FRITZ, KNOCK OFF FOR THE NIGHT!" he shouted at the top of his lungs. A rating in blue coveralls waved and all worked stopped..
Everyone seemed suddenly to notice Marty and they stared as she walked past. I saw her turn red and smiled tauntingly.
"They don't look like they've seen a woman before," Marty growled.
"Oh they have, but the others are all up in PR," he said with a frown.
I didn't know if Marty realized that PR stood for pleasure and relaxation, or what kind of women worked there. I had sat in on a lot of poker games and discussions when I grew up, so I was well aware of it.
"How far do Commander Lebert's eyes and ears extend," I asked hesitantly, noticing that we were approaching the recreation and living areas.
"Once we pass through those doors ahead, the area is clean but be careful who you talk too. Most of us have figured out who wears two faces around here but you never know."
"There," he said as we passed through the open door into the recreation area, "we're clear of his sensors. Fritz came up with a jamming device that works on almost anything. A larger version has been installed in all our fighters.
"You two," he stopped, choosing his words carefully, "have come at a most opportune time. SpaceCom has decided to break up the squadron and send one wing down for permanent assignment on Blanco Angeles, ever heard of it?"
I nodded, Marty shook her head. Temple gave me a peculiar look, knowing that Blanco Angeles was a highly classified secret. He had automatically expected us to say no, as all the others had.
"Blanco Angeles is the Hawaii of the 25th century. It was recently colonized by countries from the Pacific Rim. Lebert figured on leading the Red Wing down, they're his trained pets, if you know what I mean. I pulled a few strings and... well, I contacted my ex- wife who is a big shot in SpaceCom and we should get orders in the next few hours. If all goes well we will have our own command on Blanco Angeles by the end of the week. That means we will have our own command, our own supplies and soon our own brand new fighters. How's that for an assignment?"
Marty was enthusiastic. I bit my lip to keep from blurting out that Temple was mistaken. I had used my father's terminal and his security clearance to read up on everything concerning Bristol Ready Station before I stepped onto the transport, I knew that my father had personally vetoed the orders for Commander Temple and reissued orders for the Hell Fighters to take the assignment. Supposedly, father did not trust the station in the hands of Hell Fighters and if he must lose one base or the other, he decided it was better to sacrifice Blanco Angeles. I felt like a traitor for not telling Temple what I knew, but if I did I would have no chance on the station afterwards. It gave me one more reason to detest my father. I had no doubt that he knew about my new assignment, and that was the real reason he vetoed the orders.
With a heavy heart I took the bunk that was offered to me and while lying on my bunk thinking, with my hands behind my head, my duffle bags arrived, rolling out of the slot on the wall and across the floor to stop at the head of my bed. I glanced down and sprang off the bunk, kneeling over my bags. There was a large greasy spot on the side of each bag. When I opened each I found that my fears were justified. Somebody had filled each bag to the bursting point with a lube gun. It was going to be a long night.
Three days of refresher training followed quickly. They were intensive and brutal. On the fourth day we left on patrol with the rest of the squadron. I liked the old Excitor, it handled well and was made to take a lot of punishment and still complete its mission. Marty rode beside me as co-pilot and gunner. We promised to switch places on the next patrol.
"We are approaching sector 38," Temple's voice came through the overhead speakers in the cabin. "Keep your eyes open guys. Rice and Stamp, remember that your area is the two o'clock position. If anything comes out of that sector and eats us for breakfast, it’s your behinds that I'll have in a vice."
"Yes sir," we said in unison.
"My bags were disgusting," Marty said after a few minutes of silence.
"Grease?"
"I wish," she wrinkled her nose in disgust.
"Don't take it personally, it a long-standing tradition."
I tried to make myself believe my own words. I made a visual check of my gauges and indicator lights, punching the reset button when a red light came on, a heat warning on the port engine. It went out and stayed out so either the engine was fine, or I had punched the button to hard.
"Do you think things will change now that Lebert went to Blanco Angeles?" She asked hopefully.
"No."
"Why?"
"He's still in charge of the station. As long as he is, nothing will change. If he's not physically there, one of his flunkies will be. The only thing which can change that is his death, which will put Temple in command"... "And don't even think of it," I added, knowing the trend of her thoughts. They would have been the same as mine, of course.
"Tony, what's that," she suddenly pointed to her right. I glanced up, and then squinted, trying to focus on the darkness blotting an ever increasing area of stars. Whatever it was, I didn't like it. I turned the Excitor away.
"Don't know. Rice to Temple, something coming out of our sector. Can't make it out, sir."
"Pang, can you make it out?" Temple asked. I knew Pang was behind and slightly to the starboard, probably twenty miles behind us.
