The Battle for the Solar System (Complete Trilogy)

by Sweeney, Stephen

  Enough was enough. Dodds pulled a hand free and struck the woman hard across the face, putting considerable force behind the blow. She cried out and her hand went slack, the pistol falling free of her grip and thudding down onto the grass. After that, it was easy for him to force her down onto her knees. He slammed a foot down on the pistol as she made one last effort to reach for it, narrowly missing her fingers in the process. He then grabbed the wandering hand and twisted it around behind her back. Bound in his grip, she did not offer up any further resistance and, at last, Dodds felt she had given in.

  “Dammit,” she said, sounding totally vanquished. Breathing heavily, she sniffed and shook her head as though trying to clear a daze.

  “Yeah, fun’s over,” Dodds said. “Now, who the hell are you?”

  “Who the hell are you?” she said, glaring up at him.

  “You’re hardly in the position.”

  “My name’s Grace,” she said after a pause.

  Dodds waited for her to continue, then prompted her with a twist of the arm.

  “OW!”

  “Why did you attack me?”

  “I … I thought you were one of them,” she said, looking back down to the ground, avoiding his eyes.

  “One of who?” Dodds continued to hold her firm, watching in case she should make any sudden movements. He adjusted his footing, to ensure he still covered the pistol effectively.

  “The soldiers who invaded the planet. You looked like you were looting the bodies and everything.”

  “No, far from it.”

  She faced back up. “So, who are you?” Her eyes seemed to be studying his attire.

  “Name’s Dodds. I’m a pilot with the CSN.”

  “CSN?” she breathed in surprise. “You’re a long way from home, aren’t you?”

  “You could say that.”

  “What are you doing here?”

  “My carrier was just shot down over the planet. We were boarded during jump and were forced to drop back to normal space. We were then attacked by waiting Imperial forces and our captain ordered us to abandon ship.”

  “That was you?”

  Her angry stare was beginning to subside, and Dodds started to loosen his grip. She didn’t seem to be such a threat, after all. “You saw it come down?”

  “Doubt there was anyone this side of the city that didn’t,” she said. “We were going to mount a search for survivors, but, as you probably saw, we had our own problems.”

  She seemed genuine enough. Dodds paused to consider her statement. If she was right then it meant that not only had the civilians witnessed Ifrit’s fall, but the Imperial forces, too. Should Hail have stayed true to his plan, then he would have ditched the carrier somewhere out to sea, on the east coast. It would mean that a literal army of Imperial soldiers would have descended on the area. And if everyone – save for the unknown occupants of the sled here – had come down on the beach … Estelle. Enrique. Kelly. Chaz … In his mind’s eye he saw their bodies lying in the shallows of the sea, like the bodies here in the park, their limbs flapping in the surf.

  “You’re hurting me,” Grace’s voice brought him back.

  “Oh, sorry.” Dodds released her, but continued to keep his foot firmly on the pistol. He indicated for her to back away, before finally retrieving it. He gestured towards her uniform. “How about you? What’s your full name and rank? Where’s the rest of your unit?”

  “I’m not in the military,” she said. “My name’s Natalia Grace. I work for the IWC Secret Service.”

  Dodds raised an eyebrow. “You’re a government agent?”

  Natalia nodded. “And now you know, you don’t need that anymore,” she added, motioning to the pistol as she dabbed at her lip and nostrils with the back of her hand. The second blow that Dodds had dealt her had been enough to make her nose bleed far more than before, as well as split her lip.

  Looking at her now he felt a twinge of guilt, though he didn’t feel right about stowing the pistol yet. “What were you doing up that tree?” he said.

  “I … I was hiding, if you must know.” She sounded almost ashamed to admit it. “When you arrived, I thought you were part of an Imperial scouting party that had spotted me and sent someone to deal with the problem. There was nowhere for me to go, except up.”

  Dodds frowned. “When you say Imperial, you mean the ones in the black uniforms, right? With the white emblem on their arms and chest.”

  Natalia nodded.

  “You took a hell of a risk by attacking me.”

  “It was either that or wait to be discovered.” She sniffed at the blood that was still trickling from her nostrils. She pinched the bridge of her nose and tilted her head forward. “Which they would do eventually; the planet is crawling with them.”

  Dodds felt his heart jump. “It’s not just this city?”

  “No.”

  Oh hell! A full-scale invasion. “They were the ones who attacked us in jump. They killed about a quarter of the crew before we began the evacuation.”

  “Then you know that it’s not safe for us to be standing around like this,” Natalia said. “We need to leave, now.”

  “Hold up,” Dodds said, motioning to the sled. “You didn’t happen to see who was in that, did you?”

  Natalia glanced over and shook her head. “No, it was deserted when I got here. One of yours?”

  “Yeah, that’s one of the escape sleds we used to evacuate the carrier,” Dodds said. “I’m trying to locate my friends. My own sled suffered a malfunction and I came down a long way off course. I thought that whoever the passengers were might have an idea of where my team-mates went.”

  “I’m sorry, but I didn’t see anyone,” Natalia said. “And like I said, we really don’t have time to stand around and talk. There’s nothing left for either of us here, so you may as well come with me.”

