Aurora Rising: The Complete Collection (171 page)

Even before it was destroyed the other two were closing in on his position and firing blindly. He pulled up in a vertical climb, inverting to gain distance—while ignoring Noah’s expletive-peppered muttering—and pivoting to fire at a 45° downward angle.

This drew fire from the lead frigate. He was forced to disengage prior to the complete destruction of the fighter, but he doubted it would recover from the damage inflicted. Slowly but inexorably the two frigates began to line up as his location became clearer. Not in a straight line from his current vantage of course, but it was fine. He wasn’t constrained to a single vector.

One fighter remained, and he felt the distinct need to eliminate it. It would be a shame to leave it free to fly around the city and inflict greater damage. Besides, the cruiser needed to be drawn a
little
farther out and over the increasingly desert-like flatlands.

Caleb targeted the final fighter and fired. Instantly he broke off, arced up and sideways and fired again. Climbed and fired again. The fighter tumbled through the sky as a shot from the frigate nearly caught the
Siyane
on the third round.

It was now or never.

He checked his harness and swung wide to 60° port of where he had been and reversed to gain distance. The broadside of the lead frigate loomed due ahead, with the tail section of the other frigate peeking out beyond it.

“Do you trust me?”

Beside him Noah snorted. “To not get us killed? Not in the slightest.”

“Fair enough. Do you trust Kennedy?”

“To not get us killed? Um…probably.”   

“Good.”

Noah stared at him. Then, as realization dawned, he burst out laughing and sank down in the chair until he was half on the floor, held up solely by the restraints.

“You are the craziest motherfucker I have ever had the pleasure of knowing. In the highly unlikely event we survive this, I will buy us the finest bottle of single-malt scotch I can afford to celebrate before Alex kills you. And she
is
going to kill you.”

“Won’t be the first time. You ready? This is about to get exciting.”

“Thank goodness. I was getting bored.” Noah gave an exaggerated eye roll. “Just out of curiosity, is this the stupidest thing you’ve ever done?”

“It wouldn’t be fair to rank them.” Caleb gunned the engine.

43

EARTH

S
EATTLE

A
SUDDEN GUST OF WIND BENT
the tall, reedy grass shoots to tickle the exposed skin on Kennedy’s hand. She pulled the sleeve of her sweater down lower and hugged her knees tighter against her chest.

Discovery Park was Alex’s favorite place to go running in Seattle, and she’d mentioned it often. Kennedy had never visited it before, but this had seemed as good a time as any. Now that she was here she understood why Alex liked it. It exuded a quiet, peaceful aura and a rustic, natural charm. A pocket of seclusion tucked against the bustling city behind it.

The sun dropped beneath the wooded profile of the Olympic Mountains in the distance, and the sky shifted to a deep slate blue to match the waters. She closed her eyes.

The battle for Seneca would be starting about now, she presumed. She couldn’t say for certain, because despite all her work these last weeks to boost the war effort, as a civilian with no specific contribution to make in the battle itself she was not allowed to be in the War Room.

The
Siyane
would be reaching Krysk about now, she presumed. She couldn’t say for certain, because she hadn’t talked to Noah since they left. A critical observer might say she was being vindictive, punishing him for leaving with such easy glee.

But the truth was she didn’t dare invest any more of herself in him. Not unless or until he returned and possibly not then. The thought of him dying already hurt too much as it was, but what she’d told Alex had turned out to be painfully accurate: he was a free spirit, and though she’d tried her damnedest, she wouldn’t be able to keep him. No matter how much she wanted to.

Alex was gone, transformed into a cyborg and sent to the beachhead three kiloparsecs away. Her precious adiamene—while Alex had inadvertently created it she thought of it as her own—was gone, shipped to the front line to patch some holes.

The fate of the galaxy, of humanity itself, would be decided in the next several hours. And she sat on a frigid, empty beach, shivering her ass off and feeling sorry for herself. Clearly not her finest moment.

She could have gone home, of course. Home to her parents in Houston or home to her apartment on Erisen. She could have visited her brother in Miami or Gabe in New York or a dozen friends in a dozen locales. She needn’t have been alone. But wallowing was so much easier to pull off when one was alone.

She had done her part, spent seven hundred million of her family’s fortune and half her own to give the military one more edge, one more tool to increase their odds of victory. She owned half of the patent on the adiamene, with Alex and Caleb sharing the other half, so if the Metigens were defeated at least she should eventually make the money back.

But perhaps Noah was right; perhaps she was too spoiled, and a bit of a princess, too. She’d overplayed her cards with him, blithely thinking she could wave her hand and patch up his life because that must be what he wanted, right? And when she’d realized her error and tried to correct it…

…well, she’d never needed to fight for a man before. She had no idea how to do it.

Now she found herself alone and as helpless as the countless billions of people out there, huddled with friends or family or wandering the streets but all waiting to learn whether destruction would rain down from the stars.

For tonight the stars brightened in time with the darkening of the sky, and she tucked her hair behind her ear and lifted her gaze upward to study them. Her great-great-grandmother had helped people shed the leash of Earth to not merely reach the stars but inhabit them. Two hundred forty years later the idea that they had once been tethered to this single, solitary planet, lovely though it may be, seemed incomprehensible to her.

And now the Metigens wanted to kill them because they reached too high, too far, too fast.

