When the atmosphere had bled out of the compartment, she opened what was now an outer hatch and was rewarded with a breathtaking, straight up bottom view of the Santana Nexus Station, still majestic even with only nine rings remaining. Though the station appeared to be slowly receding, it still took up almost half of the expanse of space that she could see. She drank in the spectacular sight for a few moments before she took a deep breath, pulled herself though the hatch, coiled her legs against the outside of the bulkhead that the separation had exposed to the hard vacuum of space and shoved off towards the nine-ringed station.
She soared out into space, free of the Sheik and his men but far from being out of trouble!
Chapter 63.
Santana Nexus Station, January 13, 2599.
With the entire tenth ring now without power, there was full-blown panic everywhere. The ring continued to maintain its rotation, so at least the people trapped on the ring didn't have to deal with any sudden changes in the simulated gravity but that was about the only thing that remained normal. Battery powered emergency lighting here and there shed some much needed light but anything that needed doing down on ring ten now had to be done in dim, surrealistic surroundings.
On the North end of the station, the combined forces of the Federation were able to gain control of the airlock area with a coordinated attack. With the Sheik's forces in that area in temporary disarray, the Dingo, the Donegal and the Glendaloch pulled up to the big force-curtain airlock on the North end of the Santana Nexus Station to unload troops. Dingo had it the easiest, she just used her docking tube to quickly disgorge all of the fighters on board. The two mining ships, showing some very fine piloting by their Captains, actually needed to poke the front portion of their craft through the force curtain far enough so that the airlock door was in the pressurized area and unload that way.
Glendaloch was just finishing up the process of unloading her fighters in this fashion when the Samak, one of the Sheik's remaining undamaged destroyers elected to rejoin the fight. The warships of the Junkyard Strike Force were all occupied trying to keep track of a half-dozen damaged ships while keeping one eye on the boarding operations. The Captain of the Samak thought he could use the distractions to disrupt the Federation boarding process.
As Captain Patrick pulled the Glendaloch's nose out of the force curtain and began a swing to starboard to clear the airlock for the Donegal, the Samak brought her front battery to bear on Donegal who was standing by waiting her turn to unload. Two pulses strobed out and struck the battered nose shield of the mining ship. The pulse beams were powerful enough to do some minor damage. A portion of the heavy metal shield near the bottom edge was actually blasted loose by the impact!
Seamus O'Connell, Captain of the Donegal had been taking his guard duties seriously and while overseeing the unloading of his sister mining ship, he had kept his ship's 10,000 gigajoule mining laser fully charged and ready.
Just in case.
O'Connell swiveled his ship ten degrees to starboard, centered the front battery of the recalcitrant destroyer in his sights and cut loose with a laser blast that flared the destroyer's shield to near incandescence. Meanwhile, Patrick on the Glendaloch, who had kept his laser capacitors fully charged as well, also drew a bead on the destroyer and triggered the powerful beam. With her shield already overloaded by the blast from the Donegal, Glendaloch's follow up blast utterly destroyed the front battery of the Samak.
The now badly damaged Samak surrendered for good shortly after.
Now the two mining ship captains could each boast that they had defeated a destroyer in battle!
After Donegal pulled into the force curtain and unloaded her fighters, the combined forces of the Junkyard Dogs, the Piedmont miners, the Patagonian Militia and the Nexus Station Resistance deployed throughout the upper nine rings of the station and got into position as quickly as they could. As the tenth ring continued to slowly drift away from the other nine rings of the station, the combined forces launched coordinated attacks on all of the Sheik of Barsoom's personnel still remaining in the nine upper rings of the station.
The Resistance forces from the Nexus Station itself, with support from the Patagonian Militia, concentrated their efforts on the Sheik's personnel who remained on any of the internal rings of the station, rings two through eight. The Revolutionary Forces were really pretty thin on these rings and the Federation forces met with only token resistance for the most part. The most intense fighting occurred in the spoke elevator areas of the rings which was where the Sheik's men headed in an effort to access the spoke elevators, get to the central spindle and eventually to what they thought would be safety on the tenth ring.
Most of them had no idea that there was no longer a tenth ring to escape to!
The Station Resistance forces herded the Sheik's men towards the spoke areas, right into the waiting arms of Juan Carlos and the Patagonian Militia. Caught in that vise, most of them surrendered after a few of their companions were killed or wounded and they found out how formidable the opposition they were facing was.
As expected, the Sheik's forces on most of the upper nine rings of the station were relatively light with no more than twenty to thirty of them interspersed thinly within in any of the rings.
There were two places in the remaining nine rings of the station where resistance was stout enough that the Revolutionaries were not all subdued within the first half hour following the separation and they were, as expected, at the two opposite ends of the spindle. In the North end of the spindle, there was a concentration of the Sheik's men that gathered in an effort to retake the big commercial airlock. Chris Hartmann and a contingent of Piedmont miners were tasked with handling those forces. The south end of the spindle was probably where the greatest level of resistance was encountered. Many of the remaining revolutionists had fled southward towards the tenth ring when the hostilities had broken out. Here Kelly and his marines, seven of them in full battle armor along with hand-picked men from all of the various Federation forces, made ready to challenge the concentration of the Sheik's men who gathered. Neither of these pockets of resistance was unexpected nor did anyone get overly concerned. It was only a matter of time, after all, the Federation forces now controlled virtually everything.
