by E J Gilmour
‘Buckle yourself in. This could get really ugly.’
‘What about Cap and Cynthia? We can’t leave them behind,’ said Ajax.
A huge explosion lit up the city, and the building directly across from the docking platform began to crumble as a huge blast of plasma ripped through it. The shockwave from the explosion caused the Out Drifter to shake.
Sara pulled back the vertical control lever and the ship lifted off the platform and hovered for a moment as the adjacent building crumbled into the city below. A massive cloud of smoke and dust rose up.
Sara reached up and grabbed the combat visor and placed it over her face. She then pushed the acceleration lever and the ship instantly powered forward and flew out into the city. She looked up as they exited the docking bay. Hundreds of alien fighters clouded the sky above the city. The Out Drifter plunged downward into the thick dust cloud and then into the smog of the lower city. The ship rapidly accelerated. Sara weaved through the buildings and flew just below the smog layer. Buildings were collapsing around them and she had to concentrate to dodge the falling debris. A thick dust cloud was spreading through the city.
There was the sound of an explosion; the ship shook and careered downward. She struggled to take control and clipped the side of a building, which caused the Out Drifter to spin uncontrollably.
‘We took a direct hit. I can’t fly through all this falling debris. Ivan, check the systems. What’s the status?’
‘All the systems are operational. The electronic shield is at forty percent.’
‘Forty percent!’ she repeated angrily.
The ship veered upward and shot out of the dust cloud. She rapidly ascended into the bright blue sky. Thousands of fighters were engaged in aerial combat and the sky was ablaze with streams of plasma, charged particle beams and smoke trails from missiles. It was instantly clear that the alien fighters vastly outnumbered the Zeno Par fleet. Three massive triangular alien ships were hovering high above the city. Thousands of mounted plasma turrets were unleashing on the city below and causing absolute devastation.
‘Flying in the open poses a risk,’ said Ivan.
‘I disagree! We can move much more quickly if we are above the buildings, and there is way too much falling debris down there,’ she replied as the Out Drifter’s main cannon started firing at a squadron of nearby alien fighters. She unleashed several rockets as she veered away from the battle toward the outskirts of the city.
‘We are being trailed by a group of alien fighters,’ said Ivan.
‘I can see them,’ she snapped.
‘There are eight alien fighters,’ he added.
‘I know!’ she yelled.
The ship shook. Ivan checked the electronic shield console; thirty-two percent. He then switched the ship’s external com to Michael’s com channel. ‘Captain Michael, can you hear me?’ There was no answer. ‘Captain Michael, this is Ivan. Can you hear me?’ Again there was no answer. They cleared the outskirts of the city. Sara brought the ship into a rapid descent. The eight alien fighters followed closely. She shifted from left to right to avoid the torrent of plasma and charged particle beams.
Seconds later they reached the mountain range that encircled the city. She brought the ship to an extremely low altitude. They were just above the treetops. The ship shook again.
‘…Sara, the casings are overheating!…’ shouted Ethan.
‘I don’t want to hear it, Ethan. Tell me some good news,’ she yelled.
‘…There is no good news! You have to slow down!…’
‘That’s the one thing I can’t do right now!’
She guided the Out Drifter along a deep valley between two huge snow-capped mountains. The alien fighters were still directly behind them. Charged particle beams and lasers shot by, and Sara did her very best to evade the onslaught. The sound of an explosion rang out, and the ship suddenly plunged toward the wooded valley below. The console lights flickered off and on.
‘Sweet neutrino!’ she yelled, struggling to take control. They were approaching the treetops at a blistering rate. ‘Ethan, manually increase the power!’
‘…I can’t; the valves will crack!...’
‘Do it!’
‘…I can’t!...’
‘Do it or we are finished!’
‘…Fine, I’ll do it, but this could be the end…’
The ship thrust forward and sharply turned upward. The rear side scraped the treetops. Sara then pushed the forward thrust lever to full power and entered an acute vertical climb. They could only see bright blue sky and hazy white clouds through the viewing panel.
