Jessica stepped carefully around the storage crates that had been repositioned at the forward end of the hangar bay. It had been slow going making her way from the entrance to her present location about halfway into the massive compartment. Still only illuminated by emergency lighting, it was difficult to see where she was going. Many of the smaller containers had been knocked about by recent events, creating a maze of sorts, composed of crates of varying size and shape, strewn about in no discernible order. She had noticed, however, that they would make good cover in the event of another firefight, which is what she was expecting.
Following her were Sergeant Weatherly, the two surviving technicians that had fought off the first boarding party, and three other crewmen they had picked up and armed along the way. As they broke out into the open, she looked about, glancing up to either side of the bay. There were catwalks located about 2 decks up, running the entire length of the bay.
“Sergeant,” she whispered as she stopped. “Put two up on each side,” she instructed, pointing to either side of the bay. “Tell them to open fire if our guests start shooting. You stay with me.” The sergeant turned to deploy their remaining forces, sending the two that had fought with them earlier to the starboard side, while the other two that had just joined them were sent to the port side.
Jessica took up a position crouched on one knee behind a crate out in the middle of the bay, the sergeant joining her. About one meter high and three meters long, it would provide good cover for their confrontation.
“As good a spot as any,” she whispered. “They’ll have to come through that smaller personnel hatch built into the bay door,” she explained, pointing at the large bay doors at the opposite end of the bay. She had been through this entire section only an hour ago, on her way to board the Jung patrol ship back in the Oort cloud. “There’s no decent cover between them and us, so they’ll have no chance. As long as those guys on the cats can shoot straight,” she added.
“Bridge,” she whispered over her comm-set. “We’ve established a defensive position in the hangar bay. No one’s getting through here without some serious fire power.”
“Don’t shoot first and ask questions later,” Nathan warned over the comm-set.
“I know, Sir. We could use some intel.”
“Exactly. But don’t take any unnecessary chances, either. We’re running out of crew.”
Just then, the hatch lock turned and the hatch swung open. She watched across her gun sights, waiting for someone to step through the hatch. It was at least ten seconds before a helmet leaned in and peeked through briefly before disappearing again.
They’re not stupid, she thought. She tightened her grip on her weapon, her entire body tensing up in preparation to fire as the first visitor stepped cautiously through the hatch. It appeared to be a man, dressed in a pressure suit similar to their own. He was still wearing his helmet, the interior of which was lit, but from this distance she couldn’t make out any facial features. He was however, carrying a weapon that looked exactly like the ones carried by the enemy boarding party they had just defeated. And to her, that wasn’t a good sign.
“You notice that weapon, Ma’am?” the sergeant whispered in barely audible fashion.
“Yeah,” she whispered back. “Just hold, let’s wait for a few more to step through.”
They watched as the first one took a few steps into the bay, after which he stopped and twisted his body about, scanning the dimly lit interior. He turned back toward the hatch as three more stepped through, two men and a woman. As they began to move forward, Jessica and the sergeant popped up from behind their cover, weapons held high in firing position. “That’s far enough!” she shouted.
Two of the male visitors immediately raised their own weapons in preparation to defend themselves.
“DON’T DO IT!” Jessica insisted, leaning slightly forward to not only prepare herself for her weapon’s recoil, but also to emphasis her point, the sergeant imitating her posture.
The man at the center of the group of visitors raised his hands up slowly, stopping about chest high. He turned his body right and left, leaning back slightly to see the four others, two on each side, their weapons also trained on them. Realizing Jessica and her team had the tactical advantage, he motioned for his men to lower their weapons.
“That’s it!” Jessica instructed, as she watched them stand down. “Put them on the deck!” she continued, sweeping her weapon in a downward fashion to indicate her meaning. The two armed men slowly placed their weapons on the deck, before standing upright again, hands held out and up to communicate their cooperation.
The leader of the group slowly removed his helmet. He was a rugged looking fellow, perhaps in his late forties to early fifties, with light brown hair and dark eyes that looked both sympathetic and fiercely determined at the same time. He looked at her for a moment, as well as at the others under her command, after which he said something unintelligible to Jessica, something in another language. He repeated himself one more time before realizing that she did not understand him. It was apparent by his expression that her lack of comprehension was a bit surprising to him.
The other two men removed their helmets next. Both were considerably younger than their leader, one with black hair and eyes, and the other with similar features but of considerably darker complexion. Neither of them smiled, however, only glancing upwards out of the corner of their eyes to assess the guns trained on them from above.
The fourth one to remove her helmet was, as Jessica had observed, a woman, young enough to be the daughter of the leader, but not possessing any similar features. She was of similar complexion, with long straight black hair, and green eyes that held the same determination as their leader’s.
“Bridge, Engineering,” Vladimir’s voice came across the internal comm system. Nathan was instantly encouraged by the improved clarity in the hard-wired comms.
“Go ahead.”
“Main internal communications are fully operational again,” he announced proudly. “We are working on getting full power restored to command decks.”
“Great…”
“…Bridge, Nash,” Jessica’s voice interrupted over the wireless.
“Hold on, Vlad,” Nathan told him, switching back to Jessica. “Go ahead.”
“We’ve got four, uh, visitors in custody down here.”
“Who are they?”
“No clue, they’re not speaking English.”
“What are they speaking?”
“No clue there, either, Sir. What do you want us to do with them?”
Nathan thought for a moment. Somehow, he needed to speak with these people, to find out who they were and what had just happened out there. More importantly, he needed to learn their intentions.
“Bring them to me, I guess,” he said, not really knowing what else to do.
“To the bridge? I wouldn’t advise that, Sir,” she warned. “Too risky.”
He could tell she was trying to hide that last statement from their guests, even if they didn’t appear to speak the same language. But he didn’t see what harm it could do, especially considering their current inoperable state. But he also knew that being a graduate from the spec-ops school meant that Jessica probably knew better about such matters.
