Test of Magnitude (The Torian Reclamation) (20 page)

“Good shot, Mip7!” Brandon said.

Mip7 waved at him from his cockpit.

But two missiles in that group got through. Explosions could be seen coming off the front side of the station. Brandon knew that was no good. They must be blowing gaping holes in it. At this rate, Cardinal-4 could eventually be destroyed two missiles at a time. Brandon felt he could stop it.

He had to stop it.

It would be dangerous, because he would risk taking friendly fire. But he knew what to do. He got ready. He could already see what was going to happen next.

The next group of missiles would probably be taken out by a Reep-3 hit at a medium range. Brandon anticipated it happening right between where the last two blasts had been, due to the timing of the blasts. Then, it would be open season for the fighters on the cluster behind it.

Apparently, the enemy had figured that out as well. The next group consisted of another five missiles, too many to ignore considering the dismal success rate the fighters were having with their current strategy. The following cluster looked to be about eight—yes, eight missiles. Those were trouble.

Brandon grabbed the joystick and fired his main engines. Up and out he went.

“Brandon!” Mip7’s voice crackled on the speaker. “Don’t do anything stupid! The Reep-3 is firing.”

Brandon ignored the radio and concentrated on his flying. He went up and out to the left, away from the station, then arced his way back toward the field of battle at an intercept point he figured would be about right. This wasn’t that hard. It was like level seven he figured, maybe level eight with that Reep device thrown into the mix. You just had to time for it.

Brandon’s timing was good. The front group of missiles all exploded in a Reep blast, and then Brandon swooped in on the cluster of eight behind it, just after the wavy space cleared. There were some after-effects from the Reep device he didn’t count on, however, because his ship shuddered for a moment or two. Then he got a fix on his first missile, the second one over from the end. He connected a laser on it. This one was an easy hold from his angle of approach. It detonated—and the explosion took out the two adjacent missiles on either side of it as well. First shot was a triple. Things were starting off well. Five left.

Now he was more to the side of the remaining missiles in the cluster, but still slightly above them. He eased up on the throttle to get behind them more and veered left. As he did, Brandon noticed they were beginning to spread out. Need to get them quick. Laser on the top dog, hold, hold, boom—there she goes.

Now lasers were firing from the fighters above and below the station. Some were coming very close to Brandon’s ship, from both directions. These guys didn’t have great aim. Mip7’s voice was yelling something on the speaker.

Take aim, got the top dog again, hold, hold, hold, boom. Three to go.

Nope, two to go. One of the boys from underneath got one. Piece of cake. Aim, adjust damn it, got it, hold, hold, boom. One left. Getting close now. Those damn lasers, get them off me boys, and learn to shoot for crying out loud. Got it. Hold, hold, hold, boom. Up and away.

Brandon got seven of the eight. Maybe he could have gotten them all, but he welcomed the help, as long as the help didn’t shoot him down. Yeah, he scored a three-for-one deal on the first, but that was part of the game—happened all the time on the simulator. Brandon assessed himself as being only a little rusty, and the turbulence from the Reep gun was a new element, plus those stupid lasers coming at him from everywhere didn’t help either. But he was getting in the groove. Back for around for another go at it.

Brandon circled across behind the station, and came out from the right side of it this time. More of Mip7’s frenzied voice on the radio which he mentally tuned out. He needed to concentrate. Brandon saw the next barrage now. Something different this time; two groups of three then a third large cluster of twelve. Interesting. The enemy must figure the big cluster to be the one that gets through, based on the prior patterns. If Brandon were in command of this battle, he would put the lasers on the first two small groups and then use the Reep gun for the large cluster in the rear. Yep. That’s what he would do. That Olut6 commander seemed pretty sharp. There’s no way he would leave the large group to the lasers. No way. Hopefully.

Brandon came around hard and started diving towards the three missiles in middle group. That should give him a little room for error in case he was wrong about the reaction from the bunker. And if he was wrong, and he died up here, well, so what? Earth was halfway across the galaxy and his life had been stolen from him anyway. Yes, he felt duty-bound to help the other human prisoners on the ground, but maybe they wouldn’t like being woken up in this place after all. Besides, what he was doing now might just be the best thing he could to try and help them.

