Eye of the Dracos ec-3

by Ian. J. Smethurst

  “Those of you who were with us during the Krenaran war will remember our former medical officer, Kathryn Jacobs. The ship she currently serves aboard was destroyed by a new unidentified enemy, resulting in the deaths of over two hundred naval personnel and scientists. The Copernicus itself is an unarmed survey vessel under the command of the research division; it was conducting a survey of the Auriga system. Although not everyone died, sixteen people are still trapped on the surface of Auriga III, including Kathryn in some unknown alien structure. The vessel that destroyed the Copernicus is still out there, and is still a threat. Here is all the information we currently have on it.”

  Michael played a video feed containing the sensor data and the ships logs of the Copernicus through the shimmering holographic main viewer.

  It showed the dark shape of the enemy ship closing with its prey, Michael studied the reactions of his crew intently as they watched; in particular Eldathar. The Solarian’s eyes widened in shock as he instantly recognised the alien vessel.

  The crew witnessed the devastating impacts of the torpedoes, and the carnage wrought onboard, the smoke, fires, and lifeless broken bodies, and then the final coup de grace from those deadly laser lances, the video went black.

  The crew stood in silence, not since the Krenaran war had they witnessed this kind of wanton destruction, and for many it brought back uncomfortable memories of that dark time.

  “The E.D. F has initiated an alert level three, the highest alert level since the Krenaran war in response to this, so this is absolutely as real as it gets gentlemen. The Liberty is the only ship in the area fast enough to rescue the stranded science team. This is what we’ve trained for, what the Liberty is built for, we won’t let her down, and we won’t let those scientists down; for Kathryn!”

  The whole crew echoed solemnly, “for Kathryn.”

  “Dismissed.”

  The crew all fell out and began to filter through to their familiar stations throughout the six decks of the one hundred and forty metre long ship.

  All that is, except Eldathar. Michael needed to know what the Solarians knew about this new alien species.

  “You know who that was, don’t you?” He probed gently.

  “Yes; they are a people long thought forgotten, and one I didn’t expect to see again,” he bowed his head low as though in shame. “They are called the Dracos, and were once Solarians; a breakaway radical group who placed the infliction of pain and torture above that of peace, culture and science.” Eldathar took a long deep breath, as if trying to re-open a long suppressed memory buried deep within his people’s psyche, and never told to anyone. “They once tried to overthrow the Solarian government over three hundred years ago, causing a brief but bloody civil war, in the end they were defeated. Our people went mad, seized by a vengeance to right the wrongs they had done to us, we chased them relentlessly through our space, the warfleet mercilessly harried them world from world, system-by-system, until they disappeared forever. We devastated their key facilities, infrastructure and bases from orbit, and thought we had destroyed all trace of the Dracos. In doing so we had destroyed a part of ourselves, though now three hundred years later they have returned.” Eldathar sighed sadly as he recounted the tale.

  “So they are like the Solarians smaller, evil little brother?”

  “In a way, yes.”

  “So why don’t the Solarians get involved, help us to stop them?”

  “It is not a time we are proud of as a people, we derived no pleasure in turning weapons against our own kind. No matter how wayward they had become they were still our brothers and sisters, this was a time of nothing but universal sadness for the Solarian people. Before this, no Solarian had killed another in anger, and to us it was like killing our own family. Now three centuries on we feel exactly the same, and that is why the Solarian empire cannot intervene.”

  Michael searched the Solarian’s features as he looked up at him, the sadness was plain to see, this news must be tearing him apart on the inside. “I understand, I will not force you to go on this mission Eldathar, if you wish to remain behind I will not hold it against you.”

  “I am a Solarian yes, though I am also a member of this crew, and I will continue to do my duty; Kathryn was my friend too captain.”

  Michael smiled knowingly, this was exactly the kind of response he had come to expect from his number one pilot, although he couldn’t imagine how difficult this must be for him.

  The Solarian quietly took his place in the Liberties pilot’s chair, while Michael took up the centre seat.

