First Command

by Scott Bartlett

  “You idiots,” Devine said, and he could hardly believe the words had left his mouth once he said them. He resisted the urge to clap a hand over his lips as Jowers and Navarro looked up to see him standing there, the flow nozzle replacement all but forgotten in his clenched fist. Their faces whitened.

  “Devine?” Jowers said. “You—what’d you say?”

  He knew he should try to walk his words back, but he couldn’t force himself to do it. I’m tired of playing the insubordinate ensign. Tired of pretending to agree as the others bash the captain. “I said you’re an idiot.”

  “Why?” Jowers said, his eyebrows bunched. “You heard what we said, I’m guessing. But Thatcher’s been hardest on you out of anyone. You’re not about to tell me you disagree.”

  “Yeah, I am, actually. You got a big problem, Jowers, and I’ll tell you what it is. Your attitude’s all twisted. This company’s been spoiled with soft targets for way too long. Frontier’s gotten by on superior weaponry, and better ships, so dealing with any pirates you stumbled on was like shooting fish in a barrel. But it ain’t like that anymore. The wormhole’s closed, and it might not ever open again. The UNC ain’t gonna hold your hand no more. Pirates are forming their own corps, now, and PMCs have free reign to get violent if they want to. There’s no one left to tuck you in and tell you everything’s gonna be all right.”

  Jowers’ face grew harder with every word, and Navarro’s was completely blank. There was none of the jocularity they’d shown Devine since he’d joined the Jersey’s company. That stung, a little, but he was too riled up to stop now.

  “From now on, anyone in the Cluster who doesn’t run a tight ship is screwed. So are you, if you transfer to a corp that shrinks from a fight. You’re lucky Thatcher took command of the Jersey. You won the lottery with him. You’ll realize that soon enough—hopefully it won’t be after you transfer to a ship where they run things sloppy, a ship doomed to get turned into space dust.”

  With that, Devine turned and marched the rest of the way across the catwalk, leaving Jowers and Navarro wearing expressions that mixed shock and anger. His stomach turned over as he entered the next compartment, and his head felt light.

  I screwed up, didn’t I? He’d just removed himself as a valuable source of intel for the captain. All because he couldn’t keep his big mouth shut.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Aboard the New Jersey

  Epact System, Dupliss Region

  Earth Year 2290

  Thatcher closely monitored the tactical display on his holoscreen as the small formation of Frontier and Sunder ships drew closer to the rocky red planet whose moon Prosper Station orbited

  “Adjust course two degrees to starboard, Nav,” Thatcher said. “Ops, share the new heading with our accompanying vessels.”

  “Aye, sir.”

  It was the third course adjustment he’d made since entering Epact, all in response to maneuvers made by the three pirate scows surrounding the station. ‘Scow’ probably isn’t the right word, here. For pirate ships, these vessels were above average in size and firepower. Even though the Frontier and Sunder warships outnumbered them four-to-three, they could possibly put up a strong fight, especially considering the Squall and the Lightfoot didn’t have much in the way of weaponry.

  The pirates had already succeeded in disabling all of Prosper’s turret batteries, and according to the distress signal Thatcher had received shortly after entering the system, they’d also boarded the station and taken hostages.

  His course adjustments were designed to bring his formation straight to the pirate vessel that was most isolated from the other two. Based on their behavior, it seemed likely that word had managed to reach them about the Jersey’s lopsided engagement in the Olent Region, when those pirates had paid dearly for keeping their ships too close together. But these pirates had absorbed the lesson too well, keeping their ships as far apart from each other as possible. If they kept doing that, Thatcher would pick them apart with ease.

  “We’re less than a minute from entering effective firing range, sir,” Lucy Guerrero said.

