Fury to the Stars (Universe in Flames Book 2) (24 page)

When Ryonna shook him, he jumped clear out of the
chair. It took a moment to get out of his foggy state.

“Damn, I shouldn’t have smoke it that fast,” he said
out loud.

“What did you smoke? Why are your eyes so red?
Should I call for medical assistance?” Ryonna asked with genuine concern in her
voice.

“No, no.
No
. I’m fine. I just didn’t expect
to fall asleep. I’m sorry, my brain just needs a few moments to
reboot
.”

Ryonna raised an eyebrow at the comment. Tar’Lock
stood behind her with a dubious expression, sniffing repeatedly and peering
around and trying to identify the source of the overwhelming smell.

“Can we please look at what you have uncovered?”
Ryonna interrupted the spectacle with some impatience.

“Right,” said Cedric. He slapped his cheeks a couple
of times to straighten his thought process, and mentally move back up to speed.

Circling the glowing laptop screen, they all watched
a small text box announcing that decryption was complete. Cedric quickly put a
few lines of code in place to make sure that if the file contained malicious
code, it would be quarantined within a memory sandbox. He also restricted write
access to the file’s folder, to make sure the file would not self-delete upon access.
A minute later he was sure that he’d taken all the basic security measures, and
he finally opened the file.

Two things jumped open, and sent a cold shiver down
his spine. First, the name of the window that the opening of the file had
generated—“Project Armageddon”—was scary enough by itself. But the most
worrying part, the thing that truly made him change color—was the timer. A
small visual on the right of the screen, it had quietly started counting down
from sixty minutes the moment they’d begun.

Seeing the alarmed expression on Cedric’s face,
Ryonna interjected, “What? What is it?”

“We may have a serious problem. If I’m reading this
right, and I think I am, this file is not only schematics but also serves as a
trigger for something else: something very nefarious.”

“Could you be more specific? We’re dealing with acts
of terrorism an awful lot lately. I’m sure their end game involves doing some
sort of damage eventually,” proposed Tar’Lock, who had stayed silent until now.

“You can say that again! I’m afraid the damage could
be global. Give me a few more seconds.”

He sifted through the schematics, piecing together
an impromptu analysis. But the more he looked at them, the more he felt a sense
of dread and urgency. Soon, the fear turned to utter terror.

“This is schematics for a quadrinium-enhanced,
portable bomb. Alone, it would probably destroy half a block if used in a city.
There seem to be thirty such devices located all over the world. All located
near either nuclear- or quadrinium-powered plants. If these devices blow, it
could very well render this world uninhabitable for thousands of years. That
is, if the sheer combined force of these synchronized detonations doesn’t set
off a chain reaction. One that could very possibly destroy the entire planet.”

“Well, it sure is a good thing you managed to decode
this file first! Right?”

“Except there’s a timer. And it’s ticking...” He
pointed.

“What? How long do we have?!”

“Fifty-seven minutes and thirty-five seconds.”

“And you’re sure opening the file triggered those
particular devices?”

“Let me double check.”

The impending planetary doom sent a jolt of
adrenaline through Cedric’s body. It was like nothing he ever felt before in
his life. Whatever hazy high was left in his mind was obliterated by racing
thoughts. He sifted lines of code and logs from within the sandbox.

“I did put fail-safes around the file. I’m checking
to see if they’ve succeeded in restricting communication with the outside
world. After a few tense moments, a slight relief at a taskbar notification:
All network communications had been stopped by the sandbox. Cedric permitted a
slight exhale, seeing no data had been sent to the Internet.

He did, however, curse himself for not simply
disabling any of the devices such as wifi and Ethernet. He quickly sent the
terminal commands to promptly do so. He also checked at the hardware level, to
make sure they hadn’t been accessed at a lower level.

That’s when his heart skipped another beat. An
unknown device was listed under networking, and it was active and transmitting.
He tried shutting it down but none of the commands were working. Moreover, he
intuited that even had he managed to do so, the start of the timer was probably
tied to the signal being initially sent.

“We’re fucked!”

“What? Explain!”

“Even with my safeguards in place, I think we’ve
triggered the timer on the devices. In fifty-five minutes, Earth might be
obliterated.”

“Why would the terrorists give us a one hour delay?”

