The Galactic Chronicles: Shadows of the Void Books 8 - 10

by J. J. Green

  With their mother ship gone, they were as good as dead. They had nothing to lose. And if Jas left without them, her fighters were in nearly the same predicament, though if the Thylacine made it through, they would return to search for them.

  Sayen was busy calculating their next jump from the coordinates given by the Camaradon. Jas wondered what the problem was. The Unity’s fleet ship had never been beaten in battle. She had never even had her hull breached, as far as Jas was aware. And Pacheco knew what he was doing when it came to space battles. Maybe their intelligence had underestimated the enemy’s firepower.

  “Trimborn,” Jas said, “what power capacity are we at?”

  “After this jump,” he replied, “I estimate seventy-three percent.”

  Not too bad, but not great either. Not for entering another intense engagement. Pacheco knew that, yet he’d still asked them to come. Things had to be bad.

  “Sending coordinates,” Sayen said.

  “Got them,” said Kennewell. “Engine three minutes from jump, Commander.”

  Jas gripped her arm rests and stared down at the list of pilots’ names ever present on her screen. The dots were missing from a large percentage, and as she watched, one of the lights wavered and went out. Looking up at the holo, she saw the fighter vessels approaching, dogged by fire from the Shadow fighters.

  “Trimborn,” she said, “can you aim a pulse at those Shadow vessels without risking hitting our own ships?”

  He frowned over his console for a moment before replying, “Yes, ma’am.”

  “It will delay our jump a few seconds, Commander,” the comm officer said.

  Kennewell scowled at him.

  “I’m aware of that,” said Jas. “Do it.” She watched as the short pulse from the Thylacine obliterated the tail end of the Shadow fighters. The Thylacine’s fighters were already arriving at the ship and entering the launch bay. The remaining pilots fought off the Shadows still chasing them.

  “Jumping in one minute,” Kennewell said.

  Their fighters were going to make it. Jas checked with the repair crew that everyone was in a place of safety, and she told the rest of the ship to get to their jumpseats. She comm’d the Squadron Leader to tell his pilots to remain aboard their vessels for the jump.

  Jas leaned back in her seat and passed a hand over her eyes. The adrenaline from the battle was fading, leaving behind a deep fatigue. She felt like she could sleep for a month. Just one last effort, she told herself. Just one last fight, then it would all be over. Sayen could return to Earth and her brother, Toirien could be reunited with her daughters, and Pacheco could find someone else to moon over.

  What she would do, she didn’t know, but neither did she care.

  “Here we go,” Kennewell said, and Jas felt the familiar falling sensation.

  “Krat, would you look at that,” exclaimed Trimborn as the holo of the battle scene flickered to life.

  The Thylacine had appeared to one side of a flurry of pulse fire. Pacheco had brought them right into battle, and it soon became obvious why. The Camaradon was under severe attack.

  Jas’ heart froze at the sight. A mere few hundred thousand kilometers from the Camaradon was a ship bigger than any she’d ever seen. It dwarfed the massive Unity ship like a planet did a moon. The ship’s make was also entirely unfamiliar.

  Her mind flew back to the Thylacine’s battle with the unfamiliar Shadow ships. The Shadows had been building their own ships. They’d moved on from using their victims’ knowledge and skills and begun to innovate and create. Had the ships Jas had encountered been mere test vessels for the technology of this new, gargantuan ship?

  “Attack that ship,” she shouted, leaping out of her seat. “Full pulses.”

  Her hand rose to her mouth. Had they been tricked? Had the entire battle been the Shadows’ idea? Had the Camaradon and the other Unity Alliance vessels been lured into a trap?

  Her eyes rose to the holo of the Shadow ship that overhung the bridge. She scanned the vessel for any familiarities—sensor arrays, drive assemblies, cannons—anything that could give her a handle on what they were dealing with. But the ship was a mystery to her. Even its firepower was different. A long stream of energy burst from it, not the familiar bolts of pulses.

  The Camaradon was being raked by this raw firepower, and its own barrage of pulses were being trapped and eradicated by the wavering energy beam before they could even hit the Shadow ship.

