Far Space (42 page)

Williams moved to Ian’s side and said. “Crowder and his assistant are SOF.”

Ian nodded, realizing he would have to take William’s word for the time being. He moved to Jennifer’s side and took her hand. “You all right?”

“Yeah, those bozos didn’t drop me that far,” Jennifer said with a nod.

Ian let his gaze drift to the ceiling where the battle for Near Space would be taking place.

“Crowder needs to take a look at your wife, sir,” Williams said as he laid an arm on Ian’s shoulder.

“I’m fine,” Jennifer said

“I’m just going up to Ops,” Ian said, squeezing Jennifer’s hand. “I’ll be right back.”

“Go, you’ll be a mess if you stay here,” Jennifer said.

Ian stood and holstered his pistol.

Williams stepped out of Ian’s path. “I’ll keep an eye on things down here, sir.”

With one last look down at Jennifer, Ian strode from Yates’ quarters. As soon as he was outside the door, he picked up the pace, taking the longest low-gee strides he could manage without hitting the ceiling. He did not know
what he could do to protect Jennifer, but there was nothing he could do from her bedside.

Once he got away from the senior officer quarters, Ian found the hallways crowded with base personnel rushing to their emergency stations or to the shelters on lower levels. Ian pushed through them feeling like a salmon going in the wrong direction. He finally found himself alone outside the main entrance to the CSOC Ops Floor. He held up his access badge. The scanner confirmed his identity and the reinforced door slid aside.

Ian stepped inside the Ops Center and was suddenly at a loss for what to do. This was where the battle for all of Near Space would be run. The crew on duty would be in charge of handling the crisis and probably would not appreciate him just showing up after more than two weeks of practically being AWOL.

It took Ian a moment to realize everyone was staring at him. He knew a majority of the people manning the consoles and nodded to a few. They returned the gesture and went back to their work, more concerned with the approaching alien ships than the return of a prodigal son.

Looking over the heads of the personnel seated at their control stations, Ian caught sight of General Yates conferring with the Center Commander. Yates gestured for Ian to join him at the airlock leading to the tightly controlled Special Forces Ops Cell, SOC for short.

Ian pressed around the edge of the tight room and wished the new ops center planned for Level 10 was complete – both for the extra hundred meters of ice pack it would have put between him and the alien forces headed toward Europa and because the floor plan would have been more open.

Yates held the SOC lock open for Ian, allowing him access to the General’s inner sanctum.

The SOC was lit only by the display screens and a few small map lights. The focus of the room was the nine display screens taking up every centimeter of the far wall. Yates nodded at the block of four screens in the upper right-hand side displaying a detailed view of force and asset distribution in the solar system. He said, “They’re everywhere this time, not just out here in Jupiter Space. The closest ships will be in firing range in about three minutes.”

The looks he got out on the Ops Floor suddenly made sense. Ian glanced over his shoulder at the door sealing off the SOC from the rest of the Ops Floor.

“They think this is my fault…Jennifer’s fault,” Ian said. “If I led them back here…”

Yates shook his head. “No, Ian, we’ve already checked your Reaper’s sensor logs. There was nothing indicating you were followed back to this cluster.”

“This can’t just be a coincidence,” Ian said. “Maybe if I’d used more quiet time…”

“Captain,” Yates said, “those Soosuri would have found out we were prodding around their neighborhood soon enough no matter how hard we try to hide like rats in the walls.” He faced the main screens again. “Maybe it’s better to get the fight out in the open once and for all.”

“It’s going to be some fight,” Ian muttered. He faced Yates and said, “We destroyed two of their ships. Jennifer’s ship destroyed a third on the water planet. How can this
not
be our fault?”

Yates cornered Ian with a steely gaze and hissed, “Pull it together Langdon. If this is anyone’s fault it’s those idiots who sent Jennifer out and me for sending you out after them.” He laid a hand on Ian’s shoulder. In a softer tone, he said. “I need you in the game.”

Ian thought for a moment then nodded. “Yes sir.” He looked up at the display board again. The red icons vastly outnumbered the blue and grey icons representing friendly forces. “How long can our defenses hold out?” He took in the other five screens representing Jupiter, Earth, Mars, and Saturn Space along with the ever-present news feed.

