#
Harold barely had time to confirm that the giant pile of military hardware they’d brought down from the super-battleships had contained what he thought it did before Ramona returned and gestured for him to step outside with her.
“Civilian evac is moving,” she said. “Is there anything you need from us?”
He shook his head.
“I want you to babysit that hull sample yourself,” he told her. He looked around, making sure that no one was close enough to hear him. “I don’t know how this is going to end, Ramona. But I don’t think it’s going to end with us in possession of the ship. Take two samples of the hull, two copies of all of the data.”
“You want me to bury one.”
“Exactly. Bury it deep. I’m worried we might have to give somebody everything we’ve learned before this is over, and I want to be sure we’ve got as much as we can salvage.”
“I’ll make sure of it,” she promised. She paused, looking him directly in the eye. “Are you ordering this evacuation to keep me safe?”
Harold laughed and waved a hand in the air.
“Fifty-fifty,” he admitted. “I’m ordering the evacuation to get everyone out of the line of fire. I’m tasking you with making sure we keep a secret copy of everything because otherwise, I’m half-certain you’d try and stay.”
“I’m tempted,” she said.
“I know. But you’re no soldier,” Harold told her. “Hell, I’m not a soldier. I plan on leaving the actual fighting to the Guard and the Marines.”
“Then why are you staying?” Ramona asked.
“Because someone has to take responsibility for what happens here,” he said. “And, like it or not, the Admiral put me in charge. So, whatever happens down here, it’s under my orders. Which means I stay.”
“Captain goes down with the ship?”
“Something like that. I’d rather be on my ship, but I know the meds mean I’d be a liability.”
“And you’re not down here?” she asked.
“Down here, I’m leaving the split-second decisions to others,” Harold told her. “Mine are bigger decisions with more execution time. Like getting you to take those samples back to New Hope.”
She shook her head, glanced around to be sure no one could see them, and then stepped in to kiss him fiercely.
“You are not allowed to get yourself killed, Captain Harold Rolfson,” she told him. “That’s an order.”
He smiled and nodded cheerfully, watching her as she walked toward the shuttles that would take her to safety.
Then he went back into the command center to give more orders.
#
Battalion Commander Indus had joined the crew in the command center while he’d been speaking to Ramona, and Harold gave the curvaceous blue-feathered alien a crisp salute. He was in charge of the camp, but there was no question that Indus—who now had two battalions under her command, with Marines borrowed from the Stalwarts, and hence outnumbered the Ducal Guard—was in command of the ground troops.
Once he’d finished giving his instructions to Sommers, Harold joined her next to the tactical hologram portraying the area around them.
“Do we have any hits yet?” he asked the tech running the analysis.
“Only normal weather patterns,” the Pibo technician replied. “Is a stealth-field ship likely to be that obvious?”
“It’s designed for space, Initiate,” Harold said. “The Kanzi had a version that only seemed to work in atmosphere, but if the Wendira are coming…I’m betting that their version doesn’t handle atmosphere well.”
“They’re a Core Power,” Indus objected. “Their tech is—”
“Still limited by physics,” the Terran officer interrupted her. “And if we assume our enemies have godlike technology, Battalion Commander, then we may as well surrender now.
“And I refuse to consider that.”
The Yin snapped her beak in sharp laughter.
“Agreed,” she said. “Keep scanning, Initiate,” she ordered the Pibo. “If nothing else, we are preparing for their attack.”
“No one was expecting to fight an open-field battle on the Corellian Plateau,” Harold said.
“No, but our power armor and tanks can handle the conditions,” Indus told him. “We are in trouble if they land on top of us. Can you prevent that?”
Harold glanced over at the small section of naval technicians running the control panel for the surface-to-space missiles they’d brought down.
“How close a target lock do you need with your birds, Chief?” he asked the middle-aged Chinese woman in charge.
Chief Petty Officer Kun Hu shrugged. “In space, direct hit,” she told him. “In atmosphere? Near-miss is good. Within half a klick or so.”
