“Waa-ah,” a voice cried out behind him.
Risi stopped and looked back as a woman came stumbling down the steps toward him. He caught her in midfall, the impact almost knocking him over.
“Thanks,” she said. She sat down on the steps with a grimace. “I slipped, think I rolled my ankle.” The nametag on her uniform read Callenstal.
“Move it, Callenstal!” Risi shouted at her. “Those big, nasty aliens are right behind us.”
That statement had the desired effect. Callenstal stood up and began hobbling down the stairs. Risi grabbed her right arm and pulled it over his shoulder, helping her.
As they rushed down the steps, he wondered if this was how shepherds of ancient Earth felt, hurrying their flock of sheep to the barn before the wolves arrived. Except in this case the wolves were insectoid aliens with meter-long jaw pincers and deadly, claw-tipped forelegs. They could slaughter his entire flock in seconds.
The wolves, marked on his tactical display as large red blips, had just arrived at the cafeteria, reaching it from the other end of the platform. They went inside and spread out, moving through the dining hall then into the kitchen and bathrooms. They met back in the dining hall and began milling about, seemingly confused.
“Any idea what they’re doing?” Risi asked the lieutenant.
“Given their apparent insect biology, they may be trying to pick up your scent. Some insect species on Earth use olfactory organs to hunt. These aliens might do the same. If true, it implies they lack technological sensory gear.”
“So, they can only track us through their nose?”
“I surmise their elongated antennae serve that purpose,” Tesla answered. The AI had seen the aliens through mini-cams built into the marauders, studying their physical structure in detail.
“Any other useful tips you can infer about them?”
“Yes, many inferences, in fact,” Tesla responded. “Given they have three eyes of a complex structure, with one larger than the other two, we can assume they have specialized vision. The possibilities include telescopic, infrared, even ultraviolet or X-ray. Perhaps even a combination of multiple types.”
“Oh, great,” Risi said. “So they can see in the dark, and possibly through walls. Wonderful.”
The tactical display beeped an alert. Whatever the aliens had been doing back in the cafeteria, they were done with it now, as the red blips raced out into the corridor and down it toward the stairwell in fast pursuit.
Risi sighed, realizing he’d never get his sheep to the barn in time.
Nighthawk
“Where’s that rescue team?” Mitterrand asked, struggling to mask the nervousness in her voice.
“En route back to the assault ram,” Tactical responded. “Walking wounded among the platform workers. It’s slowing them down.”
Mitterrand stared at the holosphere as tiny blue dots sped toward a red oval that was steadily closing in. The scatterpack missiles had been launched seven minutes ago. Their velocity now was almost sixty-two thousand kilometers per second. They were fast approaching the optimal payload deployment point.
Their engines cut off suddenly, and the nose shroud of each missile blew apart, revealing forty-eight softball-sized spheres mounted on a conical ejector platform. Each sphere was a fourteen-megatonne thermonuclear bomb. Layered with absorption polymers and cloaked by a dark energy shroud, the matte-black bomblets were sensor invisible except at pointblank range. They were jettisoned four at a time into the prescribed dispersal pattern. With a dozen scatterpacks, this created a fast-moving minefield of 576 thermonuclear devices. Anything in its path stood little chance of survival.
“Scatterpacks have released,” Weapons reported. “Time-to-target: thirty seconds.”
The bomblets used graviton pulse micro-thrusters to veer toward the inbound alien warship. Their proximity detonators activated, set to go off if they came within a kilometer of the target. Closing speeds were nearly 31% of lightspeed, however, and eleven spheres exploded less than a hundred meters away. Nine more were able to alter their trajectory enough to strike the target, thus delaying detonation until impact. Of the total number deployed, thirty-four detonated.
Like pellets from a shotgun blast, nuclear explosions ripped into the alien warship, shredding it apart. Once the blasts had dissipated all that remained of Outlaw Two was a broken carcass tumbling through space. Glowing radioactive debris mixed with chunks of the wreck fell away behind it like a comet tail.
