Vatican Assassin (31 page)

"Good. That's what I wanted to hear. Okay, you guys got one free shot, you don't get another one,” the captain tells the enemy.

He turns to BC. “Hey there, Father, how you doin'? Ever ride a cruiser into battle before?" BC musters a smile. "I'm, uh, I'm okay.
Can't say as I have, captain."

"First time for everything, huh?"

"Captain, we've got missiles locking on!" the guy BC now knows is Chargon shouts. Yamano turns to face front.

"Return fire!" he barks.
"Countermeasures!"

"Another one coming in from starboard, sir!" Chargon reports.

"I'm on it, captain,” the guy on BC’s right tells Yamano. “Starboard side batteries firing."

"Good. Keep those missile away from us. No lasers yet? Funny. They may not have them on every ship. Missiles are easier to mount, easier to come by, too," Yamano says, thinking out loud. BC watches the bridge crew in their ballet of battle.

It is almost a dance, the way they work together to run the ship. They’re the interactive
human brain for the cruiser's killing machine. Kill or be killed.
They close in on the UIN ship that fired on them. As the ship gets close enough for BC to see some detail it erupts into an orange cloud of debris and quickly extinguishing flame from the nearly invisible laser fire from their cruiser.

Another UIN ship suddenly appears from behind and to the left, bearing down on them. The
Eisenhower’s
lasers soon focus on the new intruder. It’s obliterated in turn, only to be followed by a third, right behind it. It, too, quickly disintegrates under laser fire from their cruiser.

"I've got a fix on another two, maybe three of them," the officer to BC's right tells the captain after they've taken out the third UIN vessel.

"Try to keep us between them and the moon. There are still civilians alive down there. Let's see if we can't keep more of our people from being killed.” The captain pauses, thinking. “Don't let us get too close to the surface. We need to be able to maneuver. If they get too close to us, or head towards the surface, slice ‘em and dice ‘em," he orders.

"Captain, The
King
on the com!" Chargon says.

“Go ahead,
King
,” Yamano authorizes.

"
Eisenhower
, you are a sight for sore eyes! Good to see you. You're hot! Good shooting!" the com sputters, stronger than the last time.

"Who else we got here,
King
?" Yamano asks.

"Well, we
had
the
Kennedy
, but they're gone, back for repairs. The UIN first wave took out the
Blair
... down with all hands, the poor bastards. But The
Blair
took out a huge UIN Transpace Transport ship, one we hadn't see before, before she went down.

“The UIN used the big ship to ferry smaller ones here from Mars. If the
Blair
hadn't stopped them, they woulda been able to bring in more ships."

"The
Blair
took it out, huh?" the captain asks the com.

"Yeah, but unfortunately not before it unloaded it's last batch of assault craft. We got another one coming in!" the com clicks off.

"We got it, captain. Coming up from the surface, didn't see that one on the scans! Incoming!" BOOM-THUD-ANG

"I want that ship! Get some fire on that fucker!" Yamano yells. The UIN ship explodes in their viewport.

BC watches the battle blur by. Their ship is hit, but not badly damaged as they mop up the failed UIN flanking action on the dark side.

After, Yamano brings the
Eisenhower
back around near Lunar Prime. The UTZ line has been holding the main UIN advance at bay in the space around Lunar Prime. As The
Eisenhower
approaches the UTZ line, more UIN ships appear, probably the last of the UIN

flankers.

The
Ike
engages a couple of these straggling assault ships, but they’re no match for the UTZ

Heavy Cruiser. The
Eisenhower
takes some damage, but deals out more. Both ships are destroyed. The
Eisenhower,
two other heavy cruisers
,
and several smaller support craft are all that are left of the UTZ forces by the time the
Ike
arrives on the line. To BC, the battle seems to be all but over, with the exception of a UIN straggler here and there like the two The
Eisenhower
had taken out earlier. But the bridge of The
Ike
remains tense and alert. The crew is using every scanner at their disposal searching for enemy ships. Eyes wide open. BC figures the scene is the same on the bridges of the other cruisers as well.

