“Helm,” I called, “bring us about red nine zero, north ten degrees!”
The ship started to turn away from the Xerxes, presenting our propulsion to the larger ship. It was dicey, but so far I had not witnessed as much firepower from the organo-ship as the Destroyer was bringing to bear. A scattering of hardlight cannons and the light missiles was all it had fired.
I watched as the Destroyer came about, following our movements. We began to circle one another. Although we had inflicted damage on the Destroyer, the enemy Captain had done what we had done and rotated to present an undamaged face. With the enemy drones, the limited fire from the Xerxes and the Destroyer’s Class 3 weapons, the firepower was almost evenly matched.
Destroyers, smaller and less armoured than a Cruiser, nevertheless fielded an impressed arsenal and these merc ships were certainly equipped similarly. The only advantage we had was the fact that the majority of incoming fire came from all directions, while we could focus our damage output effectively. As the helmsman had put a lateral spin on the ship, neither the Xerxes nor the Destroyer could pinpoint a weakened section of our hull.
“Keep us circling, helm! Don’t let that Destroyer get on our tail.”
“Aye, Commander!”
As we turned, the gee-forces started to push me along the railing. I sat down again, swiping most of the reports from my display with my hand and focusing on the battlefield arrangement.
As we rotated, Hieron directed each battery to fire upon the Destroyer, coordinating the strikes as they presented themselves. The opposing battery he directed to fire upon the more manoeuvrable, smaller vessels. So far, he’d yet to hit any, but the effect was noticed in that smaller incoming fire lessened. We had ceased to fire upon the Xerxes, but I knew that taking out that Destroyer was now a priority. We could focus on the Xerxes once this risk was taken care of.
Like galab, our two ships orbited, facing our broadsides at each other. The Restitution’s greater firepower started taking its toll. First one, then two of the Destroyer’s four propulsion nacelles flared out, pushing the ship out of the virtual arena. The enemy ship turned a lazy arc away from us, pulling us out of their firing arcs. The constant hammering on our hull abated immediately.
“Life pods launching!” cried out an elated sensor operator. A ragged cheer broke out from the operations deck, echoed by Reza’k.
I turned my attention to the condition of our ship, noting with concern a growing casualty list. Several sections of our ship were flashing an angry red.
“Not as bad as it looks, Commander,” she said, noticing my attention, “Nothing penetrated beyond a few compartments deep. Nothing critical.”
“Commander,” called Rego, “Alex reports heavy fighting near the Jump Drive compartment and engineering. Most of the boarders gravitated to there, but marine squad leaders report they’re pushing them back.”
“Get armed crew to reinforce them,” I said, “We have to keep them clear of engineering.”
The crew had undergone basic shipborne combat training and every last one of them was qualified in small arms weapons. They were not as thoroughly trained as the marine detachment but, in a pinch, they could defend themselves if need be.
I turned back to the main display and put some steel into my voice. “Time to finish off the Xerxes.”
No sooner had I said this, then the communications station call out an incoming signal. I noticed immediately the smaller ships pulling away from their attack and drone swarms started to break off as well.
“It’s the Xerxes, Commander!”
42.
“Put it on the main display.”
An image of a dishevelled, nervous looking Corporate appeared on the view screens, his crisp uniform damp around the neck. I could see the whites of his eyes.
“Hold your attack, Commander! We have no wish to continue this battle.”
I turned to Hieron, “Hold all fire, let’s hear them out.”
“We wish to agree to the terms of your warrant. Halt your attack and allow our ships to withdraw. In return, I will personally hand myself over to Protectorate custody…”
“Hold on,” I said, interrupting the Corporate’s speech, “The warrant was for the Captain of the Xerxes.”
He blinked. “But I am the Captain of the…”
“You take me for a fool? I’ve met the Captain, sort of. I know what he looks like. You most certainly are not him.”
“I…you have?” he stammered. The man was rudely shoved aside and a familiar face appeared before the recorder. This I knew to be the man we wanted.
“So…” he said, a sneer on his face. I could see the signs of extensive gene therapy and rejuvenation treatments on his features – a sort of angelic, almost feminine visage.
“Couldn’t help but try one last deception?” I asked.
“I am Captain Borges,” he said, distaste clear on his face, “Korveli-Xue Space Defence Division. If you refrain from destroying my ship, I will surrender myself to your custody, as per your warrant.”
I muted the comms channel and turned to Reza’k. “What powers do we have, since he retaliated against us? Can we impound the organo-ship?”
Reza’k looked thoughtful for a moment before answering. “Technically, although I doubt he would agree to those terms. His primary concern at the moment will be fallout from his superiors. If he puts more assets at risk just to save his own neck, they may cut off any support they may offer to his legal defence. Far easier to adhere to our original wording.”
“Call off your synthetics,” I said to Borges, “Deactivate them immediately, or I start pounding that great big hole you’ve now got in your ship.”
“Done.”
I turned to Rego, he gave me a thumbs up. “Reports of synthetics holding, Commander.”
