by Evan Currie
If the enemy commander had any idea how limited the Terran “fleet” currently was, they’d press the fight to the bitter end and leave the entire first fleet of Earth’s forces smoking in space.
That was why the commodore was so determined to show the flag as constantly as he could, at every possible meeting with the Imperial forces. Make them think they were dealing with a significant force, a group that could throw metal into the masher and come back for more. If they realized how badly they could mangle Terran forces just by eliminating three cruisers and a handful of destroyers, it would change the game in a very bad way for both Earth and the Priminae.
Every trained man, every ton of space-going steel and ceramic, every gun, and every core represented a significant portion of the available forces holding the line here.
No one was sure just how large the Empire was. The interrogations of captured Imperials had been spotty in determining how reliable the intelligence from captured enemy forces was, but the higher-ups believed the Empire was big. Time was the currency Eric Weston had been charged with acquiring, and Jason Roberts was going to ensure his CO accomplished that mission.
“Press the attack harder and target their destroyers. Pick off as many as we can.”
“Aye aye, Captain.”
► Beams of destruction nearly on par with the effects of cosmic cataclysmic forces crossed the empty space between the dueling fleets, burning through armor and bulkheads with almost impossible ease. Missiles tore into hulls, ablating in energetic releases that made nuclear weapons look like pop caps as they peeled open ships like overripe fruits.
For all the destruction being flung around, however, the core of both groups was designed with just such a force in mind and could take beating after beating with minimal loss of functionality.
The smaller ships—Rogues and Imperial destroyers—caught in the blasts tended to die in silent fire as they were burned or torn to their component atoms. The larger vessels, however—the cruisers on both sides—waded in and took the beating while dishing plenty of the same from their own weapon systems.
Up close, the fight degenerated into a slugging match between giants wielding great clubs with inelegance only matched by their raw power. Despite the devastating power being exchanged, however, the Imperial squadron reformed mostly intact and began to accelerate away from the closing course the Terran ships had taken.
The Boudicca and Bellerophon twisted space into pretzels as they too shifted course to follow, their remaining Rogues taking up escort positions as lancing laser fire poured into the Imperials from the other side.
The Odysseus and Priminae squadron had finally closed back into engagement range.
► “Enemy ships are withdrawing from combat, Commodore.”
Eric nodded from where he was standing at the captain’s station. “I see him, Lieutenant Chans. Thank you.”
The scene hadn’t changed a lot since they’d blown through the enemy squadron, leaving them somewhat in disarray but incurring a frightful level of damage themselves in the process. The enemy still had more than enough weight of metal to take on both the Terran and Priminae vessels and emerge the victor. The only thing in question would be the final butcher’s bill, but it seemed that the enemy estimated that price to be too high to be palatable.
Good, Eric thought grimly.
He was under no illusion that the situation would last. For now, the Imperial forces were trying to determine just what they were up against and what it would cost them to secure it.
Eventually, though, they would finish with their probing missions and advance to taking star systems in earnest. It was inevitable, for that was what an empire did, after all.
All too often, truly successful ones never found an external force to stop their expansion. They just kept taking and taking until the overreach and internal rot finally did them in. That too was ultimately inevitable.
Eric didn’t want the Earth to suffer while waiting for that eventual outcome, however, so he was determined to stop this empire dead in space, one way or the other.
“What’s the delay on signals to the rest of the squadron?” he asked, glancing over to where the commander was standing her station.
“Just over a minute and closing now, sir,” Heath answered. “The Bell and the Bo have turned to press the engagement, but I think it’s mostly a pro forma action. They’re not maneuvering as radically as they could.”
Eric nodded. “Captain Roberts knows our orders. We’re here to make them think twice, not die gloriously and uselessly in the black. Match our profile to his, on a reciprocal approach of course.”
“Aye Commodore.” She entered the orders and sent them to the helm with a swipe of her fingers. “Their withdrawal course is going to bring them close to the damaged Priminae vessel, Tetanna.”
Eric checked the telemetry again and saw that she was right. He hadn’t been paying much attention to the ship, as it was effectively out of the conflict for the duration.
“Damn. We have people there.”
“Commodore,” Milla said, “I believe that they may also have people there.”
“What?” Eric looked over, then turned to the scanner station, where the technician was nodding.
“She’s right, Skipper,” the chief standing watch said. “They’ve got a couple of their small Parasites tucked in under the Tetanna’s hull. We missed them coming through. Probably they were on the other side of the ship and, well, we were distracted.”
That was an understatement, Eric supposed, and not one he could really fault.
Still, the situation wasn’t great. He hadn’t sent nearly enough Marines to properly mount a defense of a ship the size of the Tetanna. Actually, Eric wasn’t certain he had enough Marines on board the Odysseus for such a mission, though obviously the brass thought differently.
“Okay, best-case scenario, they’re looking to pick up their people,” he said. “But let’s not count on that being their only goal. The Imperials haven’t exactly been the most thoughtful sorts in our previous encounters with them in that regard. Run simulations. I want to have options for getting our people out of that mess!”
