The metal catwalk clanged under Rick Merk's spacesuited heels and the sound echoed off the far wall of Pod Number 5. He had to grip the handrail to keep from toppling into the dizzying depths below as he fought back a wave of nausea -- although it was unclear whether that was just vertigo or because he knew he was about to strap himself into the death machine below.
"I'm a scientist, not a fighter pilot!" he said crankily, but Colonel Christopher ignored his complaining and handed him his flight helmet.
"We've already been through this," said the Colonel. "We need someone to clear the asteroid field ahead of the Enterprise, but none of the crew can be spared during the passage, and you're the only one among the passengers with flight training. Besides, these things practically fly themselves. You'll have no trouble."
Rick harrumphed, but proceeded deeper into the pod at the Colonel's prodding. Then, in the shadows below, there it was -- a long, sleek, gray and white form -- the SDF's newest weapon in their ongoing struggle against the Eriarti. The Colonel had called it a VF-1A fighter, code-named Grizzly -- when Rick had heard that name, he'd finally understood that cryptic conversation between the Colonel and Maverick Slike on the bridge.
The Colonel flipped a toggle and the pod's interior floodlights lit, revealing the Grizzly in all its splendor. It was truly a marvelously beautiful thing to behold. Under any other circumstances, Rick would have thought it was super-cool, but at the moment his mind was too busy worrying about what he was about to do.
Rick climbed down the steep ramp connecting the catwalk with the Grizzly's cockpit, with the Colonel right behind. He hopped across the small gap and sank into the padded pilot's seat, pulled on the flight helmet and started flipping switches, bringing the Grizzly to life. The Colonel patted him on the helmet a few times and gave him some last-minute advice. "Remember Rick -- no need for heroics. All we need is a straight path cleared in front of us, okay?"
"You don't have to tell me twice," said Rick as confidently as he could, toggling the control that lowered the cockpit canopy into place.
"Right." The Colonel smiled, gave Rick a thumbs-up and climbed back up the ramp and exited the pod. A few tense minutes later, Claudia's calming voice crackled over his helmet speakers. "Angel One, prepare to launch."
"Ready," reported Rick, and braced himself.
The pod's floodlights winked out, plunging him into complete darkness, but it didn't last long. Below, the entire floor of the pod bay split down the middle, and the two huge halves swung outward revealing the depths of space beyond. Slowly, the Grizzly was lowered out of the pod by a huge telescoping armature. When fully extended, it stopped with a jerk, and a loud clang and another jolt told Rick he's been released and was floating free below looming bulk of the Enterprise. That same instant, Claudia's voice ordered, "Launch!"
Rick
pushed the throttle all the way forward, and was rewarded with the roar and
feel of the plane's impulse engines flaring to life. Slowly at first, but very
quickly accelerating, the Grizzly pulled away from its docking arm, then shot
out ahead of the Enterprise.
Now that he was actually sitting in the cockpit and flying, Rick's nervousness disappeared altogether, replaced by the thrill of flying in zero-gee. He had to be careful not to become giddy and reckless, or this would be his first and last space flight. Calming himself, he checked the lidar display. Sure enough, there was the oncoming asteroid swarm dead ahead. He gritted his teeth and adjusted his course to intercept.
Luckily for everyone on the Enterprise, the Grizzly had been shipped fully armed and with a full complement of missiles. In addition to two powerful x-ray laser cannons, his ship was carrying ten nuclear-tipped sidewinders -- For those extra-stubborn asteroids.... he thought wryly, but didn't really anticipate the need to use them. The lidar beeped at him just then -- the time for idle wryness was over. The fleet-winged fighter plane had traversed the distance between the Enterprise and the asteroids posthaste, and it was now time for action!
Suddenly, Rick was nervous again.
A large rock lined itself up very cooperatively in his targeting reticule. Taking a deep breath, he gently squeezed the trigger on the joystick. A deafening BANG! rang through the cockpit and a sharp jolt kicked him in the seat of his pants. Two blinding streams of concentrated x-rays lanced out from the nose of the Grizzly and connected with the asteroid, which immediately ceased to exist as such. A rapidly expanding cloud of dirt and gas was all that was left of it.
