This made Vincent wonder. Since they were so far away from known Dagon territory, and well into an area where they were known to never go, this amount of ships was highly unusual. It was as if this small squadron was small enough to be hidden yet large enough to take out the Harbinger and any personnel that would be aboard. This would mean that the Dagons were waiting, that this was a trap, a setup from the beginning. But how did they know that the Harbinger would be out here and at this time? Was there an informant aboard? Was there a traitor to the Earth’s defenses? He had already looked at everyone’s files and a couple of the individuals were suspicious, but were any of them really traitors? It would be a mystery to work out later. Right now, he had more important things to worry about.
Chapter: 21
Vincent watched as the dots on his screen stopped accelerating. The vacuum of space and the ships’ momentum would allow the ships to drift in. If the ships had continued to use their engines then they would bypass the Harbinger and would be too far away by the time they tried to attack. This only helped verify Vincent’s view of these creatures’ intelligence.
The security officer hoped that Eric would wait until the last moment before beginning his assault. Because space flight was done with slight maneuvers, it would be easy for the Dagons to make a minor correction in their trajectory and it would be extremely difficult to target them. However, if they could wait until the Dagons were a lot closer and weren’t paying attention to their maneuvering thrusters, then they could hit them several times before any correction was made to their trajectory.
Vincent waited as the dots came closer and closer. When they were close enough, he switched the radar to a more detailed version. Here he was able to make out some of the details of the Dagon ships.
From what he could tell, these crafts looked similar in design to an Earth flying atmospheric jet, only on a larger scale. It had a small bridge up front where the shape was narrower. As the ship extended toward the back, it became wider until the body of the craft was part of the extending aft wings. From the heat sensors of his screen, Vincent was able to make out the fact that the main engines were located in the back of the ship with a few maneuvering thrusters on the sides.
Vincent waited just a little longer. He knew that once his targeting system went completely online then the ships would know that he was there. When he was set, he punched in the commands.
The back side of one of the ships lit up as the targeting system came on. Vincent wasted no time, opened fire and did not relent.
An almost invisible set of twin beams shot out with incredible precision. Their super heated and condensed streams of light hit with force over and over, striking the most important and probably the most sensitive part of the ship.
The Dagon ship’s hull was hit hard. Its heat shielding that kept it from burning up in an atmospheric reentry and protected it from being effected by solar radiation was struck again and again. Their design was to reflect an area of heat and disperse it over more heat shielding panels. They were not designed to take a pinpoint, super focused hit from a close ranged laser.
The laser penetrated the back side of the ship and continued to eat its way through, into the engine room and into their fuel storage. The craft continued to get small blasts across its hull that compromised its integrity.
The explosion wasn’t as incredible as would be expected. There was no air in space so there wasn’t a fireball that detonated in a grand spectacle. Instead, the ship seemed to have a few small explosions inside its structure before the ship lost pieces of its hull, powered down, and started to drift away.
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From the way the dots moved on his screen, Eric could tell that Vincent had taken out one of the Dagon ships on his side. Two of the dots started to kick in their maneuvering thrusters and started to make short bursts to give them more of an erratic approach, at least until they came to this side of the ship where they would have to straighten out if they wanted to board.
This was where Eric would come in. Just when they thought it would be safe on this side and they cut thrusters to coast in on their approach, he would take out at least one of them. With any luck, they wouldn’t be able to readjust their maneuvering thrusters fast enough and he just might be able to get them both.
The third dot was still visible, but it was simply drifting away from the Harbinger and from the looks of things, it was caught in the gravitational well of the planet that they were hidden behind. It would still take some time before the ship was completely pulled into the planet or would probably be locked into a synchronized orbit for a while, but either way, it was not coming back.
Eric bid his time and waited. He watched as the dots carefully circumnavigated the Harbinger and came around to his side. As much as he wanted to switch on more of his short range radar and get a better readout on what they were doing, he was sure that the Dagons would already be looking for a power surge. With this in mind, he continued to wait.
Eric could tell that the ships’ speed started to slow down. This meant that the Dagons were using a few of their thrusters to bring their ships to the course that was needed before cutting them off and coasting in. Now was the time to strike.
Quickly Eric flipped on his detailed radar and picked up the details of the ships. He had to move fast, they would be on to him. He had no time to pick and choose his target, he just fired.
The superheated beams of light found their mark and struck. Pinpoint blasts struck across the alien’s hull. Shot after shot, blast after blast, the ship took on more and holes, until the ship’s integrity was breached.
