Fury to the Stars (Universe in Flames Book 2) (26 page)

He examined his telemetry. The
Hope
had only
fifty seconds before all the Zarlack ships’ engines would go critical, and take
down the shipyard. With the shields disabled, an explosion this size would
probably ignite the nebula itself, potentially vaporizing everything within as
it did so.

There was a deep, dark pit in Saroudis’ stomach.
He’d long thought of Chase as a hotheaded, borderline-insubordinate officer,
but also admired his courage and tactics under pressure. Tears started forming
around the commodore’s eyes. He wiped them and addressed the fleet.

“The second you are out of the nebula, jump to these
coordinates.”

All ships confirmed the order. In twenty seconds
they would be out of the nebula. The
Hope
would inevitably be vaporized
soon after.

“Goodbye, Chase,” whispered Saroudis at the screen.

*   *   *

Chase got up from the captain’s chair and took Sarah
by the hand. He walked towards the glass for one last moment together, life
flashing before his eyes. Suddenly his dreams were interrupted: he noticed that
the emperor was no longer on the bridge. He’d normally have been deeply upset
by this casual betrayal, but under the circumstances he couldn’t blame him for
trying to save his own hide. There was nowhere to hide, anyway.

“We could have tried making a run for it with my
F-147. It’s still in the launching bays.”

“We could have... but I doubt its shields would
survive this whole nebula imploding.”

“I guess not... How long now?”

“It’s a matter of seconds, Sarah. I’m so sorry.”

“Don’t be. I’m glad to be next to you at least,” she
said, and took him in her arms.

Chase closed his eyes. He found himself wondering
why Aphroditis hadn’t tried giving him any sort of warning or advice, but then
remembered how much interference this nebula generated… It probably affected
Olympian technology just as much as theirs.
So this is it
, he thought.

Oh no it’s not!
He heard a familiar
voice from within his mind. A voice that sent a cold shiver down his spine.

It was Argos’ voice! No doubts about it.

Open your eyes, fool! And hang on
to something!

Chase opened his eyes to witness a succession of
massive detonations. The ships were blowing, one by one. Surrounding parts of
the nebula were already igniting, a wash of colors. The spectacle, while
utterly terrifying, was almost beautiful in its utterly chaotic rendering.

From the corner of his eye, over Sarah’s shoulder,
Chase noted that the behemoth Zarlack destroyer had broken through its
construction structure and was heading towards them at maximum speed. A red
beam impacted with the
Hope
. As it passed by, the
Hope
was
tractored away with an enormous lurch. Everyone on the bridge but Chase flew
off their chairs; some of them crashed into the walls. He’d held onto Sarah
with everything he had, and she was fine, if stunned a bit. And surrounded in
an apocalyptic thunder of explosions and raining fire, the Zarlack ship jumped,
with the
Hope
in tow.

*   *   *

On board the
Kollassi
, Argos witnessed the
Black
Death
manage to capture the
Hope
in a tractor-beam, pulling her prey
out of the nebula just in the nick of time.

He inhaled in a clipped breath, hands clenched at
the railing. He opened a channel to his science officer. Before he could say
anything, however, Argos eyes blinked red. The officer exploded on the spot,
sending body parts, blood and flesh all over the bridge.

“May that be a reminder to all of you of what
happens when you do not perform as expected!”

He snapped off the channel.

Chase was safe, meanwhile, and for the time being that
was all that mattered. But he had given his brother a piece of information
which he would never have wanted him to have. He couldn’t kill him! Not yet.

Argos lashed out at a table nearby and broke it like
it was made of dust. His fists were clenched so hard, nails cut through his own
skin. A small, red river formed from his forgotten blood, snaking lazily across
the floor. The red in his eyes shined brighter still.

Tar’Lock arrived at the power plant, but almost
crashed the shuttle in a very rough landing. He jumped out of it and summarily
surveyed the damage, embarrassed. No time! Within seconds, he’d broken into the
facility, and was peering down the long corridors. He consulted Cedric’s
smartphone and memorized the best path with which to reach the third
underground floor, where a red dot was blinking. He couldn’t help but notice
that on the top right corner of the screen, a timer display indicated only
twenty minutes remaining. Suffice to say, he moved quickly. It took him one
minute to reach the blip, but when he arrived he found a reinforced door,
controlled by an access pad with numbers on its digital screen.

He commed Cedric.

“I have a problem.”

“Join the club!”

“No really, I can’t enter the room where the device
is located. There’s a keypad lock!”

“Crap! Hold your phone next to the door’s lock,
please.”

“Done.”

“It should be noted I really don’t have time for
this,” said Cedric with a clear tone of annoyance in his voice.

Tar’Lock sighed deeply.

But before he could say anything, Cedric began to
swear noisily.

“For the love of...”