The remaining bomblets that failed to come within the designated target proximity coasted on. After sixty minutes their detonators would self-terminate, rendering them inert and harmless. Onward they’d drift, reaching a neighboring star system some fifty-eight years from now.
Scaveer
Jokin`Dor’s antennae stiffened with tension when he learned Kozill had been destroyed. Once again, the biped warship had vanquished a legion cruiser with relative ease. Its reactions were swift, weapons deadly. No weaknesses had been found, yet.
Jokin`Dor issued new commands, causing six warships to detach from the legion. They accelerated swiftly, each heading out on a different attack trajectory. Three were dreadnoughts, the other three battlecruisers. Now the biped warship would be given a test of true power.
Minutes later, null portals began to form.
Nighthawk
“Spatial anomaly detected. Bearing three-oh-two, elevation minus four-eight degrees, range ninety-seven MKs.” Operations sounded nervous. “Alien warship coming out of it. Designating as Outlaw Three, and it’s . . . huge. Length, twelve point four klicks, mass two-eight-six megatonnes.”
They’re sending in their big guns, Mitterrand thought.
“A second anomaly is forming, bearing two-one-four . . .”
“Get that rescue team back here now!” Mitterrand snapped.
“A third anomaly is forming, bearing oh-one-seven . . .”
Mitterrand’s stomach tightened. Every intuitive fiber in her body was screaming at the captain, telling her things were about to get really bad, really soon. Her flight instinct had just triggered like never before. Run now or die.
“The rescue team is pinned down,” Tactical reported. “ETA, fifty minutes.”
Mitterrand bit her lip as six anomalies formed. Out of each came an enormous alien warship, all converging on Nighthawk.
Zeres Able
Sergeant Risi, the three marauders, and twenty-eight platform workers had just exited the stairwell onto Deck 3. The assault ram, their ride off the mining platform, was only 280 meters away.
Might as well be a trillion klicks from here, Risi thought.
On his tactical display, eight red blips formed a line between him and the ram. The aliens had raced down another stairwell, looping around into blocking positions to prevent their escape. They move so fast!
To make the situation even worse, eight more were in the stairwell they’d just left, climbing down the steps from Deck 8 to block their retreat.
The alien wolves had his sheep surrounded.
Lieutenant Tesla gave a blunt assessment of their predicament. “Sergeant, you have just one option: you must go straight through them. Form a wedge up front with the marauders, group the civilians tight behind them, then charge for the ram. I will provide covering fire from here once you are close enough.”
Risi knew the lieutenant was right. He turned to the workers, noting some had armed themselves with crowbars or metal pipes and looked ready for a fight. As for the rest, not so much. That worried the sergeant since he was about to ask them to run through an alien-infested battlefield. The frightened looks on their faces was a bad omen. Hopefully they’d do what real sheep did and just blindly follow the rest of the flock.
“Listen up,” he told them. “There are aliens up ahead, and we need to get past them. When I yell ‘go’ I want everyone to run after me as fast as you can. Don’t stop for anything. If you do you will die, so DO . . . NOT . . . STOP! Whatever happens, keep moving. Everyone understan
d?”
The workers nodded.
“Tic and Tac, battle wedge formation up front,” Risi thought. “Toe, rearguard.”
Tic and Tac took lead positions side by side. Risi moved up behind them, with the workers gathering in close behind him. Toe, minus a weapon arm, fell back to guard against flank attacks.
Risi looked back at the workers. “Ready, set―”
“Sergeant!” Sorenson yelled, pointing to his left. “There’s a conveyor tube behind that wall. It carries extracted minerals from the sifters to the holds. We can use it to get behind those aliens up ahead.”
Risi smiled, loving the idea. “Suit, overlay engineering schematic.”
A gold-line engineering diagram overlaid his tactical display of the platform. A double-dash line filled with a crosshatch pattern was right behind the wall Sorenson had pointed out. It extended in both directions almost the entire length of the platform. The conveyer tube also passed close to the ram, giving them a route past the aliens. He thought-painted a target marker on the display where he wanted an opening made.
“Cover your ears,” he told the workers, then he thought, “Tac, HE round, fire.”
