Dystance 3

by Mark Tufo

  “Oh, hey, Winter.” He was smiling and firing his rifle. They were specially designed for training purposes and shot a much lower-powered ray. Still, when you got hit, there was no doubt, as it caused a fair amount of pain and would put the unlucky victim out of commission for a few moments. Cedar yanked me out of the way as a yellow bolt traveled past my shoulder.

  “Sorry!” Tallow yelled from behind a stack of boxes.

  “Can I kill them all?” I asked.

  “Do you blame them?” Cedar asked. “Yes, I know you want them all to be safe and that is why we’re doing what we are, but don’t think for a minute that those aren’t the same thoughts going through their heads.”

  “Don’t you have a book to read?”

  She smiled.

  We stayed and watched for over four hours as they trained hard, getting yelled at or shot when they made a mistake.

  “They are in their element,” Cedar observed.

  “Unfortunately,” I responded.

  Cedar looked up from the book she was pretending to read. “True.”

  A whistle signified the end of the exercise for the day. “For those of you that got shot, I want you to burn that feeling into your memory, to make sure it never happens again. Get some chow and I want you back here at 1430; we’re going to go through the breaching exercise again,” Sergeant Balline said. There were groans, not for having to do more training, but rather for the sore and aching muscles that they were enduring.

  “This was my idea!” Tallow was beaming as he came over to us, putting the rifle away in a nearby rack.

  “Finally, I can make use of my many talents.” Lendor had stripped off his soaked shirt; I would have had to be blind not to see Cedar ogle his abs.

  “Maybe you should just touch them,” I whispered.

  “Think he’d mind?” Cedar reached out a few inches before thinking better of that.

  “It would seem, Ghost, we will finally fight together again!” Lendor wiped his brow.

  “Does he realize what he’s doing to me?” Cedar asked.

  “No, he’s a man, which basically makes him clueless.” She laughed outright at that, maybe slightly too loudly, and with a nervous titter. “Okay, don’t do that again,” I told her.

  “What do you hope to accomplish?” I asked Tallow.

  “Same thing as you. To stop the enemy from following this ship. And don’t give me a hard time about not having any right to do this. I have more right than most, and just as much as you. We’re from Earth; if there should be anyone fighting for it, it should be us.”

  He was basically echoing the same words we had given Brigend.

  “He’s right,” Cedar said as she attempted to keep the fury that was building within me bridled.

  “All will be well,” Frost said as she and Ferryn entered.

  “You two, as well?” I asked, although the answer was self-evident.

  Like Tallow and Lendor, Frost and Ferryn seemed thrilled with the prospect to finally be able to do something. That night after their training was done, Brigend had a feast for all of us who would be on this mission. I could not get the idea of this being our last meal out of my mind.

  “Lighten up, sis. What did I tell you about worrying?”

  “Someone has to,” I said, looking over a fair amount of the people laughing and singing as they drank something called beer. I found the beverage to be entirely too bitter, but that didn’t stop Cedar from downing more than a few.

  “I rink if I knew bout this struff earlier maybe I wouldna been so eager to fright.” She hiccuped and giggled at her slurred words, as she sloshed a fair portion of the liquid onto my shirt.

  “I rove roo, sis.”

  “I rove roo, too,” I told her as I swept her hair from her face.

  “I’m going to ask Lendor to dance with me.” She grew serious, then busted out laughing.

  And she did. It was strange to see the scowl he generally wore fade into a smile as she made her way to him.

  “Good for you,” I said as she grabbed his hand. I thought perhaps he would be reluctant, but he went out and made moves that looked like dancing, to my untrained eye.

  “Ah, young love,” Tallow said as he plopped down in the seat next to mine.

  I grabbed his hand and we went and found some private quarters. I wanted to think on something different, and we succeeded. For a while, at least.