“You’re too used to working out there,” Yates said, hooking his thumb over his shoulder to the CSOC Ops Floor. He reached over the shoulder of one of his controllers and hit a key. “There are more players on the field than we usually let on.”

Green icons, previously unnoticed by Ian began flashing across all the displays. He thought he recognized the patterns. “Are those wormhole thresholds?”

“Yes and no,” Yates said. He pointed at the screens. “Those are all SOF posts where we have teams. You didn’t think I’d let my boys sit on the sidelines for the big fight, did you? Military and civilian teams have been able to map just about every wormhole threshold in the planetary system of Near Space. SOF has explored a majority of them with our own ships. The ones which seemed likely avenues of attack were seeded with observation posts.”

Ian just stared at Yates for a moment. “You can’t stop an entire attack fleet with a few troops, even if they are SOF.”

“No, probably not,” Yates answered grinning darkly, “but we can sure try.”

One of the controllers spoke up, “Sir, we have burst transmissions from posts twelve and seventeen. Their charges are in place.”

“Blow them,” Yates ordered. He turned to Ian. “Twelve and seventeen are here in Jupiter space. The standing orders were to mine anything that didn’t have an IFF.”

On the Jupiter screen, two of the icons representing the enemy ships started blinking. Thirty seconds later they winked out.

“Targets destroyed,” one of the controllers said.

“Two down, forty-seven to go,” Yates muttered. In a louder voice, he said, “Blow every mine as soon as we have confirmation they’ve been activated.”

The controller nodded.

Ian checked the counter clicking down in a corner of the Jupiter space screen.

“One minute,” the operator in front of Ian called out.

Ian had to do something. He turned to Yates and asked, “Has Reaper 16 lifted yet?”

Yates shook his head, “Ghost dropped Rider and Mason off and was trying to get back. I haven’t heard from him though.”

“If he gets there first, tell him to wait as long as he can,” Ian said and headed for the door.

“What do you have in mind, Langdon?” Yates asked.

“Gotta protect humanity, sir,” Ian said without looking back. Silently he added, and Jennifer.

As Ian reached the SOC hatch, the controller updated the countdown.

“Thirty seconds…”

USS Saratoga

Jupiter Space

“Have they fired, yet?” Mitchell asked after glancing at the status board confirming his ship was prepared for battle.

“No sir,” Growler replied.

Mitchell spent an entire ten seconds doubting his decision to automatically engage the alien ships; it was all the time he could spare. He wanted to stick to his decision, and yet, there was that chance he had made a disastrous choice. Mitchell was expected as a commander to make the hard decisions and face whatever consequences might result from his actions. He blew out a single long breath and reminded himself to ask Yates if he had these same doubts while commanding Schriever. Mitchell pushed the lingering doubts from his mind and focused on the display screens. He pulled a battered cowboy hat from its strap above his head and settled it comfortably on his head, low over his brow.

“Make sure they know we’re here, DO,” Mitchell said.

“Fire two missiles,” Osprey ordered.

Mitchell watched as the hyper-velocity missiles streaked away. Even with their impressive speed, the missiles would require nearly a minute to reach their targets.

Mitchell turned his attention to the nav board. The Saratoga had been patrolling beyond Jupiter’s major moons when they had detected the enemy ships popping out of the wormholes. Mitchell noted his navigation officer had required only a nominal coarse adjustment to the ship’s trajectory in order get onto their current attack vector. Saratoga would round Europa at nearly the same time the enemy ships reached the moon.

The enemy’s obvious target on Europa was Reagan, the largest military base in the outer solar system. Mitchell switched to a video feed from a satellite perched in orbit around the icy moon. The zoomed image showed a formation of ships. They were exactly like those which had attacked Earth.

Any lingering traces of doubts Mitchell may have been harboring evaporated. It was up to him to keep the second Battle of Near Space from going the same way as the first.

“Three minutes,” Tactical called out.

“On your toes people,” Osprey said.

Mitchell changed his display for a feed from Reagan. Tracers and faint ionization from the thin atmosphere showed the rail gun and laser defenses were already engaging the alien ships. Someone there had the sense to fire first, Mitchell felt reassured by his fellow commander’s initiative. He glanced at the counter running down the engagement ranges.

