The Epherium Chronicles: Embrace (24 page)

The door now completely open, Walsh let go of the handle, stepped into the doorway, and spun to face Krieg with his side arm in his hand. The
Armstrong’s
Air Boss took quick aim at his chest.

The docking technician called out, “Gun!” Realizing he was too far away to stop Walsh, the technician launched himself at Krieg. Walsh’s first shot rang out and struck the technician in the upper left shoulder. The technician’s bold move shielded Krieg from the blast, but both men slammed head first into the pilots along the left wall and clanged into the hallway’s thick metal bulkhead.

Walsh squeezed off a second round, but it went high and right of the two men and clipped the now approaching Thielson in the left arm. Pain lanced down her arm. She grasped the wound with her free hand, but lost her balance and landed hard on the floor intermingled with several of her squadron mates’ legs on the opposite side of the hallway from Krieg.

Most of the pilots were now in motion, trying to free themselves from their harnesses. With an unnatural calmness, Walsh stepped back into the airlock and closed the door as the first pilot closed on him. He pulled the interior handled down to seal the lock and blasted the control panel with another round from his pistol. The panel on the inside of the hall with the pilots erupted in sparks.

Commander Sanchez’s voice could now be heard over the ship’s comm system. “Thirty seconds to jump.”

The pilot nearest the door tried to open the airlock, but it wouldn’t budge. “Walsh fused the controls, we can’t open it.”

“We have to stop that countdown,” another pilot said as she pulled open the hallway comm panel and tried to open a channel to the Command Deck. Nothing happened. “The panel’s been disabled!”

Another pilot tried the panel at the far end of the hallway, and he encountered the same thing. “The commander is in the docking bay, and we have no communications. What do we do?”

* * *

On the Command Deck of the
Armstrong
, one member of the Sensor Team called Ensign Pershing over to his station. “Sir, I’m having difficulty locking on to the beacon. The signal I’m receiving is extremely intermittent.”

Pershing leaned over her terminal and checked the readings. “Probably some fallout from our high powered scans earlier.” He typed a few commands on the terminal, and the signal stabilized. “Just needed to adjust the beacon’s array. We’ll do a full systems check on it after we jump.”

“Aye, sir,” the Sensor tech replied. “Thanks for the assist.”

At the central Command Station, Commander Sanchez continued his countdown which had now reached the twenty second mark. Sanchez stood by Hood as both monitored the overhead displays for the
Armstrong’s
system readiness to jump. The board was all green, and Sanchez continued his countdown.

Hood couldn’t stand still and began to pace in front of the monitors. Something was off, he could feel it, and it agitated him. Sanchez’s countdown echoed in his head as reached ten seconds. He stared at his empty coffee cup. Four cups in the last hour didn’t help him either, but each cup he felt kept him focused. Sanchez began the final count from five as he walked to his chair and finally sat down. Maybe he was wrong. As Sanchez completed the countdown and initiated the jump, Hood glanced at his terminal. A new comm request flashed urgent on his screen. It was from Greywalker.

Chapter Eighteen

EDF Armstrong
Deep Space Route to Cygni
Thursday
,
January 23
Earth Year 2155
Seconds After Fifth Jump

As the
Armstrong
completed the jump, the quick fog of the space-fold event was cleared from the Command crew’s minds by the sounds of emergency klaxons across the Command Deck. The computer’s voice followed declaring a collision alert.

“What the hell?” Sanchez yelled.

Hood looked to his left at the port side viewports then keyed his terminal to display the external cameras on the overhead. The asteroid field. They had jumped right into the middle of it. But how?

A large asteroid was close now and closing fast. “Brace for impact!” Hood strapped himself into his command chair.

The asteroid struck the
Armstrong
on the port rear quarter, partly smashing into one of the docked gunships. The entire ship shuttered with the impact, and sounds of grinding metal could be heard along the hull.

More asteroids were moving toward them, and Hood called to the helmsman station. “Evasive maneuvers!” The
Armstrong
lurched forward as her engines fired, and the two helmsmen tried desperately to avoid any of the huge rocks. “Aldridge, what’s the situation out there?”

A smaller asteroid struck the ship amidships on the starboard side, and Hood could hear Aldridge grunt in frustration as she tried to maintain her seat during the impact. “We jumped nearly a third of the way into the field, sir,” she blurted. “It doesn’t make sense. We are right with the beacon.” She checked the telemetry of the nearby asteroids. “Looks like the asteroids close to us are being drawn toward the ship because of the gravity field we created when we jumped.” She leaned over her terminal toward the front of the Command Deck. “Helm, z minus one thousand meters. Now!”

The helmsman answered by executing a radical shift on his controls and everyone on the Command Deck felt as if the floor was dropping out from under them like a runaway elevator. The ship continued to move as a large asteroid, similar to the size of the first one that struck the ship, passed harmlessly overhead.

Aldridge exhaled in relief. That asteroid was moving much faster than the first one and would have inflicted serious damage if it had struck the hull. She checked her screen again. There were no more asteroids of size on a collision course, but they were still deep in the field. Getting out would not be easy.

