Far From Home: The Complete Series (58 page)

Panting, trying to catch his breath, Hawk looked from one console to another.

“Right. Which one of yuh buggers control this cannon then, eh?”

He reached down, activated the tiny beacon on his belt, then set to work putting the cannon out of action.

* * *

Dolarhyde looked up. “He’s signalling. Mission complete.”

Jessica nodded. She shifted in the command chair. It was true, the battleship no longer fired at them. Commander Greene brought them into a more stable flight path over the mighty vessel. But what had it cost them?

The after-image of Captain Praror’s ship blowing up in front of them was still burned into her retinas. She couldn’t quite believe it.

“Order?” Greene asked.

“We’ve taken a few licks,” she said. “Now let’s show them what we’ve got up our sleeve, see if they can do the same. Let’s honour Praror and his sacrifice. Because of him, because of them… we get to kick Carn’s ass.”

6.

Chief Gunn nodded at Lieutenant Belcher. “Go.”

He threw the switches at the same time as her, diverting power to the weaponry they’d rigged to the
Warrior
‘s power core. It amounted to a twin set of Neutron lasers, a Duotonic Cannon and two dozen warheads designed to break apart the molecular structure of metal alloys. Literally dissolve an enemy’s hull.

Gary Belcher quickly checked the readouts for the new weapons. “They all look good, Chief.”

Gunn contacted the bridge. “We’re hot.”

* * *

“FIRE!” Jessica yelled.

Commander Greene shot the Neutron lasers at the battleship as they rumbled over its surface. The twin shafts of bright green energy left thick lines of melted destruction in their wake. Wherever it hit, it burst through the battleship’s hull. Atmosphere tore free from the blistered skin of the vessel, as if the lasers were scalpels making incisions.

“Their hull is compromised,” Dolarhyde said, monitoring both the tactical and communications stations. “You know, I always thought ‘If this baby gets hit, she’ll go supernova with the amount of hardware below decks.’”

Greene spun about. “Dammit, don’t say that NOW! You make me feel like I’m flying a giant bomb!”

King snapped her fingers. “Del, eyes forward. Bring us about for another pass and prepare to fire the experimental warheads.”

* * *

The battleship shuddered from the multiple hull breaches.

General Carn pointed to the tiny Union ship performing a tight roll to double-back on itself and attack them again.

“Target that ship! Full power to the Crusher. Blow them out of the sky!”

“Yes General!”

* * *

Hawk grinned from ear to ear as the power levels for the cannon dropped to nothing. Then he ripped out every cable he could. “That’ll fix ‘em.”

He headed for the exit, the battleship lit by deep red emergency lighting. The air was thinner out there in the corridor.

Breach somewhere, he thought to himself as he ran in what he hoped was the direction of the shuttle bay.

Several Naxor stopped to watch him run past, and a handful of them took chase. Hawk freed his sword and turned to hack away at them, Naxor body parts flying left and right as he chopped at their bodies.

Two Naxor foot soldiers lifted their weapons and fired at him. Hawk ducked behind a bulkhead as the gunfire struck the wall a few inches to his left.

“Should’ve brought a pistol!”

The moment they paused, he was moving again. He leapt out, lifted his legs and rebounded off the bulkhead opposite. His momentum carried him through the air, and he crashed clumsily into the two soldiers, knocking them to the floor with him. They scrambled over him, but they spilled off of him as Hawk shoved himself up. One of them let loose a battle cry and Hawk slammed his kataan into its open mouth. The other one attacked him from behind, took hold of his head and yanked it back. Hawk just managed to pull his sword free of the dead Naxor and stab behind him into his other attacker.

Covered in Naxor blood, he dashed toward what he took to be the shuttle bay, following three Naxor dressed in what could only be pilot’s gear, sleek black helmets tucked under their arms as they ran.

Time to get out of Dodge,
he thought as the huge ship quivered underfoot.

7.

The warheads erupted over a wide area, disintegrating whole sections of the battleship’s hull. Instant erosion that left it exposed immediately to the harsh vacuum. Naxor crew were sucked out into space, clouds of debris and frozen atmosphere rushed past the
Warrior
as she continued her onslaught of the larger ship.

