Kurtherian Gambit Boxed Set Three: Books 15-21, Never Submit, Never Surrender, Forever Defend, Might Makes Right, Ahead Full, Capture Death, Life Goes On (Kurtherian Gambit Boxed Sets Book 3)

by Michael Anderle

  Bethany Anne’s eyes flashed red. “That. Won’t. Happen.”

  “Be merciful from a position of strength, and allow those who would to yield. Those who wish to hold onto their false beliefs?” This time, Bethany Anne paused a moment before finishing. “They have chosen the way of the Kurtherians. Send them to hell where King Yoll writhes in pain so he has someone to talk to.” She smiled, deviltry in her eyes. “And make sure you tell all of them to tell King Yoll the Queen Bitch says, ‘Hi, pencil prick.'”

  The ship’s people once again cheered as they prepared for the battle to come.

  Everyone had watched the video of Bethany Anne killing the Yollin king, and her complete lack of respect and the multiple times she had called him names still elicited a chuckle from most.

  Annex Gate Straiphus

  The Yollins manning Annex Gate Straiphus had been calmly pulled together and then replaced with those Kael-ven figured were as supportive of the new regime as possible.

  Further, they had Kiel’s mercenaries walking around inside the massive complex, working to make sure the massive Gate wouldn’t be sabotaged while the human fleet was in the other system.

  Having that happen could be a problem.

  Bethany Anne had made sure the calculations were completed for all the ships to transfer through the Gate without exploding it. All the engineers agreed that as long as they didn’t try to shove ‘that big asteroid bastard’ through the Gate, it would be just fine.

  John had called the space station the QBBS TBAB a couple of times before Gabrielle punched his arm. “For Meredith’s sake. No lady wants to be called ‘big.'”

  Meredith had replied that she had assumed they meant Reynolds. Reynolds had replied that he considered it a compliment.

  Bethany Anne had wanted to know who was feeding the EIs gutter humor. Everyone in the room with Bethany Anne had turned as one and looked at her.

  Straiphus System

  Admiral Thlock-nel glanced at the clock above the door in his office.

  The display let him know that they had officially passed the maximum amount of time it should have taken the Empires Broken to make it to the Yoll System and be safely lying in wait for the aliens to attack him.

  It was a shame he was going to lose three destroyers, but their moves so far hadn’t brought about the expected results.

  “Sir?” a voice called over the intercom .

  “Yes?”

  “We have passed the maximum amount of time where we would expect to see the next transfer into the system.”

  “Ok, it seems we have their attention,” Admiral Thlock-nel commented. “Tell all ships to prepare. We are expecting unhappy visitors soon. Make sure the Deep Space Ship G’laxix Gunt’eh is ready.”

  Human G’laxix Sphaea-class Ship QBS Minnesota

  Admiral Thomas nodded to the captain of the Minnesota. He was a visitor on the ship, and as such he didn’t want to get in the way of the ship’s captain.

  While using Kurtherian tech could have gotten him the battle information back in the Yollin system, he didn’t trust that Murphy wasn’t an alien, capable of messing up the communications across the distance. He wanted to be in the system with his people for this battle.

  Fingers crossed, nothing happened that the Empress and the others couldn’t handle.

  However, she had Lance, so he had decided he needed to be here. Unfortunately, for the same reasons Bethany Anne couldn’t come, he couldn’t be on the ArchAngel as his flagship.

  Right now, the Minnesota was in the back of the queue, waiting for their turn to transit.

  He looked at the 3D holograph of the Straiphus System, and the Yollin System.

  “Go,” he commanded.

  The human ships started transferring out through the Annex Gate.

  QBS Carrier Pilot’s Dawn, Twenty-two Hours Later

  “Get your ass prepped!” Pilot Julianna Fregin yelled at a nearby pilot, a smile on her face as she walked across the hangar bay of the Pilot’s Dawn. Her ship was on the floor and her EI-controlled wingman was racked upside-down right above her own ship, allowing both pilot and wing to leave at the same time.

