by Richard Fox
“A decent way to look at it,” Gage said.
“But we are sensor deaf,” she said. “Only…ninety-three more seconds until we’ve decelerated to target velocity. Not long after that before we cross the horizon and engage the Daegon. Assuming…assuming a good number of variables: the Daegon committing to the attack, Indus falling back to—”
“Hell of a time to raise concerns.” Gage put one hand on his buckle.
Thorvald stood nearby, his boots mag-locked to the ground and one hand gripping the frame of the doorway to the emergency escape pods. Whether or not the Genevan could get Gage into a pod before the ship burned to a crisp was debatable, and Gage didn’t want to know the answer.
“Almost…there,” Price said.
Gage unbuckled his straps and leaned forward as the Orion lurched up. The motion sent Gage pitching forward, and Thorvald caught him under the arms just before he could smack against the deck. The Genevan lifted Gage up and set him on his feet at the controls of the holo tank as the ship leveled out.
“I didn’t see anything,” Price said as she slipped into her station opposite of Gage.
Ahead, the orange glow of the burning atmosphere faded away. Bands of blue gave way to stars and the void as the ship angled up and away from the planet.
In the holo, Albion ships blinked into existence as their telemetry data feeds linked together. The ships packed in tight around the Orion so close, Gage could see the prow of the Sterling off his port side.
“We’re…” Price swallowed hard. “…we’re missing the Perilous and the Xiphos. Two IR plumes behind us…they must have hit debris from the battle and—”
“Why is the Renown in high orbit?” Gage stared hard at the ship’s icon. It was on a course to join back up with the Castle Itter, far removed from the battle that was just over the horizon.
“Shall I hail her?” Price asked.
“Arlyss, you little coward.” Gage beat a knuckle against the control panel. “Three warships down and we haven’t fired a single shot yet. I’ll deal with him later.”
“Data coming in from the Indus.” Price swiped up from a panel and a mess of fragmentary images populated the holo. There was a scrum of Indus and Daegon ships over Theni city, the edges of the two fleets bleeding together as missiles and energy bolts made a murderous cross fire. Gage refreshed the data, and his heart sank.
“The Amritsar is gone,” Gage said.
“We’re not too late,” Price said. “The Indus are holding their own. For now. If we—priority message from the governor. Coming in on several channels.”
Gage touched a blinking icon and a solemn-looking governor, flanked by well-dressed men and women, bowed his head slightly.
“It is with great regret that I must accept our situation,” he said. “The Daegon forces have seized control of the skies over our home. As such, I hereby order the immediate and complete—”
Gage killed the feed.
“The Indus fleet seems to have missed the message,” Price said. “Are we going to ignore it too?”
“I don’t need the governor’s permission to kill Daegon,” Gage said. “So long as the Indus keep fighting...”
He adjusted his fleet’s course, moving their projected path just behind the Daegon armada to directly through their center.
“Commodore, we do that and—”
“It’ll be a knife fight. Gunnery! Work up firing solution for a hot runner launch and send it to all ships. All cannons load and be prepared to fire at will once we’re in the thick of it. Helm, ready for manual control. We can trade paint with the Daegon, but no more.” He turned to Thorvald. “Shuttle bay three. A fighter escort will get you to the planet. Find Aidan and keep him safe. Disappear into the population as best you can if our attack fails.”
“My duties are to you, Regent,” Thorvald said.
“There’s not a damn thing you can do for me if this ship goes down. Aidan is the Crown Prince. He is the priority. Now get moving before I kick your ass and throw you in the shuttle myself,” Gage said.
Thorvald took a halting step away, as if his armor wasn’t under his control, then he entered the bridge’s lift with a nod to Gage.
“That was easier than I thought it would be,” Gage said.
“Hail from the Arjan Singh,” Price said.
“Torpedo solution nearly done, sire,” the gunnery officer called out.
Gage held up a hand to acknowledge the update, then turned his attention to a new window in the holo.
