped out of the monster and shivered for a few moments. "It's too fast. I felt like it was gonna snap my neck."
Porter concurred, "Too fast for me…"
Nobody liked it. Nobody in the crew had grown up on a high gravity world like Jack. He loved it.
* * *
Within a week they left for Korwin, all the Fleet ships except the two Horsemen. The invasion force consisted of 200 men with powered battle armor, the 18 hover tanks including Jack's second generation machine, and a Kilken suicide squad of 30 highly trained fighters. Jack found the Kilken to be an odd bunch. They called themselves a suicide squad, but they said they survived for seven generations. They acted like a close-knit family. They cooked meals as a group, and sometimes they fought against each other for sport. They stayed close to their weapons at all times. Many of them carried blades and throwing knives. Kai led them. Although Jack couldn't be sure if Kai signified a rank or the Kilken's name.
Wilson led the infantry in powered battle armor. They rehearsed the battle plan over and over during the six month flight. They reviewed the biology, studying the various native life forms. A month away from Korwin, Wilson gave Jack a communications bandwidth ration card, so he could call Lexi up for five minutes. Jack scurried to his cabin and pushed the card into the slot and dialed for home. Lexi answered the video p
hone, and she had gotten huge! "You bastard, look at what you did to me!"
"Lexi, it's not that bad…"
"I'm huge. I'm a monster. I can barely move!"
Jack's sister Meghan came out of a back room and into the view of the video phone. "Hi, Jack."
"You moved in?" Jack asked.
"Yeah, Lexi needs help around the house. Plus, boys kept trying to make friends with me. They assumed I was some kind of tramp what with my own place. Inviting themselves over and then making passes at me, and it was very annoying."
"You might find you'd like that kind of attention in a few years…" Jack replied.
"Oh, there is this one boy I like, but he's very shy, and I can't get him to come over. Although I do intend to work on him more."
"That's my sister… Lexi, is everything alright? I mean with the pregnancy?"
"Everything is fine. They're right on schedule…"
"We'll be at Korwin in another month…"
"I have it marked on our calendar--the day of the battle…" Lexi said.
"Well, I just called to check on you. I'm glad to see Meghan is helping out. The card is almost used up. I love you both."
"I love you, too. Win at Korwin. Kill them all…"
"Yes, big brother, kill them all…" Meghan said.
"I will. I will…" and the communication timed out.
* * *
Dawn's early light broke slowly on the horizon. Korwin's main population center was ahead of him. He started to loop the city, hopefully without raising an alarm. His sensors would find their big tanks and their infantry housing, then the computers would assign targets to the hover tanks and the infantry in powered armor. Then the orbital bombardment would commence. The sensors should pick up concentrations of Humans as well which would be first on the Kilken agenda. Fleet figured that the Lithor would start killing the captives once they realized their situation.
Jack cranked the tank up to 50 kph. He needed to stay within forty to eighty kph for the sensor sweep. He rose to 50 meters. He needed to stay within a window. A blue circle showed on his radar, and he followed it around the city. Red blips started to appear on his radar in clumps of five. About a quarter of the way around the city, he noticed a big tank practically on his blue line.
He accelerated a bit, hoping to fly past it. The big tank didn't aim at him, and he figured he got lucky. He started to sweat a bit. He didn't enjoy this assignment--he'd rather be in a stand up fight. Soon enough, he thought to himself as he followed the blue line around the far side of the city. His map showed plenty of red and green dots. The green icons made him smile. Their scoutship did its job: Humans still lived on Korwin.
He made it past another quarter loop of the city, and no alarm had been raised. Once again a big tank waited in his path, almost directly on his blue line. This time it started to track Jack's hover with its main gun, and he had no choice. He blasted it with one of his Neutron cannons hitting the ammo reserve. Fire jetted out of the thing. Jack stayed on his course, following the blue line, but he cranked his speed up to 80 kph. Wilson radioed, "Their alarm is triggered--all units engage computer assigned targets."
Blasts from the heavens rained down on sleeping and unsuspecting Lithor troops.
The Kilken took off in a run. The armored infantry started to march. The hover tanks lifted off the ground and punched towards the city in a line. Jack's targets flashed in a line through the center of the city. The line started where the other hover tanks started their lines. The damn tactical computer hadn't adjusted for Jack's current position. Jack punched the accelerator down all the way, streaking across the city. A big tank came into view, and he blasted it with a neutron cannon. Infantry seemed to be organizing around the tank, and they fired laser rifles at Jack's tank. He used a Gel-pack on them, and they burned. Jack slowed down and turned. His targets formed a line in front of him on the radar.
The Kilken suicide squad separated into teams of five. One Kilken would take point, leaping onto the rooftop of a house, scouting ahead of the others, cutting down any Lithor in the way with multi-barrel blast rifles. Then the four other Kilken would run ahead, and another one would jump to a rooftop. The Kilken left behind would then double time it to catch up to their squad. They did their best to avoid the Lithor; main bodies of Lithor would be handled by the Fleet soldiers in powered armor.