“Aye Skipper,” Heath answered. “We’ll get something for you as quickly as we can.”
“Copy everything to the Bell and the Bo,” he ordered. “They’re closer than we are and have more shuttles and Marines. Most of our people are still trying to run damage control.”
“Aye Captain. I’ll shoot a heads-up over to them,” Heath said. “Get them working on solutions from their end too. It’ll probably cut down on delays if they can mount a rescue force entirely from their end.”
Eric turned his focus back to the Imperial vessels but was unable to keep from sneaking glances at the stricken Tetanna now that he knew the cruiser was back in play.
CHAPTER 15
► Conner drew her sidearm as one of the Imperial troopers broke through the line, charging her position, and emptied the magazine before he got within twenty meters. As the armored man tumbled along the deck, she evaluated the situation, dropped the spent magazine, and reloaded.
“Looks like they were heading for the bridge after all,” she said with a bit of a scowl.
“Something in your voice makes me think you aren’t convinced, Colonel,” the sergeant said. He leveled his assault rifle and stepped between the colonel and the line in case anyone else tried a bum’s rush. He wished that the colonel wouldn’t insist on seeing the situation with her own eyes. That was why they put scanners on enlisted suits, after all.
“Numbers feel light,” she admitted, “but they are putting up one hell of a fight.”
“You tell me to mount a distraction, Colonel, do you expect me to half-ass it?” the sergeant pointed out dryly.
Conner had to give him that one. Her Marines would do what it took to sell the story she wanted the enemy to buy. Unfortunately, the severe damage the ship had taken was preventing her from confirming most of what she suspected was going on. Inte
rnal scanners were spotty, even this deep, as power shorts on other decks had caused massive outages.
“Well,” she said finally, “I guess there’s only one way to know for sure. Sergeant, get me a squad for a recon mission.”
“Rider! Get your ass up here!” the sergeant called instantly.
A corporal ran up. “Yeah Sarge?”
“Colonel has a mission for you, Ramirez, Kensey, and Dow.”
The corporal turned to the colonel, saluting quick and dirty. “Colonel, ma’am. Ready and willing.”
Conner nodded crisply. “I need eyes on the library core. I have concerns, Corporal. I want them put to rest.”
The Marine was silent for a moment, but Conner could see him pulling data over the network as he grabbed whatever he could in relation to the Tetanna’s library core. He nodded after a few seconds.
“Yes ma’am, we’ll put ’em to bed for you.”
“I knew you would, Marine,” Conner said as she walked past him, slapping him on the shoulder. “Recon!”
“Oorah!” Rider answered back instantly before running back to his squad.
“Now, we’d best get to the bridge and secure it just in case I’m chasing ghosts, Sergeant,” Conner said firmly. “Get everyone ready to move. I want this deck cleared of hostile forces in the next five minutes or, by God, I’ll go out there and start shooting the enemy myself. You want that to happen, Sergeant?”
“Ma’am, no ma’am!” The sergeant shook his head.
That was the last thing he wanted to happen. If she got herself killed, he’d have to explain to the commodore just how the hell he managed to lose a full colonel on a damn rescue op. If she survived and actually managed to help, the sergeant would have the very devil of a time keeping the colonel out of trouble in the future.
Best to go see to this personally.
“I’ll make it happen, Colonel,” he said.
“I suspected you would,” Conner replied, trying to hide her amusement over the fervency of the sergeant’s promise.
► As Corporal Rider arrived back to where the rest of his squad was holding their position, Private Ramirez looked up questioningly.
“What’s up, Rider?” the private asked.
“Mission for the colonel. Get ready to break contact. We’re going to do a little recon,” Rider answered.
“Sounds fun.” The private grinned under his armor, nodding to the next team over. “We’ve got an op for the colonel. We need to drop back. You guys good?”
“We got this,” the man down the line answered, waving them off. “Just give me a second to get my team ready to shore up the hole.”
“Take your time,” Rider said. “I’m still plotting our route.”
That was something easier said than done, Rider quickly realized, even with the access they had to the ship’s internal systems. Damage was only the first problem to deal with, with entire decks cut off due to toxic fumes, fires, and hard vacuum. The enemy held key positions between them and the directive’s goal, which made the colonel’s concerns more real. Possibly worse, multiple potential routes were completely hidden from him because the internal scanners in those sections were damaged or sabotaged.
If he chose one of those routes and was wrong, they’d waste valuable time. On the other hand, the only other viable routes would certainly require a fair amount of fighting, which they were up for. But Rider would rather not risk his team if the mission profile could be done on the down low.
“Okay, I’ve got a route,” he said finally. “We’re moving out as soon as we can break contact without getting anyone killed.”
“We’ve got cover, Rider,” Private Dow, the squad-designated marksman, told him. “We’re good to go.”
“Alright, pull back by the numbers. We’re heading for the ship’s library,” Rider said with a grin.
