There was a pause while a self-adhesive bandage was applied to the base of her neck. Then came the screech of unoiled metal as they turned her faceup. “Here it is,” Nola-Ba said, as he held the tiny bb-sized globe between two sausagelike digits. “My technicians will hook it to a power source and place it on a zurna. Then we’ll turn the animal loose and let your troops chase it!
“All right,” Nola-Ba said as he turned away. “Take her back to the cell. And find a blanket. Humans are ugly enough with their clothes on.”
CHAPTER: 13
Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more;
Or close the wall up with our English dead.
In peace there’s nothing so becomes a man
As modest stillness and humility;
But when the blast of war blows in our ears,
Then imitate the action of the tiger . . .
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
Henry V, act 3, scene 1, 1–6
Standard year circa 1599
THE HEAVY CRUISER MARS
In spite of a four-hour nap, Admiral Nigata felt tired as he made his way onto the ship’s bridge. The lights were dim, people spoke in hushed tones, and the atmosphere was more akin to that of a library rather than a warship. Captain Somlyo looked up from the screen in front of him. The light gave his skin a greenish hue. “Good morning, sir. Or is it afternoon?”
“Beats me,” Nigata said, as he dropped into his chair. “What kind of condition is our condition in?”
“The situation is stable,” Somlyo replied. “We haven’t been able to destroy the Hudathan moon base yet. So the ridgeheads own whatever portion of the planet’s surface is available to them at any given moment. That means they can take potshots at the marines and prevent them from coming together. But we’re using the bulk of the planet to prevent the STS cannons from firing on our ships.”
“What about the landings?”
“Most of the jarheads are on the ground, but they’re spread out and trying to get their shit together.”
Nigata nodded. “And the Hudathans?”
“Their troops and armor are on the ground and maneuvering to engage the closest marines. We fire on them from space whenever we can, and our fighters are harassing them. They have some very effective antiaircraft batteries, however, so there’s a limit to what the Tachyons can accomplish.”
“So that’s it?”
“No, sir. There are two new developments. First, the Legion was able to recover Prince Nicolai! He’s on board, and the Doc says he’s in good shape.”
“That’s wonderful,” Nigata said. “Finally, something is breaking our way. And the empress?”
“That’s the other development, sir. Ophelia’s locator beacon began to behave in a very erratic fashion. It left the Hudathan base and began to wander around the desert.”
Nigata frowned. “Is there a possibility that she escaped?”
Somlyo shook his head. “No, sir. We sent some fighters for a look-see. An animal called a zurna was running around free. Once they destroyed it, the beacon stopped moving.”
“So the Hudathans found the beacon, removed it, and are giving us the finger.”
“That’s about the size of it, sir.”
Nigata swore under his breath. “If they decide to move her, we won’t know.”
“That’s true,” Somlyo agreed. “Major Remy has been informed. He and his people are closing in on the base from the south. Unfortunately, they are one day out.”
“Okay,” Nigata said as he studied the holo map that occupied the center of the room. “We don’t have enough throw weight to attack the moon base until we eliminate at least one enemy cruiser. What’s the status of the ship they took under tow?”
“It looks as though the vessel’s propulsion system is still down,” Somlyo replied. “The ridgeheads took it out a way and left a DE to guard it. It seems reasonable to suppose that they’re attempting to bring the drives online. That’s what we’d do.”
Nigata could pick out the red delta that represented the enemy ship now. It was floating well away from the planet, with a single red dot to keep it company. Was there another option? And if there wasn’t, could he bring himself to make the necessary sacrifice? Or, to be more precise, to ask other people to make that sacrifice.
Part of what made the decision so difficult were his feelings regarding the empress. She wasn’t worth saving. Not in his estimation. The unnecessary slaughter on Orlo II had been her doing. But what about the Human race? What about Earth? Who would take over in the event of her death? And would they be even worse than Ophelia was?
A full two minutes passed before Nigata spoke, and when he did, his voice was dull. “Which gunboat is in the worst shape?”
