Desperate Fire (Angel in the Whirlwind Book 4)

by Christopher Nuttall

  And yet, the producers don’t seem to recognize the existence of female spacers, she thought wryly. There was a streak of sexism running through the series. The show suggests they simply don’t exist.

  Her terminal bleeped. “Commodore, Admiral Christian is requesting a private conference,” Wheeler said. “Do you want me to put him through to your cabin?”

  “I’ll be on the flag deck in two minutes,” Kat said. She hated long good-byes, but part of her wanted to stay with Pat. If she walked him to the shuttlebay—all of a sudden, the scenes where the girls had followed the men as far as they could made a great deal of sense. But she couldn’t refuse Admiral Christian’s call. “Have the call routed into my office.”

  She tapped her terminal, then looked at Pat. “Stay safe.”

  “I’ll do my best,” Pat promised. “And you too.”

  “I’ve got a superdreadnought wrapped around me and over a hundred more providing covering fire,” Kat said. “I’ll be safe.”

  “And so will I,” Pat said. He gave her a kiss, then pulled back. “I wish—”

  “Duty calls,” Kat said. She smirked, looking down at the ring on her finger. “You should have given me the ring last night.”

  “We were busy,” Pat said. “I love you.”

  He turned and headed towards the hatch. Kat fought the urge to call him back as the hatch opened. She turned and headed down to the flag deck. Wheeler was sitting at his console, watching the endless stream of updates flowing across the tactical display. Sixth Fleet, having spent the last three weeks simulating as many possible encounters as its tactical staff could imagine, was as ready as it would ever be.

  “Admiral Christian has issued the last set of tactical orders,” Wheeler said. “We’ll be in the van.”

  “Good,” Kat said.

  She stepped through the hatch into her office, feeling oddly disconcerted as the portal closed behind her. The ring felt heavy on her finger. She understood, all of a sudden, why so many of her friends had enjoyed showing off their engagement rings. It was a sign of commitment, a sign that someone wanted to spend the rest of his life with you. And yet, what would they have endured? Pat and she had gone to war together.

  Enough, she told herself firmly. We’ll be jumping in-system soon.

  She keyed her console. “Admiral,” she said, “I’m here.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  “Captain,” Sonja Robertson whispered, “can they see us?”

  William found himself torn between anger and amusement. Sonja was a reporter, a woman with long red hair and a heart-shaped face. He wasn’t sure if she was as silly as she acted or not, but she had a positive gift for making people talk to her.

  “I hope not,” he said. “But we don’t know for sure.”

  He smiled rather grimly. They’d slid out of hyperspace right on the edge of the system, carefully emerging on the opposite side of the sun from Ahura Mazda. And yet he wasn’t sure if they’d escaped detection or not. Theocratic forces might not be able to afford the immense sensor arrays the Commonwealth used to cover its major systems, but they would definitely have rigged up a network to protect Ahura Mazda. Their homeworld could not be allowed to remain undefended.

  “You could be wrong,” Sonja whispered. “What then?”

  William grinned. “You don’t have to whisper,” he said. “They can’t hear you.”

  He leaned back in his command chair as the display began to fill with icons. “If they detected our arrival, they’ll either wait for us to do something or dispatch a squadron out here to catch us,” he added. “We can evade any hunters if they do come after us.”

  Sonja gave him a sharp look. “And how long will it take for them to react?”

  “I have no idea,” William said. “We’ll know when their ships arrive.”

  He forced himself to relax as Thunderchild crawled forward, her passive sensors drinking in every last fragment of data. The Ahura Mazda system slowly began to take shape in front of him: a dozen cloudscoops, hundreds of asteroid mining stations, large settlements on a dozen planets and moons. Yet he still felt that there was something odd about the whole display. He mulled the problem over, time and time again, as his ship crept farther into the system, considering and discarding possibilities one by one. The Theocracy had apparently worked hard to center everything on Ahura Mazda.

