Chapter Seven
“What’s your status?” asked Sash from behind him, addressing the computer officer he had sent to the navigational mainframe in an attempt to undo whatever damage the saboteur had created. When there was no answer for a moment, he asked again. “Officer Bal, what’s your status?”
The communication device hissed before the younger officer’s face appeared on the screen. “We’ve secured the mainframe, Commander. Two of the soldiers you sent have captured a Dazon soldier who was fleeing the scene, and they’re taking him to a holding cell.”
“Who was it?” asked Orix, tense with anticipation.
“He didn’t identify himself, General, and he carried no identification, but one of the security details said he recognized him from the construction crew that built the consulate and now maintains it.”
He let out a small sigh of relief to know the traitor hadn’t arrived with his armada. There might still be those loyal to Aryk embedded in his group of soldiers, but he hadn’t brought an active traitor into their midst and facilitated this attack.
“Will you be able to fix what he’s done and remove the dampening field to fold our ships back?” asked Sash.
Orix held his breath for a moment in anticipation of the computer officer’s answer, his gaze never deviating from the ships filling the screen as they circled Earth, with the Exodus-class ships getting into position to land. So far, they had ignored the consulate, but he didn’t expect that to last, especially since they had no means of defending themselves beyond some surface-to-air missiles installed by humans and part of one of their programs designed to deflect large meteors and space junk, not engage fully weaponized battleships.
“I believe so. I’m going to have to reboot the whole system and go in through a back door, so it’s going to take a little while, but I think I can get the dampening field down and return our ships.”
Sash asked the question that had been weighing heavily on everyone’s minds. “Do you believe the emperor has a way to override the dampening field when he’s ready to leave Earth?”
“Undoubtedly, Commander. He wouldn’t want his only escape route to be tied to the navigational mainframe here on the consulate.”
“Can you deactivate his device remotely?”
Officer Bal hesitated for a moment. “It depends on what I find in the coding, but probably not, Commander. I’m sure this was carefully planned, and it’s likely that he has redundancies and backups, should I managed to somehow deactivate the primary device. He wouldn’t leave anything to chance.”
Sash nodded. “Send status reports every five minutes and work as quickly as you can, Officer Bal.”
“Of course, sir.” A second later, the younger officer broke the link, and the screen went blank.
“What’s happening on the planet, Orix?”
He looked up at his friend as Sash walked over to join him. “They’ve landed a few Dazon ships, and it looks like they’re syncing Exodus-class ships to enter the atmosphere and land as well.”
“How long do you think they’ll ignore us?”
Before Orix could answer, one of the ships broke away from its orbit closer to Earth and streaked toward the Moon. “I think time’s up.”
Commander Darvig turned to an ensign on his left. “Bring up the SAM system and target the ship heading toward us. Use Firing Protocol 18-B.”
Orix arched his brow ridge. “The Dazon ship will withstand any of the Earth missiles you fire at it.”
Sash nodded grimly. “More than likely, but they’re the only weapons at our disposal, and I don’t like the idea of just giving Aryk’s people a free shot at destroying us.”
Orix agreed with his friend’s reasoning, but he didn’t see the point of deploying missiles that had no chance of harming the ship to which they were directed. He reevaluated his opinion a moment later when he saw one of the missiles explode just before reaching the ship. A second later, the ship faltered and began to spin out of control, with no signs of energy showing. He turned to Sash with his mouth hanging open. “What was that?”
“That was an electromagnetic pulse created from the discharge of the nuclear weapon. The EMP from the nuclear warhead short-circuited the electrical system on the ship. I figured Aryk hadn’t bothered to read any of the debriefings we sent his way when we first set up the consulate and incorporated the preexisting human SAM system into the defense system. Our shields would withstand a direct attack from a nuke, but I was betting on the fact Aryk hadn’t bothered to harden our systems against any Earth defenses, assuming he would just dismiss them as inconsequential.”
“You accurately judged Aryk’s hubris.” He paused as he saw another ship breaking formation and coming their direction. “How many of those missiles do you have?”
