Junkyard Dogs series Omnibus

by Phillip Nolte

  With the possibility that there was an enemy onboard the wreck who was looking for her, she used her suit lights only sparingly. She was just about to switch her suit lights back on when she caught a light moving in the corridor, coming from the bow end of the wreck. It had to be the enemy that the two younger women had warned her about. Whoever it was, they would almost certainly be carrying some kind of hand weapon. She ducked through an open hatch into a small room off the main corridor.

  "Easy, Tamara," she said to herself, "you've got a pulse pistol, you can defend yourself." Running down a brief list of responses to the situation, each of which was probably inadequate anyway, she immediately made the decision to leave her suit lights off. She moved over to the open hatch and peeked down the corridor with her helmet sticking out from the hatchway only far enough so that she could get a good view. The lights of the intruder were getting closer. With her all but perfect memory, Carlisle still had a pretty good mental picture of where she had come from and what lie between her and the charged pulse beam emplacement in the aft of the old wreck. If she could find somewhere to hide where she could surprise the enemy, she might have a chance to kill or disarm them. The major problem with this plan is that there was practically no compartment available in this part of the ship that she wouldn't be trapped in if she tried to set up an ambush and was unsuccessful.

  Wait... there had been a small compartment just a little ways back up the corridor that would normally have been another trap but severe battle damage to the hull meant that she would be able to get out of the ship if she had to. Maybe that was the thing to do, just escape out through a hole in the hull. As badly damaged as the old wreck was, Carlisle could probably find another spot with bad enough battle damage that she could get back into the ship somewhere near where she needed to go.

  "Time to make your mind up, Tamara," she said to herself. "Are you going to run or fight?"

  Carlisle thought the problem through some more. She might or might not win a fight with the intruder but, whatever it was that she did, her first priority was to get the last two shots from the aft beam weapon fired off. After that, she would deal with the new threat if she had to. With her suit lights still off and her eyes having had some time to adjust to the darkness, she could just make out the opening to the room with the battle damage, some five meters down the corridor. She peeked down the corridor and noticed right away that the invader was closer than before. She shoved off the bulkhead towards the open hatch and the dim light from the outside, grabbed the edge of the hatchway and pulled herself into the small compartment. As she slipped into the room, she saw the unmistakable flash of a pulse weapon light up the corridor where she had just been.

  "Go, Tamara," she told herself, "get to the aft beam emplacement."

  There was no time to think. The hunter had spotted their quarry and would be pursuing the hunt with a vengeance. Fortunately, the hole to the outside in the compartment that Carlisle was using was large enough to span two decks and she had no problem pulling herself through the opening. The damaged area was narrower than she had originally thought, however, and she felt her suit scrape against the jagged edge of the opening as she negotiated the battle-damaged area. Fortunately, the material that her special suit was made from was durable as she had been told it was and no damage was done. Emerging on the outside of the old cruiser, it took her a moment to get her orientation. She clipped her primary tether onto a D ring on the hull and kicked off as hard as she could towards the aft main battery turret. It looked like there was some damage near that structure as well but she wouldn't know how much wandering around would be needed before she could gain access to the turret until she got there.

  "Pointer? Can you get a good look at the damage near the aft turret?" she sent to the two young women. "I need to get back inside the ship."

  Amanda replied a few moments later, "Yes, from here it looks like you should be able to use a large damaged area on the port side about ten meters in front of the turret."

  ***

  Fahada, her head sweeping back and forth as she scanned the interior of the wreck with the lights of her suit helmet, in her continued search for the Federation gunner, thought she saw someone down the corridor ahead. With her pulse rifle at hip level, she placed the laser sighting dot in the area where she had seen the movement, and fired a pulse down the corridor. Keeping the weapon at the ready, she began to advance on the area.

  "Our sensors indicate the person on board that ship has started moving aft," said Jubayr from the bridge of the Skorpios. The contact is about twenty meters from your position and moving away."

  "Roger, Skorpios," replied Fahada.

  ***

  Carlisle stopped her rearward progress by pulling up on the tether. Realizing that the tether would immediately tell her attacker exactly where she had gone, Carlisle quickly clipped her secondary tether to the nearby rail and, using the remote controls of the compact, powered tether system, unclipped the primary tether and reeled it in. Her special suit gave her a great deal of agility but, without any sort of thruster system, if she were separated from the wreck she could wind up in a very dangerous situation. The tether system could shoot a grappler some distance, about fifty meters, which was the length of the ultraslim cables. Beyond that distance, if she were floating free she would have to wait until she came within that critical fifty meter distance of another structure. In the worst case, she could wind up heading out into deep space!

  Carlisle scanned the hull area in front of her, looking for the battle damage that Amanda had described to regain access to the interior of the old wreck. Facing towards the aft of the ship, she could see the top of her destination, the aft main battery turret, visible about thirty meters away. Double checking the security of the tether, she coiled her legs up against the wreckage and, after mentally measuring the distance and the angle, again launched herself towards her target. She visually swept the wreckage in search of the opening back into the ship. There, a few meters in front of the turret, was a partially melted, almost circular opening. The damaged area was only a little to the left of her current path and she should be able to reach it without too much trouble, especially if she could get an accurate shot with her primary tether.