  Perhaps they did, he thought. They want to keep everything under their direct control.

  That made sense, he reasoned. The pre-space powers had lost control of dozens of asteroid settlements during the march into space, as the interests of the spacers diverged from their former masters. Quite a few of the early out-system colonies had been founded by men and women who wanted to get away from Earth. The UN had certainly found it impossible to keep control of hundreds of colonies, despite being far more powerful than all the colonies put together. Clearly, the Theocracy had learned a few lessons from the past.

  “Captain, I think the cloudscoops are pushing their systems to the limit,” Cecelia said. “I’m not sure how long they can sustain this tempo.”

  William rose and paced over to her console. “Why do you think that?”

  “Here,” Cecelia said. “They’re pushing out HE3 containers at a staggering rate, better than we can do. I think they’re pushing themselves too hard.”

  “Oh, what a shame,” William said. He looked up at the system display, silently estimating just how much raw material was being mined and shipped to the industrial nodes orbiting Ahura Mazda. “You may be right.”

  Sonja looked at him. “Does that mean that their system will collapse under its own weight?”

  “I don’t know,” William said. He returned to his command chair and sat down. “But it would be unwise to count on it happening.”

  The hours ticked away slowly as the starship slid into the system, heading straight for Ahura Mazda itself. William forced himself to take a break, leaving Roach in command, even though sleep was impossible when they were so close to the enemy homeworld. He could practically feel the Theocrats watching for his ship, even though he knew such sensations were nothing more than his imagination. No wonder Sonja and everyone else spoke in whispers. The sense they were being watched, that the slightest sound would give them away, was impossible to ignore. Cold logic said otherwise, but what was cold logic now?

  His terminal bleeped. “Captain to the bridge; I say again, captain to the bridge.”

  He strode back onto the bridge. “Report!”

  “The enemy sensor network surrounding Ahura Mazda is good,” Roach reported. “Too good.”

  William scowled. The Theocracy had deployed everything from simple radar to laser cages and active sensor beams. Getting through the sensor haze without being detected would be almost impossible, unless the Commonwealth ships were very lucky. Perhaps they could sneak through posing as a sensor malfunction, but he doubted they’d survive the attempt. It didn’t look as though the network had been overstressed and was on the verge of breaking down. The Theocracy certainly wouldn’t ignore an alarm so close to their homeworld.

  “Hold us here,” he said. “We’ll see how much we can pick up without going any closer.”

  Ahura Mazda unfolded in front of them, a planet ringed by industrial nodes, shipyards, orbital battlestations, and asteroid habitats. William had seen long-range sensor scans before, but seeing the planet in person brought it home to him just how much firepower the Theocrats had assembled to protect their homeworld. Six squadrons of superdreadnoughts and hundreds of smaller starships were merely the icing on the cake. Layer after layer of defenses would make breaking through incredibly costly.

  He sucked in his breath. Hundreds of freighters held position near the industrial nodes, more transport than he’d thought remained in the Theocracy. It was hard to be sure, thanks to the sensor haze, but the freighters didn’t look non-functional. Perhaps the Theocracy had been unable to crew the ships, or perhaps they were fearful of losing them to deep-strike raiders
. Or perhaps—he shook his head. The answer, he was sure, would only make sense to the Theocrats.

  They have enough escorts covering their homeworld to get a convoy safely through the Gap, he mused. And yet they’re holding them here.

  “I’m picking up over a thousand orbital weapons platforms and missile pods,” Cecelia said. “They’ve been improving their defenses since the last time the system was probed.”

  Roach scowled. “Do they know we’re coming?”

  “Unknown,” Cecelia said.

  William let out a breath. The Theocracy could have deduced the Commonwealth’s plan. Or they might simply have been reluctant to uncover their homeworld, even though the ships tied down guarding Ahura Mazda would have tipped the balance in any one of a dozen battles. For all he knew, someone had discovered the wrecked minefield and sounded the alert.