  17

  Turning Point

  The next morning, I had never remembered seeing so many people look less likely even to be awake, much less fight. I mean, of course, except for Cedar; she looked like she’d just slumbered peacefully for the last twelve hours.

  “What’s wrong with everyone?” she asked.

  “I think it was the brew.”

  “Hmm, maybe I didn’t drink enough of them.”

  “I think you had plenty.”

  “Where’s Lendor?” I asked.

  “How would I know?” she said much too quickly.

  I left it at that.

  Brigend was walking around clapping shoulders, talking animatedly with everyone that was going. He was all smiles in appearance, but his movements were stiff; he was doing his best to hide the burden he was carrying, of basically sending us all to our deaths. Maybe that was why he gave everyone the brew, so that they would be too distracted to be able to see through his façade. Unlike last night, lunch was a somber affair. There was little talking and even less eating. Again, except for Cedar; she was eating leftover meals from everyone next to her.

  “How can you eat?” I asked as I pushed my tray over to her.

  “How can you not?” She gladly took it away from me.

  “I mean, with what’s about to happen?”

  She studied me, her eyebrows furrowing. “We’re going to kick ass today. And I’ll let you in on a little secret: we’re not dying.”

  She said it with such absolute ferocity she had me half convinced. I was doing fine—right up until I watched Tallow and Lendor walk into the shuttle and the doors shut behind them. It was about that point that my legs got weak. I looked to the ladder that led to my fighter and wondered how I was going to make it up with dead legs. Cedar was standing at the top of the platform for her fighter, whistling while she checked something in her helmet. She swept her hair back and forth before donning it. There was not any part of her that was not a warrior; I did my best to mirror her. Did surprisingly well until I stumbled on the second step.

  “One foot in front of the other, sis!” she yelled over.

  I gave her the gesture she told me was for swearing; she laughed.

  “Wrong finger!” Then she hopped in, the canopy closing and locking.

  I stuck each finger up in turn; one of them had to be right. Coordinating the launch made it necessary to not only sit in our fighter for an extended amount of time but also within the confines of the launch tube. Claustrophobia, which I didn’t suffer from, was worming its way into my head.

  “This is Raven Two.” It was Cedar; she was second-in-command for this mission. Should have been first, but it was difficult to tell a Colonel he now had to listen to a Captain, even if she could fly circles around him backward, as she would tell me. “Each of you on this mission are among some of the bravest souls I have ever had the honor to know. Today we are going to accomplish something that our forefathers could only dream of. We are going to pierce the heart of the beast. A lesson will be learned here that will be talked about for generations. And you want to know how that is going to happen?”

  There were more than a few smatterings of: “How?”

  “I am going to personally make sure that this story lives on, because all of you here will be telling it to your kids and grandkids. Nothing? Tough crowd. Listen, people, this isn’t the end; this is just the beginning. If you think I joined this thing because I thought I wasn’t coming back, you’re just crazy. Though I walk through the valley of death, I will fear no others….”

  “Launch in fifteen,” interrupted
her.

  “This day is ours, Raven squad! And don’t you ever forget that!” she yelled.

  “Ten.”

  “Victory is ours!”

  “Five.”

  Now she got the triumphant yells she was looking for, as we screamed through the launch tubes. I felt like I could finally breathe, though the space I was allotted had not grown. We got into a loose and very spread out V formation; Colonel Rafferton was front and center. The three shuttles of troops were behind us and hopefully, adequately protected. And with the Talbot to our back, for the time being, anyway, it felt like maybe Cedar was right; we could make it through the day. Then the alien ship showed, and if everyone there didn’t feel the dread wallop them in the chest like I did, then they were stronger than I. It caused discordant feelings just to look at it. It did not look like any vessel we had thus far encountered. I might have stayed there with my mouth hanging open for another few moments if not for Cedar spurring us on.

  Brigend fired two of those ship-busting missiles seconds before they had even appeared. Evading them was all but an impossibility, though the enemy fired as well, but by then Brigend had buckled away and the Ordnance flew harmlessly off into space. With the departure of the ship went the illusion of safety.

