Carson Mach 1: The Atlantis Ship (31 page)

“You need to head up and forward,” Babcock said. “It’s at the front end of the ship. We’ll head for the guts.”

“Okay. Stay in touch. Let me know if you come across any trouble.”

“Don’t worry about that,” Sanchez said. “I’ll make sure nothing stops us.”

The
Intrepid
thrust to the side and drifted toward the damaged superstructure. Mach pressed the pad and the door whined open. He hit the thrust button and drifted forward with his laser raised.
 

Sparks crackled and quickly vanished in the cavernous space inside the Atlantis ship. Mach swatted away floating parts of smashed electrical boards and white plastic casing. He switched on his shoulder lights. The remaining equipment looked like it was designed for giants. A ten-meter-high console, with a series of symbols, shattered screens, and buttons the size of his head, lined the opposite side of the room. A five-meter-high stool, still secured to the chrome floor, sat in front of it.
 

A tall corridor, matching the scale of the infrastructure, on the right-hand side provided access further into the ship. A vertical shaft in the bottom right-hand corner led down. Mach twisted around to check the other three, who had also activated their lights.
 

“Split from here,” Mach said. “We’ll take the corridor.”

Adira thrust toward him. Babcock, with Squid in tow, and Sanchez tilted and powered themselves down in the direction of the shaft. For a brief moment, Mach thought splitting up wasn’t the best idea, but with the clock ticking, it was the most sensible option.
 

Light shone through the meshed flooring and ceiling in the twenty-meter-high corridor, creating beams of light that crisscrossed the space. Darkness lay beyond, but Mach realized that he had no time to analyze every last little detail and delay their search for the controls.
 

Pounding echoed through the helmets’ listening sensors. Mach looked up. Something scuttled across the floor two floors above them. Life or machine was still active on the ship. He curled his finger around the trigger and gestured his laser up.
 

“Seen it,” Adira said. “Let’s keep heading up.”

“Not unexpected,” Mach said. “Shoot first, ask questions later.”

She thrust toward another upward shaft and advanced. Mach immediately followed and they rose through dull mirrored walls that rose at least forty meters up toward flashing lights. He pressed his glove against the wall to maintain a steady ascent and glanced up.
 

“How are things with you?” Sanchez said through the intercom.
 

“We’ve got company in here,” Mach said. “Keep your eyes peeled.”

“All good so far,” Sanchez replied. “What did you see?”

“I’m not sure. Not big but it made a lot of noise.”

“We’ll be at the core soon. I’ll—”

The transmission cut to static.
 

“Sanchez? Sanchez, are you there?”

Nobody replied.
 

“Could just be frequency jammers or protective shields for the core,” Adira said. “We better keep moving.”

Mach continued up and tilted his chest back, allowing his lights to shine into the space above. A murky ceiling stretched fifty meters above the edge of the shaft.
 

“Cover me,” Mach said, pushed his arms back and thrust. He rose out of the shaft and glanced around. Whoever designed the Atlantis ship had a strange way of doing things, but it all seemed configured for giants.
 

Adira’s helmet knocked against his boot. He knew she wouldn’t be far behind. Two things were reliable when she was around. Death or conviction. It’s what drew Mach to her in the first place. She had a compulsive nature and saw things clearly in black or white.
 

The lights brightened overhead and Mach punched his thruster to shoot higher. Twenty large dust-covered space fighters, with broad wings and triangular bodies, pointed diagonally toward a closed oblong exit shoot. These craft hadn’t moved for generations to be in this kind of state in space. A fresher looking tartarun droid stood by the closest. The fighter bay was the size of the
Intrepid
.
 

“Look out,” Adira screamed.
 

Mach looked down. He couldn’t see anything and thrust left. A pain shot across his right leg and droplets of blood floated in front of his visor. He twisted down and powered toward the first fighter, coming to a rest at its side and grabbing the wing. Dust puffed away from it and spread in the immediate area. He looked down at a tear in his suit. The compartmentalized nature of the fabric meant he wouldn’t have his life support degraded, but it stung like hell.
 