“Just four, and I don’t know if the trick will work again. If they replayed the recording, they’ll likely realize what happened, and they’ll be less likely to allow the nuclear warhead to get that close to them again before they destroy it.”
Under normal fighting conditions, they would’ve ignored something as ineffectual as a nuclear missile that would implode as soon as it collided with their shields, but now they knew what the missile could do, and it was likely it had lost any advantage over them.
Orix held his breath as Sash ordered the next missile fired, and it deployed with a sure arc straight toward the ship that was rapidly approaching the consulate. He barely smothered a curse when the ship destroyed the missile with ample time to avoid the EMP blast.
“Brace yourselves,” said Sash as the ship entered firing range and began to shoot at the consulate. The building rumbled, and the walls shook around them with the first blasts. The structure was a hardened facility designed to withstand alien attack, should the Earth ever decide Dazons were no longer welcome, but all the fortifications would only delay the battleship’s ability to destroy them. Unless they could get their ships back quickly, the enemy warship would soon destroy the consulate.
Security still hadn’t arrived, and she braced herself for the third impact as Elak moved forward in the familiar pattern, clearly intent on slamming her against the wall again. The impact never came. Suddenly, the room trembled, and Elak was thrown off balance. He stumbled forward, and she continued to cling to him as they both went down while the walls shook and cracks formed in the floor.
She didn’t have to ask Elak’s opinion on what was happening. The consulate was clearly under attack, and it had saved her from a third bashing against the wall, though she had a hard time being grateful about that when she looked up and saw the cracks also appearing in the ceiling. They were all in danger, but she was certain she couldn’t persuade Elak to help her evacuate the babies from the nursery. He would continue on his appointed mission as soon as he dealt with her.
She couldn’t allow that. The answer was literally staring at her. As a chunk of the wall fell away, she could see a section a wire inside. Electricity coursed through it, and she could hear a crackling sound. Cautiously, she reached out a hand for the encased wire, half-expecting volts of electricity to shoot through her and send her flying across the room. The wire hummed in her hand, but it didn’t electrocute her.
Holding her breath, she tugged carefully, trying to expose more of the wire. With a big wrench of her shoulder, she was able to rip free a section, and that section hissed with raw electricity. She scooted away from Elak, who was slightly disoriented, or he probably would have realized what she was up to sooner than he did.
He looked up just as she extended the severed electrical wire and touched the exposed section to his side. She was afraid nothing would happen, since the Dazon used a different power source, one with which she was unfamiliar, but sparks flew as soon as it touched the man in front of her. He screamed, and his body began to twitch and jerk under the force of the electrical current flowing through him.
She had no idea the voltage, or if it was even measured in volts from the alien power source, but it was clearly sufficient to incapacitate Elak. She kept the wire against him until he slumped to the floor, no longer moving. Even then, she held it to his skin several moments longer, until the unpleasant scent of burnt flesh filled the room. Finally, she jerked it away and stuffed it back into the wall as best she could. It wasn’t safe or secure, but she needed it out of the way long enough to ensure she didn’t trip over it as she tried to maneuver the cart full of babies out of the nursery.
She got to her feet, feeling pain radiate from her skull all the way down her back and into her tailbone. If it hadn’t been for the nanotechnology inside her, she probably would have been dead from the second collision with the wall. Carefully, she probed the back of her skull, which was slightly mushy, but not as squishy as it had felt even a few minutes ago. She was healing, and she could only hope it would be a rapid process, because she didn’t have time to baby herself or be limited by pain.
Cautiously, she approached Elak’s prone form, stepping carefully around him. Could a body still carry an electrical charge? She didn’t know, and she didn’t want to find out the hard way by accidentally electrocuting herself while brushing her foot against him or something equally mundane.
He made no move toward her, and she couldn’t be certain if he was dead or alive. She should have been horrified at the idea that she might’ve killed someone, but she couldn’t muster that emotion, especially as she looked down at the unconscious babies and recalled exactly what Elak had planned for them—well, what Ha had planned for them, but Elak was perfectly happy to set in motion.