Jack flew on. He blasted the next two big tanks on his screen, but two more lived and aimed at him. He pulled back on his left control stick, flying straight up into the heavens. Both tanks fired and missed. Jack needed to wait five seconds for his cannons to recharge. He heard Hong scream across the radio, damn-it. New targets started to flash on Jack's screen--Hong's targets had been divided up by the computer automatically. Jack radioed, "Focus on the big tanks closest to the green sections on the map, give the Kilken support." Jack turned towards the city center, following his own order. The big tanks he left behind tried to get a lock on him, but he outran them.
Wilson marched down the main street of Korwin with men in armor behind him on his left and right. Wilson approved of Jack's order to engage the big tanks at city center, 'Screw the tactical computer,' he thought. Every third man in armor carried a dozen rockets which would punch through a big tank's armor. Wilson radiod, "Infantry, ready rockets, advance at slow."
The Kilken faced too many big tanks to get through to the Human captives. They cut through infantry and waited for the hover tanks to do their work. Jack arrived at city center first. He blasted two big tanks and dropped three Gel-packs on three clumps of Lithor infantry. At least a hundred laser blasts chased him as he sped past the Lithor. His shield strength counted down with each one that hit him. Other hovers made it to city center while Jack turned to face the Lithor horde again. The hovers flew in like hornets over the big tanks and infantry. There was another scream, and a green light on his radar flashed a few times and then went out.
The Lithor fought back with their laser rifles, and Jack's shield warning started to beep. He blasted two more big tanks and dropped another Gel-pack on the Lithor infantry. The Kilken could reach the skyscrapers in city center, so they ran past burning infantry and leapt over big tanks that still smoked. Every five seconds or so, Jack killed two more big tanks and kept dropping Gel-packs. The other hover tanks killed one every three seconds or so. Two more green hover tank blips blinked out on Jack's radar.
Jack's shields flashed zero percent. He pushed the tank to its limits trying to avoid the laser blasts. He turned on the infantry and with great sweeping motions left and right cut into them with his fifties. He had three Gel-packs left, and he intended to save them. Finally after a good fifteen minutes at city center, they finished their sweeps. Jack radioed, "Set a waypoint here. Then fly in a circular search pattern. If your shields are down, stay close to city center while they recharge."
"Aye-Aye's" and "Affirmative's" followed that order.
Jack's shield reached ten percent, and he started a slow circle outward from city center. He turned down a city street and saw something that stopped him cold. A Lithor held a woman up in front of himself as a shield, with a pistol of some kind pointed at her head. Jack flipped on his exterior sound system and spoke, "Let the girl go."
The Lithor turned to face him and shouted, "When I get to the ship!"
The woman shouted, "Kill us both if you have to!"
Jack disengaged the external sound system and spoke, "Computer, set fifty caliber to single shot, fire left center first."
Computer spoke back, "Order confirmed, single shot."
With four crosshairs on his screen for the fifty calibers, he focused on the left center one aimed it at the Lithor's face and spoke, "Zoom." His view screen zoomed in on the Lithor's face. The Lithor started to back away, and Jack squeezed the trigger blowing the creature's skull off. It knocked the woman down, but she seemed alright, and she picked up the dead Lithor's pistol. Jack broadcast on his external sound system, "Hide until the fighting is over."
The wom
an said, "Thank you."
"You're welcome."
Jack sped past her looking for more tanks and Lithor to kill…
* * *
By the end of the day the battle died down. Jack called his squadron back to the original staging area, where their ship waited. He parked his hover and got out. He noticed the scars up and down its sides from laser blasts. Chewy walked over to Jack and said, "Man, I can't believe you ordered us to ignore the tactical computer. I bet Wilson is gonna chew your ass up!"
"We won. I doubt he'll be mad at me."
Chewy pointed to a line of armored infantry walking their way. "Here he comes now."
The line of armored infantry stopped and people stepped out of their suits. Wilson approached Jack. "We need to talk. Come with me."
Jack replied, "Of course, sir!"
They went into the bowels of the ship to Wilson's office. Wilson poured them glasses of Scotch for the second time. Jack said, "I'd rather not, sir."
"Nonsense, we're going to have a few drinks together."
Jack took the glass and took a small sip of it. It didn't taste as bad as last time, but it still burned. Jack asked, "Did I do something wrong, Captain?"
"For starters, you disobeyed the tactical computer. In fact, you ordered the whole squad to disobey it. We may have lost a few troops because of that order you gave. You left the men in suits hanging."
Jack stared into the bottom of his glass and took a big swig of it.
Wilson added exactly one ice cube to his drink, and it took him a while to pick which cube he was going to add. "But we were expecting to lose a few troops this mission."
The officer noticed Jack's glass and poured more of the Scotch into it.
"The computers are still running through the battle report. But the latest run says the Kilken wouldn't have made it into those structures in time had it not been for your hovers taking the risk they took," Wilson said. "The way it's looking we may have lost an extra suit or two, but we saved thousands if not tens of thousands of civilians. I'm sure the inquiry will go in your favor, Jack."
"Inquiry?" Jack asked, as he pushed forth his once again empty glass. It started to make him feel warm inside.
R.A.E.C.E. Genesis Page 10