Lacuna: The Sands of Karathi

by Adams, David

  She wouldn’t cry. She forced herself, somehow, to not cry, her voice coming out as a choked whimper. “I won’t have James die for nothing.”

  With their strike craft in formation, the Tehran and the Hirakan making their way towards the jump point and freedom, and alien ships of all descriptions breaking free of their moorings and flying off in all directions, the TFR Beijing launched the last of its missiles, striking at the centre of Cenar and igniting its primary power reactors. As the Triumph-class vessel sped away with a sizable Toralii fleet in screaming hot pursuit of all of them, the centuries-old fortress of Cenar was enveloped from within by a bright, impossibly white light and utterly obliterated.

  * * *

  Chapter XII

  “Beyond the Impossible”

  * * *

  Operations

  Liao watched the station explode with a sense of finality. It was done, and there was nothing to do but focus on the business of escaping.

  She would soon have a child to care for, after all, who would die with her if they didn’t make it. That was a motivating thought, something to break her out of her stunned grief. There would be time enough for tears, but the moment called for action.

  Liao looked her XO in the eyes, her tone hardening, the weakness in her voice stripped away by the reality of their situation. “Commander Iraj.”

  The Iranian man released her shoulder, his gaze meeting hers and holding firm. “Captain.”

  Liao took a breath. “Coordinate with the Sydney. We’re going to be coming in hot, and we don’t have a jump drive. We’re going to need some cover as we approach and while we dock and transfer the crew. Verify the integrity of the scuttling charges and prepare to evacuate the ship when we arrive.”

  Recognising the gravity of her order, Kamal gave a slow nod. “Right away, Captain.” He stepped over to Jiang’s console, speaking to her in hushed tones.

  Liao watched them for a moment, then turned her head to Dao.

  “Lieutenant Dao, time to arrive at the rendezvous?”

  “Eight minutes, Captain.”

  She frowned. “Eight minutes? It was six minutes two minutes ago.”

  “Aye, Captain. The Hirakan is not accelerating as fast as our ships—they are falling behind. This is probably a result of the significant mass difference between us.”

  Liao gritted her teeth. “Slow our acceleration to match. We’re a fleet, dammit, and we’re going to stay with them as long as possible. I don’t want to give the impression we’re leaving them to die.” She gestured to the long-range communications headset. “In fact, let me talk to them.”

  Hsin nodded and patched in the two ships. “Channel open, Captain.”

  Liao touched the talk key. “Beijing to Hirakan, this is Beijing actual. Report.”

  The sound that came back was a combination of a guttural roar and a snarl, but it was clearly Garn’s voice. [“What in the almighty stars art thou doing, Captain? Art thou trying to steal our glory?”]

  Liao blinked in confusion. “Steal your glory?” Realization dawned. “You’re deliberately slowing down to let them catch you?”

  [“Nay, not quite deliberately,”] the Kel-Voranian man admitted. [“The starboard section of our ship has experienced a significant breach–I believe it is due to starting our reactors too rapidly–and I doubt it will be able to jump. We are in the process of abandoning that section, with the remains of my crew transferring to the port side.”] He roared triumphantly into whatever passed for his microphone. [“Still, this is a welcome development. Our beam arrays will roast the Toralii dogs alive, and we shall bathe in their blood!”]

  Liao pressed the talk key, her tone dry. “Why don’t we save the blood-bathing until we’re all safe, mmm?”

  [“Bah, those art not the words of a true warrior! What kind of soldier would I be if I were to avoid honourable death fighting hated enemies?”]

  “One who can live to fight another day?” she suggested, and then a thought struck–sudden and powerful, like a punch to the head. “Garn. The starboard side of your ship—how badly damaged is it?”

  [“So badly we are abandoning it, Captain. That should tell you everything thou need to know, I would have thought.”]

  She shook her head. “No, I mean, you mentioned your ship had multiple redundant systems, are any of your reactors still online? And does your jump drive still work?”