“You’re right,” he admitted. “Bring them to the main briefing room on deck C. I’ll meet you there.”
“Yes Sir.”
“Vlad?” Nathan asked after he switched back.
“Yes.”
“How are you for crew down there?”
“I’m not sure,” he admitted. “There are six of us, including myself. We have found four dead, two of them we cannot identify, and three more are missing.”
“What about Chief Patel?” Nathan asked. At some point in time, he was going to have to figure out who should actually be in command. Surely, somewhere on the ship there was a higher ranking officer who was still alive and could relieve him.
“He is still missing,” Vladimir answered, a touch of sadness in his voice.
After a respectful pause, Nathan made his first battle-field promotion. “I guess that makes you chief engineer, Vlad.”
“Yes,” he answered soberly. “Then I guess I should be getting back to work,” he added before clicking the line off. Nathan knew that Chief Patel had been important to Vladimir, as he had talked about him often and had been looking forward to learning from the chief. So he had to figure that the loss was difficult for his friend.
Nathan stood straight and straightened his uniform. “I’m going to the briefing room to meet our visitors,” he announced as he turned to exit. “You have the bridge, Cam,” he added.
“Me?” It caught her slightly off guard. “Why me?”
Nathan looked around the bridge. Other than Doctor Sorenson and Ensign Yosef, Cameron was the only other person in the room. “Why not?” It wasn't much of an answer, it was just the first thing that came out of his mouth.
Cameron had no response, her mouth just hanging slightly open in shock as she watched him exit. She couldn’t see the smile on his face as he exited, as it was the first time he could remember that she had been left speechless.
Nathan entered the briefing room a few minutes after Jessica and their guests. The room was a bit large for such a small gathering. But considering how its contents had been tossed about recently, it probably was just as well. For it had been easy for them to push the knocked over tables and chairs out of the way.
As he entered, he saw the four visitors sitting at the table that had been hastily setup. Two younger men, an older man, and a young women who had green eyes the likes of which Nathan had never seen. There was a strength and compassion behind them, and he found it difficult to look away.
The leader of the group rose as a sign of respect to Nathan, whom he considered to be the leader. The expression on the man’s face seemed a bit off to Nathan, hinting that Nathan was not what the visitor had expected.
Jessica’s reaction to the man’s attempt to stand was more defensive, immediately raising her weapon, with the other two guards following suit. She saw in the man’s eyes as he froze half standing, that he was aware of the threat, just as she noticed how the other two men’s bodies suddenly became taught, as if preparing to take action. This told her much of the experience and demeanor of these men, and she didn’t much like what she saw.
“It’s okay,” Nathan immediately intervened, not wanting things to turn ugly. He watched as Jessica and the guards slowly lowered their weapons, allowing the man to finish standing. The man nodded at Jessica, as if to pay respect to her alertness. But she couldn’t help but feel like he was silently conveying an open challenge to her. There was something in this man that she did not trust.
The leader of the group finished standing and began to speak in a strange language. Although Nathan did not understand him, it was obvious that he was trying to identify himself, by patting his chest and repeating the word ‘Marak’. Within moments they had managed to learn each other’s name, but that was all. But there was something about the language that he kept speaking to the woman sitting next to him. It sounded familiar to him. That’s when he realized that it sounded a lot like Russian.
“Engineering, Briefing Room!”
“Yes, Nathan.”
“Vlad, listen, I’m here with some visitors, from those ships you spotted approaching. They’re speaking a language that sounds like Russian to me. Can you try to speak with them?”
“So I am translator now?”
“Just give it a try, Vlad. Say something to them in Russian.” Nathan pointed at the comm, indicating to Marak that the voice on the other end would be speaking to him.
“Vui ponimayetye po Rooski?” Vladimir said through the comm. The leader of the group looked at the woman next to him, a puzzled look on his face.
“Vui po-ni-ma-ye-tye po Roos-ki?” Vladimir repeated a little more slowly, sounding a little impatient. The leader started speaking in his language again, this time into the comm-set as if he were expecting the man at the other end to understand him.
There was a moment of silence, broken only by Vladimir’s voice. “That is not Russian. May I go now?”
“Sure, thanks.” Nathan sat down, rubbing his face with his hands. It had been worth a try. After all, the humans living on the core worlds were descendants of people from Earth. And Fleet intelligence indicated that many of the primary languages spoken on Earth more than a thousand years ago when they first began to colonize other star systems were still being used out here, at least in some derived form. That was why all communications officers were usually fluent in at least half a dozen languages. But their only comm officer was dead. And even though they had translation software, with all the systems down he wasn’t able to utilize the programs. This is not going to be easy, he thought. What should I try first? After thinking for a moment, he looked at the man and started talking slowly and clearly to him. “Where-are-you-from?”
The man just looked at him. Nathan thought he saw a spark of understanding in his eyes, like he thought he understood what Nathan was trying to ask him, but was afraid to answer incorrectly. And the woman, she had the same look, but even more so than her leader. Nathan repeated himself, after which the two of them exchanged words in their own language. It sounded as if the woman was trying to explain something to her leader, maybe something she understood, or at least thought she understood.
“We-are-from-the-Sol-system,” he began. Nathan frantically searched his mind for the right words, which was usually not a problem for him. But these people were from another world, another planet. How do you communicate with someone from another planet? “Sol? Have you heard of it?” he asked in frustration. Again, he thought he saw a glimmer of recognition from the women. “Earth?” There were more unintelligible words exchanged between the woman and her leader, and Nathan got the feeling that the two of them were in disagreement about something. “Earth? Have-you-heard-of-Earth?”
The leader said something else to the woman in a stern voice, after which she spoke up. “I hear,” she said, thinking for a moment before continuing, “I-hear-Earth.”
“You have?” Nathan responded, shocked that he had actually made a connection, no matter how slight. “You’ve heard of Earth?”