  “Kinraid, contact engineering, tell them to bring main power online.”

  There was a pause of a few seconds while commander Kinraid transmitted the order down to the Liberties engineering section from his console. “Engineering confirms, Solarian power core’s charging up and is stable, we’ll ‘ave full power in two minutes for ‘ya cap’n.”

  “Excellent, contact Charlie Gamma base control, and request permission to get under way.”

  Kinraid worked the controls again, after another brief pause the response came, “clearance’s been granted.”

  The holographic viewscreen shimmered into life once again, before becoming crystal clear, the face of Commodore Valente and the rest of the command team in the background became visible. “Good luck Liberty, and god speed.” The viewscreen shimmered out of existence, leaving just the bare bridge wall.

  Lights flickered into action and consoles came to life throughout the ship, the half-orb that housed the ships plasma drive system beneath the vessel, covered in a lattice work of delicate conduits, began to power up. Navigation lights fitted to the widest part of the Liberties sloping, angular hull began to blink their respective green and red. The primary negative Ion propulsion drive lit up into its brilliant electric blue, as did the ships Ionic turning thrusters nestled within wide indents halfway along the ships hull.

  Everywhere onboard people were glued to their stations, checking over the readouts of status displays flashing across a plethora of terminals.

  The elongated barrel of the ships most deadly weapon, that Solarian designed fusion cannon lit up; being the most energy intensive system on the ship it was always last to fully power up, although the weapon itself wasn’t active, that would only happen once the Liberty entered into a combat situation.

  Finally, Michael gave the command, “blow docking hatch, release all moorings, reverse thrust one quarter power, manoeuvring thrusters at users discretion.”

  Keeping his eyes glued to the sensor readouts in front of his chair, Eldathar gently pulled on a small throttle control nestled within the palm of his hand just a fraction. The one hundred and forty metre long vessel gradually began to reverse. The confines of the small dockyard were tight, and the Solarian had to guide the ship skilfully around the hull of the Lincoln class supply ship that had docked earlier.

  The Liberties port turning thruster flared a brilliant electric blue as power was shunted to it, lighting up a section of the transports hull as it gently glided around it, slowly edging its way out of the dockyard and into the star filled blackness of deep space. The only object to impose upon that universal blackness was the bright blue-green atmosphere of Malthus IV below them, the site of the Malthus colony, and the dull grey hull of Charlie Gamma base itself ahead, festooned with its numerous shining portholes, and lit sections.

  From a distance, the station resembled a giant oblong, with a tall cylindrical main structure at one end, it was in this cylindrical section where the stations crew lived and worked. The large oblong structure extending outwards from it was the dockyard itself, providing shelter for the ships huddled within, and wherefrom the Liberty had just emerged.

  “Okay, now that we are clear, set a new course, bearing zero-six-seven degrees, elevation twenty one.”

  “Aye captain,” Eldathar replied as he raised one arm of his pilot’s chair, while simultaneously lowering the other. The ship instantly responded to the pilot’s movements and r
apidly spun around to face this new direction. The fore section and fusion cannon was pointed away from the station, as the ship raised itself as though on a gentle incline to match the co-ordinates given for elevation.

  Michael had to hold onto his seat as the ship manoeuvred into position, unlike a big, bulky E.D. F ship that took a veritable age to turn, the Liberty was almost instant. At times Michael wondered whether the Ionic thrusters were too good, though he rarely complained as they had proven to be such a boon when in battle.

  “Full power to main engines, then initiate maximum plasma drive once we are clear.”

  “Understood captain,” Eldathar replied, as he pushed sharply down on the same throttle control, the Liberty rapidly accelerated, soon leaving the colony world and its small orbital facility far behind.

  After about ten minutes of sub-light cruising, the planet was little more than a tiny speck, barely visible in the surrounding vastness of space. In-fact the only thing that was visible was the bright yellow-orange of the Malthus sun.

