A Greater Interest: Samair in Argos: Book 4

by Michael Kotcher

  “Sketzk, sketzk, sketzk!” Verrikoth swore, hammering the arm of his command seat. He turned to Tyler. “Fight your ship, Commander.”

  “Yes, my Lord. Roll the ship,” the man ordered the helmsman. Both of the commanders checked their displays and were surprised by how minimal the damage from that salvo was. Yes, with the plasma conduit damage, their combat performance was diminished, but the ship’s heavy armor had held, better than Verrikoth had expected. This ship was certainly slower than his last flagship, but it was far tougher.

  Verrikoth activated his display, checking the sensor feeds. “Ssensorz, where are the cargo sshipss?”

  “They are approaching the tank farm, my lord,” the zheen replied. He pressed a few commands. “Fletcher’s Dolly is moving in, and it should be there in less than thirty minutes. The rest are lagging slightly, but no more than five minutes behind.”

  The pirate lord hissed, waggling his antennae. “Keep in contact with them. Once the sshipss are loaded, we are leaving.”

  Tyler turned to face him. “Leaving, my Lord?”

  He nodded. “Yess, Commander, leaving. We came here to fill the cofferz, not to wasste sshipss and perssonnel. I have losst enough today already.” He buzzed out a hiss. “No, once they are filled with the fuel, we are going.”

  The human commander stood and stared at the pirate lord for a long second and then nodded. “Of course, my Lord. I heartily agree. As you say, we’ve lost enough already.”

  “Make ssure that damage control teamz are getting thoze plazma conduitss patched,” the pirate lord ordered.

  Tyler nodded. “Yes, my Lord. I’ve got teams moving now.”

  “Good. Tell them to move quickly. And tactical,” Verrikoth said, leaning forward in his seat.

  The man turned to face the pirate lord. “Yes, Lord?”

  “The next time those fighterz launch a sstrike like that againsst uss again,” he said, his voice so menacing that the temperature on the bridge plummeted and the bridge crew immediately went silent, “and if thoze missilez get through our defensez again, if we ssurvive that hit, I will perssonally have your kneecapss sshot out and have you thrown sscreaming out of an airlock. Am I clear, tactical officer?”

  The man visibly gulped. “Yes, Lord, you are perfectly clear.” Verrikoth turned his head, presumably looking back at the displays, but with his compound eyes, he could still see the man seated at the tactical station. He meekly turned back to the controls, trying to keep his back ramrod straight and immediately began reprioritizing his remaining weapons.

  “Open a channel to Ganges,” Verrikoth ordered. “Inform Commander Hesstian that he iz to cover the cargo sshipss while they procure the helium 3 fuel for me. And unless they fire on him, Hessitan iz not to fire on or desstroy their gass mining sstation in the atmossphere.”

  “Pardon, Lord,” Tyler replied. “But he isn’t to fire on them?”

  “No,” the zheen pirate lord answered, steepling his fingers. “I do not want to damage their production of fuel. I want to be able to return here in a few monthss, a year, and be able to get our holdz filled up with fuel again.”

  Commander Tyler nodded, giving a smirk. “Understood.” He turned and nodded to the comms officer, who began sending the pirate lord’s orders. “Hestian might not be too happy with those orders, Lord.”

  Verrikoth gave a low growl. “Hesstian will do az he iz told.”

  Tyler nodded again. “Yes, Lord.”

  “And contact Commander Ssokann. Hiz fighterz are to continue to harasss the local sstarfighterz and keep them off us and the tranzportss. I do not want them to line up another ssalvo like that lasst one again.”

  “Would you look at that!” Hama exclaimed, looking at the sensor display of the assault transport. “The fighters really tore a hole in her.”

  “Good,” Marat replied. “Make our job easier.”

  Ekaterina nodded. “Marat’s right. We don’t need to worry about damaging her, but we do need to get aboard.”

  “Trash the shuttles,” the male bodyguard said.

  “Too right. We’re ready to jump over in less than thirty seconds,” she said, getting to her feet and checking her gear, one last time.

