Winter Dread, page 26
She plopped down next to me, and with her data pad, she started to pull in information. “We’ve got them. What else we have here we can decode and reprogram. They won’t ever be able to use these things anymore to catch people.”
“Does that mean they will die, though?”
She put the pad down and looked at me. “I don’t know. That depends how far the nearest station is going to be.”
“Then we need another way. Those people in our pods now are innocent. They never asked to be here, no one asked to be put through what they have been.”
Her brows furrowed, tapping the screen some more.
“Maybe we can reprogram them to send to each other, like the relay networks. Get them to safe zones, ships, planets. Anything,” I said.
“That I think I can do,” she said. “It’ll take a little more working with Abi and the others, but now we have this one I think we can track every single one of theirs. That means every route they take.”
“That sounds like the best plan,” I said and smiled at her.
“Thank you, Kyle. Thank you for all of this.” Denn’s face softened. “From any one of us that’s been trapped in there.”
I wanted to say something to . . . I don’t know, help. I had no words for her right now. She leaned over and rested her head on my shoulders. And I let her. We stayed there for some time. No one came near us.
“You guys okay?” Tyto eventually asked, stepping behind us.
I turned and finally decided to move. “Yes. Let’s get up, get some food, and reconvene in the war room.”
I helped Denn up—or was it she helped me? I wasn’t so sure who did what at first. We no sooner had made headway out of the hangar and down towards the mess hall when the light above us turned red.
“General quarters,” came across the comms.
“No rest for the wicked.” I looked to the both of them. “Engines,” I said to Denn.
She nodded, and Tyto and I ran for the bridge.
I pushed for entry, and Jai let us in and then moved out of the way so I could see the screen.
I could see a ship being decimated ahead from here. “Fuck. Who are they?”
“I have no idea. We got the incoming distress call seconds ago.”
“You going in?”
Jai raised an eyebrow at me, and I nodded, moving to take tactical. I hit the controls as soon as I did and was connecting to the captain of the ship. “This is the Metal Titans answering with Artemis. We are ETA in four minutes, can you hold out?”
“Captain Ivanov, Imperator here. We’ll hold.”
“Get us there as soon as you can,” I said to Jai.
“Fighters,” Tyto said. “Ready for launch.”
I didn’t even know how many we had onboard, but seeing the screen in front of me light up with a full contingency, I realised Artemis really wasn’t a cargo hauler anymore.
We raced towards the other ship, and I could see her stats flashing up. She was in a bad way but doing exactly what she was supposed to: holding out.
“Launch,” I said.
We hove into position, and I heard Jai call. “All missiles, fire.”
We opened up with a full volley on the enemy ship. Their fighters were picking the Imperator apart, but our fighters were soon targeting them.
They were intense to watch, but with their extra speed, within seconds the other ship was trying its best to retreat.
“Jai,” I said, holding my breath.
“Don’t you worry, they’re not getting away,” he said. “Second volley.”
When these hit the enemy shielding, this time they were wiped out. That was it, nothing left. Debris in space.
“Damn,” I said. “I had no idea you had that much firepower.”
“We’ve improved her a lot.” He grinned, sitting back. “You know, while you guys have been training.”
“I’m super impressed,” Tyto said.
“Thanks,” he said to Tyto. “That means a lot from you.”
The comms blinked once more, and Jai answered it this time. “Captain.”
“Artemis, thank you for your assistance.” His face blinked on the screen, and I barely got a look at him as denti. But he was. When his face vanished, his words carried on, bad signal or damage. Both probably, Asht said. “I don’t think we will be alone for too long. They sent out a distress signal before you destroyed them.”
“Can you move?” Jai asked.
“Not yet. Our engines are toast.”
“We can send over someone to help. A team?”
“That would be very kind of you, but I fear they will come in force.” His face came back on screen, and this time stayed stable. “You may be putting yourselves at great risk.”
“We’ll decide that,” Jai said. “Thank you for your concern, though.”
“Of course, captain.”
“General,” Jai said. “General Jai Trix.”
Ivanov almost took another look at Jai. “You’re really the General Jai Trix.”
“Correct,” Jai said. “Send over a list of things you need and injuries. We’ll help any way we can.”
“Thank you.” Ivanov lowered his head.
Jai cut off the comms, and I asked, “Sending Denn?”
“No, we need you and her to still work on the catcher. The sooner we know that’s something solid and we can move forward with that, the better.”
I couldn’t fault him with that. “Sir. I’ll get right to it.”
He winked at me. “I know you can do it. Just giving you more time and pushing.”
I left Tyto on the bridge and made my way down to the engines and met Denn on the way. We headed for medical bay. I read my system messages and rank ups.
FOR SAVING THE LIVES OF SEVEN, YOU WILL BE REWARD CUMULATIVELY
REWARDS WILL FOLLOW
When we arrived, Hiroto was in there with the staff, and he looked concerned. “Something wrong?”
“No, the pods have taken. The denti are holding well.”