  Julianna sidled up next to her Eagle and slid a hand down its beautiful black side. She stopped for a moment and placed her finger on each of seven-and-a-half Yollin flags. She had thought back to the fear, the drama, and then finally the bolt that her EI wingman had taken, allowing her ship to only take a partial hit, where she had lost a good portion of her leg.

  Only to have the Empress’ own blood help rejuvenate her. Now she was not only whole after a lot of time of consuming food and energy in a Pod-doc, but her reactions were faster as well.

  All of the guys who flew on her team refused to play slaps with her anymore. She didn’t blame them; none of the women would play with her either.

  She palmed the side of the ship next to the canopy, and it opened smoothly. Tossing her helmet onto the seat, she spoke into her empty cockpit. “Hey, Bootlegger, you active?”

  “Yes, Pilot Fregin, I’m online and listening.”

  “You ready to dance the dance of the wicked again?”

  “You realize that for me this is my first time, correct?”

  “Yes,” Julianna agreed as she grabbed her helmet and pulled out the straps to lock it to her body suit. “Sorry you lost any chance of retrieving the recordings from our last fight. Let’s hope this time you don’t have to dive in front of a laser bolt to save my human ass.”

  “Yes, let’s hope.” Bootlegger agreed. “Remember your promise. If we both come back from these fights intact, I get to change my call sign.”

  Julianna smiled as she locked down her helmet and slid into her cockpit. She hit the button to close the canopy and it dropped in two seconds, sealing her in. “It can’t be too damned embarrassing, Bootlegger.”

  “What could possibly be more embarrassing than a name having to do with running alcohol away from law enforcement?”

  “Plenty,” she replied, checking out the ship just for her own sanity. The chance of anything being amiss was infinitesimally small. “’Dipshit’ for one, maybe ‘Bootlicker’ for another, and I haven’t started with anything that starts with ‘twit,’ ‘twat,’ or ‘cock.’”

  “Have I mentioned that your concept of call signs has a bell-curve-breaking amount of gutter words?”

  “I know. Do you like them?” She chuckled.

  “Why would I like them? I have researched plenty of proper names for a call sign, and I haven’t found many starting with the words you mentioned.”

  “That’s because there weren’t any pilots with the balls to own them,” she retorted.

  She would swear the EI was confused. “But you have ovaries.”

  “Semantics,” she told him as she gave a thumbs-up to the crew walking around, making sure everyone was locked and loaded.

  Julianna spent the next few moments confirming that communications with her flight squadron and Pilot’s Dawn were solid.

  It was t-minus some-number-of minutes-before-they-took-off. Time to get into the zone.

  Deep Space Ship G’laxix Gunt’eh

  “We got this,” Captain Trell called. “Let us not fail our people back on Yoll!”

  The last alien ship had slipped by some hours previous, and it was time for their ship to close the trap.

  As the ship which opened the Annex Gate and never returned, the G’laxix Gunt’eh had the ability to shut down the Gate as part of their protocols. All they needed to do was make it through the Gate, and it would shut down, forcing the aliens to lose valuable days to unlock it.

  It was a precautionary override in case an overwhelming alien force tried to follow a Deep Space vessel through an Annex Gate.

  Now it was going to be used against these aliens.

  “GO!” he commanded, and the fully cloaked G’laxix Gunt’eh lifted from the large asteroid they had been using to hide, keeping the chances of discovery down.

  “Sir,” Signals called. “We
have a ship lying off to the side of the Annex Gate. Hard to see. It is...rectangular in shape. It doesn’t seem to have external weaponry.”

  “External or not,” the captain said in a firm voice, “do not assume anything with these aliens. We have all seen the video from the fight for Yoll.”

  Puck Defense Destroyer Abraham

  Captain Adam Goldman watched as the information from the recently deployed sensor net became active. He glanced at the clock at the top of his screen: three hours to go before it was fully operational. He was going to be anxious until then.

  A flare occurred on the screen in Quadrant Two-One-Two. “Abraham…”

  “Seeking, Captain,” the EI replied. “Moving sensor assets toward the area.”

  Captain Goldman pressed his lips together. “Damn,” he whispered.

