He shook his head. “I happen to know Lt. Miglar but he isn’t Takkian, but Takian, almost the same but we are pronounced with two ‘K’s. The Takians are very closely related to us, much like the Sarans and Terrans.”
I had to raise my voice a little to make sure he understood. “Seems you both enjoy water to get drunk!”
He downed the rest of his water and said, “We sure do, but then we are the only Silicone species that get drunk from water. The Piamee, who seem similar to us, can’t do nothing with water.”
We both tried to keep our conversation neutral and ignore the argument, but then an Army lieutenant reached for the Navy ensign and pulled him half across the table. Glasses tumbled and the second Army officer actually whacked the ensign across the face and I said, “Come on, gentlemen, this is an officer’s club and not an enlisted bar. I suggest you take it outside and do be fair. Two against one isn’t exactly honorable, you know.”
The lieutenant, quite obviously drunk, dropped the ensign and bowed. “Who asked you for your opinion? This is an Army base, and we should not even have to share our facilities with the high and mighty Navy.”
He kicked the table aside and moved toward me, his intentions clear. Did I ever manage to stay clear of trouble? He was a lieutenant, Army or not, and hitting him would not be a good idea.
But Rock Hound laughed and rolled up his sleeves even more and grinned, deeply satisfied. “Welcome to Checkpoint 96, Mr. Olafson and welcome to the bi-weekly club rumble. Well, a rumble it will be until the Marines get mixed in, so be careful and duck!”
The wiry muscle-packed Wolfcraft pilot catapulted himself past me and attacked the other Army officer, while the Navy ensign on the floor performed a leg sweep against the Army man and moments later, it was a free for all slugfest. So far, I’d managed not to get hit and evade, I hoped I could manage to maintain that until base security would show up, but then Rock Hound sailed past me and yelled, “Mr. Olafson, you can’t let the Army win!”
As much as I wanted to stay out of trouble, he had a valid point…
The cute commander wasn’t pleased at all. She was pacing before the holding cells of the base security jail. The bushy tail twitched nervously. Agitated, she first chewed out the Lieutenant. “It’s the eleventh time this year that I am here to bail you out, Lieutenant. Let me make that absolutely clear to you, there won’t be a twelfth time.”
We all stood at attention. It wasn’t long since Base Security finally moved in and only the more severe cases had yet received medical attention—not due to lack of medical facilities, but due to a standing order of her, the Commandant. This was why Lt. Yordat sported a split lip and not one but a double set of colorful shiners. He belched out a stern, “Yes, ma’am.”
She stopped and said, “Now I understand the Navy is seriously under-represented with only one squadron on this side of our cold little world. I am long enough in this Union’s Fleet to understand that there are fundamental differences between our brave and strong Army and Spacers, so I am deeply, and I must say very deeply, disappointed to see not one Army officer in the brig as well.”
Her little fists clenched. “Next time, you better call for backup, and I will come!”
Rock Hound said, with a painful-looking grin, “Ma’am, as much as we could have used your help, there aren’t any Army here because they are all in sickbay. We had the great fortune to have a drunk Neo-Viking on our side, who did the Bezerker part after someone insulted his mother.”
I looked ashamed at my boot toes and said, “Sorry, ma’am.”
She looked up and said to Rock Hound, “Don’t tell me the Navy won this time?”
“Yes, ma’am, the Navy won!”
Her voice changed from the shrill accusing tone to a satisfied one. “Well done, men! Let’s get you out of here and then you need to tell me all about it… after I send my apologies to the Army Commandant.”
Chapter 9: Red Dragon
The Holdian Commander sat across from me and watched Rock Hound working the controls of a Tabtil Tosser, trying to win a game against the Takkian. The goal of the game was to maneuver a Tabtil that was a tetrahedron-shaped object with different colored sides, inside the opponent’s colored holes, while tossing blockers with remote controlled catapults, to prevent the opponent to do the same to you. Almost every recreation room outfitted by the Navy had at least one of these boxy contraptions, usually completely worn out.
