Rebel Fleet

by B. V. Larson

  “They’ve got a target lock, Chief,” Gwen said.

  “Permission to deploy defenses aft, sir,” Samson said.

  I shook my head in disbelief. “They won’t shoot at the enemy, but they’re willing to blast our tails off for bringing the fight to them? What selfish pricks.”

  Samson shrugged. “They do look more like cockroaches than anyone else in the Fleet.”

  “Reconnect me with that bug,” I ordered.

  A moment later the air in front of my eyes glowed. Chief Super-ugly worked his mouth-parts at me.

  “Chief, we’re not the enemy,” I told him. “Firing on my ship would be a violation of Rebel Law.”

  “We’re examining that right now,” he replied. “That’s the only reason we haven’t dismantled you yet.”

  “What’s your problem, bug?” I demanded. “You sat back and let the others do your fighting for you. That’s cowardice, plain and simple. Now, because we needed help and brought the fight to you, you’re contemplating treachery. Just what kind of a race of cowards are you people?”

  “We are the Chosen. We are the last. By logic and law, we are more valuable beings than you are.”

  My eyes squinched together in confusion, but I thought I understood what this roach was talking about.

  “You mean you think that because your population took a hit, you’re more important than the rest of us?”

  “You state the obvious. Our estimations of your intellectual capacity are improving.”

  “Great. Okay bug, here’s what I think: you’re arrogant and selfish. Those traits aren’t all that unusual for anyone of Kher descent, but you’ve taken it to an extreme. Plenty of the combatants here have lost their home world.”

  “That is undoubtedly true,” the bug said, “but we aren’t concerned with the reproductive lines of the non-Chosen.”

  “Well, I’m becoming less and less concerned with your continued existence as well. Go back to your dim red sun and the rock circling it, if you want to.”

  The bug began to explain to me how that was technically impossible, and to suggest I was some variety of idiot for mentioning such a line of action. Clearly, bugs didn’t have a good grasp of sarcasm.

  I disconnected. “Watch them,” I told Samson and Mia. “If they fire on us, shoot back without hesitation.”

  Our return to Shaw’s squadron was tense, but we made it without taking a beam in the backside.

  Shaw didn’t talk to us right away, he was too busy giving the entire squadron orders.

  “Pilots,” Shaw said, addressing the entire squadron, “that was a miserable performance. We outweighed and outgunned the enemy. We should have destroyed those interceptors with few losses. If you all stay together and hold your formations, we’ll do much better when we hit the carriers.”

  There were some grumbled complaints, but no one swung their ships around to run. Such poor discipline made me sick. These people weren’t real military, we were more like a band of gangsters or Apache warriors. Individual crews were often brave enough in their own right, but the squadron hadn’t yet gelled into a determined force.

  Lt. Shaw lit up the target, the closest of the carriers. We applied thrust and approached in a parabolic formation, giving everyone a free range of fire.

  Long before we reached effective range, defensive fire began coming at us from the enemy vessel. She was big and ugly—possibly even uglier than Killer. She had bulbous projections that extended from the forward part of the craft in a trio. It made the carrier look like a shark with three snouts.

  “I see them firing something out of those large forward cannons,” Gwen said, her eyes glued to the scope. “I… I think those must be launch bays. They’re deploying more interceptors.”

  “Great,” I said, “hold your fire, everyone. We’re way too far out.”

  Around us other fighter pilots weren’t so professional. They beamed radiation and fired wasps at the looming ship. Shaw soon shouted at them, pointing out they hadn’t been given the all-clear to shoot yet.

  “Blake?” he called to me. “Take point on the first run.”

  “Me sir?” I asked, my heart sinking.

  “Yes. You can thank me for the honor later. I was very impressed with the way you took out that hunter-killer group, then rounded up the straggling beetles.”

  I puffed out my cheeks and shook my head. I thought about telling him the beetles were contemplating waxing my ass for my heroic efforts, but I passed on the idea.

  “I’ll need two more wingmen, Lieutenant,” I said.