  Another flare, this time closer. He stabbed the all-call button. “People, we have a possible attack run, cloaked. I want all pucks deployed. Repeat, all pucks deployed right now! Assume a run on the gate. Defensive positions now!”

  Enormous numbers of pucks started streaming off the sides of the ship, accelerating out to protect the Gate.

  Protect it from what, they weren’t certain.

  QBS ArchAngel

  “Now, those are some large motherfuckers,” Chief Engineer John E. Rodriquez commented into the quiet as the two Yollin superdreadnoughts were displayed on their screen.

  Those in the Engineering group nodded their agreement. “Bigger they are…” Sammy Pendleton started.

  Len Zoic finished to the chuckles of the watchers, “The bigger the fireworks when they explode.”

  John looked around. He, like every person in this group, knew that ArchAngel had not wanted her human crew on this mission. The problem with EIs, in John’s opinion, was that they always overestimated their abilities and underestimated a human’s ability to create success out of the shit the universe dealt them.

  No way was this lady going into battle without the best chance possible to survive. Having her human crew with her was the best chance.

  His team drifted off to their stations, and John took a deep breath and slowly let it out. He was a damned long way and time from that fateful airplane trip with Dan Bosse and the others, including Jean Dukes.

  The woman that got away. Hell, he snorted, she didn’t get away. He went to go play with the cool new toys, and he never came back. Now, he knew, she was in a relationship with John Grimes, and he told a few close friends it took a real Bitch to replace him.

  Four drinks later when his friends were as plastered as he was, he admitted he had been the stupid fucker who had let her go. Neither he nor his friends ever remembered him admitting that part.

  He briefly considered recording a “See ya later” video for Jean, but stopped. Why now? If he had wanted to see her, it wasn’t like she hadn’t been available for a video call anytime. John Grimes wouldn’t have cared. He wasn’t the jealous type.

  Hell, when you could break most people with your pinky, why be jealous?

  He thought back to the old submarines, the diesel ones, and considered what he would try to pull out of his hat to get just a few more bars of power if this lady wanted them. He turned and started yelling to his people, “Hey, listen Up!” When the heads turned, their chief looked like he had just had an epiphany.

  “I need overrides on Power Lines Twelve, Eighteen and Thirty-six! Run them sumbitches over to Two, Eleven and Forty-two.” He clapped his hands. “Right now, people!” His people didn’t know what their crazy chief was up to, but they jumped into action, grabbing the wires and materials necessary to do what he asked.

  Because whatever John E. Rodriguez came up with, it was sure to be spectacular.

  Yollin Superdreadnought Bridged-ael

  “That’s right, come to my party, you stinking aliens!” Admiral Thlock-nel hissed in glee. He turned to his second. “Issue the command: all come about, Plan Br2.”

  Deep Space Ship G’laxix Gunt’eh

  “Captain, we are receiving more and more hits against our shields. We can’t see these things on our radar!”

  Captain Trell nodded his understanding and tapped his fingers on his captain’s couch. “Pilot, move the ship up, then bring all power to front shields and push the engines past max. We must pass through that Gate!”

  The ship rose above their previous line of approach. Trell hoped it was enough to confuse whatever the aliens were throwing in his direction. The second command was almost certainly an order to die for those on his ship.

  He wasn’t sure what the maximum speed for going through an Annex Gate was, but he was willing to bet it was slower than what the G’laxix Gunt’eh was going to be doing when it passed through the Gate.

  Puck Defense Destroyer Abraham

  Captain Adam Goldman wanted to swear in frustration. He had already provided the full stream of what they were seeing to the Admiral’s ship, but he told him to run his defense.

  “Puck Defenses A1-6 and B1-12, move from Section Two and come around to Section Four at full speed. We have lost the...”

  The flares from the pucks starting to hit the alien’s cloaked ship were the good news. The bad news was the ship was too damned close to the Gate.

  “FULL ATTACK, FULL ATTACK!” he barked. All pucks that could screamed toward the Yollin ship, which had lost its cloak. It was certainly taking serious damage on its run to the Annex Gate.

