“What are you doing?” Oscar shouted.
“Helping them.”
“Get back to the shuttle!”
“I’m with you, Mac,” Francis Rawlins said.
Mac was already in the tunnel. Light shone on him from behind. “I’ll take care of them,” he told Francis.
“They’re my team, damnit.”
“Okay.”
“Mac, for Christ’s sake,” Oscar said. “Get back to the shuttle, both of you.”
“Two minutes, Oscar. Come on, man, that ain’t going to make any difference.”
“Jesus.”
“The wall is changing again, look,” Dudley said. He stopped himself, and shone his suit lights on the patch just in front of his helmet. Emmanuelle drifted up beside him.
The tattered aluminum now formed a series of small corrugations. Spaced between them was a yellow ceramic. It had small red markings on it. “That’s interesting.”
“Hey, is that writing?” Emmanuelle asked.
“Could be. What do you think, Oscar?”
“We’re not sure. Make sure you get a clean video of it.”
“Copy that.” Dudley waited a moment. “Geddit? Copy. That.”
“Just video the bloody thing,” Emmanuelle moaned.
“OhmyGod.” Sandy pushed herself back from her console as if it had just given her an electric shock. “Sir, missile launch. The lead ship has fired. Eight. Nine. Twelve. That’s confirmed as twelve missiles.”
“At us?” Wilson asked. He was pleased by how calm he sounded.
“Four of them, yes. The rest are on courses for ships two, three, and six.”
Wilson’s virtual finger stabbed at a communications icon. “Mac, Francis, get out of there now. I’m recalling the shuttle in three minutes.”
“We’re almost at level seven.”
“The aliens are firing at us. Get out of there. I am not going to repeat this order.”
“Yes, sir.”
“The other ships are responding to one’s missile launch,” Anna called out. “Salvos launching from ships three, two, five, six, four. Oh, now eight has launched. Lead ship has fired again. Over one hundred missiles in flight. Sir, twenty-four of them are heading for us. God, they’re hitting fifteen gees.”
“Son of a bitch,” Wilson spat. “Pilot, take us over to the Watchtower. We’ve got to get that shuttle on board. Tu Lee, is the hyperdrive ready?”
“Aye, sir,” Tu Lee said. “We can go FTL at any time.”
Mac’s virtual hand twisted the throttle as far as the graphic would let him. He shot out of the station compartment into free space. His suit sensors locked on to the shuttle, and a bright red trajectory plot streaked across his virtual vision. He steered himself along it, ignoring the amber velocity warnings winking urgently. Francis was beside him, matching his flight.
A searing white light appeared from behind the Watchtower. Mac flinched inside his suit. Then logic kicked in. It was the Second Chance’s plasma drive, bringing the ship in close. Cutting down the time it would take for the shuttle to get inside its force field.
A time that shouldn’t have existed. I couldn’t leave them without making some effort to help. I just couldn’t. Who knew this would happen?
He started to decelerate a few meters short of the shuttle, using his legs to absorb most of the impact. Even so, he hit hard. The cilia on his soles gripped the fuselage grid, preventing any rebound. Francis came down beside him. “Bugger me,” she grunted. Her legs were bent sharply, torso twisting.
“Go,” Mac told the shuttle pilot.
“You’re not inside yet.”
“Just go. We’re secure.”
Space around him flared yellow as the chemical rockets ignited.
Oscar had hurried back into the bridge compartment. Wilson acknowledged him with a quick wave as he claimed his console. He was waiting for the shuttle, willing it across the gap. Both Jean Douvoir and the shuttle pilot did a superb job, rendezvousing thirty kilometers from the Watchtower. A small screen showed the little craft settle onto its cradle, which sank back into the hangar.
Wilson kept clenching his fist, which was disrupting his contact with the console interface pad. “Any contact?” he asked for the tenth time.
“No,” Oscar said. “I think Mac was right, they’re in trouble.”
“What the hell kind of trouble? It was dead over there. Cold and dead.”
“I don’t know.”
“Missile detonation,” Anna said. “Ho boy, here we go. Multiple blasts. High megatonnage. They’re using diverted energy pulsers, very heavy e-band emission, gamma and X-ray activity. Plenty of electronic warfare.”
“Where were they?”
“Ship three. Attacking and defending barrage. The ship’s still intact. Changing trajectory slightly.”
Wilson glanced at the forward portal that was tracking the twenty-four missiles powering toward them. Their velocity alone was terrifying.
“We should go,” Oscar said quietly.
“Right.” The second shuttle was on its cradle, a volunteer pilot ready to launch the second there was any signal from Verbeke or Bose.
“More missile launches,” Anna announced. “And we’re about to get another round of explosions. There’s an attack cluster almost in range of ship five.”
“Any reply to our signal?” Wilson asked.
Sandy shook her head.