Frontiers Saga 10: Liberation (35 page)

“Beginning yaw and roll maneuver!” Mister Chiles reported as the Aurora began to pass under the exploding aft end of the cruiser.

“Switch cameras,” Nathan ordered. The image changed, and Nathan watched the Earth and the cruiser twist about on the view screen as the Aurora spun on her lateral axis and rolled on her longitudinal one. The bridge suddenly began to shake violently.

“Taking rail gun fire!” Mister Randeen announced.

“Ten seconds until we’re belly up!” Mister Chiles reported.

“Poor choice of words,” Nathan said, his eyes still fixed on the main view screen.

“Just lost port side forward rail gun!” Mister Randeen announced.

“Damage control reports outer hull breach in section one seven two!” Naralena reported. “Pressure loss on decks C and D, same section!”

The shaking became less violent, settling into muted vibrations that only occasionally rattled them in their seats.

“Our underside is toward the target,” Mister Chiles announced. “Twenty seconds until the yaw maneuver is complete.”

“Coming out from under the cruiser’s bow,” Mister Navashee reported.

“Fire all rail guns!” Nathan ordered.

“Firing all guns!” Mister Randeen answered.

The Aurora’s mini-rail guns, located around her perimeter, began spewing a steady stream of slugs at the enemy ship as they drifted apart at one hundred fifty meters per second. Enemy rail gun fire ripped into the Aurora’s outer hull, creating craters a few meters across and sending debris flying in all directions.

Nathan looked at the left side of the spherical view screen, following the image of the Jung cruiser as it moved toward the center. As it moved closer to the center, the shaking became more violent. The Aurora began taking the enemy rail gun fire across their own bow.

“Yaw complete. Nose on target,” the helmsman reported.

“Range: two kilometers and increasing!” Mister Navashee reported.

“Plasma cannons fully charged and ready to fire!” Mister Randeen announced.

“Snapshot tubes two and four!” Nathan ordered.

“Firing two and four!” Mister Randeen announced. “Two and four away! Ten seconds to impact!”

“Fire plasma torpedoes!” Nathan ordered.

“Firing tubes one and three!” Mister Randeen replied.

Again, the bridge glowed red as the bolts of plasma energy streaked over their heads.

“Lock four missiles on the target and fire!” Nathan ordered.

“Locking missiles on target!” Mister Randeen replied.

Two white flashes on the main view screen that lit up the inside of the bridge announced the detonations of their first two conventional torpedoes. The two red flashes from the plasma shots that followed did the same.

“Firing missiles!” Mister Randeen reported.

“She’s lost forward shields!” Mister Navashee reported. “She’s got hull breaches across her bow…!”

“Missile impact in ten seconds!” Mister Randeen interrupted.

“Ten degrees nose down,” Nathan ordered. “Stand by to fire quads.”

“Pitching ten down, aye,” Mister Chiles acknowledged.

“Locking quads on target,” Mister Randeen added. “Impacts!”

Nathan watched as four yellow-orange explosions tore open the nose of the cruiser, sending sections bigger than his parents’ estate back in Vancouver spinning off in different directions.

“She’s coming apart!” Mister Navashee reported.

“Fire all quads,” Nathan ordered calmly. “Pound the hell out of them.”

“Firing quads!” Mister Randeen replied.

Nathan watched the view screen as they continued to drift away, pummeling the helpless enemy cruiser with rounds from the Aurora’s quad rail guns. “Full magnification,” Nathan added. The view screen refocused, giving them all a front row seat for the Jung cruiser’s death. The Aurora’s massive quad rail gun rounds drilled into the already crippled ship’s outer hull, digging deep down inside her. Bulkheads, furniture, pieces of hull, structural beams, and even human bodies all hurtled away from the doomed cruiser.

“Target is down,” Mister Navashee reported from the sensor station. “Zero threat potential.”

“Cease fire,” Nathan ordered. There was no emotion or remorse in his voice.

“All weapons have disengaged,” Mister Randeen acknowledged.

“Pitch us back over,” Nathan ordered. “Nose first attitude.”

“Pitching over, aye.”

“Contacts!” Mister Navashee reported. “The battleship is firing.”

“At us?” Nathan asked, dreading the answer.

“No, sir,” Mister Navashee answered. “At the surface. Six nukes.”

“Reload all tubes and missiles, and recharge the plasma torpedoes.”

“Aye, sir,” Mister Randeen answered.