  He chewed that over then ordered two ships to join me on the front lines. Together, four fighters accelerated toward the looming carrier.

  The Imperial ship hadn’t been slacking. They’d pumped out a new, small group of defensive fighters and begun firing radiation cannons that beamed short, accurate bursts in our direction. One of my assigned wingmen was dead before we reached effective range.

  Just as we got within shooting distance, the big ship powered up her shields. They were bluish in color and looked like a nimbus around a cloud that’s slipped between the sun and the eye of the beholder.

  The incoming fire ceased as the carrier wasn’t configured to fire at us with her deflection shields up, but we still had her deployed fighters to deal with.

  The enemy captain’s plan was clear. He would sit inside the safety of his shields to see how his interceptors did. Already, Imperial gunships were detaching from the main battle lines ahead and approaching to defend the carriers. They’d called for help, and we didn’t have much time.

  “We’re only going to get one shot at this big bastard,” Shaw said. “Let’s do what we came for—make an attack run at her core, strike amidships. Enough damage here will buckle the shields.”

  Superimposed on my vision, the carrier now had a red circle low and in the central belly region. That was our target, and I dove low to come up and get a focused shot at the monster’s gut.

  The defending fighter group didn’t go for my team. They’d decided the rest of the squadron was a bigger threat, and so they roared out to meet them.

  “We’ve got a chance,” I said. “Stay together and fire together. Everyone on that target on my mark. Three… two… one… mark!”

  We blazed furiously at the weak point in the enemy defenses that Shaw had designated. Behind us, the rest of the squad tangled with the interceptors and broke through. They poured on fire as well.

  The tactic worked, and the bluish-silver shielding flickered. I could see sparking strikes were getting through, melting the hull underneath and making it run like dark wax.

  Suddenly, the central module of the big ship imploded. It was the strangest thing I’d ever seen. One second, she was there taking fire, and the next the belly folded in on itself like a crushed can. After compressing inwardly for a second, the reaction reversed in a larger, brighter explosion outward. The hull had been compromised, and the gasses inside the vessel were gushing out into space.

  The running lights on the carrier went out. She wasn’t completely destroyed, but she’d been knocked out of the fight. The shield flickered and died.

  “Let’s finish her,” I said, swinging my group around for another run.

  “Squadron,” Shaw said before we were half-way turned around for the next run. “We’re being recalled. All fighters return to Killer. CAG’s orders.”

  “Fuck!” Samson yelled. “All this and they call us off? The Imperials will repair this monster and we’ll have to fight her again.”

  I couldn’t argue with him. “Orders are orders,” I said, “Dr. Chang, plot me a safe course back to our carrier.”

  Samson stared at me, shaking his head. “No one else in this outfit follows orders. Why should we?”

  He had a point. The bugs were already leading the pack away from the battle. A few other fighters were dog-fighting with interceptors or making runs at the crippled carrier.

  I sucked in a breath and contacted Ra-tikh with my sym.
>
  “What do you think?” I asked him. “Should we obey Shaw or destroy this carrier?”

  “Shaw can mate with his own tail,” Ra-tikh said. “I vote we destroy the enemy while it is weak and helpless.”

  “One more attack run,” I said. “Let’s hit that damaged belly-region again.”

  It took a full minute to swing under the big ship and come at her from the right angle, but the results were magnificent. The carrier was torn apart and pieces went spinning off into the void.

  “We must have nailed her core,” Mia said, awestruck. “That was glorious.”

  Her predator side was enamored. It almost made me shiver. Most humans showed at least a fraction of remorse after inflicting mass casualties. But Mia’s kind was different. Killing obviously gave her great pleasure. Her big eyes glowed as she soaked in the destruction she’d helped cause.

  “Wingmen, stay with me,” I told my group. “Let’s head home.”

  =34=

  We were far from safe. The battle was effectively over, and it had ended in defeat, despite our best efforts.

  The Rebel Fleet was pulling out, retreating. We’d done well against the Imperial carriers, and there were other bright spots, but the overall battle had gone badly.