  As her trajectory brought her even with the hole in the hull, she fired the tether into the opening, hoping that the magnetic end would find something to get a grip on. She was rewarded by the line going taut. She used the remote system to unclip the secondary tether and as it reeled in, had a moment of sheer panic as she saw the opening she had just vacated light up with the suit lights of her attacker. She couldn't go immediately into the new area of the ship because the line from her secondary tether needed to be fully reeled in to avoid getting it entangled with something and to hide her destination from the adversary in the wreck. The tether reeled in as swiftly as it ever did, but seemed to take an inordinately long time to Carlisle. Finally, with the secondary tether secured, she could reel herself back down into the wreck using the primary tether. She let out her breath in a rush when she was safely within the old ship again and was reasonably certain that her attacker hadn't seen where she had gone.

  The area she found herself in was very badly damaged by the pulse bolt or whatever it was that had struck the ship all those years ago, with twisted and melted hull and bulkhead material in practically every direction. Fortunately, for Carlisle and her mission, the damage had been severe enough that it penetrated deep into the hull and she was able to regain access to the main corridor. The hatch that opened into to the capacitor chamber in the base of the aft turret was only a few meters down from where she reentered the main corridor. Since the crew that had charged up the capacitor banks had just accessed the turret the day before, the hatch door should be free. She disengaged the short length of her grappling tether and reeled it back in. In the meantime, she reached down to check her pulse pistol to make sure that it was ready to fire if she needed it.

  The pulse pistol was gone!

/>   She fumbled frantically at the belt on her suit, but to no avail. She must have lost the weapon while squeezing through that narrow opening in the ship just a few minutes ago. She fought a sinking feeling, knowing there was nothing she could do about it now. She reported the new development to her two handlers.

  "Pointer?" sent Carlisle. "Bad news, I'm afraid. I've lost my pulse pistol somewhere. Keep me informed the best you can on the whereabouts of that intruder. I've got to keep my distance.

  "We'll do our best, Vixen," came the reply

  Having regained the interior of the ship, Carlisle could no longer see what her attacker was doing. That whoever it was would know that Carlisle was heading towards one of the two intact beam emplacements on the aft portion of the ship was almost a certainty. She worked the hatch to the capacitor chamber and slipped inside, closing the hatch door behind her.

  In the pitch black interior of the chamber, she could see the two green LEDs indicating that the capacitors were charged and ready. Out of danger, at least momentarily, she switched on her suit lights and swiveled her head to the right and up, in search of the central hatch that led upward from the capacitor chamber to the pulse projectors themselves. Keeping the ladder centered in her suit lights, she crossed the chamber to the central hatch, which in this case had also been left open. That made sense, she realized, because the ship was not holding air and normal shipboard hatch integrity was an unnecessary hindrance. She pulled herself up through the opening and into the gun control room.

  Carlisle found herself in a difficult situation. As soon as she fired the first of the two stored pulse beams, the enemy would immediately know which turret she was in. With no powered shielding available on the otherwise dead hulk, the main batteries of the Skorpios could penetrate the turret armor material like a hot knife through butter. After firing the two shots, she would have to retrace her path back through the capacitor chamber to leave the turret. Not much of a choice here, stay in the turret and be incinerated or retrace the path through the chamber below and possibly face an attacker armed with what had appeared, from the strength of the bolt she had seen earlier, to be a formidable hand weapon, probably a pulse rifle.

  Duty first, survival second, she thought grimly. Carlisle levered herself into the gunner's chair, strapped herself in, pulled the battle periscope down and began to search for the Skorpios. The search didn't take long. The Greyhound had been leading the enemy ship on a course that would place the Skorpios almost immediately aft of the wreck Carlisle was on and within the zones of fire of the two beam projectors in the aft turret. She began to work the manual controls to move the turret and bring the pulse projectors into alignment with where the target was likely to be.

  The periscope had a split field of view, with the top portion of the view free to scan potential targets, or threats, and the bottom portion dedicated to aiming the guns. Carlisle kept the scanning view on the enemy ship and moved the turret and the targeting view into rough alignment. Having taken several direct hits in just the last few minutes, the enemy ship had slowed to a stop relative to the wreckage, apparently to allow her own shields time to recover. Carlisle could easily see the glow from the ship's slowly cooling shields but the ship itself was not in a position that offered Carlisle a firing solution. All she could see in the targeting portion of the periscope was the very tip of the bow. She didn't doubt that she could hit the target but any damage to that part of the ship would be inconsequential. From the intensity of the glow, it would probably be several minutes before the shields recovered. She had a sudden flash of inspiration. Until she fired one of the weapons in this turret, the crew of the enemy ship would have no reason to target the turret. It also appeared as though the enemy ship would be maintaining its present position, at least for a while. She might have time to ambush the lone attacker who was pursuing her and kill or disable him. Tactical mind operating with its usual efficiency, she immediately concluded that the capacitor chamber below was the perfect place for just such an ambush!