“That would be the Leda,” Somlyo replied. “She took a lot of hits during the opening exchange.”
“Okay. Take her crew off and ask for volunteers. Assuming you get some, put a skeleton crew aboard and order them to attack the damaged cruiser.”
Somlyo looked alarmed. “She’ll never make it, sir. The Hudathans will destroy the Leda before she even gets close.”
“I know that,” Nigata said irritably. “But the ridgeheads will be forced to respond by sending more assets to protect the drifter. And once they do, we’ll go after whichever cruiser looks the weakest. With it out of the way, we’ll have a better than fifty-fifty chance of destroying the moon base.”
Somlyo had always been an ambitious man. But now, based on the pain in Nigata’s eyes, he no longer had an interest in making admiral. “Aye, aye, sir. I’ll take care of it.”
—
PLANET SAVAS
Now that the navy had arrived, and Ophelia’s signal had been compromised, Team One-Five could no longer afford to rest during the day and travel at night. In order to reach the Hudathan base before the aliens took Ophelia off-planet, it would be necessary to march from sunset until noon the next day. And Remy would have pushed his people even harder had that been possible.
As a result, they were well inside the territory that the northern Paguumis considered to be theirs. So where were the locals? That’s what McKee wanted to know as Bartov paused just short of a rise. By doing so, he allowed McKee to peer over the top without exposing more than her helmet. It was the sort of thing an experienced T-1 was expected to do without being told. And she made a mental note to mention it later on.
McKee’s visor could provide some magnification. But if she wanted to look a long way out, there was no substitute for her binoculars. So she pushed the visor up in order to glass the area up ahead. The desert shimmered in the heat, and a distant hill appeared to float just off the ground. Supatha and his scouts were out in front of the legionnaires as usual—and she could see the wispy dust trails produced by their zurnas. But no northerners. Not that she wanted to see them. It would be wonderful if the team and its allies could attack the Hudathans without having to fight their way through a Paguumi army.
At their present rate of travel, Remy and Huzz planned to arrive at their destination just before dawn the next day. Then, assuming the navy could spare some fighters, the zoomies would prep the area immediately around the installation. Unfortunately, they couldn’t put any ordnance on the outpost itself without running the risk of killing Ophelia. The possibility didn’t bother McKee in the least—but was unthinkable to the high command.
But with or without air support, the ground attack was going to take place, and McKee knew that fighting their way into a well-established Hudathan base was going to be very difficult. Avery was still acting as XO. Would he survive? Would she?
McKee pushed such thoughts away to concentrate on the situation at hand. The immediate challenge was to find the one-thousand-gallon water bladder that had been dropped along their line of march. The water wouldn’t be enough to meet the needs of three thousand Paguumis, but it would allow the legi
onnaires to remain independent and camp separately. The latter was made necessary by the fact that Remy had very little trust for Huzz, who, McKee suspected, had similar doubts about the Human.
Unfortunately, the water bladder wasn’t where it was supposed to be, which was within a hundred yards of the spot where Bartov was standing. That meant the legionnaires would have to home in on the low-power beacon that was attached to it. A potentially dangerous task, what with Hudathans flying around over their heads. But, for the first time in her military career, McKee had real honest-to-God air cover. Three of the navy’s aerospace fighters were flying lazy eights directly above her position. And when they ran low on fuel, more aircraft would replace them. Could they see the water bladder? No, they were too high, and had to be in case the ridgeheads sent fighters to intercept the company.
“Okay,” McKee said. “Let’s proceed in a line abreast. We’ll maintain one-hundred-yard intervals. Maintain your situational awareness and monitor the nav channel. If you hear the beacon, let me know.”
So the squad spaced out and began to sweep forward. Five minutes passed followed by ten more. Finally, just as McKee was about to break it off, Linda Mora spoke. “I’ve got it, Lieutenant . . . Or I think I do. The signal is faint and off to my left.”
“Okay,” McKee said. “Close in on it. We’ll follow.”
