Haywire (41 page)

Her phrasing rocked Alex on his heels. “
For now,
” she’d said. That implied the situation was temporary, and that was in more ways than one. He looked down at Shawn and knew that soon the infection would be the least of the kid’s problems.

When a sudden throb vibrated through Alex’s bones, he turned to the cockpit and saw the pilots hitting switches and buttons in a rapid series of movements. Within seconds the shuttle’s engines and computers were online and powered up.

“
I hope you people are ready back there,” the pilot said without turning to look, “because it’s go-time.”

Alex started to walk to the front of the shuttle, but before he could take two steps Artemis said, “Has anyone che-e-ecked the Zeus canisters to make sure they’re st-still okay?”

“
Not since we took off,” he replied. “But, if they weren’t, wouldn’t you be the first to know?”

The Titan nodded and coughed up a half-hearted chuckle. “I s-suppose so, but we can’t be too sure. I’ll go-o-o make sure–”

Her sentence was cut off when something slammed into the shuttle hard enough to knock everyone standing off their feet, even Artemis.

“
We’re taking fire!” the pilot shouted. “Everyone brace yourselves!”

Alex picked himself up and dashed to the cockpit, holding onto whatever handholds he could find along the way. The plan had been to wait amongst the broken bits of mined asteroid, just another chunk of floating debris, until the dreadnaught flew past, and then to power up and slip in close before they could be detected. Apparently that hadn’t gone as planned.

“
How bad is it?” he asked once he was standing behind the pilots.

The co-pilot pointed at the forward window, which was filled by the dreadnaught, its razor sharp edges and dark hull like a nightmare waiting to destroy them. Sizzling bolts of plasma came at them in a steady downpour from the alien ship’s cannons. “Bad enough. We’re trying to get an angle on their aft shuttle bay, just like Artemis said, but there are just too many guns covering it. I don’t think we can make it, even as close as we are.”

Alex saw what he meant. The pilot was doing an admirable job keeping them alive amidst the barrage of fire coming at them, but the closer they flew, the tighter the screen became. If they wanted to get on board the dreadnaught, they were going to need some help.

“
Open a channel,” he said, dreading that more lives were about to be put in harm’s way.

“
They’re beginning their approach,” Admiral Kaiser said, her grim face like a specter on Townsend’s communications screen. “Pour it on! Give that dreadnaught everything you’ve got! But remember, once they reach the shuttle bay, everyone back off. The fight will be out of our hands at that point.”

Townsend tightened his grip on his chair arm. Since the dreadnaught had passed through the conduit, his ship had stuck to the periphery of the fight, getting off what shots it could while drawing some of the fire and attention its way, but most of the real fighting had been done by his fellow sailors on other ships. One after another they’d thrown themselves against the dreadnaught, and one after another they’d been disabled or destroyed. At the rate the battle was going, the asteroids would soon be outnumbered by shattered starship hulls.

That didn’t mean the Alliance and Union ships weren’t giving as well as they got. Skillful flying and tight hands on gunnery controls made sure that for every hit the dreadnaught scored, two more pounded its own thick hull. In any other fight with any other ship, the battle would have been over within minutes. But this wasn’t any other fight, and the dreadnaught they fought against didn’t waiver or slow its course for a moment.

“
Dallas
and
Dreben
have scored several direct hits,” the radar operator said. “We should have destroyed that ship several times over by now. How are they still flying?”

With every second another life was lost. What had been a battle of attrition was quickly becoming one of desperation.

“
Sir, the Union has sent another carrier group!” Sanchez said. His tone was giddy.

Townsend felt his face cool as the good news washed over him. “If they wanted to make a grand entrance, they achieved it. Roberts, how–”

“
The SWAT shuttle is taking fire!” the radar operator shouted from her station.

The comms officer looked at him a second later. “They’re calling for help, Sir! All channels, all frequencies.”

A chill trickled down Townsend’s spine. He’d hoped Artemis’s plan of approaching the ship from the rear while everyone kept it busy would work, but – as with all good plans once the shooting started – it hadn’t. Like all good officers, though, he was ready to do his duty. “Then let’s give it to them. Open a line to the
Amsterdam
and
Shenzhen
.”

“
Aye aye, Sir. Comm line is open.”

Townsend looked at the display next to him and stared into the eyes of the Union officers. “It looks like our escorting duty isn’t finished yet. Care to join me?”

“
Roger that,” Commander Williams replied.

“
Let’s pave the road, Captain,” Commander Sobel followed.

The two gunships peeled away from the far side of the dreadnaught and pushed their engines into the redline, and once they joined the
Culper
the three ships swooped under the alien ship’s keel. Within seconds they were flanking the SWAT shuttle.

“
Thanks for the assist,” the shuttle pilot said to his three guardian angels.

Together the four vessels powered forward, the escorts dodging what fire they could without exposing the shuttle, who had its own hands full. Quickly space became a sea of plasma as every cannon on the rear of the dreadnaught turned their way and opened fire. Townsend felt like he was racing into a star going nova.

“
The
Shenzhen
has taken multiple hits to the–”

The Union gunship exploded before the radar operator could finish speaking, its shattered hull now spinning with the rest of the dead.

“
Tighten formation,” Townsend said, knowing the odds of their survival had gone from bad to worse. He also knew the importance of his mission was all the more vital.

The
Culper
trembled as enemy fire hammered against it. Ablative armor boiled away layer by layer. The helmswoman did an incredible job of handling the ship amidst the chaos, but no one could have avoided every shot, and the ship shook violently with each hit. Townsend leaned forward to ask for the status of the
Amsterdam
, but the Union ship detonated before the question could be uttered.

