The Tiāntǐ tíqǔ was the largest of those ships, a million ton crescent-moon shape half a kilometer long. The processing ships like the Thor’s Digger were the next largest, portable refineries varying from five to eight hundred thousand tons. There were less than a dozen of them though.
Around them were literally hundreds of small miners, anything from a thousand to a hundred thousand tons, with crews varying from well-trained corporate crews of fifty or more to family units and single-person operations.
“I’ve got six hundred and forty-eight individual vessels in the cluster,” Arrington reported. “Reading another hundred and sixty or so inbound, mostly smaller ships that would have been way out there.”
The last count Grace had seen had put the number of Sherwood ships in the system at just under four hundred in total. Even assuming everyone had escaped the massacre at Greenwood, there was no way all of those ships were hers.
“How many are Míngliàng?” she asked. “And… do we have a read on Míngliàng’s CPF from here?”
“We should,” her XO told her. “MacClare?”
The tactical officer looked up and shook his head. He was a pale-skinned, dark-haired man who looked far too young for his current job. Who was, Grace knew, far too young for his job – which was why Arrington was doing almost half of it to keep the youth afloat.
“I’ve got a clean scan of where the station should be,” MacClare said slowly, “but… there’s nothing there.”
“Raise your resolution,” Grace suggested. “Look for debris.”
What color MacClare had drained from his face as he hastened to obey her suggestion.
“Our Father who art in Heaven,” he whispered. “I have a debris field.” The youth swallowed, checked something on his screen, and then looked up to meet Grace’s gaze with surprisingly level eyes. “The field is consistent with the destruction of the Míngliàng Antonius Central Processing Facility by high power laser fire.”
“Damn,” she murmured. She’d known. From the moment she’d heard Liddell’s transmission, she’d known what had to have happened. Someone had killed every major colony in Antonius. The eight hundred ships in front of her represented roughly fifteen thousand people, but over sixty thousand were already dead.
Any intent to complete the counter-force mission died. The woman who’d come home and put on a uniform when her grandfather called because her world needed, the woman who’d taken the accursed crystal oak leaf when it was offered to her… that woman couldn’t leave the survivors in front of her unprotected.
“All ships,” she said calmly, reopening the Captains’ channel. “We will get back into formation, and then we will proceed to establish a defensive perimeter around the Tiāntǐ tíqǔ and the other mining ships. Let’s keep these people safe, folks. I won’t settle for less.”
To her surprise, no one disputed her orders, and she leaned back in her chair to study the screens. With a clear objective in front of her, one that wouldn’t start a war, she actually started to relax.
Then MacClare snapped ramrod straight, staring at his screen in shock.
“Commodore!” he shouted. “We have jump flares!”
#
Commodore Grace McLaughlin froze. It was a matter of moments, long enough for her to feel a flash of embarrassment and for the details of the jump flares to filter onto the main screens surrounding her. Fifteen icons burned the bright flashing orange of unidentified ships, on the far side of the cluster of civilian ships.
“What am I looking at?” she demanded. “Who are they?”
“I’ve got two ten-megaton range signatures and thirteen one-megaton range,” MacClare announced. “System is calling it two cruisers, thirteen destroyers… IFF codes coming in now.” The youth swallowed and glanced helplessly at his superiors.
“IFFs confirm Míngliàng Security Flotilla,” Arrington finished for him. “They are maneuvering towards us.”
“Pull us away,” Grace ordered. “All ships, vector ninety degrees horizontal and vertical versus the ecliptic. Maximum safe acceleration.”
The orange icons solidified into yellow icons marked with tonnage and scanner data as the Patrol maneuvered to pull the hundreds of civilian ships out of the potential line of fire. No matter what happened in the next few minutes, she did not want those survivors caught in the middle of it.
“Time to missile range?” she asked Arrington.
