Zero (52 page)

“
Beta sweep though 8-5-7, push in on a Lunar heading,” an Analyst purred in his ear. “Gamma bank 5-2-5. Engage enemy. Acknowledge.”

Hugo ground his teeth a moment.

“Gamma, acknowledge,” Luscombe snapped.

“
Sir,” Hugo growled. “There's a break to port. If we -”

“
Bank 5-2-5, Gamma. Engage enemy. Acknowledge.”

Hugo ground his teeth some more.
“Acknowledged.”

He relayed the
instructions to his unit and swept them along the edge of the battle, firing as he went. He barked more orders, keeping his unit on its course, wincing when the enemy fighters reflected their move and took out two of his fighters before they'd gained position.

“
Hugo?”

“
What?” Hugo snapped, pulling his fighter round to avoid an oncoming enemy, pulse cannons blazing.

“
There's a break,” Webb replied. “Point 7-4... uh... over there! To port. Between you and the
Resolution
.”

“
Stick to formation, Commander. You've got a bank coming through below.”

“
I got them,” came More's calm voice and Hugo caught the flash of the
Zero
's heavier guns taking out two of the engaging on-comers, breaking their pattern.

“
Hugo -”

“
Webb, the break's closing.”

“
We could still get your fighters through. And the
Zero
.”

“
What for? The only thing that can engage the
Resolution
is another flagship.”

“
That's Service thinking. And just what Pharos will be expecting.”

Hugo switched his comm feed to order a bank of Gamma to swing round in response to the re-engagement of a new squadron attempting a sweep from above. When he switched it back Webb was still talking.

“Stick to your orders, Commander,” Hugo talked over him.

“
Since when do you care about orders, Hugo?”

“
Since ignoring one got you killed,” he snapped.

“
That wasn't me,” the clone's voice was low and dangerous. “Hugo, three or four good shots could take out her communication rig.”

“
How do you know that?”

“
Webb knew. I know. Seriously, Hugo. We cut the puppet strings and her fleet will fall apart. Tell me I'm wrong.”

“
Captain, watch out!”

Rami's warning had come just in time. Hugo swore as he swerved out of oncoming fire.
“Dammit, Webb.”

“
Hugo, do it!”

Hugo swore again then switched his comm.
“Gamma Company...” he took a breath, checked his instruments then swung his steer stick round. “Follow and flank. Needle formation to point 7-4-0. Acknowledge.”

Every Service pilot in his company acknowledged without question which caused a momentary chill to brush through him. Harvey was the only one to pause.

“You sure about that, Hugo?”

“
Stick close,” Hugo said. “Webb has a plan.”

“
Why doesn't that reassure me?”

“
Move out,” Hugo ordered and he banked hard. The battle disappeared from view and yawning, starry blackness filed his viewscreen, looking calm, cool and peaceful in comparison to the blinking chaos of his controls. A glance at his scope showed the remains of Gamma Company tailing him, with the rogue blips of the
Zero
and her three fighters alongside. He sent one more glance over all his instruments, ignoring the cool voice of the Analyst in his ear ordering him to respond, and plunged his fighter into the thick of the action.

He held his breath and willed his control to let his eyes and hands do the thinking. The drift was a tangle of fighters with the
Resolution
insignia across their sides, all pressing forward for a chance to break through. The break in their own line ebbed and flowed but Hugo wove and ducked with cannons on full, his company keeping in a tight cluster behind him and together they blasted a narrow channel through the swarming fighters.

The
Zero
went by on his starboard as nothing more than a flash of light. Its weapons blazed and three enemy fighters that had peeled off from the main engagement to tighten the defence were reduced to so much rubble bouncing off his cockpit. The pale backdrop of the moon gleamed in the distance, Tranquillity glowing in its crater. The
Resolution
hung like a giant insect before them. Some of Beta and Omega that had managed to get this far were engaged around her. She was expertly placed, just far enough towards the moon to be out of range of the
Sincerity
's and the
Assertion
’s guns but still close enough to get accurate readings on the battle.

“
Keep tight and close, Gamma,” Hugo said. “Pilots Brian through Jango engage the defensive fleet. Keep in close with Beta. Everyone else...” he took a breath. “Engage the
Resolution
. Concentrate fire on the communication towers and network relays. Co-ordinates and schematics being transmitted.” Hugo keyed in the numbers from memory then engaged his thrusters to maximum power before he could change his mind and slammed forward between some approaching fighters, firing as he went.