Tac launched a missile into the wall, causing a flash, boom, and pale-grey smoke to billow out from the blast. Once it cleared there was a jagged hole big enough for a man, woman, or marauder to slip through.
Risi ran to it, stuck his head in, and looked both ways. The conveyor tube was about three meters wide, ribbed with magnetic flow rings running down its length. It was empty other than some loose gravel scattered across the floor. He motioned to the workers. “In here, hurry.”
He helped a man climb through, then Sorenson took over the task.
“Squad, defensive perimeter,” Risi thought.
The marauders formed a protective arc around the workers as they scrambled into the conveyor tube one by one. Less than half were inside when aliens emerged from the stairwell, causing men and women at the back of the group to push against those in front, desperate to escape. Risi heard Sorenson yelling at them to quit shoving, doing his best to keep order.
“Squad, AP missiles, stagger-fire a full spread on my command.”
The aliens moved closer, eight from the stairwell, eight from the direction of the ram. Suddenly, they all charged forward.
“Fire!”
Each marauder launched three armor-piercing missiles at 1.5-second intervals. The lead missiles struck deck plates held up by the aliens as shields, detonating harmlessly. The logic processors in the second and third volleys altered trajectories accordingly, and the missiles darted up and over and down in tight arcs to streak into their targets from above. The explosive force of the shaped-core plasma warheads vaporized deep into six aliens, killing three and seriously wounding the others. Smart guidance made the AP missiles formidable weapons. Their weakness: a limited supply, as each marauder carried six. Combined, they now had just one left, and ten aliens were charging in. The logic processors had no solution for that.
As the aliens charged they threw javelins, heaving them with such power they pierced marauder shields and embedded in the polyceramic armor underneath. Risi heard the sharp crackle of electrical discharges as overload surges flowed into the marauders, but he knew their hardened optical circuitry was impervious to whatever EMP effects those javelins might carry. He saw Tac pluck two of the projectiles from its armor-chassis and drop them to the floor.
“Squad, HE missiles,” Risi thought. “Stagger-fire at will!”
A high-explosive rocket streaked out from each marauder, followed a few seconds later by another. Risi fired four in quick succession, adding to the barrage. The lead missiles burst against deck plates, shattering them so the rockets following behind could plunge through the gap. These detonated against insect faces with brilliant flashes and thunderous booms that reverberated through the cavernous ore-extraction chamber. Three aliens dropped, their heads blown off, but the rest kept charging forward despite hideous wounds.
To Risi, it was obvious they felt no pain or could suppress it somehow.
“Everyone’s inside, sergeant!” Sorenson shouted at him. “Come on!”
Risi spun around, ran forward, and tossed his rifle through the opening to Sorenson just before he dove in after it. He bumped into Sorenson on the other side, causing him to tumble to the ground. Risi saw a purple flash as he hit and knew right away his shield was down. Sure enough, an indicator blinked on his suit display, confirming an emitter was offline. He was now unshielded, though the tough flexarmor of his combat suit still provided considerable protection. A lot better than the flimsy uniforms those workers are wearing.
“Squad, retreat.” Risi stood up, grabbed his rifle from Sorenson, and then took off at a sprint down the conveyor tube. Farther ahead, men and women ran for their lives, urged on by the loud booms behind them. Sorenson chased after Risi.
Meanwhile the marauders retreated toward the opening, firing their heavy 30mm fusion cannons in full auto mode. The aliens charged in after them, not slowing down at all as bright-orange pulses burst against their armorshell exoskeletons. The marauders sent a mass barrage of antipersonnel missiles into the creatures, but the ceramic slivers caused superficial wounds only, either pinging off or embedding harmlessly just a few millimeters deep.
Tic launched the last AP missile. This time an alien fell as the plasma jet vaporized its skull. The rest closed in, jaw pincers opening wide.
A flurry of encrypted signals flashed between the three marauders. In 780 milliseconds they reached a collective decision―one must be sacrificed so the other two could continue the mission. Tic sped into the conveyor tube with Tac close behind, both marauders following Risi.