***
Military spaceship docking area near the Santana Nexus Station, onboard Federation prototype cruiser, Foul Beastie, January 13, 2599.
In the middle of all the action, Oskar Kresge on the Beastie got an unexpected call.
"Commander?" said the Beastie's communications officer.
"What is it?" replied Kresge.
"I have someone on a spacesuit radio who is asking for you."
"Do you know who it is?"
"I'm not sure, Commander. She says her name is Carlisle but she's calling on one of the Sheik's frequencies."
"Carlisle? For Heaven's sake, put her on!"
"Go ahead, Commander."
"Carlisle? Is it really you? Where are you?"
"Yes, Commander. I'm drifting between the two parts of the station in a borrowed spacesuit."
"What in the hell are you doing outside in a spacesuit?"
"I was on the tenth ring when it separated. You didn't know that I had been captured?"
"Um...no, we didn't. Are you alright? How did you get captured? How did you get free?"
"I'm fine, Sir and I promise I'll tell you all about it but right now I need someone to come and pick me up. I'm free-floating out between the two parts of the station but I didn't realize how fast the tenth ring was receding and I'm getting further away from the main part of the station by the second."
"I'll send someone right away!"
"Thanks, Commander."
Kresge was on the intercom immediately. "Harris?"
"What is it, Sir?"
"It's Ensign Carlisle. She's free-floating between the two sections of the station. I need you to get suited up right away and take our two-man sled and go get her."
On the
off chance that they might need some kind of small transport capability, the Junkyard Dogs had loaded one of the Scrapyard's two-man sleds on to the Beastie.
"How did she wind up there?" asked Harris.
"I don't have any details yet, just go and get her!"
"Aye, aye, Sir!"
Harris was suited up and ready to depart in less than five minutes. He took the sled and headed out into the ever-widening space between the two portions of the station. He had to force himself to remain calm as he searched frantically for the Ensign.
***
Santana Nexus Station, ring one spindle area, January 13, 2599.
"Central? This is Chris Hartmann up at the North Airlock,"
"Go ahead, Chris."
"I've got maybe twenty-five revolutionaries holed up in the receiving area just outside the north airlock. They're pretty well armed and putting up some pretty stiff resistance. We need to soften them up a bit. Any chance you could start lowering the temperature up here?"
"No problem, Chris. How does minus twenty-five Celsius sound?"
"That ought to do the trick," replied Hartmann, "we've got them cut off from any of their spacesuits and none of them are wearing much more than the light coveralls that everybody wears. I'll let you know if we need to go any lower."
"Initiating cooling sequence for North Airlock area...now!"
"Thanks, Central."
"We aim to please! Central out."
About a half hour later a call came down from the North airlock area.
"Central? This is Hartmann. It's okay, you can return the heat to normal. These guys just surrendered. Seems they need to warm up a bit. Can't say I blame them!
At the South end of the Station, the fighting continued to be intense. Kelly and his battle-armored contingent had managed to push the enemy down to the lowest levels of the spindle but with several of the enemy soldiers also outfitted with battle armor, the situation rapidly settled into a stalemate. Kelly, realizing that he and his forces had the enemy effectively bottled up, decided to simply wait. The enemy wouldn't be able to hold out for too long. Meanwhile three of his battle-armor equipped marines began to set up their 5.5 gigajoule assault cannon. If Kelly ran out of patience, perhaps he could use it to break the stalemate!
Chapter 64.
In space near the uncoupled tenth ring of the Santana Nexus Station, January 13, 2599.
"I can see you, Lieutenant," said Carlisle.
"Thank goodness," replied Harris, "Where are you?"
"I’m at your two o'clock and about thirty degrees below your current vector."
"How far away?"
"Half a kilometer or so. Wait, I'll see if I can turn on my suit lights."
"Ah! There you are!" Harris couldn't keep the relief out of his voice. "I'll be there in a couple of minutes."
He maneuvered up close enough to her that she could pull herself into the back seat of the two man sled.
"Got her, Commander," Harris announced, "We're heading back towards the Beastie now.
"Roger, Lieutenant. Good work!"
***
Military spaceship docking area near the Santana Nexus Station, onboard Federation prototype cruiser, Foul Beastie, January 13, 2599.
Oskar Kresge was still on the bridge of the Foul Beastie, coordinating the surrender of the remnants of the Sheik of Barsoom's Navy. The communications tech on the Beastie called out to him again from her station across the bridge.
"Commander Kresge?"
"Yes, what is it?" replied Kresge.
"I have another call for you. There is someone on the tenth ring who wishes to speak with you."
"Do you know who it is?"
"He didn't say, Commander, only that it was extremely urgent."
"Alright, put me through," said Kresge.
"This is Kresge, who in the hell are you?"