* * *

Near the port side docking bay, Krieg managed to crawl from the pile of his fellow pilots that had been tossed around the hallway, when the first impact struck the ship. His head was throbbing from when it struck the wall, and he felt some swelling and blood trickling from a small gash in his scalp.

The docking bay technician who had tackled him groaned, and Krieg knelt beside him. He could see blood oozing steadily from the wound in his shoulder, and one of the other pilots in Thielson’s squadron retrieved the medical kit from the wall, opened it and started to apply a dressing.

Krieg helped him to a sitting position. “You’re going to be alright buddy. Hell man, you saved my life.”

The tech shook his head slowly and pulled back his sleeve to reveal a security comm band. He opened a channel and moved it closer to his face. “Base, this is Fields.” His voice was raspy, and he paused to breathe deeply as he spoke. “Weapons fire in port docking bay hall...officer down, request assistance...suspect still at large...suspect is armed, I repeat, suspect is armed.”

Krieg looked surprised. “You’re security?”

The security officer nodded in obvious pain. “Assigned to protect you. We were unsure...” The officer passed into unconsciousness.

Krieg eased the security officer onto the floor and stood as Thielson walked up beside him. “You seem to have that effect on everyone these days, Krieg,” she said jokingly as she fought off the grimace she exhibited from her shoulder wound.

Krieg had the pilot with the medical kit start to examine and treat her wound. “Let’s sit you down,” he said as he tried to move her over to the nearby wall.

“I’m all right,” she said. “Flesh wound, but it hurts like hell.” She motioned to the airlock door. “What the hell got into Walsh?”

Krieg helped Thielson down just as the
Armstrong’s
direction shifted abruptly, and everyone was thrown about the hallway until the inertia compensators could adjust. Krieg sat upright next to Thielson after being sprawled once again on the floor. “What was that?! That wasn’t an impact like the first one.”

Thielson shook her head. “No, but if the captain’s calling for maneuvers like that, we’re in trouble, probably under attack. We need to get out there, Krieg.”

Krieg got up and walked over to the airlock door. Through the glass he caught a glimpse of Walsh in his flight suit and helmet, moving from the controls for the catapults to the ladder for the closest fighter. The catapult had already begun to cycle and was aligning the first two fighters into position.

Krieg turned back toward Thielson. “He’s prepping a fighter to launch. He’s going to use it to get off the ship!” He grabbed two of his squadron mates, popped open the panel beneath the airlock keypad and pointed to a large metal bar with a long handled grip. “You two start working on the lever here to manually open the door. Once you get it open, I’ll slip in and you can close it. That way when I open the airlock, we won’t have an atmosphere breach.”

The pilots quickly began to work the lever. After a few pulls, the airlock cracked open, and the opening began to widen. “What are you doing, Krieg?” Thielson asked.

“I’m going after him. If anyone has a chance to stop him, it’s me.” The doorway widened enough for Krieg to slip inside the airlock with his helmet. “Use the security officer’s wristband to contact the Command Deck, and let them know what’s going on.”

The airlock door sealed shut once again, and Krieg secured his helmet into place. Giving a thumbs up to Thielson and the rest of the pilots, he opened the door to the bay and sprinted inside the docking bay with the rush of atmosphere from the airlock.

Walsh was already in his fighter, which was now moving into launch position on the catapult. Knowing he had little time to catch him, Krieg raced to the other side of the bay on the pilot’s catwalk that led to the far fighter that was about to move into its own prelaunch position. It was
his
fighter.

Krieg slid down the ladder and landed on the platform just above his Stingray. He spun to step into the cockpit and glanced toward Walsh. Walsh’s fighter had reached its launch position, and Walsh looked over at Krieg. Krieg could barely make out his head underneath the shaded glass of the cockpit. Reminiscent of two seasoned gunfighters in the old west, both men locked in a stare to see who would make the first move. Krieg stood motionless, he couldn’t even blink. Finally as his own fighter began to move again, Krieg broke the stare, hopped inside his fighter, and rapidly began powering up systems.

* * *

On the Command Deck, the situation was still tense. Two more asteroids were narrowly avoided, but a third smaller one clipped the bow of the ship, narrowly missing the new particle cannon.

Aldridge and Sanchez stared intently at the Tactical Station terminal, studying the current situation around the ship. After nodding in agreement, Sanchez looked up, announced an all clear to the crew and moved down to the Command Station.

Hood stared at his terminal as damage reports began to come in from throughout the ship. He sighed and looked over at Sanchez as he sat down. “What do we know?”

“Well, it looks like the immediate danger is over, but we may have bigger problems.”

“Bigger than this, Commander?” Hood said tiredly.

Sanchez huffed in agreement with his CO. “According to Aldridge, our gravity field set the asteroids nearest to the ship in motion toward us, but the field was strong enough to get almost all of them moving,” he explained. “We found a safe spot for now, but we’re going to have a lot of colliding rocks out there soon. We need to find our way out of here fast.”

“I have an idea about that,” Hood said as he opened a channel to Engineering. “Mr. Whitaker. I need that shield of yours.”

