Out of the Black (Odyssey One, Book 4) (8 page)

“Talk to me, General.”

“We’re still tracking landings, sir, with an eye to seismographic readings worldwide. Total confirmed count is now over three thousand, sir.”

“My lord.” Conner closed his eyes. “God save us.”

“Let’s not rely on the almighty just yet, sir,” General Caern said. “All the landings have been in major population centers. That’s bad for casualties, but it’s even worse for the enemy.”

Conner scowled. “How could it be worse for the enemy?”

“We can easily strike at every major population center on the planet, Mr. President,” Caern answered. “Especially if the choice is do or die. We’ll kill a lot of our own, yes, but we’ll kill them too. If I were planning a genocidal strike on a planet using a weapon system such as these Drasin, I’d be landing
my assets in Antarctica, the Sahara desert, any out of the way, impossible to get to place I could find. I sure as hell would not land them in New York City, Mr. President.”

“You think they’re planning something?” Conner asked, confused.

“No, sir. I think they’re specifically
not
planning.”

“I don’t follow.”

“Captain Weston’s reports on these things indicates an almost . . . schizophrenic personality,” Caern said. “One personality is a planner, picking targets, using strategy even . . . the other, however, is bestial. Sir, I think that the beast is in charge right now. They’re striking at population centers just because they don’t like them, not out of any kind of strategy.”

“The people?”

“Perhaps,” the General conceded, “or maybe they’re targeting based on power usage, heat, or any number of other signatures from a major city. The point is, they’re not thinking big picture. They’re acting like a wounded animal, sir. See the thing that hurt them and rip its heart out. If they were planning, we’d be in a lot more trouble.”

“We’re in plenty as it stands,” Conner said sourly.

“Yes sir, we are. However the problem isn’t with the aliens on the ground. We can take them, Mr. President,” Caern said confidently. “It’s the goddamn battle fleet holding our high orbitals that we can’t take. As long as they’re up there, we may as well just roll over and die.”

“That’s
not
going to happen,” Conner growled, slamming his hands down on the table.

“Didn’t say it was, sir. Just said that we need to take those fuckers out,” Caern said bluntly. “Otherwise, sooner or later, we’re going to run out of bullets down here, and I can’t promise that they’ll run out of troops first.”

Conner scowled, but nodded curtly, looking over to the Air Force general in charge of SPACECOM. “Thoughts?”

General McCullen sighed, shaking his head. “We’ve got nothing right now, Mr. President. We’re half blind. We think that the
Enterprise
transitioned out of the system almost two days ago, but we can’t confirm. Certainly the Priminae ships went to FTL sometime before that, but we can’t confirm anything beyond that. We have no more military assets in Sol space, sir.”

“Ground to orbit missiles.”

McCullen shook his head. “Nothing but nukes and light conventional payloads. Every report we have on the alien armor clearly indicates that those will be of no value.”

“What about high-velocity missiles?” the President asked, thinking about the weapon systems the
Odyssey
employed.

“Can’t launch those inside Earth’s atmosphere. Besides the fact that they’d ablate away from friction, we’d destroy the launch site with the shockwave alone.”

“Lasers?”

“We wouldn’t even heat up their hulls at this range,” the general said.

“The
Odyssey
engaged them from
light seconds
away!”

“The
Odyssey
didn’t have to fire through atmosphere, sir.”

The President wasn’t stupid enough to suggest pulse weapons. He was well aware of what the use of antimatter inside an atmosphere would do. He closed his eyes. “What about the new transition cannons?”

“Those . . .” McCullen hesitated. “I don’t know, sir. We’ve never tried to transition this deep in a gravity well, or through atmosphere. They may be feasible, but we certainly don’t have a targeting zero for firing from Earth’s surface and, more importantly, we don’t have any of the tachyon waveguides or their munitions.”

“Then
build
some. Find an egghead to tell you if you can fire them, build some, and do your
jobs!
” Conner growled. “We will
not
go quietly into the night, gentlemen! This is not where the human race ends! Are you listening to me?”

“Yes sir.”

“Good. Now go get me some answers. Find me something we can use.”

Earth was a blue-white ball in the black of space, hanging in an eternal dance around the blazing yellow of the Sun. From anywhere in cislunar space, the Earth was the epitome of a peaceful icon.

That is, under all normal conditions.

Even during the worst human wars, all was serene from space.

Serenity, however, had now left the system.

Drasin ships literally surrounded the planet, some firing on random targets, others launching on the planet with regular ferocity. The alien ships evoked a visceral reaction from any human eyes that saw them, a deep burning urge to fight or to flee that couldn’t . . . wouldn’t be denied.

To human eyes they were the most viscerally terrifying things that ever existed, or ever
could
exist. There was no serenity where the Drasin passed, no life in their wake, and no hope for anything caught in their path.

In Drasin eyes, they were purity and humanity was the abomination.

Two species, literally born to hate and fear one another. One could even say that they had been
designed
to do so.

CHAPTER TWO

Angels Twenty Over NYC

“STRYKER LEAD, NEW priority tasking.”

“Roger command. Standing by.”

The F/A-66 Mach Fighter curled slowly on its orbit of the city below, turning easily as Commander Miriam Benoit checked her instruments and waited for targeting information. Her squad had been deployed to provide CAP for the Guard in the city, but there hadn’t been a lot to do so far with the Guard mostly caught in
traffic,
of all the damned stupid things.

A tasking, any tasking, was just what she’d been praying for since the first impact shook the city below.

“Stand by, Commander, we are relaying targeting data now.”

“Roger that.”

Her instruments went active almost instantly, targeting data feeding into the fighter from the ground below. She looked it over briefly, noting its location, and whistled.

“Central Park? We’re going to launch on Central Park? Damn, this is fucked up,” she said before keying back into
the command channel. “Roger command. Have paint on the screen. Stryker Five, follow me in.”

“Right behind you, Lead.”

Two Mach Fighters peeled off from the squadron, angling down and picking up speed as they lined up for their run. The city grew ahead of them as they dove in, leveling out at Angels Ten as their computers began to calculate the release point.

“Stryker Lead. Weapons free.”

“Stryker Five. Weapons free.”

The computers took over then as the two Mach Fighters broke mach one at ten thousand feet over the city, calculating the changes in speed and position against the target data coming in from below. The red icons blinked to yellow, then quickly over to green as the computer released the guided munitions.

“Bombs away,” Miriam called, pulling up and around in case she had to line up for a second run. “Strike inbound.”