Marshall stared at Doctor Schmidt blankly as he digested what he had said. ‘How long will it take?’
Schmidt’s eyes flickered as he performed a rapid calculation. ‘Two or three hours, perhaps, maybe less if I start the moment we’re done here.’
‘Do it,’ Marshall ordered. ‘Right now we need to know everything we can about this species. They could be sufficiently advanced that we’re already doomed, but I’m not going down without a fight. We need to find a weak spot in their armor and we need to do it fast.’
Foxx wracked her brain for a rapid solution to the crisis, more aware now than ever of what was at stake as she glanced at the damaged warship outside the station. She knew from school that it had taken intelligent human life around four and a half billion years to appear on earth, and that event had occurred in a relatively stable solar system in a sedate corner of the Milky Way galaxy’s Orion Arm. Much of the rest of the galaxy was a turbulent milieu of gravitational waves compressing spiral arms into dense clouds of violent star birth, or superheated to millions of degrees in the galaxy’s dark heart, wherein ruled the gargantuan supermassive black hole Sagittarius A.
Life could not realistically be expected to emerge in these dense, hot, radiation bathed furnaces, and so mankind looked to similar areas of the galaxy for signs of life around yellow spectral stars like the sun, or long lived red and brown dwarf star systems, or in globular clusters where millions of suns would fill the sky in a dazzling halo of stars orbited by planetary systems rich in the heavy metals necessary for life.
‘They must have been doing this for millennia,’ she concluded. ‘They’re nomads.’
‘That is likely true,’ Schmidt agreed.
‘So you’re sayin’ that the entity we captured must be old,’ Vasquez said, ‘really old.’
Schmidt nodded.
‘Who knows what this life form may once have looked like, but it has clearly progressed to a state that we no longer recognize immediately as life, not in its current and natural form anyway.’
Rear Admiral O’Hara looked at Nathan and Foxx.
‘You must hunt them down, all of them,’ she said. ‘You must find out how many of these things there are and what they’re trying to do before our enemy reveals itself. If you don’t, I fear that the fate that befell the Ayleeans will be visited upon us and that there is little time remaining to prevent our extinction. Go, now.’
The men and women at the table stood up and hurried away to perform their duties. Nathan wasted no time in approaching Admiral Marshall.
‘Admiral, you said that Endeavour is a ship in CSS and that it encountered the enemy?’
‘What of it?’ Marshall asked, clearly preoccupied with the task at hand.
Nathan swallowed, suddenly uncertain of how to voice his concerns. ‘I have family aboard her.’
Marshall looked at him curiously for a moment. The admiral knew enough about how Nathan had come to be here that the idea of him having any surviving family was remote in the extreme. And yet, here he was. Nathan could see the understanding blossom in the admiral’s eyes, but any sense of compassion was devoid from his expression.
‘We all have people aboard the fleet,’ he replied. ‘Endeavour is a military vessel and completed its mission to the best of her crew’s ability. You’re one of us now, Ironside, and if you have family in the fleet this probably won’t be the first time they find themselves in danger. Get used to it.’
Marshall strode off with his lieutenants as Detective Foxx moved to Nathan’s side.
‘Thanks for the pep talk,’ Nathan muttered as the admiral hurried away.
‘He’s got a lot on his plate,’ she said in a meagre attempt to comfort him.
‘Sula was on Endeavour,’ was all he could say in reply, and then he looked down at Foxx, ‘which one is she?’
Foxx’s hand closed around his arm in comfort as Allen and Vasquez waited a discreet distance away.
‘That one,’ Foxx said, and pointed out of the vast viewing ports.
Nathan looked out into the blackness and saw the shattered hulk of the ship he’d noticed when he’d first walked in.
‘No,’ he gasped and pulled away from her.
‘Is there something wrong here?’ Rear Admiral O’Hara asked as he strolled over.
Nathan whirled. ‘Sula Reyon, eighteen, Ensign aboard Endeavour. Can you tell me where she is?’
