Freedom Vs. Aliens (Aliens Series Book 3) by T. Jackson King Read Free Book Online

he walked back to his seat. “Any sign of chatter about this on the worldwide web? The NewTube? On business intranets?”
    She peered at her comlink panels. “Yes! Five different internet talk shows have now switched to debates over your broadcast. They are live events, not recorded. And the business nets in Asia, Europe and North and South America are all chattering about the effect of our attacks on global and interplanetary trade.”
    “Good!” He sat down in his Tech seat and relocked his straps. Tapping his Tech panel he called up the Fire Control touch points for the railguns and lasers. “It’s time to complete—”
    “Incoming!” yelled Maureen from the holo above Jack’s panel. “Anti-sat missiles launched at us from southern Germany! From the former NATO bases at Ramstein, Stuttgart and Hohenfels. They’re approaching at one-fifth planetary escape velocity.”
    Jack’s panel showed what Elaine now added to the front screen. Yellow lines that were the approach vectors for twelve missiles launched from the three bases. They were still a hundred kilometers below them but coming on fast.
    “Everyone! Fire lasers! Those missiles could be nuke-tipped! Gareth, back us up with a wide Higgs footprint!”
    The true-light image of the Earth below them suddenly filled with green laser streaks, blue particle beams and then a wide yellow beam emitted by the Dragon’s Combat Node.
    “Nine dead!” called Elaine anxiously. “Ten! Eleven . . . yes! Twelfth one dead. Just thirty klicks below us. No warhead explosions.” She looked at Jack, her expression worried.
    He sighed. “All ships, target practice time. Use your antimatter beams to destroy those three bases. Take out everything that stands above ground!”
    “Firing!” Maureen grinned maniacally and added the Uhuru’s antimatter thread to the 32 other black beams going downward.
    Yellow-white light glared from three spots in southern Germany, rising up through the snow-white cumulo-nimbus clouds like three thermonuke mushrooms. Only there was no radioactive fallout from their antimatter strikes. It was a point he had stressed at the fleet battle conference, that there was to be no thermonuke use against the surface of Earth. Their battle was with the Unity, not with the civilians of their home world.
    “Entering the space above Switzerland,” Elaine said, sounding relieved.
    “Denise, give me an AV link to the Dictat’s private office. Break through any calls he might be making.”
    She looked up at the ceiling. “Autonomous, locate the AV frequency for the office of Dictat Katsaros, Geneva, Switzerland. Override any outside signal and project AV imagery and sound on the front screen.”
    “Executing,” said the impersonal voice of the expert system computer that ran most functions aboard the Uhuru . “Accessed. Displayed.”
    An image of a black-haired, muscular man of swarthy skin tone and irritated manner looked at them from behind a standard executive desk. The office occupied by the well-dressed man was located in Building S of the Palais des Nations Unity headquarters at the north end of Geneva. According to Elaine’s sensor backtracking of the Come-Back signal.
    “Who dares to break into my private calls!” the man said in guttural French, which Autonomous automatically translated into Belter English. “You! You pirate! You will pay—”
    “Shut up,” Jack said, keeping partial attention on the Tactical Display above his panel that tracked any incoming attackers.
    The clean-shaven man shut his mouth, but the man’s brown eyes glared at Jack. The he started up again. “You are the pirate Jack Munroe. Well, we captured your two spies and found out what we needed to know. You Belter rebels will—”
    “How do you wish to die?” Jack asked, raising one hand to the Fire Control screen on his Tech panel. “By antimatter? By laser? By orbital bombardment like we offered your predecessor, Dictat Maathias?”
    “What do you want?”