Three more of his unit were lost in the first few minutes. He pressed on, backing up the fighters drawing up the defences. The
Resolution
was radiating interference, so his readings on the flagship were sketchy, but from what he could tell by eye his unit were landing the hits.

“
Concentrate fire,” Hugo barked and three fighters swerved to obey. “
Zero.
We need your cannons.... where's Webb?” Hugo asked, scanning his readings
“
Sir,” More sounded uncertain. “Sir...
Father
made impact with the flagship.”

Hugo went cold.
“Repeat,
Zero
.”

“
He cut his comm and
Father
went straight in at speed and took out a whole docking sector.”

“
Is he okay?”

“
I don't know sir,” said More.

“
Sir?”

“
Sub?”

“
Sir... I feel I should tell you...”

“
Sub,” More warned.

“
Silence, More,” Hugo snapped. “Sub, what's happened?”

There was a pause when they all had to dance away from an incoming wave and let the next wave behind them make a hole in the line before they could swing back round towards to the
Resolution
. “Sub?” Hugo prompted again.

“
Webb took some explosives from the hold before he launched. He told me not to tell you.”

Hugo swore, long and bitter
ly. “Idiot,” he growled. “Fucking suicidal moron.”

“
Sir,” More started again but Hugo ignored him.

“
Webb,” Hugo barked into the comm. “Webb, come in. Come in
now
.” Just static returned on
Father
's comm channel. He tried Webb's wrist panel and still no response. He swore again. “All
Zero
crew, flank Gamma and run interference and defensive manoeuvres. Report in to the
Assertion
and keep in track with the battle plan.”

“
Kaleb, what are you doing?”

“
Marilyn, stick with the
Zero
,” he ordered.

“
Kaleb,” she called again before Hugo could no long hear anything over the blaring of proximity alarms in his cockpit. The
Resolution
loomed closer and closer until he could pick out individual viewscreens in her hull. His readings blurred and buzzed from the interference as he approached the impact site that had once been the starboard docking station.

Webb had expected to feel anger. He'd expected the wash of red that almost blinded him when he had overhead the conversation between Hugo and Luscombe to rise up and swamp him again, make him so charged with the emotion that it gave him energy. He had been concerned that it might cause him to get clumsy or caught before the job was done.

But he needn't have worried.

He didn't feel hot or cold. There was nothing. Just a blank coolness like the drift of space. He knew what he had to do and that was it. It was easy.

He hadn't even felt a pang when
Father
's chassis crumpled and flame from the engines bloomed and snuffed in the vacuum of the ruined docking bay. His neck was a bit sore from the impact but that was it. The harness and crash frame had done its job, just as Sub had said it would.

He'd already sealed on his helmet and what was left of the controls along with a few determined kicks got the hatch open. He shrugged the pack on his back then launched a wire into the mess of shadow and floating debris
that was the docking bay. He pressed the recoil and was speeding through the silent space deeper into the
Resolution
. One body, eyes wide and mouth frozen in a silent scream, bumped past him in the dark then drifted on.

He activated
his boot magnets and set about trying to override the breach protocols on the first door he came to. The chilled determination in him guided his fingers and he had the door open in moments. There were alarms blaring in the corridors and people running. Orders scrolled on wall displays. He ducked into the first dark space he could find and shed the vacuum suit. He prowled through the back corridors, the ship's schematics cold, hard lines inside his head and grabbed the first unfortunate technician who happened to pass by on his own.

Webb left
his body tucked in a corner of a conduit cupboard. The glassy eyes stared up at him from either side of the bullet hole as he pulled on the Service-issue coveralls.

“
Don't worry buddy,” Webb mumbled. “Better a hole in the head now than eating drift later.” He nudged the technician’s legs further into the corner with his foot, not looking at the slack face, then moved out into the busy corridor. No one gave him a second glance.

Part of him marvelled at the efficiency of the activity around him. There was no panic. Every face was calm, every workstation had an occupant and every officer had a headset they were muttering orders into. Everyone was dressed in black and grey and moved with control, even the ones pelting down towards the engineering decks with tools and panels.

Not that it would do them any good.