The room had briefly stopped rumbling, but it resumed now, and she was certain the consulate was under attack again. She looked up cautiously at the ceiling, and the cracks forming were enough to persuade her that they would be safer outside of the nursery. Or at least she hoped they would. It was entirely possible the whole consulate could collapse on top of them at any moment.
That was a cheery idea, she thought with a slight edge of hysteria as she pushed the cart out of the nursery and through the playroom. She thought briefly of trying to rouse the Dazon attendants who had been knocked out by their comrade, but the babies were her first priority.
Fortunately, as she opened the hydraulic door to take them through, a team of security people arrived just then. “There are four inside that need to be saved, and one that probably can’t be. He doesn’t deserve it anyway.”
She was certain they would have asked more questions and insisted on a debriefing, but she pushed on through and made her way to the command center. There was no logical reason to go there, other than she was certain that’s where Orix would be if he wasn’t on his ship already. At least at the command center, she might have a chance to talk with him aboard his ship before the consulate was destroyed.
An ache in her stomach made her pause and bend forward for a moment. It wasn’t caused from a physical injury. It was simply an emotional reaction to the rational thought that invaded her brain. There was no way if Orix was still alive, and the Nembria was intact, that an alien ship would have had a chance to fire on the consulate anyway. Orix would have died rather than let that happen, and he had probably already done so.
Pain like she’d never known consumed her, and she barely resisted the urge to let out a howl of suffering. Instead, she stood up and forced herself to move forward, needing to know if her guess was correct and hoping against hope that it wasn’t.
When she entered the command center, it was controlled chaos. She’d never seen so many people filling it before, though she wasn’t a frequent visitor to the room. She’d only been there a couple of times before, usually in search of Commander Darvig for something related to the babies.
A surge of happiness filled her when she saw Orix standing before a monitor with Sash on his left and the president’s daughter a few feet away on his right. She let out a small cry and pushed the cart faster as he turned to face her.
He met her halfway, his expression full of confusion and concern. “What happened?”
He had barely finished uttering the question before she threw herself into his arms and pressed her lips to his as she stretched as tall as she could to reach them. “It was awful, but now isn’t the time. We’re safe, and you’re safe.”
He carefully set her down, though his arm remained around her waist. “We’re safe for a few more minutes,” he said, his tone heavy.
She looked up at the screen, watching one of the largest Dazon warships dominating the view as it blasted the consulate. Each time its turrets fired, the building shook. “Where are your ships?”
Before Orix could give her an answer, an excited voice broke in, and a younger man’s face filled the screen, removing the view of the ship that had been firing on them. “The dampening field is down, Commander. I took the liberty of initiating the folding of the ships back to our space, and they should be here quickly. Without the dampening field though, Aryk’s armada can fold away as soon as they’re the minimum safe distance from the planet or the Moon.”
“Understood,” said Sash. A moment later, the view on the screen changed once more, this time showing several new ships appearing on the screen. She recognized the Nembria from Orix having shown it to her once before on the screen in her quarters. “What’s going on?” she asked, confused by the turn of events.
“I’ll explain to you when this is over.” He bent his head and pressed a deep kiss to her mouth before lifting it again to look down at her, his gaze solemn. “And I will be back.”
Orix lifted his wrist and pressed a button on his device, winking out of sight a second later.
She knew he had folded, and she assumed it was to his ship. Answers would have to wait, but she clung to the promise he had made. Orix fully intended to return to her, and she was certain he was stubborn enough to do so.
Orix had just settled into his seat on the bridge when his communications device chimed. He pressed it and brought it closer to his eye, somewhat surprised to see Dr. Wy’s face. “Now isn’t a good time, Doctor.”
Dr. Wy nodded, and he spoke quickly. “If you can salvage either one of the Exodus-class ships, that would solve our lab problems. They’ll both have self-contained lab facilities aboard, and they should be comparable to what I left behind on Dazonia Major. We can shorten production time down from years to months, but only if you can save at least one of those ships and prevent it from folding back to the home world.”
