I originally set this story to be six chapters, but it's not working out that way. I know how it ends, but the journey getting there is taking different routes than envisioned. I'll write until the story is told and not make any further arbitrary predictions as to length.
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I should have been sleeping. It was a three hour flight to High Guard War base.
Trouble was I couldn't relax. Part of it was anticipation, of course. I hadn't seen Janetta in four, going on five days and it seemed a lifetime. Even more, it was almost two weeks since I'd been inside her wet, writhing heat. However, it wasn't just excitement about holding my dark sultry warrior in my arms again that kept me awake.
I kept re-playing Senior Sergeant Itznacoco's revelation in my head. It was by his actions that we were all still alive. I hoped his stated reason was a true one and that the incident was buried with that bastard Zoubat and his two toadies. He could have said nothing at all and I would have been happily ignorant of just how close we'd been to being caught. The warning he gave, that all officers were chipped and monitored while on base was valuable, and no doubt something a mere sublieutenant like myself should not be privy to. And the knowledge that enlisted were not chipped was a puzzler. Was it truth? The Empire was strongly bound by caste, and enlisted were drawn from the lower classes. Was it arrogance on Command's part to dismiss them so? Or was it simply that whoever designed such a tracking system would include some means of keeping tabs on enlisted as well? Rank made no difference on ability to kill or commit crimes or acts of treason. Itznacoco himself had opened my eyes to look for layers within layers. Perhaps he'd just masked the enlisted on the data display he'd shown me?
I had a feeling that I now had a blood debt and that one day the Senior Sergeant would come collecting.
The plane turned and banked. It was past our second hour of flight and an hour before midnight. Below us were the Eastern Islands of the Inland Sea. Like the Seven Nations on the east coast of the Northern Continent, the Eastern Islands were a buffer state between the Empire of Chomorro and Atlantis. Flying direct, we could easily have arrived at High Guard in under two hours. It was only eleven hundred rads by direct flight. But by treaty, military craft flew in narrow corridors that added over an hour of flight time in a show of respect for foreign air space. High Guard War base was technically within the Seven Nations, but the War base itself was Imperial territory. Had been for over two hundred years. As large as a small city, it was defended by six interceptor groups, two ground-attack air groups, search and rescue units, and an adjacent naval base as well as a submarine pen. There was even a division of armored Ground Service for base defense. High Guard was vital in monitoring Atlantean activities and for deflecting raids.
I glanced out the window beside me. The moon hung huge and luminous over the Ocean of Atlan, surrounded by starlight gleaming brilliantly in attendance. Outside the thick glass I spotted the Navigator's Triangle of Altair, Vega, and Deneb. The summer stars were in their splendor, sharper and clearer so far from city lights. My parents had their home in the mountains southeast of Tohingo on the Southern Continent, and the nights were pristine there, too. Ahead, I spied the constellation of the Big Bear and traced the arc to the red sun of Arcturus.
"For those of you still awake, we are on final approach to High Guard, ETA thirty-three minutes. If you care to assist, Lieutenant Kandikan, my co-pilot, Lieutenant Canbatca, will do his best to avoid eating at the vending machines at Tikun while he makes yet another detour to the latrine."
The pilot's crisp voice came over the hard earmuffs we all wore. Without them, the numbing noise of the six rotary engines carrying us through the night sky made it impossible to talk. JEBos Condor transports had little insulation, being designed for work, not comfort. Because of that, all of us wore jackets to keep warm. Even in the summer, flying anything above about five rads gets cool or even downright cold. Less atmospheric pressure to keep the heat in. To ease communication, the ear protection also came standard with short range radios and microphones.
I heard the flight engineer laugh at the pilot's tease. Inside the huge belly of the Condor there were three enlisted and myself and over ten thousand stone's weight of food, tools and sundry supplies, as well as eight new HueCac Light Transports and two Tortoises -- the Ground Service's nickname for the heavier, armored electric transports. I looked toward the cockpit and spotted the pilot waving at me. I unbuckled and made my way forward. I passed the co-pilot on the way to the latrine. He did indeed have a look of urgency about him.
Stepping into the cockpit, I first shook hands with the flight engineer. I'd been inside a couple of Condors before. I'd flown and was rated in the much smaller, two-engine JEBos Albatross as well as the cutting-edge Sunskipper, a high-orbital shuttle for long distance runs.
The pilot, a Senior Lieutenant, turned and held out one hand. "Zim Blaychan." As with the navy, the commander of any aircraft with a crew was called captain. To captain a ship and to have the rank of Captain were not the same thing. A lot of flight crews also referred to the bigger transports as ships, a holdover from when anything that flew was an airship.
I shook his hand, pleased to have something else to do. "Ranji Kandikan." I settled into the co-pilot seat, scanning the instrumentation around me. I spoke what they were, to check them off, and he nodded each time. I noticed we were about eight point two rads above the ocean.
"The Flight Controller at Tikun mentioned you were a pilot. I'm satisfied. We'll be at Point Reception in about fifteen minutes and at High Guard about two minutes later," Blaychan said. "Enough time for you to ride the stick a little before we land. Have you flown a Condor before?"
