Edge of Solace (A Star Too Far) (28 page)

The room smelled of antiseptic and a hint of piss.

“I’m not going to move her. You do it here
.” Castro walked to the main med station and sat with his elbows on his knees. “Major, how are you feeling?”

“Why?” Archie asked in the midst of the room.

“You were exposed to the same environment, no quarantine.”

“Fine
.” Archie turned to where Captain Asa lay. “Marine,” Archie said to the guard.

He was taken back for a second. The
Marine’s nose and ears were scarred and ragged. His name badge read: ‘Avinash’.

“Sir,” Private Avinash said with dimples that spread on gray tinted cheeks. His tone was the same tone that every private had used since Alexander the
Great.

“I’m going to have a talk with the prisoner, mind taking a walk?”

“Apologies, sir, but this is my post.”

Archie nodded once. Couldn’t argue with that.

He leaned down and sat on the floor. Inside of the bunk the blankets were cast aside and a single leg poked out. Blotchy bruising spread along the ankle and foot.

The blankets rolled and turned. A face that was thinner, lighter, and missing the heavy cheeks looked back at him. Her eyes seemed pressed into her skull. Sweat beaded on her brow.

“Archie,” she whispered.

He wanted to feel bad for her, just for a moment.

“Captain, I have a question.” He didn’t have the heart to banter.

“Marjorie,” she said.

He blinked.

“My name is Marjorie.”

Archie nodded slowly. “Where are your fleets?”

She cracked a smile that split lines in her dry lips. “Pursuing your fleets.”

“You left no one behind?”

She looked at him with questioning eyes. “Where are you
, Major? Running home?”

“Somewhere that we should have found Sa’Ami starships.”

“You’re going to see the Commandant,” she said.

Archie was silent.

Her eyes peered at his. A bead of sweat rolled along her brow and dropped into the corner of her eye. She raised a hand up and rubbed her face. Bruising and sickly purple blotches covered her wrists.

“There’s nothing you can do to stop the Commandant.”

He thought quickly. Why? “You don’t have enough ships,” Archie said. “Your fleets are buying time to get this barrier working. That’s it, isn’t it?”

Captain Asa ran a finger along her brow and pushed away the rivulets of sweat. “It won’t matter then. All we need to do is keep you away until it is up, then you will leave us alone.”

Her words were like a prayer, a whispered nothing that came at night.

“Good god, you’re sacrificing them?
All
of them?”

She shook her head softly. “It’s a price we are willing to pay. Now go home, there is nothing you can do here, it is already set.”

He ran through his thoughts. The crate. “What’s in the crate?”

She croaked out a laugh
, followed by a wheeze. “I’m dying, Major, but I’m not a traitor.”

Something seemed different about her and he couldn’t place it. She wasn’t his friend, or even someone he respected. Did she deserve some words? No. He stood and stretched his back.

Cries and moans echoed through the hall. Castro was prepping a set of tables while the other Medics and Corpsman were scrubbing down and laying out nanite kits. He looked to Avinash.

“Trouble outside
, sir,” Avinash said quietly.

He didn’t have time to leave before the casualties streamed in. Puncture wounds. Vacuum. The price paid to fight in space. Castro was too busy to pay him any mind.

He walked out with Private Avinash following behind.

“Private?” he asked.

“Relieved sir,” Avinash said. “Pardon me, Major, I’ve got some friends to check on.”

Archie nodded and watched the Marine sprint away. He felt a tug of humanity. He, of all people, knew how she felt. Alone, dying.

He walked away and left the thoughts behind him.

The
Malta
burned closer to the smoky blue marble that was the outermost planet of the Bosporus System. A trio of squat moons, like blistered potatoes, soared around the unnamed planet. Behind them the Sa’Ami ship blinked in and followed. The rest of the enemy fleet was light years behind, but following.

William looked up at the display and wondered what his pursuer was thinking. Three ships moving behind the planet where there were only two before. The Sa’Ami would have no visual. He wasn’t worried about the structure closer in, they’d know if a laser painted them.

The watch bell rang with a dull tone. The sounds of armored Marines shifting verified the change of guards.

He looked up at the shared data link between the
Malta
and the
Scylla.
In thirty seconds they’d pass where the Sa’Ami ship couldn’t see them.

“Prepare to launch eyes,” William said.

“Eyes prepped,” Huron replied.

The display shifted and the ships passed out of the view of the pursuer.

“Drop it,” William said. “Second probe in thirty seconds.”

The bridge was crisp, tight, taut. In under an hour the Sa’Ami would either pass by and head to the inner system
, or engage. Either way, they’d get a fight soon enough.

“Execute pulse,” Captain Martinez called.