“They carry the same Phoenix VIIs we do,” he replied. “We’re in missile range. With the debris around the asteroid field, our hit probabilities are atrocious, but we’re in range.”
“We will not fire first,” she ordered. “Spin up all missile defenses and prepare to protect ourselves and the civilians if necessary.”
“Yes, ma’am,” MacClare confirmed. Her command network quickly flashed up notifications showing the rest of her squadron was also prepared to defend themselves.
“Commodore,” Arrington said softly from behind her shoulder, “they haven’t even tried to communicate. They just started maneuvering to intercept as soon as they saw us. And… look at this.”
Her XO highlighted details on her screen that she hadn’t looked at closely. Examining them, she saw exactly what he meant. Three of the destroyers had fallen behind the rest of the Flotilla, accelerating at three gravities to the rest of the ships’ ten. Even…
“Are they venting atmosphere?” she whispered.
“Those three look damaged,” he agreed. “They’ve been in a fight, Commodore – and it wasn’t with us. But the way they’re maneuvering towards us… I’m not so sure they don’t think it was.”
“Amber, get over here,” Grace ordered. When the communications officer finished scrabbling across the bridge, the Commodore smiled at her. “Lieutenant, we were given command-level protocols for confidential communication with the Flotilla at one point, weren’t we?”
“Yes, ma’am,” Amber replied crisply. “They require your personal key to operate, though.”
“I thought so.” The Commodore studied the ships in the surrounding screens. The Patrol was burning at ninety degrees to the ecliptic at ten gravities, and the forward group of Míngliàng ships was on a clear intercept course at the same acceleration from fifteen light seconds away.
They weren’t in effective battle laser range, yet, though God alone knew what the cruisers were carrying. If they were holding their missiles until they cleared the worst of the asteroid debris, they would be able to fire in… thirty minutes.
That was a lot of time to try to stop a war.
“Get me those protocols, Melissa,” Grace ordered.
Lieutenant Melissa Amber saluted crisply and all-but-teleported away from Grace’s command console. The Commodore met her executive officer’s gaze. Arrington looked exhausted, still awake after making a full light year jump barely an hour before.
“What do we do if they don’t respond, ma’am?” he whispered.
“We have them out-massed two to one,” she said grimly. “I won’t start this fight, Liam – but I won’t betray our people by not returning fire if they do. Plus…” she trailed off. “If they came from Míngliàng, where’s Damien?”
Grace turned away from Arrington as an icon on her console informed her that Amber had forwarded her the necessary communication protocol. She tapped a series of keys on the touch screen, entering her personal key.
The system chirped to inform her the secure communications package was online. Leaning forward into the camera, she turned on the recorder and put on her best ‘please don’t make me kill you’ smile.
“Admiral Yen Phan, this is Commodore Grace McLaughlin of the Sherwood Interstellar Patrol,” she said calmly. “I don’t know what you think is going on. I’m honestly not sure I know what’s going on – but both of our colonies in Antonius are gone and tens of thousands of the civilians you and I are both sworn to defend are dead. Several of your vessels are damaged, and we have fifteen thousand civilians in need of rescue and succor.”
<
br /> She inhaled and bowed her head slightly.
“Admiral, I strongly recommend that we both cease maneuvering aggressively and return to neutral positions near the cluster of civilian ships – the ones praying that we rescue them instead of killing each other. I am prepared to hold the Patrol in Antonius until such time as Hand Montgomery arrives to mediate the situation.”
Ending the recording, Grace considered it for a long moment, and then launched it into space. Fifteen seconds for her message to be received, fifteen seconds for any answer to get back to her. They were down to twenty-seven minutes to both sides clearing the asteroid field.
#
A minute passed. Another. The precious time before the two fleets were in position to fire on each other without asteroids or civilians in the way was slipping away, and Grace couldn’t think of anything else she could do.
Even if she turned her battle group and accelerated directly away from Phan’s ships, an action that stuck hard in her throat, she wouldn’t change that timer. They couldn’t leave the range of the Míngliàngs’ missiles in time.