The commander had kept her word and gotten us out of the holding cell without any permanent records and she had even taken all of us to a pizza restaurant that was part of the adjacent housing settlement attached to the base. Mostly the families of long-term deployed army and navy personnel were housed here and had a few small stores and restaurants.
“Tell me the truth, Midshipman; we are off duty, and nothing will get past this table. Did they send you to evaluate me and what are you really?”
“Ma’am, I can do nothing else but repeat myself. I am a midshipman and nothing more. The details of my journey here are classified, but I assure you it has nothing to do with you. I don’t know Admiral McElligott all that well, but I can assure you he isn’t biased toward or against any race or species. I am sure Fleet Command would not have picked you to run this difficult post if they did not have absolute confidence in your abilities, ma’am.”
Her cute nose quivered and she took another bread stick. “Here I am getting a pep talk from a midshipman. There are many Holdians in the Navy and quite a few on this station as Holda isn’t far from here, but I am the first making it to commander and being usually perceived as nothing more than a fluffy plush animal has its challenges.”
Before I could say something, her Duty PDD and mine went off at the same time. It appeared that this was true for every service personnel in the restaurant. The message flashing over the screen accompanied by a blaring sound was only two words: Battle Stations.
Interbase Transports now switched to emergency distribution, working fast to convey personnel to their various duty stations.
Gone was any rivalry between Army, Navy, or Marines. Everyone stood orderly in line until the next IST capsule was available.
Of course, the little Holdian was among the first and gone several minutes before I made it. The capsule shot through vacuum tubes and the ready room of the fighter squadron.
The child-like ready to play Lt. Yordat was gone and replaced by no-nonsense, by the book Squadron leader. “Viking, you’re the most experienced; take lead of wing Alpha. You will be briefed in flight.”
I acknowledged him and jumped into the Battle-Dresser. The preset machine assembled a Mark 19 flight suit around me, and the floor parted the second I was done, sliding down a steep chute and right next to the waiting Wolfcraft. Thanks to the outer microlayer of the adaptive skin and thanks to my new Takkian friend, the Wolfcraft was already black and red and sported the Olafson Wolf Head logo.
The pilot seat with me in it rose from the floor into the cockpit, and while the fighter was already sliding inside the revolving starter, the neuro connections were made, and I was ready.
The communication equipment came on, and I heard the Holdian Commander say, “This is for Checkpoint Squadron. One of the last convoys from Netlor has been attacked by a group of pirate ships. Emergency transmissions are just coming and identify the lead pirate as the Red Dragon.”
After that, she added, “You are under no circumstance allowed to cross into Free Space to assist, but our long-range scan results confirm that twelve, maybe thirteen ships will make it. They are being pursued and you are authorized to use all means to reassure the safety of the civilian ships once they are in Union Space. Our battleship, the USS Makki-Grodno is on its way but more than twelve hours out, as she left for patrol early this morning. Super Cruisers USS Castro and USS Pollux are even farther out. So, until the pirates come into firing range of the planetary defenses, if they dare to cross the border, you are the only hope for those ships once they enter the system.”
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br /> “Rock Hound to Viking, take the lead; the entire squadron is deployed. Don’t mind taking the backseat to you, Viking. You’re the Ace.”
The computronic rearranged the symbols reflected into my sight to adjust them to my new status. This was no time to argue or ask why he had changed my position from wing to squadron lead. I saved the long-range scanner results of the big sensors on Checkpoint 96 to my strategic view and counted nine armed vessels of destroyer size and four of cruiser size pursuing seven means of transport and a Kermac T Cruiser.
“Listen up, guys. Beta wing, take the Z axis and jump to the coordinates I am sending. Stay about a light minute over Herman’s star. Delta Wing, you do the same at the opposite, and then you activate your active camouflage and wait. Alpha, Gamma, and Delta, we stay in spearhead formation and approach openly. If it comes to a fight, there is not much those tubs can do to you. You got excellent shields and Translocator Gatlings. Always keep an eye on the weapon scans of the enemies and for the most part, you should be too fast for them to hit you in the first place. Take out their engines first.”