Like the ship before it, the vessel had too much of the vacuum of space rush into it. Its artificial atmosphere leaked out all over the place. Critical systems were hit. The ship’s hull was completely compromised. Small explosions shot out across the ship but were only short lived once it was affected by the lack of air from space. In but a short time this ship, and small pieces shot off by the small explosions, started to drift away.
Eric turned his attention toward the last ship. If he could just swing the lasers around and strike at something, anything, then they wouldn’t have to worry about a boarding party. Of course there was always a chance that a larger cruiser might be in the area and would come to the realization that boarding the Harbinger was no longer worth the effort and would simply destroy them, but that was going to have to be a concern for another time. First thing was first; he needed to target this last craft.
It was too late. The ship had already changed course and was now heading to a section of the ship that wasn’t covered by the two laser systems that he and Vincent had been utilizing. He had lost it.
At first Eric just sat there and didn’t know what to do next. Was the ship going to come back around and try for another place to dock on this side? The loud crash of metal against metal that reverberated throughout the ship answered his question for him.
Without even bothering to power down his station, Eric sprang from his chair and started down the hall as quickly as he could. It was time to leave his post and join with the others in preparation for a boarding party.
As Eric rounded one corner, he had to pull up. In his haste he hadn’t been paying attention and almost ran into Vincent who had also left his post and was trying to get back to the mock-bridge just as he was.
“What was that noise?”
The sound of Bruce’s voice pulled the both of them away from the shock of almost running into each other. Both Eric and Vincent looked in his direction. The geologist was returning from the cargo bay and had two sonic blasters and Eric’s plasma pistol, which he quickly handed to Eric.
“Dagons,” Vincent merely stated as if that alone would explain everything. “Come on, we need to join the others and quickly.”
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Another loud bang of
metal against metal echoed across the ship. Its resonance vibrated everywhere as if the very fiber of the ship was being threatened.
“Stop it! Stop it!” Tracy screamed. The sounds were starting to get to her despite the fact that Doctor Atkins was trying to calm her down. “What is that noise? What are they doing?”
“That was the last Dagon ship.” Vincent’s voice notified the rest of the crew of his arrival. “Prepare to be boarded.”
Chapter: 22
“What’s taking them so long? What are they doing? And why aren’t you doing something about it?”
Vincent’s fingers danced across the keyboard. The clicks of the keys echoed off the mainly silent mock-bridge that they had made. They had gathered here under Vincent’s directions as soon as the last Dagon ship had disappeared from their sight and had started its docking process.
“From the reports from survivors of attacks, I would say that they are tapping into the life support systems. The Dagons line their ship up to the airlocks of those that they wish to board and use their system to override their victims’ life support. They are trying to increase the humidity in our ship. Their bodies are more used to higher humidity. Once they balance out the atmosphere to what they desire, they’ll force the airlock open. This will keep any ship from engaging their engines since our engines are programmed to come to a stop once an airlock is opened, not that it matters since our navigation system is offline anyway.”
“That’s ridiculous. Why would anyone build that program into a ship’s design?”
“For safety reason,” Vincent said as he continued to tap commands into the computer terminal. “It prevents a ship from taking off while people are still boarding. It only took three accidents that wiped out the repair crew, the ship’s crew, and a resulting implosion of each ship with the devastation that followed to have the feature programmed.”
“And you are trying to…?
“I’m trying to override their commands and trying to override the engine override. If I can shut them out long enough and override the engine controls, then we can fly, although blindly. That should force them to disengage their ship from ours and buy us some time to get the navigation system online. From there we can...damn. They’re in. They should be aboard within moments. Now’s your time to decide if you are going to fight or hide; just stay out of the way.”
The quick patter of feet against the hull made what was left of the scientists turn out of fear. At first, they thought that the Dagons had already made it to their spot. However, once they turned they were able to realize that Bruce had run from the room in a dead sprint. In his spot, where he had been only a moment ago, were the two sonic blasters that he had left behind.
‘Good’, Vincent thought to himself. ‘If he was going to be useless in a battle then it was best if he wasn’t even here. There’s one less person to be worried about.’
The flickering of the monitors, the flashing red warning lights and the alarm that had been set off had caught the crew’s attention.
“Warning...computer security compromised.”
“Warning...life support systems compromised.”
“Warning...unauthorized breach in airlock thirteen.”
“Warning...unknown life form…”
Vincent typed in a few commands that shut off the computer warnings. It was hard to concentrate with that voice constantly running. Quickly, he handed one sonic blaster to Cleo and the other to Richard.
“Stay here, lock the door behind us and shot whatever tries to get in.”