“But I’m not so sure it was the best joining,” Denn said.
“I guess we’ll see how they feel when they come out,” I said.
“They’ll be ready to pop any minute. You and Denn can carry on with what you need. We’re just watching carefully.”
“What species are they?” I asked.
“They’re Kiain.”
I cringed. “We’ll do everything we can to settle them.”
I turned to Denn, and we made our way to the back of the room where Sadie was. It was so good to see her fussing over the pods and everyone in here once more. Sadie came straight to me and gave me a hug. “You have no idea how happy we are to see you. Even if it’s for one mission.”
“Love you too,” I said, hugging her back.
“We’ve been coordinating with everyone we can to get this going. I think your new idea is perfect. Using them as a relay station instead. It might scare anywhere they do end up, with their pods just suddenly lighting up. But I think it is worth the risk. No one would stop a respawn.”
“No, they wouldn’t.” I leaned over and touched one of the pods.
“Then we’re all good. Hiroto and Dylan have been helping while here, we already think we’ve a way for it to work,” Denn said.
“Already.” I glanced back to Hiroto.
“You are talking about one of the quickest minds in our galaxy,” Denn replied.
“Yeah, even if you think he isn’t, he surprises everyone. That alone I love about him too.”
“We all do,” Sadie said.
I pulled up all the details then, and both Denn and I began to look over what Hiroto and Dylan had done with Sadie.
Hiroto then wandered over, his arm leaning over me, spying on my screen. “Any good?”
“Of course, you idiot.”
“I think I don’t need to do anything, maybe just move this tiny little bit of code here to here,” Denn said.
He smiled. “Yeah, I wasn’t so sure if it would be better there, or not.”
“You think this will work?”
“We do,” Hiroto said. “All we have to do is get it into the catcher we have onboard and then get it back into space.”
“Brilliant.” I was excited. Excited that this would end a terrible reign of tyranny going on in this sector.
“I’ll get back on the bridge, and we can coordinate it with the rescue for the ship out there. Whatever it was—”
“You didn’t even catch its name?” Denn said. Then within a second she pulled up the picture of it. “You’re kidding . . .”
“What, what is it?” I couldn’t believe I’d already forgotten. I really was bad with names.
“That’s the Imperator, one of the most respected ships out in the quadrant. The engineers on her are amazing. If I can get over there will you let me, I’d love to meet her.”
“I tried. Jai wanted you here.”
“Yeah, but you don’t need me here,” she begged. “Not really.”
“Well, if there’s something you think you can do to help them a little more.”
“I know I can, and if I can see how she really worked that engine, I am sure there’s something I can do with Artemis or even anything else.”
“Okay.” I comm’d for Jai. “I’m sending Denn over to the Imperator. There’s something she really, really has to help with. And we don’t need her—Hiroto has already done what we were going to.”
“You’re sure? I don’t want to send her over and then we get attacked either.”
His warning did have a good point.
“Yeah, that’s something I think we can deal with. They can get the engines up quicker, I think. Even all of us can move then and together, we stand a better chance of beating any other attack. I mean, how many other ships can even be near here?”
“I’m not sure. We’ve never been in this part of space, and we can’t know their way of working till we get the network up and running for us, right?”
“Yeah, I think that’s also a good idea. Let’s get that catcher programmed and back into space.”
27
Denn had been gone quite a while, but I wasn’t worried. The time here gave us the opportunity to get in more debris and tech from the offending enemy ships. That gave me something to look over while Hiroto checked the catcher reprogram. Even Hiroto wasn’t happy sending it out there without making sure, and this was just all double and triple checking.
His numbers I’d trust, of course, without even checking, but he insisted, so I was at present looking over the console off one of the fighters. It was large, but I moved around it with mag boots. Abi had returned to making drones, and I checked on her through comms.
“How’s it going?” I asked.
“We have twenty programmed and ready drones. We can drop them at points as we’re on our way to drop off that main catcher, then they’ll help spread out too. They each have a target to reach.”
“Sounds perfect. You’ve done amazing.”
“Following your examples. Ever since we sent out the first drones, I’ve been working on making them better, stronger. With defence if they need and ways to outmanoeuvre any ships that want to ‘catch’ them.”
I was impressed.
“You going to leave that alone for a while?” Hiroto’s voice eventually came to me some time later. I was tinkering still, feeling my way with Molecular Insight.
“Sure.” I poked my head up. “We all good to go?”
“Everything is ready. Denn’s on her way back, should be okay to leave in five minutes.”
I disengaged the boots and returned to the deck, then set off to the bridge, listening to him. Denn returned, and even though I couldn’t see her, I could hear she had a fire in her I’d not heard for a while, all about engines and powering the different ships.
I walked to the bridge to make sure our departure was good, and we were leaving the other ship to go on its way with no issues. I did catch the tail end of the conversation with the captain of the Imperator. “Once again we thank you, general.”
Then they were gone. They fired up their engines and vanished.
