The Battle for the Ringed Planet (3 page)

“That’s a Glock-Ruger 27 plasma pistol, military issue. One shot and you fry my guts all over the cockpit.” He shot her a serious glare, but she did not bite eying him suspiciously, slowly easing back a little.

“I just saved your ass. Doesn’t that grant me some sort of warm puppy dog smile of appreciation?”

Then she mocked him with a smirk, “How is that?”

“Cute, so you can talk.”

Swallowing, with cold eyes, she placed her other hand on the pistol grip to steady her aim.

Narrowing his own chestnut eyes, he locked them with hers, “This was to be my last mission before I went home. Now I’m stuck in this cursed city.”

With a stony glower followed by some coughing, she replied evenly, “Looks like you’re going to die here, Sky Demon.”

With a melancholy sigh, “Well, I suppose my time was due,” he lowered himself down to the console chair, “So I got some stuff to do, so shoot away if you must.” In silence, she just continued to watch him.

 “Callisto, this is Hawkeye 206, come in, over?”

There was only static so he tried again receiving a beep code and he glanced up at the screens in alarm, muttering to himself, “They’re running silent…why?”

Torian began to manipulate more controls switching on more screens and a couple of holos that showed the planet, all its moons and the colorful rings. Reading the data on the screens, he played with a few more controls and one of the holos began to flicker with static.

Mumbling, “All right, what’s going on up there? Enemy ships? Are they going to tunnel out and leave me?”, but the screens and holos showed nothing.

Turning his attention back to the girl, Torian lowered his voice, “Look, I have no intention of hurting you.” He gradually stood up to a slight crouch and inched towards her. In response, she raised the pistol and clenched her teeth.

“You’re in bad shape… I have a first aid kit here, why don’t you let me scan you?”

She gave him no response.

“The kit is right above you. Look!” Pointing to a white box with a red cross, he began to reach for it above her. The young woman made no move as he unfastened the box from the wall. However, when he pulled out his Con to scan her she stiffened and gripped the pistol tighter with both hands.

“Easy … this won’t hurt,” he tried a soothing voice; “it just scans you, please relax.”

A small holographic image of a female form appeared above the box with flashing sections and words appearing. Torian studied the image and data.

“Well, you appear to be a normal human female, 19 earth standard years. Got a bit of a virus going, and malnutrition … and, wait a minute...” he flicked the track ball on the device, “Do you have implants?”

She shot him a puzzled glance, “No.”

“Let’s see …” then suddenly the holograph flashed red, “Aye … classified. You got something special in your head, and its top secret!”

This time she slowly lowered the pistol and spoke up, “What does it mean?”

Torian detected a familiar dialect in her nervous yet soft voice, with words heavy on the T’s and long on the S’s, “I don’t know. It’s higher than my security classification rating, which is pretty high.”

The young woman coughed again and sniffed up the mucus dripping from her nose, but her eyes remained glued on him.

“I can give you something for that cold …” he pulled out a small green tube from the medical kit, “Have you seen one of these before?”

“I know what a hypo syringe is, evil Sky Demon who will shortly be dead.”

“Yeah…” he sighed, “You remind me of one of Tristan’s ex-girlfriends.”

“How do I know that won’t knock me out, and then you’ll have your way with me?”

The young brown haired man shrugged, but now he knew where he had heard the accent in her speech before. “If I was going to rape you, I’d make you have a bath first. A really, really long one, with lots and lots of soap.” Then he took the hypo syringe, rolled up his sleeve and shot it in his arm, “There.”

His words stung and she stammered, “I’ve been through a lot…” then a longer pause as she gathered herself and very quietly spoke, “I’ll take one of those.”

Reaching in the first aid kit, he pulled out another green hypo syringe and held it out. She took it without lowering her eyes, placed it on one of her dirty legs, and pushed the small button on the end shooting liquid inside without breaking the skin.

The tall weary soldier leaned forward meeting her eyes, “So what, are you from another ship that landed here? How did you get on this planet?”

Hesitantly, she shied away from his gaze, “I live here.” Then she swallowed and fleetingly glanced back at him, “The others said Sky Demons would come because of me.”