Over the much slower comm channels of the civilian ships, we heard a blood-curdling horror story unfold. Thirty ships had left Netlor and were systematically picked apart and raided by the pirate fleet. All pleas for mercy had been ignored. The pirates took their time to pick ship after ship, and now the last fifteen were less than eight minutes away from the outmost boundaries of Herman’s Star system and thus Union space.
The pirates caught up with two of the stragglers and shot the transport engines to scrap. Not many civilizations had developed means and weapons to scan, intercept and disrupt a ship traveling in quasi-space. To see the red ship use Union Isah-field disruptors to pull the lightly armed transports from that semi-spatial dimension was more than disturbing.
Even more concerning was the fact that my scanners clearly identified ParaDim shields and Trans-Quantum resonators. ParaDim shields would make the pirate ship immune to the instantaneous destruction effects of Translocator bombs and could only be brought down by pounding the shields with Translocator bombs and Loki torpedoes.
A battleship would have no problem defeating those shields with a few well-placed Giga loads, but it would be a hard nut to crack for the small loads our Wolfcraft fighters carried.
I relayed that info to the base.
The rest of the thirteen transports made it across into Union Space and continued their way to Checkpoint 98.
We had to watch on our long-range scanners and optics as the pirates boarded the two ships they had crippled and to our horror, we witnessed as the pirates spaced hundreds of pilgrims!
The Comm System reported an incoming GalNet transmission on military channels but without any coding and a metallic, distorted voice spoke to us. “This is the Red Dragon speaking for the Sinister Alliance.
“I know your support battleship is out. As you notice, I can hear and listen in. You are so arrogant that you do not even code your military GalNet messages. My ship has the finest Union sensors and other surprises, so I know where you tried to hide those Wolfcraft fighters and I can see the planet defense capabilities. Very impressive, and I would be scared if I was a run of the mill average space crook. But I am the Red Dragon, and I want you to remember that name. Well, those who survive.”
The voice changed and became deeper, “However I will be your nightmare, Union! No ship, no colony, and no base will be safe from me if I choose to attack. Checkpoint 96, you will be first.”
The voice laughed and added, “Oh, I know you transmit that now to Fleet headquarters and that fat, old fart face McElligott will send hundreds of ships this way, but you can’t go where I can and who knows where I will strike next?”
His fleet of pirate ships abandoned the two looted transports each surrounded by a thin cloud of frozen drifting golden dressed bodies and began their attack run!
I had to go by the book, even though the pirate’s intentions were obvious.
“This is Squadron Leader Olafson, calling hostile crafts. You are now entering space claimed by the United Stars of the Galaxies; you are hereby ordered to cut all power, drop shields and prepare to be boarded. You are identified as a hostile and criminal party and no further warnings will be given.”
Fleet Headquarters automatically sent out new code procedures and new channels.
There was a sharp laugh.
The pirate ships crossed into Union Space and attacked.
“All wings, concentrate your fire on the other pirate ships. Stay at maximum range of your TL and concentrate on engine targets. Viking to Base led enemy ship under latest Para Dim and unique Terran TQ Resonator field protection. Scanner results hampered due to said shields. If this ship decides to attack, it will be hard to stop, consider the evacuation of surface buildings.
“Load your surface batteries with Gravo-Bombs and lay double shots in the path of the Red Dragon Ship. Launch those long-range drones you got and target the other pirate ships.
“Base to Wing. Pilgrim ships were a ruse; the ships were filled with ground troops. We are under surface attack…”
The connection to the base broke off.