William slapped at the console. Icons shifted, rolled, and blurred. An audible groan shuddered through the hull.

Midshipman Lebeau whistled. “Oh
, baby.”

The
Malta
spun on her axis at the same moment as the
Scylla
did. Both ships arced tightly around a moon that was dirty brown and pocked with craters. Velocity burned off as they pushed as much thrust as they could.

The bridge was silent. Everyone focused on the display. The feed from the probes showed nothing but darkness.

“How long?” William asked.

“Eighteen minutes if it follows our side, twenty
-two if it comes on the other side,” Lebeau said, her head turned towards her display.

“Give me a diagnostics on all weapons, I don’t want any surprises.” The ship had enough repairs to make a fully equipped shop nervous, let alone the repairs they’d done on the fly.

“Captain, there’s something happening with the binary,” Huron said.

“Define
something,
Mr. Huron,” William said. He keyed up the Engineering console and scanned the readouts.

“I
, uh, well, I’m not sure, but something is happening. The gravity is varying, the orbit is starting to deviate, I’m showing a massive transfer of energy between the two stars.”

“We’ll worry about that once we’ve sorted this
. How are my weapons?”

“Running,” Huron said as his hands flew over the console.

Displays winked green one after the next. Every system was checked, loaded, and prepped. A flurry of orange danced on a mass driver before shifting to green.

“What was that?” William asked.

“Nanites priming. That one might run hot,” Huron replied. The Martian Engineer leaned closure and punched keys rapidly. “Is good I think, Captain.”

William didn’t like the thought of being down one mass driver. He’d seen the recording of the
Malta’s
first engagement. Repeating that was not an option. He needed to intercept those missiles.

The
Malta
shifted apart from the
Scylla
and both plowed around the oval moon. A dim shadow slid across the blue face of the planet as the moon orbited. The clock counted down.

“Engaging in three,” William called over the ship
’s comms. The sounds of the Marines shifting in the hall was reassuring. He pictured the entire crew snapping a bit more aware.

His hand itched. Fingers danced on his palm and he tried to calm it, sooth it, get rid of it. The itch wouldn’t stop. He’d never felt comfortable with the augmetic, though he’d heard that even a missing limb would itch.

“Comms request from the
Scylla,
” Lebeau said.

William nodded. Captain Martinez’s face filled the screen.

“Good luck, Captain, give them hell,” Captain Martinez said. He nodded quickly, like a matador.

The comms dropped and a few moments later the first
engagement point passed. Nothing.

“Coming on the backside,” William said. He cued up the secondary nav program. The
Malta
moved closer to the icy blue planet and waited. The
Scylla
pushed further out.

The mass drivers began firing before William even registered the contact. The weapons program cycled and shifted plunging one mass driver into the red. The program he’d spent so long tinkering with leaped into action.

The
Malta
rolled on the center line and sprayed out mass driver slugs. Sa’Ami missiles were over the horizon and coming in tight. Green flashes followed by yellow explosions marked where the mass drivers had succeeded.

In a flash of fury the derelict lit up and disappeared into a cloud of plasma and debris. It had served its purpose and bought them another barrage. The plan was to smash the Sa’Ami before it could bring the full weight of the missile batteries to bear.

The Sa’Ami ship appeared in a white flash as it passed into view. The ruddy brown hull was speckled with black as missile ports were visible. More flames shattered along the edge. Another barrage was coming.

William felt helpless as the rest of the program cycled. Railguns pumped more rounds and the ship continued to spin. Impact alarms sounded. The Sa’Ami missiles struggled closer. The rate of fire from the mass drivers dropped.

“Override thermals!” William yelled.

Huron shifted the panels silently and the rate increased.

Missiles arced out and away before slamming in tight directly for the
Malta.
The mass drivers paused and turned to catch the barrage. Grav shields spiked and the slightest pulse of force pushed through the hull.

The Sa’ami ship spun and bared a new side. Mass driver slugs bore into the hull as the grav shields were overwhelmed by the nickel-cobalt slugs. Then the missiles from the
Scylla
crashed into the leading edge. Sparks and flames gushed out as the missiles exploded upon the nose.

William cheered and slammed his augmetic hand down on the chair. The cue for the second weapon program triggered.

Missiles shook the entire hull of the
Malta
as both launchers fired. The stream pushed through the screen of the Sa’Ami ship. Half of the missiles were destroyed by the Sa’Ami defenses and most of the rest clashed against the shield.

The nose of the Sa’Ami ship was dimpled and ragged, but the armor hadn’t been penetrated.

“Shit,” William said.

The next barrage drove the grav shields into the red. Armor indicators pulse
d as the nanites surged out to heal the craters.

“
Scylla
is moving up,” Lebeau said quickly.