“Message incoming,” Amber announced, and Grace breathed a sigh of relief.
“Forward to my console,” she ordered. The delay and the continued maneuvers of the MSF were unpromising, but she had to at least hear what Admiral Phan had to say.
The pitch-black-skinned woman appeared on the screen of Grace’s console, and Grace wished for a moment that she had more experience with people of the Admiral’s skin coloring. Phan’s expression was unreadable as she faced the camera in silence for several seconds.
“While I can guess why Montgomery trusts you,” she finally spat, “I am surprised you think you can fool me as thoroughly as you can the Hand. The time for lies is done, Commodore. Your actions have defined you, here and on the way here.”
The expression on Admiral Phan’s face could charitably be called a smile. Maybe.
“I have watched too many of my spacers and civilians murdered by your oh-so-brave Patrol. No more. I offer you one chance to surrender and evacuate your vessels. Either way, I cannot permit the Patrol to continue its existence and threat to my world.”
It was, Grace reflected, one thing to plan to deliver that very ultimatum – and another to have it directed at you. Having been the recipient of it, she realized her neat and clean plan to neutralize the MSF would never have worked – no one was going to obey that order.
She swallowed hard, checking the timer and glancing over at Arrington.
“Liam, is there any way we’re misreading the odds here?” she asked.
“We have nine frigates, fifty-four million tons of warships,” he replied. “Over five hundred launchers and a hundred and fifty battle lasers, even with the Loxley and Newstead Abbey’s issues. They have two cruisers and only ten fully functional destroyers – thirty million tons. The cruisers probably have much heavier battle lasers than we do, but…” he shrugged. “Not enough, ma’am. This isn’t even going to be a fair fight.”
Grace nodded slowly, studying the scanner data of the Míngliàng Security Flotilla ships. She agreed with her executive officer. There was no way Phan could win the battle she seemed determined to court – and no way Grace could see to avoid it.
Twenty minutes.
She didn’t have it in her to surrender – but she sure as hell didn’t have it in her to massacre the Flotilla without at least trying to prevent the battle. She hit record again.
“Admiral Phan, I swear to you – on the honor of the Patrol, on the honor of Sherwood – that any attack carried out by Patrol vessels was launched without my knowledge or authorization. That would make it an act of treason and piracy, one I will punish given evidence.
“I do not wish to fight you, but neither will I tamely surrender. I have you out-gunned and out-massed. You cannot win this battle – do not make me fight it!”
The message flickered its way across the void, and Grace raised a helpless gaze on her executive officer. After a moment, she sighed, and brought up the all-Captains channel.
“Ladies, gentlemen,” she greeted them. “I am attempting to avoid engaging the Flotilla, but Admiral Phan blames us for the destruction of the Processing Facility and its civilians. We will not fire first, but if the Flotilla attacks us, we will defend ourselves.
“Make sure all defense systems are triple checked,” she ordered. “Charge all battle laser capacitors. Load all missile launchers.” She paused. “If they open fire, do not wait for authorization from the flagship to return fire. If it comes to a fight, I will not lose.”
“They nuked Greenwood from orbit,” Wayne objected. “Why the hell are we taking the first punch? These bastards murdered forty thousand people.”
“And they think we murdered thirty thousand,” Grace countered. “If we want even a chance at peace, we must offer the same benefit of the doubt we are demanding. My orders stand, Captain Wayne.”
She took his silence for acquiescence and waited to hear from the rest. No one said anything more.
“Good luck,” she told them.
The clock was at ten minutes. She should have heard back from Phan by now. Nothing.
“They’re maneuvering to clear their lines of fire,” MacClare warned her. “Even the three damaged ships will have a clear line of fire for their missiles. They don’t look like they’re planning on surrendering, ma’am.”