“Yes,” she answered, her pronunciation of the simple word slightly off. He could see she was struggling to try and use a language that she might once have learned, but had long since forgotten. “I-have. I-heard-of-Earth.”
“Then you speak English?”
“An-glees?” she mispronounced.”
“Yes, Eng-glish.”
She thought again, then realized what he was saying. “Ah, Angla!” she exclaimed excitedly. Suddenly a flurry of communication erupted between her and her leader that seemed to last forever before she finally settled down to try and communicate with him.
“I-learn-Angla-much-young,” she stated slowly, thinking about each word before speaking them. “Please-slowly-I-to-understand-you-much.”
He could see that she was struggling to remember the language that she had learned when she was young. “I-will-speak-slowly. My-name-is-Nathan.” It was difficult for Nathan to control his excitement over his new found ability to communicate with her. And all manner of questions were popping into his mind, making it impossible to select which one to ask first.
“Me, Jalea.
“Jalea?” he grossly mispronounced.
“Jah-LEE-yah,” she corrected.
“Jalea?” he tried again, getting a nod of approval from her.
“Ask her who was shooting at us,” Jessica suggested. Nathan motioned with his hand for her to be patient.
“And he is Mah-rahk?” Nathan asked, pointing to her leader.
“Yes. Marak.”
“Marak-is-your-leader?”
She thought a moment before responding. “Yes.” Her tone of voice left Nathan less than convinced, and he wondered if he was their leader, or just the leader of this little group. But he figured he could unravel that mystery later.
“Where-are-you-from?” he asked next. “Your-world?”
“Bah-KAH-rah.”
Nathan repeated the name of her planet to verify the pronunciation.
“The-big-ship. Was-it-from-Bakara?”
“No,” she answered immediately. “Ship-from-Takara.”
“Takara? And they are bad? These Takarans?”
“Yes. Takar, very bad.”
“You fight them, yes?”
“Yes. Long time. Many years.”
Jessica was growing impatient. “Ask them why they’re here?”
Nathan knew she was right. He was letting himself get swept up in the situation and not thinking of the big picture. They were still without main power, and the sensors were down. And they didn’t have maneuvering or main propulsion back online yet, let alone any weapons. And to top it all off, he had no idea what the tactical situation was in the immediate area. Hell, he didn’t even know where the immediate area was.
“Okay. Why are you here?”
“To help,” she answered instantly, and with a smile. “We call. You no answer. We come. You help us. Now we help you.”
Nathan was a little surprised by the offer. He had no idea how they might help them given the circumstances, but the fact that they were offering seemed a positive step. “How can you help us?”
“Your ship, broken. We help fix,” she explained, pointing at the other two men. Up until now, Nathan had thought of them as their personal security detail. But she seemed to be indicating that they were some kind of engineers or technicians.
“You can help us fix this ship? How?”
“These men, very smart, fix many things. Maybe they, fix you.”
Jessica did not like the idea, and feared that Nathan was thinking of accepting the offer. “Lieutenant, I don’t know about this. Maybe we should just say thanks but no thanks and try and fix it ourselves?”
“Soon, more will come,” Jalea added. “Very soon, maybe few, maybe many.”
“Yeah, that’s what I was afraid of,” Nathan admitted, more to himself than to Jalea.
“Nathan,” Jessica spoke up, pulling him aside and turning away from them. “Four strangers, only one of which barely speaks our language, cannot be of enough help to justify the risk,” she insisted.
“How do you know they’re only talking about these four? They’re only from one ship, and there were at least six of them out there before.”
Jessica began to offer more reasons, but Nathan turned away from her to speak with Jalea again.
“How many people do you have that can help?” he asked slowly.
Jalea turned to Marak, undoubtedly asking him the same question. “Many,” she answered.
That did sound like it might help, and Nathan’s expression turned from one of skepticism to one of curiosity.
Marak noticed the change in Nathan’s expression, and said something else to Jalea.
“We have many more to help, but not here.”
“Could turn into an ally?” Nathan explained to Jessica. She still didn’t look convinced. “I’ll let you keep your big gun pointed at them the whole time,” he promised, drawing a patronizing look from Jessica.
“You’re in command,” she said.
Nathan turned back to Jalea and Marak. “We accept your offer,” he explained slowly. “But this nice lady and her friends will have to watch you. I apologize, but we do not yet know you very well. Is that alright?”
Jalea explained the terms offered by Nathan as best she could to Marak. The two of them seemed to debate the issue for a bit longer than Nathan would’ve thought necessary. But then again, sometimes he and Cameron probably debated things for a bit longer than normal as well. In fact, the captain had scolded him for allowing it to happen too often.
Finally, Jalea turned to him. “Yes, is good.”
“Wonderful!” he exclaimed. “Now, these people will take you to where we need the most help.” Nathan turned to Jessica. “Escort them to engineering, please.”
“Yes Sir,” she reluctantly agreed.
Before she could get away, Nathan grabbed Jessica by the arm and stepped in close to her ear and whispered “I wasn’t kidding before, Jess. Keep an eye on them at all times.”
“I had planned on it,” she assured him.
Nathan smiled at them as they filed out of the room, one of the armed crewmen leading the way, with Jessica and the other crewmen following them out the door. After they had left, Nathan flopped back down in his chair, breathing out a sigh of relief. After a moment, he turned on the comm-set. “Engineering, Briefing room.”
“What is it now, Nathan?”
“Vladimir, I have a surprise for you.”
As Nathan made his way forward from the briefing room, he noticed several people helping the injured get to medical. He realized that it only made sense that anyone not helping with damage control would be helping with the injured, it just hadn’t occurred to him, like so many other things today.
“Help!”
Nathan spun around, the cry coming from somewhere behind him. He didn’t see anyone. “Hello!” he called out.