Admiral O’Hara raised a questioning eyebrow and turned to his assistant, who quickly accessed a roster and scrutinized it for several long moments.
‘Sula Reyon is not on the roster for CSS Endeavour,’ the assistant reported.
Nathan’s shoulders sank in relief and he sighed as he rubbed his forehead with his hands. Then, he looked up in confusion.
‘But she was assigned to the ship before she left earth,’ he said. ‘Why wasn’t she aboard?’
The assistant glanced down at the roster.
‘Sula was assigned to Lieutenant Hackett, a pilot aboard Endeavour who had recently been transferred from CSS Victory. Sula was transferred to another frigate for her induction as Hackett was considered an unsuitable mentor for her.’
‘Which one?’ Nathan asked eagerly.
‘CSS Defiance,’ the assistant reported cheerfully.
Nathan’s train of thought collapsed into disorder and he swayed on the spot as Foxx moved in alongside him.
‘Are you sure about that?’ she asked.
‘Of course,’ the assistant said, confused at their concern. ‘Sula wasn’t aboard Endeavour.’
‘No,’ O’Hara said, ‘unfortunately she must have been transferred just before the two ships were diverted to Ayleea. Defiance is currently missing in action after a combat engagement that Endeavour barely survived.’
‘Oh,’ the assistant said, and averted her eyes from Nathan’s gaze.
‘I’m sorry,’ Admiral O’Hara said to Nathan. ‘As soon as I have any news I will contact you immediately.’
Nathan nodded vacantly but said nothing as Admiral O’Hara turned and walked away from the chamber.
‘I only met her a few days ago,’ Nathan said softly to Foxx.
‘And you’ll meet her again,’ Foxx encouraged him. ‘We don’t know what’s happened yet, but there’s nothing we can do for Sula except our jobs.’
Nathan realized that there was one entity in their possession that might actually know what the enemy wanted from humanity, where the infiltrators might be, and how to destroy them. His fists clenched as he headed for the exit, rage building inside him like an unstoppable wave as he wondered where Sula was and whether she was safe.
‘We need to get back to New Washington.’
***
XXII
CSS Defiance
‘Approaching destination coordinates.’
The bridge of the frigate was so quiet that Captain Jordyn Lucas could hear the combined breathing of her fellow officers above the faint hum of electronics and computers. The bridge was bathed in red light and the heat was intense, a consequence of Lucas ordering engineering to divert every last watt of power into the engines.
Defiance had leaped out of the Ayleea system on emergency coordinates, a common tactical safety net designed to allow fleet warships to evade dangerous situations at a moment’s notice. Both she and Captain Travis Harper of Endeavour had agreed upon a rendezvous point in the event that such a leap was necessary, but when Defiance had arrived there they had found nothing, no sign of Endeavour and no evidence of gravitational waves that might have betrayed her presence.
‘How much did you see?’
Captain Lucas looked at Lieutenant Ellen Goldberg, who had recently been released from the sick bay after being checked out and reported to the bridge. The fighter pilot stood with a young, blonde Ensign whom Lucas didn’t recognize.
‘Not much,’ Goldberg said. ‘We were close in with Fortitude and she looked intact, but then that stuff just came right at us so we turned tail and ran. We didn’t see the capita
l ship until a moment before she opened fire. That’s when Tyrone called a warning to Endeavour but it was too late.’
‘Tyrone?’ Lucas asked. ‘Your wingman?’
‘Tyrone Tornado Hackett, Flight Leader.’ The voice of the Executive Officer, a tall and gaunt man by the name of Walker, was soft but carried with it the weight of his experience.
‘A Lieutenant, serving aboard Victory and then Endeavour. It was he whom we left behind at Ayleea.’
Sula saw Captain Lucas briefly close her eyes and nod, apparently consulting her ocular implant before she opened her eyes again. ‘Heroic beggar isn’t he, for someone who was recently grounded according to his flight report.’
‘He’s misunderstood,’ Ellen said carefully.
