Earth Song: Twilight Serenade (12 page)

“I haven’t… been sleeping… well,” she panted out after the contraction stopped. “I can sleep… later.”

“If you were to just allow me to—”

“I said no, and I mean no!”

“Very well.”

Less than a minute later she almost hovered off the table in agony and regretted her decision. The next contraction felt like her uterus was going to explode and throw out a geyser of lava.

The ship rocked, hard this time, and the lights in the medical bay flickered just as the contraction rose to a crescendo. In the part of her mind not drenched in endorphins and awash in pain, little was of concern except the contraction that never seemed to end. The part of her mind that was still conscious wondered if she would give birth, only to die with her new baby.

The carriers were no longer a concern, but the volume of fire from the other ships was… considerable. Unable to easily withdraw, Lilith continued doing what had worked so far. She did the unthinkable and dove into the midst of the still organizing multi-species fleet and began to sew mayhem.

She raked A-Paws fire down the length of a cruiser, its shields flashing brilliant white and failing almost instantly from the intense fire. She rolled away as the cruiser began to explode and threaded right down the center of a destroyer formation.

The T’Chillen destroyers panicked as the predatory Kaatan flashed between them, firing close-in weapons as it raced through. None of them noticed that she was slowing as she passed, almost allowing them time to bring weapons to bear. As the destroyers began to engage her, she surged ahead once more. Some shots hit the darting ship of the line, many more missed. As the destroyers unleashed a hail of missiles, Lilith flashed her ECM systems and sent the missiles careening out of control. Dozens of them hit their fellow ships. Already weakened from the Kaatan’s passing fire, fratricide claimed more destroyers.

She’d destroyed many ships and damaged many more, yet the enemy was so numerous and she was only one with the support of the Fiisk. If she couldn’t somehow disengage, the outcome was guaranteed.

A shipkiller caught her a glancing blow, one of a dozen launched by the destroyers she’d just savaged. As she struggled to realign her quickly diminishing reserve of shields a stray close-in defense particle beam fired from an all but dead cruiser penetrated the hole. Lilith cried out in pain as the beam drilled a hole through her left lower flank armor and penetrated two decks inboard before exploding a secondary weapons EPC bank.

Automated systems struggled to keep power levels normal as she was forced to use more and more of her dwindling reserves just to keep shields operational. As her offensive fire slowed, fell to a trickle, and then stopped entirely the enemy realized they were succeeding and redoubled their efforts.

Lilith tried to see if she could hurry the bots that were tasked with reloading the launchers. With power so dangerously low, it was all she had offensively remaining in her arsenal. They worked on fixed controls, moving ammunition carefully and methodically. Just one missile detonation within the armored hull…

“I will maneuver to enter the main threat bubble.” It was the Combat Intelligence of the Fiisk which was still more than a light second back, closer to the maelstrom of Dervish. “With my additional firepower—”

“My fate will be forestalled by another minute or two,” Lilith finished for it. “You will prepare to withdraw down into the star’s effect area. This will provide considerable protection as any enemy ships will be already weakened and much easier targets.”

“You will be destroyed.”

“I will enact a very high price for my death,” Lilith assured the computer. She was about to plot a surely suicidal attack on the pair of T’Chillen dreadnoughts when the Combat Intelligence spoke up again.

“Stand by.”

I can’t for more than a few seconds, Lilith thought, barely managing to avoid some direct and devastating fire from the aforementioned dreadnoughts.

“New signals arriving.”

“The quantum gates again?”

“No,” the other program said, “this is a tactical drive.”

“What?” she gasped and spun her sensors to the bearing the other ship’s program told her to look. There was indeed a tactical drive distortion forming. And a moment later a ship emerged.

A ship she’d seen once before slid through the tactical jump portal. A nearly kilometer long central hub holding a dozen oversized Kaatan. As she watched in fascination the battle seemed to almost pause while the enemy also considered this new arrival. The ship was identical to the one that had appeared months before.

Once it had glided its long bulk completely clear of the gateway, the dozen riders all smoothly detached and as one created a wedge formation, and rocketed into the midst of the now completely disorganized enemy host.

“I don’t know who they are,” Lilith said to her other ship CI, “but they’re on our side.”

“They have engaged the T’Chillen and Mok-Tok forces.”

Now with breathing space, Lilith split her concentration between damage control, maneuvering, and observation of the new arrivals. She continued to add to the previous evaluations of the jump rider. Tactical information was streaming on them including design elements and armament. Each was at least twice the size of the Kaatan, with a flatter, almost wing-like, look to its ball section. But for all that size, it appeared more lightly armed and with weaponry arrayed mostly forward. It did, however, sport considerably more powerful shielding.

“Why so large if not to hold more firepower?” she wondered as the wedge of twelve super-Kaatans literally obliterated first one, then another T’Chillen dreadnought. A trio of cruisers combined their fire to stagger one of the new arrivals only for them to respond as one, spinning and shifting their formation to move the imperiled member to the center where it was no longer under fire.

“They’re movements are mathematically perfect,” the Fiisk CI noted.

“Perhaps they are all AI, like yourself.”

“Their management suggests each of the oversized Kaatan may actually have a CI.”

Lilith had no comment to that.

Even with their surprise and losses inflicted, the new arrivals were still outnumbered and outgunned. The enemy fleet finally overcame the shock and began to work as a unit, trying to winnow down their adversaries. Again and again the tight precise formation shifted and maneuvered. They were unwilling to lose even one of their number, and that limited their tactics.