It should have been impossible, and indeed it would have been had they not had the experimental weapons at their disposal.

Use what you’ve got,
King thought.
That’s what Captain Singh
 
–
Dad
 – told me once. Use what you have at hand and make the best of it.

“Commander, bring us around to their rear. Fire a couple of those directly into their engine exhaust.”

“Aye.”

He made the
Warrior
turn in a wide circle around the stern of the battleship, until they faced the massive engines. He locked on to their white-hot centres and fired.

The explosion was immense and blinding. It rocked the
Warrior
until King thought she might break apart.

“Back away, back away!” she yelled. Commander Greene did his best to reverse back from the battleships engines.

* * *

General Carn grabbed whatever was nearby. It just happened to be a bulkhead jutting out from the wall. He staggered against it as the battleship fell to chaos. The deck started to tilt backward, the ship lifting at the nose as her engines died.

“Extensive damage to engines, multiple hull breaches on most decks,” the status report came from somewhere to his left. He didn’t bother to look in the direction of the speaker. Carn looked up at the viewscreen.

“Have you located the monolith yet?” he shouted.

A moment later. “On screen now, General.”

A map appeared, overlaid across the full width of the screen. It showed the artefact nestled amongst thick jungle. Surprisingly there were no defences guarding it, no signs of civilisation anywhere near.

It was all he needed to see.

This ship,
he thought.
It’s just a tool. What matters is down there. The master pyramid.

The deck still lifting crazily, Carn didn’t say another word. The bridge was in a state of craziness, all hands attempting to wrestle back control of the mighty vessel. Not one of them noticed when the General slipped out of the exit at a near run.

* * *

The battleship had stopped firing and so too had the
Warrior
, for the moment. It seemed unbelievable that they’d managed to inflict so much damage in so short a time.

“Their ship’s dead,” Greene said. “And for once we’re doing fine.”

Jessica patched herself through to engineering. “Chief? How’re we holding up?”

“Better than the last ship I was on.”

It’d been meant as harmless patter, but Jessica still felt a pang of discomfort at the thought of the
Defiant
going down the way she did. And if she felt as though she’d failed everyone, how did the Chief feel? After all, the
Defiant
was her baby. Repaired and patched together with band-aids more times than she cared to remember, usually under Chief Gunn’s watchful eye.

“I know what you mean, Chief,” King said, dismissing the little stab of guilt in her heart at what she’d led her crew into in the past. What she’d asked of them.

“Everything’s holding up,”
Gunn said.
“She may be old and full of dust, but this ship’s strong and has it where it matters.”

“Rather like another ship of her time I once knew,” Jessica said with a smile.

The Chief chuckled over the intercom.
“Yeah, Ma’am, me too.”

“Keep me posted of any changes, Chief.”

She closed the channel.

Dolarhyde looked up. “Captain King, I have Hawk on the line. Shall I put him on speakers?”

She nodded and exchanged looks with Commander Greene.

The Texan’s voice was barely a whisper, but it was clearly that of Hawk in a highly excitable state.

“Cap! Hey it’s me, Hawk. I’m hidin’ out in the shuttle bay till I can get my mitts on a ship and blow off of this tub,”
he said.
“But I got somethin’ to tell yuh. I ain’t alone.”

Jessica frowned. “Be clear, Captain. What do you mean? Members of the crew?”

“No, no, no, I mean the General. Old buzzard’s here. And he’s gettin’ into a shuttle. I think he’s ditchin’ ship.”

She smiled. Finally, a chance at grabbing Carn.

“Are there other ships there, Captain Nowlan?”

“Yuh. Another three. I’m about to try and nab one.”

“Make sure you get one,” she ordered. “We’ll follow.”

Jessica connected with engineering once again.
“Yes?”
Lieutenant Belcher said.

“Lieutenant, what’s the status of the cloak? Still operational?”

“Aye. Will we be needing it?”

“You bet. Prepare to divert power to the cloak.”

She closed the channel.