‘He’s repeatedly misunderstood the concept of rank, seniority and duty according to his service records,’ Walker snapped back, but even his sharp tones suddenly softened. ‘But his flying is of the first order. I’ve never seen a fleet pilot pull a stunt like that before.’
‘Nor had I,’ Ellen admitted as she glanced at Sula. ‘Tyrone served during the last months of the Ayleean War, and he doesn’t trust the Ayleeans. The diversion here only made things worse because he believes that the accord was a mistake.’
‘What an officer believes is irrelevant,’ Walker snapped. ‘Their duty is what matters.’
‘So does their courage,’ Lucas murmured softly, but was distracted by her thoughts.
Captain Lucas knew that Endeavour’s absence meant that she had been so badly mauled by the alien vessel that she had been forced to leap for the nearest colony she could find, her damage preventing her from reaching both the rendezvous point and then onward home to Sol. She also knew from the brief datalink transmissions received before their respective super luminal leaps that Endeavour had been hit just once by the alien vessel, and yet that hit had effectively crippled the frigate and forced her to retreat.
Now Defiance was reaching a second leap point, heading not for Sol but in a wider arc to avoid drawing the enemy closer to home. Lucas could only hope that the enemy vessel would choose to follow her and not Endeavour, that they would be tempted by a fresh target.
‘You’re playing a dangerous game, captain,’ Walker said.
‘Service in the fleet is not meant to be a safe game, XO,’ she replied, unwilling to show any hint of the crippling doubt she bore on her shoulders. ‘Tactical?’
Walker, his hands behind his back, remained otherwise motionless as his eyes swiveled to glance at his display screen.
‘We’ve left a clear trail,’ he replied. ‘Endeavour successfully veiled her leap signature, which is what we should have done too.’
‘Endeavour was crippled,’ Lucas replied, keeping her voice down. ‘She would have headed for Proxima Centauri or perhaps directly home.’
‘Concealed,’ Walker reminded her. ‘We were already the favorable target once Endeavour had cleared the field.’
‘Better safe than sorry.’
‘Us, or them?’ Walker asked without looking at her.
‘Ten seconds,’ came the navigation officer’s warning.
‘Shields up,’ Lucas snapped. ‘Divert engine power to plasma cannons. I want a salvo ready the moment we drop out of super luminal.’
The officers swiftly complied with the captain’s orders and Lucas took a last moment to survey her crew. Their faces in the ugly glow of the emergency lighting looked like shocked angels huddling away from the demonic red glare of some unspeakable creature. All of them had witnessed the destruction of Ayleea and the damage wrought on Endeavour, and now they knew that Defiance was likely only seconds ahead of the huge warship they had encountered barely two hours before.
‘Five seconds, four, three, two…’
Lucas grabbed the arm rests of her seat as the red light on the bridge was warped and a bright flare of white light burst from the main display screen. Her guts convulsed as the frigate decelerated from super luminal cruise and rocketed out of its gravity well into deep space.
‘All stations, no contacts!’ the signals officer called.
‘All plasma cannons fully charged, shields up!’ came the report from the tactical officer.
‘Helm, hard to port!’ Lucas snapped. ‘Bring us about!’
Defiance heeled over as the frigate turned hard to bring its broadside to bear on any craft following their gravity wake. Lucas watched and waited as the ship turned, circling back to a position directly behind their own gravity well.
‘She’s not there,’ Walker said. ‘They didn’t take the bait.’
Lucas said nothing, watching both the main display screen and the signals sweep of the local area. She had chosen the spot for a reason, something that her father had once said after a command tour in the Ayleean War: In space, there’s nowhere to hide. It’s like fighting in a swimming pool, where everything moves slowly and everyone can see you. You have to make the universe fight for you. You have to find something to help.
To the right flank, silent and dark, she saw the sensors detect a field of debris that caused distant stars to flicker as unseen objects passed by in the infinite blackness. Virtually invisible to the naked eye, the debris field was the remains of several moons that had once orbited a star that had died long ago, its feeble white dwarf remnant burning several Astronomical Units away and barely brighter than other far more distant starts.