“Perhaps so whomever is responsible for this would
have time to get off world. I doubt we’re dealing with suicidal maniacs... More
like a vicious mind.”

Cedric swallowed heavily. “It’s all my fault.”

“Why would it be your fault?”

“The encryption was way too strong to start with.
All of a sudden I found an exploit, almost miraculously, but I now realize it
must have been put there so we would trigger the program. If I hadn’t...”
Cedric let the suspended sentence hover in the air. He didn’t have the strength
to say the words. He was too ashamed that he’d been too high at a crucial
moment, and that all the gravity of sensitive IT security matters might have
been completely lost on him for that reason alone.

“If you hadn’t what? Speak!”

“It doesn’t matter why. We need to find a way to
stop it. And/or, evacuate the planet!”

Ryonna did not wait any longer. She immediately
opened a channel to Admiral Thassos and appraised her of the situation. Cedric
didn’t wait to hear how the conversation went; he had to try and think of a way
to stop this.

“I need access to the admiral’s ship computer,
preferably the entire computational power of the fleet,” he begged Ryonna, who
transmitted the request along.

“She says you’ve got access via sub space channel
seven, whatever that means.”

“Thanks.”

Cedric sprung away from his chair, opened a drawer
in his desk and took out two circular devices which he placed at his temples.

“What are you doing?” asked Tar’Lock.

“No time to explain. These devices from R&D will
allow me to work faster, as fast as I can think in fact. Pilots use them to
pilot their ships. I’ve asked a pair to be modified so I could control my gear
the same way, but just like 3D movies when they came out, they tend to give me
a headache after a while. But I guess it won’t matter. If I’m not successful
we’re doomed.” There was an awkward silence.

“I see. Could you at least explain the basics of
what you’re doing?”

“Sure. I need to find a way to beam these explosive
devices off Earth, NOW.” He turned to Ryonna, interrupting her conversation
with the admiral with a crazy expression. “Tell her I also need a ship, like a
frigate with a jump engine. It needs to be fully evacuated, and just as soon as
possible.”

He slowly turned to Tar’Lock, with a grave
expression on his face.

“What is it?” The insectoid tilted his head
slightly.

“I need you to do me a favor. It… might get you
killed.”

“Aren’t we all going to die if we don’t do
something?”

“Most likely. But you could just use the next
fifty-odd minutes to get the fuck away from this world.”

“Does it look like I’m fleeing? Tell me what you
actually
need me
to do.”

Cedric nodded. He took a smartphone, fiddled with it
for a few seconds and handed it to Tar’Lock.

“What do I do with this?”

“You get to these coordinates as fast as humanly
possible. One of the bombs is there. Fortunately, there’s a targeted power
plant about fifty miles from here. At least you’ll know where you’re going.
Once you arrive on the premises, it will guide your way inside as well, all the
way towards the device. Once you arrive near it, the interface will change
automatically. You simply need to press the ‘scan’ button.”

“What will that do?”

“It will provide me the exact frequency I’ll need to
tag and lock all the bombs simultaneously, so I can beam them together to that
ship.”

“Which you’ll send into hyperspace, so the bombs
detonate in space, but nowhere near Earth.”

“Pretty much, yes,” said Cedric, surprised Tar’Lock
had figured out that part of his plan. “There’s a catch though.”

“Which is?”

“If some of the devices resonate at varied
frequencies, they won’t get picked up. Some of the devices will still blow down
here.”

“Do we have any choice in how this plays out? I
mean, could you do something about it if that were the case?”

“No. I’m afraid not, in the time we have left.”

“So let’s not worry over things we can’t do anything
about.”

“Right. You should get goi—”

Before Cedric could finish, Tar’Lock blurred. He
disappeared so fast from the office that Cedric was startled anew, and fell off
his chair. He sat back up, slowed his breathing, closed his eyes and mentally
raced towards the precious projects he needed to accomplish in a very short
window of time.

I thrive under pressure
. He pushed past the
growing fear festering in every part of his being.
Let’s do this.

Ryonna approached him as she ended her communication
with the admiral.

“You’ll have your ship ready in forty minutes. Will
that be enough time?”