I cursed the fact that this was an IV type. It did not have the option to switch to Graviton ammunition, but I attacked anyway. The Red Dragon was even better armed than expected. It had strong FTL DE’s of Union manufacture, with Union computronic targeting. I only evaded being hit so far as I flew past the red line almost the entire time. Twelve of the pirate ships were burning wrecks; they had little chance against the Translocator Gatlings of the Wolfcrafts, but two of my squadron fighter symbols had just blinked out, and I could not raise them, only register the intense explosions on my scanners where I knew them to be last. I had no time to feel sorry for them now, but I knew I would. They had come to close to the Red Dragon and the pirate ship caught both with a combination barrage of Union FTL FE’s and Nul Froth Casters.
I was down to twenty percent ammo but risked a direct assault. I still had two Lokis and I would make them count. This time, I could not evade the bluish energies of the Froth Caster, but I managed to stay out of the firing cone of the FTL Directed Energy Cannons. My forward shields almost died on me, but I deactivated the aft shield generators and reduced the side shields to twenty percent while feeding the freed energies into the front shields. All this while screaming at maximum acceleration toward its aft engines, His shields had to have structural gaps there, I released both Loki torpedoes and fired long burst into his aft section.
Without aft shields, I turned and prayed to Odin to give me the five seconds to reset, hoping my almost insane attack had worked. Something did pepper my side, and I checked on my squadron and gave flank protection orders. Only fifteen of the original twenty Wolfcrafts remained, and Rock Hound reported that Matchstick, Power Socket, and Ronin were out of ammo completely.
Odin must have heard my prayer because Hot Stuff was close enough to hear my plea for flank cover and he peppered twenty TL loads on and inside the hull of a Kartanian Cruiser that was part of the pirate ship fleet. The coffin-shaped Kartanian who had just fired on me, expanded in the middle as if someone pumped air in it very fast, bright white lines followed every armor plate and it was ripped to pieces by a series of explosions microseconds later.
Now I had time to turn the Wolfcraft in a tight loop and check out my handiwork.
The Red Dragon was fleeing with a severely damaged aft section and only one ISAH pod left. As much as I wanted to, I could not pursue. Three pirate ships remained, and they were still fighting and approaching Outpost 96.
It took us still twelve more minutes to defeat the last pirates and then we flew with all due speed toward the Outpost. We still heard nothing over GalNet.
I called Fleet Command, delivered a very short report and transmitted scanner and battle data and requesting assistance. Fleet Command assured me help was on the way.
Could those freaking pirates not have attacked just forty-eight hours later? O
f all ships, the Devi was on her way!
But then the pirate was listening in; he had a GalNet Terminal. I did not want to imagine what would happen if the Union would have to face an enemy that had the same resources and the same advances. I wondered if Deepa was already on her way back to Sin 4 and hopefully was not caught in the middle of this.
We reached the planet, and the clean and spotless spaceport looked so different than before. Burning and twisted wrecks of the transport ships, a toppled and destroyed Octo-bot had crashed into the upper terminal building, the tough transparent Duranium window panes cracked. My stomach tightened as I saw a space bus, its side perforated with a dozen large blaster holes, still burning.
Most of the pirate transports were undamaged, and we saw pirate troops carrying loot!
I actually screamed in the audio pick up, “Let none escape, strive them with your DEs!”
Flying just a few meters over the ground with my Arti-Gravs and the engines pushing as slowly as they could, I pressed the FTL DE in pulse mode and mowed them down. It took us no time to clear the landing field and destroy every one of the transports, but we still received sporadic fire from individual pirates hiding behind cover we dared not to fire at, as it would have caused even more damage to the base itself.
I sent half of the Wolfcrafts to the base on the other side of the planet and ordered them to recon the situation.
“Squadron Leader Viking, switch to secure channel protocol NPBM 6.” It was Admiral Stahl.
I found I had to use my Wrist PDD GalCom protocol as the Wolfcraft Com equipment did not have that option to go to Nano pulse-burst mode. “Sorry, sir, that it took so long; this com didn’t have any NPBM capability.”
“I ordered all Fleet com to switch. Some heads will roll in my Comm. Department as they should have known Wolfcraft IV do not have that equipment. We are still at least twenty hours away. The Devi is going as fast as she can. Assess situation and report.”
Eric Olafson: Space Pirate Page 19