  Thatcher nodded. Then, he saw it. The other two pirate ships had shifted their trajectories and were now angling around the station toward the lone vessel Thatcher intended to target. So they’re not totally clueless after all. “Helm, increase engines to seventy percent. Ops, tell the Squall do the same, and send a directional jamming burst at the pirate vessel nearest us. Victorious and Lightfoot should hang back and prepare to engage the other enemy craft as needed. Tell Major Hancock to stand by to launch with Attack Shuttle One.”

  As he studied the unfolding engagement, Thatcher saw that his speed increase might not be sufficient. The other two pirate vessels had reacted quickly enough that they would have viable firing solutions on the New Jersey’s attack shuttle as it crossed to the station. Getting the marines aboard Prosper had been the true aim in isolating one of the enemy ships; knocking it off the board would merely have been a bonus.

  “XO, launch a Hellborn at the rightmost enemy vessel. Tell the Victorious to send one at the leftmost, Ops.” That should serve to occupy them while Attack Shuttle One slipped past the nearest enemy’s blinded sensors.

  Both rockets sprang forth, and the Jersey’s target reacted by putting up a shield, which the ordnance ruptured against almost harmlessly. The Victorious’ target apparently had no shields, and it reversed course while attempting to swat the missile down with railguns.

  Thatcher frowned. He’d been hoping neither ship would have shields. But the time had arrived.

  “Tell Major Hancock to launch, Ops.”

  “Aye.”

  Next came the telltale shudder as Attack Shuttle One left its launch catapult with enough energy to cross the intervening void quickly. But it’ll still be vulnerable to that shielded ship. To protect his marines, Thatcher would have to position the Jersey between that ship and the blinded one.

  Except, the blinded vessel wouldn’t remain so for much longer. It would already be working on electronic countermeasures to overcome the jamming, either hopping energy frequencies or using an omnidirectional antenna to eliminate the noise from their sensors. It might also receive sensor data from the other enemy ships. Once it got its bearings, it would eagerly move to sandwich the Jersey.

  There’s nothing for it. “Nav, set a course that interposes us between our shuttle’s course and the shielded ship. I need a firing solution for that same ship, XO. Prepare to raise shields on my mark.”

  “Aye, Captain,” said both Sullivan and Candle.

  “Tell the Lightfoot we’ll soon need some help keeping our shields up, Ops.”

  “Aye, sir.”

  “I have the firing solution, sir,” Candle said. “Primary laser is armed and ready.”

  Thatcher glanced at the tactical display, which showed Attack Shuttle One sailing ever closer to the station. “Fire.”

  The New Jersey’s primary laser lanced out, hammering the pirates’ force field and sending ripples of energy throughout it.

  A moment later, the ship behind the Jersey apparently shrugged off the Lightfoot’s jamming. It began peppering the cruiser’s shield, and the shielded pirate ship added its own laserfire.

  “Shield power is dropping sharply, sir,” Guerrero said. “We’re at seventy-three percent.”

  Thatcher felt his jaw tighten, and when he glanced at the tactical display, he saw that the third pirate ship had dealt with the Hellborn and was returning to join the fray.

  “Sixty-two percent shield power,” Guerrero said, just a few seconds later. Then: “The Lightfoot has begun maser energy transfer. Shields still dropping, but slower now. Fifty-nine percent.”

  Thatcher fought to keep his voice level. “Very good.” His eyes were glued to the visual display on the upper-left corner of his holoscreen, where the Jersey’s primary laser continued to dump energy into the pirate craft’s shield. He called up his own shield’s power on the top-right of the screen—it had dipped t
o fifty-six percent. Certainly a slower drop, now that the logistics ship was feeding power to her receiver array via microwave beam. But when the third ship added its firepower…

  She did so now, sending twin streams of solid-core rounds into the New Jersey.

  “Forty-eight percent shield power and dropping fast once again, Captain,” Guerrero said. Her words were redundant to Thatcher, now that he’d called up the percentage on his own holoscreen, but she was only following protocol. And it was important for the rest of the CIC crew to know the peril they were in.

