Dark Space- The Complete Series

by Jasper T. Scott

  “We have lost two command ships, and they are killing a third!” Lady Kala shrieked.

  Before they could argue any further, Queen Tavia’s visage appeared, hovering in the air in front of them. Her red eyes gleamed, and her black skin wrinkled. “My Queen,” Kala said, bowing her head.

  “Kala, have your clusters jump into the nebula and follow them in.”

  “The nebula?”

  “It is where the enemy hides.”

  “We shall lose contact with each other if we follow them.”

  “Yess,” Queen Tavia hissed. “But with more of us looking, it will be harder for them to hide, and we need only stumble upon them with one command ship to deal with them effectively. They shall not remain hidden for long.”

  “For glory, My Queen.”

  “For Shallah,” the queen replied.

  * * *

  Atton’s threat detection system screamed a warning, and he threw his fighter into an immediate spiral to dodge incoming fire. Bright purple streaks of Sythian lasers and missiles went racing by on all sides, creating a tunnel of flashing lights.

  Speakers crackled to life beside his ears. “Gold Squadron, take evasive action!”

  Atton glanced at the star map and grimaced. The nebula was a mess of streaking missiles and swarming enemies. Three squadrons of Shell Fighters buzzed around them like flies. As he watched, another squadron came swirling out of the nebula to join them.

  “How are they finding us?” He knew there were a lot of enemy fighters out there, but this was ridiculous. Space was vast.

  A warning siren sounded close beside Atton’s ears, and he realized the enemy was targeting him. He dropped a cloaking mine and went evasive. Seconds later the inside of his cockpit flashed with the bright orange light of the mine exploding in his wake. The simulated roar of the explosion reached his ears, and two shell fighters winked off the map.

  Mentally targeting the next nearest enemy, Atton pulled up hard and toggled his lasers for an automatic firing solution. Both lasers fired up at a 60-degree angle, shooting at his target before it even came into view. By the time he saw his target, its shields were sparking and failing, its thrusters peeling open like mechanical flowers.

  Then the Shell’s reactor went critical. A blinding flash of light lit up the inside of Atton’s cockpit with a deafening boom. A speeding wave of shrapnel hissed off his shields, and then he was through the expanding cloud of debris and cruising toward a group of over a dozen Shells, all of them facing him and firing a steady, sparkling stream of Pirakla missiles. Before Atton could so much as twitch, those missiles went streaking by him and slammed into the Dauntless. The simulated booms of explosions rumbled distantly through his cockpit speakers.

  “Let’s see if we can make them blink, Iceman!” Caldin called out. Then came a roar and a bright golden glow of thruster emissions as her fighter went racing past his, looping and spiraling rather than heading directly toward the enemy.

  A split second later, bright explosions blossomed in the distance, and six of the approaching Shells vanished in consecutive fireballs.

  Finding another group of enemies on the grid, Atton followed Caldin’s lead and tagged them with his own compliment of Thunderbolt missiles. He launched four in quick succession and five more Shells winked off the grid.

  Atton was tempted to gloat, but with hundreds of thousands of enemy fighters still out there, it didn’t seem to matter how many they killed—

  It would never be enough.

  * * *

  The deck shuddered and shook with a simulated roar of Pirakla missiles exploding against the Dauntless’s hull. Return fire rumbled, the battleships’s laser batteries flashing out in raging torrents and slicing enemy fighters in half. For every squadron of Shells that they killed, another one came racing in to take its place.

  Hoff grimaced. It wasn’t what he’d hoped for, but so far the nebula was doing its job. The Sythians had yet to amass a deadly force against them.

  “Sir! The Sythian fleet just jumped away,” the sensor operator reported.

  Hoff blinked. “They ran?”

  “I’m not surprised,” Tactician Okara said.

  Hoff glared at her. She may as well have said I told you so.

  Then, moments later, the sensor operator exclaimed. “Contact! Dead ahead! Five Sythian cruisers.”

  “Range?”

  “Twenty-two klicks, sir.”

