Chapter Text
Chapter 4.6: The Battle of Nithascal
“General quarters! General quarters! All hands, man your action stations!”
Captain Rangi’s voice, amplified over the public address system, caused Mira’s thoughts to stop circling the drain. She sat upright in her bed and finally looked out the window. She only had to gaze into the star field for a couple of seconds before she spotted the thing which had caused so much alarm:
From the asteroid field that used to be the second planet, a colossal spacecraft was ascending into view. It had a curious configuration. The entire ship appeared to have been stretched. Its command deck was separated from the engine module by a central spine that was only a few dozen Bios wide but nearly 12 Kios long. The spine itself was covered in various modules that must have served a wide variety of purposes. The only module Mira recognized on sight was a massive hanger module that seemed to double as an external construction facility. It was this hangar module that gave away the ship’s identity.
Mira was looking at the LVK Tantomile, the Mothership of the Partogan Royal Navy.
Stuffing both papers into her pocket, Mira dashed out of her quarters, scrambled up the ladder to Deck One and burst onto the bridge. All of the Midak’s officers were there, plus Queen Emily the Second, (Maki) her Kuhina Nui, and newly promoted Chief Petty Officer Moana Ranginui. Commodore Kahu Koraku was also present.
“How long until we’re inside their weapons range?!” Rangi was asking.
“Thirty minutes,” answered Lieutenant Tuu Anaru. “Maybe less.”
Captain Anika Aranui spotted Mira as she entered the room,
“Mihaka!” Anika barked, “Find Petty Officer Whiu and get down the Bushranger! We’re launching in two minutes!”
Mira nodded at Anika and was about to leave when the Hyperwave Relay suddenly spun up on the far side of the bridge and the words PLEASE STAND BY appeared on the viewscreen. Everyone stopped talking and Captain Rangi pressed a small red button on the armrest of his chair.
“Task Force Kikanalo, this is the Midak. Is anyone transmitting on the Hyperwave Frequency right now?” Rangi asked. The reply was immediate.
“Negative,” came back the voice of Admiral Apanui. “That signal’s coming from the Tantomile! We’re trying to jam it! Standby!”
A third voice came over the speakers. Mira, Rangi, Aranui, Moana, Maki, and everyone else stood rooted to the spot as a man’s voice said:
“Standby for a pre-recorded message from the legitimate elected successor to Miranda the Great, Her Royal Majesty Miranda the Fifth, Queen of Partoga, Custodian of the Great Library, Governor of the Royal Academy of Science, Patron of the Church of the Mountain, Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of the Triple Alliance, President of the Galactic Alliance, Overlord of Kaitaia and Tauranga, and the Empress of Levakia!”
A pause, and then the viewscreen flickered, revealing an image that would stay with Mira for the rest of her life:
Standing in front of an unremarkable grey background was an 11-year-old girl who was far too skinny to be considered healthy. Every bone in her neck, upper torso, arms, and hands was prominently visible; as though her skin had been drawn over her skeleton with no room to spare. Like Maki, she was wearing a green dress with little gemstone studs. A green hairband pulled the girl’s snowy-white hair away from her brow and brought her sunken, cloudy eyes into focus.
It wasn’t Queen Miranda the Fifth’s physical appearance that shocked Mira, but rather, an aspect about her that only Mira could see. Something that only a Gifted individual who had mastered their Psionic powers could detect:
Queen Miranda was bound. Thin, barely-visible tendrils of Psionic energies were wrapped around Miranda. They were coiled around her wrists, upper arms, and neck before rising up and away from her, making the Queen look like an actual puppet. The translucent strings of Psi-energy converged just above Miranda’s head, where the barely visible hand of Manaaki Ranginui could only be spotted by Mira. The rest of Manaaki was also visible, but Mira had to strain to spot his transparent figure behind the False Queen.
Queen Miranda the Fifth began to speak.
“Men and women of Task Force Kikanalo.” Miranda’s voice sounded monotone and almost robotic, “You have committed treason against the Kingdom of Partoga by aligning yourself with a pretender to the throne. The punishment is death. You can escape this fate. I have instructed the crew of the Mothership to spare the lives of anyone who surrenders to them and swears their allegiance and loyalty to me.”
Manaaki twitched his hand a little, causing Miranda to hold up her left hand to the camera. Everyone on the bridge gasped! Maki swore.
Right there on Miranda’s index finger was an ornate silver ring, decorated with beautiful circular symbols on either side of a magnificent-looking emerald. It was the Whetu Kārerarera: The Green Star.
“I am the Queen of Partoga,” the 11-year-old continued in her flat voice, “There will be no one else. Surrender now and all will be forgiven.”
The viewscreen went blank. Kahu turned to face Maki.
“Your Majesty,” he said, “did the False Queen always talk like that?”
Maki nodded,
“I don’t know why....” she answered, “She just does.”
Mira knew exactly why the False Queen had been talking that way, she had learned about it in the XCOM files Moana had brought back from Earth. Manaaki had apparently mastered a rare Psionic technique that Mira had studied and read about, but had never planned on using herself.
Mira especially didn’t want to tell Maki or anyone else that what Manaaki had done to that poor girl’s mind because... it was going to be permanent.
