Star Man 2: Star Rise

by I. G. Roberts

  Meanwhile, the two Cobras followed a curving course, heading up above the elliptic, using passive Scans to see what, if any impact they had on the Pirate formation. The manoeuvre was far more successful than Colin had dared hope. Then he noticed the ships were moving apart. Colin decided one more run should do it. This time, Theseus and Thor climbed high above the elliptic, then each of the Cobras picked a target and aimed for a position just forward of the ship they wanted to shake up. They also launched five missiles each, timed to arrive only a few seconds after they passed, while the two ship’s crews were still confused about what was happening. Of course, Colin knew the arrival of the missiles would tell the Pirates they were under attack, they simply wouldn’t know which direction the attack was coming from. Just as the Cobras were in position, and about to begin their attack run, Theseus’ Sensor Officer informed him of a Jump emergence at the Jump-Point they planned to use when they went home to Cambridge. Colin asked him to try to identify how many ships were emerging and who, or what they were. A few minutes later he’d been able to count five although two of them were quite small and one was gigantic. It was still far too soon to be able to pick up IFF, so Colin decided to give the new ships something to aim for. If these ships turned out to be friends, he could use the help, if they were civilian, he hoped to see them turn and run, if they were more Pirates, he might be able to draw them closer.

  FNS Theseus and FNS Thor started their second attack, this time intending to pass just forward and slightly to one side of their target ships. Again, they roared down towards the Pirate ships, their missiles following close behind, still coasting. Two seconds before their closest approach, they sent the signals to activate the ten missiles. On the Pirate ships, confusion reigned supreme as the two targeted ships first saw weapons appear out of nowhere and then bucked and slewed to one side and pitched down violently. The forces applied by the Cobra’s drives severely stressed the Shields on the two Pirate vessels. Before the crews could even begin to wrap their minds around what was happening, the missiles started impacting on their Shields. The first two weapons to hit each ship’s Shields caused them to collapse because they were already stressed to near breaking point. The remaining weapons all impacted directly on the hulls causing extensive damage, increasing the carnage and turning the two ships into little more than drifting hulks, barely capable of making headway. In the meantime, the two Cobras streaked away below the elliptic, looping around towards the Pirate's starboard side. Colin wanted to do one more attack run, finishing the job he started with the first two ships they damaged. By now, the sensor operator reported there were now nine ships over near the Jump-Point, and they were broadcasting Federation Navy IFF codes. This put a smile on Colin’s face as Theseus and Thor continued looping around preparing to line up for their attack run. When this attack was completed, he would light up his Shields and turn his IFF on so his allies knew who was who in the zoo.

  Once again, they ran in on their two targets, this time in a more conventional attack pattern, this time they would be hitting the two targets with a spread of twenty missiles and all the Rail-Gun and Laser fire they could manage. They were attacking both ships from their damaged sides, and as soon as they lit off their missiles, they brought their Shields up to full power, enabled the IFF and then began firing the Rail-Guns and Lasers. The effect was utterly devastating, and soon, escape pods began spewing from both Pirate ships.

  On board FNS Samurai over at the Federation task force, Commodore Nicholson was trying to make sense of what was happening with the Pirates. She couldn’t find either of the two Cobras that should have been here, but the Pirates were behaving strangely, almost as if they were under attack, but at this point, she didn’t see any signs of a weapons discharge or missile launch. She began worrying there might be something else here, something she just wasn’t equipped to handle. The unloading of the four Taipans was continuing, and they couldn’t reverse course till they were unloaded. Then she would have to decide whether to leave them behind or to reload them onto the Freighter before leaving the system behind. Suddenly, she could see missiles impacting two of the Pirate ships, weapons that seemed to appear out of nowhere. Sonya smiled, this smelled like the work of one Colin Gordon. She had no idea how he was doing this but knew he would probably need help soon, if nothing else, he had to be running out of bullets soon. As they proceeded in towards the scene of the action, the Freighter and two Taipans broke away from the formation to begin traversing the space between the Jump-Point and Lahoshar.