“Range to that battleship?” Nathan asked.

“Twelve thousand kilometers and closing,” Mister Navashee answered.

“Mister Riley, new jump. Put us ten kilometers from that battleship on a course to pass under her from a range no more than a kilometer distance.”

“Captain, we’re no match for that battleship,” Mister Randeen objected. “She’s at least five times our mass.”

“More like eight,” Mister Navashee corrected.

Nathan continued staring straight ahead at the main view screen as he spoke in cold, unwavering tones. “That battleship is killing millions of people with every shot it fires at my world, Mister Randeen, and I intend to stop it.”

* * *

“Ten seconds to jump,”
Loki said.

Josh glanced down at his threat display. “Are they turning to attack that battleship?”

“Looks like it,”
Loki responded.
“Five seconds.”

“Are they nuts?”

“Three……two……one……jump.”

The jump flash washed over the Falcon. Both her crewmen were thrown forward against their shoulder restraints as the Falcon came out of her jump and slammed into the Earth’s atmosphere only a thousand meters above the surface.

“God! My shoulders are killing me!” Josh complained.

“Contacts! Close in! They’re firing!”
Loki yelled.

“Where? Where?” Josh exclaimed glancing at his threat display and shifting his head from left to right as he looked out the canopy into the darkness.

“Snap roll! Dropping decoys!”
Loki yelled. No sooner had the first words left his mouth than the Falcon began to roll rapidly to starboard.
“Come out and break left! Now! Now! Now!”
The Falcon stopped rolling, ending up on her left side and in a tight left turn.
“No side thrust!”
he warned, knowing that Josh would try to avoid the altitude loss in the turn by adding the translation thrusters on their left side. The Falcon dropped sideways toward the Earth rapidly. Loki looked out the canopy to his right as two Jung missiles streaked above them in opposite directions.

“Fuck! They’re everywhere!” Josh cried.

“Roll out and climb!”
Loki ordered.

Josh rolled right, ending his turn, then pulled the Falcon’s nose up while increasing power to full.

“Jesus!”
Loki moaned.
“We’ve got eight missiles on our tail! And they’re closing fast!”

“I’m at full power!”

“They’re still closing, Josh! Seven seconds!”

“Jump us!”

“I can’t! The Aurora’s passing directly over us! We might slam into her!”

“Fuck this!” Josh exclaimed. “Drop more decoys!” He grabbed the throttle for the main space drive and pushed it all the way forward as he heard the sound of decoys being jettisoned from their tail. The Falcon leapt upward, accelerating at an incredible rate. Josh grimaced. The interceptor shook violently as she plowed through the rapidly thinning atmosphere in a vertical climb.

“Are you nuts?”
Loki yelled over the comms from behind Josh.

Josh eased all his throttles back slowly as the Falcon neared the edge of space, pulling them all the way to zero thrust. He watched their airspeed rapidly decrease as they bled off energy while continuing to climb without power. “Where are those missiles now, huh?” he bragged.

“Nowhere near us; that’s for sure!”
Loki exclaimed as his partner began to push the nose back over.
“You could have torn us apart with that stunt. You know that, right?”

“It was either that or get
blown
apart by those missiles,” Josh argued.

“Crew Chief is going to go nuts when he sees that maneuver on the flight recorder.”

Josh pushed the nose into a shallow dive, picking up airspeed as they descended. “Not a scratch on us though. He’s got to like that.”

“Don’t jinx us,”
Loki warned.

“I’m putting us onto a glide path for Jessica. Plot a jump to five hundred meters off the deck.”

“Are you sure that’s going to be enough?”

“We’re barely moving right now, Loki. Of course, the longer you take, the faster we’ll be going when we come out of the jump.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know.”

“You’ve got to admit that was a pretty slick idea to climb away at full space power like that.”

“How did you know we weren’t going to break up from the stress?”
Loki wondered, knowing that his friend had never been one to study the structural limitations of the ships he flew.

“I didn’t.” Josh giggled.

“Not funny.”

“I guess they finally figured out we were always jumping into the same area,” Josh added.

“Next time, can we jump in a little farther out?”
He pressed the button to accept the jump plot.
“Jumping in three……two……one……jump.”

The jump flash washed over them. A split second later, Josh pulled up on the Falcon’s nose and gradually added power, transitioning expertly to level flight only ten meters above the trees.

“What, no, ‘Jump complete’?” Josh wondered.