Manaaki had placed Queen Miranda under a type of Mind Control that was not only total in its magnitude of control, but nigh impossible to break. Whatever identity or sense of self Miranda possessed beforehand had been completely crushed out of existence and was gone forever. That girl was going to be Manaaki’s puppet, both physically and mentally, for the rest of her life.
Before Mira could even begin to think about why Manaaki would resort using to such utter Psionic domination against a child, the viewscreen lit up a second time, and Admiral Apanui’s voice came over the speakers again;
“That’s still not us! The Tantomile is-“
Apanui was cut off. The viewscreen now revealed the bridge of the Tantomile. Two Partogan Royal Army officers stood side by side, looking into the camera and, therefore, directly into the Midak’s bridge. Mira recognized one of the two men on sight.
“Ruru!” She yelled, “You filthy TRAITOR!!”
Royal Army General Irawaru Ruru hadn’t changed much since the day Mira had met him in the Royal Palace two and a half years ago, at the very beginning of this story. He was still mostly bald, still too fat for his own good, and still didn’t have a uniform that could fit his massive body. General Ruru wiped the sweat from his brow and said,
“And hello to you too, Mihaka. I wasn’t expecting to see you for another five years or so. But I suppose that’s in the past now.”
General Ruru shifted his gaze from Mira to the rest of the people on the Midak’s bridge.
“In the last... oh... eight or nine minutes we have before the Tantomile comes into weapons range,” General Ruru said, “I wanted to once again-“
General Ruru stopped talking suddenly. He had spotted Maki. The 13-year-old Queen stepped in front of her aunt and folded her arms defiantly. Next to General Ruru, the other Army officer shifted uncomfortably in his feet. Curiously, Moana did a similar movement nearby. Ruru cleared his throat and then continued talking as though he hadn’t seen Maki.
“Once again,” said Ruru, “in the few minutes we have remaining, I’ll remind you all that this can end without bloodshed. Surrender is an option today. Discharge your armor and extend your docking ports to us.”
Together, Captain Rangi, Captain Aranui, Maki, Moana, Mira, and Kahu all took a few steps toward the viewscreen and stood side by side.
“I’m so sorry, General.” said Captain Rangi, “but we can’t accept your surrender at this time.”
General Ruru wasn’t expecting a response like that.
“W-What?!” he stammered.
Captain Aranui took over for her comrade.
“You heard him.” She snapped, “We don’t have the food or living space required to take you and your crew prisoner. So why don’t you just back off so we don’t have to kill you instead?”
General Ruru stammered for a moment, then he cut the line. As soon as the viewscreen went blank, Captain Rangi rounded on the crew.
“Charge the hull plating! Anaru! Move the Queen to Radiation Shelter One. Then get the crew ready to repel boarders! Aranui?”
Captain Aranui nodded,
“Good luck, Rangi.” She said, then yelled at the top of her voice:
“BUSHRANGER CREW!! GET BELOW NOW!!”
After Mira said a hasty goodbye to Maki, she, Moana and Lieutenant Kahumanu Ngkaukawa all darted off the bridge and started sliding down ladders, going from Deck One to Deck Four. Along the way, Mira grabbed a hairband from the Midak’s infirmary. Running down the length of Deck Four, Mira prepared herself for flight aboard the Bushranger.
Humankind had never figured out how to create artificial gravity aboard their spaceships, so once the Bushranger undocked from the Midak, it would become a low-gravity environment. As she jogged down to Radiation Shelter Three (where the Bushranger was docked) Mira tied her hair up in a simple bun, buttoned up her pockets, and tightened her bra straps as far as they would go. When Mira checked her pockets one last time to make sure they were sealed tight, she felt the two pieces of paper she’d taken from the box her father had given her.
Right. Don’t lose them. Mira thought. By the time she reached the Midak-to-Bushranger airlock, Mira was ready for zero-gravity combat.
Api Eketone, Eru Tawhiti, Hoto Watene, Mana Muru, Moe Kaa, Ariki Ruru, Hoana Awika, Anahera Mita, and Tai Whiu were already aboard the Bushranger when Mira arrived.
“Ranginui! Close the airlock and cut the umbilical!” Anika ordered, “Then go fire up the power plant! Eketone and Tawhiti! You’re in the co*ckpit with me! Watene, Kaa, Whiu and Mihaka: Gunner seats! Muru, man the sensors! Awika and Mita, damage control!”
A general chorus of “yes ma’am!” went around the ship as everyone reported to their stations. Mira sat down next to Tai inside the forward fuselage in the dual starboard gunner seats, while Hoto and Moe took the port seats. Mira slammed the airlock door and threw a small lever that disconnected the Bushranger’s fuel, air, and power supplies from the Midak. Admiral Apanui’s voice threw itself into Mira’s ear as she donned a small headset that would allow her to listen to both fleet communications and inter-ship comms.
“All ships, this is Admiral Apanui aboard the HMS Dervish. We have assumed flagship position! All Strike Groups, report in!”
One by one, Strike Group commanders began reporting in:
“Strike Group Ghekula: six Assault Frigates, lead ship HMS Dervish, Commodore Hei standing by.”