Whitaker responded slightly out of breath. “Sorry, Captain. I can’t give it to you. That second rock that smacked us caused one of the reactors to scram, so we shut it down. Until we get that stable and some more juice in the batteries, I can’t power it up.”

Hood muttered under his breath as he pounded his fist on his chair. He took a deep breath, and let it out slowly as he closed the channel. “Alright, our ace is out of commission,” he told Sanchez, “and even with the best of my contingency plans, we are going to have to do this the hard way.”

“You have multiple contingency plans for this?” Sanchez asked as he pointed to the viewport and the many asteroids floating nearby.

Hood looked at Sanchez and raised a single eyebrow.

“Forget I asked,” Sanchez said.

“Raf, I want you to sync up the Tactical readouts of the asteroid paths directly with helm control. We are going to need precise timing to get out of here without any more damage.”

“On it,” Sanchez replied and started back to the Tactical Station.

“Captain, I have launch cycles starting for fighters in the port docking bay,” Aldridge announced.

“Ah, the fighters. With all the excitement, we forgot to stand them down.” He looked over a Lieutenant Wells at her Communications Station. “Lieutenant, contact Walsh and all the docking bay officers. They are to suspend operations until further notice,” Hood instructed. “We can’t have those fighters launching out into those rocks.”

“Aye, sir.” Wells immediately began opening channels.

Walsh should know better
, he thought to himself.

Wells tapped her terminal again and looked back at the captain. “Sir, I have Lieutenant Greywalker. She has a situation that needs your attention.”

Hood shook his head. “Tell Lieutenant Greywalker it’ll have to wait. We have a dire situation here. Get the details, and I’ll address it when this is over.”

“Aye, sir,” Wells responded and re-opened the channel to the Security Chief.

“Sir, I have a Stingray launch. Port bay,” Aldridge announced.

Hood turned back toward Aldridge as Sanchez reached her station. “I thought we halted all fighter launches. What’s going on down there?”

“Second launch confirmed, sir. Same bay,” Aldridge said as Sanchez looked over her shoulder and nodded in agreement.

Hood looked at Wells. “Lieutenant, why aren’t those fighters standing down?”

Wells paused briefly to finish listening to a channel then responded. “Captain, aft and starboard bays report that they have stood down, but they also report that their launchers are disabled. The docking bay techs seem to be locked out of the systems. No response from port bay, sir, or Lieutenant Commander Walsh.”

Wells saw a new flash on her terminal and opened the emergency channel. She continued to listen as Hood gained her attention again.

“Lieutenant, get those two fighters on comms now! I want them back here immediately.”

* * *

Krieg’s head pounded as he accelerated out of the bay in his Stingray. The pain subsided some once the force of the launch wore off, but his helmet was pressing right on the part of his scalp that he injured when the security officer tackled him.

He checked his HUD and locked onto Walsh’s fighter as it made a sharp bank, headed away from the
Armstrong
and deeper into the asteroid field. He banked his own fighter to pursue and activated his comm unit for a channel to Walsh’s fighter. “All right, Commander. I need you to stand down and return to
Armstrong
, or I will be forced to engage. Please respond.”

Static answered his comm request to Walsh’s fighter as he accelerated his Stingray to close the distance. “Fine,” he said. “I gave him a chance.” He activated his weapons systems and followed Walsh in a tight roll around the nearest asteroid.

Walsh accelerated his own fighter and banked hard left to slip into a gap between two smaller asteroids less than five hundred meters away. Krieg followed him, barely missing one of the rocks as it was still rotating, and emerged from the gap as Walsh’s fighter opened fire on another asteroid in his path. The asteroid exploded, and large pieces of rock were thrown into Krieg’s flight path.

Krieg inverted his fighter and pulled back on his controls to avoid the mini-asteroid cloud that Walsh had created. He could hear small particles of the asteroid clatter on his ship’s hull, but he had avoided the larger pieces that could have damaged his fighter. The effect, however, was that Walsh had gained critical space between himself and Krieg.

“So the old man can fly,” Krieg muttered to himself. “All right, Commander, you win round one, but the next one is mine.” Krieg reacquired Walsh’s position and chose a new vector to intercept as they began to close on one of the largest asteroids in the field.

* * *

Hood looked back at Sanchez who had just finished assisting Aldridge synchronize her asteroid trajectories to the helm station. “Raf, comms are down to the weapons crews. I need you get a small team together and make contact. I want the primary batteries on standby in case we have no choice. Any close asteroids are to be engaged by point defense weapons only and in short bursts, no sustained barrages. I don’t want any of those rocks to split or get any more momentum. The last thing we need is more obstacles or huge collisions around us that can cause more damage.”

“On my way, Captain. I’ll slide by the docking bays afterward and find out what’s going on with their launchers,” Sanchez said as he moved to the Command Deck elevator lift.

“Good idea, Raf. Keep in contact.”

Hood left his chair and began to walk toward the Helmsman Station when Lieutenant Wells called to him again. “Captain, I have the second fighter on comms. It’s Lieutenant Krieg. He claims that Commander Walsh shot up the pilot entryway to the port docking bay and disabled the remaining fighter catapult cycle after the first two fighter’s were put into place.”