Star Clusters: New Arrivals (5 page)

“Well, I have an idea; but we probably can’t do it on our own,” Lanis said. “Ask Poteran what kind of defenses that disruptor has - we could use our fighters’ speed to hit it early, but that won’t do us any good if they can take us down before we can do any damage.”

He had forgotten about the fact that the Petrans were listening. “I don’t think you can - it’s protected by two heavy weapons platforms; they’re not much of a threat to fighters or other small ships, but the shields and armor are impenetrable to anything smaller than what they’re designed to destroy,” Poteran told Lanis.

Meanwhile, the battlecruisers Hippasrus and Soscut - the two most powerful ships in the defecting fleet - were about to ram into the Tarhedia’s shield, which opened up for them moments before impact; both ships emerged on the other side in the same condition they had been when they had entered. The rest of the fleet maneuvered to stay out of the enemy’s weapons range, periodically swooping in to fire at their engines - and the hostile fleet was mostly focusing its fire on the Tarhedia, deliberately staying behind the slow cityship to minimize the amount of weapons it could fire at them at any given time.

“Alright then, can we beam - it’s a shorthand for teleporting, and it’s a long story - aboard or trick the turrets into shooting the disruptor?” Lanis continued, answering Hatos’ question before the confused Tarhedian could ask what ‘beaming’ meant.

“I’m not sure about the former; I’m transferring all the data I have on it, your scientists may be more capable of giving you the answer to that. As for the latter, I don’t think it’d work.”

“Transporting aboard might be possible, assuming the shield data is still accurate,” Hatos said, “and perhaps it could be disabled from within. Zeshaira, assemble a boarding party as quickly as possible.”

“Maybe some of my crew should accompany them. After all, this is Petran technology you’ll be dealing with.”

“Agreed. Choose two of your men that you think will be most useful, then move inside the Tarhedia’s shield. Once you’re inside, give us their coordinates and lower your shields so that we can... ‘beam’ them aboard; then restart the shield.”

About a minute of semi-chaotic combat later, the Hippasrus performed the operation Hatos described, and a team consisting of Zeshaira, Lanis, a quadrupedal Tarhedian assault drone, and the Petrans - Lt. Commander Benaar Herrun, an experienced soldier, and Dr. Fanra Kaa’nt, one of Petra’s best scientists and engineers - assigned temporarily to the Hippasrus to try and boost its systems; her expertise and equipment would likely prove to be useful with overcoming any structural obstacles they encountered on the disruptor - quickly assembled on the transporter pad, wearing Tarhedian and Petran AEA (Alien Environment Assault - essentially exoskeletal combat spacesuits) suits, respectively.

“Activate your personal shields,” Zeshaira instructed Lanis and the drone, following her own instructions at the same time. “If you two,” she turned towards the Petrans, “do not have personal shield generators, you can take ours.”

“Oh, we have shields, nothing to worry about,” Herrun said.

“But, uh, if yours’ll protect us better, then... well, I’ll take one,” the doctor cautiously added. Clearly, she was here solely for her knowledge, not her combat skills or courage.

“I do not know if it is more powerful, but I suppose it could work alongside your own generator,” Zeshaira answered.

“S,” Kaa’nt said shyly.

Everybody raised an eyebrow (or at least made the equivalent action - as has been mentioned before, Tarhedians have no hair, and therefore no eyebrows to raise; and due to their origin, the Petrans are also hairless). “What?” Lanis asked as Zeshaira picked up a Tarhedian personal shield generator from the nearby gear rack and strapped it to Fanra’s wrist. To her surprise, the mind-controlled generator activated the instant it was attached to the Petran.

“Generator
s
. I’ve got one of mine, too,” she explained. “I always use it when I’m in space - I just don’t feel safe when I’m not on Petra.”

“Don’t worry, we’ll be fine. We’ve got a drone as big as that,” Lanis assured her, pointing at the drone, which was about half as tall and twice as wide as the other members of the boarding party - and just as long as it was wide, “what could possibly go wrong?”