  “Right up to the hole in the hull?” Hama demanded. “What about the ship’s defensive weaponry? We’ll be shot out of the sky!”

  “None of the weapons are tracking our shuttle’s movements,” Ekaterina told him. “And the fighters that blasted the hole in the ship for us are hanging back, ready to make a strafing run on the transport to blast their weapons if I call them.”

  “Then call them!” the wolf told her, clearly nervous. “I can’t just sit here and wait to get blasted apart.”

  Ekaterina clapped him on his shoulder. “That’s the beauty part, Hama. You won’t be sitting around waiting to get shot. You’re going to be jumping with the rest of us through that hole and into the ship. We’ve got some shuttles to slag!”

  “Now wait just a minute!”

  Ekaterina turned her face to the whole group. “All right, ten seconds. Make sure your helmets are secured and your air turned on. Once that’s done, we’re popping the hatch and we’re jumping.”

  The four deputies all looked nervous, displaying various tics and ear flicks marking that nervousness. They all secured their helmets and slung their weapons.

  “Radio check.” The others all acknowledged; Marat clicked his comms. “All right. I’m depressurizing.” Ekaterina pressed the control that vented the atmo from the aft section of the ship. Once the ship was in vacuum, then she pressed the other control that popped the aft cargo hatch. Shoving hard with both hands, the door swung down.

  “Ready to roll!” the female wolf said in to the comms. “Remember, we’re there to damage the shuttles. Plant the charges and get out.” And with that, she pushed off and floated over to the hull of the transport. Gun slung over her shoulder, she reached out with both hands and grabbed a piece of metal, miraculously avoiding slicing open her gloves on the ragged piece of hull. Using her momentum, she swung around and into the hole. Once inside the ship’s gravity field she landed lightly, feet first on the deck plating. Not that it mattered, her landing with any sort of stealth; the vacuum in the bay meant that there was no sound to be heard. A moment later, the others joined her and then they were moving.

  Marat moved like a fish through water, as though he’d been working in microgravity his whole life. He and his team, which were far clunkier in their suits than he was, set the charges on the first blocky shuttle in the row. Its forward end was battered in from the explosion, but Marat was taking no chances, he planted some explosives on the port engine nacelle.

  Ekaterina wasn’t quite as smooth as Marat, but it didn’t stop or slow her down. Marat went to the right; she and her team went to the left. Coming to the first shuttle in the row, she slipped under the armorglass port and attached the round explosive charge to the underside of the engine nacelle and then signaled to the rest of her team. They had agreed, no comms while this was on, not wanting to give away their positions or alert the enemy that they were aboard. She waved her hand to the others in her team, indicating that they should spread out, each take a shuttle. Looking around, she saw that there were twelve assault shuttles in this bay, presumably there were an equal number in the opposite bay, and with eight more in each of the smaller aft bays. There was a lot of work to do.

  It was the work of two more minutes to plant the charges on these shuttles and they were ready to move on to the other bays. This, however, presented a problem. The bay was decompressed and there was no way to open the main doors into the ship since there was no airlock. Even with Samair’s electronic key, they couldn’t get the door open. And if they blasted the door open, any thought to surprise would be gone, as an explosion would alert the whole ship.

  About to give in to despair, Hama pointed to the far end of the bay. There was a control station up near the top of the bay, with a set of stairs leading up to it. As a group, they head
ed out that way. More than once, they had to stop to duck behind one of the shuttles as a skin suited lupusan trotted by. Luckily, the FP skinsuits were dark blue, with the galactic spiral in white on the left breast, but that was covered by their armored vests. The pirates, at least the few running around in the bay, had a motley assortment of suits, but all of them were patched and had splashes of color, possibly to make them look more menacing. The blue skinsuits didn’t exactly blend in, but it was a better color than the light gray ones that the personnel on the orbital used.

