SECTOR 64: Ambush (30 page)

Furious, he wanted to walk over and send the officer to an early meeting with the Forebearers. Knowing he was already shorthanded, he decided to reserve his vengeance for the Argonians.

The officer's next report removed himself from Salyth's ire. "We have no shields, but the bridge section's drive system is coming online." He looked up with a toothy grin. "It appears to be ninety percent operational."

For the first time since regaining consciousness, Salyth felt a glimmer of hope. "Bring up the exterior display!"

"Yes, Commodore Salyth," the officer replied through another bloody cough.

The main display flickered to life. The point of view was from behind and above the bridge looking forward. They had fallen into an angry body of water. Rough, steam-filled waves crashed against the Forebearer's visage.

The bridge was the only recognizable section. Scraggy trusses reached out for missing structures, steam rising from their melted and distorted features.

As Salyth surmised, the bridge section was listing to port and pitched forward, resting on its lower bow. The image of the Forebearer's face buried in this alien estuary's muddy bottom enraged him.

"Get my ship off this filthy planet. I want to know the progress of my fleet."

"Yes, Commodore."

Salyth felt the floor shudder as the bridge section struggled to raise from its watery grave. Turning to the display, he watched the outside view as the ship leveled. It stopped for a moment, the muddy bed unwilling to release its prey. Then, it broke free with a final shudder. Clear of the sea, it accelerated toward space. Unshielded from atmospheric friction, the muddy water boiled from its surface and burned up in the ship's meteoric plasma trail.

"Commodore, I have numerous targets entering Sector Sixty-Four!" shouted the officer. He paused for a moment, studying the display. Turning to Salyth with renewed energy, he said, "It's the Galactic Defense Force, sir."

Reaching the desired altitude, the remnant of the
Forebearer's Revenge
parked above the planet's curving surface. "Excellent! Instruct all ships to fallback and reform on my position," ordered Salyth.

Jake toggled the comm panel. "Vampire Six, this is Turtle One, over."

Stepping up to the helm, Richard started bringing the ship's systems online. Vic carried the newly acquired weapons to the left end of the view-wall. As he approached, a rack with a slot for each weapon grew from the floor.

"I still can't understand how it does that," Vic said as he placed the weapons in their appropriate slots.

Richard impatiently shrugged as he grasped the flight controller. "Arthur C. Clarke once said, 'Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.' Guess you'll have to go with that."

The ship turned east while gently rising to an altitude clear of the buildings and the gathering crowd. After hovering for a moment, Richard said, "Let's get back in space so we can see what's going on." His arm tensed, and the outside world blurred as the ship rocketed skyward.

Jake activated the radio again. "Vampire Six, this is Turtle One. Come in, over."

The speaker crackled to life. "Turtle One, this is Vampire Six. We're setting up to attack the ship that just hit Mexico City."

Richard looked at him with shocked dismay. "Twenty-million people live there."

The news struck Jake like a sledgehammer. "My god, there were sixteen of those ships. How many people have we already lost?"

Colonel Newcastle continued his transmission. "What can you tell me about their weapon's range? What did you find in Western Maryland?"

Swallowing down the rising bile, Jake activated the mic. "It's bad news, sir. It looks like we've lost everyone within ninety-three nautical miles of the weapon. Unfortunately, its effect doesn't fall off with distance." Pausing, Jake shook his head. "Jesus, sir. There wasn't even a drop of blood … not until the edge, anyway." Recalling the scene in Old Downtown sent a shiver down his spine.

A long pause greeted his report. Finally, Newcastle said, "Almost a hundred miles and no drop off … holy shit."

Richard said, "Yes, sir. We don't know how the weapon does it, but we've seen, very graphically, what happened to those on its periphery."

"Thank you, gentlemen," Colonel Newcastle said wearily. "I'll call you back after we kill these bastards. I want to take 'em out before they wipe humanity off another two hundred mile swath of—"

He cutout mid-sentence. By the background noise, Jake could tell he still had his mic key depressed.

"What the hell," Colonel Newcastle whispered. "They're bugging out!" Hope blossomed in a voice that, only a moment before, had carried the weight of the world.

"Say again," Jake said, praying he'd understood.

"They're bugging out, leaving. They just vertically accelerated back into space."

