Second Wave - 19
Chapter 19 of the 2nd book in the series
Frazzle informed me that the older spaceships did not carry transporters and had to physically dock, so the space station had a docking attachment that mated with the FTL ship's cargo bay. This meant that we could travel through a tube without wearing space suits. That was convenient since there were none that would fit the two big men, and I thought that I'd really need their assistance to get the remaining Pugs rousted out of the storage area in which they'd been trapped.
The Sunnys had a transporter installed in the space station, but it was an early one with only one possible destination, and the link was dedicated to the planetary surface. When I found out about that, it gave me pause for thought. There was no telling when the Pug-bears might send a large force of Pugs through to take back the station. I immediately brought it up to Whistle and he inquired of his friends on the station.
The answer was reassuring. They'd disabled the transporter when they'd realized that we were going to attempt to free them. As our attack progressed and showed signs of succeeding, they sealed off their side of the portal and also disabled the station-to-ground comm to prevent the Pugs from calling for help. I wondered if the Pug-bears had sent mental summons for assistance before they were killed by the depressurization of their habitat wings, but it didn't seem likely. They'd spent almost all of their final moments trying to attack my mind.
The lone surviving Pug-bear seemed to be a younger one without the experience and survival knowledge of the older ones. Even so, it was highly likely that it would eventually get the idea that it should ask for help from the surface. I realized that we'd need to act fast, or we might be faced with a squadron of Pugs coming up in orbital shuttles. We'd destroyed the system-capable shuttles in our first space battle, but there were a number of less-capable cargo lifters that were able to boost into orbit. These could carry out a limited mission that would allow the Pugs to reinforce the remainder of their station crew.
We started down the docking tube as fast as we could. It was an amazing experience. The Sunnys obviously had some tricks with chemistry that we could learn from. The tube was a seamless plastic extrusion. It was almost perfectly transparent with a slight blue tinge and it made a wide and smooth corridor from our port to that of the station. There was enough air pressure in it for us to breathe, but it was colder than anything.
Whistle let me know that the tube was extruded from the station on demand. It was formed from a quick-hardening plastic that could be vaporized by an electric charge when it was no longer needed. The system worked perfectly. We glided down the tube to the light mounted by the station port as if we were some kind of ungainly birds. The two big men whooped and waved their arms in exhilaration. Erin simply clung to my ankle and kept her mouth tightly shut with an expression on her face that seemed to signal incipient nausea.
Once we reached the station end, Whistle entered a code on the panel, and the lock opened, releasing warm air and humidity into the tube. The tube walls were immediately covered with frost as the humidity condensed and froze into crystalline patterns. We scooted through the lock, and the door cycled shut. The air was warmer, a good thing because I was shivering, and I could tell that Erin was really suffering. She looked half-frozen but perked up a bit when the warm air struck her.
We were immediately confronted with a group of Sunnys. They were waiting just outside the airlock in the hall, and they drew back in alarm when they spotted the four of us humans coming through the door. Whistle was leading, and he hastily assured them that there was nothing to fear. After he'd finished, the one who seemed to be their leader began a long, welcoming speech. After about a minute of this, I interrupted and asked Whistle to tell them that it was imperative that we take care of the remaining Pugs. This elicited considerable discussion along with mixed approval and revulsion at the violence they knew would ensue. The upshot was that one of them led us down a corridor that took us to the hub of the station. From there, it was obvious where the Pugs were holed up. There was a large crowd of Sunnys sort of dithering around in front of the arm's closed airlock. There were three other closed locks also and I presumed that these were shut due to our holing of the habitats beyond.
When the waiting Sunnys saw us, there was a cacophony of whistles and clicks, and the crowd parted in the middle to provide us access to the closed door. There was no vision port in the door, but the control panel held a view screen that was operational. Whistle had one of the others turn it on, and we were treated to a view of the resistance we had to face. The Pugs were grouped down the hall behind the airlock and had barricaded themselves behind a number of boxes. This view caused a lot of consternation among the resident Sunnys. After some conversation, Whistle let us know that the boxes contained highly sensitive and fragile electronic components for the two spaceships that were under construction.
Apparently, the young Pug-bear that the Pugs were protecting was smart enough to assume that we'd need these components, thus making them a better barrier. I was wondering what to do about that, having no idea if we actually needed the contents of the boxes or not, when Whistle pointed out something very obvious.
I can only assume that continued contact with me and my “violent” ways had started to influence his thinking. He actually came up with a suggestion that, if not directly violent in itself, obviously led to a lot of destruction.
“Deres another airlock behind Pugs. You shoot hole in outside of this place, they have to go back into the other lock.”
In his own way, he was very devious. If we could force the Pugs to retreat without harming the equipment, we might be able to come at them with a little more advantage, especially if we moved rapidly in the confusion caused by the loss of pressure in the hallway. The situation as it was wouldn't resolve quickly. They could probably sit inside for longer than I wanted to wait outside.