  As they watched, more Unity Alliance ships blinked into existence, called to the Camaradon’s aid, yet they looked like fleas hopping around a dog.

  The Thylacine’s pulses attracted the attention of the energy beam. It flicked toward them, and the pulses were gone. The familiar burst and dissipation of charged particles was missing, however. Had the beam absorbed the energy? Were the Camaradon’s pulses being converted and returned to it as firepower?

  “Stop firing all pulses,” Jas said. “Comm the Admiral.”

  “I can’t, ma’am,” the comm officer said. “Our comms are being scrambled. Everything that leaves or enters our system.”

  Krat. Jas got up and went over to the holo. The behemoth Shadow ship dominated the display but Unity Alliance ships surrounded it on all sides. The number of ships indicated that the UA had been successful in most of their individual battles, but that wouldn’t mean anything if they lost the Camaradon.

  The Shadow ship was bigger and the Shadow’s technology was better, but the UA had to win this fight. If they didn’t the enemy would begin to push back, retaking the planets that had been cleaned of their presence, infiltrating new worlds. All the battles of the previous five years, all the lives that had been lost would have been for nothing.

  But how could they defeat the Shadow’s devastating ray?

  As Jas watched the holo, tiny sparks began to stream from the belly of the Camaradon. Pacheco had launched his fighter ships, sending individual women and men in their tiny craft against that terrifying beam of light that was possibly being fed by pulses from the UA side.

  But Pacheco had the right idea. If pulses couldn’t break through the Shadow ship’s defenses, the only chance the UA had of destroying the ship was the force field-penetrating, low-energy fire of the fighters. If they could wreck whatever it was that was creating that ray, the Camaradon and the UA still stood a chance.

  Jas and everyone else on the bridge held their breath as the tiny sparks representing the brave Camaradon pilots neared the Shadow ship. The enemy’s beam was still flickering over the battleship like electricity in a Van de Graff generator. Jas desperately hoped that the fighters would escape the beam, but as the sparks swooped nearer, forks of light split from the ray and took out the leading ships.

  The remaining fighters took evasive action, diverting from a direct course toward the Shadow ship and splitting into different flight paths. But no matter what course the pilots took, the beam seemed to sense their presence, sending out long trails of light that split from the central ray.

  All around the bridge something between a gasp and a groan sounded. It was a massacre. The pilots were going like lambs to the slaughter. They couldn’t evade the dreadful ray, and they couldn’t get close enough to the Shadow ship to employ their firepower.

  There was nothing, nothing anyone could do to protect them or fight back.

  Suddenly, the Shadow’s beam broke through the Camaradon’s force field and hit the hull around one of its starjump engines. Jas’ chest constricted. If the ray broke through the hull, the ship would be incapacitated, unable to jump. If it couldn’t escape, it would be destroyed, along with the two thousand or more lives aboard.

  Jump, for krat’s sake. Jump. Yet she knew jumping was impossible for the Camaradon now. Jas’ hands were fists.

  “What should we do, ma’am?” Trimborn asked. His tone caused Jas to turn to look at him. The man’s usually sanguine expression had turned to fear. He was reading the next steps of the battle the same as she was.

  The Camarado
n was halfway to being lost. Pacheco had been expending all the ship’s power on pulses and her force field. He couldn’t afford to drop what remained of the force field either, or it would mean immediate annihilation. It would take ages for the ship to build the power to jump, and meanwhile the Shadow’s beam was targeting the very engines that might save it.

  Jas wouldn’t fire at the Shadow ship—that only seemed to help it. There was nothing they could do. Jas’ first responsibility was to her crew.

  “Kennewell, prepare to jump.”

  “Yes, Commander.”

  “Jas,” Sayen exclaimed, her face stricken, but there was no time to explain.

  It would take several minutes for the Thylacine to generate jump power. When the engines were at maximum capacity, they could remain in that state for several more minutes. At the current state of the battle, that should be long enough to do something to help if the opportunity arose. Though the longer they waited before expending the massive amounts of energy, the more danger they were in of simply exploding.