“What?” William asked. That wasn’t the plan.

The
Malta
might take another blow, but she might not. The Sa’Ami had focused most of the shots on the
Malta,
ignoring the
Scylla.

William leaned forward and watched, it seemed like it was in slow motion. The railguns fired and penetrated through the hull of the Sa’Ami. Thermal indicators turned red on the edge of the target.

“Ping the
Scylla!
” William yelled. The missile cruiser didn’t have nearly the defenses. The plan was to have the
Malta
be the missile magnet, not the
Scylla.

“Rejected,” Lebeau
said.

The
Malta’s
railguns rattled off another salvo. Rounds burned through the weakened shields with an incandescent flash of green. Nickel burned and nanites sheared.

William could taste it, feel it, the Sa’Ami was hit hard. Hard enough to know it.

The barrage that leapt from the Sa’Ami ship bore entirely onto the
Scylla.
The hostile missiles darted out and away, before pausing a moment and seeking the target.

“She’s not firing,” William whispered. The words were barely out of his mouth when the
Scylla
erupted in a full barrage.

Instead of the missiles heading out to intercept the Sa’Ami missiles they burned at the hostile. The one thing they had that could stop the incoming barrage was heading directly for the Sa’Ami ship.

William leaned forward and watched the missiles blossom on the
Scylla.
His eyes snapped away from the screen and watched as his weapons program engaged the mass drivers once more.

“Override now!” William shouted.

Huron glanced back quickly with a worried look and keyed it up.

The mass drivers burned into the red. Thermal alarms blared and every single battery began to blink maintenance alerts.

It was enough. The
Scylla’s
barrage deposited nearly an entire payload of missiles on the damaged nose. The mass driver slugs arrived a moment later and disappeared into the expanding cloud of green plasma around the Sa’Ami ship.

The Sa’Ami ship broke apart like a crumbled stone and began a slow descent towards the frigid surface of the inky blue planet.

“They’ve launched something!” Lebeau said. The screen zoomed and tried to resolve the image.

A grainy image of three circular balls, brownish and ruddy, appeared for a moment before they were lost.

“Shoot it,” William said.

“Mass drivers are down, missiles are loading, rails can’t resolve it,” Huron said.

“The
Scylla?
” William asked. He darted his eyes to the shared stream. Some systems were gone, but others still seemed alive.

“They’ve got damage control alerts all over, but the bridge has atmosphere,” Lebeau said. “Sir, there’s three of those things heading towards us and three towards the
Scylla.
”

The screen wavered and zoomed as the camera tried to lock onto the incoming projectiles. They decelerated just enough for the camera to latch on.

“Prepare to repel striders!” William sounded over the comms.

The Sa’Ami ship had launched the last weapon it had available, striders.

“And set course for the
Scylla,
” William said.

He knew the
Scylla
didn’t have the Marines to fend off an attack. For that matter he didn’t know if the
Malta
did either.

*

The fear found Yamaguchi when the suit powered up. There was a click, a push in his ear, and a flicker of the screens. Nanite muscles pushed, pulsed, tensed, and relaxed. Every joint and muscle proved itself to the controller and displayed results on the screen.

The fear continued to grow as the suit stepped forward and leaned a touch. He felt it in his stomach, in his eyes, in his mouth. The taste was like bad ketchup mixed with copper shavings. He could almost chew it.

He caught himself as it continued to well up and stopped. Comms chatter bellowed in his ear.

Click.

Off.

Only his heartbeat was audible and the roar of silent space.

The suit was tight around him. He was sore through to the bones. It felt like it did before the battle and he liked it, just for a moment, then the fear crawled back.

“Son of a bitch
!” Yamaguchi yelled.

No sound came from the suit.

Focus.

Stop.

Breathe.

The fear came in a wave and broke slowly, softly, like waves on a sandy shore. His eyes snapped open and he keyed the comms back on. Time to get this shit on.

The fear was on the edge, like it always was. Right where it belonged, a guardian angel to keep him out of trouble.

“LT! You reading me?” Hoffman called.

“I gotcha, Sergeant,” Yamaguchi replied. “Just took a moment to get in touch with my feminine side.”

Laughter rang out from across the squad. Nervous laughter.

“Split it. Follow the drill, Alpha squad heads down to maintenance, Beta squad to the nose. These sons of bitches are smooth in tight quarters, burn ‘em before they get close, and if they get close, pin ‘em. You’ve got more mass.” Yamaguchi drilled icons on his display to positions throughout the ship.

“Alpha on me!” Hoffman ordered. Suits sprinted out of the hold.

“Sergeant Gruber, status please?” Yamaguchi asked.

“Marines in position,” Sergeant Gruber said. “The Army is late to the party.”