“Yeah, that should be fine. The main problem is that
I have to not only replicate the miracle beam-up we used disabling that
behemoth Zarlack ship, but also figure out a way of beaming thirty bombs all at
once. I could very well fry every power generating facility on the planet doing
so, so I can’t risk beaming them one by one. Nor can I risk missing any. If one
of them is separated from the others and detonates it could still trigger the
departing cluster.”

“Are you confident you can do it? Where did you send
Tar’Lock?”

Cedric took a deep breath.

“Confident would be pushing it, but I did learn a
lot from the last time. I’m gonna say
maybe
. Don’t hold me to that, if
we all die. As for Tar’Lock, I sent him to the nearest device. It’s crucial
that he gets me the info I need, so I can calibrate locks on all of them.”

“Do you need to stay here to do this? Could we move
you to an orbiting ship while you work?”

“Yes, I need to be here, in case these…” he said,
pointing at the circular devices attached to his temples, “go wrong. They’re a
prototype, after all. I may need to have access to my own gear as a backup. It
would all be out of range for me to use from orbit, and while I could fix that
too, I simply don’t have the time. You, however, don’t need to stay here. You
should go.”

“What else did these files tell you? Any leads on
who did this? Perhaps I can locate the perpetrator, and thereby locate the
means to disable those devices in the process?”

“That’s a great idea. But I can’t reinvent
teleportation to get this stuff off this rock, and do detective work at the
same time.” Cedric quickly grabbed a tablet from an open drawer. He entered a
few inputs to it, and handed it over to Ryonna.

“There’s a copy of the file on this device. Deliver
it to my assistant at the end of the corridor and tell her to trace the source.
She’s very good at data mining, perhaps even better than me.”

Ryonna did not waste any more time; she stormed out
of the office at full speed.

“If we survive this, I’m never smoking pot again,”
he said to himself, fully aware he was alone in the office.
At least not
while working
, he compromised.

The Earth Alliance fleet jumped out of hyperspace a
few thousands clicks away from their target in the Gatos Nebula.

Commodore Saroudis ordered a series of scans. As
expected, however, the nebula’s strange composition perfectly disguised any
power signatures emanating from the shipyard within.

He hailed the EAD
Hope
.

“What are your orders, Commodore?”

“We can’t detect any signatures. I sure hope this
isn’t a ploy to divert our forces, while Argos mounts an attack on Earth...”

“Commodore, between the admiral’s fleet, planetary
defenses and the Droxian reinforcement, I think Earth would be more than ready
to defend itself.”

“What if they send more of these massive ships?”

“The
Hope’s
weaponry is partially based on
the admiral’s ship. She has the firepower to deal with them. And if there is
nothing in this nebula, well, I know an emperor whose last hour just started.”

Commodore Saroudis could hear a disapproving growl
over the call.

“Speaking of the emperor, now would be a good time
for him to provide the information he promised.”

“He’s sending the disabling codes as we speak. Hang
on.”

The commodore did not like this one bit. Their
entire plan rested on codes that could have been changed a million times by
now. At least there were no enemy ships in sight, or on scans. That was a good
sign for this mission, though he still feared that Argos would attempt a
full-on attack on Earth. He tried to push the thought away. For now his mission
remained clear, whether he had doubts or not.

“We’re good to go, Commodore.”

“Sub-light engines, half impulse ahead then. Let’s
destroy that target.”

“Understood. Athanatos out.”

The fleet reached the outskirts of the nebula. Its
green-orange tones gave it a toxic air: dangerous looking. Soon its cloudy
composition engulfed the cautious ships.

On board the
Hope
, Chase requested a full
scan. The composition of the nebula made any reading imprecise at best, though
the scans did reveal peaks of technological signatures. But the interference
was too strong to really get a clear picture of what awaited them inside. At
least it confirmed that there was something lying in the center of it. But for
now, all they could do was wait.

After five minutes, obscurity within the cloudy
nebula decreased somehow. On every ship, audible gasps were heard as a gigantic
installation arose in silhouette from within the fog. The emperor turned
towards Chase, and cast him a dark look.

Chase understood full well what it meant, but felt
no need to answer it in kind. Instead he requested that scanning be pushed to
maximum.

“Report?” added Chase.

