“We need a small amount of fresh biochemical compounds,” Marvin said.
I looked around. We were out of hamburger patties. I looked down at last to my half-eaten ham sandwich. With a sigh, I pulled the ham out and laid it down in the growing puddle of soup near Sandra’s head.
“It’s all right honey,” I said to her pretty face, which was now encircled with what looked like hot mud. “I was having a hard time eating it all anyway.”
Ning ran in with an extra piece of meat in her hands. I frowned at it. “Is that fish?” I asked.
“It’s all we’ve got left that’s thawed.”
“Okay, I hope we don’t screw this up.”
She added all of it before I could stop her.
“All she has in a brain injury,” I said.
“I’m sorry, sir.”
“We don’t need that much mass.”
“Will it matter?”
I shook my head. I had no idea.
Kwon shook the last goop from his new leg and arm. He couldn’t walk yet, however. In fact, he cursed at anyone who came near him. He didn’t want to be touched. He was in that same overly-sensitive state I had been, except far more of his body had been affected.
Carlson came awake soon after we’d lifted him from the coffin. He had a surprised look on his face, to say the least. His first sight consisted of my eyes staring into his.
“Are you okay?” I asked.
“Colonel?” he said, looking around fearfully. His body dripped with slime. “What happened?”
“I killed you-then changed my mind,” I told him.
Ning gave me a dirty look and clucked her tongue. She led Carlson out of the laboratory speaking softly to him.
I crouched by Sandra’s coffin, staring at the shallow spot over her face. I could still see some of her features under that churning liquid.
Kwon hopped and cursed over to me. “Do you think she’ll make it?” he asked.
“I have no idea.”
“She will,” Kwon said after a minute. “Carlson seemed fine.”
“Yeah,” I said.
I stayed there a few minutes, tensely staring at Sandra’s covered face. This was it. Would she stir? Carlson hadn’t moved. She had an oxygen mask tightly fitted to her face. Air bubbles rose up with each exhalation. The glass porthole into the coffin fogged up lightly.
“Marvin,” I said, “is she responding to the treatment? Is she going to wake up or not? Tell the microbes not to keep her sleeping once the treatment is done.”
Marvin and I were soon the last two in the room, besides Sandra herself. I was nervous, trying very hard not to get my hopes up. If she didn’t respond after all the success I’d seen, I knew I would have a fit of grief and pain. I even thought about firing up the old electrode to fry these little guys so they didn’t dare to fail me. I didn’t do it, of course. I wondered why I put myself into these horrible situations. If this failed, I knew I would wish I hadn’t bothered, that I had just let her go.
The fish around Sandra had partly dissolved. What were they doing in there?
“Colonel? This is Major Sarin.” Her voice cold and her words were clipped.
I heard her in my headset and knew right away it was bad news. Sarin became even more severely controlled when things were going wrong.
“Talk to me, Major.”
“The Macros have made their next move, sir,” she said.
I stood up and headed for the door. “Fix up Sandra, Marvin!” I shouted over my shoulder as I left.
“The prisoners assure me they will do their utmost, sir,” Marvin said.
I hesitated at the hatchway, looking back. I didn’t entirely trust Marvin. I decided I would send Ning down here later to keep an eye on him.
35
“They’re coming right at us, sir,” Sarin said, her voice wavering slightly. “On a collision course.”
I reached the big screen and stared down into it. I had my helmet tucked under my arm. My sides heaved from the run up to the bridge. Everyone stared at me. I knew they were all wondering what I was going to do. What magical trick I could pull to stop this nightmare.
“All right, strategy session,” I said loudly. “Major Welter, you are in this. Get over here.”
Welter handed the controls over to the robot pilot we’d built and came to the screen.
I looked at him, “You’ve been flying since I left the bridge.”
“Yes, Colonel. I think I have the hang of it now.”
“Good to know. Okay Gorski, tell me how many drones we have.”
“Five ready to fire, sir. A sixth should be available within the hour.”
“Not enough to stop a volley of eight, but it will have to do,” I said. My eyes flicked over the screen. I could see two curved colored lines and ticking digital times flying by. The lines projected the course of Jolly Rodger and the enemy cruiser, predicting their collision point and the point where we would come into range of their cannon. The screen displayed our speed and the estimated times require to reach our goal points. The Macro cruiser had left its distant, shadowing position. Instead of flying parallel to our own path, they were now veering toward us. Both ships would reach the ring and escape the system in thirty-nine minutes. On their current course, the Macros would collide with us on the far side three minutes after that.
“All right,” I said. “Give your best guesses. What are they up to?”
“They are increasing speed,” Gorski reported. “They could be planning to dive through the ring before we do, sir. They don’t want to eat our mines again.”
“We shot down all the other incoming missiles,” Sarin said. “They might think we can shoot down anything they fire at us from a distance. Therefore, they are holding their next volley until we are very close.”
I turned to Welter. “You’re a flyer. What do you think?”
Welter shrugged. “Both possibilities are reasonable. They are either trying to get in close and blast us, or they are going to fly through the ring ahead of us.”
“That could be why they are making their move now,” I said. “They don’t want us to exit the system before they do.”
“What if they lay mines of their own on the far side?” Major Sarin asked.
“Then we blow up when we follow them,” I said. I leaned on the screen. I had very few options. We weren’t up to this. I needed weeks of careful build-up and repair-but I simply didn’t have the time.
I thumped my armored fist down on the edge of the screen. It wobbled slightly, but didn’t crack. “We can’t keep them from firing at us. They could do that now, if they wished. So, nothing I do can alter that possibility. But I can stop them from getting through that ring before we do.”
I looked at them. Sarin looked worried, but resolute. Gorski shook his head bemusedly. Major Welter looked around at the others and finally at me, frowning. I could tell he was the only one who didn’t get it.
“How can you stop them from getting through?” he asked. “They’ve got the speed on us. We’ve got no missiles to fire.”
I smiled. “Captain Gorski,” I said loudly. “Lay in our new course.”
“About nineteen degrees at full acceleration should do it,” Gorski said, working his tablet interface. A new yellow line appeared on the screen. It curved away from the broken nose of Jolly Rodger and swerved right into the Macro ship.
“You’re going to ram them?” Major Welter asked.
“Not exactly,” I said. “I only want to get close enough to send about eight hundred troops on flying dishes over there to visit.”
“Oh,” said Major Welter. “How is this better than flying straight for the ring?”
“At their current course and speed they will reach the ring first,” Major Sarin said. “We can’t match their acceleration in this damaged ship. But right now, they are still a little behind us. If we veer right into them, we’ll get close before they can get to the ring.”