"They must be falling back to regroup after your success over the Chesapeake," Jake said.

"I don't think so," Richard interrupted.

Jake shook his head. "What else could it—" Turning toward Richard, he froze. Apparently, while he'd been talking with Newcastle, the hologram had come to life. Still rendered in red, the regrouping alien ships appeared to be gathering a couple of hundred miles above the North Atlantic.

Lieutenant Croft pointed at a small red dot that the alien ships were surrounding "What's that?"

"I don't know, but look," Jake said. Both he and Richard pointed to the display's top left corner.

A new fleet of huge ships was sliding into view, their holographic color: green.

Reaching the floor of the valley, Sandy guided the Hummer onto Carmel Valley Highway. Negotiating another smoking heap of burned out cars, she turned left, heading south. After a few miles, a city limit sign came into view: Carmel Valley Village Population 4,704. It was the unincorporated rural community her parents called home and Sandy's favorite place on the planet.

Growing up, she'd witnessed the explosive growth of the region's vineyards and wineries. Stone walled villas dotted the landscape. The lush green peaks of the surrounding hills and the corduroy carpet of vinery flowing across their lower climes looked like a slice of Southern France.

Sandy's concern for her parents deepened with the passage of every desolate mile. She was now just over a hundred of them from the epicenter. She'd been about this far away when the alien ship had fired its weapon. However, other than the looters, Sandy had seen no humans, alive or dead. The expectation of finding someone around each corner was drawing out the search. It was an agonizing never-ending cycle of optimism and dashed hopes.

Sandy's heart raced in anticipation as yet another blind corner loomed. Rounding the bend, she slowed the Hummer. Ahead, forming a T-intersection, a secondary road dead-ended into the highway at the apex of the curve. Again, she had to inch the vehicle over the curb and onto an empty parking lot to get around an intersection-clogging calamity. On Sandy's right, the back of a black Range Rover protruded from a winery's cobblestone-lined glass storefront. Its engine was still running. A thin wisp of fumes trailed away from its dripping exhaust pipes. Every few seconds, the rear windshield wiper swiped empty air. Apparently blown out by the impact, the blue glass pebbles of the SUV's shattered rear window had rained down onto the crushed cafe patio furniture that jutted from under its rear bumper.

Two obstacles later, Sandy steered clear of the last of the wreckage, guiding the H2 back onto the highway beyond the curving section of road. Her heart skipped a beat. A few hundred yards down the straight roadway, a line of police cars formed a roadblock, flashing red and blue lights adorning their roofs.

Reacting to her sudden appearance, a swarm of police officers took up defensive positions. In a matter of seconds, Sandy was staring down the barrels of several rifles, shotguns, and pistols.

Careful not to make any sudden movements, she allowed the Hummer to roll to a stop. As she'd been going less than twenty miles per hour, the truck halted in a couple of seconds, two hundred feet shy of the heavily armed roadblock.

Sandy killed the Hummer's engine and heard a nervous amplified voice. "—and step away from the vehicle. If you do not turn off the vehicle and show us your hands, we will be forced to open fire."

Sandy realized she was probably the first thing they'd seen emerge from the affected area. Shouting loud enough to be heard across the distance, she said, "Don't shoot! I'm an Air Force pilot."

Even from a couple of hundred feet away, she saw some of the officers visibly relax, the aim of their weapons shifting away from her. Sandy wondered what they'd been expecting to encounter, looters assuredly, aliens possibly. Although, Hummer-driving little green men with blond hair seemed slightly less likely. Many of the weapons still pointed at her. Belatedly, Sandy realized she was likely invisible behind the glare of the mid-morning sun reflecting off the vehicle's windshield.

The loudspeaker crackled back to life. "Show us your hands, and step out of the vehicle."

Not wanting to tempt a trigger-happy deputy into firing, Sandy slowly slid both arms through the open driver's window. Grasping the exterior lever, she unlatched the door and eased it open. Swinging her legs out, she placed both boots onto the road's asphalt surface. With her arms still protruding through the driver's side window, Captain Fitzpatrick leveraged her forearms against the top of the door and pulled herself to a standing position behind it.

