Claws That Catch

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

“And I will write her name and cast it to the sky,” Miriam sang, drifting shining beams across the wall of gas. The formed silhouettes of light, a circle, a swirl that resolved into a dragonfly. “Silhouettes recede into a mother’s tearful eyes…” Her eyes were wide and staring into the distance, lost in a world of music.

“Miriam, bring it down and to the right,” Bill said. “Miriam…”

“I think she’s out of it, sir,” Carpenter said over the officer’s implant.

“It’s not much good if she’s not going to target it,” Weaver responded. “I don’t want to break her concentration, though. Come on, girl, down and to the right…”

As if his will drove it, the image of the dragonfly dove, swooping into the Dreen fleet, and appeared to grasp one of the destroyers protecting the upper side of the fleet. The destroyer, under the power of a dozen Earth suns, flashed in fire and disappeared in an instant, simply adding some constituent molecules to the gases filling the system.

“I felt that,” Miriam said, shaking her head as the beams of light collapsed, the dragonfly left as a glowing image for a moment and then fading. She grabbed her head and squeezed. “There was feedback. I don’t understand the feedback. But I could feel the ship dying.”

“You’re going to have to take it,” Bill said. “You’ve got to get into the brain-ship and take it out.”

“I know,” Miriam said, wincing. “I’ll try. I need something more soothing for now.”

“Yes!” the TACO shouted as the Dreen cruiser erupted in fire. It stopped decelerating and drifted away from the formation, trailing air and water then detonating in a flash of white. “Sierra 31 is toast!”

“We’re not much better,” Captain Prael said, looking at the damage report. “And if we don’t get one of the troopships in the next five minutes, we’re going to have nine more destroyers to deal with.”

“We got some accidental hits on Sierra 50, sir,” the TACO said, still jubilant. His job was killing other ships, other officers had to deal with the damage to this one. “Recommend next run be on Sierra 50.”

“Sir,” one of the tracking technicians said. “Sierra 41 just detonated.”

“Blue on Blue again?” the TACO asked.

“No, sir,” the technician replied. “I’m not sure why…”

“Sir,” the sensor tech interrupted. “The Tree has been making some odd emissions. I thought they were random, but a series of them just tracked across the position of Sierra 41. Emission levels were approximately six hundred exajoules of energy in the area of Sierra 41. I repeat. Six. Hundred. Exa. Joules.”

“Holy Hanna, our biggest nukes are less than a thousandth of that,” the TACO said. “That makes taking out that cruiser a pretty minor accomplishment.”

“Not really,” the CO said. “So far, that’s the only hit that the Tree’s gotten in. And if somebody doesn’t stop this task force from taking the Tree, then they’re not going to get many more. Set up an attack run on Sierra 50.”

“Already laid in, sir,” the TACO said.

“Make it so,” Prael replied. “But I’m glad that Miss Moon is back singing. Lovely voice, I’ll admit. Hearing her sing ‘I Stand Alone’ is a bit odd, though. What’s next? Ozzie?”

“Sierra 50 terminated, sir,” the TACO said as the destroyer broke apart. No secondaries, but it was in pieces and drifting which was good enough.

“Was it my imagination or was the fire much less effective that time?” the CO asked.

“No, sir, it wasn’t your imagination,” the TACO said. “Return fire rate was lower and less interlocked. Don’t know why. But we took a lot less damage. And there’s a hole we can fire through to one of the troop carriers.”

“No, take out one more destroyer, first,” the CO said. “That will ensure we can get through. Sierra… 48. Set that up.”

“Ready, sir,” the TACO said a moment later.

“Engage.”

Status of boarding force.

‹Units 1,336,788 and 25,463,785 destroyed. Enemy combat unit damaged, 70% reduction in fire, significant air and water loss. Enemy combat unit preparing new attack run. Estimate loss of one Ground Combat Carrier prior to arrival of secondary escort group. Arrival at space station in point four turns.›

“Dreen fighters redeployed around the boarding group,” the TACO said. “Boarding group entering warp-denial field.”

The CIC was more than just evacuated at this point. Despite being deep in the interior of the ship, light could be seen coming in.

On the other hand, they’d managed to destroy six Dreen destroyers, one of the troop carriers and the cruiser. Not a bad haul, even if they had gotten the ship blown to ribbons.

“That’s all we can do here,” Captain Prael said. “Let’s go pick up our dragonflies and see if we can get the old girl patched up. The rest is up to Commander Weaver. If he can get it together.”

