by Unknown
The Elsys
Having at last achieved launch range, the skyline of Star Harbor hung before them, a landscape that had no natural place in the void of space, yet there it was. Admiral Arham could only imagine the chaos that was in full swing down there. Air raid sirens howling. Traffic clogging streets that led ultimately to nowhere. There was no safe place to be. For all of the terraforming involved, it was still essentially nothing more than a glorified space station.
Civilian and commercial craft could be seen attempting to pull away from the docks, making a run for the traffic lanes. Some of the smaller vessels had actually managed to reach open space, and were speeding away toward Earth. They were of little interest to him.
“Where is your glorious navy now?” He taunted.
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The six light cruisers that constituted the station’s only defense force were opening fire, their feeble gun mounts spraying low-intensity rounds that bounced harmlessly off of the Elsys’ hull.
“Forward batteries, take them out.” Arham ordered.
All it took was a single, well-placed shot from the rail gun on each of the cruisers. High velocity plasma punched straight through their command towers, causing explosive decompression. The cruisers were rendered helpless, and floated stationary. Nothing more than so much junk in the path of the Elsys to be shunted out of the way. There were likely survivors still in the pressurized areas of the engineering plants below. That, too, would be dealt with.
“Launch the squadron.”
Fighters began taking off in quick succession, assuming formations according to their wing assignments. Each attack wing would handle a different portion of the harbor. On their way in, the jet-shuttles destroyed the disabled cruisers, ensuring that no one was left to live to tell the tale.
Behind Arham, the Tracking officer called out, “Admiral, the Terran LHA has destroyed our interceptor, and is closing fast!”
Arham growled with aggravation, looking at the over-monitor. Sure enough, it was beat up, but pressing closer nonetheless. This one was proving a worthy adversary.
“Aft tubes, launch a full salvo at them!”
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The Belleau Wood
The Tracking tech jumped as an alert tone sounded from her station, followed by a data stream that scrolled down the monitor.
“Missile launch detected!” She shouted involuntarily. “Multiple contacts, bearing dead ahead! Range, nine hundred, and closing fast!”
“How many?” Robert demanded as the roar of the Phalanx system filled the Bridge. Space ahead of them was washed in an undulated river of blue energy.
“Six!”
The display of power out there began to flash with explosions, as the missiles were being struck. He counted a pair in rapid succession, then another. That left three, and they were dangerously close. No room to attempt an evasive turn.
Another burst. Then a fifth, ever nearer.
The remaining missile was feinting and dodging with incredible dexterity, somehow managing to avoid being hit. The sonar-like pinging came faster and faster.
“It’s acquiring on us…”The Tracking tech stated. “Acquiring….” She turned to face Robert.
“Sir, it’s locked on.”
It was also inside their firing zone.
Robert and Ghent watched breathlessly as it made one final arc upward, high above them, then veered sharply downward. It punched effortlessly through the flight deck at amidships, leaving a neat hole behind it from which its own accelerant, and a puff of escaping atmosphere jetted out
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In that first instant, nothing seemed to happen. Time slowed to an unnatural slowness. The officers each heard their hearts complete a beat. Then time sped up, back to normal with merciless intensity.
The flight deck actually bubbled upward, as if ready to pop, flame shooting from the hole. The metal melted around the puncture, sealing it. Somehow, possibly through an act of God, the deck and surrounding hull held fast. The entire ship shuddered horribly as a low, menacing rumble of thunder vibrated the deck and bulkheads. The lights dimmed, came back, dimmed again. The ventilation system stopped.
The Bridge shared a moment of strange quiet. People looked at one another with uncertainty.
Ghent whispered to Robert, “Looks like it wasn’t a nuke.”
They were thinking the same thing. Had they gotten lucky? Perhaps the warhead was a dud, and hadn’t detonated.
The over-monitor crushed those hopes, though, as it brought the 1MC to life.
“Fire! Fire! Fire! Uncontrolled fire amidships, all decks! Frames nineteen through twenty-five! Away the damage control parties away!”
The fire bell rang loudly throughout the ship.
Robert and Ghent stood beside the Air boss, peering down onto the flight deck. The launch section was rendered useless with that huge section buckled upward. That meant there would be no launching the jet-shuttles. There was a helicopter attack squadron parked in the hanger bay that could be brought into play, though. They weren’t out of the fight just yet.
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The Helm officer came over to where they stood, a pale expression on his face.
“Captain, we’ve lost steering and drive control. We’re dead in the water, so to speak.”
Cursing, Robert moved to his command over-monitor, and pulled up an initial damage report that was displayed on the large plotting table. The officers gathered around it, immediately disillusioned at what they discovered.
Ghent pointed to an area of the schematic flashing red, “My God! We’ve practically been hollowed out!”
Robert sighed deeply, “That explosion took out the forward main machinery room, the aviation support platforms, and most of the crew area.”
The Air Boss had been on a handset. He cupped a hand over the receiver, and spoke with a voice that was empty of feeling.
“The hanger bay, and our entire air wing is gone.”