When they found it the bladder was resting about two hundred feet from the wreckage of a burned-out shuttle. What had taken place wasn’t clear. Had a fighter been chasing the marines? And jumped them immediately after they dropped the water? There was no way to know. The only thing that McKee could be sure of was that the jarheads had died trying. Now there was more metal for the Paguumis to harvest and more next of kin to be notified.
McKee was forced to swallow the lump in her throat in order to make the call. “Charlie-One to Charlie-Six. The bladder has been located and secured. We will remain here until we’re relieved. Over.”
—
ABOARD THE HEAVY CRUISER MARS
Admiral Nigata didn’t want to watch the men and women aboard the gunboat Leda die—but felt that it was his duty to do so. Especially since few if any of them understood their role as pawn in a much larger game. But he, too, was a pawn for others, all of whom would sacrifice him to protect their queen, and therefore themselves.
Having sentenced himself to do so, Nigata sat in the big chair and turned his attention to the holo tank. Shortly thereafter, a single spark of light left the relative safety of the Human fleet and accelerated out into space. Though currently immobile, the Hudathan warship might still be capable of defending itself, and if that was the case, the lives aboard the Leda would soon be snuffed out.
But regardless of that, the Hudathans couldn’t let the gunboat get close enough to fire what could turn out to be a lucky shot. So the ridgeheads did what Nigata wanted them to do. They dispatched two DEs out to intercept the Human vessel—and in doing so stripped one of their cruisers of its escorts. That was an excellent beginning.
The sacrifice of the Leda wouldn’t be enough, however. Nigata knew that. In order to destroy a ship with a throw weight nearly equivalent to what the Mars could produce, he’d have to do something unexpected. Something so crazy the Hudathans wouldn’t understand his intentions. The problem was that his plan was crazy, and could quite possibly kill every person aboard the Mars, including Nigata himself. Because on his orders, Captain Somlyo and his crew were going to execute a maneuver known as a microjump. A term that referred to a hyperspace jump calculated to move the Mars a mere 250,000 miles. An inconsequential trip when compared to six trillion miles or a single light-year.
The difficulty was that hyperspace drives couldn’t deliver such precise movements with any sort of certainty. That’s why ships didn’t enter or exit hyperspace until they were well clear of the celestial objects that might be nearby.
Some experiments with so-called microjumps had been successful, but most had not. So there was a very real possibility that the Mars would exit hyperspace outside the Altari system, leaving the rest of Nigata’s ships vulnerable, or worse yet, wind up inside the planet Savas. An event that would kill the entire crew and might damage the planet as well.
Nonetheless, Nigata was determined to try it; more than that, he felt he had to try it in order to destroy the cruiser and open a path to the moon. So as the Hudathans fired on the Leda, Somlyo’s voice was heard over the intercom. “This is the captain. All personnel will prepare for a hyperspace jump in ten, nine, eight . . .”
The crew hadn’t been briefed about the jump, or the risks involved, since telling them wouldn’t make them feel any better about it. Perhaps they thought the Mars was going home. But Nigata figured most of them were still thinking about the order when the countdown came to an end, and they felt the usual lurch, and some nausea. That was the moment when the cruiser entered another dimension.
But not for long. The downshift followed seconds later. Nigata’s fingers dug into the armrests on his chair as he waited to die. But he didn’t die. And as he felt the second bout of nausea, he was filled with a sense of joy. But where were they? Where they needed to be? Or five million miles out in space?
The answer came via a host of alarms as screens lit up with real-time video of another ship. The Mars was less than twenty miles from the Hudathan cruiser! And right where Nigata wanted her to be. Somlyo gave the order to fire. And the crew, all of whom were still at battle stations, complied. Most were just starting to understand what had taken place, but they knew how to follow orders and did what they were told. Torpedoes whispered out of tubes, missiles streaked across the narrow gap, and every energy cannon that could be brought to bear fired in unison.