I faced Borges. “Order those merc ships to stand down. I want them no more than three hundred kilometres from the following waypoint. I’m sending a marine shuttle to dock with your ship. You will present yourself for arrest as soon as the shuttle reports its arrival. Any attempt at subterfuge will be met with immediate retaliation and the eventual destruction of your ship. Is that understood?”
He swallowed, probably choking down his pride, “Understood, Commander.”
“If I detect even a single watt of power directed to any weapon system or movement of those mercs beyond the zone we have set them, we will recommence our attack, understood?”
“Don’t insult my intelligence…”
“Is that understood, Captain Borges?”
His face turned a deep purple and he visibly shook, and for a moment I thought I’d overdone it. “Understood, Commander.”
I flicked off the channel, ending the communication. Next, I contacted the hangar controller.
“Prep a shuttle for departure, relaying orders to a marine squad to head your way. Launch as soon as they’re ready.”
“Aye, Commander.” came the reply.
I fell back into my seat, blowing the air out of my lungs as I did.
I tasked Martine and Reza’k with coordinating the remaining damage control incidents, while Hieron and Rego directed the ‘clean up’ of deactivated synthetics. I called Alex up to the bridge.
When he arrived, he was damp with sweat, but otherwise in high spirits.
“We held, Commander,” he said, a beaming smile on his face.
“You did good,” I said, “Lieutenant.”
“Lieut…” he trailed off, “…I…thank you, sir!”
“Don’t thank me, Kekkin wanted you commissioned as soon as possible. He just wanted to see how you did without him guiding you. He’s still in charge, overall, but he wants you to take a more active role in leading the marine detachment. You’re to serve under him and learn what tactics and strategies he can teach and, hopefully, come up with some new ones using our gear.”
He nodded, clearly already thinking of the possibilities.
“In the meantime, I want you to organise the escort for reigni
ng in this Captain Borges. I don’t trust him, so make sure the marines you send to fetch him are smart and very well armed.”
He flipped me a crisp salute and left. I turned to face Hieron and Reza’k, the former raising an eyebrow, the latter giving me an annoyed look.
“You don’t approve?” I asked them both.
“The boy’s a bit young,” said Hieron.
“He’s got combat experience,” I said, “He’s resourceful and very brave. Kekkin and I both saw that while we were on Ambrose. The troops love him, too. Especially the ones we kept from Gossamer.”
“I’m not sure you can do that,” said Reza’k, “Handing out commissions on a whim.”
“It’s not a Protectorate rank, it’s a ship rank,” I explained, “I cleared it up with Admiral Jalabir before we left – I can install whatever rank structure I choose on the ship, so long as upper echelons are Protectorate assets, such as Kekkin and I.”
“I’m not sure I follow.”
“The crew, besides yourself and a small handful of officers, don’t answer to the Protectorate – they answer to me. I pay them from a budget allotted to me for Protectorate operations. Just like Maxine’s retainer.”
“I’ll have to look into this…” she started, but Hieron sighed in frustration.
“Just give it a rest, girl,” he said, “You don’t need to be on every single committee, or have a finger in every aspect of running this ship. Let the lad do his thing! They put him in charge for a reason.”
She turned to him and opened her mouth to retort, but I put a stop to it. “Enough. You can look up the legalities later, Lieutenant.”
I sent them back to their stations, there was still work to be done. I returned to my command chair and brought up the status indicators that were still glaring red on my display. We had not gained our victory unscathed. The starboard batteries had taken a pounding – we’d lost nearly a quarter of our guns. There was other damage as well.
I sent a call down to engineering, where I knew Gannerson would be hard at work coordinating damage control and repair work already. It took a full minute for the Chief to get online.
“Gannerson,” I said, “I want a priority put on the starboard battery repairs, give me a sitrep as soon as you have it assessed.”
“We took a couple of direct hits to our main propulsion, Commander. I’m going to need a full team to get it sorted. I recommend we focus on that first.”
“I need to be able to defend ourselves if the Corporates think to try something, we’re not done with them yet.”
There was a slight pause on the line before he answered. “All right. It’s your ship, Commander.”
“Is there a problem?”
“No, sir. Just rearranging schedules in my head.”
“I need my top people to be open with me. If you think I’m making a big mistake, I need to hear it.”
“I get it, without guns we’re just a passenger ship. I’m still thinking like a freighter engineer.”
“What’s the extent of the damage to the engines? I didn’t notice any loss of capability during the battle,” I started flicking through the warnings for that part of the ship.
“You probably wouldn’t, these old Linus Drives were built for reliability, after all. We’ve got irregularities in the ejection lines along the starboard nacelle. We probably have some structural issues from the impacts of those hits. Our armour held, but the force alone did the damage.”
“My engineering is limited to a Meridian Class Transport, Chief. Ion drives only.”
“Okay, so the Linus works by generating ball lightning in a central chamber. The helium-3 reactors power this process, the Hawking radiation is directed along a series of ejectors to provide directional thrust…”
“Wait, wait…Hawking radiation? As in what you would find near black holes?”
