The Battle for the Ringed Planet (15 page)

“Um … who am I speaking with?”

“Specialist First Class Torian McCallum, from the C.S.S. Callisto.”

“In the middle of the city? And this data …” another long pause.

“Camulus, the data is correct.”

“How did you come by these coordinates?”

“I can’t tell you right now. But they’re accurate …” then he selected pause and turned to Siiri, “Kayla wouldn’t lie, would she?”

“She never has before.”

“These are rather fantastic, and you survived the Callisto destruction?”

“Yeah, I’m in a Hawkeye, we scouted the city.”

“Inside the city? Don’t get me wrong McCallum, but no one has ever survived landing there.”

“I did, but my pilot died.”

“Are you alone?”

Pausing the comms again, “Crap!”

“What?” Siiri crept up beside him.

“I should have put up the shields, they’re scanning us. How do I explain you?”

“Um, I hid in the bunk when you left the Callisto?”

“That won’t work! Chang would have never gone for it, Tristan, though …”

“Not for that!”

“Ok, here I go … Camulus, I have a contact from the city …”

“Really, someone from the city … alive?”

“That’s right.” he wanted to say there were more but he was beginning to get worried.

“McCallum, you want us to risk our ships to check these coordinates you sent?”

“Those are enemy cruisers!”

“They’re pretty spread out …”

“Send probes!”

“On just your word … never mind. Just sit tight.”

“Roger Camulus …” Torian decided to risk a scan because his fleet was close. A holo appeared tracking several vessels in orbit, though he could not detect the other side of the planet.

“Camulus, are you there?” but he got silence on the other end.

“What are they going to do?” Siiri watched the screens and holos.

They both observed a vessel depart from the others moving into low orbit.

“Son of a … we’ve got to get out! Damn you! I gave you the rebel ships!” he slammed his fist into the consul and then jumped out his chair, “Grab your things!”

“Torian! What’s happening?”

“Go! Go! Go!” he pushed her to the hatch.

She jumped down followed by the anxious tall young man, but as she ran away from the Hawkeye, Torian stopped. Siiri followed his eyes to a fast moving star in the late afternoon sky, descending towards them following the river.

“Torian!” she knew now what was happening.

Seething, Torian aimed the assault rifle up to the sky, “I was trying to help you, dicks!” then he fired a steady stream at the fast moving star. Red tracer bolts arced in the sky falling well short of the starship moving into firing range. The Camulus was a heavy battle cruiser, with ship-to-ship gun turrets, but no fighters or scout ships. Its claim to fame was the giant plasma canon extending out from the nose.

“Come on!” she ran back, grabbed him by the backpack, and began to drag him away.

“I’m going to find that captain and fry his ass!”

“Move it soldier!” Siiri growled with more force than he expected.

“Ok…” he raced to shelter between apartment complexes. Both man and woman charged through the small shrubs and trees rounding the corner of a building, panting.

“Farther! Hurry!” now Torian began to haul Siiri racing to the next set of buildings, “In here!” they entered a small garage and repair shop with hover cars still raised and parts scattered. In an empty bay, they both jumped down and ducked behind the concrete wall. Then there was a huge “whoosh” blowing out the remaining windows as well as part of the wall. Old rusted vehicles jumped and flew against others and into the wall. Flames shot overhead, engulfed the roof, and sucked the air out of their lungs while Siiri screamed. The ground vibrated and the cement they were pressing against cracked. Debris rained down over and on top of them, and pieces of rotting wooden roof fell all around the two crouching figures. Finally, there was silence in a storm of dust as glowing embers from the roof began to drop on them.

Brushing off the fiery ashes Torian, with desperate strength pulled the girl up and they ran out the back before the entire roof of fire fell on them. Outside of the garage fire raged on the roofs of adjoining buildings and the area behind where they had just ran from completely obliterated into a smoldering darkened mass.

Gasping for breath the tall young man dragged the coughing girl around the corner to another garage-like building, still intact, but with a long yellow hover truck on its side. They pushed open the steel door, burst inside where it was cooler and collapsed on the floor, wheezing.

After a few moments of catching their breathes, with Siiri rolling on all fours coughing deeply, Torian spit out black ash, “I hate ‘God of War’ class battle cruisers.”