‘Open an emergency channel to Polaris Station,’ Lucas ordered.
The communications officer obeyed instantly, then Sula saw him frown as he adjusted his controls.
‘The channel is open but the interference from a nearby white dwarf star is causing an intermittent connection. We can’t signal them in real time, we’ll have to keep it open and hope for the best that something makes it through.’
‘Time lag?’ Captain Lucas asked.
The officer glanced briefly at his instruments. ‘An hour, maybe two.’
‘It’ll have to do,’ Lucas replied as she glanced again at the shadowy asteroid belt. The one thing that could save them was now the one thing blocking their line of contact with home. ‘Record everything and transmit as of now. We’ll send them everything we’ve learned so far and…’
‘Contact, gravity bow shock, zero nine zero, elevation two four!’
‘Hard to starboard, port guns to bear, all power to main cannons!’ Lucas yelled.
‘We can’t fight them!’ Walker snapped. ‘They’re too powerful!’
Lucas nodded, almost standing out of her seat as she saw a patch of stars ripple on the main screen as the alien ship’s gravity well warped the curvature of space time before them.
‘We’re not here to fight,’ she replied. ‘We’re here to learn.’
‘We’re here to do what?’
‘Contact, vessel, capital class, port bow!’
Lucas squinted as she saw the gravity well flare bright white and the huge alien warship lurched out of super luminal cruise in the same spot that Defiance had, barely five kilometers away.
‘Fire all, now!’
Defiance shuddered as her port batteries opened up with a salvo of twelve massive plasma charges. Captain Lucas saw the shots rocket away from the frigate, bright blue and white spheres of energy each as large as houses.
The shots crossed the vacuum of space between the two vessels in less than three seconds and slammed into the alien vessel with a ripple of brilliant explosions that tore into her hull. Lucas shot out of her seat and let out a ragged cry that matched those coming from the rest of the crew as they saw the salvo hit home.
‘Evasive manoeuvers!’
Defiance lurched and accelerated as it turned, coming around behind the big warship as Lucas peered at the main display screen and saw flickering lines of bright orange flame surrounding the ship’s massive hull panels on her port bow.
‘I’m detecting damage,’ the tactical officer reported. ‘She came out of super luminal with her shields down! She’s trailing debris and gases!’
‘Analyze them!’ Lucas snapped. ‘And then get us out of here! Helm, take a heading directly toward the stellar remnant!’
Walker stared at Lucas. ‘But there’s an asteroid field in the way!’
Before she could reply the tactical officer shouted a warning. ‘I’m detecting a massive energy surge, she’s turning and preparing to fire!’
‘All power rear shields!’ Lucas yelled as the ship accelerated away from the alien vessel. ‘Keep running!’
Walker wrung his hands as he saw on the main display screen the huge ship’s plasma cannons glow with vivid yellow light as the huge vessel swung around and then four red plasma charges rocketed from them. The massive shots filled the screen in an instant.
‘Brace for impa…’
The shots slammed into Defiance’s stern and the entire vessel heaved as her shields took the force of the blows and tried to dissipate the energy across the hull. Lucas threw her hands up to protect her face as wall panels burst outward in showers of sparks and flames licked across the ceiling.
‘Direct hits, two impacts astern!’ the engineering officer shouted, struggling to stay upright at his post. ‘Shields are holding but another hit like that and we’re scrap metal!’
Lucas looked at the tactical display on her viewing screen and knew that there was nowhere else to run.
‘Head into the asteroid field!’ she snapped. ‘Right now!’
The helmsman did not hesitate to obey the command, but Walker stormed to her side.
‘We can’t run in there! Once inside we’ll be trapped.’
Lucas strapped herself into her command seat. ‘They’re on a mission, XO. They won’t want to spend hours hunting us in there. It’s the only way we can save ourselves.’
Predator (Old Ironsides Book 3) Page 17