A few more weapons lowered. However, having shifted from the vehicle to point at her, several still aimed at Sandy. Evaporating her patience, the grainy red flicker of a laser sight's light filled her vision. "Lower your damn weapons, for Christ's sake! I'm one of the good guys!"

A portly balding officer rose from his crouched position behind a police cruiser's front fender. "Sandy?"

Sandy squinted at the man and then smiled. "Uncle Bobby?"

"Holy shit!" He waved both arms in wide downward arcs. "Lower your weapons. It's Johnny Fitzpatrick's girl!"

Finally, the last of the weapons veered away from her head. Sandy stepped from behind the door and limped toward the roadblock. Bobby did the same, meeting her in the middle of the impromptu No Man's Land.

He nodded at her left leg. "Are you okay?"

Sandy waved a dismissive hand. "I'll be all right." She studied his face. Not really an uncle, Bobby had been one of her parent's closest friends. While he wasn't a pilot, he had spent many an afternoon in her father's hangar sharing post-flight beers and war stories with dad and his small collection of instructor pilots. She'd just seen Bobby a few months back. At the time, he'd looked like his usual self, youthful for his sixty years. However, today, he looked bone-weary and haggard. The morning's events appeared to have aged him. Sandy placed a concerned hand on his shoulder. "What about you? You look like I feel."

"I don't know, Sandy." He shook his head. "Between missing bodies and rumors of aliens and the such, everybody's scared shitless. There was an explosion or sonic boom early this morning. Sue and I heard it, but I thought it was lightning. Then, we woke up to blinding light and one hell of a burning stomach. Since then, we've had no TV or Internet. Hell, I can't even raise anybody on the radios or the phones. What the hell happened?" He paused, looking over her shoulder. "And, where'd you come from?"

She told him about the alien's arrival and her unit's deployment. Having apparently heard this news, he nodded. When she told him about the energy wave and what she'd seen between San Francisco and their roadblock, the man's face darkened, appearing to sag under the weight of the news.

"It goes on for a hundred miles from here?"

Sandy nodded. "Yeah, and a hundred miles to the north, as well. I've heard it went that far on the east coast too."

Turning pale, he shook his head. "Oh my god, hun. That's gotta be millions of people."

Sandy nodded. "More like tens of millions." Remembering the San Francisco teddybear, she shivered. "It's bad, Bobby, really bad."

"Hell, Sandy, I've been a cop for thirty years. Thought I'd seen everything, but I've never seen
anything
like this shit."

"Yeah, I still don't understand what happened to everybody. The way it left the empty piles of clothes is almost worse than finding a body."

Bobby shook his head. "No, hun. It's not the
empty
clothes I'm talking about." He pointed up the street, beyond the line of police cars. "Once you see that crap, you'll wish empty clothes were all you'd seen."

"What?" Sandy said. Her heart pounded with renewed fear. Her parent's home lay less than a mile in the direction he was pointing. "What is it? Are my parents okay?"

"Your parents?" He looked confused for a moment, then comprehension filled his eyes. "Oh, they should be fine. We've had a few reports of broken windows, even some structural damage. Shit, one wacko claimed a giant rock fell from the sky. I wouldn't worry too much, though." Shifting his arms, he pointed east and west. "They're not along the line."

It was Sandy's turn to be confused. "Line?"

"You don't know?"

She shook her head. "I'm supposed to find out how far the weapon reached." Sandy pointed at a pink and white jogging outfit sprawled ahead of a pair of pink trimmed white sneakers. "But, so far it hasn't even tapered off."

Bobby shook his head. "It doesn't."

"It doesn't what?"

"Taper off."

"What do you mean?"

He shook his head again. "It's best you see for yourself." Gesturing for Sandy to follow, he turned toward the line of police cars. Passing between the two closest at a fast pace, he continued talking. "It took us a while to figure out what happened. Hell, I still don't understand it or what exactly
it
was. At first, we thought the aliens had nuked us." He pointed at the Starbucks they were approaching. "But, there's no amount of radiation that could do this."

Studying the scene, Sandy saw nothing unusual—at least under the revised definition the day's events lent the word. Like misplaced dirty laundry, a man's suit, draped half in the doorway, laid in a drying latte puddle. Lying where the vaporized hand had dropped it, an empty paper cup rolled back and forth in the morning breeze.