Toe moved into the opening and hovered perfectly still, then the marauder fired grapples, one shooting straight up, two more lancing down to each side at 135° angles. The grapple bolts embedded deep in duralloy surfaces. The high-tension cables that had spooled out behind them were reeled in, becoming taut as the marauder anchored in place. Finally, Toe locked both weapon arms onto the edges of the opening, bracing for the alien onslaught.
Risi could have countermanded Toe’s actions but chose not to. Given the squad’s mission, it was the right decision. The marauder’s sacrifice should gain them enough time to get the workers to the assault ram.
“Thank you, Toe,” his thought whispered over the Squad Net.
Risi stared at his tactical display as red blips converged on the green dot that represented Toe. He heard muffled booms detonate behind him as the marauder emptied what was left of its arsenal into the aliens at pointblank range. Then the green dot disappeared as the red blips overwhelmed it. Just before all signals from Toe had faded away, the marauder activated the destruct sequence.
“Everyone, hit the deck!” Risi yelled to the workers ahead.
He then knelt down and hunched over, opening his mouth to equalize the air-pressure differential on his eardrums when the shockwave washed over him. Sorenson ducked down beside him.
Risi heard and then felt the blast as 34 grams of antimatter erupted from Toe’s annihilation reactor to collide with the normal matter around it. Despite bracing for the shockwave, he was knocked forward onto the floor.
Behind him, a spherical volume almost nine meters across ceased to exist, the elemental atoms within canceled from existence by their antimatter counterparts. Even subatomic particles such as quarks and bosons were gone.
Risi staggered to his feet, noticing there were no red blips on the display. Tic and Tac moved down the tube toward him. Their bulk had blocked much of the shockwave, shielding him and the workers from the worst of it.
Nearby, Sorenson groaned, rubbing his head. Risi helped him up, then ran forward down the conveyor tube. “We're almost there, lieutenant,” he thought. “Cut us an opening so we can exit this tube.”
Tesla had of course been monitoring their progress. Atop Saturn’s Glory, the heavy twin turret was already in position. Suddenly a pair of 30mm
fusion beams lanced out from it, burning into a wall and the conveyor tube behind it. One beam cut clockwise, the other counterclockwise, quickly cutting an almost perfect circular opening just over two meters wide.
Risi jogged to the exit hole as a circular section of the tube fell in. Once there, he saw Saturn’s Glory not even twenty meters away.
He gestured the workers forward and began helping them through, warning them to be careful of the still-hot edges.
How ’bout that, Risi thought. I got my sheep safely to the barn after all.
Well, most of them, he realized with a sigh. He still needed to rescue the platform AI several decks up. Whether they were civilians or soldiers, marines left no one behind.
Nighthawk
Captain Mitterrand was gripping the armrests of her recliner tight as she stared at the bridge holosphere. Six alien warships were closing in, all dwarfing Nighthawk, each approaching from a different direction. Got us boxed in like a fish in a barrel. . .
The combat AI had launched five scatterpack volleys. Each inbound alien warship had ten missiles racing toward it. Closing velocities exceeded fifty-four thousand kilometers a second.
Tactical gave a running report of the AI’s defensive measures. “Shields at full power with EM benders at max deflection. Decoys ready to launch. Jammer on standby.”
The alien ships were heading straight at Nighthawk and ignoring the scatterpacks. That worried Mitterrand. They must’ve seen what these missiles did to their sister ship. So far, the aliens had shown smart tactics in their attack patterns. She didn’t believe they’d be foolish enough to fly straight into a missile barrage again. Somehow, she suspected, they would negate the scatterpacks. She just didn’t know how they’d do it.
“Scatterpacks have released,” Weapons said. “Thirty seconds to impact.”
Everyone on the bridge had eyes glued to the holosphere, watching clouds of tiny blue specks creep toward the six red ovals that were relentlessly closing in. Each alien warship had 480 nuclear bomblets racing toward it. No one dared breathe.
The Sphere Imperium: Book Two of the Intentional Contact Trilogy Page 19