“
Sir, the shuttle’s hailing us!”

“
Put her through,” he said, his teeth barely moving.

The speakers rattled with static for a moment, then the shuttle pilot said, “
Culper
, we’re nearly at the landing bay! Break off!”

Townsend appreciated the sentiment, but he wasn’t about to shirk his duty now. “Nearly isn’t good enough. Now shut up and let’s do our jobs.”

The pilot was silent for a moment. “Aye,
Culper
. We really do thank you.”

Despite the danger, Townsend grinned. “If you really want to thank us, get in that ship and rip those bastards apart.
Culper
out.”

Townsend didn’t consider himself a bad person, just a man whose duty it was to sometimes go into dark places to do dark things. He didn’t question his orders, or worry about the consequences. As he looked at the hardened sailors sitting around him, he knew they were willing to follow their orders with the same grim determination. It was with that knowledge that he kept them in the thick of it, taking hit after hit, shielding the shuttle and its passengers. Alarms shrilled loudly, and red status alerts blinked from every control station, but Townsend and his crew stayed where they were and did their duty. As the shuttle finally lined its bow up with the dreadnaught’s rear landing bay and hit the afterburner, he knew they would make it.

When the
Culper
’s upper hull was hit by two plasma blasts that broke through the last of their armor plating, Townsend was smiling, happy that he and his crew had done their part to deliver the shuttle where it needed to go. He’d lived by his duty, and he was content to die by it. As the broken bits of his ship spiraled apart into space, they did so without regret.

“
I’m nearly finished,” Crowe called up from the engine room. “A few more coolant hoses, and then you can replace that control board.”

Gimble barely heard his crewmate. The activity outside his ship was too amazing to let him think about anything else. Never in his life had he seen such destruction, or such daring. He’d nearly soiled his knickers as the dreadnaught came through the Mars conduit, and when the Alliance and Union ships threw themselves against it he hadn’t known whether to laugh or cheer, so instead he’d just watched. It wasn’t until the SWAT shuttle had powered up and made for the alien ship that he’d understood what was really gone on. When the
Culper
fell beneath the dreadnaught’s cannons, he wasn’t glad to see it despite their earlier conflict. Gimble understood their sacrifice, and it made him hold his life cheap in the face of it.

“
Are you listening up there?” Crowe asked.

After a few seconds, Gimble tore his eyes from the windows and said, “Yes, I’m here. It’s... well, it’s been a sight out there, and one I’m glad to have been just an observer of. I’m ready with the control board.”

“
Good. I’ll just be a little bit... Damn it! I’ll have ya yet, ya old bastard!”

Gimble didn’t know what new gremlin had bitten his crewmate on the behind, but he trusted Crowe to deal with it and get their ship up and running again. Meanwhile, he kept an eye peeled on the drama unfolding before him. He’d never seen its like before, and he hoped he’d never see it again. That much death and destruction was enough for one lifetime.

Shawn awoke just as an explosion filled the sky with light and shrapnel above the shuttle. The floor bucked beneath him, so he grabbed the leg of a nearby seat and held on so hard his fingers dug grooves into the metal. A million questions ran through his mind, and they weren’t helped by the alarms and warnings that filled his vision. He looked at Artemis next to him, but before he could ask her anything, the shuttle’s guns let loose a rapid volley of charged particles, and seconds later another burst of light and debris shook the shuttle, and then everything stopped in a rapid deceleration that sent everything around him crashing into everything else. The universe became one long scream in his head.

“
You could have warned us they had landing nets,” Alex said as he picked himself up from the floor. His body armor had dings in it from where loose items had slammed into him, and a thin trickle of blood seeped from a cut on his forehead.

“
To be-e-e honest,” Artemis replied, “I wa-asn’t sure they’d work after blowing the ou-ou-outer bay doors off.” The smile she offered was weak and faltering.

After everyone shook themselves off and walked down the gangplank leading out of the shuttle, Artemis and Shawn unloaded the canisters of Zeus. To Shawn’s amazement, they’d survived the frenzied flight through space and less than gentle landing onboard the dreadnaught intact.

“
Now-now that we’re close I can sen-sense Thanatos,” she said once the last canister was set down and everyone was gathered together. “He’s on the bridge with s-s-several other Titans. The others ar-ar-are spread throughout the rest of the ship. L-luckily I’ve been he-here before, so I-I-I know the layout. Delgado and Hutchins, let me see-see your computer pads.”

The agents reached into their pants’ pockets and brought out hand-sized tablets. Artemis laid her hands on them for a moment, then said, “Okay. I’ve up-uploaded maps that will le-e-ead you to the environmental controls areas. Once you’ve re-e-eached them, wait until I give the word, and then du-ump the Zeus. Are we clear? On my word.”

A chorus of voices replied, “Ma’am, yes, Ma’am!”

The Titan held her hand out. “Let me have the case.”

Alex reached down next to the canisters and lifted the case Hofstadter found on Mars. “You going to jam this up Thanatos’s ass personally?”

For the first time Shawn could remember, the Titan laughed good and hard. From the case she withdrew the Zeus grenade and held it against the armor above her right hip. The nanites pulled away, revealing olive-toned skin, and then reformed around the grenade, keeping it hidden and protected. The rest of her armor then shifted as well, forming into thick plates. When it finally settled she looked like a tank on legs, with only her face showing her for the human she was.

“
Thank you, A-agent Delgado,” she said. “Without your help we-e couldn’t have made it this far. Humanity does-doesn’t know it, but they all owe you and your fellow agents a d-debt of gratitude. Please tell-ll Dr. Campbell I’m so-so-sorry about everything. Hopefully she’ll remember all the go-good we Titans did, once upon a time.”