Free Fleet Box Set 2

by Michael Chatfield

  Chapter - Shifting Tides

  Lady Fairgate stood at her viewscreen, watching as KEWs descended into Worshun's atmosphere. The blue clouds rolled away, showing as the massive rocks hit the ground. Foshunti had moved beyond the edge of the FTL relay but her support fleet would be catching up with him quickly. They would be in the system within hours of Foshunti. That had little to do with her ordering her captain to fire onto Worshun. She did it because it would play with the planet's atmosphere, making it even harder for the Dovark's that survived.

  Her chair beeped, she turned to it, her gaze going from bored to alarm. There was only one reason that her station would make a noise. She walked over to it, her thin clothes fluttering around her as she accepted the message. It was a simple text message, but it took a few infuriating minutes for her security codes to be analyzed before she was allowed to see it.

  It is as we feared. The Kalu have returned. What are your orders my Lady?

  She looked up, memories passing through her mind. She saw the purple, yellow and green vistas of her world, the buildings that grew with nature rather than overpowering it. She saw the Kinetic Energy Weapons as they hit, the rumbling and the fires. The super fires, that raged across the planet, a targeting mistake by the Kalu.The Kalu had missed the small picket force that the PDF had put in place.

  Then the Kalu landed in their shining ships. They were fearsome creatures, in their carved armor.

  The roaring was the worst. Fairgate remembered them running after those that had taken refuge in the caves. They had been so stunned. Fairgate knew only one thing, to find her mother. So she ran towards the destroyed remains of her home, hearing the Kalu battle-roars mingled with the helpless screams of the refugees. She had thought the Kalu were coming for her, she couldn't get the noise out of her mind. Those same sounds coursed through her mind, as clear as the day her planet fell. She now knew her mother was dead, but she had also learnt how to run from her problems better than she had before.

  Her fingers started typing out a message.

  Return to Quarst, use the Syndicate to slow them. Once we are grouped together we will go to Earth.

  She pressed a button on her command screens, giving her a direct line to her Captain.

  “Selise, prepare the fleet to move,” Fairgate said, terminating the channel.

  She looked at Worshun. The KEW bombardment had stopped. Killing them all would be too merciful. She would leave them for the Kalu.

  ***

  Bok Soo wondered what Rick had been thinking when he was doing these kinds of missions for James. He and every single shuttle of the assembled fleet waiting at the co-ordinates Salchar had given them. Bok Soo knew very few leaders that could have had every single person not only follow their orders but believe in them.

  He had been in the meetings with Salchar once he had resumed command. He was clearly back in command, but there was a darkness to him. He hid it from the others but there was an anger that lurked behind his calm facade. He was going to need to learn to keep that under control, not just off of his face. Otherwise, there was going to come a time when that anger boiled over and he lost it at the wrong moment.

  “Event horizon forming!” someone said over the commanders net.

  An event horizon looked like a sphere of molten glass. One could see the stars on the other side of it but they looked to be distorted from their position. The ships came through and the first and smaller wave of assault shuttles raced to get to them before their shields came online.

  How's it looking, Santos?” Bok Soo asked. Santos was leading the group that was to take the first grouping of ships.

  “No shields and no guns so far. We'll be on them in two minutes,”

  Cutting it close, Bok Soo thought. It took five minutes for a good crew to get their shields online. Changing to the gravitational constants of the system one was coming into took roughly two minutes. Depending on how good one's shield generators and how much energy they could create, powering up fully took close to three minutes. The Free Fleet had trained to do it all in two. They had better power plants and shield generators, but the main thing was getting the adjustments right the first time and everything else flowed after.

  Bok Soo waited a tense few minutes.

  “Last man down,” Santos said four minutes later, cutting the channel. Bok Soo didn't try to reconnect. He had other things to do, like take the ships he was assigned to and make sure that they were actually on the Free Fleet's side.

