Phoenix Odyssey Book 1 (Battle Beyond Earth)

by Thomas, Nick S.

  A cheer rang out from those on the bridge, and Marks piped in the sound from those about the ship. They raved with elation at his words, and he felt proud and powerful.

  “Enough talk, let’s do this. Show no mercy, and take from them everything they have to give!”

  He looked to Marks and pointed his finger at him.

  “Go!”

  It was rather informal, and yet the Captain did not question him. They were all too caught up in the ecstasy of the situation to care about protocol.

  “Target set in, prepare to jump!”

  The countdown began as he took up position beside King.

  “Nice speech,” she said with a smile.

  “Five, four…”

  CJ felt a hand rest over his and looked down. It was Emily’s. She smiled at him with both joy and sadness as if it were the only chance she would ever get.

  “I don’t want to lose you,” she whispered.

  “I’m not ready to die yet.”

  “Jump!”

  All four ships jumped simultaneously, but the Phoenix came out in dense nebula with no visibility at all. They waited and watched their screens with anticipation.

  “Launch the drone!” Marks ordered.

  A small module fired out from the bow and vanished into the fog like nebula within twenty metres, and they soon turned their attention to the viewscreen as it soared through with no visibility at all.

  “Is our position secure? Have they spotted us?” CJ asked.

  “No chance,” replied Marks, “Nobody can see in or out of this field beyond a few metres. If we cannot see them, they cannot see us.”

  “Nor the Cholans,” whispered King.

  “Tamay knew what she was getting herself into.”

  “You weren’t wrong about them. They are weak,” said Kaner.

  “I said the same about Humanity, but I am starting to think I was wrong.”

  The drone began to slow as if it had detected the edge and closing at a treeline to look out upon an enemy position. The brightly coloured interference and fog began to part, and then they spotted it. The base.

  “Wow,” said King.

  It was far larger than they expected. It was as black as night as if in shadow on every edge. The two sections of its hull were crossed to make an eight-pointed box like shape. It was ugly, but imposing. The camera feed panned, and they could see three enemy vessels moving away. It all seemed to be going to plan when to their horror a jump gateway opened up right in front of the drone.

  “What the hell is going on?” King asked.

  “That isn’t us!” Marks yelled in a panic.

  Another four Morohtan warships surged through the gateway and appeared before the drone. Moments later a pulse of energy was fired from one. The drone exploded, and their video feed died. King drooped her head in despair. The plan was falling apart.

  “We have been made,” said Marks.

  “Fire up the jump engines and get us out of here!” CJ barked.

  “I…I can’t,” said Marks.

  “What do you mean, you can’t?”

  “Our navigation systems are being jammed. We cannot jump.”

  “Can’t or won’t?”

  “We cannot jump without a course plot. We could end up in the middle of a planet or anywhere!”

  CJ looked to King as if to check that he wasn’t being lied to.

  “He’s right, CJ. It could be suicide.”

  “And if we stay here, we are dead.”

  “What choice do we have?” Mirov asked.

  The ship rocked as the first shot hit them, and they stumbled and tried to keep their balance.

  “We can’t jump, and we can’t fight, so take us further unto the Nebula!”

  “Yes, yes, it may be our only chance,” said Marks, understanding what CJ was doing.

  “Engines to full and take us about!”

  They rushed forward with the turn of speed never expected by such a large vessel, but they were rocked by another three shots before they succeeded in making the turn. Another shot skimmed them, and one more hit directly. Warning lights flashed on the consoles all around them.

  “They are following our heat signature. We can’t stay at full burn.”

  “I thought this ship was fast?”

  “She is, but we can’t make the distance before they destroy us.”

  “Then what do you suggest?”

  Marks thought fast as another two pulses smashed into them. He opened a channel to engineering.

  “Cut the engines. Dump the coolant into the reactors.”

  “But, Sir, we won’t get the engines started again for at least five minutes,” protested the officer before them.

  “Just do it!” Marks screamed.

  They heard the engines power down as they went silent.

  “Port and upper landing thrusters, five-second burn, now!”

  They were so quiet CJ could barely hear them, but he smiled at what the Captain was doing.

  “Give me a thermal imaging view of the area, one klick radius,” added Marx.

  The screen lit up, and they could see the trails of the four enemy vessels. Everybody was silent now, watching the screen and hoping they would not be spotted. The landing thrusters had adjusted their course enough that they were diverted from the centre of the enemy position.

  “They’re spreading out,” said King.

  “Trying to track us down.”

  “It could take them some time,” said Mirov.

  “Time is what we do not have. Tamay is out there fighting for us right now.”

  “I didn’t know you cared for the Cholans?” King asked.

  “If they die before we get there, we will never succeed in our mission,” he replied coldly.

  They turned back to the screens. One of the vessels was passing overhead. It was close, and yet they could not see it on their screens. Lights flashed as though they were in an electrical storm of some sort, and all around them was a purple and red coloured fog that obscured everything.

  “What are we going to do?”