“Help me!” the voice cried out again. It was a woman’s voice, and it sounded like it was coming from around the corner farther down the corridor. Nathan broke into a jog in the direction the voice had come from, stopping at the corner to look down the corridor in search of the woman calling him.
About ten meters away was a young woman that Nathan recognized as one of scientists working on the jump drive. Bloodied and disheveled herself, she was fighting a losing battle to get a seriously injured crewman to medical for treatment. The injured man was considerably larger than her, and she would’ve had difficulty handling him even in an uninjured state.
Nathan quickly ran over to help her with the injured crewman. “Here, let me take him,” he offered.
“I can’t make it,” she pleaded. She looked like she was about to collapse herself, probably from the large gash on her forehead that was still actively bleeding. Nathan immediately stepped in between them, taking the injured man’s arm and draping it over his right shoulder. Once he had the man securely in his right arm, he grabbed the woman with his left arm to provide assistance to her as well.
“Here,” he told her. “Hold on to me.”
“I don’t think I can make it,” she pleaded. “I just need to rest.”
“Come on, it’s just a little farther, you’re almost there.”
She continued to plod forward, her head hanging down low from fatigue.
“Your leg, it’s bleeding,” she pointed out to him, noticing his blood soaked left pant leg.
“Yeah, I know.”
“Does it hurt?”
“Quite a lot actually,” he chuckled, wincing in pain with each step. He had thought his leg was broken when he first woke up back on the bridge. But the more he had gotten used to the discomfort, the more he was convinced that it was just a deep laceration at most. He had managed to ignore the pain up until now, with more important concerns to distract him. But now, with the additional burden of these two injured persons, each step was sending blinding pain shooting up his left leg into his hip. “But I’ll be alright.”
The trip to medical felt like it took forever, despite the fact that it only took a few minutes. As he approached, he called for help and two more crewman rushed to help.
Nathan followed them into medical, not realizing what he was walking into. There were at least twenty people with varying degrees of injury. Some had obvious broken bones and severe lacerations that would probably only require some bone knitting and suturing. But others had far more serious injuries, including traumatic amputations, wide open abdominal wounds, and crushed torsos. And nearly everyone had some sort of burns, which explained the strange smell that hit him as he entered. Oddly though, the less seriously injured seemed to be in the most pain, while the more critically wounded seemed to be too far out of it to feel anything.
He watched in horror as those that could helped care for those that couldn’t. Most of them had little more than basic emergency medical training, and it was doubtful that any of them had practical experience. But yet, there were all in here, doing the best that they could in unbelievably difficult circumstances. They were in a barely lit room full of the injured and dying, while drifting in a wrecked space ship that was waiting to be picked off by the next enemy that came along. How did we end up this way? he wondered. How did it get this bad?
He had almost made it across the main treatment bay, when he noticed an open door to an adjacent room. The room seemed oddly quiet, especially considering the limited space in the main treatment area. Nathan wondered what was in that room, and why it wasn’t being used to treat the wounded. The room was unlit, except for the scant light spilling into it from the main treatment area. Perhaps it was the darkness that peaked his curiosity and drew him closer to the door to peer inside. He wished that he hadn’t. Because in the darkened room were the bodies of the dead, piled unceremoniously just to get them out of the way. The gruesome sight caused a wave of guilt to wash over him. Did these people all die because of me? Because of the decisions I made?
It was almost too much for him to bear, and he quickly made for the small utility room nearby, barely making it to the wash basin before heaving up his breakfast. His head spun and his skin became cold and clammy. Were it not for the counter, he probably couldn’t have remained vertical. He stood there for several minutes, trying to pull himself together. But the guilt was still twisting his gut into knots, and making him want to vomit again, despite the fact that his stomach was empty.
“Are you alright?” a female voice came from behind him. He turned his head slightly to look at her.
“I’m fine,” he lied.
“Yeah? Well you don’t look fine. How much blood did you lose?”
“Huh?” he asked, turning to face her. She was a petite Chinese woman, young, wearing a medical uniform that was stained with blood. Her long black hair was tied back in a pony tail that had also been pulled up into an additional knot, no doubt to keep it out of the open wounds of her patients. She wasn’t even wearing the usual exam gloves that medical personnel always wore, having given up on changing them every few minutes as she jumped from patient to patient in rapid succession. She looked like she had been at it for days, even though it had been just over two hours since the first jump put them into harm’s way. But despite it all, she was still observant enough to notice his discomfort.
“Your leg,” she explained. “It’s bleeding?”
“Oh, that,” he remembered, realizing it was still throbbing. “I can wait. Besides, you’ve got plenty of patients worse off than me.”
“Are you sure?” She suddenly noticed that he out ranked her, and added, “Sir.” Then it dawned on her. “Are you here to talk to the captain?”
Hope suddenly sprung forth in Nathan’s mind. He’s still alive? And he’s conscious? Suddenly, he thought that an end might come to this nightmare called command. If the captain survived, even if was infirmed for awhile, at least he might have someone to come to for advice in the interim.
Nathan looked at the woman, noticing her blood-smeared name tag for the first time. ‘M. Chen M.D.’ “He’s alive?” he asked. “How is he, Doctor? Is he conscious? Can I speak to him?”
“Maybe, he’s in and out,” she warned. “He’s severely injured.”
“Will he make it?”
“If we can get him back to Earth, maybe. He desperately needs surgery.”
“Well can’t you do it?”
She looked at him a moment, puzzlement on her face. “I’m just a resident, not a surgeon. He needs to be taken to a properly equipped facility with a good trauma surgeon, and soon.”
Nathan’s hopes suddenly began to fall again. “I don’t think that’s an option right now.”
“Surely you sent out a distress call? It shouldn’t take more than a few hours for help to arrive from Earth, right?”
“I’m afraid you’re the only chance he’s got right now, Doctor.”
“But I’m not a surgeon. I’ve only assisted in a few minor surgical procedures so far,” she protested. “Besides, we can’t perform surgery as long as the power is out.”