“You think I’m a demon? Fire runs through my veins and horns stick out of my forehead?”

“Some think that. Though I know that you are human, but it does not matter because of what you will do to us. Murder, rape, cut us to pieces …”

In the realm of inhabited planets, there were pirates, slavers, raiders, and worse. He knew even in the Confederation fleets atrocities had been committed by rogue elements.

“I could see how you would be suspicious. There are Sky Demons out there that would do that, but not me. But I probably can’t convince you otherwise.” Watching her finger itch on the trigger, he knew that he had to act. Generally, not an impulsive person, Torian knew that if he did not do something, in her weakened or hallucinogenic state, the girl might just shoot him. So basic military training kicked in and before she could react, he slapped the cylindrical barrel of the black pistol away and in the same movement, pulled it out of her hand.

While Torian holstered the pistol, the girl shrunk back onto Chang’s bed and curled up in a ball pulling her dress down over knees. As her wide round blue eyes watched him with fear, Torian realized she was genuinely terrified of him. Guessing at her background, and that survivors of this hellish city must have had it tough, he felt a wave of sympathy for her.

“My name is Torian,” as he extended his hand to her he received a blank frightened stare in response.

“So, you live here? I was told everyone died.”

Slowly she shook her head and replied, “Not everyone.”

“Well, that explains something. When we were descending, I scanned the valley. You farm there?”

The head of the dirty tangled blonde hair nodded, “We live outside the city.”

“Then did you get lost?”

Glancing away sadly, she softly replied, “I didn’t. I was cast out.”

“Thrown to the wolves?”

“That’s right.”

“Nasty way to go.” The young man went to the far back of the crew area and opened a cabinet door to reveal a small fold out sink, some metal shelves and cupboards with fasteners to keep them shut tight. In the bottom section was a toilet, a small fold out bowl with tubes used in weightlessness or gravity.

Inside a cupboard, he unsnapped a mug from a cup-holder, lowered the sink, and ran some water. The mug was blue and white with the logo of a military spacecraft circled by stars and the caption, ‘C.S.S Callisto, CHF’.

Crouching next to Chang’s bunk where the girl had squeezed as far as she could against the wall, he took a sip of water. “I’ll bet you’re thirsty; it’s just water.” Then he held the cup out for her.

Hesitating at first, eyeing the cup, she snatched it with both hands and gulped the water down. Torian turned away and reached inside the cupboard for a colorful orange box.

“Cheese squares,” he pulled out a small cracker with a thick cheese coating on one side and popped it in his mouth. “I guess I have to try everything first.” She watched him with those round blue eyes.

“Take them,” he offered her the box and girl with the once pretty dress wolfed down the small crackers handfuls at a time. Refilling the mug, he offered it to her again while she finished the rest of the cheese crackers. Most of the food in the vessel was standard rations, little synthesized cubes of various meals converted with a food processor in the cabinet. When Torian and Tristan had been a team, they had always brought snacks and fruit drinks along on their missions.

“So…” Torian leaned back in the chair by the computer consoles and after a while, the girl handed him back the empty box and began to examine the interior of the vessel, “I told you my name.”

 Studying him with a little more confidence she replied, “Siiri.”

Then he grinned, “Finnish,” which confirmed her slight accent.

“What is that?”

“Your name, it’s a Finnish name from a place in old earth called Scandinavia. My mother is Finnish. Her name is Anna.”

“I think I remember that from school.”

 “Why don’t you use the sink and clean up a bit. I have a fresh washcloth…” then he pulled out a small cylinder, “…and I have this tooth brush, brand new, still sealed.”

Keeping her eyes on him, she nodded while he pointed his thumb behind to the cockpit, “I’m going to be up there trying to find out what’s going on in orbit.”

Chapter 3: Fireball

Torian heard water running as he flicked on the cockpit screens and slipped on his helmet to read the HUD in his visor. Whatever was going on in space worried him. The Callisto could be engaging hostile forces, though the deadly battle cruiser was one of the advanced ‘Moon’ class series, and half the 4
^th
fleet comprised of them. It boasted four triple gun plasma turrets, a squadron of fighters and the latest shielding technology. The enemy had similar cruisers, but not with the latest military advances. Still, in space nothing was ever certain.