  “Get me a visual!” Hoff bellowed. The main forward viewport shimmered, and a group of five Sythian cruisers appeared, dark shadows lurking within the flashing gray clouds of the nebula.

  “Gunnery! Open fire!”

  “Yes, sir!”

  Bright orange fireballs lit those shadows on fire as quantum-launched ordinance wreathed their hulls in fire. Fat white beams of light lanced out from the Dauntless, filling the air with a resonant hum. One of the Sythian warships exploded, followed by another, and then two more. The last one died with a titanic boom that rattled through the bridge speakers. Moments later, a wave of debris hissed against their shields.

  Then the deck shuddered violently.

  “What was that?” Hoff asked.

  “Nebular ice, sir!” the sensor operator replied. “With everything going on our gunners must have missed intercepting it.”

  “Damage report!”

  “Breach on deck six,” engineering replied.

  “Seal it up. Gunnery! Tell your crews to wake up!”

  “Yes, sir!”

  Hoff sighed, watching as the remaining enemy contacts on the grid—all of them Shell fighters—were torn apart by the Dauntless’s fighter screen.

  “That was close, sir,” Okara said.

  “Let’s hope no one saw those cruisers exploding.”

  The nebula grew calm. X-1 Interceptors flew back to point and flank positions.

  Minutes passed.

  The nebula impaired their sensors enough to hide all but the largest of the enemies ships—their thirty-kilometer-long behemoth-class command ships. Hoff was about to order his gunners to open fire on the next nearest one, when something happened.

  One of those behemoths jumped in right on top of them. It opened fire, and a dazzling wall of pirakla missiles came spinning toward them.

  “Helm! Evasive action! Gunnery—give that ship everything you’ve got!”

  White-hot beams lanced out, humming through space, and drawing fiery lines across the enemy cruiser’s bow. Explosions peppered its hull as quantum-launched torpedoes reached their mark.

  “Enemy shields at 82%!”

  The enemy missiles drew near, and it became hard to see past all of the bright purple halos they cast in the nebular clouds.

  “Brace for impact!” the sensor operator yelled.

  Dozens of impacts roared against their hull, some of the noise simulated, some of it real. Bright purple lights strobed through the bridge as missile after missile impacted on the bow of their ship. Fire sprang up in a dozen places. Damage alarms wailed. The deck shuddered and shook.

  “Forward shields at 25%! We have hull breaches on several decks!”

  “Equalize shields!” Hoff roared. “Helm! Roll over and show them our keel.”

  “Yes, sir!”

  Hoff watched the enemy cruiser on a display that was part real visual, part rendered. The command ship’s hull gushed debris from ragged, molten craters all along its length. Those craters flashed brightly from within as the Dauntless launched more ordinance, straight past their shields and into their exposed decks. The port side of the command ship buckled and appeared to liquify as a raging ball of fire tore it apart from within.

  Then, suddenly, the entire ship bulged, as if trying to contain a mighty flood. A second later it flew apart with a deafening boom. Hoff was blinded by the explosion. The deck rocked under their feet as the shockwave hit. The debris were too dispersed to do much damage.

  Hoff sat in his command chair, blinking and slowly shaking his head. “We didn’t kill them,” he said.<
br />
  “No, sir! They appear to have self-destructed.”

  Hoff grimaced. “They sacrificed themselves to call for reinforcements.”

  Okara turned to him. “We need to get out of here.”

  “Helm! Calculate a jump back to Avilon.”

  “Too late,” Okara whispered.

  The grid came alive with enemy contacts jumping in on all sides.

  * * *

  Atton saw the Sythian command ship detonate, spewing white hot flecks of molten alloy in all directions. Then the shockwave hit, and his shields hissed loudly with the assault.

  “What was that?” Gold Two asked.

  “They just did our work for us,” Atton replied. “They blew their reactor.”

  “Why would they do that?” Gina asked.

  “It’s a beacon,” Gold One said. “We’re going to have company again real soon.”

  The Chevalier was right. Hundreds of fighters came swarming out of the Nebula from all sides, followed by dozens of Sythian cruisers and battleships jumping in.

