by Easton Royce
The briefing room on board the Saratoga was a glassed-in, high-tech enclosure beside the battle bridge. A collection of projectors and state-of-the-art holographic display screens were set before the rows of seats now occupied by the 58th Squadron. In the center, a single table was filled with more equipment and notes.
Captain Eichner stepped into the doorway as the 58th stood at attention. He eyed them solemnly, clearly concerned that the war was going to hinge on less than two dozen pilots fresh out of Loxley.
Behind him, they saw a familiar face. Or half of one.
McQueen stepped to the front of the room. The scars from the 127th's defeat ravaged his face—deep crevices burned beyond medical science's ability to repair. But apparently the wound was only skin deep. They could all sense that his fighting spirit was very much intact. He was, in fact, the only one of the surviving Angels still on active duty.
He looked them over and said simply, "Sit down."
Eichner left them to their business. The second he was gone, McQueen grabbed the table laden with notes and equipment.
SLAM! He flipped it to the other side of the room, sending every device shattering on the floor, papers flying.
As the debris settled, McQueen pulled up a chair and sat down in front of them.
"I want to be able to look into your eyes," he said to the startled group. He did exactly that as he spoke; he singled out each and every one of them.
"Courage," he began. "Honor. Dedication. Sacrifice." He paused to make sure they were all following him. They were.
"Those," McQueen continued, "were the words they used to get you here. But now the only word that means anything to you is 'life.' Your life. The lives of your buddies."
It hit home better than any other words the military had given them. It cut through all the pretenses. It cut through all ranks.
"In an hour, maybe two," he continued, "you'll either be alive or you'll be dead. And for the next hour, this is your best chance of staying alive."
He went on to tell them what they had to do. They needed no fancy visuals from McQueen, only his words—blunt and to the point.
"The Trojan asteroid belt trails Jupiter's orbit. Your objective is to hide in this debris, which may be as difficult as engaging the enemy. You'll have to react to the pitch and yaw of the asteroids to keep out of sight and shielded from their LIDAR. Intelligence says they should fly right past you. Then you'll jump 'em."
The Squadron began to shift in their seats, lean forward. Maybe there was a glimmer of hope—for them, for the war.
"No one's asking you to wax their tails," McQueen advised. "Your goal is to stall them. Our forces at Groombridge have doubled back, and with any luck will soon be passing through the Kali wormhole. If you can successfully delay the enemy, you'll have reinforcements appearing from behind them and from out of the sun. And that's when we teach them about payback."
As intense as the look on McQueen's face was, it suddenly became darker, angrier. "Listen closely to what I'm about to tell you. I'm here because I've already been in a knife fight with them. They come at you in groups, and they have a low angle of attack, so keep your noses level. That could be tough; the planes you've been issued have an upgripe in the retro-thrusters.
"And one more thing," he added. His eyes fell on Cooper. "It's okay to be scared. See you in an hour."
When he was gone, Damphousse shook her head. "An hour." She turned to the others. "I guess it's true what they say about time dilation. This is going to be the longest hour I've ever spent."
The 58th Squadron returned to the upper flight deck to find the chaos they'd left behind intensified as technicians made last-minute checks of the equipment.
As Nathan approached his cockpit, he could only imagine how many more technicians were racing around down below, preparing the bodies of the fighters for battle.
In the hour they'd had after the briefing, there had been very little talk. Nathan had kept his silence, as if uttering a word might break his concentration.
He watched Wang, Damphousse, and several others pass what might be their last minutes together. He watched Shane, too, as she pushed out words of encouragement to the more anxious pilots.
Now the waiting time had gone.
As he prepared to step into his cockpit, he turned to see Cooper checking his flightsuit.
Cooper's face no longer had the contemptuously cold look it had when he'd first arrived at Loxley. His face was directed, focused. Just like Nathan's.
For the longest time Nathan had hated the Tank with a passion that had little to do with Cooper Hawkes the man. But there was no room for that now.
"Hawkes," he shouted.
Cooper looked up.
Nathan wanted to say he was sorry, wanted to let Cooper know that he was an equal, part of the team now. But Nathan couldn't put it into words. So Hawkes did it for him.
"Yeah, I know," said Hawkes with the slightest grin.
Nathan smiled in spite of the frantic tension all around them and stepped into his cockpit. Like a precision racetrack pit crew, the technicians strapped him in and sealed the canopy.
The lesson that Bougus had given them after their first disastrous simulation wasn't lost on Nathan or any of the fliers who had been there. Although they flew separate planes, they were connected by an invisible tether that made them what they were—a team.
The alarm sounded. The support crews cleared the deck and the airlock door came down behind them. A sudden, intense wind rose and fell as the deck depressurized to the vacuum of space.
Nathan caught sight of Shane in her cockpit, facing him. She gave him a thumbs-up, and he returned it, just as the cockpits were lowered through the floor and locked onto the bodies of the Hammerheads that were already positioned for launch on the lower flight deck.
Nathan felt his hair stand on end as the mass-accelerator engaged. The force propelled his entire ship through the length of the carrier and slingshot him into the star-filled void.