"PE-15 Albatross is the biggest I've flown. I appreciate this opportunity." I adjusted the seat a bit and buckled in.
Blaychan shrugged. "This is a cake run. This time of night, we don't have to worry about the Atlanteans or the East Islanders. We passed the big island of Pangosta and the wild city of Dyn Choga about half hour back. We'll reach Mehayan Peninsula and the Seven Nations shortly. Grab the stick and I'll let you drive a while."
Flying the Condor was a little rocky at first. The controls were firm but the slightest adjustment easily moved the plane. I put my feet to the rudder controls and experimented with some slow yaw to the left and right. Pulling a bit on the wheel, the ailerons moved and we rose a bit, and then I pushed down and our pitch descended. I asked about payload capacity, rate of fuel consumption loaded and empty and other useful information as I felt for how the big transport responded to me. Big and ponderous was my assessment, but manageable.
Naturally, that was when the proximity alarm began to blare. Blaychan grabbed the master wheel and I let mine loose.
The engineer was reading the radar scope behind me. "One unidentified, flying Mach four, repeat Mach four. Crossed behind us. Now he's turning and coming up behind us at eighty-five degrees."
Almost directly behind us then. I glanced back at the engineer as he rubbed his mustache nervously.
"What do we have?" I asked.
"No armaments, if that's what you mean. The Condor's big and slow. Four chaff bursts and four anti-missile rockets. She'll take multiple lightning strikes and keep going, but against an interceptor? Forget it. Mach Four? It's an ET."
The engineer leaned over and scanned out the window. "He's pacing us alright. Fucking aliens. Elongated bubble. Confirmed as a Grey."
The Grey leader types were spindly with only four fingers and enormous black, almond-shaped eyes. Bald, too. Ran around with dwarves that acted as their drones. Reports were that they were somehow linked in some sort of hive mind. And they were allies of the Atlanteans. I didn't like them. They reminded me of insects, and I always got the impression they looked at humans the same way that humans viewed animals. The draconians, uneasy allies of the Aesir-Vedans, simply wanted to subjugate us. There were other interstellar races on earth but they were in much smaller numbers than either the Greys or the draconians.
Blaychan pulled on the wheel for altitude. "Hang on, boys," he muttered.
"Need a hand?" I asked.
"No. Keep your hands clear in case they--"
There was a bright flash of light outside that flooded the cabin, brighter than a clear day at noon, and at the same instant, static electricity danced over the instrument panel. Blaychan shook as the energy leaped from the console, up the wheel, arced up and jolted him. At the same moment, all six engines sputtered and died.
"What was that?" I demanded.
"Electro-Magnetic Pulse," the engineer answered. I heard a big breaker being flipped, and then he was pulling the pilot back into his seat. There was a scorch mark on the captain's right temple, and a trickle of blood coming from his nose.
"Grab the wheel and keep us steady as you can," the engineer continued. The Condor began pointing its nose down. "We have a sixty-second wait before the system resets and we can restart the engines. The Condor may be old, but the tubes in the avionics are immune. It's the modern circuits up front here that need time to reboot after being hit. Research is working on shielding, but in the meantime, it's the best we've got. "
I grabbed the wheel and pulled. There was still some assist from the hydraulics, but without the electrics, it was a lot tougher to move the controls.
The alien ship zipped ahead, crossed back and forth across our nose three times, then shot up into the sky in a full vertical ascent.
They were now officially Grey Bastards in my book.
"Will he be all right?" I put my feet to the floor, straining to pull the wheel and keep the nose up. Without power, we were descending fast. Empty, the Condor had a glide ratio of about eight point five, but loaded down, I estimated we were doing about five to one. Probably less. And we lost a bit of altitude between the time Blaychan went unconscious and I grabbed the wheel. The altimeter now read five point four rads between us and the glittery ocean below, and falling steadily. The Inland Sea south of Mehayan Peninsula was known for both tiger and bull sharks.
The flight engineer broke smelling salts under the pilot's nose. Nothing for several seconds, then Blaychan jerked awake, arms flailing. I glanced at him as he wiped the blood from his nose. Then he swore, rubbing the burn on his temple gingerly.
"Time?" Blaychan whispered hoarsely.
The flight engineer glanced at his watch. "Ten seconds."
Blaychan turned my direction. "Can't quite see yet, Kandikan. Altyun, did you hit the master control? Good man. Ready the reset. Kandikan, when Altyun resets the power, count to five, then begin engine restart in this order: innermost engines first, then center pair, and then finally the outer pair."
Altyun, the engineer moved behind me. "Four, three, two, one. Engaging."
I heard the master switch click into place. Lights flickered and the console came alive again.
"One thousand," I counted aloud. "Two thousand, three thousand, four thousand, five thousand. Engine restart, inner pair." I flipped both switches. Both engines coughed and nothing. Without both hands pulling on the wheel, we descended faster. Three rads and falling. Even blinded, Blaychan had his hands on his own wheel and was struggling to help me keep the nose up. And still we were coming down like a brick! The surface of the ocean loomed closer.