“What is it?”

“It’s got military-grade encryption! Give me a few
seconds while I access the fleet’s computing power. And... that should do it.”

“Nothing happened.”

“Enter the following code. 7117947057. Then press
enter.”

Tar’Lock entered the combination in a split second,
and the panel turned green. He opened the door and spent some time searching
before he located the device hidden behind a series of pipes.

He looked at his phone. The interface had changed
like Cedric said it would, with a predominant green scan button in the middle
of the interface. Tar’Lock quickly pressed it.

A bar started filling on the interface.

“I’ve initiated scanning.”

“I see that. Thank you, Tar’Lock.”

“How are we looking?”

“I’ve managed to reprogram my teleportation
subroutine and optimized it to drain just the right amount of power so that the
Earth’s power grid doesn’t collapse completely during our transfer. So
hopefully it should work.”

“Should?”

“Look, pal, this isn’t exactly a walk in the park. I
never worked at this speed before. Let’s hope I don’t suffer from an aneurysm
before I manage to beam these bombs off of the planet.”

“Is the ship ready to receive them?”

“Yes, it’s empty and ready. As soon as I have the
frequency and feed it into my code, I should be able to send this ship far, far
away from Earth.”

“Please avoid sending it to my home world.”

“Is it within a five minute jump from here?”

“Point taken. I was just trying to break the ice.”

“Good job!”

Tar’Lock looked at the phone and saw that the scan
was about ninety percent done, when he noticed a blinking red icon on the top
right of the screen.

“Cedric.”

“Not now!”

“Yes now. There is a blinking red icon on that
smartphone you gave me.”

“For the love of god, don’t tell me you’re running
out of batteries... Let me che—Oh, fuck me! Alright, let’s hope the battery
holds. The scan should be done in five seconds. The moment that transfer button
appears on your screen, click it immediately. And then pray to whichever gods
you believe in… On second thought, just start praying now.”

Tar’Lock made a noise crossing between a snort and a
growl.

The scan bar completed and blinked, then a second
blue button labeled
Transfer
appeared.

Tar’Lock pressed it, and the phone turned black.

“Please tell me you got it?” Cedric yelled.

“It turned off,” Tar’Lock exclaimed, examining the
phone.

“We’re doomed. The one thing that will kill this
planet is a crappy, old-gen phone battery…”

“You could have charged the phone.”

“Yea and that helps us how right now!?”

“Tell me what to do, Cedric, NOW!!”

“Okay… let me guide you towards the main control
room. We’ll just hope one of the guys there has a USB cable.”

“I’m listening.”

“It’s on the first floor, to the east of your
position. How fast can you run?”

Tar’Lock didn’t even bother to answer. He flew over
corridors and stairs to reach the first floor, and when he saw a wall panel
indicating “main control room,” he ran there as fast as he could.

“I’m almost there. How much time do we have left?”

“I’d say a minute or two for me to have enough time
to input, to receive the data, and then beam the bombs off.”

“No pressure, surely.” Tar’Lock gasped and kept
moving.

He stormed the central control room. The three
people present in the room jumped out of their chair in horror. A fourth man
emerging from another side of the room with cups of hot coffee in his hands
simply lost consciousness at the sight of Tar’Lock.

“Don’t panic, everyone, I’m not here to hurt you. I
don’t want to stress you out either. But if you don’t provide me with a USB
cable to charge this phone,” he said, showing them the smartphone, “a bomb on
this power plant will explode, and probably destroy the entire planet.”

“Funny guy,” snorted one of the techs.

Tar’Lock’s eyes thinned. He screamed at top volume.
“DOES IT LOOK LIKE I’M JOKING?! GIVE ME A GODDAMN CHARGING CABLE!”

The faces of the three techs lost all color.

They started looking through their belongings as
fast as they could, but none could find anything.

“John! Where’s the power bank you borrowed from me,
quick!”

“It’s in the passenger seat of my car in the parking
lot.” He turned towards Tar’Lock. “It’s the blue Mistubishi Galant in front of
the main door, here take the k−”

But before he could get his keys out of his pocket
Tar’Lock was already gone. The three guys looked at each other, not knowing
what to say or how to react.

“Did he say how long we had to live, if he can’t
charge his phone?”

“From the speed at which he took off, I’d say not
long.”

“John, I think it’s a little too late to tell you
this… I love you, man.”

“What the fuck, Richard? You’re married!”

“I know… terrible timing. But it’s true.”

The third guy started laughing.

“What’s so funny, Tony?”

“Well, I just thought that if we survive this, the
next hour should be interesting.”

*   *   *

Tar’Lock arrived at the parking lot in front of the
building and there were three blue cars parked in a row. He swore something in
his own tongue, expressing frustration in a very clicky and annoyed way.