“What do you think we mean by the term ‘ball lightning’?”
“I don’t know – a ball of lightning?”
“It’s technically the same thing. Slightly more controlled than a naturally occurring black hole, and much, much smaller. On the scale of attometers, actually.”
“Slightly more controlled?”
He sighed. “I have this conversation every time someone wants to know about the guts of large scale starships. Next thing you’ll be asking me if it’s safe.”
“Is it?”
“Safe? Hell, no. Why do you think engineers get paid so damn much?”
“So I should really make damage to the Linus system a priority?”
“No, sir. You do what your gut tells you. It’s gotten us pretty far on less than what we’ve got right now. The worse that can happen if we let this slide is our turn rate might be uneven for a while. Leave the science up to the science guys.”
“Roger that, Chief. I have enough nightmares already.”
“I’ll have an assessment on the starboard battery in half an hour. Gannerson out.”
Next, a call came up from the operations deck. “Hangar control reports the marine shuttle is on its way, Commander.”
I flicked my display back to local space, watching as the small craft crossed the distance to the disabled organo-ship. I checked the positioning of the merc ships and was satisfied that they were cooperating. I checked the roster on the shuttle and called up the squad leader of the marines on board.
“Commander?” came the response.
“Radio me directly the moment you have Captain Borges in custody,” I said.
He acknowledged the command, and I let him go. I waited patiently, tensely, as the distance between the two ships shrank, holding my breath. When sensors reported the ships had docked, I mashed the call accept button the moment I saw it light up.
“Go ahead,” I said.
“We have a problem, sir. Captain Borges insists we let a pair of synthetics escort him. Won’t board the shuttle without them.”
“What model are they?”
“Looks custom, some KV design.”
“Can you and your men disable them in a pinch?”
“Affirmative, Commander.”
“Let them on. The moment you disengage from the Xerxes, take them out. Put the bastard in restraints once they’re dealt with.”
I could hear the smile on the Corporal’s face. “Roger, sir. Will comply.”
A few minutes later, after the shuttle began its journey back to the Restitution, the marine Corporal reported the synthetics neutralised and the good Captain secured. The man had the foresight to flush the components out of the airlock, figuring that they could hide a bomb or other hidden danger. I made a note in my overlay to watch this man’s career – a smart, cautious marine was a valuable asset.
Gannerson reported in just before the shuttle returned. Although several of our guns were ‘slag’, as he called them, he was confident the onboard repair nanites could rebuild them.
“There’s enough raw material in stores to feed the repair,” he said, “We just need to program them from the ship’s database and set the nanites to work.”
“How long before they’re operation?” I asked.
“About a week. Should have one or two of the less damaged one's operational within the day, but a full rebuild is going to take time. I’m having the engineering manufactories working on the main components, and they’ll need EV time to assemble, but I can have a full schedule put together once the rest of the damage control is handled.”
“Thanks, Chief. Let your men know that I appreciate the work being done.”
“Will do, Gannerson out.”
Hieron cleared his throat in a not-so-subtle gesture to get my attention. “You should really let everyone else know how they did as well. It’s all fine and dandy hearing praise from your direct superiors, but the boss man is responsible for morale as well as the tactical directions. They need to hear it from you.”
I nodded, calling down to the communications station. “Give me main broadcast, please.”
“Main broadcast on
line, Commander.”
“This is Commander Donovan. Don’t stop what you’re doing, just listen up. We’ve been through one hell of a fight. We got bloodied, and we got beat up a little. The good news is that we won. Even better news is that we won because each and every one of you did an outstanding job. This is your victory as much as it is the Protectorate’s. We showed the Corporates that money doesn’t buy you protection from the law – that they have to abide by the rules as much as anyone.
“You did that. For this, you should be proud. I know I am. Donovan out.”
Hieron gave me a thumbs up and returned to his console.
By the time our captor arrived on the bridge, the damage control was almost concluded. There were no more venting compartments, all fires had been put out and the deactivated synthetic boarders had been ‘recycled’.
I had a big grin on my face when Borges was marched into the command deck, cuffed and pushed ahead of four burly marines. I checked my sidearm and waved the marines away.
“Are you done gloating?” said the Corporate, disdain clear on his features.
“Not quite,” I quipped, “I’m still deciding if I’m going to pace in front of you or lecture you from this chair.”
“Typical. Your pedestrian attempts at humour belie your intelligence. This uncivilised nature is part of what’s wrong with this Network.”
“And your arrogance has once again put you out of sorts.”
“We can trade insults all day, you and me, but I would not wish to waste my time with someone who is beneath me. Mark my words, when I am free, I will finish what I started when I…” he closed his mouth, suddenly aware that he was about to admit his guilt in my attempted murder.
“Go on. I’m getting used to these little rants of yours. It must make you feel impotent, this seething rage you have for me. This unquenched hatred of me.”
Frontier's End: A Seth Donovan Novel Page 27
