Admiral's Fall

by Luke Sky Wachter

  “Thanks, Doc!” the Sergeant said with relief. He didn’t know what he would have told the Admiral if his wife died on the Commandos' watch.

  Chapter 44: Desperate Measures

  “I don’t know why you should get all the fun, Commodore,” sneered the ship captain on his screen, “you’ve got command of the squadron. Your place is here. Far better to cut me and my ship loose while you hold things together here.”

  “Do you understand my orders, Captain Jackson?” he asked frostily.

  “I don’t see what my understanding has to do with you hogging all the glory, Druid,” Captain Rampage snapped, “my crew’s been in tighter situations than this and pulled through before. We’ve got a proven track record. Just give us the order and we’ll seal up those Imperials and wrap them in a bow for you and the Little Admiral.”

  “Time is of the essence,” Commodore Druid of the MSP said firmly and then at Captain Quentin ‘Rampage’ Jackson’s mutinous look added, “I’ve got this, Captain. You just hold the line here.”

  “Not a problem. Even if I have to wreck this ship, too, not a one of those enemies will get past the Metal Titan,” Captain Rampage said seriously. “Good luck, Commodore.”

  “We’ve got something better than luck. As we’re about to prove, the old crew of the Parliamentary Power has got skill—something we weren’t able to showcase when the old Invictus Rising got the jump on us. But we’ll showcase it now,” he said with finality.

  This was his shot. His one opportunity to set the record right and wipe free the stain of the Parliamentary Power’s loss from his record and from the legacy of the crew. It was 'do or die,' and by all the demons of the netherworld they were ready.

  “We are Murphy’s fly and it’s time to spill some ointment,” ordered Druid, snapping orders as his ship pulled free from the battle line and engaged its engines. “Tell the Chief I need one hundred and ten percent on the engines, Mr. Shapiro,” instructed the Commodore.

  “Aye, Sir,” agreed the stout little man before passing the orders.

  “And stay frosty with those bucking cables, Benjamin,” he said flatly, “there’s no way that Battleship rams the Little Admiral’s flagship on my watch. No way in all the blazes.”

  “I’ll handle it personally, Sir!” said the Engineering Watch Stander on the Bridge.

  “See that you do,” instructed Commodore Druid, turning eyes of iron on the enemy ship in his targeting reticule.

  Some men might think he was after, glory but the Commodore knew something most of those would forget. This battle hinged on the Super Battleship Lucky Clover II and it would be won or lost on whether or not it could survive the next few minutes.

  “Oh, and somebody inform the Admiral that we’re coming. But if he asks, I’m unavailable,” said Druid because no one, not the little Admiral of the MSP himself, was going to stop them now.

  Chapter 45: End Maneuvers

  “Gunboats report total engine annihilation. It’s down to maneuvering thrusters over there,” reported Lieutenant Commander Steiner.

  “Annihilation, my hairy left foot! They may be shut down but there have been no explosions in the stern of that ship,” growled the First Officer.

  “I’m just relaying their message to the Admiral,” Lisa snapped back.

  I opened my mouth to calm the situation, but before I could speak I was interrupted by Lieutenant Shepherd’s dire interjection.

  “They may have taken out its engines but that Battleship is still on ramming course. Given our current speed and those maneuvering thrusters, it’s going to be tight—real tight. I’m not sure if we’re going to escape,” said the Navigator.

  “Belay that sort of defeatist talk, Nav,” ordered Manblaster, “with Mr. DuPont at the helm we’re going to slide past that enemy Battleship easier than a greased pig in a hog-catching contest.”

  “That’s the ticket,” I said, clouting Joe Manblaster on the shoulder. This guy was proving to be a much better First Officer than Tremblay had been even on his best day...and that man hadn’t had a lot of good days.

  DuPont looked over and visibly pasted a weak smile in our direction, silently giving his own opinion on the likelihood of our great escape, and quickly turned back to his console.