Only one read “Mitsubishi” on its back so he ran in
a blur to the right side of the car. He caught a glimpse of a black brick on
the bucket seat, with a cable splitting into many connector ends. He tried
opening the door but it wouldn’t budge. He punched the window and felt
excruciating pain from the impact, but it only made a small crack on the
window.

“How are we doing? Time is running out!” he heard
Cedric on his comm.

“How do I open a car that is locked?”

“Surely you have the strength to break that glass?”

“Normally I would, but I only cracked it…” he said,
panting heavily. “I’ve been running at two hundred miles per hour for the
better part of the last twenty minutes. I’m running out of juice, Cedric, and
I... I’m moments away from passing out.”

“Please don’t, please, please, please...”

“CEDRIC!”

“Right, if the glass is cracked its structural
integrity is compromised now. Try and vibrate your hand very fast on its
surface, okay?”

Tar’Lock put his hand on the glass and made his hand
tremble as fast as he could, using every bit of energy he had left. After a
second the glass shattered. He grabbed the power brick, looked at the four
different ends, looked at the hole in the phone and put the cable that matched
the geometrical shape.

“Cable is in, but nothing is happening.”

“Give it a second.”

“It’s been five seconds.”

“Alright, something is wrong. Describe what you’re
doing.”

“I’ve connected a cable to what I can only surmise
is a portable power source.”

“A power bank, okay. Is there a button on it?”

Tar’Lock turned the power bank and saw a small,
metallic button protruding from the box, which he pressed fervently.

“Still nothing. Is it out of juice?”

“Try pressing it and holding it, perhaps a second or
two.”

A blue light flashed across the screen, then the
phone turned on with a white default logo on a black background, with a cheesy,
musical ditty playing.

“I see something on the phone.”

“Boy this is going to be close, Tar’Lock. We need to
wait while the smartphone boots up, but—”

“How long will that take?”

“Another twenty seconds.”

Tar’Lock started to feel really light headed.
“I’m... I’m not feeling well.”

“Dude, DO NOT PASS OUT on me now! You still need to
press the transfer button when the phone finishes booting.”

Tar’Lock’s vision started to blur as the phone
display re-appeared. He could no longer read the font, from his current
exhaustion. But he could still see the familiar blue button. He pressed it, and
swooned, and collapsed to the ground.

“Good job, Tar’Lock, I’m receiving the signature.
You’re okay, buddy? Tar’Lock? Oh dear...”

*   *   *

Ryonna was waiting in the office of Cedric’s
coworker, a beautiful, young, blond lady named Johanna. She was still analyzing
the tablet file.

“How are we doing?” she demanded for the millionth
time, long out of patience.

“Not exactly the kind of data I’m used to working
on, but I think I’ve managed to locate something of use.”

“Could you be more specific?”

“While I can’t pinpoint the exact IP where this file
was created, I did manage to access subsystems’ history, like GPS and the
onboard camera. I have the recent GPS locations, listed here. It looks like a
copy of this file traveled to about thirty locations all around the planet in
the last few days.”

“Yeah, that is consistent with the thirty bombs
we’re trying to beam off-planet.”

Johanna swallowed heavily.

“Did you say bombs?”

“Yes, bombs. So keep working. If Cedric doesn’t
manage to beam them out in the next few minutes, we’ll all be long dead anyway…
So there’s no need to panic.”

“Interesting bedside manners...” she muttered
tearfully, hands trembling uncontrollably.

Ryonna cursed herself for telling her about the
bombs. She approached Johanna and put a hand on her shoulder.

She looked up at Ryonna, her eyes widened by sheer
terror

“I... I don’t want to die.” Her voice trembled on
every syllable.

“I don’t want to die either, Johanna. But understand
this, survival is out of our hands. There is nothing you and I can do to fix
that, nothing at all, you understand? But we can help.”

She nodded nervously.

“So please take a deep breath, and tell me more
about the GPS information you’ve managed to find.”

Johanna took three successive deep breaths, and
entered a few more commands on her computer. The screen started displaying a
map of Earth, superimposed by mad, converging lines all over. Ryonna looked at
them and saw that they all converged to one single point.

“Can you please tell me where this place is?” She
pointed at the converging lines.

“It’s in DC. Give me one moment to bring up the
address.”

“What information could you get from the camera,
anyway?”

“The file references a file that must still be on
the original device. While GPS locations were embedded in the file, camera
information must be stored in the original system.”

“Does that mean that if I bring you the laptop, you
could access this data?”

“I think so, yes.”

“Alright, give me a minute and I’ll bring it to you.
In the meantime, try to cross-reference the address you found with databases of
known criminals, Earth Alliance employees and whatever else you think might be
relevant.”

“Cross-checking now.”

Ryonna rose to her feet and crossed back to Cedric’s
office.