“Strike Group Kinloka: six Assault Frigates, lead ship HMS Necrofinch, Commodore Kopunui standing by.”
“Strike Group Kavinika: five Assault Frigates, lead ship HMS Valiant, Commodore Tukino standing by.”
“Strike Group Hikaki: five Assault Frigates, lead ship HMS Nova, Commodore Karawana standing by.”
“Strike Group Muaka: four Ion Cannon Frigates, lead ship HMS Firelance, Commodore Kaa standing by.”
“Strike Group Gadunka: four Ion Cannon Frigates, lead ship HMS Sunray, Commodore Hakiwai standing by.”
Then, Captain Aranui’s voice sounded both from the co*ckpit and in Mira’s headset as she spoke,
“Strike Group Tarakava: one gunship and one science vessel, lead ship HMAS Bushranger, Captain Aranui standing by!”
With a massive lurch and much groaning of metal, the Bushranger separated from the Midak and fell away from the battered science ship. Moana’s voice sounded in Mira’s headset:
“Power plant online!”
The four targeting computers that Mira, Hoto, Moe, and Tai were going to use powered up. Mira knew that somewhere else in the ship, Mana was feeding her computer a constant stream of sensor data. All four gunners placed their hands on the joysticks which controlled their respective turret. Looking at her screen, Mira saw that she was controlling the dorsal (topside) turret above the co*ckpit. She had a perfect view of the Task Force and the Midak. Then a big red blob obscured part of her screen.
“I have eyes on the Tantomile!” Mira called out,
“Look at the size of that thing!” gasped a voice over the radio.
The Mothership was flying sideways through space as it bore down on the Task Force, so that her vulnerable hangar bay faced away from enemy guns. This meant that the Tantomile’s entire dorsal side was pointing towards the Bushranger and her allies. And any guns located on the Tantomile’s topside were also facing the same direction.
“Two minutes to weapons range!” Called the commander of the Firelance,
“Strike Groups Muaka and Gadunka, this is Flagship,” said Admiral Apanui’s voice, “Get set up for your attack run on the Tantomile’s vital subsystems. Everyone else, run interference.”
Anika threw down the throttle and the Bushranger’s engines roared to life! The Human gunship was lighter and faster than the heavier Partogan Corvettes, even though its nuclear propulsion system was primitive in comparison to the more advanced Ion Engines being used by the Partogan ships. In moments, the Bushranger had covered the distance between itself and the Royal Navy Task Force.
Thirty-one little warships screamed towards the gargantuan Mothership at maximum speed! There were 10,000 Kios between the two opposing forces!
“Charge the armor plating!” Anika ordered, “Gunners, load armor-piercing rounds!”
5,000 Kios!
Mira counted her ammunition one last time: 110 armor-piercing rounds and 75 high-explosive shells.
2,500 Kios!
“Be advised!” Called out the commander of the HMS Nova, “The Tantomile has charged armor and is powering up her Railguns!”
1,000 Kios!
“We’re in weapons range!” Anika yelled, and Admiral Apanui answered,
“Ion Cannon Frigates! FIRE AT WILL!!”
Eight particle accelerators projected millions upon millions of charged Ions towards the Tantomile at just under the speed of light! The bright blue beams connected with the Mothership and were soaked into her armor!
At once, the Tantomile returned fire! Hundreds of Mass Driver and Railgun rounds careened towards the Task Force. Like a constellation of fast-moving stars, the deadly projectiles flew between the small attackers. One round struck an Assault Frigate and ricocheted off into deep space.
And then they were in the thick of it! Mira was thrust one way in her seat and then the other as Anika maneuvered the Bushranger hard and fast! Mira, Moe, Tai, and Hoto swiveled all four of the Bushranger’s turrets towards the Tantomile.
“Fire at will!” Anika ordered,
Mira filled her targeting screen with a section of the Tantomile’s hull and squeezed the trigger! Moe, Tai, and Hoto did the same. THUNK! THUNK! The Bushranger vibrated with each shot. Mira watched her targeting screen and saw four small dents had appeared in the Mothership’s flank, followed quickly by several hundred more as the Assault Frigates and Ion Cannon Frigates loosed another salvo. The Tantomile’s armor was still fully charged. It was going to take a serious amount of punishment to actually rupture it.
Flying in groups of five or six, the Assault Frigates (and the Bushranger) began to pummel the Tantomile’s dorsal hull. Then, after the Task Force had spent some thirty seconds pouring fire into the Tantomile, Commodore Kahu Koraku’s voice came through over Mira’s headset,
“Strike craft launching from the Tantomile! They look like old Silvestris-class heavy fighters!”
“How many fighters?!” Responded a Strike Group leader,
“Two hundred!” Commodore Koraku responded, “They’re about to come ‘round the Mothership’s port side! THEY’RE ABOVE YOU!
Mira quickly swung her turret around to face the Mothership’s port flank. A cloud of little silver points was growing bigger with every second!
“Assault Frigates and Bushranger!” Called out Admiral Apanui, “Engage the fighters! Keep them off the Ion Cannons!”
The fighting was now too fast-paced for Mira to keep up. The Assault Frigates were able to lay down a screen of anti-fighter fire for only a few seconds before the cloud became a swarm, and the Task Force became enveloped in a storm of shrapnel.