  “Here they come!” Gold Five said.

  Two squadrons of Shells angled toward them.

  “Tag your targets! We fire on my mark,” Gold One said.

  Atton tagged a pair of enemy fighters. His threat detection system screamed a warning and half a dozen Pirakla missiles spun out toward him.

  “Mark!” Gold one said.

  Atton pulled the trigger. Something clunked as his missiles shot away.

  Explosions blossomed against the nebula, and a whole squadron of enemy fighters vanished.

  “Ruh-kah!” Gina cheered, uttering the old Imperial battle cry.

  “For Omnius!” Gold One replied.

  The surviving Shells opened fire and bright lavender lasers came streaking out. Atton made his interceptor dance. He targetted the nearest enemy and toggled his own lasers for a charged shot. Taking careful aim, he lined up his target, doing his best to ignore the angry hiss of lasers hitting his shields. The targetting reticle flickered green. Atton pulled the trigger. Two dazzling red beams shot out, and his target disintegrated. He flew through the speeding debris, and the larger bits clunked as they bounced off his hull.

  Atton’s comms crackled. “Nice work, Golds! Form on me. Lets go back around for another pass.”

  Pulling up hard, Atton found his squadron already hot on the tails of the enemy fighter wave. Those Shells fired volley after volley of missiles at the Dauntless. Enemy cruisers and battleships did the same, closing to point blank range.

  Atton watched helplessly as Strategian Heston’s battleship was ripped open in a dozen different places. The Dauntless fired back valiantly, but they were badly outnumbered.

  The Sythians peeled them open like an overripe fruit.

  Chapter 30

  Hoff watched the scene unfold like something out of a bad dream. Explosions blossomed all around them, clearly visible through the simulated viewports running around the bridge.

  “Shields are coming and going, sir!”

  “Boost the power!”

  The deck shook with a violent series of explosions, and the lights flickered out.

  “Our power core is already ten percent past maximum output, sir! To increase the power draw any further would risk catastrophic failure of the containment field.”

  “So funnel the power from someplace else!”

  Beside him Okara spoke through gritted teeth as another explosion rocked the deck. “There isn’t anywhere to funnel it from!”

  Hoff scowled and stood up from his command chair. He watched out the viewports as gleaming lavender starships circled them like carrion birds, firing steady streams of missiles and lasers.

  Sirens wailed. Crewmen yelled at one another. The deck shook. Return fire thumped and hummed from the battleship. The overhead lights came and went. Hoff turned in a slow circle, looking from one viewport to the next.

  Suddenly something changed. The enemy switched from firing spinning purple stars to firing dazzling blue spheres.

  “Sensors! What is that?”

  “I don’t know, sir . . .”

  Just a few seconds later those weapons began impacting on their hull. The roar of exploding warheads continued, but this time the ship didn’t shudder violently with every hit.

  “Power levels are dropping!” engineering reported.

  “Did they hit our reactor?”

  “No, sir . . . something is interfering with energy conversion and transmission from the core. I think they’re disabling us, sir.”

  “Helm! Where is that jump I ordered?”

  “We have to stop maneuvering, or our calculations will be off! We could end up jumping into the middle of a planet or a sun!”

  “Power output dropping below eighty percent.”

  Too late for a jump now. Hoff’s eyes narrowed to deadly slits. “They’re trying to capture us. Everyone to armory! Prepare for boarding!”

  * * *

  Atton saw the sudden shift in the Sythians’ strategy, and he was the first to call out the alert.

  “They’re trying to capture us!”

  No one argued with that assessment. Instead, Gold One ordered them to keep an eye out for any Sythian transports trying to get to the Dauntless. Maybe they wouldn’t be able to win the fight for Dark Space, but at least they could draw it out and force the Sythians to suffer greater losses.

  “I’ve got nothing yet! Just thousands of fighters,” Atton said.

  “Be patient,” the chevalier insisted. “They’ll be here soon. We need to buy time for our crew to fortify themselves. Save your Thunderbolts for the transports.”

  A pair of stray laser bolts hissed off Atton’s shields, bringing him back into the moment.