“Are you shitting me?” Ramirez asked. “What kind of place is that for Marines in the middle of a firefight?”
“It’s the place the colonel has an itch,” Rider answered. “If she’s wrong, no loss. If not, well, what do you think the enemy might do in a ship’s library core?”
Kensey slapped Ramirez across the back of his helmet. “He’s got a point, Ram. Let’s go make sure no one is talking too loud in the library for the colonel, shall we?”
The recon Marine team broke contact with the enemy as the teams on either side of their position moved in to secure the hole they were leaving. Crawling back until they reached a junction in the ship’s corridors, they then scrambled to their feet and broke into a light jog as they began making an end run around the fight.
► The sounds of fighting were starting to get closer to the command deck as Drey made sure that the surrounding crew had been issued hand lasers. He didn’t expect the doors to hold for long once the enemy got there, but the command level was reasonably defensible, and he hoped to at least put up a decent accounting of himself before it was all over.
The outcome, unfortunately, was not in question.
Infantry lasers would make short work of any cover they might use within the command deck, so once the enemy decided to cut the defenders out, there was little that Drey or his crew could do. He just hoped that they would be trying to minimize damage, at first at least, which would allow the defenders some chance at extracting a level of justice from their attackers.
“Secure all controls. Lock everything,” Drey ordered as he walked around to take cover in front of his station. “Whatever they are seeking, they do not find it here.”
“Yes Captain!” his second said and ran from station to station to check the work of the other officers.
A hiss in the air caused him to shift his attention to the main entrance of the command deck, where the door was smoking and starting to glow a deep-red color.
“They are cutting through! Get away from the door,” Drey ordered, waving people away from where they’d been caught staring at the entrance in horror. “Get to cover! Move!”
The door was ceramic, and it quickly reached a temperature at which any metal in the universe would have begun to slag and drip to the deck below. These doors, however, continued to hold. They didn’t melt, they didn’t bow, but eventually they did give as the material sublimated directly from solid to gaseous matter when its limits were finally reached.
A blue line cut through the air, striking the far bulkhead of the command deck. Sparks flew from a power relay behind the light plate. Power to half the bridge cut off in an instant, the lights shifting to distributed load sources and dimming to conserve energy.
Drey fired a beam back through the door, the red florescence of his laser like an afterimage on the eyes as it cut through the air and burned out into the hall. He didn’t know if he hit anything, but at least he was finally able to do something.
Other officers followed his example, the lightning flashes of their lasers igniting the air as they fired. Blue flashes answered their red ones, not particularly well aimed except for the fact that it was almost impossible to miss something of importance when firing into the command deck. Drey felt his stomach twist as he realized that the enemy didn’t seem particularly interested in taking any part of his ship intact.
They could have just shot it out from under us from their ships. Why send an invasion group? he wondered bitterly.
He steeled himself for the last defense of his command, thinking briefly about what might have been.
► Conner felt more than a little useless and nearly as silly as she watched the sergeant lead the clearing of the corridor ahead of them. She’d prefer to be down there herself, frankly, but her NCO was right. Colonels didn’t belong in the thick of a firefight. If that happened, you knew that something had gone drastically, horribly bad.
Ah, for the days of being a mere captain, she thought idly as she watched over the fight through the battle network. But she didn’t see anywhere she could cut new orders that would substantially improve things. She generally didn’t like to interrupt her Marines when t
hey were doing something right or the enemy when he was making a mistake. Two rules by which she attempted to run her command, and to this point in her career, they had both served her well.
She took a knee as laser flashes left the ceiling not far from her position, glowing red and radiating enough heat into the corridor to seriously burn an unarmored human. If they didn’t get this situation in hand in short order, much of the ship was going to be temporarily inhospitable to humans due to risk of heatstroke, along with other dangers.
The ship will have to be abandoned if the heat dissipation systems can’t be brought back to full operation, she decided. It might take weeks to cool down sufficiently to even begin serious repairs if those systems were entirely disabled, given that they couldn’t shut down the cores, which would be continually generating internal heat.
Thankfully, it wasn’t going to be her problem to work out, Conner decided as the last of the fighting died down under the direction of her NCO’s determined maneuvers. She got back to her feet and took note of what the Marines in her command could see before she made her way down to where the sergeant was looking over the mopping-up operation.
“Good work, Sergeant,” Conner said as she approached.
“Thank you, Colonel. I’ll relay that to the men,” the sergeant said crisply, as though his armor wasn’t smoking from a near hit.
She noted that the sergeant’s armor was reporting that his coolant was redlined and the system in general was reporting potential faults across half its base functions. She let him play it off as nothing important, though, as there was no point in bringing up the issue. The most she could do was order him back to the shuttle evac point, and while she knew that the sergeant wouldn’t disobey a direct order, she also doubted he’d ever forgive her or fully trust her again for not trusting him.
That said, she wouldn’t be letting the damn fool run out front again until his systems had cooled down enough to at least be entirely in the yellow, if not green.