“Understood.” A second later, the doctor’s face was gone, and the battle fully engaged Orix’s attention. It didn’t last long, and the ships began folding as soon as they realized the dampening field was down, and Orix’s armada had returned.
He coordinated the ships to focus on the Exodus-class cruisers, deciding salvaging labs would be more important than trying to destroy the ships that were sneaking away. From their monitoring, he was certain they hadn’t managed to acquire any Earth captives during their landing process, and they had never completed docking either Exodus-class on Earth’s soil.
The only way to keep the Exodus-class ships from folding back to Dazonia was to destroy their folding technology. He coordinated the ships so that several were firing on each Exodus-class, while the remaining ships served as a perimeter and blocked any attacks from Aryk’s ships, should they try to interfere in the process of crash-landing the Exodus-class ships.
Most of Aryk’s ships were already gone, and his people managed to shoot down one more before the last one folded away. The Exodus-class ships had sophisticated weaponry, but his ships were close enough that the larger ship couldn’t risk using it without destroying themselves as well. One of the captains’ faces flicked onto the screen. It was Kible Del. “General Monash, if you’ll cease firing on our ship, we’ll fold away and not return.”
“At least for today,” added Orix cynically. “The only thing I can accept from you is surrender. You have to land your ship on Earth or by the consulate on the Moon, and then I’ll allow your people to fold back to Dazonia if you can catch one of your ships that’s fleeing.” He nodded to his communications ensign. “Open communications with the other ship and extend the same offer, Ensign.”
Kible nodded stiffly. “Allow us to take an escape pod, and we can fold back on our own without trying to hail one of the ships that has already folded back.”
Orix had his doubts about that plan, since escape pods weren’t designed for folding over long distances, but it wasn’t his problem if they got stranded or folded into the middle of a black hole. “That’s acceptable. Now land your ship.”
His group followed Kible’s Exodus-class ship all the way down to the planet, ensuring it landed as agreed. He observed the process as one of the escape pods prepared to launch, wondering if they had managed to fit all two hundred people that would have been required to keep the Exodus-class at minimal functioning level into the pod. He would ensure his people knew to check the ship carefully, to look for any traps left behind and ensure it hadn’t been rigged to explode.
He turned his attention to the other ship, whose captain had declined to surrender. The ship was now in freefall, and he hoped the lab would be salvageable by the time it landed. He also hoped they had maneuvered the ship far enough away from any habitable zones to prevent or severely reduce human casualties when the ship crashed.
In less than five minutes, the Exodus-class ship was buried with its hull into the ground, having created a huge crater in the bare land surrounding it where it had crashed. Sensors indicated there were no human dwellings nearby, and the computer found no signs of human life in the area surrounding the crash site.
He sent troops to round up the survivors and try to salvage as much of the lab as possible, also warning them to be alert for traps or auto-destruction initiated by the ship’s captain.
With little left to do that required his attention in the air, he returned to the consulate and docked the Nembria before folding back onto the station, directly to the command room.
He went straight to Mac, who stood by the cartful of babies. His first priority should have been to debrief Sash in person, despite the commander having witnessed events from the command center. Instead, he had to hold her again first, and he took her into his arms, squeezing her tightly.
She buried her face against his chest, and her words were obscured, but not incoherent, when she asked, “Is it over?”
He ran a hand through her honey-blonde hair, savoring the feel of his mate in his arms. “For now, but the Emperor hasn’t given up. He underestimated us today, but I doubt he’ll make the same mistake twice. I don’t know what he has planned, and we’ll have to be ready, but today was a victory for our side.”
“I was so scared I was going to lose you and the babies.” She clung to him. “I love you, Orix.”
“I love you too, Mac.” It shouldn’t have been possible, but he somehow managed to hold her even closer as he put a hand down on Carmen, whose eyes were just starting to open. He wasn’t surprised that she was the first baby stirring. They were all so eerily still, and he was certain they had been through something, but Carmen was the first to recover. She was going to be a handful, and he looked forward to the challenge of raising her with the woman in his arms at his side.