by Scott Baron
“Hot damn,” Sarah gasped. “Daisy, did we actually just––”
“Yep,” she replied. “But we can’t abuse it.”
“I know,” Sarah said. “But this trick could come in really handy.”
“If we don’t break the universe in the process,” Daisy replied.
“Well, yeah. I suppose there’s that.”
“Come on already. Suit up and get that thing, you two. Time’s a-wasting.”
The sisters quickly donned their space suits and made a quick moon walk, gathering up the fully functional warp orb and installing it in Freya’s drive system.
“Okay, big note to self, gang. We’ve gotta get that other orb from Chu and come back here eventually.”
They all locked that task away in their minds, then plotted a course back to Dark Side. Back to their waiting friends.
Moments later, Freya popped into the clear space a ways beyond Earth’s moon.
“Look at them all,” Sarah marveled. “We captured a lot of ships.”
“Yeah, but at what price?” Daisy wondered. “If they warped here, that means the improved warp drives from other vessels had to be retrofitted. How many ships did we leave behind?”
It was a question the answer to which would have to wait.
For the time being, Daisy wanted nothing more than to land safely at Dark Side. After that they could deal with the rest.
Freya dropped Daisy and Sarah off before heading to her fabrication hangar for some alone time.
“Losing that little project ship of hers really seems to have upset her,” Sarah noted as the powerful AI quietly flew to her room.
“Yeah, I noticed,” Daisy agreed. “She must’ve really put a lot of time and effort into it. You know how she can get with her projects once inspiration hits her.”
“Yeah.”
Daisy spotted Vince and George loading gear into the Váli across Hangar Two, right where she thought they’d be. The run to Taangaar would be a hairy one, but with Mal and Captain Harkaway at the helm, dropping Chithiid and operating remote drone ships, Daisy felt a great confidence that they’d be successful.
The Ra’az wouldn’t know what hit them, and the loyalists on the ground would be taken by surprise. And a small armada of disposable drones would be a wonderful tool to further confuse the enemy.
Daisy walked quickly across the hangar deck, wrapping her arms around Vince and planting a big kiss on him.
“Wow. What’s that for?”
“Just because,” she said, a happy smile firmly plastered to her face.
“Well, I’ve gotta be getting down to Virginia,” George said, dusting off his hands. “Lots to do,” he said, flashing Vince a wink.
“What’s that all about?” Daisy asked as she watched her mechanical friend walk away.
“Oh, just a couple of guys shooting the shit,” Vince said. “And we were having an interesting discussion about cyborg physiology.”
“Really? Tell me all about it,” Daisy said.
“Alas, much is still a mystery to me. But human physiology I’d be more than happy to review with you,” he said, planting a warm kiss on Daisy’s lips.
Chapter Seventeen
Daisy was grabbing a bite in the mess hall when she got word that Marty and Arlo had returned. The whole base was abuzz after their arrival, it seemed.
“What’s going on?” Sarah asked as she joined Daisy and the throng of people hustling down the corridors of Dark Side toward the hangar.
“I don’t know,” Daisy replied. “Mrazich had Barry come and tell me personally that the kid was back. Said I needed to get down there and be part of the debrief. He also said he would be summoning all of the fleet leaders for a vid conference in a few hours.”
“Dang, that’s a lot of hustle for a simple scouting run. You think he found something?”
“Seems pretty obvious,” Sarah quipped. “For someone like Mrazich to react that way? Yeah, Arlo found something, all right.”
Daisy pushed through the murmuring crowd when they reached the hangar doors. Barry was standing in the doorway, his cybernetic frame blocking anyone from entering.
“Daisy. Sarah. I am glad you were able to make it here so quickly.”
“Well, you did kinda stress the urgency of it,” Daisy said.
“Yes, I suppose I did,” he said with that odd little smile of his. “Please, come in and join the others. They are about to debrief Marty and Arlo.”
“Big news, then?” Sarah asked.
“Better you get it directly from the source,” the cyborg said, stepping aside and letting them pass, then returning to his doorman duties.
They found Arlo seated outside of Marty’s stealthy mass, a cup of cocoa in his hands. He looked more than a little shaken. Vince, Chu, Mrazich, and Harkaway were also there.
“Hey, bud, you okay?” Daisy asked, ruffling the teen’s hair.
She got a little whiff of his cocoa. There was definitely something a bit stronger than milk and chocolate in it. Vince flashed her a little smile and what could easily be described as a ‘he-needs-it’ look.
Judging by the poor kid’s face, she was inclined to agree with him.
“Okay, everyone is here,” Commander Mrazich said. “Arlo, Marty, why don’t you just take it from the top?”
Arlo’s shell-shocked eyes scanned the friendly faces surrounding him. He forced himself to sit up straight, driving the slight tremor from his hands before he began.
“Okay, here’s the thing,” he said. “Marty and me”––he looked at Daisy––“Marty and I, we think we found the Ra’az homeworld.”
A buzz of interest flashed through the others.
“You’re not sure, though?” Vince asked.
“We couldn’t get close enough to do a proper scan.”
“But Marty is a stealth craft. Surely you were able to––” Mrazich began.