Two Assault Frigates were annihilated almost immediately, and Anika had to perform a disorienting roll to prevent the Bushranger being peppered with debris. Mira and her fellow gunners disengaged from the Tantomile completely and were now solely focused on taking down the fighters.
A squadron of five enemy strike craft turned abruptly and made an attack run on the Bushranger! Mira saw them coming and fired four high-explosive rounds. Three missed, but one connected with its target! The explosive shell detonated, and the shrapnel from both the destroyed fighter and the round itself shredded the entire squadron!
“Scratch five!” Mira yelled,
“Dozens to go!” Tai yelled back, “Don’t lose your head yet!”
The Bushranger performed another dangerous maneuver, flying only a few Bios above the Tantomile’s armor plating! Mira and Tai fired on the fighters above while Moe and Hoto poured armor piercing rounds into the Mothership. Anika pulled the Bushranger up just in time to see an Ion Cannon Frigate explode into millions of little pieces!
“HARD A ’STARBOARD!” Anika screamed, and Api wrenched on the flight controls, pulling the Bushranger away from the wreckage. The Tantomile filled the co*ckpit’s viewscreen!
“The mothership is moving!” reported an Assault Frigate captain, “It’s making a run at the Midak!”
“They’re going for the Queen!” Admiral Apanui yelled, “Muaka and Gadunka, take out her engines!”
The seven remaining Ion Cannon Frigates maneuvered around to the Mothership’s stern and began to realign themselves. Because Ion Cannons are very long weapons, and the entire ship is simply wrapped around them, the frigate needs to face its target in order to use its one and only weapon. Before the ships could re-orient themselves, a swarm of fighters descended upon them!
“We’ve getting torn apart up here!” someone hollered over the comms channel before three of the Ion Cannon Frigates were torn asunder!
Without waiting for orders, Anika pulled the Bushranger out of formation and doubled back to help out their stricken allies. Mira and the other gunners loaded high-explosive rounds and started tearing into the enemy fighter craft. As the Bushranger pulled the fighters away from the more vulnerable targets, the four surviving Ion Cannon Frigates were unleashed upon the Tantomile!
“Flagship, this is HMS Firelance, we’re starting our attack run now!”
The Bushranger suddenly flew through a cloud of debris! The sound of thousands of little pieces of shrapnel colliding with the armor reminded Mira of a powerful hailstorm. She quickly swiveled her turret around, looking through the external cameras to get her bearings on the battle.
Both the Tantomile and Task Force Kikanalo had taken a beating. Disabled and destroyed ships spun helplessly through the void, and clouds of debris were so think they’d become opaque. While on the other side of the coin, the Mothership’s armor had finally been ruptured, revealing the decks, rooms, and facilities within. The swarm of two hundred hostile fighters had been worn down to just over a dozen scattered fighters by the overwhelming fire of the Assault Frigates.
Someone up the chain of command had noticed the lack of fighter cover as well.
“Flagship calling fleet!” Admiral Apanui signaled, “Press the attack! CONCENTRATE ALL FIRE ON THE TANTOMILE!”
“Do what he says!” Anika called from the co*ckpit, “Load armor piercing rounds and light’em up!”
Mira, Hotu, Moe, and Tai all swiveled their turrets around and began firing into the Tantomile’s flank. The remaining ships in the Task Force did the same, although the Assault Frigates spared one or two turrets each to fend off the remaining fighters.
Hundreds of thousands of projectiles thundered down upon the Mothership! The small cracks in her armor became fissures, her maneuvering thrusters flickered as their fuel lines were cut, and her turrets seemed to be firing less frequently as well. Aboard the Bushranger, Mira had just allowed the thought “We’re close” to cross her mind when next to her, Tai yelled:
“I’m red on ammo!” Tai called out, followed quickly by Hotu and Moe.
Mira flipped a switch on her console that revealed how much ammunition she had left:
11 armor-piercing rounds, 4 high-explosive rounds.
Mira added her own voice to the chorus:
“Red on ammo!”
Then the floodwaters came in:
“This is the HMS Nova, we’re running out of ammunition!”
“Fifteen rounds!” announced another voice, followed closely by another one:
“This is the HMS Firelance, we’re starting to overheat! Unable to sustain rate of fire!”
“We’re on our last magazine!” cried one more. “Then we’re out!”
The bombardment lasted only thirty more seconds. One by one, the ships of Task Force Kikanalo stopped firing as their weapons ran out of ammunition. First the Assault Frigates fell silent, then the Bushranger as Mira fired her last shell, and then finally the HMS Firelance, the only Ion Cannon Frigate still flying, began to pull back as her main weapon overheated and shut down.
But the Tantomile, being a massive city-sized spacecraft, had plenty of ammunition and was in no danger of running out. Her mass drivers and railguns continued to pour fire into the Task Force as the ammo-starved warships began to scatter!
“This is Flagship!” Admiral Apanui said over the radio, “I want weapons checks!”
“HMS Nova! We’re black on ammo and we can’t get clear! We’re launching a marker beacon to coordin-“
The captain of the Nova was cut off as his ship was obliterated by a Railgun slug fired from the Tantomile. Mira watched her screen with a sense of rising dread as the Tantomile began picking off targets one by one. Two, three, four more Assault Frigates were reduced to scrap by the Mothership!