  Dodds considered the offer for a moment. He wished he had an idea of who it was that had abandoned the sled here, though he admitted to himself that it could have been anyone. If the passengers had had any sense, then they too would have journeyed towards the coast. “Okay, so what’s the plan?” he said, somewhat reluctantly.

  “I’ve got a set of wheels we can use,” Natalia said. “Over this way.”

  “If it’s just a vehicle we need, then there are plenty of cars—”

  “It’s a Sabretooth,” Natalia said. “Military vehicle; well-armoured.”

  The pair started over to where Natalia had indicated, and it wasn’t long before Dodds spotted her proposed method of transportation, ploughed into a tree up ahead. His first impression of it was that it looked like a four-seater recreational vehicle, though a lot larger and appearing a great deal more heavily armoured. A body was slouched half in, half out of the driver’s seat, and Dodds saw that the man had been shot in the back of head, the bullet having penetrated the helmet he wore.

  The tree the Sabretooth had struck was a great deal smaller than the others around it, with a far thinner trunk than its neighbours. It had barely managed to halt the advance of the Sabretooth and now rested at a shallow angle, no longer fully upright. Many of its roots had burst forth from the ground, splitting apart the soil above them, and looking like the thrashing limbs of an angry octopus.

  “Looks like a dune buggy’s bigger, badder, older brother,” Dodds said, looking over the Sabretooth. It wasn’t quite what he had expected when Natalia had said military. Though a roll cage surrounded it, the open-topped nature of the vehicle was already making him feel overly exposed, even before he had sat down. It was a far cry from the safety provided by the fully enclosed cockpit of the starfighters he was used to, even less so in the absence of an encasing energy shield.

  “It’s a type of light strike vehicle,” Natalia said. “Used for reconnaissance missions and that sort of thing.”

  “Do you know how to drive one of these?” Dodds said, examining the driver, to determine if there was any chance that the man might still be alive. There wasn’t, so he
pulled the man’s body from the seat, dragging him over to one side of the tree, where he laid him down.

  “A couple of times,” Natalia said, “but we need to get it started first.”

  “Where’s the key?”

  “I’ve got it,” Natalia said. She reached into a trouser pocket and removed a small, wallet-sized card-like object. It was mostly grey, save for a handful of symbols and an embedded chip, which added speckles of colour to the surface. “And I’ve also got this.”

  She held out her hand and Dodds picked up the small object that lay in her palm. He turned it around in his hand, eyeing it closely. Its overall shape was mostly cylindrical, with a number of light blue, disc-like protrusions covering the midsection. The main body was white, with black numbers and lettering circling the top portion, which, unlike the bottom half, which tapered into several prong-like points, was levelled off.

  “Where did you get this?” he asked.

  “I removed it from the engine.”

  “Did you happen to remove it from a bit of the engine that was labelled, ‘No user serviceable parts inside’?”

  “Isn’t it just some sort of spark plug?”

  “No,” Dodds said, chuckling as he rolled it between his fingers. “It’s part of the hydrogen regulator.”

  “Is it important?”

  “You could say that,” Dodds nodded, wagging the little component at the blonde woman. “Good thing you didn’t try to drive without this. You’d have gone about five miles before the engine had overheated and the whole thing had just packed up. Then again, given that this is a military vehicle, the engine would probably have exploded and taken the rest of it along with it.”

  “Ahhh,” Natalia said, “so now you’re a mechanic, as well as a pilot?” A smile had appeared on her face for the first time since the two had met. It might have been nicer, if it weren’t for the bloodied split on her lower lip.

  Dodds chuckled again, finding it hard not to return the smile. “No, I just learned a few things from my dad, when we were fixing up the trucks. I never found it particularly interesting, to tell you the truth.”

  “Are trucks a big part of what he does?”

  “Not really,” Dodds said, with a shrug. “But I would just pitch in to fix up whatever needed to be done, really.”

  “Good,” Natalia said, moving around to the driver’s side. “You can give me a hand fixing up this one, then.” She fumbled around by the driver’s seat and popped the bonnet, before joining Dodds around the front and showing him where she had removed the component, so that he could replace it.

  As he did so, he looked over the rest of the engine, applying what general mechanics knowledge he had to help them get the Sabretooth up and running. “How long were you up that tree?” he asked, his eyes flickering over the many components.

  “Not long. I climbed up when I saw you crossing the park. Well, okay; to tell the truth, I didn’t really think you were one of them, but I couldn’t take any chances.”

  “I hear you,” Dodds said, examining a number of cables and checking that they had not come uncoupled during the Sabretooth’s altercation with the tree.

  “I was up this one a lot longer.” She jerked her head up at the canopy of branches above them. “I thought maybe they had come to try and start the Sabretooth again, even though they couldn’t the first time. They’d need to either push it all the way across the park or collect it with a lander.”

  “I wouldn’t put it past them to just pick it up and carry it themselves,” Dodds said, turning to look at Natalia. She gave a knowing, uneasy nod of agreement, but said nothing. Dodds went back to scrutinizing the engine, poking and prodding at various components. “So, were you part of another team? What happened to them? Did you get separated?”