“Look, the brain works in strange ways, okay?” Miriam said defiantly. “Mine especially. I’ve tried just about every song you two can’t mangle too badly. I’ve thought about beams of light, lightning, hammers, everything I can think of. Nothing seems to work. ‘Dragonfly’ worked once. I just can’t get it to work again. But there’s something there, I know it. I can feel it.”

“You know, it actually was the dragonfly,” Carpenter said. “I mean, that was the attack method. A big, glowing, green and yellow dragonfly. Does that help?”

“Yeah,” Bill said. “I mean, what hit the ship was the beams, but the thing that attacked them was a dragonfly.”

“I made a dragonfly?” Miriam asked, blinking. “Cool.”

“Well, it was like a laser light-show dragonfly,” Bill pointed out. “It was about as insubstantial as mist.”

“That just makes it cooler,” Miriam said. “A mist dragonfly is cooler than a real one.”

“But that’s what did it,” the petty officer said. “That big mist dragonfly… ate the destroyer. Does that help?”

“Sort of,” Miriam said, staring into the distance. “Avatars.”

“And that means… ?” Weaver said.

“An avatar is, in Hindu mythology, the descent of a deity in carnate form,” Carpenter said. “In computer terms — ”

“I know what an avatar is, PO,” Bill said. “I meant, what does it mean in this context?”

“It means I have to have an image of something to form,” Miriam said, still staring into the distance. “Songs with avatars. ‘Dragonfly’… I’m blanking.”

“ ‘Black Unicorn’?” Carpenter said then shrugged at their expressions. “Sue me. I’m a Heather Alexander fan. I can set this thing to bodran.”

“Got some music?”

Analysis of gaseous phenomenon.

‹Phenomenon generated by combination of gravitational beams and coherent energy beams interacting with gaseous particles. Phenomenon nonhazardous. Intersection of combat units with coherent energy beams transfers six hundred exajoules of energy to combat unit resulting in termination. Secondary effect of gravitational beams irrelevant.›

Defense?

‹None. Power levels are equivalent to multiple main sequence stars. Only defense is capture of station.›

There was a pause as the Dreen fleet-mind considered this new weapon the hell-spawned thing Species 27264 had created.

Why is it black? And why is it just… hovering?

“If you ever meet me standing there, you’ll wish that you were never born,” Miriam sang. “I’ll seize your soul and strip it bare, I am the Black Unicorn.”

“Come on,” Weaver whispered, mostly to himself. “You’ve formed it, now use it!”

A black unicorn with bat-wings out of nightmare was crossing the system, galloping through glowing clouds of mist. Just as insubstantial as mist, it was, nonetheless, impressive. Especially given that it was bigger than all four of the Jovians put together and using about ten percent of the output of the blue-white star to generate.

It had formed slowly, most of the way across the system from the Dreen fleet. Now it closed on the Dreen, seemingly moving in slow motion. The actual speed was very close to that of light, but from their position it seemed ominously slow.

If the Dreen had anything similar to emotions, it was going to seem agonizingly slow.

As the music crescendoed, the monster from the deeps of space lowered its horn and drove it into the Dreen fleet.

The fleet was gathered in an egg-shaped formation around the brain-ship. As the horn hit the lead ships, dozens flared and died under the enormous power of the Tree. The entire vanguard of the fleet was ripped asunder.

Miriam gasped in response, but maintained the image and continued to sing. The unicorn, though, only circled the fleet as the music continued. It only seemed to attack on the instrumental portions, diving in again to slash its horn through the fleet, ripping dreadnoughts, superdreadnoughts and destroyers apart as if they were the insubstantial mist.

As the song drew to a close, the unicorn turned and began trotting away, fading into the stars as the last chord died, the only sign of it a flash as from a silver hoof.

“Damn,” Bill muttered, looking at the Dreen fleet. It was redeploying, fast, and seemed to be putting most of its combat power forward, as if to shield the brain-ship.

“And I will stand here at the gates,” Miriam sang, “and face the onslaught, fighting…”

Again, the avatar had formed slowly, fading into view from the mist that now filled the system. A Greek hoplite in full armor, spear extended, shield up and helmet down. Smaller than the unicorn, he drifted into reality between the station and the approaching fleet, then began striding forward.

All units, engage the anomaly.

‹Anomaly gaseous in nature. Engagement futile.›

Obey.

Beams of plasma, massive chunks of heavy metal driven to relativistic speeds, the full output of the remaining fleet flashed out at the warrior. He paused and raised his shield, shedding the fire as if it were so many Persian arrows. As strikes got through to his armor, though, it was penetrated, red blood running unheeded down his chest.