Nathan hadn’t thought of that. “And if the power was restored?” he asked, “could you operate then?”
Doctor Chen looked around, thinking of how she might pull that off. “Maybe, I guess. I could have someone call out the procedures to me from the medical database to help.”
“How long has he got?”
“I don’t know, could be hours, or it could be minutes,” she admitted. “But I still don’t see why we can’t just wait for a rescue ship to come? He’ll have a much better chance if…”
“…There is no rescue ship coming!” he interrupted, frustration getting the better of him. She could tell that he was upset by their current situation. And she saw by the insignia on his uniform that he was bridge staff, so he probably knew more about their situation than she did.
“Can I see him?” he asked.
“Yes, but keep it brief,” she warned. “He’s in the corner,” she added, tilting her head to the right.
Nathan stood up straight, gathering his strength as he straightened his uniform. A few moments later, he was standing at the foot of the captain’s bed. His head was wrapped with a bandage that was soaked with blood where it covered his right eye. His right shoulder still appeared odd, and Nathan realized it was probably dislocated. He had a large, wet bandage laying over his right abdomen that was also stained with copious amounts of blood. He had several large bags of fluids hanging from the ceiling, all connected to an intravenous line that had been placed in his left arm. And there was a large bag of a synthetic blood replacement fluid connected to a tube leading to the one in his right arm. He was breathing on his own, through an oxygen mask that fogged up slightly with each exhalation. His face was swollen and puffy, and at first Nathan wasn’t even sure it was Captain Roberts.
Nathan stared at him for several minutes. He wondered what the captain would have done differently if he were still in command. Would he have killed two of his crew just to suck the boarders out into space? Would he have put the ship in further jeopardy by detonating that torpedo while they were still too close? Would he have allowed those strangers to come aboard and help repair the ship? But mostly, he wondered if the captain’s injuries had somehow been his fault as well.
He was about to leave, as the guilt was starting to make him nauseated once more, when the captain spoke.
“Lieutenant,” he whispered from behind the oxygen mask.
Nathan tried to come to attention, fighting back the nausea that was still swelling up inside him. “Yes Sir!”
“How’s my ship?” he managed to ask.
“She’s busted up pretty bad sir. But we’re still here, and repairs are underway.”
“How’s the XO?”
Nathan was afraid to answer, but knew that he had to be honest. “I’m afraid he’s dead sir.”
The captain coughed several times, which appeared to cause him much discomfort.
“Chief Patel?”
“Missing.”
“Who’s in command?”
“I’m afraid I am, sir.”
The captain flashed what looked like a smile to Nathan, but it was hard to tell with all the swelling. “Well, we’re still alive, so I guess you’re doing okay so far.”
Nathan felt his guilt swelling up again. “I don’t know about that sir,” he admitted. “I think I’ve just been lucky so far.”
“Nonsense,” the captain insisted. “You’re a natural born leader, Nathan. Just like your old man.”
The statement struck Nathan as odd. Although he was aware that the captain knew of his father, he wasn’t aware that he knew anything about him.
“Sir, I don’t know that I can do this,” Nathan admitted. The thought had been running through his mind since the moment that he assumed command. And it felt good to finally admit it to someone.
“Bullshit. Just remember, it’s not about being right and knowing all the answers. It’s about making the call.” The statement had taken a lot out of the captain, who closed his eyes for a moment to rest. Nathan thought for a second that he might have slipped back into unconsciousness, but then his eyes opened again, slowly. “Nathan, take the bars from my uniform.”
Nathan looked around, finally spotting the captain’s cut-up uniform shirt laying on the counter behind him. He picked it up and carefully removed the blood stained bars. He was about to hand them to the captain, when he realized his intentions.
“Put them on,” he ordered softly from behind the oxygen mask.
Nathan reluctantly replaced his lieutenant’s bars with the captain’s bars.
“I hereby order you to assume command of the Aurora, effective immediately.”
Nathan looked down at the floor, unable to look the captain in the eye. He didn’t want the captain to see the fear in his eyes. The fear for his captain’s fate, the fear for his own fate, and most of all, his fear of command. After a few moments, he managed to raise his eyes to meet those of his dying captain, stiffening and offering a salute.
“I relieve you, Sir,” Nathan announced quietly, but with far more conviction than he expected.
The captain could not return his salute. “I stand relieved.” A wave of calm seemed to wash over the captain at that moment, as he closed his eyes again. Nathan started to turn away to exit, when he felt the captain’s hand tug at Nathan’s shirt, stopping him.
“Get them home,” he stated emphatically as Nathan turned back to him. “Get the jump drive home,” he coughed. “It’s their only hope.”
Nathan watched as the captain’s grip on his shirt loosened, his hand falling back to the bed as his eyes closed. Suddenly, an alarm on the bio-monitor started beeping rapidly, startling him. Oh my God.
Doctor Chen had been watching the entire exchange as she cared for a nearby patient. Hearing the alarm, she dropped what she was doing and came running over. “He’s crashing! I need some help in here!”
Doctor Chen pushed Nathan aside as she rushed past, her eyes on the bio-monitor the entire time. “He’s in V-Fib!” she declared.
Nathan backed away, making room for the few people available to help the Doctor as she frantically tried to resuscitate the captain. But Nathan already knew it was too late. The captain had known it as well. That was why he had transferred his command to him.
Nathan exited the sick bay and began wandering the corridor, his mind racked with an overpowering combination of guilt and grief. The medical bay was packed full of people with injuries he had probably caused, and there was a pile of bodies, bodies of men and women, all of whom had sworn to serve their world just as he had upon graduation only a few short weeks ago. Is this what it’s like to be in command?
