by Hugo Huesca
“What in the unholy shit happened with him?” asked Walpurgis. “He’s saying the same shit he did before, but now—fuck—I actually believe he may carry it out.”
“It’s like the Singularity happened backward,” Beard whispered. “That’s why the Signal won’t let Cole play with his own code. You change one thing without knowing what you’re doing and you become something else. If that something else changes a bit of its code… and this repeats over and over again…”
Abomination, the other Translator, the Visitor, had called it. A cancer that’s contagious.
The ships rushing for us weren’t so far away anymore. I could see them clearly on screen. Their cabins were empty. Space rippled around them, leaving swaths of darkness damaged, as if melted. The game was dying.
More ships followed behind them. Too many to count on the map. But the green dots were mobilizing, giving them chase.
“We’re engaging!” I exclaimed. Whatever Keles was, I was anxious for it to stop existing.
I launched a pair of torpedoes without a lock on the starships. I wanted them to dodge—make them break formation—so we could pick them off one by one. Instead, one of the fighters shot forward and kamikazed itself against the shots.
The starships and the remaining escorts reached targeting distance. The Teddy’s computer blared alarms informing us several lock-ons were being placed on our asses. Rylena cursed and started to run interference.
At any other point, with any other objective, I’d have simply flown back and put more distance between us. Waited for reinforcements. Let my crew do their job and get us an advantage.
This was not a normal battle. Our objective was behind those starships. Still, I wasn’t about to face them head on.
“Walps, iron-sight straight to the point between us and them,” I announced.
“Got it.”
I gunned down another pair of torpedoes. Before they completed their arc, just before the spot where Walpurgis was aiming, I told her, “Shoot them down!”
She did so without hesitation. She pressed the trigger two seconds before the torpedoes appeared on her targeting reticule, and the laser beams hit them square on.
The explosion was silent, but it hid the Keles-ships from us in a radioactive cloud. Our flight computer flickered for a second, stunned, trying to find them again between the storm of interference.
Here goes nothing. The advantage we had over Keles was that every mook of his was a copy of himself. No different tactics, no innovation from fighter to fighter. Just the same, genocidal maniac.
The fighters would rush the torpedo’s cloud blind, either to stop us from launching more torpedoes from the dark, and to rush us down, or to simply gain time for the starships to get close to ramming range.
Instead of playing by his rules, I steered the Teddy toward the cloud before it had a chance to dissipate, punched the acceleration to its maximum, I unloaded a string of flares a couple hundred clicks before we reached the dissipating reaction. At the exact same time, I pushed the flight controls all the way up.
We were vertical now, the cabin looking north of our former x-axis. Momentum was still very much on the side of our former flight path, though, so the Teddy kept moving forward like a giant dolphin doing tricks in a pool.
I used the oxygen streams to reduce our horizontal momentum, slowing us down, but allowing the engines to propel us over the cloud instead of going through it.
The flares, meanwhile, went straight into it.
A second passed. The cloud dissipated…and then several simultaneous explosions occurred below us.
“What just happened?” asked Beard. He had been holding on to his controls for dear life during all the maneuvering and looked ready to throw up. “The fighters are gone.”
“Keles just got baited,” Rylena laughed.
“I assumed he was going to try to ram us down,” I explained. “That’s more or less what he’s been doing since the Algernon, right? The flares made the fighters’ flight computers think the Teddy was in the middle of the explosion. So they rammed it together.”
“Oh,” Beard said. The color was quickly returning to his hair-covered face. “They blew themselves up? What a bunch of noobs.”
I corrected course downward, looking for the two starships. They had gone opposite directions during their fighter’s mad rush—when we located them we had already passed them. One made a sharp turn in the direction of the other, and the second ship went for a longer curve that allowed it to keep more speed during the change of direction.
It was a classic chase move, they were getting into formation. The slower ship would be wingman to the one going the fastest, and from there they’d try to outmaneuver the Teddy.
They were missing just one tiny detail.
I had little interest in killing two random Keles-ships. The prize was in front of me.
“Divert shield power to engines,” I ordered. “Rylena, can you jam their controls for a second?”
“Of course.”
Beard took care of the power transfer, and without wasting time I hit the accelerator at full capacity. Rylena’s interference stopped the ships from reacting in time.
The Teddy propelled itself through space as fast as it could go, and the starships behind us were out of radar range—ours and their own—before they had time to react.
“That was so satisfying,” Mai whispered. “Like giving them a virtual middle finger.”
Validore was near.
The map of the system updated itself with enemy dots as they came into radar range. We had reached the bulk of the battle.
We didn’t have to wait long before the screens picked up the live-feed.
“Oh, damn,” one of us whispered.
Dreadnoughts from the PDF were covered in flames, their shields long gone, fighting in close-quarter-range with one or two Keles-dreadnoughts (guess what they looked like) at the same time.
Keles’ copy ships were much weaker than the player’s, so the Dreadnought-level cannons of the PDF did immense damage with each pass, overloading shields and armor at the same time.
I saw how one volley of plasma cannons reduced a fresh black-and-orange dreadnought to smoking cinders, and how a straight shot from a railgun pierced another one from end to end and kept going straight into another’s midsection which was instantly engulfed in plasma.