“You’re just saying that to make me feel better, aren’t you?” she asked after a brief pause.

“Is it working?”

“Not quite. I guess we’d better get going, though...”

Once she said that, the transporter activated, and the platform was clear.

Chapter 3

Overprotective

Internally, the hyperspace disruptor looked just like a Petran base. The assault drone could barely fit in the corridors, and if it hadn’t been capable of moving left or right with equal ease as if it were moving forward - in fact, it rotated its turret and the sensors and specialized equipment on it rather than rotating the entire body, so from its perspective it was always moving forward - it would have been stuck, for it could not turn its legs around and completely obstructed the corridor. Fortunately for the team, the Petrans hadn’t expected a boarding party - especially not this early - so they had plenty of time to get their bearings.

“Alright, I
think
the control room’s that way,” Dr. Kaa’nt said, pointing forward into the corridor the drone had completely obstructed, “in which case we
may
be able to get to several key systems if we go down that corridor,” she pointed to her left, “that corridor,“ she now pointed to her right, “or through the wall behind us. On the other hand, if I’m wrong, then opening that wall’s a really bad idea.”

“Why? What’d be behind it?” Lanis asked.

“Let’s just say I’m more afraid of what wouldn’t be behind it.”

“Oh. Can’t you scan the area, see where we
are?
”

“Right. Sorry.” She took out a scanner, and after fiddling with it for a few seconds, she embarrassedly said: “Oh boy.”

“What’s wrong?” Zeshaira asked her. She sensed a few Petrans, but they did not yet appear to know of their presence.

“I... uhh... I may have...” She trailed off, while Herrun snatched the scanner out of her hand.

“There’s no battery in this thing!” he exclaimed. “Wasn’t she supposed to be brilliant…?”

“This’d almost be funny if it wasn’t dangerous,” Lanis commented, pressing a few buttons on the suit’s left wrist.

“Actually, I kind of forgot to put them in
all
of my stuff. I was working on boosting the power output when this whole thing started, and... too many things happened at once and I just lost track of it. Anyway, what I’m trying to say is we couldn’t vent ourselves into space even if we wanted to, because none of my tools’ll work.”

“Can we not ask Captain Poteran to send the power cells to the Tarhedia so they can transport them to us?” Zeshaira suggested. As she said that, the station’s alarm went on - they had been detected!

“I was trying to, but it looks like the guards have turned on some kind of jamming device; I can’t get through!” Lanis said. He sighed. “Alright, let’s try the control room…
if
that’s the control room...”

It should be worth noting that although the formal definition of a laser hadn’t changed in the 730 years since it was published on Earth - or the 1200 or so years since the Petrans wrote up a definition - the term ‘laser’ was now commonly used (in conjunction with several other terms, such as ‘blaster’ for smaller weapons) to describe any directed energy weapon which fulfilled either of the following criteria:

1. Impact is not instantaneous; the weapon fires bullet-like ‘bolts’, like all of the non-Tarhedian personal energy weapons described up to this point, as well as a sizable portion of Terran and Petran ship-based energy weapons. A certain amount of kinetic energy is also imparted upon the target, though large objects such as structures or ships may ignore the push entirely, depending on the circumstances. (Most notably, if it’s just a small handheld weapon.)

2. Impact may or may not be instantaneous, the weapon emits beams of light (actual lasers) or, more commonly, beams of light-enveloped plasma.

While most of the Tarhedian weapons loosely fulfilled these criteria, their wrist weapons operated using principles which were considerably different from those of the weapons usually described as lasers, harnessing their considerable mental abilities to generate their destructive power; and all of their ship-based weapons mentioned to this point either fired actual projectiles enveloped by highly explosive energy shells, streams of superheated plasma (as opposed to beams of light-enveloped hot plasma), and/or were not entirely understood even by the Tarhedians.