"Nothing, sir, just darkness. Could be a large asteroid, but it looks too... HOLY S***, break off, it's coming..."
His transmission suddenly quit. Marty swung around to look and gasped as the darkness took the form of a spinning asteroid or small moon and it was about to hit us.
"Tony!" She screamed. I had seen it too and slapped my hand down on the boosters, while turning hard to port. The engines suddenly roared. The gravity compensators began to scream, trying to compensate for the tremendous gee forces being applied to the ship.
We just cleared the edge of the asteroid when it shot past us.
"All hands, asteroid heading towards the center of the formation. Everybody get out of there, it's traveling at several thousand miles per hour!" I shouted, trying to regain my composure.
We heard shouts and terrified screams, some suddenly cut off as Lieutenant Pang's transmission had. We knew Pang was gone, we didn't know who else.
I quickly turned the Exitor around to give assistance to damaged ships. But there was no helping those who had been in it's path. Only three of the twenty ships still remained, other than our own. Since the wing leader normally brought up the rear of the formation, Temple was one of those who survived. He was swearing soundly and continuously. I knew he was feeling horror at the loss of his squadron, most of whom had been his friends. Father always said never make friends because you might lose them. I began to wonder if he was right.
I should have known that the asteroid had been electronically shielded or we would have seen it on our scanners, but I didn't make the connection until too late. A laser bolt flashed by our port side. I sat watching for a moment, wondering where a laser blast had come from. Stamp recognized it for what it was.
"Ships coming in from the asteroid's shadow!" She screamed and her hands took control of the Exitor. Two shots from particle beam weapons crossed just beyond us, coming in from different angles. A blast shook the Excitor and we started a slow spin. Marty hurried to
correct it, but I reached out and slapped her hand away. Another blast shook the Excitor, but a particle beam weapon was designed to destroy people, not equipment. Our ships was burned and looked destroyed, but actually there was little damage, at least I hoped there wasn’t. My monitors were flashing red all across the board. I had faith in the Excitor, I had heard stories of the punishment they could take and still fight.
I switched frequencies to one known to be above the enemy’s frequency band. I was hoping they had not stolen or salvaged one of our radios.
"Bristol and Blanco bases, Scramble, Scramble, Scramble. One meteor weapon and an enemy fleet approaching from sector..."
The Excitor rocked again and my readings told me we were no longer sending.
"Radio down, computer control down, long range navigation is down," Marty said in a tight voice. "Don't you think we should do something?"
"If we face them we have no chance at all," I said and she opened her mouth to object. I held up my hand to stop her.
"But if we let them pass and target the weaker aft sections of each ship, we could inflict major damage."
She closed her mouth and nodded slowly, watching the last ships pass and begin receding, in pursuit of the other three fighters from our squadron.
"OK, let's take her in," I said and my hands flew over the controls. The Exitor surged forward. Marty readied the weapons while I fiddled with the manual control to get used to them again. I hadn't used manual control since the boring exercises in the academy. It came back to me quickly and I was glad. The three rear ships were slowing, preparing to turn and fight.
Marty's hand flicked switches across the board and her fingers tightened on the control stick. Three quick blasts hit each ship, beginning with the one on the left and ending on the right. Two began spinning out of control; one came on and began firing.
Marty gripped the stick repeatedly and six blasts rocked the incoming ship. It flared into a brilliant nova-like explosion. Several more ships turned to fight.
I believe this is our last dance, sweetheart," I mumbled as I put the ship into an erratic approach, making it harder to target.
"Don't call me sweetheart unless you mean it, Rice."
I watched the contents of our torpedo bay drop and blossom into life, one at a time. The flare of their engines as they passed the forward screen briefly blinded us. Marty kept targeting ships with our lasers as fast as she could grip the control stick. I watched the charge reading slowly drop.
I kept evading the incoming shots and torpedoes, making it harder for Marty to hit the enemy but so far impossible for the enemy to hit us. She knew it was necessary and didn't complain when her aim was thrown off. She was a good space gunner.
Out of the corner of my eye I could see the fight going on with the rest of the enemy fleet and some of our boys. It looked like a real party. The laser reading just reached the critical point when the
automatic safeguards shut them down.
"We’re out of power," I said grimly as I watched three ships approach. In knew our time was up. I used evasive maneuvers, but the ships closed in quickly. They were much newer than our Excitor. As I twisted and swerved each shot the ships grew close enough that they couldn't miss. Three rapid shots rocked the ship and our engines went down. I could see a white haze spreading to our aft; I knew it was the last of our fuel.
"Well, it's been a short, interesting tour," I said as I sat back and waited for the last volley which I knew would come shortly.