The 4
^th
fleet consisted of 12 battle cruisers strung out over several star systems to guard civilian populations, supply conveys, and natural resources. Spread thin, the Confederation forces faced difficulty protecting all the colonies and earth, while the rebels could hit anywhere. One of their favorite tactics involved capturing supply vessels and loading them up with an obscene amount of nukes. When security forces realized the harmful intent, too late, entire space stations and ports paid the price. It was an old tactic from Earth’s water navy ships, made famous in space by a lethal attack years ago on the main station at Alpha Centauri. Dispatched to Selunia, the Callisto gathered intelligence from the mysterious dead colony.  

Glancing back at Siiri, vigorously brushing her teeth, he thought about the filthy girl for a moment. His briefing had not even considered the possibility of colony survivors on this planet. All he wanted to do was get back to Callisto, and if she wanted to come, perhaps it would make up for losing Chang’s body. Then he felt a little guilty. In her current state, subjecting her to interrogation by the intelligence agents on the Callisto would be mean.

Sighing, Torian began to run the diagnostic programs that checked all the systems. Before Callisto would even consider sending a pick up, they would want to see if the R-26 Hawkeye could fly. Though not a trained systems technician, he knew enough to isolate most problems.

All of the systems were fully functional except for the main thrusters, which would make lift off difficult. On the ground, with the engines off-line, the vessel gave off a low signature, which meant that a possible detection from enemy scanners was remote. However, firing the thrusters would be like announcing their location with a bright neon target. Torian ran repair programs, then glanced out the cockpit and watched the pack of wolves and wild dogs still milling about gnawing on a few bones. When he got a particular view of Chang’s femur, he grew angry, and fired up the shields. He was risking detection, but by extending the radius of vessel’s defenses a few meters beyond the main fuselage of the R-26 Hawkeye, the energy barrier became a weapon. He knew it had been successful in other scenarios similar to this one and would fry anything within ten meters from the hull. After entering the command, there was a low hum followed by yelps of startled wolves and dogs. There would be nothing left except blackened ash; at least Chang`s body would be cremated instead of wolf food.

A slight cough almost made him jump and glancing back, he saw Siiri standing on the small steps up to the cockpit watching him manipulate holo fields of data and play with the colorful buttons.

“Do you feel better?” he asked lifting his visor to get a better look, “I can actually see a girl’s face under all that dirt.”

A tiny movement of her lips might have been the start of a smile, but she replied too quickly for it to form, “What happened outside?”

“I cleared the area, it should be safe now.”

“I wanted to thank you.”

Torian removed his helmet and ran his hand through his thick chocolate hair, “So I’m not a Sky Demon?”

“I don’t think so, but I didn’t believe the voices. Mostly I never do.”

His brows lifted, “Voices?”

“She said to run to you, or in your direction. No Sky Demon has ever entered the city and lived.” then she coughed deeply.

“Maybe you should lie down for a while. The medicine should kick in soon…”

Siiri pointed up through the transteel cockpit, “Stars, in the daylight?”

In Selunia’s bright blue sky, there were four moons visible through light wispy cirrus clouds, and bright flashes between several shiny dots of light near the largest green moon. Battle cruisers were large enough to reflect the sunlight in the day sky.

“Damn!” Torian grimaced, above them was the evidence he had feared, “There is a space battle going on, my ship is under attack.”

“Sky ships? Like this one?”

“Bigger, battle cruisers. They’re in the atmosphere …” then the bright spots began to vanish, “…wait, moving out. I can’t risk trying to scan them because they’ll spot us, we’d be like a beacon in the city, so I don’t know what’s going on.”

“You belong to a bigger sky ship?”

“Yeah, a ship with a crew of about 500, the C.S.S Callisto.”

“Can you go back to it?”

Glancing at a holo column of words and numbers on his right, checking the status of the repair programs, he frowned, “Probably, this vessel needs some time to repair, but I think it can fly. Hopefully the Callisto can take out whatever is up there, then I can fly you to your home if you’d like.”