Alien Conquest

by Tracy St. John

  Li­don grinned as adren­a­line pumped through his veins. “It won’t be any fun if they don’t.”

  He guided the trans­port to­wards the on­com­ing Tra­goom ship, eas­ily mas­ter­ing the con­trols. “Can I pi­lot this ship,” he mut­tered un­der his breath. Tra­nis should have known bet­ter than to ask such a ques­tion.

  “Time to act Earther-pissed,” he in­formed the small crew. “Do not speak Kalquo­rian while the fre­quency is open. Com, open trans­mis­sion to the Tra­gooms.”

  “Trans­mit­ting, Com­man­der.”

  Li­don closed his eyes for a mo­ment, re­call­ing Gen­eral Hamil­ton’s pat­terns of speech along with his ac­cent and ca­dence. When he had the voice in his head, he spoke. “At­ten­tion, Tra­goom ship. You have en­tered Earth-con­trolled space. This is a hos­tile act. State your in­ten­tions and pre­pare to sur­ren­der your ves­sel. This is your only warn­ing be­fore we open fire.”

  At his nod, the Nobek han­dling com du­ties shut off the trans­mis­sion. Li­don’s fin­gers flew over the helm con­trols, never tak­ing his eyes off the vid pro­jec­tion of the Tra­goom ship. They were still com­ing.

  “No re­sponse from the Tra­gooms, Com­man­der.”

  Good. I’m over­due for a fight. Li­don looked for­ward to an all-out bat­tle. He halted the trans­port.

  “Com­man­der? We’re stop­ping?” Dov kept his ques­tion re­spect­ful.

  Li­don seized on the op­por­tu­nity for a les­son. “If you check the read­out for Earth’s long-range sen­sor net, you’ll see this is a void area. We can en­gage the Tra­gooms here with­out alert­ing the de­fense grid of our pres­ence.” He swept a glance over his young crew. “Never for­get the pres­ence of all your en­e­mies, even while you must di­rect your at­ten­tion on the im­me­di­ate threat.”

  “Yes, Com­man­der.”

  He was grat­i­fied to see the ea­ger ab­sorp­tion on each face. His Nobek un­der­lings were a good lot. They sim­ply needed the sea­son­ing that only com­bat could pro­vide.

  A slight fluc­tu­a­tion in the field on their star­board side told Li­don the spy­ship had kept pace with them. He hoped the Tra­gooms were too in­ter­ested in the trans­port to take no­tice. The spy­ship had de­fenses, but not enough to fight off their clos­ing en­emy. It was built for sub­terfuge, not bat­tle.

  “The Tra­goom ship will be in weapons’ range in five sec­onds.” Dov growled in an­tic­i­pa­tion.

  “Lock on and pre­pare to an­ni­hi­late.” In­wardly, Li­don urged on his en­e­mies. Don’t make this too easy on me, you mis­be­got­ten waste of rot­ten flesh. Give me a good fight, one I can share with the an­ces­tors when I join them. We will toast your deaths and laugh over your stink­ing car­casses for dar­ing to think you could de­feat me.

  It was an un­der­state­ment to de­clare Li­don hated Tra­gooms. Why the All of Cre­ation had brought such crea­tures into be­ing was some­thing the Nobek sim­ply could not un­der­stand no mat­ter how dili­gently he stud­ied the Book of Life.

  A ball of fiery light bloomed at the bow of the Tra­goom ship. They were at­tack­ing. Li­don grinned, his fangs un­hing­ing and drop­ping down. His war­rior heart re­joiced.

  “Brace for fire!” Dov yelled to the crew.

  Li­don was blinded by the burst of white-hot glare, but his fin­gers flew over the helm with calm as­sur­ance, rolling the trans­port in a steep dive to avoid the blast. Not built for ma­neu­ver­abil­ity, the ves­sel shud­dered be­neath his feet. The ship sounded with groans as the struc­ture fought the force of the move­ment.