  There was a pause as, presumably, the Kel-Voranian man consulted his systems. [“The voidwarp device is functional,”] he admitted, [“along with the attached reactor. What good will that do?”] His tone grew ominous. [“I’m not using it to escape, if that’s what thou art implying.”]

  “Nothing of the sort,” she admitted. “I promise. I was curious–you said it has an attached reactor?”

  Garn’s voice betrayed his confusion. [“Yes? The whole system is designed to be extracted at a moment’s notice, in case the other hull needs it. Why?”]

  “Well, Garn, our jump drive is currently–uhh–offline. I was wondering if we could borrow the one from your starboard section, especially if you’re just going to throw it away?”

  He gave a low chuckle through the communications line, and Liao could almost picture his scaled and menacing form shaking his head. [“Captain, I hath already promised thee that I would burn in thy service, so I hardly think thou shouldst need to ask to borrow a piece of technology that I am prepared to discard.”]

  Liao bit her tongue, wincing as she tried to explain to the Kel-Voranian man the next part of her plan. “Understood, and that’s very welcome news, but transferring the reactor core and jump drive over will take some time, I imagine. I doubt we can last that long without your vessel covering us, so I need you to hold off on your—” she almost said suicidal, but caught herself. The Ken-Voran had strong opinions on the subject. “Heroic last stand until we can get the device inside our ship.”

  [“I’m unsure we’ll have time to move the whole assembly into your ship before the Toralii dogs arrive, Captain.”]

  Liao was thinking the same thing. “What if we just bolt it to the side and jump? If it has its own self-contained power source, so I’d guess it doesn’t need to be inside to work.”

  Summer spoke over her. “Captain, that is beyond the impossible. You realize that, right? Right? You’re suggesting that we take a possibly damaged alien jump drive that we have absolutely no idea how to operate, provided by people we just met, and just attach it to the outer hull of the ship in the middle of a pitched battle? All the while having no idea if, at any stage, the whole thing is just going to blow us all to atoms?”

  Liao gave the engineer a cocky grin, moving over to Rowe’s console. “That’s basically the gist of the plan, yes. Thank you, Summer. Now, if I give you whatever manpower resources you need and enough spacesuits to go around, do you think you can do it?”

  Summer balked, then made a weird half-strangled noise in the back of her throat. “You want me to do it? You want me to bolt that damn thing to the hull?”

  “It has to be outside the ship, Summer, and I’m going to need your skill to make it work.”

  Although she was a civilian, Liao could still order Summer to do it. But Liao had learned that the redhead worked best when she was doing things her way.

  Rowe looked understandably reluctant, so Liao tried a different approach. “I mean, could you imagine the look on Alex’s face when he hears about your thrilling heroics?”

  Liao could see Rowe was still hesitant. She leaned over the redhead’s console, giving a low chuckle. “And, of course, there’s the fact that if you don’t, he and all of us will probably die. Just something to think about.”

  “You should have led with that one,” Rowe snorted, groaning and easing herself out of her chair. “Gimme a suit and fifteen minutes. If I die, I hate you all and blame you for everything.”

  “Noted,” Liao said, giving Summer a playful clap on the shoulder as she left.

  Liao pulled out her radio. “Captain Liao
to Saara. Please report to Operations.”

  She had instructed the Toralii pilot to remain in the hangar bay in case her ability to speak Toralii was needed by the Marine boarding parties, but Liao was glad that it had not been. Now she had someone to cover Rowe’s position at the engineering console.

  She had other engineers, yes, but Saara was different; she was more familiar with alien technology because she was Toralii. Summer was different because, well, because she was Summer.

  [“Of course, Captain. I will be with you momentarily.”]

  “Thank you.”

  Liao moved back to the command console, closing her eyes, inhaling, and slowly letting the breath out in one long motion.

  “Okay. Round the room. Mister Dao, how far are we away from the jump point?"

  The blue-eyed Tibetan man looked up. “Four minutes, Captain. We’ve nearly completed our deceleration. The Tehran has kept pace with us the whole way, and the Sydney is standing by for fire missions.”