“What the hell happened?” Mach said.
 

“Gimme a second.”

Adira fired her laser and a red beam stabbed across the fighter bay. She dropped by Mach’s side, briefly glanced at his leg and rose again, hovering over the fighter’s domed cockpit with her laser raised.
 

Mach winced and drifted to her side. “What are we up against?”

“Not sure. A thin silver cable whipped from behind a fighter. It rolled back like a huge robotic tentacle.”

“Whatever it is, we need to take it out. The clock’s ticking.”

He dropped lower and peered along the ground underneath the fighter. Something glinted ahead. A dim light rushed toward him. Mach thrust up and felt a sharp pain in his hip.
 

A silver cable shot ten meters past him and retreated with the same rapid speed, back underneath the row of fighters. Mach pressed his glove against his hip and looked at the blood streaked across his fingers.
 

“Damn it,” Mach said.
 

Adira fired her laser and shouted, “Fire, Mach. Fire!”

Light spread across the high metallic red ceiling. A three-meter-wide spinning bright blue star moved across it toward them. Five cables attached to each point. All snapped in Mach’s direction.
 

***

Babcock glanced to his left, making sure Squid was by his side. If they were to hack the core, stop the boot sequence and gain control of the ship, it would require their teamwork. Sanchez descended ahead of him. The burly gun-runner’s two lights punched into the dusty gloom of the shaft.
 

They came up against a dead end.
 

“The map looked like a continuous route,” Babcock said.
 

Sanchez searched around the space. He pressed his gloved hand against a series of five pressure pads.
 

A section of the wall to their side rumbled, vibrated and slid to one side. Bright light flooded the shaft from a smooth white five-meter-wide corridor leading to another dead end. The light blue lines crossing the ceiling gave it the appearance of a huge circuit board.
 

A loud groan murmured ahead. Not infrastructure straining under the pressure of the damage inflicted by the cannon. This had a living sound. Sanchez paused and pressed himself against the wall.
 

“You ready for this?” Sanchez asked.

“We haven’t got a choice,” Babcock said. They did, but running would mean all of their deaths, and the people of Larunda. He wasn’t a fighter, but there were exceptions to nearly every rule. “Lead the way. Squid and I will be right behind you.”

Sanchez nodded, spun and thrust forward.
 

Three metallic clanks came from somewhere below. The corridor shuddered. Babcock checked his smart-screen. They had less than ten minutes before the Atlantis ship’s systems restarted. He studied the map of the ship and realized they were right on top of the core.
 

“There’s another shaft at the end,” Babcock said. “We’ll be there in a minute.”

Another deep undulating moan echoed from below. Babcock wondered how it was even possible, as they were still in an unpressurized environment, and glanced around the walls.
 

“Sounds like we’ll have company,” Sanchez said. “Stay close. You’re the one who needs to stay alive if the shit hits the fan.”

The solid white wall at the end punched to one side and slammed open. The corridor jolted, knocking Sanchez, Babcock and Squid against the wall.
 

Babcock panicked, thrust and hit the ceiling. Squid hung below him. He twisted and looked toward the open entrance ahead.
 

A chrome trapezoid, with two whirring arms on either side, shot out of the dark space. It headed directly at them and scraped along the wall, tearing a jagged gouge through the white material as it advanced.
 

Sanchez hunched and repeatedly fired.
 

Babcock fumbled with the laser’s controls with his trembling hand. He aimed down and fired. His beam hit the floor, creating a black smoldering dent.
 

Sanchez ducked to one side.
 

The trapezoid passed directly between them, smashing into Squid. It came to an abrupt halt and its arms, in a spinning blur, smashed Babcock’s little AI friend into hundreds of pieces.
 

Babcock gritted his teeth. His hand steadied and he fired down. Sanchez’s laser struck the underside of the trapezoid. They both kept their fingers on their triggers, draining the charge of their weapons.
 