  The flare sub­sided. An in­stant be­fore Li­don’s eyes ad­justed, Dov’s an­gry voice filled the bridge. “The spy­ship took a di­rect hit! The bas­tards knew it was there all along!”

  Li­don’s mo­ment of de­lighted an­tic­i­pa­tion for the com­ing fight fiz­zled as rage washed over him. “Re­turn fire! Hit them with ev­ery­thing!” he roared.

  His guts clenched as the spy­ship’s cloak­ing sys­tem failed and the ves­sel swam into view. It drifted drunk­enly, the thrusters on one side blown com­pletely off. The hull of the en­tire for­ward sec­tion was a black­ened, twisted mess. The crew’s quar­ters were lo­cated at the stern along with Med­i­cal, so Cas­sidy and De­gorsk would still be safe. But the bridge was nes­tled in the cen­ter of the dev­as­tated bow.

  Tra­nis…

  The spy­ship joined Li­don’s bom­bard­ment of the Tra­goom’s ship, its weapons sys­tems still in­tact. The quick­ness of the re­turn fire al­lowed the Nobek hope. Some­one was still alive and fight­ing on the bridge. The pro­tec­tive bul­warks around the brain­cen­ter of the spy­ship had done their job.

  Li­don pi­loted the trans­port around the Tra­goom ship, find­ing the most vul­ner­a­ble parts for Dov to fire on. He ig­nored the im­pulse to get be­tween his en­emy and the spy­ship, to pro­tect his clan from fur­ther fire. He had to take the en­emy out.

  “Di­rect hit on Tra­goom ship. Heavy dam­age to their weapons ar­ray.” Dov sounded pos­i­tively glee­ful as he pounded on their foes’ de­fenses.

  “They’ve still got pulse guns. In­com­ing fire! Brace for im­pact!”

  Li­don held onto the helm sta­tion as the trans­port shud­dered around him. “Open com to spy­ship.”

  “Com open.”

  “Cap­tain, I’ve got this fight. Get out of here.” Li­don lis­tened for Tra­nis’ voice, but no one re­sponded. The spy­ship had stopped fir­ing. It drifted dead in space.

  Dov howled with tri­umph. “I’m locked onto Tra­goom raider’s en­gines.”

  “Fire bar­rage!” Li­don bared his fangs.

  Blooms of yel­low, or­ange, and red flow­ered on the Tra­goom ship as ex­plo­sions shook the hap­haz­ardly con­structed ves­sel. Li­don watched the fire­works as they spread over the en­emy.

  “Di­rect hit! It’s started a cas­cade ef­fect on other sys­tems. The en­ergy read­ings are off the charts. The Tra­goom ship is go­ing crit­i­cal, Com­man­der. It’s go­ing to blow.”

  “Tra­nis, break off! De­struc­tion of the raider is im­mi­nent! Go!” Li­don held his breath.

  For a won­der, the spy­ship moved away. How­ever, its progress was a slow, drunken spi­ral. For the lives of his crew and the cap­tured Earth­ers, Li­don had no choice but to leave the spy­ship be­hind to face the com­ing blast. His mouth set in a grim line, the Nobek pi­loted the trans­port a safe dis­tance from the doomed en­emy.

  They’re mov­ing too slow. Tra­nis will never get the ship clear in time.

  “Com­man­der, de­struc­tion of Tra­goom ves­sel is hap­pen­ing. Brace for shock­wave!”

  The en­emy’s ship blew to bits. A low growl trick­ling from his throat, Li­don could only watch as the spy­ship top­pled end over end when the shock­wave hit it.

  Mother of All, let the grav­ity field hold in­side the ship.

  He tried not to think of the mem­bers of his clan tossed around to break against the walls of their rooms. Es­pe­cially not Cas­sidy, so tiny and frag­ile. As the trans­port groaned around him, hold­ing res­o­lutely still in the shock­wave, the spy­ship tum­bled past their po­si­tion. Li­don’s stom­ach churned to watch it.