‘…The valves! They’re going to crack open. Sara, you have to power down the reactor!...’
‘Just a second!’ she shouted as the Out Drifter rapidly ascended.
‘…You have to!...’
They entered the upper atmosphere. She reached forward and switched off the reactor power. The engines fell silent; the ship slowed to a complete stop and then went into freefall. She turned the ship with the lateral emergency thrusters. The eight alien fighters were instantly upon them. She fired all the Out Drifter’s weapons at once. Two of the fighters exploded; one was taken by a rocket and the other was hit by the shrapnel from the explosion. They descended through the remaining fighters; two plasma beams hit them at once. The Out Drifter started to spin out of control as it descended.
‘Ethan, how are those valve casings?’ she asked.
‘…They’re cooling down, but they’re still unstable…’
‘I have to restart the reactor.’
‘…Wait! The casings are still too hot…’
‘We are in an uncontrolled descent. We don’t have a choice.’
‘…Wait as long as you can…’
Sara focused her full attention on the fast approaching ground. The alien fighters didn’t bother pursuing them as they assumed they had lost power and would shortly crash into the rocky land below.
The main console monitor read: EMERGENCY: IMPACT WARNING! The forested hills were only seconds away. She reached forward and hit the three reactor operation switches. The engine rumbled back to life; she brought the ship out of the uncontrolled spin.
‘Come on!’ she yelled as she tried to pull the ship up. The angle of descent was gradually decreasing. She directed the ship into a deep ravine to give herself more time to complete the maneuver. Ivan watched as the base of the ravine grew increasingly closer. His probability program predicted the chance of impact was eighty-six percent. He gripped the handrail and closed his eyes, expecting a heavy collision with the ground. Somehow Sara flattened out just in time, only metres from the rushing water at the base of the ravine. The Out Drifter sped away and followed the course of the river.
Sara wiped the sweat from her brow and looked back over her shoulder to see if the fighters were following. ‘The fighters aren’t following us. They must have thought we were done for,’ she said.
**
There was a large wooden oak table inside the house. Acacius was preparing some traditional tea on an old-fashioned stovetop. The interior was made of polished wood and all the furniture was handmade.
‘In ancient times human beings would drink tea because of its healing properties. This particular tea is soothing for a troubled mind.’
A sweet aroma filled the house. Acacius took three teacups and a small tray from a wooden cabinet beside the stove. He poured the boiling tea from the kettle into the cups and then brought the tray to the table.
‘Please drink and enjoy,’ he said as he sat down beside Cynthia.
Cynthia took a sip of the aromatic tea. She was so used to drinking synthesized flavoured drinks that she had forgotten how nice it was to actually drink something that was naturally brewed.
‘You like it?’ questioned Acacius, smiling warmly.
‘Yes, thank you,’ she replied.
‘We have lost much with the advancement of technology. For many thousands of years humankind enjoyed such things. Somet
imes it’s good to be reminded.’
Acacius placed his teacup on the table. His eyes narrowed, and the smile melted away from his face and was replaced by a look of deep concentration. ‘Aliens are coming,’ he said sternly.
‘What?’ exclaimed Michael.
‘They are surrounding the approaches to the waterfall. There is an entire battalion, more than five hundred. Somehow they found us here. We only have a few minutes before they arrive.’
‘How did they find us?’ asked Michael as he stood up.
‘It doesn’t matter how,’ answered Acacius as he walked to the back of the room.
Michael only had a standard plasma pistol which was latched to his belt. Cynthia was entirely unarmed.
Acacius unlocked a cabinet at the back of the room. ‘We have to prepare. This house was once owned by an old hunter. He left most of his hunting rifles behind when he fled Zeno Par.’ He slid open the cabinet door revealing a gun rack with assortment of ancient hunting rifles that looked like antiques.
Michael walked over and reached for one of the larger rifles. The weapon had a wooden grip and shoulder rest with an intricately designed trigger system and a wooden hand guard with patterns etched into the woodwork. ‘We can’t hold back five hundred aliens with these. The magazines only hold seven rounds, and they aren’t plasma rifles; they fire conventional bullets. The bullets may not pierce alien armour.’