  “Watch it, Eight!” someone warned. “You’ve picked up a dozen Shells on your six!”

  Atton dropped a cloaking mine behind him. A split second later, there came a flash of light and a titanic boom. His fighter rocked in the explosion, and two Shells winked off the grid. The others scattered.

  “I’ve got transports, incoming!”

  The coordinates were highlighted on Atton’s star map, and he began tagging targets. The other members of his squadron did the same, broadcasting their choices to avoid overkill.

  “Targets marked?” Gold One asked.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Affirmative.”

  “Locked in and standing by,” Atton added.

  “Open fire!”

  Atton pulled the trigger three times fast, dropping ordinance two at a time. Half a dozen Thunderbolts went teleporting straight to their targets, and the grid lit up with fire. The first wave of enemy transports disappeared without a trace.

  “Hah! Take that!” Gold Seven said.

  A grim smile sprang to Atton’s face as he realized that transmission had come from his wingmate, former Captain Caldin.

  “Keep that enthusiasm, Pilot!” the chevalier said. “We’ve got more incoming! Same routine people! Mark your targets!”

  “I’ve got enemy fighters on my six!” Gold Nine interrupted.

  “Shake them off!” Two replied. “You’re lightning compared to them.”

  “I . . . they’re everywhere!”

  “Twelve, go help Nine and Ten! The rest of you, stand by . . .”

  “Already on it . . . Sir!” Twelve replied, sounding like he was speaking through clenched teeth.

  “I—”

  A scream of static followed that transmission, and Atton saw both Twelve and Nine wink off the grid amidst dozens of Pirakla missiles. Atton saw Gold Ten go flying out the other side of that engagement, hounded by dozens of enemy fighters.

  Gina. He eyed her fighter as it bobbed and weaved between enemy fighters, lighting them up with her lasers and ventral auto-cannon.

  “Motherfrekkers!” Gina gritted out over the comms. “That’s the second time you’ve killed my wingman!”

  “Language, Pilot!” Gold One said.

  “Frek you, sir!” Gina replied.


  Atton felt a grim smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. You can take the mortal out of mortality, but you can’t take the human out of humanity.

  “Can I get a little help over here? Someone?” Gina went on.

  “Stay on target!” the chevalier replied. “It’s going to take all of us to stop this next wave.”

  Coming to a sudden decision, Atton began tagging the squadron of Shells still chasing Gina. He launched three thunderbolt missiles at them, and then he slid and twisted his flight stick to the left, engaging lateral thrusters and maneuvering jets simultaneously to bring Gina’s fighter under his sights. Explosions tore through the group of fighters chasing her as his missiles reached their targets.

  “How’s that, Ten?” Atton asked, pushing his throttle to the max and racing up behind the other fighters still chasing her.

  “Well, well, making up for lost time, are we, Iceman?”

  “Better late than never.”

  “You two will be facing disciplinary action when we return to Avilon!” Gold Two reported.

  Atton hassled the remaining fighters on Gina’s tail with his pulse lasers, while she fired backward on them with the same. Two more Shells flew apart, and the remaining ones broke off their attack.

  “I’m clear,” Gina reported. “Thanks.”

  “No problem.”

  “Three transports got by us thanks to you!” Gold One continued. “Get back in formation now!”

  “Yes, sir,” Atton replied, banking back the way he’d come and firing his afterburners to catch up. The battle was a confusing mess to look at from afar, but the HUD projected over Atton’s ARCs helped by bracketing and magnifying only the nearest enemy targets.

  Atton handed his evasive flying over to the autopilot for a moment and released the flight stick to flex his aching hand. Temporarily freed from having to think about evading all the random swarms of Shell Fighters and Pirakla missiles swirling around him, he turned to look over his shoulder at the Dauntless. Once a majestic covenant-class cruiser at over eight klicks long, she was now riddled with molten, jagged holes, her outer decks flayed open and exposed. She lay slowly drifting through fuzzy black clouds of her own debris. Absent was the subtle blue glow of energy shields, and her thrusters were dark and dormant.