  He vowed that for ev­ery mem­ber of his clan that per­ished, he’d kill a thou­sand Tra­gooms. For Cas­sidy, five thou­sand.

  The wave passed, and Li­don set off af­ter the spy­ship. The stricken ves­sel slowed its mo­men­tum, and he al­lowed a small sigh of re­lief. Some­one was still alive on the Kalquo­rian ship’s bridge, bring­ing it to a grad­ual stop. The grav­ity field on board must have held.

  “Com­man­der, the spy­ship is se­verely dam­aged. I read no power from the en­gines.”

  “Be ready to board and ren­der aid to the in­jured. Tra­nis, what is your sta­tus?”

  Li­don’s heart sank when Sim­dow an­swered. “F
irst Of­fi­cer here, Com­man­der. The cap­tain is in­jured. Emer­gency med­i­cal to the bridge! Cap­tain Tra­nis re­quires im­me­di­ate treat­ment.”

  He’s still alive. My Dramok lives, and as the Book says, ‘while the body draws breath, hope is kept.’ Li­don re­peated the mantra in his head, hold­ing the snarling an­i­mal of his war­rior ten­den­cies at bay.

  De­gorsk’s voice was a balm to his nerves as well. “I’m on my way, Sim­dow. What is the cap­tain’s sta­tus?”

  Shout­ing over Osopa’s or­ders to seal off the ar­eas blaz­ing with fires, Sim­dow an­swered the doc­tor. He’d for­got­ten to shut off the com to Li­don’s ship. “That shock­wave knocked Cap­tain Tra­nis across the room. He’s out cold with a head in­jury and is bleed­ing heav­ily from sev­eral wounds. I think his arms and legs may be bro­ken. Osopa, make sure the power is cut to the en­gines and nonessen­tial func­tions. Re­move all oxy­gen from the sealed off ar­eas to put those fires out.”

  Li­don waited for a lull, let­ting Sim­dow at­tend to the most im­por­tant tasks first. At last he was able to speak. “First Of­fi­cer, we’re nearly to your po­si­tion and will board shortly. What is the sta­tus of the ship?”

  “Most sys­tems are off­line, Com­man­der. We have backup power only, which is be­ing routed to life sup­port and med­i­cal. No de­fense, no weapons, no nav­i­ga­tion, no thrust. This ship is dead.”

  Li­don heard the raw panic edg­ing Sim­dow’s voice. Had the first of­fi­cer been a Nobek, Li­don would have had some­one punch the man in the face to clear his head. But Dramoks were a dif­fer­ent breed and re­quired more del­i­cate han­dling.

  In a trust­ing tone Li­don trans­mit­ted, “Act­ing Cap­tain Sim­dow, I rec­om­mend you send all weapons crew to the Earther trans­port. Only mi­nor dam­age has been sus­tained over here. We’ll stand guard while you make re­pairs.” He added in a re­spect­ful voice, “With your per­mis­sion, sir.”

  Li­don’s quiet con­fi­dence turned the trick. Af­ter a mo­ment of si­lence, Sim­dow re­sponded with more as­sur­ance. “Ac­knowl­edged, Weapons Com­man­der. As soon as you are in po­si­tion, your team will be sent over. I leave the de­fense par­tic­u­lars in your ca­pa­ble hands.”

  He broke com­mu­ni­ca­tions. Li­don wanted noth­ing more than to board the spy­ship and see to Tra­nis’ con­di­tion him­self, but he had his duty and his or­ders. Still, there was one thing he could do.

  He opened his per­sonal chan­nel to De­gorsk. “What’s go­ing on with Tra­nis?”

  “It’s go­ing to be some time be­fore I can an­swer that, Li­don. He was ap­par­ently try­ing to run sev­eral sta­tions him­self af­ter some of the men were hurt from the Tra­goom’s at­tack. He wasn’t locked down when the shock­wave hit and the bridge ex­pe­ri­enced a fluc­tu­a­tion in the grav­ity field. Ric­o­chet­ing off the sta­tions and walls hurt him pretty badly.”