This long overdue explanation of energy weapons as used by the inhabitants of this universe had finally become indispensable as Lanis got hit in the face by a bright blue bolt from a Petran laser pistol, and was - despite his shield generator - thrown to the ground as multiple Petran guards and light combat drones opened fire from the control room(?) corridor at our somewhat confused boarding party, which each acted as they saw fit - Zeshaira and Herrun simply returned fire, Lanis got up and started firing at them, the apparently nameless assault drone ejected a pair of plasma cannons out of the sides of its turret and projected a one-way shield to cover the team, while Fanra panicked and ran into the corridor to the left; she quickly returned, running into the other corridor, followed by more weapons fire - and returned again as more guards fired at her.

“They’re everywhere!” she screamed, hiding next to Lanis.

“We know!” Herrun annoyedly yelled, trying to make himself audible through all the shooting - and firing several more shots from his blaster rifle.

“Doctor, what’d it take you to fix your... wall opener?” Lanis asked.

“My what?” she asked back. “I didn’t quite catch that!”

“Your wall opener!”

“WHAT!?”

“YOUR WALL OPENER!”

“Oh, that! Well, ideally, I’d take a small power crystal, as that’s what these things are designed to draw power from, but I don’t have any, so I’ll have to-- No, wait, I can use the one in my shield generator; it’ll just take me a couple of minutes. Why?”

“Because we need a way out - or a way to get rid of these guys!”

“Oh, I get it! You’re going to--”

“Please, focus on repairing your equipment!” Zeshaira interrupted, firing another volley towards a Petran in the left corridor. “We can’t hold them off much longer!”

“Almost... got it... Hold on to something!” As Kaa’nt said that, three things happened: The drone shut off the shield it was projecting, the boarding party magnetized their boots (or legs, as drones clearly don’t need footwear), and she pressed a button on the device she was holding in her hand, opening a large gap in the wall, which turned out to be a segment of the outer hull. Consequently, the air started rushing out of a large portion of the station, pulling a good deal of the defenders out past the team and into space before majority of the station was completely depressurized - along with the shocked Petran scientist and her device, as she forgot to take her own advice.

“Kaa’nt!” Lanis yelled as she flew out of the breach; and she was gone. “How long will her life support last?”

Herrun shrugged. “Long enough, I guess. I’m more worried about the sun, though; we’ll be out of the shade within minutes, and once that happens, the station’s shields’ll be the only thing keeping her from getting fried - and we
have
to shut them off to get back.”

“Yeah, I think I’ve got a more immediate issue,” Fanra said, “five of them, actually. Remember those drones that were helping the crew? I don’t think these guys like me very much...” Indeed, five of the drones that had been sucked out of the station were still quite active, and about to start shooting.

“We can send our drone out through the breach to fight the remaining enemy forces - it won’t be severely affected by the sun, and it might even be able to shield her somehow,” Zeshaira suggested. Without waiting for an answer from the others, the drone walked to the edge of the breach, onto the station’s exterior, demagnetized its legs, and pushed off - firing towards some of the more safely targetable drones to attract their attention.

“Alright, let’s get to work. Kaa’nt, now that we know just where in the station we are, can you guide us towards the control room?”

“Sure; just give me a second. Outer hull, section 3D... Go all the way down the corridor to the left until it turns right, second corridor to the right’ll lead you right into the control room. I think.”

“You
think?
” Lanis asked.

“Hey, going from memory
and
being shot at here!” she snapped back. Meanwhile, the drone had attracted the attention of most of the attacking group - one had been destroyed, two were still attacking their defenseless victim, while two were defending themselves.

“Right. Alright, let’s go - schedule’s tighter than ever...”

By the time they got to the control room, one more drone had been wiped out trying to defend against the Tarhedian warbot, and the shield generator in Fanra’s suit had lost power. “I just lost one of my shields! And, uhh... I think we’re coming out of the shade... It’s beautiful...”

“Wonderful. Just wonderful,” Lanis said, trying to decipher the glyphs sticking out of the main control console. “How do we shut this thing off?”

