Free Aneka Jansen 6: The Lowest Depths of Shame by Niall Teasdale

the hospital in the last couple of weeks.
    Deena had had a cough for the last month, and Mizzy had caught it a week later. Neither had said anything to the guards because sometimes the people who left the cave did not come back. Mizzy’s cough was not getting better, and she knew Deena was worried about it, so she tried very hard not to cough, but it was difficult when she was cold.
    The bed moved. ‘Something’s happening,’ Deena whispered from outside the blankets. ‘The guards are running about.’
    Mizzy pulled the blankets back and looked up at the older girl. ‘Is someone coming?’
    Deena reached out a hand and stroked the little blonde’s hair. ‘I don’t know, hun. Just be ready.’
    ‘What for?’
    ‘Anything.’
    BC-101 Hand of God.
    The primary beam, a one-hundred-gigajoule gamma-ray laser, sliced through the hull of its target. Fuel tanks exploded and the ruined frigate began a lazy tumble. The Hand’s computers projected a deorbit over the southern pole in six hours. Tasker made a note to send a shuttle out to check for survivors.
    ‘Hand of God reporting last Herosian vessel down,’ she said aloud for the benefit of the Jenlay contingent.
    ‘Prepare for ground invasion,’ Thackett’s voice said. ‘Anti-aircraft fire to begin on my mark.’
    ‘We’re getting radio transmissions from the surface.’ Tasker did not recognise the voice, but it came from one of the Jenlay ships. ‘Repeated statement that they will take extreme measures if we don’t withdraw.’
    A flurry of thoughts passed across the Hand’s internal network. Ground batteries below were opening fire. There were three squadrons of fighters in the air, more preparing for launch. Point defence fire was being initiated from all Old Earth vessels. No one could detect the transmissions the Jenlay ship was reporting.
    ‘Open fire,’ Thackett ordered.
    Tasker’s visuals showed missile tracks heading for the airborne craft below. Seventeen seconds to interception. Point defence had taken out the ones coming up…
    ‘Continued radio traffic,’ the same voice reported. ‘They demand we back off.’
    ‘Or what?’ Thackett growled. ‘They’re going to shout at us harder?’
    Missile detonations. Sixty-one per cent estimated kill rate. Tasker dispatched an order to her ground force leaders indicating they should prepare for launch. And then chaos consumed the fleet’s communications.
    ‘Detonations,’ someone reported.
    ‘Two detonations. Nuclear!’
    Figures flashed across Tasker’s field of vision. Two nuclear detonations a couple of kilometres outside the city. Estimated yield twenty-five kilotonnes. More precise locations appeared. The mines…
    Beryum.
    When the cavern began to shake, Deena grabbed Mizzy from the bed and pushed her under the frame.
    ‘Stay there,’ the lanky girl said.
    ‘What about you?’ Mizzy called back as Deena turned away.
    ‘Have to get the others under cover.’
    Mizzy curled into a tight ball as she heard small rocks hitting the floor of the cavern. She was not sure exactly what was going on, but she was sure it was not good and that she wanted Deena in with her, under cover, and away from the falling ceiling.
    There was another sound, deeper and more resonant, from somewhere above them. It sounded a bit like the explosions Mizzy had heard when the Herosians had first come, but it went on for longer and it had to be louder because of all the rock above their heads.
    Screaming started as something big hit the floor of the cavern. One of the voices sounded like Deena.
    Mizzy’s screams joined the others as something heavy slammed into her bed, buckling the frame.
    LV-101 Argus.
    Norden was momentarily stunned. None of his simulations, none of his research, had indicated that the Herosians would commit suicide rather than allow the planet to fall into Jenlay hands. But there it was. Two warheads had been detonated near the mining facilities.
    The data was indicating surface blasts. Nuclear