A stab of the planet-sized spear and a destroyer flared into nothingness. Another and a superdreadnought was cut in half. A cut of the spearhead and a dreadnought exploded in actinic fire.

But as the song reached its end, the avatar faded away, raising his spear in a final tribute.

“No stopping this time,” Weaver said. “ ‘Fight For Freedom’…”

“Now that there is something to see,” the CO said, watching the screen. The major interior holes in the ship had been patched and while the atmosphere in CIC wasn’t exactly thick, it was at least breathable.

“Sir, with respect,” the TACO said, “I’m glad Captain Weaver talked you into letting him go back to try to get the system working.”

“Duly noted, TACO,” Prael said. “Duly noted.”

All combat units, shield retreat. Maximum deceleration. Exit by nearest warp point.

“Where The Eagles Fly I Will Soon Be There,” Miriam sang.

A bald eagle, its wings as wide as planetary orbits, stooped through the fleet. Where its wings passed, dreadnoughts shuddered and faltered, destroyers flared white-hot and exploded, frigates ceased to exist. The fighters trying to provide cover lasted no longer than gnats caught in an oxyacetylene torch. Where its talons closed, superdreadnoughts burst apart, their refractory armor as insubstantial as tissue paper.

The Dreen fleet had changed vector, heading off for points unknown. The brain-ship was in the lead of the retreat, showing an unexpected turn-of-speed for such a large vessel. The eagle disdained to engage the enemy commander, as if letting it flee to tell of the power of the rulers of this patch of space. Ships had fallen out of the retreat, untouched by the power of the station they simply ceased to accelerate. Some of them, those that were fully Dreen, exploded or came apart like overripe fruit. Converts simply coasted, leaking air and water for reasons unknown. The eagle disdained these carrion of the battle as well, concentrating on the ships that tried to avoid the battle.

As the song closed the eagle didn’t fade. It simply took up a proprietary position between the fleet and the station, a bundle of arrows appearing out of the mist for it to perch upon.

“Can you hold that?” Weaver asked.

“Easily,” Miriam said, her eyes closed. “Now that I know what I’m doing. In fact… There,” she continued, opening her eyes. “It’s set, now. Until I tell it to go away or we shut down the station. Easy, really.”

“For you,” Weaver said. “You sure you can’t get the brain-ship?”

“There seems to be a range limiter,” Miriam admitted. “I can’t get out much beyond the gas cloud. They’re already past that.”

“We really shouldn’t let them get away,” Weaver said with a frown. “We’re going to have to fight them again some time.”

“Like, right now, sir,” Captain Zanella said. “The Dreen boarding force just entered the docking bay.”

“Damn,” Weaver said. “I knew I’d forgotten something important.”

“Interesting,” Berg said, watching the new monitors in the docking bay. “It’s not landing.”

“Would you, sir?” Gunny Juda said.

The docking platform was covered in space spiders, to the point where it was solidly purple in spots. The spiders had also sensed the approach of the Dreen and were up and awake, scurrying around in groups trying to get to the hovering ship.

What the Dreen apparently didn’t realize, was that there were spiders on the upper levels as well. Berg could see them cascading off the upper platforms in a broken river. Many of them were killed by the impact on the hull of the Dreen ship, others missed and plummeted into the depths. But quite a few were landing on it.

The Dreen ship, unheeding of the parasites, opened up a hatch on the underside and dropped out seven of the oddest things Berg had ever seen. They seemed to be sea anemones, with thousands of tentacle legs.

As they hit the platform, the legs flashed out, scooping up the spiders. Nearly as many orifices opened on the side and the spiders were flipped in to be crushed by what looked like large molars.

The cleaner systems probably would have worked if there hadn’t been so many of the space spiders. Unfortunately, as fast as they ate spiders, more and more came on. The cleaners were actually increasing in size from all the sustenance, bulging from the mass of the spiders they were consuming. But the spiders were getting through the flickering tentacles, climbing up onto the bodies of the things, cutting with their claws and looking for a way in that didn’t have teeth.

The ship dropped two more of the cleaners but it was fruitless; the station had become packed with the Dreen-eating spiders. And just as the hatch was opening, the ship suddenly gave a massive twitch as if it were a dog bitten on a nerve by a flea. It spun in place and headed for the airlock. It was already beginning to shudder as it exited the Tree.

“God, I love those things,” Eric said, grinning. “Captain Zanella… ?”