Their thrusters were at full burn. The Saratoga disappeared behind the 58th Squadron in a matter of seconds. They headed around to the dark side of Jupiter and to the deadly asteroid field that lay beyond.
chapter 16
Shane had hated the asteroid simulations back in basic training. She had come through them all with flying colors, but it didn't mean she had enjoyed them.
She had simply learned to judge and anticipate the movements of the sim-asteroids as she had maneuvered between them. But sim-asteroids were all roughly the same shape, and they came in only three sizes.
Here, there was no telling what they would come across. They had no idea how the asteroids would be shaped, how densely they'd be packed, or how their gravity might affect the Hammerheads' flight patterns.
As the 58th approached, the asteroid belt looked like specks of dust trailing the red-eyed planet. But as the Squadron drew closer, the specks grew to boulders. The boulders grew into mountain-sized chunks of stone, drifting randomly past one another.
It was an obstacle course no pilot should ever be asked to run.
"Stay tight," Shane instructed. "Thrusters at ten percent. Let's go for cover."
They broke formation and maneuvered into the shadows of the asteroids coming at them from all sides.
Total concentration was needed now, thought Shane. Being able to see out the back of her head would have helped, too, but without that, she and the rest would have to rely on instinct and full attention to their instruments and thruster stick.
As Shane looked at the field around her, something caught her eye. A Hammerhead, trying to evade an asteroid to its starboard, hadn't seen the one looming up from below.
"Red-four, you're too close," she radioed. "Coming up at nine o'clock."
Red-four responded with a single thruster. Too late.
The asteroid clipped his wing and sent him spinning into the larger one.
"Red-four! " Shane called. But the only response was a fiery blast as Red-four smashed again
st the asteroid.
Shane had to turn her eyes away. Who was Red-four? She knew every name and assignment in the Squadron, but right now she couldn't remember who it had been. All she could think about was how horrible it was for the pilot to die without his wing commander even remembering his name.
When she looked up again, she realized that the explosion of Red-four had changed the trajectory of all the asteroids in her immediate vicinity. The same one that had done in Red-four was now spinning right toward her.
She jinked right, sending her craft into a roll that corkscrewed her around the asteroid. She pulled her stick to the left, taking her ship around another chunk of stone before she finally leveled off. For the moment she was out of harm's way.
Further off, another flash of light signaled a second lost fighter.
Wang reported the loss. It had been Gold-three. His name was Osborne. Shane promised herself she would remember that.
The "Beyond and Back" perfectly mimicked the motion of the asteroid above it. It hovered just a few delicate meters away from the crushing rock. Inside the ship, Nathan studied his instruments, making sure the readings were all correct. He'd been given the responsibility of communicating with the Saratoga.
He turned his radio on a coded band the enemy couldn't pick up. "Saratoga, this is Blue Leader. We're tied on."
There was a pause. No response. And then, after a few more seconds: "Copy that, Blue Leader. Will advise."
Something didn't sound right. Keeping one hand on the stick to negotiate the asteroids, Nathan engaged his LIDAR. Instantly his Heads Up Display switched from asteroid vectors to a wide view of local space.
There was the enemy.
Just a microparsec away, thousands of tiny green dots danced on Nathan's screen, too many to count. The smaller crafts were surrounding a core of motherships. Altogether, the force was probably enough to lay waste to Earth in a matter of moments.
Nathan watched the screen. From what he could see, they were changing course—away from the asteroid field. Could the enemy know they were there?
No, thought Nathan. If there was one thing he knew about the enemy, it was that they always took the offensive. If they had been spotted they would have been attacked, plain and simple. It was more likely that the huge Alien attack force was just being careful, giving the asteroid field a wide berth so they didn't risk losing any ships.
This was supposed to be an ambush. But an ambush worked only if the enemy came your way.
"Saratoga," hailed Nathan. "LIDAR shows the enemy to be—"
But the Saratoga cut him off before he could finish. "Affirmative, Blue Leader. Will advise," the voice said more strongly.
It was a different voice this time. A stronger voice.
McQueen's.
Nathan couldn't believe they were just sitting there, letting them pass.
"Hold your position," McQueen ordered.
Hold your position. Wait them out. Those were the orders. Nathan was bound to obey them. But he hoped beyond hope that something would bring the enemy their way.
Cooper Hawkes had a tendency to pocket things of interest from time to time, a habit born from years of having to live on the street. Little good had ever come of it—until now.
As the Alien force moved further and further away, Cooper pulled out the gold micro-CD he had taken from the Mars tracking station.
He had jury-rigged a disk drive in his cockpit for his own amusement. Now he slipped the disk in. Rock music began to blare out from his cockpit. Pink Floyd, to be exact. It carried over the coded frequency radio to each Hammerhead and back to the Saratoga.
"What the heck...?" he heard Shane say.
Cooper let the pounding music fill him. Over the past few months, he had learned to be a team player, but he was still best at being a renegade. And now a renegade was exactly what this mission needed.
He eased his stick forward, thrusting clear of the asteroid field. Then he cranked his engine to full power and headed straight for the enemy.