Harold turned back to Indus.
“If nothing else, we can make them blink,” he promised.
“Red tides,” the Pibo tech suddenly cursed. “It worked.” They paused. “That’s bigger than I was expecting.”
“Show me.”
The tactical display zoomed in, marking out the disturbance pattern of an invisible warship descending toward the Corellian Plateau. There was no way to be sure how large the actual ship was, but the zone of air it was heating up and shoving aside was almost two kilometers wide.
“Chief Hu!” Harold barked. “Two missiles, right up the middle of the anomaly, if you please!”
“Roger.”
The command center rumbled as the launchers, spaced in a ring five kilometers away from the dig site, activated. The initial stage of an SSM remained a chemical rocket, blasting the weapon clear of the surface so it could activate its interface drive semi-safely.
Cee-fractional speeds weren’t possible in an atmosphere—but thousands of kilometers a second were. The two missiles went from zero to several hundred kilometers an hour as the rockets lifted them up—and then to just over one percent of lightspeed.
The ship never had a chance to dodge. They saw the missiles coming with only fractions of a second to spare. Somehow, they still managed to eject landing craft before the hammer of god ripped the stealth carrier to pieces.
“ID those ships,” Indus snapped. “Get me a number and tell me who they belong to.” She hissed, her beak opening to expose a dark blue tongue. “Please tell me they’re someone we’re expecting and not somebody new.”
“I’ve got ten transports, probably platoon level,” the Pibo tech replied instantly. “They are…Wendira. Definitely Wendira.”
Harold sighed.
“Well, it could be worse. Battalion Commander, I believe the rest of this is yours.”
#
Chapter 32
“Wendira.” Pat shook his head. “Well, I can at least hope that they only had one damned stealth ship in the system, right?”
“You can hope,” Chan agreed, but his tone wasn’t hopeful.
“Rolfson,” the Admiral pinged his subordinate on the surface. “Do you have this under control?”
“Civilians are evacuating; Guard and Marines are moving out,” the Captain replied. “They came down hard and fast, before we could hit them with more missiles. Best guess is the ground force is thirty minutes away—and the civilians will be out by then.”
“Can you hold?”
“Indus thinks she can overwhelm them,” Rolfson said. “I’m not going to argue with the specialist. The ground gear we saw before wasn’t that much better than ours. I think we can hold. They won’t get the ship, sir.”
“I’m relying on you, Captain,” Pat admitted. “If the Wendira take the damned ship, this whole fight up here is for nothing.”
“Hell, maybe we should tell Kandak they’re here and ask for help,” the Captain replied. “It’s not like we can piss him off worse.”
“I’m not taking that bet,” Pat said. “Watch your back, Rolfson. We’ll keep the skies clear.”
“Wilco, Admiral. Good luck.”
Pat turned his attention back to the system projection. The Laians had withdraw
n well out of range and were hovering protectively around the damaged cruiser. He was quite certain Kandak hadn’t expected to lose anybody in this attack, and the destruction of the cruiser had been a rude awakening.
Somehow, his entire task force had made it through intact. There were damage and casualties, and they’d lost a good third of their deployed Bucklers, but every ship was still with him—and with the Laians licking their own wounds, the colliers had moved forward to resupply the warships.
Missiles and defensive drones drifted across space in carefully guided swarms. President Washington had been rearmed first and now stood watch as Emperor of China uncovered her vulnerable magazines to reload the munitions expended.
The Vice Admiral was far too aware of just how many missiles could be fired off in a deep-space engagement. One of the problems they’d had during Tornado’s exile was the discovery that the cruiser’s magazines simply weren’t large enough for any kind of extended engagement by galactic standards.
The Thunderstorms had incorporated that lesson along with many others, and the Majesty-class super-battleships had been designed by the Imperium. Nonetheless, he wasn’t going to pass up the opportunity to reload.
It was going to be a long few days.