  Li­don swal­lowed. “Cas­sidy?”

  “She’s fine. I se­dated her just be­fore the fight­ing started, much to her dis­may. Grav held in our quar­ters, for­tu­nately.” De­gorsk’s voice took on an an­gry tone. “Tra­nis, lie still, damn it. You’re pour­ing blood, you id­iot.”

  A weak voice that sounded noth­ing like Li­don’s Dramok slurred, “Fight – fight Tra­gooms.”

  “The threat is over. Stop shov­ing me. Fine, fuck this. Or­derly, se­date him while I get this sta­sis field go­ing. Stay down, you stub­born, cracked skulled—”

  “De­gorsk, your com’s still open,” Li­don prod­ded with a gen­tle tone. His heart thud­ded painfully. De­gorsk al­ways used anger to mask fear, and the heat in the doc­tor’s tone told the Nobek that Tra­nis’ con­di­tion was very bad in­deed.

  The Imdiko’s voice cut off in mid-curse. Li­don tried not to think about his clan leader ly­ing bro­ken and bloody and dy­ing. Such a thing couldn’t hap­pen, not af­ter only six short years of clan­ship. Li­don had waited a long time for the right Dramok to come along. He was sup­posed to spend the rest of his life with Tra­nis.

  Tra­nis will be fine. He’s young and strong, and De­gorsk knows what he’s do­ing.

  But the words of the Book of Life rang in Li­don’s head: Make death your friend, for it gives life its sweet­ness. Noth­ing is taken for granted when mor­tal­ity is re­spected and revered.

  There was damned lit­tle com­fort in that, and the Nobek fought against his own tide of an­gry help­less­ness. Some­times even the most closely held faith failed a man, leav­ing him to flail in the dark­ness. Un­der­stand­ing that didn’t make it any eas­ier.

  With tremen­dous ef­fort, Li­don con­cen­trated on his du­ties and waited to hear from De­gorsk.

  Chap­ter 12

  The sounds of the door whis­per­ing open and De­gorsk’s soft voice mut­ter­ing dragged Cas­sidy from sticky sleep. She fought to open her eye­lids. What she saw helped her push her way out of fog-shrouded slum­ber.

  De­gorsk looked tired as he smiled at her. He guided a hover stretcher next to the bed. She gasped to see Tra­nis lay on it. Her Dramok tor­men­tor and lover was un­con­scious, his dark skin gray­ish in pal­lor. A thick cov­er­ing hid most of his bulk un­til the De­gorsk pulled it free. Tra­nis’ sturdy, nude body was livid with freshly healed-over wounds and black­ened bruises. Cas­sidy made a small sound of hor­ror and forced her dull limbs to move so she could sit up.

  De­gorsk picked up Tra­nis as if he was a child. The Imdiko eas­ily trans­ferred his clan­mate from the stretcher to the bed to lie next to Cas­sidy. “All right, you big brute. Safe and sound in your own bed at last.”

  Tra­nis’ eyes flut­tered open. His head lolled as he looked blearily at his dim sur­round­ings. He blinked at his clan­mate. He slurred some­thing in Kalquo­rian.

  De­gorsk shook his head. “Ev­ery­thing is down. All avail­able power is routed into Med­i­cal and life sup­port.”

  Cas­sidy re­mem­bered Tra­nis and Li­don leav­ing the room to deal with the Tra­goom threat and De­gorsk ar­riv­ing soon af­ter­ward, se­dat­ing her de­spite her protests. She’d even thrown a few punches, try­ing to keep him off her. De­gorsk had over­pow­ered her eas­ily and with many apolo­gies.

