by Terry Mixon
Kelsey commanded the armor to seal as soon as she slipped inside. The systems came online and did an auto check. All green. Talbot would check her again before they boarded anything. She disconnected the armor from its stand and took two steps forward.
She squatted and then stretched. The range of motion was good and the armor settled around her like a little black dress. Her implants had already overridden her senses and she could see and hear everything around her.
To make a point, she stepped in front of Meyer without turning on the chameleon portion of the helmet. All he would be able to see was a featureless helmet of hardened metal without the slightest hint of humanity.
“Forget what you think you know about me, Commander. I’ve earned my maturity the hard way. Do not underestimate me.”
To his credit, Meyer stood his ground. “I won’t, Highness. And in return I ask you to consider that you don’t know everything about either your half-brother or Captain Breckenridge.”
The corners of her lips quirked upward. He had more steel than she’d expected. “I’ve dropped the half-brother reference. Jared is my brother. I know him a hell of a lot better than your CO. Captain Breckenridge is going to need to prove himself to me, and so are you. Be glad we’re only boarding a freighter. That has to be easier than a stand up firefight. Or crash landing a pinnace.”
She turned the helmet projection on and watched his expression as her face appeared. It wasn’t really her, but the projection on the helmet was very lifelike.
That’s when the overhead alarms began to ring. Jared’s voice rang out through the overheads. “All hands to battle stations. This is not a drill.”
Kelsey brought the ship’s tactical overlay back up. The task force had split up. Courageous was on her way toward the enemy flip point. The other five ships were still heading for the two ships in the enemy task force. That wasn’t the plan.
She pinged Jared through the ship’s network. What’s happening? Why did we change course?
Captain Breckenridge said he has enough ships to run down a destroyer. We’re to play backstop to make sure the enemy doesn’t slip past him and make a run for it.
Is that the best idea?
No. My guess is that he doesn’t trust us not to get involved. Keep prepping for your mission. We might have to board the destroyer if things go south.
She scowled at Meyer. “Your captain changed the plan at the last minute. We’re on the way to the enemy flip point while he tries to take out the destroyer and capture the freighter on his own. If this goes bad, I’m going to be pissed.”
Meyer took a step back. “I’m certain that he had his reasons.”
“They’d better be damned good. Suit up. We might need to launch in a hurry. Coulter, get him ready.”
“Aye, Highness. This way, Commander.”
She was certain that ‘Aye, Highness’ wasn’t the correct response, but she had to admit it made her smile.
Kelsey made her way over to Lieutenant Reese. The officer was huddled with Talbot and the other noncoms. They had ship plans up on one of the screens. It didn’t look like a freighter.
They made room for her without comment. Reese tapped the screen. “I just got word that our potential target has changed. This is the most common type of destroyer in the Old Empire, a Zombie class. Small, fast, but relatively lightly armed.”
She loaded the plans into her implants. “Faster than this ship? Lightly armed in comparison to what? Us? The task force?”
“Courageous can take her, if she can catch her. The task force can, too, though their lack of missile range leaves them open for a mauling if they screw up. Captain Mertz says he warned them.” The marine officer shook his head. “They’re making this more complicated than I like, but that’s been our luck lately.”
“Status change,” Courageous said through the overhead speakers. “The enemy vessels have changed course back toward the hostile flip point and are accelerating.”
Kelsey looked at the tactical situation through the ship’s passive scanners. They could directly detect the enemy ships at this point. “Courageous, can we cut them off from the flip point?”
“Affirmative, if the situation remains static. If the destroyer accelerates, this vessel is not close enough to stop it from fleeing.”
“Well, we’ll just have to hope that—”
The Fleet task force accelerated sharply. If the enemy had only suspected their presence before, they knew they were there now.
“Dammit,” Kelsey cursed. “What the hell is that man thinking? He’s going to spook them into splitting up. The bastards are going to get away.”
Reese looked grim. “Let’s hope not. If they do, the Pentagarans are in real danger of an invasion. And so are we.”
Chapter Eleven
Jared watched in frustration as the enemy destroyer accelerated away from the freighter. At that speed, it was going to beat them handily to the flip point. Breckenridge had ruined the ambush.
“Maximum acceleration. I want to be in range of the ship before it flips.”
Courageous leapt to its top speed, but Jared only had to do one check to realize they wouldn’t make it. Even though the battlecruiser had an edge in speed, the destroyer would be able to flip before they came into extreme range.
The Fleet task force had split in two. The faster ships were in pursuit of the destroyer while Spear headed for the freighter. That really made no sense. Why send a heavy cruiser to catch a freighter? The Pentagaran ships coming out from Erorsi would be able to catch the lumbering cargo ship before it got to the flip point. Breckenridge shouldn’t have split his forces.
That’s when it hit him. Breckenridge wanted to capture the freighter and its cargo for himself. He’d come up with some excuse or reason to keep it. Or he’d try.
Jared put it out of his mind. Kelsey could deal with the man once the situation was under control. Right now, he needed to figure out how to stop that fleeing ship.