“Shit.” Robert swallowed hard. “We’re no longer combat effective.”
The captain looked desperately out the forward view port, at the Storian carrier bearing down on Star Harbor.
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Star Harbor
Air raid sirens were indeed howling throughout the city.
Uptown was a scene of chaos as automobiles clogged the streets. People swarmed the sidewalks, carrying their possessions, children, and pets. Terrified faces looked upward as Storian fighter-bombers roared through the artificial sky. Far off explosions thundered through the jungle of concrete and steel, echoing, fading only to be replaced by others. The ground shook beneath their feet.
The elevated tram sped past on its magnetic tracks, ferrying frightened citizens to the docks. As it cleared the tall buildings of the city, the view opened before the operator, casting fear in his heart. The big, tree-lined park was filled with people who had been able to run no further. The crowds clustered on the grass, jostling one another to reach the high point of a knoll. They were trying to see what the operator of the tram had a horrifically clear view of.
The industrial side of the harbor was aflame. Not just a warehouse here and there, but all of it. Every structure had been torn asunder, and was alive with dancing fires. Beyond, the piers of the harbor were invisible behind a solid sheet of black smoke. The curtain of darkness was rising toward the zenith of the atmospheric dome, curving outward, spreading. Like a blanket of death. Already, the sunlight was taking on a reddish hue.
Fighter jets sent rockets blazing into the sides of tankers, and other civilian craft attempting to flee the harbor. Some were still moored at the piers, trying to load more passengers. One large cargo vessel canted under the force of being hit, and began to fall back down toward the docks, pulled by the artificial gravity. It struck with incredible destructive power, sending a roiling cloud of smoke and fire out across the already ruined district.
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Bombers were pounding the power station, carpet bombing across the site. The electricity wavered, an
d failed. The tram began to slow, then lacking the magnetic field, dropped down on the tracks, screeching to a sparking halt. Passengers in the cars screamed in terror as they rocked back and forth in the hard stop.
The operator hit the emergency release, and all of the doors hissed open. He was about to yell for everyone to flee to safety, as they had luckily been stopped at a low point, where the tracks were in the ground. There was only a slight incline, and a grassy run leading out toward the big park.
Unfortunately, there was no time for that. No chance to even yell. A jet-shuttle was coming right at them, diving from above. It fired its machine guns, and plasma strafed across the tram from front to back, shredding the rooftops of the cars. Butchering the passengers within.
From the front, the operator crawled out, one agonizing pull at a time, dragging himself forward with his arms. His legs were hamburger, leaving a path of gore as he gained inch on painful inch. He fell from the door of the locomotive car, and plopped heavily down on the gravel bank, not even feeling anymore pain below the waist. He drew his last breath looking at the ruddy sky. It escaped his lips with a gurgling sound, his lungs filling with blood.
This was filmed from the city park. A GNN crew had happened to be on the harbor in preparations for the Thanksgiving Day parade later that month. The crew was now among the thousands congregating among the grass and trees, huddling in fear as their world fell apart.
They captured some great footage, making the reporter certain that some sort of award was in his near future. All of it was being transmitted live. The attack went on for well over a half hour before waning. At long last, the fighters appeared to be regrouping, heading off for the curve of the smoke-filled dome.
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“It looks as if the Storians are pulling back,” the reporter said into his microphone as the camera followed.
They panned around, trying to provide as much a view as possible. Day had become dusk, the sky choking with clouds of smoke. It was beginning to become difficult to breath. The acrid smell of burning metal, rubber, and heaven-knew what else burned at throats and nostrils. The city skyline was burning. The docks were burning. The park was surrounded by a ring of orange fire, capped by the blanket of toxic smoke.
The cameraman panned downward, catching the smudged, tear-streaked face of a little girl, no more than two or three years old. She clutched desperately at her mother. The little girl’s face turned upward, her eyes attracted by something bright. The camera followed.
The image of a missile trail arcing down from above the smoke filled TV screens across the allied system. Billions of viewers witnessed the sky going white, and the transmission ending in a wash of static.
A nuclear explosion wiped everything clean in an instant.
The atmospheric dome gone, and the entire crux of what was once Star Harbor swept away, all that remained was the engineering portion beneath. The concave disc of ruined metal began a slow, spiraling descent toward the moon’s surface, now victim to the weak lunar gravity.
The fall lasted a lifetime. The ruins trailing sparkling, flaming debris that winked out in the cold vacuum of space behind it. Directly below, those that called the Lunar Array home watched their doom filling the sky above them.
The collision shook the lunar surface, the quake spreading far beyond the plateau on which the colony had been built. Dust spewed from beneath the wreckage.
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Above it all, the Storian carrier recalled its fighters, regrouped with its remaining destroyer escort, and veered away. The task force began steaming in the direction of Earth, and its last meager line of defense.
The Belleau Wood
Twenty-four year old Timothy Corbin was fighting desperately to save his ship.
The young lieutenant, clad in firefighting gear, was taking his turn at the nozzle for his damage control party. He swept the nozzle in circles over the corridor ahead while his crew supported the weight of the hose behind him.