“Aranui!” yelled Tai from Mira’s left, “We still have our nukes! Let’s use’em!”
“Negative!” Anika called back from the co*ckpit, “We have to save those for Fort Miranda when we get home!”
Tai started to respond, but as another Assault Frigate exploded nearby, Mira cut him off,
“We’re not going home if this keeps up, Aranui! This is our last chance!!”
Moe Kaa chimed in,
“The rest of the Task Force is backing off! It’s now or never!”
Anika swore,
“Hang on everyone!”
The Bushranger banked hard and began diving towards the Tantomile! From the co*ckpit, Anika pushed a series of buttons on the control panel in front of her, and at once, a very loud alarm began to sound, followed up by a computerized voice saying:
“WARNING: NUCLEAR WARHEADS HAVE BEEN ARMED.”
Anika then called the rest of the fleet,
“Bushranger calling all ships! Put your blast screens down! We’re going nuclear in five! Four! Three! Two! One!”
A loud hissing noise came from somewhere to Mira’s right as an anti-ship missile separated from the Bushranger and fired up its engine! The missile, tipped with a 20 Megaton nuclear explosive, hurtled towards the Mothership as Anika reported to the fleet:
“Bird away! Time to impact, seven seconds! Dropping blast screens!”
There was a loud metallic noise and all of the Bushranger’s windows were blacked out up as metal covers slid into place.
“Detonation in three! Two! One! MARK!”
The Bushranger shook violently, throwing Mira against Tai as the gunship was caught and thrown about by the blast. As soon as the shaking stopped, Anika yelled,
“That’s a negative impact! Mothership is still active and we’ve got incoming fire!”
Both the Tantomile and her surviving fighter escorts were now concentrating all fire on the Bushranger. The intense thermal radiation of the nuclear explosion had been absorbed by the Mothership’s armor, which now glowed white-hot despite being exposed to the vacuum of space. Thousands of Mass Driver rounds descended upon the Bushranger, and no amount of clever maneuvering was going to save the little gunship now.
WHAM!
The Bushranger caught a railgun slug in its midsection and lurched violently!
TING! TINGTING!! T-T-T-T-TING!
Dozens of Mass Driver rounds impacted the hull, producing an even louder rendition of that hailstorm sound. Mira pulled herself up and out of Tai’s lap. Through her targeting screen, she saw five fighters on the Bushranger’s tail. The hull of the Tantomile raced by on one side of the screen. Anika was skimming the surface of the Mothership, stopping the Tantomile crew from bringing their guns to bear. Mira looked at the Tantomile’s hull on her screen, and then she got an idea.
“Aranui!” she yelled, “take us around to the far side!”
“What?!” Captain Aranui replied, “The far side?”
“Yeah!” Mira answered, “Ram a nuke down the Tantomile’s hangar bay!”
Anika understood the plan at once. She got on the radio.
“Bushranger calling all ships!” she said “Get these damn fighters off us for a few seconds! We’re gonna nuke the hangar bay!”
As the Bushranger maneuvered around the Tantomile’s hull, the HMS Dervish, despite being out of ammo, turned around and rejoined the fight. It was a bizarre line of ships that flew just above the Tantomile. The Bushranger, being chased by five fighters, the fighters being chased by the Dervish. Looking over to Tai’s targeting screen, Mira saw the Dervish swivel her Mass Driver turrets threateningly.
It was all they needed. The squadron of fighters broke off their pursuit and went after the Assault Frigate instead.
The Bushranger cleared the Tantomile’s last remaining guns and found itself on the Mothership’s ventral side. The big, vulnerable hangar bay hung beneath the Mothership’s central spine like a handbag from an unattended chair, just waiting for someone to take advantage. Mira heard another loud hiss, this time from her left side!
“Bird away! Time to impact, five seconds!”
Mira shut down her turret camera about half a second after the missile soared into a docking bay, penetrated the inside wall and vanished from sight. Somewhere deep inside the Tantomile, the 20-Megaton nuclear warhead detonated!
This time the Bushranger shook with incredible violence! They’d been a little too close to the blast, and the Bushranger’s armor struggled to soak up the vast amounts of thermal radiation generated by the detonation. Mira’s joystick became hot to the touch and she relinquished it at once. Similar gasps of surprise and pain told her that something similar had happened throughout the rest of the Bushranger.
Then… for the first time in what felt like an eternity, there was finally silence. Mira deactivated the blast screen on her window and looked outside, seeing the result of the battle with her own eyes.
It was sickening. The Tantomile, gutted from the inside by a thermonuclear explosion, spun grotesquely through space surrounded by a dense cloud of wreckage blown out every possible window, docking port, or other structural weak point. All two hundred of her fighter escorts were destroyed, either blown into fragments or reduced to twisted metal hulks.
Only four Task Force ships were still flying. A lone Ion Cannon Frigate limped its way back to the three surviving Assault Frigates, all of whom were very badly battered.
The Midak was some distance away, having fled at the start of the fight, but she was now turning around to rejoin the Task Force.