“It wasn’t about being detected by scanners,” Marty interjected. “It was about the sudden loss of our warp system.”
Daisy shared an uncomfortable look with Sarah.
“What exactly happened, Arlo?” she asked.
He took a deep breath.
“We were chasing down some leads Maarl had dug up. Possible freighter routes, likely areas we’d come across Ra’az transport ships and the like. But then on our seventh––”
“Eighth,” Marty corrected.
“Right. Our eighth warp, we landed just outside a fucking massive asteroid field. We’re talking utterly enormous, and spanning most of the core of the solar system.”
“But you weren’t hurt, were you? I don’t see any impact marks on Marty’s hull,” Mrazich noted.
“No, we were fine. At least on the outside. But as soon as we got into the asteroid field, our warp system cut out entirely.”
“And it wasn’t just a normal internal failure,” Marty added. “This was caused by something else. Something outside my systems.”
“Marty, put your scanner readings up on the screen, please,” Daisy asked.
“Sure thing, Daisy. Hang on one second. Tap me in, Sid, will you?”
“Of course,” the base AI replied.
A moment later, the nearest vid screen lit up with images of their arrival and subsequent approach into the asteroid field.
“You can’t see much through there,” Sarah said. “All those rocks––I’ve never seen an asteroid field so vast.”
“I know,” Arlo replied. “And this is just part of it. We wanted to go deeper, to see if we could get a clearer look at the planets on the other side, but Marty runs entirely on warp power now, and whatever was in that asteroid field totally knocked out our drive systems.”
“But how did he stay activated?” Daisy asked. “If you lost your power source––”
“He didn’t,” Arlo said with a little shudder. “You’ll see in a minute. Marty was booted offline.”
“Oh, shit. That poor kid.”
It must’ve been terrifying.
; “To say the least. No power, no life support, no gravity. It’s a miracle he made it out in one piece.”
Sure enough, the video abruptly went black on the screen.
“How did you survive, Arlo? If your systems were all down, you would have been drifting, dead-stick,” Daisy said.
“And I was,” he replied, haunted by the memory. “With Marty gone, I was floating inside the ship with no way to reactivate him. I figured we were probably goners, what with life support out along with everything else, and I was making my peace with that when I got pissed off. I didn’t want to die out there, and I sure as shit wasn’t going to give up.”
“What did you do?” Vince asked, on the edge of his seat.
“I used the only systems available to me. The maneuvering thrusters.”
“This is sounding a little too familiar, Daze.”
I know, Sis.
“How did you activate them with the power down?” she asked.
“Since we hadn’t gone too far into the asteroid field, and since it wasn’t too densely populated with debris at that precise location, I manually opened the lines feeding the air thrusters aiming into the field. That gave us enough of a reverse push to start drifting backward, out of the asteroids.”
“Quick thinking,” Daisy complimented.
“It was dumb luck, is what it was,” he replied. “Fortunately for us, there weren’t any obstacles behind us, or we would have backed right into them and probably cracked the hull with all shielding down.”
“So you got clear, but then what?” Mrazich asked.
“Well, once we were clear and had drifted a little distance from the asteroid field, the warp systems suddenly powered back on, as if nothing had happened.”
“It was a very uncomfortable reboot, let me assure you,” Marty added. “And with all power out, I have no logs from the moment power dropped until we were clear of the asteroids.”
The video feed picked back up again, and deep within the floating chunks of rock, Daisy thought she could make out what appeared to be a pair of planets, orbited by a moon. She also saw Ra’az ships, though just for an instant.
“Marty, replay that last bit.”
“Ah, you saw them too,” he said, rewinding a few seconds and pausing the frame. “They appear to be Ra’az battle stations. Given what we know of their conquests, and considering the direction we traveled to reach this solar system, plotted against the known forward spread of the Ra’az fleet, I’d wager we found their homeworld.”
“Yeah, and it’s a fucking nightmare,” Arlo added.
“What happened next, Arlo?” Chu asked. “Did the warp systems hold power?”
“Oh, that they did, because as soon as we were able to, we warped the hell out of there. Isn’t that right, Marty?”
“Damn straight, Arlo. That was most definitely not cool.”
Daisy studied the brief scan of the solar system. It was incredibly preliminary and contained very little useful data, but it did at least provide a rough boundary of the asteroid field.
It would obviously be unsafe for their ships to warp too close to the asteroid field in any circumstances, and as such, it would need to be properly scanned and mapped before any plans for an attack could be formulated.
“I know what you’re thinking, Daze.”
Of course you do.
“You know I don’t think it’s a good idea, then.”
I figured as much, she silently replied. But someone’s gotta do it, and we only have two stealth ships.
“But you saw what happened to Marty.”
Yeah, but he’s also running entirely on warp drive power. Freya still has her original power systems. We wouldn’t be able to utilize warp, but we should be able to fly closer and get a proper look without losing power.
“You willing to bet our lives on that?”
Sarah, the second it looks like we’re in danger, I’ll have Freya turn tail and boogie out of there. Believe me, with the assault on Taangaar right around the corner, the last thing we need is to prematurely engage the Ra’az homeworld.