The
King
tried to follow them from the dark side, but ended up touching down for repairs at a nearby outpost instead when their damage proved too extensive for them to continue. “They’ll live to fight another day,” Yamano had quipped. BC heard him mention something about another cruiser coming back from action on the dark side, too.

BC sits in his chair and listens. He knows the battle is really over when all of a sudden everyone seems to simultaneously exhale a breath they didn’t know they were holding. No one says anything, but it’s been a while since they’ve seen an enemy ship, and all of a sudden everything is All Right. A relative calm descends over the bridge.

I guess we won. There are more of us than them. But the cost seems incredibly high. What
is the UIN doing?

The white lighting comes back on. BC realizes Chargon is reciting a list of ship’s damages to Captain Yamano and begins to pay attention.

"...about seventy percent. It's okay, not great, but okay. And the other one, well... it'll probably blow up if we push it beyond minimal directional firing. But we'll need it for that, because most of the starboard side directional engines are out. We suffered most of our hull breaches on the starboard side, some explosive Dee, mostly confined to deck two."

"Casualties?" Yamano asks.

"Two," he's told. "Endoway is gone, sucked right out of C corridor on deck two. LeClair was killed when Engine Two flared."

"Roger." Yamano massages his brow, closes his eyes.

"Orders, sir?" the helmsman asks.

"Right." Yamano lowers his hands, opens his eyes. "Take us in to Lunar Prime, Reagan Station. Take us down, Mr. Chargon."

BC leans forward to see what he can of Lunar Prime out of the viewports as they approach. What he sees makes him feel sick, sour and twisted in the pit of his stomach. The entire station is a charred mess. Twisted metal beams jut up out of melted piles of what were once walls, ceilings, floors. New craters mar the surface.

One of those craters is where I used to live.
I can only hope everyone made it to some kind
of shelter. But I'm not sure anywhere was safe from that blast, by the look of it. Might have been a
nuke! Would they dare?

Man, this is the most destruction I've ever seen, maybe worse than some of the Earth attacks back
when I was a kid.
This was major, an all out blitz.

"There were a lot of casualties down there," Yamano says at BC's side, startling him out of his thoughts.

I never heard him approach... must be slipping.

Might be shock. Caught me daydreaming, or, what, day-nightmaring?

"Looks like it." BC says.

“I’m sorry. I know you were based here. Maybe you were lucky to be with us instead of here when the attack came,” Yamano says. He looks out at the ruins with BC.

"They threw everything they had at us, seems like," Yamano ponders aloud.

"Looks that way. Merry Christmas, huh?"

"They won't forget the massacre." It's a statement.

"Not likely," BC agrees.

"Captain, we're down. Into what's left, anyway. We're improvising an airlock using our ship-to-ship facilities. Should be able to disembark in twenty minutes," the com says.

BC thanks Captain Yamano and makes his way off The
Eisenhower
and back onto Lunar Prime through the makeshift airlock.

I can breathe, guess that means it works.

This is not the way I saw myself getting back here. I figured little trip to deposit Fiza, then
right back in time for Christmas, no worries. How wrong can a man be?

Lunar Prime's spaceport is in chaos. Armed UTZ guards move in patrols throughout the confused crowd. LSCs are doing their best to move among the people, comforting them, telling them where they can go to get help.

Most of those wandering through the spaceport seem a little dazed, still in shock from the terrible, shattering force of the attacks.

BC spots Governor Edwards in the crowd, doing his best to help the cause. He makes his way up to Edwards, finds him staring off into space while a UTZ officer reports. It takes over a minute for Edwards to turn, see BC, and register whom it is standing there. Then his eyes snap alert and brighten.

"BC!" Edwards says, surprised and smiling. Then his smile drops, his eyes darken and dim with sadness.

BC tries for comfort.

"Marc, I can't believe this, that they'd do this."

"I guess I know better what you've been talking about now, huh?" Edwards shakes his head.

"Why? Why did they... they never hit us like this before. We're not on their side, but we're not their enemy. Why us?"

"I don't know, Marc. I just don't know. Why kill anybody this way? Deep and ancient hatreds. It is Christmas, you know."

"I know. They'll never forget that. I don't think they should. But that wasn't even us! Not the Lunar Free State! We didn't kill them. Why us? Why today?"