He got down to the engineering decks and still no one looked at him. The breach he'd caused
with
Father
was scrolling in the damage reports but nowhere was there a report to check for an intruder. He guessed they thought no one would be that dumb. Or perhaps sneaking in wasn't the proper ethics of war.

He strolled into the main reactor chamber without any technicians even glancing up from their displays. He paced through the safety hatch and up to the towering metal structure that housed the port reactor. The humming was so
loud it made the air feel solid. He took a moment to gawp up at the structure, was caught unaware by the thought that Kinjo would love to see this, then shook his head and bent and shoved the block of high-power explosive as far under the reactor housing as he could reach.

He made a show of pausing at a workstation and tapping in some commands as he left, taking the opportunity to re-route some of the reactor's diagnostic scans, then paced back out of the reactor room and into the teeming corridors
.

The river of activity continued to flow by him. He turned towards the bridge, keeping his pace steady but finally starting to feel fire mounting inside him.

The command levels were emptier but still no one gave him a glance. The viewscreens looked out on the battle, but he kept his eyes on the deck. The guarded doors of the bridge were in sight when he heard a familiar voice.

“
Governor Cho-Jin, you must stay put,” Fitzroy was growling into a wrist panel as he came up behind him. “I’m on my way to Pharos now. All is going as planned. Stay in Tranquillity to centralise communication.”

Webb slowed and let Fitzroy overtake him and proceed onto the bridge, the security men nodding him through.

Webb drifted along, putting in a pair of ear plugs, searching inside himself for fear but finding none, until the guards at the door asked for ID. He dropped the stun charge right between them, squeezing his eyes shut. He could still felt the blast ripple through his flesh and had to blink as the effects dissipated, then stepped over the downed guards, pulling out the ear plugs. The double doors to the bridge hissed open as he approached.

The
Resolution
’s bridge was easily as big as the
Zero
’s hold and was almost blindingly bright. Everything was again Service-white and pristine. It made his head ache. No one, not the navigators, gunners, pilots or guards looked up as he slid himself into a tech workstation right at the back of the room.

Pharos was not sat in the command chair but stood in the centre of the deck, feet apart, face set and eyes locked out the viewscreen, even as Fitzroy chattered urgently in her ear. Webb
’s jaw ached. He made himself breathe slower as his hands on the controls worked their way around the
Resolution
’s system firewalls, but he couldn’t tear his eyes off the admiral. He couldn’t look away from the way she stared out at the thruster trails and explosions lighting up the darkness of space with nothing in her eyes.

He watched his hands enter the re-route commands and then pulled out his gun.

ɵ

Hugo had to make a conscious effort to push aside the creeping chill produced by moving through the corridors of a Service flagship whilst knowing he was in enemy territory. He cursed Pharos and Fitzroy and everything he could think of as he looked around at the Service men and women, clothed as he was, thinking like he did, or like he used to, but knowing that they were fighting and dying for something that, at the end of it all, was nothing to do with them.

He kept his head down in case he was recognised and accessed the first unmanned workstation he came to to try and find out what the hell Webb was up to. The strength of the surge of relief he had felt when
Father
's cockpit had been empty had unsettled him. But this, along with everything else, he pushed aside. For a moment nothing but Doll's words echoed through his head...

...you might still get a chance to save him...

It wasn't Webb... and yet it was. All the hurt, all the anger, all the bitterness of everything that had ever been done to Ezekiel Webb now belonged to his clone. Hugo could guess what he would do in the same situation. And if he was anywhere near right, he knew Webb would not have planned on surviving.

It was down to Hugo to get him
out. To save him.

He stared at the workstation screen with his zero-results search blinking at him whilst system alert lights flashed and alarms sounded around him, then went with his gut and turned aft to try and find express lifts that would take him up to the bridge.

The first moment of real panic rung through the corridors when the ship gave a great shudder and the lights all blacked out. There was a moment of swallowing silence and then the air was storming away. His feet went out from under him. He grabbed out blindly, got a hold on something solid and clung. His ears were filled with a rushing like a waterfall and the air was ripped from his lungs. Muffled screams rang out and objects knocked against him in the dark.

Something struck his head. He bit his tongue and saw stars but managed to keep his fingertips around the handhold. He blinked the hot stinging out of his eyes and spat blood. Just when his fingers were starting to slip, there was a surge that rocked his belly and he fell to the ground.