  Like a linebacker who’d cleared the O-line, the Reclamation warship continued its slow and ponderous charge. If there had been any notion before this that they intended to veer off at the last moment, it was now gone as far as I was concerned. These people were committed and worse, at this point there were only a trickle of escape pods leaving her.

  Contrasting that, Commodore Druid’s ship was doing the Battleship equivalent of a bat out of Hades—and it hadn’t slowed down a wink.

  “Is the Commodore still refusing hails?” I asked my Chief of Staff.

  She put a hand to her ear, spoke, and then turned to me.

  “His staff says he’s still too busy to come to the vid-link,” she reported.

  I shook my head as our gunnery department continued to slam broadside after broadside into the enemies to our rear, and our Shield Operator continued to call out an ever-decreasing shield percentage.

  If we could pull through this then we could blast free the front firing port of the Clover and lay waste to the battlefield. If we couldn’t stop the ram attack, or if those ships to our rear shot down our shields and crippled our engines, everything would still be in doubt if not lost entirely.

  It looked like we were about to see the measure of the MSP’s resolve pitted against that of the Norfolk’s Reclamation Fleet. Tensing up despite myself, I wondered just who was going to win this battle of wills.

  Chapter 46: The Final Confrontation

  “Hold steady, men,” I said gripping the arms of my throne with white knuckled fingers.

  Like watching a train wreck there was nothing I could do as DuPont worked the helm and the enemy Battleship entered danger-close range.

  “This is going to be tight,” I said, and then feeling the ever green eye in the room on me forced myself to visibly relax and present an image of total confidence.

  Silently chastising myself for the lapse, I reminded myself that I wasn’t surrounded only by the veteran crew on my flag bridge, I was once again running a command bridge and half my crew weren’t hardened veterans.

  Like an angel of doom, all I could do was watch as our gun deck switched targets and half our lasers, all of the ones on the side of the ship facing the ram attack, opened fire in one last ditched attempt to ward off the inevitable.

  The Commodore’ s ship was rushing forward with all its might, but was simply too far to come. 'Nearly there' wasn’t 'actually there,' after all.

  “I just ran the numbers again and I don’t think they’re going to make it in time, Sir,” said Shepherd heavily, “that slight downward jog they did so they can come up slightly underneath the enemy cost them too much time.”

  “The Commodore did his best,” I said steadily, “there was no point in getting here only to drive their ship into us too.”

  “That was never an issue,” muttered the Navigator.

  Apparently as able to run the numbers as we were, Druid’s flagship suddenly put on a burst of speed as its main and secondary engines flared even brighter and its maneuvering thrusters flared to sudden life.

  “They’re moving too fast. I don’t see what they’re trying to do. There’s no way they’ll survive a counter ram at that speed and they haven’t launched a single escape pod,” observed First Officer Manblaster, “if this was an attempt to scare them off, I don’t think it’s going to work.”

  “Steady on, Joe. I expect Druid is about to give us all a surprise,” I said. He’d better be, I silently added. I was not at all liking the feeling that the battle space I was operating in was out of my control. The new and improved Lucky Clover was proving to be even more of a slug than a regular Battleship, and I wasn’t liking it at all. The otherwise overwhelming main armament was proving to have several decided drawback
s.

  “Not a problem, Admiral,” said Manblaster.

  “Enemy Battleship will impact the ship in 10-9-8…” Shepherd started to call out.

  “How long until our main engine fires, Weapons?” I asked quickly.

  “Twenty seconds, Sir,” Weapons said in a high-pitched voice.

  I looked over to make one last fatalistic comment, only to see an otherwise calm First Officer facing the main-screen with his eyes closed.

  Shaking my head, I decided to dispense with the witty repartee and turned back to face the screen. If I was about to die or be knocked unconscious, I intended to face it with my eyes fully open.

  Then, like an avenging angel of mercy, Druid’s ship shot past with bucking cables launching out from the spine of his ship. For a moment they hung in space, looking like a clean miss, before snagging on the nose of enemy Battleship.