  The massed Imperials had focused firepower in coordinated strikes. They’d methodically destroyed ship after ship, and their tight formations had interlocked their shields, making our weapons less effective.

  From what I could gather from the chaos, the enemy phase-ships had broken our front lines first, then the concentrated fire of the highly organized fleet had done the rest. The enemy had broken us.

  As we zoomed away from the drifting wreck of the carrier we’d gutted, we had the chance to see the reality of the situation. The battle was turning into a rout, and even now it was sinking into a disaster.

  Instead of retreating in an organized fashion, the Rebel captains all tried to save themselves. There was no thought of covering for the wounded to escape first. As soon as any ship was able to open a stellar rip it plunged into it and vanished, leaving their comrades behind. The ever-shrinking circle of survivors was blasted to pieces by concentrated Imperial fire.

  “Chief!” Gwen called to me. “Interceptors on our six!”

  I used my sym to perceive what followed. After counting nineteen of the sleek little fighters, I stopped bothering. If they caught up to us, we were doomed.

  Already, they were peppering us with low-powered strikes. We were inside their maximum effective range.

  Fortunately, most of my fellow wingmen had enough defensive systems left to survive these pinpricks to our tails—but not Hammerhead. She was a good, tough little ship, but she’d taken too much abuse today.

  “We’ve got two more hull breaches,” Samson said, moving around with the patches.

  “Get them sealed up,” I ordered pointlessly.

  “We’re out of nanite juice. We’re out of everything.”

  Mia was the only happy member of my crew left aboard. She fired her cannon continuously. She was breathing hard and seemed oblivious to the fact we were doomed.

  Looking ahead, I gave it everything our engine had. If we could make it back to our carriers—any carrier—I’d jump into the first hangar I found and take my chances.

  But it wasn’t to be. The engine shivered, setting up a grim vibration that made my butt hurt right through my seat, the padding and my spacer’s suit.

  “What’s the situation?” I demanded.

  “I think we’re losing the engine,” Dr. Chang said. “Performance is down by thirty-nine percent.”

  Sure enough, our acceleration arc was falling. We weren’t slowing down as there was no air-pressure to put drag on our ship, but we couldn’t push any faster. The enemy interceptors were still gaining.

  Then the ship to my side blew up. Most of the incoming fire had been targeting her. They’d all died in an instant.

  Now, the enemy turned their guns on us, the next easiest target.

  I was gritting my teeth, an instant from flipping around and charging into their faces. My only hope was to ram one and take him down with me—but then, I got an idea.

  “Team, keep running,” I told Ra-tikh and the rest. “We’re breaking off. They’ll probably follow us, as we’re wounded.”

  Ra-tikh took a moment to manifest into my mind by way of his sym-link. He nodded to me.

  “You spread your scent so the predators follow,” he said. “An honorable effort. You will be remembered in our dreams.”

  Before I could answer, he cut off the channel. We were alone.

  Well, not quite alone. We still had a pack of angry interceptors on our tails.

  My idea was a simple one, but it was very risky. Our carriers had been in the rear of our formation, so they were too far away to shield us. I had to find a closer refuge. Instead of trying to reach a carrier, I headed toward one of our damaged ships that was trying to escape.

  Banking sharply and working the shivering engine to its breaking point, I streaked toward a nearby destroyer. She was running, just like the rest of them. Locked in a struggle with a larger heavy cruiser, she had no chance, and her captain had decided to open a rip in space to exit the battle.

  Under my guiding hands, Hammerhead plunged directly toward this flux zone. It was a crazy thing to do, I knew that. Fighters weren’t built to go through hyperspace alone. The hulls hadn’t been designed for it, and we had none of the physics-stabilization systems aboard that would help us keep our form.

  But there wasn’t anything else I could do. We had no better chance to live.

  When we got close to the big ships, it seemed like we shrank. Our fighter was tiny in comparison. We were like a gnat zipping between battling titans.