  “Leave it for the moment,” he ordered. “Can you get any solid visuals on the ground?”

  “Some,” Cecelia said. “But the detail isn’t great.”

  “Show me,” William ordered.

  He shuddered as Ahura Mazda took on shape and form. Admiral Junayd had warned them that Ahura Mazda was densely populated, but he’d been understating the case. The largest city on Hebrides would have vanished without a trace on Ahura Mazda. The largest city on Tyre was still only a quarter of the size of the megacities on Ahura Mazda. Even from this distance, the cities were clearly overpopulated. He couldn’t help wondering why the Theocrats hadn’t expanded their metropolises or even established new ones. But he had a feeling that it would make social control difficult if they tried.

  Bastards, he thought.

  “I’m picking up over fifty PDCs,” Cecelia said. “Their interlocking force fields will cover their capital and much of the surrounding countryside.”

  William glanced at her. “Is there a place for the marines to land?”

  “I think so,” Cecelia said. “But getting down is going to be hellish.”

  “Yes,” William agreed. “That is fairly clear.”

  He studied the display for a long moment. Sixth Fleet should have enough firepower to sweep the planet’s orbit clear of threats, but the engagement was going to be costly. And risky too, if a warhead accidentally struck the planet’s surface. The possibility of accidentally committing mass slaughter could not be ignored.

  But there was no way to avoid it. “Do you have solid locks on their defenses?”

  “Yes, Captain,” Cecelia said. “The superdreadnoughts may change position, of course.”

  “Of course,” William agreed. He wished, suddenly, for the long-range missiles they’d used at Hebrides. But there just weren’t enough left to make an impact. “I don’t believe there is anything to be gained from trying to sneak closer.”

  Roach looked up. “Captain, our orders say we need to probe the system.”

  “And avoid detection,” William pointed out. “If we slip any closer, Mr. XO, there is a very real chance of being detected and killed. And then the mission will be compromised.”

  “True, sir,” Roach agreed reluctantly.

  William didn’t blame him for being concerned. It was important to have solid data on the defenses. Nothing they’d gleaned from previous recon flights could be trusted, not when the Theocracy had plenty of time to reposition its battlestations and emplace more automatic weapons. But there was always a point of diminishing returns. Getting closer would give them harder data, yet it would also raise the specter of being detected and destroyed. And then none of the data they collected would survive.

  He glanced at Cecelia. “Do you have a solid lock on their StarCom?”

  “Here,” Cecelia said. She tapped an icon on the display. “It seems to be a modified Type-III, Captain. I doubt they have the ability for real-time conversations between star systems.”

  “It doesn’t matter,” William said. “A simple email will be more than enough to carry orders from place to place.”

  Sonja glanced at him. “Like a command to destroy every last occupied world?”

  “Yes,” William agreed. “They could send such a command, if they wanted.”

  He looked at Cecelia. “Can you determine what other targets need investigating?”

  “They have several shipyards and a smaller web of defenses around their moon,” Cecelia said slowly. “And a large facility that doesn’t seem to have any purpose.”

  “That’s an antimatter production facility,” Roach said. William glanced at him, surprised and alarmed. “What else could it be?”

  He might be right, William realized. The facility looked like a giant fuel storage dump, yet he saw no sign of a mining station on the lunar surface. And it was holding station on the far side of the moon, with all its mass between the facility and Ahura Mazda. The Commonwealth preferred to keep its antimatter production stations on the far side of the sun, but the Theocracy was too paranoid to let the antimatter out of its sight. William wouldn’t have cared to take the risk—the threat of losing control of the antimatter outweighed the security risk if the facility were located on the far side of the sun—yet the Theocracy seemed to feel differently.

  “Mark it down for attention when we hit the system,” he ordered. A simple missile would be more than enough to take out the facility, knocking out the containment systems and detonating the antimatter. Done properly, parts of the Theocracy’s defenses would be badly damaged. “What about the rest of the system?”