  Victorious added her own primary laser to Jersey’s, but still the pirate shield held fast. It should be down by now. Then, it struck him: The station. They must be feeding power to her from the station.

  “Thirty-three percent, sir.”

  “Candle, have the forward gunners add their laserfire.”

  His XO twisted in his chair to peer at him. “Sir, the capacitor’s already overtaxed with powering the primary as well as our—”

  “It can handle it, with the power feed from the Lightfoot. Do it now.”

  The forward gunner crews began pelting the enemy shield with the Jersey’s secondaries, and a few seconds later it finally went down.

  “Put a Hellborn in her, XO.”

  “Aye, sir.”

  “Ops, have Engineering prepare to deploy repair drones.”

  As the missile’s departure sent a tremor through the cruiser’s frame, her own shields reached zero, the force field dissipating under enemy fire. Neither the Victorious nor the Jersey flinched, however, and they continued to focus on destroying the pirate ship whose shields had also fallen.

  The Lightfoot had already released a cloud of remote repair drones, which had almost reached Thatcher’s ship to land on her hull and lend their efforts to the Jersey’s own drones.

  At last the Hellborn reached its target, planting itself inside a section already melted by laserfire. The enemy vessel blew apart, and a ragged cheer rose up in the CIC.

  “Bring us about, Nav, and take us away from the station on a course perpendicular to the enemy ships’ turrets.”

  “Aye, sir.”

  The Jersey’s hull was taking extensive damage from the remaining enemies’ railgun turrets, but increasing her transverse velocity relative to those turrets offered some protection, making it harder to track and hit her. Between that and the efforts of two repair drone complements, the beating was limited to just superficial damage.

  The battle was all but over, and together with the Victorious, they neutralized a second enemy ship just four minutes later.

  Such is the nature of warfare in space. It takes hours to maneuver into position, and minutes for engagements to play out.

  Instead of destroying the third enemy ship outright, they managed to secure her surrender. Her hull was largely intact, and as Thatcher told Veronica Rose, “We can put her to good use. This isn’t over. Guerrero detected a ship leaving the system just after the battle—we’re pretty sure it saw everything. Our enemies will learn of what happened here soon enough.”

  “Do you expect Reardon to come at us?” she asked.

  “Not Reardon. Not yet. First, they’ll try to handle us without revealing their affiliation with pirates to the entire Cluster.”

  “So they’ll send more of them at us, then.”

  Thatcher nodded. “I think we can expect everything within two hops of this system to come at us before the day’s out.”

  Chapter Twenty

  On Prosper Station

  Epact System, Dupliss Region

  Earth Year 2290

  Captain Will Avery crawled along the life support service duct as quickly and quietly as he could, pushing his Dragon Tac-50 semi-automatic sniper rifle along ahead of him.

  “Your ships are getting blown apart as we speak,” Major Hancock, commander of the Jersey’s marine company, whispered into his ear—a whisper, since Avery’s directional speaker was turned down as low as it would go. “We’re your only way out of here. I repeat: do not harm any of those people. We’re willing to negotiate with you, but those people’s lives are nonnegotiable.”

  “Everything is negotiable,” a pirate answered back. “Particularly their lives, since we hold them in our hands. As it happens, I don’t trust you. I don’t think you have the firepower to destroy all three of our ships.”

  “Not all three?” Hancock shot back. “Just how many do you think we’ll destroy, then? Two? Two-and-a-half? Don’t dick me about. I think you understand full well the position you’re in.”

  Avery reached an intersection, where he could either continue straight or turn right. He consulted his eyepiece, which displayed a map of the service duct network he’d entered just a few minutes after Attack Shuttle One had docked with Prosper Station. He’d left his helmet behind—even though it was capable of syncing with his rifle’s scope, he preferred to go natural.

  “No pressure, Avery,” Hancock had whispered as he’d pushed himself along the first stretch of cramped tunnel. “But you’re those people’s only hope for survival. We have time to play just one card before we need to clear the rest of the station. Else, the pirates will regroup and punish us for being so soft-hearted.”