  Natalia said nothing at first, and Dodds eventually looked up to meet the sorrow in her eyes. She simply nodded back the way they had come, to the numerous bodies that were scattered intermittently across the grass. Though he couldn’t make out any specific uniforms, Dodds knew that they must be there.

  “I was with a reconnaissance team,” Natalia said. “We were trying to pinpoint troop landers and the smaller groups of Enemy detachments. We couldn’t hope to fight the number of soldiers filling the streets, so the battle had become a matter of attrition.

  “When we came to the park, we saw a couple of children trapped inside an overturned car. But as we headed over to help them, the soldiers just came running out of the trees. I’ve never seen them employ a tactic like that before – using bait. We were right out in the open and had nowhere to head for cover. They just used the trees. As if they aren’t hard enough to take down as it is.

  “When my team started to fall, they just told me to run, saying they’d cover me. I dropped my rifle and went as fast as I could. When I spotted the Sabretooth up against the tree, I knew it was going to be the only way for me to escape. I removed the ident keycard and that bit from the engine, and then jumped up the tree.”

  “Sorry,” Dodds said.

  “I was right above them when they came over to the Sabretooth. They didn’t see me, though, they were far more interested in trying to get it running. Three of them stood around for a full half-hour, trying to start the engine. In the end, they gave up and headed off. I waited nearly another hour before I thought it was safe to come back down. I was actually more worried that I was going to fall, than them spotting me.”

  Dodds couldn’t think of anything to say. He nodded and turned his full attention back to the engine. He looked over it for a few more minutes, before he stood back and eyeballed it one last time. He then reached up and slammed down the hood, satisfied that the engine was in good working order, as far as he could tell, anyway. “Right, give that a go.”

  Natalia said nothing. She didn’t appear to hear him, or even be aware that he was still with her. She was staring over in the direction that she had said that her team-mates had fallen.

  “Natalia?”

  She looked around to him, as if snapping out of a trance. “Hmm?”

  “You okay?”

  “Oh, I … I’m fine.”

  Dodds didn’t think so. She looked a little upset. “Did you see someone?”

  “No, no one.” She nodded at the Sabretooth. “Are we ready?”

  “Yeah, give her a go.”

  Dodds watched as the young woman walked over to the driver’s side and slipped into the seat. She inserted the ident card into a slot on the dashboard and then attempted to start the engine. A single push of a button was all that was required to prove that the Sabretooth was up and running. The engine roared into life, components lighting up all along the dashboard.

  Dodds bounded around to the front passenger side and hopped into the seat, as Natalia reversed the vehicle away from the tree and swung it around. She pressed her foot down on the accelerator and the Sabretooth leapt forward, tearing up the short grass beneath it. She continued for a time, and then slowed, bringing the vehicle to a near-halt.

  “What’s up?” Dodds said.

  “I want to collect my team’s id tags,” she said.

  Dodds detected a hint of sadness in her voice. Or was it regret?

  Natalia drove them over to where a group of bodies lay and exited the vehicle, before starting to go through their clothes, removing a number of small card-like objects. Dodds joined her in her search, crouching down over the blooded body of a man. He unbuttoned a small, rectangular pocket on the shoulder, slipping out the card that resided within. It featured a photograph of the man’s face, his name and rank, as well as what appeared to be a serial number, running along the bottom. A small microchip caught the sun as he began to turn it in his hand.

  “No, don’t.”

  He turned to Natalia, who had moved on to another of her fallen comrades. She wore a look of hurt.

  “I need to do this by myself,” she added.

  Dodds paused for a moment, before returning the card to its owner’s shoulder pocket. Natalia s
oon came to collect that one too, then indicated that she was done.

  “Where did you drop your rifle?” Dodds said, scanning the ground for signs of the weapon.

  “They’ve taken it,” Natalia said, climbing back into the Sabretooth. “They took all the weapons.”

  Dodds returned to the passenger seat, Natalia revving the engine and starting off once more. He looked to one of the screens on the dashboard, which was displaying a map of the city. Natalia was heading west, towards the iron gates he had passed through upon entering the park.

  “You planning on circling around? Isn’t there an eastern exit to this place that’ll let us get to the coast easier?”

  “We’re going north,” Natalia said. “That’s where we’ll find friendly forces.”

  Dodds shook his head. “No, wait. My squadron came down on the coast, along with the other evacuees from my carrier. I need to meet them there.”

  “If we go to the coast, then we’ll only be putting our own lives in danger,” Natalia said. “The whole east side of the city was crawling with soldiers just a few hours ago. It’s doubtful they wouldn’t have seen you all come down.”

  Dodds was flabbergasted. “Natalia, turn around!”

  “No, it’s too dangerous,” she said, maintaining the same calm voice.

  “I can’t leave them there to die!”

  “They’re probably already dead.” Natalia snapped, sharp eyes turning to him. “As I keep saying, it’s too dangerous to go that way. And even if we get there, all you’re likely to find waiting for you is a pile of bodies!”

  Dodds was stunned by the way the woman had flared. Had he touched a nerve? He sat quietly for a moment, searching for a way to prove her wrong. He couldn’t find any.