“Any sign of Tanaka?” he asked quietly. They were finally into the window where he might luck into seeing reinforcements.
“Nothing so far,” Chan replied. “We don’t know exactly where she was when she turned for Centauri.” The chief of staff shook his head. “We don’t even know for certain that she did, except that she’d already be at Sol if she didn’t.”
“And the Duchess is a minimum of fourteen more hours.” Pat shook his head. He didn’t want Duchess Bond in the middle of this mess—but he wasn’t going to turn down four more super-battleships and three battleships, either.
“Let me know the moment the Laians even twitch,” he told Chan. “I’m going to grab a coffee. I need a moment off this damn flag deck.”
#
“We are not alone out here.”
Lesser Speaker Piotr Han was a half-Chinese, half-Russian officer and one of the first humans to have entered the Imperial Navy as a raw recruit. Barely a year out of training, he’d earned his first promotion—to the equivalent of a junior grade Lieutenant—just before the task force had left Kimar.
Right now, he was holding down the sensor relay panel on Tanaka’s flag deck while his supervisor grabbed some much-needed nutrition. They were still twenty minutes from Alpha Centauri, and Harriet Tanaka was quite certain they were going to be busy upon arrival.
“That’s not very informative, Piotr,” she told the junior officer gently. “Anything further you can tell me?”
“Sorry, ma’am,” Han replied crisply, “but not really. I thought the first contact was a ghost, but it’s repeated ten or eleven times now. I’d say we’re looking at at least one, possibly more ships in hyperspace, closing on Alpha Centauri.”
“What kind of range?”
“I can’t be sure,” he confessed. “The computer is only assigning a fifty-percent probability that there’s an actual contact out there, but given the briefing on what we’re expecting…”
“Anyone know what a stealth-fielded ship looks like in hyperspace?” Harriet asked conversationally.
“They’re not supposed to work in hyperspace,” Piditel told her. “At least, not against anomaly scanners. The anomaly should still register.”
“Well, I agree with Lesser Speaker Han’s assessment,” Harriet replied, pulling the young officer’s data onto her repeater screens. “Too much repetition, especially when we’re expecting contact.”
She hummed to herself as she ran the data through a filter.
“Two contacts,” she agreed. “Each might be more than one ship, but…the radius translates to several light-weeks in real space.”
There was no way they could identify a ship from the hyperspace anomaly, either. The flickering ghost wouldn’t even let them assess speed. It could be the Mesharom. It could be the Wendira or the Laians. Or it could be the mystery Kanzi or someone completely different.
Her money, however, was on the Mesharom. No one else was supposed to have more than one ship out there.
“The Terran Militia is almost twelve twentieth-cycles behind us, people,” she reminded her flag deck staff. “Tan!Shallegh is at least three full cycles, easily as many as five. We can’t jump at ghosts, not when we know the Laians have almost certainly beaten us here.”
If they had beaten the Laians, they’d have been close enough that she’d have expected to see Harvester of Glory on her anomaly scanners. Whoever these ghosts were, they had to be her second priority.
“Our time is up, in any case,” she continued. “Signal to the task force: all ships to battle stations. We will assess the situation once we arrive, but we must assume that we are entering a combat environment and will need to relieve Hope’s defenders.”
And if she was very, very lucky, she might not have to avenge men and women she’d once called comrades and the sentients she’d sent to fight by their sides.
#
Another hyper portal flared on Pat’s screens, and this one he hadn’t been expecting.
“I don’t suppose their whole fleet is running away?” he asked, looking at the portal in the middle of the Laian battle group.
No one bothered to answer him. It took a few seconds for the sensors to resolve the sequence of events, but it was quickly clear that Harvester of Glory, at least, wasn’t leaving. The portal wasn’t big enough.
The cruiser they’d damaged disappeared into the portal, accompanied by one of her sisters. Only thirteen cruisers remained to escort Harvester—but all of them settled into a calm course back toward Hope.
