Chapter 6

MARK

The jump would not take long, but long enough for them to get something to eat. They ran into Jasiid on the way, who was more than willing to join them. Most of the crew had places to be, leaving the halls on their deck at least almost entirely empty. Almost eerie silence as they walked through the older areas of the hull structure now rusted with age. The background hum of the ship’s power plant could be enough to irritate, if not drive some mad.

“How long until arrival?” She asked as they walked back from the mess hall.

“Three more minutes should do it, best to get going,” Jasiid answered. He parted ways with them near the elevators. The door opened to the same blinding aqua as before. The group gathered on the deck again appeared to be waiting on them. “Took you long enough,” captain Leonard said. “You both scored highest on the target drone trials, therefore you’re both first picks for the new models.” In addition to the seven Arrow-class scouts, two larger ships were in the racks. “The Blade mark-five interceptor. Not as fast as an Arrow, but double the firepower and twice the fuel.”

“You say that like there’s an actual enemy to fight,” she said. The captain’s face didn’t lighten up. “Right?” She was uncertain now, as was Mark, same as the others.

“If you’d arrived here on schedule with the rest you’d have been briefed. The support ship hasn’t responded to any of our hails. Fleet Command thought it was a miscalculation in the jump, but we’re in the right spot. The support ship is not. At this point, we have no idea what to think. It could be off-course, they could think we’re early. It’s been a decade, after all. We’ll know for certain soon enough.” He felt uneasy about the news. The mission’s planning stretched back generations. It was hard to think it possible for there to be a miscalculation of any kind. “Enough, into your ships! I’ll see you when you get back. I want a report on their handling from the both of you.”

They walked with the others for the ships. Once in the cockpit, he noticed a few differences from the scout. Most noticeable was how cramped it felt. There were more controls on the dash and a third monitor. He didn’t bother learning all the extra systems just yet; most were useless for his purposes. There was also the inclusion of a red eject and self-destruct button, he noted to avoid that.

The light flashed green, he unclipped. He took a look around once outside the hangar. The galactic band could be seen ahead, their system’s star behind. The asteroid belt was cluttered with boulders and dust clouds. They lined up in parade formation. Three scouts branched off to escort the resource collector.

“So what’s up, anyway? I missed something,” she said.

“We might be a light-minute off-course, in which case we make a smaller jump— the pilot was cut off by a blip on the sensors.

“We have picked up the Khar-Selim’s automated beacon,” came Intel’s interruption. A probe flew out of the hangar door and headed to investigate.

He opened a private channel up to Isabella. “Hey, so it looks like your training might have to wait,” he said.

“Yeah, I figured.” Her voice wavered, reaffirming his own uneasiness.

“Listen, if anything does happen to show up…”

“On your right, got it. Don’t have to tell me twice. I’m rash, not stupid.”

They waited for the small green dot to reach the target area.

“The Khar-Selim has been destroyed.”

Destroyed. It took a few seconds to register what Intel meant.

“Is anyone else hearing this?” a pilot asked.

“I can’t believe it!”

“But how? What could destroy a ship that size?”

“An asteroid, maybe?” Isabella added in.

“They’ve got weapons and tug ships to deal with those,” Mark replied. The centre monitor displayed what they all refused to believe. A massive wreckage in the form of the support ship. A gas cloud was surrounding it and there were bullet holes in the sides as large as entire fighters.

“Incoming targets fleet,” Leonard chimed in on their chatter. He glanced at the sensors and sure enough, small red dots appeared from the upper left.

“Keep it together, guys. Set to evasive tactics and get into delta formation behind me.” He took the lead without question from the rest. Orders were to protect Mothership.

“S-so do we know who it is?” Isabella asked.

“Doubt it. Curious, how many of you have been in actual combat?” Silence. He sighed, but it could be worse. “Alright, do as I do. Don’t break formation and get out of weapons trajectories. We’ll make it home alive.” He was in no position to make promises, but it kept them from panicking. They followed behind him, moving forward to the oncoming targets. He had too many questions, had too many thoughts to pick any one. If not for having something to focus on, it would be overwhelming. Many must have felt the same in that moment, the short but crucial interval of response to what was before them. He had an enemy to face.

“Our first encounter with an alien race and they turn out to be hostile. Great,” she complained. The squadron gained speed until making contact. They were under heavy gunfire, but let off their own rounds in return. One scout exploded in a flash, but two enemy fighters were also taken out. Another was hit by the debris. They spread out and reformed for the next pass.

