The Right Things
Andrew J. Talon
Disclaimer:I don't own Atomic Betty, nor am I making any profit from this endeavor.
Fifth (or ninth) chapter of the series, depending upon your POV. But no matter the number, I hope you enjoy it!
--
The Kitty Hawk's CIC rocked as the huge carrier took a direct hit on her shields. Commondore Finch grimaced as he held onto the plotting table, narrowly avoiding slamming his head into the digital display.
"Fleet status?" His tactical officer, an Asian-American lieutenant named Hoshi, turned and shook her head.
"The Melbourne and the Rommel have been destroyed, sir. The Sakura and Farrago have been heavily damaged and are evacuating. The Arizona is coming up to bring her main battery to bear-" Hoshi was interrupted as the Kitty Hawk took another blast from the Messiah's main weapons array.
"Forward Shields are at twenty percent, sir!" The XO shouted over the alert klaxons. "DC says we've got fires in sections 14P through 13A!" Finch growled. Another hit and a quarter of their shield array would be down.
"What's wrong with her? We should have been blown apart with one blast from Messie's biggest gun," he mused. Hoshi, looking over her data, gasped.
"Sir! Looks like Messiah's main weapons array is still at its low setting." Finch gawped Low! The Messiah had decimated his task force on the low setting!
"Then we can't let her escape so they can figure out the max setting!" Finch growled. "Helm! Full rotation, 180 degrees X-axis! Keep our forward shields away from her line of fire!" Finch turned to the XO. "Commander, have you alerted ORIONCMD about our situation?"
"Yes sir! Comms reports they've received our status report and are scrambling reinforcements, sir!" Finch nodded. The commander then coughed.
"Sir, Messiah is powering up her hyperdirve. Can we catch her if she makes a run for it?" Finch shook his head grimly.
"No, Commander… I want every ship to concentrate their fire on Messiah. All weapons, full power! And see if you can get the abandoned ships online via remote to ram! We're going in! We can't let her escape!"
--
Maximus IQ cursed. "FISHBOY! Can you get your wind-up toy to release the safeties on the main weapons array!" On the numerous holographic display screens lining the bulkheads of the Messiah's bridge, a hundred different views of the battle theywere engaged in were displayed. How the humans were able to coordinate their efforts with all this information being presented to them boggled even his incredible intellect.
"Safeties protected by manual control system isolated from primary network," X-5 replied in a monotone. Lamprey muttered a particularly-foul sounding curse in his native language.
"Doctor Cerebrum!"
"Gah! This technology is so primitive, it's ingenious!" The brain-in-a-jar scowled. He was sorting through a module of locks and control devices that looked like those strange human cooking contraptions-What were they called again? Cuisinarts?
"Keep at it! We can't decimate the Earth fleet with our weapons at their lowest setting!" Lamprey grumbled, steering the huge ship out of the way of the main guns of an Earth battleship. The Messiah, currently taking continuous fire from nine Earth combat ships, barely registered the impacts on her shields as distant-sounding booms. Lamprey was a bit shocked to discover that the Earth starship's shields actually absorbed the energy of the weapons fire and converted it for use for the ship's power systems. It took using the strength of your enemy against him to a whole new level-As long as the Messiah kept dispersing it's excess energy through it's weapons and shields, it could theoretically fight a single battle for days, even weeks.
"Bah. We're already decimating them with our weapons at their current settings!" Icicla cackled. "And they cannot harm us! Indeed, their fire only makes us stronger!"
"Still, we will have plenty of time for that later," Lamprey stated. "X-5! Prepare to take us to hyperspeed, and input the following coordinates…"
--
Outside, the Titan made another high-speed attack run, launching dozens of missiles and rail gun rounds at the Messiah to no affect. Maximus had been attempting to destroy that most infamous of Earth warships, but her commander clearly knew their stuff-Stay moving, stay alive. Many of the other Earth ships simply sat there, forced to stay in front of the big carrier to defend it, but there were ways to do that without becoming sitting ducks. The hundreds of drones and dozens of Earth fighters constantly attacking their shields were like tiny gnats-not even causing a hundredth of a percentage point's worth of damage to the mighty Messiah.