“But you said that if we wanted to fight…” Cleo started to say. She was more than eager to blast these creatures into the void of space than she was to face the possibility of being around them any longer than necessary. However, she was never able to finish her sentence.
“I’ve changed my mind. Since there’s only one ship and its crew, Eric and I will take care of them. I don’t want anyone getting caught in the crossfire and I don’t want to be continually looking over my shoulder to see if you’re alright. Now stay here and stay out of the way.”
The response from Cleo was cut short by the fact that Vincent had stormed off in search of his arrogant and prideful last stand that he seemed to want to take in a final blaze of glory. Eric could only shrug his shoulders.
“He may have a point. These creatures can’t double back and catch you off guard while you are here. This is probably the safest place on the ship. Besides, we’ll need someone to start up the engines again and get us out of here the moment we get their ship off of ours before any more show up. This room needs to be protected.”
That seemed to have placated the three of them and Eric hoped that they would stay. Vincent did have a point, even if he was a little jagged in the way that he stated it. One wrong move by any of these individuals in a battle could compromise any strategy that he and Vincent were going to conceive. This really was the safest spot for these three and the best place for them in a firefight.
A slight jog brought Eric around one corner and then another before he finally caught up to Vincent. As soon as he did, he found him examining a portal connecting one hall to another before moving on to the next. After moving through several portals, Vincent motioned to him to take one flank while he took the other.
“We’re not too far from the airlock. It’ll still take a couple of minutes before they swam aboard, so we have a little time.”
“I thought that the computer stated that it had registered an unknown life form.”
“It might have picked up the aliens from their own ship while the computers were linking together.”
Vincent’s words made less sense as soon as he said them than they did in his head only a moment ago. In all quite honestly, he really didn’t know what the warning had meant. Did it mean that there was another alien life that had already come aboard before the Dagons? Or was it just picking up some microbe from the other craft that had come through the airlock before the space squids had initiated their assault? Either way, neither idea sounded good.
“We’ll make our initial stand here,” Vincent continued. He was going to have to solve the last mystery another time, if there was going to be another time. “If and or when we have to fall back, we’ll close this portal and run back to the next, falling all the way back to our CIC room where we’ll make our last and final stand while protecting the others. This way we can prevent them from circling around back and maintain our defensive positioning as long as we can. With any luck, we might just turn this battle around.”
Eric looked at him straight in the eyes. “Tell me the truth. What chance do we really have?”
Vincent shook his head. “I’ve heard of more experienced Space Marines, with more fire power be taken down. Of course, those could just be rumors mind you. I’ve even had a run in with a few space squids myself, pretty easy to kill if you ask me. My guess is that too many think that these creatures are too easy or perhaps the inexperienced soldiers started making stupid mistakes. Either way, they didn’t last long. The two of us? We probably don’t stand a chance. But I’m not going down without a fight and if I go, I’m taking down as many of them as I can before I do go. The question is, are you in?”
Eric nodded. Now he understood why he wanted the civilians locked away. They would not only play upon Vincent’s concerns to protect them, there was a good chance that their inexperience could, and more than likely would, turn the tide of battle against them. They also wouldn’t have the same resolve to stand and fight even when they knew that it would be certain death.
“And once we fall back to the CIC room?”
“We overload the singularity drive. We’ll take our ship, their ship, and every one of them down with us. Like I said, I’m taking down as many of them as I can before I go”
Again, Eric had to agree with that. If they were going to die then there was no reason to salvage the ship.
As they waited, Vincent took out his Cerberus mock III plasma pistol and checked it to make sure th
at it was fully loaded. He then checked his supply of clips of crystals; he wanted to keep track of how many he had. It would be highly detrimental to their odds of survival to run out of plasma crystals at the most inopportune time. When he was satisfied, he started taking out various pieces, add-ons to his weapon, from his uniform pockets. First, he pulled an extended shoulder piece from the back of the weapon. An amplifier snapped on the front. A rapid discharge compressor fit on top of the pistol making it into a fully automatic weapon while a laser sight was attached to the top of that. By the time he was done, the gun was easily twice as big and was now more of an automatic assault rifle than the mere pistol that it originally was.
“Are any of those parts legal?” Eric asked.
Eric knew that these parts were available on the black market. He also knew that they once were available to the public but were banned when too many irresponsible individuals were changing their legal handguns in to automatic assault rifles and using them as extremely deadly weapons that were either illegal or that the public didn’t even have a permit to carry. Either way, Eric already knew the answer to his rhetorical question. He really didn’t expect a response from Vincent. Of course, he got one anyway.
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