Thin wisps of smoke drifted from the trapezoid and its arms slowed to limp shiny rods. It drifted lifelessly to one side and clanked against the wall. Pieces of Squid floated past Babcock’s visor and his heart sank. His favorite partner for the last decade had been destroyed in a heartbeat.
 

“Switch on,” Sanchez said. “There’ll be time to mourn Squid.”

“Without him, it’s gonna be a whole lot harder.”

“I know, but as harsh as it sounds, you need to forget it… him. We’ve got a mission to complete.”

Babcock took a last glance at the smashed circuitry and wires he had lovingly constructed into a friend. The task became doubly difficult without Squid’s assistance, but he would complete it in his honor. The Atlantis ship had made it personal. “Lead the way, Sanchez. The tartaruns are going to regret the day they crossed Kingsley Babcock.”

Sanchez thrust forward. Babcock checked the charge on his laser. He still had four seconds of shot left.
 

A shaft led down at the end of the corridor. The maps so far had proven correct, and this was their final descent. Sanchez didn’t waste any time heading down. As Babcock followed him, descending into the gloom, he feared they might not have enough time.
 

***

Mach thrust to his side, keeping his finger on the accelerate button. He shot across the bay and smashed into the solid wall. His leg and hip throbbed and droplets of blood drifted in his wake. The star’s cables thudded against the ground, sending debris and space dust floating in the air.
 

Adira split in the opposite direction. She scrambled under the body of the second fighter in the row of ten on the opposite side of the bay.
 

The brilliant blue star zipped in her direction and snapped its glinting cables down, sending up a plume of gray mist.
 

“Adira?” Mach said.
 

“Close call. Do something!”

Mach leaned forward, raised his laser and thrust forward. He’d faced worse than this, but the thought of Adira being attacked motivated him in a way that he hadn’t felt before.
 

Thick gray dust shrouded the whole bay. The lights on the ceiling glared through the dusty haze.
 

A thin blue glow punctuated the gloom. Snapping noises cracked through Mach’s earpiece as the machine continued to attack Adira.
 

“Still alive?” Mach asked.
 

The beam of Adira’s laser shot up, hitting the ceiling at multiple points as she fired in different directions. Mach advanced further forward, toward the light blue star, and swept his visor clean.
 

Stiff-lined arms crackled with electricity and snapped down toward Adira. Mach fired, sending his thin red shot directly into the machine’s central body.
 

The machine struck the fighter again, splitting it down the middle. Sparks momentarily fizzled around the wreck. Mack spotted Adira roll under the next craft. He raised his laser and fired at the star. It turned its focus on him. A cable whipped over his shoulder and smacked into the wall. Shrapnel peppered his suit. One shard punctured his chest, sending Mach spinning against the tartarun droid, and he took a deep breath before crashing against one of the mechanical legs.
 

Both lungs drew in air from the life support pack. Just a cracked rib, Mach guessed. He glanced at his smart-screen. Three minutes before the ship restarted its systems. Without word from Sanchez and Babcock, he felt it was down to him and Adira. They needed to reach the bridge.
 

Adira rose behind the machine and fired. Her beam ricocheted off the body, but its cables drooped. Mach ascended, breathing heavily and feeling faint. He fired his last charge and thrust toward the ceiling.
 

The star slowed on its axis and plummeted. It hit the floor and tumbled to a skidding stop below them.
 

“Go now,” Adira said. “Before that thing recovers.”

Mach felt momentarily disorientated. He gripped his side to stem the blood flow and surveyed the area. The blue star had lost most of its effervescence, dimming the bay. A shaft led up at the far end. He leaned forward and powered toward it.

Adira drifted up from the dust-clouded floor.
 

“Are you okay?” Mach said, looking at a gouge on the arm of Adira’s suit.
 

“I’ll live. Lead the way,” Adira said. “I’m on five percent laser.”

“Let’s hope we don’t come across another.” Mach checked the reading on his weapon. “I’m out.”

The five-meter-wide shaft rose toward black star-studded space. It had to be the bridge. The Atlantis ship didn’t have an open structure.