  On board FNS Theseus, Lieutenant Commander Suni Shimona sat dumbfounded as she watched Colin work. The Lieutenant realized just how wrong she’d been about him. Suni thought the Commander must have ice water running through his veins as he ordered one attack run after the another. She heard the announcement of more ships in the system, but the man made another run, Suni heard the report that the ships were Federation, and the Captain ordered yet another run, this time, finally identifying himself to the Pirates and to the Federation ships. In all, he managed to put four enemy ships out of action using nothing more than guts, cunning, and tactical genius. After the final run, Colin ordered a Laser-Comms channel opened to the incoming Navy ships. He was surprised when Sonya came on-line, a broad grin on her face.

  She said, “You are a very greedy man Commander. It seems you’ve made me come all this way and you don’t want to leave any game behind for me to hunt.”

  Colin could see Sonya was joking, so he said, “I’ve left you these other four, but be aware, they’re a bit wrathy now, I think I’ve upset them, just a little. I’d suggest you let your Cobras and Taipans handle the rest, they need the practice. Would you be too upset with me if we disappear again for a while, I’m sure there’s an observer in the system, and think we know where he is. I’d like to go out there with Thor and pay him a quiet visit, with your permission of course.”

  She laughed and immediately dispatched the two Cobras and two Taipans to deal with the remaining four Pirates before giving Colin permission to go hunting. As soon as she released them, both Theseus, and Thor disappeared again and changing course streaked out in a long looping track intended to bring them up to the suspected spy ship nearly six hours later. While the watcher was running quiet, his stealth capability was a long way short of that available to the Cobras. He was almost exactly where they expected to find him. The first he knew he was in trouble was when several Rail-Gun rounds tore through his engines, destroying them and leaving him with only limited life support and not much power for anything else. Lasers then began burning the limited armament he carried off his outer hull.

  Dave Bach, the owner, and Captain of the Cassandra knew someone was there, he even had a good enough idea where they were, based entirely on where the weapons fire was coming from, but he couldn’t see them on his Sensors. The attackers were fully capable of destroying Dave’s ship if they wanted, but their attacks seemed to be aimed at removing his ability to run or to defend himself. Finally, when Cassandra had no weapons left to fight with, two small ships suddenly appeared, hanging motionless in space, one above him and slightly to his Port forward quarter, the other below, also slightly towards his Port forward quarter. After they had hung there for a few minutes, the Comms Panel lit up indicating an incoming call. By this point, Dave felt like a mouse being stalked by a cat. Dave knew he was dead if the commander of those ships didn’t feel like rescuing him. The people on those ships didn’t even need to waste any more ammunition on him. They only needed to fly away, and Dave would be dead in a few weeks anyway. These two ships weren’t very big, but clearly, they were deadly in the right hands, and Dave knew without a shadow of a doubt, these two were in the right hands. Dave looked over towards his girl Julia then pressed the key, accepting the call and the screen lit up with the face of a man. Dave thought he should recognize that face, but couldn’t quite work out who it was. There was not point trying to argue or complain, so Dave didn’t bother. They had him, and both Dave and they knew it.


  Dave quietly asked, “What are your instructions?”

  The person on the other side said, ”First, how many people do you have on your ship?”

  Dave looked across at his partner Julia again. Technically, she was his slave, but somewhere along the line, he’d fallen in love with her, so he didn’t think of her as a slave. Julia was the right woman for him. The girl filled a hole in his soul Dave never even knew was there till she came along. Julia made him a better person. Dave had never been cruel to her, not ever and Julia responded till they both realized they loved each other. He was prepared to die to protect her. Dave looked at the screen and saw the man on the other end had hard, unflinching eyes. Dave hoped he was doing the right thing but couldn’t see any other choices.

  Dave answered, “There are only two of us. Just me and my part…, my slave.”