“I know,” she agreed aloud. “But no matter what, we cannot go on record as being the ones to fire the first shots of this war. The Protectorate will destroy the aggressor here.”
“All systems are one hundred percent,” her tactical officer replied. “We should be able to take their first punch and keep fighting.”
“Sometimes, you gotta let the other bastard swing first,” her exec chimed in.
Grace nodded in silence, watching the clock and the tactical plot as the time ticked away. Second by second, minute by minute, every moment of silence brought an increased certainty that this was going to end in violence.
Sixty seconds.
“Stand by all missile batteries,” Arrington ordered over the PA. “Stand by all lasers. Be ready to fire on command.”
“I’m sorry, Damien,” Grace whispered. “I tried.”
Thirty seconds until the Míngliàng Security Flotilla cleared the asteroids.
“Jump flare!” MacClare shouted – and Grace’s attention snapped to the tactical plot.
In a perfectly timed demonstration of power, magic, and skill, the Duke of Magnificence burst into existence exactly between the two fleets.
Chapter 32
Mage-Lieutenant Jessica Philips jumped the Duke with professional competence, dropping the big twelve million ton cruiser exactly where Mage-Captain Jakab had told her to – thirty light minutes up from the ecliptic, directly ‘above’ the star Antonius.
“Get me all passive scanners,” Jakab ordered as the young Mage wavered.
Damien was there first, catching her as she stumbled against the exhaustion. The blond woman might have been ten years younger than him, but she was notably taller than him. For a moment, he thought he might drop her regardless, but braced himself to hold her weight.
“Sorry, my lord,” she murmured, managing to regain her balance and stand back up, her hand on his shoulder. “Thank you.”
“Get yourself to bed,” he ordered. Every so often, a jump could take more out of you than normal – especially if the Mage had been up for a while before making the jump. “We’ve all been there, Lieutenant,” he continued as he noticed her looking rebellious. He could see both of the Mages close enough to overhear him nodding vigorously – which make Philips chuckle and bob her head in agreement.
Returning her smile, Damien passed her to Amiri. His bodyguard took the young woman with a nod and helped her towards the exit from the bridge.
The side drama had, thankfully, kept Damien distracted from looming over Jakab’s shoulder as the sensor data came in. They’d picked their position carefully
. With the two colonies in roughly equal orbits and exactly opposite each other, arriving at the wreckage of Greenwood or the CPF wouldn’t let them see what was going on at the other. Coming in high above the ecliptic gave them a view of almost the entire star system.
A view, sadly, of what had been going on over half an hour ago, but better than nothing.
“The CPF site is abandoned,” Rhine reported. “I have no ships anywhere near it. I’m reading nine ships near Greenwood, though – big ships. I’d say we’re almost certainly looking at the Patrol.”
“Where are the miners?” Damien asked. “There should be hundreds of sublight ships here.”
“Still refining the smaller heat signatures… there,” the Duke’s tactical officer pointed out. A section of the star system ‘beneath’ them was suddenly highlighted. “Every ship I can pick up is either centering their position on a chunk of ice here, or is on their way to that area.”
“The miners might feud and bicker,” Jakab said, “but they’re the kind of hardy people that will band together when everything goes to hell. Combining everyone’s resources could keep the survivors alive for longer than you might think.”
“Wait – the Patrol just jumped,” Lieutenant Carver interrupted. “Well, thirty-four minutes ago…”
“Where?” Jakab demanded. “Are they still in the system?”
“Give it a minute,” Damien told him. “I suspect… there!”
Nine jump flares appeared on the screen, some distance away from the cluster of ships Rhine had identified. The sensors informed Damien that they were now accelerating towards the ships – many of which had to be from Míngliàng.
“What are you thinking, Grace?” he murmured.
“Damien,” Amiri whispered from just behind him. “I know… Alaura had a device that let her see what was going on light years away. It would be useful right now.”
Voice of Mars (Starship's Mage Book 3) Page 23