“We’re getting a clearer picture, Captain,” one of
his officers began. “There are thirteen separate installations. One is much
larger than the others. Most of them have ships under construction; most look
nearly completed. The scans aren’t clear enough to determine their firing
capabilities or whether their engines are functional. But it does seem that for
now all ships are offline, as very little power signature is emanating from
them.”

“That doesn’t make any sense. Emperor?”

“I agree. They should be fully powered during final
construction stage. I don’t like this. May I personally just suggest we blow
them all to hell, right now?”

Something in Chase’s mind squirmed. This did not
feel right.

The commodore’s incoming transmission interrupted
his thoughts.

“Ready to open fire. Maximum firepower.”

“Wait!”

“What is it, Chase?”

“I don’t know. Something feels wrong here.”

“The shields and defenses are down. These ships look
like ghost ships. Completely unpowered. We won’t see this easy opportunity
again, so let’s just take them down now.”

“This is a trap. I can feel it.”

“Lieutenant Commander, I don’t need this right now.
We’re here, their shields are down; god knows for how long. If we’re going to
do something, we should do it now.”

Chase’s mind raced with an ever-increasing flurry,
intensifying every second now. What was going on?

“Alright, let me make it simple, Lieutenant
Commander: all ships engage! This is a direct order: destroy these ships and
structures, now. Fire at will.”

The entire fleet but the
Hope
opened fire,
pouring forth a beautiful light show of blue, red and green laser fire.
Explosions burst out across the shipyard. A ship and its construction
scaffolding burst into a fiery display of yellow-orange tones that illuminated
the foggy atmosphere all around it.

The door of the bridge opened and Sarah stepped in.

“What’s happening? Why aren’t we firing on
anything?”

“Why did you exit your starfighter? You're this
ship’s wing commander. I might need you out there at any moment’s notice!”

Sarah looked puzzled. Not by the remark, which
seemed valid, but more by the tone behind it.

“What is it, Chase?”

“Something isn’t right; everything is too easy.”

“Wasn’t that the plan all along behind the emperor
giving us an advantage? Wasn’t the plan that we would then take out Argos’
shipyard with minimal damage?”

“I expected some resistance.”

“And I expected to blow up more ships, but I’m glad
to watch the fireworks from here. Now will you please shoot at something?”

Before Chase could answer, his tactical officer
interjected.

“Captain, there’s a behemoth class ship in that
larger structure—”

“What about it?”

“It’s powering up, Captain. So are other ships.
They’ve already raised shields.”

“I knew it!”

Sarah started running towards the doors. Chase rose
up from his chair.

“Commander Kepler! Stand fast!” he shouted.

Everyone on the bridge was stunned. But not as
stunned as Sarah was. The tone of his voice hit her like the simmering
explosions outside. She stopped in shock and spun around to face Chase.

“What the hell? You’ve just reprimanded me for
leaving my post, and now what?”

“Now you stay on the bridge. That’s an order.”

“Mind explaining why?”

“Argos orchestrated this. He knows full well that
I’ll do anything to protect you, which is true,” Chase muttered, not
comfortable saying this in front of his crew. “I cannot take the risk he uses
you to get at me; or the Alliance. The safest place for you to be right now is
onboard the most powerful destroyer ever created.”

She stayed silent but cast him a blistering look.
She was furious he was trying to shield her like a child. Part of her knew it
was just how much he loved her, and she wondered if she wouldn’t act the same
if the situation was reversed. And of course she didn’t want a repeat of what
had happened in orbit of Earth the last time Argos was involved: she had enough
nightmares about being tortured as it was. But at the end of the day, this was
war. She was a soldier, and her place was in a cockpit, blowing the enemy to
pieces.

“Captain,” cut in the tactical officer, “incoming
fighters.”

“Chase!” she implored loudly.

“I’m sorry. Request denied.”

He could feel her anger and frustration boil near
the point of explosion, but then he remembered something. He lifted his index
finger slowly.

“However,” he began, grabbing the round neuronal
link devices from the arm rest of his captain’s chair, which he threw to her,
“you can still be part of the battle. All I ask is that you do it from here,
onboard this ship. These devices are configured to give orders to the
Hope
as well, so just don’t use these subroutines please. It looks like today isn’t
the day I’m gonna fly the F-147 remotely and command this ship at the same
time.”