"I'm glad I pulled you," she said grimly, watching the enemy ships close.
"Yeah, I could have done worse too," I said shortly, trying not to hold my breath while keeping my eyes on the slowing ships. I used attitude control to turn the Excitor to face the approaching ships. This was not a show of defiance, the front of a ship was less vulnerable than the rear, not that it would matter in the long run. Marty suddenly stiffened and gasped.
"Message coming in on my weapons console," she said in surprise. "They must be using our scanners to transmit a message."
I pulled my own weapons console closer and read the screen as each word appeared slowly, almost painfully.
"Male and female life forms in the old human ship..."The word ship blinked for several seconds while we waited.
"Your human bible has a saying similar to our prophets which states, "If thine eyes offend thee, pluck them out.""
"I wonder where they got a copy of the bible," I whispered from the side of my mouth while staring unblinkingly at the screen.
"We value our fellow beings and abhor war. To end this war we are removing the item of contention in the hope that future peace negotiations can begin. We are inviting representatives from your race to meet us at these co-ordinates in five of your units of measurement called days. Your attendance is also requested as diplomats speak the words that they believe others wish to hear, while warriors speak their minds."
"He obviously doesn't understand our chain of command," Marty whispered.
"A life pod is being dropped from my ship. Our sensing devices tell us you have a functioning tractor beam. Use it carefully to retrieve your lost comrades."
"I don't think they're going to kills us," Marty said in surprise.
"Look, there's the pod," I pointed at the silver egg which floated down and away from the centre ship. "Is he right, do we have tractor beam control?"
"I'll find out," she said, chewing the corner of her mouth as she took the control stick, activated the tractor beam and aimed it at the pod. It floated effortlessly towards us. At some point while we watched the pod nearing, the ships had vanished. I looked around in surprise, then glanced at me screen to see three human ships floating helpless, about five hundred miles away. The aliens were gone.
"I'll be damned," I said in wonder. "We're going to live through this after all."
"Shhhhh!" she hissed as she concentrated on the pod. "Swing the ship so the pod enters the hangar bay," she said quietly, concentrating on the pod. I knew she was asking me to perform a tricky maneuver. If I used too much power the pod would smash into the ship and break open. Too little would allow the pod to slip away. It was like trying to get a ring to the center of a long pole, while holding the end and raising or lowering it.
She finally relaxed and shut off the beam. "It's drifting just right," she sighed. "It's all yours."
I cut the gravity to the hangar bay and watched the pod enter. When it was near the center of the bay I gently increased the gravity until the pod grounded with a metallic clang.
When the doors closed I turned on the oxygen and left my seat, with Marty right beside me. We arrived at the hangar bay airlock and found it cycling. I looked at Marty uncomfortably and looked around for a weapon. I settled for a large wrench, resting in it's clamps by the door.
The airlock opened and two men stepped out.
"Lieutenants Rice and Stamp?" The first man stepped out with a smile and extended his hand. I guiltily slid the wrench over on an I-beam beside me and took the hand.
"Lieutenant's Wicket and Wookie. I'm Wookie."
"The missing pilots!" Marty said breathlessly.
"The very same," Wookie nodded with a grin. "Wait until I tell you what we've seen."
"You've seen the aliens?" Marty asked anxiously.
"The butterfly people?" Wicket asked. "Yeah, we've seen them. Believe me I'm not very proud to be a human right now. We blew it."
"What did they mean, the item of contention?" I asked.
"If you will turn the ship to face Blanco Angeles, you will see," Wicket said stiffly.
"Oh no," Marty hurried to the controls.
She switched to the port forward camera just as the meteor collided with Blanco Angeles. There was a bright light, and then molten rock exploded into space in every direction. Blanco Angeles suddenly became a new asteroid belt.
"All those people," Marty moaned in horror.
"It could have been worse; they could have reached Earth as easily as Blanco Angeles. They literally live what the bible and their prophets teach. "An eye for an eye. If thine eyes offend thee", the whole thing. During this war we have killed seventeen hundred and twelve of their people. When you deduct our casualties and with the new influx of people to Blanco Angeles, they saw what they have been waiting for. The total population of Blanco Angeles was equal to their losses. "An eye for an eye"," Lieutenant Wicket said sadly with a shrug.
"The sudden influx they noticed was Commander Lebert and his Green Wing," I said, trying to keep my face neutral. "He was assigned to the planet three days ago."
"Really?" Wicket said with a straight face. He didn't appear to be broken up about it.
"Well we've all been invited to the peace talks," Wookie said suddenly. "We can't get there if we don't get this rust bucket moving. Anybody got a tool box?"