  “That won’t do any—” Shepherd started pessimistically right before the cables snapped with a violent jerk that sent Druid’s Battleship shooting sideways and off-course for any kind of intercept. However, not before the movement revealed a half dozen shuttles hidden behind the body of Druid’s Battleship—shuttles that were not moved off-course and which slammed into the Reclamation Battleship at high speed.

  As Druid’s ship barreled right over the top of our rear end, close enough to scrape a good five percent on our shields, a massive explosion rocked the screen and the enemy ship was forced into a twisting, end-over-end roll that took out the rest of our shields on the starboard side and then just barely cleared the top of our hull.

  “Starboard shields are gone,” Longbottom yelped.

  “We’re alive!” Manblaster shouted in what sounded like disbelief.

  “We’re also taking fire,” snapped Petty Officer Blythe, “the Battleship to our starboard stern is continuing to press the attack.”

  “No rest for the weary,” I said with a hungry expression. “Tell Spalding to blast free our forward facing firing port and you’d better start charging that capacitor, Weapons.”

  “The capacitor is fully charged, Sir,” replied the Weaponeer.

  “Mr. DuPont!” I said, looking at the Helmsman sharply.

  “On it, Sir,” he said, every thruster on the ship suddenly flaring.

  “Let’s see if we can’t take some of the pressure off the Metal Titan,” I bared my teeth.

  “I’m closing the main engine port before we lose it,” reported Blythe.

  “Good call,” I nodded.

  “Target acquired,” reported Weapons.

  “Fire!” I shouted, pounding the arms of my throne.

  There was a deep thrum, and moments later a fiery ball of death shot forward, striking an enemy Battleship in the stern.

  She wasn’t totally destroyed, but that was one ship that was going nowhere fast.

  “Scratch one Battleship, Admiral,” DuPont said gladly as the force of the blast, assisted by his control over our grav-based secondary engines, slid us abruptly backwards in space and not-coincidentally brought both of the ships to our stern within our firing arc.

  “The Commodore reports he’s coming around but it’s going to take him a couple minutes to get back in the fight,” my Chief of Staff reported from her position in the com-department.

  “Stay focused, people. This battle isn’t over til it’s over, and we don’t stop until the fat lady starts her singing,” I said, slapping the side of my throne happily.

  “I suggest we send in the gunboats to help relieve the difficulty to our stern,” advised First Officer Manblaster.

  “Make it so, Joe,” I said.

  The enemy ships to our front hurriedly activated their engines, maneuvering fast to get away from our main gun and back to our rear.

  Despite the best efforts of the boats, they were successful in returning to our blind spot. And this time both of them did their best to harry us and destroy our engines from the starboard side.

  Unfortunately for them, the Clover wasn’t just built tough, she was built to last in exactly this sort of engagement. They took out our starboard shield generators and damaged the blast doors covering our main engine’s exhaust port, but five minutes after our previous shot the gunboats, with the help of our starboard broadside, were through their shields and the main gun was once again ready to fire.

  “Gunboats report it’ll take ’em a little awhile to reduce this pair to the scrap metal they’re supposed to be, but they say they’re still game, Sir,” Lisa Steiner reported steadily.

  “Fire when ready,” I commanded, and I’d barely finished speaking when the main gun spoke again.

  Apparently a couple of people are eager, I thought, glancing at the Weaponeer and our Helmsman before looking back over at the gunboat force on our main-screen. It had thinned out considerably, by at least another fifty boats if I was any judge, and I did my best to hide a wince.

  “Thank you for the update, Lisa,” I said gravely as I pulled up a count on my computer showing there were only 156 still active gunboats remaining, “I’m afraid I’m going to have to take our boat commanders up on that offer. Tell them as soon as they finish taking the engines of these two out of the picture, they’re free to return to their carrier to rest up and rearm.

  “I will tell them that, Sir,” said my Chief of Staff. I hated to ask it, but the fact was as soon as their engines were down we could get out of range and this battle would be close to in the bag.

  “A hit!” declared Weapons as another enemy Battleship fell out of formation and broke in half.