“This is Flag- uh, Dervish calling all ships.” Said Admiral Apanui’s voice over the comms network, “Who’s not dead? Everyone sound off with your ID and weapon status.”
“This is Tempest, we’re out of ammunition.”
“HMS Acolyte here. Black on ammo”
“Firelance calling. Weapon damaged due to overheating.”
And that was it. There was no one else left. As the Bushranger and Midak fell into line, the Admiral asked for damage and casualty reports. Only the Midak had escaped unharmed.
The Dervish had been hit over 30 times and had two dead, five wounded.
The Acolyte had been hit almost 45 times and a quarter of her crew was dead or missing.
The Firelance had taken some 19 or 20 hits, lost 4 crew members, and suffered the destruction of her one and only weapon.
But it was the HMS Tempest who had suffered the most. She had been hit over 120 times and nearly half of her crew was dead. The captain of the Tempest declared the ship to be a total loss. The Midak swooped down and docked with the Tempest, taking away her remaining crew before the ship itself was scuttled and left behind.
At some point during the evacuation, Maki got onto the Midak’s Hyperwave Relay and called the Bushranger, demanding to know if Mira was okay and asking to see her. Once the Midak pulled away from the corpse of the Tempest, the Bushranger flew in and docked with the Midak. As the shaken and exhausted crew departed the little gunship and returned to the Midak, the small group of warships turned towards their Homeworld once again.
It was chaos aboard the Midak. When the 29 crew members of the science ship were combined with the 12 surviving members of the Tempest crew, it was almost like the Midak had a full population again. Mira suddenly found her old quarters had been taken over by the last female Tempest shipmate, a skittish and possibly traumatized woman named Erana. Mira decided to let Erana get settled into the crew quarters by herself and went for a walk around the Midak to clear her mind.
How had she managed to stay sane after witnessing so much death and destruction, after nearly being killed herself multiple times in just the past two and a half days? Why hadn’t Mira just... snapped?
If war was like this all the time, then Mira felt truly sorry for all of the fighters who had survived the day’s action, or indeed, the past year-and-a-half of this conflict. Mira certainly wasn’t strong enough to put up with this kind of stress for months or years.
Was that it?
Mira stopped walking, coming to a halt inside the old Engineering Lab on Deck Three. A new pattern of thoughts, theories, and potential explanations had just exploded into Mira’s mind. She remembered what few scraps of information the Whisperers in the Void had given to her about Manaaki Ranginui and his actions on Partoga.
He was starting to have trouble controlling the Eater of Worlds, she remembered that. The monster’s Psionic influence was bleeding into other fighters, wasn’t it? So... what if...
What if Manaaki knew he was losing control of the Eater of Worlds? Mira asked herself. And then she answered her own question. I’d find some way to increase or expand my powers.
A working theory began to grow in Mira’s mind. What if Manaaki had stolen the Whisperers in the Void from Mira with the express purpose of keeping the Eater of Worlds in check?
Except... no.
Manaaki definitely saw the Whisperers in the Void trying to fight the Eater of Worlds during Mira’s second entry into the Shroud. The best the Whisperers had been able to do was slow down the Eater for a few seconds at best. It wasn’t the best choice for a combatant.
Like any good scientist, Mira threw out her bad hypothesis and started on another one, pacing the lab as she did so.
What if... What if... And then she had it!
Mira’s new idea was based on one simple assumption: That a certain statement the Whisperers in the Void had once told her was absolutely true. During Mira’s visit to Mazama Monastery on Earth, they had told Mira about how a massive amount of energy was required to enter the Shroud.
Perhaps Manaaki really did want another Shroud-being to check the Eater of Worlds, but he may not have had enough energy to get into the Shroud, so stealing the Whisperers in the Void would have been the next logical course of action!
Mira’s heart was pounding. She wished her tablet computer still worked so she could put all of this down in a log!
Manaaki would then force the Whisperers in the Void to reveal how to get into the Shroud using less energy... and then...
Oh, no.
Mira stopped pacing. She had never asked if it was possible to form a covenant with more than one Shroud-Being. She’d never considered it, but someone as greedy as Manaaki might not shake hands with these creatures. He might just take what he wanted instead.
Manaaki Ranginui already had control of two beings from the Shroud. This made him an exceedingly dangerous opponent for Mira to face down. If he had three or more... then he might actually be invincible!
Mira quickly counted on her fingers. The Instrument of Desire and the Composer of Strands were both still in the Shroud. If Manaaki got his hands on one or both of them, Mira would stand no chance against him in a fight, let alone anyone else.
Mira needed to get inside the Shroud, RIGHT NOW. She needed to claim at least one of the two remaining Shroud-Beings for herself in order to stand a fraction of a chance against the Holy Father when the time came to confront him. Preferably, she’d want the Composer of Strands, but given the desperate situation, Mira would take whoever was left with no questions asked.
But how? Mira had never gotten into the Shroud under her own power before. Mira still didn’t know how the first incursion had happened, but the second time, the Abbess of Mazama Monastery had done all the work.
A massive amount of energy...
There was one thing aboard the Midak which could do something like that.