He came in on the middle three and picked the first two off in short order. These were spread out more so he had to get them one at a time. Lasers from around the station began firing, so his analysis had been correct. He got the third missile, and then accelerated to try and catch the first group ahead. There they were, in range now. Connect, 1-2-3 boom. Connect, 1-2-3 boom. Connect, 1-2-3 boom. He got them all. Couldn’t those guys hit anything? Up and away.

As he lifted, a laser connected on the hull of his ship. The dash lit up, and the temperature in the cockpit became quite hot for just a second. Then it stopped. Yes, they could hit something—the guy who was saving them. Idiots.

Brandon got up and away fast, to clear a path for the Reep gun. His ship seemed undamaged, but he didn’t know how many more laser hits it could take. When he was back above the station, he swung around to his left and circled out on the right side of it again, just in time to witness the spectacular explosion of all twelve missiles detonating from the Reep blast. Brandon slowed down and waited for the next barrage.

Nothing happened, so he got himself into position and cut the engines. If this was anything like level seven on the missile defense simulator, a massive, disorganized onslaught would come next.

“Brandon, are you all right?” Mip7 said on the speaker.

“Yes—fine. Sorry I haven’t responded. Been concentrating. I wonder what they’ll throw at us next.”

“Whatever it is, you’ll have company on your next run.”

“What’s that?” Brandon looked behind him. Six fighters were following his path and approaching his position. They pulled up on both sides of him.

“Look to your left,” the speaker said. Brandon looked over and saw Mip7 waving at him. He looked to his right and saw another lizard-pilot waving at him from that cockpit.

“Your method is working better,” Mip7 said. “Consider yourself an honorary squadron leader.”

Brandon started laughing to himself. He hoped these guys weren’t going to get in the way. Picking off missiles is one thing, being cognizant of a bunch of other ships around you was something else—something he had no experience with.

“I don’t know if this is a good idea, Mip7.”

But it was too late. Missiles started coming from the warship again. No groups or patterns this time, as Brandon suspected. Just a straight blanket barrage of missiles upon missiles upon missiles upon missiles. No way to pick all those off.

“Let the Reep gun get them,” Brandon said to the radio. “We’ll have to swoop in and pick off the front strays afterwards, and then clear out to let them fire again.”

“Looks like we’ll have even more help,” Mip7’s voice said .

Brandon turned his head in the cockpit and saw a large group of additional fighters, perhaps three dozen, coming in behind them from the direction of the planets. Even farther in the distance, more squadrons could be seen approaching from Amulen. Help was finally arriving. The additional fighters eased in behind Brandon’s group, probably ordered so by the commander. But who was in charge, now? Were they all going to follow Brandon’s lead? He was only an escaped science project. Maybe he and Mip7 should tune their radios to the command station.

Too late. The space became wavy and distorted in front of the space station. Time to approach. Brandon took off, slowly at first, and looked behind him. The others were all following. They stayed up above battle range waiting for the Reep detonation, ready to swoop down for some missile hunting.

It came. It was huge. There were so many missiles in the air that the repulsion explosion caused a chain reaction. For a moment, the entire area was one bright red fireball. Then smaller fireballs made their way back along the lines of missiles, like so many strings of firecrackers going off. The detonating missiles were taking each other out.

Still, some made it through. Brandon dove on them. He locked on his first target and then saw lasers all around him everywhere. Another laser locked on to Brandon’s missile just as it exploded. As he was about to fire on another target, another laser beat him to it. He let that one be and found another. Connect, 1-2-3 boom.

Lasers everywhere. Hard to see the strays. Other fighters were flying close to Brandon now. He didn’t like that, and he had no idea where Mip7 was. Brandon pulled up and out of the fray, carefully, and circled back over the station. Most of the fighters that had previously been there were gone, probably out in front of the station involved in the hunt now. Brandon settled over a spot near the center of Cardinal-4, next to the tower. He would try his luck the old fashioned way.