Battleships half the size of the massive titans flew into, and away, from their threat ranges and did battle among themselves, trying to keep their enemy’s Dreadnought defenders out of position, so their own fighter squads could pull bombing runs on the Dreadnought’s shields, making them vulnerable to their own force’s capitol cannons.
I realized the colors on the hulls of the player-base fighting Keles was too varied to belong only to the PDF. I saw the neon purple-and-pink of Spark Bandit’s companions, the gold of the Noobhunter Empire, the military green of the SuperSoldier Association—even the Posse of Iron made an appearance. Hundreds more that I didn’t recognize were surrounding the Zodia System, with more arriving each passing minute.
Lone-wolf players were here, their ships painted with their own personal insignias and designs. I saw enough movie and book franchises flying side by side to make any Sci-Fi convention salivate with envy.
A Borg Cube (scaled size) was busy absorbing a crippled Keles battleship while a dozen X-Wings flew around it, keeping the desperate Keles fighters away.
Several Enterprises were chasing down retreating black-and-orange starships with their engines burning. The Battlestar Galactica joined the fray and cut off the retreat of the Keles-clones and bolstered the merry band of Enterprises as they murdered every single starship.
A carrier from the Gundam franchise passed right on top of the Teddy and engaged an approaching Keles-station that was trying to fry the Teddy’s flight computer.
There were more fan-mods than I could recognize.
It was such an impressive sight we couldn’t stop ourselves from commenting
on it while we flew towards the golden dot of Validore in the distance.
“That’s Serenity rescuing a Star Destroyer from getting boarded,” Beard pointed. Serenity was tiny by comparison to the Destroyer, but its crew didn’t seem to have gotten the memo and was fighting like it was ten ships instead of one.
“Over there,” Walpurgis pointed out. “That’s a goddamn Macross Super Dimension Fortress. I wonder if its crew went to the trouble of adding the mecha mode.”
Turns out, they had. Walpurgis whistled as it transformed in front of our very eyes.
Mai pointed out a cluster of modern space-sim ships that had been imported into Rune that got my attention. The pilots were some of the best in the game and they were fighting as one single, cohesive squad that had rivaled the PDF’s organization. “Their leader is an EVE veteran,” Mai explained. “This is just another Friday night to him.”
“No Starcraft so far,” Rylena said, slightly disappointed.
I zoomed in on a far corner of the battle. “Over there,” I told her, “that’s a Terran Battlecruiser, right?”
It was the one with the giant railgun as its main weapon. It had a squad of Wraith fighters covering its path towards Validore, fighting off incoming Keles all the while.
“It’s perfect,” Rylena said dreamily.
I looked at the entire scene and agreed. It was perfect. So many people together. Even when everyone knew what was at stake, I couldn’t help but think we were having a blast.
We joined the fight with glee as the Teddy crossed the distance to Validore. For several minutes, we flew side by side with the rest of the players, having the Teddy join forces here and there with everyone who needed a hand. We stopped boarding attempts, evaded missile runs, shorted battleship’s drone defense systems, and evaded the rain of cannon fire from the Keles dreadnoughts.
The Teddy’s turrets spat laser fire for so long that we had to slow down to let the generators keep the pace, and the missile bay ran dry.
We took down so many enemy spacecraft that I lost count of the Skill rank increments. They were coming in batches now.
If Keles hadn’t been able to spit more clones than he lost by the second, he’d have been stopped right then and there.
But he was able to. And the entire player-base wouldn’t be able to hold him for long.
His counter-attacks became bolder. Our strikes started to slow down. The density of fire started shifting to orange-colored beams.
“He’s spawning more ships than what he started with,” Rylena said as she inspected the reports of a hundred different players. “More powerful each time. With more weapons, better shields…”
Far in the distance, one of the Enterprises went down in flames, hounded by an overwhelming swarm of fighters.
The Noobhunter Empire’s fleet crumbled when a massive dive-bomb of suicide starships broke their lines and crippled their flagship.
Shields everywhere struggled to hold on and died, engines shut down, entire decks were engulfed by plasma fire.
Attrition was a bitch.
And for every Keles-ship that we downed, another hundred appeared on the map.
“He’s about to explode in numbers,” Rylena announced. “The Terran Federation just announced that Argus has been overwhelmed. The fight on Earth is going badly.”
“How long until we reach Validore?” asked Mai.
“Less than two minutes in a straight line,” I said. “But Keles has too many ships in Validore’s range.”
I looked at Rylena and told her, “We aren’t going to make it. We need a plan.”
She held my gaze and nodded. “On it.”
While the Teddy evaded the railgun potshots of a couple distant dreadnoughts, Rylena focused on the map. For a few long seconds, no one dared speak, lest we distracted her.
David and I exchanged nervous glances. “Can you rebuild a ship if they shoot us down?” I whispered at him over a private channel. The Teddy’s shields were barely holding at 25%
“Maybe. But by that point, we’ll have already lost.”
Rylena turned to Mai. “Get me a channel with Crestienne.”
