by T. R. Harris
Adam wiped more blood from his upper lip. “Sit down, guys. Let’s watch the show. Who knows, it may have a surprise ending.”
“There will be no surprises here—”
Just then the lights flickered off, and then came back on a moment later. The big screen had gone blank, and it instantly rebooted. Then the power flickered on/off in rapid succession several more times, before a hesitation and then two more flashes again. When the lights eventually stabilized, Nomar looked around at the others in the room. “This has happened before. What is the matter with the power grid?” he called out. Several underlings reached for comm pads, while two others actually ran from the room to investigate from another location.
The Kracori leader turned to the screen. “Bring up the graphic,” he commanded.
The center section of the large screen was instantly filled with a remarkably detailed 3-D representation of a small cluster of stars and planets, all in brilliant, vibrant colors. The image would rival the best CGI work of Hollywood’s special effect departments, and the vantage point was not static, either. It was constantly moving, sweeping in to show lines of defensive ships forming behind the various planets, while a huge wave of what were obviously Juirean ships approached the Corridor from between a pair of stars. And off to the bottom edge of the screen could be seen a fairly accurate depiction of the Shield, with all its roiling mass of hot stellar gases, all in startling colors.
“This is the entrance to the Volseen Corridor where the next battle will soon be joined,” Nomar said, beginning his narration. “The Juirean fleet is approximately five thousand ships strong and they will be met by a force numbering nearly their equal, comprised of ships from the neighboring worlds in the Nebula—”
The power suddenly shut off again, and ran through the same annoying pattern as it had before. When it finally settled down again, Nomar was visibly upset, but this time he simply glared at one of the senior Kracori standing near him. The confused alien looked back at his superior with wide, pleading eyes. He shook his head as his narrow mouth fell open slightly.
Nomar’s own mouth became a pinpoint as he tightened his jaw in frustration. He turned back to the screen. “The Juireans will no doubt prevail in the coming engagement, with the first units joining ... now.”
Indeed, a line of green and red-designated icons came together near the center of the gap between the stars.
“Having underestimated the defensive force which they are facing, the Juireans will suffer many more casualties than they had anticipated, yet they will clear the entrance to the Corridor and enter the Void. It will be at that time they encounter the thirty-five hundred ships of the Kracori defensive fleet. Fighting within our territory, the Kracori will lure the Juireans into designated killing zones where mines and other passive deterrents will reduce their numbers even more. With no replacements available, the Juireans will either elect to withdraw—or more desired—will fight to the last ship. Either way, the Juireans will lose all their strategic strength, here and throughout the Expansion. And the Kracori, thanks to the fodder provided by our useful allies in the Nebula, will emerge nearly fully intact … and ready to confront the Human fleet a few months later.”
He stopped and turned back to Adam. “Yes, we have analyzed the strategy that would be used by your fleet. We have to assume they are aware of the Juireans, and as such, will let the two of us fight amongst ourselves before facing the weakened victor. Yet we will not be weakened—”
For the third time, the power cycled through its odd fluctuations, causing the Langril this time to completely lose control. He grabbed the nearest chair that was not bolted to the floor and heaved it across the room.
All Adam needed was this third time to have complete confidence in his assumption. He turned his head slightly both ways so he could see the faces of the others. With steady gazes and ever-so-slight nods, Adam knew they had recognized the pattern as well. Only a few days earlier, the team had initiated a sporadic disruption of the Kracori power grid themselves. Now it was happening again, and with a regular pattern: dot … dot/dot/dot … dot … dot/dot. He recognized it, as one of the most-common door-knocking sequences on Earth, whose origins he knew were much older than the dorm rooms where it was most practiced.
Some of the other members of his team had survived, and they were here, on Elision, and very, very close. Something was about to happen, and they were letting Adam and the rest of them to get ready.
********
“Kaylor, where are all the military and security people around the ship?”
“There is still the small ship circling above, using chemical power.” He rotated the exterior cameras around until he had scanned the entire perimeter of the ship. “The tech crew is still outside the rear airlock, and there is a contingent of impatient-looking Kracori military—about thirty of them—almost directly in front of us.”
Sherri reached out with her own ATD and tried to detect any flash weapons larger than a Xan-Fi in the area. There was a cannon of some kind mounted to the left of the domed complex, just within her range, probably a defensive battery for the Citadel.
“Trimen, can you get control of the cannon and disable it?”
Trimen’s expression went blank as he, too, reached out with his telepathy device. “I have acquired control of the processor. It is done.”
“Good. I’m not that worried about the MK’s and Xan-Fi’s, but the cannon could have stung some.”
“What of the craft above us?” Kaylor asked.
Again Sherri flashed her devilish smile. “For liftoff, where will you aiming the gravity-well?”
Kaylor’s eyes grew wide. “Upward! Why is it that I cannot think like you?” There was more frustration in Kaylor’s words than compliment.
“It’s because you aren’t as devious as we Humans. I think it’s one of the traits that sets us apart from all the rest.”
“I will not argue with you on that point,” Kaylor said as he rapidly flicked switches on his pilot’s console. “I have to assume we are nearly ready.”