The fighters suddenly pulled out, except for three which still had lasers on missiles. There must have been an order to get out of the way. The space went wavy. The three missiles locked on by the remaining three fighters all detonated. Only one of the ships was then able to clear out in time. The repulsion blast detonated in another massive explosion, but it also took out two fighter craft—which were simply blown to pieces. Brandon felt nauseous. Two Torian fighter pilots just lost their lives from friendly fire. Why didn’t they pull out? Couldn’t they hear the order to clear? Oh, no.

“Mip7, do you read me?”

Silence.

“Mip7, you all right?”

No response.

More stray missiles were coming. The fleet out in front of the station began diving in on them again, many of the fighters having circled back around after pulling out before the last Reep blast. The squadrons from the planets had arrived and were now in the mix. The battle had become one giant circular motion of fighters diving on a never-ending blanket barrage of missiles. They were getting better at hitting them, though. Brandon managed to get one stray from a straight-on shot, the only one within his range. Then all the fighters cleared out and the scene repeated.

“Mip7, are you there?”

The speaker crackled faintly this time, but there was no voice. Brandon then nailed two strays with straight-on shots. It was definitely more challenging this way, but he could still get them.

Not that it mattered all that much if Mip7 was gone. Brandon had no idea what he would do if one of those destroyed ships was his. That big bronze lizard-man was his friend. Brandon didn’t even know what he was supposed to do with this fighter when/if the battle ended. The military hangar was too damaged to go back into. He wasn’t sure how much fuel, oxygen, or ammunition one of these things held. Also, an occasional missile was still getting through. During the last go-around, one missile scored a direct hit on the station, off on the right side. They could still destroy it, methodically and painstakingly, assuming the enemy didn’t run out of missiles first.

Around and around the Torian fighter pilots flew. Bugging out for the big explosion and then diving back in for the residual shoot-out. There must have been a hundred fighters in the rotation now. Brandon was picking off occasional strays from head-on shots that the other pilots didn’t get to, but he couldn’t be everywhere at once. On average, one missile was still hitting the station for every Reep detonation. This was ultimately a losing proposition.

Brandon looked down at his instruments and pondered over his own missile supply. He had ten of them. He looked up to the enemy warship. No fighters were harassing it. They were all engaged in a purely defensive action. The enemy must love that.

The incoming missiles all seemed to be firing from two places under the enemy ship. With the constant barrage, a pilot should be able to get a fix on the batteries and possibly shove one right up the pipe. That ought to give them pause, if nothing else. Maybe a lot more. Of course, they had laser defenses when you got in that close. But Brandon was pretty good at maneuvering.

Did Mip7 just die in this battle?

“Mip7, are you there?”

Nothing.

That was it. Brandon put his hand back on the joystick and spoke to himself.

“Let’s get those bastards where they live.”

Brandon moved off the station to the left, did a quick circle-around, and loosely got into the counter-clockwise rotation with the other circling fighters. Another Reep explosion went up in front of the station. Brandon stayed on the outside to the far right of the formation. He looked like just another ship in the engagement.

When it was time for the ships in his group to dive in on the missiles, however, he made a quick right turn and took a beeline toward the enemy ship.

“Brandon, please tell me that’s not you making a suicide run at the enemy,” the speaker said.

Mip7!

“Can’t talk now,” Brandon happily replied, “busy, glad you’re all right, but you owe me an argim for going silent on me.”

“Brandon—”

Brandon reached over and turned the volume dial all the way down. That was a mistake. Laser fire shot above his head, barely missing the cockpit. Time to dance. Brandon rolled right, then dove and rolled left, then pulled back up. Lasers fired all around him, some of them in spots he had just moved from. These laser beams were bigger than the ones the fighters had. He pulled up. Another beam shot right underneath him. This one stayed on and started tracking him. Brandon pulled out hard right and dove fast. It turned off. This was going to be tricky.