Red Fury yelled, “I want everyone to form a neat line. We’re heading for bay 1!”
Sirens screamed as both agents and heroes scrambled all over the place. People bumped into David several times, and he skillfully avoided a robot that was in a hurry to reach an unknown destination. The scene overflowed with controlled chaos, suggesting that the control would be lost soon. Other recruits gathered around him as the four armed instructor bellowed directions at them like a first-grade teacher organizing their students.
“Move, one two, one two! NOW!” Red Fury jogged with them, guiding them along at a hurried pace.
David followed as close as he could until he nearly tripped over an older woman who was struggling to keep up. “Here, can I help?” David asked.
She said, “I can’t run like them.” A dire fear filled her eyes as she struggled to move.
“I will carry you.” David picked her up and held her in his arms, his new morphonic strength proving to make her as light as a feather in his arms.
They rounded corners and rushed down hallways as the station continued to sound the alarm. Soon, they crossed through the mess toward another hallway. The lights in this room changed to a flashing red and a loud computer voice said, “Class Ten emergency! All heroes, this is a Class Ten Emergency!”
“Damn!” Red Fury bellowed, but then threw several arms over his head as he waved them along. “Keep up, move. Good work Mr. David.”
David followed along, hoping the old woman couldn’t hear his heart racing in fear at this. He did not know what constituted a Class Ten emergency, but it was bad enough to send BADGE into this frenzy and that was all he needed to know.
They raced out into the enormous main docking bay of the station. Several shuttles were being prepped as people lined up to get inside. Krystal Fae and Chase both directed everyone to their locations.
Red Fury stopped the team and spoke directly to Krystal, “What is going on? I thought you were magic’ing them down to the planet's surface.”
Krystal said, “Not safe any longer.”
David asked, “What?”
“There’s no time to explain,” Chase said. “We’ll be putting everyone on the shuttles and moving you to a safe distance while we prepare the Orbital Arena to receive guests.”
David set the old woman down so she could get in line with the others. He asked Red Fury, “What is a Class Ten emergency?”
“You don’t need to know.”
“Yes, I do. I want to go home, I want out of this situation. What is the emergency?”
Red Fury said, “A Class Ten means that the entire planet is at risk. It isn’t safe to go back right now.”
David went numb. He didn’t know when or how, but someone moved him into a shuttle with many others. The shuttle flew away from the station. He couldn’t stop thinking about his friends, his coworkers, his home, his cat. Everything was in grave danger, and he might see none of them again. A great flash of light jostled his rattled mind, and everyone gasped as the shuttle rocked hard.
A woman screamed, “It exploded!”
David couldn’t see. This shuttle didn’t have passenger windows, just the front. What had just exploded?
Ten Minutes before:
“I want information now! Where is it targeting? What missiles will it be firing? Get the heroes into space!” Nova spoke to various people and robots around him at the top of his voice.
EB said, “Come on, this is big. Get those big wings out and go slicey slicey that ship with your super sword!”
Nova scoffed, “I can’t. Not anymore.”
“What!”
“Not the time to discuss this!” Nova looked over at a screen. Five heroes flew into space, led by Strange Quark. “Communications open a channel to Quark.”
“It is open.”
“Quark, we don’t know when it will fire, but the weapon readings are growing off the charts. Can you do anything?”
“Don’t worry, I got this.”
EB said, “Quark, bud, that won’t...”
“Not now!” Nova barked.
“But,...”
“NOT NOW! Quark, do it!”
Quark stopped in space, watching this rusted hulk slowly moving toward Earth. The other heroes around him waited for his next action.
“Okay, one ship, zapped to the surface of the sun, coming up!” He waved his hands and snapped both fingers.
A bubble of energy formed around the ship and buzzed, but then nothing happened. He tried this again, with more flourish in his actions. Nothing but the same buzz.
“Aw, duck feathers! It has quantum shields!” He slapped his comm. “Nova, that thing has super advanced shields.”
EB said, “I was try’n to tell ya. Legion has had Quantum shields for like a billion years. You can’t just zap it away.”
Nova asked, “Anything else we need to know?”
EB said, “I don’t know much more, well, cept that the defense systems aren’t weapons based. But, I can’t remember what they used to defend the ship. “
“Can we penetrate the shields?”
“Maybe. Those things are tough eggs to crack. But, you might...”
“Warning, critical decent!” Robot 12323 announced. “Vessel’s orbit is failing. Impact imminent.”
EB hopped up, “Aw, carrot sticks! That’s it! These ships are suicidal. They don’t launch anything, they charge up and them ram the planet.”
Nova yelled into his comm, “Quark! Tell the heroes out there to blow that thing up!” He then yelled into the comm of the station, “Arx, plan B. Move!”
Arx stood at the edge of a smaller docking bay with a unit of his ATLAS heroes. He wore a rocket-geared space suit, as did all the other non-space-abled heroes.
“This is an ATLAS situation. The call to heroes from the surface has gone out, but they probably won’t make it in time. It is up to us. We can’t let that ship hit the planet! Go, Go, Go!” He jumped through the force-field as his rockets buzzed on. They propelled Arx toward the falling ancient vessel. Behind him flew two dozen members of ATLAS.
Approaching the rusted ship, they could see the heroes already there, blasting away. Beams of energy and even two heroes were punching it. Their attacks hit an energy barrier that flickered with the iridescent rainbow hues like the surface of oil. However, nothing was touching the hull of the ship.
“Pop that bubble!” Arx yelled and then dove straight at it with both fists out. He rammed it, but merely bounced off.
A pair of twins rushed up. One used her powers to create large balls of energy that turned solid. Her sister met the object with a hard kick that sent it zooming toward the ship. When it hit, it would bounce off the shields and then evaporate. Others sent eye beams or blasts of energy from their hands.
Arx heard a loud beeping in his suit, and he checked a monitor on his wrist. Punching the call-button he contacted Nova. “Sir, we have a serious problem… actually several.”
“What is it?”
“We aren’t doing much damage to the shields of this thing. Also, the radiation levels are dangerously high. This thing is going to kill us before we can finish this.”
“I’m sorry, Arx, but you will have to put your team at the risk of death. If that ship crashes into the surface of the planet, a lot of people are going to die.”
Arx’s warning system got even louder. “Damn! It just reached the atmosphere. It will fall in less than a minute and the sub-nuclear systems are about to go critical. If that thing blows, even in the air above the surface, it will spread radiation across the planet. Billions will die.”
“Options?” Nova asked.
“I don’t… wait… what the hell is that?”
Nova heard this statement and then Arx’s voice garbled and the line cut off. All the visuals of the situation went fuzzy.
“Get him back!”
10915 Replied, “Radiation levels near Arx are blocking communications and sensors.”
“Damn!” Nova paced, “Visuals!”
“Visual sensors are being blocked by high radiation.”
“Doesn’t this station have any old cameras?” Justin asked.
“No. Only sensor based. We’re blind and deaf. I need something!”
EB hopped up. “I can go out and look. Be right back!” He vanished away.
“Idiot!” Nova scoffed. “He can’t zap back in. I need…”
The station shook hard, and the power across the entire facility flickered and died in places. Justin caught the wall he was next to while Nova hit the floor.
“Report!” Nova bellowed from the floor.
10915 answered, “Large explosion registered.”
“Oh, god. No.”
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