‘They are modelled on archaic hunting rifles. As I said, the previous owner was a hunter, not a soldier. These are the only weapons I have,’ said Acacius as he handed a rifle to Cynthia. She grabbed several magazines from the bottom of the cabinet.
‘We could use the Lore of the Ancients,’ suggested Michael.
Acacius shook his head. ‘I told you the End Machine is searching the Outer Worlds for us. If we were to use our powers the machine would know our exact location. Then we would surely die. We can only use our powers of perception and revelation, never our outward power as you previously did to save yourself. You were fortunate the machine was far from you; if it had been closer you would have been located. We must not use our powers until we find the Magnifier. You have to understand this, Michael.’
Michael nodded as he loaded a magazine into his rifle. He then lifted his wrist-com. ‘Sara, can you hear me?’
‘…Where have you been, Captain?...’ she yelled.
‘What’s going on?’
‘…We nearly lost the Out Drifter. The planet is under attack! An entire alien battle group is here…’
‘Is the ship still flying?’
‘Yes, but only just. This flying piece of scrap metal will need some serious work when we get out of here. Captain, we have to get off this planet.’
‘Listen, Sara. A battalion of aliens is surrounding our position. I need you to extract us. Can you locate my wrist-com?’
‘…I’ll see what I can do…’
Acacius crossed the room and glanced out the window. ‘The aliens are nearly here. Prepare yourselves.’
‘Their plasma weapons are going to tear this house apart,’ said Michael as he took a position beside one of the front windows. He peeked around the edge of the window. Groups of aliens were advancing across the paved area beside the river. He counted at least twenty. He could see three mobile hover turret guns further back; crowds of aliens were assembling and preparing to attack.
Dog-Two hissed and growled. Cynthia was crouched down on the opposite side of the window; her hands were trembling and her forehead was covered with sweat.
‘Wait for them to come into the house,’ whispered Acacius.
Acacius drew a large dagger from his boot. Michael ducked down to make sure the aliens couldn’t see him through the window. They waited in silence.
A moment later the brass doorhandle turned. The door opened and an alien stepped into the room. Acacius moved like lightning. He grabbed the alien by the neck and rammed his dagger into its ribs. The creature let out a gurgling moan as Acacius ripped the plasma weapon from its hands. The alien’s lifeless body fell to the ground. He then turned the weapon toward the open door and unleashed a torrent of plasma. Two aliens directly outside were instantly killed. Michael smashed open the window and began firing at the closest aliens. Cynthia did the same. The aliens ducked for cover as bullets whizzed through the air.
Within seconds they returned fire. Beams of plasma and charged particle beams tore through the front wall of the house. Michael and Cynthia ducked for cover as the house shook. For about a minute they lay low as the front wall was ripped to pieces by the relentless barrage. The wall was smoking. Suddenly the aliens ceased their attack. Cynthia hadn’t been hit, but Acacius’s left arm was bleeding.
‘What do we do now?’ whispered Michael.
‘Wait,’ whispered Acacius. ‘They must think we are dead.’
‘We should be dead after that,’ whispered Michael, hardly believing they had survived the onslaught.
‘But we are not dead yet,’ said Acacius stoically.
Dog-Two came out from behind a couch and snarled. A smoking grenade bounced through the open front door. They watched in horror as the grenade rolled along the floor. It stopped in the middle of the room and green poisonous gas started leaking out.
‘Hold your breath!’ said Acacius as he stepped toward the gas grenade, but the gas started to burn his skin and he was forced to retreat. Dog-Two, seeing the threat, leapt forward and picked up the gas grenade in his mouth. The poison had no effect on his synthetic flesh. He dashed through the front door and out into the open, taking the smoking grenade with him.
Michael watched from the window. The aliens were backing away as the poisonous green gas drifted across the field. Dog-Two flung the grenade away and charged for the nearest alien, pouncing on the creature; he buried his fangs into the alien’s neck. Michael slammed a new magazine into his rifle and fired several times. The poisonous gas was filling the outside area and forcing the aliens further back. Dog-Two dashed across Michael’s visual field with incredible speed and ripped another alien to the ground. He then turned back toward the house, bursting through the door.