She rolled over on her back and sat up taking deep breathes.

Swallowing and coughing as well, he sighed, “Sorry, sometimes I have anger management problems.”

“Just a little ...” she wheezed, and then lay on her back.

“City smashers they call them; more accurate than nukes, surgical strikes.” he lay down beside her.

“I don’t want to know what a nuke is. Why did they attack us, you were helping them?”

“They thought I was an enemy ruse. You can play many tricks with scanners and holo images. And they wanted to destroy the intact Hawkeye so it wouldn’t fall into enemy hands.”

“Are they going to shoot again?”

“I doubt it, too risky without lining up a proper target, and a waste of ammo.”

 Both lay quiet for a few moment before she commented, “At least you get angry when you care, and not because your selfish.”

Then Torian clued in, “That was Brant?”

“Most of the time.”

“I’m sorry.” relaxing resting his head on his backpack laying flat on the cement floor, “Well, this is ironic.”

“What?”

“There’s a big fire out there, and we’re in a fire station.”

Chapter 11: Dragon Marine

An hour later, they were on their feet again after having guzzled the water from the silver bottle Siiri had refilled in the now disintegrated Hawkeye.

“We have to get back to the tunnel; do you remember any other entrances? The way back to the civic building is sort of blocked now.”

“My father spoke of gathering supplies with scavenging parties at some sort of shopping complex near the river. A tunnel led there.”

Examining his Con in the rifle Torian remarked, “There’s something that might be a shopping center south of here 5 klicks along the river.”

Brushing off his arms she remarked, “I can’t believe how dirt and grime just fall right off your clothes. I’m all filthy and disgusting again.” 

Along the Norstrom River, there had been parkland that at one time had beautified the city with a lovely view of the wide waters, but now was just dense woods and tall birch, pine and maple. A cracked concrete path wound through the high bushes, some bearing blueberries Torian and Siiri picked them happily. It had once been a bike path for casual walkers, joggers, bicycle and personal grav sled riders.

Among the treetops were the double spires of a large white colored brick church next to the river and a path that led to the overgrown yard. Curious, Torian took a detour and Siiri followed quietly.

“Holy Redeemer Lutheran Church”, Torian pushed aside the vines on an iron picket fence reading an old rusted faded sign. Toppled gravestones littered the back yard and bones littered the steps. A couple of stained glass windows remained in the front, the others removed.

“Do you believe in God, Torian?” she inquired as they ascended the stairs side stepping the bones.

“Not much when I was a teenager, but lately I sort of had a revival. You?”

“Kind of opposite … more when I was younger, but now …”

The heavy wooded double doors cracked open and a plaque by the side of the entrance still bore meeting times a century ago. Inside rays of colored lights bathed the rows of pews, with small flat panel hymnal displays still intact on the back of each seat for the faithful seated behind. The altar was missing.

“I bet I know where it is.” Torian pointed to the front.

“All these people came here for comfort in time of dying …” Siiri spoke softly observing piles of bones in the aisle and in the plush rotting velvet seats, then she added, “I used to believe in God, until the voices came.”

“When did they come?”

“Right after womanhood, at first infrequently, Kayla, and a few others, but she chased them away.” Siiri sat down in an empty pew and let out a long sigh.

“Tired?”

“Exhausted, you?”

He nodded, “Let’s find the tunnel and get some rest.” taking his hand, she gave him a weak smile.

Walking along the path bracketed by trees with tall buildings visible over the green canopy and the noise of the flowing river nearby, Torian glanced at Siiri, her long pristine blonde hair now dirtied up again with streaks of ash and dust. He was worried about her and what the voices really were. He knew that a lot of mental conditions had been cured, though some still raged in the poorer colonies, and he had at first thought she might have one. But the voices were more than that.

Siiri caught him watching her, “What? Don’t tell me my face is all dirty!”

“No, I see a clean spot.”

“Oh look!” she pointed to the western sky over the city, where the waning sun sprayed its orange streams of light between the two largest moons, bathing the broken glass city buildings in a spectrum of rays. Layers of clouds were reddish waves flowing like a tide.