He watched the situation play out for a little while. The task force had drawn substantially ahead of Courageous during the stealthy approach on the enemy ships. The destroyer was still going to be far outside their missile envelope, but it looked tantalizingly close to them.
Zia turned toward him. “Sir, something isn’t right. The destroyer should be pulling further ahead. It’s not moving at full speed.”
“Are you sure? Perhaps it’s not really a Zombie class.”
“Our scanners are on active mode and I’m getting a decent reading on it. I think it is a Zombie. One that isn’t using its full potential. Sir, I’m concerned it might be sucking the task force into missile range.”
Jared checked the distances between that ship and the task force. “Give them a warning that thing might be setting up an ambush.”
That’s when the destroyer put on a burst of speed, cutting in toward the task force and firing missiles.
“Missiles fired,” Zia said briskly. “Six missiles on an inbound track for the task force. They’re accelerating at Old Empire speeds. The enemy ship is still closing. It’s fired a second salvo. Now it’s turning for the flip point and putting on maximum acceleration.”
Jared watched the two clusters of missiles close in on the task force with a sense of dread. He’d warned them just how capable those weapons were, but that wouldn’t help. The first group of missiles turned out to have two scanner jammers. They blinded the Fleet vessels, allowing two of the real missiles to get through.
Both struck the light cruiser Shadow in titanic explosions. The warship lurched and veered off course, leaving it broadside to the next salvo.
Titan interposed herself between the danger and her wounded companion, firing her antimissile railguns at the incoming weapons. She stopped two of them. Three missiles struck Titan and she exploded with the fury reserved to the gods of failed fusion plants. The remaining missile hit One Bullet, sending the destroyer to join Titan in the grave.
The enemy destroyer had killed a Fleet light
cruiser and destroyer without taking a single bit of damage in return. It hadn’t even come within range for the ships to return fire. Wisely, the remaining two Fleet destroyers began rescue operations, leaving the fleeing enemy to Courageous.
“Tell me we’re going to catch that sonofabitch short of the flip point,” Jared snarled.
Zia shook her head. “He still has enough distance to flip before we come into extreme missile range. We’re going to have to make a combat flip and go after him.”
Jared watched the ship make it to the flip point and disappear with impotent rage. “We have no idea what’s on the other side of the flip point. What are our options?”
The tactical officer held up three fingers. “He’ll either being waiting for us to flip, be hauling ass for the next flip point, or dropped to a crawl, hoping to hide until he gets so far away from the flip point that we can’t find him.
“Odds are good the next system isn’t occupied. The Old Empire maps have it as a white dwarf with no habitable planets. The flip point leading deeper into the Old Empire is on the other side of the system.”
Jared nodded. “He has enough of a lead to get some distance and drop out of sight. The problem I see with that is that we’ll be able to block his escape. If he can ambush us right after the flip, he might be able to take us out. That’s the worst-case. What can we do if that’s his plan?”
“Send a spread of probes through. He won’t get them all. One of them will tell us where he’s at. Then we can flip through and blow him into atoms.”
“Pardon, Captain,” Courageous said. “There is one additional option. This vessel has decoys designed to masquerade as this vessel. One could be sent through and it would likely fool the enemy scanners long enough to draw their fire.”
“That could work. How long until we flip?”
“Just over twenty minutes, Captain,” Ramirez said.
Jared watched the situation behind them as they sped toward the flip point. The Pentagarans were still hours away from being able to assist in the rescue operations. With the loss of Titan and One Bullet, the death toll would be almost two thousand people. They’d blown up so quickly that there wouldn’t be any survivors.
Shadow was intact, but two Old Empire missiles would’ve wreaked havoc inside her. She had to have hundreds dead and even more wounded. The two destroyers would have their hands full with rescue operations. Their medical staffs would work themselves to collapse, but it wouldn’t be enough.
He mentally glared at the icon representing Spear. That bastard should’ve been chasing the enemy destroyer. Those people died because Breckenridge had underestimated the threat. Again.
Jared sighed. He didn’t wish anyone on that ship harm. If Breckenridge had chased the destroyer and the enemy had destroyed Spear, they’d have lost almost as many people.
“Spear is launching pinnaces,” Zia said. “They’ll be boarding the freighter about the time we’re ready to flip.”
Hopefully they could capture the freighter without any further loss of life.
The freighter dashed those hopes when it fired on Spear. A missile flashed out of one cargo hold, followed by two more. The low rate of acceleration told Jared that the enemy had used the same trick he’d used on the Pale Ones shipyard. They’d taken missile warheads without the normal drives and fired them. Perhaps they’d been in the cargo the ship was delivering.
Spear stopped two of them at a safe distance, but the third almost made it before the defensive railguns detonated it. They needed to get on board that freighter as soon as possible.
A missile flashed out of the heavy cruiser and into the freighter. The cargo vessel disintegrated in a massive explosion, destroying everything Jared had hoped to capture: the cargo, prisoners, and any computer records.
He rubbed his face tiredly. Breckenridge had botched every aspect of this ambush by the numbers. The incompetence that he’d accused Jared of was on full display. And he’d no doubt find a way to blame someone else.