  “Navigator,” Jas said, “plot a course for as far away from here as we can go.”

  Sayen’s nodded, understanding that Jas was going to wait until the last possible second before they jumped, requiring the Thylacine’s engines to top out their power.

  How long would it take before Pacheco realized the battle was already over?

  “Open launch bay doors,” Jas said, then spoke into her comm. “Squadron Leader, maneuver all fighter ships to the back of the launch bay. Prepare to receive survivors.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” The man’s tone was relieved.

  Trimborn’s sharp intake of breath caused Jas to look up. Light flared blindingly from the holo of the Camaradon. The Shadows’ beam had broken through the hull of one of its jump engines and released the energy Pacheco had been building to jump.

  That was it. He had to abandon ship now. Around the holo of the Shadow ship, UA vessels began to wink out of existence, their captains and commanders retreating before the dreadful ray was turned on them.

  Come on, Pacheco. Save your crew.

  If only the Shadow ship wasn’t scrambling their comms, Jas could have ordered the remaining Camaradon fighters to retreat to the Thylacine. Some were returning to their stricken ship, some were continuing to brave the terrifying ray. Jas wished they’d see sense and give up their hopeless attack.

  Pacheco, come on.

  “Ready to jump, Commander,” Kennewell said.

  Jas’ gaze frantically searched the belly of the Camaradon. Any evacuees needed to leave immediately if they were to reach the Thylacine before she would have to jump. She exhaled. A few specks had appeared. Fighters that Pacheco must have told to turn around when they arrived. They headed in the direction of UA ships, but some were jumping before they could reach them.

  Thankfully, some were heading for the Thylacine.

  Larger specks appeared. The evac ships. These held one hundred. Some of the crew were getting away, but Jas thought it would take longer than the Camaradon had to launch them all.

  As an evac flew from the Camaradon’s belly, it attracted the notice of the Shadow’s beam. A lick of lightning, and one hundred lives were lost. Somewhere on the bridge, a voice cried out.

  “Ma’am,” Kennewell said, “the jump engines are becoming unstable.”

  Jas didn’t reply. She was biting the edge of her thumb. Blood was running down her hand to her wrist.

  “Commander,” Kennewell said.

  Jas opened her mouth to answer, but at that moment another evac ship appeared and began to streak toward the Thylacine, one of the few UA ships remaining in the vicinity.

  “Squadron Leader,” Jas said into her comm. “An evac’s on its way to us. Tell me the second it arrives.”

  Everyone on the bridge was frozen, transfixed as the evac drew swiftly closer.

  “Ma’am,” Kennewell said, a note of desperation in her voice.

  Jas ignored her.

  “Commander,” Trimborn exclaimed, “the Camaradon’s going to blow.”

  Jas ignored him too.

  The Squadron Leader’s voice sounded from her comm. “Evac ship’s aboard, ma’am. Launch bay doors closed.”

  “Jump.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  Sayen was helping with the survivors from the Camaradon. Most were in shock, but very few were injured. The first evac ship had been filled with the injured. The evac ship that the Shadows’ beam had destroyed.

  Twelve fighter pilots had made it to the safety of the Thylacine’s launch bay. Along with the hundred of the Camaradon’s crew who had made it to the evac ship that made one hundred and twelve. One hundred and twelve out of two thousand. Sayen hoped that other evac ships had reached UA vessels before they jumped. Jas had said they would return to the battle scene in an hour to look for survivors. Fighter ships had twenty-hour hours of life support. There was a slim chance that some pilots were still out there, or even an evac ship or two that had escaped the Shadows’ notice.

  It was a slim hope, but Sayen clung to it as she walked among the survivors, who were sitting and standing in groups in the launch bay: technicians, engineers, troops, and general maintenance staff. Sayen handed out blankets and energy drinks, which were accepted with shaking hands. Most of the survivors were silent, others were crying.

  She didn’t see Pacheco until she was nearly upon him. He was sitting by himself, looking the most shocked of all.

  “Admiral,” Sayen said, holding out a drink she’d opened. “Are you okay, sir?”