He wandered down the corridor, not really headed in any particular direction that he was aware of. He passed an ensign that was carrying supplies back to medical. Upon seeing the captain’s bars on Nathan’s collar, the crewman immediately stopped and snapped to attention, which was something that was only done for upper level command staff. At that moment, the lights in the corridor came back on. And suddenly, Nathan knew exactly where he was headed.
Minutes later, Nathan walked onto the bridge. A young marine armed with a close-quarters defense weapon snapped to attention as he passed.
“Captain on the bridge!” the marine announced. It was the first time Nathan had been referred to as captain, and it felt strange, but in a good way.
Cameron spun around from the tactical station, expecting to see Captain Roberts, miraculously healed and returning to take command and get them safely home. But instead, she saw Nathan, wearing a pair of blood-smeared captain’s bars.
“Sorry,” Nathan apologized, seeing the disappointment in her eyes. “It’s just me.”
“I guess it’s official, then,” she admitted reluctantly. She also knew what it probably meant. “Is he…”
Nathan didn’t answer. He didn’t have to, she saw it in his eyes.
“You might want to clean the blood off of them,” she whispered as they turned back to the tactical station.
“Maybe later.”
“Main power just came back on a minute ago,” she told him, noticing him looking at the tactical displays.
Nathan looked around the bridge, noticing that they had cleaned it up in his absence. “I see you tidied up the place a bit.”
“Yeah, well, with everything down there wasn’t much to do. And a few people showed up to help, so we moved out the bodies and as much debris as possible. And we got a tech to shut down the damaged consoles so we won’t have any more sparks or fires if you decide to bounce us around again.”
“How many systems are back up?” he asked, ignoring her sarcasm.
“We’ve only just started assessing things since the power was restored a few minutes ago. We’ve got most of our local sensors back online, although Kaylah says that until she can run a full diagnostic on them, we shouldn’t trust their accuracy out to more than a few million kilometers. She also reports that there are five more small ships out there, that have taken up positions all around us. But I can’t tell if they’re in position to attack us or defend us.”
“Yeah, well, they said they were here to help.”
“Really? You spoke to them?
“Yeah, one of them speaks Angla.”
“What?”
“Angla. I think it means really bad English in their language,” he said. “They’re down in engineering helping Vlad right now.”
“You think that’s wise?” she questioned.
“Don’t worry. Jessica has orders to keep a close eye on them.”
“Jessica?”
“Ensign Nash, from Spec-Ops? She’s one tough nut. Kinda scary. You’d like her,” he jabbed. It felt good to lighten the mood after what they had been through over the last couple of hours.
“I see. How many of these helpers are there?”
“Four, for now. If it works out, there’s more available if needed.”
“Four? How’s she going to watch all four?”
“She’s armed. And she’s got help,” he assured her. “Besides, they warned that more of the enemy might return soon, so I figured we’d better accept their offer, and get out of here as quick as possible.”
“And you just believed them?”
“For now, cautiously.” Nathan stepped up to the tactical console and pressed the comm button. “Engineering, Bridge!”
“Yes,” Vladimir answered.
“How’s it going down there?”
“I’m sorry, Nathan, but it will take longer than I thought to get maneuvering and propulsion systems back online. The damage is worse than I expected.”
“Well, at least you got main power up, that’s something.”
“Thank you, Nathan. But it was not me. It was those people you sent down. They are pretty good engineers. Difficult to speak with, but they are very smart and learn quickly.”
“Glad to hear it. Keep working on maneuvering and propulsion. Bridge out.”
“Lieutenant!” Jessica called out as she entered the bridge with Jalea at her side. Nathan spun around, not expecting to see Jessica back on the bridge so soon. “Oh, excuse me, Captain,” she corrected, after seeing the bloody bars on his collar. “We need to talk.”
“I thought you were watching our guests?” Nathan asked, surprised.
“I’ve got Sergeant Weatherly and the rest watching them. Besides, this couldn’t wait,” she insisted.
“Jalea, this is Cameron,” he introduced.
Jalea, still not terribly confident in her ability to speak English offered only a respectful nod, taking Cameron’s handshake when offered.
“Listen, we’ve got problems,” Jessica continued, interrupting the pleasantries. “According to Jalea, there are more Takaran ships on their way…”
“…What? I hope you don’t mean more like that last one, ‘cause it nearly killed us.” Nathan did not like where the conversation was going. He had just been officially placed in command, and he was hoping for a little more time to get used to the idea before the next crisis.
“No, smaller ones, she thinks…”
“…Anything on sensors?” Cameron interrupted, turning towards Ensign Yosef.
“No Sir.”
“I don’t understand?” Cameron asked Jessica. “How does she know they’re coming?”
“Their ships reported it. They picked up the incoming vessels on their sensors a few minutes ago. I brought Jalea up here so she could translate between you and their ships.”
“Good thinking.” Nathan commended.
“Actually, it was Marak’s idea,” she admitted. “He thought it would be better for her to remain with you, as your translator, for now.”
“But how are Marak and the others going to communicate with our people in engineering?”
“Vladimir figured out that their language is a mixture of Slavic and Germanic languages, with a little Arabic thrown in.”
“Odd combination,” Cameron observed.
“Yeah, well, Vladimir speaks German as well as Russian, and with Jalea’s help he managed to fill in a few of the blanks, at least enough for now. He’s pretty smart, I’ll give him that.”
“Captain!” Ensign Yosef interrupted. “I’ve got them now! Transferring to tactical.”
Cameron looked down at the tactical display. “Two of them, much smaller than the first one. They’re moving fast, maybe twice light, so we can’t out run them.”
“We can’t outrun anything in our current state,” Nathan added, the frustration obvious in his voice.
“How long until they reach weapons range?” he asked Cameron.
“Well, they’ll reach us in about twenty minutes. Assuming their weapons range is about the same as ours, maybe fifteen?”