  He noticed the man start at his declaration and his eyes softened slightly if only for a second, then he became all business again and said, “I’ll send a Shuttle over to collect you. Do not try anything, do exactly as you’re told, and you will not be harmed. Do you understand?”

  He knew there was no leeway, no give, so Dave just answered, “Yes, Sir. We will wait just inside the port airlock for your Shuttle.”

  Twenty minutes later, a Shuttle docked at his port airlock. When the hatch opened, two fully armoured Troopers entered and secured Julia and Dave. He noted they weren’t unnecessarily rough or cruel, just efficient and once he and Julia were both restrained, the two Troopers quietly led them into the Shuttle before thoroughly searching them. He noticed Julia was looking terrified, so he told her they’d be okay. The Troopers seemed to ignore the interplay. While they were being searched, another six Troopers boarded his ship and examined her thoroughly from top to bottom. Dave didn’t much care anymore, his ship was so badly damaged, he could never afford to fix her, even if he could escape. When he was completely honest, Dave wasn’t even entirely sure he was upset about being captured by the Federation. Over the last two years, Dave had been finding it increasingly difficult to protect Julia from some of the more extreme individuals who seemed to infest the Peschal Alliance. Dave even had to kill two men not long before coming out on this assignment. The only reasons he wasn’t summarily executed were the two he killed were worthless individuals anyway, and the Boss needed him here in Lahoshar System for this job.

  The Troopers sat Dave and Julia in acceleration couches next to each other and secured them before sitting and watching them in silence. There was no attempt to communicate with them, nor was there an effort to treat them badly. The Troopers were efficient, but they weren’t cruel. Dave told Julia to relax then tried to take his own advice, resting his head on the headrest and closing his eyes. Some time later, the other Troopers returned from his ship, and his home carrying two duffels which they secured then everybody strapped in before the Shuttle uncoupled from his ship and made its way back to the one that sent it. On the way back, one of the Troopers caught Dave’s attention and pointed at the duffels.

  He said, “We brought back as much in the way of your personal effects as we could fit. I don’t know what the Captain has planned for you, but he said not to be too harsh, not that we would without provocation. You will both be interrogated when we have time. I’m afraid you won’t be able to see or talk to each other from the time this Shuttle docks, till after your interrogation is completed.”

  Dave nodded, they weren’t threatening to separate him from Julia permanently. Of course, once they knew she was, in fact, a slave, she would be able to choose for herself whether she stayed with him or not. This was a choice Julia never had before. Dave wondered what the girl’s choice would be. Thinking about it made Dave sad when he started to worry Julia would want to leave him.

  Julia sat beside Dave, wondering if the two of them would be separated for long. She’d been a slave all her life, she was born a slave but when Dave bought her at the slave market her life changed. Unlike her former master, Dave was always kind to her, never beat her, or forced her to do something she didn’t want. He taught her things, even showed her how to help him, and he protected her. Now Julia had no way of knowing or understanding what was going to happen to them.

  When the Shuttle went over to the spy-ship, it attached a beacon so the ship could be found again and recovered. As soon as the Shuttle returned and docked, Theseus and Thor departed the area, heading back towards the Task Force Commodore Nicholson had brought to the system. On Lahoshar, those with the ability to observe what was happening within the system were first alarmed when no less than eight Peschal Alliance ships arrived in the system and began traveling toward the planet. The arrival was followed soon after by a cryptic message coming in on FTL Comms, letting them know the Pirates had arrived. Then, some strange things began happening with the Pirate fleet. It almost seemed as if they became confused. Ships did strange things, two even looking on the Sensors as if they collided, then the Pirate ships moved much further apart with two seeming to lag behind the others. Then more ships arrived at another Jump-Point followed by missiles impacting another two ships, weapons that appeared from nowhere. Cusi and Haliban had no idea what was taking place. All they could tell was the Pirates were having a hard time out there. Soon they saw the two ships that appeared to collide near the start were destroyed by weapons fire and two other ships, soon identified as FNS Theseus, and FNS Thor appeared nearby, seemingly out of nowhere. How did they do that, it was unheard of? What new weapon did these people from Cambridge have?