As soon as the idea came to Mira, she had a sudden flashback. The corpse of Maia Maaka was suddenly in front of her again. Her final, desperate pleads echoing in the back of Mira’s mind. Mira shook her head. The only way this insane plan would work was if Mira suddenly discovered a way to survive...
Mira froze.
She had discovered a way to survive an unshielded Hyperspace Jump! She’d discovered it over a year and a half ago! It had been aboard the Midak this whole time! Mira frantically ran into the Biology Lab, grabbed a computer and pulled up a list. She saw the names of the Midak crewmates who’d been infected with the extremophile bacteria “Anaplague.” Mira was Number 16 on the list! That tough little microbe might still be running around in her own blood!
Mira ran to a computer console embedded in the wall and hit a button labelled “Dial Bridge.” There was a soft tone.
“Biology Lab calling Bridge!” Mira said into the microphone.
“Mihaka?” replied Captain Rangi’s voice, “Good to hear from you. I wanted to ask you-“
“Sir, there’s no time!” Mira cut him off, “How long do we have until the next Hyperspace Jump? I need to run a quick experiment!”
“Uh...” Rangi’s voice was full of hesitation, “About three hours... but I thought we were beyond doing science experiments after everything that-“
Mira cut across him again,
“Sir! This is important! Find Chief Petty Officer Moana Ranginui and Acting Medic Anahera Mita and send them to the Biology Lab immediately!”
Two hours and fifty minutes later, Mira repeated her plan to Moana and Anahera for the umpteenth time, feeling that she’d finally gotten them to understand what she wanted to happen.
“When the jump happens,” Mira repeated, “I’m going to siphon some waste energy off the Hyperspace Module into my Gauntlets. It should be enough for me to get into the Shroud for a few minutes. As soon as the jump is over, you both get in there and resuscitate me.”
Anahera, who didn’t know Mira was Gifted until two hours ago, put her head in her hands and sighed. She restated Mira’s words aloud so she could understand them better;
“You’re going to use the Hyperspace Module to do magic... while it pumps you full of nearly 1,000 Roentgens of Gamma Radiation PER SECOND... and then you want us to come in and resuscitate your crazy suicidal ass even though you think you’re not going to die at all because of... a combination of Microbiology and magic. Do I have it right?”
Moana had come to accept Mira’s Gift and all the baggage that came with it some time ago. She just pressed on with her own line of questioning.
“Are you sure,” Moana asked, “that the Anaplague can keep you alive in there?”
Mira nodded and held up the blood test results from an hour ago.
“The Anaplague is a little less prevalent in my bloodstream than the blood itself. I’ll boost its protective abilities with my own powers, kinda like giving the shield a shield of its own. It’s no guarantee I’ll survive, though. That’s why I need you. Get me that Nanomedikit as quick as you can.”
Moana and Anahera nodded.
“Alright.” Said Anahera, “Let’s get this over with.”
As the Trio climbed down to the Hyperspace Module, the ship went on Hyperspace Alert. Alarms and claxons sounded. Crew members made their way to their assigned Radiation Shelters, and Mira, Moana, and Anahera entered the Hyperspace Module.
Inside a complicated web of pipes, wires, and struts, the spherical core of the Hyperspace Module hummed gently in its housing. Moana tapped a computer screen.
“Captain,” she said nervously, “There’s a computer bug down here causing problems. I need to disable the Safety Interrupt for this Jump.”
“Understood,” Replied Rangi, “You’re ‘go’ to disable the Safety System.”
Moana typed Cmd_usr/ Disable safety interrupt. Authorization: Chief Petty Officer Moana Ranginui – Partogan Royal Navy into the computer, then turned to face Mira.
“We’ll be in this Radiation Shelter,” she said, pointing to the nearby door. “We’re coming for you as soon as the jump is over, not a second more. Clear?”
Mira nodded.
“Sounds good to me.”
As Moana and Anahera closed the door of Radiation Shelter 4 behind them, Mira looked down at her Celestial Gauntlets. They were charged with her own stockpiled Psi energy. Mira had read about how the Human Templars would use their powers to protect themselves from harm. Mira had actually used that power on a small scale during the Green Guard’s attempted takeover of the Midak, but she’d never tried anything on this scale.
There was only one way to see if this would work. Mira put both of her Gauntlet-covered hands on the core itself. It began to hum even louder as it spooled up.
Initiating Hyperspace Jump in five, four
Mira focused her mind intensely, summoning up as much of her powers as she could.
Three, two,
The Celestial Gauntlets activated, and Mira’s whole body was enveloped in swirling ribbons of Psionic energy. They extended out and away from Mira until they struck the walls of the Module, giving Mira the appearance of being at the center of a plasma storm!
One.
Through her Celestial Gauntlets, Mira drew in all of the waste heat bleeding off the core and repurposed it with some of her pent-up power. Ignoring thousands upon thousands of stray ionized particles striking her body like a sandblaster, Mira breached the Shroud!
It took Mira a few moments to get her bearings. She had arrived in a place that was both foreign and strangely familiar. Mira stood on the precipice, at the edge of this strange new realm for a moment overlooking a vast ocean of swirling color and shadow. Then Mira remembered: I don’t have a lot of time. I gotta get going.