“Fire on the the lead three only, it’ll break their formation.” They did so, and got two more. Two then locked onto him, chasing his ship down. He spun around and set to aggressive, opening fire on the one in front. The first blew up, but he took off before getting the second. He turned the ship so the bottom alone took damage. He could hear the light tick of the rounds hitting the hull. The noise stopped.

“Yeah! Got ‘em!” Isabella had his back.

“We’re getting too spread out,” someone said.

“Doesn’t help that they’re fighting dirty,” Isabella replied.

“They’re slower, but have heavier armour than we do. Use that to your advantage. Just keep focus, and you’ll be fine.”

“Roger, squad leader.” He wasn’t technically in charge, but why argue?

“Sending out two heavy corvettes to assist in crowd control,” Leonard answered. He’d been giving assistance to the pilots since the combat began. He had been quiet to him, assumed he was busy keeping the scouts alive and trusted in his skill. He ordered the damaged scouts to go dock with a nearby repair corvette that launched with the two Hammer-class heavies. The corvettes rushed in and took aim. One by one the enemy ships exploded. 

These were not drones, he reminded himself. There were pilots in those ships. They had no idea what the enemy’s face looked like or why they were fighting, but that was nothing new. Sometimes there isn’t a reason, just orders and a will to survive.

They were outnumbered ten to one even with the five interceptors that launched after the corvettes. He had doubt in their ability to counter this, but let that thought pass. It would end soon enough one way or another, and best to keep his focus on the immediate problem.

“Is it over?” Isabella asked.

“I think they’re regrouping with their flagship—wherever it is. We should take this chance to dock and refuel,” he suggested. The others followed. The refuel stations were on the deck immediately within the hangar. His ship got clamped in and deck teams got to work. The ship was fuelled and the armour sprayed with sealant to patch the holes. When the light was green to launch, the clamps released. Once outside, he saw a salvager moving in on one of the enemy fighters, but it self-destructed.

When the squadron rejoined him, now made up mostly of interceptors, they were given orders to guard a salvager as it made its approach to Khar-Selim. A second squadron joined his in this task. It was vital to get the data.

“How are there so many of them?” a pilot asked.

“My guess is there’s a carrier hiding somewhere in the dust,” he replied. Their approach took five minutes, but no enemies appeared. The corvette’s magnetic grapples hooked onto the wreckage. The airlock opened, and an orange figure stepped out. He had a thruster pack on and used it to maneuver himself to an entrance. “Stay sharp,” he reminded. No contacts. Not long after, the man returned holding a box half his size. Once inside, the group turned back. Contacts began closing in two at a time then backed off once fired upon. They made no attempt to fully engage. This went on for a minute and he was unsure what to make of it.

“Enemy units closing in with Mothership,” Command alerted.

“Distractions,” Isabella said. She was right. There were far more ships ahead than coming from behind.

“Thought so. Squad two, head on home. We’ll take care of this,” Mark said.

“Roger.”

To the starboard, the resource collector was guarded by a single scout. The enemy appeared to ignore its harvesting operations, which was some consolation. It meant a steady supply of resources for ship construction.

“They’re like pirates,” Isabella said. He thought it was a ridiculous comparison until paying attention to their behaviour. Their aim was poor even when in combat, and when approaching, they sometimes bumped into each other. Their formations were sloppy and some ships looked, upon closer observation, to be made out of parts from several different models.

“Pick them off until the corvette docks. After that we’ll give a hand to the light corvette guard around the research ship.”

Joining the main fight once the salvager was on its docking run, their remaining two wingmen were hit with a missile barrage. One ship was in critical condition, and the other was worse off.

“Interceptor down!” The pilot didn’t eject in time.

“Are you alright?” he said to the other.

“I’m heading back to dock. Shit’s fried, I’m useless now.” The two of them were on their own.

“Mark, there’s too many!” She was afraid, he heard it in her voice. That was reasonable. He was sure he would be as well if the adrenaline that came with taking command was absent. Glancing at the sensors monitor gave a sobering sight. Many red, few green. And the red were closing in on them.

“I know, we can still make it.”

“Mark, there’s a swarm heading your way,” Leonard said.

“I know, but if we dock they’ll pick off our research division. They’re more important than a couple of pilots,” he said.

There wasn’t a response to that. He wasn’t wrong. “I’ll get reinforcements out to you soon, hang in there.”

The swarm arrived. Evasive tactics were helping to avoid direct line of fire and he dodged their shots well enough for the time being. Isabella was keeping up, but was taking on more followers than him. They were aiming for the easiest target. They put up a fight and wouldn’t be taken out easily, but there were too many, and the damage the two of them were taking was concerning. 