  Marks didn’t seem to have any idea.

  “It’s a miracle we are still alive. I don’t know what we can do.”

  CJ shook his head and grimaced. He wasn’t satisfied with that at all. Then he thought back to when the enemy first arrived.

  “You said they were jamming our navigation?”

  “Yes, I have never seen anything like it; in theory, of course, but never in reality. I never thought anyone would be so sick as to use this technology in such a way.”

  “This is war,” he replied unsympathetically, “How are they doing it?’

  Marks shrugged and tried to think of a way.

  “I am the wrong man to ask, but what I can tell you is that to do it, they’d have to have a tremendous power source, especially to travel that kind of distance.”

  “Power source?”

  “Yes.”

  “Are they still blocking us now?”

  He nodded.

  “Is there any way you can trace the source? Tell us which ship is carrying the device?”

  “Well, yes, but I don’t see how that will help us.”

  CJ strode up to the screen and pointed at the vessels.

  “Just look at them. They are spread thin, desperately trying to track our location. The gap is widening all the time.”

  “And?”

  “And if we can figure out which one has this jamming device, we can take it out.”

  “Without the other three descending upon us?”

  “We’ll find a way.”

  “Captain?” King asked, “Wouldn’t a ship equipped with this technology also be the one that enabled them to jump in the first place?”

  “It’s likely. It is rare for the Morohtans to have the capability on individual ships unless they are of great importance.”

  “Would the heat signature of that vessel also be different to the rest?”

  “Yes, yes, almost certainly,
of course!”

  He rushed to one of the consoles and punched in a few keys. Another overlay filter passed their screen, and all but one of the ships shows the same signature. He smiled in amazement, nodding towards King in gratitude.

  “I have you now,” CJ said under his breath.

  He studied the screen carefully. The vessel was on the furthest flank and conveniently the closest to them. It was the one that had passed overhead.

  “Time for payback,” he said with a wicked grin.

  Chapter 25

  “We can’t pursue them. The moment we fire up our engines, they’ll be onto us,” said Marks.

  “Then if you won’t go after them. We will.”

  “What?”

  “The engines on our assault craft, they’ll give off a small enough signature that we won’t be spotted, won’t they?”

  “If…you…kept the power to moderate levels, maybe. But what are you going to do when you get to that ship? Even if you could get on board, there are probably two hundred enemy soldiers aboard.”

  “You know that for sure, do you? Two hundred?”

  “That’s a good estimate.”

  “He’s probably right,” added King.

  “Yeah? Well, we’ll worry about that when we get there.”

  “Mirov, your platoon is with me. Kaner, you stay aboard the Phoenix. Your job is to get those bombs in position, no matter what.”

  “But you…”

  “No matter what, you hear? We have to go after that ship, whether we like it or not. Somehow we have to knock that jammer out, or we’re all finished.”

  He rushed to the door, but King grabbed his arm and brought him to a stop.

  “Don’t think I am not coming with you.”

  He saw the look in her eyes. She wasn’t going to be dissuaded, and Boron followed her as the shadow that he always was.

  “Come on, while we still have a shot at this!”

  They rushed to the hangar and into the craft that Mirov’s platoon was already waiting in.

  “Get us in the air. Keep the power low, and follow the heat signature of the farthest vessel to the starboard side,” ordered CJ.

  The doors opened to reveal the inhospitable looking nebula. They could see nothing because of the poor visibility. Even as they got out into space, and their screens allowed them to see all around, they could not make out any objects at all. The pilot was flying on instruments only, and he looked terrified.

  “You know when I signed up for this, they said it would be dangerous, but this isn’t quite what I had in mind. This isn’t dangerous, it is suicidal.”

  “Only if it fails,” replied CJ with his characteristic smile.

  “Not much gets you down, does it?”

  “Plenty of things disappoint me in life, Emily, but I won’t fear them. Why fear death, it will find us all eventually?”

  “That’s a positive outlook,” she replied sarcastically.

  “That is the Krys way,” added Mirov.

  CJ nodded in agreement.

  “Well, I think that’s crazy.”

  But CJ was already shaking his head. “Death in the service of a good cause is not crazy.”

  “But what does it achieve?”

  “That remains to be seen.”

  “What? You already think we are going to die here?”

  “I wouldn’t presume to think anything of it, but I accepted long ago that I could die at any moment. When you spend every minute of every day amongst the enemy, a long life is the last thing you expect for your future.”

  “But that is different now.”

  “Is it? Because it seems to me that for all the problems Humanity had when I left, they have a whole lot more today. The Krys only wanted Earth.”

  “And the end of the Human race, don’t forget.”

  “Maybe that, too, but they didn’t want to destroy every living creature in the universe.”

  “Tell that to the Aranui.”

  CJ had no answer for that. He didn’t have much of a leg to stand on.

  “Face it, the Krys Lords of old were every bit as despotic as Bolormaa. Why? Because they could be, but now better men and women have taken the stage. Those days hundreds of years ago, your days, were not the glory days. They were barbaric times, and the very worst of times for both our peoples.”