“There should be a bunch of switches controlling some of the less significant systems, like the jamming device keeping us from communicating with the fleet. You’ll probably need the commander’s access codes to access more critical systems like the shields or the actual disruptor - but I think I can hack past that.” She paused. “Of course, that idea depended on me being... well, there.”

Lanis flipped the switch controlling the jamming device. “Is there any way we can bypass it? We really don’t have the time for this.”

“You could try blowing up the control room, but I’m not really sure that’ll work.” Another Petran drone melted, losing cohesion in its weightless state and dispersing away from its position.

“We’re out of options anyway. I’ll place a charge here. Zeshaira, get to the shield generator, plant a couple of charges. Herrun, you take the disruptor down. Uh... drone, see what you can do about that sun; there’s a chance the detonation’ll shut down the shields, so...” The drone beeped in acknowledgement, emitting a controlled graviton beam - more commonly known as a tractor beam - towards Fanra, trying to pull her in between its legs.

“Very well,” Zeshaira said.

Herrun seemed almost satisfied upon hearing that. “No problem.”

Placing his bomb, Lanis tried to contact the Tarhedia. “Tarhedia, are you receiving this? Please respond.”

Meanwhile, on the Tarhedia, things were not going well. Several ships had lost shields and made a hasty retreat into the Tarhedia’s faltering shield bubble, some of the smaller ones had been destroyed altogether, and even the desperately launched fighters were having no effect against the superior enemy force. “Lanis,” Hatos quickly answered, “what’s going on? We thought something had gone wrong when we lost contact and couldn’t send in reinforcements. We’re losing badly.”

“Too many things
have
gone wrong, but we’re alive - for the moment. Listen, one of us is in space; we’re going to try and disable the shield, but you have to beam her out the instant the shield’s down or she might not make it out.”

“We will try - but please, hurry!”

The assault drone wrapped its slender legs around Fanra’s suit, still shooting at the remaining Petran drones, and emitted a shield in the direction of the Petran sun, similar to the one it used earlier during the firefight. “Fire in the hole!” Lanis said, detonating the charge he placed.

Outside, the shield protecting the station - having become visible when the sun came out - had disappeared. “Uh, guys...?” Fanra said before being transported out along with the drone.

“The disruptor’s still active,” Poteran said. “We can’t jump to hyperspace until you disable it!”

“We’re working on it, Captain!” Lanis answered; and as he said that, the station shook violently as multiple charges went off near the power core. “What was that?”

“Tarhedia, get us out of here,” Herrun said. “Don’t worry, sir; the disruptor’s about to blow.” Once he said that, he and the rest of the team were beamed aboard the Tarhedia, and the station was consumed in a large explosion. “Couldn’t find the disruptor, but I found the power core,” he explained as the fleet entered the Tarhedia’s shield and the ship jumped to hyperspace along with the rest of the fleet.

“I don’t want to rain on your parade, but... I’m kind of stuck here,” Fanra said; the drone had arrived in a pose that made it impossible for it to unfold its legs and release her. Before anybody could say anything, Herrun kicked the drone, causing it to roll over and release her. Then the four of them spent the next five minutes trying - unsuccessfully, for the most part - to put the drone in a position where it could get up and walk.

Once they had finally done that, she tried to remove the still-active Tarhedian shield generator on her left wrist - but it pushed her hand away. “Hey, how do I turn this thing off?”

“Just think something along the lines of ‘shield generator, shut down’ or ‘off’,” Zeshaira answered.

After a brief pause, Kaa’nt tried to remove the generator from her wrist again. “Nope, not working.”

“Interesting. It activated the moment I put it on you, but it does not appear to be willing to deactivate.”

“I can still eat and drink through it, right?” she asked worriedly.

“I do not know - we have never had to do so until now. Remove your visor.” After saying that, she ordered the transporter operator to get some water. When the water arrived, she handed the glass to Fanra, who was unable to force the glass - or the water within - through the gap where the visor had been, as it just slid down the yellow surface of the shield and onto the floor. Everyone looked at her and at each other.