Nathan thought some more. No propulsion, no maneuvering, no weapons. To him it all equaled one thing-no options. He looked around the bridge. There were marines guarding both exits once more, and two more ensigns had come in and taken the ship’s systems station behind Ensign Yosef, and the Port Auxiliary Station located just in front of the port exit was being reconfigured to manage both Communications and Electronic Countermeasures.
“Can your ships stop them?” he asked Jalea.
“No, Takaran ships big, very strong.”
“Can you call for help?” Jessica interjected.
“No, help too far, no time.”
Nathan noticed that Doctor Sorenson was sitting quietly at her station, running systems checks to keep her mind off of her father’s untimely demise. “Doctor Sorenson?” he asked. “Can we jump again?”
She stared at him coldly for a moment, finally answering. “I do not think you understand the complexity of this system, Captain,” she warned. In her mind, she blamed the reckless manner in which Captain Roberts had used the system for the death of her father. The first transition algorithms had taken days to calculate, and even longer to verify. And these people thought using it was like jumping over a puddle. “You can’t just jump, jump, jump, whenever you like…”
“…Doctor,” he interrupted, trying to take a more gentle tact. “I understand what you’re saying, and under normal circumstances I wouldn’t dream of using it in such a haphazard manner. But these are not normal circumstances. We’ve got more enemy ships on the way, we’ve got no weapons and we’re adrift. I don’t see any other options.”
She looked at him again, realizing he was right. “Maybe. We just got power back minutes ago, and I haven’t finished running diagnostics on the transition sequencer yet. But the field generators are okay, and there is still enough energy in the storage banks for a short jump, maybe two or three light years at the most. But I do not know the state of all the field emitters on the outside of the hull. We took a lot of weapons fire, and if too many of the emitters are damaged, the fields may not initiate properly.”
“What happens if they don’t” Cameron asked.
“I’m not sure.”
Cameron could see in the Doctor’s eyes that she at least had a suspicion of what might happen. “What do you think could happen?”
“Part of the ship might not jump.”
“Part of the ship? I don’t think I like the sound of that,” she insisted.
“Neither do I. Doctor, can’t you check the emitters from here?”
“No. We did not have time to add hard-wired sensor leads to all the emitters, so we used wireless ones on more than half. But the external comm array is damaged, so I am missing status information on at least half of the emitters.
“Well,” Nathan said, “I guess the next question is, how do the Takarans treat prisoners?”
“No prisoners. Takar execute all rebels.” Jalea answered solemnly.
“I don’t like the sound of that either,” Cameron added.
“Rebels?” Nathan asked.
“Yeah, I was getting to that,” Jessica explained. “Seems these people are part of a rebellion against an oppressive regime. Nasty people, from what she tells me. They’ve been fighting them for decades, and have nearly lost everything. I’m not sure, but it sounds to me like we arrived just in time to save their butts. They had lost twenty ships before we jumped into the middle of it and took out that warship.”
“When did you…” Nathan began to ask.
“…We talked on the way up,” she interrupted.
“Well, that explains why they want to help us,” Nathan realized.
“Yeah, they want our ship for their little war,” Cameron said under her breath. She wasn’t sure how well Jalea understood English and didn’t want her to be aware of her suspicions.
“Or maybe they’re just looking for an ally?” Nathan offered.
“To be honest, Sir,” Jessica interrupted. I don’t think they knew what to expect when they came aboard. They tried to hail us first, but got no answer.”
“Comms were down,” Cameron reminded him.
“Is there enough room in the hangar bay for the rest of the rebel ships?” he asked Cameron, an idea brewing in his head.
“Yeah, I think so, If we park them tight, they’re a bit bigger than a fleet tactical shuttle, but they should fit.”
“Doctor, will the additional mass of those ships affect your jump calculations?”
“Not at all. The transition system uses the same mass canceling technology as the FTL system.”
“Jalea, have all your ships land in our hangar bay,” Nathan told her.
“This is not a good idea,” Cameron warned him. “You heard what she said-part of the ship might jump?”
“Better than all of us being executed,” he argued.
“I’m with her, Sir,” Jessica agreed. “Besides, I don’t like the idea of taking on who knows how many more rebels.”
“How many people on your ships,” Nathan asked Jalea.
“Twenty, I think. But I not understand,” she added.
“Twenty? I can’t watch twenty of them,” I’ve only got six guys right now, and four of them aren’t even combat trained.”
“Keep them in the hangar bay for now. I doubt they’re going to want to keep all their ships bottled up for long after we jump anyway. I know I wouldn’t,” Cameron explained.
Nathan looked at Jessica, who finally resigned to the inevitable. “You’re the boss.”
“You can have my two marines, if it makes you feel better?” Nathan offered.
“Naw, better you keep’em, in case something goes horribly wrong,” she advised.
“Why you want ships here?” Jalea asked again, confused.
“If you bring the ships here, I can get us all far away from the Takaran ships,” Nathan explained.
“I must speak with Marak,” she told him, pulling a small communication device from her pocket. Nathan indicated to her that it was alright, and she began explaining the situation as best she understood it to Marak. Although they could not understand what was being said, it was obvious that Marak was not enthusiastic about the idea.
“Marak, he not want do this. He not understand why?” Jalea told him.
“Trust me, I can get us out of here, like that,” he told her, snapping his fingers.
“How? Your ship not move,” she insisted.
“It’s complicated,” he told her. “Hell, I don’t even understand it myself,” he mumbled. “You just need to trust me.”
She said nothing, only looked into Nathan’s eyes.
“We’re going, with or without your people,” he warned. “In?” he asked, turning to Cameron.
“Thirteen minutes.”
“Thirteen minutes,” he finished. “So if you don’t want to go, you and Marak better leave now, before it’s too late.”
After another pause, Jalea resumed her argument with Marak over her communicator. Only this time, she seemed to be arguing in support of Nathan’s plan. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, she switched channels on her communicator, apparently giving instructions to the rest of their ships.
“They will come,” she assured him.