The bulkheads were actually emitting a soft glow, they were so hot. The actual flames were, in fact, still held at bay behind the airtight hatch at the end of the passageway. The incredible heat threatened to ignite burnable material on this side of the beam. The air was literally wavering as a hot road would do. Foam gathered ankle-deep around their boots, the only thing keeping the metal deck plates cool enough to stand on.
The hose man directly behind Timothy tapped him of the shoulder with a gloved hand, shouting to be heard through the re-breather helmet.
“Sir, why hasn’t the Bridge opened the hull seals?”
Timothy wiped foam from his visor, and shrugged. He had been wondering that very same thing. In the event of an uncontrolled fire, it was standard procedure to seal the affected compartments, and vent the oxygen into space, thus extinguishing
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the problem all at once. It was easier, and safer to regenerate the lost atmosphere. Otherwise, as in this case, it seemed, the fire would continue to spread, and possibly consume air faster than the generators could produce it. It could actually gut a starship, if left too long.
For some reason unknown to the lieutenant, that act had not been carried out by the Bridge. He ticked off the possibilities in his head as he kept spraying the foam mixture. It could have been that the explosion had so buckled the compartments involved that the pressure seals were not able to isolate that section from the rest of the ship. Perhaps the mechanical controls had failed, which would be the case if the main MMR had been compromised. Lastly, and one reason that he preferred not to believe, was the possibility that the Bridge and the CIC had been disabled.
That last thought sent chills up his spine, as it was the more difficult to discount at the moment. Communication with those entities had been knocked out, and runners sent to establish a line had yet to return. He envisioned his father having been killed, and just as quickly chased the image from his mind.
He hunched forward, and tried to advance, spraying furiously. Cooling the bulkheads would not eliminate the problem. They needed to reach those flames.
While Timothy led his team from the forward section of the ship, fighting toward the center, Chief Engineer Carter was doing the same from the aft portion. His crew was combatting actual flames from their position, practically on their knees in the gathering foam mixture to stay below the undulating sheets of fire, and blinding smoke rolling above their heads. The lighting was out where they were, but that was no problem, as the dancing glow of the fire
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provided all the illumination they needed.
The bulkheads were singed black, and the airtight hatch at the end of the corrider lay cockeyed at an angle, hanging only by a single, bent hinge. Beyond roared a curtain of flame that radiated into the white spectrum, the heat was so intense. Their chemical spray was evaporating into thin air before it.
Chief Carter took a tentative step, or at least tried to, realizing that the rubber composite seal of his helmet was beginning to melt, as was the bottom of his boots. There would be no winning against this kind if onslaught.
“Fall back!” He ordered. “We need to seal off this frame!”
They began to retreat, still spraying while they stepped backward, hauling the heavy hose as they went. Chief Carter noticed that the smoke seemed to abruptly begin to pile downward from the ceiling, and that the air pressure seemed to shift, becoming thicker. Slipping, trying to keep a foothold, unable to see clearly in the dense smoke. The roar of the flames was frightening beyond words.
Carter felt a moment of relief when they came alongside the hose station. That meant that they were almost to the end of the frame.
Shouting started from behind, drawing his attention.
“What is it?”
“It’s sealed!” Someone shouted. “The damn hatch has closed us in!”
Carter dropped the hose nozzle, and muscled his way past the other men on the team. He was blind standing up all the way, but it provided the best leverage against the pressure bar.
With all of his might, all of his body weight, Carter was still unable to make the
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release bar budge. Panic began to rise. The corridor was growing hotter by the second, enough for it to begin to be felt through their suits.
He squeezed the transmit button on his helmet so hard that it nearly popped, and shouted fruitlessly for the Bridge, the CIC, the AIMD locker. Anyone. The line remained quite dead. His men were pounding on the sealed hatch with their gloved fists. Yelling. Begging for help.
Carter forced his way to the hatch again, and pulled mightily on the lever. The man nearest to him even through his weight on it as well, but their effort was for naught. The chief, exhausted and light-headed, peered through the tiny port window. The last thing that he saw before losing consciousness were the words stenciled on the bulkhead across the way.
MUNITIONS LOCKER
The heat and pressure in the corridor reached a flash point, and the very air ignited. The agonized screams of his fire team went unheard. Their brutal deaths came mercifully quickly.
On the Bridge, Captain Corbin and Commander Ghent stood before a tactical display, arms folded, studying the colored schematic of the ship. A huge, red circle enveloped the entire center of the image, signifying sections that had succumbed to either the explosion, or the resulting fires that the missile strike had produced. Ribbons of yellow laced out to adjoining corridors and compartments, areas that were in the nearest danger of following suit.
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“What we’re seeing here is nothing short of a miracle,” Ghent stated matter-of-factly.
The master chief joined them at the table, sweat sopping his brow. His shirt was soaked as well. He had been running from one Damage Control station to another, trying to glean as much information on the ship’s status as he could with the communications down.
“It’s bad, Sirs,” he panted, helping himself to the nearest coffee cup, and gulping the contents down.