  He looked from the drink to her face for a moment as if not hearing or understanding what she’d said, then recognition dawned in his eyes.

  “Navigator Lee,” he replied, his voice choked. “Thank you.” He took the drink. “Is Commander Harrington on the bridge?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Thanks.” He stood up unsteadily and walked away, his hand drooping, spilling his drink in a trail along the floor. Sayen went after him, concerned about his state. He stopped and turned to her. “She made me leave, you know.”

  “Sir?” Sayen asked.

  “The Fleet Admiral. I wanted to stay. A captain should go down with his ship. I was going to stay. But she made me leave. She told me there was nothing I could have done. It was false intelligence. A trap to take out our best ship. The Shadows will make their move now. They’ve begun to push back. I have to help coordinate our response.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “You do understand? I had to leave. I didn’t want to abandon my ship.”

  “Yes, sir. I understand completely.”

  The admiral nodded to himself. “Don’t worry. I know the way.” He left the launch bay.

  Others of the Thylacine’s crew had also come to the bay to help with the survivors, and to search for family members and loved ones. These latter went from group to group asking for news. Sometimes the news wasn’t what they wanted to hear, such as that the person they were looking for had been injured and on the first evac ship. Crew members were hugging and crying.

  Sayen recognized a ginger-haired woman, and she went over to see her.

  “Toirien,” she said. “Jas told me you were aboard.”

  “Umm...,” Toirien replied, her freckled face turning pink.

  “I’m Sayen Lee. From the Galathea.”

  “Oh, right. Hi,” Toirien replied, in a tone that said she still didn’t know who this strange woman was.

  “Navigator Lee. Do you remember?”

  “Oh,” exclaimed Toirien. “I remember. You were the one in stasis in the sick bay while we were trapped on the Shadow planet.”

  “Yes, that was me. But I was also the ship’s navigator for the mission.”

  Toirien shook her head. “I’m sorry. I didn’t really take any notice of who was who aboard the ship. I mostly kept my head down and got on with my job then. I was fighting my demons.”

  “Demons?”

  “Never mind.” Toirien held out a hand and the
y shook. “It’s good to meet you finally. I just wish it was in better circumstances. I came here to look for my daughter. She was an engineer aboard the Camaradon, but someone just told me she was transferred to another ship before the battle. Now I don’t know where she is.”

  “I’m sorry,” Sayen said, “I hope she’s okay. I hate to ask you this, but could you help me with something if you have time? I want to find berths for these people.”

  “It’d be my pleasure. The engines are ready to roll, and I was starting to feel a little useless. I don’t know how to help these people.”

  Sayen found Trimborn, who was inputting the survivors’ details into the ship’s system, and explained what she wanted to do.

  “Be my guest,” Trimborn said, handing her an interface. “That was next on my list. While you’re doing that, I can organize people to help the doctor with triage and dispensing sedatives.”

  Sayen and Toirien searched the Thylacine’s system for spare berths or other potential sleeping accommodation and assigned the survivors to bunks. They would need somewhere to sleep after the doctor’s sedatives began to take effect. A period of recovery was needed, though what would happen after, Sayen didn’t know.

  “Toirien,” she said, “you got to know the commander quite well while you were on the Shadow planet, didn’t you?”

  “Yeah, pretty well. I like her, though she’s got a tough side to her.”

  “Would you say she’s changed a lot?”

  “Krat, yes,” Toirien exclaimed. “I don’t know how she’s still standing, to be honest. Never seen someone look so bad who wasn’t sick in bed. If I didn’t know better, I’d say she was on something.”

  “Really?” Sayen asked. “You think the commander might be on drugs?”

  “No, that’s not what I said. From the way she acted toward me on the Galathea...Sayen, I have to confess, I used to have a bad drug and alcohol habit, so I know what I’m talking about. What I said was, if I didn’t know better. Jas Harrington hates drugs, and, anyway, she isn’t the type to take them. She’s no thrill seeker. But she looks just as exhausted and ill as if she were on something strong and had been for a long time. I should know. I used to mix with those people. I was one of those people.”