  “I told you: all you needed was someone who can work the helm properly,” DuPont puffed up as another Battleship fell out of formation. “Let’s focus on the next target.”

  Looking at the screen, I saw the three Battleships that had pulled away were now pointed at us and advancing rapidly.

  “Tell the Metal Titan and the other three members of their squadron we could use some assistance. Have them disengage and return to help us out with the remnants of that bucking cable force. We can handle the ships in front of us while they deal with the remnants,” I said.

  They could stand off those ships to our rear which meant that unless Norfolk sent another ship to ram us, we had this battle in the bag.

  Chapter 47: Norfolk in Fury

  “Admiral, we must withdraw, Sir!” advised Senior Captain Wilkins in a rising voice.

  “Never! Montagne dies today,” roared Norfolk, “the blood of our spacers cries out for vengeance. Captain,” he said turning to the flag captain in command of his flagship, “set a course for that Super Battleship. Ramming speed!”

  The Flag Captain blinked.

  “Sir! That’s a direct violation of our orders. You yourself said if the battle was lost we were to withdraw,” protested Wilkins.

  The Rear Admiral pulled out his sidearm and held it with the muzzle facing the floor.

  “This isn’t the first time I’ve had someone question my orders in the middle of a fleet battle,” he coldly reminded his Chief of Staff.

  “But High Command…,” Wilkins paled, trailing off as Norfolk raised his weapon.

  “My order stands.”

  The Flag Captain cleared his throat. “I’m afraid this ship will not be engaging in any suicide mission today, Sir. As your Chief of Staff said, we have orders to withdraw. This ship will not be ramming anyone,” said the Flag Captain.

  Norfolk whirled. “Either he dies or I die,” said Norfolk, leveling his weapon.

  There was a flash as a weapon discharged. “I had hoped it wouldn’t come to this,” sighed the Flag Captain.

  “You just shot the Admiral,” gaped Wilkins as Norfolk collapsed to the floor.

  “I’m acting on the personal orders of Admiral Davenport and Imperial High Command, and so are these Marines. After his last episode of shooting down his own captain at Easy Haven, contingency orders were issued,” the Flag Captain said stone-faced, and then turned to the Marine jacks on the bridge, “take the Admiral down to Medica
l immediately. If he is stabilized, escort him to the brig. He can explain himself to a military tribunal…if he survives.”

  “Aye aye, Captain,” said the Marine.

  “General order to the fleet: all ships are to withdraw from this star system by order of the Empire. Acknowledge or be classified as a mutineer,” said the Flag Captain.

  Wilkins gaped at the Flag Captain as the Marines put the Admiral on a stretcher and hurried him to a turbo-lift.

  Chapter 48: Victory and Sweeping Up

  I stared at the screen in surprise as every ship in the Imperial fleet began to move away from us, in a chain reaction that started with the three warships from the original two squadron bucking cable party which were first to turn and began blasting for the hyper limit.

  “Did we win?” asked Manblaster.

  “It appears so,” I said, watching as the enemy continued to fleet in all directions.

  “Huh. Normally it takes a little longer for them to realize they’re beat,” I said, thinking back to the long and protracted battles leading up to and culminating in Easy Haven.

  “Shall I order a pursuit?” prompted Lisa Steiner.

  I frowned. “Order the screen under Laurent to initiate a pursuit,” I said finally, “but if it looks too tough to handle, bypass it.”

  “Do you want us to continue firing, Sir?” asked DuPont.

  I looked at him like he was stupid. “I haven’t heard a surrender request, Helmsman. We keep going until they’re out of range,” I said.

  “Of course, Sir,” the Helmsman seemed more than happy with the rebuke.

  We got off three more shots before the last warships got out of range.

  The Imperials kept running until they hit the hyper limit and left, and it was a very much reduced fleet that did so.

  “I think it’s time the Multi-Sector Patrol Fleet once again finish something the New Confederation has already attempted and failed at. Anyone up for liberating the Sector?” I asked drolly.