"Maybe it was us. The Vatican, I mean. Our fault. I saw the crater where the mission used to be."

Marc Edwards lowers his head, then looks back up, eye to eye with BC. He clears his throat and prepares to pass along grim news.

"The Cardinal is dead, BC. I helped identify him after the first wave of attacks. I'm sorry. The Reverend Swan is still missing, but presumed dead. The Vatican Mission was hit first, and hard."

"Was it a nuke?"

"No. I think they were flinging captured asteroids at us at first."
Damn, that’s hardcore.

Oh, man, not now!

A headache comes on and overwhelms BC where he stands. Pain shoots through his skull. He closes his eyes, squeezes the bridge of his nose between his thumb and right pointer.
A bad one! Gotta be the crazy stress.

"You okay, BC?" Edwards asks, concerned.

"Yeah, I think, it's just a lot, getting one of those headaches again." BC says, and looks around for somewhere to sit. Quickly.

"Here, man, sit down. Sit down," Edwards says, helping him to a chair and clearing off debris so BC can plop down.

BC sits, head in his hands, as the headache grows. He rubs his temples but it doesn't help.
So much pain this time! Shit! What sort of permanent damage did those cult drugs do to
my brain? This is their revenge for my letting them down.

"BC?" Edwards is leaning over him, worried.

"I'll be okay, just give me a sec."

I hope I’ll be okay. They tell me again and again there are no tumors or growths but then
what aw fuck what ouch ow!

"Have you heard about the Earth attacks?" Edwards asks him. BC tries to concentrate, lowers his right hand from his head and opens his right eye to look at Edwards.
"Not in any detail. Have you heard any reports?"

"It was bad, BC. They may still be attacking. I haven't heard any recent updates. We were lucky to get the small defense group we did from the UTZ when we requested it. Most of the UTZ fleet was defending Earth."

"What have you heard?"

"They threw everything they had at us. And they had more than anybody knew. They've been majorly stockpiling on Mars. They did major damage to Sydney, London, New York, Los Angeles
,
Tokyo, Lima, and Vatican City." Edwards pauses as something else occurs to him. He leans in a little closer. "Pope Peter is dead, BC. It happened before the attacks. We got the news right after you left with that woman Fiza. His death was confirmed this morning. I'm sorry."
I’m sorry... I’m sorry... I’m sorry...

The words echo in his brain. BC's head feels like it's about to explode, as if his brain is expanding, trying to break out of the confines of his skull. He closes his eye. The pain is intense.
I'm sorry... I'm sorry... I'm sorry... I'm sorry... I'm sorry...
The words keep echoing in BC's head. Then the floor falls away. BC keeps falling, falling, dropping faster, free falling.

Everything is gone. The world falls away.

BC opens his eyes. The world around him contracts down into a small marble that shrinks into a pinpoint of light and then -pop-disappears.

Everyone is dead. The Cardinal. Swan. Who knows who else. M'Bekke? Marino?

BC doesn't realize he's passed out until he comes to lying on his back on a couch.
In Edward's office. Still here, still intact.

Edwards is sitting behind a desk across the room from BC and notices him stirring. He smiles and gets up to come over.

"BC! You're back!"

"Where did I go?"

"You tell me! You went... I don't know. Catatonic or something." BC sits up and rubs his temples. The headache has passed.

I still feel like I'm hungover. I should have more fun if I'm going to end up suffering like
this. How long has it been?

“How long was I out for?”

"It's been almost a day! You were staring straight ahead, but you weren't seeing anything. You wouldn't respond to anything. I had them bring you here so you weren't left sitting staring into space in the middle of the spaceport. Not that you were the only one shell shocked.”

"Thanks, Marc," BC says in a mumble.

Still groggy.

"How's your head?" Edwards asks, sitting down in a nearby chair.

"S'okay," BC laughs, "least of my worries.

“Everyone I know and work with, and for, is dead. Where I lived and worked is gone. And I'm still here, somehow."

"So am I, man. So am I. Hey, Doctor O'Neel says it may have overwhelmed you, everything hitting you at once, mental overload or something. Brought on your headache. Sounded like a good explanation to me."