  ***

  Back in the amidships area of the wreck, Fahada peered around the hatch opening into the small compartment that her target had disappeared into. She felt of flash of anger as she immediately noticed the narrow opening in the hull that led to the outside of the ship. She pushed herself over towards the opening, looking for something to clip a tether onto. She caught a movement out of the corner of her eye. Something was spinning lazily, floating near the opening. It was...a pulse pistol! Her adversary must have lost it while squeezing through the damaged area of the hull. She smiled inside her helmet. Her task, it seemed, had just become a great deal easier.

  The suit thrusters of the reconnaissance suit she was wearing could get her back to the wreck if she somehow managed to float free, but their endurance was not unlimited and she had used fully a third of the thruster capacity of the very compact unit getting onto the wreck in the first place. She reached out and clipped a tether onto a D ring on the outer hull and pushed her body up and out of the small compartment. As she looked aft, the first thing she saw was a main battery turret that looked to have sustained little or no damage in the long ago battle. In fact the turret was rotating slowly as she watched. She smiled. There was only one way for someone to get out of that turret. Fahada would be going in after them.

  ***

  "The enemy is still following you, Vixen, he just now came out of the same opening that you used a minute ago," sent Amanda.

  "Thanks, Pointer. Keep me posted," Carlisle sent back.

  Carlisle retraced her route down into the capacitor chamber and pulled the hatch door to the corridor partway open. She then positioned herself behind the open hatch door ready to attack whoever was after her.

  "Pointer, let me know what that enemy soldier is doing," said Carlisle over the wristcomp net.

  "Will do, Vixen," came the reply.

  ***

  UTFN Auxiliary Ship Greyhound.

  Meanwhile Murdock, Hawkins and the crew of the Greyhound had their hands full with their own problems. The ship had absorbed the last pulse beam hit and the shields had held, but the power plant was still racing at one hundred and ten percent and the overloaded cooling systems were only just beginning to catch up. Fortunately, the makeshift upgrade that the engineering team had come up with for the mismatched powerplant and weapons/defensive systems had proven to be effective.

  They had fired pulses whenever they had the opportunity but the enemy destroyer's shields were too strong for them to do much damage, especially at the slow rate of fire they could sustain. While he and the rest of the crew continued to wait until their systems stabilized, Kresge had a sudden inspiration. He would continue with the previous plan to lead the enemy ship into the path of the charged weapons on the stern of the Lexington. If Carlisle could manage to hit the Skorpios with another of those big pulse beams, the Greyhound might be able to inflict some real damage while the shields of the enemy ship were temporarily weakened.

  Especially if Kresge's scheme worked.

  Chapter 59.

  UTFN Reclamation Center, December 16, 2598.

  Onboard utility sled Rover I, somewhere in the scrap cloud.

  Clancy Davis-Moore had been assigned to Sergeant Kelly's gun team. The portable beam projectors required a team of four to be operated with maximum efficiency and there were only seven Federation Marines. While any of the team members could certainly have aimed and fired the weapon, Davis Moore, with years of big game hunting experience using a comprehensive array of weapons, had demonstrated that his abilities regarding the aiming and firing of the weapon was superior to any of the Marines. Displaying typical Spacer practicality, the Marines had immediately adopted him and made him one of their gunners. The marine contingents with their assault cannons, had been deployed in opposite directions from the stationary Istanbul to provide support if they should be needed. Their duty was to use the cannons on smaller targets like troops in battle armor.

  It didn't take long before they were
put to work. One of the enemy cargo ships had been converted to use as a troop transport. With the inventory from three modern warships at their disposal, the enemy had somewhere around fifty sets of battle armor. The Scrapyard defense team, meanwhile, had less than half that number and all but a fourth of the fighting suits were antiques that had been captured from the terrorist group that had attacked the Scrapyard and the Orbital Station a couple months earlier. The defenders had elected to use most of their armor, particularly the old sets, in purely defensive roles, meaning the operators were not encouraged to leave their respective ships unless the situation demanded it. Those equipped with the most modern battle, armor, the two Federation Marine contingents and one group of four Meridian Imperial Marines, were outside in the Scrapyard in an attempt to neutralize any enemy assault troops that threatened to attack and board any of the Federation ships.

  The Marines were to wait until the last minute to reveal their presence. Kresge and Ambassador Saladin were pretty sure that the enemy had remained unaware of the three lightweight pulse cannons that the defenders possessed. Kresge and the Federation Marines had mounted their two cannons on the two Scrapyard utility sleds, Rovers I and II. To avoid being hit by heavy weapons fire, the Marines had practiced working with the utility sleds, keeping something between them and the enemy, taking no more than two shots, and then, using the cover provided by a wreck or two or three, moving the utility sled to another spot before setting up to fire again. Kelly's group was ready to begin firing, they were just waiting for the best opportunity to do so.

  Kelly watched in growing alarm as armor-clad troops began exiting the enemy transport vessel. Kelly counted that somewhere around a dozen men had left the ship when he finally made the decision to open fire.