February 14, 2019. Kuiper Belt (The Nomad). Ship Time: 08:00.
We were hiding in the shadow of a dwarf planet, deep in the freeze. It was quiet. Judy was in the mess hall, watching a delayed news feed from Earth. Suddenly, she dropped her cup. "Surgrim! Mereel! Bridge! Now!"
I ran in, Mereel close behind. "What is it? Did they find us?"
"No," Judy pointed at the screen. "They found a debris cloud. A massive one. It's on an intersecting orbit with the ISS. NASA calls it a 'Mission Kill' scenario. They can't evacuate because the docked Soyuz has micro-meteoroid damage on its sensors."
"Analyzing trajectory," Archi interrupted. His holographic sphere turned red. "Origin point of debris field: Low Earth Orbit, above Brandenburg, Germany. Date of origin: January 25th."
Silence fell over the bridge. "It's us," I whispered. "When we punched out... the shockwave. We shredded the local satellites. We created the cloud."
"Those astronauts are going to die because we panicked," Judy said, her voice shaking. She looked at me. "We did this. We fix it."
"We can't just fly back," Mereel argued. "Vance will see us."
"We go back," I decided. "But we don't go to fight. We go to block. Archi, plot an intercept course. Maximum burn. We need to get between that cloud and the station."
"Calculated. We will arrive with less than 60 seconds to impact. It will be tight."
"Shields up. Let's go save the neighbors."
February 15, 2019. Earth Orbit (ISS). Altitude: 408 km.
Commander Higgins floated in the Cupola module, looking out at the beautiful Earth. It was likely his last view. Houston had already said their goodbyes. The cloud was too dense, too fast. He didn't have sensors to see the debris coming. He just watched the horizon, waiting for the end.
Suddenly, the stars went out. A massive shadow blotted out the sun. There was no sound, but the station shuddered slightly as a gravity wake washed over it. Higgins squinted. It wasn't a cloud. It was a wall. A slab of black metal, four hundred meters long, had just drifted into position less than two kilometers away, matching the ISS's orbit perfectly. Blue ion flames flickered from its maneuvering thrusters as the behemoth stabilized.
"Houston..." Higgins whispered to himself, his hand pressing against the glass. "What is that?"
The Nomad. Bridge.
"Position locked," I ordered. "Rotate the ship 90 degrees. Present the ventral armor to the debris field. Maximize surface area."
"Rotation complete," Archi reported calmly. "Debris impact in 5... 4... 3..."
"Here it comes," Mereel muttered, gripping his console.
The debris cloud wasn't just dust. It was thousands of bolts, paint chips, and pieces of solar panels traveling at 28,000 km/h.
"Point Defense active."
Outside, the hull of the Nomad lit up. The four laser turrets spun rapidly. Thrum-Thrum-Thrum. Bright red pulses of coherent light stabbed into the darkness. Flashes of silent explosions blossomed in the void as larger pieces of debris were vaporized into plasma. It looked like a strobe light show.
Then the main wave hit. CLANG. The sound resonated through the ship's frame, a dull, heavy thud like a hammer hitting an anvil. THUD. THUD. CLANG.
"Report!" I shouted.
"Shields fluctuating at 92%," Mereel read off the diagnostics. "Armor integrity holding at 99%. Scratches on the paint, nothing more. We are a brick, Surgrim."
"Keep firing," I ordered. "Don't let anything past us."
The red lasers continued to pulse, creating a wall of fire. The Nomad was taking the beating intended for the fragile station behind it.
But space is chaotic. A large piece of a defunct weather satellite—a twisted titanium strut—came spinning out of the darkness. The port dorsal turret tracked it. It fired a high-energy pulse. The beam hit the strut. But instead of vaporizing completely, the metal shattered under the thermal stress. It exploded into a shotgun blast of molten slag and jagged shrapnel.
Most of it slammed harmlessly into our shields. But one jagged piece, red-hot and spinning wildly, ricocheted off our angled hull. It bounced. It flew past the Nomad. It bypassed our protection shadow.
ISS. Russian Segment.
Higgins watched the light show in awe. The unknown ship was firing red beams, disintegrating the death cloud. They were saving them. "Incredible," he breathed.
Then, a Master Alarm blared. BEEP-BEEP-BEEP. Red lights flashed on the console. "Pressure drop!" the onboard computer announced in a calm, female voice. "Decompression in Module Zvezda. Atmosphere loss critical."
Higgins froze. He hadn't seen it hit. He hadn't felt it. But the air was already getting thinner.
The Nomad.
"Leaker!" Archi reported. "One fragment ricocheted. Impact confirmed on the ISS."
"Status of the station?" I demanded.
"They are venting atmosphere. The hole is jagged. They have approximately 15 minutes of breathable air remaining before critical hypoxia sets in."
I looked at Judy. She was white as a sheet. "We failed," she whispered. "We tried to be a shield, and we deflected the bullet right into them."
"No," I stood up. I looked at the ISS on the main screen. It was small, fragile, and dying. "Archi. Open the main cargo bay door. Drop the ramp."
"What?" Mereel looked up. "Surgrim, what are you doing?"
"We're not just shielding them anymore," I said, pointing at the station. "We're taking them with us. Archi, initiate difficult docking procedure. We are going to swallow the station."
"The whole station?" Mereel's jaw dropped. "It's 100 meters wide!"
"It will be a tight fit," I said. "Get us close. We scoop them up before they suffocate."