Sherri took a deep breath and looked around the pilothouse. Trimen had taken a seat at the nav console and strapped in. Jym and Kaylor were in the co-pilot and pilot seats respectively, also strapped in. Ruszel was in a flip-down seat attached to the rear bulkhead, just then strapping in. Sherri slipped into the observation seat behind the pilot and pulled the straps around her chest.
All eyes were now on her. “How’s the buildup coming, Kaylor?”
Kaylor looked back at his station. “Gaining compression; another thirty seconds and we reach liftoff mass.”
“Give it sixty seconds; I want us to really make an impact when the well forms.”
“I will monitor it. That will be close to critical mass, however.”
“I know. Do it ... just don’t let us explode.”
Kaylor turned back to his screen. The tension in the pilothouse increased exponentially over the next few seconds. There was a dull humming coming from the rear of the ship, growing rapidly in intensity.
“Five seconds ... four ... three....”
Kaylor gripped the controls tighter—and suddenly the air in the pilothouse was ripped from their lungs as a sharp, electric crackling echoed against the metal walls….
********
It began with a sudden distant boom that refused to fade away after the initial shock. Nomar and the other Kracori looked around the room, suddenly aware of the bass rumbling growing within the building.
“Find out what is happening!” Nomar yelled to no one in particular. Adam had no idea if earthquakes were common in this part of Elision, but it did appear as though the Kracori were surprised by the tremors. Already they were scrambling about the room.
Daninf turned to the cadre of guards positioned behind Adam and his men. “Watch them carefully,” he commanded. “They are not to move from this spot. If they do ... kill them.”
With no countermanding orders coming from Nomar, Adam knew the guards wou
ld follow through—if they could. For at that very moment, the distant rumbling sound wasn’t so distant anymore. Instead, the entire building now shook violently, with ceiling tiles raining down on everyone in the room. Flooring buckled, and the massive video screen suddenly exploded outward.
Everyone along the front rows of the auditorium—the Humans included—all dove for cover as sharp shards of glass cut into their flesh. Yet the glass cuts soon became the least of their worries, as the very ceiling in the room began to crack and break apart. Yet instead of falling dangerously to the floor below, the shattered ceiling appeared to lift away, moving upwards slightly before some of the larger chunks began to fall off to the side, crashing down on the opposite side of the room, killing several huddling Kracori.
Through the ever-increasing dust and debris filling the room, Adam could see that Nomar and Daninf had been spirited away by not only the entourage around them, but also by the Kracori who had been guarding them.
Adam did his best to protect himself from the falling debris by squeezing under several of the broken chairs they had once been sitting in. Whatever the others were doing outside, they were definitely having an impact.
********
The Pegasus surged upward off the concrete landing pad, lifting with it a perfectly round section of ground ten feet deep from the surface of Elision. Dozens of Kracori who were within the hundred-foot diameter of the gravity-well simply ceased to exist, their bodies ripped to shreds as they were pulled into the series of microscopic singularities being formed a few hundred yards above the Pegasus.
The monitor aircraft in the skies above the spaceship was, unfortunately, right near where the back hole formed and its entire mass was pulled into the pinpoint in space that was the singularity. It didn’t explode before entering the event horizon; just one moment it was there, and the next it was gone.
The internal gravity-wells activated simultaneously with the drive singularities, yet the compensators took a split second to adjust to the added strength of the well. All the people in the pilothouse were jerked upward, their safety harnesses digging painfully into soft, pliable flesh. Fortunately, this only lasted a moment otherwise their fragile bodies would have been torn to pieces, to become nothing more than thin pools of bloody flesh painting the ceiling of the pilothouse.
“Let’s go, Kaylor!” Sherri yelled once air returned to her lungs.
Kaylor didn’t say a word. Instead the Pegasus began to approach the Citadel complex, gaining altitude as it went. The cluster of buildings was only a mile from the landing zone, so it was only seconds before the ship was hovering above the target building. Already there were blinding clouds of dust, dirt and debris spinning around the ship, creating a tornado of tremendous proportions out to half a mile from the Pegasus.
And then pieces of the dome began to fragment and splinter apart. Through the remote cameras on the exterior of the ship, Sherri could see large chunks of concrete and steel fly off the dome, in a weird reversal of traditional gravity. The ship was buffeted by violent collisions, as parts of the building impacted the underbelly of the ship. Watching the swirling scene below, through the vantage point of several camera angles, Sherri suddenly became very nauseous, and within seconds couldn’t keep from spewing a sickening mass of brown and white matter in Kaylor’s direction.
The Belsonian felt the wet, sickly-smelling gunk on his back and cranked his head around to cast Sherri one of the angriest looks she had ever seen from an alien.
“Sorry!”
Kaylor merely grunted before turning back to his duties.
The entire top of the dome was now gone, as were the roofs of several of the nearby buildings. “Set us down in the gap!” Sherri yelled through the roar of all that was going on in and around the ship.