  The hostages were being held inside a long, low control room that overlooked two repair bays as well as the docking bay where the marines had come in. Other than the bulkhead facing the station, the control room was surrounded by deck-to-overhead windows of bulletproof acrylic. The pirates stood in full view of the marines in the docking bay below, weapons pressed theatrically against their captives’ heads. It would have been a simple matter for Hancock and his marines to rush the control room up the metal staircase that switched back and forth until it reached a standard-sized hatch, which Hancock would have ordered blown open. In that scenario, Avery would have stayed on the docking bay deck, to shoot any pirates who tried to use the high ground against the ascending marines. With the Frontier marines’ training and silver power armor, Avery wouldn’t be surprised if they mowed down every last pirate in there without taking any casualties. But the hostages would never have made it.

  So Avery had begun his journey through the duct system, climbing ladders and squeezing himself through spaces that would make most men feel claustrophobic. Hell, it made him feel a little cramped, if he was being honest.

  Six pirates. At least, six we could see through the window. Luckily, his weapon was self-loading, and the distance between the grate he intended to use as his hide and the acrylic window was no more than seventy-five meters. Accuracy shouldn’t be a problem, and neither would having to pause to reload. Shooting them before they can react might be.

  He was banking on their shock being enough to throw them off without causing them to take it out on the hostages. What these pirates apparently didn’t realize was that Frontier had been given detailed schematics for every station and Helio base in Dupliss, as part of the Oasis contract. I guess Pegg considered it too big a risk to share that intel with them. If the pirates were found to have it, then the cat would be out of the bag about them colluding.

  The way Avery saw it, if you were going to be a scumbag, you might as well commit to it. Now these pirates would pay for Pegg’s waffling.

  “We want a shuttle out of here,” said the same pirate as before. Hancock had continued to wear him down as Avery crawled through the ducts, just as the major wore his marines down during daily PT. And I don’t mean physically. The way that man gets inside your head…

  “And safe passage out of the system,” the pirate continued. “We’ll take the hostages with us, and we’ll dump them in their suits near the jump gate. You can come and collect them five hours after we’re gone—their suits will keep them alive for up to eight, yes?”

  “That’s right,” Hancock mused. “But tell me something. How do we know you’ll keep up your end of the bargain?”

  “You don’t,” the pirate said. “But this is your only chance to save these people.”

 
Avery finally reached the grate and immediately detached the laser cutter from his belt, switched it to a low-power setting, and started in. The cutter gave a low whine as he ran it along the grate’s edges, and its muzzle flashed, but it shouldn’t be enough to alert the pirates. He prayed it wouldn’t, anyway.

  Just before he finished detaching the grate, he fished for his magnetic gripper and pressed it against the grate, turning it on. Then he finished his cutting, and the grate came free of its casing. He pushed it out beyond the duct a little, turned it horizontal, and slid it underneath him. All as silently as possible.

  Hancock was still conducting his phony negotiation with the pirates, none of whom had noticed Avery at work, seventy-five meters behind them. He crawled back a foot and set up his Dragon at the duct’s mouth, extending the telescoping bipod to rest against the metal floor. Then he stuffed in a set of earplugs.

  Before shooting, he eyeballed his six targets, all lined up nicely with their backs to him. He sequenced them in his head as they stood arrogantly before the acrylic glass, sure they were safe from the marines below.

  And you are. Safe from those marines, anyway.

  He peered through the scope and sucked in a breath, then let it out in a slow exhale. His body lay perfectly still, and his fingers did not shake.

  The shot boomed in the narrow duct, deafening even through the earplugs. His first target’s head exploded, blood and bone spattering the hostage he’d been threatening.

  Avery shifted the barrel smoothly to the next pirate, who was turning. The round took him in the neck, ripping in and out, and the man staggered back to entangle himself with the hostage he’d been responsible for.