  We were close enough to the Others’ ship that we had to avoid the debris that flew free from the missile strikes. I was happy they had hit, but I had misgivings; if they did destroy the ship and now we were out here for virtually nothing, what would the point have been? I’d expected more, for them to keep firing, for a buzzing of fighters to exit and attack. Something. In the meantime, we were performing strafing runs along the hull in preparation for the shuttles to breach through the opening the missiles had made.

  “Any idea what is going on?” I asked to whomever wanted to answer. “They give up?”

  “Something’s going on,” Colonel Rafferton said. “There’s a yellow glow rising along the surface.”

  “Pull back! Everyone pull back!” Cedar announced.

  “I did not give that order!” Rafferton replied.

  “If you want to live, move now!” she shouted. We were peeling away from the ship as fast as we could. The ship started to glow so brightly it was difficult to look at. The slower shuttles were having a difficult time keeping pace. I was matching pace with Tallow’s shuttle when the percussion wave radiated out from the Others’ ship. Those, including the colonel, who had not heeded Cedar’s advice, were instantly blown apart. We could see as the spherical energy ball radiating out further and further, quickly catching up to those that had reacted too slowly.

  Two more ships, including a shuttle, were caught and exploded into fragments—and still, the ball came.

  “Get that shuttle moving,” I hissed.

  Cedar pulled up alongside me.

  “This is Raven 7.” Lieutenant Cooper was speaking, a man I’d not talked to more than a handful of times. “I’ve been hit…still here, but my engines have shut down.” I located him on my radar; he was bearing our same direction and at speed, though apparently, he had no control.

  “Who else is without power?” Cedar asked.

  Two more ships reported in. The question was, what did we do now? If they had been stopped, we could have potentially pulled a shuttle up to them and made a transfer. It wasn’t without risks, but it beat the alternative. As it was, the fighters were traveling too fast; the shuttles would not be able to keep up.

  “Winter, Captain Faulkner, we’re going to stop those runaway fighters. Shuttles, stand by for orders,” Cedar ordered. “I’ve got Raven 7; Winter, you’re on Tunney, and Captain Faulkner, you get Brentner.”

  I was about to ask her how we were going to get them when she continued.

  “This is the plan.” I shook my head back and forth the entire time she talked. “Now get to it.”

  Facing a Stryver with a small knife would have been less harrowing. At least, if the Stryver killed you, it was only one person; this crazy maneuver endangered both pilots. What was worse was we had lost comm with the fighters; whatever had taken out the engine had also now shut down the electrical system, so we couldn’t even tell them what we were about to do.

  “Gotta move fast people; their life support systems are most likely offline. The clock is ticking.”

  “Thanks, Cedar, I was hoping we could have a little more pressure.”

  “You’ve got this. Shuttles, stay close.”

  I pulled alongside Tunney; she was a small brunette which she more than made up for with her loud and boisterous attitude. She was one of the most well-liked and well-respected pilots out here. She had a small flashlight in her mouth, her head down; she was attempting to get the ship back up and running. I pulled slightly ahead of her until she finally noticed. I put my left hand up; she was looking at the back of it, then I brought my right up in the same manner, moved it slightly past the left and placed it in front of my right hand and then pulled back.

  She put her thumb and forefinger together in an OK gesture. I was glad she was alright with this; my guts were churning. Although really, what choice did she have? Her life was void in a few minutes, once the freeze of deep space got to her. I sped up before turning my thrusters off. Pulling in front, I hesitated before I slowed. If I did this wrong and the nose of her fighter didn’t strike the center of my rear end, there was a chance she could damage my engines, or worse, she would begin rolling, and once that happened, there would be no chance of this working.

  I had to silence my collision alarm; the maneuver had to be done completely by the radar system, as I could not see her once I pulled ahead. My hands were sweating within the gloves. I would have felt so much better if Tunney could have at least verbally guided me. Then the heavens finally felt the need to bless me.