Kaylor banked the Pegasus over to port, decreased the well-intensity, and let the hundred-foot long craft drop onto the gaping hole that had once been the top of the dome covering the main governmental building. There was a deafening squealing sound, accompanied by crashing and a series of heavy thumps against the hull. The Pegasus settled down at a twenty-degree angle to starboard, semi-resting on the abutments remaining in the building, with the remainder of the ship’s bulk supported by the greatly diminished gravity-well above.
********
“I think they’re trying to kill us instead of rescue us!” Geoffrey Rutledge cried out from next to him. Adam caught Riyad’s eye and winked. They knew what was happening. They’d done the same thing less than a year before.
“I hope they don’t expect us to get sucked up with all this. I don’t think I’m up for it, no pun intended!” Riyad called out.
“I’m sure this is just their idea of a diversion.”
“No shit?” Admiral Tobias yelled. “Your call, Captain, what do we do now?”
“Like in any earthquake, find a strong doorway and get in it. Let’s go!”
The Kracori guards were nowhere to be found. What aliens who did remain were either dead or injured from the falling debris. Adam sprinted up the long flight of stairs between shattered rows of chairs, followed closely by Rutledge and Tobias, who were now literally carrying Riyad as they went. At the top of the stairs, they all crowded into the wide portal that was the entrance to the auditorium.
“Shouldn’t we try to move deeper into the building instead of higher” Tobias coughed through the suffocating dust.
“I can’t imagine this going on much longer. The damage has already been done.”
No sooner had he spoken the words, when the rumbling dropped in intensity by clearly ninety-percent. What reverberations remained seemed to come from throughout the entire structure, as ceilings, walls and floors continued to crumble and settle in the aftermath.
Adam looked up to the sky above, now peeking through gaping holes in the ceiling, just as a large dark shadow passed overhead, blocking out the light from outside. And then the entire building shuddered again, but this time accompanied by a loud thud that threatened to bring down the entire structure. Something huge had just hit the building, and from the direction of the most-prominent creaks and crumbling, whatever it was appeared to be sitting almost directly on top of them.
********
Sherri unbuckled and jumped from her seat, grabbing various handholds to keep from sliding down the steep angle of the deck. She fought her way to the rear of the ship—to the airlock—and slapped the controls to open the hatch. She braced herself against a bulkhead and withdrew her weapon.
Her ATD provided her with a preview of what threats existed outside the ship, and while flash weapons were prevalent, none were moving in her direction. Understandably, there was mass confusion inside the building.
The warm air from outside swept into the airlock, filled with thick, choking dust. The swirling clouds outside made it difficult for her to see more than a few feet beyond the entry hatch, and she sheltered her eyes from the burning and stinging effects of the dust now entering the ship. She hesitated going outside. Just give it a few seconds, she thought. Just a few more seconds….
********
In the relative reprieve from the more violent quaking, Adam took Riyad by the arm and began to pull him through the shattered remains of the building, climbing onto huge chunks of fallen concrete and steel supports. Like climbing blocks of a giant pyramid, they moved ever higher to what was now the new roof of the dome. Tobias and Rutledge helped by pushing on Riyad butt, and the team moved from foothold to foothold, reaching for a point where daylight still penetrated the dust and gloom....
********
At first she wasn’t sure, but then she could definitely make out a set of dark objects within the shattered skeleton of the building. They were moving haphazardly, yet definitely towards the ship. Her ATD didn’t detect any energy signatures coming from the figures, but still she lifted her weapon and aimed it at the outer doorway of the airlock.
Through the haze and dust outside, the dark figures grew larger and more defined, until sud
denly a familiar face greeted her with a smile.
“Is this elevator taken?”
Sherri let out a laugh-cry and embraced the bloodied and dust-covered body of Adam Cain, feeling his warmth and heartbeat through her thin tunic. The reunion only lasted a second, however, as they were both shoved further into the airlock by the other men entering the small room. She looked around at the dust-caked faces, taking a quick inventory. Andy ... the Chief ... Riyad!
She broke away from Adam and rushed into the arms of Riyad Tarazi. He grimaced as she squeezed tight. She pulled away so she could get a good look at him. “Are you all right?”
“That is a matter of perspective, my lovely Sherri Valentine,” Riyad answered, his brilliant white smile unfazed by the dirt and grime on his face and accentuated by the darkness of this thick, black beard.
Sherri looked around again; there was something wrong. Her eyes locked on Adam. Adam’s mouth tightened. “That fucker McCarthy killed John.”
Tears began to flow freely down Sherri’s now equally dusty and grimy checks, creating dark trails that gave her face the look of a native warrior painted for battle. She was relieved when Adam took her by the arm and led her out of the airlock and forward to the pilothouse. She vaguely heard him bark out an order to Kaylor to get the ship back in the air and out into space as fast as the tub could fly, and soon she was placed back in the observation chair with the safety harness secured around her.
Never had she felt so exhausted, so worn down. She let her head fall to one side and she closed her eyes. Maybe just a little rest. Yes, I just need a little rest….
********
Adam lifted Sherri’s limp head and pulled open an eyelid. He smiled as he gently let her chin fall to her chest.
“Is she okay?” Riyad asked, shuffling unsteadily along the radical slope of the ship’s deck.