An Indus naval officer with a cracked visor crouched against a damaged seat. The camera wobbled as he picked up an armrest and turned it to him.
“Albion ships? You’re still on your attack run?” he asked.
“We’ll open fire with hot runners in…forty seconds,” Gage said.
“I am Captain Sahib Birbal. We can…we can last that long.” The camera feed shook as the ship took a hit and Birbal dropped the armrest with the camera. He picked it back up and shouted commands over his shoulder as fire spread across the ceiling.
“Admiral Chadda said there might be a surrender announcement to confuse the Daegon, and that we must keep faith that Albion will perform their part of the battle.” Birbal gave Gage a knowing smile. “We will hold, Albion. Make it worth the price we pay, yes?”
Gage nodded.
“Guns.” He raised a hand. “Fire!”
He chopped down and torpedoes launched from his ship, streaking toward the maelstrom raging over Theni City.
****
“My lord!” a Daegon cried out.
Eubulus snapped his head around, anger at the officer’s breach of decorum hidden behind his lion mask. Surprise and fear did not belong on his bridge. Such emotions meant he’d lost control of the situation, and such a situation should have been beneath his capabilities.
“Control your tongue or I will rip it out and—” Eubulus made for the officer, and came to a sudden stop when one of his cruisers exploded in the holo next to him. “What? What just happened?”
“Albion drive signatures,” another crewman said, and Gage’s fleet appeared in the holo, more and more salvos of high velocity torpedoes bent towards Eubulus’ force with each passing moment.
“How did they…” Eubulus looked to the moon in the holo, and he made the connection. “Bold. Very bold, Gage,” he said. “Perhaps Tiberian is right to despise your abilities.”
The Medusa rumbled as Albion weapons hit home.
“Minor damage to aft shield emitters. Themata squadrons can’t engage yet. They’re asking to fall back to our point defense perimeter and—”
“No.” Eubulus watched as eight of his slave-crewed ships exploded almost as one. “Bring the port squadrons in behind what’s already under attack.” One hand double-tapped an icon on the screen on the opposite side of the force from the Albion advance, and he dragged the ships to where his four battleships and attending Daegon crewed cruisers were. He pushed his own ships away, swapping places with the outer screen. The holo for the ships began moving toward their new positions.
“Put more space between us and the Albion,” he said. “They want me? They’re going to go through the thorns first.”
“What of our forces engaged with the Indus?” an officer asked.
“They can die in place. I’ll finish the Indus off once I teach the Albion a lesson. Fortune favors the bold, but the battle goes to the side with the heavier firepower. Bring the prow cannon to bear on the Orion. Kill her first.”
****
“Energy spike!” a bridge crewman shouted.
“Brace!” Gage shouted as the Orion lurched to one side. A blast of yellow light ran through with red streaks flashed to one side of the ship, so close it left an after image on Gage’s vision.
The sky over Theni city was a maelstrom of energy bolts, wrecked Daegon and Indus ships, and contrails of torpedoes and missiles swirling to engage targets. The battle had devolved into a slugging match, and the Albion fleet charged straight thr
ough it all, heading for the Daegon battleships at the core of their formation.
The Albion torpedo salvos had ripped a hole through the Daegon perimeter, leaving a gap for Gage and his ships to charge through. Wrecked hulls of Daegon destroyers slowly drifted toward New Madras, a handful had already succumbed to the gravity well and become flaming comets over Theni City.
The surviving enemy ships on the outer spheres were contracting toward the Daegon battleships, but the Albion fleet had come over the horizon with enough velocity after the atmosphere brake that they’d reach their targets at the center of the Daegon formation before the smaller ships could join the fray.
The Daegon that had been stuck in against the Indus were attempting to disengage, but the surviving defenders didn’t let them get away easily, punishing any ship that turned its unshielded aft toward them and scoring kills so fast that the flank of the battle was turning in favor of the Indus.