"Allright… This isn't doing anything," Captain Annette Sparrow shook her head from the Titan's bridge. She was an attractive, middle-aged American woman with long brown hair and piercing grey eyes, which were currently focused on the holographic display before her, showing that the Messiah's shields were as impenetrable as advertised.
"We just keep more energy to them to use against us, captain," the blond navigation officer next to her, a former-Czech Republic Air Force pilot named Radrich Avernok, reported glumly. "This isn't even noticeable."
"Allright… We clearly can't beat through their shields," Sparrow grumbled. "Can we beam a nuke through their shields?" The transporter operator responded over the ship's intercom.
"Sorry captain. Too much interference." The captain growled in irritation… Before turning to Avernok.
"Lieutenant? Think you can plot a hyperspace jump to within Messiah's shield bubble?" She asked, her eyes suddenly lit up in inspiration. Avernok grinned.
"Like with GG task force in 2012?" The Czech pilot inputted the data, his eyes narrowed.
"Unfortunately, risks the same. Too far away, ship cut in half by Messiah's shields. Too near… Boom." Sparrow grinned.
"We've managed to make it just right so far, Goldilocks." Avernok grimaced at the too-often used nickname, and muttered something in his native Czech that Sparrow decided to ignore.
"Ready. Hope," Avernok reported finally. Sparrow nodded.
"Well then, Mr. Avernok: Tally ho!"
--
Betty smiled in triumph as she heard the door lock disengage with a mechanical thud, and grinned when the hatch opened. Quickly she ran down the corridor, not sure where to actually go. The Messiah was certainly a ship she had no information on, but she'd managed to spy a situation monitor on the bridge before she was imprisoned. Her enhanced memory led her to believe she could find the bridge without too much trouble…
The entire ship seemed to blur around her, and she paused by a porthole. She looked out, and gasped. The bright blue vortex of hyperspace now surrounded the vessel.
"Where are we headed?" She wondered aloud, before dashing down the corridor even faster. If the villains had decided to make a break for Earth already…
The ship blurred again, and Betty froze. They couldn't be at Earth already, could they? She spied another porthole, and ran for it, looking out. Her blood turned cold at the sight before her.
"Oh no…"
--
Admiral Degill breathed deeply, stretching his piscine body out in his elegant command chair. The humans, he decided, in addition to their numerous failings, did not appreciate proper starship design. The commander of the vessel should be in the middle of everything, not standing around like a common enlisted man at some table. That had been one of the first alterations to the design of the vessel he now sat in.
"Sir? The Messiah just jumped out of hyperspace," Kilrabi reported to his superior, seeming a tad nervous. Degill dismissed it as the young officer's inexperience-After all, he was serving under a legend, in a perilous situation.
"Open a channel!" Degill ordered, and a holoscreen with his nephew's face appeared before him. The admiral smirked.
"Lamprey! You have done well. The crew?" Lamprey smiled.
"Trapped on the planet our comrades were on."
"Excellent! A fitting punishment!"
"Yes, we thought so. Betty, unfortunately, refused to cooperate so we had to put her in the brig," Lamprey reported. Degill's eyes widened in rage.
"WHAT! That… THAT! Grrr… We shall deal with her for her treachery! Her allegiance was never for anyone but herself!" Degill shuddered in rage, and for a moment looked as though he would resume his rant… Before shaking his head.
"No matter. The stolen plans we took from the spy were enough… And the Earth certainly cannot stand against us. Nephew! Signal the fleet. We make for Earth immediately!"
Degill then began to laugh, deep in his throat, as the ship he now commanded began to power up. From the outside, aside from her incomplete hull plating in a number of areas, and lack of scientific sensor arrays, she was a mirror of the mighty Messiah. Only across her hull had been scrawled the ship's name: Omega. And around this instrument of destruction, flocked over two hundred Galactic Guardian starships, all of their crews primed and ready.
"Yes… TO EARTH! For glory, and justice!" Degill cackled. "TO EARTH!"
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Stand by for the exciting conclusion to "The Right Things!" Coming soon!