‘Well done, Dog-Two!’ yelled Michael. Dog-Two’s tail started wagging and he yelped.
Michael and Cynthia watched as the aliens began to reconfigure their attack formation. A few moments later the gas grenade had completely exhausted its toxic contents. The aliens brought their three hover turret guns toward the front of their formation at the far side of the paved area.
‘This doesn’t look good,’ said Michael in a low voice. He took aim with his hunting rifle and emptied the magazine. A massive stream of plasma lit up the entire area and slammed into the front door, causing a huge explosion. Acacius was thrown across the room from the force of the impact. Half the front wall crumbled away.
‘Cynthia, Dog-Two; get back!’ yelled Michael.
They sprinted toward the back of the house. Michael was not far behind them when a second explosion rang out. The shockwave knocked him off his feet and he fell heavily to the floor. The entire front section of the house collapsed. Acacius was lying unconscious against the back wall. Michael struggled to find his feet. He crept behind the couch where Cynthia and Dog-Two were taking cover. She was gripping her rifle and staring at him with wide eyes.
‘Are you missing the space station yet?’ he whispered, managing a smile.
‘How will we get out of here?’ she whispered anxiously.
‘I don’t know,’ he said as he peered over the edge of the couch.
The front of the house was in ruin; all that was left was a pile of rubble. The air was full of dust and some of the wooden debris was burning. The aliens were advancing again.
Michael’s wrist-com beeped. ‘…Captain, we found you, along with half the alien infantry force…’ said Sara.
‘Sara, can you get close enough?’ he whispered.
‘…not with those three turret guns down there. The electronic shield is at sixteen percent. One direct hit and yo
u can say goodbye to the Out Drifter. You need to get clear of that alien army…’
‘All right, don’t leave without us.’
‘…What will you do?...’
‘I’ll think of something.’
The aliens were standing at the front of the rubble and talking in sharp tones about what to do next. Their language was incomprehensible. To the left there was a side door, which was hanging on one hinge. The door led out to the rushing river.
‘We will swim our way out of here,’ he whispered to Cynthia. ‘Dog-Two, I need you to jump into the water. Do you think you can doggy paddle?’ Dog-Two snarled and bared his teeth. ‘I’ll take that as a yes.’ He turned back to Cynthia. ‘Don’t hesitate when I say run. It’s our only chance.’
‘I can’t swim,’ she whispered.
‘Just push the water in the direction you don’t want to go,’ he replied.
Several aliens started moving toward them through the ruined house. ‘Go now!’ he yelled. Michael dashed back to where Acacius was lying. He grabbed his arm and began dragging him toward the door. Within two seconds the aliens began firing.
Cynthia kicked the door open and sprinted to the edge of the surging white water. She leapt forward and was taken away by the power of the river. Michael dragged Acacius’s unconscious body toward the exit. Rays of bright plasma smashed into the crumbling back wall beside him. His total focus was on reaching the river. Dog-Two wouldn’t leave the house without them and was growling and barking at the approaching aliens.
Acacius began to stir. His eyes slowly opened as Michael dragged him through the doorway.
‘What is happening?’ he asked in a weak voice.
‘We are leaving!’ yelled Michael as he lunged from the bank, dragging his teacher into the turbulent water. Michael felt the icy water surge around his body. Acacius was fully awake by the time the current was pushing him downstream. Michael was completely submerged for several seconds; the powerful flow made it difficult to swim or stay upright. Dog-Two’s head appeared above the surface. He yelped before disappearing below again.
A group of the aliens were standing on the riverbank and firing their plasma weapons as they passed by, but within seconds the river took them around a corner and away from the alien battalion. Cynthia was ahead of them; she was struggling to keep her head above the water and gasping for air. Michael could see they were approaching rapids. The river cut directly through a crevice and then descended at a blistering rate. It was impossible to swim against the current; all he could do was try to stay upright.