  It was ten tense minutes before the next part of the fleet came through. Bok Soo's shuttle bucked as it plowed forward. Now the first fleet would be able to see them and shoot them. Bok Soo didn't see any weapons fire as the first ship of the second fleet emerged. Fighters powered their drives, the wire plot of their believed positions changing as their engines shot them forwards like darts.

  “Sweet lords of light and dark,” Bok Soo muttered as, for one of the rare times, he was close enough to see the fighters as they raked the incoming ships shield generators.

  It would buy the Commandos precious minutes and was ballsy as all hell. Bok Soo had thought he and his Commandos were swinging brass between their legs, but these fighter jocks must have had platinum.

  ***

  Wing Commander Smith's music choice had become very familiar to all of those that had graduated fighter school with him, and now those that called Floater their home berth. So it wasn't strange to hear one of his 'classics' come thumping out from his cockpit, him hmm-ing and bump-ing right along with it.

  “Oh! Let's go!” He sang along, putting more power into his fighter's engines as he was pushed back into his seat.

  “Steve walks warily down the street, with the brim pulled way down low. Ain't no sound but the sound of his feet, Machine guns ready to go.”

  He checked his weapons, cycling his railgun, opening his internal racks and priming his external ones.

  “Are you ready, hey, Are you ready for this? Are you hanging on the edge of your seat? Out of the doorway the bullets rip, To the sound of the bea.”

  The targeting computer lit up the Dreadnought he was closing on. He eased up on the throttle, lining up his holographic aimer with the shield generators. He couldn't help but grin. Sometimes the timing is just perfect, he thought.

  “Another one bites the dust!”

  He hit the first shield generator, swinging and shooting the next, he turned backwards, firing his engines to cut his forward thrust.

  “Another one bites the dust.”

  Another shield generator fell prey to him as he fired a series of short sprint missiles.

  “And another one gone, and another one gone.”

  His thrust had caught up with his forward momentum powering him back in the direction he'd come from and on to the next target.

  “Another one bites the dust Hey, I'm gonna get you, too. Another one bites the dust,”

  “Smith will you shut the hell up?” Heston himself said over the radio.

  “But it's a classic!” Smith said, the song still continuing in the background.

  “That it might be, but keep it off my channels. Listen to it in your own brain box,” Heston said.

  “Alright CAG,” Smith said, sounding rather put out.

  He cut the music to external channels and kept singing to himself as his next target came into range. Missiles spewed from his internal and external blossoming int nuclear clouds. The enemy’s PDS came online, the lumbering lasers couldn't depress very well. Something that Smith was going to use to his advantage. Though it meant he had to be low. Very low, less than ten meters off of the armor of the ship. Shuttles came in, thumping against the ships, harpoons and mag clamps pulling them to the surface.

  “Good luck, Commandos,” he said, opening a channel to Connolly.

  “What?” Connolly said, not sounding all that pleased with Smith's call.

  “Good luck there, grumpy,”

  “Thanks,” Connolly grunted, his shuttle probably hitting a ship. Smith
turned his MEF. The thing could turn on a pinhead, momentum wise. Well...Newton was kind of a dick in that area.

  Thrusters and main engines fired as Smith shifted targets, accelerating for a Battle Cruiser.

  “Got to go!”

  “Ughh, but it's so boring out here.”

  Smith got a warning. It seemed that some ships had anti-fighter missiles. He swerved and flickered his engines. Firing decoys and spinning, with a flick of his thumb he went from piercing rounds to explosive buckshot rounds. The scatter hit the remaining missiles on his trail. With flick of his wrist and foot pedal adjustments he was facing the right direction.

  “Sure doesn't sound like it. Keep yourself alive, flyboy,” Connolly said, cutting the channel.

  Smith glanced to his squad's readouts.

  “Alright, Devil Dogs! Let’s go get that nice juicy Battle Cruiser,” he said, marking his intended target by looking at it and giving a combination of clicks with his mecha’s finger balls.