This one was for Pags.
He could hear in his radio the commotion his move had caused. They all knew what he was up to. He was going to bait the enemy past them. He smiled as he remembered how that single enemy craft had gone beneath them like a fish on a line. Well, it was time to see if this school of fish would go after the bait.
Over his radio he heard Nathan say, "I'm going to help him out."
"Negative, Blue Leader," he heard Shane respond. "He'll bring 'em past. Wait 'til we can all go."
Cooper was coming up on the enemy faster than he thought. The sky seemed packed solid with their ships.
"I'm goin' in, fangs out," Cooper radioed back. Then he tore into the tail of the enemy, firing at will.
The enemy's pack was so dense, he destroyed a ship with practically every blast. He was literally tunneling through the enemy, clearing a path for himself, obliterating everything in his way.
He jinked hard to the right to avoid smashing against one of the massive, pylonlike motherships. Racing forward at twice their speed, he took aim at the lead formation. Perfect! He blew the six forward-most Alien fighters to oblivion.
But now they were firing on him. He had no choice but to take a wild, careening arc around the enemy's left flank. He cut through space as fast as his engines could carry him, back toward the safety of the asteroid field.
Behind him, the enemy ships quickly changed formation, going on attack.
"They're snagged!" Cooper announced gleefully. "I'm reeling 'em in."
He threw his ship into a roll, but not quite fast enough. Enemy fire blasted past him, narrowly missing his wings. Just a few seconds more...
The asteroid field came crashing toward him, engulfing his ship like the mother of all hailstorms. In an instant boulders twice the size of his vessel were blurring past all around him. It took all of his focus to keep from hitting the mammoth rocks head on.
Behind him, the enemy continued to fire. Four enemy fighters had already entered the asteroid field. One was instantly taken out by an asteroid that had eclipsed its path, but the other three "fish" were right on Cooper's tail.
BLAM! An enemy blast detonated a small asteroid right in front of him. The debris scattered—some of it was sent swirling off into space, but the rest pummeled his canopy. He tried to roll right, to evade the enemy. Tried... but his stick wouldn't move.
"My controls froze!" he shouted out. His HUD showed that the enemy had locked on to him. In front of him an asteroid loomed in the center of his path.
This was it. He knew he was dead.
Then, over the radio, he heard McQueen.
"Kill your left thrusters, you stupid Tank!"
Cooper hit the thruster with one hand, yanked hard on the controls with the other.
His ship turned, barely rolling past the asteroid. It was so close he could practically feel the huge boulder scraping his belly. The enemy ship was not as lucky. Still locked in position, Cooper saw it disappear in a burst of flame and dust as it hit the asteroid.
Cooper took a deep breath. When he looked up again, he wasn't alone.
The 58th Squadron had come out of their hiding positions and had begun to engage the enemy.
chapter 17
Damphousse got the first kill. She forced her fire down the enemy's throat and blew one ship to pieces as she rocketed through it.
Wang locked on to another. His fire clipped its wing and sent it careening out of control into an asteroid.
Shane held her fire and took stock of the situation around her. More enemy fighters were headed into the asteroid field, always in clusters of four, always in the same formation.
"McQueen was right, they fly in gangs," she reminded the others. Focusing on the pattern rather than on the individual fighters, she blew one whole gang out of the sky.
"Hoo-yah! Let's go downtown!" she shouted.
The 58th Squadron hit their thrusters. Pulling out of the asteroid field, they headed straight into the heart of the
enemy.
Nathan emerged from the asteroid field with a gang of four on his tail. He managed to blow two of them away with his rear guns, but the other two were still firing on him.
Around him, in all directions, explosions lit up the dark sky. They weren't just Alien ships. They were Hammerheads as well.
Blue-four.
Gold-two.
But they couldn't stop to count the casualties now.
Over his radio, he heard, "This is Red Leader. I need a little help." Cooper never asked for help...
He found Cooper on his LIDAR, still deep in the asteroid field, still trying to shake the Aliens on his tail.
"I'm on it," Nathan said as he did a barrel roll and plunged back into the asteroid field.
In a moment, he could see Pags's Payback, jinking wildly between enemy fire and the asteroids in its path.
BAM! Nathan fired and sent one of the Alien fighters careening into a nearby asteroid. But the one remaining fighter had already locked on to Cooper. Nathan could do nothing but watch as it fired.
Cooper took the blast in the tail. His right engine sputtered, then stopped altogether.
"I'm losing thrust!" he yelled.
The enemy veered around an asteroid and locked on again, coming in for the kill.
There was only one thing Nathan could do. It would be a tricky maneuver, but it was the only way to save Hawkes.
Behind him, two Aliens were still breathing down his neck. In front of him the crippled "Pags's Payback" and the Alien fighter disappeared behind a giant asteroid.
Nathan pulled on his controls with all of his strength and forced his Hammerhead into an inverted loop around the asteroid. He would loop around the asteroid in a tight bank and come at Cooper head on. Neither Cooper nor the enemy would see him until he was flying down their throats. He hoped his judgment had been right and that Cooper would react quickly enough.