Invasion

The High Priest turned back to the display. Now that he had issued his orders, and further orders would only confuse the issue still further, something was alarmingly clear. The human shuttles weren't just similar to the Takaina shuttles, but practically identical. The conclusion wasn't very pleasant, but the Takaina had seen it before, back during the Unification Wars. There was a reason why females were generally kept away from the danger of being taken prisoner; their tendency to fall into the mindset of the enemy side was well known. It was a survival trait, and not something that the Truth blamed them for – in contrast to some of the more perverted human religions, which blamed women for things they couldn’t remotely help – but something that had had to be taken into account. Someone, down there, had gotten their hands on a Takaina female and brought her into the human race.

The Inquisitors are going to be furious, the High Priest thought. It didn’t take much imagination to know which female had been captured. The reports that the shuttle had crashed and had been destroyed during the battles on Earth had obviously been inaccurate. The humans, so much more practiced at deception than the Takaina, had taken the crew alive…and one of the foremost engineers from the Guiding Star. The recriminations would be dreadful; the Inquisitors would claim that it was his fault, for protecting her from the fate reserved for all whose sterility marked them as sinners.

He watched, grimly, as the parasite ships began to engage. One way or the other, it would be over soon.

***

“All right, here they come,” Gary said. In theory, they could have engaged the parasite ships as soon as they reached orbit, but their lasers didn’t have the power required to do real damage at such range. The aliens clearly agreed; they might have been pushing their ships around the planet, but they hadn’t opened fire. “Mark your men…and fire!”

The shuttle’s lights dimmed as power was rerouted to the lasers. The parasite ships, targeted, returned fire at the same instant, their lasers burning against the heat shielding and armour the engineers had built into the hull. Gary had seen the specs on the armour – it was designed to provide considerable protection against laser fire – but no one had really tested it in space. A dull series of clunks announced the launch of four missiles from the lower hold, their drives already boosting them ahead of the Armstrong towards the alien craft. The parasite ships would have to switch their lasers to serve in a point defence role, buying time for the human ships to engage them.

“This is Homer,” a voice said. The pilots had been allowed to name their own ships, but after several scatological names had been added to the rosters, and several other names that no one had dared to write down, that particular permission had been withdrawn. “We’re burning up; they’re breaking through…”

Communications vanished in a hail of static. “The Homer has been destroyed,” Simon reported, grimly. The lasers would have burned through the armour, flashed through the cockpit and ignited whatever fuel remained in the shuttle. The parasite ships were learning and concentrating their fire on the human ships. Two more vanished within seconds as the missiles lanced closer. “One direct hit; one parasite ship destroyed.”

Gary bit down a curse. The missiles would guarantee the destruction of the parasite ships – if they were allowed to hit them. The aliens now had every reason to burn the missiles out of space before they reached their targets…and the missiles were easy to hit. They weren’t armoured like the shuttles.

“Deploy the rail guns,” he ordered. He’d hoped to hold it in reserve for the Guiding Star, but there was no longer any choice. The lasers just weren't inflicting enough damage on the alien ships. Their armour was just too strong. Craft designed to skim to the very limits of Earth’s atmosphere wouldn’t be too troubled by their lasers. They just didn’t have the power. “Prepare to engage.”

“Rail guns deployed and locked on target,” Simon said. Three more shuttles vanished in bursts of fire, the wreckage falling down towards the planet below, while one of the parasite ships started to leak air. Somehow, Gary doubted that that would really put the aliens off the attack. They were fighting to protect themselves as well as suppress the human race. “We’re ready to fire.”

“Fire,” Gary ordered.