The four enemy battleships at their center had turned their prows to face the Albion head on, but were holding their positions. A final ring of Daegon ships of the line stood between Gage and Eubulus’ flagship.
“Helm, shift course to one-four mark two-nine,” Price called out, and the Orion turned toward a Daegon cruiser. Its smaller energy cannons couldn’t throw the same firepower as the battleship lance they just dodged, but the enemy ship still could hurt the Orion.
“Valiant,” Gage said. “I need your task force to deal with this.” He tapped the nearby cruiser within the holo. “I spend the Orion’s spine cannon here and I won’t have anything for their flagship.”
“I don’t need convincing, sire,” Captain Erskine said. His portrait appeared next to his frigate as his ship and the Huntress and Firebrand sped up to flank the Orion and the rest of the Albion ships.
Gage scanned the status of the other capital ships. The Ajax, Concordia, Storm—and two recent additions with the Sterling and Adamant—formed a nucleus around the Orion. Their joined shields absorbed much of incoming fire, but the hits from the Daegon battleships’ massive prow energy beams had taken a toll. The impact of the enemy beams dropped off against more distant targets, and each moment Gage closed on the flagship and its three cohorts meant an even bigger hit should Eubulus score a direct hit.
But the Medusa had yet to fire, biding its time for a perfect strike against Gage. Two of the Daegon battleships alternated strikes on Gage’s spear thrust, but not Eubulus’ vessel or the Minotaur…Tiberian’s ship.
“Not a word from Tiberian,” Gage said.
“Sire?” Price glanced up at him as the Valiant and her fellow frigates cut ahead of the Orion in the tank.
The Valiant’s smaller spine cannon fired and struck the Daegon cruiser’s shields, sending a ripple through the energy field. The Huntress and Firebrand fired as one a moment later, their shells striking in the valleys of the cruiser’s shield disturbance and punching through. The twin hits split the ship into three, its turrets overloading and exploding like faulty bulbs on a string of lights.
“Well done, Valiant,” Gage said. “Fall back and—”
A blast from a Daegon battleship erased the Huntress from existence and sent the Valiant veering to one side.
“Cut power to the starboard thrusters before they overload!” Erskine shouted, then his portrait cut out next to his ship in the holo as a slew of damage reports popped up next to the Valiant.
“No lifeboats from the Huntress,” Price said.
Gage nodded quickly and touched the nearest Daegon battleship.
“Their shields…you saw the frigates’ spine cannon hits on that cruiser…if our shells create some sort of resonance frequency when they strike, we can punch through without having to batter them down,” Gage said.
“All for it, sir,” Price said, “but is the middle of this fight the time for experimenting?”
“Our ships of the line barely out mass two of their four battleships,” Gage said. “Any advantage we can—”
Twin prow energy beams converged from the Daegon battleships and hit the Orion’s shields. White light blasted through the bridge’s windows and Gage crashed into the holo ring, knocking the air out of his chest. The holo tank fizzled then snapped back into focus.
“Shields at sixty percent,” Ensign Clarke called out from the engineering station. “We can’t take another hit like that, sire. Permission to redirect power from the spine cannon to—”
“Denied!” Gage took in a hard breath and pulled Price back up onto her feet. “Gunnery! Target the nearest battleships and prepare to fire. Stagger hits from the rest of our battle cruisers.”
“We’re still beyond max effective range,” the gunnery officer said. “The plan called for three strikes from the Concordia and—”
“All spine cannons fire,” Gage said. “We need to take out at least one to give the Indus a chance.”
“We fire every spine cannon and we won’t be ready for another volley until…until we’re almost on top of the Medusa,” Price said. “We’ll take every shot they have on the chin…”
“We don’t have to survive to win this fight, XO,” Gage said. “Not a word from Tiberian or from his ship. That bastard loves the sound of his own voice. If he could taunt me, he would. Which means he’s not aboard his ship.”
“He’s on the surface. He’s after Aidan, isn’t he?” Price asked.