  Liao found she was building a new respect for the crew of the Tehran. They’d been prisoners only a half-hour ago–tortured, abused, and starved, according to the reports that had already begun to filter their way to her–but they had responded to the call of duty admirably. While the badly damaged Tehran would not be able to contribute much to the coming battle, for now they were far from a burden.

  If they survived, Liao would pin a medal on every last one of the surviving crew’s chests.

  “Good. How long until the Toralii vessels have us in weapons range?”

  “Approximately ten minutes, Captain, but possibly less. They’re decelerating beyond the halfway point, which suggests they’re planning to overshoot slightly.”

  “Let’s be gone before they get here.” She looked expectantly at the tactical console. “Mister Jiang, tactical report.”

  Jiang twisted in her seat, glancing over her shoulder. “All five Broadswords are currently in formation with us, Captain. Four have reported in; the Archangel has a damaged radio and is silent, but otherwise combat effective. Strike craft are ready to launch once again.”

  Liao nodded. “Good. When we’re in the jump point, launch ‘em. Be prepared to retrieve them at a moment’s notice, though—combat landings.”

  Her gaze turned to Hsin. “Communications?”

  “Our targeting computers are linked with the ones from the Sydney. We can commence coordinated barrages to try to dissuade the Toralii from coming in so fast.”

  Liao grinned crookedly. “That’s what I like to hear. Hit them with whatever we have. Try to cripple one of their ships if possible; the more we stop out there, the less we have to fight when we’re trying to jump.”

  She glanced over her shoulder. “Mister Ling, coordinate with the Sydney. I want our rounds to fly right down their throats.”

  “I was going to aim for the eyes, ma’am.”

  “Also good. There are five of them, but we’ll do what we can.”

  She felt a wild surge of adrenaline course through her as she contemplated their situation. Cenar was gone, almost certainly taking James with it, and now she had five Toralii cruisers heading directly for her. If their insane plan to borrow the Hirakan’s jump drive didn’t work, or if there was even the slightest delay, the three Human ships and their Kel-Voranian allies would be swiftly and sharply annihilated.

  In Liao's first battle with a Toralii cruiser her enemies had boarded the Beijing despite having the tactical advantage in space. Saara explained that this was because the Toralii wanted to take them alive–as slaves, they now knew–but after what Liao had just done to Cenar, she fully expected that such a measure would not be taken this time.

  The Toralii Alliance was out for blood, and she knew nothing less than their blasted, frozen bodies floating in space would satisfy them.

  “How long until the Hirakan arrives and jettisons their starboard-side jump drive?”

  “Four minutes, Captain. They should be pulling up right beside us.”

  Liao did some swift mental calculations. “That’s not going to give us much time to rig the thing up. We’re probably going to be in weapons range for a minute or so, at least. Can we hold out that long against five of them?”

  Jiang nodded. “The Sydney and the Beijing, certainly. We don’t know enough about the Kel-Voran to know for certain what their capabilities are, but I can guess well enough. They’ll be fine.”

  “Good. Get the Tehran to jump as soon as they’re ready. With their ship and crew in that state, I want them safe as soon as possible. Mister Hsin, signal Commander Sabeen and tell her to jump away.”

  The man nodded and spoke into his headset. “Captain, Commander Sabeen reports their jump drive is still charging.”

  Liao stared. “What?”

  “They only have one reactor–they used almost all of their juice just keeping up with us.”

  “How long?”

  Hsin spoke again into his headset, then nodded. “Captain, she says to give her five minutes and if they’re not ready, jump without them.”

  Already the Toralii ranging shots were flying past their ship. Liao muttered a dark, bitter curse and nodded. “Tell her that there’ll be no waiting. Five minutes, then I’m leaving.”

  Assuming I can.

  Hsin began relaying her message, and Liao turned back to Jiang. “I’m sorry, did I say one minute? I meant two.” She screwed up her face. “I’ll take you to dinner in Paris if you can give me some good news.”

  The groan of an opening hatchway heralded the arrival of Saara, and out of the corner of her eye Liao saw the Toralii woman move towards the Engineering console.