“Great!” Nathan exclaimed, happy to have a plan to act upon. “Jess, get some people down to the hangar bay to guide them in. And keep them all there.”
“Yes Sir,” she acknowledged as she turned to head for the exit.
“Captain,” Doctor Sorenson interrupted. “It might be safer if I actually had a destination this time.”
“Can you plot a jump that quickly?”
“It’s not really a plot,” she explained. “I have to write an algorithm that will control the entire process so that our jump is for the correct distance. The course will have to be plotted by your navigator.”
“I guess that would still be me,” Cameron volunteered, knowing that there was no one else available.
“Well then, can you write the algorithm that quickly?” Nathan asked the Doctor.
“I can write it, yes. But there will not be enough time to verify its accuracy.”
“I can live with that. Jalea,” Nathan asked. “We need somewhere to go, a place to hide while we make repairs. Somewhere close. Do you know of such a place?”
“I think, yes. Korak,” she told him.
“Korak?”
“KOO-rahk,” she corrected.
“Great! Don’t really care how you say it,” he mumbled. “Show her,” he told Jalea, pointing toward Doctor Sorenson. “Kaylah, can you help them figure it out?”
“It looks like we’re currently in a system that’s part of a five star cluster,” Cameron explained, pointing to a chart displayed on the tactical station in front of her and Nathan. It had taken a few minutes to figure out what Jalea had been describing. But with Kaylah’s help, they were able to put together a rough plot. “It’s pretty small, considering. Only about eight light years in diameter. And if I’m understanding her correctly, there’s gotta be at least a dozen inhabited worlds scattered throughout the entire cluster.”
“I’ve never even heard of such a system,” Nathan commented. “Where the hell are we?”
“Yeah, I was thinking the same thing,” Cameron admitted. “I know one thing, we sure aren’t in the core.”
Nathan had come to the same conclusion the moment that Jessica had told them about the rebellion. That was surely something that Fleet intelligence would’ve known about. And to their knowledge, the entire core and most of the fringe worlds were controlled by the Jung Dynasty. And they would not have allowed someone like the Takarans to rule over such a system in their own backyard.
“Do we have a destination?” he asked.
“Well, we’re currently in the primary component of a binary system,” she explained, pointing at the display. Over here is the secondary component, Korak, about one point five light years away. It’s small, only one gas giant orbiting a red dwarf. Dozens of moons, one of them inhabited, some sort of mining colony. The system is mostly an asteroid field beyond that, and a pretty dense one so it’s a good place to hide. She says that if we’re lucky we can hide out there for at least a few days. There are one or two Takaran ships in that system, smaller ones, like the ones that are inbound now. But Jalea says that it would take at least a couple of days for word of us to reach them. I guess they have some kind of really fast comm-relay probes that can go like a hundred times light or something. But, at least there won’t be anyone looking for us for a few days. And since the asteroid field is so dense, unless they’re watching for us, they’re not likely to notice when we jump in.”
“Yeah, they wouldn’t be expecting that, would they,” he chuckled. “Then I guess that’s our destination. At the least, it might give us enough time to get maneuvering and propulsion back online.” Nathan turned his attention to Ensign Yosef, monitoring the sensors from her sciences station. “Ensign Yosef. How many rebel ships have landed so far?”
“Only two, sir.”
“Two?” Nathan quickly activated the comm. “Jessica! What’s taking so long down there?”
“These ships are bigger than we thought, Captain. I don’t know if we’re going to be able to fit them all in here!”
“Well, leave one in the airlock and one on the apron, if you have to! Just get them on deck! How long before they can fire on us?” he asked Cameron
“Five minutes, maybe,” Cameron answered. He knew she was guessing. They knew nothing about Takaran weapons and technology.
“Jalea,” he asked, drawing her away from Doctor Sorenson’s side. “We need to get your ships on board more quickly, there’s not enough time.” She looked puzzled. “Not enough time,” he repeated. “Go faster.” Suddenly, she understood what he wanted, and began communicating the problem with Marak. A moment later he heard Marak’s voice giving a rather important sounding command over their communicators. He didn’t understand what he was saying, but from the tone of Marak’s voice he was pretty sure that if he had, he wouldn’t have liked it.
“Nathan,” Cameron called. “Two of the rebel ships have reversed course!”
“What?”
“They’re on an intercept vector for the incoming Takaran ships.”
“What are they doing? They’ll be destroyed!” Nathan spun back around to face Jalea “What did he tell them to do!”
“Need more time,” she explained. “They give.”
“They give? You mean they give their lives?” Nathan couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “Do they know this?”
“They know,” she answered, with no emotion showing in her voice.
“The rebel ships have fired on the Takarans, and they’re changing course, heading away from us.”
“Did their fire…”
“…No effect,” Cameron reported. Nathan was now standing next to her at the tactical display, watching the engagement. “The Takaran ships are changing course, pursuing.” They watched for less than a minute, until the two Takaran ships caught up to the rebels and obliterated them. “The rebel ships are destroyed,” Cameron reported. “They’re resuming original course. ETA six minutes, weapons range in one.”
“How many people were on those ships?” Nathan asked Jalea coldly.
“Six,” she answered in much the same tone.
Nathan couldn’t believe what he had just witnessed. Six people had just sacrificed themselves for nothing. At the most, it might have gained them an extra minute.
“They’re firing!” Cameron reported. “Missiles inbound, tracking four, all nukes! ETA thirty seconds!”
“Bridge! Hangar Bay! The last of the rebel ships are on deck!”
Nathan stood there staring intently into Jalea’s eyes. She didn’t blink, didn’t look away. Where he had once seen strength and compassion, he now saw only a cold ruthlessness that he wasn’t sure he could understand. And he knew he didn’t like it.
“Captain!” Cameron begged.
“Kill the view screen,” he ordered calmly. “Doctor Sorenson, it’s time to go.”