  Twice, Ekaterina needed to bluff through pirates using hand gestures because her strike teams didn’t have the proper channels for their communicators. Luckily, there was enough confusion with the missile strike and the damage to the bay that none of the crew in the hangar paid much attention to a small group of well-armed lupusan. Both of those times, the two bodyguards needed to make gestures to the deputies to avoid an overreaction and an incident. The last time was very close; Huw was very jumpy and nearly raised his weapon but luckily everyone here in the bay was amped up at the thought of the pending shuttle drop. In moments, the group had made it to the control station, which at a gesture from Marat, the technician inside nodded and opened the door for them. Once inside, the technician waited until they were all inside before sealing up the room. Thirty-five seconds later, the room was aired up again and the tech was looking to them.

  Marat popped the seal on his helmet as did the tech. “What’s going on?” the technician, another lupusan, demanded. “Why is your squad in here? Why aren’t you on comms?” His questions were cut off by the blade that slashed across his throat; Marat’s hand moved faster than anyone in the control booth could see. Another pair of quick stabs through the unarmored chest and the tech dropped to the deck, gasping and gurgling until he finally died. Moving quickly, the big male lupusan stripped the corpse of his comm gear, an annoying headset that looped over his ears, which thankfully didn’t have any blood on it. He’d been pretty careful with his knife strike; the blood had gushed into his victim’s suit and onto the deck instead of the armorglass window that looked out into the bay.

  “Let’s move,” Marat ordered, and Ekaterina nodded. “I’ll hit the opposite bay, you go to the aft bay.” Again, the brindled female nodded. Opening the outer door going into the ship, they hustled through.

  Getting into the aft bay didn’t prove to be difficult for Ekaterina and her team. What with Samair’s electronic key they managed to get into the aft bay without serious issue. There they were, the shuttles, all lined up and ready to go. The problem was, once the trio entered the bay, they ran smack into a full company of pirate soldiers finishing gearing up and getting ready for boarding. Both groups stood and stared at each other for a long moment. They didn’t seem to know how to react, and it seemed as though the pirates might just accept that these were just more soldiers, ready for boarding actions.

  But then Huw panicked. He raised his weapon, pointing it in the direction of the boarding company. One of the pirates saw, screamed an obscenity and brought up a massive boarding axe. Huw fired, his assault rifle shredding him. The bullets tore through him, injuring three others behind him. Pandemonium broke out as the interlopers were noticed and the victims cried out in pain. Within seconds, Ekaterina and her group were fighting for their lives. Axes and blades and guns versus her group’s own firearms, claws and blades.

  Roaring in battle lust, a huge male lunged at Huw with what looked like a petrol-powered chainsaw, which was giving off a terrible rusty racket. The deputy bayed in terror and fired his rifle unleashing a storm of bullets into the charging wolf who gagged in pain. The pirate toppled and crashed to the deck, landing on the deputy. Huw shrieked in agony as the spinning blade sawed through his shoulder and cut deep into his chest. Blood fountained, drenching the lupusan and his fallen foe. His gun went off, spraying bullets in all directions until the remainder of the hundred-round magazine ran dry, wounding another two of the pirates.

  Not waiting around, Ekaterina grabbed Konnair by the shoulder and yanked him out of the bay, back through the hatch they’d entered by. As the deputy stumbled backward and skidded, trying to regain his balance, the bodyguard yanked a trio of Samair’s slimer grenades from her bandolier, pulling the pins and tossing them through the hatch just as she passed through back into the corridor. There were roars of frustration and then panic as the quickly expanding foam turned from a slight nuisance into a trap, blocking the door and sealing several of the soldiers in place.

  “Huw!” Konnair breathed, trying to regain his composure.

  Ekaterina grabbed a fistful of his sleeve and shoved. “He’s gone! Now move!” she hissed, her aura pulsing with fury and malice. He needed to get back into the game and she did not have time to coddle him. The stupid fool was not ready for this mission, neither of them. Huw had gotten himself killed and blown the element of surprise and if she wasn’t careful, Konnair might just get the both of them killed.

  She flashed a quick message to Marat. [We’re blown. Couldn’t get to aft bay port side. Huw dead. Moving to starboard bay.]

  An instant later, she got a response back. [Starboard main bay complete. Key worked great. Moving to jo…] And the message cut off in mid-sentence.