“Good idea,” Dolarhyde said. “I did wonder how we’d get past the inhabitants of that planet and their need to enact revenge. They’ll be on their way up here, no doubt, to take advantage of that ship being disabled.”

Commander Greene steered them beneath the listing battleship. “Yeah, and I for one don’t plan on staying up here to see what happens when they spot us.”

“Commander, activate the cloak. Let’s drift but prepare to punch the engines once Hawk gives us word.”

“Aye.”

8.

Hawk watched from his hiding place as the General carefully lowered a large mottled egg into the back of one of the shuttlecraft. He then slid into the pilot’s seat. The shuttles were for two passengers only, seated side by side. A pilot and a gunner. They were like two separate pods connected by the bullet-shaped engine in the middle. Carn activated the little ship, and the hood slid shut over him.

That was when Hawk moved. With the General’s attention now fixed on the matter of getting up off the deck and out the hangar bay doors, he dashed to the nearest shuttle and dived in.

His eyes darted over the controls to find the activation switch. He knew he only had seconds before the hangar was purged of atmosphere and the doors were allowed to open. If he couldn’t get the canopy down by then…

“There!” he said with a grin and slapped the switch. The shuttle rumbled to life at the same time as the canopy slid over him and sealed shut with a whoosh of air. He watched out the cockpit as General Carn’s shuttle lifted and seconds later the hangar bay doors opened to reveal a corner of space over a bright, blue planet.

“Come on come on come on,” Hawk muttered. He grabbed the stick and swung the shuttle around. Carn slid through the gaping exit and he hurried to close in behind, though keeping a respectable distance.

He left the battleship behind and followed the General into the upper atmosphere.

* * *

Dolarhyde nodded, holding the comm. piece to his ear. “Hawk is in pursuit. He’s activating his tracker now.”

Jessica pointed at Commander Greene, who merely nodded in compliance. “On it,” he said. “Pursuit course. Full thrusters.”

“Activate the cloaking device,” Jessica ordered. “And try to keep up, Del. We can’t lose them.”

Commander Greene shook his head as he brought the
Warrior
to full thrust, tearing toward the planet as fast as she could without going to Jump speed. “Always trust the driver,” he said.

The alien planet rushed to meet them as they left the field of battle behind, the nose of the
Warrior
glowing red-hot.

9.

Hawk followed the General into the cloud layer. Visibility cut to barely anything, he had to rely on the crude sensor display before him. It showed the General as a green dot –
a friendly
 – several clicks in front of him. And Carn was steadily dropping altitude.

Definitely moving toward a target on the ground somewhere near here,
Hawk thought.

The clouds gave way to jungle terrain populated here and there by some of the tallest, thinnest trees Hawk had ever seen. Up ahead he could see Carn’s ship still dropping toward the ground. Hawk picked up speed to close the gap.

“Hawk to
Warrior
. Hope yuh not too far behind, folks. Mirror face is gettin’ ready to land.”

“We’re right behind you, cloaked,”
Dolarhyde’s voice came through.
“Just keep up with him, Captain.”

* * *

“With the vegetation this dense, will we be able to land, do you think?” Jessica asked.

Commander Greene shook his head. “No. And I don’t think we’ll have the time to scout about for a clearing, either.”

“We’re racing the clock.”

“Yeah,” Greene said. The trees sped past beneath them in a green blur.

King got up out of the command chair. “Then we’ll have to do this the old fashioned way. What’s it like out there?”

Dolarhyde checked the adjacent station. “Standard atmosphere. Slightly higher pressure. One gee of gravity. Won’t take long to equalize.”

Jessica nodded, flicked the comm. by the chair. “Chief, Lieutenant Belcher… get yourselves up here please.”

* * *

General Carn raced ahead, clawing closer and closer toward the tree canopy as he neared his target. Hawk checked his readings, then when he glanced back up he saw it. A little triangle on the horizon, coming up fast. Getting clearer, bigger, darker. Not just a triangle against the sky, but the tip of a pyramid.

“
Warrior
, Hawk. Better hurry. And be ready to move. I see the artefact.”