Invasion

“No,” Brent said. He looked over at Luke, but the alien was coming apart at the seams. The sight of one of his priests blown apart by a spray of bullets seemed to have unhinged him slightly. He wouldn’t be any use at all and it was damn lucky that they’d never given him a weapon. “We just keep heading into the ship and…”

A spray of bullets cut off his words. The aliens had, somehow, managed to get a blocking force in ahead of them…and, he suspected, another in back of them. The space engineers had suggested that the aliens would be reluctant to use heavy weapons on their mothership, but clearly no one had bothered to tell them that; they were firing heavy machine guns right into the confined space. The small unit split up and threw a pair of grenades back down the corridor, hearing an explosion and screams of pain, but Brent knew that they were trapped. They might punch their way through the blocking force, but by now the aliens would be sealing them into a trap and sending warriors to cut off all the escape routes. They’d be expecting a surrender; they knew that most trapped human units tried to surrender, but not now.

“Cover me,” he ordered, and pulled his backpack off. It was the work of a moment to open the covering and reach the control panel and then, taking a breath, to enter his code. The red lights lit up, revealing a countdown, but he cancelled it impatiently. The aliens would break through at any moment…and, he realised now, they had been foolish to think that there was even a chance to get away. He thought, briefly, of the remainder of SF34 and allowed himself a moment of relief that they hadn’t come with him, and then held his finger over the button. It was a moment for last words, but he couldn’t think of anything he wanted to say, even though he’d known it would come down to this one day.

“I’m sorry, Luke,” he said, and pushed down on the button.

It made a single ominous click under his finger.

The world went white.

Chapter Forty-Seven

Wars end when one side decides that the uncertain prospects of peace are more hopeful than the uncertain prospects of war.

– Anon

We’re going to lose this, Gary thought, grimly. A cold sense of hopeless came over him, a feeling that it had all been for nothing. Guiding Star was picking up speed now, its massive drive starting to push it out of orbit, contemptuously outrunning the pitifully feeble human opposition behind it. The massive ship should move like a whale, he thought, but it still had the legs to outrun them. They’d barely have a chance to light it up with their lasers, let alone the rail guns, and it was large enough to shrug off a hit from one of those. It would be difficult to hit at such speeds, let alone damage enough to…

Guiding Star exploded. He stared at the twinkle of light on the display, the cameras showing the starship literally ripping itself apart, the full fury of a nuclear blast, inside the ship, shattering it like paper. The weapons and ammunition onboard the ship only added to the catastrophe tearing the ship apart…and there was no way that it could shrug that off. It might have been able to survive a nuclear blast close to the hull – and the Russians claimed that it had done just that – but the detonation had occurred inside the hull. They would have some precautions against accidental detonations, but nothing that could stop a nuke. Offhand, he couldn’t even think of anything that would stop a nuke from vaporising the ship.

Simon was laughing. “Sir,” he said, delightedly. “Didn’t I promise you fireworks?”

“Shut up,” Gary said, unable to keep a smile from his face. Even the thought of the commandos who had sacrificed themselves to take out the battle section couldn’t put a dampener on his mood. “What the hell are they going to do now?”

His thoughts turned pensive. The briefcase nuke onboard the shuttle had been the most powerful small nuclear warhead ever built, capable of levelling a major city…or at least inflicting serious damage on it. In space, where there were no rescue services, it had proven devastating…but there were still the remaining parasite ships. He did a quick count and was relieved to see that there were only fifteen of them left, most of them out of position for a quick engagement. They appeared to be trying to concentrate their forces…

It didn’t really matter. The laws of orbital motion bound the shuttles now, as thoroughly as they bound the alien craft. It would be hours yet before they were either in a position to engage or return to Earth…if they could return to Earth. It was possible that one of the two craft that had remained on the surface could be repaired to lift a small amount of propellant to orbit, but if the parasite ships wanted to interfere, they could slaughter the remaining shuttles when they made re-entry. Judging from their positions, and the uplinked data from the ground, they'd knocked out most of the ground-based laser stations…and probably still carried enough weapons to slaughter a few million humans.

His eye caught the icon for the habitation section of Guiding Star. What were the aliens thinking over there? They’d lost most of their supplies and a vast number of warriors – and the female crew members who did all the supporting work in the background – but would they feel defeated? Would they seek terms, or would they try to continue the war? Even without the battle section, they were in a formidable position to just continue fighting…and perhaps they would win.

He looked over at Simon. “The war’s not over yet,” he said. “Your wife will have to wait a few hours longer.”

“Or forever,” Simon said, numbly. He’d finally married the girl only a week before being launched into space. “I hope she waits for me before starting the honeymoon.”

Gary laughed. “Hey, you’re going to be one of the most famous people on Earth,” he said, grinning. “Girls will be lining up to suck you off and offer themselves to you.” He allowed his grin to become a leer. “If you want my advice, you got married at the wrong time…”

“Sir, with the deepest respect, go fuck yourself,” Simon said. Gary found his laugh growing deeper, almost as if he couldn’t stop. “I love her…”

“And she’s going to be insisting on the pair of you travelling incognito,” Gary pressed. “If people find out who you are, you won’t have a moment’s peace.”

“Yeah, they’ll make me sign autographs,” Simon said. He looked down towards the icon of the alien craft. “What the hell are they doing over there?”

“I wish I knew,” Gary said, checking the updates from the other shuttles. One of them was too badly damaged to make it back to Earth, not without help…and the only people who could help them were the aliens. He wasn't too sure about themselves, for that matter; the heat shield had been bubbling off under the impact of alien lasers. They might win the battle and disintegrate in Earth’s atmosphere. “I bet they’re wishing they knew too.”

***

“The Guiding Star has been destroyed, Mr President,” Paul said, formally. The room had erupted in cheers when the starship had disintegrated, but the habitation section remained at L4, completely out of reach. Femala swore blind that the habitation section had nothing in the way of weapons, but Paul distrusted that on principle; he would have armed both sections to the teeth. “The attack craft are preparing to engage the remaining parasite ships.”

“And they’ve said nothing?”

“They took some damage, but the remaining craft can continue with the mission,” Paul assured him. The download suggested that several of the craft were no longer fit for anything, but scrap, but they had to fight with what they had. “They can probably defeat the remaining parasite ships, but probably at the cost of mutual annihilation.”

The President shook his head. “I meant the aliens,” he said. “Are they not trying to talk to us?”

“Not yet, Mr President,” Paul said. The President stared at the display. He had to know, more than any of them, just how close the war was – still – to being lost. If the aliens decided to call it a draw and wreck the planet, the human race would be exterminated or, at the very least, knocked back down to barbarity. There were people, he