  The star of the Malthus system was a very old one, almost twice as old as the sun the Earth orbited, and had all but used up the hydrogen contained within its corona. As such it was beginning its expansion, slowly transforming from a yellow star into a red giant. Scientists had predicted that unless no unusual phenomena interfered with the stars natural metamorphosis, the colony wouldn’t need to be evacuated for at least the next five hundred years.

  The Liberty reached a safe distance and then engaged its plasma drive, the half-orb beneath the warship glowed with barely contained power, as plasma energy filled the myriad conduits adorning the sphere. The plasma built up, and then shot forward along a wide slightly raised channel, running from the plasma drive itself along the length of the Liberties hull, to a sharp frontal emitter, where an intensely bright blue beam of raw plasma energy lanced out from the front of the ship. Exploding into the swirling multi-hued plasma wake, fringed with its distinctive halo of bright white light. The Liberty itself, still hurtling along at full sub-light speed, dove headlong into the plasma wake and entered plasma drive.

  Now travelling at plasma factor seven, seven times the speed of light, the small yet deadly warship shot through the swirling tunnel of colours that was the plasma wake, racing towards its destination just outside the Auriga system to pick up the commando assault team, before venturing into the system itself.

  Michael prayed for the scientist’s sake, that they would make it in time.

  8. Extreme measures

  The Liberty continued to race through plasma drive, though the Auriga system was relatively near Malthus, it was still a journey of several hours.

  Drax however, was enjoying hunting down the interlopers, he found them resourceful, worthy, but ultimately easily killed. Although his own men had taken severe casualties, his other team virtually wiped out, and his own team reduced to seven out of the original ten men. Now they were bolstered by the arrival of the two survivors from the second team. Even better news was on the cards however, as word had reached him of two more Dracos ships that had come to join in the fun, and would likely be despatching their own assault teams shortly.

  He and his men had checked every room on the second floor, quietly creeping through ventilation ducts and service passages, never along the main corridor itself. Now they were heading down toward the third and lowest floor, he knew they had to be here, there was simply nowhere else they could hide. The thought of the slaughter to come excited him greatly.

  Further they crept, through the narrow square shaped metallic interior of the ventilation ducting. Following precisely the outline of the map displayed on the A.R. uplink over his left eye.

  Finally, when he switched his view onto thermal imaging mode, he was rewarded with what he was looking for; thermal signatures given off by his enemy’s body heat. Drax waved for his men to follow cautiously.

  The Dracos Kallan warriors crept forward slowly, and with such skill that barely a sound was made, just metres away from their prey now, some were sleeping while others kept watch, a few others were acting as sentries out in the corridor beyond the large room being watched by the arrayed men.

  Drax quietly ordered his team to split up, there wasn’t much point in keeping all his men together as had been proven by the ill-fated second team, he ordered two Kallan to drop into the next room, come around and eliminate the sentries, thereby creating a diversion allowing himself and the four other Kallan to swoop in and wreak havoc.

  Drax and his guards silently waited as the two other Dracos peeled off down the narrow ducting.

  The two scientists Matthew Broadhurst and Pablo Gomez were guarding the entrance to the briefing hall. They were tired, heck everyone was tired, though they didn’t know just how long they had been down here. Everyone had lost complete track of time after the chaos of the initial attacks, together with the business of staying alive. For all they knew it could have been weeks, Broadhurst however doubted it was any more than a couple of days. The rations wouldn’t have lasted that long anyway, food was already becoming scarce, if they didn’t think of something soon, they would all starve to death down here.

  Kathryn was still tending to the injured Thorsson as best she could under the circumstances, and as for poor Corporal Jankov, without his sight he was effectively a walking dead man. Broadhurst and Gomez continued to scan the dark, wide corridor that extended into the gloom as far as they could see in either direction.

  Broadhurst thought he could sense the faint shuffling of feet, a paralysing fear came over him, his skin ran cold and clammy, his nerves set on edge. The gentle hairs on the back of his neck began to rise.

  He swung his weapon in the direction of the sound, “what’s that?” he whispered nervously.