  Any of them could have fired upon us, destroying us, but they were all too busy hacking away on a bigger prize.

  Mia had stopped firing her cannon. She was out of missiles, and her main gun was either damaged or overheated. She climbed to my seat and wrapped an arm around my neck. I let her do it, as we were probably all dead anyway.

  In the last moments before we plunged into the plasma-edged rift, I had the opportunity to look down at the inhabited planet we’d been protecting.

  The world had joined the Rebel cause and provided us with fresh crews. Now, they were paying a gruesome price. As I watched, gravity-bombs fell and their bright, flat cities were sucked up, drawing all the local mass into a conical shape. New dark mountains appeared at every population center.

  When we hit the rift, I let out a roar of defiance—but I didn’t hear any sound. I couldn’t see much, either. Then there was a dim glow around me, coming from beyond our thin hull. I could hear and see again, but it seemed like every subsystem on our ship had been switched off.

  “Dr. Chang…” I said, my voice sounding loud in the sudden, eerie silence. “Are we dead?”

  “Probably,” he replied calmly. “We can’t hear our ship, that much I know. Does that mean it doesn’t exist, or that it has ceased to operate? I have no idea.”

  “I’m getting some instrument readings,” Gwen said. “The central computer appears to be rebooting. There’s no output from the engine. No emissions at all. Nothing is exiting our central mass.”

  I looked around at our instruments. We appeared to be drifting. Outside the transparent parts of Hammerhead’s hull, there were no more stars. There weren’t any bright lights either though.

  There was nothing but a faint, variegated grayness. It was as if we’d been becalmed in an endless underground river, encapsulated by fog.

  Before I could open my mouth to ask another question, the journey was over. We’d leapt a great distance. One lightyear or a thousand—I had no idea which, and I wasn’t sure that it mattered.

  When we came out of the rift on the far side, the sudden reappearance of stars took me by surprise. It shouldn’t have, but it did. I chalked it up to a lack of experience on my part.

  When we reappeared in normal
space, we were thrown into a spin. Possibly, part of our propulsion system had been operating while we were transiting the rift. Or maybe we’d come out with our engines thrusting unevenly. Whatever the case, I fought the controls.

  “Chief!” Gwen called out. “We’re going to ram the destroyer!”

  I envisioned it the second she spoke. My sym cast to my mind the location of the starship, and it was a good thing my sym was on the ball. We were still spinning, and evasive action on my part was desperate.

  Accelerating out of the spin, Hammerhead did a sickening double-backflip before I could level her off. We slid by the destroyer’s belly. It was so close the big ship’s shields flickered and sparked.

  With a sick sigh of relief, I leaned back from the controls.

  “We’re clear,” I said. “Hail the captain of that ship.”

  A moment later, an amused alien-looking face regarded me. I had him pegged as some kind of desert-dwelling reptile the moment I saw him.

  “Captain Behir of Talon here,” he said. “You’re a crazy pilot, even for a primate.”

  “Thanks. Have you got a fix on the location of Killer?” I asked him. “We’re part of her 2nd squadron.”

  Behir made an odd, huffing sound. Laughter, maybe?

  “We don’t have a fix on anything, Chief,” he said. “Take a look around—we’ve scattered.”

  For the first time, I cast my perception far and wide in this new system.

  I saw an F-class star, hot and white—but it was a long way off. There were no planets nearby and no other starships. Nothing, not even dust.

  His words sank in, and I began to worry.

  Scattered, I thought to myself. It was the whispered doom-word of everyone in the Fleet. Always, there was the possibility a given ship might miss a jump, lose its fellows and end up somewhere in deep space, alone.

  Under the best of conditions, scattering could happen to any starship on any jump. In this case, it was far more likely. We’d horned into a rift built by Talon, a risky move at best. But because the starship had opened the rift in a panic, without communicating with her sister ships, she’d been almost bound to scatter. Hell, Captain Behir might not have known where to jump to in the first place. I wouldn’t put it past the Rebel admirals to have no contingency plan in case disaster struck.