“Yeah, giving them a heads-up that there may be trouble would give them an advantage.”
And I have no intention of doing that.
“It’s worth noting, Freya also experienced a warp-related power issue, and we were nowhere near Marty and Arlo’s coordinates,” Daisy informed them.
“Daisy?” Freya interjected.
“Yes, Freya? What’s up?”
“I just thought I should mention that I talked with Marty and went over all of his logs. Whatever happened to him seems to have been something different, and his warp systems are all back in perfect working order. In fact, they all returned to normal once they pulled clear of the asteroid field.”
“So, there might be something about those rocks, then,” Daisy mused. “All right. Chu, I need your help.”
“Whatever you need, Daisy.”
“I need you to load Freya with the longest-range scanning gear she can carry.”
“You’re not seriously going in there, are you?”
“Not if we can help it,” she replied. “But we can warp to the edge of that solar system and collect all the data possible from that range.”
“Swarthmore, we’re about to launch an all-hands assault on the Chithiid homeworld. I know this is our ultimate goal, but there’s another mission at hand,” Mrazich said. “This can wait.”
“It won’t take long at all, Commander. Like I said, just a scanning run and we’re out. And Freya’s main drive systems are still operational, so even if we do experience some sort of warp issue, we’ll still have near full maneuverability.”
The steel-jawed man stared at the images on the screen, deep in thought. There was no denying, those were Ra’az battle stations, and proper scans could allow their planners to devise an attack, once Taangaar was retaken, of course.
“All right, Swarthmore. Get to it,” he finally agreed. “But be quick about it, and don’t take any chances. We can’t afford to lose you, and we sure as hell can’t afford for you to be seen.”
“Copy that, Commander. We’re on it,” she said.
“Hang on,” Vince said. “I’m coming with.”
“Babe, you have things to do.”
“They can wait a few hours. If you have any mechanical issues, I want to be there for you, okay?”
Daisy knew better than to argue once his protective Papa Bear instincts kicked in.
“Okay,” she said. “You hear that, Freya? We’re going on a recon run.”
Freya warped to the far edge of what they suspected was the Ra’azes’ home solar system. Immediately, she began scanning the area, documenting every last detail with the enormous array Chu had provided her.
“You seeing this, Daisy? Look at the size of the asteroid field,” she said as she collected her data.
“I see it, Freya. I just don’t believe it.”
There were a dozen planets orbiting at varying distances from the large central sun in a long, flat ring spreading from the center along one plane. That was normal.
What was not normal was the orb-like cluster of debris encompassing the two innermost planets, almost like the walls of a cell protecting the mitochondria within.
Of those two planets, only the farthest from the sun was capable of supporting life, and judging by even the most distant of scans, it was densely packed. Incredibly so, in fact. All of their preliminary observations pointed to the same conclusion. It was a hive world.
They had found the home of the Ra’az.
“We should move in a little bit closer and get more detailed readings,” Daisy said. “You ready for this, kiddo?”
“Yeah,” Freya replied, though she sounded a little unsure of herself.
“Hey, you’ll be fine.”
“I know. It’s just a little scary, the thought of going in there with all those rocks floating around. It makes maneuvering incredibly hard, you know.”
“Yeah, I do. But we’re stayi
ng way outside of them for now. This is just an intel run. But even if we were going in, I want you to know that I have total confidence in you, kiddo.”
“Me too,” Vince said.
“And me too, hon. You’ll do fine.”
“Thanks, guys,” the young ship said, then began her scan of the area.
Hours later, Daisy and Vince walked through the hangar to meet the anxious men and women awaiting their report. George Franklin was also present, though he simply handed Vince a small pouch, then left, flashing him a wink and a grin as he did.
“It’s their planet, all right,” Daisy informed the gathered command group and their key fleet leaders. “And it’s a doozy.”
She put up the first set of images on display.
“Are you transmitting this, Sid?”
“Yes, Daisy.”
“Great. You reading it okay, Zed?”
“Coming in clear,” he replied.
“Okay, great. So, let’s get started. You see the solar system, right? It’s a normal enough looking arrangement. Planets are spread out on a flat orbit of the sun.”
“Looks normal so far,” Celeste said. “But I have a feeling you have a surprise for us, don’t you?”
“You know me so well,” Daisy said with a grin. “So, we scanned the Ra’az planet. That’s the second from the sun, here,” she said, pointing to a spot on the screen. “The thermal scans showed an insanely dense planetary colony system. As we had been informed, it seems the Ra’az are truly a hive-like species.”
“And protected by an asteroid field, I notice,” Commander Mrazich pointed out. “That’ll make any assault incredibly difficult, though I suppose with those periodic gaps in the field, it’s possible.”
“Well, that’s a yes and a no,” Daisy said. “Yes, it’ll be incredibly difficult, and yes, we could likely maneuver ships through the gaps, though it will be tight for the larger ones. But the interesting––or disturbing part, if you prefer––is that this asteroid field is not naturally occurring. It was created.”
“Hang on a minute, how does one create an asteroid field of that magnitude?” Reggie asked. “I’ve flown through some crazy-tough space, but there’s no way you could drag all of those asteroids and position them like that. It would take millennia.”