The PDF’s leader appeared in front of us shortly afterward.
“It’s you,” she greeted us phlegmatically. Crestienne was commanding the PDF’s attack from a command vessel far-removed from combat. “I hope the Terrance gambit paid off, Dorsett. The State’s efforts to stop Keles by other means didn’t…go as we needed.”
The lines of worry running on her forehead were new. It was the first time I’d seen Crestienne scared.
“It did,” said Rylena. She moved the screen so Crestienne could see David, who waved happily at her. “But we need to reach the Core at Validore if we’re to stop Keles in time.”
Crestienne nodded. “I can get the Alliances to strike together at Keles’ defenses. Is that what you wanted me to say?”
“Yeah.”
“You’ll get your window. Don’t fuck this up, people. We’re counting on you.”
Crestienne cut the connection before we had a chance to say thanks.
“I’ve never seen her so stressed before,” said Mai.
“Shit is about to go FUBAR,” said Walpurgis. She had gone far above the 200 rank in Shooting, but she didn’t even care to brag anymore.
Yes, the situation was dire.
A gigantic plasma bolt flew so close to us the cabin’s lighting shut down for half a second. I stumbled blind with the controls and managed to evade a follow-up shot just by pure, blind luck.
The battleship that was firing on us went up in flames an instant later when Galactica charged in and rammed it from the side, spearing it with a brutal strike. Both ships went up in a huge explosion that engulfed all the fighters duking it out in their vicinity.
“They’re moving!” pointed out Beard. “This is the last charge, boys and girls. We’ll never see something like this again.”
Every ship, from capitol vessel to meager merchant trader, suddenly turned (taking catastrophic damage as they did so) to the same spot. Players everywhere went up in flames as the Keles-bots took advantage of it to shoot them with impunity.
With their friends going down in every direction, all Alliances pushed forward.
The Keles fleet that was accumulating in the planet’s orbit answered in force. Entire ammo stocks were depleted in seconds. The radar went down with the massive amount of jamming that was being launched in all directions.
The explosions blotted out the view of the battle, making it hard to see who was winning.
“Wait for it,” said Rylena. “We’re not close enough.”
“He’s fucking massacring them,” Walpurgis growled. “We’re going to lose!”
Rylena smiled savagely. “That’s exactly what he’s thinking. Look, he can’t resist the chance to show everyone how powerful he is…”
She’s right, I realized. The fleet was mobilizing. Moving away from Validore. Giving chase to the wounded players’ capitol ships, ramming the ones that still resisted, jamming whole squads of fighters into submission all at once.
“Just a bit more,” whispered Rylena.
I could almost feel Keles laughing as the desperate attack brushed against his never-ending defenses. More ships spawned over and over again, quickly dispatching even the Alliances that had been winning the fight a second ago.
The Keles-fleet was starting to claim the numerical advantage.
The Teddy dove into a maelstrom of laser fire and I had to pour every single bit of practice and talent as a pilot to keep us alive and flying. Flares went off until we had no more left. Shields fizzled and died. Mai, Rylena, and even David worked together to keep us from being jammed from simultaneous attempts.
An explosion shook the cabin when a glancing hit from a pursuing starship reached us. The Z-Alloy burned and blackened, and the hull of the Teddy was marred with a nasty scar. But it held.
Not for long…
Rylena struggled to her feet while the cabin’
s alarms bathed us in an intense red light. “There!” she exclaimed. “That’s our opening!”
The PDF led the charge, paying for it with most of their fleet. Battleships plunged carelessly into the swarm of Keles, paying little attention to their defenses and getting their hulls pummeled by bombing runs as a result.
Dreadnoughts died with the golden planet as a background, fighters went on suicide missions against their counterparts, looking to do as much damage as possible before the end.
The first anti-matter engine overloaded.
The screens were bathed in a flash of white light.
“They’re too clumped together,” whispered Beard. He looked at Rylena with pride. Keles had overextended in his winning run and was paying for it. “Masterful.”
Another PDF Dreadnought exploded. With it, it took five of Keles own Dreadnoughts. The one farthest away from the blast had its engines overload as well…
Explosions peppered the battlefield. The number of enemy Keles dropped dramatically, as did the PDF fleet.
This was the only chance we were going to get.
Before Keles had time to replenish his losses, I plunged the Teddy down the point in the middle of the PDF’s spearhead, a direct path to Validore bought with anti-matter.
He reacted by throwing everything our way. Crestienne’s Alliance used their own ships as shields for the Teddy, like they had done a long time ago, right over this very planet.
That time, though, I flew with a much different intention.
With explosions of anti-matter raging all around us right at the limit of the safe-zone, the Teddy danced in the storm of incoming plasma and laser fire, engines at full power and every weapon system roaring constantly.
The constant blare of the alarms in the cabin told me that the ship was reaching its limits. The generators were on fire, the Z-Alloy was barely holding together the left wing, and a curtain of smoke covered the view at the screens. Sparks went off in every direction and breaches and loss of pressure forced us to rely on our suits for breathing.
Rylena’s computers caught fire and died. Walpurgis’ turret disappeared when a laser blast reached them.