  “What’s what?” Gomez whispered back.

  “I thought I heard something, I’m going to check it out, stay here.” Broadhurst crept through the darkness.

  “Get back here!” Gomez shouted after him, but it was no use, he had already disappeared into the darkness.

  Broadhurst ventured through the gloom alone, the flashlight from his pistol illuminating the various dark foreboding panels, casting deep shadows along their edges. He nervously crept further and further away from the briefing hall doors, his weapon shook gently in his hands as he mentally tried to calm his jangled nerves. The shuffling sound was getting steadily louder, there was definitely something down here, and close. He risked a quick glance back over his shoulder, and could still see the faint glow given off from Gomez’s flashlight; it reassured him a little.

  He stopped at the entrance to the next room, the environmental systems monitoring station that had been damaged earlier in the fighting. He tentatively shined his torch inside, almost afraid of what he might see, his heart pounded in his chest; there was nothing. He breathed a huge sigh of relief, perhaps he had just imagined it? After all, tiredness and extreme stress can do strange things to a man.

  Wait a second, there it was again, a faint, almost imperceptible shuffling, now he knew he was not imagining it, his nerves set on edge again, the pounding returned, cold fear reasserted itself with a vengeance, as slowly, nervously he peered closer, his breathing quick and shallow, straining to hear the noise again. Drawing level with the door itself, he looked around at the interior of the room, there was nothing but smashed consoles. A few were working, their lights shining brightly in the surrounding darkness, coating the nearby panels in flickering red, green, and yellow colours. The shuffling had stopped, and so did Broadhurst, standing absolutely still, barely daring to breathe in order to pick up the faintest of sounds. A cold sweat trickled down his temples to the sides of his neck; his whole body shook in a cold fear and his hands felt clammy as he tightened the grip on his pistol, eyes constantly flickering around the room, alert to the slightest hint of movement.

  There was a whoosh of displaced air as in an instant a black arm whipped around and slammed into his throat, Broadhurst felt a searing agonising pain, coug
hing and spluttering he realised he couldn’t breathe. Stumbling backwards, his neck felt warm and wet. The arm festooned with a series of razor sharp, shark fin like blades, coated with a thick smear of blood retreated back behind the other side of the wall. Broadhurst dropped the weapon and clutched at his throat, his vision began to get spotty, cloudy, he was weakening, slumping to his knees he coughed and gurgled on his own blood, before slowly collapsing onto the floor. The slash of the Dracos wrist blades had torn his throat wide open. The last thing Matthew Broadhurst saw were the forms of the two Dracos warriors rushing past him in the reflected torchlight, the bright scarlet of their vision slits permanently etched onto his slowly dying mind, as he lay still in a slowly growing pool of his own blood.

  The two Kallan sprinted into the corridor, zigzagging and crossing paths wildly so as not to afford Gomez a clear shot. He heard footfalls racing toward him and instantly levelled his weapon, the flashlight illuminated the on-rushing black figures. He pressed the trigger and opened fire, the muzzle flashed brightly in the darkness as the flurry of pulse pistol shots echoed aloud. He managed to clip one of them in the upper arm as he charged, sending the alien stumbling off balance into the wall of the corridor, before quickly leaping to its feet again.

  The second came on relentlessly though; the dark suited alien launched itself like an arrow through the air, wrist blades outstretched. The lethally sharp blades sliced right through the exposed neck of Gomez. His body seemed to freeze for a split second, and, just as the Kallan warrior executed a neat forward roll upon landing. The scientists head, slowly, wetly separated from his body, before both collapsed into a bloodied heap.

  The gunfire outside instantly alerted those sheltering within the briefing hall, they rushed to grab their weapons. There was shouting, screaming, and widespread panic at the horror they had witnessed at Gomez’s decapitation.

  The two Kallan who had just slaughtered Gomez and Broadhurst, now took up positions either side of the doorway, effectively laying siege to the room, they released their eviscerator rifles magnetically attached to their backs.