Then, right on schedule, the Ibeen that was due appeared at the extreme range of Lilith’s sensors. A pair of T’Chillen destroyers broke off to engage the new enemy. The approaching transport was completely unaware it was stumbling into the biggest fleet battle the galaxy had seen in hundreds of thousands of years.

Her systems stabilized, overloaded shields dumping energy into space, and magazines nearly reloaded, Lilith hovered in indecision. The Fiisk was holding back, almost at the edge of Dervish’s area of effect, mostly safe. But if she moved to protect the Ibeen, it would be vulnerable to the swarming battle fleet, even with this mysterious assistance they’d received.

Then she received a text transmission in English. “Go and help the transport.” And without further thought, she swung around and fell on the two destroyers with a flurry of shipkillers.

Minu gasped and tried to keep from losing consciousness as the contraction finally ended. It had seemed to go on and on forever. Every muscle in her lower body contracting with one purpose, to expel the little intruder who’d over stayed its welcome.

She passed fecal matter more than once, something that distressed her more than a little but her robot attendants not at all. “This is normal,” they informed her.

“You appear to have dilated sufficiently,” the MI told her, “the baby has begun to move downward. It is almost over.”

The pair of destroyers tried to fight, and they died. Lilith swept then aside with contemptible ease and moved to intercept the Ibeen, warning its Beezer crew of what was happening. She didn’t tell them to flee, that would be even more dangerous. Instead she had it fall into a defensive position a little more than a light minute outside the threat bubble. Now prepared, its nominal defenses would protect it for a short period of time, and Lilith was freed back up to rejoin the fight.

Another cruiser and a destroyer had fallen victims to the strange battle riders as Lilith evaluated the situation. However the new ships were now almost completely defensive. Their armaments were completely energy based, and with shields badly depleted they were unable to spare the energy to attack.

The dreadnought which Lilith had originally bypassed to attack the newer arrivals was pouring fire into the battle riders, reeling them and finally inflicted some real damage, when it suddenly jerked, stopped firing, and exploded spectacularly.

“New targets,” the Fiisk CI called just as the dreadnought blossomed into fire and debris.

“Where did they come from?” Lilith asked.

“Inside Dervish.”

A smarm of small and medium sized ships were erupting up out of the swirling plasma storms of the three dancing stars. Lilith tried to identify their origin only to quickly come to the conclusion that there was no one design scheme. Ships of a dozen or more species (many extinct for eons) all few in tight formation, breaking off to engage T’Chillen battlecruisers or the Mok-Tok fighter squadrons still trying to form up after losing their carriers.

The enemy hung in just long enough to realize their position was untenable, and began to disengage. The newest arrivals attempted to flank them and were blocked by a strong defensive line of Mok-Tok cruisers that had just come though the quantum gateway. Tasked only with holding the point, they were able to put up massive and coordinated fire. The aggressor swarm fell back, only staying close enough to ensure the snakes and what remained of their allies knew that the fight would stay lost for them. Unlike their attack, their withdrawal remained orderly.

Lilith turned to the first ship/ships that arrived to help her, sending hails on every frequency she could. The dozen ships were returning to their carrier and redocking with the same precision as they deployed. Their formation was adapted to assist for two of their number which were damaged. The ship turned after the last was docked and a tactical jump portal formed.

“Please, your ships resemble The People, who are you? Why have you helped us yet again?” Lilith asked in the clear. The ship left with the same fanfare with which it arrived, gliding through the portal and away.

Lilith controlled her anger and filed away all the data on that enigmatic ship and its riders for later analysis.

What appeared to be the flagship of the ragtag fleet came to a relative stop a hundred kilometers off Lilith’s beam. It was a design for which she had no records, not much bigger than a light cruiser but heavily modified and carrying enough firepower to make it a match for the Kaatan. The ship hailed her, in of all things, The People’s script.

“Ship of the line, do you recognize our signal.”

“I do,” she replied. “My name of Lilith. To whom do I owe my thanks?”

“I am Sure Strike, of the command cruiser Octal 1.” Video was enabled and the bucktoothed visage of a Squeen resolved in her mind.

“While I am grateful for the assistance, Squeen ships have been belligerent with us in the past. May I inquire why that has changed?”

“It would be best explained by my passenger.” The view changed and Lilith gasped in surprise, then smiled.

Minu struggled to stay conscious through the seemingly never ending waves of pain. An indeterminate amount of time ago the ship had shuddered so violently she’d feared that it had been cut in half, or was about to explode. The power had fluctuated wildly for a time, then stabilized and there was no more signs of battle.

“It’s over,” she thought, “one way or another.”

As more minutes passed the pain grew and grew, turning from waves to an all-encompassing blanket that threatened to drown her out.

“You are progressing well,” she dimly heard the MI say through the veil of endorphins. It was finally becoming more than she could stand. The pain, the pain, the all-encompassing soul stealing pain that never relented and only became more, and more, and more.

“I can’t anymore,” she gasped and it turned into a sob. Tears ran down her cheeks and she shook her head from side to side. “I… I… oh please, it hurts so bad!”

“You can do it, baby,” a new voice spoke. Through the agony, some part of her mind refused to believe it could be who it sounded like. A ghost had come to help her.

“I’m right here…” A strong hand took her left hand and squeezed. She latched onto it like a line thrown to a person in the final stages of drowning and squeezed with all her might. The hand stayed firm, holding but not squeezing back.

She turned her head and opened her eyes. Through the tears, Aaron looked back at her dressed in an unfamiliar spacesuit. His black hair had grown long and was pulled back in a ponytail and he had a short but well-trimmed beard now, but it was him.

“But you’re dead,” she said in wonder, more tears flooding down her face.