“It’s getting kind of redundant, don’t you think?”
Loki scanned the surface for Jung troops.
“Movement to port. Come left thirty.”

“I was wondering when you were going to figure that out,” Josh said as he started his turn. “Coming left.”

“Nash, Falcon! Head down! Attacking ground forces in five!”
Loki pressed his finger to the target screen and drew a circle around the symbols that represented the Jung troops on the surface that were closest to Jessica.
“It’s going to be close,”
he said.

“How close?” Josh asked.

“Close.”

“Bug’s ass close?”

“Closer. Just hold us steady; that’s all I ask.”

“Any threats in the area?”

“Just the six fighters turning toward us to fire.”
Loki engaged the nose turret.
“Firing.”

Bolts of plasma energy spat out of the twin barrels of the Falcon’s plasma turret as she skimmed the treetops. The bolts slammed into the ground, the firing pattern snaking back and forth within the defined targeting area and tearing up everything in its path. Trees, bushes, rocks, and Jung troops were all blown apart.

Josh looked down to his left as they passed the target area. Burning debris flew everywhere. Trees and bushes were burning below them. “Fuck, that gun is nasty.” Several energy bolts shot upward from the troops on the ground as they vainly tried to defend themselves against the passing interceptor.

“Fighters have range,”
Loki announced.
“They’re firing. Ten seconds!”

“Time to go,” Josh said as he pulled the nose up and brought the jet turbines to full power.

“Jumping in three……two……one……jump.”

“That’s gotta be frustrating, don’t you think?” Josh said as they came out of the jump and found themselves in orbit above the Earth.

“What?”

“We keep jumping in, they keep shooting, and we keep jumping out again.”

“Probably. Turn toward the Aurora. I’m going to contact Telles,”
Loki said.

* * *

“Jump complete,” Mister Riley reported as the Aurora’s jump flash subsided.

“Ten kilometers and closing rapidly!” Mister Navashee announced.

Nathan looked at the view screen, surprised that he could see the battleship even from ten kilometers out. “Damn, she’s big,” he said under his breath. “Snapshot two and four!”

“Firing two and four!” Mister Randeen answered.

“Target is firing rail guns!” Mister Navashee reported.

Mister Randeen watched his tactical console as the launch indicators for torpedo tubes two and four flashed green four times to indicate they were launching torpedoes. They then turned red to show that the tubes were empty. “Two and four away!”

The bridge began to shake violently as rail gun fire from the Jung battleship began to rain down upon them as they approached.

“Fire missiles!” Nathan ordered.

“Firing four!” Mister Randeen answered.

“They’ve got all four starboard guns on us,” Mister Navashee warned.

“Hull breach! Topside!” Naralena reported. “Maintenance spaces in the forward quarter are open to space! Damage control reports no damage to inner hull!”

“If we take another round in the same spot…” the systems officer began.

“Roll us over, Mister Chiles,” Nathan ordered without hesitation.

“Rolling over!” the helmsman acknowledged.

Nathan watched the view screen as the image of the massive battleship, which now filled their entire view screen, rotated around their center point.

“Ten seconds to torpedo impact!” Mister Randeen reported. “Fifteen to missile impacts!” Red lights appeared on the tactical officers displays. “Forward rail guns have taken direct hits! That’s a total of six guns down! We can’t put up a point-defense against missiles without those guns, sir!”

“Then we’ll just have to stay in close so she can’t use her missiles,” Nathan said. “Fire plasma torpedoes! Both tubes!”

“Firing one and three!”

The bright, red light washed over the bridge as the two bolts of plasma energy from the torpedo cannons streaked over them on the spherical view screen. A second later, two red flashes appeared at the center of the view screen as the torpedoes struck the enemy battleship’s shields. Their shields glowed a dull orange. A moment later, the dull orange glow was obscured by two brilliant white flashes, and the nuclear warheads on the conventional torpedoes detonated. They were followed immediately by four yellow-orange explosions as their missiles struck the battleship’s shields and also detonated.

“Dive under her!” Nathan ordered.

The upside down image of the massive battleship began to slide upward. Seconds later, a thin strip of black space appeared between the underside of the enemy battleship and the Earth below. The ship began to shake even more violently than before as they passed under the battleship at close range, exposing their underside to close-range bombardment by the Jung’s rail guns.

“We can’t take much more of this!” Mister Randeen warned. “Recommend we jump!” he added.