Twin Stars 1: Ascension (36 page)

“You never cease to amaze me, Fawn.” Veers commented. “How far away?”

“The benefits of so much reconstruction, I’m afraid.” Fawn turned and gestured behind them. “Perhaps in the last section.”

“Could it be the pirates fighting amongst themselves?” Veers offered.

“Perhaps,” considered the knight. “But I’d rather not find out. I think we should keep moving away from them until someone tries to contact us.”

Veers peered into the long dripping tunnel behind them, as if trying to see the distant battle. “But, if it’s our men the best place to be will be right with them, won’t it?”

“If they are ours, then why have they not broken radio silence to reach us?”

The Admiral considered this. “Maybe they’re also hiding from the enemy.”

“Exactly.” Fawn pointed out. “In which case their force is small, and we will do well to let them do their work without us. No. I believe…” Then he spun to face ahead of them and dropped his hand to the hilt of his sword.

Something was approaching them, fast.

“What is it?” Veers whispered, drawing his pistol.

Fawn heard the rapid footsteps slow, and then from around a bend ahead in the corridor a slender olive skinned woman appeared wearing a standard-issue fleet smartsuit.

“Stay where you are!” Veers ordered, leveling his weapon at her. But, Fawn reached out and gently pushed the weapon down, motioning her to approach.

“Ashe, is it not?” He asked as she did.

The Squire bowed. “Yes, father.”

“A Squire!” Veers exclaimed, finally seeing the woman’s violet eyes and the choker collar she wore around her neck.

“I mean you no harm. I have been sent to guide you out.”

“I think it’s safe to say she’s one of ours,” Veers said, holstering his weapon. “What ship are you from, Squire?”

Fawn noticed she paused for the briefest of moments, then answered- “I am attached to the
Crystal Leaf
, sir.”

“The
Leaf
, eh?” Veers said cheerfully. “Good man, Tysen.” Then he motioned back the way she’d come. “Okay then, young lady. Lead us out.”

* * *

“Got it! You should be seeing them on your map now.”

Ping An called up the display, and found she again had access to the full security grid of the station.

“Vaela, I owe you a drink.”

She began calling up the data for section 65.

“Just one?”

“Get us through this, and you can drink ‘till you’re on the floor.” She accessed the visual logs, and found she was looking at feeds of a young crew-woman leading the dignitaries down a hallway and two groups of imperial soldiers in arrays fighting in close quarters with her men.

The board was now hers again, and she set to work.

* * *

Outside the station, the battered Cutter
Silverthorne
approached the side opposite to where Ping An’s forces had landed.

“There’s the docked shuttles,” Kip said, pointing at the enhanced image of their own dark grey shuttles hanging attached to station airlocks. “Bring us close as you can, Ensign. We may need to get out of here fast.”

“Aye, sir.” Helgi answered.

“I wonder how things are going in there?” Kip looked over at Ensign Lott, who was manning operations. “Any word from the shuttles?”

“None,” he replied. “The pilots report they’re under orders not to contact the rescue parties.”

Kip nodded. “So, I guess we wait then. If you need me Ensign,” he told Lott as he headed for the door. “I’ll be in the sick bay. I’m going to go check on Al. Let me know the minute anything happens.”

“You got it, sir.”

* * *

Leaping forward as enemy fire poured off his array’s defense field like a golden shower of sparks, Colonel Cole landed right in the middle of the terrified pirate troopers. Before the men had even had time to react, Cole brought his shock-axe around like scythe, filling the air with screams and vaporized flesh as the energy blade did its work.

Chest heaving, he turned, looking for other resistance, but what he saw dismayed him- was there no end to these pirates? Even as his unit was locked in combat with one group, reinforcements were pouring from nearby passageways into the former shopping district where the first bunch had ambushed he and his people.

As he watched, combined sniper fire took down another of his crew- the third lost in just the last few minutes.

The Imperial forces had come into this fight with a significant advantage, but now it had melted away in the face of co-ordinated attacks. How had things turned on them so quickly?

Taking a moment to cut down a pair of pirates with more courage than brains, Cole finally, reluctantly, called for his forces to retreat and regroup. “Go back the way we came!” He sent to them. “I’ll cover you!”

“Colonel!” Came a frantic reply. “We can’t! They’ve cut us off!”

“What?!?” Cole ducked behind a pillar and looked back down the promenade. Sure enough, more enemy soldiers had moved in behind them and were exchanging fire with his rear guard.

They were trapped.

“Ulstead?” He sent, “Ulstead I need support!”

“Sorry chief, a little busy here!” Came the reply, stress audible in the other man’s voice.

“Ulstead, my men and I have been cut off! Can you assist us?”

There was a pause, then- “No-can-do, Chief. A bunch of bloody bulkheads came down on us and crushed two of my girls. Me and the others are trying to get back to the rendezvous point but they’re hot on our heels.”

Cole started to say something, then stopped. It was clear Ulstead had his hands full, and could offer little help.

“Understood. Cole out.” He sent back, then closed the link.

A crew-woman landed next to him, panic on her face. Cole glanced at the nametag- it said “Tran”.

“Sir! What can we do?” Ensign Tran said, looking at him with fear in her eyes.

“Do?” Said Cole, raising up his shock axe. “What we signed on to do, soldier! We fight!” Then he spun around the pillar and flew straight at the nearest bunch of pirates he saw.

* * *

“There, that takes care of the little mice.” Said Ping An, satisfaction in her voice. “Now let’s keep the rats from escaping…”

“You rather seem to be enjoying this, my dear.” The Lady said, watching her.

“Do I?”