If the aliens had been ‘watching’ since the beginning like Alex said, didn’t they realize this was what humans
did
? It wasn’t as if there hadn’t been warning signs. People reached further than before, beyond their grasp, attempted the impossible and failed. Tried and failed again—then succeeded. Not everyone or even most people, but enough.

If the Metigens didn’t care for this behavior, they should have stopped humanity before they were strong enough to defeat them. They should have stopped humanity when they were still leashed to Earth.

Why the aliens hadn’t done so was an open question, but regardless of the answer it was their mistake, and one she hoped they would be regretting very soon.

EASC
H
EADQUARTERS

Miriam considered the varied assortment of information displayed above the war table with a critical eye.

The upper two-thirds of the space was devoted to high-detail tactical maps of Senecan and Romane space. For the time being they hovered quietly, but that would not last. Along the bottom third ran a series of ever-changing charts and data readouts: damage assessments, casualties, outstanding supply requests, formation numbers and more.

A comparatively narrow column in the center was reserved for stacked holos of the decision-makers. Dedicated connections were established for Prime Minister Brennon in Washington, Chairman Vranas in Cavare and the overlooks on the bridges of the
EAS Churchill
and
SFS Leonidas
. Those would, generally speaking, be occupied by Admiral Rychen and Field Marshal Gianno respectively. And, of course, Alexis. Slots for smaller holos at the bottom accommodated lesser or transitory ‘guests,’ such as Defense Secretary Mori, Assembly Speaker Gagnon and various field commanders.

Satisfied with the presentation, she allowed her gaze to blur and lose definition. The room bustled with activity around her, but she tuned the noise out.

This was it. She had pulled every string she controlled and used every trick she knew to get the necessary resources into place. Eighty-seven percent of Alliance ships had reached their intended destinations; the final thirteen percent continued toward their goals with due speed.

Nearly five thousand sheets of adiamene had been shipped and more poured into the supply chain every hour. Over four hundred vessels used it to patch holes and cracks while in transit. Supplies of the metal were loaded onto all dreadnoughts and cruisers and as many of the frigates as they were able to manage. The remaining quantities were stored at the rear staging points, where damaged vessels would retreat for repairs if the campaigns went on for long enough.

Seventy-two percent of both militaries’ reconnaissance craft were equipped with the cloaking technology, as well as a few additional tricks that had been dreamed up.

The Prevos had spent much of the intervening time combining the Alliance and Federation forces into a cohesive whole, then rearranging them into new groupings based on role and purpose. Miriam had twitched at each shuffling of ships and alteration of formations, but she couldn’t argue with the results: after twelve or so hours they had legitimately constructed a single United Fleet.

Alliance and Federation ships not only not shooting at one another, but working together side-by-side as one force….

She didn’t know what that would mean for the world should they wake up tomorrow victorious, but she would worry about it on said morrow. This was also when she would worry about her daughter, about what she may be and become and what this too may mean for the world but mostly for Alexis. The morrow.

There was so much more which, given a little time, she could do to ensure they were adequately prepared for this battle.

But there was no more time.

She directed her attention to the Seneca tactical map. As if they had been awaiting only her notice, a legion of red dots exploded on the screen. The aliens had arrived.

Her focus shifted to the holo positioned conveniently at her eye level. “Admiral Rychen, you are a go.”

44

KRYSK

S
ENECAN
F
EDERATION
C
OLONY

T
HE
S
IYANE’S
WIDTH MEASURED ALMOST
thirty percent the length of an Alliance frigate. The narrow, tapered nose tore into the frigate’s hull, bringing the rest of its width ripping through the thick walls along with it by sheer speed, which was so fast they were out the far side in a blink and a roar of shearing metal.

Caleb had only an instant to align their heading before they were crashing into the next frigate. He felt the drag brought on by the resistance of meter-thick reinforced metal and had an extra breath to glimpse the blurred rush of
interior
on the other side of the viewport and a wall of metal, then gleaming sky.

His nanobot-enhanced combat senses were in full effect now. Time slowed to a tick of each microsecond as they closed in on the cruiser. Though less than fifteen seconds had passed since his arguably kamikaze run had begun, the
Akagi
was already turning toward him, denying him the broadside and creating a diagonal trajectory for impact. Three times larger than the frigates, tearing a thirty-meter-wide hole into the cruiser might not be sufficient to bring it down.

He caught a flash of fire and metal in the rearcam as the frigate behind them broke into two jagged pieces—then metal struck metal once more.

Entering all but dead-on beneath the bridge, the
Siyane
careened through the innards of the cruiser, slowing as it ripped apart internal bulkheads and wall after wall. They had decelerated enough for him to perceive bodies bouncing off the nose, causing a brief twinge of regret in his chest. Some of those people didn’t want to be here; some wouldn’t have supported O’Connell’s actions. But in more than a week they hadn’t killed their general or relieved him of command, so they bore a portion of the blame for the man’s continued carnage.

The
Siyane
shuddered and cavorted as it continued to meet greater resistance. He no longer had any control over either their trajectory or speed.

There was a loud
crunch
above the constant roar of wrenching metal. He dared not ponder if it originated from the
Siyane
or the
Akagi
.

The nose lurched downward sixty degrees, and with a violent jolt they lurched to a stop.

“
Jesus
, Caleb. Okay…our ship is now inside a ship filled with renegade Alliance soldiers. What next?”