Less than two and a half minutes remaining until Saratoga could fire.

Mitchell hoped Reagan could hold out that long. “Come on, baby,” he quietly told his ship. “We got a scrap to get into.”

Reagan Space Corps Base

Jupiter Space

Ian was halfway to the Reaper when he felt the initial effects of the long range bombardment. The floor bucked and the walls creaked as the base was impacted by laser or high velocity projectiles. Ian could not tell what weapons were striking the surface about him. He figured it really did not matter; a few meters of ice was not going to protect anyone very long against the firepower the Soosuri were capable of unleashing upon the human settlement. He glanced up at the ceiling, all too aware of the thin veil protecting him from hard vacuum.

In between explosions, Ian noticed the ghosts in the ice had returned. The cracking and wailing was more intense than he had ever experienced. He was knocked to his knees by a particularly violent blast. As he pulled himself up using a support pillar, his arm shook in tune with the moaning from the ice pack.

Ian imagined the demons from the dark hell of an ocean far beneath his feet could sense the destruction occurring here on the surface. He pushed away from the wall and muttered, “Hang on guys. It won’t be much longer ‘til you get some company.”

Shaking his head, Ian said, “Focus, Langdon, or you’ll be one of the first to join them.” He forced his way down the hall despite the pitching floor, determined to get into the fight raging above Europa.

Ninety seconds, and several blasts later, Ian reached Gate 25. He cycled through the airlock into the connecting tunnel and stumbled down the narrow access tube as the ground continued to rock.

Inside the ship, he called, “Ghost! Robin! What the heck are you guys still doing on the ground?!” He squeezed onto the bridge only to find it completely empty.

“Crud.”

Ian climbed into the pilot seat and activated the controls. Within moments the engine was on line. He heard the main hatch aft of the bridge slam. He did not look up from his preparations as Ghost dropped into the co-pilot seat.

“Nice of you to show up,” Ian said.

“Sorry,” Ghost replied, “Had to take a detour. Seems a few corridors are lacking air.”

“Yeah,” Ian said. “I hear that happens occasionally during attacks by hostile aliens. Check the access tunnel.”

Ghost activated his display boards. “Tunnel’s clear. The ground crew seems to have abandoned us.”

“Can’t blame them,” Ian said as the Reaper swayed on its landing gear. “Okay, I’m pulling away.”

“You’re gonna wreck the access tunnel,” Ghost warned.

“They can bill me.”

Ghost strapped in and asked, “So, did you file a flight plan with the tower?”

“Yates gave me a verbal,” Ian said. “We’ll fill out the paperwork when we get back.”

“You mean ‘if’,” muttered Ghost.

“Yeah, well, I wasn’t going to put it that way,” Ian said.

Reagan Space Corps Base / SOF Ops Cell

Europa

Jennifer nearly fell out of bed in the aftermath of the latest blast. “That was close,” she muttered and looked over at Williams. “Exactly how deep are we?”

Before the SOF soldier could answer, Dr. Crowder soothed, “We are quite safe down here, Jennifer. Please, just relax. Your wound is healing quite nicely, but I’d like to perform a few more tests.”

Jennifer pushed herself up on an elbow.

“Please, Mrs. Langdon,” Dr. Crowder said as he gently pushed Jennifer back down onto the pillow. “Nurse…”

The ground shook again. Crowder and the nurse both had trouble staying on their feet.

Jennifer started to get up again. “I need to find Ian.”

“There’s really no need to worry,” Dr. Crowder said, speaking loudly to be heard above the racket of his equipment rattling all around the room. He was finally driven to his knees by a violent upheaval of the floor.

“Apparently there is!” Jennifer shouted.

“Nurse, a sedative,” Crowder called as he got his feet under him again.

“Oh no you don’t,” Jennifer shouted. She eyed the nurse as the woman stumbled to the far side of the room where an injector was bouncing all over Yates’ desk.

Jennifer pushed herself off the bed as the nurse grabbed the auto-syringe.

Crowder stumbled toward Jennifer on unsteady feet. “Mrs. Langdon, I must insist…”

Jennifer rolled over to find a pair of legs rooted to the floor like tree. She looked up and said, “Williams! I need to get to Ian.”