Probably Jared.
“Three minutes to flip,” Zia said. “I’m thinking of sending the decoy through on the far edge of the flip point and coming through on this side in fifteen seconds.”
He shook his head. “Reverse that. We’ll go through on the far side. Release the decoy with a good trajectory to go through where we’d transition. We’ll brake hard and go through after it. This is going to be difficult, but I want you to be surgical, Zia. I want that ship crippled, but not destroyed. We need any information from him that we can get. Work with Courageous on targeting critical areas.”
Jared opened a channel to Lieutenant Reese. “We’re flipping in three minutes. Be ready to launch at a moment’s notice. Things went sideways in the ambush. The freighter is gone. We need this ship in one piece.”
“Aye, sir. We’ll do our best. The pinnace we brought over from Athena won’t be as good as the three Old Empire models, but if you can get us close, we’ll be able to lock onto their hull.”
“I’ll buy you every meter that I can. Good luck. I know it’s asking a lot, but keep Kelsey alive for me.”
“I’ll do my best. Reese out.”
They crossed into the flip point and dropped the decoy. Its scanner signature blossomed into one identical with Courageous. Jared was impressed. He wouldn’t have known it was a decoy if he hadn’t seen it come online with his own eyes. Metaphorically speaking.
The decoy flipped and he counted down fifteen seconds. “Raise the screens. Flip the ship.”
The gut-twisting surge of transition washed over him, but he kept a firm lock on the tactical situation through his implants. The first thing he saw was the spread of six missiles arrowing toward the decoy.
He traced them back in a flash and located the destroyer. It was in an area of space that would be behind a ship that made the fastest transition. With the course change he’d laid in, Courageous had the other ship right in her sights at point blank range while they were reloading.
Jared made a split second-decision, overrode Zia’s attack plan, and locked the missiles down. Courageous’ beam weapons came to life at his command and lashed out at the vessel sitting right in their face.
The lances of coherent energy slammed into the enemy’s screens, dropping them. The following shots tore into the destroyer’s hull.
Jared used his knowledge of the enemy deck plan to take out both his fusion plants by vaporizing the cooling and control circuitry. Two other beams disabled two of the missile launchers.
Robbed of the ability to control their own temperature, the plants performed as designed and shut down.
The destroyer fired two missiles at Courageous. Zia stepped in behind Jared and resumed control of the beams. She incinerated the warheads before they closed the distance to Courageous. Then she knocked out the remaining launchers.
The Zombie class destroyers didn’t have beam weapons. The massive power requirements for them restricted them to heavy cruisers or above. The antimissile railgun slugs it fired at them failed to penetrate Courageous’ screens.
Low power, pinpoint shots disabled even that offensive capability. The enemy destroyer hung before them, crippled.
Jared sent the go signal to Reese. This was all in his hands now. And Kelsey’s.
“Captain, I’m picking up a probe moving at high speed,” Zia said. “It’s on a course toward the other flip point in this system. It’s already at the far edge of our missile envelope.”
“Fire missiles. Take it out.”
Probes didn’t have the speed of missiles, but they could flip. He absolutely couldn’t afford to let word of their ambush get back to wherever this ship came from. If the probe got too far away from them, it would escape.
Zia launched four missiles, ludicrous overkill for a probe. Her caution proved warranted when two of Courageous’ missiles burned out before catching it. The other two took it out.
He heaved a sigh of relief. “Thank God.”
The marine pinnaces had launched while
they dealt with the probe and were fast approaching the destroyer. This was the moment of truth.
Chapter Twelve
Kelsey felt surprisingly calm as the pinnaces swooped in on the crippled destroyer. Perhaps having a small celestial body dropped on one put things into perspective.
“Listen up,” Lieutenant Reese said over the general channel. “These people are likely armed with Old Empire weapons and they’ll know this ship better than we do. Don’t take any chances. If someone surrenders, fine. If not, don’t hesitate to put them down.
“If you see any computer equipment, make note of it. The engineering team will secure the ship’s AI. See that they and the princess stay clear of the fighting.”
He gave her a stern look. “The princess will try to stay out of the worst of it, but if she becomes engaged, you will support her to the hilt.”
She snorted softly. She’d keep clear if she could, but if they needed her, she’d bring the heavy firepower.
Reese continued. “We’ll be breaching the hull in four places. Tiger One will take engineering, Two will hit the bow, Three will take port, and Four will hit the starboard. Overwhelm any resistance as quickly as you can and support the other teams. We breach the hull in sixty seconds. Good luck.”
Up close, the ship looked surprisingly like Courageous had when they’d found her. The beams had melted their way through the hull in much the same way. Only there was a lot more debris pouring from the breaches: equipment, air, and bodies.
Kelsey didn’t want to think about that, but these people had just killed thousands of her countrymen. Her gut tightened and she pushed her regrets away. These people had earned what was coming.
Their pinnace stopped short of the enemy and fired the breaching charge, a web of small explosives bound together like a fishing net. It spread across a small area of the hull and exploded. The shaped charges ripped that small section of hull apart.