“If you leave now one of us might make it,” she said.

“Fuck that, I’m not leaving you here to die. Dirty bastards!” He set to aggressive, rolled back, and fired on the leader of the five following her. It exploded, damaging the two behind. He took them out without a problem, but began taking fire. He switched back into evasive and dodged a rain of bullets.

“Thanks,” she said. Speeding away from her startled pursuers.

“Any time. Hey Leo, any day now!” As he said this, three ships behind him were destroyed. Hammers arrived to help thin their ranks. 

“You’re a couple of nut jobs, you know that?” the corvette’s captain said. Moments later, two Blade squadrons joined in taking care of the few stragglers the corvettes’ cannons couldn’t track.

“Let’s land these scraps,” she said.

He agreed. He’d had enough for one day. The enemy fighters were retreating, realizing their ships weren’t fairing at all well now that the heavies joined the fight.

“Interceptor nine, back in formation!” Leo shouted over the intercom. Mark checked the screen and saw a lone dot moving far out of where it should have been.

“I see something. It’s a ship! Huge! Bigger than a Sakala!” He knew how big those were, he’d landed on several before. “Wait, it’s doing something. Danger! Beam weapons of some kind… Sajuuk have mer—

 The voice cut to static. He saw what the pilot was talking about. A large light-brown hulk. It fired blue beams of some sort out the front end. Despite this terrifying, overpowered technology, the enemy continued retreating. The battle was over, at least for now.

Once the ship hit the deck and all systems shut down, he opened the hatch, but didn’t climb out right away. “You saved me today,” he said thanking it. He relaxed into his seat and took a deep breath. Tears began welling up in his eyes as the rest of the thoughts came back. He was alive. His father would be proud, so would Valerie. Destroyed, he thought. The Khar-Selim was destroyed. Hundreds killed, having reached the end of a ten year voyage only to be met with death and destruction possibly only hours before their arrival.

After changing out of his uniform, he found Isabella lying on the deck beside her ship. “You okay?” he asked.

“Solid ground is great. Don’t care that it’s metal and floating in space, it’s solid and I like it.”

“We’re lucky.” He held out his hand to help her up. When she stood she hugged him tight. She was shaking and wouldn’t ease up. “You’re alright now, we lived. You did great out there. It’s a shame about the others, though.” He could remember their faces, their voices. Gone now. He hardly knew them. They were not prepared for this, none of them were.

“You saved me, thank you.” She let go and ran off down the hangar. She was a tough girl, but there were a dozen moments where she could have died in the past hour, and she knew that. He decided to let her be for now.  He had his own thoughts to sort through.

On his way to the elevator, Captain Leonard stopped him. “Is your friend okay, she was crying when the elevator opened.”

“Well, she almost died a lot, she’s never been in combat, we encountered hostile aliens, and we have no idea what’s even happening! So you tell me!”

“You did well out there, I’m not here to argue. I’ll get a report on the ships from her later. We fear there are more enemies in the system, we don’t know yet. We’re returning to Kharak immediately.”

“Or maybe the legends of the Gaalsien were true, the Khar-Selim was leaving the system and so it was destroyed.” He liked that explanation more.

“Listen, Mark. Your father was an old friend of mine. I’m glad you were here today. You’ve got his blood in you, that’s certain.” He recognized him now, it had been bugging him earlier. He was one of the two men in a framed photo on his father’s living room wall. “Your bravery can get you promoted a rank, maybe two.”

“I did it for her,” he said. “She’s just a kid. I don’t give a damn about rank, it means nothing here. She’s a rank six and has never been in a single dogfight. If this convoy is to survive, you’ll need to train them daily. I felt like I was leading a bunch of children into a slaughter!” The captain was silent.

“I know. I’m sorry. We didn’t expect this kind of confrontation, especially not here within our own star system.”

“That’s what you’re not seeing. It’s not our system, Hiigara is. I’m starting to think there’s truth to the legends now, and it terrifies me, Leo! I’m asking you, captain, what kind of monstrous power can exile an entire world of people all the way across the galaxy? You really don’t want to be unprepared again.” He began to walk to the elevator.

“Mark,” he stopped him. “Just so you’re aware, my nephew was the wingman who got hit with missiles. Half our interceptors had faulty ejection wiring.” He couldn’t say anything more about it, Mark felt a cold chill run through him. He couldn’t look him in the eyes. “Dismissed.”

He wanted to be home. He wanted to go for a long drive on his bike, he wanted his sandstone hut and he wanted Valerie above all. The day had been too long. He felt Mothership slip into hyperspace, and felt himself slip out of his mind.