Shocked and stunned by the violence of the lasers and the total, instantaneous annihilation of such a huge space-rock, Rick just sat and blinked for a few seconds. The outer shell of his Grizzly was buffeted and scoured by the debris cloud as he flew through it, but it barely registered on his overloaded senses. He'd always imagined the lasers would sound kind of like phaser banks on Star Trek or something, but then he remembered that these particular weapons were powered by actual miniature nuclear explosions, then focusing the radioactive blast into a single narrow beam. That explained the noise, and also the astonishing ferocity.
He recovered his wits and opened a comm channel to the ship. "Angel One to Enterprise. One bogie down; 999,999 to go."
From the bridge of the Enterprise, he could hear whooping and cheering, then the Colonel's gruff voice requesting a return to professionalism, then, responding to his report. [Acknowledged, Angel One. We are diverting our course to follow you through the field. Good luck.]
"Roger," said Rick, then clicked off.
Trying to keep as straight a course as possible, he set about blowing a clear path through the killer asteroid field for the Enterprise. Time and again, the x-ray lasers fired, jarring his very bones and making his eardrums hurt, but each time, the solar system's stock of asteroids diminished by one.
Five hours later, thinking he couldn't survive one more shot, Rick checked the lidar to find it almost clear. Only one asteroid remained that was a threat to the Enterprise, but its size was enormous! He lined up the space-going mountain in his sights and pulled the trigger, fervently hoping it would be for the last time. The lasers slammed into its bulk, but this time the target was not instantly vaporized.
"Rats," grumbled Rick. "Looks like it's time to break out the big guns." The lidar started beeping at him, so he checked the readout again. It took him a few moments to interpret the data, and when he did he gave the lidar screen a good whack with his hand because it was obviously broken -- the readings it was giving didn't make any sense.
According to the sensors, the asteroid was accelerating! Fast!
"That thing is under power!" exclaimed Rick in alarm. A quick check of the computer readout revealed yet another alarming detail. The accelerating asteroid would impact the unsuspecting Enterprise in less than fifteen seconds! There was no time to lose, and no time to be concerned about his own safety -- the lives of everyone on board the ship depended on him.
He yanked the joystick hard to the side and back, causing the Grizzly to tumble head over heals and settle to a stop directly facing the asteroid. The high g's pressed Rick back in his cushioned seat and turned his arms to lead, but he still managed to flip up the missile arming switch on the joystick. The three weapon bay doors in the belly of the plane swung open revealing their lethal payload.
He had a pretty good idea what his fate would be if he fired ten nuclear missiles at a target at this close range, but didn't give that a second thought. Down went his thumb on the button, and ten flaming arrows shot away from his plane.
A second and a half later they impacted, and the black of space turned into the white of the heart of a supernova. Another half-second after that, the shockwave slammed with unbelievable force into the Grizzly, and everything went dark again.
Darkness gave way ever-so-slowly to light. Sounds turned from incoherent noise at the edge of his consciousness into intelligible speech. His mind struggled up from the depths of fevered nightmare to sanity. He opened his eyes.
A hospital room.
He tried sitting up, but discovered he had no strength, and the effort sent a wave of pain and nausea through him. A voice from somewhere outside his immediate field of vision rebuked him, though not unkindly, "Let that be a lesson to you. Just lie there and behave yourself."
A man in a white lab coat -- a doctor, the source of the voice -- walked around his bed to where he could see him, checked the readout on the lifesigns monitor, and made a note on the clipboard he was carrying, grunted in satisfaction and addressed his patient again. "Well, Doctor Merk. You certainly are one lucky son-of-a-gun, not to mention a hero."
Rick cleared his throat, and in a scratchy voice asked the cliché question. "Where am I?"
"Medical ward, Titanbase Sagan."
That means the Enterprise survived! Rick thought triumphantly.
"You've been unconscious for a little over two weeks," the doctor said. "You have a severe concussion, a few fractures, and radiation poisoning. Luckily, the dose wasn't quite high enough to be fatal, and the Enterprise found your wrecked fighter and brought you here in time for us to treat you. Like I said -- lucky."
Rick didn't feel very lucky at the moment though, his head ached too much. He made a mental note to feel lucky later. Just then, a new voice in the room interrupted his thoughts. "Thought I told you not to be a hero, Merk."
Rick turned his head towards the door and saw Colonel Christopher standing there with his arms folded across his chest and a stern look on his face. Rick ventured a weak smile and said with as much conviction as he could muster, "Take my word for it. It'll never happen again!"