  “There’s very little worth inspecting, sir,” Cecelia said. “Just cloudscoops and mining stations.”

  “Unless they’re hiding an entire fleet in stealth,” Roach put in. “They could.”

  “Let us hope not,” William said. He didn’t think an entire stealthed fleet was particularly likely. If the Theocracy had a few extra superdreadnought squadrons, it would have sent them to the war. The ships might have made a real difference if they’d been deployed six months ago. “Helm, pull us back carefully.”

  “Aye, sir,” Gross said.

  William sat back down, bracing himself. Crawling out of the system would be just as nerve-wracking as sneaking into the system, although the odds of being detected would go down sharply as soon as they were away from Ahura Mazda. It would take a stroke of very bad luck to be detected. And yet . . . he pushed the thought aside as he studied the live feed from the tactical department. Admiral Christian’s staff would draw the final conclusions, of course, but his staff was telling him things he didn’t want to know about the planet’s defenses. Getting through them was going to be incredibly costly.

  “Captain,” Sonja said, “can we take the system?”

  “Yes,” William said. He rose. “But it won’t be painless.”

  He passed command to Roach and motioned for the reporter to follow him into his office. The coming battle wouldn’t be painless. Hundreds of ships would be destroyed, perhaps including Thunderchild. But it had to be done.

  “There’s a lot of ships out there,” Sonja said. “Are you sure we weren’t detected?”

  “There’s no way to be entirely sure,” William said. “But the odds of us having been detected are very low. Coffee?”

  Sonja shook her head. She looked tired, he noticed, despite using her implants to keep awake. He didn’t really blame her, even though experienced naval officers knew the odds of anything happening in interplanetary space were very low. Her bosses would be furious if she was asleep when something newsworthy happened.

  She sat down on his sofa. “What happens if they do detect us?”

  “We run,” William said. “There’s no point in trying to break contact.”

  He sat down in his chair, sipping his coffee. “You have to understand the scale of interplanetary space,” he said. “A planet, even one as developed as Ahura Mazda, is very small. A starship is so tiny, it’s really no more evident than a grain of dust floating in the air back home. They are not likely to detect us so long as we don’t do anything stupid.”

  “So I’ve been told,
” Sonja said.

  She leaned back, curling up her legs. “Do you want to see Ahura Mazda burn, Captain?”

  “I want the war to end,” William said firmly. “And I want it to end in a manner that ensures the Theocracy won’t rise again.”

  Sonja met his eyes. “Do you want revenge for your homeworld?”

  William took a moment to formulate his reply. “Burning their homeworld to ash would merely pile one crime on top of another,” he said. On or off the record, the question needed to be answered carefully. “The vast majority of the folks down there have absolutely no control over their lives, let alone what their government does. It is not right that they should suffer or die. Revenge would be satisfying, but it would get us nothing.”

  He paused. “Does that answer your question?”

  “I thought your people prided themselves on being hot-blooded,” Sonja said.

  “A common misunderstanding,” William said. He wondered absently just who’d been filling her head with such crap. Sociologists were about as trustworthy as psychologists and only marginally more useful. “My people pride themselves on standing up for themselves, in handling certain matters themselves. If a person crosses the line, we are expected to deal with it ourselves, not go whining to higher authority.”

  He took a breath. “But a fistfight with a man doesn’t oblige you to pick a fight with his wife and children too,” he added. “How could our society have survived?”

  “And yet you’ve lost everything,” Sonja said. “Aren’t you angry?”

  William met her eyes. “If I thought that destroying Ahura Mazda would bring back the dead civilians and rebuild the smashed cities, I would destroy that cursed world without a second thought,” he said. “But it won’t. No amount of revenge and bloody slaughter will bring life back to the dead. I am angry, yes. I am angry at the bastards down there who have plunged their own people into a futile war and killed millions, perhaps billions, of innocents in a desperate bid to impose their will on the universe. I want them dead and gone.