“Make sure our course is set.”
“All green here,” Tyto replied.
We too then left that area of space and the last bits of floating dead. I settled into my position, scanning space, the chatter. Watching for anything which seemed out of place. Unusual. I also knew this had been something Hiroto would do without even thinking plugged into the ship, the wholeness of everything around me.
At intersections, we did indeed start to drop the drones. Their little green lights turned off. Two drops later, I’d a better idea of how we’d track them and they’d work.
We can still track them, but they’re not as bright as before, Asht said.
This is going to be an interesting mission.
“We are approaching position to drop the catcher. Everything is still green.”
Then there were red flickers ahead.
“What’s that?” I saw Tyto look my way as the area ahead was lit up with enemy ships.
“They’ve not seen us as yet.”
“They’re talking though,” Hiroto said. “Word’s gotten to several that one of their own was taken down. They’re hunting the ship that did it.”
“The Imperator?” Jai asked.
“Not out of the woods by any means. If these guys are hunting them, they’re in more trouble than they let on. I’m not quite understanding why they haven’t hightailed it the hell out of here.”
“I never asked,” Jai said. “We had our own priorities. Just getting them back on their feet was more than anyone else would do. If they wanted to stick around, though . . .”
“Something important is out here,” I answered for them.
“I agree. Any chance we can get another message to them?”
“I can’t,” Tyto said. “If you can, go for it.”
“I’ll watch the space,” Hiroto said.
I flickered kenosi inside myself, moving across into Artemis and the nites, finding the network they used and the easiest way for me to get to the Imperator. It was just like hopping across a really long network. Backtracking. I found them; they were not far from where we had originally found them. I thought it odd. But then I tracked where they were going. It seemed a station? I wanted more information; I wanted to know why they’d put themselves at such a risk.
It’s pretty clear that they’re out here for a reason. They’ve got a fighting ship, Asht said. Even if it isn’t as powerful as Artemis, they’ve spent all their funds on getting that ship capable of stealth missions. Look.
I saw it disappear from my view. I mean, I could still see my nites, but there was no ship. The oddest thing ever.
It is, but what they want is on that station.
Let’s see if I can at least get them a message. Then we’ll see about dropping and turning back.
You’d go back to help them again?
There’s only one reason a captain would be going through what they just did. They have people on that station. People they love.
I felt Asht shiver inside me, and I knew I was right.
I couldn’t however get any further and had to program the nites around me to send the message on. I didn’t even know if they’d get it, but I had to pull back. Red lights were flashing in my view.
“What’s going on?” I asked, coming out of my trance.
“The ships turned for us instead,” Jai said. “At the moment, I think we can lead them on a good enough chase. At least get them away from the Imperator and whatever the heck they’re up to.” It was the way he glared at me, waiting.
“Oh, um, I got them a message, but it looked like they’re about to launch a rescue.”
Jai nodded. “Figures. He was cagey about a few things I asked, and in the end I left them to it. I can’t change someone else’s mind without putting us into the full front of it.”
“But now we’re acting as decoy?” I grinned and shook my head. “Good plan!”
Jai tapped the screen. “Get on with your job, kid.”
I focussed back on the screens in front of me and began to watch as the enemy battleship and its fighters were indeed heading off in our direction instead.
“Run around, we can do,” Tyto said. “They’d still not stand a chance even if we wanted to stand and fight.”
“No, but we also don’t need to waste ammo or resources unless we really have to.”
“True.”
I could see his disappointment. “I think we all want to keep wiping these scum out of the dark.”
“We do,” Jai agreed. “There’s no point hitting them, not while the catcher is still in our hold and your reprogramming hasn’t started to take effect. We are going to time it so anyone hit out here now is out for good. There’s no respawn for these men, got it?”
I lowered my head, the actual severity of what we were doing and the reasons behind it all hitting hard. “Yes, sir.”
I kept feeding Tyto information, and he plugged it in and moved us easily through the vastness of space. But in the back of my mind, something then started to irk me.
They started to move us in a different direction, Asht said. I can see it coming up in the patterns they’ve used to how it changed.
Hiroto then looked at me and tapped the screen, then flicked something my way. I opened the file and I could see it too, even with his extra numbers. “I agree.” I looked at Jai. “General, they’re funnelling us towards a trap as well. At least they think they are.”
“Can we get anything ahead of time?”
“I don’t know,” I answered honestly. “I’ve used the skill a lot lately.”
“We need every heads up we can get out here, Kyle.”
I nodded, pushed my screens away from me. “Hiroto, we need Ty on piloting, you got me?”
Hiroto stood. “I have. I’ll use grav boots, lock in behind your chair.”
I didn’t want to see what was coming out here. Sure it would give us some advantages, but to see things and change them was becoming more and more of a hindrance. Why? Because the things I’d see could change things for eons, and I couldn’t always watch that far into the future. It meant there were just so many things that were variable. So this kind of test could work—or backfire drastically.