“We need to push them back, convince them this planet isn’t worth the blood anymore,” Gage said. “Anything to give the prince a better chance.”
He looked in the holo for Thorvald’s shuttle, but everything was chaos.
“Commodore.” McGowan of the Sterling appeared in a window. “My bridge crew noted something unusual from the frigate’s strike on the—”
“There’s a shield resonance, yes,” Gage said.
“No need to mince words, then. We’ve worked up a firing solution that may work against their battleships. I’d bet my rank on it, if Arlyss hadn’t turned tail with the Renown and taken her firepower with him,” McGowan said.
“Send it.” Gage hovered a finger over the Sterling and swiped the data file toward his gunnery station when it appeared. “It’s not rank that’s on the line here, McGowan. It’s lives. We mass our fire and I know we can take out at least one of their battleships. This doesn’t work and we might—”
“It does work and we can take two of them, likely damage a third before we die,” McGowan said. “History will not remember this day as a lackluster charge from Albion. I believe you’re with me?”
“New firing solution checks out, sir,” Gage’s gunnery officer called out.
“Send it and make ready,” Gage said.
“I’ll see you on the high ground, sire.” McGowan’s portrait snapped off.
“I really wish they’d stop calling me that,” Gage said.
“All ships report ready,” Price said, and a cross hair appeared over the nearest Daegon battleship.
“Fire,” Gage said.
The Sterling’s spine cannon fired, shooting a hypervelocity slug at the Daegon battleship. Before it could hit, the Ajax and Concordia staggered the next volley. The Sterling’s shell hit, sending a ripple of disruption across the battleship’s fore shields. The Ajax’s round struck a rising wave, but the shields held. The Concordia’s strike hit…with no reaction from the shields.
“Didn’t work. Guns! Fire our cannon on the same target and—”
“No, wait!” Price swiped her hand over the target and infrared readings from engines rose higher and higher. The ship exploded into a fireball that formed a momentary star over New Madras.
“Golden BB got through their shields,” Price said with a smirk.
“Guns, ready for the next target,” Gage said. “Bring our spine cannon into the firing solution and keep the Storm’s—”
A swirl of light formed at the Medusa’s prow and a tight energy lance struck out from Eubulus’ ship and punched through the shields protecting Orion’s formation. The lance traced down
the flank of the Adamant, leaving a trail of fire and explosions as it eviscerated the ship. The lance punched through the aft of the ship and hit the Storm at the base of her superstructure.
The Adamant ripped in half, spilling sailors and twisted metal into the void.
“Shield overlap failing!” Price shouted. “Rest of our cruisers need to—”
Cannons from the remaining Daegon battleships opened fire, pummeling the Orion. The forward shields failed and the dorsal hull took hits. A turret exploded, sending a geyser of fire up into the void before it snuffed out.
The ship canted to one side and Gage felt the engines sputter.
“Damage report,” Gage looked to the gunnery officer.
“Main cannon’s offline, sire,” the man said.
Gage looked out the newly repaired windows to Eubulus’ ship, cannons still firing. The Orion couldn’t reach that ship anymore. Not with its weapons.
“Helm, transfer control to my station,” Gage said. “Price. Abandon ship. I’ll take the Orion in and distract them long enough for the rest of our ships to—”
“I will not,” Price said. “None of us will leave you, sire. You know who you are. We will not abandon Albion.”
“You can survive without your pride,” Gage said.
“Then you abandon ship and I’ll ream the Daegon myself.” Price raised an eyebrow at him.
“Damn you.” Gage pulled up the helm control and the rest of the bridge crew turned to look at the commodore as he set a collision course. The Orion lurched forward, deck vibrating from the overworked engines.
Gage concentrated on the holo, his heart sinking as the Sterling took more damage as it had to drop back from the formation.
Then…a single hailing channel appeared in the holo. From the Castle Itter.
“What do they want?” Price asked.
Gage jabbed the icon with a finger and a text box opened. It read: ADJUST 19X-7Y-20Z-KLAVEN.