  Green lights cascaded down the left side of his visor and he reversed his fighter, his thrusters fighting his inertia. A wing carrying onto another ship racked the Battle Carrier ahead of Smith. He turned his speed down. One could only gauge speed by the counters in space. Going a hundred thousand kilometers an hour and ten an hour could look the same. Carats came together, shield generators being marked in different colors as the fighters in Smith's squad designated the targets for their pilots. Short sprints flew from his external racks. A blinking light telling him that he was dry as he expelled the remaining weaponry in his internal racks. He raked the hull with his rail guns hitting anything that looked like a threat.

  “Alright, let's get back to the barn. I'm out,” Smith said, humming along with a new song as he really put his foot down, heading to the Free Fleet which was just coming over the second enemy fleet.

  Smith cast an eye to his plot as shuttles were coming down like angry bees on a bear. He kept out of their paths as he saw missiles launch for a shuttle. He threw off all his decoys, getting all but one missile that glanced the side of the shuttle. It tumbled, correcting itself sluggishly and bringing itself down on the Battle Carrier Smith had just raked with fire. More small defensive missiles were rising from the second fleet. It seemed that they didn't trust Foshunti either. There was no other reason to have those missiles other than to hit fighters and small space craft. PDS systems fired, a few getting lucky. Missiles piled into shuttles leaving a muted fireball as lasers crossed, catching anything unlucky enough to be in their path. Fighters that flew too far off the enemy ships deck were being hit now the enemy was recovering. Smith looked away, he was powerless to do anything.

  “Floater deck chief, this is wing one two, coming in for R and R,” he said, his voice duller than normal.

  “Come in on pod three, transmit fighter data,” the controller told him.

  Smith did so, taking his flight to his assigned pod. The catapult system had been changed around to catch the fighters, slowing them, instead of shooting them out the other side. The fighters would be pulled on a conveyor into Floater, as they moved to pod one they would be hooked up to fuel and ammunition tubes. Weapons techs would take their old external racks at one point, down the line another group would add them. It was like a pit crew turned into an assembly line. It would have interested Smith usually, but now even with only two and a half minutes full reload and refuel time, he was wishing to be back out in the black making a difference.

  ***

  “They've betrayed us!” Wasta said, getting out of his seat and snarling. The Dashuna was a natural predator, and he and his people kept to a strict code of honor which had stopped them from committing atrocities on one another. A low birth rate had made them come together against any and all intruders. They had been some of the best allies to Foshunti. Wasta was their Prime.

  He was all red and purple scales, he had three lower limbs for incredible speed, and two upper arms that unlike the Kuruvians were not only strong, but able to do delicate work.

  He looked like an Earth snake, his neck opening slightly in outrage and the implied challenge to his honor. His eyes which could look forwards and sideways firmly forwards.

  “Sit,” Foshunti said. Wasta looked at him in askance, getting riled up.

  “Maloti, tell all ships that they are to follow the orders of the Commandos. Also, get me a channel to Salchar,” Foshunti said, probably looking a lot calmer than he felt. He looked to Wasta who was still in pissed-off mode.

  “He trusted us, now we have to trust him,” Foshunti said.

  “We have a channel.”

  Salchar's bridge was a hive of organized activity. People were talking into their implants, moving to stations their fingers and variety of limbs moving to feed their commander the information he needed, as well as keep the ship operational. Foshunti could see the level training that these people had undergone. It showed in the way that they conduct themselves.

  “Captain Lord,” Salchar said, looking to Foshunti before doing something on a side screen around his chair.

  “You've landed forces not only on the second fleet but my own. I was wondering why? And if this succeeds it's just Captain,” Foshunti said.

  “Very well, Captain. I'm getting myself some peace of mind. You've kept to your side thus far. Now with my Commandos aboard your ships they can make sure that nothing bites us in the ass, at least until we take the remainder of your fleet. Have your people move to their own quarters, except those that you need to carry out operations on your ship,” Salchar said.