Having been caught completely unawares, the cruiser’s shields went down. Explosions rippled along the ship’s hull, she shook as if palsied, and her drives fired as the Hudathans sought to escape the unexpected barrage of fire.
But it was too late. A torpedo sailed through an open hatch, entered the main launch bay, and detonated. The blast triggered more than a dozen secondary explosions as fighters blew up. Some were in the process of being refueled. So flames found fuel, followed the substance to its source, and set that off as well. The result was a miniature supernova that consumed all the available oxygen within a few brief seconds and blinked out of existence. All that remained was a debris field that would orbit Savas for a thousand years.
A cheer went up throughout the Mars as the heavy cruiser turned onto a course that would take her toward the moon. But Nigata wasn’t cheering. He was searching the holo tank for a tiny green arrow and the name Leda. It was no longer there. A sacrifice had been made. And for what? A tyrant, a mass murderer, and a possible psychopath. Nigata felt sick to his stomach.
—
PLANET SAVAS
After catching up with McKee, the team made camp. And to the north of them, only five miles short of the Hudathan base, Huzz and his warriors did the same thing.
As McKee made the rounds, she could feel the tension in the air. None of the normal high jinks could be seen. And what talk there was had a subdued quality. As they cleaned their weapons, all of her fellow legionnaires were wondering the same thing. Would they survive? Or would they be buried on Savas? McKee knew how they felt.
That was why she went looking for Avery after finishing her dinner. Not to talk . . . Since opportunities to do that were few and far between. But to see him. To hear the sound of his voice. To take comfort from the knowledge that he existed and there was something to hope for, to survive for.
When McKee found Avery, he was sitting in a circle made up of legionnaires from different platoons. Hats mostly, but some of her people, too, all talking in low tones. Their eyes made contact, and a spark jumped the gap.
Sergeant Jolo offered McKee a mug of instant caf, and she accepted, so she would have an excuse to sit on an ammo crate and be near Avery. The legionnair
es were telling stories, many of which were exaggerated, to keep their minds off what was to come. So hardly a word passed between McKee and Avery during the next fifteen minutes. But such was the bond between them, nothing had to be said. Both knew what they had—and what they stood to lose.
As the bullshit session began to wind down, Avery dumped a few drops of caf onto the bone-dry ground and stood. His eyes found hers, and he smiled. “Watch your six, McKee. Lieutenants are in short supply out here.”
McKee nodded. “You, too, sir. There’s no such thing as too many majors.” That got a laugh—and McKee turned away. Please God, don’t let him die, she prayed. But there had been other prayers, for other people, and most were dead.
Even though she hadn’t been assigned to a watch, McKee didn’t sleep well. Part of that was due to the noise from a navy shuttle as it made a delivery of personnel and supplies. But most of it was nerves.
That’s why McKee was up a full hour before she had to be and busy checking on her platoon. Her helmet light projected a blob of white light on the ground in front of her as she crossed the encampment. There were rumors that the navy was about to clobber the Hudathan moon base, but that hadn’t happened yet. That meant the marines were still taking STS fire and wouldn’t be able to participate in the assault.
So without any armor, and without being able to attack the base with aircraft, the T-1s would constitute the heaviest weaponry the so-called joint force could bring to bear. That’s why Major Remy had decided to join her platoon.
McKee reported to the CO at 0600. After ducking under some netting, she removed her helmet. Remy and Avery were standing over a video table looking at some images. Both men turned as she entered. Remy smiled. “Ah, the cavalry has arrived. I won’t have to walk.”
“No, sir. Private Kane is standing by.”
“Excellent. Have you seen these? If not, you might want to take a look.”
The sun wasn’t visible yet. But, thanks to a hanging lantern and the illumination provided by the table itself, McKee could see the photos. Some had clearly been taken by navy fighters, while others were surface shots, courtesy of the company’s hardworking drones. The outpost was located adjacent to the sand-drifted ribs of what had clearly been a large spaceship. A vessel too large to land and take off again.
Andromeda's War (Legion of the Damned Book 3) Page 28