“It’s lovely, what’s the red moon called again?” Torian remarked.

“Green Vanir and red Mospel. When they come together like that it marks the beginning of a new season. We call it the brother and sister, but the brother always goes away.”

“What season?”

“Harvest.” she sighed, “We should be getting to the fields or they won’t have enough for winter.”

They walked on in silence until he spotted large buildings close by through a gap in the trees and checked his Con, “I think that’s it.” he also noticed smoke rising but couldn’t get a reading because the shopping mall was in the way, “Something there, let’s be careful.”

Both Siiri and Torian emerged from the woods following the bike path to a large parking lot cluttered with wrecked vehicles which made good cover. Torian signalled the pretty girl to duck behind a blue coupe as he tried to read the scans.

“What do you think it is?”

“Dunno, Siiri, could be artillery, or a downed fighter. Let’s keep low and check behind that store.” Creeping behind vehicles, some still containing bleached bony remains of passengers and long ago purchases, Torian led Siiri closer to a huge department store. He didn’t recognize the large round store logo with three triangles of different colors. Against the wall, both figures stepped stealthily near a corner and then crouched down. In the parking lot across from them was a mangled spacecraft with a giant rectangular box underneath.

“Torian…” Siiri whispered in his ear, “ours or theirs?”

“Ours, a Spacemaster.” He squinted trying to read the insignia on the crumpled box, “Looks like Dragon Marines.” Then he checked his Con.

“But they’re on our side?”

“Yeah, but don’t get them mad, they have a reputation.”

“How many were in that big space craft?”

“Usually a company … wait…” he brought up a holo on his Con of a crouching figure watching them from behind a large cargo hover truck, “… live one…” he selected several virtual buttons on the holo panels, “trying to authenticate …”

He muttered, “Don’t shoot … don’t shoot … Dammit! Duck!” He jumped back and squeezed her against the wall as a plasma bolt fried a section around the corner.

“Friendlies!” Torian shouted.

“Bullshit!” A female voice shouted back, “You have an Imperium rifle!” The standard Imperium plasma rifle differed from the Confederation M-32 assault rifle with the magazine behind the pistol grip, while the other had it in front.

Grumbling, Torian sighed and snapped off his Con from the weapon, and then tossed it away with a clatter, yelling “What rifle?”

“Who are you?”

“I’m from the Callisto, Hawkeye crewman.” He drew his pistol.

“That didn’t work before,” Siiri mumbled.

Replying, annoyed at her, “Feel free to jump in any time.”

“Who’s the girl?” The marine called.

“She stowed away in my bunk!”

Then Siiri swatted him on the back of the head, “Don’t tell her that!”

“Ow! She’s going to shoot us and that hurt!”

“I’m not that kind of girl!”

The marine stood up, levelling her assault rifle, “Who are you really?”

“I’m from the fleet!”

“You authenticated with yesterday’s code.”

“That’s when the Callisto went down.” his voice hinted frustration.

“Then drop your weapon and come out.”

“Switch off your targeting first.”

“You switch your targeting off …”

Suddenly Siiri flew into a rage, “Oh will you two stop it! I’ve been shot at, exploded on, I’m dirty and I smell bad! I’m having a really terrible day! So hurry up and make nice!”

The marine lowered her rifle slightly, “You two been together long or what?”

Holstering his pistol, Torian inched around the corner with his hands in the air, “See, now I’ll be the brave dragon, no weapon.” The blonde haired girl poked her head out, nervous now instead of irritated.

Lowering the assault rifle all the way, the marine chuckled, “Figures, a blonde.”

“What?” Siiri stepped out and folded her arms.

The wiry flight specialist took Siiri’s arm, “Come on.” He walked up to the marine who now slung her rifle and as he got closer removed her helmet.

The civilian girl was surprised to see flowing long shiny black hair fall from under the camouflaged metal helmet, and almost hung her jaw at how tall the other girl stood. She was gorgeous with dark almond eyes and smooth deeply tanned skin. And when Torian came up to the dark haired woman he had to look up, way up, into her eyes.

“A little short for a Dragon, aren’t you?” Actually she was; most members of the Dragon Marines were over seven feet tall.