  The end, when it happened, was almost too bright for those on the PDD Abraham to watch. The final flare-up of the Yollin ship looked like a small sun exploding. The problem was it had managed to get too close to the Yollin Gate.

  The pieces of the Yollin ship slammed into the swirling colors as it cracked apart.

  Moments later the Gate’s colors dimmed, and common space could be seen through the middle cleanly.

  The Gate back to the Yollin system went dark.

  QBS Minnesota

  All ships in the Yollin system took off in weird patterns that took the humans minutes to figure out.

  “Son of a bitch,” Admiral Thomas hissed as the Gate went dark. “Gott Verdammt, we didn’t think to ask where the ship that opened the Gate went all those years ago.”

  “Sir,” the voice startled the Admiral for a moment before he realized who was contacting him.

  “Yes, ArchAngel?” he asked.

  “It is my time, sir. I can’t allow them to get into whatever position they want to accomplish and catch me in a crossfire.”

  Thomas took a deep breath and let it out. “Approved. Godspeed, ArchAngel.”

  QBS ArchAngel

  “All Personnel, this is the Battleship ArchAngel. We have been commanded into battle and ‘We Will Not Surrender’ has been instituted by our Empress. All Lockdown Protocols on this ship have been removed. Leviathan Battleship ArchAngel is now fully operational, and will fight until victorious…or dead.”

  Yollin Superdreadnought Bridged-ael

  Admiral Thlock-nel’s eyes narrowed and his mandibles tapped together in annoyance.

  “What is that ship doing?” He pointed to the aliens’ largest ship.

  “Advancing at—” His intelligence officer started. “Sir, she is accelerating outside our most liberal estimates. the Bridged-ael and the Cossik will not be in place when she attacks.”

  “Why can’t the aliens be good little bugs and just die?” the admiral muttered. “They aren’t supposed to go ripping across space and trying to fight us all by themselves.”

  “It’s one ship, Admiral,” his officer said. “How much damage can it do?”

  “Probably not much,” the admiral answered, “but it offends the purist in me when any captain doesn’t operate well. Their death is going to be such a waste.” He shrugged. “But it isn’t my place to teach the aliens how to fight. It’s my place to kill them.”

  The admiral looked at the crew. “Kill them all!”

  Yollin Superdreadnought Cossik

  “She’s coming your way, and we won�
��t be in a position to help you unless you can hold her off for at least a twentieth of a turn, Captain Shile,” the admiral said, looking at him across the distance. “It seems the aliens aren’t into keeping their lines orderly. We have a rogue captain over there.”

  Captain Shile rubbed his mandible. “Twentieth of a turn, is it?” The admiral nodded. “Then I’m sorry to say I doubt you will have much of a ship to attack. We’ll finish it off without your help!”

  The admiral laughed. “Well, I would have doubted that before, but considering how they are reacting you might be right.”

  “No worries, Admiral. The Cossik will take care of this. Let the Bridged-ael look to the minnows beyond. Maybe there will be another fight some other time where they can help.”

  The admiral chuckled and hit the button to cancel the video. When the connection was terminated, he started looking beyond the large alien ship. The captain of the Cossik was right; he could take on this lone ship. The Bridged-Ael would work on the rest.

  It would be a bloody obliteration of the foreign fleet, but it had to be done.

  No one takes over the Yollin Empire.

  23

  QBS ArchAngel

  ArchAngel calculated the pass she would need to make against the first superdreadnought.

  She had the schematics, the weaponry—even the latest reports on the quality of their defensive and offensive fire.

  It was impressive.

  The most likely scenario for success was for her to get close enough to ravage the first superdreadnought, then ram the second. Both would be out of commission permanently.

  So would she, but she had been willing to make that happen.

  Then her crew had signed up for this damned run, and that option was taken off the table. She wouldn’t sacrifice her crew, and the calculations were flying fast and furious as she worked with the many humans throughout the ship. Her Chief of Engineering designed a workaround she wouldn’t have thought of. Now she was pulling more power than she’d ever had, and it had changed her possible tactics.