  “Kors!” she swore. “Move it!” Ekaterina pelted down the corridor, side-by-side with Konnair, both of them holding their weapons at the ready. Marat had done his job, apparently, but either he was pinned down or dead and either way he wasn’t responding. There was nothing to be done about it now; she had a mission to complete. And it wasn’t as though she was going to be able to get all the shuttles, but if she could just get that last bay, figure out a way to damage or disable those last ones that would mean only eight out of the forty were spaceworthy. If each shuttle could hold forty troops that meant just shy of five hundred soldiers would be getting off this barge in one drop. Surely Chief Nymeria, Magnus and Samair could handle five hundred soldiers.

  ~~~~~~~~~*~~~~~~~~~~

  “The light cruiser is coming by for another pass, ma’am,” Tiyaana Moreetz reported over the comlink. “She’s taken a bit of a beating, but it looks as though her shields are still holding and she hasn’t taken much in the way of hull damage.”

  “Shit,” Tamara swore quietly, attaching the wiring for the navigation to the missile housing she was working on. One of the wires slipped in her haste and she swore again. “Calmly, Tamara, calmly. You’re in your workshop, you’re just putting this little beauty together in your spare time. Nothing at all to worry about.” Apparently her fingers believed the soothing lie and she quickly finished the job. A second later, she had a screwdriver in hand and was closing up the casing. “All right, this one’s done. Everyone, get ready! We’re going to go with the first salvo!” She tossed the screwdriver onto the nearby toolbox.

  Grabbing her helmet, Tamara quickly put it on and sealed it. The suit’s electronics quickly activated and interfaced with her implants, bringing up the status feeds. A quick glance around showed that the rest of the technicians in the bay were suited and ready.

  They had improvised a launching system, which was little more than an elevated platform with a series of tubes, aiming out of the closed bay doors at a fifty degree angle toward space, in the general direction of where the Ganges was tearing apart the last of the orbital defense turrets.

  “If you’re going to fire, ma’am, you’d better do it soon,” Tiyaana warned, her voice starting to rise an octave in her anxiety. “That ship is moving to hit the last platform. Once that’s done, I can’t imagine it’s going to hang around near the tank farm. It’s probably going to put some distance, or else it’s going to turn its guns on us!”

  “Yes, thank you, I know that,” Tamara snapped. “Ten seconds,” she said, staring at her HUD. She was linked in with their launching systems and telemetry for their targeting was being provided by one of the orbital satellites. The missiles would exit the bay and go screaming out of the gas giant’s atmosphere and into space. The
y would burn up nearly three quarters of their propellant doing it, so making sure that the Ganges was in just the right position was critical. They wouldn’t have much time on target.

  “And… now!” she cried, sending the command. The doors opened and the missiles blasted out into the raging winds.

  Chapter 4

  Forty-eight missiles raced through the atmosphere, clawing their way up out of the gravity well, out of the atmosphere, fighting through the winds. They were all targeted at the light cruiser that was moving at a steady but unhurried speed overhead, as it took out the last of the orbital defense platforms. The light cruiser Ganges had taken several hits from the defensive platforms’ weapons, and was showing moderate spotting on the shields, a bit of scoring on the hull, one of the heavy lasers was knocked out. Nothing too serious.

  The very high winds were causing a serious problem, however. In order to keep the weapons on course, their motors were forced to burn through more propellant than was expected. By the time the missiles cleared the atmosphere, seven of them ran out and fell back into the raging winds. They plummeted down, buffeted about and missing the Kutok mine by over a kilometer. The remaining missiles were scattered about, no longer in a tight cluster, but that was actually to the good. It was less likely that the cruiser would be able to shoot them all down with them spread out like that. The missiles accelerated and began moving in on their target.

  “Commander, we’ve got missiles incoming.” Gorgen’s voice was tense as he keyed up his point defense. The two tactical operators in his section were also bringing the main weapons to bear. “I’ve got point defense online and ready.”

  Hestian nodded, folding his hands and resting his muzzle on them for a long second before straightening and nodding his head. “Good. Engage those missiles, Mister Gorgen. Put us between them and the freighters.”