"In a moment, Commander, first I have news. The Sheik of Barsoom or Prince Merrikh of Jasmine, if you prefer, is dead; killed by one of his ship commanders."
Kresge sat in shocked silence for a long moment before finally responding with, "You are absolutely certain of that?"
"Yes, Commander, there was a dispute between the two leaders that broke out into violence. The entire ring is in total chaos."
"Who did you say you were?"
"This is Lester Dobbins, Commander."
"Lester Dobbins?" The voice sounded familiar but Kresge couldn't quite place it.
"You probably know me by another name, Ezra Brimstone."
"Brimstone! I might have known you'd be a part of this mess? What do you want now?"
"You need my help, Commander."
"Like the help you gave me out at my Scrapyard? You killed almost two hundred of my men! Thanks, but no thanks!"
"Hear me out, please. I...I have made mistakes, Commander, horrible mistakes. The situation here has now gotten totally out of hand."
"I can't argue with that! Where are you?"
"I don't know if that really matters but I am somewhere on the tenth ring of the station, the one you and your colleagues have so conveniently just separated from the rest of the station."
"What is it you want, Brimstone, I still have a battle to fight."
"I have a very simple request, Commander. You know the thruster system that you used to move the tenth ring away from the rest of the station?"
"Yes, what about it?"
"Put all of those thrusters on full power and get this ring as far away from the rest of the station as you can in the next half hour."
"Now why in Space would I want to do that?"
Brimstone hesitated but only for a short moment before he replied, "Because there is a weapon on board this ring of the station that can generate a hyperdrive transfer field two hundred kilometers in diameter. It is currently set to transport whatever is inside the field into the nearest star. This device has been set to go off in half an hour and it will destroy the tenth ring and anything else that is within a hundred kilometers on either side of it."
Kresge fell into silent shock for a few moments.
"You're making this up."
"I'm afraid not, Commander. The man who designed this device is the same one that designed the hyperdrive damper module. His plan for this device had been to use it to destroy the Federation Navy. That changed when the Sheik was killed. He doesn't want his invention to fall into Federation hands so he has locked himself up with it and has activated a countdown."
"Can't you stop him?" asked Kresge.
"Sorry, Commander, the area he's barricaded himself into is impenetrable."
"What about the Sheik's men? Can't they get in there somehow?"
"The Sheik's forces disintegrated into chaos right after he was assassinated, Commander. It's every man for himself down here. I have pulled together a small band of fighters but it's not enough. No one else will listen to me and, besides I don't think there is enough time to organize an assault on him."
"Who is this guy?"
"I don't know his name, he calls himself Al Majnun, which literally means "the madman." The name is, unfortunately, an entirely accurate description. The man is utterly brilliant but, I am afraid, he is also utterly mad. Look, Commander, even if his device doesn't work, it is powered by the nuclear self-destruct unit that I took from the Veritian derelict!"
"What! You're just full of good news aren't you?"
"Like I said, Commander, I've made mistakes. When I sold the device to him, I also gave him the activation codes. So you see, my hand is in this as well. I cannot stop him but by warning you and getting you to move this ring further away from the rest of the station, perhaps I can keep the loss of life to a minimum."
"Why should I believe you?"
"Actually, Commander, you don't have to. But moving this ring is really a very simple request and really, what do you have to lose?"
"To be truthful, I wouldn't mind if that part of the station were a little further away. A moment, Brimstone."
Kresge went a
way from the audio pickup for a moment.
"Okay, Brimstone, I have given the order for those the thrusters to be used at maximum thrust to push the tenth ring as far away as we can get it in your allotted time."
On his display, Kresge could see that the ring of thrusters had begun firing again.
"Why are you doing this?" asked Kresge.
"I thank you, Commander, for...having faith in me. Though I admit I have done nothing to warrant it. Why am I doing this? As I was saying, I...have been a bad person... a very bad person. I am supposed to be a Christian leader and I have abused my office, murdered innocent people. The current chaos across this entire quadrant was initiated by my actions out at your Scrapyard. It's all gotten totally out of hand. I...I have to try to do something to make up for it. I'm up to my neck in this whole mess but now I may have found a way to salvage something."
Brimstone had one more request.
"Most of the people on this ring are the Sheik's henchmen, Commander, and you would be hard pressed to find a worse lot of bullies and ne'er-do-wells. I think the Sheik somehow managed to recruit every criminal in the Quadrant! All of these people have committed serious crimes and their deaths will be no great loss to humanity."
"I can't argue that," said Kresge.
"A few innocents do remain though," continued Brimstone, "If you hurry, there should still be time to evacuate most of the women and children and some of the wounded. You need to do this as soon as possible, preferably within the next few minutes."
"I don't think I have a suitable ship nearby," said Kresge, "We'd need something equipped with a docking tube to evacuate people that quickly."
"I have been in contact with the Carpathia, the Sheik of Barsoom's yacht. Her Captain has his ship up and ready. In the current confusion, they were going to run as soon as they saw a chance but her Captain has agreed to a rescue attempt. That ship has a docking tube."
Junkyard Dogs series Omnibus Page 111