Whatever hesitation the loss of a ship had instilled in Kandak, the Laian had clearly decided that he could absorb any further losses and take Hope.
That wasn’t an assessment Pat Kurzman could disagree with.
“Course?” he asked aloud, but he could see the pattern already.
“They’re heading directly for Hope, ignoring us,” Chan said. “We can either fight them or watch them drop into orbit and take the ship. And if we fight them—”
“They’ll pull us into range of whatever they’re using for beams,” Pat agreed. “Well, it would have been nice to have shocked the Pincer of the Republic into retreat, but we didn’t expect it.
“The Task Force will go to battle stations and maneuver to intercept the enemy,” he ordered. “We will vector for a zero-range intercept—they’ve got something in store for us, but our beams and lances will have their part to this conversation.”
If any of his ships had actually stood down from battle stations, he’d be surprised. With the Laian battle group in system, they’d all known this moment was going to come again.
“Any report from Rolfson?” he asked.
“No new updates,” Chan answered. “The evacuation is complete; Indus is estimating contact in ten minutes. She has them outnumbered almost two to one, she seems confident.”
“And all of that goes to shit if the Laians drop another regiment on their heads,” Pat said grimly. “So, let’s see what we can do, shall we?”
“Last I checked, the Laians and the Wendira hate each other’s guts,” his chief of staff replied. “It seems like there should be something we can do with that.”
“I’m unenthused with the ‘find a bigger fish’ method of diplomacy these days,” Pat told him. “The Republic are egotistical bastards, but I know Laians. I don’t know Wendira, and the Laians have at least tried talking.”
“The Wendira just started shooting,” Chan admitted. “So what do we do?”
“We fight. And if you have a deity you like, I suggest you start praying for Tanaka to show up!”
“Sir! Vector change on Harvester!”
Pat turned to look at the display. It was true. The Laian warship was suddenly breaking off, at a ninety-degree angle to his origina
l course. He’d swing well clear of both Hope and the First Task Force now.
“What am I missing?” he murmured.
“Hyper portal!” Chan snapped. “Big one—I’ve got at least half a dozen capital ships, plus escorts.” The chief of staff turned a massive grin on Pat. “I hadn’t started praying yet, so I’m giving credit for this one to you, sir.
“The lead ship is definitely Duchess of Terra. Tanaka made it in time.”
#
Harriet studied the screen grimly. There were a lot fewer Laian cruisers out there than she’d expected—and a lot more Terran and Imperial ships than she’d dared to hope. Either there hadn’t been a battle yet, or it had gone a lot more her people’s way than she’d been expecting.
“Laians are breaking off,” Han reported. “Vector is away from us, maintaining distance from Hope and the Militia task force.”
“Let’s demonstrate what we think of Pincer Kandak’s activities,” Harriet replied. “Orders to all ships: pursue the war-dreadnought. Form on Duchess of Terra in standard combat formation.”
Her cruisers and fast battleships fell in around the two super-battleships. Other than the fast battleships, each barely a quarter of Duchess’s size, her force wasn’t that much heavier than Kurzman’s.
Unlike Kurzman’s force, however, hers wasn’t primarily Militia. If the Two Hundred and Eighty-eighth Pincer of the Republic decided to fight an Imperial task force, that meant war.
“Piditel, record for transmission,” she ordered.
“Laian war-dreadnought Harvester of Glory, Pincer Kandak commanding,” she greeted the hostile ship. “Your presence in this system is unexpected and unwelcome.” She glanced at the sensor data filling in her displays and managed to conceal a grimace.
“My sensor data is showing an exchange of fire between you and Imperial forces. I have no choice but to regard you as a hostile force.
“You have one twentieth-cycle to withdraw from this system. Failure to withdraw or further hostilities towards Imperial forces will be an unquestionable act of war and will leave me no choice but to destroy or intern your forces.”
Terra and Imperium (Duchy of Terra Book 3) Page 26