  Foshunti knew he was being tested. This man was clearly not on the side of the Syndicate, he'd given him the half of the fleet that was loyal to Lady Fairgate and he'd descended on them like a wrathful force.

  I wonder where he kept those fighters hidden. Foshunti thought as he nodded.

  “Very well. You have proved that you can be trusted. I will do as you say,”

  “Thank you, Captain. Hopefully, sometime soon we can have a talk face to face,”

  “Indeed,” Foshunti said as Salchar cut the channel.

  “Maloti, make sure that the Commander's orders are carried out,” Foshunti said.

  “He is boarding our ships, it is an affront to us,” Wasta said, his voice deadly.

  “We have a bare trust with them. These measures will go to cement that trust. While you might be Prime on your planet remember who commands this fleet,” Foshunti said.

  “For how long? He will take it from you,” Wasta said, indicating Salchar.

  “So what if he does, if it will finish this war?” Foshunti said. If Salchar proved himself, he was given the authority on behalf of the Dovark people, to assist Salchar in any way possible. That included telling him about resources that not even Wasta knew about.

  “It is dishonorable,” Wasta said, his neck fluttering again.

  “Keep this talk up and I will take you up on that fight you wanted,” Foshunti said, his voice cold as Wasta looked to him in alarm. He looked away quickly as Foshunti's cold eyes stared into his own. Foshunti had kept the last statement so quiet that no one other than Wasta could hear.

  The Dashuna had the wisdom to not comment, his anger quickly cooling.

  It's more like a damn nursery than a fleet, Foshunti thought, shaking his head at the ridiculous issues he had dealt with.

  ***

  Santos waited as the Commando techie broke into the airlock's controls, the doors opened and people piled in. The temporary electrostatic field emitters came to life, allowing the airlock to open fully without losing air. Commandos thumped down into gravity filled hallways, and for once Santos didn't hear the cries of incoming fire, or see the enemy, or here the reports of weapons fire as he crossed through the electro-static field.

  Instead he got a report coming in through all bands on the internal comms of the Talhalla. He opened it in an offline portion of his operating system, just in case it was a virus. It listed all of the personnel on the ship as well as their location. Ninety perc
ent were in their quarters, he saw and he pulled up the names of the two platoon leaders with him.

  “Check and verify this list,” he ordered as he received an incoming message from another Commando group on another one of Foshunti's loyal ships.

  “Sir, I've just got a message detailing all of the positions of the crew. What am I to do?”

  Roughly translated to mean 'should I rip walls apart for cover'.

  “Check that the list is valid. Stay alert,” Santos said as he changed to his leadership net.

  “Report in if you have been given a list. If you have, check the ships as planned to confirm it. Be respectful, but if anything happens, put it down hard,” Santos said. It seemed most of his people had gotten a list by the number of green lights flashing on the left side of his helmet. He contacted Vort. In Sook was probably too busy coordinating shuttles and fighters.

  “Commander Santos?”

  “Vort, pass this on. Foshunti's loyal forces have given us lists of his people's positions. We're checking to see that they’re valid, I will report back when we have ships cleared. Also, can you tell me if any of the ships have jamming going on?”

  Santos waited just moments.

  “No. Not these ships. Only the second fleet has jammers blocking the Commandos there,” Vort said.

  “Thanks.”

  Santos cut the channel and opened his visor, chucking a piece of gum into his mouth and chewing. The stuff seemed to calm him as he moved through the halls behind the first group. He had the feeling he wasn't going to run into any issues. Still, they checked every corner, quickly moving to the bridge that was buried deep in Talhalla's systems. He felt the need to rush, to clear the ship and post his people in secured and vital positions. He knew that Bok Soo was definitely not having such an easy time.

  Santos checked with his commanders again. None of them were having issues, and there was still no jamming, which showed him something.

  “Slow and steady Commandos. We rush this and we won't be any use to Bok Soo,” he said as he saw his own people speeding up and taking more risks.