  “Just a bit to the left, Win.” It was Tallow. “We’re watching you on the screen…almost perfect. Right there, that’s it.”

  The harness kept me tight to the seat; didn’t prevent the jarring impact that jerked my entire body as I slowed enough for contact to be made between us. If we lived through the day, I was going to pay for it in soreness. I eased the backward thrusters on; my ship began to shake as Tunney’s ship wanted to keep moving forward.

  “Ease off,” I said softly. If I applied too much pressure on her, chances were Tunney’s ship would skitter off to the side. There was another bump, not quite as bad as the first. I again applied some backward force. This time my ship was not shaking nearly as much. I kept slowing down, careful to ease off if I began to shake again. The grinding, grating noise as we scraped together echoed loudly through my cabin; I would imagine it was just as bad for Tunney. Alarms warned of structural damage to my ship; it was all I could do to block out the extraneous noise and concentrate on getting her as close to a standstill as possible. It must have been working, as the shuttle was catching up.

  “Good job, Winter! I’m going to help Faulkner,” Cedar said.

  “Show off,” I said through gritted teeth. The other shuttle was already in the process of bringing the pilot over.

  “When you’ve got it, there’s no sense in hiding it.” She sped off.

  Tunney was basically crawling now; I felt as if I could finally breathe.

  “Good job, Win. We’ve got it from here,” Tallow said. I watched the shuttle door open. Tallow was suited up and tethered to the ship. His thrusters moved him closer to the dead fighter as Tunney popped her hatch and free floated out, making sure to keep one hand on the canopy—I would imagine as a sort of safety blanket.

  “Push off, Lieutenant,” Tallow told Tunney. He wanted her to be free of the ship. If either of them hit the still-moving ship, they could be forced away and possibly slam into the shuttle with bone-breaking results. Her movements were hesitant, but she knew she only had the few moments of safety that the suit and helmet afforded her. She pulled herself close to the ship and pushed away. Tallow deftly maneuvered and caught her gracefully. I wasn’t sure when he had become so proficient with the c
ontrols, but he made it look effortless.

  “Pull your arms in. Got you,” he said as he wrapped his arms and legs around her. “All right, Lendor, bring me in. And not as fast as in training when you thought it was hilarious.”

  “But it was,” Lendor responded. “Arms flailing about like a rag doll.”

  I gave the shuttle the thumbs up sign as I sped off to see if there was anything I could do to help Cedar and Faulkner.

  “Ease up, Captain!” Cedar exclaimed just as they were coming into view.

  “I’ve got this.” The tremble in his voice was a sign that he didn’t.

  “I can do it,” Cedar told him.

  “I’ve got this,” he said again. A metallic crunching sound came over my headset. “Dammit,” he muttered. “Looks like I destroyed my starboard engine.”

  Brentner’s ship had skipped off the back plate. There was a bright blue flame out as the engine was wrecked. Faulkner was doing his best to keep his fighter stable, Brentner was very much in danger of spinning.

  “Move!” Cedar ordered. “Winter, going to need you to tap Brentner’s wing. Wait until I get into position.”

  I raced around to come up and behind, waiting for her order.

  “Few more seconds. Winter, the very moment you tap that ship, dive down and away. You got it?”

  I knew the dangers here. If I did not move out of the way, we would very likely be involved in a deadly three-way collision as Brentner’s ship smacked into Cedar and I plowed into and through both of them. The sense of accomplishment and peace I had been feeling moments before was wiped away in a sea of anxiousness.

  “Ready, Winter.”

  I was easing closer, my heart concussing in my chest so violently it was sending tremors into my extremities.

  “Now!” she demanded.

  I tapped the wing and dipped down using after burners to get away. I more than expected to hear my tail wing being torn off and was pleasantly surprised when it wasn’t.