She didn’t remember where she had encountered the Composer of Strands or the Instrument of Desire before, but that didn’t matter. In less than a minute Mira had sprinted thousands of Kios, having grown fully accustomed to the strange properties of this place and taking advantage of them. Mira ran into deep gorges and valleys, dashed up the highest mountains, crossed wide plains, and found the outermost edges of the world, where the Shroud slowly started to transition into some other plane of reality Mira didn’t have time to explore.
After what felt like four or five minutes, Mira sat down in the dirt, panting. She had revisited all of the parts of the Shroud she’d been to before. She had discovered and searched through several new ones as well. She’d combed tens of thousands of Kios in every direction, and there was no sign of the Instrument of Desire or the Composer of Strands.
It can’t be possible. Mira thought. An evil voice in the back of her mind answered. Why can’t it be possible?
Mira was forced to accept the truth. The Shroud was empty. Manaaki Ranginui had gotten here first and he had taken both of the remaining Shroud-Beings. Whether by consent or force didn’t matter at all. They were gone.
The full weight and implications of the upcoming final battle hit Mira like a ton of bricks. Four depleted warships and three hundred thousand inexperienced volunteer soldiers were about to go to battle against some 50,000 elite warriors who were trained from a young age to win against greater odds than this.
And alongside that Mira, an untrained amateur Psychic, faced the prospect of confronting Manaaki Ranginui at the height of his power. With the Instrument of Desire, the Composer of Strands, the Eater of Worlds, and the Whisperers in the Void all at his side, Manaaki must have acquired near godlike powers by now.
Mira brought her knees up to her chin and shivered with terror. Perhaps this was how an ant felt as the boot came down.
It’s over. Mira thought. Manaaki won. I can’t fight him now.
Perhaps it would be better if Mira just died now. If the radiation from the Hyperspace Module took her life right at this moment, Mira wouldn’t complain. Anything would be preferable to the nightmare which awaited inside the halls of Fort Miranda.
But Maki will have to face that nightmare. So will Rangi, Anika, Moana, Tai, and all the others. They’re all going to fight Manaaki. And they’re all going to die.
Mira had a choice. She could wait here in the Shroud until her body succumbed to Radiation exposure back in Normal Space, or she could go back and be with her niece and friends right up to the end.
She looked up towards the purple horizon. The spot where Jericho had died was over there somewhere. She had said something about not wanting to die alone. Mira decided she didn’t want that either. Mira stood and prepared to walk back to the spot where she’d entered the Shroud from. She was ready to face her destiny.
Mira had only gone a couple of paces through, when she noticed it.
The presence was not waiting for Manaaki Ranginui, therefore he had passed over it without ever being aware of its existence. The presence was waiting for Mira and no one else. It had always been waiting for her.
Mira turned her head to face a dense purple fogbank. It was similar to the one that had once contained the Whisperers in the Void. From the fog, three illusory copies of Mira emerged. Mira knew at once that they were illusions, but she didn’t know how she knew that. The three copies of Mira were all radically different from each other, and yet they had one thing in common:
They were victorious.
The First Copy of Mira was outfitted in a beautiful royal dress that shone and sparkled like a moonlit ocean. She was significantly older than Mira, her face was wrinkled, her hair had lost its silver color and was fading to grey, but she had a peaceful smile on her face. In each hand she held one half of a broken rifle: the barrel and chamber was in her right hand, while the stock and trigger were in her left. Psionic power, warm and comforting, radiated gently away from this alternate person. The First Copy of Mira said in a gentle, soothing voice:
“It took an incredibly long time, but with patience, tact, and diplomacy, I resolved the conflict peacefully and brought about an outcome that saved lives, made people happy, and placed Maki on the throne with almost no bloodshed. Absolutely no one needed to die, and I made sure of it.”
The Second Copy of Mira wore more practical clothing: a dark shirt, cargo pants, and combat boots. She appeared to be roughly the same age as Mira if not a little older. In one hand she held another broken rifle, while in the other hand was a book, into which she had place a white poppy flower in place of a bookmark. This version of Mira looked like she was at peace with herself, yet she still seemed to be haunted by a dark memory. Her Psionic energies were so contained that they were barely noticeable. She spoke in a tired, resigned voice:
“Maki is Queen and no one challenges her anymore. I did what I head to do to win. Nothing more.”
The Third Copy of Mira was the most frightening. Exactly the same age as Mira, she wore a battle dress made from leather and chainmail. Her arms, chest, and face were splattered with blood, as was the sword she gripped tightly in one hand. In the other hand, smoke curled up and away from the barrel of a fully functional rifle. This version of Mira had no regrets, no second thoughts about what she’d done. Cold, harsh, and violent Psionic energy simmered up and away from her. Spitting blood, she said;
“I beat Manaaki. I don’t give a damn what it cost because I won, Maki’s Queen, and Manaaki’s dead.”
The presence was offering Mira a choice. All three of these outcomes were possible. Perhaps there might even be others.
Mira stood there, gazing at each possible outcome in turn. She was vaguely aware of other copies of herself shuffling about in the fog, but it was impossible to make them out. Behind Mira, the presence waited patiently.
The offer hadn’t changed. All Mira had to do was say yes or no.
IT IS NOT YET YOUR TIME.
BUT IT COULD BE.
