Trinity Universe: Code Five

[ProfPotts]

‘Admiral on deck!’

The barked announcement was accompanied by a dimming of the lights in the Leviathan’s voluminous hanger bay, and soon followed by the ambient noise levels quieting to a soft murmur as the mismatched assortment of individuals crammed onto the deck all turned their attention to the man - wearing the uniformed great coat of a fleet Admiral - who now strode onto the upper gantry to address them. Hands gripping the rail the grizzled war veteran leant forward, allowing the deck lights to highlight the spider web of scars marking the left side of his pale face, and the patch covering his empty eye socket. Wasting no time, and pulling no punches, he launched into his speech, his voice rough and graveled, yet carrying clear to those at the far side of the hanger,

‘I don’t care how you got here: it’s not my concern whether you volunteered for this mission, or were recruited, drafted, or press ganged into service. You’re here, you’ll do the job – or I’ll flush you out the nearest airlock myself. Don’t think I haven’t got the legal authority to do so, or that I’ll hesitate to use it.’

‘This is a fight for the future of the species, people: do or die, crunch time, zero hour. There’s a horde of monsters coming to devour you, your friends and loved ones – everything you know or have ever known. We’ve tried talking to them, we’ve tried to out think them, we’ve tried every trick in the book. None of it has worked, so it comes down to this: us versus them, we hit them with everything we’ve got… and pray to God that it’s enough to make a difference.’

‘Looking around you’ll see strangers: you come from all over the globe, all creeds, all colours. Some of you are heroes, career military, some of you are mercenaries, some of you are from the private sector, whilst others are the scum of humanity – brigands, pirates, terrorists, murderers. Some of you are psions, some are just the best at what you do. As of right now all that matters is this: you are all human, you are all here to fight the good fight – to stop these monsters, these aberrants, or to die trying. I don’t much care whether you think this cause is noble or doomed, I just care that you get the job done.’

‘For those of you thinking about backing out, know this: we have already jumped to our target coordinates beyond the oort cloud. Long range scans have picked up the predicted aberrant activity. In less than thirty minutes we will be within range of a firing solution – but the fusion warheads and particle cannons alone can’t do the job. They will come at us with every drop of hell-spawned power they have. Within thirty-five minutes I will call a “Code Five” – from the Roman numeral “V” – and that’s where you come in: up-close and personal, it’s the only way… You and your VARGs have to finish the job.’

‘I not going to lie to you – we’re way beyond that now – we predict heavy losses: one-hundred percent if we fail, and not much less than that if we succeed. But succeed we must, or humanity will be nothing but a proverbial footnote in the history of the universe.’

Standing up straight the Admiral checked his pocket watch – an antique clockwork timepiece passed down through his family, father to son, since the nineteen-twenties. Once more addressing the crowd on the hanger deck – pilots and support crews both – he added,

‘In twenty-nine minutes we enter Hell. God have mercy on us all.’