He sat up, blinking, just as the lights came back on. People were shaking themselves and getting to their feet, some rubbing bruises, others wiping blood out of their eyes like he was. There was lots of coughing. The air tasted thin and the hum of the ship's workings had changed key.

Crew around him gathered themselves and limped on, muttering into wrist panels and headsets, giving or seeking new orders. Hugo got to his feet then froze as he caught a glimpse of one of the
displays across the corridor. He made himself stagger to it and stared. The port reactor was gone and had taken most of the stern with it. The results displayed just long enough for Hugo to gather that all external communications, 40% of life support, 25% of the crew and 60% of the power were now gone. Then the screen went blank and the overhead lights dimmed.

He turned and ran, picking his way through dropped equipment and debris. Technicians worked feverishly and were shouted at by officers hovering like crows. The displays flickered back on and someone somewhere cheered but then was silenced. Their course had changed.

“Get back in the system,” someone barked. “Get those commands overridden, now.”

“
I can't, sir,” a navigator quavered. “Someone's put in a lockdown -”

“
Break through it.”

“
There's not enough processing power left in the main servers -”

Hugo kept moving, heart pounding. The lights went
again. Only emergency lighting came back on. The panic around him fizzled to a frozen acceptance, like ice forming in the air. A few people continued to rush by, but most just stood and stared at the wall displays. He could smell smoke.

When he got to the lifts they weren't working. He swore again and turned about to try and find a service hatch. The order to abandon ship started blaring out just as he found one. He had to press against the bulkhead to avoid being swept off in the throng of crew heading towards what was left of the stern and the escape pods. They hurried but they didn't push and they followed each other like ants moving through a colony. He wanted to scream at them to hurry the fuck up. Didn't they know the
Resolution
was bleeding oxygen? Bleeding fuel? If the stern fires reached the second reactor...

He shook his head and elbowed his own way through the oncoming tide of crew and took the ladders and stairs two and three at a time. After the chaos of the engineering and service corridors, the stillness in the command-level corridors was eerie. The
evacuation command was still repeating through wall speakers and the alarm lights were still flashing, but there was no one around. He passed one downed security guard and then another, and pulled out his own gun. The doors to the bridge were closed but not locked. They slid open when he hit the control.

Only one of the guards who had her weapon trained on Webb looked around as
Hugo came in. The other two kept their eyes on their target, dressed in Service Technician coveralls with a grim look on his face and a gun pointed at Admiral Pharos. Their focus allowed Hugo to take them out before they even realised what was happening. The one who had seen him opened fire in his direction but he had already managed to get behind a workstation. It exploded into shards of metal and sparking wires. More shots were exchanged and cries rung out and then everything was silent again. Even the alarms and automated announcements seemed muted. Smoke hung in the air.

His ears were ringing and there were fresh spots of pulsing heat in his shoulders and leg where shrapnel or bullets had grazed him. He swiped blood out of his eyes and got to his knees.

The security team were all dead. Fitzroy was propped up in a control chair, hand clutched at his chest and struggling to sit up. There was blood dribbling from his mouth and his already pale skin had taken on a greyish tinge. The only ones standing were Webb and Pharos.

“
Stay back, Hugo,” Webb grated in a voice Hugo barely recognised.

Pharos looked at Webb like he was an insect caught in her cockpit. The grip the commander had on his weapon caused his knuckles to stand out white and his face looked like it had been cast from steel.

“You destroyed a future today, Webb,” Pharos said into the silence. “If your hell exists, it will welcome you with open arms.”

“
Funny,” Webb said, grin sickly. “You seemed rather fond of me at one point. How times change.”

She glared down her nose at him. The bridge shuddered around them and the proximity alarms rose in volume. The yellow streaks of jettisoned escape pods arced off and away outside the wide
central viewscreen. The white surface of the moon filled the whole expanse beyond. Tranquillity blinked ahead.

“
Webb,” Hugo said, standing. “You set us on a collision course?”

Webb didn't move.
“You shouldn't have come.”

“
I can't let you do this.”

Webb threw him the twisted grin that had been turned on Pharos.
“Don't worry. It'll all be over soon.”

“
Webb -”

“
Don't call me that.”

“
He's right,” Pharos intoned. “He doesn't deserve the name Webb. Or McCullough. Despite his blood, despite his life, none of the Lunar greats have manifested themselves in him in any way. They would be ashamed.”