“You do,” Whitcombe nodded. “You are very good at this. I predict a bright future ahead of you.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment,” Ping An brought up another map. “Now if you’ll excuse me…Vaela, I want you to drop the following bulkhead doors in this order…”

* * *

“Any change?”

Esther glanced at Kip as he entered the sick bay, then went back to watching Tysen. “None. He remains in a healing coma.”

Kip walked over, checked a few readouts on the healing tank and nodded, looking at Esther. “You really care about him a lot, don’t you?”

“He is my master.” She said properly. “I am always concerned for his safety.”

“Yeah, right!” Kip laughed, and when Esther looked at him quizzically he continued. “I got shot up once when I was in training- ended up in the med center. The whole time I was in the tank, my old girlfriend waited for me in the room just like you’re doing.” His voice took on a nostalgic tone as the memories came back. “First thing I saw when I woke up was the look in her eyes, and lady, I see the same look in yours right now.”

Esther returned to looking at the tank, her face impassive.

“As I said. I am concerned for his future.”

Kip just grinned. “Yeah, I bet you are.” He said, then felt the link request. “Yeah?”

“Sir,” Ensign Lott reported. “I’ve got incoming transmissions from the shuttle pilots. They say the raiding parties have taken heavy casualties and are trapped. The dignitaries are also trapped in one of the other sections.”

“Dammit. I’ll be right there.” Kip sent, then turned to look at the tank as he started to go. “Al, I sure wish you were awake. We could really use you right now.”

Esther watched him leave, then stepped forward, letting her fingers spread out on the frosted glass as she reached out with her mind. “Tysen. Your crew needs you. I need you. Please…” Her thoughts called to him- “Come back to us.”

* * *

On the edge of the asteroid cluster, aboard the clan ship
Clockwork God
, Captain Michaels paced his bridge, concerned. It had been over an hour since his ship had picked up the explosions inside the asteroid field, and since then there had been no word from the raiding party.

“Sir, we’ve got contacts approaching.” Reported one of his bridge crew.

Michaels spun and looked at him. “From the field?”

“Nossir.” The ops man shook his head. “From the alpha jump point.”

“From the jump point?” Michaels frowned- there’d been no word from the ships they’d left to guard the point. Michaels summoned up a tactical display to see who they were, and when he did his jaw nearly dropped.

The display was filled with ships, not just a squadron or two as he was used to seeing, but literally hundreds of ships.

“It’s…the clan. It’s the whole bloody clan!” Michaels stammered.

“Sir, incoming link request for you.” Said the ops man.

“W-who’s it from?”

“ID marks it as Squadron Leader St. James.”

“Bella…” Michaels whispered, feeling a cold sweat across his skin. Well, it could be worse, it could have been Volkstag. Maybe there was still a chance…

“Put it through- private link!” He ordered.

An AR window flicked open in front of him, and from it Bella smiled.

“H-hi honey…” Michaels sent, “What are you doing here?”

“You left me behind, lover.” She cooed. “I missed you.”

“Well…ah…I missed you too. Look, you know I was going to come back for you, right?”

“Of course, darling.” She soothed. “I know you’d never leave me.”

“Clan ships are targeting us!” Yelled the ops man.

“Of course not,” Michaels answered her. “You know how much I need you. I just didn’t know how this would go, right? I wanted to protect you.”

“Yes, I know darling. I know.”

“Sir! We need to dive into the field!!” Said his Helmsman. “We’ve gotta get out of here!”

Michaels ignored them, he had to talk his way out, it was their only chance. “It’s Ping An- you can’t trust her. She’s always up to something, and how could I risk you?”

“Yes, she’s always plotting.” Bella agreed, then her manner became more serious. “Where is she, Michaels?”

“In the cluster, on the station. She went in to capture a bunch of VIPs.” He explained. “S-she left us here to keep watch. She took the rest of the fleet with her. Look, I can help you trap her, just let me in.”

But Bella shook her head sadly. “I would, I honestly would, lover.” Then her lips curled into a cruel smile. “But I’m afraid the clan leader wants you dead, and I promised him I’d take care of it…personally. Goodbye, Michaels.”

“B-but…Bella…I…” He sent, but it was too late, she was already gone.

“Sir! Incoming missiles!”

“Taking us into the asteroid field!”

The crew was screaming around him, but all Michaels could do was stand there and watch the screen in horror. He’d gambled, and lost…everything.

Then he lost his life as well.

* * *

They were trapped- well and surely trapped.

Admiral Veers ran his hand over the armored bulkhead door and then punched it in frustration.

“Does that make you feel better?” Sir Fawn asked.

“Not as much as I’d like,” Veers said, turning to look at the assembled group. They were milling about, scared, stuck inside a short hallway with no side exits, and the armored doors had come down at either end.

Veers looked at the Squire- “How about you, can you help us out of here?”

Ashe shook her head. “The Linkspace network nodes around us have been shut off, I cannot access the network to perform that function.”

“Well, they certainly thought ahead.” The admiral commented, looking up at the ceiling to see if there were any ventilation shafts they could use. He frowned, the ventilation ducts were all closed.

As he wondered about that, he heard a rumble from behind him and spun to see the armored door start to lift.

“Stand back, everyone!” He ordered, but as he did the lights went out and they were plunged into near total darkness.

The only light now was from the space that had opened beneath the door- not more than a single handspan- and then several small, round hissing objects came rolling in underneath.

The gas took only seconds to do its work.

* * *

In the station’s shopping district, Colonel Cole and what remained of his people were huddled inside one of the former shops along the promenade. Cut into the walls, the shop’s cave provided solid protection from enemy fire, but it had no other exits and they were quite effectively trapped.