She instinctually wanted to stay mad, but smiled
automatically when she put the devices on her temples. She was greeted with a
similar HUD experience as she’d found onboard the StarFury, except that she was
seeing two images at once: both what her own eyes were seeing and the view from
the ship’s screen—currently still onboard. She sat down at the chair nearest
Chase on his right. Closing her eyes helped her block out confusion from the
double imposed image. Immediately, she felt like she was onboard the ship.

On one corner of the HUD there was a dedicated EAD
Hope
command menu. She simplified, selecting only to see the ship’s vitals at all
times: its shield level, currently at maximum, engine energy levels, and hull
damage. That way she could always keep half an eye on local status while
flying, though she was sure if the ship started shaking, commotion around her
would alert her of trouble onboard anyway.

Or would it?
Her eyes set upon a
command called immersivity and noise cancellation. Once selected, all of a
sudden all she could hear was the humming of the StarFury engines as she
activated them. In less than ten seconds, she’d completed her pre-flight
checks, inspected her ordnance and was blasting out into the green-orange foggy
space. She headed towards the incoming fighters that spewed from the behemoth
Zarlack ship. Soon she would be entering firing range. The rest of her wing
came about.

“Sledgehammer to Firefly?” buzzed in Fillio.

“Yeah, I’m here.” She was amazed to hear herself
speak the moment she thought about it. She didn’t even have to open her mouth.
This was a practical consideration; this way she wouldn’t interfere with the
rest of the bridge’s operations locally.

“Firefly, how come you’re flying the reserve
StarFury?”

“Long story. I’m actually onboard the
Hope
physically, but still here with you, remote flying this craft instead.”

“Now why am I not surprised? Would I be right in
assuming that ship would normally have been flown by Phoenix?”

She was not used to using call-signs, but apparently
the admiral’s wing commander did things differently.

“That’s correct. Heads up; enemy entering firing
range. All ships, engage and destroy.”

She received multiple comm clicks as acknowledgement
of her orders. She loved this. She had to admit, the part of her who wanted to
rip Chase a new one had quickly been tamed by the experience of flying a craft
remotely with her mind, all while comfortably seated onboard the
Hope
.
She could get used to this!

The first wave of Zarlack ships flared out a barrage
of laser fire, but the Omega fighters simply vanished from view as they
cloaked. Sarah activated drones on her fighter and assigned offensive patterns
to them. She then locked two of the incoming ships with missiles, rained down
laser fire on their frontal shields with the help of her drones for added
firepower, and when she felt satiated depleting shields, she fired both her missiles
and blew them out of the sky.

Chase commed in. “Having fun?”

“You and I still have things to discuss when this is
over. But yeah, right now I’m enjoying your precious toy. Surely you’ll get to
play, eventually.”

“Next time, next time. There will always be a next
time. Today doesn’t seem like the day I will fly the StarFury either.”

She felt a little selfishness beneath her glee, but
considering the situation, Chase needed to give his full attention to
captaining the
Hope
. Even though she had little doubt that his Fury mind
could probably handle both ships at once; intimidating in and of itself.

“Just don’t break my toy, please.”

She laughed.

“Roger that, Phoenix.”

The communication ended right when two bandits
started to tickle her aft shields with heavy fire and missiles.

The prospect of relative risklessness gave her
wings. She thought about trying new tactics she wouldn’t have dared in a normal
craft, and started a bit of impulsive improvising. She spun her craft around by
cutting the twin engines and engaging the reverse thrusters to max power as she
ended her turn. When she saw the two incoming missiles, she decided to shoot
them out of the sky with laser fire; and it worked. She was amazed how precise
the neuronal targeting was. Whatever she thought, the ship did to the letter,
at the exact time she thought it.

With both missiles out of the way, she rained heavy
fire and the drones did the rest. The first bogey didn’t have time to react and
was quickly obliterated. The second fighter veered just before its front shield
gave in, but she’d already locked on another missile, and experimented with the
new, advanced targeting upgrades of the StarFury. She discovered she could
select which part of the shields the missile was to impact with, and cooed with
joy. She selected aft, fired her missile, and disengaged to acquire a new prey,
as the forgotten ship melted into fire. She moved towards the next ship on her
starboard, but before she could engage, it exploded. Blue fire from two
separate cloaked Omega fighters had blown it right out of the sky. It never had
a chance.