  Jiang nodded. “I’m not big on French food, so if you make it Rome instead I think I can do that, Captain. Two minutes is a bit of a stretch, but with a bit of luck we shouldn’t lose any major systems. However, I’m more worried about the Tehran. They’re quite badly damaged, with sections exposed to space and a significantly reduced hull plating charge–I doubt they'll last even through the first barrage, let alone two minutes.”

  Closing her eyes a moment, Liao gritted her teeth, leaning over her console. “Then we’re going to have to be their armour.” She straightened her back. “Mister Dao, I want you to reposition the ship between the incoming Toralii vessels and the Tehran. I want anything going towards it to strike us first. Link up our navigation systems to theirs; I want our vessels moving synchronously. Any defensive maneuvers we use, I want them to copy us. We have to protect that ship until we’re all ready to jump.”

  Jiang winced. “Captain, I didn’t count on having a third fewer targets, and protecting the Tehran is going to significantly affect our defensive posture.”

  “You want to go to Rome or not? I’m pretty sure Summer would love to smear spaghetti sauce all over her face if you aren’t up to it.”

  Jiang looked despondent for a moment, then she laughed. “Captain, you know I’ve never failed you. Now would be a bad time to start. I’ll see what I can do.”

  Liao chuckled. “I’m giving up my delicious blanquette de veau to cater to your tastes, so you damn well better.”

  She felt the ship shift and position itself in front of the Tehran, then the first shots started striking their forward hull.

  “Captain, the Kel-Voran report that they have engaged the Toralii Alliance. Captain Garn was extremely optimistic of their chances, although he appeared to be distinctly jealous that we’re absorbing the lion’s share of the Toralii weapons fire,” Hsin called.

  “Tell him he can have it if he wants it,” she muttered, reading the hull temperature from her console. The Toralii had struck from farther out than anticipated, probably because the Beijing was less maneuverable when they were protecting the Tehran. That made their already precarious tactical situation even worse.

  [“Captain,”] Saara called. [“Summer reports that the starboard half of the Hirakan has jettisoned their jump drive, and the Paladin is maneuvering it towards the underside of our hull. She also said some other
things, but I did not feel the need to repeat them.”]

  Summer, despite her obvious fear, was at least being herself. Liao expected nothing less than a foul-mouthed barrage from her.

  “Thank you, Saara. Keep me informed about their progress. The sooner we can get that thing attached and functional, the sooner we all get to leave.”

  [“Sooner would be better,”] Saara agreed, chuckling softly.

  Hsin turned to Liao. “Captain? I have Captain Sabeen on the line for you.”

  Liao touched the side of her headset. “Tehran, this is Beijing actual. Go ahead.”

  From down the line the wailing of alarms and klaxons was heard, along with the shouting of voices. Farah’s voice was remarkably loud to try and compensate. “Our jump drive is functional, Captain. We’re good to give it a shot.”

  “And not a minute too soon. Thank you for the good news,” Liao responded, nodding to Dao. “We’re going to continue to shield you as you make your way into the jump point. Some shots might get through. I suggest you fire whatever ordnance you have, overload whatever hull plating you have, then hold on tight and prepare for a wild ride.”

  Farah gave a loud laugh. “We’re already dry, Captain. To be honest, I barely thought we could get this ship moving at all, let alone the jump drive. It’s a miracle the old girl’s still kicking.”

  “People make their own miracles,” Liao said, feeling the barely perceptible shift as her ship dropped, protecting the Tehran as it descended towards the Lagrange point. She watched on her console as the ship grew closer and closer to their escape route. “Godspeed, Tehran.”

  “Good hunting, Beijing. We’ll see you on the other side.”

  Liao took off her headset and gestured to the Tactical console. “Mister Jiang, move us away to a safe distance and inform Rowe to hold onto something. Things are going to get rough on the underside.”

  Liao returned her attention to the her console. The five Toralii ships bore down on them like rampaging elephants, their shots becoming more accurate the closer they got. The ship began to shake and shudder with the force of the impacts, despite the best efforts of Dao to twist and turn them away from the worst of it.