  It was ob­vi­ous the fight against the Tra­gooms hadn’t gone well. De­spite Cas­sidy’s great­est ef­forts to ap­pear un­moved, tears fell from her eyes to see Tra­nis hurt. He looked so beaten. The man who ap­peared as un­mov­able as a rock had been re­duced to a bat­tered mor­tal, ca­pa­ble of be­ing fa­tally wounded. That he must have come close to death from the many in­juries was ap­par­ent to Cas­sidy.

  Tra­nis turned his head to look at her. His eyes riv­eted on her. The dazed ex­pres­sion in his face cleared. He reached to brush her cheek with the back of his hand, his smile warm­ing his drawn face. “I’m glad to see you are un­hurt, my lovely Matara. Don’t cry. I’ll be all right.”

  Cas­sidy caught his hand in her own, press­ing her lips to his fin­gers. She’d shown his in­juries af­fected her; it was too late to pre­tend oth­er­wise. “Is he re­ally go­ing to be all right, De­gorsk? And is Li­don okay?”

  “Li­don is fine. Tra­nis will be too, if he does as he’s sup­posed to and rests. You promised, my Dramok. Life-threat­en­ing in­ter­nal in­juries and three hours in surgery is not some­thing you can just shrug off.” De­gorsk gave him a se­vere look.

  “I’m fine, and we have a ma­jor sit­u­a­tion on our hands.” Tra­nis moved as if to sit up. He gri­maced, the pain ob­vi­ous.

  “You will rest.” The medic put a re­strain­ing hand flat against the in­jured man’s bat­tered chest, still­ing his strug­gles with ef­fort. “You lost a lot of blood. Don’t make me call Li­don to sub­due you.”

  Cas­sidy saw Tra­nis’ stub­born ex­pres­sion and mar­veled at the will of the man. She had the feel­ing if De­gorsk let up for an in­stant, the Kalquo­rian cap­tain w
ould drag him­self around the ship on his hands and knees, bark­ing or­ders and set­ting to rights what­ever dam­age had been sus­tained. She looked at Tra­nis’ thick torso. Not one inch of it had been spared from bruises and long, red lines where the skin had been so re­cently slashed open. He didn’t look like he should be alive.

  Cas­sidy feared for his well-be­ing. The de­ter­mined look on his face scared her even more. Tra­nis would drive him­self to the grave if they let him.

  “Li­don is needed on the Earth trans­port. Leave him be,” Tra­nis growled at De­gorsk.

  “Only if you do as you’re told. He’ll come charg­ing back here if he thinks his Dramok’s life is in dan­ger he can pre­vent. Don’t think for one sec­ond I won’t call him.”

  “I am the cap­tain. This mis­sion is my re­spon­si­bil­ity.” Tra­nis bared fangs at De­gorsk and shoved him­self into a sit­ting po­si­tion.

  Cas­sidy saw the Dramok’s back. It was ev­ery bit as dam­aged as the rest of him. De­gorsk wasn’t be­ing alarmist when he said Tra­nis needed to rest.

  Cas­sidy knew she had to do some­thing. Still, she feared de­fy­ing Tra­nis when he looked so in­tent. She knew in his pain-rav­aged, de­ter­mined state, he was pos­si­bly as dan­ger­ous as Li­don. But she feared for him even more, feared he would fin­ish the job the Tra­gooms had started. He’d kill him­self if they didn’t stop him.

  She threw her arms around his neck, mold­ing her body against his bat­tered back. “You’re not go­ing any­where, you big, stupid Kalquo­rian,” she said. “Do what De­gorsk says or I’ll find Li­don’s cuffs and stick you to the ceil­ing.”

  Tra­nis stopped push­ing against De­gorsk in an in­stant. Cas­sidy buried her face in the ebony spill of his hair, will­ing the Dramok to be rea­son­able. She tight­ened her grip on him, hop­ing the tight em­brace wouldn’t add to his in­juries.

  Tra­nis’ fin­ger­tips brushed her arms where they bound about his throat. In a soft voice, he said, “You know, I think you would re­strain me. But there’s so much to do, and I’m needed, my Matara. I’ll be fine, I prom­ise.”