  On FNS Thor, Captain Carl Fraser was having the time of his life. This was the sort of thing Carl had hoped for when he joined the Navy in the first place. Theseus and Thor had destroyed or disabled nine ships between them since entering Lahoshar system. It was completely unprecedented for only two small Patrol ships to be so outstandingly effective against a force that on paper at least, should have been able to make short work of them. The first four on their own should’ve been able to cause these two little Cobras a lot of grief but they barely even fired off a shot. He realized just how much he appreciated having Colin in command here. The man was a tactical genius. You could never tell what Commander Gordon was going to do next. Sonya sent Carl with Colin to keep an eye on him and report back what happened, mostly if there were any problems. By this point, Carl had concluded that Colin was writing an entirely new book about how to use Cobra Patrol Boats, and he was doing a damn good job of it.

  Over on the Pirate Flagship Pavidus, the commander, known by everyone as ‘the Boss’ was in a rage. This should have been a simple, easy operation. This fleet should have been able to go in, fill the Holds with slaves, and make a nice safe profit. But the first four ships disappeared without a trace. Now his eight ships were only four, the others destroyed, and till a few minutes ago, he didn’t know who, or what was causing all the damage. Now the cursed Federation Navy had arrived, just as he finally identified what was attacking them. It was clear they had some new weapon, he just didn’t know what it was. He’d shot his flag Captain for cowardice when the fool suggested they run for the Jump-Point not long after the trouble began. The Boss regretted the impulsive action now, they may have been able to escape then, they couldn’t any longer, though. The Federation ships coming their way were insanely fast and hard to pick up on Sensors. It made no sense whatsoever, but he knew there was no escape, not now. His Comms panel lit up with a demand for immediate surrender. Then he noticed two of the incoming ships decelerating hard. Suddenly, those two ships disappeared, only to reappear half a second later, on the starboard side of his force. He ordered his force to fire all their missiles at the nearest ship. The Point-Defense fire from the two ships on that side had destroyed all his weapons before they covered even half the distance. At the same time, the ships to starboard began an attack run, strafing as they came, dancing around and making it very hard for his Point-Defense to draw a bead. On the odd occasion when he scored a hit, it seemed to bounce harmlessly off their Shields. Now they were right on
top of him, and suddenly he had forty missiles coming in towards his ships. Even these weapons seemed to dance around, making it hard for his Point-Defense. Then all the weapons hit, severely weakening the Shields on all his ships. By now the ships on the port side were making a strafing run, further decreasing the Shield strength on that side. And firing yet more missiles. This time, the Shields on Iugum failed, and two weapons penetrated, exploding inside her engineering spaces, causing her to lose power, and she began tumbling through space, soon spewing escape pods.

  After this disaster, there was a short respite while the Federation ships repositioned themselves for another attack run. While his Shields were beginning to come back up slowly, the Boss had no illusions about how long he had left to live. If they didn’t kill him on this run, they’d do so with the next, or on the run following that one. Again, the surrender demand came in, again the ‘Boss’ ignored it, he knew he’d probably be executed after being captured. He was, after all, one of the signatories to the Peschal Alliance and he was determined to take at least one of these little monsters with him before he died. The monstrous little ships began their next attack run, again from behind so he couldn’t bring many missiles to bear. He fired everything he could at them and once again, they shrugged everything off as if he were throwing pillows their way. Once again, they fired missiles, this time eighty of them as they continued to pound his Shields with Laser and Rail-Gun fire. His Shields barely held under the Lasers and Rail-Guns. When the missiles arrived, his remaining three ships had no chance, all three, along with their crews were vaporized in the resulting maelstrom. The Boss went out the way he thought he had to, fighting to the end, but ultimately, it didn’t matter, he was still dead and would no longer be able to hurt anyone.