It was only a matter of a few minutes for me to get into a pressure suit and into one of the arms that I'd already holed. Since it was already evacuated, I simply burned a man-sized hole in the outer hull with an anti-matter rifle. I then carefully climbed onto the outside of the hull and walked around until I was standing on the side nearest the storage arm. From that vantage point, I could easily see the location where the Pugs were waiting. The arms were rather narrow near the hub of the station since the only thing there was the two airlocks. Once beyond the airlock section, the arms gradually expanded to contain a larger volume, so large, in fact that it couldn't be accommodated nearer the hub.
The Pugs were clustered in the narrow area, and as soon as I had assured myself that I was facing the correct arm, helped by seeing Whistle peering out the adjacent view port located on the wall of the hub between the arms, I dissolved a small hole in the airlock's hull. I knew that it had gone through since there was a steady stream of rapidly condensing air and frozen water droplets shooting out. That was good enough. I returned through my hole and the airlocks back into the hub as fast as I could.
The Pugs were in considerable disarray, a few were trying to block the hole by throwing pieces of flooring and other materials at it and, in fact, they'd been somewhat successful in slowing down the leak. The others were cycling through the airlock behind them as rapidly as they could. It was too small to hold many of them at once and it looked as if it would take a couple of more cycles for them all to get out.
There was still some air in the space, although it was leaking out quickly. I didn't know if there was enough for a human to survive, but then I remembered that the Pugs preferred a different gas mix than humans. I didn't know if the big guys and Erin could make it through the area. They didn't have space suits, so that meant that the first one in would have to be me. Without waiting for an invitation, it looked like the Pugs were too busy to issue one, I cycled through the lock, weapon at the ready.
According to the HUD in my suit, the air inside was thin but breathable. I motioned for the others to come on through and began to shoot the remaining Pugs at the same time. With the anti-matter rifle, beginning to shoot an organic target and finishing shooting it was almost instantaneous. A simple pass of the muzzle over the visible Pugs was sufficient.
Erin, Frank, and Ted came through the lock, and we sprinted for the other lock. It was open with the remains of a couple of half-dissolved Pugs lying on the floor. I'd dissolved a little of the wall and the door itself, but not enough to affect the functioning. We cycled through and started shooting the instant the door cracked open. It was not a moment too soon. The Pugs were just starting to get organized. As it was, we caught them unawares, and most of them went down immediately. A couple of them managed to run down the hall away from us and duck around a corner. I sighed. It looked like they'd have to be hunted down individually, a dangerous task.
We'd just finished checking the destruction and assured ourselves that there was no resistance left when the last Pug-bear came tearing around the corner, followed closely by the two Pugs. It had decided that we might be more susceptible to an all-out attack than some hide-and-seek hunting game. It paired its charge with a mental attack at the same time. I was able to easily deflect its effort, but my companions were all stunned into inactivity.
As soon as the two Pugs came into view, they started shooting splinters at us, but by then, I'd gotten the eraser rifle up and simply burned through the Pug-bear horizontally in a slicing motion that also left the two Pugs without mid-sections. None of their shots had done any damage, but I inwardly shuddered at the possibility of seeing my companions struck.
I turned, and they were just starting to blink their eyes as if coming out of a deep slumber. Erin's eyes immediately opened wide as she saw the Pug-bear's remains.
“Oh, Dec! You got it! And and we were no help. I was somewhere far away, hiding from something that frightened me! It was like a bad dream where you're being chased, but it faded out. How did you kill them?”
“I've learned to fight off their mental attacks,” I didn't want to get into a long explanation. I'd already told her that I had that sort of ability.
“Hey, Man! It's a good thing you can fight that stuff! I couldn't move. It was like seeing about five defensive linemen running at you at the same time; you don't know which way to run for a moment.” Frank had been affected differently, obviously, but had now recovered. “What's next? What do we have to do now?” he asked.
Ted was quiet, simply passing his hand over his eyes a couple of times, then looking alertly around. I checked our immediate area for anything I'd failed to notice. There was a long hall with a T-shaped crossing at the end. The enemy had come running around the right-hand corner and their remains were lying near the intersection.
I said, “We probably don't have to do anything else in here. I think we've gotten all the Pugs unless there were some others that stayed back somewhere.” That statement decided me. We'd have to physically clear the arm unless there was another way to do it. I started to walk down to the intersection but then changed my mind again. I returned to the airlock and started to press the cycle button to open the door. My action was interrupted by the door cycling as Whistle came walking blithely through, acting as if he hadn't a care in the world.
“You get dem all!” He had a definite tone of triumph in his voice. “Dere no other creatures showing in the life monitor at the door.” He waved his arms vaguely in the direction of the airlock to emphasize his meaning.
“You have sensors that can tell how many occupants are in a wing?” I asked.
“Dat correct! We know they all gone,” he said.
“OK. Have the station Sunnys start repairing our ship as fast as possible! I don't know how much time we'll have. The Pugs could have called for help when they realized what we were up to.” I was fearful that there might be an Ansible on the planet that could instantly alert the enemy to send FTL reinforcement. The possibility made me nervous, and I wanted to be ready to go. I had a feeling that it was urgent that we have our ship in good fighting order.
Whistle turned to the airlock to get the other Sunnys organized. When we arrived, the hub was empty except for the five of us. Whistle led us to a lounge area that held some of their food machines. There were none there that were specifically tailored for humans, but we could eat some of the Sunny food and we did so, seated on the floor.