“Okay, we’ve got about seven destroyers by the door,” Bill said. “I’m not sure how we’re going to get rid of them; the system won’t shoot under the station. Maybe the Blade can drive them off. But as long as they stay inside the field… I don’t think the Blade can get them. And there’s a few hundred fighters left. We can’t even see them with this system, so they’re going to be a pest until they run out of fuel…”

“Or into a space spider,” Miriam said. “I told you they were cute.”

“Very,” Weaver said. “And we’ve got the brain-ship headed out of the system. But we’re sort of stuck here.”

“We are, aren’t we,” Miriam said, frowning. “It’s the destroyers by the door that are the problem.”

“I wonder how they’d react to an airlock opening,” Berg said.

“Why?” Weaver asked.

“Well, sir, in space once momentum is imparted to something it maintains it,” the lieutenant said. “And we’ve got all these damned spiders just sitting here…”

“I can’t believe we’re down to throwing rocks,” Day said.

“Just get ready to hand me spiders,” Lurch replied. “Opening airlock.”

When there was no immediate reaction he stepped right up to the edge and looked out.

Two Dreen destroyers were “down” from his perch. He couldn’t tell how far away but it didn’t really matter. Once velocity was imparted to an object in zero gravity…

“Take that you interstellar menaces,” Sergeant Lyle shouted, throwing one of the baseball-sized ovoids. “Eat space spiders you… you…”

“People-eating morons?” Day suggested.

“Jerks,” Lyle said, continuing to throw the spiders. “I think one just… Yep, we have spiders on-board.”

“Why are you throwing, anyway?” Day asked.

“Were you the pitcher of your school’s baseball team?” Lurch asked. “No? Then hand me some more balls. I wonder if they’d fire if we did a space walk? The others have to be inside the shield somewhere…”

‹Organism 8139 infestation in quadrant three.›

Source?

‹Unknown. With degree of gravitational disturbance in system and reported numbers of infected units, random source high probability.›

Degradation?

‹Five percent failure in forward armaments and shielding. And increasing.›

Divert all available resources to Cleaner Unit generation.

“What’s our status, Eng?”

“Sickbay is overflowing,” Commander Oldfield said. “We’ve got Laser Two back up and three of the damaged ball guns on the port side. Starboard is trashed, through. We’ve used up all our molycirc getting the port back up and we’ll have to find some more osmium before we can do anything on the starboard. And, frankly, sir, most of the guns are beyond local repair. The fabber isn’t big enough to make some of the components.”

“That gives us, what? Seven guns on port and two on starboard?” the CO asked.

“Yes, sir.”

“Good,” Prael said. “That’s enough. Conn, set course for the brain-ship.”

“Sir, are you insane?” the Eng snarled. “We’re going to get our ass handed to us! We’ve done enough!”

“TACO?” the CO said. “What was that about all the times I’ve busted up my ship?”

“ ‘If I had been censured every time I have run my ship, or fleets under my command, into great danger, I should have long ago been out of the Service and never in the House of Peers,’ ” the TACO said automatically.

“With your shield or on it, Eng,” Prael said. “With your shield or on it.”

“CIC, Conn. Two minutes to intercept.”

“I miss the music,” the CO said. “What do we have in the way of tunes?”

“About a billion MP3s, sir,” the TACO replied.

“What to play, what to play?” the CO said, accessing the entertainment server. “I’m getting a bit tired of rock, heavy metal and Goth. Hmmm… Ah. There we go…”

The TACO looked up as orchestral music started to pour from the 1MC and tapped his foot.

“I don’t think I’ve ever heard this before, sir,” the TACO said. “Catchy tune, though.”

“That’s because you were forced to attend that wimpy liberal school in Annapolis, Lieutenant,” the CO said. “If you were an Aggie, you’d have learned the words by heart.

“Yes, sir, very nice,” the TACO said, wincing. Like the XO, the CO really should let others sing. “But we’ve got an emergence at the warp-point.”

“What?” the CO asked, standing up and walking over to the sensor operator. “What class?”

“It looks like a Dreen convert,” the sensor tech said. “Dreadnought class. Pretty much like that one we captured in the Orion battle. But the readings are off enough I’m not sure. Accel is way up, total energy output is up about ten percent. So… I’m not sure, sir.”

“Just one more Dreen to engage,” the CO said, sighing. “Sound the battlecry, men, we’re going — ”

“CIC, Communications. Incoming transmission, SpacCom codes. Visual and audio.”

“Put it on,” the CO said, resuming his seat.

“Captain Prael, Admiral Blankemeier, Alliance Flagship Thermopylae,” Spectre said, grinning evilly. “I see you’ve managed to make hash of my ship. Again. Congratulations, glad to see the tradition has been upheld. But we’ve got this one, you can back off.”