  “And yet both were stronger. Look what peace has brought you.”

  “Peace didn’t bring us to the Morohtans.”

  “Really? What did?”

  “Space exploration,” added Mirov.

  “Really? What made you such an expert?”

  “I was there, the day that an ancient enemy was awakened. I was aboard one of the support vessels when we made first contact. I was there with your descendant, William Jones.”

  CJ looked surprised, as if it were all new to him.

  “William?”

  “That’s right, you didn’t know?”

  “Know what?”

  “Charlie Jones may have been killed in the last war, but his family was not. He had a son, and that lineage still exists today. Lieutenant William Jones serves alongside Colonel Taylor, just like his forbear did.”

  “Well, I’ll be damned! I didn’t believe that was true.”

  He didn’t know how to take it. On the one hand he had never had anything resembling family, and yet at the same time, he already thought of the man as an enemy for allying himself so closely to Taylor.

  “He is quite an officer, almost as famous as Taylor himself,” said King.

  “Wonderful, that’s just great,” he replied cynically, “Let’s focus on the task at hand.”

  “I was wondering when we were going to get to that point. We have one platoon to take an entire ship.”

  “And we have the element of surprise, and one more thing, I am not in the mood to lose.”

  That brought smiles all around and did wonders to defuse some of the tension they all felt.

  “So how do you intend to destroy this warship?” asked King.

  CJ looked surprised.

  “I don’t intend to destroy her. I mean to capture her.”

  They couldn’t believe that, but it was crazy and ambitious enough that they all laughed. CJ laughed along as well.

  “Sixty seconds and we’ll be alongside the enemy vessel, Sir,” said the pilot.

  “All right. Take us up as close to the bridge as you can, and then deploy us.”

  “Where?”

  “Anywhere you can.”

  They fell silent and watched the nebula part as they drew closer. The vast enemy ship came into view. It wasn’t much larger than the Phoenix and shaped like the body of a shark, with a small tower towards the back of the fuselage.

  “That’s it,” said the pilot.

  “They keep the bridge close to engines and engineering. That is smart,” said King.

  “A lesson the Humans could learn a lot from. That was a weakness the Krys exploited many times in the wars,” added CJ.

  The pilot cut the power and let them drift in, using just the smallest amount to adjust as they chased their target. The vessel looked to be running at slow speed as if to loiter while it hunted for the Phoenix.

  “One things for certain, they won’t be expecting this.”

  CJ smiled at King.

  “That is their own foolishness. Easy now,” he said as the pilot made final adjustments.

  They touched down onto the hull with absolute precision; to the level they barely even noticed the contact when the landing gear sealed onto the enemy ship.

  “You sure you want to do this?”

  “If there were an easier way I’d take it, but time is running out, and this has to be done.”

  “And you aren’t even afraid?”

  “What would be the point? Anyway, haven’t you always wanted to steal a warship?”

  “No, not particularly,” she said, her eyes wide, shocked he’d even had to ask.

  He dropped the visor on his helmet, and the
others did the same. He lifted the hatch in the floor of their craft and jumped out into open space. He felt the weightlessness before his boots connected with the hull and sealed shut. He didn’t stop to look around and moved immediately for the bridge, looking for some way in. To his surprise, he noticed a hatch open ahead and a head popped out. He lifted his rifle and took a shot.

  The bullet found its target, striking a Gueros between the eyes, killing it instantly. It fell back inside, but the hatch remained open.

  “I guess we found the back door,” he said, smiling.

  He wanted to say it over the comms, but he had to maintain radio silence, at least for a little longer. It was a ten-metre walk to the hatch. It felt frustrating that they could only manage it at a crawling pace, and time just ticked away. He had no love of the Cholans, but he felt concern for Tamay and her people. He could only imagine the battle they were engaged in. Any sensible officer would have jumped away by now, having realised something was wrong, but he hoped her stubbornness had kept her in the fight, in the hope that he’d pull something out of the hat.

  Finally, he reached the hatch and looked in. The body of the enemy soldier was stuck inside. He reached in and pulled the body out, pushing it away so that it floated off into space. He then jumped in and descended down and through a small energy field. He felt the pull of gravity as he dropped onto the deck and into a well lit room. He looked up to see the others descending through the translucent field above.

  “Huh,” he said, marvelling at the technology.

  He went on a few steps to clear space for the rest of them to get in, but as the last one touched down, a red warning light lit up and a siren rang out.

  “We’ve been made,” said King.

  “No shit, better make this quick!” replied CJ.

  He leapt forward into a sprint. He wasn’t at all familiar with the layout of the ship but knew where the bridge was from his orientation when out in space. They took a bend. Two Gueros ran towards them, but CJ didn’t slow down a single bit. He activated his shield and fired on full auto, and King did the same. The shots knocked the enemy soldiers back but didn’t kill them. They closed the distance in no time at all. CJ smashed into the first with his shield, knocked it to the ground, and ran past.